Roy Spencer

Roy Spencer gets lots of attention going on TV talk shows telling other people what's wrong with their science, but Spencer himself wouldn't withstand such scrutiny very well.

Spencer's most famous research was into tropospheric temperatures that he claimed proved that global temperatures were cooling, not warming. It turned out that Spencer had made significant mathematical mistakes in his research, however, and when these mistakes were corrected for, Spencer's research showed warming, not cooling. In spite of these developments, global warming deniers still cite the old research as proof that global warming is a hoax.

There are more fundamental problems with Roy Spencer's approach to scientific work, however. His book on climate change science actually begins with a denial that scientific data are relevant to the debate. He demeans the data as "blindingly technical statistics".

If the facts aren't important to Roy Spencer's science, then what is? Religion, it seems, forms the foundation of Spencer's research. He's worked with a group called the Interfaith Stewardship Alliance, which states that climate policy should be based upon the religious prophecies of the Bible. Roy Spencer also argues that biology classes in public high schools should include the Christian Creationist curriculum of Intelligent Design Theology.

Roy Spencer's work with organizations that are funded by fossil-fuel giant Exxon-Mobil show, however, that religion isn't all that motivates his "scientific" work. Plain old money seems to play quite a large role as well.