 I hope you enjoyed the first week of Denial 101X. This week, we examined the science of science denial, in order to understand what's driving the political and social controversy about climate change. First, we looked at the scientific consensus. We saw that there's a consensus of evidence. Many independent human fingerprints all point to a single consistent conclusion. Humans are causing global warming. Now, my apologies that I went through all the fingerprints so quickly. But don't worry, we'll be returning to the different human fingerprints in Week 3 and digging much deeper, so stay tuned. Based on all this evidence, 97% of climate scientists have concluded that humans are causing global warming. There's no controversy in the scientific community about climate change. So why is there so much political controversy? We looked at some of the dragons of inaction, the psychological barriers to climate action. One of the most significant dragons of inaction is political ideology. Often when people don't like the solutions to climate change, such as increased government regulation, they reject the science of climate change in order to avoid those solutions which threaten their values. Understanding why people deny science is important. Equally important is understanding how they deny science. No matter which topic you're looking at, science denial shares the same five characteristics. Fake experts, logical fallacies, impossible expectations, cherry picking, and conspiracy theories. A useful acronym to help you remember them is FLIC. You'll need FLIC next week as we look at some of the myths casting doubt on the basic reality of global warming. Kevin Cowton in England will explain the challenges of building a temperature record. He'll visit the snow at the University of Ottawa as Robert Way debunks some of the myths about the cryosphere. And in the US, Keir Shaneerman will look at sea level rise, while Peter Jacobs explores the difference between climate change and global warming. For each myth, we'll explain the science and will also identify the characteristic of denial in each myth. This is crucial to understanding how each myth distorts the science and how this relates to the psychology we've learned this week. Over the course of Denial 101x, you'll learn and practice the tools to identify and refute new myths, whether they relate to climate or other areas of science. Lastly, while developing this MOOC, I had the privilege of interviewing many of the world's leading scientists who are researching the physical science of our climate or the social science of how we react to climate change. Be sure to check out our interviews. The short highlight videos are must see, but I also highly recommend the full interviews with each scientist. They offer fascinating insights into their experiences and research into climate change. Next week's interviews are equally exciting as we speak to Phil Jones from the University of East Anglia as well as many of the world's leading glaciologists. Plus, you'll see something I'm sure a few of you have never seen before, permafrost surfing. We hope you enjoyed your first week in Denial 101x. We'd love you to share what you've learned so far, the questions you have and your first thoughts about next week's topic, the many indicators of global warming on the weekly wrap up discussion forum. Sharing your thoughts and interacting with your fellow students is a great way to continue learning beyond the lectures and we look forward to seeing you in week two.