UPDATE: After a cursory look at the percentages in the response to the Lewandowsky survey from the blogs he listed as participating, it seems the outcome doesn’t fit the title. See below.
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From the “free the metadata” department, we have this gem. Dr. Stephan Lewandowsky of the University of Western Australia’s Cognitive Science Department devised some sort of survey where he supposedly contacted skeptical climate blogs to ask we post a link to gather opinions for his survey. He says he contacted five and they all declined. Only one problem with that; none of the mainstream skeptical blogs appear to have any knowledge of being contacted. That includes WUWT and Climate Audit, among others.
I keep all my email, and I see no such contact or invitation. I’ve searched WUWT and found nothing in comments from him inviting to participate either. To be thorough, I also searched for any communications from his co-authors Klaus Oberauer and Gilles Gignac. I’ve found no invitation of any kind, but I did find that a commenter in the USA, PaulW left a note about it on WUWT here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/08/29/new-wuwt-sstenso-page-now-online/#comment-469869 But, he’s not affiliated with UWA or the authors, and it was purely a comment of curiosity. One of our moderators, D.B. Stealey took the survey (now deleted) after seeing the comment, and noted “Interesting questions.” but he didn’t note any invitation to post it on WUWT, nor did I.
Similar lack of confirmed invitations are being reported in other skeptical blogs, and the list is growing. But, for some reason, Dr. Lewandowsky refuses to divulge which skeptical blogs he contacted.
Jo Nova and Lucia Liljegren are asking some very pointed questions. Given the sheer lunacy on display in the paper…
Lewandowsky, S., Oberauer, K., & Gignac, C. E. (in press). NASA faked the moon landing—therefore (climate) science is a hoax: An anatomy of the motivated rejection of science.. Psychological Science.
…I think Jo Nova nailed it with this line:
It’s as if Stephan did not want to know what real skeptics think?
Lucia asked Lewandowsky in a direct email about it and got this response:
Sorry, no, they likely replied to my requests under the presumption of privacy and I am therefore not releasing their names.
The blogs that did post the link (thereby publically identifying themselves, unlike those who declined) are:
%http://www.skepticalscience.com
%http://tamino.wordpress.com
%http://bbickmore.wordpress.com
%http://www.trunity.net/uuuno/blogs/
%http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/
%http://profmandia.wordpress.com/
%http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/
%http://hot-topic.co.nz/
“…they likely replied” That seems to me to be pretty weak data for a scientist. Either they replied requesting confidentiality or they didn’t, there’s no “likely” about it when gathering hard data.
Time to fess up, perfessor. Show the list and proof of contact and confirmation that they declined the invitation. You have my full and complete permission to release my name. Other skeptical bloggers have also granted permission on Lucia’s website, so there’s no reason to hold back now.
In comments at Lucia’s, Steve McIntyre notes:
The University of Western Australia has fairly standard academic misconduct policies.
http://www.research.uwa.edu.au…..guidelines
http://www.research.uwa.edu.au…..rch-policy
If Lewandowky’s claim about 5 skeptic blogs was fabricated, it appears to me that it would be misconduct under university policies. The person responsible for investigating complaints appears to be the Pro VIce Chancellor (Research) ,Robyn Owens, dvcr@uwa.edu.au.
She is in a position to get an answer, given Lewandowsky’s refusal to disclose the information.
In other news, the Lewandowsky survey data was put online at Bishop Hill. See it here.
Make of that data what you wish, but it seems to me that if you only ask questions of one side, as shown is the blog list above, you’ll get one-sided answers. That’s hardly science.
UPDATE: After looking at the survey data provided on the Bishop Hill blog here, it is beginning to look like the answers were skewed by participants at those blogs for what they think he wanted to hear, rather than a true sample.
For example: If you look at column R in the Excel spreadsheet, labeled CYMoon, which according to the paper in question:
Lewandowsky, S., Oberauer, K., & Gignac, C. E. (in press). : An anatomy of the motivated rejection of science.. Psychological Science.
It says:
CYMoon The Apollo moon landings never happened and were
staged in a Hollywood studio. .742
That is the result of this question structure:
Unless otherwise noted, all items used a 4-point scale ranging from \Strongly Disagree’ (1) to \Strongly Agree” (4). Table section headings correspond to latent variable names in
Figure 2.
