John Schwartz reports at The New York Times that prominent members of the United States House of Representatives and the Senate are demanding information from universities, companies and trade groups about funding for scientists who publicly dispute widely held views on the causes and risks of climate change. In letters sent to seven universities, Representative Raúl M. Grijalva, an Arizona Democrat who is the ranking member of the House committee on natural resources, sent detailed requests to the academic employers of scientists who had testified before Congress about climate change. "My colleagues and I cannot perform our duties if research or testimony provided to us is influenced by undisclosed financial relationships.” Grijalva asked for each university’s policies on financial disclosure and the amount and sources of outside funding for each scholar, “communications regarding the funding” and “all drafts” of testimony. Meanwhile Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts, Barbara Boxer of California and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island sent 100 letters to fossil fuel companies, trade groups and other organizations asking about their funding of climate research and advocacy asking for responses by April 3. “Corporate special interests shouldn’t be able to secretly peddle the best junk science money can buy,” said Senator Markey, denouncing what he called “denial-for-hire operations.”
The letters come after evidence emerged over the weekend that Wei-Hock Soon, known as Willie, a scientist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, had failed to disclose the industry funding for his academic work. The documents also included correspondence between Dr. Soon and the companies who funded his work in which he referred to his papers and testimony as “deliverables.” Soon accepted more than $1.2 million in money from the fossil-fuel industry over the last decade while failing to disclose that conflict of interest in most of his scientific papers. At least 11 papers he has published since 2008 omitted such a disclosure, and in at least eight of those cases, he appears to have violated ethical guidelines of the journals that published his work. “What it shows is the continuation of a long-term campaign by specific fossil-fuel companies and interests to undermine the scientific consensus on climate change,” says Kert Davies.
See our earlier story: Climate Change Denying Scientist Paid Millions by Energy Companies.
Related Stories
The New York Times offers a story on Wei-Hock ("Willie") Soon, a scientist often cited by climate change skeptics. Greenpeace, through a Freedom of Information Act request, turned up evidence that Soon has been paid more than $1.2 million by energy companies in the past decade. He refers to specific reports as "deliverables," but has not disclosed potential conflicts of interest to some journals. Soon, whose degree is in aerospace engineering, is known for his claims that solar activity can account for any shift in climate.
Mother Jones and Daily Kos also have articles based on the NYT report.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @06:35AM
It's the law, by law. Gay.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @06:37AM
Preferably Niggery, but the Gayness is mandatory.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @06:39AM
Especially the Lesbians.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:19AM
Beat that, mofos.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Saturday February 28 2015, @06:40AM
Now where will this moneygram in the same way as a sociogram be published?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @10:50AM
In the same place as the moneygrams of the politicians asking the questions.
I think everyone at Congressional hearings should be required to display charts and graphs detailing their donors/employers/anyone with whom they have contracts, the amounts, any gifts, etc. Surely these scientists are not the only ones with their hands out or whose decisions/conclusions/statements/what have you are influenced by money.
Someone once suggested that politicians should be required to wear NASCAR style logos of all their "sponsors". I think that's a good place to start.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:47PM
I'm all for it as long as it applies to both sides because we have seen there are some in the AGW camp that are also money motivated [jrdeputyaccountant.com] so as long as we are given info on both? Sounds good to me.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday February 28 2015, @06:42AM
Just saying, this is not going to end well. Willie, slick Willie, has outed all the deniers. Now comes the part where everyone compares how much they sold their souls for. In the words of Edward Longshanks, "some settled for much less."
What's in your wallet?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:06AM
My Depressing Day With A Famous Climate Skeptic [npr.org]
The author of the piece does not appear to be claiming an expertise in climatology, just a guy with the a PhD in astrophysics (Soon's PhD is in aerospace engineering) who has seen a lot of presentations over the years.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:13AM
To be fair once you have PhD level knowledge in any subject you realize just how full of shit experts really are. It is rational to expect everybody's theory to be hogwash, but that does not detract from any theory's correctness.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:21AM
It is rational to expect everybody's theory to be hogwash, but that does not detract from any theory's correctness.
Run that by me again?
Your statement seems internally inconstant.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:50AM
I guess the AC's point is: the theory may be hogwash, but don't be detracted by that from the grammatical correctness of TFAs which explain it; everybody knows that proper grammar is everything.
