Reposted from Dr. Judith Curry’s Climate Etc.
Posted on April 10, 2021 by curryja |
by Judith Curry
“Like a magnetic field that pulls iron filings into alignment, a powerful cultural belief is aligning multiple sources of scientific bias in the same direction. – policy scientist Daniel Sarewitz
Statistician Regina Nuzzo summarizes the problem:
“This is the big problem in science that no one is talking about: even an honest person is a master of self-deception. In today’s environment, our talent for jumping to conclusions makes it all too easy to find false patterns in randomness, to ignore alternative explanations for a result or to accept ‘reasonable’ outcomes without question — that is, to ceaselessly lead ourselves astray without realizing it.”
Psychologists Richard Simmons et al. find that researcher bias can have a profound influence on the outcome of a study. Such ‘researcher degrees of freedom’ include choices about which variables to include, which data to include, which comparisons to make, and which analysis methods to use. Each of these choices may be reasonable, but when added together they allow for researchers to extract statistical significance or other meaningful information out of almost any data set. Researchers making necessary choices about data collection and analysis believe that they are making the correct, or at least reasonable, choices. But their bias will influence those choices in ways that researchers may not be aware of. Further, researchers may simply be using the techniques that work – meaning they give the results the researcher wants.
The objective of scientific research is to find out what is really true, not just verify our biases. If a community of scientists has a diversity of perspectives and different biases, then the checks and balances in the scientific process including peer review will eventually counter the biases of individuals. Sometimes this is true—but often this does not happen quickly or smoothly. Not only can poor data and wrong ideas survive, but good ideas can be suppressed.
However, when biases caused by motivated reasoning and career pressures become entrenched in the institutions that support science – the professional societies, scientific journals, universities and funding agencies – then that subfield of science may be led astray for decades.
Biases caused by a consensus building process
Consensus is viewed as a proxy for truth in many discussions of science. A consensus formed by the independent and free deliberations of many is a strong indicator of truth. However, a consensus can only be trusted to the extent that individuals are free to disagree with it.
A scientific argument can evolve prematurely into a ruling theory if cultural forces are sufficiently strong and aligned in the same direction. Premature theories enforced by an explicit consensus building process harm scientific progress because of the questions that don’t get asked and the investigations that aren’t undertaken. Nuzzio (2015) refers to this as ‘hypothesis myopia.’
If the objective of scientific research is to obtain truth and avoid error, how might a consensus seeking process introduce bias into the science and increase the chances for error?
‘Confirmation bias’ is a well-known psychological principle that connotes the seeking or interpretation of evidence in ways that are partial to existing beliefs, expectations, or an existing hypothesis. Confirmation bias usually refers to unwitting selectivity in the acquisition and interpretation of evidence.
Philosopher Thomas Kelly (2005) provides the following insight into confirmation bias. As more and more peers weigh in on a given issue, the proportion of the total evidence which consists of higher order psychological evidence of what other people believe increases, and the proportion of the total evidence which consists of first order evidence decreases. Kelly concludes that over time, this invisible hand process tends to bestow a certain competitive advantage to our prior beliefs with respect to confirmation and disconfirmation.
Allen et al. (2020) demonstrate how dependence, pressure, and polarization can force a consensus, making reliance on consensus as an indicator of truth unreliable. As a result, a consensus can only be trusted to the extent that individuals are free to disagree with it, without repression or reprisal. Similarly, when strong incentives favor affirmation of a position, a consensus affirming it becomes almost inevitable, and therefore all but meaningless.
Communication theorist Jean Goodwin argues that once the consensus claim was made, scientists involved in the ongoing IPCC process had reasons not just to consider the scientific evidence, but also to consider the possible effect of their statements on their ability to defend the consensus claim.
