Professor Steve Running is not a Nobel Laureate

by Dr. Ed Berry

Professor Steve Running, University of Montana, mades two claims:

1. He shares the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Al Gore and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
2. His Nobel Peace Prize means he is an expert in climate physics.

On Oct 3, 2013, Dr. Steve Running discussed “the importance of the latest IPCC findings for Montana policymakers.”

Here’s the truth:

1. Professor Steve Running does NOT have a Nobel Peace Prize.
2. Even if he did, a Nobel Peace Prize has nothing to do with science.
3. Running worked on IPCC’s Working Group Two, “Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability“.
4. Running worked on Chapter 14 on hypothetical climate effects in North America, if climate change were true.
5. Running did not work on IPCC’s Working Group One, “The Physical Science Basis” on the cause of climate change.
6. Running’s expertise is in Forest Ecophysiology, Forest Management, and Botany, NOT Physics.

Since 2007, Steve Running, the University of Montana, and other sources have used Running’s false claim to a Nobel Peace Prize to promote IPCC’s unproven climate claims. Sometimes they omit the critical word “Peace” to imply Steve Running’s fictitious Nobel Peace Prize means he is an expert in climate physics.

Thousands, especially students, have swallowed this bait to believe human CO2 is the cause of climate change. Running has given his climate lectures all over Montana on the average of once per week, according to his recollections. I attended three of his so-called climate lectures. I am aware of how Steve Running uses false logic and fake science to promote belief in climate change.

In actual fact, half of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to the IPCC as an organization. The other half was bestowed on a specific individual (Al Gore). Five years later, in October 2012, the IPCC formally admitted:

“it is incorrect to refer to any IPCC official, or scientist who worked on IPCC reports, as a Nobel laureate or Nobel Prize winner.”

Canadian journalist Laframboise, author of the book Into the Dustbin: Rajendra Pachauri, the Climate Report & the Nobel Peace Prize, wrote:

The world’s science academies deserve special scrutiny in this regard. Why do they remain mute, year after year, when Pachauri and others are being falsely described as Nobel laureates? If the public can’t count on science academies to police a matter this straightforward, what purpose do they serve?

Steve Running’s resume according to the University of Montana

Education:

• PhD, 1979, Forest Ecophysiology, Colorado State University
• MS, 1973, Forest Management, Oregon State University
• BS, 1972, Botany, Oregon State University

Professional Experience

Dr. Running shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 as a chapter Lead Author for the 4th Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Awards

• Co-recipient, Nobel Peace Prize 2007

Here is a copy of his “award” he shows in his video.

The top section is a copy of the Nobel award to the UN IPCC. The bottom section to Steve Running says:

“For contributing the the Award of the Nobel Peace Prize for 2007 to the IPCC.”

If Steve Running received any part of this Nobel Peace Prize then his name would appear in the top section of this image. The bottom section is a “Thank you” note, not a Nobel Peace Prize.

However, as of August 5, 2014, neither the University of Montana nor Steve Running has made this correction in Steve Running’s resume nor announced their error to the press. (See my article about this in the Daily Inter Lake on September 19, 2014.)

 Important information about Nobel Prizes

A Nobel Peace Prize has nothing to do with scientific expertise or accomplishment. Here are noted recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize:

• Barack Obama (2009),
• Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, and Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (2007),
• Jimmy Carter (2002),
• United Nations and Kofi Annan (2001),
• Kim Dae-jung (2000),
• International Campaign to Ban Landmines and Jody Williams (1997),
• Joseph Rotblat and Pubwash Conferences on Science an World Affairs (1995),
• Yasser Arafat, Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin (1994),
• Nelson Mandella and Frederik Willem de Klerk (1993),
• Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (1990),
• The 14th Dalai Lama (1989),
• United Nations Peacekeeping Forces (1988),
• Mother Teresa (1979),
• Mohamed Anwar al-Sadat and Menachem Begin (1978),
• Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov (1975),
• Henry A. Kissinger and Le Duc Tho (1973),
• United Nations Children’s Fund UNICEF (1965),
• Martin Luther King Jr. (1964),
• Linus Carl Pauling (1962),
• Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees UNHCR (1954),
• Albert Schweitzer (1952),
• Thomas Woodrow Wilson (1919).

There is only one scientist on the list: Linus Pauling (1962), my chemistry teacher at Caltech. He never claimed his Nobel Peace Prize meant anything about his scientific expertise. He did not have to. He received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1954.

Professor Running is neither shares a Nobel Peace Prize nor is professionally qualified in the physical or geophysical aspects of climate change.