People send me stuff. Even though I’m supposed to be on break, I thought this worth a few minutes to post up. I have redacted the recipient address as well as the exact time stamp, and the suffix code in the URL to prevent the sender from being identified by Cook, and face possible retaliation or harassment. Since Jo Nova’s website has yet again been taken down by a hacking DDoS attack, I felt this to be an important step to protect the recipient. From the language and pre-selection filters imposed, clearly there is no further doubt about the connection of John Cook’s Skeptical Science effort to the advocacy disguised as science going on at the University of Western Australia with Stephan Lewandowsky. Since this was sent using the University of Queenslands public network resource, it is fair game for posting, especially since no caveats for disclosure of the survey are given in the invitation letter.
I found the methodology of the sample selection quite ridiculous:
Our search of the ISI Web of Science database has found X of your papers published between 1991 and 2011 matching the search phrases ‘global warming’ or ‘global climate change’ (noting that due to the specific search parameters, it’s possible that some of your papers may not be included). It’s not essential that you are an expert in attribution of global warming
With all the caterwauling at SkS by Cook himself and elsewhere about my supposedly “non-expert” involvement in expressing my invited opinion on the PBS News Hour, here in Cook’s world, they simply don’t care if you are an expert or not if you have an opinion on global warming/climate change. Such hypocrisy. I suppose we can call this the “cartoonist clause” since Mr. Cook is a cartoonist by trade.
Of course we all know now (after examining the survey and data) that the 97% of climate scientists believe in global warming meme is predicated on just a few responses in a flawed survey, which you can read about here: What else did the ’97% of scientists’ say?
This survey promises to be no better, as it has a flaw in the invitation process that will induce bias. Here’s why.
The survey appears to be sent only to publishers of papers that have shown up in search phrases for ‘global warming’ or ‘global climate change’. Cook even concedes that:
“(noting that due to the specific search parameters, it’s possible that some of your papers may not be included).”
So with that criteria, what sort of papers and authors will be excluded? Here’s a short, but by no means complete, checklist of papers and author opinions Cooks sampling method will likely miss:
- Papers/authors that don’t use those two phrases cook deems important because they (or the journal) feel it politicizes or polarizes the paper.
- Papers/authors that study other natural variation effects on climate, such as ENSO, solar influences, aerosol influences, volcanic influences, etc. that are only studying those effects and don’t use the terms Cook deems important.
- Papers/authors that study issues, biases, adjustments of datasets that are only studying those datasets and nuances and don’t use the terms Cook deems important.
- Papers that study climate models that deal with the methods and performance, and don’t use the terms Cook deems important.
And there are probably more examples that I haven’t thought of.
From my viewpoint, Cook’s methodology is fatally flawed, because the search terms act like a data sieve and results in some pre-selection biases for those authors/papers that don’t think twice about using those terms (which are political hot potatoes) in a science paper. As a result I would expect a greater numbers of “believers” (to quote the PBS label) than non-believers to be selected.
There’s another bias. Cooks states in the invitation letter:
“Our search of the ISI Web of Science databasehas found X of your papers published between 1991 and 2011 matching the search phrases ‘global warming’ or ‘global climate change…”
This starting condition will of course exclude papers in journals that are NOT part of the ISI database, and there are more than a few. So, it becomes a double bias in pre-selection on Cook’s part. This of course means that some of the journals that do gatekeeping, such as we witnessed in Climategate emails, exclude skeptical authors
Here’s the solicitation:
==============================================================
From: j.cook3@uq.edu.au
To: xxxx@xxx.xxx
Sent: xx/xx/xxxx xxxxxx
Subj: Invitation to survey re climate research (closing Oct 12)
Just in case our original email may have gone unnticed, you are receiving this reminder about our invitation to participate in a survey (closing Oct 12) by the University of Queensland measuring the level of consensus in the peer-reviewed literature for the proposition that humans are causing global warming. Our search of the ISI Web of Science database has found X of your papers published between 1991 and 2011 matching the search phrases ‘global warming’ or ‘global climate change’ (noting that due to the specific search parameters, it’s possible that some of your papers may not be included). It’s not essential that you are an expert in attribution of global warming – we are interested in whether your paper explicitly states a position on anthropogenic global warming (AGW), makes implicit assumptions about AGW or has no position. You are invited to categorise the topic of research and level of endorsement in each paper. You will not be asked to supply your private views but merely to categorise your published research. To participate, please follow the link below to the University of Queensland website.
http://www.survey.gci.uq.edu.au/?c=xxxxxxxxxx
The survey should take around 4 minutes. You may elect to discontinue the survey at any point; your ratings will only be recorded if the survey is completed. The rating must be done in one uninterrupted session, and cannot be revised after closing the session. Your ratings are confidential and all data will be de-individuated in the final results so no individual ratings will be published. You may sign up to receive the final results of the de-individuated survey.
