Brandon Shollenberger writes: I’ve been mulling over an idea I had, and I wanted to get some public feedback. What would you think of a public re-analysis of the Cook et al data set?
A key criticism of the Cook et al paper is they didn’t define the “consensus” they were looking for. There’s a lot of confusion as to whether that “consensus” position is weak (e.g. the greenhouse effect is real) or strong (e.g. humans are the primary culprits). The reason for that is Cook et al tried to combine both definitions into one rating, meaning they had no real definition.
You can see a discussion of that here.
I think it’d be interesting to examine the same data with sensible definitions. Instead of saying there’s a “97% consensus,” we could say “X% believe in global warming, Y% say humans are responsible for Z% of it.” That’d be far more informative. It’d also let us see if rating abstracts is even a plausibly useful approach for measuring a consensus.
My current thinking is to create a web site where people will be able to create accounts, log in and rate a particular subsample of the Cook et al data. I’m thinking 100 “Endorse AGW” abstracts to start with should be enough. After enough ratings have been submitted (or enough time has passed), I’ll break off the ratings, post results and start ratings on another set of abstracts.
The results would allow us to see tallies of how each abstract was rated (contrasted with the Cook et al ratings). I’m thinking I’d also allow raters to leave comments on abstracts to explain themselves, and these would be displayed as well. Finally, individual raters’ ratings could be viewed on a page to look for systematic differences in views.
What do you guys think? Would you be interested in something like this? Do you have things you’d like added or removed from it? Most importantly, do you think it’d be worth the effort? I’d be happy to create it, but it would take a fair amount of time and effort. It’d also take some money for hosting costs. I’d like to have an idea of if it’d be worth it.
An added bonus to doing it would be I could move my blog to that site as well. Self-hosting WordPress takes more effort than using WordPress.com, but it allows for far more customization. I’d love that.
So, thoughts? Questions? Concerns?
By the way, don’t hesitate to tell me I’m a fool if you think I’m spending too much time on the Cook et al issue. I’ve been telling myself that for the last two weeks.
Source: http://hiizuru.wordpress.com/2014/05/20/a-re-analysis-of-the-consensus/
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My opinion is that given the vast number of people interested in this at WUWT, we could likely crowd-source this work much more accurately and quickly than Cook did, without having to fall back on a small cadre of “like minded friends”. Both sides of the aisle can participate.
I don’t know what the result will be of such an analysis proposed by Brandon, but I do know that we can get far more participants from a much broader venue (since WUWT has almost an order of magnitude more reach than “Skeptical Science”) and that Brandon’s attention to detail will be an asset.
We already know many of the mistakes made in Cook’s work, so a re-do has the advantage out of the gate. This disadvantage may be that the gatekeepers at IOP may refuse to publish it, and University of Queensland may publish yet another bogus legal threat, since they seem tickled that Cooks 97% is the subject of worldwide gossip – Anthony
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No. Reality is not subject to majority vote. Don’t legitimize the idea.
Far better to assume that it was a fiddle, there is no advantage to reverse engineering it and to use the simplest possible analysis to disparage it.
Your comment ‘The reason for that is Cook et al tried to combine both definitions into one rating, meaning they had no real definition.’ is good enough for me. it is risible.
“Both sides of the aisle can participate.
Absolutely key. Magnificent idea. Do it!!!
I’d be up for some of that action. I read a lot of climate science papers every month so this would not be a great added burden.
I’ve commented here before that it’s unclear what it is about which 97% of climate scientists is supposed to agree. If it is that the world is warmer now than in 1850, then that figure might actually be accurate & indeed scientifically warranted. If it is that humans are the main cause of allegedly observed warming & that the result of this man-made climate change is liable to be “catastrophic”, then surely the figure would be lower.
Bit pointless..?. As very few are as motivated as the SkS crowd..
just keep asking people who cite it. What is the object of the consensus?
I’m certain many, many, many papers endorse AGW. Anecdotes suggest endorsing AGW or working “climate change” into a grant request is a near never-fail way to get funded.
The real question is — What evidence is being offered to support AGW?
I’d rather see a straightforward survey of scientists. Ask them specific questions about various controversial aspects of climate research. In particular, ask for their opinion about
— the numerical value of climate sensitivity
— their degree of certainty in various beliefs.
— which steps should be taken
I think the whole consensus argument is political BS, that it doesn’t matter, never did, and never will, so why keep beating this dead horse?