OK do a simple scan of the 1’s and 2’s in column R, which correspond to ‘Strongly Disagree’ and ‘Disagree’ and you get them as the majority, with a smattering of 3’s and 4’s. So I decided to use Excel’s function for counting occurances. =COUNTIF(R2:R1146,”1″, and =COUNTIF(R2:R1146,”2″ =COUNTIF(R2:R1146,”3″ =COUNTIF(R2:R1146,”4″
The (corrected, I had the 1 and 4 counts backwards originally, thanks Lucia) distribution of responses to the Moon Landing question are:
1067 Strongly Disagree
68 Disagree
4 Agree
6 Strongly agree
Total responses are 1145 (Rows R2 to R1146, top row R1 is title, so subtract 1 from 1146). Therefore 1067+68 = 1135 1135/1145 = 0.9912
Only 0.9% of respondents actually believe that the moon landings “never happened and were staged in a Hollywood film studio”. So what does that say about the title of the paper:
NASA faked the moon landing—therefore (climate) science is a hoax
I see a retraction for this paper in the very near future.
Further to my earlier comment and Lucia’s above, I have now posted up some data analysis of the link between rejection of climate science and the belief conspiracy theories. I think there ain’t any link what so ever, but I leave you to form your own conclusions.
Thank you Steven Mosher for your comments. Although you cannot say so, we guess that you find yourself embarrassed and not a little peed off by Lewandowsky’s slipshod work, because it taints the entire pro-warming camp by association.
From the abstract: “This provides empirical confirmation of previous suggestions that conspiracist ideation contributes to the rejection of science. Acceptance of science, by contrast, was strongly associated with the perception of a consensus among scientists.”
Looking at the paper, it indeed seems like the authors subscribe to their own conspiracy theory where climate scientists are the target of a secret plot by powerful individuals and virtually omnipotent organizations. So, what then are the implications for the science done by “climate scientists”? Are they doing real science, or just being amalgamated into a consensus of some sort as a response to a perceived conspiracy?
Science should always be based on utter honesty. So then, are the authors of this paper willing to doubt their own results? Look at the discussion part of the paper, it is less than impressive. The authors do not really question their own theories and methods, and the three possible flaws they can see in the paper are all summarily dismissed.
This is not science at its best…
As Ned points out: “10 of them claimed to think the moon landing was fake (gave it either a 3 or 4 on the conspiracy 1-4 scale). Of these, 5 appear to be climate believers (respondents 48, 140, 301, and 627) and 5 appear to be climate deniers (134, 861, 870, 890 and 964). ”
So the title could just easily be:
Nasa faked the moon landings and climate change is real worry to me
An anatomy of gulllibility amongst climate change suckers
A couple notes and observations:
1. This paper received a grant from the Australian Research Council. While I am not usually an advocate, in this case – due to the apparent extreme failures of this paper – what appear to be outright lies about its creation, it would seem requesting a reply from them might be appropriate here.
2. Lewandowsky says data avail on request. Someone should request the complete data, as the paper offers, INCLUDING the sites where sampling occurred.
3. The KwikSurvey site was allegedly hacked and all prior data mysteriously lost in late June this year. The question then becomes what documentation DO the authors have for their claims. Where was the survey posted, and what were the answers.
4. The survey questions are listed in Table 2. Along with how the questions were rated/scored.
Why not simply recreate the survey. Use a survey site that allows tracking referring site and IP address. This time insure broad coverage. Replicate the questions exactly along with the scoring. I believe the questions should be randomized in order – ie: not “grouped” as shown in the Table 2. This helps minimized standardized answers for each group. For example the 4 CO2 related questions should be spread thruout the survey – not one after another.
It appears this recreation would be relatively simple, and the data analysis not terribly difficult once obtained.
At the end of the day it is absurd that Lewandowsky would even attempt to draw conclusions from such a seriously flawed paper as this. But in reading the Discussion it becomes very clear the whole point was to try to prove biases – “Motivated Rejection of Science” – by skeptics, and how to defeat those alleged biases. Simply ridiculous – and wholly unsupported by this unprofessional and seriously flawed work.
At the risk of being “Mann-handled” over the statement … I would venture to say I believe it is entirely accurate to call this paper fraudulent.
John says:
Perhaps the Lewandowsky et al paper is an example of “Post Normal” science..
No.
“Post-normal science” is not science. The term should not be used at all, as it is deceptive. If it is used, the word “science” needs to be within the (sneer) quotes, to avoid the confusion of people into thinking that it is actually science.
“Post Normal” science“Post-normal science”Liberals always seek to demonize their opposition
@ur momisugly John says: Certainly it is “Post Normal” science. It is “ideological science”, therefore conclusions can be reached which advance the ideology no matter what the actual answers to the survey might show. Lewandowsky, come on here and defend yourself. Wait. Don’t bother, we’ve wasted enough time on you already.
Mike.
There is no embarassment. I happen to believe in the science. It is consistent with the physics I know. GHGs warm the planet, they dont cool it. I have issues with bad science. I don’t care who does it. This survey is bad science. The challenge we face will not be solved by publishing junk.