The IPCC’s consensus-building process arguably promotes groupthink. ‘Groupthink’ is a pattern of thought characterized by self-deception, forced manufacture of consent, and conformity to group values. Janis (1972) describes eight symptoms of groupthink:
- illusion of invulnerability
- collective rationalization
- belief in inherent morality
- stereotyped views of out-groups
- direct pressure on dissenters
- self-censorship
- illusion of unanimity
- self-appointed mind guards
Many defenders of the IPCC consensus − both scientists and consensus entrepreneurs − show many if not all of these symptoms.
Thomas Gold (1989) discussed the dangers that ‘herd behavior’ poses for scientists, potentially leading to an inertia-driven persistence of false consensus opinion within the sciences. While herd instinct has value in sociological behavior, it has been a disaster in science − in science what we generally want is diversity. When people pursue the same avenue all together, they tend to shut out other avenues, and they are not always on the right ones.
It is not just the herd instinct in the individuals that is of concern. If support from peers and moral and financial consequences are at stake, then staying with the herd is the successful policy for the individual; however, it is not the successful policy for the pursuit of science. Mental herd behavior, even if it does not actually put a clamp upon free thinking, insidiously applies pressure to follow the fashion. The institutions that support of science − financial support, the journals, the judgment of referees, the invitations to conferences, professional recognition − are all influenced by herd behavior.
Economist William Butos (2015) characterizes the IPCC as a ‘Big Player’ in science in that it possesses all of the attributes characteristic of Big Players in markets: bigness in terms of influence, insensitivity to the usual constraints, and discretion in its ability to promote a favored direction of research. This characterization of the IPCC as ‘Big Player’ is similar to economist Richard Tol’s characterization of the IPCC as a knowledge monopoly. The IPCC’s influence in climate science is pervasive, allowing it to largely ignore the usual scientific constraints on the acceptance of hypotheses. Professional success in climate science has become more tied to the acceptance of the IPCC’s pronouncements than with the exploration of contrary possibilities.
The existence of the IPCC as a ‘big player’ and a ‘knowledge monopoly’ on climate change can lead to premature canonization of IPCC conclusions. Premature canonization refers to widespread scientific belief in a false or incomplete conclusion, which leads to suppression masquerading as rejection. Suppression occurs when the fear of social sanctions prevents ideas from being explored or empirical findings from being presented in scientific or public forums. In science, rejection occurs when an idea has been explored and the evidence has been found wanting. A classic, relatively recent case of premature canonization involves the scientific identification of causes of ulcers.
So what are the implications of these concerns for the IPCC’s consensus on human-caused climate change? Cognitive biases in the context of an institutionalized consensus building process have arguably resulted in the consensus becoming increasingly confirmed, and even canonized, in a self-reinforcing way. An extended group of scientists derive their confidence in the consensus in a second-hand manner from the institutional authority of the IPCC and the emphatic nature in which the consensus is portrayed. This ‘invisible hand’ marginalizes skeptical perspectives. Overconfident assertions by the ‘Big Player’ take away the motivation for scientists to challenge the consensus, particularly when they can expect to be called a ‘denier’ for their efforts and see their chances diminish for professional recognition and research funding.
The consensus building process acts to amplify personal biases, and marginalizes disagreement from either a majority opinion or the opinion of the loudest or most motivated person in the room. One can only speculate on the magnitude and importance of the biases introduced into climate science by the IPCC’s consensus seeking process.
However, a consensus can only be trusted to the extent that individuals are free to disagree with it.
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disagree. Consensus has no special powers to divine the truth regardless of how many individuals might agree or disagree.
Consensus is based in belief, which is better known as superstition. It is the belief that a forced change in human behavior can change the weather on a planetary scale.
Yet if human history shows anything, it is that the use of force rarely achieves the original goals.
disagree. History rather shows that force rarely achieves the STATED goals. How those statements of intent was received by the original audience depends entirely upon their cultural, religious and/or intellectual BIAS. Mostly that bias, in turn, depends upon what they consider to be the consensus wisdom.
The only way out of that vicious circle, is the constant questioning and evaluation of one’s own bias(es?), starting with the premise that one’s entire reality is held together by lying to oneself, at least once a while. How many will admit to their self-deception, the foundation of the ego? (Id?, I have perfunctory interest in psychobabble ((which I tell myself is irrelevant to my own wonderful, individualistic self))).
