Latest news with #scientificconsensus
CNN
08-07-2025
- Politics
- CNN
The Trump admin just hired 3 outspoken climate contrarians. Scientists are worried what comes next
The Trump administration has hired three prominent researchers who over the course of their careers have questioned and even rejected the scientific consensus on human-caused climate change. Each were given positions in the Energy Department, which is led by Secretary Chris Wright, a former oil and gas fracking executive. The researchers are John Christy and Roy Spencer, both of whom are research scientists at the University of Alabama at Huntsville, and Steven E. Koonin of Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Koonin previously served at DOE during the Obama administration, and earlier was a scientist for the oil and gas giant BP. He, along with others, pushed for a public 'red team' debate on climate science findings during the first Trump administration, but was overruled by political advisors in the White House at the time. The hirings were first reported by the New York Times and confirmed by CNN. In the Energy Department's internal employee directory, Koonin is listed as a 'special government employee,' Christy is listed as 'expert' and Spencer a 'consultant,' according to an agency source familiar with the matter. All three are listed as being under the office of Energy Secretary Wright, the source confirmed. The Energy Department did not immediately respond to CNN's request for comment on the hires of the three men, as well as questions on what they were working on at DOE and how long they would be there. CNN has reached out to Koonin, Christy and Spencer individually for comment on their work at DOE. Christy told CNN in an emailed response that he was not on the Energy Department's payroll and was 'just here to help as needed.' Koonin, a theoretical physicist, served as the undersecretary for science at DOE under the Obama administration. He is the author of the 2021 book, 'Unsettled: What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn't, and Why It Matters.' The Trump administration is currently working on overturning a 2009 federal scientific finding that planet-warming pollution poses a threat to public welfare, which underpins many regulations designed to curb the nation's pollution. That effort is being led by the Environmental Protection Agency, but is likely to involve other agencies, including the Department of Energy. In addition, the second Trump administration has taken a hatchet to public spending on climate science research, proposing to eliminate the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's research activities altogether while making cuts at other agencies as well. The Energy Department employs numerous climate scientists and houses some of the world's most powerful supercomputers, which are used in part for modeling future global warming and its impacts. Christy and Spencer have long maintained that satellite data does not show the same trends and extent of global warming as surface weather data and have used that to poke holes in the mainstream scientific data. The Trump administration recently let go of hundreds of scientists who were beginning to work on the next iteration of the congressionally mandated National Climate Assessment, which includes input from all climate-related federal agencies. In recent weeks, the administration took down past iterations of these climate assessments, which are the most authoritative reports on how climate change will affect the US. It also shut down the educational website, and laid off its staff. While the scope of their work is currently unclear, some prominent climate scientists are concerned Christy, Spencer and Koonin will be working on an alternative version of the next National Climate Assessment, which would be far more slanted to fringe views on the causes and consequences of global warming. Andrew Dessler, a climate scientist at Texas A&M University, told CNN the hires signal an effort by DOE to arrive at a predetermined result. 'Hiring Koonin, Spencer, and Christy is not just irregular, it's a recognition that none of the normal channels would not give them the answer they want,' Dessler said. 'This seems to be a thread running through this administration. They don't seek out legitimate expert opinion; instead, they find people to give them the answer they want.' Christy suggested in his email to CNN that he wasn't involved with either the national climate assessment or efforts to overturn the 2009 endangerment finding. 'I don't know what is happening with the National Climate Assessment or the Endangerment Finding,' he wrote. Dessler noted that Koonin, Christy and Spencer are well-known for making value judgements in their supposedly scientific assessments as well as cherry picking data, and the language they use tends to be in the personal-opinion space, rather than the science space. 'There's also a lot of 'I'm not convinced' on areas that everyone else in the field is convinced by ('I'm not convinced climate models are any good'). That's not really a scientific argument,' Dessler said. Climate scientist Zeke Hausfather noted where Koonin and Christy's views, for example, fall in the broader climate science community. 'While Koonin and Christy are among the more reasonable climate contrarians, they represent a tiny minority view representing perhaps 1% or less of climate scientists,' he told CNN. 'While it's useful to assess a variety of views, specifically seeking out and elevating fringe views that are not supported by the vast majority of the scientific research on a subject is deeply problematic.' This story has been updated with additional information.
