Astronauts Condemn NASA’s Global Warming Endorsement

By Paul Bedard

In an unprecedented slap at NASA’s endorsement of global warming science, nearly 50 former astronauts and scientists–including the ex-boss of the Johnson Space Center–claim the agency is on the wrong side of science and must change course or ruin the reputation of the world’s top space agency.

Challenging statements from NASA that man is causing climate change, the former NASA executives demanded in a letter to Administrator Charles Bolden that he and the agency “refrain from including unproven remarks” supporting global warming in the media.

“We feel that NASA’s advocacy of an extreme position, prior to a thorough study of the possible overwhelming impact of natural climate drivers is inappropriate,” they wrote. “At risk is damage to the exemplary reputation of NASA, NASA’s current or former scientists and employees, and even the reputation of science itself.”

Read the rest at the Washigton Examiner.

See the press release, full text of the letter and all signers at CFACT.

37 Responses to Astronauts Condemn NASA’s Global Warming Endorsement

  1. NEILIO April 12, 2012 at 10:38 pm #

    Wow! A bunch of NASA astronauts and scientists agree with me? Who knew? Fire Jim!

  2. Rob N. Hood April 13, 2012 at 6:57 am #

    Uhhh… I think it’s more the other way around… Mr. Big Head from planet Neilio.

  3. Rob N. Hood April 13, 2012 at 2:50 pm #

    You Rightys were right! POLLUTION is a good thing! Vernier explains that the radiative effects of aerosols are noteworthy – about 1/3 that of carbon dioxide over the past decade. The average radiative forcing between 2000 and 2010 by stratospheric aerosols has cooled the Earth down at 0.1 watts per meter squared, while the amount of carbon dioxide emitted in the same decade has warmed the Earth at 0.3 watts per meter squared.

    “Climate simulations should include the temporary cooling effect of stratospheric particles, said Vernier. “They have partially masked the warming from human derived greenhouse gases in the last decade.”

    Now we can use hair spray again, with abandon!

    • NEILIO April 13, 2012 at 6:43 pm #

      That’s a great point! You know if they had listened to sceptics like Pat Micheals, or Richard Lindzen they would have know this fact 10 years ago, but back then you know everything was CO2 all the time. It’s amazing how far we’ve come.
      It is true that there is a fair amount of aerosols released by human industry, but I think it is worth noting that the vast majority of aerosols are from natural sources, namely volcanoes.
      You know it is interesting too that the quote in your post above says “Climate simulations should include the temporary cooling effect of stratospheric particles.” Too which my response is “NO SH*T”!!!!!!! I mean…. really? Is he saying that climate models are not factoring in all possible variables? Golly gee whiz! How long have I maintained that position?

    • Rob N. Hood April 16, 2012 at 9:56 am #

      FYI- still a net gain of warming.

      • NEILIO April 16, 2012 at 5:43 pm #

        Says who?

  4. Joe April 14, 2012 at 9:05 pm #

    Nice read and I agree. Thanks Neilio. Nice name.

  5. Rob N. Hood April 16, 2012 at 7:02 am #

    Uhh, ok… yay hoorah for pollution!? But there are aerosols and there are aerosols. Remember the Ozone holes? We’ve been able to reduce them, and in a relatively short period of time. But that’s just a detail, eh? “Cele-brate good times, come on!”

    • NEILIO April 16, 2012 at 5:45 pm #

      The practice hoax! I just have two words for that, Crista-Spas. If you don’t know what that is…. Google it!

  6. Rob N. Hood April 17, 2012 at 6:58 am #

    Oh of course! And the burning Hudson River in the early 70’s was a hoax also. DDT too. Rachel Carson was a CIA operative. J. Cousteu too. Let’s all party like it’s 1999! No worries, life is like a fairy tale (no offense intended).

    • NEILIO April 17, 2012 at 5:41 pm #

      I don’t feel that you are qualified to respond to that if you did not look up Crista-spas. I’m shure you didn’t. Basically it was a sensor array that was sent up on the shuttle. It was sent up to measure the climate, and the ozone, and what it found was that the ozone layer is not what people thought it was, and that the effect of the “ozone hole” has nothing to do with CFC’s and everything to do with seasonal conditions. It was the practice hoax for global warming, and it was much more successful than the global climate scam. It fooled you!

