Dec 10, 2015
PEN International
ATTN: Ms. Margaret Atwood
Vice President
AN OPEN LETTER
Dear Ms. Atwood,
RE: Public Trial – No Jury
On this December 10, 2015, the UN Human Rights Day, we appeal to you and PEN International for justice.
On Dec. 8, 2015, the Hon. Kirsty Duncan, Minister of Science, stood in the Canadian House of Commons and declared “The war on science is over” to a standing ovation.
However, for us, the war on science has just begun and the attack is against us.
A Public Trial with No Due Process has Occurred
Last week, our organization was publicly smeared by an organization, a taxpayer funded charity, of which you are an honorary director, which claims to defend justice, but which in fact unjustly denigrated our group of scientists, engineers and citizens, by publishing an extensive document in the public domain which made sweeping false, misleading and damaging accusations against us. This was allegedly filed as a complaint to the Competition Bureau of Canada, under a section of the Competition Act, an act which requires such complaints and inquiries to proceed in confidence.
Claiming to represent the interests of several high profile Canadians, many of whom frequently speak out for human rights and free expression, this organization has since posted the document on-line and appears to be using it as a fund-raising cause for themselves, under the banner of “ACT NOW. Help advance an HONEST CONVERSATION ABOUT climate change.”
Honest conversation? Ironically, that’s what we’ve been trying to do since 2002 when our group was formed.
Our first foray was into the field of public debate.
In November 2002, the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Alberta (APEGA/then APEGGA) published an open debate between members of the Pembina Institute and three experts, two of whom became our scientific advisers.
The three arguing for our perspective, that the sun is the main direct and indirect driver of climate change offered a scientific argument. The Pembina Institute proponents argued the political case of Kyoto. The scientific argument for the sun’s role still stands, and grows in importance as we see the solar minimum of today progressing with periods of a complete lack of solar activity. This is the quietest the sun has been in 100 years and is a likely harbinger of a time of imminent cooling, for which the world is not prepared as the focus has solely been on global warming – now known as ‘climate change.’
Climate changes – we agree. For warmer or cooler.
By NASA Goddard Space Flight Center [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
As experts in this area of science, we are trying to have a fair and honest discussion about such issues, but our efforts fall on deaf ears.
Now, with the publication of this damaging document, we have been coerced into a public trial, but with no due process, no judge or jury, and no means to properly defend ourselves.
What ‘crime’ did we commit to be so excoriated in public?
We spoke our minds.
We expressed our views – our opinions and some scientific tidbits – in a series of public billboards.
Ms. Atwood, those who have attacked us claim we are publishing false and misleading information, though the scientific billboards are based on actual scientific images or data.
Those who have attacked us claim our statements are false and misleading because it does not fit a ‘consensus’ view.
Those who have attacked us claim that we are simply promoting our message in order to beneficially gain from the outcome, when in fact our organization is based on volunteer work by professionals who, if anything have lost much by being publicly smeared and condemned, and who have volunteered for some 13 years.
Those who have attacked us claim we are part of some greater ‘conspiracy’ of sorts; they intimate we have nefarious funding – when in reality our modest beginnings are based in the scientific expertise of an Oxford-educated astrophysicist, and several earth and atmospheric scientists who had the temerity to challenge what they believed was a flawed concept – Kyoto Accord – that would cost the public much, and not result in any benefit to the environment.
A decade later, this has proven to be true.
National Academies Press publication “On Being a Scientist: Responsible Conduct in Research”
We write against impunity.
The impunity of a large, well-funded group, representing high profile individuals, to ‘jump the shark’ and depart from due process, proscribed by law, and publicly denigrate our organization.
We write against mob rule. An on-line campaign by this charity now asks people to sign on and petition the Competition Act for an “honest conversation on climate change” – in this inherently dishonest way.
We write against bullying – the kind of bullying that is acceptable in no other part of Western society, but one that flourishes, for some reason, in the world of climate science. And it is not simply name-calling, Ms. Atwood. One of our early scientific advisers, a very talented woman scientist, was driven from her role in the sciences by denigration, abuse and even death threats – to a safer profession. Dog walking.
So. This is the liberation of women in the West? To reach the goal of scientific expert only to be driven out.
We speak out against intimidation.
In this is the field of ‘science’ – diverse intellectuals like an Austrian music professor and an American philosopher – people who have no professional standing to assess the science, have, with impunity, called for the death sentence for climate science ‘deniers.’
The personal attacks on dissident scientific voices led to a public statement by the AAAS in 2011 – but these attacks still continue, as evidenced by last week’s public attack on our organization.
You may say that as citizens of a Western democracy like Canada, we have legal tools and process to right this wrong. A glance at the ruinous state of affairs in the climate science legal battle between Mark Steyn and Michael Mann shows where such an effort will lead.
Here we stand publicly accused – but “without charge or legal due process.”
We represent “the many critical voices across the world currently being silenced.”
