Celia Farber's Day in Court: Dismissed with Unavailing Contentions

Supreme Court Decision in 

Celia Farber, Plaintiff-Appellant, 

v

Richard Jefferys et al.,

Order, Supreme Court, New York County (Louis B. York, J.), entered November 9, 2011, which granted defendant Richard Jefferys' motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint as against him, unanimously affirmed, with costs. 

Supreme Court properly determined that plaintiff was a limited public figure because, through her publication of countless articles, she voluntarily injected herself into the controversial debate on whether HIV causes AIDS with a view toward influencing the debate (see Krauss v Globe Intl., 251 AD2d 191, 192 [1st Dept 1998]), and "project[ed] [her] name and personality before . . . readers of nationally distributed magazines . . . to establish [her] reputation as a leading authority" in this area (Maule v NYM Corp., 54 NY2d 880, 882-883 [1981]). The court also properly concluded that the subjects of HIV/AIDS, plaintiff's journalism, and her receipt of an award for her journalism fell "within the sphere of legitimate public concern" (Chapadeau v Utica Observer-Dispatch, 38 NY2d 196, 199 [1975]). Indeed, the record established that plaintiff was a contentious figure within the traditional HIV/AIDS community. 


Jefferys met his burden of demonstrating that plaintiff could not show by clear and convincing evidence that he made the challenged statements with actual malice or with gross irresponsibility (see Huggins v Moore, 94 NY2d 296 [1999]; Chapadeau v Utica Observer-Dispatch, 38 NY2d 196 [1975], supra). The record was devoid of evidence that Jefferys acted with knowledge that his statements were false or with reckless disregard for the truth, or that he did not follow the standards of information gathering employed by reasonable persons. Jefferys sufficiently explained that his statement about plaintiff's journalism was based on his expertise and research on HIV/AIDS for many years, on an article signed by prominent experts in the field, as well as on the many articles in the record which critiqued plaintiff's 2006 article as being filled with misquotes or misrepresentations. Jefferys also provided documentation to support why he believed what he wrote about the plaintiff was true and compared in detail plaintiff's journalism to the articles and studies she cited and explained why he believed her work to contain misrepresentations. [*2]

In opposition, plaintiff failed to raise a triable issue of fact. Her effort to establish that her work does not contain misquotes or misrepresentations is immaterial because even if plaintiff were correct about her work, she can point to no evidence that would establish actual malice or gross irresponsibility (Mahoney v Adirondack Publ. Co., 71 NY2d 31, 39 [1987] ["(f)alsity and actual malice are distinct concepts"]). Similarly, plaintiff's assertion that Jefferys was biased against her or bore her ill will does not aid her cause (see Harte-Hanks Communications, Inc. v Connaughton, 491 US 657, 666 [1989]). Moreover, there is no reason to offer less protection to the contested statement because it was made via an Internet communication (see Sandals Resorts Intl. Ltd. v Google, Inc., 86 AD3d 32, 43-44 [1st Dept 2011]).

Supreme Court was also correct in finding that the use of the word "liar" in the contested statement was not actionable (see Ram v Moritt, 205 AD2d 516 [2d Dept 1994]; see also Steinhilber v Alphonse, 68 NY2d 283, 294 [1986]). The full content of the statement, including its tone and apparent purpose, and the broader context of the statement and surrounding circumstances leads to the conclusion that what was being read was "likely to be opinion, not fact" (see Thomas H. v Paul B., 18 NY3d 580, 584 [2012] [internal quotation marks omitted]; see Immuno AG. v Moor-Jankowski, 77 NY2d 235, 254 [1991], cert denied 500 US 954 [1991]).

Supreme Court appropriately resolved the case through summary judgment because the issues can be determined by the objective proof in the record (see Kipper v NYP Holdings Co., Inc., 12 NY3d 348, 354 [2009]; Karaduman v Newsday, Inc., 51 NY2d 531, 545 [1980]), and no additional discovery was necessary or warranted to resolve the motion.

We have considered plaintiff's remaining contentions and find them unavailing.

THIS CONSTITUTES THE DECISION AND ORDER 
OF THE SUPREME COURT, APPELLATE DIVISION, FIRST DEPARTMENT.

ENTERED: FEBRUARY 19, 2013

CLERK

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Crazy Is as Crazy Does: Conspiracy Theories and Anti-Science

Recursive fury: Conspiracist ideation in the blogosphere in response to research on conspiracist ideation
Published in Frontiers in Personality Science and Individual Differences, 2013
by Stephan Lewandowsky et al.

Conspiracist ideation has been repeatedly implicated in the rejection of scientific propositions, although empirical evidence to date has been sparse. A recent study involving visitors to climate blogs found that conspiracist ideation was associated with the rejection of climate science and the rejection of other scientific propositions such as the link between lung cancer and smoking, and between HIV and AIDS (Lewandowsky, Oberauer, & Gignac, in press; LOG12 from here on). This article analyzes the response of the climate blogosphere to the publication of LOG12. We identify and trace the hypotheses that emerged in response to LOG12 and that questioned the validity of the paper's conclusions. Using established criteria to identify conspiracist ideation, we show that many of the hypotheses exhibited conspiratorial content and counterfactual thinking. For example, whereas hypotheses were initially narrowly focused on LOG12, some ultimately grew in scope to include actors beyond the authors of LOG12, such as university executives, a media organization, and the Australian government. The overall pattern of the blogosphere's response to LOG12 illustrates the possible role of conspiracist ideation in the rejection of science, although alternative scholarly interpretations may be advanced in the future.