    • NEILIO April 17, 2012 at 7:50 pm #

      “And the burning Hudson River in the early 70?s was a hoax also.” I know you said this sarchastically, but it’s actually true! I don’t know if it was a hoax per se, but it is definately a myth. The Hudson river NEVER cought on fire. The Cayuga river did in 1969, but never the Hudson.
      The river was polluted pretty bad back then, but……

      http://www.observer.com/2008/07/a-cleaner-and-even-swimmable-hudson-river/
      “The clean up of the Hudson is far from complete, and has come at great cost and struggle, but earlier this week, my colleagues Michael Purdy, Director of Columbia’s Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory (the scientific heart of the Earth Institute), along with Observatory scientists Greg O’Mullan, Andrew Juhl and Raymond N. Sambrotto, announced a river monitoring collaboration with Riverkeeper. Monitoring the river in 2006 and 2007, this research collaboration found the river to be substantially cleaner than it was before clean up began in the 1970?s. However, the quality of the Hudson’s waters is still subject to great variability. Riverkeeper and Columbia plan to conduct monthly monitoring studies in the next several years and make these results available to the public each month.”

      Now, DDT was banned and people died because of the ban. A lot of people.

      http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/viewSubCategory.asp?id=1259
      “This is a story of triumph and tragedy. The triumph occurred in the middle part of the 20th century, when the larger part of mankind finally succeeded in overcoming the ravages of malaria, the deadly infectious disease that had afflicted the human race since the dawn of time (and which, by one estimate, had killed approximately half the people who had ever lived on earth). But within three decades, the triumph would give way to tragedy when leftist ideologues, professing concern for the integrity of the natural environment, collaborated to ban the use of the pesticide best known by the acronym DDT—the very substance that had made it possible to vanquish malaria from vast portions of the globe. By means of that ban, environmentalists effectively ensured that, over the course of the ensuing 30+ years, more than 50 million people would die needlessly of a disease that was entirely preventable.”

      But I suppose if you are one of those that thinks the problem with the world is overpopulation, then you probably think that’s great.

  7. Rob N. Hood April 18, 2012 at 7:10 am #

    OMG. They still use DDT in some countries. You have a rationale for Everything. And you love to Ignore anything that remotely conflicts with it. BTW- Bald Eagles would probably be extinct by now if we all thought the way you do. And gosh we’d all love the spectacle of burning rivers, especially on July 4th right? Reminds me of the DoDo. And please Neil- no half-baked lecture on the Dodo, ok?

    • NEILIO April 19, 2012 at 6:47 pm #

      Exuse me for challenging your firmly held environmentalist leftist beliefs, but I have some sad news about your firmly held belief that DDT was responsible for the near extinction of Bald Eagles. Namely that it is false. Sorry.

      http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,202447,00.html
      As early as 1921, the journal Ecology reported that bald eagles were threatened with extinction – 22 years before DDT production even began. According to a report in the National Museum Bulletin, the bald eagle reportedly had vanished from New England by 1937 – 10 years before widespread use of the pesticide.

      But by 1960 – 20 years after the Bald Eagle Protection Act and at the peak of DDT use – the Audubon Society reported counting 25 percent more eagles than in its pre-1941 census. U.S. Forest Service studies reported an increase in nesting bald eagle productivity from 51 in 1964 to 107 in 1970, according to the 1970 Annual Report on Bald Eagle Status.

      The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service attributed bald eagle population reductions to a “widespread loss of suitable habitat,” but noted that “illegal shooting continues to be the leading cause of direct mortality in both adult and immature bald eagles,” according to a 1978 report in the Endangered Species Tech Bulletin.

      A 1984 National Wildlife Federation publication listed hunting, power line electrocution, collisions in flight and poisoning from eating ducks containing lead shot as the leading causes of eagle deaths.

      In addition to these reports, numerous scientific studies and experiments vindicate DDT.

      U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologists fed large doses of DDT to captive bald eagles for 112 days and concluded that “DDT residues encountered by eagles in the environment would not adversely affect eagles or their eggs,” according to a 1966 report published in the “Transcripts of 31st North America Wildlife Conference.”

      The USFWS examined every bald eagle found dead in the U.S. between 1961-1977 (266 birds) and reported no adverse effects caused by DDT or its residues.

