Thread by @j_timmer

My obit for Freeman Dyson has gotten more push back than perhaps anything else i've written, entirely because i included his late-career dabbling in climate misinformation.

I have some thoughts on this push back so, in the interest of getting them all in one place, a thread:

This wasn't just a one-off oddity. Dyson returned to the subject multiple times, joined up with the Global Warming Policy Foundation, and contributed a foreword to one of its reports.

If an obit is intended to give a full picture of someone's life...

This isn't really something you can skip over for Dyson's. It shouldn't be the focus, because Dyson did so, so much more, but it can't really be omitted either.

So, you should focus on the science behind his break with other scientists then? Not so easy.

In his writing, he never really engages with the evidence that climate science has generated. It's mostly whataboutism and arguing that the whole field has gone astray because of social conformity and internal politics, plus perhaps a grudge that he wasn't listened to.

In many ways, that makes it more important to include it. Dyson was a brilliant scientist, and apparently very humane and generous with his time. But he was also human, and the climate stuff makes that clear.

The fact that great scientists _are_ still human...

with warts and flaws they share with the rest of us, is really important to emphasize in a culture where people feel removed and isolated from science and its practitioners.

Which may be the most important reason to include the climate stuff in his obit.