Science Committee Stunned by Senator's Attempt to Link Fake Penis Article to Climate Data

A Senate hearing turned awkward on June 1 after a far-right senator and climate change sceptic attempted to suggest science data was compromised because a gender studies article about “conceptual penis” was incorrectly published.One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts opened his salvo of questioning to members from Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, the chief scientific research body in Australia, about their peer review processes. After he was advised CSIRO conducted both internal and external reviews on their journal articles, Roberts inquired about whether they were aware of the Sokal affair – a 1996 incident in the US where researchers submitted a hoax article that was subsequently published – as well as a similar incident where a study entitled “The conceptual penis as a social construct” was published on May 19, 2017. Roberts referred to these incidents to note there were “gaps” in the peer review process in the science community.Industry, Innovation and Science Minister Arthur Sinodinos appeared flabbergasted by Robert’s line of questioning and interjected to chastise Robert’s attempts to discredit CSIRO’s peer review process – at one point saying, “We really are in a Kafkaesque world.”He took out his phone and, presumably reading from the Sokal affair’s Wikipedia entry, noted it was from 1996 and was considered an isolated incident for one specific journal that had no external peer review process.The “conceptual penis” article was an oversight, according to a public statement from academic journal Cogent Social Science who published the piece, adding it was originally rejected by a gender studies journal.Roberts is a stringent climate change denier who has repeatedly accused the likes of CSIRO, NASA, and the United Nations of faking climate data. He is a former mining engineer who said he has relied on his “own research” to inform his conclusions. He has associations with prominent climate change sceptics from the United States, including Tim Ball and Tony Heller – the latter of whom Storyful noted was a Sandy Hook Truther and Obama-birther conspiracy theorist.