On May 25, 2008, at 10:28 AM, David Opderbeck wrote:
>
> I was "discussing" global warming with someone and he threw a couple
> of stats at me I hadn't heard:
>
> 1. The majority of climate scientists in major universities in the
> U.S. reject anthropogenic warming;
> 2. 40,000 scientists (or maybe it was 20,000, i forget) signed a
> document denying anthropogenic warming.
>
> Does anyone know the source of these claims, and what the reality is?
>
> --
> David W. Opderbeck
> Associate Professor of Law
> Seton Hall University Law School
> Gibbons Institute of Law, Science & Technology
Lynn's reference talked about the Oregon Institute of Science and
Medicine. Checking them up on source watch gave me this. (You can also
do a wikipedia account on Oregon Petition. The links from wikipedia
check out. See NAS reference below.) Note how long the petition has
been in circulation and the deception that they were associated with
the National Academies of Science. When I was doing my research for my
climate change class at church I came upon the deceptive work of Fred
Seitz, Fred Singer and the Marshall Institute. Fred Seitz was an
advisor to R.J. Reynolds so that they could prove that there was a
lack of "scientific consensus" that tobacco causes cancer. Some other
things that the Marshall institute said lacked scientific consensus:
1. The hazards of second-hand smoke
2. That CFCs cause the ozone hole two weeks before the Nobel prize in
chemistry was given for work on this.
3. Power plants cause acid rain.
See a pattern here? On to OISM. Also note this has been going on since
1998. You can see the petition here: http://www.oism.org/pproject/GWPetition.pdf
---------
The Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine (OISM) describes itself
as "a small research institute" that studies "biochemistry, diagnostic
medicine, nutrition, preventive medicine and the molecular biology of
aging." It is headed by Arthur B. Robinson, an eccentric scientist who
has a long history of controversial entanglements with figures on the
fringe of accepted research. OISM also markets a home-schooling kit
for "parents concerned about socialism in the public schools" and
publishes books on how to survive nuclear war.
The OISM is located on a farm about 7 miles from the town of Cave
Junction, Oregon (population 1,126). Located slightly east of Siskiyou
National Forest, Cave Junction is one of several small towns nestled
in the Illinois Valley, whose total population is 15,000. Best known
as a gateway to the Oregon Caves National Monument, it is described by
its chamber of commerce as "the commercial, service, and cultural
center for a rural community of small farms, woodlots, crafts people,
and families just living apart from the crowds. ... It's a place where
going into the market can take time because people talk in the aisles
and at the checkstands. Life is slower, so you have to be patient.
You'll be part of that slowness because it is enjoyable to be
neighborly." The main visitors are tourists who come to hike, backpack
and fish in the area's many rivers and streams. Cave Junction is the
sort of out-of-the-way location you might seek out if you were hoping
to survive a nuclear war, but it is not known as a center for
scientific and medical research. The OISM would be equally obscure
itself, except for the role it played in 1998 in circulating a
deceptive "scientists' petition" on global warming in collaboration
with Frederick Seitz, a retired former president of the National
Academy of Sciences.
...
The Oregon Petition, sponsored by the OISM, was circulated in April
1998 in a bulk mailing to tens of thousands of U.S. scientists. In
addition to the petition, the mailing included what appeared to be a
reprint of a scientific paper. Authored by OISM's Arthur B.
Robinson,Sallie L. Baliunas, Willie Soon, and Zachary W. Robinson, the
paper was titled "Environmental Effects of Increased Atmospheric
Carbon Dioxide" and was printed in the same typeface and format as the
official Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Also
included was a reprint of a December 1997, Wall Street Journal
editorial, "Science Has Spoken: Global Warming Is a Myth, by Arthur
and Zachary Robinson. A cover note signed "Frederick Seitz/Past
President, National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A./President Emeritus,
Rockefeller University", may have given some persons the impression
that Robinson's paper was an official publication of the academy's
peer-reviewed journal. The blatant editorializing in the pseudopaper,
however, was uncharacteristic of scientific papers.
Robinson's paper claimed to show that pumping carbon dioxide into the
atmosphere is actually a good thing. "As atmospheric CO2 increases,"
it stated, "plant growth rates increase. Also, leaves lose less water
as CO2 increases, so that plants are able to grow under drier
conditions. Animal life, which depends upon plant life for food,
increases proportionally." As a result, Robinson concluded, industrial
activities can be counted on to encourage greater species biodiversity
and a greener planet:
As coal, oil, and natural gas are used to feed and lift from poverty
vast numbers of people across the globe, more CO2 will be released
into the atmosphere. This will help to maintain and improve the
health, longevity, prosperity, and productivity of all people.Human
activities are believed to be responsible for the rise in CO2 level of
the atmosphere. Mankind is moving the carbon in coal, oil, and natural
gas from below ground to the atmosphere and surface, where it is
available for conversion into living things. We are living in an
increasingly lush environment of plants and animals as a result of the
CO2 increase. Our children will enjoy an Earth with far more plant and
animal life as [sic] that with which we now are blessed. This is a
wonderful and unexpected gift from the Industrial Revolution.
