Credibility challenged
Bruno Walther makes several ad hominem attacks on Bjorn Lomborg in his opinion piece (“Global economy must be rebuilt,” Dec. 21, page 8). One of these borders on dishonesty and deserves a challenge, going directly to Walther’s own credibility. He states: “The Danish Committees on Scientific Dishonesty (DCSD) showed that [a book Lomborg authored] contained deliberately misleading, biased and fabricated data, flawed statistics and misrepresented conclusions, and was thus a clear case of scientific dishonesty contrary to the standards of good scientific practice (www.lomborg-errors.dk).” Note the url address of Walther’s source.
What Walther did not say was that the DCSD report was withdrawn after the committee itself was found to have not documented the very review they supposedly conducted by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation in Denmark. Further, the ministry found the DCSD’s work to be “dissatisfactory,” “completely void of argumentation,” “open to criticism” and “emotional.”
The DCSD was given an opportunity to redo their work but declined to do so.
Surely Walther knows this, since the action was taken in 2003.
BRUCE HIGGINS
Flagstaff, Arizona
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