4 ms·

You're just attacking ESR's character. It's fallacious to discount his blog post just because you don't like his character. Please, can't we have a rational dis

by javert 17y ago

You're just attacking ESR's character. It's fallacious to discount his blog post just because you don't like his character. Please, can't we have a rational discussion on the topic?

ieure 17y ago
No, what I’m doing is pointing out that his opinions are a) wrong and b) delivered with right-wing spin. As such, you should not take what he says about matters political at face value.
- davidmathers 17y ago
  I don't know what ESR's politics looked like before Before what? I don't remember there ever being a time when esr wasn't a deranged wingnut.
  - mjgoins 17y ago
    He was significantly less deranged prior to 9-11-2001.
- holygoat 17y ago
  You seem to be making some unsubstantiated leaps from what he's written, to "right-wing", to "wrong". Just because you don't agree with what someone has written doesn't mean you can dump them in a camp you don't like, and just because you do so doesn't mean that you can discount him entirely on all such matters.
  - spamizbad 17y ago
    Considering the variable produced by code in question is never used, as shown by two comments in this thread, indicates to me that ESR is wrong. Which is odd, because ESR is an expert programmer, so one would assume he'd check to see if this was a case of dead code. He does not do this, and instead prattles off wingnut talking points on climate gate.
    - zppx 17y ago
      ESR a programmer? Do you ever read the mailing list of the major FLOSS projects out there? Read them and search for his name. It was even the theme of a webcomic in the past: http://geekz.co.uk/lovesraymond/archive/show-them-the-code http://geekz.co.uk/lovesraymond/archive/show-them-the-code
    - dk 17y ago
      If the variable is never used, why does it exist nonetheless? It's a valid question.
    - jimbokun 17y ago
      The fact that the variable is never used is relevant to whether or not ESR's claims are valid. His general political view points are not.
trominos 17y ago
He is certainly attacking ESR's character, but I think that the old mantra that we should always address an argument and not the person delivering it isn't entirely fair. The strongest reason for this, in my opinion, is that most complex systems can't be thoroughly analyzed with any objectivity, because it's impossible to consciously process all the available data; there's just too much going on. So whenever somebody argues about a complex system, there's a very implicit part of their argument that involves which data they choose to present. A bystander who's trying to follow (and validate or invalidate) a logical argument can't always tell if the choice of data is unbiased, and of course looking at all available data takes the bystander as much time as it took the arguer to formulate the argument in the first place. So USUALLY what an unbiased observer will do is proceed with caution: see what the arguer's point is, see how it fits with the observer's intuition (because this is the same as appealing to the observer's subconscious, which in most cases has processed far more data relevant to some issue than has their conscious mind), and see whether the data seems overwhelming enough that its conclusion couldn't be the result of biased data selection on the part of the arguer. But this method often fails. Without formulating your own opinion by immersing yourself in data, you just can't be sure whether you're looking at a legitimate picture of an issue. That's why whenever I hear a convincing argument about something complex, I only provisionally believe whatever I've just been convinced of. And that's why an argument's author actually matters if the argument relates to a sufficiently complex system. Now, arguments about simple (by which I really mean "completely specified") systems aren't victim to this weakness -- mathematical proof, for instance, can actually be really verified by an observer without the observer doing the same work that the discover did, as can many logical arguments in the hard sciences. But what ESR is trying to show here is that some particular set of scientists committed scientific fraud. This is a) a value judgment and b) depends substantially on context. So I think that it is not only reasonable but very much a good thing that ieure pointed out that ESR is a nutjob. Now I know that even if I find his post compelling, he has no intellectual honesty and the data he's showing me have been carefully selected from the unimaginably vast amounts of data in the world because they happen to support his worldview. Maybe he's still right -- but ieure's post is still very much relevant.
- Estragon 17y ago
  the old mantra that we should always address an argument and not the person delivering it isn't entirely fair. At some point, the only sane thing to do is flip the bozo bit. Life's too short.
voidpointer 17y ago
Well put. There are far more relevant points, such as the fact that the fudged data series isn't even used anywhere in the rest of the program. The code fragment is indeed pretty useless without the entire program. It seems like ESR has stopped looking at the code once he thought he had found what he was looking for. The adjusted data is never referenced in the rest of the program: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=964896 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=964896 Ideally we would have access to the entire program + data and could re-run it to see whether the graph was produced with or without the adjustments enabled. It is very well possible that the program was altered after the graph was plotted and before that version of the source became public.
akamaka 17y ago
If we were in a formal debate, you'd be right. But we're not. The original poster's point is that ESR shouldn't even be admitted into the debate. Personally, I'm ignoring everything I read about this story unless it there's evidence that it comes from someone who has invested some serious effort into the subject.
jbooth 17y ago
It's much more fallacious to discount the overwhelming scientific consensus on global warming because of one scientist's character. A virtual army of teabaggers combing over this data and all they could find was one marginal case of cooking the data? I'm more confident than before. Also -- it's not fallacious to point out historical bias by the author when discussing a partisan issue. It's additional information to be taken into account. EDIT: Partisan downrate? Please, people, go to redstate.com or something if that's how you feel.