    • NEILIO April 19, 2012 at 7:15 pm #

      http://dwb.unl.edu/Teacher/NSF/C06/C06Links/www.altgreen.com.au/Chemicals/ddt.html
      In 1968 two researchers, Drs. Joseph J. Hickey and Daniel W. Anderson, reported that high concentrations of DDT were found in the eggs of wild raptor populations. The two concluded that increased eggshell fragility in peregrine falcons, bald eagles, and ospreys was due to DDT exposure.9 Dr. Joel Bitman and associates at the U.S. Department of Agriculture likewise determined that Japanese quail fed DDT produced eggs with thinner shells and lower calcium content.10

      In actuality, however, declines in bird populations either had occurred before DDT was present or had occured years after DDT’s use. A comparison of the annual Audubon Christmas Bird Counts between 1941 (pre-DDT) and 1960 (after DDT’s use had waned) reveals that at least 26 different kinds of birds became more numerous during those decades, the period of greatest DDT usage. The Audubon counts document an overall increase in birds seen per observer from 1941 to 1960, and statistical analyses of the Audubon data confirm the perceived increases. For example, only 197 bald eagles were documented in 194111; the number had increased to 891 in 1960.12

      At Hawk Mountain, Pennsylvania, teams of ornithologists made daily counts of migrating raptors for over 40 years. The counts—published annually by the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary Association—reveal great increases in most kinds of hawks during the DDT years. The osprey counts increased as follows: in 1946, 191; in 1956, 288; in 1967, 457; and in 1972, 630.13 In 1942 Dr. Joseph Hickey—who in 1968 would blame DDT for bird population decline—reported that 70 per-cent of the eastern osprey population had been killed by pole traps around fish hatcheries.14 That same year, before DDT came into use, Hickey noted a decline in the population of peregrine falcons.15

      Other observers also documented that the great peregrine decline in the eastern United States occurred long before any DDT was present in the environment.16,17 In Canada peregrines were observed to be “reproducing normally” in the 1960s even though their tissues contained 30 times more DDT than did the tissues of the midwestern peregrines allegedly being extirpated by the chemical.18 And in Great Britain, in 1969, a three-year government study noted that the decline of peregrine falcons in Britain had ended in 1966 even though DDT levels were as abundant as ever. The British study concluded that “There is no close correlation between the decline in population of predatory birds, particularly the peregrine falcon and the sparrow hawk, and the use of DDT.”19

      In addition, later research refuted the original studies that had pointed to DDT as a cause for eggshell thinning. After reassessing their findings using more modern methodology, Drs. Hickey and Anderson admitted that the egg extracts they had studied contained little or no DDT and said they were now pursuing PCBs, chemicals used as capacitor insulators, as the culprit.20

      • Rob N. Hood April 20, 2012 at 7:09 am #

        Neil- the fact that there are conspriacy theories for EVERYTHING is really nothing new. Use your own advice below re: “facts” etc. Or not. You won’t. You don’t. DDT was a Huge business, not unlike oil, tobacco, etc. and per corporate mentality was willing do anything, and pay just about anything to anyone to secure the bottom line.

  8. Rob N. Hood April 18, 2012 at 7:15 am #

    BTW- a Righty lecturing a Liberal on the value of life and health is extremely absurd, no matter what. Just an FYI. But the Right is all about blind absurdity.

    • NEILIO April 19, 2012 at 6:51 pm #

      So it doesn’t matter what the truth or the facts of a matter are? As long as it is believed by the Left, it is correct? I’m sorry that you find the truth to be absurd. I can only imagine what your perception of the world is because of the distortions of the falsehoods that you think are truths. It must get reather confusing for you at times, you poor dear.

    • NEILIO April 19, 2012 at 9:05 pm #

      The value of life and health? Are you kidding? So you value life and health though you think it’s ok for a woman to choose to destroy a living, healthy fetus? That is a very hypocritical position to take. Don’t you think? That…. I find extremely absurd. Come on dude.