The research, titled The Consensus Project, is being conducted by the University of Queensland in collaboration with contributing authors of the website SkepticalScience.com (winner of the Australian Museum 2011 award for Advancement of Climate Change Knowledge). The research project is headed by John Cook, Research Fellow in Climate Change Communication for the Global Change Institute at The University of Queensland.
This study adheres to the Guidelines of the ethical review process of The University of Queensland. Whilst you are free to discuss your participation in this study with project staff (contactable on +61 7 3365 3553 or j.cook3@uq.edu.au), if you would like to speak to an officer of the University not involved in the study, you may contact the Ethics Officer on +61 7 3365 3924 or humanethics@research.uq.edu.au.
Regards,
John Cook
Global Change Institute/University of Queensland
Skeptical Science
================================================================
And here are screen caps of the introduction and questions:
The drop downs are interesting, first the drop down that tells them what sort of paper it is:
Note the “Not peer-reviewed” highlighted answer. I found this laughable. He’ll accept an opinion from an author of a non-peer reviewed paper, but by the pre-selection filter of choosing only ISI Web of Science accredited journals, that answer will likely never occur. Here’s why:
The Thomson Reuters Journal Selection Process
By Jim Testa, VP, Editorial & Publisher Relations
updated 5-2012
Why Be Selective?
It would appear that to be comprehensive, an index of the scholarly journal literature might be expected to cover all journals published. It has been demonstrated, however, that a relatively small number of journals publish the majority of significant scholarly results. This principle is often referred to as Bradford’s Law.2
…
Peer Review
Application of the peer-review process is another indication of journal standards and signifies overall quality of the research presented and the completeness of cited references.6 Inclusion of Funding Acknowledgements is also strongly recommended. Not only do they help create a greater context for the journal, these acknowledgements also function as a confirmation of the importance of the research presented.
Source: http://thomsonreuters.com/products_services/science/free/essays/journal_selection_process/
It seems pretty clear to me a non peer reviewed journal would not be selected (for inclusion in the ISI database). Thus skeptical papers that were forced (by the active journal gatekeeping we have witnessed) into journals that didn’t meet ISI’s criteria or simply were not peer reviewed, likely would not be included in Cook’s survey results.
Though the fact that Cook included “not peer-reviewed” as an option for paper author that he would accept means that he’s now bereft of any rational argument when it comes to peer reviewed -vs- non peer reviewed findings.
Here’s answers the authors could give, which are the same no matter which pulldown is first selected.
This new survey by Cook is yet another flawed and transparent advocacy effort to use predetermined opinion gathering as a public relations tool with the help of a compliant and unquestioning news media.
I can imagine that there are many papers skeptical as well as alarmist that use the term ‘climate change’ rather than ‘global climate change’ or ‘global warming’. All those papers will not be included.
@ur momisugly Pamela Gray:
Pamela, here’s a great tool to help you locate the ‘meney pots’ mentioned above. My blood pressure goes up too much everytime I run this so I have to limit the minutes of viewing! ☺
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/Thinkmap%20SDK%202.5%20Standard%20Edition/webapp/TM-1VER/index.asp?keyword=Ford%20Foundation
Pamela, try searching for Energy Foundation in that graph. That seems to be near the epicenter concerning AGW.
Heads I win, Tails you lose.
“The research project is headed by John Cook, Research Fellow in Climate Change Communication for the Global Change Institute at The University of Queensland.”
It seems that Cook is not doing research in to Climate Change Communication, as his title implies he is DOING Climate Change Communication.
Perhaps the “ethics officer” should be looking at this misuse of a research project:
“if you would like to speak to an officer of the University not involved in the study, you may contact the Ethics Officer on +61 7 3365 3924 or humanethics@research.uq.edu.au.”
The drop down list says it all
“Minimise” means to make as small as possible. Any objective scientist who finds evidience that CO2 attribution is less than 50% had no alternative than to respond that his work is “minimising” the effect, ie an admission of bias.
Any objective and honest scientist (who probalby would not put global warming in the title of his paper in the first place ) would very likely bail out at this stage.
The separation between the science of measurement and the chatter of opinion is being deliberately blurred. Here is an old piece of writing from which all should gain benefit, presuming that they have nor read it & remembered it from before. Pieces like this survive because they contain wisdom and logic. This example can be read by any party that considers itself the wronged party (or the virtuous). Therefore, the main impact of the message is that measurement trumps beflief, as some of us are learning, some ever so slowly ….
…………………………………..
A quotation from 1877.
