Steven E. Koonin

Last updated

The science is stronger than ever around findings that speak to the likelihood and consequences of climate impacts, and has been growing stronger for decades. In the early days of research, the uncertainty was wide; but with each subsequent step that uncertainty has narrowed or become better understood. This is how science works, and in the case of climate, the early indications detected and attributed in the 1980s and 1990s, have come true, over and over again and sooner than anticipated... [Decision makers] are using the best and most honest science to inform prospective investments in abatement (reducing greenhouse gas emissions to diminish the estimated likelihoods of dangerous climate change impacts) and adaptation (reducing vulnerabilities to diminish their current and projected consequences). [29]

Physicist Mark Boslough, a former student of Koonin, posted a critical review at Yale Climate Connections. He stated that "Koonin makes use of an old strawman concocted by opponents of climate science in the 1990s to create an illusion of arrogant scientists, biased media, and lying politicians – making them easier to attack." [31]

Nonprofit organization Inside Climate News reported that climate scientists call Koonin's conclusions "fatally out of date ... and based on the 2013 physical science report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)." [10]

Mark P. Mills, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank, and faculty fellow at Northwestern University’s McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science, [32] lauded the book in The Wall Street Journal as "rebut[ing] much of the dominant political narrative". [33] Twelve scientists analyzed Mills's arguments and said that he merely repeated Koonin's incorrect and misleading claims. [34] Koonin responded with a post on Medium.com answering these critics. [35]

On August 21, 2023, an interview with Koonin was released via the Stanford University Hoover Institution video series, Uncommon Knowledge with Peter Robinson.

Publications

  • 2024 edition: Unsettled: What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn't, and Why It Matters (Updated and Expanded Edition). Dallas: BenBella Books. 2024. ISBN   9781637745250.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">California Institute of Technology</span> Research university in California, US

The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech) is a private research university in Pasadena, California, United States. The university is responsible for many modern scientific advancements and is among a small group of institutes of technology in the United States that are devoted to the instruction of pure and applied sciences.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cold fusion</span> Hypothetical type of nuclear reaction

Cold fusion is a hypothesized type of nuclear reaction that would occur at, or near, room temperature. It would contrast starkly with the "hot" fusion that is known to take place naturally within stars and artificially in hydrogen bombs and prototype fusion reactors under immense pressure and at temperatures of millions of degrees, and be distinguished from muon-catalyzed fusion. There is currently no accepted theoretical model that would allow cold fusion to occur.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fred Singer</span> Austrian-born American physicist (1924–2020)

Siegfried Fred Singer was an Austrian-born American physicist and emeritus professor of environmental science at the University of Virginia, trained as an atmospheric physicist. He was known for rejecting the scientific consensus on several issues, including climate change, the connection between UV-B exposure and melanoma rates, stratospheric ozone loss being caused by chlorofluoro compounds, often used as refrigerants, and the health risks of passive smoking.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Andrews Millikan</span> American physicist (1868–1953)

Robert Andrews Millikan was an American experimental physicist who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1923 for the measurement of the elementary electric charge and for his work on the photoelectric effect.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory</span> National laboratory located near Berkeley, California, U.S.

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory is a federally funded research and development center in the hills of Berkeley, California, United States. Established in 1931 by the University of California (UC), the laboratory is sponsored by the United States Department of Energy and administered by the UC system. Ernest Lawrence, who won the Nobel prize for inventing the cyclotron, founded the lab and served as its director until his death in 1958. Located in the Berkeley Hills, the lab overlooks the campus of the University of California, Berkeley.

David Louis Goodstein was an American physicist and educator. From 1988 to 2007 he served as Vice-provost of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), where he was also a professor of physics and applied physics, as well as the Frank J. Gilloon Distinguished Teaching and Service Professor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Raja Ramanna</span> Indian physicist

Raja Ramanna was an Indian nuclear physicist. He was the director of India's nuclear program in the late 1960s and early 1970s, which culminated in Smiling Buddha, India's first successful nuclear weapon test on 18 May 1974.

JASON is an independent group of elite scientists that advises the United States government on matters of science and technology, mostly of a sensitive nature. The group was created in the aftermath of the Sputnik launch as a way to reinvigorate the idea of having the nation's preeminent scientists help the government with defense problems, similar to the way that scientists helped in World War II but with a new and younger generation. It was established in 1960 and has somewhere between 30 and 60 members. Its work first gained public notoriety as the source of the Vietnam War's McNamara Line electronic barrier. Although most of its research is military-focused, JASON also produced early work on the science of global warming and acid rain. Current unclassified research interests include health informatics, cyberwarfare, and renewable energy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Nierenberg</span> American physicist

William Aaron Nierenberg was an American physicist who worked on the Manhattan Project and was director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography from 1965 through 1986. He was a co-founder of the George C. Marshall Institute in 1984.

