The Heartland Institute, famous for misinforming on the Health effects of cigarettes, and the bogus science of climate denial, now promotes the views of the creationist Discovery Institute, in attacking Science education as “propaganda”.
Not a surprise to me, as, when I attended the Heartland “science” Conference in 2012, I sat thru a lecture where former astronaut “Jack” Schmitt expressed support for education bills passed in Tennessee and Louisiana, which essentially allow schools to teach religious tracts as part of the science curriculum – see above.
The Heartland Institute, a prominent, Chicago-based organization opposing climate science, has teamed up with the creationist Discovery Institute to launch a smear campaign against a group promoting the nationwide adoption of updated science education guidelines.
The guidelines in question are the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), adopted so far by 11 states and the District of Columbia. The National Research Council, the National Science Teachers Association and the American Association for the Advancement of Science—working with 26 state governments—developed the NGSS to update K-12 science education in schools for the first time since 1998.
But, because the NGSS includes material on evolution and how humans are causing climate change, it has faced opposition in some states. Most recently, the Wyoming legislature became the first in the U.S. to reject the NGSS. Lessons on climate change, lawmakers said, would brainwash kids against the state’s coal and oil industries.
The non-profit National Center for Science Education (NCSE)—whose members include thousands of teachers and scientists—provides information and advice to defend quality science education at local, state, and national levels. And its advocacy on behalf of the NGSS has made it a target for both young-earth creationists and climate change deniers.
And thus, a partnership is blossoming. Yesterday, the main article on the Heartland Institute website is written by the Discovery Institute’s Casey Luskin, whose ignorance of science is the stuff of legends.
His article is the first in a two-part column on “how the National Center for Science Education is targeting the nation’s schools to enforce a mythical consensus on global warming alarmism.”
The column trots out the popular young-earth creationist tropes, such as claims of censorship:
Critics believe that, by seeking to put a lid on scientific controversies, NCSE actually serves as an impediment to science education—such that many school systems and individual teachers refrain from teaching about the topics extensively, or avoid the topics entirely, in order to avoid the wrath of “consensus” enforcers. As a result, the nation’s schoolchildren learn neither the facts underlying the theories and counter-theories, nor the reasoning processes by which real science separates fact from fiction….NCSE has attempted not to promote good science education but to censor views with which it disagrees.
And, Luskin characterizes this as “propagandizing kids,” comparing the new education standards to racist beliefs:
Indoctrination in the schools is nothing new. During the lead-up to Prohibition, supporters of a ban on alcoholic beverages planted propaganda in textbooks declaring that drinking alcohol could cause a person to combust spontaneously in blue flame. In the Scopes “monkey trial” of 1925, the American Civil Liberties Union defended the use in a classroom of the book A Civic Biology, which taught evolution but also white supremacy and eugenics (the alleged need to eliminate “parasitic” people from the population). In 1957, at a key point in the Civil Rights movement, the textbook Alabama History for Schools declared that slavery had been beneficial, “the earliest form of social security.”
And, he explains, the National Center for Science Education is part of an elitist, scientific cabal:
NCSE is the beneficiary of grassroots activism on the part of scientists, educators, and others who support its mission. But much of its support comes from powerful groups that are pillars of the political establishment and the scientific-technological elite. (President Eisenhower, in his farewell address, warned of the danger “that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.”)
Indeed, NCSE has been collaboratively envisioned, created, and supported financially by elite establishment groups, including the National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the National Association of Biology Teachers, the National Science Teachers Association, the National Science Foundation, and many other national educational and scientific (or scientist-activist) organizations.
All of this is in keeping with the long-term strategy of the Heartland Institute. Two years ago, leaked documents revealed its plans to promote a science curriculum for schools that would raise doubts about human-caused climate change. They even discussed strategies for “dissuading teachers from teaching science.” I’ll be looking forward to seeing what Luskin has to say in the second part of his column.
This is good news. Siding with the anti science crazies goes a long way to discrediting the climate deniers. As long as they pretended to base their views on scientific data, they had some chance with the typical voter. Now they back nonsense that’s not even fake science.
Remember that “elitist” means someone that actually knows what they’re talking about.
We should hope the Republicans stick to their denialist guns…. so they become totally unelectable.
FYI, the video implies a non-sequitur. Just because climate deniers are wrong does not mean Harrison Schmitt is wrong in his belief that Marxist social engineers have hitched their cart to the climate-science horse.
It would certainly benefit the credibility and public acceptance of the climate policy groups if they expelled the social engineers and repudiated their policies.
That’s an interesting assertion, E-P. But have you any evidence for it? I’ve seen none myself.
A number of the policy elements advocated by “climate activists” are pure Marxist, such as massive international wealth transfers. If such transfers ever got to the common folk (unlikely, given the corruption in so many third-world countries) they would certainly spend a lot of money on… fossil fuels and things that use them. Definitely not a good thing for the climate. Very good for people with sticky fingers along the path of the money, though.
