[Heartland President Joseph Bast submitted the following reply to an opinion-editorial by Matthew England, joint director of the Climate Change Research Centre at the University of New South Wales, that ran on June 17, 2009 in the Sydney (Australia) Morning Herald. A much shortened version of this letter ran in the newspaper the following day.]
The scientific debate over the causes and effects of global warming, and what (if anything) should be done about it, is far from over. Matthew England (“How noisy naysayers led Fielding on to false path”, June 17) is either ignorant of the extensive peer-reviewed literature on the subject which would be odd, given his position with the Climate Change Research Centre at the University of NSW or he is deliberately concealing that information from readers.
Senator Stephen Fielding paid his own way to Washington DC to listen to such experts as Dr Richard Lindzen (MIT), Dr Patrick Michaels (University of Virginia), Dr Willie Soon (Harvard-Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics), and Dr Roy Spencer (NASA and University of Alabama-Huntsville) who dispute claims that the “debate is over” or that global warming is a crisis. These scientists are not “noisy naysayers”. Every one of them has appeared in the peer-reviewed literature on climate more frequently than has Mr England.
The Heartland Institute was not “made famous for its view that smoking is not a health hazard”. It is famous for its 25-year record of producing credible research on a wide range of public policy issues, for the 120 distinguished academics and 150 elected officials who serve on its advisory boards, and for its reputation for independence and high-quality research. The only people who think otherwise are the
folks who have made careers out of lying to people about the science of public policy issues, a list that grew one name longer with the publication of Mr England’s essay.
Joseph Bast, President
The Heartland Institute
Chicago
Joseph Bast is a Senior Fellow at The Heartland Institute. He cofounded Heartland in 1984, serving as executive director then as president & CEO until January 2018. His research and writing focuses on climate change and energy policy.
