A manufactured controversy (sometimes shortened to manufactroversy) is a contrived disagreement, typically motivated by

profit Profit may refer to: Business and law * Profit (accounting), the difference between the purchase price and the costs of bringing to market * Profit (economics), normal profit and economic profit * Profit (real property), a nonpossessory inter ...

or ideology, designed to create public confusion concerning an issue about which there is no substantial academic dispute.Manufactroversy
"A contrived or non-existent controversy, manufactured by political ideologues or interest groups who use deception and specious arguments to make their case", Paul McFedries, Wordspy.com, December 16, 2009 This concept has also been referred to as manufactured uncertainty.

Mechanisms of manufacturing controversy and uncertainty

Manufacturing controversy has been a tactic used by ideological and corporate groups to "neutralize the influence of academic scientists" in public policy debates.

Cherry picking Cherry picking, suppressing evidence, or the fallacy of incomplete evidence is the act of pointing to individual cases or data that seem to confirm a particular position while ignoring a significant portion of related and similar cases or data th ...

of favorable data and sympathetic experts, aggrandizement of uncertainties within

theoretical model A theory is a rational type of abstract thinking about a phenomenon, or the results of such thinking. The process of contemplative and rational thinking is often associated with such processes as observational study or research. Theories may be s ...

s, and false balance in media reporting contribute to the generation of manufactured controversies. Alan D. Attie describes its process as "to amplify uncertainties, cherry-pick experts, attack individual scientists, marginalize the traditional role of distinguished scientific bodies and get the media to report "both sides" of a manufactured controversy." Those manufacturing uncertainty may label academic research as "

junk science The expression junk science is used to describe scientific data, research, or analysis considered by the person using the phrase to be spurious or fraudulent. The concept is often invoked in political and legal contexts where facts and scientifi ...

" and use a variety of tactics designed to stall and increase the expense of the distribution of sound scientific information. Delay tactics are also used to slow the implementation of regulations and public warnings in response to previously undiscovered health risks (e.g., the increased risk of

Reye's syndrome Reye syndrome is a rapidly worsening brain disease. Symptoms of Reye syndrome may include vomiting, personality changes, confusion, seizures, and loss of consciousness. While liver toxicity typically occurs in the syndrome, jaundice usually doe ...

in children who take

aspirin Aspirin, also known as acetylsalicylic acid (ASA), is a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) used to reduce pain, fever, and/or inflammation, and as an antithrombotic. Specific inflammatory conditions which aspirin is used to treat inc ...

). Chief among these stalling tactics is generating scientific uncertainty, "no matter how powerful or conclusive the evidence", to prevent regulation. Another tactic used to manufacture controversy is to cast the

scientific community The scientific community is a diverse network of interacting scientists. It includes many " sub-communities" working on particular scientific fields, and within particular institutions; interdisciplinary and cross-institutional activities are als ...

as intolerant of dissent and conspiratorially aligned with industries or sociopolitical movements that quash challenges to

conventional wisdom The conventional wisdom or received opinion is the body of ideas or explanations generally accepted by the public and/or by experts in a field. In religion, this is known as orthodoxy. Etymology The term is often credited to the economist John ...

."The Paranoid Style in American Science: 3. Contrary Imaginations"
Daniel Engber, ''

Slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...

'', April 17, 2008 This form of manufactured controversy has been used by environmentalist advocacy groups, religious challengers of the

theory of evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...

, and opponents of

global warming legislation The politics of climate change results from different perspectives on how to respond to climate change. Global warming is driven largely by the emissions of greenhouse gases due to human economic activity, especially the burning of fossil fuels, ...

."The Paranoid Style in American Science: 2. An Uncertain Truth"
Daniel Engber, ''

'', April 16, 2008

Legal effects

In the United States, the generation of manufactured uncertainty about scientific data has affected political and legal proceedings in many different areas. The

Data Quality Act The Information Quality Act (IQA) or Data Quality Act (DQA), passed through the United States Congress in Section 515 of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2001 (). Because the Act was a two-sentence rider in a spending bill, it had no name give ...

and the

Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

's ''Daubert'' standard have been cited as tools used by those manufacturing controversy to obfuscate

scientific consensus Scientific consensus is the generally held judgment, position, and opinion of the majority or the supermajority of scientists in a particular field of study at any particular time. Consensus is achieved through scholarly communication at confe ...