(large grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by fritsd on Saturday February 28 2015, @02:03PM
The theory may not be hogwash, but your starting point in your evaluation should be that it is.
Well, that's how I read it, anyway.. Falsification and all that.. I must read Popper [wikipedia.org] one day..
(Score: 2) by fritsd on Saturday February 28 2015, @02:08PM
(replying to meself) Hey, that's actually a fascinating Wikipedia page. Check it out!!
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday February 28 2015, @02:24PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2, Interesting) by khallow on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:46PM
Mmmmmhh... I'm tempted to agree with you, be it only because I'm tired of all this dark energy and matter..
Dark matter is just matter we can't see compared to the effects of its gravity.
Dark energy is a poor name for negative curvature of large scale space-time. It comes from trying to apply a flat model of general relativity to negatively curved space. The effect of negative curvature appears as negative energy in the flat space formulation. Dark energy theory is in vogue because we have observations that indicate distant objects are more distant than they should be, given their age and/or red shift.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday February 28 2015, @09:57PM
Or, maybe, at these large scales, the gravity potential is no longer a 1/dist one, but perhaps another potential function? What we experience in our "galactic scale" may be just a local approximation of what happens at the Universe scale. (e.g. Yukawa potential [wikipedia.org] with a very low k constant)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Sunday March 01 2015, @02:56AM
Dark energy is a poor name for negative curvature of large scale space-time.
Unfortunately the media demands some sort of buzzword to use in reporting on these things. Try to explain it thoroughly or, heaven forbid, show the math, and I'm sure most of the media scrambles away like cockroaches in a room with the light suddenly clicked on. Thus we have endless articles "Scientists may have found dark matter", "Scientists think dark energy behind..." and so on. All of them quietly forgotten about by the next popular article.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:22PM
An expert knows what they don't know.
Kind of a corollary to Dunning-Kruger effect that the most confident people are generally the most ignorant.
(Score: 2) by Aighearach on Saturday February 28 2015, @09:11PM
You should always keep parsing until you find a plausible, self-consistent meaning. Never start from the hypothesis that somebody is speaking nonsense. People are misunderstood, or simply wrong, way more often than that they are just talking crazy.
What you missed was that your expectations of a theory has nothing to do with the correctness. That was the clear point. It is an expectation, set against the abstract reality.
You can make the gap even smaller and it still makes perfect sense. You can place the expectation even against the consensus. It is rational to expect everybody's theory to be hogwash, but that does not detract from the ability to participate in achieving consensus about correctness.
There are many more incorrect hypotheses than correct ones. The whole process of making a hypothesis is to engage in useful absurdity; speculation about what might be, before having checked. It is natural therefore for somebody scientifically minded to assume any hypothesis is hogwash. (I'm assuming that `theory' is used sloppily in the GP) Even your own hypothesis should be assumed, by yourself, to be hogwash. Otherwise you're biased. People will be personally biased, too, even when trying not to be, so there is an important role of general skepticism towards any new idea.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:24AM
Necessary life progression for an expert: from knowing nothing about everything to knowing everything about (a certain) nothing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:40AM
> To be fair once you have PhD level knowledge in any subject you realize just how full of shit experts really are.
The problem seems to be people who think their expertise in one speciality makes them experts in other fields.
Like Linus Pauling and vitamin C. [theatlantic.com]
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:59AM
To be fair once you have PhD level knowledge in any subject you realize just how full of shit experts really are.
Not true of philosophers, however! Or rather, this is the point of philosophy. Socrates was declared by the Oracle at Delphi (Netcraft of the ancient world) to be the wisest person. Being the wisest person, he was smart enough not to take this at face value, like a CEO would, and set out to test the Oracle by seeing if he could find someone wiser than himself. How hard could it be? After a lifetime of searching, Socrates realized by his method of asking questions that those who appear to be wise only think they know when they actually do not, and so Socrates was in fact the wisest because he knew that he did not know anything.