Steven Earl Jones is an American physicist. Among scientists, Jones became known for his research into muon-catalyzed fusion and geo-fusion. Jones is also known for his association with 9/11 conspiracy theories. Jones has claimed that airplane crashes and fires could not have caused the fall of the World Trade Center Towers and 7 World Trade Center, suggesting controlled demolition instead. In late 2006, Brigham Young University (BYU) officials placed him on paid leave until he elected to retire in an agreement with BYU. Jones continued research and writing following his early retirement from BYU.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steven Chu</span> American physicist and former U.S. Secretary of Energy (born 1948)

Steven Chu is an American physicist and former government official. He is a Nobel laureate and was the 12th U.S. secretary of energy. He is currently the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Physics and Professor of Molecular and Cellular Physiology at Stanford University. He is known for his research at the University of California, Berkeley, and his research at Bell Laboratories and Stanford University regarding the cooling and trapping of atoms with laser light, for which he shared the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physics with Claude Cohen-Tannoudji and William Daniel Phillips.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Climate change denial</span> Denial of the scientific consensus on climate change

Climate change denial is a form of science denial characterized by rejecting, refusing to acknowledge, disputing, or fighting the scientific consensus on climate change. Those promoting denial commonly use rhetorical tactics to give the appearance of a scientific controversy where there is none. Climate change denial includes unreasonable doubts about the extent to which climate change is caused by humans, its effects on nature and human society, and the potential of adaptation to global warming by human actions. To a lesser extent, climate change denial can also be implicit when people accept the science but fail to reconcile it with their belief or action. Several studies have analyzed these positions as forms of denialism, pseudoscience, or propaganda.

The Office of Science is a component of the United States Department of Energy (DOE). The Office of Science is the lead federal agency supporting fundamental scientific research for energy and the Nation’s largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences. The Office of Science portfolio has two principal thrusts: direct support of scientific research and direct support of the development, construction, and operation of unique, open-access scientific user facilities that are made available for use by external researchers.

Robert V. Duncan is a physicist at Texas Tech University, Texas and previously served as vice chancellor for research at the University of Missouri in Columbia, Missouri. Prior to his current posting he held various assignments while serving as a professor of physics at UNM, including associate dean for research in the college of arts and sciences there, professor of physics and astronomy at the University of New Mexico, was named as the Gordon and Betty Moore Distinguished Scholar in the division of physics, mathematics and astronomy at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), and is a fellow of the American Physical Society "for pioneering advances in experimental studies of dynamic critical phenomena near the superfluid transition in 4He, and for the development of novel instrumentation and measurement techniques for use on earth and in space".

Padmanabhan Krishnagopala Iyengar, best known as P. K. Iyengar, was an Indian nuclear physicist who is widely known for his central role in the development of the nuclear program of India. Iyengar previously served as the director of BARC and former chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission of India, he raised his voice and opposition against the nuclear agreement between India and the United States and expressed that the deal favoured the United States.

<i>The Canon</i> (book) Book by Natalie Angier

The Canon: A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science is a book written by American science author Natalie Angier.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Clauser</span> American physicist (born 1942)

John Francis Clauser is an American theoretical and experimental physicist known for contributions to the foundations of quantum mechanics, in particular the Clauser–Horne–Shimony–Holt inequality. Clauser was awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics, jointly with Alain Aspect and Anton Zeilinger "for experiments with entangled photons, establishing the violation of Bell inequalities and pioneering quantum information science".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Berkeley Earth</span> Climatological research institute

Berkeley Earth is a Berkeley, California-based independent 501(c)(3) non-profit focused on land temperature data analysis for climate science. Berkeley Earth was founded in early 2010 to address the major concerns from outside the scientific community regarding global warming and the instrumental temperature record. The project's stated aim was a "transparent approach, based on data analysis." In February 2013, Berkeley Earth became an independent non-profit. In August 2013, Berkeley Earth was granted 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status by the US government. The primary product is air temperatures over land, but they also produce a global dataset resulting from a merge of their land data with HadSST.

Novim is a non-profit group at the University of California, Santa Barbara that organizes teams for objective scientific study of global issues and identification options for addressing the concerns, based upon a collaborative problem-solving approach used in the field of physics.

