4 ms·

That's one of the worst things I noticed from the data, the overwhelming and negative responses to Steve Mcintyre. Mcintyre is not some demagogue. He's extremel

by ellyagg 17y ago

That's one of the worst things I noticed from the data, the overwhelming and negative responses to Steve Mcintyre. Mcintyre is not some demagogue. He's extremely dry and analytical. Why are they strategizing on how to give him dirty, annoying, and obfuscated data? I don't care if climate scientists consider Mcintyre an adversary. Does everyone remember how the shuttle software is written? The testing team has an adversarial relationship with the developers. This is how quality work is forged. If these guys can't stand to have an adversary review their work, I submit that something is seriously awry. Peer review isn't strong enough right now. If you read these docs, you find that they are asking that reviewers be hand-picked for "objectivity", and it's clear from the context that this means "not global warming skeptics". Peer review needs to be more adversarial. I don't think the scientific literature is much less important than the shuttle software. If the scientific method is working, then the data and methods should be able to withstand ANYONE'S scrutiny. It should be completely open. Most people here are strong supporters of open source software. Don't tell me for one second that free and open scientific debate doesn't benefit exactly as much from being open.

tome 17y ago
I think it's easy to work against an adversary when you're being paid to spend your time doing exactly that. Climate research funding is not paid so well as to give researchers time to deal with these specific issues. Maybe it should be. But it isn't.
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
- Maktab 17y ago
  Your response is a fantastic example of why this debate has become so horribly polarised. Has there ever been reliable evidence that Steve McIntyre or Anthony Watts are being paid by energy companies for the work they do? Both have made valuable contributions to the science surrounding this issue, McIntyre by spotting actual flaws within datasets and Watts by driving the effort to catalogue and categorise the quality of the all-important weather stations. They're not demagogues throwing around baseless accusations who should be ignored. McIntyre is the main target of the Hadley Centre scientists' ire, which I suspect has more to do with the fact that he's actually competent and knows how to interpret the data they release, something they oddly seem to fear. Lest we forget, scientists like those at the Hadley Centre have their own incentives, as their funding is directly correlated to the prevailing fear of global warming. Moreover, the debate has become so poisoned that few scientists would be brave enough to go far down a route which might dispute even a small part of the conventional wisdom for fear of being labelled a 'denier' (a term you used elsewhere in this discussion). But this is not what scientific debate is supposed to be about. This is supposed to be a profession ruled by the Scientific Method and dedicated to the primacy of experiments and data. What your personal incentives are or who pays your salary should be secondary to the results you produce. Science should have no place for flippant ad hominem dismissals, nor for the talk of 'enemies' that pervades this thread and the emails of the Hadley scientists. We should be thankful for the role played by men like McIntyre, because they act as an important quality check on data which will be used to make massively important political decisions which may have huge impacts on each of our lifestyles and finances. We should have more adversarial data analysts, not fewer.
  - tome 17y ago
    I don't know anything about McIntyre or Watts. I was responding to the parent who was comparing climate science to building a space shuttle. My point was that climate scientists are not funded like space shuttle developers, nothing more than that.
    - Maktab 17y ago
      If I misread your comment, please accept my apology. I must admit that I responded in the way I did partially because of this statement that you made a couple of hours ago, and I assumed that the comment I replied to was making a similar case: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=952651 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=952651 Sure, and if researchers are being forced to draw the line higher than usual due to external pressure from highly funded deniers, whose fault is that? EDIT: Besides, if we define the adversary to be somebody making legitimate critical analyses of your data and models and showing up flaws in them, isn't dealing with that meant to be part of a scientists job? How different is it in practice to defending your work against criticism from other, supposedly more respectable, scientists? It's ridiculous to claim that a lack of resources is a valid reason for intentionally hiding data from people with the skill to perform an adversarial analysis on it. If a scientist can't defend his results against Steve McIntyre, it means his results are indefensible. The person doesn't matter; the data, and its integrity, do.
      - tome 17y ago
        You're asking me how is a massively organised campaign participated in by thousands of people not educated specifically in your field different from defending your work against a critical colleague who happens to have his own pet theory?
        yummyfajitas 17y ago
        It doesn't matter who the adversary is. If a flaw is found, the work is incorrect.
  - jberryman 17y ago

by ellyagg 17y ago

tome 17y ago

I think it's easy to work against an adversary when you're being paid to spend your time doing exactly that. Climate research funding is not paid so well as to give researchers time to deal with these specific issues. Maybe it should be. But it isn't.

deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
Maktab 17y ago
Your response is a fantastic example of why this debate has become so horribly polarised. Has there ever been reliable evidence that Steve McIntyre or Anthony Watts are being paid by energy companies for the work they do? Both have made valuable contributions to the science surrounding this issue, McIntyre by spotting actual flaws within datasets and Watts by driving the effort to catalogue and categorise the quality of the all-important weather stations. They're not demagogues throwing around baseless accusations who should be ignored. McIntyre is the main target of the Hadley Centre scientists' ire, which I suspect has more to do with the fact that he's actually competent and knows how to interpret the data they release, something they oddly seem to fear. Lest we forget, scientists like those at the Hadley Centre have their own incentives, as their funding is directly correlated to the prevailing fear of global warming. Moreover, the debate has become so poisoned that few scientists would be brave enough to go far down a route which might dispute even a small part of the conventional wisdom for fear of being labelled a 'denier' (a term you used elsewhere in this discussion). But this is not what scientific debate is supposed to be about. This is supposed to be a profession ruled by the Scientific Method and dedicated to the primacy of experiments and data. What your personal incentives are or who pays your salary should be secondary to the results you produce. Science should have no place for flippant ad hominem dismissals, nor for the talk of 'enemies' that pervades this thread and the emails of the Hadley scientists. We should be thankful for the role played by men like McIntyre, because they act as an important quality check on data which will be used to make massively important political decisions which may have huge impacts on each of our lifestyles and finances. We should have more adversarial data analysts, not fewer.
- tome 17y ago
  I don't know anything about McIntyre or Watts. I was responding to the parent who was comparing climate science to building a space shuttle. My point was that climate scientists are not funded like space shuttle developers, nothing more than that.
  - Maktab 17y ago
    If I misread your comment, please accept my apology. I must admit that I responded in the way I did partially because of this statement that you made a couple of hours ago, and I assumed that the comment I replied to was making a similar case: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=952651 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=952651 Sure, and if researchers are being forced to draw the line higher than usual due to external pressure from highly funded deniers, whose fault is that? EDIT: Besides, if we define the adversary to be somebody making legitimate critical analyses of your data and models and showing up flaws in them, isn't dealing with that meant to be part of a scientists job? How different is it in practice to defending your work against criticism from other, supposedly more respectable, scientists? It's ridiculous to claim that a lack of resources is a valid reason for intentionally hiding data from people with the skill to perform an adversarial analysis on it. If a scientist can't defend his results against Steve McIntyre, it means his results are indefensible. The person doesn't matter; the data, and its integrity, do.
    - tome 17y ago
      You're asking me how is a massively organised campaign participated in by thousands of people not educated specifically in your field different from defending your work against a critical colleague who happens to have his own pet theory?
      - yummyfajitas 17y ago
        It doesn't matter who the adversary is. If a flaw is found, the work is incorrect.
- jberryman 17y ago