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As these things go, my comment is out of date before it is published.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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“””””…..Abel Garcia says:
May 10, 2014 at 5:15 pm
Science does not advance via popularity contest. Did Einstein convene a science conference and say how does E=MC^2 sound, I am also thinking of E=MC^3 or how about E=MC……”””””
Well actually I don’t think he would have said any one of those.
Most likely he would say; E = m c^2 in German of course.
He also said E = h (nu) and they must have liked that better, because that is the one he got a Nobel Prize in Physics for..
Another piss-take out of the Americans (oh, I know they have a broad back):
An American tourist in Windsor (overheard as an aircraft flew low overhead after taking off from Heathrow just a few miles away):
“Jeez, why did they put the castle so close to a noisy, busy airport?”
[‘Broad back’: A term used by the ENGLISH to indicate an ability to accept and withstand abuse or criticism, and to take it all in good humour]
Mike Singleton:
Ah, thanks! You’re kind of right about talking to him making you want a shower. I was tempted to publish his response as soon as I got it. The thing is terrible. Not only did he fail to assert any privacy concerns, he made bold statements which were demonstrably false.
It was the sort of response which would make a lawyer shake his head. Either John Cook has no idea what he’s talking about, or he’s hoping I don’t.
bushbunny says:
May 10, 2014 at 8:06 pm
More at on that subject at http://dienekes.blogspot.co.uk/ & http://www.unz.com/gnxp/
West Saxon & Old Norse are spoken in “Vikings”. Try speaking English without using Norman French loan words, or indeed without using words of Greek or Latin origin & the use of “weasel” words & of ambiguity (Latin ambiguus, from ambigere to be undecided, from ambi- + agere to drive — more at agent. First Known Use: 1528 …) are gone.
I suspect that if we were to revert to the Ingvaeonic languages, we would again believe that disputes could be settled & indeed, leaders toppled, by hólmganga. “Ho there! Bring me my shield & my +ULFBERH+T. I seek to make an end to political (from Greek: πολιτικός politikos, meaning “of, for, or relating to citizens”) double speak”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_language
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holmgang
Sour Apple (May 10, 2014 at 7:37 pm) – The “97%” Doran and Zimmerman paper is worse than that. Take a look at the questions – even confirmed sceptical regulars at WUWT could answer “Yes”.
Patrick Ah our friend from County Cork, Eire. Did yer know I knew the nephew of one of your republicans, Harry Boland, his nephew came from a long line of goldsmiths in Cork city. And my grandmother came from Queenstown, now known as Cobh, and was married in the Cathedral there in the late 1800s to my Royal Navy grandfather. Cobh is where my cousins still live and one of my second cousins is in the Irish Navy. With internet it has become a small world. Anyway back to topic – how’s the weather there in Southern Ireland?
Adding to Philip Peake and Mike T above:
My daughter’s Mathematics teacher last year was a colorful older gentleman hailing from the UK. He had a habit for asking the teenage (American) kids, “What language do you speak–and don’t you DARE say English!”
Perry you are dead right, our languages are a mix of various historical Lords. Norman, celt,Roman of course with Latin, still used legally too, and was spoken in RC masses for a long time. And of course some Indian words, adopted after the Raj occupation. Bungalow, assassin, and others I can’t remember, oh, Old Blighty. Not after the Irish potato blight, but a name for England.
Bushbunny, I think there’s a word from every language on the planet in English. Some have a tortuous route for transmission too, like adobe… possibly Ethiopian to Arabic to Spanish then to English as a loanword. This is what makes English the richest language on the planet, in terms of vocabulary, it’s so willing to borrow from others, unlike French which has an Academy to keep the language pure and unsullied.
cold – Well our computers have American spell checks. The number of times colour instead of color or palaeoanthropology or sulphur is underlined in red, I usually keep it the way I was taught at school. And quite honestly I sometimes have trouble understanding American ‘Down South’ lingo on the movies. But as I say that, I sometimes can’t at first translate, some heavy Scottish accents. But – turned pear shaped is an RAF expression, and also a description of ladies who happen to be a bit over weight in their lower bodies. Or as Aussie would say ‘Stuffed up beyond belief’ or rather F… up beyond belief. There was an up market furnisher store named FUBBS. So rather than swearing in public, we’d say that is truly Fubbed.
Bushbunny, spellcheckers can be set up for UK or Australian English if so desired (at least in MS Word). Facebook and the like are annoying as their checkers are indeed, in US English
This Ari Jokimaki: “I am not a professional climate scientist, but just an interested layman who has been getting familiar particularly to the observational side of the issue by reading the research papers on the subject.” A guy with a very low level degree in computer engineering in Finland?
Yes I do add to the dictionary for some words, but it doesn’t worry me. Thanks Mike T.
