Global warming. It is currently and always has been a controversial topic. Beliefs and opinions on the topic vary from person to person, due to a variety of factors that play into ideas surrounding the concept.

These factors include religion, misinformation, or just a lack of knowledge. Over half of the U.S. believes that climate change is caused by the burning of fossil fuels and other issues caused by humans, while others believe that it is a natural occurrence and part of the Earth’s heating and cooling patterns. 

“Three-fourths of Hispanic Catholics and religiously unaffiliated Americans (76%) believe climate change is caused by human activity, as do the majority of other non-Christians (70%),  Jewish Americans (67%), Hispanic Protestants (61%), Black Protestants (59%), other Protestants of color (59%), white Catholics (56%), white mainline/non-evangelical Protestants (54%), and about half of Latter-day Saints (48%),” a statistic from the Public Religion Research Institute, said. “However, just three in ten white evangelical Protestants (31%) believe that climate change is caused by humans,”

Misinformation and unawareness have also caused difficulty in spreading awareness of the planet’s struggle to survive. Finding information on the subject isn’t too difficult once a person realizes the significance of it.

“I think because people aren’t as aware of it as they should be and you don’t even have to be, like, freaking out, feeling like you’re going to die to at least acknowledge that it’s there,” Madison Behrman (‘27) said.

The first step of acknowledging the existence of global warming is to find trustworthy sources. It’s very easy to find various perspectives on the topic, but knowing which of these actually have reasonable statistics or facts to back up the claims adds an extra layer of difficulty to learning more.

“The first thing that comes to mind is actually scientifically proven sources, like maybe NASA, maybe National Geographic,” Elinor Richardson (‘27) said.

Another issue that seems to come up when learning about climate change is having a fixed mindset or feeling a sense of urgency to start making changes. Some believe that there is nothing that one single person can do that will make a difference, while others believe that they need to change their whole lifestyle to be more sustainable. Both of these being opposite extremes leaves a large gray area in the spectrum. This begs the question: What changes can be made to help our burning climate?

“There is no one-size-fits-all approach to stopping or slowing global warming, and each individual, business, municipal, state, tribal, and federal entity must weigh their options in light of their own unique set of circumstances. Experts say it is likely many strategies working together will be needed,” The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said.