In reality, neither Robinson's paper nor OISM's petition drive had
anything to do with the National Academy of Sciences, which first
heard about the petition when its members began calling to ask if the
NAS had taken a stand against the Kyoto treaty. Robinson was not even
a climate scientist. He was a biochemist with no published research in
the field of climatology, and his paper had never been subjected to
peer review by anyone with training in the field. In fact, the paper
had never been accepted for publication anywhere, let alone in the NAS
Proceedings. It was self-published by Robinson, who did the
typesetting himself on his own computer. (It was subsequently
published as a "review" in Climate Research, which contributed to an
editorial scandal at that publication.)
None of the coauthors of "Environmental Effects of Atmospheric Carbon
Dioxide" had any more standing than Robinson himself as a climate
change researcher. They included Robinson's 22-year-old son, Zachary,
along with astrophysicists Sallie L. Baliunas and Willie Soon. Both
Baliunas and Soon worked with Frederick Seitz at the George C.
Marshall Institute, a Washington, D.C., think tank where Seitz served
as executive director. Funded by a number of right-wing foundations,
including Scaife and Bradley, the George C. Marshall Institute does
not conduct any original research. It is a conservative think tank
that was initially founded during the years of the Reagan
administration to advocate funding for Reagan's Strategic Defense
Initiative--the "Star Wars" weapons program. Today, the Marshall
Institute is still a big fan of high-tech weapons. In 1999, its
website gave prominent placement to an essay by Col. Simon P. Worden
titled "Why We Need the Air-Borne Laser," along with an essay titled
"Missile Defense for Populations--What Does It Take? Why Are We Not
Doing It?" Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, however, the
Marshall Institute has adapted to the times by devoting much of its
firepower to the war against environmentalism, and in particular
against the "scaremongers" who raise warnings about global warming.
"The mailing is clearly designed to be deceptive by giving people the
impression that the article, which is full of half-truths, is a
reprint and has passed peer review," complained Raymond Pierrehumbert,
a meteorlogist at the University of Chicago. NAS foreign secretary F.
Sherwood Rowland, an atmospheric chemist, said researchers "are
wondering if someone is trying to hoodwink them." NAS council
memberRalph J. Cicerone, dean of the School of Physical Sciences at
the University of California at Irvine, was particularly offended that
Seitz described himself in the cover letter as a "past president" of
the NAS. Although Seitz had indeed held that title in the 1960s,
Cicerone hoped that scientists who received the petition mailing would
not be misled into believing that he "still has a role in governing
the organization."
The NAS issued an unusually blunt formal response to the petition
drive. "The NAS Council would like to make it clear that this petition
has nothing to do with the National Academy of Sciences and that the
manuscript was not published in the Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences or in any other peer-reviewed journal," it stated
in a news release. "The petition does not reflect the conclusions of
expert reports of the Academy." In fact, it pointed out, its own prior
published study had shown that "even given the considerable
uncertainties in our knowledge of the relevant phenomena, greenhouse
warming poses a potential threat sufficient to merit prompt responses.
Investment in mitigation measures acts as insurance protection against
the great uncertainties and the possibility of dramatic surprises."
-------
This is the statement of the National Academies of Science:
http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?RecordID=s04201998
The Council of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is concerned
about the confusion caused by a petition being circulated via a letter
from a former president of this Academy. This petition criticizes the
science underlying the Kyoto treaty on carbon dioxide emissions (the
Kyoto Protocol to the Framework Convention on Climate Change), and it
asks scientists to recommend rejection of this treaty by the U.S.
Senate. The petition was mailed with an op-ed article from The Wall
Street Journal and a manuscript in a format that is nearly identical
to that of scientific articles published in the Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences. The NAS Council would like to make it
clear that this petition has nothing to do with the National Academy
of Sciences and that the manuscript was not published in the
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences or in any other peer-
reviewed journal.
The petition does not reflect the conclusions of expert reports of the
Academy.
