UPDATE5: (Saturday 10/16/10) It has been a week, and I think this piece has been well distributed, so I’m putting it in regular queue now and it will gradually scroll off the page.
UPDATE4: (Friday 10/15/10) APS member Roger Cohen comments here on Andy Revkin’s Dot Earth op/ed.
UPDATE3: (Friday 10/15/10) Andrew Revkin, after a week (I sent him this story last Friday) of digging around to get just the right rebuttal, responds here at Dot Earth.
UPDATE2: (Wednesday 10/13/10) This just in…click for the story.
APS responds! – Deconstructing the APS response to Dr. Hal Lewis resignation
UPDATE: (Saturday 10/9/10) Since this came in late Friday, many of our weekday WUWT readers might not see this important story, so I’m sticking it to the top for a couple of days. New stories will appear just below this one, please scroll down to see them. – Anthony
(Originally posted on 10/8/10 ) We’ve previously covered the APS here, when I wrote:
While Copenhagen and its excesses rage, a quiet revolution is starting.
Indeed, not so quiet now. It looks like it is getting ugly inside with the public airing of the resignation of a very prominent member who writes:
I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist.
…
In the interim the ClimateGate scandal broke into the news, and the machinations of the principal alarmists were revealed to the world. It was a fraud on a scale I have never seen, and I lack the words to describe its enormity. Effect on the APS position: none. None at all. This is not science; other forces are at work.- Hal Lewis
Below is his resignation letter made public today, via the GWPF.
This is an important moment in science history. I would describe it as a letter on the scale of Martin Luther, nailing his 95 theses to the Wittenburg church door. It is worthy of repeating this letter in entirety on every blog that discusses science.
What I would really like to see though, is this public resignation letter given the same editorial space as Michael Mann in today’s Washington Post.
Readers, we can do this. Here’s the place at WaPo to ask for it. For anyone writing to the WaPo, the national@washpost.com, is the national news editorial desk. The Post’s Ombudsman, Andrew Alexander, is the readers’ representative within the newspaper. E-mail him at ombudsman@washpost.com or call 202-334-7582.
Spread the word on other blogs. Let’s see if they have enough integrity to provide a counterpoint. – Anthony
======================================
Sent: Friday, 08 October 2010 17:19 Hal Lewis
From: Hal Lewis, University of California, Santa Barbara
To: Curtis G. Callan, Jr., Princeton University, President of the American Physical Society
6 October 2010
Dear Curt:
When I first joined the American Physical Society sixty-seven years ago it was much smaller, much gentler, and as yet uncorrupted by the money flood (a threat against which Dwight Eisenhower warned a half-century ago).
Indeed, the choice of physics as a profession was then a guarantor of a life of poverty and abstinence—it was World War II that changed all that. The prospect of worldly gain drove few physicists. As recently as thirty-five years ago, when I chaired the first APS study of a contentious social/scientific issue, The Reactor Safety Study, though there were zealots aplenty on the outside there was no hint of inordinate pressure on us as physicists. We were therefore able to produce what I believe was and is an honest appraisal of the situation at that time. We were further enabled by the presence of an oversight committee consisting of Pief Panofsky, Vicki Weisskopf, and Hans Bethe, all towering physicists beyond reproach. I was proud of what we did in a charged atmosphere. In the end the oversight committee, in its report to the APS President, noted the complete independence in which we did the job, and predicted that the report would be attacked from both sides. What greater tribute could there be?
How different it is now. The giants no longer walk the earth, and the money flood has become the raison d’être of much physics research, the vital sustenance of much more, and it provides the support for untold numbers of professional jobs. For reasons that will soon become clear my former pride at being an APS Fellow all these years has been turned into shame, and I am forced, with no pleasure at all, to offer you my resignation from the Society.
It is of course, the global warming scam, with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave. It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist. Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (Montford’s book organizes the facts very well.) I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist.
