Heartland Institute Vs. Chinese Academy Of Science, Round II

Last week the Heartland Institute got into it with Chinese Academy of Science.  The academy had seen fit to translate  HI's  Climate Change Reconsidered reports, and PR guy Jim Lakely from the institute suggested that this counted as an endorsement of the think-tank's position re global warming.  But no; CAS begged to differ, in fairly strong terms, and Lakeley was forced to issue an apology/retraction.

Now, however, we find that HI's words were hollow.  CEO Joe Bast writes:

Regrettably, the lies of some advocates, perhaps aided by confusion caused by the language barrier, led Chinese officials to threaten to cancel a planned workshop in Beijing for some of the authors and translators of Climate Change Reconsidered. With four scientists representing The Heartland Institute already in Beijing, we agreed to remove the news release and the book itself from our Web site.

Now that the workshop has been successfully concluded, we have restored our original news release...

So once they got their boys thehelloutta China, they went back to their original, misleading statement.

I emailed CAS once again to see if they had any further response to this latest bit of trickery, and they responded as follows:

Dear Mr. Murphy,

It's very kind of you to remind us the repost of the Heartland release. We have notice it last week. The CAS attitude towards the translated book had been made clear in the statements on June 15 as follows: http://english.cas.cn/Ne/CASE/201306/t20130615_104625.shtml. We are sure that we have sent you the translator's preface in our last email, in which the translator had addressed his views on climate change and on the translation of the book.

We hope to receive your continuing focus on the Chinese Academy of Sciences, both on its scientific efforts&achievements and on its official website.


Best,
Chinese Academy of Sciences

Which, to me at least, suggests they are really, really tired of the Heartland Institute and the whole clown show HI inflicted on them.  I suspect that this will be the last bit of cooperating we see between HI and CAS for a long while.

Chinese Academy Of Sciences Issues A Statement; Heartland Institute Issues A Grovelling Apology

First, from the CAS site:

The Chinese translation of the “Climate Change Reconsidered—NIPCC Report” was organized by the Information Center for Global Change Studies, Scientific Information Center for Resources and Environment of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and was published in May 2013 through Science Press. However, the Heartland Institute published the news titled “Chinese Academy of Sciences publishes Heartland Institute research skeptical of Global Warming” in a strongly misleading way on its website, implying that the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) supports their views, in contrary to what is clearly stated in the Translators’ Note in the Chinese translation.

To clarify the fact, the Chinese Academy of Sciences is now making an official statement as follows:

Firstly, the translation is organized by the Information Center for Global Change Studies, Scientific Information Center for Resources and Environment of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and published by Science Press as a product of science communication aiming at introducing diverse academic arguments.

Secondly, neither the translation nor the publication represents any views of the Chinese Academy of Sciences or its affiliations on related issues.

Thirdly, it is earnestly called upon by the Chinese Academy of Sciences to the general public not to accept and disseminate any misleading information related to the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Now from HI's Jim Lakeley:

"Some people interpreted our news release and a blog post describing this event as implying that the Chinese Academy of Sciences endorses the views contained in the original books. This is not the case, and we apologize to those who may have been confused by these news reports.

"To be clear, the release of this new publication does not imply CAS and any of its affiliates involved with its production 'endorse' the skeptical views contained in the report. Rather, as stated in the translator's preface of the book, 'The work of these translators, organizations and funders has been in the translation and the promotion of scientific dialogue, does not reflect that they agree with the views of NIPCC.' "

I have not reproduced HI's full statement out of decency's sake; click through the link to experience the full measure of Jim Lakely's self-abasement.  The date on Google Search (6 hours ago) suggests that Jim was up at midnight last night rhetorically flogging himself, which is unusual.  Its more typically HI to try and bluster their way through.

Oh, and in case you haven't been following, background is here and here.