Try to imagine the cost of our individual members speaking up. In the inquisitorial atmosphere around this topic today, people lose jobs and family members’ support. They are ostracized and called names.
Science – which used to be about free and open inquiry – is now a matter of compliance!
Your group claims “Ideas cannot be imprisoned.” But indeed they can.
Perhaps behind the scenes there are other commercial forces working against us. No one considers this possibility.
Biofuels – a Key Driver of the Refugee Crisis
We have spoken out against biofuel policies because they are driving human misery world-wide. Food prices have spiked dramatically because of climate policy. Yes, putting edible corn into gas tanks has driving up food prices and is certainly a key driver of the current refugee crisis across the MENA region.
Renewables are not Clean, Green or Free
We have spoken out against the costs and environmental damage of so-called Renewable Energy – wind and solar. Many Western citizens believe wind and solar to be ‘clean’ – we have exposed the dirty facts that wind farms kill millions of birds and bats a year, that bats die a horrible death with their lungs exploded by barometric pressure changes near the wind turbines, and that people in China, where the rare earth mines are located for wind turbine magnets, are slowly dying in an area that has no environmental controls whatsoever. In the Western world, the addition of wind and solar has driven up the cost of power so that vulnerable people have been pushed into fuel poverty – where their choices are literally reduced to deciding whether to heat their home….or to eat.
In the UK, thousands of people died prematurely due to heat-or-eat poverty.
These are human rights we are defending – the right to be informed.
Our scientific and economic messages bring these issues forward to the public domain. We have published reports by energy economist and former public servant Robert Lyman showing that the climate targets our government is committing us to are simply ‘not doable’ without destroying our own economy. Shouldn’t Canadians know that?
Commentary:
http://www.troymedia.com/2015/06/22/what-signing-the-climate-change-targets-will-mean-for-you/
Report:
http://friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/climate_change_implications_Lyman.pdf
Affordable Power is a Human Right in a Country Experiencing -40°C/F
We have informed Albertans that they have been misled on statements about the impact of coal-fired power plants on health in Alberta. This began with a simple citizen’s visit to an evening discussion forum, where one of our people realized that a great deal of misinformation was being distributed about this issue.
Sadly, despite our best efforts to publicize this information, we have found the Canadian media strangely reluctant to report on our factual, evidence based reports. But they like to pile on and call us names whenever a controversial opportunity arises.
In any other context, Friends of Science Society would be considered a national treasure and honoured.
But a taxpayer funded ‘charity’ wants to silence us, by denying us due process and effecting a public attack.
Challenging Groupthink is not a Crime if Freedom of Expression is a Human Right
Some will say – but there is a ‘consensus’ on climate science – others will claim that catastrophic outcomes are imminent and therefore our persistent efforts to open up this issue and actually have an ‘honest conversation’ represent a risk to society at large.
Neither of these claims of ‘consensus’ or ‘catastrophic risk’ is true.
Our report “97% Consensus? NO! Global Warming Math Myths and Social Proofs” shows that there is no consensus other than the self-evident fact that humans do affect climate, but cannot control climate.
US Senate testimony by Dr. Roger Peilke, Jr. and long-term evidence in his document clarifies that there is no imminent risk of a climate catastrophe and that it would take decades before any particular trend of human-caused climate changes could be identified – and that it is possible natural factors would be more influential than human effect. We simply don’t know.
Video: https://youtu.be/meoETyMA4K0
Written Testimony: http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/admin/publication_files/2013.20.pdf
US Senate testimony by Dr. Judith Curry and critical assessment of the long-term trends clarifies that many of the IPCC’s more catastrophic predictions on climate are simply not coming true and that people suffer from ‘weather amnesia’ – that climatic conditions were worse in past times. Dr. Curry states that on the evidence, “carbon dioxide (CO2) is not the control knob that can fine tune climate.”
The on-going, extra-judicial attacks on scientific dissident voices must end.
It may be, Madame, that political forces are annoyed at our factual statement that “Politicians Can’t $top Climate Change.”
We speak out to protect the interests of fellow Canadians – yes, we want an open and honest debate
We are very concerned about the 1.5°C target that has been set by representatives of our government as a climate change target. Based on the evidence, Canada’s economy will be destroyed in attempting to meet this target, particularly because carbon dioxide is not the control knob to fine tune climate, and the proposed mitigation measures based on present ‘clean-tech’ technology, will create mass unemployment and widespread heat-or-eat poverty.
We appeal to you, Ms. Atwood, as Vice President of PEN International and champion of human rights, on this day, December 10, 2015, the UN Human Rights Day, to support our cause and champion freedom of speech in science.
If, in Canada, the ‘war on science is over’ please help stop these extrajudicial attacks on us.
Sincerely,
Friends of Science Society
#ScienceIsNotCompliance
Whenever I feel frustrated at the assault on the public by our media and the doomsday alarmists, I watch one of Freeman Dyson’s videos. What a wonderful voice of reason and intelligence.
Yes, he is a breath of fresh air!
Reblogged this on Canadian Climate Guy.