References

  1. "Steven Koonin". Array of Contemporary American Physicists. American Institute of Physics. Archived from the original on 31 March 2015. Retrieved 20 September 2014.
  2. "Steven Koonin". NYU Tandon School of Engineering.
  3. "Steven E. Koonin – Director – NYU's Center for Urban Science & Progress and Former Under Secretary for Science". energy.gov. US DOE. Retrieved 11 May 2021.
  4. "Frank talk on U.S. Energy innovation". 23 September 2010.
  5. "Koonin, Steven E." history.aip.org. Retrieved 2019-12-30.
  6. "Arthur Kerman, professor emeritus of physics, dies at 88". MIT News. 2 June 2017. Retrieved 2019-12-30.
  7. "Former Caltech Provost Steven Koonin Nominated for Under Secretary for Science | Caltech". www.caltech.edu. Archived from the original on 2014-12-07.
  8. "Caltech Appoints Physicist Steve Koonin New Provost". California Institute of Technology. Retrieved 2018-12-20.
  9. "Steven E. Koonin – Director – NYU's Center for Urban Science & Progress and Former Under Secretary for Science". energy.gov. US DOE. Retrieved 11 May 2021.
  10. 1 2 Lavelle, Marianne (May 4, 2021). "A New Book Feeds Climate Doubters, but Scientists Say the Conclusions are Misleading and Out of Date". Inside Climate News . Archived from the original on May 5, 2021. Retrieved August 14, 2021.
  11. President Obama Announces More Key Administration Posts
  12. Energy.gov: "Dr. Steven E. Koonin – Director – NYU's Center for Urban Science & Progress and Former Under Secretary for Science" retrieved October 20, 2013
  13. "Steve Koonin" . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  14. "Steven Koonin". Department of Energy.
  15. "Physics Research Conference – Speaker: Dr. Steven E. Koonin". California Institute of Technology, The Division of Physics, Mathematics and Astronomy. Archived from the original on 2010-06-23. Retrieved 2014-07-18.
  16. "Awards". American Academy of Sciences & Letters. Retrieved 2024-10-27.
  17. Ritter, Stanley K. "Cold fusion died 25 years ago, but the research lives on". Chemical & Engineering News.
  18. 1 2 3 Goodstein, David L. "Whatever Happened to Cold Fusion?" (PDF). Cal Tech. Cal Tech. Retrieved 1 November 2024.
  19. Browne, Malcom W. "Physicists Debunk Claim Of a New Kind of Fusion". New York Times. New York Times. Retrieved 1 November 2024.
  20. Taubes, Gary (1993). Bad Science: The Short Life and Weird Times of Cold Fusion. New York: Random House. p. 266. ISBN   978-0-394-58456-0.
  21. Hirji, Zahra (May 15, 2018). "Here's The EPA Press Release Announcing The "Red Team/Blue Team" Climate Debate That Never Happened". BuzzFeed News . Retrieved August 14, 2021.
  22. Bravender, Robin (June 13, 2018). "Obama official would have led EPA's climate science debate—if all agencies took part". Science . American Association for the Advancement of Science . Retrieved 2020-12-20.
  23. 1 2 Waldman, Scott. "Skeptics Are Being Recruited for an "Adversarial" Review of Climate Science". Scientific American . Retrieved 2020-12-20.
  24. Eilperin, Juliet; Ryan, Missy (February 20, 2019). "White House prepares to scrutinize intelligence agencies' finding that climate change threatens national security". The Washington Post . Retrieved August 14, 2021.
  25. Eilperin, Juliet; Dawsey, Josh; Dennis, Brady (February 24, 2019). "White House to set up panel to counter climate change consensus, officials say". The Washington Post . Retrieved August 14, 2021.
  26. Koonin, Steven E. (September 19, 2014). "Climate Science Is Not Settled" . The Wall Street Journal . Retrieved 16 May 2021.
  27. "Climate Science is Not Settled" (PDF). Retrieved 2024-02-28.
  28. Pierrehumbert, Raymond (October 1, 2014). "Climate Science Is Settled Enough". Slate . Retrieved May 16, 2021.
  29. 1 2 Yohe, Gary (May 13, 2021). "A New Book Manages to Get Climate Science Badly Wrong". Scientific American . Retrieved 16 May 2021.
  30. National Post staff (2 September 2021). "The unalarmist: Steven Koonin's controversial climate contentions". National Post . Retrieved 2021-10-25.
  31. Boslough, Mark (May 25, 2021). "A critical review of Steven Koonin's 'Unsettled'". Yale Climate Connections . The Yale Center for Environmental Communication. Retrieved August 14, 2021.
  32. "Mark P. Mills". Manhattan Institute. Retrieved 2022-07-23.
  33. Mills, Mark P. (2021-04-25). "'Unsettled' Review: The 'Consensus' On Climate". The Wall Street Journal. ISSN   0099-9660.
  34. Bellanger, Boris (May 3, 2021). "Wall Street Journal article repeats multiple incorrect and misleading claims made in Steven Koonin's new book 'Unsettled'". Science Feedback. Climate Feedback . Retrieved September 16, 2024.
  35. Koonin, Steven (2021-05-16). "A bad check of climate facts" . Retrieved 2023-03-13.
Steven E. Koonin
Steven Koonin official portrait.jpg
Director of the Center for Urban Science and Progress, New York University
In office
April 2012 ?