You know, they're not static entities. Theyre way behind schedule. Whole industries bankrolled their research, sometimes laundering the money through front groups with innocuous names. And if you have time to read two, reread Merchants of Doubt. And when I said that we're doing more than just a film about tobacco and flame retardants, it's also about climate, he said to me, you know, you could take James Hansen, the world's leading climate scientist, and I could take a garbage man, and I could get America to believe that garbage man knows more about science. Merchants of Doubt How a Handful of Scientists Obscured. Erik Conway talked about the book he wrote with Naomi Orestes, [Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming] (Bloomsbury Press . It's inspired by the book of the same name by Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway. These are people who are ultimately working 80 hours a week. (MUST CREDIT: Barry Berona/Sony Pictures Classics. In 2010, he lost his bid for re-election after telling a radio host that he believed humans were contributing to. Director Robert Kenner ("Food, Inc.") and his cowriter Kim Roberts lay it all out for us in "Merchants of Doubt," a compendium of public deceptions based on the same-titled book by science historians Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway. UNIDENTIFIED MAN #3: We need more data. Using a professional magician, the film explores the analogy between these tactics and the methods used by magicians to distract their audiences from observing how illusions are performed. 'Merchants of Doubt' exposes climate-change spin doctors The book is similar to the popular Discovery Channel show How Do They Do It? Only instead of investigating quirky mysteries like how stripes get into toothpaste, Merchants of Doubt looks at exactly how we arrived at the gravest crisis in the history of our species one we created ourselves. He runs the blog Climate Depot. In Merchants of Doubt , the Same Scientists Who Lied About - HuffPost 'Merchants of Doubt': Telluride Review - The Hollywood Reporter Twitter, Follow us on KENNER: And then one man, who was so skillful in slowing down legislation on the slow-burning cigarette, saying it wasn't cigarettes that caused house fires, it was couches. Although the film The misleading appendix was written by Fred Singer. Answering Climate Change Skeptics Naomi Oreskes. In the 1950s, Big Tobacco had begun using scientists to sow doubt about links between their product and cancer. BLOCK: If it's not about the science though, as Naomi Oreskes claims - but it's about politics, it's about your worldview, what tribe you belong to - it doesn't seem that there's much that a film like yours could do to change people's minds. NAOMI ORESKES: None of this is about the science. Instagram, Follow us on About HPB-Diamond. For the tobacco industry, the tactics successfully delayed government regulation until long after the establishment of scientific consensus about the health risks from smoking. Fred Seitz was a pioneer of solid-state physics who helped develop the atom bomb. Climate of Doubt | FRONTLINE Oreskes and Conway also devote an insightful section to the mass medias mostly unwitting complicity in this scandal. The main merchants of doubt ( Seitz, Singer, Nierenberg, and Jastrow) built careers around using science to fight communism during the Cold War, and then turned against environmentalism instead. On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 84% based on 89 reviews, with an average rating of 6.95/10. Spokespeople sent into the media to sow doubt. Merchants of Doubt - CSMonitor.com - The Christian Science Monitor In 'Merchants of Doubt,' climate change presented as the last stand of "Merchants" exposes the climate change "experts" who enrich themselves by fooling the American public with bogus claims that cast doubt on scientific research and thus protect corporate. Anything you learned from the climate change deniers that gave you pause, made you think, well, you know, some in the environmental movement have gone too far in trying to make their case? Merchants of Doubt How a Handful of Scientists Obscured. Our in-depth approach to solutions-based journalism takes time and proactive planning, which is why Grist depends on reader support. The merchants of doubt come in and argue that the replication rate in psychology is "statistically indistinguishable from 100%." 5. "[9], One of the subjects of the film, Fred Singer, wrote the director indicating that he was considering a lawsuit. The most prominent of these tactics is the cultivation of scientists and others who successfully cast doubt on the scientific results. UNIDENTIFIED MAN #1: Climate is changing naturally. Here's How. Was it naturally occurring, or did humans play a role in creating the problem? Donate today tohelp keep Grists site and newsletters free. But you contrast that with a man named Marc Morano. BLOCK: That's from a new documentary film that looks into the world of climate change deniers, their campaign to sway public opinion and the business interests behind them. I had made "Food Inc." and people had seen that. Again, tried and true public re-framing of reality worked. The issue at the center of events at the time had no obvious relation to climate