So what has the APS, as an organization, done in the face of this challenge? It has accepted the corruption as the norm, and gone along with it. For example:
1. About a year ago a few of us sent an e-mail on the subject to a fraction of the membership. APS ignored the issues, but the then President immediately launched a hostile investigation of where we got the e-mail addresses. In its better days, APS used to encourage discussion of important issues, and indeed the Constitution cites that as its principal purpose. No more. Everything that has been done in the last year has been designed to silence debate
2. The appallingly tendentious APS statement on Climate Change was apparently written in a hurry by a few people over lunch, and is certainly not representative of the talents of APS members as I have long known them. So a few of us petitioned the Council to reconsider it. One of the outstanding marks of (in)distinction in the Statement was the poison word incontrovertible, which describes few items in physics, certainly not this one. In response APS appointed a secret committee that never met, never troubled to speak to any skeptics, yet endorsed the Statement in its entirety. (They did admit that the tone was a bit strong, but amazingly kept the poison word incontrovertible to describe the evidence, a position supported by no one.) In the end, the Council kept the original statement, word for word, but approved a far longer “explanatory” screed, admitting that there were uncertainties, but brushing them aside to give blanket approval to the original. The original Statement, which still stands as the APS position, also contains what I consider pompous and asinine advice to all world governments, as if the APS were master of the universe. It is not, and I am embarrassed that our leaders seem to think it is. This is not fun and games, these are serious matters involving vast fractions of our national substance, and the reputation of the Society as a scientific society is at stake.
3. In the interim the ClimateGate scandal broke into the news, and the machinations of the principal alarmists were revealed to the world. It was a fraud on a scale I have never seen, and I lack the words to describe its enormity. Effect on the APS position: none. None at all. This is not science; other forces are at work.
4. So a few of us tried to bring science into the act (that is, after all, the alleged and historic purpose of APS), and collected the necessary 200+ signatures to bring to the Council a proposal for a Topical Group on Climate Science, thinking that open discussion of the scientific issues, in the best tradition of physics, would be beneficial to all, and also a contribution to the nation. I might note that it was not easy to collect the signatures, since you denied us the use of the APS membership list. We conformed in every way with the requirements of the APS Constitution, and described in great detail what we had in mind—simply to bring the subject into the open.
5. To our amazement, Constitution be damned, you declined to accept our petition, but instead used your own control of the mailing list to run a poll on the members’ interest in a TG on Climate and the Environment. You did ask the members if they would sign a petition to form a TG on your yet-to-be-defined subject, but provided no petition, and got lots of affirmative responses. (If you had asked about sex you would have gotten more expressions of interest.) There was of course no such petition or proposal, and you have now dropped the Environment part, so the whole matter is moot. (Any lawyer will tell you that you cannot collect signatures on a vague petition, and then fill in whatever you like.) The entire purpose of this exercise was to avoid your constitutional responsibility to take our petition to the Council.
6. As of now you have formed still another secret and stacked committee to organize your own TG, simply ignoring our lawful petition.
APS management has gamed the problem from the beginning, to suppress serious conversation about the merits of the climate change claims. Do you wonder that I have lost confidence in the organization?
I do feel the need to add one note, and this is conjecture, since it is always risky to discuss other people’s motives. This scheming at APS HQ is so bizarre that there cannot be a simple explanation for it. Some have held that the physicists of today are not as smart as they used to be, but I don’t think that is an issue. I think it is the money, exactly what Eisenhower warned about a half-century ago. There are indeed trillions of dollars involved, to say nothing of the fame and glory (and frequent trips to exotic islands) that go with being a member of the club. Your own Physics Department (of which you are chairman) would lose millions a year if the global warming bubble burst. When Penn State absolved Mike Mann of wrongdoing, and the University of East Anglia did the same for Phil Jones, they cannot have been unaware of the financial penalty for doing otherwise. As the old saying goes, you don’t have to be a weatherman to know which way the wind is blowing. Since I am no philosopher, I’m not going to explore at just which point enlightened self-interest crosses the line into corruption, but a careful reading of the ClimateGate releases makes it clear that this is not an academic question.
I want no part of it, so please accept my resignation. APS no longer represents me, but I hope we are still friends.
Hal
==========================================================
Harold Lewis is Emeritus Professor of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, former Chairman; Former member Defense Science Board, chmn of Technology panel; Chairman DSB study on Nuclear Winter; Former member Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards; Former member, President’s Nuclear Safety Oversight Committee; Chairman APS study on Nuclear Reactor Safety Chairman Risk Assessment Review Group; Co-founder and former Chairman of JASON; Former member USAF Scientific Advisory Board; Served in US Navy in WW II; books: Technological Risk (about, surprise, technological risk) and Why Flip a Coin (about decision making)
When someone of Lewis’ stature speaks, us young guys are compelled to listen.
