From Roger Pielke Jr.’s blog, some strong advice.
UPDATE: Dot Earth on the debate.
If you want to know why Steve McIntyre has a large following and the respect (often begrudging) from many professionals, you need look no further than his latest post on the Yamal controversy. Some people won’t like his tone and others won’t like how his work is used and spun in the political process. All fair complaints, but they are largely a side show to the substantive issues.
And so long as Steve is delivering detailed, systematic and devastating substantive arguments — and yes this post is all three — he will continue to have a following and earn respect (however begrudging).
Anyone coming to this fresh who compares McIntyre’s latest dissection with the recent screed from Real Climate will come to a similar judgment, I’d guess.
I stand by my unsolicited advice to McIntyre that he needs to publish his work in the peer reviewed arena if he wants to have his work accepted and included in the mainstream scientific discourse. Meantime, those professionals, such as the guys at Real Climate, who want to do public battle over scientific issues on the blogs had better step up their game, because no matter how much the blog chorus gets whipped up about the tribal aspects of the debate, fair minded people observing events are going to come to a very different conclusion, like it or not.
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TomP,
Two wrongs dont make a right…or do they? Perhaps the thing you are missing the most is that if so many questions remain unanswered on both sides…then why has the hockey stick been used as the baseline by the IPCC and the global warming ™ industry?
Surely, if so many questions remain unanswered then the hockey stick should not be used at all until those questions are answered?
Mailman
What was even more interesting, 40 Shades, was Andy Revkin’s growing irritation with the carping of the fundamentalists in the comments. I’m sure I’ll see Kim’s take on that soon.
You know, it would be nice to see this prolific crowd pay Dotearth a visit and see if we could cheer up Mr. Revkin a bit. Show him what some real traffic looks like.
It is going to be very hard for Steve McIntyre to publish any of this material (perhaps Energy and Environment).
If the paper was submitted to others journals, at least one of the reviewers will be one of Briffa’s co-authors on one of the other tree-ring studies.
In the past, these pro-Team reviewers have been over-the-top negative on any such paper and it just seems the paper or journal comment gets nowhere. The editor would have to make sure none of the reviewers are pro-Team or just ignore the comments from “Reviewer #2” or it will just be a lot of time wasted.
AnonyMoose (21:13:31) :
AnonyMoose you just ruined my morning. I knew things were bad in Journal Land, I just didn’t realize how bad.
But thank you anyway for the link.
Now the big question is: What can one believe anymore?
With the internet, is peer review really necessary? Any researcher can publish his results online, essentially for free. Other people can review and criticize the results and publish their criticisms, essentially for free. What exactly is the problem?
It seems to me that peer review harkens back to a time when publishing required an expensive system of scientific journals and research libraries. The only way to publicize a research finding was to put it on paper; bind it; and store copies of it in numerous expensive climate-controlled (haha) buildings all over the world. And the same applied to criticism of that finding.
But at this point, it seems to me the main purpose of having peer reviewed journals is to have a means for researchers to compete with eachother by having their work accepted by such journals.
The only objection I can think of to moving away from peer review is that cranks will flood the internet with nonsense and drown out the good stuff. But this doesn’t seem to be a big problem and Steve McIntyre is a good example. People pay attention to him because he has a good reputation. He has a good reputation because he has a track record of making sense.
Again, what exactly is the problem?
ANTHONY
TOM P
has been called out at CA. He has been shown to be an RC lap dog with even less statistical knowledge than Gavin.
Don’t let the nincumpoop hijack this thread as well.
Washington Post has a blog about it..didn’t know if you had seen it:
Another Slapshot in Climate ‘Hockey Stick’ Faceoff
An enduring dispute in the scientific community and the blogosphere over an iconic climate science graph, known as the “Hockey Stick,” has boiled over yet again in the past two weeks, with climate skeptics touting a new analysis they say greatly weakens the evidence supporting the mainstream scientific view that recent warming of Earth’s climate is highly unusual and largely due to human emissions of greenhouse gases……..
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitalweathergang/2009/10/another_slapshot_in_climate_ho.html
I love the smell of open Science in the morning. It smells like… Victory.
stephen.richards (06:05:42) :
“ANTHONY
TOM P
has been called out at CA. He has been shown to be an RC lap dog with even less statistical knowledge than Gavin.”
