I’m a bit of a latecomer to this affair, as Lucia and Jo Nova took an early lead on pointing out the many problems with the survey methodology (or lack thereof) with 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.
“Motivated” is the key word here, as it appears there were hidden motivations for this paper. It seems though, once you scratch the surface of Lewandowsky’s paper, that it is nothing more than a journal sanctioned smear of climate skeptics based on not only faulty data, but data gathered with a built in bias.
Besides what we already know about the flawed sampling method, the lack of follow up with skeptic blogs to make sure they got communications inviting them to post the survey, and the early release of results before the survey was complete, the most troubling new revelation appears to be that some climate skeptic blogs got different questionaires than their counterpart AGW advocate blogs. If true (and it appears to be based on the survey numbering system) this negates the study on the basis of inconsistent sampling, and I think it is time to ask Psychological Science editor Robert V. Kail to investigate this paper, and if he finds what the skeptics have, start a retraction. I’ve sent him a courtesy note advising him of this issues with this paper.
Here’s a summary of what has been going on the last couple of days.
Jo Nova has a great summary here, and writes about one Australian investigator who was invited to take the survey questions two years ago, kept screen shots of it, and did an analysis. She wrote:
Graham from OnlineOpinion was so struck by the study he’s written a post titled: Fish rot from the head Part 1.
Read it to get familiar with the survey questions.
Next there’s the who got what version of what survey problem, Jo notes this:
Leopard on the Bishop Hill thread has noted that Steve McIntyre is asking Lewandowsky why there are two or even three different forms of the survey? Why indeed?
Paul follows them up:
The Deltoid, Tamino, Mandia and Hot-Topic blogs were sent the survey number surveyID=HKMKNF_991e2415 on about August 29th. That survey is on the archive, and starts with 6 questions about free markets.
Bickmore and Few Things had the survey number surveyID=HKMKNG_ee191483 also about Aug 29, but this one doesn’t seem to be on the archive.
Steve Mc was sent survey number surveyID=HKMKNI_9a13984 on Sept 6th. This survey is on the archive, and it starts with 5 completely different questions! About how happy you are with life.
This right here should be enough for a retraction from the Journal. If different surveys were sent to different bloggers, and no mention of it was made in the paper or justified in the methodology, then this amounts to purposely biased data from the beginning. UWA may also find grounds for academic misconduct if Lewandowsky purposefully sent different sets of questions based on the type of blog he was inviting.
And then we have the fact that Lewandowsky was discussing preliminary results at a seminar, while the surveys were still open and he had not heard back from the skeptic blogs yet, such as the follow up invitation to Steve McIntyre. Having an open discussion of the survey is highly irregular, because attendees/viewers are free to take the survey, possibly biasing the results.
On the 23rd of September, 2010, Dr. Lewandowsky gave a presentation at Monash university which included the following slide:
Lewandowsky & Gignac (forthcoming)
•Internet survey (N=1100)
•Endorsement of climate conspiracy (“hoax by scientists to get grants”) linked to endorsement of other conspiracies (“NASA faked moon landing”)
•Conspiracy factor without climate item predicts rejection of climate science
So three days after (unsuccessfully) asking for cooperation in fieldwork, Lewandowsky is publicly announcing the preliminary results while the surveys are still open, and he hasn’t heard back from invited distributors. Steve McIntyre of Climate Audit notes that he received a follow up invitation on around Sept 20th. (which he didn’t notice until this story broke). Note the N=1100 value in the preliminary slide. The final paper cites an N<1200 value.
And it seems they are still at it, here’s a recent WUWT comment:
Anthony, there was recently another survey (longer, and with a 1-5 scale) put out by Lewandowsky’s research assistant, Charles Hanich, on June 4, 2012. It seems that the link for this survey was only posted on two blogs: Watching the Deniers and Skeptical Science. Charles Hanich was also responsible for creating Lewandowsky’s 2010 survey, as mentioned in the comments here.