Also, it is instructive to translate every political truism into plain language, using an actual dictionary, but not the Mirriam Webster, for example, that just recently codified “irregardless”.
Somebody help me out here. Where is that bad side of the little warming that has been happening since the Great Lakes started forming and melting 2 miles of ice over Chicago? I can’t find it. Just askin for a friend 》
I’m just glad it’s not as hot as it was in the 1930’s.
I hope it doesn’t cool down so much in the future that it affects crops in a big way worldwide. A few ill-timed freezes could be devastating.
Check out Henry Bauer’s “Dogmatism in Science and Medicine: How dominant theories Monopolize Research and Stifle the Search for Truth”
https://www.amazon.com/Dogmatism-Science-Medicine-Dominant-Monopolize-ebook/dp/B008AHNIGS/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Dogmatism+in+science&qid=1618088920&s=books&sr=1-1
On fooling ourselves,
Readers should study a March 2021 paper authored by 15 people under the name of the Australian Academy of Science, title “THE RISKS TO AUSTRALIA OF A 3°C WARMER WORLD”. This is the latest extravaganza trying to convince the public that there really is a global threat from climate change – see their page 23 “… if damaging tipping cascades can occur and a global tipping point cannot be ruled out, then this is an existential threat to civilization”. President Biden used this phrase “existential threat” repeatedly a few days ago. It is catchy and it is trendy. But is it true?
There are more than 450 references and a statement that the paper was peer reviewed by 6 named individuals. Three of the reviewers have authored or co-authored 18 of the papers in the listed references. It has long been scientific etiquette that a reviewer does not review his/her own prior publications, yet here we see the supposed top scientists in the land of climate crises doing just that. Are there other signs of a lack of scientific rigour? Yes, there are many. We readers are treated to high-level pop-science gossip instead of careful, replicated original research that we expect from the AAS.
Some examples of gossip follow.
In the paper, there are terms of reference to guide its content. “TOR1: outline the global challenge under current and future climate change for Australia.” Logically, satisfaction of that term requires that the authors know the future climate of Australia. They do not, for they cannot. They can make guesses, informed more or less by subjective probability estimates of climate change events happening. This is what they have done. They have made guesses. Then, they approve each other’s guesses.
“TOR2: define the impacts of climate change so far on key sectors within Australia, particularly in the context of mean global temperatures increasing by 1.1°C since 1870.” There is no scientific agreement that global temperatures have increased by 1.1°C since 1870. Whole continents like Antarctica and Africa have inadequate past measurements for the period 1870-1950. More than half of the global ocean area was essentially unmeasured before 1950. Further, there is unsettled debate about factors affecting temperatures, such as the urban heat island effect, the variability caused by clouds, subjective adjustments like homogenisation and several more. Nobody can put an accurate figure on global temperature change since 1870 because the required data do not exist and never have. It is good ground for gossip to thrive on more guesses.
“TOR3: define the risks that are associated with reaching and exceeding average global temperatures of 3°C (as compared to 1.5–2°C) above the pre-industrial period.” The future guesses about temperature on which the authors rely are essentially all inclusive of mechanisms involving the concentrations of Carbon Dioxide forecast to exist in the air of the future. The relation between CO2 concentration and global temperatures in the air is expressed by a term, often “climate sensitivity”. There is a problem. There is no accepted sensitivity figure. The last official IPCC statement was a tiny one-line footnote in IPCC, 2013: Summary for Policymakers. In: Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis. SPM page 16. It reads “No best estimate for equilibrium climate sensitivity can now be given because of a lack of agreement on values across assessed lines of evidence and studies.” Is it not strange that future predictions of global temperatures affected by CO2 remain unquantified because nobody can agree on how small or large the effect is? This is a serious failure at the very base of the whole global warming edifice. Four decades of expensive research had failed to find the answer – yet the authors ignore this terminal scientific impediment and write as if it did not exist.
