Opinion by Anthony Watts and Charles Rotter
If you haven’t read Dr. Curry’s post about Cliff Mass, please do so before proceeding.
It is our viewpoint that Cliff Mass is an honest scientist. Some here may disagree with him as he believes AGW is a serious issue.
But unlike advocate scientists, and their media enablers, he is an honest broker who pushes back against the hyperbole advanced by those advocates. For this he is being viciously attacked. Being connected with a radio station for his popular science program, Dr. Mass is aware of both the public perception and the peer reviewed science. Having that unique perspective he sees when arguments for intervention go too far, beyond what the science can support, and because he has integrity, he is one of the few scientists with the courage to speak out about it.
Our idea is this: with the mob attacking Dr. Mass, it would probably be helpful if the administrators being bombarded by irrational hate mail against him received another side of the story, one of rational support for his commitment to truth and inquiry.
There’s some caveats to consider if you want to join in support.
- This is only about supporting a man with academic and scientific integrity
- This isn’t about arguing about whether AGW is real or not, if you go down that path, it won’t help Dr. Mass
- UW administrators aren’t going to be interested in letters that turn into diatribes
- Calm and respectful emails only. You don’t do anyone any favors with rants
- Intelligent and pertinent messaging please
- Academic credentials are a plus
- Independently created letters are a plus, which is why we provide no sample letter here
You can address the absurdity of points being made by critics, but please, only write a letter if you can be calm, on point, and polite.
For reference, here are some pertinent links surrounding the issue:
- Dr. Mass’ original essay about climate change and Washington State Initiative 1631
- Alex Lenferna, a Ph.D. candidate in the UW Philosophy Department with a Certificate in Atmospheric Science. He wrote a blog post that Dr. Curry characterized as a “hit piece” which has instigated the backlash Dr. Mass is experiencing.
- An anonymously written hit piece by an activist group: Cliff Mass, Scientific Lies, and the New Climate Deniers
- Dr. Judith Curry’s opinion piece, reposted on WUWT
- The UW faculty web page for Cliff Mass
That said, here are the contacts:
UW President Ana Mari Cauce uwpres@uw.edu
Dean of College of the Environment Lisa J. Graumlich envdean@uw.edu
Mike Townsend, Secretary of the UW Faculty secfac@u.washington.edu
Remember, only write a letter if you can be calm, on point, and polite.
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A noble gesture. But the folks who run large outfits like UW are responsive to just one thing. Fortunately, public institutions rely heavily on it being sourced from the taxpayer. If you want traction, the message should be conveyed to elected officials who control the purse strings. Luckily, many are already concerned about what is taking place on a wider front.
The difficulties encountered by Mass are symptomatic of a more pervasive cancer, one which has infected academia. Modern universities have ceased to be centers of thinking and scholarship. They have been commandeered into instruments of socialism – to indoctrinate the future generation. Climate change is just
a galvanizing vehicle.
Here are cutting descriptions of the problem:
https://youtu.be/rc7VUoytoU4
https://youtu.be/SMUZOYD1WDA
At risk is the future of free thought, speech, and other rudiments of western democracy. There is one way to stop this perversion of publically-funded “education”: Legislate protections that block funds to all elements of public institutions which, without balance, reference political ideology.
The same protection is needed to rein in abuses by monolithic media gatekeepers, like Google, Facebook, and Wikipedia, who impose their ideology by controlling what the public sees.
https://www.heartland.org/publications-resources/publications/whats-wrong-with-wikipedia
Such protections are analogous to the Hatch Act, which prohibits pernicious politicization of government offices. Without them, we’re headed for 1917.
My letter won’t count for much. We live on the Dry Side.
Still, it won’t hurt to remind the lefties over there that folks are watching.
I’ve just finished reading about the very beginnings of the University of Washington.
They paid some folks to pretend they were students, and they had a band to welcome politicians that came to shut the place down. Funny stuff.
So… A socialist is being purged by his own. Not unusual. In his book “The Gulag Archipelago” Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn described how those purged from the Soviet and found themselves in the Gulag with all the rest. Yet they still clung to the idea that somehow the Soviet had made a mistake and that this “mistake” would and could be “cleared up”. They still gave loyalty to the Soviet regime, until time and circumstance eventually disabused them of their fantasy and they came to the realization that the system had no interest in their loyalty, only it’s own power.
Never under estimate a human’s capacity to deceive themselves. This guy just hopes to be redeemed by the System…. He will soon understand that he is a pariah and utterly irredeemable to the regime.
Has Cliff Mass said he wants our help?