In particular, the Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public
Policy of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of
Engineering (NAE), and the Institute of Medicine (IOM) conducted a
major consensus study on this issue, entitled Policy Implications of
Greenhouse Warming (1991,1992). This analysis concluded that " ...even
given the considerable uncertainties in our knowledge of the relevant
phenomena, greenhouse warming poses a potential threat sufficient to
merit prompt responses. ... Investment in mitigation measures acts as
insurance protection against the great uncertainties and the
possibility of dramatic surprises." In addition, theCommittee on
Global Change Research of the National Research Council, the operating
arm of the NAS and the NAE, will issue a major report later this
spring on the research issues that can help to reduce the scientific
uncertainties associated with global change phenomena, including
climate change.
-----------------------
Notwithstanding this rebuke, the Oregon Petition managed to garner
15,000 signatures within a month's time. S. Fred Singer called the
petition "the latest and largest effort by rank-and-file scientists to
express their opposition to schemes that subvert science for the sake
of a political agenda."
Nebraska senator Chuck Hagel called it an "extraordinary response" and
cited it as his basis for continuing to oppose a global warming
treaty. "Nearly all of these 15,000 scientists have technical training
suitable for evaluating climate research data," Hagel said. Columns
citing the Seitz petition and the Robinson paper as credible sources
of scientific expertise on the global warming issue have appeared in
publications ranging from Newsday', the Los Angeles Times and
Washington Post to the Austin-American Statesman, Denver Post, and
Wyoming Tribune-Eagle.
In addition to the bulk mailing, OISM's website enables people to add
their names to the petition over the Internet, and by June 2000 it
claimed to have recruited more than 19,000 scientists. The institute
is so lax about screening names, however, that virtually anyone can
sign, including for example Al Caruba, a pesticide-industry PR man and
conservative ideologue who runs his own website called the "National
Anxiety Center." Caruba has no scientific credentials whatsoever, but
in addition to signing the Oregon Petition he has editorialized on his
own website against the science of global warming, calling it the
"biggest hoax of the decade," a "genocidal" campaign by
environmentalists who believe that "humanity must be destroyed to
'Save the Earth.' . . . There is no global warming, but there is a
global political agenda, comparable to the failed Soviet Union
experiment with Communism, being orchestrated by the United Nations,
supported by its many Green NGOs, to impose international treaties of
every description that would turn the institution into a global
government, superceding the sovereignty of every nation in the world."
When questioned in 1998, OISM's Arthur Robinson admitted that only
2,100 signers of the Oregon Petition had identified themselves as
physicists, geophysicists, climatologists, or meteorologists, "and of
those the greatest number are physicists." This grouping of fields
concealed the fact that only a few dozen, at most, of the signatories
were drawn from the core disciplines of climate science - such as
meteorology, oceanography, and glaciology - and almost none were
climate specialists. The names of the signers are available on the
OISM's website, but without listing any institutional affiliations or
even city of residence, making it very difficult to determine their
credentials or even whether they exist at all. When the Oregon
Petition first circulated, in fact, environmental activists
successfully added the names of several fictional characters and
celebrities to the list, including John Grisham, Michael J. Fox, Drs.
Frank Burns, B. J. Honeycutt, and Benjamin Pierce (from the TV show
M*A*S*H), an individual by the name of "Dr. Red Wine," and Geraldine
Halliwell, formerly known as pop singer Ginger Spice of the Spice
Girls. Halliwell's field of scientific specialization was listed as
"biology." Even in 2003, the list was loaded with misspellings,
duplications, name and title fragments, and names of non-persons, such
as company names.
OISM has refused to release info on the number of mailings it made.
From comments in Nature:
"Virtually every scientist in every field got it," says Robert Park, a
professor of physics at the University of Maryland at College Park and
spokesman for the American Physical Society. "That's a big mailing."
According to the National Science Foundation, there are more than half
a million science or engineering PhDs in the United States, and ten
million individuals with first degrees in science or
engineering.Arthur Robinson, president of the Oregon Institute of
Science and Medicine, the small, privately funded institute that
circulated the petition, declines to say how many copies were sent
out. "We're not willing to have our opponents attack us with that
number, and say that the rest of the recipients are against us," he
says, adding that the response was "outstanding" for a direct mail shot.
...
As of the Fall of 2007, OISM continued to mail petition cards along
with a reprint of "Environmental Effects of Increased Atmospheric
Carbon Dioxide," now cited as having been published in the Journal of
American Physicians and Surgeons (2007) 12, 79-90, with Arthur B.
Robinson, Noah E. Robinson, and Willie Soon listed as the authors. The
journal is published by the Association of American Physicians and
Surgeonswhose director is Jane Orient (see above), a professor at the
Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine. Also included in the mailing
is a copy of a Wall Street Journal Op-Ed article entitled "Global
Warming is 300-Year-Old News" authored by Arthur and Noah Robinson and
dated January 18, 2000.
To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
"unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
Received on Sun May 25 15:51:08 2008
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.8 : Sun May 25 2008 - 15:51:08 EDT