Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Climate Change

Thoroughly immersive and disturbing book. As I am in my 60s Ive been alive through all these events. Having followed each as they unfolded I always knew something was wrong but was unable to put my finger on it- now I can. The level and degree of deception is staggering and truly disturbing. This is not the nation that our forefathers fought to colonize and preserve. Everything in life today is polarized. Sadly (IMHO) I believe the source of this polarization is politics and the problem is getting worse every year. This book clearly describes a world (and individual events) that I watched unfold. It tells the story of the deceptive ways major companies behave to avoid taking responsibility for the damage / injury their products do/might cause. Being a spouse of someone who passed from aesbestos exposure I have one request of anybody reading this reviewRead all the one star reviews, and then ask yourself this question. Would you rather individuals / companies / countries err on the side of caution or wait until the danger is staring them right in the face. In my opinion the old saying "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" comes to mind. I think that we should re-embrace science, reward the profession when they raise concerns- not denigrate them. This book acknowledges the men and women of science who have not sold their souls to cash flush companies. a must read for anybody living in todays world

This book made me angry. And it should make you angry as well. The title "Merchants of Doubt" comes from the same line from a tobacco company executive used in a similar book that came out a couple of years ago that I recently reviewed (Doubt is Their Product). The basis, first used by the tobacco industry many years ago, was that their goal was to "manufacture doubt" in the minds of the public and policy-makers so that no policy-making action would occur, or at least so that it should be delayed as long as possible. And the tobacco industry succeeded for decades after they themselves knew that tobacco/nicotine was addictive and caused cancer. Yet they carried on a well-funded campaign to confuse and disinform the public.Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway are science historians. And what they have uncovered with this book should shock even those who are familiar with some of the tactics used by the professional denialist industry. What is even more shocking is how just a handful of scientists and their collaborators have had a hand in nearly every major science denial episode for the last 40 years. And in the center of it all is the George C. Marshall Institute, Fred Seitz, S. Fred Singer, and the lesser known but equally deceptive William Nierenberg and Robert Jastrow.After the tactics were perfected in the fight to deny that smoking causes cancer, these handful of men with close ties to the Reagan and conservative ideologies employed them over and over again to deny smokestack emissions cause acid rain, CFCs cause ozone depletion, second hand smoke cause cancer in non-smokers, and greenhouse gas emissions cause global warming. In all cases the science has been right, and this group of men helped delay action for many years until even their deceit couldn't hide the truth.And those tactics, repeated to deny the science in each of these issues, were all the same: employ a few scientists willing to shill for the industry or who are "skeptical" (to create the illusion of credibility), focus the efforts through well-funded right wing think tanks (to create the illusion of independence), create "new" science specifically designed to create uncertainty (i.e., not to answer questions, but to create contrasting data they can misrepresent), hyperventilate about how "the science is not settled" (knowing that science is never settled, but the public won't understand), and of course, using their PR skills, Frank Luntz wordsmithing, and punchy - though meaningless - catchphrases like "sound science" to make it sound like they are saying something when they are not saying anything.What I found amazing was how the origins of the George C. Marshall Institute and all of its subsequent science denialism came out of the cold war fight against communism. These handful of scientists were atomic bomb builders and astrophysicists who had no expertise in any of the science they were denying. But they had connections, most notably with the Reagan administration and the Strategic Defense Initiative (Star Wars) for which the George C. Marshall Institute was started to sell to the public, the military, and the conservative legislators they were trying to influence. Yet despite this lack of any expertise they continued to insert themselves into the acid rain debate, the CFC debate, the second hand smoke debate, and the climate change debate. And each and every time their goal was to push the denial of the science. They equated environmentalism with communism ("green on the outside, red on the inside"). And using their lobbying skills and influence they were able to create the impression that there was still a raging debate in the science, even though in all cases the science was overwhelming and they represented a very minority opinion. Actually, in all cases they were not being scientists at all, but rather advocates for non-action (all of these men had long-since stopped doing actual research, and none of them had ever done research in the areas of science they were denying).What is most disturbing is that they routinely employed unscientific methods and deceit to push their political views. These handful of men have almost single-handedly cost the lives of thousands of Americans and increased the cost to taxpayers millions or even billions of dollars through their denial of the science. Most egregious in this has been S. Fred Singer. First as a denier that smoking caused cancer, then as a denier that CFCs caused ozone depletion, and now as a denier of climate change, Singer has used despicable methods to deceive fellow scientists who were too slow to realize that such deceit was possible from one of their own. What he did to Roger Revelle on his death bed is disgraceful. What he did to Justin Lancaster is despicable. What he and others did to Ben Santer is just one more example showing that the denialist industry, led by these few men and paid for by the biggest industries on the planet, will go to no end to deny any science or destroy any scientist in their path. The recent attacks on climate scientists like Michael Mann and Phil Jones are the latest iterations in the denialist industry's tactics.And according to Oreskes and Conway, the denialist industry isn't even satisfied denying the present and the future, they have also recently turned to denying the past. You may have heard parroted from people here that the banning of DDT by environmentalists has killed millions of people in Africa. Not true. But the denialist industry has decided it needs to deny ALL science, and that means going back to the 1960s to attack Rachel Carson, whose book "Silent Spring" documented the dangers of widespread pesticide spraying. DDT was banned in the US after it was discovered that it caused the thinning of eggshells in raptors like our national symbol, the Bald Eagle. But like all the other denialist attacks, the idea that the US ban cost lives in Africa is completely false. DDT use actually increased in Africa after it was banned in the US, and in fact is still used today. It just doesn't work any more because the mosquitoes it is supposed to kill gained resistance to it, in part because of the overspraying advocated by the manufacturers to sell more product. But this is just one more case where facts are tossed aside in favor of an ideological promotion of an anti-science agenda designed to further the profit of the few at the expense of the many.Oreskes and Conway end their book with "A New View of Science," which I'll let people read for themselves. And they should. In fact, they must. This book must be on the reading list of anyone and everyone interested in science, so they can read for themselves how just a handful of unscrupulous scientists with deep political connections and a near religious anti-communism fervor have been at the heart of every denial of science in the last several decades. As I indicated to open this review, the book made me angry. And we should be angry. And then we should not let them get away with it any longer.

