Chris Mooney is a partisan author (The Republican War on Science) and a leftist political advocate. He has made a career of pushing ideological goals as if they were objective scientific agendas. And of course many science journalists–often in name only–have followed his lead, particularly in the fields of global warming and embryonic stem cell research, which I deal with, and in the Darwin wars, which I don’t.
The thing is, that approach only serves to demonstrate the law of diminishing returns. When journalists become mere boosters–exemplified at a recent climate journalists’ convention in which a reporter asking tough questions of Al Gore had his microphone turned off–people know they’re being propagandized. That has resulted in greater distrust of both science and the media.
Mooney’s answer to the public’s loss of faith, in a Washington Post piece, is more spin. From his column:
The central lesson of Climategate is not that climate science is corrupt. The leaked e-mails do nothing to disprove the scientific consensus on global warming. Instead, the controversy highlights that in a world of blogs, cable news and talk radio, scientists are poorly equipped to communicate their knowledge and, especially, to respond when science comes under attack.
Talk about revisionism! No, the central lesson of Climategate was that the scientists involved were not only far from objective, but they were hyper-concerned with communication–most particularly stifling those with whom they disagreed. They wanted a monopoly on what was reported and threatened to punish reporters and professional journals that permitted even a whiff of heterodoxy into the discussion.
And guess who wanted to use Katrina as a sledge hammer promoting the global warming meme:
Consider another failure to communicate from the global-warming arena: the scientific fallout after a devastating trio of hurricanes — Katrina, Rita and Wilma — in the fall of 2005. Just as these storms struck, a pair of scientific studies appeared in top journals suggesting, for the first time, that global warming was making hurricanes more intense and deadly. Other scientists vociferously disagreed, and the two camps fell into combat. So while public interest in hurricanes was at a high after Katrina, much of the science reporting at the time portrayed researchers bickering with one another (“Hurricane Debate Shatters Civility of Weather Science,” announced a Wall Street Journal cover story).
But the thing is, we know that global warming did not cause Katrina, nor has it increased the number of hurricanes. Indeed, we have actually had a dramatic reduction in hurricane activity over the last few decades.
And notice how he uses the usual cliches to set up the discussion of h0w to beat back the dreaded Darwin skeptics:
Science’s opponents in this fight are highly organized, and they constantly nitpick evolutionary science to cast the field into disrepute. The scientific response to creationists has long been to cite the extensive evidence for evolution…Yet such down-in-the-weeds messages probably miss most of the public — polls repeatedly show that a large portion of Americans have doubts about evolution.
Actually, at the popular level, the supporters of neo Darwinism do mostly what Mooney does; label critics “science opponents” and “creationists,” a two-dimensional caricature that not only disrespects heterodox thinkers in the field–an often thankless endeavor that science is supposed to honor–but also, the public itself, which has honest questions and concerns about these matters. (I’ve seen the same thing in the stem cell issue, with people voicing ethical concerns about ESCR or human cloning denigrated as “anti science.”) And don’t discount the snob factor in the lessening of the public’s respect for science–they know when they are being disrespected.
Advocates like Chris Mooney view science as a splendid weapon for furthering their political aims, which are shared by many politicized leaders of the science sector. But pushing better spin isn’t the answer to improving public respect for science. Indeed, such tactics are actually counter productive. The more scientists listen to the likes of Chris Mooney–the more they use sound bites, denigrate opponents, stifle heterodox views, and employ the other tools of big time PR–the less the public will trust them.
January 3rd, 2010 | 7:53 pm
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Vince Humphreys, Wesley J. Smith and topsy_top20k, topsy_top20k_en. topsy_top20k_en said: More Spin Will Cause, Not Cure, Public Mistrust of Science » Secondhand Smoke | A First Things Blog – http://shar.es/aUYKA [...]
January 3rd, 2010 | 8:10 pm
I guess I’m just one of those ignorant hicks that believes in creationism and gawd etc…
Actually I have a very good background in science and have been to several schools and universities over the years. I just do no buy into the whole anthropogenic global warming bit. I believe in evolution and the sciences. I do not believe that climate change is a legitimate science yet.
There is SO much that could be causing the very slight rise in temperatures aside from anthropogenic global warming that, after the emails, I believe that the whole thing is a farce. I truly believe that THEY believe that humans are the cause but that’s about it.
When all the factors that are available are taken into account including the fact that the earth is at a CO2 low when measured against it’s entire life then the AGW scientists are the ones that are nuts.
January 3rd, 2010 | 8:19 pm
No scientists listens to the likes of Mooney, never fear.
