Recess Week, NASA Senior Review, Climate Change
If you think it’s been a while since I’ve posted, and wonder why that is - the answer is simple. Last week was what Congress calls a “district work week” - i.e. they were in their home states or districts.
Additionally, the AAS of course has our meeting in St. Louis which is ongoing, though I’m back in DC today. So, needless to say things are a bit quiet here at AAS HQ.
A couple of items - the NASA senior review of operating missions is available online (PDF link)
The Washington Post reports that NASA’s Inspector General has found that science on climate change was manipulated by political appointees.
From the fall of 2004 through 2006, the report said, NASA’s public affairs office “managed the topic of climate change in a manner that reduced, marginalized, or mischaracterized climate change science made available to the general public.” It noted elsewhere that “news releases in the areas of climate change suffered from inaccuracy, factual insufficiency, and scientific dilution.”
The full report can be read here (PDF file)
The AAS council issued a statement in 2004 concurring with the AGU on the need for peer-reviewed science to inform our decisions on climate change. It reads in part:
… The American Astronomical Society (AAS) joins the AGU in calling for peer-reviewed climate research to inform climate-related policy decisions, and, as well, to provide a basis for mitigating the harmful effects of global change and to help communities adapt and become resilient to extreme climatic events. In endorsing the “Human Impacts on Climate” statement, the AAS recognizes the collective expertise of the AGU in scientific subfields central to assessing and understanding global change, and acknowledges the strength of agreement among our AGU colleagues that the global climate is changing and human activities are contributing to that change.