  9. NEILIO April 19, 2012 at 6:39 pm #

    Well, something I have had a suspicion about for a few years has now been pointed out at Real Science.

    http://www.real-science.com/breaking-news-nsidc-gets-in-the-data-tampering-act
    At 8:56 am MDT, NSIDC showed that April 16 Arctic ice extent was about to cross the 1979-2000 mean.
    Sometime during the day today they changed their data, and pushed extent much further from the mean line.

  10. Rob N. Hood April 20, 2012 at 7:05 am #

    This, our, reality is NOT black and white. Re: abortion for example. It is the only exception to the Liberal value re: health and life, although we worry about the health and life of the “FetusCarrier”, an actual live human being too. We also care a lot about the children AFTER they are born, unlike you sanctimonious Rightys. But as a rather extreme Righty, your brain does not do nuance very well, and this is just one example of that. You using abortion to lecture a Liberal is so boring and par for the course. It is you who are absurd. And it is the average Righty who is battling confusion, every day due to their inability to analyze data objectively and logically. From many angles, etc. The Right sees a one or two dimensional world, and that is the origin of their main strength as a group. Group Think emerges much more easily from that point of view. However, over time, logic has won out in the end, it always will. Look at history for many many examples.

  11. Rob N. Hood April 20, 2012 at 8:46 am #

    The world benefits from “anal” people. I, above, accepted my role as an “expulsive” graciously including its negatives. I am not trying to insult you, just once again employing reality and objective logic. You have filled this blog with your complusion to be anal. To be insulted by it is what is childish, and I even attempted to explain it to you, in non-offensive terms, but of course you shot that down and then anally supplanted your own researched version of it and of Freud. This exemplifies your shortcoming logically speaking and your anal habits to a tee.

  12. Buzz April 20, 2012 at 9:18 am #

    Rob, Libs are always blind to any evidence that goes against them gaining more control and growing government. http://bit.ly/JgFxAq

    • NEILIO April 20, 2012 at 6:33 pm #

      That’s right Buzz. Drama and hype are all that matter to libs. They feel a certain way about things because of liberal dogma, and when those pesky little things we call facts get in the way they just amplify the drama. Look at our friend Rob N dramaHood here. He doesn’t have to just reply to something, he has to reply to it three somtimes four times! It’s as if the answer he gave the first time wasn’t dramatic enough, he has to take it to the next level. And he claims he’s so open minded and looks at things from many different perspectives but if you offer anything that challenges his beliefs he has to go on a rant about how closed minded we are. It’s pathetic.

      • Dan McGrath April 20, 2012 at 6:46 pm #

        Let’s not make the debate about the personalities of commentators. Issues, my friends!

        • NEILIO April 20, 2012 at 10:05 pm #

          Well he kinda makes ‘imself a target. And I think it is pertainant to the mindset of the environmentalist lefties who gave us the global warming scam to begin with. And our leftist friend RNH embodies that mindset. It’s hard not to point it out on occasion. But I relent, and will try not to point the laser at him personally.

          • Dan McGrath April 20, 2012 at 10:18 pm #

            You’d have my gratitude.

  13. Rob N. Hood April 21, 2012 at 8:01 am #

    Drama and hype are not the sole properties of the Left. In fact I could logically argue just the opposite, just as I could, and have done here consistently, including the opposite of Buzz’s comment. But when one’s brain is twisted so much one way, it truly cannot see the other, regardless of overwhelming logic and reasoning. It never ceases to amaze and shock me that this is the case with humans, with our big brains. Thus my continuing Queote-like quest to extract any bits and pieces of God-given intelligence from the dark nether regions of the right-wing psyche. Give me credit, at least, for not exactly giving up on you all, despite the seemingly overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

  14. Phillip April 22, 2012 at 4:43 am #

    I, Phillip McGibbony, deny that our climate has changed because of human intervention to CO2 levels in our atmosphere. Those that believe that the climate is changing because of human intervention are either. 1) Agencies dependent on Government handouts and therefor endorse the blame on humanity. 2) Lacking any real analytical ability to discern truth from error. 3) Poor folk that trust everything the Government says or 4) Is the Government looking for every opportunity to raise taxes, so it doesn’t look like a tax because they need more money because they just can’t manage their spending within their means. Wake up world. We have, throughout all of our history, had climate change which is unrelated to CO2 levels.

