Republican Science Denial Hits New Low

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is a molecular biology denier.

What Does Poor Scientific Literacy Mean for Climate Action?

The latest National Science Foundation poll on scientific literacy (PDF) once again reveals America's knowledge of basic scientific issues hasn't improved much over the last three decades. While more people know lasers are light-based and antibiotics don't work on viruses, fewer people say the universe began with a Big Bang. And depressingly, a majority of Americans don't know it takes a year for the Earth to circle the sun or that humans evolved from earlier primates.

That's the grain of salt with which I take polling about whether Americans acknowledge climate science. I mean, if more Americans know the Earth is warming than know it takes one year for the Earth to go around the sun ... that's positive from a climate action perspective, right? Especially when the media won't even connect higher temperatures to the climate crisis. The numbers are still pretty poor for knowing that warming is man-made - but as the NSF poll shows, the more complex the concept, the worse the numbers.

Rick Perry: Galileo Got Harassed By Ignorant Politicians Like Me, Too!

At last night's Republican presidential debate, the harshest blow may have been landed by Rick Perry ... against Rick Perry.

The Texas governor, already infamous for his climate science ignorance, somehow dug his own hole even deeper last night. Perry mangled an analogy and managed to compare himself to the religious and/or political figures who found Galileo's sun-centered model of the solar system to be an inconvenient truth:

"Galileo got outvoted for a spell," said Perry, in attempting to argue that the issue of climate change remains "unsettled." But what Perry fails to realize is the fact that the scientific community actually agreed with Galileo. It was the clergy who outvoted him, accusing him of being a heretic. "By the time Galileo was publishing on heliocentrism, the idea was already circulating and widely accepted in scientific circles, including Jesuits," explains Joshua Rosneau from the National Center for Science Education. "He wasn't outvoted by scientists, he was outvoted by the political and religious leadership of his country."

The example of Galileo would actually make a great metaphor for climate change scientists, not the deniers. Following his Galileo blunder, Perry parrots the familiar political reasoning behind brushing off the theory of climate change, one supported by the vast majority of environmental scientists--97 percent of them, in fact. Perry warns of putting "America’s economic future in jeopardy, asking us to cut back in areas that would have monstrous economic impact on this country." But a study by the National Academy of Science and funded by Congress said bluntly that the "the environmental, economic, and humanitarian risks posed by climate change indicate a pressing need for substantial action to limit the magnitude of climate change and to prepare for adapting to its impacts." Despite what Perry claims, climate change continues to be debated not by scientists but by politicians.

Even as his own state of Texas is ravaged by global warming-fueled wildfires, exactly in line with the predictions of climate scientists, Rick Perry still denies reality. Think it has anything to do with the more than $11 million Perry has raked in from oil companies? Heaven forbid.

Another Climate Denier Scandal: Will Media Ever Treat Them Skeptically?

A paper came out a couple of months ago questioning climate science. It quickly became the great shining hope of the climate science denial crowd. An actual scientific paper! Accepted by an actual scientific editor! And published in an actual scientific journal!

But a review of the paper by Roy Spencer and William Braswell published in Remote Sensing is dashing the hopes of climate deniers on the rocks of reality:

• The paper itself? "Fundamentally flawed" and contains "false claims."
• The editor? Apologized for accepting the paper and resigned.
• The journal? Editorialized that the paper "should not have been published."

The question has become, how many scandals will it take for the media to apply any degree of skepticism to what climate science deniers say? Deniers hype "Climategate" - independent investigation finds no wrongdoing. Deniers attack Michael Mann - independent investigation vindicates Mann. Deniers tout work of Edward Wegman - independent investigation finds Wegman's work riddled with plagiarism & inaccuracies.

Instead, the media breathlessly hypes whatever lies the deniers push, but barely mentions the independent investigations that reveal the truth. And the scientific consensus on climate change remains as inconvenient as ever - Earth is warming, man-made carbon pollution is to blame, and we're running out of time to make the switch to clean energy as climate disasters multiply.