We have to realize unlike helping Peter Ridd finacially fight his institution in court, we are attempting working on opinion here in Deep Blue loon-ville.
The reality is likely that:
UW President Ana Mari Cauce uwpres@uw.edu
Dean of College of the Environment Lisa J. Graumlich envdean@uw.edu
Mike Townsend, Secretary of the UW Faculty secfac@u.washington.edu
have already closed their minds to this issue.
Any endorsements of Dr Mass would be would be having Hillary endorse a Texas Democrat before an election, a quite unwelcome assistance.
I personally am not so pessimistic. I contributed bigly to Dr. Ridd in Australia. I also wrote to UW before this justifiable Cliff Mass appeal.
In my view, Warmunism long since passed from ‘science’ into a politico-religious belief. Examples include Hansen, Hayhoe, Myhre, and Oreskes.
Warminism needs to be combated on their own nonscientific beleif terms.
Dr. Mass and I have personally corresponded several times since he reposted my CE guest post on the Whiskey Creek at Netarts Bay oyster larvae hatchery ocean acidification fraud perpetrated by PMEL (title, Shell Games, longer version with an additional example in the essay of same name in ebook Blowing Smoke). Jim Steele here notes the same biological PMEL nonsense that Dr. Mass called out to the Seattle Times by re-emphasizing my detailed post.
Cliff has always been civil, reasonable, and well informed in our subsequent correspondence.
I already wrote UW a factual missive concerning Cliff and this matter. No reply yet.
If it didn’t hurt Cliff Mass so much (even though he is not sceptical enough, at least he has some integrity) I would be tempted to send a thank-you letter. Its very hard to convince people how meaningless consensus is in normal science, and even more so when politically charged, so its great to have an example of a pseudoscientific assertion so impossible to defend that even a climate scientist who is one of the 3% consensus, not just 97%, has to speak up against it and the consensus of climate scientists is to cower under pressure of extremists rather than defend him.
In the words of Oliver, please Sir, I want some more.
I think letter writing is a good start, but is it to the right persons?
Question where is the grant money coming from?
If U.S. Gov, maybe it is better to start writing the Senators and Representatives that sit on the committees that oversee the grants. Rattle their cages.
If they only have to worry about alarmist votes then they don’t have worry about you or me.
michael
Once again, this is about Dr. Mass, not about fighting the climate wars.
Everything about post-modern socialist academics reminds me very much of Screwtape’s organization.
Alex Lenferna, a Ph.D. candidate in the UW Philosophy Department with a Certificate in Atmospheric Science. He wrote a blog post that Dr. Curry characterized as a “hit piece” which has instigated the backlash Dr. Mass is experiencing.
I have read the entire blog post. I disagree that it is a “hit piece”. A hit piece limits itself to name-calling and unfair accusations with no proof behind. Here the author is clearly explaining why he thinks that Dr. Mass is wrong, and showing several apparent contradictions from him. You can agree or not with what he says (I don’t), but it is not a hit piece.
A different story is everything that came afterwards, all the pushing to have him silenced. That’s ugly, very ugly.
“Weatherman Cliff Mass has teamed up with Big Oil to try kill Initiative 1631, …Washington voters who open their voting guides will be in for a surprise when they see a lone atmospheric scientist standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Big Oil to oppose Initiative 1631”
If it was just an that, its a hit piece but I also fail to find where the author puts forward a good argument
“Cliff’s recurring argument against 1631 is that the initiative is too vague in how it will invest its revenue, even though it clearly specifies that a Public Oversight Committee should oversee that the revenue is 70% invested in clean energy and clean air, 25% in clean water and healthy forests, and 5% to prepare communities for challenges caused by climate change. Of that funding, 15% should address the energy burden of poor households, 10% goes to support Tribal nations, 35% to environmental justice, and about $12 million per year to help displaced fossil-fuel workers.”
Its got numbers but still vague!
“…standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Big Oil…”
Funny thing is no one ever says ‘Big Coal’ and yet that’s what the AWG crowd are always aiming at. I’ve yet to see Big Oil getting singled out for attack. The main effect of the Global Warming crusade is to reduce the use of coal for generating cheap reliable electricity in western countries. Now digging up coal and selling it to China so they can do the same thing there? No problem. When I hear ‘big oil’ I think this is projection. ‘Accuse your opponent of doing what you are doing’.
I too have read it. And it certainly is what is usually called a ‘hit piece’. It contains unfounded and unsupported accusations of interest and personal attacks, as in:
There is, as I understand it, no evidence at all that Big Oil is using him. To show this, you would have to show that some particular oil company or agent of one or more of them was in some way involved with directing or influencing his statements. Is there any evidence of that?