The Cook et al issue is interesting because it shows what unscrupulous, intellectually dishonest people they are. As for their consensus claim, see above. Those who want to believe are going to regardless of what light is shown on what they actually did.
One of the main problems with Cook is HOW they define a climate scientist.
You are a climate scientist according to Cook and Nuticelli if the words “global warming” appear in the title or abstract of your scientific paper.
This results in 12000 papers written mainly by NON climate scientists, such as biologists studying the sexual activity of squirrels or even traffic counters.
There is NO such thing as a climate scientist – officially, only physicists, metereologists, geologists and astro-physicists.
Am all for it, but I cannot promise to do it whilst exercising on treadmills SkS-style.
Well, it isn’t the worst idea in the history of bad ideas.
What is definitely needed is clear definitions to judge against, ones which do not lead to an agenda or pre-defined conclusion.
Brandon, In my opinion it is a waste of time and is implicitly allowing Cook & gang to set the pace of the discussion. Cook’s paper, like his pal Lewadowsky’s papers, are garbage. Why should skeptics have to dig through climate extremist’s garbage?
Additionally, until it is clear that we are not seeking out papers that reject the greenhouse effect, I would rather not see skeptics dragged anywhere close to what could be- rightly or wrongly- confused with dragon slayer stuff.
Better in my opinion would be to look for papers that are not promoting climate catastrophism and are either outright skeptical or at least luke warmers.
I like the idea of a do-over. In addition to revisiting the issue with clearer definition, I wonder if there might be sufficient data to examine the change of attitude as a function of time?
Why not redefine the whole question.
Do you believe:
1. The Earth is warming enough for concern and it is caused by:
a. natural variability
b. human activity
c. both with natural variability as the leading cause
d. both with human activity as the leading cause
2. The Earth is warming but not enough for concern and it is caused by
a. natural variability
b. human activity
c. both with natural variability as the leading cause
d. both with human activity as the leading cause
3. The Earth is not warming
For me it’s 2.c
Make a place for the paper’s author(s) to comment, and perhaps correct our reviewer’s analysis. Perhaps even make that part of the review to get their Email from the paper & send them a link.
Short answer: Yes. Long answer: Does the new examination use the same or different criteria? (More pigeonholes?) As The Prussian mentions on May 19, (paraphrasing) a paper could easily be pegged as believing in CAGW/ACC, but disagree on the extent; agree on extent, but disagree on rate; agree on the first two, but disagree on the effects; agree on all of the above, but disagree on the solutions.
An earlier cutoff date for papers? How does one take into account the warmists who have become lukewarmers, or lukewarmers that have become sceptics? (See Judith Curry’s recent comments when asked to rate herself.)
David in Cal wrote :
“I’d rather see a straightforward survey of scientists. Ask them specific questions about various controversial aspects of climate research. In particular, ask for their opinion about…”
Agree. I always recommended a direct rather than the rather dopey indirect approach Cook
used. It also eliminates the problem of counting obsolete opinions (old studies) and perhaps double counting where the scientist produced multiple papers.
This little b….d is a tar baby. leave it alone.
Remember one of life’s iron laws: ‘never argue with a fool’
Go to the source. Ask the authors of each paper for an opinion regarding climate science. Make it two sets of the same very short list of questions, one regarding the content of the paper, the other regarding the author’s personal opinion.
Legates already published on how the Cook conclusion is not supported. One more result done this way, even if published, won’t prevent warmunists from citing the paper. Only way to get it out of their main stream narrative is to get it retracted. If enough folks think this approach could do that, then glad to volunteer to help. Personally, I don’t think so. Could not even get the Marcott abomination corrected, let alone retracted, last year despite very strong evidence of knowing scientific deception provided to the editors of Science
More productive time could perhaps be spent debunking 2014NCA region by region, as Cliff Mass started to do for the Pacific Northwest on his blog.
Bad idea:
1. ‘Majority rules’ is not science. Stick with this. It’s the high road.
2. The deck will get stacked. People with strong beliefs on either side will attempt to load the results.
My grandfather had an expression he used that was ground into him from living through the great depression: “Don’t throw good money after bad”
Harness the good resources of this community for something more productive.
I think it is a bad idea and somewhat pointless.
The question ishould not be about a mythical consensus but how much does Carbon dioxide affect the climate? Most people on both sides believe that Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas but no one really knows how significant it is.
All the talk about how much is natural and how much is anthropogenic is simply guesswork!
Ridicule Cook and co. Don’t emulate them.