The Bromance Continues: Kevin Folta Hearts Patrick Moore

The most recent episode of Talking Biotech podcast is yet another chapter in one of the love stories for the ages, that between Kevin Folta and Patrick Moore. We've seen their affection on display before in Turning a Blind Ideology.

Despite the title, the topic of climate change comes up for a large portion of this interview. Folta's description at the end also understated Moore's stance just a little bit. 

The dude is a full on denier.

In order to save you the pain of listening, I have summarized their discussion as follows

In addition to spouting utter BS about climate, Moore says to Folta “People have been indoctrinated to believe plastic is destroying the oceans.” Regarding the great pacific garbage patch, “It’s a fake, it doesn’t exist. It’s is not there. There is no pacific garbage patch.”

 

He continues, “It is a photo shop on the internet.”

Source

After you read his book, unless you are “completely indoctrinated into the cult of climate catastrophe,” you will believe what he’s saying. Also, polar bear counters are lying.

 
Kevin now chimes in to say he’s not a climate skeptic, he’s a skeptic of the catastrophic interpretations....then a half ass push back on one of Moore’s claims, who talks over him a bunch to declare, “we are actually in a 6,000 year cooling period now.”

 
“Read my book Kevin.”

 
“I’m a member of the CO2 Coalition. (A front group) Our conclusion is clear, increased CO2 is 100% beneficial for the environment.” 

Kevin then says he relies on the info from the National Academy of Sciences re climate, then asks Moore “who am I supposed to trust?” Moore bashes the NAS, and spews more propaganda. “We (humans) have restored a balance to the global carbon cycle.”

 
Folta reiterates his question about who can people trust, Moore says read my book.

Folta continues glossing over Moore’s ridiculous claims and kisses his ass.

Moore unsurprisingly says, “The solution is nuclear energy.”
He then sings the praises of fossil fuels, and goes on a tangent about nuclear again.

Nuclear, nuclear, nuclear.

 
Kevin loves it.

Kevin loves Patrick.

Fin.

In all seriousness, this is bad. Kevin has given this guy a platform to sell his book and promote his brand of ideological pseudoscience. Folta once again demonstrates how he gives Moore a pass on  climate science (and basic fucking ecology and logic). He weakly challenged Moore's assertions which just adds to the evidence that any credibility afforded to Folta by virtue of his teaching position at the University of Florida is undeserved. This whole podcast was an embarrassing farce. 

Several on Twitter also noticed this and voiced their criticism.

Sadly though, many who should definitely know better, including one of the organizers for the March for Science liked Kevin's shares of the podcast with Moore. Facepalm.

If you want to learn about climate science, here's a list compiled by MPH@GW, the George Washington University online Master of Public Health program. They don't list Moore, his book, The CO2 Coalition, or Kevin Folta, so you should probably be okay.

A Skeptic Promotes DDT...Again

Just in case we aren't already on the same page that getting your science information from people who call themselves babes is a bad idea, Yvette d'Entremont Ross (SciBabe) decided to make sure it was heard loud and clear with her "Moment of Science" dated January 30, 2021.

While the world is upside down and on fire, we can all take great comfort in the fact that Yvette is out there swooshing her lab coat over to the computer to type up a citation-less, expletive-peppered missive in defense of toxic chemicals and launch it onto her Facebook page.

DDT, the "miricle pesticide"

Here is the TL;DR version -

• Early pesticides were very toxic and bad!
• Enter organic chemistry...
• DDT saves half a billion lives! Wow!
• DDT safe!
• DDT safe!
• Everything's a chemical!
• Rachel Carson's book is just overblown bullshit!
• Okay so DDT was sorta bad for some birds...and it's a persistent organic pollutant...
• It's also a probable carcinogen, but coffee, so just ignore that.
• Risk is something I'm going gloss over in this sentence.
• INVOKE 500 MILLION LIVES STAT AGAIN FOR MIC DROP
• "DDT is good for me-e-e!" 🎶
• People will know I'm full of shit when they read this, but...
• Oh well! 

There is a veritable library of information on this topic, should readers wish to learn more about the history of DDT and malaria that Yvette seems to think isn't "nuanced" enough to include in her hastily written Facebook take. 

This isn't the first time SciBabe has used her platform to share myths about DDT, and it probably won't be the last.