This is one of the worst articles related to global warming I’ve ever read.  The article is so politically biased, so vacuous, and so misleading as to be totally unrecognizable as any form of scholarship.  

As can be seen in virtually all the articles on this website, the NAS has a strong conservative bias.  There is nothing wrong with that in itself, but such biases absolutely must be kept out of the quest for knowledge.  Conservative political biases (like liberal ones) will only undermine progress. They distort science because they serve as conceptual filters that amplify findings/interpretations that fit the political ideology and attenuate findings that don't fit the ideology.

Consider some of  Peter Wood’s conservative distortions.  The application of global warming science obviously conflicts with conservatives' economic agenda, which motivates some to attack the scientific data itself.  In many cases, the antagonists, such as Wood, have no expertise in the relevant research, and therefore must avoid factual arguments.  For example, Wood overgeneralizes from a very small set of problematic data to insinuate that “lies, evasions, missing data, ill-sourced extravagant claims, stonewalling, and cover-ups that have been part of what Mr. Gore calls “the science of global warming” have shaken public confidence.”  Wood’s provides absolutely no evidence or references for this smear, a smear that he extends to the entire field.  Is this scholarship?

Wood also tries to attach the notion of a “scientific consensus” regarding the reality of global warning. A legitimate article might mention the actual size of this consensus, based perhaps on the 2009 Pew finding that 84 percent of researchers believe in the global warming findings.  And this poll includes researchers as a whole, not just those with expertise in climate science.  Instead of providing such evidence, Wood again attempts to smear the researchers, who are supposedly running around “suppressing contrary views, blackballing dissenting researchers, and, on occasion, just making stuff up”.  He even attacks individual researchers with labels such as “liarist” and “lubricious”.  Is this scholarship?

Rather than waste more time with the rest of Wood’s article, let me just make some brief points:

1)  The suggestion that the NAS is out to protect freedom of inquiry is misleading, as the entire thrust of Wood’s article is anti-science (and anti-intellectual in general) in that it is attempting to tear down a knowledge base that conflicts with their political beliefs.

2.  Trying to frame this article in terms of the “integrity of science” is misleading. How can one expect science to maintain it’s integrity when it is subject to such political/philosophical/religious biases such as those coming from Wood and the NAS?  On the contrary, science’s integrity is inherent in the peer-review process, it’s tendency to be self-correcting, and the progressive integration of knowledge across disciplines.

3.   Note the hypocrisy involved in the statement that “The National Association of Scholars isn’t really suited to take positions on the scientific substance of a debate like this”, a statement made in the middle of many other statements that obviously take a position on substantive issues (apart from all the insults and name-calling). 

4.  It’s true that there have been misleading theories in the past that have been corrected by science. This is how science works, and it’s the reason that science is the best analytical tool we have. Besides, most of these "theories" mentioned by Wood were supported by only the most primitive science, something that does not apply to global warming.  There’s also such a thing as intellectual honesty, which requires attention to the extent of existing support, the convergence of support from different methods and disciplines, and so on.  Only by considering these factors can we predict which current theories might be off track. Wood does not do this.   

5.  If there’s to be an organization called the “National Organization of Scholars”, it should base its propaganda on scholarship.  This article  is simply an embarrassment, and I don’t think it’s the scientists who should be embarrassed.

It is good to hear again from our old friend, the splenetic Professor Derryberry!  I had been under the impression that he was too disgusted with NAS to pay us any more attention, but I underestimated his generosity.  Welcome back Doug! 

Let me start by calming your concern that my comment on Al Gore’s op-ed was defective as a “form of scholarship.”  My response was an opinion essay, not a research paper. Opinions too, however, should be founded on well-attested facts and good argument and I am perfectly happy to have mine evaluated by that standard.  But Doug!  Labeling the National Association of Scholars “conservative” doesn’t bear on the quality of the facts or the argument. It is just a form of ad hominem attack. 

As it happens, NAS does not consider itself a conservative organization.  We take no stand at all on the vast majority of issues that divide conservatives from liberals.  We focus almost exclusively on higher education and in that realm we take independent stands.  But I’m used to the logic of the left: if we don’t march lock-step with leftist orthodoxy (and we don’t) we must therefore be “conservative.”  Thanks, Doug, for the nice reprise of that little bit of logic chopping.