You either stand against all junk or not.
Ric Werme said (September 1, 2012 at 9:23 am)
“…Oops – not only does it appear Tamino linked to it without attribution, JoAnne Nova has links to all the blog posts at her page, http://joannenova.com.au/2012/08/lewandowsky-shows-skeptics-are-nutters-by-asking-alarmists-to-fill-out-survey/ I thought the links were just to the home pages of the blogs.
The Tamino link is http://tamino.wordpress.com/2010/08/28/survey-says/…”
The telling part is that even though “Open” Mind linked to the survey, only 55 people commented on the post. The majority of the posts that did comment about the survey questioned it.
There seems to be one running thread through Tamino’s posts, though: a deep dislike for all things WUWT. Even when the subject was this wonky survey, they managed to find a way to force it over to a discussion of a Steven Goddard post (I guess OT is ok as long as it is against “deniers”).
So, a quick survey states that 31/55 (56.36%) of the posters had a problem with the survey, while 23/55 (41.81%) had a problem with Steven Goddard/WUWT.
One person went OT (about either “subject), so I have to include that 1.81% with this “survey”.
So if Dr. Stephan Lewandowsky (or someone from his staff) had taken time to read the comments from just ONE site that presented the survey (or a link to the survey), they would have come up with two important facts: first, that several readers had serious questions about how the survey was worded; and second, the choice of OpenMind as an outlet for the survey might have been a mistake.
There is no embarassment. I happen to believe in the science. It is consistent with the physics I know. GHGs warm the planet, they dont cool it. I have issues with bad science. I don’t care who does it. This survey is bad science. The challenge we face will not be solved by publishing junk.
You either stand against all junk or not.
I agree, with most everything you said. My minor disagreement and main curiosity is (beyond the simple affect of “GHGs warm the planet”) what are the forces that contribute to the earth’s thermostat, if there is one? (I think there is). We’ve been in and out of ice ages and warm periods… It is said (I forget the source so no cite, sorry, that the ocean has a 900 year memory. Was it planetary position, ocean currents, the sun, clouds, cosmic rays, and who knows what else? My guess is a combination of most or all of the above, plus maybe others that we haven’t yet pinned down.
It’s a complex system, and IMO pinning attribution and focusing so extensively on just one variable has the potential to lead us astray…
Steven Mosher says:
September 1, 2012 at 2:20 pm
GHGs warm the planet, they dont cool it.
How else does heat get radiated to space from the atmosphere to cool the planet?
Terry,
Logically I don’t think you can rule out “natural variation” or “unforced variation” or “internal forcing” or “long term processes”. Logically, the unknown is always there. It could be gremlins.
The point is our best understanding, imperfect as it is, says that continued dumping of GHGs into the atmosphere will not be without consequences. Put another way, one cannot say with any certitude that dumping GHGs will have no effect.
If you lived up stream of me and dumped stuff in the river, I’d be within my rights to inquire about the safety of your actions. If I had some science indicating that it might not be safe, I’d say the burden of proof was more on you than on me. I would not argue that I had an absolute right to force you to stop, but it would seem to me that we should find a way to discuss rights, reponsibilities and standards of proof in an imperfect situation.
The argument: “nothing bad has happened yet”. The argument “this river was polluted before”
The argument “prove what I’m doing is dangerous” really dont work here. If you were merely putting stuff in your body or your own property I’d agree. What you do is none of my business.
But the air doesnt belong to either of us. Which means we have to find a way to discuss it.
Bad science ruins that discussion.
You really don’t get it do you? These non-productive tax funded wankers have never had to survive in the real world. From school to university to academic ivory towers from which they spew mumbo jumbo wrapped up in long words and nuances for “peer” review by their adoring uncritical acolytes. You really think they give a tuppeny sh1t about science for is it not blindingly clear they don’t understand or care about the first principles of scientific thinking and endeavour? No, for like naughty children these guys are lapping up all this attention as it forms the basis / justification of yet another grant to analyse the sub-species that communicate through WUWT.
Climate science has been getting away with (correction been rewarded with money, prestige and travel and publishing rights through) making stuff up for so long now, it is rather disgusting.
This is just another example amongst hundreds of others.
They will not be stopped until there is punishment for just making stuff up. As in the carrot and the stick / reward and punishment, which is clearly one of the biggest motivational factors for humans.
Lewandowsky must pay the price (so that in the future, there will be mush less making stuff up because the climate scientists know the stick comes out now and not the big golden carrot).
Steven Mosher,
Whoever said that “dumping of GHGs into the atmosphere will not be without consequences”?
