pear shaped (slang)
A British expression used to indicate that something has gone horribly wrong with a person’s plans, most commonly in the phrase “It’s all gone pear shaped.”The OED cites its origin as within the Royal Air Force; as of 2003 the earliest citation there is a quote in the 1983 book Air War South Atlantic. Others date it to the RAF in the 1940s, from pilots attempting to perform aerial manoeuvres such as loops. These are difficult to form perfectly, and are usually noticeably distorted—i.e., pear-shaped.
Dr. Richard Tol writes about a new revelation coming from an analysis of Cook’s climate publications volunteer raters, conducted by Brandon Shollenberger:
My comment on Cook’s consensus paper has at last been accepted. It was rejected by three journals — twice by Environmental Research Letters and once by two other journals for being out of scope. Fifth time lucky.
As these things go, my comment is out of date before it is published.
One of my main concerns was the partial release of data. The data that was available suggests that all sorts of weird things were going on, but without the full data it was hard to pinpoint what went on. Cook’s resistance to release the data, abetted by the editor, the publisher and the University of Queensland, suggested that he may have something to hide.
Brandon Shollenberger has now found part of the missing data.
Unfortunately, time stamps are still missing. These would allow us to check whether fatigue may have affected the raters, and whether all raters were indeed human.
Rater IDs are available now. I hope Shollenberger will release the data in good time. For now, we have to do with his tests and graphs.
His comment of May 10, 1:16 am shows that individual raters systematically differed in their assessment of the literature. This is illustrated by this figure; the circles are aligned if the raters are the same.
This undermines Cook’s paper. Theirs was not a survey of the literature. Rather, it was a survey of the raters.
Source: http://richardtol.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/the-97-consensus.html
Of note is the comment “Brandon Shollenberger has now found part of the missing data.”. While I don’t know for sure, it seems that the SkS kidz have left another gaping security hole wide open which allowed Shollenberger (and likely anyone, as we’ve seen before with their forum fiascos) to have a look at that rater’s data. Cook has been resisting requests to provide it.
Shollenberger writes in comments at his blog:
I’ve sent John Cook an e-mail alerting him to what material I have, offering him an opportunity to give me reasons I should refrain from releasing it or particular parts of it. I figure a day or two to address any potential privacy concerns should be enough.
His response will determine how much information I provide. No obligations were placed upon me regarding any of the material I have, but I don’t see any compelling reason to provide information about how I got it either. I’d need a better reason than just satisfying people’s curiosity.
…
But we’ll see what (if anything) Cook says. I said I’d give him the weekend. If I don’t hear anything tonight, I’ll try contacting him via Twitter/Skeptical Science. I may try having someone else from SkS get his attention for me. I don’t want him to simply overlook the e-mail I sent.
By the way, there is some value in associating ids and names. We have comments from many of the people who participated in the study. It could be useful to try to match up biases in the ratings with people’s stated views.
Tick Tock.
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evanmjones says:
May 10, 2014 at 11:16 am
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Did you know that (the glorious) Beatrix Potter received virtually no formal education?
Samuel Whiskers (or The Roly Poly Pudding) remains in my all time top ten works of fiction. Having read it to all four of my children, I’m looking forward to reading it to my grandchildren. The eldest is three, so it won’t be long.
Does anyone happen to have the e-mail address for authors of the Cook et al paper? I have John Cook’s, and I’ve sent him an e-mail.* I don’t know if he’s going to respond, but if he doesn’t, I’d like to try contacting the others as well. Specifically, I’d like to contact:
Dana Nuccitelli
Sarah A Green
Mark Richardson
Bärbel Winkler
Rob Painting
Robert Way
Peter Jacobs
Andrew Skuce
*I’ve confirmed he’s aware of this issue so I have to assume he’s seen my e-mail as well. He’s in no rush to respond, if he’s going to respond at all.
Gary Hladik says:
May 10, 2014 at 12:08 pm
Mike Maguire says (May 10, 2014 at 11:01 am): “In a world that gives Al Gore a Nobel Peace Prize and an Emmy for his movie…”
=============================================
And as Tom Lehrer noted,. irony died when Kissinger received the Nobel Peace Prize.
Brandon. You may have luck with dana.nuticelli@guardian.co.uk. No guarantee, but if he has a Guardian email address, they are usually fin that format – I’ve had a few hits with journos there using that approach.
Matthew R Marler, don’t worry about it. My name is misspelled so often it just makes me laugh. Years back I went to an airport to get my boarding pass, telling the lady behind the desk my name and giving her my ID. She said she was sorry, but they didn’t have any tickets under that name. She, of course, had added a “c” to my name when she typed it.
I figure if people can look at my ID and still spell my name wrong, I might as well just accept it. I just think it’s funny this post spelled my name three different ways. I don’t see that very often (though this wasn’t the first time).
My wife was babysitting a neighbors kids. They asked where she came from, she told them England. Then they commented that she spoke English well, and asked what language people spoke in England.
grumpyoldmanuk says:
May 10, 2014 at 9:24 am
“Pear shaped’ comes from the silhouette of an advanced pregnancy. “Tits up” from the missionary position. Both mean that the subject of the expression is Fxxxed. Basic Anglo-Saxon is earthy, mundane and unimaginative. Emotionally cathartic though.
==============================================================
Quite so. The river Kennet for example, refers to … well, I leave it to your imagination. I studied some Anglo Saxon at Oxford, and it is a glorious crackbone earthy beginning to our wonderful language.
