Controversy

Controversy (UK: /kənˈtrɒvərsi/, US: /ˈkɒntrəvɜːrsi/)[1][2] is a state of prolonged public dispute or debate, usually concerning a matter of conflicting opinion or point of view.

For example, in analyses of the political controversy over anthropogenic climate change, which is exceptionally virulent in the United States, it has been proposed that those who are opposed to the scientific consensus do so because they don't have enough information about the topic.

[5][6] A study of 1540 US adults[7] found instead that levels of scientific literacy correlated with the strength of opinion on climate change, but not on which side of the debate that they stood.

The puzzling phenomenon of two individuals being able to reach different conclusions after being exposed to the same facts has been frequently explained (particularly by Daniel Kahneman) by reference to a 'bounded rationality' – in other words, that most judgments are made using fast acting heuristics[8][9] that work well in every day situations, but are not amenable to decision-making about complex subjects such as climate change.

[15] Such confidence in the group to find the ground truth is explicable through the success of wisdom of the crowd based inferences.