I have other projects to do this weekend, so I’m taking off.
Moderation may be minimal or non-existent at times, so if your comment takes a long time to appear, don’t take it personally. In the meantime, please consider this poll.
I can’t fit the entire question into the poll header, so here it is in full:
If one existed, would you join a professional organization dedicated to offering an alternate to organizations like the American Meteorological Society, American Physical Society, American Association for the Advancement of Science, etc if this organization offered a peer reviewed journal, reasonable dues, and a healthy dose of climate skepticism rooted in science?
This stems from a conversation I had about three weeks ago, and this weekend seemed like a good time to ask the question.
This is disgusting, what idiot would vote for candidates that don’t support Private Property Rights; most of them don’t?
2012 PRIVATE PROPERTY RIGHTS VOTER GUIDE RELEASED!
http://www.calpropertyrights.com/?page_id=1195
Where do California Candidates Stand on Private Property Rights?
The Alliance sent the 2012 Property Rights Protection Questionnaire to all California candidates running for Congress and the State Legislature to determine who shares a strong commitment to protecting private property rights.
I didn’t take the poll. I’m not a professional in the field so my joining would be like Kenji (sp?), Anthony’s dog, joining that “scientist” group. But if I was a pro in the field, I’d join in a heartbeat.
I voted “Mayby” because the question said ” ….and a healthy dose of climate skepticism rooted in science”.
I would have voted “Yes” if that section had said something like “…and a passionate dedication for the truth and a firm commitment to the notion that a single observation contrary to reality is sufficient cause to discard an idea.”
David A. Evans says:
May 5, 2012 at 1:18 pm
”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy_in_Germany
Notice anything wrong about the numbers?”
Looks right to me. But beware; they counted big hydro as renewable as opposed to what California does. Maybe Californians are even crazier than Germans. So, why is that important? Because the potential of hydropower is exhausted in Germany. The “Energiewende” or final energy solution (only kidding, it would have to be translated as “Energy U Turn”) is based on the growth of the renewables sector and there will only be miniscule growth in big hydro.
Even in medicine you get people jumping on the alarmist bandwagon.
The Lancet (an otherwise respectable medical journal) produced an issue a little over a year ago devoted to the dire effects on health which could be expected from global warming.
It has been known for centuries that severe cold causes a sharp rise in the death rate in temperate countries,while mild winters are associated with a low mortality rate.
Nephron
I agree with Joh Shivley above.
“No, I would not. A scientific journal should favor seeking scientific trurth and not promoting a favored position on a political issue implied by the science. We need to support those organizations that care about the truth revealed by use of scientific principles and their correct application and that do not promote one side of the climatology.”
If the new journal takes a position, then it is just as bad as the existing journals. The journal should promote rigor in the science, openness of data, methods and code. The practice of the Royal Scociety, for the first 300 years, is a good example. ISO standards for scientific research is another place to start.
What you propose has been done to death, it all starts with good intentions, then the dogma sets in, then peer review becomes the setup to begin internal censering. and it turns into yet another overblown boys/girls club of only the “right” views are accepted.
You can try it if you really want to, but it like all the other peer reviewed, professional, open, transparent, etc, etc, etc, blah, blah, blah, will all eventualy go the way of all the others. People will corrupt it for their own purposes, eventualy.
Sadly, because it will involve people, its garanteed to be screwed up, if someone can find some sort of “power” and “control” and “ego rubbing” and “money” to be gained from its control.