Unfortunately, the link to the June 2012 survey is also unavailable. However, a skeptic called the “Manic Bean Counter” captured all the survey questions and dissected them on his/her blog, here. The following is Manic Bean Counter’s breakdown of the types of questions asked in the survey:
1. Climate Change – 5 questions
2. Genetically Modified Foods – 5 questions
3. Vaccines – Benefits and harms – 5 questions
4. Position of the Conservative / Liberal perspective (US definitions) – 7 questions
5. Select neutral (check of the software, or check for spam?) – 1 questions
6. Free market system v social justice / environment / sustainability – 5 questions
7. Conspiracy theories (political) – 6 questions
8. Conspiracy theories (scientific) – 6 questions
9. Personal Spirituality & Religion – 8 questions
10. Evolution – views upon – 7 questions
11. Corporations – 13 questions
12. Personal emotional outlook – 6 questions
The striking thing is that we have John Cook’s Skeptical Science blog listed as presenting both the original as well as the most recent survey. It as been discovered that Cook is a co-author with Levandowsky on a similar paper:
Lewandowsky, S., Ecker, U. K. H., Seifert, C., Schwarz, N. & Cook, J. (in press). Misinformation and its correction: Continued influence and successful debiasing. Psychological Science in the Public Interest.
http://websites.psychology.uwa.edu.au/labs/cogscience/documents/LewandowskyEcker.IP2012.PSPI.pdf
One wonders how much Cook contributed to the questions, based on his understanding of his readers likely responses. It is strange irony indeed that the paper discusses “debiasing”, when so many potential biases in Lewandowsky’s methods are clearly obvious to even the casual reader. Wikipedia even cites them for this paper in a section on “debunker”
Australian Professorial Fellow Stephan Lewandowsky[5] and John Cook, Climate Communication Fellow for the Global Change Institute at the University of Queensland (and author at SkepticalScience.com)[6] both warn about “backfire effects” in their Debunking Handbook.[2] Backfire effects occur when science communicators accidentally reinforce false beliefs by trying to correct them. For instance, a speaker about global warming may end up reinforcing the crowd’s beliefs that global warming is not happening.
Backfire indeed, this Lewandowsky “moon landing” paper is a full force backfire now.
Based on what I’ve seen so far, it is my opinion that Lewandowsky set out to create the survey data he wanted by manipulation of the survey system through multiple undocumented surveys, incomplete and non-representative sampling, biased survey questions, and essentially no quality control. There weren’t even significant safeguards in place to prevent individuals from taking the survey multiple times, appearing as other identities. There are so many things wrong with this paper that I can’t see it surviving intact.
I think what we have witenessed here is yet another example of noble cause corruption, where the end justifies the means in the minds of the players.
In reviewing Lewandowsky’s writings (here at The Conversation) over the past couple of years, it because painfully obvious that he sees climate skeptics as a scourge to be dealt with and that even crime can be justified:
Revealing to the public the active, vicious, and well-funded campaign of denial that seeks to delay action against climate change likely constitutes a classic public good.
It is a matter of personal moral judgment whether that public good justifies Gleick’s sting operation to obtain those revelations.
I believe that Dr. Lewandowsky set out to show the world that through a faulty, perhaps even fraudulent, smear campaign disguised as peer reviewed science, that climate skeptics were, as Jo Nova puts it, “nutters”. Worse, peer review failed to catch any of the problems now in the open thanks to the work of climate skeptics.
My best advice to Dr. Lewandowsky right now is: withdraw the paper. It has become a lighting rod for everything that is wrong with team climate science today, and multiple lines of investigation are now in progress including FOI requests and demands for academic misconduct reviews at your University of Western Australia.
I can’t see any of it ending well for you given your reticence to offer supporting data or explanations.
I am a bit ashamed of my Alma Mater, UWA, but not surprised.
I completed my Masters in coursework at the UWA Law School about ten years ago. One research paper tangentially concerned Aboriginal justice and crime rates. I happened to mention to the lecturer that I had read Keith Windshuttle, who criticised the “research methods” of the politically correct writers of the ‘black armband view of history’. This lecturer was visibly shocked, he looked at me as if I had just publically confessed to raping children, how could anybody be both so evil and so stupid as to admit it? Turns out he had never read any Windshuttle, but he knew he was evil and knew that nobody should read it. I nearly failed the course, which taught me something.
The UWA I know is a beautiful campus, but it is bereft of academic freedom, standards are questionable, and if you don’t adopt the biases of the faculty heavies you will not get a half decent degree, and dont even think about getting a job there.
So there it is, I wouldnt trust Lewandowsky or the faculty to produce a genuine paper which tries to increase our understanding of a question. Sadly UWA is a political machine of the Left, and all the follies that go with that are in abundant evidence.
