Quote of the Month – Nature disses skeptics

I wonder if a letter to Nature with their quote “It is scientists, not sceptics, who are most willing to consider explanations that conflict with their own. And far from quashing dissent, it is the scientists, not the sceptics, who do most to acknowledge gaps in their studies and point out the limitations of their data” plus a link to the conference videos, would get published?

@ur momisugly J,
and while we’re at it,….. I, nor do I believe others wish to anything but clarification, so don’t take offense, but I don’t think you’re understanding and perhaps conflating two very different concepts ….. “the deserved rich would get richer and maybe some of that will trickle down or something. Crackpots….”
“Trickle down” is a derisive term for supply-side economics, a very legitimate view of economics most notably embraced by both John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan.
However, asserting that rich people are somehow not deserving to be rich is anathema to many. Including myself. This country needs rich people, but even if we didn’t, they are indeed fellow citizens and deserving better than the class warfare people are engaged in against them today.
Personally, I don’t think I have the drive to ever become rich. Money just doesn’t mean that much to me. However, were I to endeavor to do the work, and make it happen, I’d like to think my fellow citizens would respect the effort, congratulate me on the accomplishment and emulate what I did if it was something they felt as a worthwhile pursuit.
And truly, this nation needs more wealthy people, not less. I’ve never once seen a poor person hire anyone.

At least here on WUWT folks can debate and discuss science, elsewhere you just get fed the same old unscientific diatribe.

Anthony Watts wrote: “Wow. Apparently, Nature has never seen the rampant quashing of dissent that goes on at Real Climate, which we documented with data and anecdotal reports nor have they ever noted the lack of curiosity on the part of the Hockey Team when it comes to looking at a failure of statistical analysis techniques, or alternate explanations for changes in environments and natural signals, such as the recently discovered and peer reviewed paper about sheep grazing effects on tree rings being greater than that of temperature.”
Perhaps Nature don’t think Real Climate and the Hockey Team are scientists. They fit the description thrown at sceptics much better.
As ever the devil is in the detail. I am a bog standard member of the public. The climate war has led me to reading science papers on all manner of things mostly out of curiosity and my main impression of them is that they have all manner of caveats, clauses and plainly admitted gaps in knowledge. The uncertainties tend not to appear in the summary but do appear in the conclusion. They cannot have it both ways. If such scientists wish to write speculative papers that draw no concrete conclusions then they will just have to suck it up and deal with being reminded of their own writing. If they can’t find a discrete answer maybe they are asking the wrong question.

@James Baldwin H July 27, 2011 at 11:18 am:

“It is scientists, not sceptics, who are most willing to consider explanations that conflict with their own.”
I thought that scientists were supposed to be skeptical, requiring significant proof from data to accept a new hypothesis.

That is the theory. In addition, “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proofs.”
That they didn’t do this vis-a-vis CO2 strongly suggests that they do not think the claims of AGW are extraordinary. This would seem to say much about them.
And think about it, who would go into climate science? Business types? Engineer types? Ag majors? Economist types? Hardly. Perhaps some portion of Ag, but not so for the rest, IMHO. My stereotype of a climate scientist is a tree hugger, the same type that goes in for forestry and ocean sciences, one who sees himself as a defender of nature. If true (it seems so on the surface, to me, anyway), then their predilection is to accept the idea – as fundamental – that man is injuring nature. So, when they get together, the consensus BEGINS with: Man, the killers of Bambi’s mother.
Overstated? Well, anthropogenic global warming due to CO2 is itself overstated – but they don’t see it that way, do they? They accept CAGW as true as that the sky is blue on a sunny day. And since they start from that position, it is not – to them – an extraordinary claim. As such, it does not require extraordinary proofs.
They, in fact, consider a skeptical position to be extraordinary. Listen to them! Everything out of their mouths is, “You cretins! How can you POSSIBLY deny this is happening?!” Ergo, in their eyes, WE are the ones who are required to produce extraordinary proofs.
I think I’ve got this pretty straight (even if I have a simplistic view of them).

It is apparent that the editors at Nature Magazine have never heard of Thomas Kuhn or, heaven forbid, have read his book “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.” Kuhn was a Scientific Historian who died in 1996. There is a complete bio on Wikipedia that is worth reading. He coined the term “Paradigm Shift” for the scientific community. This term was then popularized worldwide by Joel Barker. A quote from Kuhn that accurately fits the climate change debate is “When scientists must choose from competing theories, two men fully committed to the same list of criteria for choice, may never-the-less reach different conclusions. For this reason, basically, the criteria still are not “objective” in the usual sense of the word because individual scientists reach different conclusions with the same criteria due to valuing one criteria over the other or even adding additional criteria for selfish or other subjective reasons. I am suggesting, of course, that the criteria of choice with which I begin function not as rules, which determine choice, but as values which influence it.” Perhaps the Kuhn’s quote or a copy of the book should be sent to Hansen, Gavin, Mann, Jones, etc., although that probably won’t affect any change. We should also remember that this applies to both sides of the equation.

“It is scientists, not sceptics, who are most willing to consider explanations that conflict with their own”
“..it seems that whomever the reporter for Nature was, he/she didn’t venture beyond the lobby and listen to any of the presentations made as the article makes no mention of them”
So Nature certainly aren’t scientists, and they assume their readership are complete idiots who swallow Nature’s tripe whole.

Brian says:
July 27, 2011 at 1:15 pm
Henry Galt says:
July 27, 2011 at 12:18 pm
“Why shouldn’t we use links from skepticalscience? The site is full of intelligent people even if they’re not overly nice.”
Didn’t say you couldn’t.
If a person lands here with a link from, for example, skepticalscience and expects that alone to add to, or terminate, the discussion then, maybe, someone else will jump on and claim that that person lives under a bridge. Doesn’t mean you cant.
I have lived with Internet since 300 baud modems, I have never called anyone a troll. I may have thought they were, but either gave the benefit of the doubt or let it lie.

I have noticed that with regards to climate there is a confusion between the word ‘scientist’ and the word ‘omniscient’.
It is no coincidence that Chaos Theory was developed by a meteorologist in response to his study of weather – it is the most complex of sciences because there are so many variables which can not be isolated and studied one by one in a lab.
In all other sciences there is a long period of learning, often a specialising in one small area, then with some luck you can make a difference. By contrast, in Climate Research any old background seems to qualify you to be a Climate Scientist, you don’t even need to have a degree – just be a member of the right kind of organisation. If you are a bona fide scientist of any type you are wholly qualified to be an expert on climate IF you support AGW. [If not – you know what you are – a non-person]
This is what led to the growth of this pseudo-science. In science you have to prove something beyond doubt, in this pseudo-science you can simply make something up and say every one else has to disprove it! Even if they do you can just ignore it [or be incapable of understanding it] and and still claim your ‘truth’.
A lot of these so-called climate scientists strike me as being, at best, second rate. A few come across as being real carpet-biters!
For some reason it puts me in mind of Freud’s psycho-analysis, where after an hour or so of learning the ideas, you could become an ‘expert’.

It is interesting that research on skeptics by a pro–AGW organisation found that we were more intelligent and scientifically literate than the ‘true believers’.
I think their solution was that we should be talked to more slowly and in a clearer voice until we realised the error of our ways and accepted their wisdom and truth! The idea that intelligent scientifically literate people rejecting AGW was significant eluded them, but then, we are the intelligent ones!