At the end of the piece, after a bunch of similar statements, the author does admit that there is no evidence that Mass is getting money either from ‘Big Oil’ or being paid for his statements. But this is in the last para, the whole piece before that is a mass of innuendo and unfounded personal accusation.
The academic freedom point is simple. Mass may be right or wrong about AGW. He may be right or wrong about the merits of the proposition. But he is clearly within the range of opinions which rational, well informed and disinterested people may arrive at simply by considering the facts of the matter.
The same applies to the proponents of the measure. It seems a very ill conceived and ineffective measure, but one does not have to be ignorant, interested or whatever to support it. We are, on both sides of this issue, well in the realm of legitimate and vigorous public debate, from which, usually, the right course emerges.
The tactic of the alarmists on this is to deny the legitimacy of dissent. The end result of this is that their case goes unimproved by the scrutiny which debate gives. And so in the present case they are not considering a much better alternative, that is, drop the insistence on CO2 emission reduction, and instead focus on limiting and reducing real toxic pollutants.
Whether that raises or lowers emissions is unimportant.
And the reason for this? Because no matter how much Washington State or any other state or even the US as a whole reduces its emissions, these are not the problem entities, on the theory. They are emitting so small a percentage of the global total that unilateral action from them makes no significant difference to the global total.
It is this fact, the fact that the proposed action does not lower global emissions enough to lower AGW , that forces the advocates into their hysterical personal attacks. This is the reason why the activists will at all costs seek to avoid debate on exactly how much emission reduction the measure achieves.
You want a measure which would under this test be rational advocacy of something effective? Here is a simple one: close down the auto industry, worldwide. And make the corresponding changes in living and working patterns.
Like it or not, that would lower emissions in the way the activists claim to believe is necessary to the survival of civilization. It may be crazy and irrational, but it would deliver what they claim to believe is needed.
The propositions Mass is opposing are in those terms going to have no more effect on the global climate than standing on our heads.
AGW is a serious issue for sure but not the way Cliff thinks it is. The hysterical belief in a non issue like AGW is leading our politicians to destroy Western Civilization.
I don’t quite agree. First, they are doing nothing whatever to limit or reduce our emissions, so the effect of all their meetings and press releases is minimal. All they are doing is waving their arms at conferences.
But second, Western Civilization does not consist of shopping malls and freeways, a life spent pointlessly driving between places and through places, and the endless purchase and throwing out of consumer goods. We really could reduce our energy consumption enormously without it having any material effect on true quality of life, that is, the happiness of living in a comfortable and unpolluted neighborhood, with enough to eat, medical care, clothing, education, and access to entertainment.
I don’t think most people’s quality of life would be in any way impaired by having fewer cars drive through where they live on the way to somewhere else.
On both counts then, a difference. They are not doing it, and if they did do it, it would not destroy our Civilzation.
Spoken like a true Utopian silly person. People’s quality of life is immediately impaired when you and your fellows political power is spent to create a bureaucracy, a law-enforcement agency that can write the rules, who decides who “needs” to drive, and then that bureaucracy begins to exercise and expand it’s power. Compare the current interpretation of “The Waters of the USA” authorized by the EPA, which they interpret as meaning everything that might get wet with rainfall, vs. the text of the law, which mentions “navigable waters.” Pull you head out, please.
I’d like to thank Cliff Mass for being a professional who seems to value scientific integrity above all. His view on AGW is irrelevant to me. I hate that he’s having to deal with the vicious intolerance of a self-righteous clique of character assassins who exhibit the cognitive maturity of grade schoolers.
S Myhre is a horrid human being
It’s not about agreement or disagreement. She is nasty, dishonest, and the epitome of neurotic.
Good article.
In support of Anthony’s request to help Dr. Cliff Mass, I sent the following email to UW President Ana Mari Cauce, Dean of College of the Environment Lisa J. Graumlich, Mike Townsend, Secretary of the UW Faculty, and Dr. Mass.
Ladies and Gentlemen:
All through my academic studies I was told that “Universities are a bastion of tolerance and freedom of thought.” The non-existent but loudly proclaimed “Climate Change Debate” has altered my perception. First came the attacks on Dr. Judith Curry by Climate Change activists and the abominable treatment of her by academia. The latest academic example of “tolerance and freedom of thought” is UW’s handling of Dr. Mass. ‘Shameful’ comes to mind, but on reflection does not convey the true wretchedness of UW’s behavior. Based on UW’s and other university’s actions in the Climate Change arena, I now conclude that (a) during my academic studies I was brainwashed by the very people who claim to be tolerant, and (b) a belief that you are “Saving The World” trumps tolerance and academic freedom. How does the old joke go: “There are only two things I won’t tolerate: intolerance and ‘fill-in-the-blank?”