    • Rob N. Hood April 23, 2012 at 3:03 pm #

      Bravo Phillip! You have condensed the Right-wing talking points on this issue into an easy to read reader’s digest version for us all to admire. I, Rob Hood, deny all of your regurgitated assertions. Except perhaps for #4. Since we the Middle-class are so grateful to our wealthy overlords that we fight along side them (figuratively speaking of course- they won’t let us into their private clubs or gated communities) to protect their right to pay fewer taxes than even we ourselves often do.

  15. Rob N. Hood April 23, 2012 at 10:08 am #

    To the shock of most sentient beings, Facts died Wednesday, April 18, after a long battle for relevancy with the 24-hour news cycle, blogs and the Internet. Though few expected Facts to pull out of its years-long downward spiral, the official cause of death was from injuries suffered recently when Florida Republican Rep. Allen West steadfastly declared that as many as 81 of his fellow members of the U.S. House of Representatives are communists.

    Facts held on for several days after that assault — brought on without a scrap of evidence or reason — before expiring peacefully at its home in a high school physics book. Facts was 2,372.

    “It’s very depressing,” said Mary Poovey, a professor of English at New York University and author of “A History of the Modern Fact.”

    “I think the thing Americans ought to miss most about facts is the lack of agreement that there are facts. This means we will never reach consensus about anything. Tax policies, presidential candidates. We’ll never agree on anything.”

    • Rob N. Hood April 25, 2012 at 12:27 pm #

      I, Rob Hood, declare I am not a communist. (as if that is the worse thing a person could be). (methinks Mr. West needs his meds re-filled, maybe he can get them on-line from Canada). (for those who are curious, Canada is not a communist country, thus Mr. West should not hesitate to make good use of their lower cost medications). (that reminds me, many Americans now travel to other countries for actual medical care even surgical procedures that they cannot afford in the USA). (I better stop now because I am starting to want to become a communist…)

  16. Rob N. Hood April 24, 2012 at 7:24 am #

    Facts- R.I.P.

  17. Geddy May 1, 2012 at 9:55 pm #

    NASA has an ‘exemplary’ reputation?
    They have been in the loony left’s pocket for decades.

    • Rob N. Hood May 3, 2012 at 2:45 pm #

      Wow, really? They attempting to create hippy-like communes on the moon, or research for star-wars projects? Satellite placement/repair a looney left project now? Funny cuz I think much of the satellite usuage is for communication, most importantly for military purposes. If this seems “Left” to you, you may want to get a med change…

  18. Rob N. Hood May 2, 2012 at 8:17 am #

    Research suggests that conservatives are, on average, more susceptible to fear than those who identify themselves as liberals. Looking at MRIs of a large sample of young adults last year, researchers at University College London discovered that “greater conservatism was associated with increased volume of the right amygdala”. The amygdala is an ancient brain structure that’s activated during states of fear and anxiety. (The researchers also found that “greater liberalism was associated with increased gray matter volume in the anterior cingulate cortex” – a region in the brain that is believed to help people manage complexity.)

  19. Rob N. Hood May 2, 2012 at 11:19 am #

    Continue, for a moment, to stroll in the shoes of a true believer on the right. Imagine how frightening it would be to believe Frank Gaffney, a former Assistant Secretary of Defense in the Reagan administration and leading neoconservative voice, when he claims the Muslim Brotherhood has infiltrated the highest levels of the US government, or Newt Gingrich, when he says that “sharia law” (there isn’t such a thing in the way conservatives portray it – as a discrete canon of laws) poses a grave threat to our way of life.

    Imagine believing that the Democrats’ business-friendly insurance reforms included panels of bureaucrats who would decide when to let you die, as Sarah Palin infamously suggested. Or that virtually the entire field of climatology is perpetrating a “hoax,” as senator James Inhofe claims, in order to undermine capitalism and impose a one-world government. Imagine seeing energy-efficient lightbulbs as part of an international plot to, again, undermine capitalism, as Michele Bachmann believes. Imagine thinking that the public school system “indoctrinates” young children into the “gay lifestyle,” as influential members of the religious right – Pat Dobson, Bryan Fischer, Anita Bryant – have claimed for years. Imagine believing our electoral system is tarnished by massive voter fraud or that union thugs are running amok or that the Department of Homeland Security is making a list of people who advocate for “limited government.” Imagine if there really were a War on Christmas!

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