I was musing on the sources of all the self flagellation going on with these Occupy types and with “The Team”; the politicians voting through climate change acts without the foggiest notion of whether they are achievable; of the MSM parroting a theme of self destruction; of building windmills, a technology already superceded; of solar panel arrays with an output similar to a cigarette lighter, etc etc etc. It seems to be largely confined to the West Europeans and Americas,with a few ex-pats calling themselves Aussies and New Zealanders. Are we simply witnessing the “New Fall Of The Roman Empire”, except that now it is the Western Empire. Does there come a time in every society when the wars are over, the boundaries are set, our adventure into space is over. the great discoveries within the available technology have been completed and there is nothing left but the inevitable decay of that society. As the romans turned in on themselves and by much beating of chests and self mutilation they presided over their own decline, are we now at that point in Western society where there is too little to look forward to, hence our decline is now inevitable. Are we indeed doomed to pass the baton to the Chinese? Is this the natural state of evolution and resistance is futile? Could it be that this rise and fall of “empires” is as for-ordained as the advance and retreat of the ice ages?
Will we have:
– T-shirts
– Ballcaps
– Coffee mugs
– and Instruments (thermometer, sling psychrometer et al)
with the official insignia?
If so, I’m in …
/just a little humor …
I had been a member and journal subscriber for >25 years with Geological Society of America . I contributed online to discussion of a GSA Position Statement on Anthro Global Warming back in the early 2000s. I figured it was a natural for the premier American geology organization to emphasize the tremendous range of climatic variation in the long geological record, and thus to remind the run-amok climate “scientists” that the Earth has been through far greater extremes many times over. Thus, tipping points are flat-out fakes.
But GSA fell right in line with the alarmist, “it’s all Man’s fault” camp.
So I dropped my membership and my subscription. I dumped National Geographic for similar reasons. Sad when long-established science organizations get seduced by politics and popular trends. Once intellectual trust is violated, it’s nearly impossible to recover.
Sensing this same need, a professional organization was formed over a year ago with free peer review, on-line publishing and at present free membership. PrincipiaScientificInternational.org has assisted in writting, review and posting of numerous research articles using approved scientific methods. Concerned about the A/C and Refrigeration eningeers position, I wrote “Airmen of ASHRAE Enter the Fray” in Aug 2010. I confronted a science-named pressure group with few actual scientists in “Concerned About Concerned Scientists in Oct 2010. I mentioned out of control behavior at their Dec 2010 annual meeting in “Warmist Monk Immolates at the AGU Temple”.
The presumed leaders of our government, universites and professional societies do not walk on water. Most have less education and less skill that the average college student and all have sacrificed objectivity for their current positions. Engineers in particular have the required technical ability, coupled with REAL world experience to be meaningful in this debate. When I began science writting over three years ago, some mentioned that I was not a scientist.
MY REPLY: “Engineers have as much Physics as a Physics major, as much Chemistry as a Chemistry major and as much Math as a Math major. Therefore, a ‘scientist’ is an engineer that did not want to go to school an extra year.”
The PC that you have before you is the greatest library in the world, and the greatest ‘search engine’ librarian is there to assist you in finding the TRUTH. It is shocking easy to develope the on-line mentors improve your skills. Form your OWN science CC newsletter. Anthony has provided a great forum for thought that you could model. The ‘poll question’….would I join an independent science organization….YES, I already have !
I’m not a professional scientist (my siblings are, but I got waylaid by a Univac 1108 in my freshman year in college). So I used the maybe button. While my aper reading of things line Science News has been declining, largely due to everyone here, once the alarmists give up then it may indeed be worthwhile joining such an organization.
I’d have to agree with those expressing reservations about declarations of a healthy dose of scepticism, tempting as it seems, and must declare myself as only another interested amateur who would be unlikely to contribute much.
On the other hand, might I suggest that if a declaration is needed, declare that this is a forum for discussing only science based on demonstrable observational evidence, with full details of processing ‘twixt observation and claim. That should sort the sheep from the goats.
“If one existed, would you join a professional organization “…
………and a healthy dose of climate skepticism rooted in science?
=================
Ummm, I thought I was participating.
We are it.
Chris Mooney on MSNBC, peddling his thesis that Republicans have inferior brains.
http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-TV/2012/05/05/MSNBC-Panel-Determines-Republican-Brains-Inferior-To-Liberal
You mean one that didn’t make public policy statements without consulting the membership?