Sincerely,
Reed Coray
PhD Physics 1972
It’s very clear that Cliff Mass supports the idea of carbon taxes. His issue is strictly with the improper use of the revenues.
But I’m confused about the position of Wattsupwiththat.com. In urging support of Dr. Mass, it appears to be supporting the imposition of carbon taxes. How can it do this without compromising the credibility of its position that global warming is neither a threat to the environment nor caused by human activity?
To me its like deeming fraud and thievery to be desirable, if proposed by an “honest scientist” and if the proceeds are devoted to a “good cause”.
I think most readers don’t support wanton use of fossil fuels. Scepticism stems from seeing a poor excuse for science becoming fact for all the wrong reasons.
Has anybody else noticed that the link to … The UW faculty web page for Cliff Mass … in the article leads to a page where there is ONLY a picture of Cliff Mass, and NOT a word at all.
Am I jumping conclusions in thinking that the university has removed his bio from its website, in an attempt to dissociate itself from him? If this is what’s going on, then that just throws fuel on the fire for their getting burned — how fitting in an era of alarm over warming.
You just need to drill down.
https://atmos.washington.edu/~cliff/cliff.php?in=mass_home
The link presented in the article was:
https://atmos.washington.edu/~cliff/cliff.php
Your link is:
https://atmos.washington.edu/~cliff/cliff.php?in=mass_home
Seems rather a waste of server space to have these two possible pages. … not very efficient and visually obvious how to get a viable bio reference with a website designed like that.
I find that a number of professional websites that should be more intuitive and clear, due to the intelligence factor of the organizations with which they are associated, … are not.
“The link presented in the article was:”
And I said you have to drill down. FROM A LINK ON THE PAGE PRESENTED IN THE ARTICLE. That’s all I did.
Perhaps that’s what the top level looks like for all faculty and then you drill down to get more detail.
The world is what it is, not what you wish it to be.
I suppose it’s a matter of opinion what is “on point.”
Cliff Mass is just one example of a much broader evil trend known as “deplatforming.” The enviro-alarmist movement is just one branch of the Social Justice movement which is behind deplatforming, and is forcing irs opponents to create a whole separate, parallel economy of alternative institutions to cope with the problem. We’ve already created an alternative Internet search engine, an alternative Twitter, an alternative Youtube, and alternative domain registrars; soon there will be alternative banks, alternative universities, and even substitutes for Silicon Valley and Hollywood in their entireties.
The current state of this struggle is discussed in much more detail here. I urge everyone to support these new institutions and to avoid doing business with the ones taking part in deplatforming people.
Here is the email I am sending to the UW president, Dean, and others.
The most precious aspect of a university is academic freedom, providing a forum for free and open discussion of any subject. I have always taken for granted that a university is a place where open exchange of ideas and debate was encouraged, not suppressed. But as a UW grad (PhD)and long-time financial contributor to the UW, I am totally disgusted by the way the academic freedom of Cliff Mass of the Atmospheric Sciences Dept is being trashed by department chairman Dale Durran. Prof Mass posted a blog stating why he thought I-1631 was not a good bill. Chairman Dale Durran then called a department meeting about the blog post Mass wrote, with the event billed as ‘controversy.’ An ombudsperson was enlisted to run the meeting, but chairman Durran took over the meeting, serving as inquisitor and critic. He prevented Mass from finishing his opening comments and harassed Mass throughout the meeting. Professor Mass was the subject of insulting, personal, inappropriate remarks. An attack on his academic freedom is an attack on the academic freedom of all faculty.
This treatment of a UW faculty member is totally against the UW official policy of academic freedom (Section 4-33), which states “Academic freedom is the freedom to discuss all relevant matters in teaching, to explore all avenues of scholarship, research, and creative expression, and to speak or write without institutional discipline or restraint on matters of public concern as well as on matters related to shared governance and the general welfare of the University. Faculty members have the right to academic freedom and the right to examine and communicate ideas by any lawful means even should such activities generate hostility or pressure against the faculty member or the University. Their exercise of constitutionally protected freedom of association, assembly, and expression, including participation in political activities, does not constitute a violation of duties to the University, to their profession, or to students and may not result in disciplinary action or adverse merit evaluation.”
Chairman Durran has clearly violated this official UW policy. May I therefore ask if you intend to discipline him, and what do you intend to do to restore Professor Mass’s academic freedom?