re: #249 sagehen

totally OT, but…

I’m watching PBS, and just as the next program is about to start (a Nova documentary about Hurricane Sandy), there’s a title card that it’s paid for by a donation from the David H Koch Foundation. Who apparently sponsor a lot of science-y PBS stuff. Actual legitimate science. Explaining how wonderfully accurate the computer models at the NOAA are, and…

But… um…

Is cognitive dissonance the right phrase here?

(this is the same Koch, right?)

Yes, indeed:

Education

Koch contributed $7 million to the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) show Nova,[34] and is a contributor to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., including a $20 million gift to the American Museum of Natural History, creating the David H. Koch Dinosaur Wing and a contribution of $15 million to the National Museum of Natural History to create the new David H. Koch Hall of Human Origins, which opened on the museum’s 100th anniversary of its location on the National Mall on March 17, 2010.[35] In 2012, Koch contributed US $35 million to the Smithsonian to build a new dinosaur exhibition hall at the National Museum of Natural History. [36]

Koch also financed the construction of Deerfield Academy’s $68 million Koch Center for mathematics, science and technology,[37] and was named the first and only Lifetime Trustee.[37]

Koch gave $10 million to the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory[38] where he was honored with the Double Helix Medal for Corporate Leadership for supporting research that, “improves the health of people everywhere”.[39]