Monday, May 21, 2012

Just Who Has Bailed On The Heartland Institute?

Yesterday, I noticed this in the UK Gaurdian re. The Heartland Institute's ongoing travails:

A number of other experts meanwhile began cutting their ties with Heartland, according to a tally kept by a Canadian blogger BigCityLiberal.

But I noted that they just linked  to my blog front page.  So I thought I would work up a proper tally of those Heartland "experts" who have responded to my email re the now infamous billboard:

On May 11, Heartland Institute fellow Dennis Avery became the first to bite, penning this passionate if somewhat cracked defense of the institute.  You can see the form letter I've been using  underneath his  diatribe.

On Sunday, May 13th, well-known climatologist Chris Landsea became the first respondent to inform me that he no longer wished to be associated with Heartland.   Given his centrality to some aspects of the AGW debate, Mr. Landsea's renunciation generated a number of MSM stories, here and here.

On Monday, May 14th, both Miklos Zagoni of Eotvos Lorand University, Budapest, and well-known medical entomologist Paul Reiter asked that Heartland remove them from their list of experts.

On May 15th, I received stirring defenses of the Institute from Sonja A Boehmer-ChristiansenS. Fred Singer, and Brian Valentine, all of which I noted in this post.  I also had a brief contact I had with G. Cornelis van Kooten (discussed in the same post), who insisted that he had no idea what I was on about, but whose name was removed from the list somewhere between the 14th and 15th.  This was the first suggestion from any of the Heartland experts that the Institute might have volunteered them for the position without asking consent.  I would also note that Dr.Sonja A.Boehmer-Christiansen has since disappeared from the list, though this may be the result of an accident on HI's part.  I have emailed her regarding the matter but received no response.  


Later on the 15th, I was contacted by economist Henry "Jake" Jacoby, who told me that he would contact HI and have his entry deleted.  This is the first confirmed case where Heartland slapped up someone on their website as an expert without letting that person know in advance.

On May 16th, Joe Bast posted an open letter to all those scholars who had "abandoned" HI, in which he bitched at length.

On Saturday, May 19th, Economist Peter Cramton  informed me by email that he too would no longer be associated with HI.

So far, Mr. Cramton is the last person on the Heartland list to have contacted me.  In addition, I am informed that Roger Pielke Jr. has had his entry deleted, though this was not due to efforts on my part.  And Benny Peiser disappeared from the list way back on May 5th or so, presumably because of the billboards but well before my email campaign began.

So far that makes about 80 emails sent but unanswered.  I don't expect too many more responses, although I think some U.S. academic institutions may be in the middle of final exams, so perhaps when those are done  I might get another note or two.

Update: Sometime between about May 24th and 26th Bjørn Lomborg's name was removed from the Heartland list.  He confirms his removal here.

3 comments:

JP said...

I'd be curious to know if Tim Patterson and Tom Harris have anything to say about the billboards.

Especially given their hurt feelings after being criticised for that appalling climate change course at Carleton University with which they were involved. For Patterson, being accused of climate science denial is the same as being called a holocaust denier... but then, if he's happy with making that false equivalency, maybe he thinks equating climate scientists with the Unabomber is also fair.

Just the facts, please said...

Hey BCL, given the coverage you're getting from major media in the UK etc. I was just curious as to whether any Canadian outlets are picking up on it?

bigcitylib said...

JP, Emailed Patterson but he didn't respond. I didn't really want to give Tom an outlet, so I didn't email him. He would be pretty predictable.

Facts,

Nothing yet as far as I can tell. Although I should alert Mike De Souza. hemight be interested.