So once you know that the only thing you know is that you know nothing, it is easier to try to learn something, but this is not necessarily the result. But the real point is that those who think they know something, not out of inordinate conceit or having read Ayn Rand, but because they have been paid to "know" it? Ignorance may be excusable, being a mercenary is not.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday February 28 2015, @08:11AM
(would you be a political figure, this post of yours would be a great contender to the Foot in mouth [wikipedia.org] award)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday February 28 2015, @08:23AM
Short version? True wisdom is knowing that you do not know. So be quiet and listen. Asking questions will get you killed. Ask Socrates.
(Score: 3, Touché) by c0lo on Saturday February 28 2015, @08:40AM
(to quote a good SN fellow [soylentnews.org], your argument is inconstant - friendly kidding here)
One is not going to be aware of his own ignorance without raising questions - even when one choose not to voice these questions, they are still necessary.
It is rarely that answers keep an intellect alive, and it happens only if those answers are platforms for other questions.
And, my friend, staying biologically alive is orthogonally independent with epistemology. Even when, occasionally, staying alive may be a sign of wisdom.
(makes sense? ... large grin...)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: -1, Troll) by fatuous looser on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:41AM
Meanwhile, various so-called nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) are cashing in on the AGW scam.
.
THAT'S how the game is played.
.
[Citations needed]
(Score: 0, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:56AM
> Meanwhile, various so-called nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) are cashing in on the AGW scam.
I thought the big argument against doing anything about climate change was that it is a job killer.
Now that mitigating climate change is creating jobs that is a problem?
Sounds like standard conspiracy theory logic - all possible outcomes are proof of illegitimacy.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by khallow on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:56PM
Now that mitigating climate change is creating jobs that is a problem?
What gave you that idea? If you really think about it, how does giving money to politically oriented NGOs create jobs? Sure, it pays for someone in the NGO, but it doesn't pay for someone with a real job, making or doing something useful.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:57PM
So scamming is a job?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @05:11PM
Absolutely. Experian even sells identities [krebsonsecurity.com] to scammers and thieves.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @02:59PM
they probably could have just DDG'd (duckduckgo'd) it. My understanding is that the data Aaron boosted was going to be used to model these exact relationships. Oops.
(Score: 2) by hash14 on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:51PM
See, everyone has known that a large fraction of the denialists were so simply because they had a vested financial interest in it. While I do have respect for sceptical scientists who have valid, scientific claims for disbelieving climate change, the fact remains that most of the non-believers are so only because it's bad for themselves financially.
It had to take a large, public event like the one involving Willie Soon to put the denialists on their back for and start pressing them on their bull-cockery, but it's outstanding to see good people Congress using this as momentum to press against what is very plainly a denial of the truth for the gain of small, self-interested groups.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by khallow on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:15PM
See, everyone has known that a large fraction of the denialists were so simply because they had a vested financial interest in it.
You have evidence for this? Just because Soon took money from fossil fuel interests doesn't mean that he'd believe differently, if the money wasn't there. After all, virtually all research is funded by someone other than the researcher. Are we to suppose that fact means that everyone comes to the research conclusions they come to because of the money? Even if we assume that most funding sources aren't as biased as fossil fuel donors in the climate research field, we still have plenty of highly biased sources in climate research. We can use those sources to discredit virtually everyone in the field. For example, did you receive funding from the US, Japan, or the EU member governments? You're busted because those are highly biased funding sources.
It had to take a large, public event like the one involving Willie Soon to put the denialists on their back for and start pressing them on their bull-cockery, but it's outstanding to see good people Congress using this as momentum to press against what is very plainly a denial of the truth for the gain of small, self-interested groups.
And once again, we see ad hominem attacks replacing actual science. Climate research isn't going to be decided today of one research group's funding revelation. It's going to be decided in a few decades on the basis of evidence that can't be faked or manipulated.
(Score: 2) by hash14 on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:21PM
You have evidence for this? Just because Soon took money from fossil fuel interests doesn't mean that he'd believe differently, if the money wasn't there. After all, virtually all research is funded by someone other than the researcher. Are we to suppose that fact means that everyone comes to the research conclusions they come to because of the money? Even if we assume that most funding sources aren't as biased as fossil fuel donors in the climate research field, we still have plenty of highly biased sources in climate research. We can use those sources to discredit virtually everyone in the field. For example, did you receive funding from the US, Japan, or the EU member governments? You're busted because those are highly biased funding sources.