A. Scott says:
May 10, 2014 at 7:56 pm
[blockquote]
We cannot give up continuing to refute this bad science. Success builds on success – and nothing generates attention as well as scandal – especially when supported by legitimate supported claims..
[/blockquote]
I agree totally, once the story has been told, it is hard to get rid rid of it. The target for ‘blame’ needs to be the journals, it is rebuttals, public analyses exposing inconsistencies that can stop further occurrences, and the journals need to review their reviewers – that is their job.
It is a very good thing to get withdrawals as the authors becomes less credible in their field if they are known to have published shall we say, ‘questionable’ papers that do not meet the standards expected. But it is the journal that publishes the papers based on their reviewers’ recommendations.
It has been said before and it is now time that the anonymity of reviewers is re-examined too.It would dispose of or expose cronyism. In climategate it became apparent that disgraceful actions in the review process were happening so that certain papers would get through and others would not. This is clearly still the case and shows that the entire scientific method in many fields has been compromised.
But lets learn and push for greater openness is science, the days of a paper getting publishing approval by a secret band of winking and nodding reviewers is not 21st century and needs to be ended.
As for the Cook paper, here we have peer reviewed papers that are subjected to some sort of further review to categorise them into yes/no/maybe groups by people that did not necessarily have qualifications to do so, and that got published ?
Mike T: Ah, one of my favourite hates! I had to fill in a form for an English company online the other day – and they obviously think using US software is ok. It underlined ‘licence’, ‘centre’, etc. Infuriating.
Before I depart, I thought I would add the joke. ” A young boy was overhearing his dad and friend talking about the global financial slump and money was disappearing. He asked innocently, ‘Well if the world has no money, where did it all go” Yeah a good question.
I believe English is one of the hardest languages to learn. Accept Latin. Must go Mike, have a good night or day, whatever your time zones. Au revoir, see you all tomorrow in spirit at least.
When talking of modern English, we have politicans to thank for that. The last known remaining “dialect” of “old English” is that spoken by Scottish Islanders and in Glasgow. But this animation may help in understanding the changes across borders in “Europe” over the last 1000 years or so. I cannot confirm it’s accuracy but seems plausible.
Old English (Anglo-Saxon) was never spoken in Glasgow or the Scottish Islands. As others have suggested, Gaelic would have been the language of most of Scotland apart from the Northern Isles which would have spoken Norse as they were part of the Kingdom of Norway.
Patrick says:
May 11, 2014 at 2:10 am
When talking of modern English, we have politicans (sic) to thank for that.
Also newsreaders who can’t pronounce the letter ‘t’; where it comes out a ‘d’.
What astounds me is that John Cook’s survey methodology was flawed from the beginning and that if anyone bothered to ask or contract a reputable social research company to provide an analysis of the report’s methodology it would be demolished, caput and rendered useless within a few succinct points. You do not even have to bother with the results, the participants or the interpretation. His research methodology was so laughable. It is an embarrassment to people in the business of doing social research. Ps, I would be happy to contribute for the costs of a reputable independent social analysis company to pull his propaganda feeding survey to bits and publish the results on line. You have my email. Please contact me.
The irony is what Cooks consider this ‘papers’ strength is it weakness and a dead give away it was BS. The infamous 97 % before this study had all the quality of ‘nine out of ten cats prefer’ so that he exactly matched it showed that there was simply no intention to find out any real facts , merely a intention to blinding support this part of the dogma of ‘the cause’
Based on BS before it was ever done , its hardly a surprise to find the result was BS too.
One of things that marks of AGW has being more religion than science is that it feels the need to support the scientifical indefensible , has with the stick. Normal science accepts that old ideas can be fairly challenged, found wrong and so changed, its the hard core religions which regard its claims to be unquestionable truth for all time no matter what the reality.
@knr
This has something I’ve also found baffling and amusing in equal measure. “97%” is trotted out in several contexts, as if they are independently iterating through and refining various experiments to find a more accurate value of PI or the mass of the electron, or the speed of light. Ridiculous on it’s face.
Hah! that’s gas. Even Brendan is spelling his own name wrong now.;)
Good morning to my fellow Irish brothers and sisters who tune in to this wonderful site. Of course we know that the best spoken English in the world, is that spoken by the Irish.
To those of you about to ”hit the hay”, Codladh sadbh diobh.
Eamon.
“Eamon Butler says:
May 11, 2014 at 3:16 am”
No. That is Galic. You could say “Scottish”.
“Eamon Butler says:
May 11, 2014 at 3:16 am”
OT but, wiskey! And rightly so…all others are copies!
When I was a schoolboy in the 50s RAF flyers of my acquaintance used the Initials TBU which
stood for ‘Total Balls Up’ usually caused by ‘Ministry Experts!!