by javert 17y ago

You're just attacking ESR's character. It's fallacious to discount his blog post just because you don't like his character. Please, can't we have a rational discussion on the topic?

ieure 17y ago

No, what I’m doing is pointing out that his opinions are a) wrong and b) delivered with right-wing spin. As such, you should not take what he says about matters political at face value.

davidmathers 17y ago
I don't know what ESR's politics looked like before Before what? I don't remember there ever being a time when esr wasn't a deranged wingnut.
- mjgoins 17y ago
  He was significantly less deranged prior to 9-11-2001.
holygoat 17y ago
You seem to be making some unsubstantiated leaps from what he's written, to "right-wing", to "wrong". Just because you don't agree with what someone has written doesn't mean you can dump them in a camp you don't like, and just because you do so doesn't mean that you can discount him entirely on all such matters.
- spamizbad 17y ago
  Considering the variable produced by code in question is never used, as shown by two comments in this thread, indicates to me that ESR is wrong. Which is odd, because ESR is an expert programmer, so one would assume he'd check to see if this was a case of dead code. He does not do this, and instead prattles off wingnut talking points on climate gate.
  - zppx 17y ago
    ESR a programmer? Do you ever read the mailing list of the major FLOSS projects out there? Read them and search for his name. It was even the theme of a webcomic in the past: http://geekz.co.uk/lovesraymond/archive/show-them-the-code http://geekz.co.uk/lovesraymond/archive/show-them-the-code
  - dk 17y ago
    If the variable is never used, why does it exist nonetheless? It's a valid question.
  - jimbokun 17y ago
    The fact that the variable is never used is relevant to whether or not ESR's claims are valid. His general political view points are not.

trominos 17y ago

He is certainly attacking ESR's character, but I think that the old mantra that we should always address an argument and not the person delivering it isn't entirely fair. The strongest reason for this, in my opinion, is that most complex systems can't be thoroughly analyzed with any objectivity, because it's impossible to consciously process all the available data; there's just too much going on. So whenever somebody argues about a complex system, there's a very implicit part of their argument that involves which data they choose to present. A bystander who's trying to follow (and validate or invalidate) a logical argument can't always tell if the choice of data is unbiased, and of course looking at all available data takes the bystander as much time as it took the arguer to formulate the argument in the first place. So USUALLY what an unbiased observer will do is proceed with caution: see what the arguer's point is, see how it fits with the observer's intuition (because this is the same as appealing to the observer's subconscious, which in most cases has processed far more data relevant to some issue than has their conscious mind), and see whether the data seems overwhelming enough that its conclusion couldn't be the result of biased data selection on the part of the arguer. But this method often fails. Without formulating your own opinion by immersing yourself in data, you just can't be sure whether you're looking at a legitimate picture of an issue. That's why whenever I hear a convincing argument about something complex, I only provisionally believe whatever I've just been convinced of. And that's why an argument's author actually matters if the argument relates to a sufficiently complex system. Now, arguments about simple (by which I really mean "completely specified") systems aren't victim to this weakness -- mathematical proof, for instance, can actually be really verified by an observer without the observer doing the same work that the discover did, as can many logical arguments in the hard sciences. But what ESR is trying to show here is that some particular set of scientists committed scientific fraud. This is a) a value judgment and b) depends substantially on context. So I think that it is not only reasonable but very much a good thing that ieure pointed out that ESR is a nutjob. Now I know that even if I find his post compelling, he has no intellectual honesty and the data he's showing me have been carefully selected from the unimaginably vast amounts of data in the world because they happen to support his worldview. Maybe he's still right -- but ieure's post is still very much relevant.

Estragon 17y ago
the old mantra that we should always address an argument and not the person delivering it isn't entirely fair. At some point, the only sane thing to do is flip the bozo bit. Life's too short.

voidpointer 17y ago

Well put. There are far more relevant points, such as the fact that the fudged data series isn't even used anywhere in the rest of the program. The code fragment is indeed pretty useless without the entire program. It seems like ESR has stopped looking at the code once he thought he had found what he was looking for. The adjusted data is never referenced in the rest of the program: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=964896 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=964896 Ideally we would have access to the entire program + data and could re-run it to see whether the graph was produced with or without the adjustments enabled. It is very well possible that the program was altered after the graph was plotted and before that version of the source became public.

akamaka 17y ago

If we were in a formal debate, you'd be right. But we're not. The original poster's point is that ESR shouldn't even be admitted into the debate. Personally, I'm ignoring everything I read about this story unless it there's evidence that it comes from someone who has invested some serious effort into the subject.

jbooth 17y ago

It's much more fallacious to discount the overwhelming scientific consensus on global warming because of one scientist's character. A virtual army of teabaggers combing over this data and all they could find was one marginal case of cooking the data? I'm more confident than before. Also -- it's not fallacious to point out historical bias by the author when discussing a partisan issue. It's additional information to be taken into account. EDIT: Partisan downrate? Please, people, go to redstate.com or something if that's how you feel.