Okay, let's look at a few damning cases from Wikipedia:
From the oil industry:
The Royal Society conducted a survey that found ExxonMobil had given US$ 2.9 million to American groups that "misinformed the public about climate change," 39 of which "misrepresented the science of climate change by outright denial of the evidence".[6][42]
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_denial#Private_sector [wikipedia.org]
Reference #6: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2006/sep/20/oilandpetrol.business [guardian.co.uk]
Reference #42: http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-files/Guardian/documents/2006/09/19/LettertoNick.pdf [guardian.co.uk]
And here's one from the coal industry:
In 1991 the New York Times reported that coal industry advocates were planning an advertising campaign which, according to their internal documents, was intended to "reposition global warming as theory rather than fact".[22]
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_denial#Meanings_of_the_term [wikipedia.org]
Reference #22: http://www.nytimes.com/1991/07/08/business/pro-coal-ad-campaign-disputes-warming-idea.html [nytimes.com]
This is not science in any sense of the term. This is paying people to come out with wrongful conclusions, and the reasons for doing so are based on the interests of the backers.
Legitimate science _is_ to fund a scientific team to answer a question, not to come to an already-decided (and erroneous) conclusion. So no, I am not saying in any way that any scientific outcome is determined solely based on the backer. Further, I have no reason to believe that the US, Japan, or EU are biased in any way, but don't feel it is worthwhile to debate this.
And once again, we see ad hominem attacks replacing actual science. Climate research isn't going to be decided today of one research group's funding revelation. It's going to be decided in a few decades on the basis of evidence that can't be faked or manipulated.
I wasn't talking about the validity of the science. The science is beyond doubt - The UN's climate panel has concluded that human-created climate change is essentially fact. The scientific evidence is already there, and yet, as I stated explicitly in my original post, I still have respect for people who have valid scientific criticisms of climate change in the face of the overwhelming evidence (which if anything should completely clear any idea that I'm basing my stance on ad hominem).
It's the public perception and acceptance of climate change which needs to be corrected. We've found out that one phony scientist has pretty much been taken down (one who denialists absolutely loved to quote), and it's great to see that responsible government representatives are doing thorough fact-checking to ensure the denialist industries don't prop up a new one. Otherwise, these industries will continue trying to fund research which is as valid as creation science.
Indeed, I don't know for sure what these Senators going to find, and even if there are more phony scientists out there, I'll eat my shoe (figuratively speaking) if they just come straight out and say, "yep, our interests are 100% conflicted." But come on - given how the fossil fuel industries have been responding to climate change, how could it possibly surprise anyone that there aren't more phony scientists out there?
(Score: 2, Informative) by khallow on Sunday March 01 2015, @09:47PM
I wasn't talking about the validity of the science. The science is beyond doubt - The UN's climate panel has concluded that human-created climate change is essentially fact.
Let's note several things. First, scientific research by definition is never beyond doubt. I'm not saying that it can't be beyond reasonable doubt, but your choice of language is self-defeating. I think that there is some human effect on climate, but that leads us to the second problem. Second, you are only speaking of a small part of the problem of AGW. We still have a long ways to go from the basic assertion that AGW exists to the IPCC claim that we should have a cap on temperature increase from AGW and that it requires a certain level of CO2 emission reductions in order to achieve that cap.
Third, you treat the IPCC as an absolute authority even though it has a track record of exaggerating scientific results towards making AGW appear worse. For example, the Third Assessment Report forecast in the body of the report, estimates near future temperature increases of 0.1-0.2 C per decade (over the next few decades) under a particular 1991 scenario (IS92a) which describes current human activity relatively well. But in the Summary for Policy Makers, that forecast somehow morphed into 0.1-0.3 C per decade in the graphs. No justification, it just happened.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by aristarchus on Saturday February 28 2015, @08:30PM
Just because Soon took money from fossil fuel interests doesn't mean that he'd believe differently, if the money wasn't there.
Let me get this straight. If you are doing crackpot science, it is alright if you are not just doing it for the bribes, but if you are not doing it for just the bribes, then you might as well take the bribes, because it won't change your crackpot results. This is what scientific objectivity has been reduced to?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 28 2015, @09:35PM
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday February 28 2015, @09:51PM
I see further assertion that this funding was bribes
I see further evidence of a lack of reading comprehension.