@Daniel Kozub
Appeal to authority is vastly underrated. I’m an EE (Specifically DSP) who happened to double major in general physics. I guess this gives me a better background then most to get at this stuff. My conclusions; Atmospheric Physics is Fing hard! It makes my head spin.
Did you ever read “The real holes in Climate Science” in Nature awhile back? If not, go read it, no subscription required. I remember thinking when reading through said article “Wow! This is an intimidating field”. Of course I have to basically just take the word of the experts, I don’t know enough to make an informed decision. What’s the alternative, pretend I know? Unsatisfactory.
I dunno, maybe the emperor really doesn’t have any clothes, but I doubt you, me, or any of the other commentators here, or over at Realclimate, know one way or the other. Regardless of the certainty espoused in the comments.
As for the rest; This is just a rehash of the initial value vs. boundary value problem. I do agree with you “incontrovertible fact” should be a phrase not mentioned.
@Daniel Kozub
“A non-falsifiable hypothesis is not science.”
It’s been a long time since problems complex to interest the PhD guys have simple analytic solutions.
why would you throw away a connection to an organization you have been a member or for over 67 years? what would be so serious that you find you need to cut ties? this wasn’t a decision he took lightly… the ethical hurdles this man went through to make this decision.
WOW, just wow…..
Starwatcher says on October 8, 2010 at 8:26 pm
Do you actually understand science at all? An analytic solution is not the same as a falsifiable hypothesis.
For example, finding a fossilized human skeleton in strata that can be reliably dated to the Triassic would be a pretty good falsification of much of the current theory of evolution. However, that is not an analytic solution (and you can bet that creationists have been trying to find such things, like human footprints among dino prints).
Truly, a man of SCIENCE has spoken.
I just zipped off a short request to the Post.
This is right out of the pages of Atlas Shrugged. Once a “scientist” (or club) accepts tax funds and the strings that come with them, we know what they are; after that, we’re just arguing over the price.
Having graduated from Hal’s physics department (before global warming was fashionable) It is appropriate that I voted with Hal against the warmist railroad at APS. They don’t represent me either.
Galileo was right – sunspots rule.
It’s often been said that science advances one funeral at a time, but in this instance, we have the exact opposite: a distinguished elder of the scientific community, willing to put his reputation on the line and speak out against the suppression of debate. Wherever we find our pioneers and standard bearers, men like Professor Lewis, Steve McIntyre, or Anthony Watts, we have a duty to support them in every way we can.
I have watched in dismay as my country succumbed to foetid diseases born of misgovernment, many of which crossed the Atlantic in greater or lesser force and corrupted our ex-Colonies. The worst of these pestilences was the perversion of science in pursuit of fame and funding. At one time, I feared greatly that through subterfuge a great change would be wrought at immense cost without a whimper of protest, for whilst the strength of the English is their acceptance of different views without question, it has been, in this instance, their weakness.
The division that came about some years back and set our nations on different courses can now be seen to have strengthened both, for whilst the United States may at times be criticised for insularity, it is in the same place that great stores of independence and liberty have been found hidden that may enable us to survive this siege, regroup, and eventually sally forth to reconsecrate the scientific method on the altar from which is has been dragged and so foully defiled.
This scientific plague is but one example of the prevalence of men (and women, of course) who place personal gain ahead of personal integrity. They may be seen throughout our society, in science – and no field is entirely exempt – and particularly in politics. Much that is wrong can be laid at the feet of the inadequate choices offered our electorate, and it is in this way, perhaps that the great climate scandal, which has been so exploitative of this situation, can eventually perhaps offer us a way out. Let those who have led us in this battle stand for election, and we will elect them. Let them promise us only that they will govern to the best of their ability, evaluate every matter rationally, and protect our liberty. Honour and personal integrity will be their badge of office, and they cannot fail to serve better than the moral cowardice and feather-bedding that are the badge of our current malodorous governors.