I think his prophecy of doom has fulfilled itself, now, too. His career is ended.
I expect he’ll soon be back at the airport with his tambourine, begging again.
January 3rd, 2010 | 8:24 pm
The central lesson of Climategate is, in fact, that climate science is corrupt. Knowing their results were irreproducible, the scientists conspired to frustrate efforts to obtain the computer code and input data. Less famous scientists on the team fantasized among themselves about having the guts to write a paper admitting what they didn’t know, i.e., what was unsupported by the data. The lead scientists, who ought to have been the most vigilant about the rigor of their claims, who ought to have organized efforts to ensure that the work was accurate, reproducible and convincing, created instead a Byzantine atmosphere of back-scratching and patronage.
Who in America will replace Richard Feynman? He would not have stood for this and could credibly have explained what a derelict climate science is revealed to be (at least among the “Hockey Team” — their own term).
Would that the scientific establishment would call this by its right name. I fear there are none left who will stand up and do it. Is this because scientists rely on the government for money? Hmmm.
January 3rd, 2010 | 8:43 pm
Social comments and analytics for this post…
This post was mentioned on Twitter by CO2HOG: More Spin Will Cause, Not Cure, Public Mistrust of Science http://rly.cc/gxC4W...
January 3rd, 2010 | 9:04 pm
[...] post: More Spin Will Cause, Not Cure, Public Mistrust of Science … test Filed under Object | Tags: chris-mooney, deliberate-deception, entire-community, [...]
January 3rd, 2010 | 10:41 pm
Call me crazy but I am willing to suggest that each of the different scientific disciplines should compliment each other and have some form of harmony. But if it is all “purposeless” and “meaningless” and “random” then why is anyone concerned about global warming at all? Hmmmm.
January 3rd, 2010 | 11:43 pm
Nice post, Wes! Too true, I fear.
Pat Michaels
January 3rd, 2010 | 11:53 pm
I actually think Mooney is a victim of the dumbing down. I think he really believes the stuff he wrote. His ilk continue to “explain ” in smaller words what most 8th graders understood and rejected last century.
If scientists had lived up to the reputations he thinks they deserve “science” wouldn’t be sporting this well deserved black eye.
The climate debate and the evolution debate, both “consensus of the scientific community” are not won by claiming victory and calling the opposition names.
Yup, I am one of those ignorant hicks.
There were and are climatologists that retained their integrity and suffered for it. They were all shouted down, called deniers, and much worse. They put their data up for all to see and it was ignored by Mooney and his pals.
As far as I can see the warm-mongers just got schooled. They are full of crapp and its a travesty they are.
January 3rd, 2010 | 11:59 pm
Sorry, I forgot to thank you for the post Wesley.
January 4th, 2010 | 2:45 am
A consumer of paleoclimatology in my research, I knew the primary data concerning the Medieval Warm Period (when temperatures were warmer than today), the Minoan Warm period (when temperatures were warmer still), and the history of global climate change since the Oligocene. Thus, I was surprised when I watched Al Gore’s movie to see the “hockey stick”, which Gore stated was “settled science”, claiming that human CO2 was driving dramatic temperature rise. these claims are at the center of the IPCC predictions. Surprised, I did what a scientist does; I went back to the primary data to see who was right and who was wrong. The answer is clear. Gore is wrong. The hockey stick (and the IPCC 3rd and 4th installments) was based on a flawed principal component analysis. It has been retracted. An attempt to resurrect the model was based on a cherry picked tree from Siberia; it is nothing but bad science. And then I looked further. German chemists had measured atmospheric CO2 starting in the 1820′s; it is higher than today. In the Vostok ice cores, CO2 concentration follows temperature rise; it has not (historically) caused it. And then I had a look at the ground and satellite temperature data. If there has been a temperature rise over the past century, it is close to the noise.
This is not creationism versus evolution. This is a case where the political class has picked a winner in an interesting scientific dispute. The better analogy is evolution versus Lysenko.
January 4th, 2010 | 11:01 am
Steve: The reason for this is that science is being hijacked and distorted for ideological purposes. The Medieval Warm period is a very powerful argument IMO. Also, I seem to recall that during Roman times, they grew grapes in England.
January 4th, 2010 | 11:39 am
The Red-Green links go deeper than many would suspect, as recent news shows. Arguing that the present cold winter weather “proves” anthropogenic global warming is a classic page from Communist dialectical materialism, which has as one of its core tenets “three steps forward, two steps back” in gradually imposing a socialist utopia. In other words, in their minds, regression is proof of progress as well. This explains the infuriating statements that record cold somehow proves global warming as well as anything else.
