Scientific publication 'sting'

Science used to mean something before it became a political vehicle.
Science was probably a search for truth.LOL
Reminds me of how the tobacco industry used MDs in their commercials to push cigarettes.
Using respectability to sell a questionable product.
Thats similar to how the government is using million dollar climate scientists( ie Mann) to sell the biggest tax /power scheme in history.
You dont know it yet, but climate science has already taken your vocation out of the realm of respectability.
In a few years when temps drop as predicted ,"climate scientist" will widely be synonymous with fool and liar.
BTW how can you say you havent witnessed "faked data" when you are familiar with Mann and Marcott?

 

For that matter youve never been critical of the climate science "Pal" review system.
Where the Hockey Team controlled publication in journals by threatening to cut off submissions(boycott) and forcing resignations of editors .The hockey team controlled publishing faked studies and rejected those which went against their cabal.
BTW back to the article,Mullers BEST study is a good example of junk getting published.
Couldnt pass peer review for over a year and was never going to pass peer review.
So they submit to a brand new journal started from scratch, and voila ,BEST is now published peer reviewed climate science.
Was the journal created just to publish BEST?

 

The climategate emails detail how Manns hockeystick team controlled Pal review.
Its a public record,Prove me wrong .
I dont care if BEST is now in prestigious journals ,prove me wrong that BEST FAILED PEER REVIEW.
But why arent you outraged that BEST cheated the peer review system, if you love science so much?And which speaks to the point of this thread.

I really dont believe you give a rats nice person about science.
You care about your noble cause.
But you want to use your respectability as a scientist to persuade others.
You lost me there in the respect department.

 

Just a couple of thoughts:

I read engineering magazines and many are nothing more than collections of advertisements. But the better ones have technical articles needed to evaluate the relative merits of one or another technology. Sad to say, the better ones are often owned by publishers pushing more vacuous magazines. I might sample one but never renew the worst.

There is a spectrum of publications that vary in quality and content. As readers and subscribers we have to choose where we spend our time and subscription monies. So I am dropping Consumer Reports because we no longer trust their automotive reviews. But this isn't the first nor the last time we'll change what we read. In some cases, reviewing at the magazine rack and others . . . not even bending over to pick one up . . . Flying, Kitplanes, and Private Pilot being examples.

Science does mean something but even SAE papers can have . . . 'problems.' I've bought papers based upon abstracts only to discover some pretty serious and obvious problems. Two examples being one on 'Pulse and Glide' and another claiming to 'model Prius transmission efficiency.' Part of the problem is burdening reviewers to be the quality control when some act more like English graduate students 'grading the paper' without 'reading the content.' Finding content reviewers is harder than finding papers.

The best papers I remember are those published in a journal before a conference and presented by the author(s) with an open mike for questions and comments. The audience self-selects because they have the energy to attend the conference, an interest, and technical knowledge about the subject. So when the mike open up, you get the type of pointed, technical questions and discussions that really dig into the subject. But then you occasionally get someone who speaks from an alternate reality.

Historically, pre-Internet, information aged:

• books - lucky to be within two years of the date of the new discovery
• magazines - about a year from the discovery
• conference papers - about three to six months from a discovery
• birds of a feather and bars - what happened just last week

The Internet lets us self-publish new information much quicker BUT sad to say, it also attracts those living in alternate realities. I'm thinking of one character in "Prius Technical Stuff" a self-described, libertarian who at the drop of a hat will convert a technical discussion into a useless political screed.

Disconnected from reality people used to piss me off until I realized they are kabuki-like(*) in their responses. Many times their predictability provides opportunity for humor. So to quote a rascally, disagreeable, former co-worker, Greg Katz, 'My doctor told me to be blunt instead of keeping it bottled up. He said it is better to give an ulcer than receive.'

Bob Wilson

* - It is perfectly OK to 'take a break' from the alternate reality people. Sometimes, it is necessary to drag them back to reality. Sometimes you just have to 'ignore user' to turn off their noise . . . and take a vacation. After a month or so, turn off 'ignore' and see if they've gotten a clue. If not, silently turn them off again. The PriusChat ignore user is especially effective. Free speech does not mean forced listening.

 

Your noble cause is environmentalism.
Which has clouded any scientific objectivity when it comes to climate.

 

Youre spewing bullshit.
Read the linked studies directly ,anyone with intelligence would do that.
Then make a judgement of the studies.
But you want to disregard the studies for the lamest reason .A reason for which you have no evidence at all.
You just want to ignore science that disproves your theory.
Which makes you ignorant by choice.
So much for respect of science.

 

In my case, I'm only getting Sport Aviation, the EAA magazine which strangely is printed in larger font . . . for us older clients. <grins>

Indeed but it is also true that those committed to empiricism bleed that behavior in all aspects of life. So I have a memories of:

• Roberts Rules of Order and burnt Kraft - my brothers and I ran the experiment and confirmed that RR of Order do not work when making a box of Kraft macaroni and cheese.
• Holding a knife like a scalpel - it wasn't until living in a dorm that I learned most people had never seen anyone who without even thinking about it, held a knife with three fingers, thumb and the index finger on the backside to precisely guide the cutting edge.

