Donnelly letter: Science

Galileo championed the theory that the Earth revolves around the sun, and ran into opposition from the Roman Inquisition in 1615. He was found guilty of heresy and spent the remainder of his days under house arrest.

This year, the sun and the earth were again in the news, this time for the total eclipse. Our own Weiser even played a major role in this event, as one of the sites for the National Solar Observatory’s Citizen CATE experiment to capture images of the corona.

The eclipse’s freedom from controversy was actually quite rare for a scientific event these days.

In August, the president disbanded the federal advisory committee on climate change. Members from 13 federal agencies were scheduled to deliver their Climate Science Special Report. Now it is dust in the wind. How can knowledge be harmful? We could always debate the findings. But prevent them from seeing the light of day? That is unconscionable.

Science cuts through cultural, geographic, political and historical barriers. The report from the committee could have had a significant influence on the direction our country moves forward in ways we can only imagine. Stifling scientific truth is our own version of the Inquisition.

This story was originally published September 7, 2017 at 3:11 PM with the headline "Donnelly letter: Science."