Sunday
Sep092012
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Replicating Lew
Sep 9, 2012 Climate: Sceptics One of Anthony Watts' readers is attempting to replicate the Lewandowsky survey study, an interesting development in my humble opinion. Details here.
Also fascinating is Steve McIntyre's dissection of Lewandowsky's results.
Reader Comments (81)
I posted at WUWT saying why I think this is a bad idea. The large number of comments there tends to inhibit discussion, I find. My main reason was this:
On-line surveys are a terrible way of finding out people’s opinions. Cheating is easy, and feels morally indifferent, for the same reason that it’s easy to murder people by pressing a button that rains bombs on innocent civilians miles below. You don’t lie to the interviewer who stops you in the street, any more than you lie to the person who stops you to ask the way to the post office. The face-to-face interview is just a stylised version of a normal human interaction. Filling in a form on your computer is like filling in a tax form - but with no chance of your inexact responses being found out and punished.
We’ve all been so busy discussing how bad the survey, and Lewandowsky’s subsequent behaviour, has been, that we’re a bit blinded to the simple fact that a survey like this would be inherently flawed, even if conducted by someone less biassed and incompetent than Lewandowsky.
Yeah, because when WUWT's survey results come out everyone will take that as gospel right?
I don't understand how it will "create a more robust set of replies" it looks equally open to gaming and what's more it is primed to the hilt. Weird idea. Scratches head.
I don't think the idea is to come up with a better paper. I am sure A Scott realises how flawed the methodology is. However, Steve M may be onto something worthwhile, and that is the responses of sceptics to the two questions CO2TempUp and CO2HasNegChange The other side may indeed think we are all no/no on these, but I'd bet we are mostly yes/no and nobody much is no/yes. Maybe, just maybe we could get the other side to realise what the majority sceptic position is, as they do not seem to right now.
Yeah, I know, hopeless. You cannot fight certainty with 'nothing much'. However I see no harm in the exercise provided we don't take it seriously, because it is not a serious question at all to judge somebody's opinion on one subject by his opinion on another. If I only had a pound for every time I've read assumptions of sceptic positions on evolution, God, MMR vaccine and so on based purely on the prejudice of the accuser.
Sorry for the offtopicness, but can somebody please point to me an article/link explaining exactly why windfarms and solar panel cause net instability? Especially some info about the short (millisecond) interruptions that seem to plague the German grid?
I had a good link explaining this, but have lost it.
So what better place to ask then here...
Thanks in advance for your help!
I did Scott's version of the survey for a bit of fun to and to show how a genuine sceptic views the world.
However such surveys are a farce. You are completely in the hands of the person choosing how to pose the questions. HE is in charge of the "results" not the respondents. Ask a loaded question get a loaded answer.
Open-ended questions are the only way to plumb the respondent's OWN attitudes. These would be of the type "Have you been following the debate over whether Co2 affects the climate or not?" and providing a Yes/No option followed by a box where the respondent can amplify on his answer in his own words up to certain limit in number of words.
Questions must always be neutrally worded, words must be clearly defined and the respondent must be permitted to put his views in his own words.
Of course, this kind of response takes some effort to analyse. Those powers of analysis are clearly beyond the politically motivated cod psychology Lew is involved in.
I hope Bish won't mind if I copy here a comment I have just posted on Adam
SmithsCorner's Talking Climate blog.It's currently in moderation, but Adam has said he's very busy at present and it might take him a while to release it.
Adam
Many of us who are interested in the climate debate are puzzled and disappointed that you have not responded to the question I posted at your Talking Climate blog almost a week ago - asking you to comment on the Lewandowsky paper you launched into the world ,with such enthusiasm, in the Guardian and this blog.
You have told me on Twitter that you are busy and have more important things to do - but this seems odd when the paper is so central to your field of study and you had no difficulty in finding the time to promote it.
Since my last comment, the discussion of this paper has reverberated around the blogosphere and attracted huge attention. It has now probably had more public exposure than any published work on the psychology of climate change "denial" - a field where you seem to be the most prominent UK practitioner.
It's a bit like God appearing in St Peter's Square, surrounded by a choir of angels - and the Pope lurking in the Vatican and refusing to comment.
In the expectation that you will, eventually, find time to comment on this important controversy, there are a couple of supplementary questions I would like to add to my original request - in order to better understand the origins of the controversy.
1. When you first reported on this paper here, I pointed out to you that it seemed to me more like activism than science. You have stated here that you see no problem in pursuing your climate activism in your spare time as long as you keep it separate from your work as a publicly funded academic and occasional government adviser.
It therefore becomes very important for people to know whether particular statements by you are delivered in your academic role or as a climate activist. Since the Guardian is the UK forum of choice for fringe political activism - I think you should clarify for us whether your article on the Lewandowsky paper was written as part of your academic work or as an activist statement.