Even less? That must mean none then.
Isn’t the peer review process supposed to ensure papers can stand up to people like Steve M?
Steve is doing what peer review is supposed to do. If the peers had done what they were supposed to do, Climate Audit would not exist. The Peer Reviewers provided the opportunity, (although I’m not sure Steve would classify it that way), for Climate Audit to exist. If anything, I hope Steve’s and others’ actions will move peer review from a rubber stamp process to one of robustness. Much like Corp. Boards are becoming much more than rubber stampers.
One thing I can tell you, if I were to produce a significant paper which relied on the robustness (if that’s a word) of the stats, I would contact Steve and see how much it would cost to put it through his stat mill. If it could withstand his mill, I would be a lot more confident it could withstand the public mill.
Tom P and Mailman
It is Briffa’s work that must be explained. He has obviously been selective in his use of data but has failed to explain the selection process. Steve’s work simply points out that Briffa’s calculations are not robust to the substitution of other data sets yet his work has been one of the great pillars of AGW beliefs for a decade and is on the verge of helping to commit us to spending trillions of dollars on carbon trading schemes that may be completely unnecessary. But how can we decide if carbon cap and trade is or is not required if proponents of the hypothesis of unprecedented AGW are not required to disclose their data or explain their methodology?
Let’s recap for a minute:
Briffa failed to disclose his data for almost a decade
Briffa’s work is not robust to substitutions or the use of other available data sets
Briffa has not disclosed his tree selection criteria
However:
Briffa’s work has been used in the IPCC’s reports to demonstrate the severity of global warming
Those IPCC reports are about to be presented as uncontested fact in Copenhagen to justify the imposition of a whole new branch of “ecofriendly” taxation
In 1 week since Briffa’s data was finally published, Steve McIntyre has cast enough doubt over the robustness of Briffa’s work for any rational scientist to step back and question his methods.
Tom, you should be asking questions of Briffa not Steve McIntyre
Tom, your continued attempts to justify the practice of ignoring valid tree ring data just because it doesn’t correlate with temperature is really growing old. That data is 100% valid and appropriote to use.
Richard (1:15:02) My father knew. To put some of the controversy in perspective, I recall as a boy dinner table discussion of the viability of tree rings as a proxy. Climate scientists (my father has a doctor of science in climatology) have known for decades the problems with dendro proxies. The Hudson’s Bay archives are very cool. I have read firsthand some of the tales of hardship these brave men went through, all to gather furs to keep people warm in Europe during the LIA. It is also interesting to look at the weather data that was gathered over almost 400 years. Sorry TomP, but I smell something rotten in dendro. Real temperature data trumps speculative temperature data in my book.
Tom P (01:07:06) :
Steve has yet to find time to respond…
Tom,
It appears Steve McIntyre has addressed you in his post.
You should be able to deduce what his reply might be to your comments, and why he hasn’t responded to you in the comments, from what he says in the post.
Following the discussions about SM needing to be peer reviewed I am wondering why a statistician using his expertise to question the statistical methods used by climatologists would be expected to be peer reviewed in a climate publication? Wouldn’t his methods be better reviewed in a statistical pub? Are climatologists ever peer reviewed by those same statistical publications? After all, they rely on those methods to produce their results. What is the level of expertise of these climatologists in applying proper statistical methods to their raw data? It seems to me that the idea of “peer review” needs to be changed to the idea of “cross discipline review”.
Frank Lansner (02:26:27) :
Here the lates reality check after the Hanno-scandal, the Jones/Hadcrut scandal, the Briffa/Hockey scandal:
http://www.klimadebat.dk/forum/vedhaeftninger/climateinternettraffic.jpg
Is this the Yamal Day Oscillation, YDO, spike of 2009?
All this post means is that Roger Pielke Jr. is also going to go down with this ship once all of the information is available.
Have any of you seen these?
http://delayedoscillator.wordpress.com/2009/10/05/yamal-emulation-i/
http://delayedoscillator.wordpress.com/2009/10/05/yamal-emulation-ii-divergence/
These links suggest that SM’s work might not be so good.
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/122374111/abstract
Trends and uncertainties in Siberian indicators of 20th century warming
http://deepclimate.org/2009/10/04/climate-auditor-steve-mcintyre-yamal/
SM claims no libel but this blog shows differently.