The alternative to the current peer reviewed journals is not another journal, although a respectable journal without biased gatekeepers would be nice. Something that would make it worthwhile would be a focus on comments and rebuttals to papers published in other journals.
Like several above, I would have no business joining such a society. I would be happy to provide the little bit of financial assistance I am able to contribute, perhaps as an “associate member” or some such, provided that the organization rejected the concept of “peer review” outright.
Peer review originated as a stopgap. The limited bandwidth of print publications, combined with the expense of typesetting equations, presenting adequate illustrations, and the like made it necessary to restrict publication to those papers that “made sense”, because there simply wasn’t room to accommodate crackpots and monomaniacs in the limited space.
The Internet removes those restrictions. There are plenty of people, “peers” and otherwise, available to screen whatever might appear. A voting/karma system, perhaps adapted from Slashdot or some other established Web forum, might be useful as guidance for people just getting into the system, but the only restrictions on publication, as such, should be “SHOW ALL THE DATA” and “SHOW YOUR WORK” — the latter to include adjustments, “normalization”, and all the other manipulations.
There is no way a system based on gatekeepers can remain honest over time, because the gatekeepers become themselves invested in particular notions, and there is no better example of that principle than peer review as it is currently implemented. Let’s get back to the precepts of the Royal Society, where anybody with anything potentially interesting gets a moment at the podium — and has to withstand the resulting rotten tomatoes and brickbats if their presentation doesn’t hold water.
Anyone knows how to get GHCN v1 temperature data?
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/v1
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/v2
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/v3
As I see it, the average V1 temperature data are no longer public?
Or which dir would hold avg temp data?
And for the V2 I see a Max temp dir?
Originally GHCN V1 was lanched in 1992, is there any chance that a GHCN V1 today looks like it did in 1992?
K.R. Frank
My cure for all things wrong in the ocean and how to prevent the next Great Dying.
Some where on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico we build a pipeline that goes to the Gulf Stream and down to the depth of 5,000’+.
Then put millions of pin holes in several miles of pipe and place it across the stream.
Then pump in 50+ barrels of air per minute. The water pressure will keep the air in the water like carbonated soda.
The current will carry the aerated water around the world. The oxygen will help the fish and other critters and aerobic biodegrading. The nitrogen will help the teeny tiny plant life. This will increase the bottom of the food chain and cleanup pollution. We should also do this with lakes and rivers.
Wow! I am so smart.
Or am I trolling?
I’m never sure.
I’m not American, so I have no place in this poll. However, if it were about Canadian or UK institutions, I’d certainly say YES.
I don’t care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members.
Groucho Marx
Anyhow me not real professional caveman, only obsessive hobbyist.. Not membership material.
Administrative harassment via excessive red tape (e.g. peer review by non-hybrid unqualified parties) compounds the already severely-crippling protraction of cutting edge delays that HARD-limit organizational potential:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Principle
The only balanced, sensible approach where there’s no one-size-fits-all:
Hedge bets. Diversity’s KEY to survival prep.
Solar-Terrestrial-Climate Weave
http://i49.tinypic.com/219q848.png
Disko Troop says:
May 5, 2012 at 2:12 pm
Are we simply witnessing . . . the inevitable decay of that society.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Yes.
I can see two big problems with the idea:
(1) If the organization is explicitly about truth, not fashion, it will NEVER gain any status, and the media will NEVER listen to it. Fashion talks. Money talks. Truth walks.
(2) O’Sullivan’s Law. Every national-level organization quickly turns into just another Soviet front, even if all of its rank and file members are non-Communist. I don’t see how this organization would protect itself. Its executives would get tired of being called Crazy and Fascist and Holocaust-Lovers and so on, and would give in to Gramscian fashion.
Better to keep things decentralized, pretty much as they are now.
http://www.leaderpost.com/Discovery+sheds+light+Cabot+travels/6571068/story.html