Science

"On June 4, 1963, less than a year after the controversial environmental classic 'Silent Spring' was published, its author, Rachel Carson, testified before a Senate subcommittee on pesticides. She was 56 and dying of breast cancer. She told almost no one. She'd already survived a radical mastectomy. Her pelvis was so riddled with fractures that it was nearly impossible for her to walk to her seat at the wooden table before the Congressional panel. To hide her baldness, she wore a dark brown wig."

Federal and state health officials say that pesticide spraying for adult mosquitoes has reduced risk of West Nile virus by killing specific percentages of mosquitoes. When confronted with Freedom of Information Act requests for the data to back up those claims, they do not seem to be able to find any.

"A recent report from 'PBS NewsHour' on climate change has drawn sharp criticism from climate groups that feel it provides a false sense of debate around the facts of climate change."

"The segment, which aired on September 16, features interviews with 'converted skeptic' and University of California, Berkeley professor Richard Muller, along with climate skeptic Anthony Watts, a retired meteorologist.

"OTTAWA -- Atmospheric scientists from around the world are asking Environment Canada to back down from a plan that they believe would compromise ozone and radiation monitoring by putting it into the hands of an Information Technology computer expert."

After a study by Stanford researchers, published September 4, concluded that organic foods had negligible health benefits, controversy occurred. Now critics, mostly from the environmental health and organic food communities, are challenging the study's methods, its accuracy and completeness, its framing questions, potential conflict of interest stemming from funding support, and the competence of the news media in reporting it.

"When Kenneth Olden discusses environmental justice, he knows what he is talking about."

"The harassment faced by U.S.-based climate scientists has been well documented in the media -- but not the harassment of scientists in Europe, Canada or the rest of the world. That's because there hasn't been much to report."