Welcome to The Consensus Project home. This page is a hub of links to various articles and resources associated with The Consensus Project.

The Peer-Reviewed Paper

Our peer-reviewed paper Quantifying the Consensus on Anthropogenic Global Warming in the Scientific Literature is freely available at the Environmental Research Letters (ERL) website. ERL has a innovative feature for peer-reviewed journals - they feature a video abstract which summarises the results of the paper in under 4 minutes. You can download the full paper (PDF) and the Supplementary Material (PDF).

theconsensusproject.com

The website theconsensusproject.com explains the results of Quantifying the Consensus in a simple, user-friendly fashion. The website was designed pro-bono by New York design and advertising firm SJI Associates. The Share page presents a number of graphics ideal for sharing on Facebook and Twitter.

Data

You can download the following data related to our research:

• Details of each paper and ratings based on the papers’ abstract (Year, Paper Title, Journal, Authors, Category rating (based on abstract), Endorsement level (based on abstract)) [Note April 21, 2023: the original link to the ratings file went to the ERL-website but was found to no longer work. ERL now provides just a ZIP-file as an alternative for all supplementary material, so we downloaded an archived version of the original file dated April 21, 2021 from the wayback machine and uploaded that to our server.]
• Ratings by the authors of the papers (Year, Abstract Endorsement Level, Self-Rated Endorsement Level)
• First and second ratings by our team. Ratings are ordered sequentially. E.g., in order that original ratings were made (Article Id #, Original endorsement rating, Original category rating, Endorsement rating after consultation stage, Category rating after consultation stage)
• Data of 1000 "no position" abstracts that were reexamined for expressions of uncertainty about AGW (Article Id #, Expression of uncertainty on AGW. 0 = no position expressed on AGW. 1 = expression of uncertainty)
• The survey protocol used by the rating team
• All the articles listed by Id number (Article Id #, Year of Publication and Paper Title)
• Article abstracts (Article Id #, Year of Publication, Category, Endorsement Level, Title and Abstract)

Rate Abstracts: Replicate our Research!

We've created an interactive rating system that lets you rate the abstracts examined in our analysis. This lets you repeat the process we went through, reading through abstracts and categorising their type of research and level of endorsement of human-caused global warming. We found reading through these abstracts impressed on us the breadth and depth of climate research in existence.

My Ratings

Once you start rating abstracts, you can compare your ratings to the results from The Consensus Project. All your ratings are saved (but kept private) so you can come back anytime to check out the papers you've rated. You can view the research category and the level of endorsement rated by yourself next to the ratings given in the Quantifying the Consensus paper.

Frequently Asked Questions

We address a number of questions about our research in our Frequently Asked Questions. The section is divided into two sections. Methodology Questions looks at questions about the specific processes we undertook in our research. Philosophical Questions looks at more general questions about consensus and it's role in science. It is anticipated that this page will continue to grow as we encounter more questions about our research.

Graphic Resources

We have a collection of graphic resources relevant to our research and the scientific consensus in general. All our graphics are under a creative commons licence and freely available for republishing. Most of the graphics are provided in 1024 x 768 form, ideal for powerpoints but also useful for blog posts and articles.

Media Coverage

Check out the media coverage of Quantifying the Consensus in newspapers, online magazines and blogs.

The Consensus Handbook

In March 2018 John Cook, Sander Van Der Linden, Ed Maibach and Stephan Lewandowsky published The Consensus Handbook. It summarizes research into how opponents of climate action have cast doubt on consensus, why that matters, and how we (including journalists) can respond.

Rebuttals related to consensus

• Contrarian opinions on global warming match the 2–3% fringe minority of peer-reviewed papers (intermediate version)
• The Cook et al. (2013) 97% consensus result is robust
• The 97% consensus on global warming (intermediate and advanced version)

Blog Posts about "Does it Matter ... ?" published in May 2017

• New publication: Does it matter if the consensus on anthropogenic global warming is 97% or 99.99%?
• Is the climate consensus 97%, 99.9%, or is plate tectonics a hoax?

Blog Posts about "Consensus on Consensus" published in April 2016

• Consensus confirmed: over 90% of climate scientists believe we're causing global warming
  16 April 2016 by John Cook
• It’s settled: 90–100% of climate experts agree on human-caused global warming
  13 April 2016 by dana1981

Denial101x videos about the consensus

The following videos were created for our MOOC Denial101x and explain the various aspects of a scientific consensus

SkS Blog Posts about The Consensus Project

• 97% global warming consensus paper surpasses half a million downloads
  23 June 2016 by dana1981
• James Powell is wrong about the 99.99% AGW consensus
  12 April 2016 by Andy Skuce
• Why the 97 per cent consensus on climate change still gets challenged
  18 May 2015 by Andy Skuce
• Why we need to talk about the scientific consensus on climate change
  20 November 2014 by John Cook
• Why we care about the 97% expert consensus on human-caused global warming
  24 June 2014 by dana1981
• Resources and links documenting Tol's 24 errors
  6 June 2014 by John Cook
• Richard Tol accidentally confirms the 97% global warming consensus
  4 June 2014 by Dana1981
• Skeptical Science consensus paper voted ERL's best article of 2013
  21 April 2014 by John Cook
• How we discovered the 97% scientific consensus on man-made global warming
  1 November 2013 by MarkR
• Consensus study most downloaded paper in all Institute of Physics journals
  14 October 2013 by John Cook
• Public talk explaining our consensus paper & answering critics
  30 September 2013 by John Cook
• Debunking 97% Climate Consensus Denial
  9 September 2013 by dana1981
• Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists: Closing the Consensus Gap
  20 August 2013 by John Cook
• The Consensus Project self-rating data now available
  8 July 2013 by John Cook
• The Consensus Project Update and Dana on Al Jazeera Inside Story
  6 July 2013 by dana1981
• An estimate of the consensus project paper search coverage
  10 June 2013 by Ari Jokimäki
• The 5 characteristics of global warming consensus denial
  28 May 2013 by John Cook
• On the value of consensus in climate communication
  23 May 2013 by John Cook
• Skeptical Science Study Finds 97% Consensus on Human-Caused Global Warming in the Peer-Reviewed Literature
  16 May 2013 by dana1981