Copich: Student response to climate lecture by Dr. David Legates

For decades, climate scientists have worked tirelessly to prove the urgency of the climate crisis and immediacy of human intervention. It is remarkable to me that one man believed he could disprove the work of millions of researchers with a simple click through a PowerPoint slide deck. 

Last Wednesday, April 29, in the Sun Room of Iowa State’s Memorial Union, 50 minutes of climate change disinformation was presented by Dr. David Legates.

The lecture, full of hand-picked examples, attempted to disprove decades worth of climate change research and ventured to demolish the entire foundation of climate change.

The backbone of Legates’ thesis was that the increased global warming seen today is not entirely human-made, or anthropogenic, but instead the result of natural processes. Throughout his presentation, he rapidly flipped through graphs and figures, which were linked back to his employer’s website, while repeating the phrase, “We see a lot of variability, but no long-term change.”

However, 97% of scientists agree that the global warming seen today is man-made as a result of reliance on fossil fuels and other consumption factors. 

“I don’t think he gave a fair representation of climate science, because he cherry-picked data in his presentation and overall used the data to undermine the current foundations of climate science that have decades of information to back it up,” Nora Bass, a junior in climate science and president of the Climate Science club, who attended Wednesday’s lecture, said.

Legates’s presentation hit on many different topics, from hurricanes and tornadoes to urban hotspots and, briefly, sea-level rise. None of which were elaborated on besides a surface-level explanation of what his carefully selected data sets showed.

Throughout the presentation, Legates emphasized the impacts of urban sprawl on how weather stations collect temperature data. He claims that the warming trend spread by climate scientists in recent decades is because the weather centers collecting the data are found in urban areas, which are heavily influenced by the heat island effect, making the globe seem warmer than it actually is. 

What he forgot to mention is that proxy data from clam shells, trees and ice cores — many of which are collected away from urban areas — show an exponential increase in global temperatures. 

As a climate science major myself, I know that science can be unpredictable and comes with a lot of uncertainty. However, I also know the importance of backing up your claims with extensive research and peer-reviewed citations, a step that Legates decided to skip over. 

“I have no issue with promoting ideas that differ from mine. I really appreciate the previous lecture program’s challenging of my beliefs, but there is a distinct difference between hosting a dissenting voice and promoting blatant, harmful disinformation. Dr. Legates is firmly the latter,” Daniel Musel, senior in climate science and environmental studies, said after Wednesday’s lecture. 

I do not doubt Legates is a highly educated individual who has put in decades of research; however, this is precisely what makes this lecture so dangerous. His association with groups like the Independent Institute and Heartland Institute make his credibility, or lack thereof, troubling.

Legates holds a long list of credentials — he received a PhD in climatology from the University of Delaware, is the former executive director of the United States Global Change Research Program and a research fellow at the Independent Institute, among other things.

“It can be hard to trust the work coming from a scientist who has worked with these organizations extensively,” Luke Juffer, a senior in economics and philosophy at ISU, who attended Wednesday’s lecture, said.

Groups like the Heartland Institute and Independent Institute receive millions of dollars in donations from private donors who work to spread disinformation. For the Heartland Institute, these donors have included tobacco companies like Philip Morris, oil companies like ExxonMobil and numerous conservative foundations. 

I believe it is the responsibility of a public university like Iowa State to foster an environment of accurate and productive discussion. However, inviting Legates to take the stage set disinformation on a pedestal and worked to undermine the integrity of climate science professors and researchers on our campus.