CNN
08-07-2025
- Politics
- CNN
The Trump admin just hired 3 outspoken climate contrarians. Scientists are worried what comes next
The Trump administration has hired three prominent researchers who over the course of their careers have questioned and even rejected the scientific consensus on human-caused climate change. Each were given positions in the Energy Department, which is led by Secretary Chris Wright, a former oil and gas fracking executive. The researchers are John Christy and Roy Spencer, both of whom are research scientists at the University of Alabama at Huntsville, and Steven E. Koonin of Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Koonin previously served at DOE during the Obama administration, and earlier was a scientist for the oil and gas giant BP. He, along with others, pushed for a public 'red team' debate on climate science findings during the first Trump administration, but was overruled by political advisors in the White House at the time. The hirings were first reported by the New York Times and confirmed by CNN. In the Energy Department's internal employee directory, Koonin is listed as a 'special government employee,' Christy is listed as 'expert' and Spencer a 'consultant,' according to an agency source familiar with the matter. All three are listed as being under the office of Energy Secretary Wright, the source confirmed. The Energy Department did not immediately respond to CNN's request for comment on the hires of the three men, as well as questions on what they were working on at DOE and how long they would be there. CNN has reached out to Koonin, Christy and Spencer individually for comment on their work at DOE. Koonin, a theoretical physicist, served as the undersecretary for science at DOE under the Obama administration. He is the author of the 2021 book, 'Unsettled: What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn't, and Why It Matters.' The Trump administration is currently working on overturning a 2009 federal scientific finding that planet-warming pollution poses a threat to public welfare, which underpins many regulations designed to curb the nation's pollution. That effort is being led by the Environmental Protection Agency, but is likely to involve other agencies, including the Department of Energy. In addition, the second Trump administration has taken a hatchet to public spending on climate science research, proposing to eliminate the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's research activities altogether while making cuts at other agencies as well. The Energy Department employs numerous climate scientists and houses some of the world's most powerful supercomputers, which are used in part for modeling future global warming and its impacts. Christy and Spencer have long maintained that satellite data does not show the same trends and extent of global warming as surface weather data and have used that to poke holes in the mainstream scientific data. The Trump administration recently let go of hundreds of scientists who were beginning to work on the next iteration of the congressionally mandated National Climate Assessment, which includes input from all climate-related federal agencies. In recent weeks, the administration took down past iterations of these climate assessments, which are the most authoritative reports on how climate change will affect the US. It also shut down the educational website, and laid off its staff. While the scope of their work is currently unclear, some prominent climate scientists are concerned Christy, Spencer and Koonin will be working on an alternative version of the next National Climate Assessment, which would be far more slanted to fringe views on the causes and consequences of global warming. Andrew Dessler, a climate scientist at Texas A&M University, told CNN the hires signal an effort by DOE to arrive at a predetermined result. 'Hiring Koonin, Spencer, and Christy is not just irregular, it's a recognition that none of the normal channels would not give them the answer they want,' Dessler said. 'This seems to be a thread running through this administration. They don't seek out legitimate expert opinion; instead, they find people to give them the answer they want.' Dessler noted that Koonin, Christy and Spencer are well-known for making value judgements in their supposedly scientific assessments as well as cherry picking data, and the language they use tends to be in the personal-opinion space, rather than the science space. 'There's also a lot of 'I'm not convinced' on areas that everyone else in the field is convinced by ('I'm not convinced climate models are any good'). That's not really a scientific argument,' Dessler said. Climate scientist Zeke Hausfather noted where Koonin and Christy's views, for example, fall in the broader climate science community. 'While Koonin and Christy are among the more reasonable climate contrarians, they represent a tiny minority view representing perhaps 1% or less of climate scientists,' he told CNN. 'While it's useful to assess a variety of views, specifically seeking out and elevating fringe views that are not supported by the vast majority of the scientific research on a subject is deeply problematic.'