Oh, fabjous fantasy:
“The data reported in this article are invalid and should not be considered part of the scientific literature.The responsibility for this problem rests solely with the first author, Michael E. Mann. Coauthors Raymond S. Bradley and Malcolm K. Hughes are in no way responsible for this problem.” – Michael Mann.
I thought “Capricorn One” was a documentary. I mean, Karen Black! What’s not to like about a film with Karen Black, James Brolin and that fount of all truths, O J Simpson in it .
“An Inconvenient Truth” on the other hand was so full of holes that it could not possibly be a documentary. Perhaps they could have used Steven Seagal instead of Al Gore. They look the same.
Lewandowsky seems to live in a fictional world, perhaps he should go into films as well.
Ivor Ward
brooksie, you should stick to cheer-leading for your god, michael mann, as he continues his assault upon decent people for Daring to have an opinion that counters His Word in any way- especially when it is about Him.
The pom-poms have more sense than you.
Jannie you are not alone. I was told years ago by a Ph.D student of history at UNE, don’t provide any info that goes against the academics in charge of your papers an alternative view point, although graduate students are supposed to do their own independent research! When I presented a alternative and obvious rebuttal of a historical local topic, I was refused a supervisor because it was going to show up their so called academics research. You are not alone in your criticism of UWA. They are just holding on to their tenure, bending over to placate political schemes and not interested in the truth, and of course they have to preserve their superior in a subject matter as being the only truths available. Glad you received your MA though. I have still a few units to go before I proceed to mine.
WARNING WILL ROBINSON – SATIRE APPROACHING
It is outrageous Anthony Watts that, like the dolt Bolt in Australia, you cast further aspersions on the brilliant work of the dedicated anti-AGW Denier, the most honorable and honored Professor Stephan Lewandowsky, OUTRAGEOUS. The lies and falsehoods peddled by the rest of the CLIMATE DENIERS cabal are bad enough but are at least confined to the miniverse of the DENIER BLOGOSPHERE. You bring their filthy assertions to the mainstream using the corrupt agency of your popular web site thereby perverting the public mind with doubt about The Consensus faith in global warming created by the toxin CO2.
It is crystal clear that Lewandowsky et al’s methods are beyond reproach as is The 97% Consensus on Climate Science. The Consensus was established as firmly in indisputable fact by that brilliant survey conducted in order to demonstrate the fact. This is the true genius of self reference plain for even deniers to see but of course they refuse to achnowledge the new reality.
Lewandowsky et al have trodden the hallowed path of truth and adapted the consensus establishing methodologies to their study which clearly exposes the intellectual corruption of the Denier movement. It is only DENIERS that question the validity of this landmark piece of psychological research and the opinions and false assertions of DENIERS are in no way equal to the radiant truth emanating from the genius Lewandowsky and his brilliant co authors.
To appreciate the true genius of Stephan Lewandowsy all posters here should view the following
END OF SATIRE
(Seeing is believing):-
and
On the subject of presenting preliminary results prior to all the data coming in, isn’t the proprietor of this blog just as guilty of making this same, supposed, error, only with considerably more acclaim and fanfare?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/05/10/a-report-on-the-surfacestations-project-with-70-of-the-ushcn-surveyed/
Thank you Dr. Stephan Lewandowsky for killing the peer-review dragon.
Name calling bullies always try and pick on the more intelligent in the class as they will always show they for what they are, name calling bullies.
This concerns me in two ways 1) The corruption of the universities maybe nearing a tipping point 2) The relevance of these so called higher education institutes and what/who they produce.
I will not mention what this education now costs.
When I think of the time and effort put in, to get Psychology at least recognised as a first cut at a science, and contrast that with the damage a clown like Stephan Lewandowsky can single-handedly do to its credibility, I’m appalled. On every conceivable front, the Lewandowsky paper fails massively. Who on Earth were the referees?
All those erudite people and their studies, research and papers, lent a spurious legitimacy and authority to the whole thing and having laid that essential groundwork, facilitated what inevitably followed.
http://thepointman.wordpress.com/2012/05/25/the-real-bastards/
Pointman
Here I go, into the fray.
Maus. if it’s of any help, I knew your were being sarcastic/ironic on two counts…
a) The over the top nature of the original comment.
b) a) may have been influenced by my knowing you’re a sceptic.