2. Assuming that the article was produced as part of your official academic work - many of us are puzzled by the fact that it pre-dated the official UWA press release of the paper by almost a month.
Would you mind explaining how you came across the advance copy of the paper and the associated promotional material? Did it arrive at your university as part of an academic collaboration - or did the Guardian receive a copy direct and ask you to write a comment on it?
Whichever route the paper arrived, was it direct from UWA itself or via an intermediary organisation?
3. When you wrote about the paper, had you been supplied with the actual data in order to be able to judge whether or not it supported the headline conclusions?
4. Your Guardian article, in particular, put a lot of emphasis in the "fake moon landings" conspiracy theory. When you wrote it, were you aware that only ten valid respondents out of around 1,100 had supported that theory and, of those, only three identified as climate sceptics?
Do you now think that this data supports the paper title and the sub-headline of your article?
I, and I think many others, would be most grateful if you could find time to answer these simple questions.
Your continued silence is beginning to look like hiding from a controversy of which you were a key instigator.
Adam Smith? Your political affiliations are showing Foxgoose. The bushy tail of the carnivore is peeking out from under the downy plumage.
Good questions though. Since Adam is in one of his periodic phases of Trappist retreat, perhaps I could reply for him? Like Evelyn Waugh assuming the post of official spokesman for the Catholic Church while the Pope is indisposed.
It’s pretty simple. Corner the journalist got it from his mate Stephan, getting a scoop in return for some free publicity. It happens all the time in journalism.
What’s interesting I think is that Corner’s Guardian article received 1300 comments, far more than any other on the environment pages lately. Yet these comments added absolutely nothing to the discussion. Then the same article appeared at Talkingclimate, and 25 comments from you, me, and the rest of the Boys from BishopHill sparked off something which is still reverberating.
When I was a kid, my gran read a paper called Reveille. It had a readership probably fifty times that of the Times Telegraph and Manchester Guardian combined, but (sensibly) nobody took a blind bit of notice of what it said. The Guardian is our new Reveille, doomed to disappear and be replaced by who knows what. The difference is that our leaders haven’t noticed. They’re basing the country’s economic, industrial and energy policy on the astrology page and the Useless Eustace cartoon in Reveille.
Actually I think it I'd the Telegraph article that kicked things off. A month later, and the public crowing about it by the liked of Mann, Monbiot, Redfeatn, Hundal, etc. Tweeting and teywertong to all their followers.
And Jo Nova's article immediately afterwards. We had chatted weeks before about it.
The Aussie Telegraph journalist seems to have been one of the few to fall for the press release, but now it was out there.
A funny moment was when @ajcorner (guardian) tweeted to @georgemonbiot (also guardian) that he Corner had written about it already.
And it still is in press. This months edition?
Oops - that's my earnest, green, lefty cover blown for good.
Any chance of correcting it Bish?
In the States we have a term dating from the Clinton administration: "Lewinsky." It can be both a noun and a verb. I am wondering if "Lewandowsky" will similarly enrich our vocabulary?
Sep 9, 2012 at 2:32 PM | Barry Woods
My guess is that the Telegraph guy was was prompted by the death of Neil Armstrong 3 days earlier and decided to dust off the crazy climate deniers = moon-landing deniers story as a tie-in.
Barry
Agreed, the Telegraph article kicked it off this time round, but because we’d already rehearsed the arguments at the Cornershop, and particularly because of your comment there listing the links to the different blog articles, we were ready for them. (I think Paul Matthews at Notrickszone was the first to list all the links). Thus the BishopHill threads, particularly FarleyR’s discussion thread, became workshops of creative interaction, instead of simply opinion pieces.
Compare threads here with what happens at Joanna’s, or Lucia’s or WUWT. However good the articles, the threads never take off because the useful contributions are swamped by opinionating. This is not to criticise, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. But I think the chance fact that a critical mass of regulars at BH were already knowledgeable about the subjet helped enormously in the spread of information. And one of the excellent results, I think, has been the participation of lots of new names with interesting and original things to say.
Then, when I took the debate to SkepticalScience, and you, omnologos and Ben Pile took it to Lewandowsky’s blog, it took off, because enough of us were available to carry on the debate.
I hope the Tree Hut Gang are paying attention. This is how a successful conspiracy works.
I found the survey as posted by "A. Scott" impossible to answer.
First: I refuse to answer personal questions about sex, age or financial status.
Second:
I am convinced that whoever (lewandosky or ?) prepared this list of questions knows much less than the average citizen and has many assumptions of causes without evidence or proof. Their level of understanding is not that of a scientist, but seems to be that of a religious zealot.
e.g. Question 34: Smoking causes cancer. Is this a generic or specific question? Does smoking always cause cancer or is it that smoking tobacco may cause cancer. As stated the question is absolute but in the most general way, therefore I cannot agree nor disagree to any degree as I do not wish to further belief in general absolutes.