Checkout “The Seafarer”, which is about hard times asea, but also uses this as an analogy for the Christian life. It’s very fine. The Middle English of Chaucer, and Sir Gawayne and the Green Knight, is more readily comprehensible, and just as down to earth.
http://www.anglo-saxons.net/hwaet/?do=get&type=text&id=Sfr
jeremyp99, thanks, though you either misspelled Dana Nuccitelli’s name or the Guardian uses a really weird format 😛
I suppose I could try the e-mail addresses listed in the Skeptical Science forum. Some may still work.
I hate to say it but I don’t think it matters how completely debunk Cook’s paper becomes, it will be used by people who would rather dismiss than make their case with skeptics.
I wonder if Cook would be as thoughtful to give a few days grace on any exposures of questionable analyses of a sceptical nature.
So can we all now agree John Cook’s 97% claim is now going at least 97% pear shaped, sideways, and tits-up, the paper is now FUBAR, and from the beginning it was a Charlie Foxtrot?
To Grumpyoldman: I disagree. The term “tits up” refers to a floating dead human body. A male body will float face down in the water. A female will float face up because of the estra buoyancy of the breasts. Of course this is a little off the subject but unlike Cook, I wanted to correct the record..
Brandon Shollenberger says:
May 10, 2014 at 1:51 pm
– – – – – – – –
Sarah A Green’s public info at Department of Chemistry, Michigan Technological University, USA
It contains her email address.
http://www.mtu.edu/chemistry/department/faculty/green/
John
Brandon, yes, sorry – if he has an email address there (some do, some don’t – Leo Hickman for example is.was leo.hickman@guardian.co.uk) so the Nutter would be
dana.nuccitelli@guardian.co.uk
Good luck. Squeeze his gonads hard for me if you can catch him 🙂
Brandon Shollenberger says:
May 10, 2014 at 1:51 pm
– – – – – – – –
Brandon Shollenberger,
Mark Richardson’s public info at Department of Meteorology, University of Reading, UK
It contains his email address.
http://www.met.reading.ac.uk/users/users/1596
John
Brandon Shollenberger says:
May 10, 2014 at 1:51 pm
– – – – – – – –
Brandon Shollenberger,
Robert Way’s public info at Department of Geography, Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada
It contains his email address.
http://www.mun.ca/geog/people/grad/RobertWay.php
John
I hate to say it but I don’t think it matters how completely debunk Cook’s paper becomes, it will be used by people who would rather dismiss than make their case with skeptics.
Maybe so, but facts are their own reward and falsehood must always be challenged, no matter what.
Best is “Irritable Climate Syndrome”
The whole idea that such “studies”, as Cook’s on “consensus” papers, can be considered remotely scientific is mind boggling . That the media has just eaten it up and published it as fact, is even more troublesome. Anything that can be done to show it for the bs it is, has to be a worthwhile and welcome endeavor.
My ancestors were all decidely anti-United Kingdom (I’m fine with them now). They almost all trace back to the Scotch Irish (Ulster Irish) area of Ireland, resulting in me being 3/4 Irish (the rest is German), qualified to be a Daughter of the American Revolution, great-grandaughter of an Oregon Homesteader Pioneer, and as Irish as I can be without the accent. I shoot straight, can cook anything, have eaten just about anything, and have been known to be stubborn. I also look decidely like a female leprachan. When we claim something, it is all or none. Tits up is Amercian.
She said sweetly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuatha_D%C3%A9_Danann
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danu_(Irish_goddess)
http://www.ulsternation.org.uk/ulster's%20contribution%20to%20america.htm
The way things have been for the last 17 or so years…
It won’t be long until they have to change it to
‘Climate stagnation”
This must be getting towards one of the longest periods for a while that it basically DONE NOTHING.
from public record.
Sarah Green sgreen@mtu.edu
Andrew Skuce skucea@telus.net
You have Mark Richardson’s from John’s post above. The rest are skeptical science bods or students so I’m not wasting an hour googling them. If you struggle to get Nuccitelli’s email i would be happy to call the Guardian to obtain it tomorrow. ( UK morning )
jeremyp99 says:
May 10, 2014 at 1:52 pm
Gary Hladik says:
May 10, 2014 at 12:08 pm
Mike Maguire says (May 10, 2014 at 11:01 am): “In a world that gives Al Gore a Nobel Peace Prize and an Emmy for his movie…”
=============================================
And as Tom Lehrer noted,. irony died when Kissinger received the Nobel Peace Prize.
=================================================================
Ole Tom conveniently omitted Le Duc Tho, the co-winner, but hey, Ole Tom is very selective with his leftist buddies. I go back a lot farther to Woodrow Wilson, one of our more vile presidents, and ahead to the triad of Arafat, Rabin, and Peres. But the all time winner has to be BHO, who got it for promising to stop the ocean’s rise, cool the planet—-oh, wait–. Luv’em or hate’em, the others DID something.
This is not a secret, the raters have been known since before the paper was released. Ari Jokimaki rated the most papers.
“Tits up” is something I remember hearing from the time I started to understand language 66 years ago – and on a ranch, it referred to dead animal because when they are totally bloated when you find them in the hinterland, cows tend to be “tits up” … at least until the coyotes get at them and release the gas. But I suppose all the other views are just as probable and because there are so many, the expression probably evolved from many places, some others of which I have heard but who knows.
Have a great weekend, time to go do some welding on the tractor and move some hay now the snow has stopped. Lovely climate here in central Alberta. (Not kidding, I love it!)