Anthony, having seen exactly this kind of over the top comment from a section of the CAGW types and not knowing you are sceptic however was also correct in his response. moderating huge numbers of comments as Rik Werme said, you just can’t remember all the nicks.
Just goes to show, you can’t assume in this medium that people will see things the way you do, best to remember the /sarc tag
DaveE.
John Brookes says:
September 5, 2012 at 9:29 pm
On your Facebook page you note:
I understand that FB is making me lose time, and given that time is money, you may be right. (I would posit that in my experience, WUWT is the much greater time sink.)
I also understand your comment appears to be tongue-in-cheek.
However, I can’t think of any acquaintances that have “lost” money on FB. Some have probably spent money, but I think they knew what they were doing.
Given that I’m less than a decade from my seventies, perhaps you could explain your logic in more detail.
Way up in the comments was a quote from a former paper by Dr. Lewandowsky claiming that the tragedy in Darfur was “caused by climate change”. Well… I have bad news for the eminent scientist: religion is actually the main factor, as described in at least one book by the Belgian journalist Els de Temmerman who has visited the region multiple times in the ’80 and ’90 and reported on the ever recurring atrocities there. Overpopulation may be another factor, but it’s mainly the adherents of one religion treating non-adherents (who -by the way- happened to live in a far better region of the country (more fertile, more ores and such) than their own) as cockroaches to be exterminated or at least enslaved. Climate by the way is constantly changing (see for instance what happens in the areas where rain forests are being destroyed… less rain, or am I wrong ?) and certainly in Africa which is the longest inhabited-by-humans-and-thus-changed area on this world.
Back to the topic:
When I was studying for my Masters in Communication Sciences in Brussels (Belgium) we were told that when holding surveys at NO point were we allowed to change the questionnaires. At ALL times were we to use the same set of questions during a research because using different questions would invalidate the resulting data and our research would be refused for consideration. We were also told to make as certain as possible that no “doubles” (multiple questionnaires filled in by the same persons) occur. Have scientific standards changed so much in 20 years’ time ?
I see that there are people still determined to smear skeptics despite that the AWG conjecture is long dead and buried.A conjecture that even warmists have been defending less and less these days as they shift to a new mode of attacks against the “deniers” themselves as an attempt to get them out of their way by reducing their influence.This Lewandowsky paper is just another attempt to screw over the skeptics much like Naomi Oreskes and Stephen Schneider has tried to do in recent years.
It is apparent that there is another reason why they continue to do their dead on arrival attacks and that has to do with building control over those they perceive as an enemy to their post normal science paradigm.They have a new world order to build on and one of the methods is to attacks those they perceive as being in the way to that goal.
They will go on screaming for years to come and that this is indicative of their anti science attitudes since they are coming from a POLITICAL perspective.It is all about control and thankfully they are bad at it because there are plenty of lemming out there to do their bidding.Lemmings I confront week after week in the various places I visit on the internet.
I am afraid that this will go on for years as the political regimes around the world continue to try pushing their pseudoscience and pseudo environmentalism as their means to build a powerful socialist world government.First regional and them coalesce into a giant government where they push their socialist utopian brand on the world.
The future is going to get really ugly.
Oh, and the other thing about the original post maus made.
S/he is correct, Anthony hasn’t published any peer reviewed papers in the psience of psychology.
That is exactly what made the comment so funny for me as before he published on the temperature data it was the exact criticism made in the field of climatology.
I apologise to Ric Werme for misspelling his name as Rik in my previous post.
DaveE.
Jannie, you read Windshuttle. Why? The man is a fraud. He pretends to be a historian, but simply ignores the testimony of witnesses when it suits him. Your supervisors horror was at your gullibility.
Honestly, if you wanted to do a masters in economics, and owned up to admiring Ayn Rand, or you wanted to do a PhD in physics, but had a theory that Einstein was wrong, you would get the same horrified response. And you don’t need to have read Rand or any of the Einstein sceptics to know that they are nutters.
All these poor persecuted free thinkers. Does it never occur to them that they aren’t being persecuted for their radical thoughts? They are being persecuted for being stupid, or ratbags, or both. But feel free to keep indulging your Galileo complexes.