So Doug accuses us of “conservative political biases” that “distort science” and “filter” findings.  He knows we have that supposed bias because…because?  Evidently because I expressed an opinion he disagrees with. He infers from this that I embrace a conservative “economic agenda.”  I am not aware that I do embrace such an agenda and I am at a complete loss as to what I wrote in “Unimaginable Calamity” (or elsewhere for that matter) that displays my fondness for such an agenda. 

Hey Doug, it is kinda fun to see you take a running leap past the evidence to accuse me of avoiding the facts and overgeneralizing. You clearly know a thing or two about the broad jump. I defer to your expertise, but I really can’t compete with someone in your league. 

I let the rest of your statement stand as a nice monument to the moment in history when retired psychology professors felt entitled to speak with authority on the integrity of climate science. But in defense of the numerous physical scientists who are members of NAS, some of whom have been victims of the reign of intellectual intimidation and abuse of the peer review process that had become the hallmark of the bogus “global warming consensus,” I will add that yes, NAS does support freedom of inquiry and we are robustly pro-science.  The reality or non-reality of global warming is now an open question precisely because scientific inquiry has been undermined by thepolitical advocacy of the warmists. 

Peter Wood

Although I appreciate Wood’s willingness to publish and respond to my critique, the response was just as vacuous, incoherent, and intellectually dishonest as his original article.  

One major criticism was that Wood’s article is extremely non-scholarly because he provided no evidence or references.  He seems to admit this in his response, saying that he is willing to have his claims evaluated.   But note that it would have been quite easy for Wood to have provided some evidence in his response, he doesn’t offer anything substantial.   I stand by my earlier position that Wood’s article is virtually devoid of scholarship, and is basically insulting to academics (and other scholars).

A more importnat criticism was that Wood’s article is biased by an underlying conservative agenda.  In response,  he makes the truly stunning claim that he (and the NAS) are not conservative.  Instead, he attacks the “logic of the left” (whatever that is), and offers the bizarre argument that the NAS doesn’t take stands on the majority of issues that divide conservatives and liberals.  The problem here is that rather than depending on proportion of overall issues that are addressed, what’s important is the proportion of addressed issues that are slanted in a conservative or liberal direction.  Wood seems to have some difficulties with basic logic.  

And as always, Wood has problems with basic facts.  Although he claims that the NAS is not a conservative organization, it is well known that NAS has been funded extensively by politically conservative foundations, including Scaife, Olin, and others (see wikipedia).  Second, if you examine the articles on this NAS website, the vast majority deal with topics (or controversies) that are more important to conservatives than liberals.  Third, if you  actual content within the articles, many more conservative than liberal propositions are evident.  Fourth, just consider Wood’s current article:  It trots out many of the conventional, dishonest conservative talking points, and even stoops so low as to mock Al Gore.  In contrast, virtually none, if any, of the liberal counterarguments are explained or even mentioned. One might argue that the lack of evidence is simply a sign of Wood’s poor scholarship, but given the overwhelming extent to which he selectively presents conservative rather than liberal ideas, the most reasonable conclusion is Wood’s scholarship has been very much compromised by his political agenda.  His claim of neutrality is preposterous, and the NAS is not an a non-political organization.    

Rather than questioning  Wood’s competence, however, the main aim of my initial comment was to emphasize that science and other disciplines must be protected from the distorting pressures exerted by political, religion, and other essentially irrelevant belief systems. Such a fear, was, after all, a primary motive underlying the development of modern notions of academic freedom (i.e. a “free search for truth”)  It is particularly important today as conservatives seem to launching more and more attacks on science, including the lunacy regarding evolution, the bizarre efforts to undermine global warming research and other environmental research, silly attacks on current psychiatry (e.g., George Will), and so on.  It is especially disturbing, to say the least, to see an organization that deems itself an educational association, facilitating this anti-intellectual agenda.  

Such attacks are damaging in many ways. Because they distort reality, they mislead citizens and encourage even more anti-intellectual attitudes.  We need an ever more science-literate populace in the future.  These attitudes will also lead to a further undermining of education, as can be seen in the curricular atrocities surrounding evolution that have occurred over the last 25 years across the country.  And keep in mind that the global warming deniers, who may prove successful in limiting good science and public knowledge, will bear responsibility if millions of people suffer or die in the future as a result of global warming.   

Hopefully, this will not be the case.  As an organization that is supposed to facilitate knowledge in higher eduction, the NAS needs to set its political blinders aside and stop undermining the advance of knowledge.