Posted by
Kim Crockett on Tuesday, October 11th 2011
Update: KSTP did a short blurb on our rained out protest (hey,weather happens). We had great conversations with some curious geologists, some of whom agreed and some of whom did not but appreciated out concerns about scientific integrity. I had never met a geologist before! One smart grad student told me that academic geologists are left wing (because they are out of touch with who pays the bills and like it that way) and that geologists who work in industry tend to be conservative. Go figure.
Dr. Michael Mann, who is one of the scientists at the center of ClimateGate and a proponent of man made global warming/climate change, will be a guest speaker at the Geological Society of America convention in Minneapolis tomorrow, October 12. His brief lecture or rant (all the details are here and reprinted below) is about how his work has been scrutinized by non-scientists and politicians (more below). How dare we ask questions! After all, his hockey stick graph has only been used to alter energy, environmental and transportation policies around the globe.
Bring your hockey sticks! We plan to welcome Dr. Mann to town by gathering outside the convention center from 1 PM to 2PM and again at 5PM to 6PM (sidewalk, north side, across from the main entrance).
His protests to the contrary, we want Dr. Mann to know that science and scientific standards should not be influenced by power politics and big grant money.
The irony is that he claims to be out-spent and out-gunned. This claim is outrageous when you consider the billions being poured into the “green” economy, “green” think tanks, “green” government and so forth.
Minnesotans for Global Warming, who always bring much needed humor to the debate on global warming, have a great post on the Hockey Stick. We heard that chicken little might show up at the 5PM gathering tomorrow.
Dr. Mann is trying to stop the American Tradition Institute from getting his emails in a Freedom of Information (FOIA) action against the University of Virginia where he used to work.
Dr. Mann’s famous “hockey stick” first came under scrutiny when a Canadian named Steve McIntyre noticed serious flaws in the data. It seems appropriate that a Canadian would notice problems with a hockey stick, eh? You can read more about it here on John Daly’s post and here at McIntyre’s website Climate Audit.
Dr. Mann’s lecture is described here:
CLIMATE SCIENTISTS IN THE PUBLIC ARENA: WHO’S GOT OUR BACKS?
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| MANN, Michael E., Dept. of Meteorology and Earth and Environ. Systems Institute, Penn State University, Walker Building, University Park, PA 16827, [email protected] scientists have an important role to play in informing the public discourse on human-caused climate change. Our scientific expertise provides us a unique, informed perspective, and despite recent high profile attacks against climate science, the public still affords climate scientists the greatest trust to deliver an honest, unbiased assessment of the potential threats posed by climate changes. Yet, as with all areas of science where powerful special interests perceive themselves as threatened by the findings of science, scientists enter the public fray at our peril.Our efforts to communicate the science are opposed by a well-funded, highly organized disinformation effort that aims to confuse the public about the nature of our scientific understanding. In recent years, the disinformation campaign has demonstrated a willingness to attack individual, climate scientists as a means of achieving a broader end: discrediting climate science itself. These attacks are rarely fought in legitimate scientific circles such as the peer-reviewed scientific literature or other scholarly venues, but rather through rhetorical efforts delivered by nonscientists, using ideologically aligned media outlets, special interest groups, and politicians.Scientists are massively out-funded and outmanned in this battle, and will lose if leading scientific institutions and organizations remain on the sidelines. I will discuss this dilemma, drawing upon my own experiences in the public arena of climate change. |
2011 GSA Annual Meeting in Minneapolis (9–12 October 2011)
General Information for this Meeting |
Follow the Money by Bill Glahn
Follow the Money: Tar Sands Edition
Vivian Krause, a Canadian blogger, has been following the money on the well-funded campaign against Canadian oil sands production and export. On this side of the border, we see the campaign as the fight against the Keystone XL pipeline, a project designed to take Canadian crude to U.S. markets as far south as the Gulf Coast.
Ms. Krause has traced more than $10 million in funds from the Tides Foundation of San Francisco over a two-year period (2009 and 2010) to more than 40 groups opposed to Canadian oil. Popping out on her list of recipients are two Minnesota groups: No. 17, Fresh Energy, received $110,000 in 2009 and No. 21, the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy (MCEA), received a total of $60,000 over the two years.
Ms. Krause documented some of her earlier findings in Canada’s Financial Post. Of course, you don’t have to take her word for it, Tides documents all of their 2009 and 2010 (and other years) grantees on their website.
Let no one say that the folks behind Tides have not received value for money. Fresh Energy features the campaign against the Keystone pipeline and Canadian oil prominently on its website and in coverage on its affiliated Midwest Energy News website. Here is an example. Midwest Energy News links to this article on Inside Climate News which quotes Friends of the Earth ($160,000 Tides recipient). Par for the course, I guess. MCEA has been doing its bit, too, featuring the Keystone controversy on its blog.