This is an important book (and also a movie, but I have not seen that), which meticulously and factually (half the book is the references) documents how not only did the tobacco industry consciously and knowingly bamboozle the public for years to keep making money, but the same methods and very often the very same individuals did the same thing for acid rain, DDT/chemical manufacturers, and now climate change. With tobacco, DDT, and acid rain, the facts and the crushing majority of scientists around the world ultimately prevailed but not before years of continuing damage were permitted due to ignorant media and skilled manipulation of the public. The same is happening with climate change. There really is no "argument", just the illusion of one and creating and repeatedly airing "doubt" so more money and freedom to do what they want accrues to big companies, the 1%, and political extremists. I know many will be outraged at this but facts win over innuendo and urban myths. Makes one wonder about human nature and our future if a few will, knowingly, sacrifice all just for some incremental wealth.I rated this four stars vs five because it is a bit rambling and long, and some of the most important and clear arguments are near the end, so many people may not make it all the way through at all or miss the most compelling information. But if you read it, and feel free to cross-check the references as factual and correct, the conclusions are inescapable. I just wish they were as good at telling the story as they were at gathering the facts.I remember getting an email from a friend of mine on climate change, it cited some Australian college professor, expert in climate, who scoffed at climate change in general and man-made sources being its cause, citing that one volcano puts more greenhouse gases into the air than all of industrial civilization over the entire history of mankind. My friend believed it, sounded factual. I checked around, found out that the man was indeed a professor at an Australian college but he also was a Director and major stock-holder at several natural gas companies (gee, any interest in letting gas companies continue to do their thing??) and he had been cited by the US EPA and the European equivalent for citing false and incorrect "facts" and such, and that one volcano, even a big one, puts a lot into the atmosphere but something like a few weeks of what our industry does. People who out of hand discount things like this book but without question or critical thinking accept the hate and doubt arguments simply have it wrong, sorry.