global warming again

[Peter T]

sensible majority of people who don't believe in man-made climate change

Not worth commenting on the rest of your drivel,

Mike

Suits me! I'm not sure I could cope with being referred to as a Holocaust denier AND a Daily Mail reader twice in one day.

So, the science is done, the data has been "manipulated", and the results are exactly as we predicted they would be..............and if that doesn't convince anyone we can always resort to semantics.

 

[MikeG.]

I'm not sure I could cope with being referred to as a Holocaust denier AND a Daily Mail reader twice in one day.

I didn't do that, and I wouldn't because I have no evidence. Evidence. You struggle with the concept of evidence, and you clearly also struggle with the concept of analogy.

So, the science is done, the data has been "manipulated", and the results are exactly as we predicted they would be..............and if that doesn't convince anyone we can always resort to semantics.

But you don't struggle with the idea of sarcasm. The science isn't done......because science never is "done". No data has been manipulated. The problem scientists face is that there are some fools on this planet who won't accept anything they say, whatever the evidence, and so some are tempted occasionally to present results in the strongest possible way. This does not, does not, does not mean that any data has been changed or manipulated.

Mike

 

[jlawrence]

A quick search on google will show flaws in the peer review process. Although it may be a flawed system it is the only one they've got - in that way it's better than nothing.
To be fair the only reports I've ever read about manipulation or falsifying of evidence always seem to relate to the medical field - hmmm, any surprise there with the monstrous sums of money involved.
The peer review process doesn't show that the paper presented shows the 'truth' but rather that it shows a correct conclusion following acceptable methodology from the dataset used. I would assume that the reviewer/s also check that the dataset is accurate - how the heck they can do that I don't know.

Would a reviewer say yes to a paper which came to a differing conclusion to that which they understood to be accurate - I don't know, but I would hope they would.

Why is there no peer review papers giving opposing views (I'll have to take Mike's word that there isn't). Given a data set I've never heard of only one conclusion being drawn - if that were the case then it would become a fact that xyz was happening surely.

The main problem with this climate change debate (imho) is that phrase 'global warming' and the reporting (by the main stream press) that it is down to CO2. People look (if they can be bothered) at data that is openly available which clearly shows that CO2 levels aren't higher than they have been in the past. This isn't something rarely (if ever) reported in the general media. It could well be that the scientist explain this in their various papers - how would we know as we don't see the papers and may well not understand them if we did. I actually think that is a likely scenario, no scientist would look at a data set and draw xyz conclusions without looking to see whether previous records and data support those conclusions. Where they find anomalies I would expect that they would look into them and give reasoned explanations as to why they exist.
The press are alarmist - always have been and always will be because that's what sells papers etc. They don't report on half of what is said at these various conferences and so we rarely (if ever) get the full picture.

I find it stunning (and next to impossible to believe) that the scientists are saying that climate change is man made. That statement just beggars belief - are they therefore saying that without our influence the climate has been stable all these years. Blatantly this isn't the case.
Again, I believe this is down to misreporting. Various bodies let it carry on because it suits them - they know something needs to be done and it won't be done unless everyone is alarmed enough to make something happen.
My personal belief is:
The global climate does run in cycles. The cycles in the past have been changed by various things - volcano's etc - with horrendous consequences. This time we are altering the cycle and again the consequences are likely to be bad.
The various computer models are attempting to predict what those consequences might be and when. Despite my problem with the models, and the fudge factors involved, that doesn't change my belief that something is happening which is out of the 'normal' cycle and we (mankind) are the one's causing the change to the cycle. Note I'm not saying I believe we're causing climate change but that we're causing a change to the climate cycles - the two are not the same.

What annoys me in this whole debate is that we are being told something which is demonstrably untrue - that global climate change is man made. We are relying on the media to actually report on what is being said - I fail to believe that they are accurately reporting what is being said. If they are accurately reporting things then the various scientific bodies involved are deliberately muddying the waters by using alarmist phrases which aren't true. I don't believe that the actual scientists involved in the research are using the phrase 'man made'.

You'll notice that I'm using the phrase 'I believe' a lot. I see no other way - I don't know the facts involved, just what is reported on websites and in the press. The IPCC (which seems to be what everyone likes reporting) is an intergovernmental body and as such is very politicised and we've all seen reported recently exactly what happens to a scientist who disagrees with his political masters. I'm not for one minute suggesting that things would be any different if it were private industry which setup the body. I doubt that it would be different at all - they would still only report the conclusions in the way that they wanted them presented.

 

[devonwoody]

Thank you JL. for a balanced reply without any insults thrown at anyone.

 

[big soft moose]

Why do eco-mentalists insist on comparing the sensible majority of people who don't believe in man-made climate change to Holocaust deniers?

