Review of Michael Mann and Peter Hotez, Science Under Siege (New York, NY: PublicAffairs, 2025)
Sometimes a book is so absurd that writing a review is difficult. So it is with Science Under Siege written by Michael Mann and Peter Hotez and published in 2025.
Readers who follow the climate science debate know Mann as one of its loudest voices. He earned his entry into the ranks of climate alarmists while still a graduate student by inventing the “hockey stick” graph purporting to show the surface temperature of Earth skyrocketing after the start of human greenhouse gas emissions.
Mann’s mistakes as a scientist are so egregious that a book about him, featuring quotations from 120 scientists, is titled A Disgrace to the Profession. His unethical conduct exposed by the Climategate scandal in 2009 should have made him ineligible for any academic position.
Last year in March, Mann was ordered to pay $1 million in legal fees to two plaintiffs in a defamation case because he lied about having lost funding due to their criticism of his scientific research. In January, the judge made him pay an additional $28,000 to Mark Steyn, another plaintiff in the case.
In Science Under Siege, Mann claims he won the defamation lawsuit and is silent about another lawsuit, against Canadian climatologist Tim Ball, that he also lost. Why would anyone believe anything this guy has to say?
Peter Hotez is like Mann only worse. He was one of the corporate media’s favorite go-tos during the Covid pandemic, reliably repeating drug industry and government propaganda on the origins of the Covid virus, “safe and effective” Covid vaccines, and the need for masks, social distancing, and closing schools and churches. All of these talking points have come tumbling down as the public learned how fraudulent and deceptive they were.
While pimping for Big Pharma, Hotez was a harsh critic of alternative treatments that could have saved thousands or even millions of lives. Ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, Vitamin D3, Quercetin, curcumin … Hotez went on TV to say they are all part of some giant hoax. You have to wonder how he sleeps at night.
It is no surprise, then, that two such characters would produce a book that begins and ends with lies and is full of delusions, myths, and bizarre conspiracy theories.
Mann and Hotez mindlessly chant, without evidence, that climate change has caused “catastrophic losses in human life” and “irreparable damage to us and our planet.” The “threat to human kind,” they write, “is now as grave as the prospect of nuclear annihilation at the height of the cold War.”
Do they really expect us not to know that none of the hair-on-fire predictions made by climate alarmists during the past three decades has come true?
- weather-related deaths have fallen to an all-time low;
- sea levels are not rising;
- extreme weather events are not increasing in frequency or severity;
- crop yields and food production are rising; and
- the deserts of Africa are turning green.
The benefits of rising CO2 levels clearly outweigh the costs, just as “skeptics” of climate alarmism have been saying since false predictions first emerged in the 1990s.
Despite these facts, Mann accuses anyone who disagrees with him of promoting “antiscience” and “disinformation.” Organizations that give skeptics platforms are a “cancer,” a “virus,” or a “plague.” And such organizations are all “heavily funded” by the fossil fuel industry.
In this book and in previous ones, Mann slanders scores or even hundreds of distinguished scientists by accusing them, again without evidence, of being funded by “special interest groups.” The gall is nauseating.
Every year, billions of dollars in federal research grants go exclusively to scientists who support climate alarmism, yet the corrupting influence of those dollars somehow escapes Mann’s attention. Environmental advocacy groups that spew alarmist propaganda raise billions of dollars more from left-wing foundations and the renewable energy industry, while skeptics rarely if ever receive funding from the fossil fuel industry. I know this for a fact because I was there and repeatedly responded to this libel. Mann simply lies about this, again.
Mann pretends that climate skeptics are a tiny minority of the science community and they often lack academic credentials. Another lie. Surveys show that most scientists express doubt about key propositions and assumptions upon which the alarmist house of cards rests.
Mann isn’t qualified even to hold the coats of the genuine scientists who have spoken out against climate alarmism. These scientists include Robert Carter, John Christy, John Clauser, Judith Curry, William Happer, Ross McKitrick, Richard Lindzen, Patrick Michaels, S. Fred Singer, Willie Soon, Roy Spencer, and too many more to list here.
While Mann demonizes real scientists who disagree with him, Hotez similarly mocks thousands of doctors and medical researchers and millions of patients who disagree with him. These doctors, nurses, nutritionists, and others have demonstrated the safety and effectiveness of supplements and repurposed drugs in preventing Covid and speeding recovery. Like climate skeptics, they are nearly all unfunded, often cancelled on the internet, and demonized by the corporate media.
The doctors associated with America’s Frontline Doctors and Independent Medical Alliance (formerly FLCCC), politicians such as Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson and Kentucky Senator Dr. Rand Paul, and think tanks such as the Brownstone Institute and Citizens Council for Health Freedom spoke out against Covid vaccine mandates and other pandemic measures. All have been vindicated by the latest research. Rather than acknowledge this, Hotez just libels and defames these groups and repeats his lies and evasions.
Why would anyone believe what Hotez has to say about Covid?
I could go on about how this awful book lies, misleads, hides inconvenient truths, and betrays basic human ethics, but really, this book is not worth any more of my time or yours. Avoid it if you can, and discourage others from reading it.
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Joseph Bast was president and CEO of The Heartland Institute for many years and wrote, edited, and published several books on climate change and health care policy.