Right on the heels of our screed against denialism (once again that's using arguments of Conspiracy, Selectivity, Fake Experts, Impossible Expections, and Arguments from Analogy/Red herrings to deny scientific consensus and obvious facts), the Royal Society has written a nasty letter to Exxon Mobile asking them to please, for once in their lives, stop lying to the public about climate change.

In an unprecedented step, the Royal Society, Britain's premier scientific academy, has written to the oil giant to demand that the company withdraws support for dozens of groups that have "misrepresented the science of climate change by outright denial of the evidence".

The scientists also strongly criticise the company's public statements on global warming, which they describe as "inaccurate and misleading".


Royal Society tells Exxon: stop funding climate change denial

Read the letter in full here (pdf)

David Adam, environment correspondent
Wednesday September 20, 2006
The Guardian

Exxon petrol station
The Royal Society is worried about climate change lobby groups, including those funded by Exxon. Photograph: Matt Slocum/AP


Britain's leading scientists have challenged the US oil company ExxonMobil to stop funding groups that attempt to undermine the scientific consensus on climate change.

In an unprecedented step, the Royal Society, Britain's premier scientific academy, has written to the oil giant to demand that the company withdraws support for dozens of groups that have "misrepresented the science of climate change by outright denial of the evidence".

The scientists also strongly criticise the company's public statements on global warming, which they describe as "inaccurate and misleading".

In a letter earlier this month to Esso, the UK arm of ExxonMobil, the Royal Society cites its own survey which found that ExxonMobil last year distributed $2.9m to 39 groups that the society says misrepresent the science of climate change.

These include the International Policy Network, a thinktank with its HQ in London, and the George C Marshall Institute, which is based in Washington DC. In 2004, the institute jointly published a report with the UK group the Scientific Alliance which claimed that global temperature rises were not related to rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.

Good for them, lets hope the US NAS is next. They forgot to mention though, the Mercatus Center at the George Mason non-University, which also specializes in blowing smoke up the publics' ass for sweet sweet oil money. If you want to track how Exxon distributes money to a network of dishonest hatchet-man groups who whore opinion for money, check out ExxonSecrets.org. The flash implementation of the money network is actually quite interesting to explore.