David, UK says:
October 8, 2010 at 3:52 pm
Reading this made me very sad – not so much sad for this fine, honest scientist and gentleman who leaves the Society with his integrity firmly intact (although that is of course a very sad fact). I am more sad to have yet another reaffirmation of the politically- and money-driven state of today’s “science.” And sad to be reminded that there are millions of brainwashed sheep out there who will happily label this man a “denier,” and a “lunatic on the fringe,” doubtless accompanied by accusations of being in the pay of Big Oil. There will be more still who simply close their eyes to this, deep in denial (yes, the word is more aptly applied to YOU), and carry on spreading alarm, business-as-usual.
——————————————
This was my reaction as well. I was actually sickened to have so firmly confirmed what I suspected all along. Even Hal and 200 petitioners could do nothing to raise the debate in APS circles for over a year. But it also made me even more impressed for what Anthony and WUWT are doing to expose the lie of CAGW!
Whilst my previous post might perhaps have suggested otherwise, I am, in fact, hip to you kids’ modern jive.
“Yes, we damn well are capable of answering the Royal Society’s climate statement, sentence for sentence, statement for statement, hypothesis for hypothesis, evidence for evidence. But can we organize ourselves to do it?”
“REPLY: This topic has been on my mind of late. -Anthony”
There exists a unique opportunity to crowd-source support and funding for a new political movement of independent political candidates dedicated to rational government.
I couldn’t help but contrast Lewis’ eloquent words with the following example: “The task of climate change agencies is not to persuade by rational argument… Instead we need to work in a more shrewd and contemporary way, using subtle techniques of engagement…. The ‘facts’ need to be treated as being so taken-for-granted that they need not be spoken.” (Ereaut, G. & Segnit, N., 2006. “Warm Words: How are we telling the climate story and can we tell it better?”. Institute for Public Policy, London.) It’s part of a quote at the head of Chapter 8 from Bob Carter’s book, “Climate : the counter consensus”, 2010.
Wow, I just googled Hal Lewis resignation and the count was 198,000!
It is with great sadness that I read this letter of resignation. It as others have said, only confirms that many of our once highly respected scientific organizations are rotten to the core.
Having made the same sort of decision years ago when I walked away from a career because I realized the organization was so broken and politicized that I could no longer in good conscious stand by silently as they manipulated and twisted every fact to serve a political agenda, I know how agonizing it is to finally pull the plug.
Sir you have my greatest respect and my most sincere best wishes.
You may have fired a shot that will be heard around the world (we can only hope).
If not the silence will be a confirmation in its own way of how corrupt the media has also become due to the same self serving behaviors that have destroyed science and turned it into a gun for hire to produce what ever the highest bidder is requesting.
As others have commented, I once saw science and engineering as fields relatively uncontaminated by politics and assumed that political intrigue in science was something that belonged to histories and biographies of long dead individuals.
Sadly as in all human enterprises, political corruption and greed for money and power, eventually push the scum to the top of most organizations, and only by lancing the boil, can we eliminate the infection.
I truly hope that the general public takes notice of your courageous stand and gives it the respect it is due.
I also salute your action!
Larry
“Wow, I just googled Hal Lewis resignation and the count was 198,000!”
A little optimistic – that gets hits for ‘Hal’, ‘Lewis’, and ‘resignation’ in various combinations, or even just the same page.
Dr. Mann is concerned with unwarranted political interference with science? His real concern is laid out in the second paragraph:
As a scientist, I shouldn’t have a stake in the upcoming midterm elections, but unfortunately, it seems that I — and indeed all my fellow climate scientists — do.
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) has threatened that, if he becomes chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, he will launch what would be a hostile investigation of climate science. The focus would be on e-mails stolen from scientists at the University of East Anglia in Britain last fall that climate-change deniers have falsely claimed demonstrate wrongdoing by scientists, including me. Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) may do the same if he takes over a committee on climate change and energy security.
Mikey knows that a Republican victory on November means he will be testifying before a Congressional inquiry. He also knows that perjury is a felony. Rock, meet hard place.
I wonder how many members of the APS read WUWT on a regular basis, perhaps space could be made available for members to air their concerns and opinions to a larger audience if the APS tries to stifle and suppress dissent.