change. As its second example, the film describes how manufacturers of flame retardants worked to protect their sales after toxic effects of the retardants were reported in the scientific literature. Documentaries about the dangers of climate change are nothing new, but Merchants of Doubt, which had its world premiere in Telluride, adds a pointed perspective to the debate. BLOCK: There's a moment in the film where you interview climate scientist James Hansen, who's been one of the strongest voices sounding the alarm about the risks of climate change, the real dangers, and he admits to you that scientists make lousy communicators. They used to show up to argue against the dangers of secondhand cigarette smoke, but these days they're more likely to dispute the existence of human-caused climate change. Robert Kenner, the documentarian who made "Food, Inc.," is back with "Merchants of Doubt," which approaches the climate change controversy, already well covered in film, from a somewhat . Featuring a new Foreword by former Vice President Al Gore Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize "Important and timely. They must've known you had a point of view here that was not going to agree with theirs. In it, she outlined the similarities between the political fight around climate change and the earlier debates about . BLOCK: And on TV, he, Marc Morano, is not boring. [10] Although no lawsuit was filed, Kenner noted in an interview that "when [Singer] implies litigation is very expensive, I think it's an attempt to be intimidating." Merchants of Doubt, directed by Robert Kenner who also directed "Food, Inc.," is based on the 2010 book of the same name by Naomi Oreskes and Eric M. Conway. E-mail: davidlewis@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @davidlewisSF, Documentary. At a conference in Long Island, we witnessed how these skeptics . Accuracy and availability may vary. These "experts" supplied it. Rather, they say, climate concerns are a. Magicians learn how to distract their audiences from noticing the deceptions that underlie their tricks and illusions. Adaptation, loss and damage, and African oil: Whats at stake at COP27? The authors do an excellent job, however, of touching on many of the cogs inside that dreadful box, from clueless writers (Bjorn Lomborg, John Tierney, George Will) to odious politicians (Sen. James Inhofe, Vice President Dick Cheney) to the scores of conservative foundations that wrap themselves in the flag that they disgrace by their actions. In the 1990s, Singer had sued Justin Lancaster over his statements regarding the inclusion of Roger Revelle as a co-author of a climate change paper with Singer and Chauncey Starr; Revelle had died shortly after the paper was published. So all of a sudden, our scientists become the targets, and I think that's very unfortunate. The website's critics consensus reads: "Merchants of Doubt is a thought-provoking documentary assembled with energy and style, even if it doesn't dig as deep as it could. They knew before anyone else because big corporations have to have good science. Kenner, best known for his film adaptation of " Food, Inc. ," is out with a new documentary, " Merchants of Doubt ," in which he introduces us to a "professional class of deceivers": P.R.. They found it in Seitz, who was not merely a scientist, but the former president of the Academy of Sciences. These tactics were systematically developed by the tobacco industry in the 1950s in response to scientific research showing that smoking was a significant health risk; the research was a significant threat to tobacco sales. How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming, Eco dog treats confound canines and humans alike, A NASA satellite launched to detect dust has discovered huge methane leaks, To ensure access to electric cars, some activists are calling attention to charging deserts, Two ways to think about Patagonias $3 billion climate donation, These red states dont want climate targets but they do want green jobs. 'Merchants of Doubt': Exposing climate change 'experts' - SFGATE All rights reserved. R. J. Reynolds put Seitz in charge of the companys biomedical research grant program. For the most part, the executive summary agreed with the 1981 NAS study. Directed by Robert Kenner. The assurance they are marketing is this: no matter what the scientists discover, God will keep his flock from harm. Merchants of Doubt: The Spread of Climate Skepticism | EPIC 'Merchants of Doubt' review: Manufacturing dissent on climate change - nj PDF Film 3, A Climate of Doubt and Merchants of Doubt - UC Santa Barbara Bob Inglis: Climate Change and the Republican Party I think as people start to realize that this is not an issue that's an ideological issue - it's really about the planet, and the science is there - that they'll want to change. The informative Merchants of Doubt plays like a sequel to An Inconvenient Truth, a landmark film that raised awareness of global warming. Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Most scientists regarded SDI as technologically impossible and almost certainly destabilizing. The filmmakers interviewed more than a dozen individuals who have been involved in a series of conflicts ranging from the regulation of tobacco products due to the health risks to global climate change. Robert JastrowNineteen eighty-four marked a key moment in Oreske and Conways darkly fascinating history of selling doubt. . SC 130 04 Climate Science Merchants of Doubt Questions.docx (PG-13. They are the. 