Click here to download the provisional PDF of the article.

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AIDS Denier Henry Bauer is Unlikely to be Appointed to Journal of Cryptozoology Editorial Board

Monster Hunting 2.0 by Dan Cossins for ScienceNews

So long as the standards are kept high, then I think it will demonstrate that cryptozoology isn’t just full of crackpots chasing Nessy. —­Darren Naish, University of Southampton, U.K.

Since the demise of the journal Cryptozoology in 1996, there has been no peer-reviewed English-language periodical for the controversial field, which studies animals known from anecdote, folklore, or fragmentary physical evidence, but not yet authenticated with actual specimens. So when the U.K.–based Centre for Fortean Zoology (CFZ) approached popular cryptozoology writer Karl Shuker about launching a new journal, he was happy to oblige.

“I felt it imperative that a journal of this nature should exist again as a platform for formal scientific cryptozoological research and reviews of past cases that mainstream journals may not be willing to consider,” says Shuker, who has a PhD in zoology and comparative physiology from the University of Birmingham, U.K. Having assembled a panel of reviewers who then pored over the first batch of submissions, the CFZ and Shuker published the first issue of The Journal of Cryptozoology in October 2012. Editor-in-chief Shuker insists that all articles are subjected to the “same level of rigorous peer-review evaluations as [in] any mainstream journal.”

Shuker hopes that by providing an outlet for cryptozoological research with a genuinely scientific approach, the new journal will ensure that serious contributions get the attention they deserve. Much depends on the quality of the material and rigor of the review process, of course, but he also hopes that The Journal of Cryptozoology will raise the reputation of this much-maligned field in the eyes of the scientific community.

Such aspirations will no doubt raise a few eyebrows. For many onlookers, the term cryptozoology is inextricably linked to crackpot amateurs who make sensational, unsubstantiated claims about the existence of Sasquatch or the Loch Ness Monster. That’s understandable; there are all manner of “investigators” seeking out fantastical cryptids in a distinctly less-than-scientific manner.

Most people who unashamedly call themselves cryptozoologists are doing a form of travel writing, says Darren Naish, a paleozoologist at the U.K.’s National Oceanography Centre at the University of Southampton who also dabbles in cryptozoology. “It tends to be a lot of speculation and not much analysis of data, and the conclusions are not based on a robust-enough framework to be considered of the normal caliber you’d expect for scientific conclusions.”

But the fundamental concept of cryptozoology is not pseudoscientific, argues Shuker. “If cryptozoology is approached in a rigorously scientific, objective manner, it is no more a pseudoscience than is any other branch of zoology,” he says. And there are several recent cases of new species being discovered on the basis of anecdotal evidence, including the saola (or Vu Quang ox), found in the forests of Vietnam in 1992, and the kipunji, a monkey in Tanzania, officially described in 2003. These creatures are not as exotic as the yeti or the orang pendek—a bipedal primate said to roam the rainforests of Sumatra—but they demonstrate that even today, in an age of satellite maps and camera traps, animals as large as oxen can escape science’s gaze.

Zoologists engaged in this sort of research are doing cryptozoology, says Naish, whether or not they would identify their work as such. But there is a small cadre of trained zoologists with positions at accredited universities who scientifically analyze supposed evidence for the existence of cryptids—and who describe themselves as “scientific cryptozoologists.”

Naish, who includes himself in that group, uses his knowledge of vertebrate paleontology to scientifically evaluate strange-looking carcasses and to assess the likelihood that extinct marine creatures such as plesiosaurs could still be around. He was part of a team that used statistical models to predict the number of extant pinniped species yet to be described, a study published in 2008 in Historical Biology. Another notable example is Jeff Meldrum, a professor of anatomy and anthropology at Idaho State University, who applies his understanding of functional foot morphology in primates to evaluate alleged sasquatch footprints.

Citing the work of Meldrum in particular, Loren Coleman, director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine, says that “the standards are already high among those who are working academically and scientifically.” Despite the presence of established scientific cryptozoologists, however, the term cryptozoology remains tainted—something Shuker hopes to change with The Journal of Cryptozoology.

The first issue featured a reevaluation of evidence for a footprint first reported in 1871, said to have been made by a Queensland tiger, an Australian marsupial thought to be similar to the Tasmanian tiger; and another, by Naish, that examines a previously enigmatic carcass from Australia’s Margaret River known only from a single photograph. “Neither paper was likely to have been published in a mainstream journal,” says Shuker, “and yet both were fully deserving of publication on account of their strictly scientific approach.”

Although it’s early days, the response to the new journal has been encouraging: since the first issue was published, Shuker says he has received submissions from researchers within the mainstream zoological community.

Naish is cautiously optimistic. If cryptid studies come from a well-reasoned scientific approach, they should be accepted by mainstream zoological journals, he says. “On the other hand, you could argue that every specialized subdiscipline needs its own special community-interest publication.”

The big challenge is to make sure the journal is robust enough to be taken seriously, Naish adds. “So long as the standards are kept high, then I think it will encourage a gradual rise in the standing [of the field] and demonstrate that cryptozoology isn’t just full of crackpots chasing Nessy.”

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