I am sure that WUWT reaches a wider audience than the APS can hope to match so perhaps a third party platform will encourage APS members to speak out. My own guess is that the APS will try to freeze out and silence dissenters and sceptics and critics so if they try to steal the ‘microphone of vocal dissent’ then maybe the placing of another that they cannot silence will help to open up the APS to serious debate.
Seems like there’s an omission here. What exactly is the APS statement on climate change that Lewis objects too so strongly?
If anyone wishes to read the commentary, it’s here with the above statement: National Policy: 07.1 Climate Change
Part of the commentary says: “Even with the uncertainties in the models, it is increasingly difficult to rule out that non-negligible increases in global temperature are a consequence of rising anthropogenic CO2. Thus given the significant risks associated with global climate change, prudent steps should be taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions now while continuing to improve the observational data and the model predictions.”
Isn’t just about everyone calling for better science in this field?
I am in particular heartened that in their Energy Policy for the 21st Century statement, the APS says:
“Since 1996, demand for oil and natural gas has continued to grow with the expansion and globalization of the world’s economy. In addition, our nation’s dependence on imported energy has increased, and the effects of burning fossil fuels on the global environment are becoming a major concern. The Council of the American Physical Society believes that the use of renewable energy sources, the adoption of new ways of producing and using fossil fuels, increased consideration of safe and cost effective uses of nuclear power, and the introduction of energy-efficient technologies can, over time, promote the United States’ energy security and reduce stress on the world’s environment.”
I think that’s an entirely reasonable position to take. Even if you discount the effects of CO2 on global temperatures, such things as ocean acidification and the influence of black soot aerosols ought to be reasons to move toward cleaner fossil-fuel technologies and reliable, high-yield alternative energy sources.
u.k.(us) says:
October 8, 2010 at 6:49 pm
WOW
Talk about Deja Vu, the address seems to be an outline of our current situation.
The link seems to lose audio after 10-11 minutes, but it exactly describes our current situation. He was warning us,… now others seem to be trying to take advantage.
Live and learn.
Or just vote.
Thanks for the link.
u.k.(us) You’re most welcome. Here’s a better link with audio and transcript in its entirety:
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/dwightdeisenhowerfarewell.html
Excerpt: “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades. In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.
Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers. The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present — and is gravely to be regarded.
Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.
It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our democratic system — ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.” (Dwight Eisenhower’s Farewell Address) http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/dwightdeisenhowerfarewell.html
I won’t trust a group of people who insist that they are smarter than me, and yet don’t know the meaning of the word incontrovertible.
Either they’re engaging in the hyperbole that comes from political garbage , or they’re a bunch of morons.
Political hacks and clueless blowhards tend to be the people that rise to the top of an organization, so neither one is surprising.
Starwatcher,
You are advancing the case of accepting an authority who has already been shown to be corrupt? Hilariously stupid argument. A lot of us with science backgrounds have been digging into the science and politics of climatology ever since ClimateGate. We’ve found found that the climate science is corrupt but not settled.
Starting in January, an open, honest, and thorough investigation of Climategate and the IPCC will start.
BTW, Kevin Trenbirth has already announced that the climate models confidence intervals will have to be widened quite a bit for the next IPCC report. The wider the CI, the less faith you have in your model. Kevin also mentioned that maybe they shouldn’t be doing predictions at all (i.e. the science is not settled).
Hal Lewis is a great man. The classy thing to do is to either pay respect to the man for his courage and honesty (so rare in science nowadays) or just be quiet. You are not helping your cause.
[SNIP – Brendan, I will not have you call Dr. Lewis names, either rephrase your words or get the heck off the blog. – Anthony]
Anthony – you should extend an invitation to Dr. Lewis to write a guest article about his experience.
What’s up with the photo labeled “Hal Lewis”? His letter says he joined APS 67 years ago, but the person in the photo looks to be in his 30s.
REPLY: The only photo available that could be found, if you can find a more recent one leave a note.
AGW always was and always will be the product of 2 of the most corrupt Western Governments in world history. The US & the UK.
Now. Watch the human flotsam at the APS came out and, with massive Govt media support, take out the lamb who is trying to protect the sheeple.
regards