Ronald Bailey

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Ronald Bailey

Ronald Bailey

Science Correspondent

Science Correspondent
Reason magazine
rbailey@reason.com
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Bio

Ronald Bailey is the award-winning science correspondent for Reason magazine and Reason.com, where he writes a weekly science and technology column.

Bailey is the author of the book Liberation Biology: The Moral and Scientific Case for the Biotech Revolution (Prometheus, 2005), and his work was featured in The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2004.

In 2006, Bailey was shortlisted by the editors of Nature Biotechnology as one of the personalities who have made the "most significant contributions" to biotechnology in the last 10 years.

From 1987 to 1990, Bailey was a staff writer for Forbes magazine, covering economic, scientific and business topics. His articles and reviews have appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Commentary, The Public Interest, Smithsonian, TechCentralStation, National Review, Reader's Digest and many other publications.

Prior to joining Reason in 1997, Bailey produced several weekly national public television series including Think Tank and TechnoPolitics, as well as several documentaries for PBS television and ABC News. In 1993, he was the Warren T. Brookes Fellow in Environmental Journalism at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Bailey won a 2004 Southern California Journalism Award for best magazine feature for his story, "The Battle For Your Brain," which delved into the ethical and political conflicts over new brain enhancement technologies. In 2005, Bailey won a first place Southern California Journalism Award for best online commentary for his series on creationism, "Creation Summer Camp."

Bailey is the editor of several books, including Global Warming and Other Eco-Myths: How the Environmental Movement Uses False Science to Scare Us to Death (Prima Publishing, 2002), Earth Report 2000: Revisiting The True State of The Planet (McGraw Hill, 1999), and The True State of the Planet (The Free Press, 1995). He is the author of ECOSCAM: The False Prophets of Ecological Apocalypse (St. Martins Press, 1993).

Bailey has appeared on numerous television and radio programs, including the NBC Nightly News, PBS' Newshour, several National Public Radio programs, and various C-SPAN programs. He has lectured at Harvard University, Yale University, Morehouse University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Rutgers University, the University of Virginia, and many other places.

In 2004, Bailey testified before a congressional committee on "The Impact of Science on Public Policy."

He is a member of the Society of Environmental Journalists and the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities.

Bailey lives in Washington, D.C., and Charlottesville, Virginia, with his wife Pamela.