'Merchants of Doubt' approaches the climate change controversy from a View SC 130 04 Climate Science Merchants of Doubt Questions.docx from SC 130 at Monmouth University. Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on David Lewis is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Director Robert Kenner (Food, Inc.) takes us back to the days when the tobacco industry invented the playbook for obfuscation, stalling smoking regulations for 50 years despite indisputable research linking cigarettes to cancer. Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscure The ultimate goal hasnt changed since the tobacco days preventing government regulation of industry. As part of our commitment to sustainability, in 2021 Grist moved its office headquarters to the Bullitt Center in Seattles vibrant Capitol Hill neighborhood. The core argument of the new documentary "Merchants of Doubt" is simple: the movement to debunk climate change is corporate-funded and lacks credibility. (SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "MERCHANTS OF DOUBT"). The second element of the deniers' story in "Merchants of Doubt" is their claim that environmentalists don't really care about climate change. Directed by Robert Kenner, of the excellent documentary Food, Inc., MERCHANTS OF DOUBT feels a little scattershot. 'Merchants of Doubt' attacks climate change skeptics Again, tried and true public re-framing of reality worked. By extension, the audience is supposed to determine that climate change is exactly what they are told it is. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. KENNER: It's many of the same people, and it's almost identical playbook. Follow us on When the Soviet Union broke a moratorium on atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons, Seitz immediately urged President John Kennedy to respond in kind, despite evidence that radioactive fallout contaminated swaths of land for more than a thousand miles. Merchants of Doubt movie review (2015) | Roger Ebert The film, Merchants of Doubt, explores how many of the same people that once lobbied on behalf of the tobacco industry are now employed in the climate denial game. And hopefully we can get to the real debate, not this sort of fake debate. He began his career developing the governments earth observation satellite system. Think tanks like the George C. Marshall Institute were financed specifically to publish and disseminate their papers junk science that couldnt survive the rigors of peer-reviewed journals. The subject of Robert Kenner's documentary Merchants of Doubt is the catastrophe of global climate change, which is engulfing us even faster than predicted. Merchants of Doubt. James Hansen had very little interest in going on camera with me 'cause he'd much rather be doing his science. This premise may sound like a conspiracy theory, but the truth Oreskes and Conway elucidate is more banal and convincing. As the unworkable SDI inevitably faded, GMI turned to other ideological battles, including ozone depletion and global warming. UNIDENTIFIED MAN #5: CO2 is a benefit to plant life. UNIDENTIFIED MAN #4: There is no need for us to rush to this kind of judgment. He found himself alienated from many of his scientific colleagues over the Vietnam War (many of them were against the war; Seitz was an enthusiastic supporter). Though the film touches on how these purveyors of misinformation have distorted such issues as food safety and fire retardants, its front-and-center issue is the global warming debate.. Amazon.com: Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured The documentary Merchants of Doubt portrays climate skeptics using the same deceptive techniques - and even the same cast of spin doctors. The only newsroom focused on exploring solutions at the intersection of climate and justice. Illustrates FILM-MERCHANTS-ADV13 (category e), by Ann Hornaday 2015, The Washington Post. In a 2007 article, Newsweek called the George C. Marshall Institute a central cog in the denial machine. GMI has received millions of dollars from conservative foundations and corporations. What is the connection there? Merchants of Doubt (film) - Wikipedia They call them watermelons - green on the outside, red on the inside. Instagram, Follow us on In his new documentary Merchants of Doubt, director Robert Kenner ( Food, Inc. ) shines a light on the very people that are hired to sway public perception of major issues (like climate change . To support our nonprofit environmental journalism, please consider disabling your ad-blocker to allow ads on Grist. "Merchants of Doubt": How a Handful of Scientists Obscured - Truthout "If you read just one book on climate change this year, read Merchants of Doubt. All of this is a political debate about the role of government. Go after the messenger. They see them as reds under the bed. (Along with Jerry Falwell, Weyrich founded the group Moral Majority.). Is no need for us to rush to this kind of judgment that with a MAN Marc... 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