There was once an island in which some of the inhabitants professed a religion teaching neither the doctrine of original sin nor that of eternal punishment. A suspicion got abroad that the professors of this religion had made use of unfair means to get their doctrines taught to children. They were accused of wresting the laws of their country in such a way as to remove children from the care of their natural and legal guardians; and even of stealing them away and keeping them concealed from their friends and relations. A certain number of men formed themselves into a society for the purpose of agitating the public about this matter. They published grave accusations against individual citizens of the highest position and character, and did all in their power to injure these citizens in their exercise of their professions. So great was the noise they made, that a Commission was appointed to investigate the facts; but after the Commission had carefully inquired into all the evidence that could be got, it appeared that the accused were innocent. Not only had they been accused on insufficient evidence, but the evidence of their innocence was such as the agitators might easily have obtained, if they had attempted a fair inquiry. After these disclosures the inhabitants of that country looked upon the members of the agitating society, not only as persons whose judgment was to be distrusted, but also as no longer to be counted honourable men. For although they had sincerely and conscientiously believed in the charges they had made, yet they had no right to believe on such evidence as was before them. Their sincere convictions, instead of being honestly earned by patient inquiring, were stolen by listening to the voice of prejudice and passion.
Let us vary this case and suppose, other things remaining as before, that a still more accurate investigation proved the accused to have been really guilty. Would this make any difference in the guilt of the accusers? Clearly not; the question is not whether their belief was true or false, but whether they entertained it on wrong grounds. They would no doubt say, “Now you see that we were right after all; next time perhaps you will believe us.” And they might be believed, but they would not thereby become honourable men. They would not be innocent, they would only be not found out. Every one of them, if he chose to examine himself in foro conscientiae, would know that he had acquired and nourished a belief, when he had no right to believe on such evidence as was before him; and therein he would know that he had done a wrong thing.
William K Clifford. Originally published in Contemporary Review, 1877. Reprinted in Lectures and Essays (1879). Presently in print in The Ethics of Belief and Other Essays (Prometheus Books, 1999).
Will Cook be formally presenting his findings in person wearing a Polar Bear suit or a Rubber Boot on his head?
Ian H says: September 23, 2012 at 3:44 pm
So why doesn’t he just read the papers and classify them himself?
Because it would take a Solyndra-sized govt grant to get past all the paywalls.
I think some good progress can be made in the “survey” field. Here’s what I suggest:
1. Find some sort of neutral/authoritative body to do the survey, in order to encourage participation — and by both sides. And have various pooh-bahs speak out urging members to participate.
2. Have experts in survey technique critique the proposed survey first.
3. Survey segments of scientists separately, and restrict the set of questions asked to the most pertinent ones for that group. For instance,
Focusing on such small groups will make it easier to get high participation rates. It will also make it easier to get the job done, if there isn’t a lot of funding provided. IOW, each group can be surveyed in turn, which is a manageable task.
4. Avoid a do-all, too-long survey. Instead, conduct multiple surveys of the same group. One survey might ask about beliefs. (E.g., “What credence do you give to the temperature record portrayed by the hockey stick?”) Another might be a timed knowledge-test about climate-related matters. Another might be a timed test of awareness of what the each side has to say about the other side’s contentions and rebuttals. Another might be about what sort of adaptive or mitigative measures they recommend, and how practical they think such measures are.
5. Perhaps conduct follow-up interviews to flesh out the survey’s findings.
The only good thing about Cook’s survey is that it is virtual – at least no trees will be cut down to produce it or paper be burnt when it goes the way of all such utter pieces of nonsense – into the bin…
Such ‘surveys’ do more to highlight the utter blinkered thinking involved than really doing anything to contribute to the debate – in the end it weakens his position and the position of those who support him. We do not forgot and nor does the Internet.
Re: “You will not be asked to supply your private views but merely to categorise your published research. ”
Because of rabid AGW gatekeeping as exposed in ClimateGate, some authors may state AGW in their paper to prevent it from being rejected and/or to have a better chance at getting future funding, even though they privately have major questions or uncertainties on the level of anthropogenic global warming.
Edohiguma says:
I’m tired of “social sciences” trying to sell statistics as scientific evidence.
You are being very unfair on social sciences. As an engineer I was skeptical about the value so I did a degree in it in my spare time and found it had much to recommend it. I started to do the same for climate science after picking up a file during some equipment radio emission tests virtually saying do not allow the following questions to be asked in any public forum or even suggested in publicly available documentation and found it to be so prejudiced and unthinking in favour of AGW as to be beneath contempt.
As a social scientist one of the questions I would ask would be “At any time in your career has AGW belief been a topic in any interview for employment or promotion. Since I have actually met some climate scientists squeezed out of the profession for questioning the belief I feel consensus is merely proof of an AGW disbelievers exclusion policy not a proof of integrity of the theory and therefore nothing to be proud of.