BTW, I think the pic at the beginning should have hockey sticks flying out of the record player instead of axes….
There are many people out there that have the ability to look at surface, atmosphere, ocean, etc. temperatures and make good judgments. To say “climate scientist” does not mean a thing. It could mean a statistics major feeding garbage, given him, into a computer. Is a trained astrophysicist better then a engineer trained and experienced in conductive, convective and radiation heat transfer? I’ll go with the engineer, he is probably, shall we say, more down to earth.
Real Climat is funny. As usual, they use not data or facts. They just keep repeating their mantra “We use facts, We are peer reviewed…” Get a grip people. It is obvious that your data is corrupted.
Mr. Mandia,
The divergence problem is defined by the assumption that the instrumental record of Siberian temperatures is accurate and that somehow, trees decide to behave differently than ever before. The later assumption is ridicules and there is ample evidence that the first assumption is also wrong. The collapse of the soviet union and the loss of the majority of Siberian temperature reporting stations has obviously played a role, with only the most ‘urban’ stations remaining active.
As far as the debate is concerned…Briffa and his colleagues routinely hide their data and use statistical methods that have been found inadequate by impartial panels of statisticians, not just SM. You defend their statistical methods as being well accepted in the community, but that is hardly a defense, considering their lack of expertise in this matter. The real bottom line is that they have made claims that can not be supported by the total data and they have hidden the evidence that calls their claims into question. This is scientific fraud, pure and simple, even if they eventually turn out to be correct, which is not appearing likely.
Scott Mandia links to an anonymous blogger at Deep Climate. Interesting “about” page. Apparently a big believer in the ExxonMobilBigEvilOil conspiracy. Volunteers for Sourcewatch, an organization willing to smear any individual or organization that gives off even a whiff of skepticism. Self-appointed watchdog of Canada’s skeptical community. Not. Very. Impressive.
Eli Rabbit, Tamino, Deep Climate. Don’t any of you clowns have the cajones to show your faces? I think I know why. They aren’t really sure, deep down inside, that they are on the right side. They want plausible deniability when AGW belief is finally laid to rest.
Peer reviewed journals are obsolete. Things become obsolete when something else does the required task better. The required task in this case is the advancement of science. It is obvious that the journals are supporting a structure that is retarding the advancement of science in favor of political and financial rewards. The internet is exposing the failure of the journals and pushing the science further.
The internet is far from perfect, but it is advancing the science more than the ‘peer-reviewed’ journals. RP is holding onto the past and advocating a process that is shown to be corrupt and much less efficient.
“While I am on the subject; why does any scientist believe the ravings of anyone, scientist or not, who does not divulge publicly all data and methods? Why should I trust a guy who keeps his data selection of trees a secret? Or, more importantly, that keeps the computer code a secret?”
I’m about to sound like a lunatic conspiracy faddist. I am not, but I won’t be able to prove it.
This (like the “We are going to freeze” halfs of the cycle) is not about weather, climate, or science (that is three things related only that they use some orf the same letters and words).
This is about politics. About gaining control of every thing. It is identical to and congruent with the fight for gun control, financial control, economic control, birth control (and the closely related death control), “health care” control, school control, language control, and on and on down the list.
TO PEER REVIEW OR NOT TO PEER REVIEW:
Let’s bear in mind that in the US, and even in Canada, free speech such as Steve McIntyre’s blogs is a protected right.
Facts are facts, and, analyses & conclusions derived from them are what they are, or aren’t. It seems very odd that scientists, at least some, wouldn’t accept data & findings simply because they’re not peer reviewed.
And how good is the peer review process?
Not very good at all. Consider (from the medical profession) the following article, and some that have piggybacked on it:
http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pmed.0020124
Maybe this blog, or at least somewhere, its been noted that the various “climate scientists” tend to peer review each other’s work in a very biased fashion, with like-minded people supporting similar conclusions, etc. “Incestuous” describes the process reasonably accurately.
All that aside, if someone chooses not to publish then there’s absolutely nothing wrong with someone else essentially taking the raw data & replicating the findings in a peer-reviewed article…burying in a footnote the original source to defend against plagarism (the “legal ethics” with this tend to differ from generally accepted principles of right & wrong…but that is what it is).
