Dive Brief:
- The case of a climate-change-denying scientist under fire for accepting money from energy companies is raising questions about claimed academic affiliations and donation disclosures.
- The scientist, Wei-Hock Soon, an astrophysicist at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, claimed an affiliation with Harvard University through the observatory, even though it is only a shared physical facility and he was not a Harvard employee.
- The Smithsonian and Soon received $1.2 million over 10 years in donations from contributors opposed to the idea that fossil fuels cause global warming, but the institution doesn’t require its researchers to disclose potential conflicts of interest in their journal articles, the Chronicle of Higher Education reports.
Dive Insight:
While Soon is bearing the brunt of the criticism for failing to disclose his financial ties to the industries supporting his point of view on climate change, the Smithsonian also deserves blame for not requiring such disclosures. Both the Smithsonian and Harvard should be held responsible for allowing Soon to continue claiming the “Harvard scientist” mantle. The reluctance of the Smithsonian to challenge the veracity of Soon’s scientific views or his Harvard designation could be attributed to the institution’s own conflict of interest — it risked causing a lucrative source of funding to dry up, and the nebulous Harvard connection through the shared observatory also benefits the Smithsonian.