Page after page of this AAS document is open to criticism. The paper should be retracted on the grounds that it has failed to be adequately robust. Geoff S
Thanks for studying the paper for us, now I can spend my time usefully, like drinking beer, weeding the garden, playing with the dogs, harassing the children, irritating the wife… so many better things to do than read yet more fear porn by consensus sciencers.
PG
Apart from those matters we do plant breeding, philately, photography, cat showing, travel. It is a good idea to keep up with science reading if you are a scientist, if only to help show contrasts of good work and bad.
I did not read all of this horrible paper, just scanned some.
Geoff S
I won’t ask for your definition of a scientist, but I’ve alwasy thought one reads sciency stuff because it’s so darn interesting, because one must at least try to understand the nature of reality, and, lastly, to learn how to recognise bullshit masquerading as science…just in case you come across a Baal Gates, Antoninchrist Frauci or Gory Al the Melting Ice Bear.
Also, it keeps you from wasting your life on TwatFaceGram, begging to be Liked.
“see their page 23 “… if damaging tipping cascades can occur and a global tipping point cannot be ruled out, then this is an existential threat to civilization”.”
There is no evidence from past history that CO2 caused “tipping cascades” in the Earth’s climate.
CO2 levels have been much higher in the past compared to today (7,000ppm verses 417ppm today) and there has never been a runaway greenhouse effect in history.
A lot of alarmists like to attribute some warming periods in the past to be the result of increased CO2 levels, but they really cannot show whether the CO2 levels preceded the warmth or came after the warmth.
And if Dr. Happer’s contention is correct that there exists a ceiling on the amount of warmth CO2 can add to our atmosphere, then the alarmists will have to adjust their speculation about CO2’s contribution to past warm spells, because according to Dr. Happer, the Earth’s atmosphere is almost “saturated” at 417ppm, and cannot add much more additional warmth no matter how much more CO2 goes into the atmosphere.
So about 417ppm is the limit for adding warmth to the atmosphere, and all the rest above that level, right up to the 7,000ppm in ancient times is irrelevant to the temperatures.
You alarmists are going to have to explain past temperature increases using something other than CO2, if Dr. Happer is correct. My money is on Dr. Happer.
If some rich person out there would be willing to loan me a million dollars on the easy payment plan (repay $500 per month until paid off), I would be happy to put this money up as a challenge to any and all to take up Dr. Happer’s theory and either confirm or find fault with his results.
It would be worth paying $500 a month to me for the rest of my life to get this CO2 argument off the dime. It probably wouldn’t be worth it to the lender. But, you never know. If Dr. Happer proves to be correct, then we can save Trillions of dollars we would have wasted trying to regulate CO2, and I might try to crowdfund the debt and maybe that lender could get their money back.
There are people walking around to whom a million dollars is pocket change. They ought to put some of that pocket change to use in a good cause: Relieving the world’s population of the anxiety many feel about CO2 and its alledged dangers.
A million dollars might go a very long way. Somebody could be a science truth hero and save us Trillions of wasted dollars, and take away an excuse from the Elites to place us all under authoritarian regimes. That ought to be worth a million to someone.
From the article: ““Like a magnetic field that pulls iron filings into alignment, a powerful cultural belief is aligning multiple sources of scientific bias in the same direction. – policy scientist Daniel Sarewitz”
That “magnetic field” sounds a lot like the Western world’s Leftwing Media.
Our magnetic field consists of propaganda and brainwashing. Our Leftwing Media completely distorts reality, and they do so as a method of controlling people’s lives.
“However, a consensus can only be trusted to the extent that individuals are free to disagree with it.”
An option that appears to be rapidly being removed, not just from climate science.
Just remember, phrenology was once the scientific consensus.
citation required
“our talent for jumping to conclusions makes it all too easy to find false patterns in randomness,”
for a blog that repeatedly posts “no warming since [cherry picked start date]” that is rather amusing ;o)
Hands down, the $ are in denial…
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/meet-the-money-behind-the-climate-denial-movement-180948204/