January 4th, 2010 | 12:59 pm
Does the headline refer to Chris Mooney’s column or to Wesley Smith’s?
January 4th, 2010 | 2:11 pm
Michael S.,
I’m pretty sure that all you need to do is look to the court of public opinion to get the answer to your question.
Evidently, you either didn’t read or didn’t understand Chris Mooney’ column.
(Or, Wesley’s Blog Post, for that matter.)
.
January 4th, 2010 | 3:13 pm
Let them ramp up the propaganda. The masses are immune to propaganda in the long run. Their innate common sense always wins out. The more the propaganda ramps up the more the bullshit meter kicks in. Its actually the intellectual classes that are most susceptible to propaganda because of their huge egos.
January 6th, 2010 | 5:33 am
[...] J. Smith wrote More Spin Will Cause, Not Cure, Public Mistrust of Science, an article appearing at First Things. The article implicitly points out a more subtle war on [...]
January 21st, 2010 | 6:12 am
Those interested in potential friction between media, science and politics may want to read Science and the Media: Securing the Future, a report commissioned by the Department for Business Innovation and Skills in the UK.
Access the report and discuss at: http://bit.ly/sciencemedia
January 22nd, 2010 | 5:08 am
[...] A consumer of paleoclimatology in my research, I knew the primary data concerning the Medieval Warm Period (when temperatures were warmer than today), the Minoan Warm period (when temperatures were warmer still), and the history of global climate change since the Oligocene. Thus, I was surprised when I watched Al Gore’s movie to see the “hockey stick”, which Gore stated was “settled science”, claiming that human CO2 was driving dramatic temperature rise. these claims are at the center of the IPCC predictions. Surprised, I did what a scientist does; I went back to the primary data to see who was right and who was wrong. The answer is clear. Gore is wrong. The hockey stick (and the IPCC 3rd and 4th installments) was based on a flawed principal component analysis. It has been retracted. An attempt to resurrect the model was based on a cherry picked tree from Siberia; it is nothing but bad science. And then I looked further. German chemists had measured atmospheric CO2 starting in the 1820’s; it is higher than today. In the Vostok ice cores, CO2 concentration follows temperature rise; it has not (historically) caused it. And then I had a look at the ground and satellite temperature data. If there has been a temperature rise over the past century, it is close to the noise. original comment from http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/secondhandsmoke/2010/01/03/more-spin-will-cause-not-cure-public-mis... [...]
January 29th, 2010 | 7:57 pm
Organized and coordinated climate racketeering for profit uncovered. Are you angry about this obvious RICO Act fraud and the national media’s complicity in the cover-up, misinformation, reframing and misdirection of the issue and the related “carbon derivatives” market Obama’s Administration is spinning up? Why pay for propaganda? Take responsibility and take action. STOP all donations to the political party(s) responsible for this fraud. STOP donations to all environmental groups which funded this Global Warming propaganda campaign with our money, especially The World Wildlife Fund. DEMAND they take you off their donors’ mailing list. They have violated the public trust. KEEP donations local, close to home. MAKE donations to Oklahoma’s Senator Inhofe, the only politician to stand firmly against this obvious government/media coordinated information operation (propaganda) targeted at its own people. Senator Inhofe, the only politician to refuse the GREEN KOOL AID. Senator Inhofe, the only senator to stand between us and the collective insanity of the ruling class of elitist hucksters led by Al Gore. WRITE your state and federal representatives demanding wall to wall investigations of government sponsored propaganda campaigns and demand indictments of those responsible. WRITE your state and federal Attorneys General demanding Al Gore and others conducting Global Warming/Climate Change racketeering and mail fraud operations be brought to justice, indicted, tried, convicted and jailed. Carbon is the stuff of life. He (Obama) who controls carbon, especially CO2, controls the world. Think of the consequences if you do nothing! For one, the UK is becoming the poster child for George Orwell’s “1984”. The mendacity of UK’s John Beddington, Robert Watson and Ed Miliband prove the point. The US government’s sponsorship of this worldwide Global Warming propaganda campaign puts it in a class with the failed Soviet Union’s relentless violation of the basic human right to truthful government generated information. Given ClimateGate’s burgeoning revelations of outrageous government misconduct and massive covert misinformation, what are the chances that this Administration’s National Health Care sales campaign is anywhere near the truth?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bdneX1djD
http://www.kusi.com/weather/colemanscorner/81559212.html
Links
Blogs
Find Us
Contact