Which leads to an odd remark from the RealClimate website screed on the Yamal tree ring study (item entitled “Hey Ya! (mal)” at http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/09/hey-ya-mal/ toward the end it reads:
“There is nothing wrong with people putting together new chronologies of tree rings or testing the robustness of previous results to updated data or new methodologies. Or even thinking about what would happen if it was all wrong. What is objectionable is the conflation of technical criticism with unsupported, unjustified and unverified accusations of scientific misconduct.”
COMMENT: After reading S. McIntyre’s work I find no remarks that support this accusation. None at all. The RealClimate author is indulging in the very act he is complaining of.
“Steve McIntyre keeps insisting that he should be treated like a professional.”
COMMENT: be that as it may, or may not, its irrelevant to any assessment of his findings on the subject. Such ‘ad hominem’ attacks reflect on the author.
“But how professional is it to continue to slander scientists with vague insinuations and spin made-up tales of perfidy out of the whole cloth instead of submitting his work for peer-review?”
COMMENT: Emotional flailing that is in itself a slanderous accusation of a vague & insinuating, and more, nature.
“He continues to take absolutely no responsibility for the ridiculous fantasies and exaggerations that his supporters broadcast, ….”
COMMENT: FREE SPEECH is a right — RealClimate needs to deal with that. It is only in rare cases that someone’s speech is not considered free and one becomes responsible for the resulting actions of others (e.g. yelling “bomb” in an airport, causing a stampede). S. McIntyre’s blogs don’t even come close to any such standard.
“…apparently being happy to bask in their acclaim rather than correct any of the misrepresentations he has engendered.”
COMMENTS: a) so now RealClimate can read minds? and, b) nobody is responsible for correcting the misrepresentations they engender in others — but, that is ostensibly what the RealClimate author set out to do with its rebuttal, which degenerated to the ‘ad hominem’ attacks, slanderous insinuations, etc (not to mention RealClimate’s snippy sarcastic tone & style in general to anything they don’t seem to like). All of which is well beneath anything S. McIntyre has blog-published. Why didn’t RealClimate simply publish a cogent rebuttal in a professional manner? Perhaps because they can’t? It seems extraordinarily hypocritical to maintain a website in which their science is presented & explained, in which they address another’s science (e.g. S. McIntyre’s) and then go on to complain that S. McIntyre is essentially doing the same thing they are!
Put another way, if RealClimate is going to act out like a spoiled brat teenage girl that doesn’t get her way every time someone presents a finding they don’t like (i.e. immaturely) , why would they expect someone else (someone mature) to engage them on their level? Oh yes, they’re too immature to get it. At any rate, RealClimate goes on to say:
“If he wants to make a change, he has a clear choice; to continue to play Don Quixote for the peanut gallery or to produce something constructive that is actually worthy of publication.”
COMMENT: Oh, S. McIntyre IS making a positive change, and relatively quickly. His so-called “supporters” aren’t making “ridiculous fantasies and exaggerations” and “misrepresentations” so much as they’re taking advantage of the opportunity to poke fun at the immaturity oozing throughout RealClimate’s blog pieces. Perhaps if RealClimate (and that ilk) presented themselves maturely they’d stimulate a different response.
And immature people just hate to be made fun of; and immature people simply don’t comprehend that its their antics that provoke the responses they get.
Let Steve continue to publish however he wants — that’s his protected right and some people just have to deal with it.
And let Steve’s [so-called] “supporters” poke fun at RealClimate, etc., as long as RealClimate continues to publish blogs dripping in sarcasm, slanderous innuendos, etc. while hypocritically complaining that others are doing that very same thing (it seems that few sites can top RealClimate for dripping sarcasm & whining hypocrisy on topics that are elsewhere very dry & objectively addressed). THAT kind of behavior invites in-kind responses–and S. McIntyre isn’t responsible for that.
For the temperment of RealClimate’s authors, laughter hits where it hurts — and their childish rants & sarcasm invite it. So please do continue…. As most people with kids learn, the spoiled brats are notorious for NEVER acknowledging their mistakes and always blaming someone else. Which is to extrapolate that they’ll never learn and never change. Spoiled brats may grow up & earn various academic credentials, but at heart they commonly remain spoiled brats forever.