I believe that some supporters of the CAGW crusade are conspiring to make it look like sceptics such as me are conspiracy theorists. Oh dear. Does that make them right for once, in one instance? Perhaps, but then so would I be if they are so conspiring.
If these researchers were actually good at what they do, they’d do the same study investigating the alarmist side. It might be entitled “IPCC faked climate alarm – therefore (climate) science is true: An anatomy of the motivated acceptance of science.”
Somehow I doubt they will investigate climate alarmism in the same way they did climate skepticism. I doubt they would have the balls.
cheers
Forgive me for this wildly O/T, but: A large poster of the Gare Montparnasse wreck hung in our office for a few years. After a while, captions began to be affixed to it: “OK, Pierre, if you are so smart, you drive.” “Louis, I think I’ve got it, throttle on the left, brake on the right.” and so forth, but the very best was “That day, young Charles De Gaulle realized that his future might not lie in railroading.”
FWIW, There is a photo of a similar wreck at Dublin’s Huston station where the effect of a long downhill run from Inchicore to the station and some imprecision in setting the brakes had the same result.
From Lewandowsky et al:
Sounds like a conspiracy theory to me — the free-market contrarians are all in it together, and are trying to overheat the rest of us.
jorgekafkazar: “Maus has a history of making insulting comments.”
Perhaps you didn’t notice that the reply to you, which you take umbrage at, and my posts in this thread have in common that they poke fun at genuflections to peer review. Now you’re certainly free to put forward the argument that peer review is useful and our expectations of it are satisfied. Though I daresay you’re best off waiting for a thread that’s not about Lewandowsky before you take up that task.
bushbunny: “They are just holding on to their tenure, bending over to placate political schemes and not interested in the truth, and of course they have to preserve their superior in a subject matter as being the only truths available”
More ironic in that tenure is purported to cure this very problem. If you are not familiar with Thomas Kuhn, you might find his writings of interest.
David A. Evans: “Anthony, having seen exactly this kind of over the top comment from a section of the CAGW types and not knowing you are sceptic however was also correct in his response.”
Yep, as I said the error was mine for expecting too much of the quality of argument from the canon point of view. Though, given that’s the case, I can hardly sort out how to make things obviously absurd unless I resort to typing with my forehead. However, this seems rather inconvenient and I suspect the output would be inscrutable.
Unless of course your name is Edwin Hubble. Then your work can get Einstein to say that the cosmological constant was “the greatest mistake of my life”.
And you can get a Space Telescope named after you.
Who is this John Brookes guy, and does he understand anything about science?
John Brookes says:
September 6, 2012 at 5:50 am
“..or you wanted to do a PhD in physics, but had a theory that Einstein was wrong, you would get the same horrified response. And you don’t need to have read … any of the Einstein sceptics to know that they are nutters.”
I am no physicist, but isn’t a lot of cutting edge physics questioning Einstein’s theories? No physicist should be beyond questioning.
@John Brookes 5:50
Honestly, if you wanted to do a masters in economics, and owned up to admiring Ayn Rand, or you wanted to do a PhD in physics, but had a theory that Einstein was wrong, you would get the same horrified response. And you don’t need to have read Rand or any of the Einstein sceptics to know that they are nutters.
———————————–
Really, this is ridiculous. First, Ayn Rand was not an economist so I don’t know why anyone would be horrified to have a Master’s student who admired her. That statement is a complete non sequitur. Second, Einstein was misguided on several principles, most notably his refusal to accept that quantum mechanics is not completely deterministic. In addition, he developed his cosmological constant for the wrong reasons. So far, his theories have been correct but I wouldn’t be horrified at any of my students for postulating competing theories with supporting evidence. That’s what being a scientist is!
I have a Ph.D. in Genetics and yours is the type of attitude that resulted in tremendous lost time not studying so-called “junk” DNA, now shown by the ENCODE project to be highly functional and deeply involved in the regulation of gene transcription. Throughout history science has advanced by challenging the “consensus” view. Dr. Barry Marshall (jointly appointed to UWA!) is a modern example of how the consensus can be totally wrong. Scientific theories aren’t proven by consensus, they are proven by matching the real world.
wobble:
At September 6, 2012 at 9:05 am you ask
“Who is this John Brookes guy, and does he understand anything about science?”
I answer, he is a troll who often afflicts WUWT threads. And, no, he doesn’t.
Richard