Are they so insecure that they have to use these riduculous sledge-hammer tactics whenever anyone sugests that they may be wrong and that the blessed MMCC mantra is nothing more than hysteria and the wet dreams of schyster politicians and the IPCC et al?

there actually isnt a "sensible majority who dont believe in man made climate change" there is a very small, but vocal minority - largely funded by the american far right and the oilo companies and a larger number of credulous fools who believe what they read on the websites the deniers set up.

The reason mike compares them to the holocaust deniers is because the thought process is the same - however much evidence is presented that they are wrong they just keep on insisting on denying that something happened/is happening

and also like those who deny the holocaust when they cant persuade they rersort to posts like yours which substitute rhetoric for reasoned argument and bring little or nothing to the debate

 

[big soft moose]

I find it stunning (and next to impossible to believe) that the scientists are saying that climate change is man made. That statement just beggars belief - are they therefore saying that without our influence the climate has been stable all these years. Blatantly this isn't the case.

.

the thing is that what you are saying here is the fundamental misunderstanding of what the scientists are saying. No reasonable person is going to deny that the climate does alter naturally from time to time when there are millenias of evidence that it does.

what the IPCC etc are saying is that by releasing a lot of sequestered carbon in a comparitively short period of time we are accelerating the process, and if we get to the point where this anthropogenic release causes the permafrost to melt we will see a runaway feedback reaction as CH4 is released from the tundra.

this ch4 release and its effect on the climate will technically be a natural process but we will have caused it to happen. Of course this will not be the end of the planet or of life on earth because species will evolve to deal with the altered climate, and eventually (in several millenia) natural processes will resequster the carbon and cause the planet to cool again - however it is distinctly doubtful that the human species will survive the climatic change or if we do it will not be as a comfortable industrialised society that we have today.

 

[big soft moose]

with regard to the scientific papers and the peer review process I know a fair bit about this because my sister is a researcher working (broadly) in this feild ( incidentally she's a research fellow on an independent fellowship funded neither by the government or the oil companies - as indeed many scientists are)

her research centres on the analysis of lipid traces in stalactites and what these can tell us about the overlying vegetation and thus the climatic past (because knowing more about past helps with modelling the future)

The bottom line is that most papers are extremly technical and have very specific conclusions which taken individually could probably be interpreted in either pro or anti especially to those who dont understand the technical science. Therefore it is not entirely accurate to say that there are no peer reviewed paper that support the anti argument. No one paper is going to deal with climate change in toto because that is a huge topic not suited to one researcher or even research group (hence the existence of the ipcc)

I suspect what mike meant was that you will not find any papers by the rabidly anti lobby (or for that matter the rabidly pro) surviving the peer review process or being published in credible journals because scientific papers deal in facts, evidence and analysis - not in opinion and rhetoric that have no evidential support.

 

[Smudger]

JL - Could you sum up the flaws which make the peer-review process so unreliable? Rather than say 'google it' - which is a bit insultingly dismissive. After all, it is a claim you made. If you can't back it up...

 

[jlawrence]

Firstly define a peer - someone involved in a the same research ? someone in the same field ? or what ?
Now having defined what you class as a peer, now define what you refer to as peer reviewed ? Is it just read by one peer, 2, 3, 4 ,5 or what ? Is it just read by whoever the Editor of the journal decides to send it to ? What level do they review the information to - do they look deeply into the actual research - or just at the paper presented (I suspect the later).
Is a paper only classed as peer reviewed as and when it gets published ?

For an example of what one editor thought of the process take a read of http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1420798/

At the end of the day a scientific journal is in some ways very similar to any other magazine in that the Editor decides what goes in it - he/she also decides on what he/she will send for peer review and who he/she will send to, and once back from review he/she can still decide not to publish it.

 

[Smudger]

You found one paper.

Back to looking at the balance of evidence, not cherry picking...

 

[big soft moose]

At the end of the day a scientific journal is in some ways very similar to any other magazine in that the Editor decides what goes in it - he/she also decides on what he/she will send for peer review and who he/she will send to, and once back from review he/she can still decide not to publish it.

thats not technically true - most academic papers are sent for peer review prior to publication by the university or research group concerned- they go to a number of researchers in the same or similar feilds (similar because if you are in a very small feild you may be the only group researching it) - for example my sister who used to be a cambridge (now at the OU) has been part of the peer review process for papers from newcastle, birmingham and UCL.

It is in the universities interest for such review to be rigourous as submitting something with little scientific validity doesnt do a lot for the credibility of the whole institution (vis that muppet who claimed to have performed cold fusion but no one could replicate it and it turned out that the helium ions were from his glassware cleaning process).

Once the peer review is complete and suggested changes have been made (or declined to be made in some cases) the paper is then submitted for publication along with a note that it has been peer reviewed by x, y, and z - at that point the editor may choose to simply print it (if you are an established and credible research group), to contact the peer reviewers to discuss the paper further (this tends to happen if you havent adopted suggested changes as the editor will want to know why not), or he may choose to send it for further review ( if your research is particularly cutting edge or difficult for him to believe in , or if you (stupidly - like cold fusion man) are submitting a paper which has not been peer reviewed)

no credible journal is going to choose to publish a paper that has not been subject to any review - for the same reason, that their credibility as a scientific journal is at stake - they might however choose to publish soimething with which no reviewer agrees if its particularly cutting edge - but they will say so on a footnote

likewise when publishing a paper that has been reviewed it will normally say somewhere in the footnotes who it has been reviewed by so that other academics can judge the credibility of the review by the reputation of the reviewer.

