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Smithsonian 'Toned Down the Science' In Climate Change Exhibit
An anonymous reader writes "According to an International Herald Tribune article, the Smithsonian pre-emptively toned down the scientific content of a climate change exhibit put into place last year. The changes, including removal of scientist conclusions and muddying of displayed data, were made to ensure that the exhibit would not offend the Congress or the White House. Pressure brought to bear by Institute officials resulted in the resignation of Robert Sullivan, a sixteen year veteran of the organization. 'This is not the first time the Smithsonian has been accused of taking politics into consideration. The congressionally chartered institution scaled down a 1995 exhibit of the restored Enola Gay, the B-29 that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, after veterans complained it focused too much on the damage and deaths. Amid the oil-drilling debate in 2003, a photo exhibit of Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was moved to a less prominent space.'"
Who ever has the gold, makes the rules.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
The most troublesome part is that it was Smithsonian's administration that wanted the changes, not people from the US administration.
There's two kinds of people: those that change their beliefs to fit the facts and those that change the facts to fit their beliefs.
When you're changing the facts to fit other people's beliefs, well, I guess you get the budget dollars but lose all self-respect.
Well maybe the administration isnt responsible for all the stuff that goes on. If the Smithsonian would pre-emptively change how it does things just because it thinks thats whats expected of it, then all you need is the idea that you are going to suppress certain ideas, not actively pursue their suppression.
Libertarian Leaning Political Discussion Forum.
"...the script...was rewritten to minimize and inject more uncertainty into the relationship between global warming and humans..." Imagine that! Uncertainty in science. If you want certainty, get a shaman/priest/rabbi.
"...officials omitted scientists' interpretation of some research and let visitors draw their own conclusions from the data..." Why would they do that? Don't they know the great unwashed can't be trusted to draw trhe "proper" inferences?!?!!?!!
"...changes were made for reasons of objectivity. And some scientists who consulted on the project said nothing major was omitted." Speaks for itself, I guess.
*AND*, despite the summary above, "Sullivan said that to his knowledge, no one in the Bush administration pressured the Smithsonian."
668: Neighbour of the Beast
It's like your typical parent company shareholder override situation:
The Smithsonian institute are funded by the government of the United States.
Most of the current Congressmen / Senators / President which make up the government of the United States are funded by the big Oil companies.
The big Oil companies obviously don't want to see pictures of Climate Change or pictures of the national parks they are in the process of trashing and so get what they see as their subsidiary company to "make the changes".
Courtesy of United States Inc.
I guess these guys have to be as politically neutral as possible.
That's crap. Politics has no place in science. "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it" comes to mind when politics and science meet.
Trolling is a art,
Whether the museum curator in the parent posting existed or not, I salute anyone with the guts and gall to question assumptions and place integrity above deceit. And, yes, such people probably will lose jobs and - in rare cases - possibly a whole lot more. History teaches us, however, that in the long run, inaccuracies do get weeded out. Nobody these days uses Geoffrey of Monmouth's History of the British Kings as a textbook, and popular Victorian school texts (which depicted Iron Age Britain as filled with unkempt cave-dwelling barbarians with no language or culture) have been replaced with more reliable and infinitely more believable studies of Celtic life.
Pissing off the public with the truth is inevitable. It will happen, sooner or later. May as well get it over and done with quickly, even if that carries risk. Life is all about risk - so why not take risks that might make a difference?
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Or to put it more elegantly: You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you mad.
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.