. Concerns have been raised regarding the conflicts of interest inherent in many types of industry regulation. For example, many industries, such as the pharmaceutical industry, are a major source of funding for the research necessary to achieve government regulatory approval for their product. In developing regulations, agencies such as the

Food and Drug Administration The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA or US FDA) is a federal agency of the Department of Health and Human Services. The FDA is responsible for protecting and promoting public health through the control and supervision of food ...

and the

Environmental Protection Agency A biophysical environment is a biotic and abiotic surrounding of an organism or population, and consequently includes the factors that have an influence in their survival, development, and evolution. A biophysical environment can vary in scale ...

rely heavily on unpublished studies from industry sources that have not been

peer review Peer review is the evaluation of work by one or more people with similar competencies as the producers of the work ( peers). It functions as a form of self-regulation by qualified members of a profession within the relevant field. Peer revie ...

ed. This can allow a given industry control over the extent of available research, and the pace at which it is reviewable, when challenging scientific research that may threaten their business interests.

Prominent examples

Examples of controversies that have been labeled manufactured controversies: *The health risks of smoking tobacco *

Depletion of the ozone layer Ozone depletion consists of two related events observed since the late 1970s: a steady lowering of about four percent in the total amount of ozone in Earth's atmosphere, and a much larger springtime decrease in stratospheric ozone (the ozone la ...

Climate change denial Climate change denial, or global warming denial, is denial, dismissal, or doubt that contradicts the scientific consensus on climate change, including the extent to which it is caused by humans, its effects on nature and human society, or t ...

*Contesting the development of

skin cancer Skin cancers are cancers that arise from the skin. They are due to the development of abnormal cells that have the ability to invade or spread to other parts of the body. There are three main types of skin cancers: basal-cell skin cancer (BCC) ...

from exposure to

ultraviolet radiation Ultraviolet (UV) is a form of electromagnetic radiation with wavelength from 10 nm (with a corresponding frequency around 30 PHz) to 400 nm (750 THz), shorter than that of visible light, but longer than X-rays. UV radiation i ...

via

sunlight Sunlight is a portion of the electromagnetic radiation given off by the Sun, in particular infrared, visible, and ultraviolet light. On Earth, sunlight is scattered and filtered through Earth's atmosphere, and is obvious as daylight when ...

and

tanning lamp Tanning lamps (sometimes called tanning bulbs in the United States or tanning tubes in Europe) are the part of a tanning bed, booth or other tanning device which produces ultraviolet light used for indoor tanning. There are hundreds of differe ...

s *

Denial of the Armenian genocide Armenian genocide denial is the claim that the Ottoman Empire and its ruling party, the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), did not commit genocide against its Armenian citizens during World War I—a crime documented in a large body of ...

by the government of Turkey *

Rwandan genocide denial Rwandan genocide denial is the assertion that the Rwandan genocide did not occur, specifically rejection of the scholarly consensus that Rwandan Tutsis were the victims of a genocide between 7 April and 15 July 1994. The perpetrators, a small mino ...

* Vaccination controversies, particularly those alleging a causative relationship between the

MMR vaccine The MMR vaccine is a vaccine against measles, mumps, and rubella (German measles), abbreviated as ''MMR''. The first dose is generally given to children around 9 months to 15 months of age, with a second dose at 15 months to 6 years of age, ...

thiomersal Thiomersal (INN), or thimerosal (USAN, JAN), is an organomercury compound. It is a well-established antiseptic and antifungal agent. The pharmaceutical corporation Eli Lilly and Company gave thiomersal the trade name Merthiolate. It has been u ...

in the development of

autism spectrum disorder The autism spectrum, often referred to as just autism or in the context of a professional diagnosis autism spectrum disorder (ASD) or autism spectrum condition (ASC), is a neurodevelopmental condition (or conditions) characterized by difficulti ...

s. *

AIDS denialism HIV/AIDS denialism is the belief, despite conclusive evidence to the contrary, that the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) does not cause acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS). Some of its proponents reject the existence of HIV, while oth ...

Teach the Controversy The "teach the controversy" campaign of the Discovery Institute seeks to promote the pseudoscientific principle of intelligent design (a variant of traditional creationism) as part of its attempts to discredit the teaching of evolution in Uni ...

" efforts of

intelligent design Intelligent design (ID) is a pseudoscientific argument for the existence of God, presented by its proponents as "an evidence-based scientific theory about life's origins". Numbers 2006, p. 373; " Dcaptured headlines for its bold attempt to ...

supporters *

Carcinogen A carcinogen is any substance, radionuclide, or radiation that promotes carcinogenesis (the formation of cancer). This may be due to the ability to damage the genome or to the disruption of cellular metabolic processes. Several radioactive sub ...

icity of

hexavalent chromium Hexavalent chromium (chromium(VI), Cr(VI), chromium 6) is chromium in any chemical compound that contains the element in the +6 oxidation state (thus hexavalent). Virtually all chromium ore is processed via hexavalent chromium, specifically the ...

Mechanisms of manufacturing controversy and uncertainty

Legal effects

Prominent examples

See also

References

Further reading