Everything has consequences. What you always ignore is a cost/benefit analysis. There is no evidence of any GHG-caused problems, so the effects appear to be minor. You cannot point to any global damage or harm from the added CO2, so spending $trillions to mitigate a non-problem is irrational.
Months ago I felt a stench arising from Lewandowsky. He and John Cook of SkeSci have collaborated on the monstrosity hyperlinked above by Butch. This deserves expanding here:
The Debunking Handbook: now freely available for download
The Handbook explores the surprising fact that debunking myths can sometimes reinforce the myth in peoples’ minds. Communicators need to be aware of the various backfire effects and how to avoid them, such as:
The Familiarity Backfire Effect…”How does one avoid causing the Familiarity Backfire Effect? Ideally, avoid mentioning the myth altogether while correcting it… ”
The Overkill Backfire Effect… “occurs because processing many arguments takes more effort than just considering a few… The solution is to keep your content lean, mean and easy to read… Stick to the facts. End on a strong and simple message …such as “97 out of 100 climate scientists agree that humans are causing global warning”…”
The Worldview Backfire Effect… “occurs with topics that tie in with people’s worldviews and sense of cultural identity… For those who are strongly fixed in their views, being confronted with counter-arguments can cause their views to be strengthened. One cognitive process that contributes to this effect is Confirmation Bias…”
It also looks at a key element to successful debunking: providing an alternative explanation. The Handbook is designed to be useful to all communicators who have to deal with misinformation (eg – not just climate myths)…
Professor Lewandowsky … has published [a lot] including numerous papers on how people respond to misinformation.
Not all psychology is this corrupt. The best psychology contains vital insights, honesty, integrity, and is capable of providing deep healing. Liesandoffkey is an affront to his profession.
I still feel strongly that the skeptics’ community needs to pull together to debunk Cook’s false science, item by item. I would gladly pass on the climate skeptics’ wiki I started, if someone else is willing to take on its management, for this purpose.
When I first saw an article based on this paper, my immediate thought was Dr Goebbels would be proud. The associations are quite similar to the image of rats being portrayed over a soundtrack about “jews”. The alarmists must be getting very alarmed to trot out such absurd nonsense.
I tried to chase down details of the “poll”….and surprise, surprise it was almost invisible, but point made, damage done, associations set in concrete.
So I am very glad that it is being unpicked in the blogosphere. More power to you!
Even this “Only 0.9% of respondents actually believe that the moon landings “never happened and were staged in a Hollywood film studio””. is a misrepresentation. In this type of survey, it is always important to remember that the survey NEVER discovers what “respondents actually believe”. Never Never Never , really Never. Survey findings can only report what respondents responded. 0.9% is very likely an unaccounted-for ‘spoof’ result — a total of ten respondents fooling around with the survey. [Anyone who participated in University Psychology Department studies during the late 1960’s knows what I am talking about.]
I wonder what the retraction might sound like?
Another study that demonstrates that John P. A. Ioannidis was correct.
http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pmed.0020124
Chris H says:
September 1, 2012 at 3:28 am
I am utterly amazed that propaganda masquerading as science such as this got through the peer review process and was published. From hypothesis, through methods, analysis and conclusions, the paper is riddled with errors and should have been rejected by the editorial team without bothering reviewers.
I do think it is unfair to tar the whole of psychology because papers such as this. There are many areas of psychology where the science is as rigorous as any of the better conducted physical sciences.
_______________________
ERRRRrrrrr, given psychology already has a large amount of egg on their face, the fact this paper made it through peer review indicates the “science” is anthing but rigorous.
MAJOR EGG in FACE:
You would think with THAT looming in the background the journals would be a tad bit more careful wouldn’t you.
Lewandowsky had some of the survey topics on his mind when he wrote this: skepticalscience.com/Peer-review-vs-commercials-and-spam.html
An excerpt: >>>It was peer-reviewed science that developed the anti-retroviral drugs that can now control HIV. It was peer-reviewed science that discovered the physics that got us to the moon, and it was peer-reviewed science that identified the potential threat posed by climate change and that also delivered the knowledge necessary to deal with the problem.<<>>And finally, compare the process of peer review to the people who run websites that sprout nonsense about conspiracy theories ranging from “MI6 killed Princess Diana” to “9/11 was an inside job” and “Climate change is a hoax.” Well, the only hoax is played on those people gullible enough to put any credence in that nonsense.<<<
Mike from Tassie says:
September 1, 2012 at 5:52 am
PS Timothy Leary was a psychologist too just to make it absolutely clear which cloud I think the Lewandowsky cuckoo hails from.
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Has he been sampling Leary’s favorite mind altering substance?