It's Gettin' Hot in Here: The Big Battle Over Climate Science

Where does climate science go from here? The Copenhagen talks were a dud. Stolen e-mail correspondence has embarrassed some leading climatologists. If the science is settled and the threat is urgent, why has global warming become a soap opera? To find out, DISCOVER sought two different, important views, from Penn State’s Michael Mann and Georgia Tech’s Judith Curry. What was your reaction to the scandal over stolen e-mail? I sympathize a bit with the guys who got caught out in the e-mail hack. I know what it’s like to be under that kind of attack, and it’s not pleasant. We were attacked pretty soundly in the media [for a 2005 paper showing that the frequency of intense hurricanes has almost doubled in the past 30 years]. We had firsthand experience dealing with climate skeptics, amplified by advocacy groups like the Competitive Enterprise Institute and a lot of the think tanks ...