@ur momisugly rogerknights
“Another might be a timed knowledge-test about climate-related matters. ”
A study in Sweden on the general public’s opinion on C/A/GW was done in July this year with a fair round of test questions on basic climate issues. The correlation between high belief in (C)AGW and low basic knowledge was clear. It was also clear the low knowledge generally meant providing answers that the state of climate is worse than it actually is. E.g. 50% believed more than 10% of Greenland icecap has already melted (correct answer: 0.3%); 79% believed the polar bear population has decreased in the last 30 years (correct answer: unchanged); 58% believed the number of storms has increased (correct answer: slight decrease), etc.
Maybe even more interesting was also that in spite of the low rate of correct answers people in general stated having both a “fair” or “high interest” as well as “fair” or “good knowledge” of the climate change issues which could be interpreted as support to the “noble cause corruption” meme.
Not surprisingly the highest interest and CAGW worry was stated by people supporting the Environmental party (Miljöpartiet) in Sweden, sadly also with a very low correct answer rate.
Again this study was on the general public opinion and could not be used to draw any conclusions on what scientists think or know about the climate. However, I do think a couple of basic climate knowledge questions would be a really interesting qualifier to any respondents opinion on C/A/GW.
Link to article (google translated): http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.newsmill.se%2Fartikel%2F2012%2F07%2F03%2Fmediernas-osakliga-klimatrapportering-leder-till-okunskap
Link to the study result data (only in Swedish): https://dl.dropbox.com/u/19152363/SI_Demoskop%C3%A5lder_k%C3%B6n_ut_b_ink.pdf
It’s just a double standard: Warmistas/hype vs Skeptics/truth.
We’ll see how this one plays out in the long run.
On an unrelated note:
97% of surveyed palm readers truly believe that palm reading can tell the future.
Is this the same survey he sent to Roger Pielke Sr?
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2012/08/22/skeptical-science-survey-by-john-cook-on-climate-related-research/
David Ball: ” despite the fact that you will lose your funding, career, and pension if you answer in the negative, do you think that global warming is real?’
Yes.
I’m sure this is the biggest skewer of survey results. The whole of Climate Science has been corrupted, usurped, for long enough now for most of the true scientists of ability and vision to have left, or never joined, while their places were taken by alarmist activists (as Lindzen showed), secondrate scientists on a mission to gain ephemeral, hunky kudos fame and glamour, and a younger generation who never really were taught Scientific Method as we were, who learned a potted stew of all the sciences, spiced with political correctness, “necessary cuts”, “saving the planet”, “health and safety”, and general interference in curricula.
We hear rumours of such departees here. We know of a few like Tim Ball (Wikipedia deleted his bio – their most ruthlessly efficient means of censorship) and David Deming. Probably there are many more than we know about, because losing funding, career and pension has made life harder.
Canadian Mike said (September 24, 2012 at 10:23 am)
“…97% of surveyed palm readers truly believe that palm reading can tell the future…”
I knew you’d say that…
Since we know the search terms used, it would be possible to audit the survey by running the same search on ISI and keeping the results for comparison with the published paper. This might come in handy for determining the true response rate.
I took Lewandowsky’s survey and felt very uncomfortable at what it was trying to get at with questions on what ones understanding (or should we say beliefs) on many issues. The test should have been for the news media to test if its propaganda was successful or not. Here is another test to find conspiracy theorists –
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-09-24/you-know-you-are-conspiracy-theorist-if.
I wonder how many readers everywhere including Lewandowsky, Cook etc etc can ever fail this test. By the way there are tests for finding suspected terrorists and just like this test most people will flunk in that too. Conclusion – no prizes for guessing.
Jameel Ahmad Khan says:
September 24, 2012 at 7:35 pm
I took Lewandowsky’s survey and felt very uncomfortable at what it was trying to get at …….
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Put a little thought into it and I think anyone of us could come up with a “survey” that would reach the conclusion we wanted or that someone paid us to reach.
The most honest surveys out there are probably the ones a business puts our to get information to improve whatever it is they produce.
I’d like to see a survey on what percentage of climate scientists work for government organizations, universities, or other organizations which depend on government funds or the hope of carbon trading.
I suspect it is about 97%.
I thought the Science was settled and if so, why another survey ? Which implies that the ball hasn’t stopped rolling yet.
Yet another survey team SkS that will more than likely provide a 97% result. But ! won’t that be a percentage of 97% of 97% of all Climate Scientists result? So if they keep doing surveys they will get closer and closer to zero. We have nothing to fear they are slowly agreeing with us with every survey …he he
So if a biologist publishes a paper that concludes Global Warming will harm the Pika, that will be assumed to support global warming despite the fact that the paper merely assumes global warming is happening, but doesn’t address whether or not it is actually happening?