Behind the Climate Change Deniers

By BJ

It should surprise approximately no one that behind those looking to cast doubt and deny the human impact on the world's climate, is a very familiar name using tried and tested tactics, though that may be about to change.

When the tobacco industry was feeling the heat from scientists who showed that smoking caused cancer, it took decisive action.

It engaged in a decades-long public relations campaign to undermine the medical research and discredit the scientists. The aim was not to prove tobacco harmless but to cast doubt on the science.

In May this year, the multibillion-dollar oil giant Exxon-Mobil acknowledged that it had been doing something similar. It announced that it would cease funding nine groups that had fuelled a global campaign to deny climate change.

Exxon's decision comes after a shareholder revolt by members of the Rockefeller family and big superannuation funds to get the oil giant to take climate change more seriously. Exxon (once Standard Oil) was founded by the legendary John D. Rockefeller. Last year, the chairman of the US House of Representatives oversight committee on science and technology, Brad Miller, said Exxon's support for sceptics "appears to be an effort to distort public discussion".

No word yet whether these groups will be included in the funding cuts.

Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world's largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report due to be published today.

Letters sent by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), an ExxonMobil-funded thinktank with close links to the Bush administration, offered the payments for articles that emphasise the shortcomings of a report from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Travel expenses and additional payments were also offered.

. . .

On Monday, another Exxon-funded organisation based in Canada will launch a review in London which casts doubt on the IPCC report. Among its authors are Tad Murty, a former scientist who believes human activity makes no contribution to global warming. Confirmed VIPs attending include Nigel Lawson and David Bellamy, who believes there is no link between burning fossil fuels and global warming.

The tactics both the tobacco and oil industries used is remarkably similar to the "Intelligent Design" crowd's. Do everything you can to attack the real science and credibility of the scientists in an attempt to have your preferred mythology be the one people hear and believe. This way, they don't have to disprove the science, since they are already aware they can't, they just have to keep the belief alive that there is some kind of controversy about it, pretend that we don't really know if our addiction to burning fossil fuels is responsible for Climate Change.

Of course, there are still too many people who want to accept that particular lie. After all, who wants to acknowledge that they may be in part responsible for a global catastrophe? Odds are despite this slightly encouraging sign from Exxon, attitudes will change very little, and we'll continue on down our self-destructive path.

Comments

[anderson]

BJ,

I'm glad you're highlighting this here. For further reading, I recommend George Monbiot, one of the first people to bring to light the common thread behind the front organisations who first worked on Big Tobacco smoking/cancer denial efforts, only to move to global warming denial. Same clowns. Same tactics.

Monbiot has a quite large collection of articles on this phenomenon, but
The Smoke Behind The Deniers’ Fire is a good place to start. I even remember seeing, almost two years ago, that The Royal Society had sent a letter to ExxonMobil, demanding that they stop funding global warming denial groups.

But the whole movement saw its germination at the Marshall Institute, which was first organized by three American physicists under the Reagan administration to fight off the overwhelming opinion of the country" rel="nofollow">

If you get a chance, watch this 1 hr, UC Television lecture by Dr. Naomi Orestes (UCSD).

The American Denial of Global Warming. It is a must see teevee. [Warning: Orestes voice is a bit grating, but the lecture is invaluable.]

-k

[anderson]

Sorry, the above comment is all screwed up. But watch Orestes lecture.