A free-market response would be something like a carbon tax offset by dividends or rebates on other taxes, with taxes levied on imports of goods from outside the carbon-tax bloc.
Wealth transfers are not “pure Marxist”. All economic systems transfer wealth. You have not provided evidence of Marxism.
Should the rich countries “benefiting” from pollution recompense the poor countries “suffering”?
No economic systems have massive transfers of wealth, coerced from its producers and given to others without expectation of reciprocity or even use for its avowed purpose, other than despotisms. In this case, the call for massive funding of the third world in the name of “social* justice” has been Marxist boilerplate for decades and it doesn’t stop being Marxist because of a newly-minted excuse.
Is there any reason to believe that any suffering would be alleviated, instead of magnified by e.g. creating more mouths to feed under the same or worse conditions? The rich countries should work on fixing the problem at the source, which is going to take plenty of money right there. When our emissions are zip and the atmosphere is back down to 350 ppm CO2, it will be time to hear debate about writing checks. Not one second sooner.
* “Social” has become a modifier meaning “not”. Social justice, social work, Social Security…
Yes, there is reason to believe the rich helping the poor works. Christianity sounds a lot like your Marxism.
And, yes, we should reduce our emissions.
We can do two things at the same time.
Huge transfers of money unrelated to the welfare of the population, such as the much-touted “resource curse”, do not help the poor. They let the rulers ignore them.
Coerced transfers of wealth, spent in ways that may harm rather than help, are the opposite of anything that can be legitimately called “charity”.
You are speaking with an advocate of “Golden Dawn” a Greek neo-Nazi anti-immigration group. We are off topic, but you could say not too much, because we are talking about Heartland, which shares some of those same qualities.
I had the same thought, especially when I saw this statement—“Is there any reason to believe that any suffering would be alleviated, instead of magnified by e.g. creating more mouths to feed under the same or worse conditions?”.
The xenophobes don’t seem to understand that helping the poor countries is what allows them to slow down their population growth rates and ultimately IMPROVE conditions and alleviate suffering (which would perhaps cause some immigrants to stay home rather than move in next door).
Of course, the fact that “improved” conditions usually come with a bit of a population overshoot and a shift to higher consumption levels and carbon footprints is a definite negative, as we have seen as the human population went from 1 billion in 1800 to 7+ billion today, but that’s another discussion.
PS to E-Pot Do you approve of the decision to shut off people’s water in Detroit?
An interesting confluence– climate denial and evolution denial certainly belong together, so it’s nice to see this alliance coming into the open. I don’t think it will do them much harm, since climate deniers put off by the craziness of evolution denial will simply stick to another brand of climate denial. As for EP above, throwing the label ‘Marxist’ around as if s/he knew what it means, externalities like GHG emissions are precisely the kind of economic malfunction that does require a big change in how the economy works– a substantial carbon tax will indeed be redistributive, but that’s the point: so long as the damage done by emissions isn’t accounted for, the economics of fossil fuels (and other emission sources) are ignoring a massive, widely distributed cost that is accumulating in the form of an environmental deficit. On another point, libertarianism (especially of the Ayn Rand, ‘everyone has already got what s/he deserves, so the poor and sick should just die’ variety) is a license for the same kind of denial: if the gap between wealth and poverty were really about who’s a producer and who’s a ‘moocher’, the world would be a very different place…
mbrysonb – Yes. You tell it. As if the poor were not exploited enough, they have to endure pet coke piles, pollution, and GW. All benefits of a culture that elevates the individual, the ego drive, above the common good. You neatly summarized Ayn Rand. Its pretty much, ” I got mine. Who cares about anybody else.”
More tentacles of Heartland. Tom Tanton.
http://barnardonwind.com/2013/07/09/w-h-o-has-seen-the-wind-well-not-really/
“The trigger for this post was one Tom Tanton, who found my blog recently and decided to spread some muck in the comments. For those who clicked on the link under his name, you’ll see that he has a history of being on the wrong side of reality, facts and the PR wars. The AGW-denying, fossil-fuel funded Heartland Institute calls him an expert. He presents at AGW-denying conferences funded by the AGW-denial lobby in the USA. He heads organizations that receive all of their funding from the fossil fuel industry. He appears to be affiliated with the misnamed Interstate Informed Citizens Coalition (IICC) headed up by Kevon Martis, also a spreader of odd perspectives in the comments here and elsewhere. He neglects to publish anything in peer-reviewed journals, despite his expertise.”
Heartland odd comments appear to include creationism.
Koch Bros and Heartland are not at all against taxes – on anything that competes with FF.
http://investigativereportingworkshop.org/investigations/years-living-dangerously/story/powerful-group-against-wind/
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/27/opinion/sunday/the-koch-attack-on-solar-energy.html?_r=0