Your point was that the bribes were not bribes unless they caused the researcher to assert the opposite of what they actually find. So funding to actual scientists is not bribery, either. And they have the further advantage of being correct!
This was sarcasm. Are you a robot from Elysium?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 28 2015, @09:57PM
Your point was that the bribes were not bribes unless they caused the researcher to assert the opposite of what they actually find. So funding to actual scientists is not bribery, either. And they have the further advantage of being correct!
I didn't say they were bribes.
(Score: 1, Disagree) by sfm on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:55PM
My call on the AGW debate:
One side goes overboard exaggerating what little valid data is available, which is
understandable because the general public will ignore anything less than predicted
dire consequences.
The other side cherry picks that same (or similar) sparse dataset to show there is
nothing to worry about.
The real answer is likely somewhere in between. With EVERY proposed to mitigation
strategy being so incredibly expensive. I am okay sitting on the fence a little longer
before ransoming our future.
(Score: 3, Touché) by fritsd on Saturday February 28 2015, @10:08PM
Some say the sun rises in the east; however, others say the sun rises in the west.
The real answer is likely somewhere in between :-)
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:02PM
Meanwhile, Climate Change "science" researchers receive BILLIONS from various groups poised to take advantage of Climate Change regulations: Venture Capitalists on Sandhill Road, Al Gore's group, Warren Buffett, George Soros, etc.
"Climate Change" is a total scam. You'd have to be a complete idiot not to see it. Not only is there no science, just fudging of numbers and computer models researchers won't share, much less their data, the "science" has no predictive value. You might as well shake chicken bones and entrails out to predict long-term climate patterns as use the "Climate Change" models.
Climate Change is ultimately a bunch of scammers taking advantage of religious beliefs about the inherent sinfulness of modern technology and Western Civilization. No one ACTUALLY believes in Climate Change. Its just a way to make money off gullible religious idiots.
After all, IF Climate Change were real, it would be imperative to fight nuclear wars to destroy nascent industrializing nations in the Third World and destroy China and kill most of its population "to save the planet" from China's carbon dioxide emissions and prevent China let alone the rest of the Third World from reaching something close to say, Portugese levels of income let alone German or American levels.
IF Climate Change were real, campaigners would be urging Americans to use the military to kill most of Africa, Asia, Latin America, to "save the rainforest" and prevent those peoples from climbing the income ladder and thus emitting more carbon. IF Climate Change were real, Al Gore would not spend $15,000 a month on his electricity bill, nor would he fly by private jet. He would not fly at all, simply Skype his appearance before groups. IF Climate Change were real, Davos would not see over 2,000 private jets flying in big wigs. IF Climate Change were real, Climate Change people would want a global dictatorship and force the biggest and wealthiest to live in cardboard boxes as a good example to the rest of us, who would join them soon.
I keep reading and hearing apocalyptic stuff about how the world will end, and then see a reach into my wallet. Not anything that would presumably fix things -- like killing off half of humanity and a brutal global dictatorship, which would seem the only solution to such a world-ending threat. With the "secret" data (the opposite of science, if you can't replicate it via experiments its not science, merely religious doctrine) and backing of world class crony capitalists like Soros and Buffett, I figure the whole thing is a scam.
Certainly if Climate Change were "real" America and European nations would be kicking out would-be immigrants and those who had recently (last thirty years) immigrated along with their descendants into the Third World, where those people would have far fewer carbon emissions living off garbage dumps or something on a subsistence level rather than the high-carbon output Western World. Indeed Italy would let illegal immigrants drown in the Med rather than admit them to Europe where they'd be spewing out carbon, now would they?
If the Italians really believed in Climate Change aka Global Warming. How cold is it today in NYC? Must be that Global Warming.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday February 28 2015, @09:20PM
"Climate Change" is a total scam. You'd have to be a complete idiot not to see it.
Oh, yes, of course. Thanks for pointing that out! Now that you have opened my eyes, I totally don't believe in Global Warming. That makes two of us against the scientific community. But it's worth it, because, you know, I don't want to a complete idiot!
(Score: 4, Insightful) by SuperCharlie on Saturday February 28 2015, @09:59PM
How about everyone who does scientific research regardless of the subject or outcome disclose their funding?