The only major problem in the review system is politics - If you are (hypothetically speaking) a researcher at birmingham and your research group leader doesnt get on with say the equivalent hypthetical group at bristol but your paper is sent to bristol for review it is possible that it might be unfairly slated for personal resons. However this is why most papers are sent to two or three different groups for review.

the other, more minor , problem occurs as i mentioned above if you are so cutting edge that you are the only group researching a particular topic and you have problems finding someone whos research is similar enough to yours for them to understand and review your research.

 

[jlawrence]

You found one paper.

Back to looking at the balance of evidence, not cherry picking...

Smudger, how about you go take a look in google. I'm not putting up a list of urls for you.

You'll also probably find that there aren't that many editors who are willing to comment at all.

 

[big soft moose]

You found one paper.

Back to looking at the balance of evidence, not cherry picking...

Smudger, how about you go take a look in google. I'm not putting up a list of urls for you.

You'll also probably find that there aren't that many editors who are willing to comment at all.

you'll also find editors with an axe to grind with the review process because they think they no better than the reviewers and reseachers who are annoyed that they're reviewer told them that they were talking out of their fundamental orifice

perhaps the reason mnost editors have know comment to make is because they are happy with the process.

google is great for most things but on topics like this (as with climate change) the trouble comes in picking the hits that kniow what they are talking about frm those that dont.

 

[Smudger]

You found one paper.

Back to looking at the balance of evidence, not cherry picking...

Smudger, how about you go take a look in google. I'm not putting up a list of urls for you.

You'll also probably find that there aren't that many editors who are willing to comment at all.

You aren't getting this.
If you make a statement you are expected to be able to back it up, not tell people to Google it. In any sensible discussion, that means you have lost.
'Probably' find 'not many' editors - hardly compelling.

 

[devonwoody]

Blimey, I didn't know there are such things going on.

I still didn't get my thread intentions aired but still the thread did give me and others by post and viewing numbers a lot of interest.

Please tell me I am not a Troll

 

[Peter T]

Blimey, I didn't know there are such things going on.

I still didn't get my thread intentions aired but still the thread did give me and others by post and viewing numbers a lot of interest.

Please tell me I am not a Troll

You're not a Troll

 

[Digit]

I have repeatedly tried to steer a middle line on this, specifically arguing about 'lousy science' etc and have stated in the past that if I found an article that fitted that category from the 'other' side I'd post it.
From today's Telegraph.

Experts claim that the loss of ice climbs is a poor indicator of reduction in mountain ice, as climbers can knock down or damage ice formations with their ice axes and crampons!

I'd say that was a pretty good example!

Roy.

 

[mr grimsdale]

Ooh climate change!

Nowadays I try to avoid getting drawn in as the debate is always completely dominated by the 'sceptics'.
It's like trying to talk about geography but having to argue with flat-earthers every time, before you can even begin to talk about the interesting stuff.
I've spent many hours trying to talk about it on chat groups, in pubs and other places, but a complete waste of time because of the nay sayers.
Even our local 'Environment Group' can't talk about it because it is supposed to be hypothetical and a sinister plot by the green lobby - so they stick to talking about windfarms and eco light bulbs.
I'm not sure what it will take to get the prats to pull their heads out of the sand, but it will probably be too late.
A massive world wide filibuster by the massed idiots of the world.

 

[Peter T]

Ooh climate change!

Nowadays I try to avoid getting drawn in as the debate is always completely dominated by the 'sceptics'.
It's like trying to talk about geography but having to argue with flat-earthers every time, before you can even begin to talk about the interesting stuff.
I've spent many hours trying to talk about it on chat groups, in pubs and other places, but a complete waste of time because of the nay sayers.
Even our local 'Environment Group' can't talk about it because it is supposed to be hypothetical and a sinister plot by the green lobby - so they stick to talking about windfarms and eco light bulbs.
I'm not sure what it will take to get the prats to pull their heads out of the sand, but it will probably be too late.
A massive world wide filibuster by the massed idiots of the world.

Oh my, that stupid boy Miliband has "Declared war" on climate change sceptics and now Mr Grimsdale appears to be gearing up for a full fronted confrontation..............................it must be true :shock:

 

[Smudger]

Why, or in what ways, is Milliband (I presume you mean Ed) 'stupid'? And why should he not argue his case, given that he is right?

He said

"It's right that there's rigour applied to all the reports about climate change, but I think it would be wrong that when a mistake is made it's somehow used to undermine the overwhelming picture that's there," he said.