"Promoting science and debunking junk since 1978" Elizabeth Whelan, a Harvard-trained public-health scientist, founded ACSH in 1978 as a counterweight to environmental groups and Ralph Nader's consumer advocacy movement. "ACSH protects consumer freedom from a variety of unscientifically based activist organizations—such as the Natural Resources Defense Council, Center for Science in the Public Interest, and Environmental Working Group—that use 'junk science' and hyperbole about risk to promote fears about our food, pharmaceuticals and chemicals, and other environmental and lifestyle factors," ACSH says on its website. "Their agenda is to limit or dismantle many technological achievements that contribute to consumer choice and good health."