Irish Times
05-07-2025
- Health
- Irish Times
Scientific consensus is not a fruitful concept
The term scientific consensus – as in 'there is a scientific consensus on climate change' – is often used to characterise a matter considered to be scientifically settled. But the concept of consensus is poorly suited to science, where conclusions must always remain provisional and revisable in the light of new evidence. The concept of 'convergence' better describes the nature of the scientific enterprise. Convergence means we can begin to have confidence that science is accurately/truly describing a phenomenon when the evidence from many and diverse approaches all point to the same explanation. The relative merits of the concepts of consensus and convergence were discussed recently in a recent editorial in Science , and elaborated by Chuck Dinerstein in The American Council for Science and Health . The value of the convergence concept is illustrated by the history of the MMR vaccine and the claims that this vaccine causes autism. There is a huge amount of evidence from very many lines of investigation that MMR vaccines do not cause autism – in other words, there is extremely strong scientific convergence pointing to this conclusion. READ MORE Nevertheless, US secretary for health Robert Fitzgerald Kennedy jnr does not accept this conclusion, and has asked the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to conduct a new study to demonstrate cases where MMR vaccination does cause autism. [ The global fight for science in the face of Trump's attacks Opens in new window ] Given the strength of evidence to date, it seems highly improbable the CDC will demonstrate any link between MMR and autism. Even if it does produce some evidence, the fact remains that innumerable past studies have found no link. A single contrary indication would not destroy the existing convergence of evidence, which will remain even if a single or a few exceptions come to light. If exceptions do emerge, the onus will be on proponents of the MMR/autism link to explain why scientific convergence so overwhelmingly indicates the opposite conclusion. And, of course, those who now argue for a link between MMR and autism, in the absence of evidence to date to support their claim, would seize on a single apparent demonstration of a link in some cases as a demonstration that 'scientific consensus' is broken, and they would be emboldened to greatly intensify their campaign against vaccination. In other words, as far as the evidence goes they would have the tail wag the dog and would certainly sow great confusion and persuade many parents not to vaccinate their children, with disastrous consequences. Creative people who are not completely shackled by existing paradigms are very important when science consistently struggles over a long period to make further progress in explaining a situation On the other hand, the convergence concept would not lend itself to any such easy manipulation. A single contrary demonstration, albeit interesting and demanding further investigation, would remain a single demonstration to confront innumerable published demonstrations to the contrary. Another weakness of the consensus concept is that it can be used to bully scientists who dissent from majority opinion. This can be done by refusing monetary support to fund the researches of scientists who question the consensus position. I would imagine that the minority of climate scientists currently seeking support to study potential natural explanations of global warming unrelated to greenhouse gas emissions are finding it very hard to win funding from grant-awarding bodies dominated by scientists hostile to any questioning of the conventional 'consensus'. [ Political correctness now a bullying tactic aimed at stifling legitimate debate Opens in new window ] Creative people who are not completely shackled by existing paradigms are very important when science consistently struggles over a long period to make further progress in explaining a situation. 'Thinking outside the box' may be the only way forward to full explanations in these cases. For example, research on Alzheimer's disease has heavily concentrated on amyloid plaques for a long time now, but has produced little progress in fully accounting for the disease. The problem calls for creative, not consensus, thinking. The strong majority position in science can sometimes be wrong and hostile to new opinions. For example, when the idea was first mooted that Earth's crust is divided into large fragments that 'float' on an underlying partly melted layer and that whole continents, once residing close together, gradually moved apart until widely separated (plate tectonics), it was widely resisted by geologists among whom a consensus to the contrary existed. It took many years for this intercontinental drift and plate tectonics model to become established, as the evidence in its favour gradually accumulated and neatly explained very many observations – in other words, as scientific convergence emerged. William Reville is an emeritus professor at UCC
