Bob Park. If you haven’t come across him, let me introduce you – Bob writes a weekly column for the American Physical Society titled What’s New. It’s a short, punchy little piece, with the emphasis on ‘punchy,’ since Bob certainly doesn’t pull them. Week in, week out, he launches broadsides at the Christian Right, manned spaceflight, energy policy… wherever he sees science being disregarded or misused, he’ll wade in swinging. Go Bob!
This week, one unlucky focus of his attention is the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, who have recently announced the recipient of their annual Journalism Award, to be granted in April. It’s… novelist Michael Crichton, being recognised for his recent best-seller State of Fear. Which – in the manner of Crichton – is a world-spanning conspiracy thriller taking as its premise the idea that global warming might not be for real.
Let me recap: Learned society. Journalism Award. Novel. Global warming hoax.
You couldn’t make this stuff up. Thanks to Bob Park, we don’t have to – he’ll point us at it. Bob’s own book, Voodoo Science – the Road From Foolishness to Fraud, is well worth a look too.