AllOp-Eds

Rare Earth Ruckus
Are we at the mercy of China's mercantilist mandarins?
Ronald Bailey
November 23, 2010
Let Ethanol Subsidies Die
A policy that free marketeers and militant greens can agree on
Ronald Bailey
November 16, 2010
Can the Climate Be Fixed?
A new book offers a clear-eyed view of the technological and economic magnitude of addressing climate change.
Ronald Bailey
November 9, 2010
The Science of Libertarian Morality
A new social psychology study explores the moral formation of the libertarian personality.
Ronald Bailey
November 2, 2010
Will a Republican Congress Knock Science Back Into the Stone Age?
Predicting the effect of a victory for the G.O.P. "know-nothing flat-earthers" on science policy
Ronald Bailey
October 26, 2010
The Eternal Return of Overpopulation
Getting the cause of high fertility backwards.
Ronald Bailey
October 19, 2010
Regulating Personal Genomics to Death
The FDA threat to direct to consumer genetic testing.
Ronald Bailey
October 12, 2010
From Yuck to Yippee!
What this year's Nobel Prize for a test tube baby pioneer tells us about the moral endorsement of technology.
Ronald Bailey
October 5, 2010
Revving Up Electric Cars With Government Cash
We'll never know if the electric car industry would have been viable without subsidies.
Ronald Bailey
September 28, 2010
The Bioethanol Binge
Fuel made from corn is expensive, inefficient�and undrinkable.
Ronald Bailey
September 21, 2010
Burning Money to Turn Coal into Gas
In which Science Correspondent Ronald Bailey confesses to his role as a petty Igor to Jimmy Carter's energy-regulating Dr. Frankenstein.
Ronald Bailey
September 17, 2010
Wind Turbines Are Beautiful
...but a tad expensive.
Ronald Bailey
September 14, 2010
Is Gassing Wolf Pups Better Than Hunting Their Parents?
Environmentalists force a tough choice in the Northern Rockies.
Ronald Bailey
September 7, 2010
Gas Prices Explained
Solving the deep mystery of gasoline price fluctuations
Ronald Bailey
August 31, 2010
Egg Recall Hatches More Regulations
More FDA regulations don't always mean greater food safety.
Ronald Bailey
August 24, 2010
Biotech Beets Banned
Beet ban will hurt farmers while strengthening massive seed monopolies
Ronald Bailey
August 17, 2010
Invasion of the Invasive Species!
Local biodiversity is increasing.
Ronald Bailey
August 10, 2010
Citizen Science, Microfinanced Research, Patent Trolls, and Pharma Prizes
A final dispatch from the Open Science Summit.
Ronald Bailey
August 3, 2010
Scenes from the Open Science Summit
Ronald Bailey's first dispatch from the conference that aims to launch Enlightenment 2.0
Ronald Bailey
July 30, 2010
A Genetic Testing Dupe?
The government says I am being misled by useless information about my genes. I disagree.
Ronald Bailey
July 27, 2010
Got Environmental Problems? Think Government.
Foreign Policy identifies true environmental catastrophes, but misses the main cause.
Ronald Bailey
July 20, 2010
Forcing Consumers to Buy Renewable Energy
Congress pretends to solve an energy crisis
Ronald Bailey
July 13, 2010
Sustainability Semantics
John Locke, the U.N., and how to figure out if an acre of land would rather be a swamp or a cornfield
Ronald Bailey
July 6, 2010
Scientific Consensus Redux
Looking back, it turns out that a lot of scientific consensuses were wrong.
Ronald Bailey
June 29, 2010
Who�s Liable for the Gulf Oil Spill? You Are.
Government failure and the Gulf oil spill catastrophe
Ronald Bailey
June 15, 2010
The Talking Cure for the Tragedy of the Commons
Bad things happen when governments keep people from cutting their own deals on resource management
Ronald Bailey
June 8, 2010
Do Liberals Suffer from Arrested Moral Development?
What 10-year-olds and liberals have in common.
Ronald Bailey
June 1, 2010
Who's Afraid of Synthetic Biology?
Don't let fears about frankenmicrobes halt promising research.
Ronald Bailey
May 25, 2010
The Kerry-Lieberman Scheme for Carbon Rationing
The American Power Act will raise energy prices, reduce incomes, cut jobs, and do precious little about climate change.
Ronald Bailey
May 18, 2010
The Wrong Kind of Toyotathon
The unintended consequences of an unintended acceleration panic
Ronald Bailey
May 14, 2010
The Pill: The Male Version
In 1960, the female contraceptive pill changed the world. Would a pill for men do the same?
Ronald Bailey
May 11, 2010
Weighing the Benefits & Costs of Offshore Drilling
Offshore drilling remains a risk well worth taking, even in the wake of the oil spill disaster.
Ronald Bailey
May 4, 2010
Peak Everything?
Forget peak oil. What about peak lithium, peak neodymium, and peak phosphorus?
Ronald Bailey
April 27, 2010
Earth Day Turns 40
Environmentalist pioneers have had it their way for four decades. It's time for a change.
Ronald Bailey
April 20, 2010
On Being a 21st Century Peasant
Environmentalist Bill McKibben's new book on the coming global collapse.
Ronald Bailey
April 13, 2010
Red Ink and Green Jobs
Citizens of the Golden State get nervous about carbon rationing plans made in flusher times
Ronald Bailey
April 6, 2010
Ridding the Earth of Nukes, One Treaty at a Time
President Obama takes significant steps toward global nuclear disarmament
Ronald Bailey
March 30, 2010
Health Care 2020
A dispatch from the future on the effects of health care reform
Ronald Bailey
March 23, 2010
The Wrong Kind of Toyotathon
The unintended consequences of an unintended acceleration panic
Ronald Bailey
March 16, 2010
Sea Turtle Tastes Like Veal
Can eating endangered species help save them?
Ronald Bailey
March 9, 2010
Cap and Trade is Dead
Long live cap and trade.
Ronald Bailey
March 2, 2010
Everyone Who Knows What They're Talking About Agrees with Me
And everyone who doesn't wears a tin foil hat
Ronald Bailey
February 23, 2010
Climate Crackup
A breakdown in Copenhagen saves a divided world from carbon rationing.
Ronald Bailey
February 17, 2010
The Presidential Commission on Birth, Death, and the Meaning of Life
Obama's new bioethics czar just wants us all to get along.
Ronald Bailey
February 16, 2010
Overpaying for Green Power
Americans are adopting a failed type of clean energy subsidy�the feed-in tariff�just as Europeans are abandoning it.
Ronald Bailey
January 26, 2010
Obama Follows in Bush's Footsteps on Climate Change
The era of massive global climate meetings may finally be ending. Thank goodness.
Ronald Bailey
January 19, 2010
Global Warming and Melting Ice
The seas are rising, but you've still got time to enjoy your beach house
Ronald Bailey
December 29, 2009
The Cultural Contradictions of Anti-Nuke Environmentalists
Why do environmentalists reject a good bet for renewable energy?
Ronald Bailey
December 22, 2009
Copenhagen Climate Conference Collapses
Ronald Bailey's fifth and final dispatch from the Copenhagen climate conference
Ronald Bailey
December 18, 2009
The Green Jobs Delusion
Ronald Bailey's fourth dispatch from the Copenhagen climate conference.
Ronald Bailey
December 17, 2009