Even now, I prefer to conduct an experiment rather than just copy-and-paste someone else's claim. Having duplicated the work, I cite my work as well as giving credit to those who taught me. And this is where we'll have to take different paths.

An adversarial point of view or critical eye certainly is appreciated by those who are willing and able to 'do the heavy lifting.' What I don't care for are copy-cats who simply parrot what they want others to hear without the bringing original content to the discussion:

• right-wing nuts
• PnG advocates
• climate deniers

They don't realize that their Kabuki-like postings are the perfect target for the didactic 'banana peel.'

I came to this forum incidental to my Prius studies with only a casual interest in environmental and climate change:

• Mariner 2 - showed CO{2} as a run-away, greenhouse gas cooked our twin planet Venus.
• Global warming will melt ice, polar ice, and raise the sea level.

But along the way, some of our meteorology experienced members helped me understand more aspects of tornadoes and some climate models. Then there is this undergraduate level book next to my keyboard that tied climate science to 40 year old, engineering undergraduate studies. Now I can translate climate science into engineering terms even after a beer or two. But these happy, learning experiences are nothing like the dreck that comes from 'copy-cat' advocates who exhibit signature characteristics as distinct as any natural phenomena.

So I'll hang here for a little while without getting terribly bent out of shape. But like everyone, we have other commitments which reminds me it is time to work on other chores.

Bob Wilson

 

Im a skeptic because Im an original thinker.
You are a sheep who follows consensus.

 

Certainly an interesting read, but I think the problem is far less serious than it sounds. Simple stated, while a number of fly-by-night journals have found it profitable to take advantage of the "publish or perish" culture of academia, there is no evidence that any first rate scientists read these fly-by-night publication for serious science.

At the end of the day, there is only enough time in any reviewer's and readers life to examine the best science investigations. Finding out that the science at the bottom of the barrel is sometimes rotten, does not change the reality that even 100% ethically pure science at the bottom of the barrel is not worth reading.

 

Rule 1: People can only operate at their level of understanding.

You have the whole range here at PC. Some fully understand the subject material. Some understand the implications of the subject material, but not the terms and jargon routinely used. Some may want to understand and participate, but the first non-daily used word turns all the text into gibberish. For example, anytime something like the "Younger Dryas" is mentioned, you have just filtered your readership to two people or less. Even simple words like "Temperature Proxy" do great readership damage if the desire is to connect to the PC crowd. It may be hard to believe, but probably over 90% of the posters first checking into the Environmental Forum wonder why all the sports based arguments over a hockey stick are occurring.

All you have to do to make a dramatic change in readership interaction is present the issue in everyday language. Replace "Younger Dryas" with the "1000 Year Big Freeze". Now you have increased you readership by at least a factor of 10. Replace "Hockey Stick" with "Explosive Warming Graphic" and then you might be caught offguard with requests for explanations.

 

Another outlet for propaganda

 

My core point is essentially nobody actually reads these third rate journals for insight and education.....nobody. That is the real story. Why the explosion of open access journals that nobody reads? ScienceMag would do well to investigate that question. Answering that makes the issue of missing or faulty peer review a non-issue.

Kerry Mullis (Nobel Prize winner for inventing the DNA PCR process) had two notable publication events. Event one was a meandering meaningless article about cosmic time reversal he wrote for Nature and got published. I actually read this and could not for the life of me figure out the point of the article. He later revealed he was in a self-induced drug stupor at the time and the physics made perfect sense. Apparently some Nature peer reviewers were in their own stupor. Somehow, Physics survived this bad theory. (You can pay money to read this in the Nature web site if so motivated.....) Decades later, after Mullis finalized the PCR process, his paper describing that Nobel worthy discovery was rejected by Nature. Go figure. Which is worse? Publishing garbage or not publishing gold? (Warning--Mullis's ratio of crazy publications to worthwhile publications is unbelievable! Scientific discipline and a Nobel worthy idea need not be present in the same person.)

At the end of the day, it's the substance of what comes out of disciplined investigation, research, and repeatability. Peer review has failed in the past, often fails today, and will fail in the future. The real problem is rejection of key new stuff, not the failure to properly vet 3rd rate stuff. Real knowledge will always survive human publishing shortcomings.

 

We need to have a healthy suspicion of any Koch Brothers funded think tank. They remind me of the old Tobacco Institute guys.

 

As a professional scientist, I have a healthy appreciation of the advantages and limitations of peer review. I have been an editor of a biomedical journal for many years. I have found that those who assert that an entire literature of a given subject can be fabricated or part of some conspiracy (climate change is the best example) invariably have no idea how science is done or how it is funded in most western countries, especially the US. Often this is for political reasons. Since the facts don't conform with their political (sometimes religious) beliefs, they either 1) attempt to discredit those who produce the facts, 2) cite their own "experts" who claim to understand the scientific issues, but on further examination turn out to be, at best, only peripherally involved in any form of scientific work, and 3) try to block legitimate scientific investigation. Right wingnuts especially favor these tactics applying them to all kinds of issues. What is amazing is that such people, even those who are otherwise intelligent, are absolutely impervious to factual information and, if it suited them, would deny the existence of fire even as their clothes burned off their bodies.