John Cook

A man called Cook. Author of Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change, founder of

[John Cook @johnfocook]

I’m delighted to announce the @crankyuncles game - teaching resilience against misinformation - is now available free on iPhone & iPad! More details about the game at https://t.co/TtJ529X0Dn and you can get the game directly from the App Store via https://t.co/DUbHeVyER7

[John Cook @johnfocook]

Want to test how good you are at recognising authors? Fill out this (anonymous) survey, checking authors you recognise but also avoiding checking fake authors (purpose is to measure which authors are too well known or not known at all) https://t.co/dtGDNMLFYR

[John Cook @johnfocook]

Have moved to BlueSky and am posting there about critical thinking and my research into misinformation - but popping back to X briefly to post my BlueSky account so find me there! https://t.co/IHZHuT3hIq (hoping posting this link doesn't get filtered)

[republicEn.org @republicEn]

Looking for something to do this evening?

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@fredymorz Well, it hasn't happened yet but thanks for the vote of confidence :-)

[John Cook @johnfocook]

Am giving a free webinar this week with @350_Chicago on fine-tuning yoru BS detector to spot climate misinformation. Register at https://t.co/1C53zoRp0n

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@tkaiser_science @Sander_vdLinden Correct. Currently doing an RCT in Australia with control group but our pilots in Uganda/Kenya (paper in revision), Ghana (published), Rwanda (French/Kinyarwandan translations, in draft), Pakistan (Urdu/Roman Urdu translations, pilot underway) are all pre-post field studies.

[Skeptical Science @skepticscience]

Words cannot really do justice to express our sadness at losing our team member John Mason.
https://t.co/NvBp6m0Ba8

[John Cook @johnfocook]

Deeply sad to say that our much loved and valued @skepticscience team member John Mason passed away last week. Amazing & tireless story teller and climate communicator. He will be deeply missed https://t.co/4bzGJFvVgJ

[John Cook @johnfocook]

Spoke to @StellaLevantesi about AI & climate misinformation: certainly AI is a threat in amplifying misinformation but I also discuss how we're using AI to develop solutions to misinformation https://t.co/54t3vrKrOw

[Mirjam Nanko @MirjamNanko]

Just published in @GEC_Journal: We investigate how climate contrarians and the fossil fuel industry obstructed US cap-and-trade policy. Disproportionate access to key hearings and FFI lobbying played a major role. Full study: https://t.co/fyxiXvFxxC @TravisCoan1

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@0rf @crankyuncles Bad News came out before @crankyuncles - they're both based on inoculation theory (@Sander_vdLinden and I both published separate studies in 2017 on using inoculation to neutralise climate misinformation) https://t.co/LDBoqmpQwv https://t.co/zS3mlKKe1w

[John Cook @johnfocook]

I’m delighted to announce the @crankyuncles game - teaching resilience against misinformation - is now available free on iPhone & iPad! More details about the game at https://t.co/TtJ529X0Dn and you can get the game directly from the App Store via https://t.co/DUbHeVyER7

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@j_kneen @StephenLeahy @RobSchneider @RealJamesWoods Especially the hard time I give my grad students whenever they leave spelling errors in their thesis...

[John Cook @johnfocook]

Just published a paper in @CommsEarth where we use the CARDS machine learning model to detect climate misinformation in 5 million climate tweets, finding over half of misinformation tweets involve personal attacks @MarkAndrejevic @liyuanfang @TravisCoan1 https://t.co/6UraGPVOHO

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@j_kneen @StephenLeahy @RobSchneider @RealJamesWoods Dammit, that kind of thing really bugs me >:-(

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@rahmstorf I regularly cite your 2004 paper on trend/attribution/impact scepticism given they are the first three categories in our taxonomy of contrarian climate claims

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@scotbryson @RobSchneider @RealJamesWoods Currently looking deeper into the virality of climate misinformation on social media with @qutdmrc who are experts at that kind of analysis.

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@DrShepherd2013 One thing we're trying to do is shine light on the fact that attacks on scientists is such a dominant part of climate misinformation, given a dearth of research into the impacts that has (e.g., breeding distrust in science) and how to counter it - we need to fill that gap.

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@Redoubtably10 @ejwwest @RobSchneider @RealJamesWoods @dana1981 I interviewed @dana1981 about his book back in 2014 https://t.co/9YzMZTymim

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@Redoubtably10 @ejwwest @RobSchneider @RealJamesWoods @dana1981 wrote a whole book on this, contrasting the successful predictions of climate scientists (based on physics) with the failed predictions of climate deniers (based on wishful thinking) https://t.co/gOxOhsjh7o

[John Cook @johnfocook]

@RobSchneider @RealJamesWoods The major take-home from this research is that 40% of climate misinformation tweets are ad hominem attacks & 20% are conspiracy theories. The majority of climate misinformation involves discrediting climate actors & eroding public trust in climate science.

[John Cook @johnfocook]

We also found misinformation spikes instigated by influencers, both contrarian influencers promoting misinformation & convinced influencers who provoked misinformation backlash. Never thought I'd coauthor a climate misinformation paper mentioning @RobSchneider & @RealJamesWoods!