Much of this survey is framed in variations of this general absolutes form. Did a true Doctor of Psychiatry truly agree to these questions?
And where did they get their inadequate level of scholarship on historical events? The absolute simplistic questions on some very complex historical events are just plain absurd, incompetent or outrageously fraudulent.
I pity anyone who actually believes useful knowledge can be derived from completing this survey. Surely such people are activists or worse, zeolots.
Somewhat off topic, for which I apologise, but this bizarre attempt to characterise sceptics as conspiracy theorists for some reason reminded me of Isaiah Berlin's essay on the categories of fox and hedgehog. For those of you who are not familiar, Berlin divides writers and thinkers into two categories: hedgehogs, who view the world through the lens of a single defining idea and foxes who draw on a wide variety of experiences and for whom the world cannot be boiled down to a single idea. It occurs to me that warmists, particularly the more strident of them, are clearly hedgehogs whereas many sceptics are foxes. This may account for the inability of the more extreme warmists to understand sceptics other than in terms of psychological pathology.
Do posters here have any opinion regarding a blog that allows one of its moderators to also post under a sockpuppet name?
Alex Heyworth
A new fragment from this poet has recently been identified among the papyrus fragments recovered from the Greek Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchus. Many of these papyri were used to wrap the mummies of pet cats and crocodiles. This fragment begins with what might almost be a prophetic message for Professor LewandowskyThere are so many things in this world more interesting than arguing about climate change (well, I think).The title of Berlin’s essay comes from a poem fragment by the 7th century Greek poet Archilochus:
Louise
care to enlighten me further as I've no idea what you're talking about?
Hopefully not breaking DNFTT
Sep 9, 2012 at 5:01 PM | geoffchambers
You're making that up! :)
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2012/09/01/arctic-sea-ice-turning-points/#comment-70117
Louise, others
Please take this to the discussion forum. It's O/T on this thread.
Louise
I'll take the bait - doesn't bother me really. I put up with being snipped and abused at Skeptical Science for some time before I noticed that the mods' intitials matched the abusive posters names.
It's nice that the WUWT mods don't carve up opposing posts automatically like the SkS kids though.
Getting back to conspiracy theories - there was a wonderful example in the post after the one you linked to at Tamino's ;-
These "few regulars" must have had their work cut out - generating 125,000,000 million page views so far!
Thanks for the link anyway - best laugh since Prof L's last rant from the bunker.
I took the survey because I think it's important for the AGW crowd to see what skeptics really think.
But, honestly, some of the questions are absurd. On a par with, "Have you stopped beating your wife."
So many railroading, question conflating sentences it's hard to imagine they could have not understand what they were doing. The compiler is either a crook or an idiot who cannot think logically.
Question 10 is a doozy. So much logical fail in so few words. And from a tenured professor. Sheesh.
The Lewandowsky paper is indeed risible trash. It also must be underlined that the paper’s very title “NASA faked the moon landing, Therefore (Climate) Science is a Hoax: An Anatomy of the Motivated Rejection of Science” must rank as one of the vilest propagandistic titles ever given to a paper purporting to be scientific. [I am cross-posting my comment from JoNova]
There is NO basis for thinking that climate “skeptics” predominately believe in any conspiracy theory about faked moon landings, or that there is any “therefore” at all (i.e., faked moon landings IMPLY climate science skepticism). Lewandowsky’s title is pure propaganda designed to influence judgment before one ever encounters the data (sic) of his paper. He took a propaganda meme, concocted fraudulent “data” to try to support it, and then issued a title designed to be quoted endlessly by journalists, alarmists, et al who would never even read the scurrilous paper. This is truly agitprop of a low order. For shame, Professor, be ashamed of yourself! Lewandowsky is a disgrace to academe and an embarrassment to the pretensions of psychology to be scientific in any way.
Far from embracing conspiracy theories about the moon landings, I proudly welcome the stance of four eminent Apollo astronauts who include actual moon-walkers in expressing skepticism about CAGW alarmism:
Four Apollo astronauts who express skepticism about CAGW alarmism
Chapter 5 of Stephan’s epistle to the Contrarians is up at
which is nice. He doesn’t say what extent of engagement he’d like, but I’m sure we appreciate the gesture.http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/lewandowskySouljah.html
He says
Lew continues:
and so on. In other words, some of us are the equivalent of mass murderers, while others are like innocent AIDS sufferers.The last time I remember the word “triage” uttered by a warmist it was by the SkepticalScience author and occasional Guardian contributor who blogs as Johntherock. He’d been having a drink or two with Monbiot in his Welsh belfry and the conversation got round to the coming catastrophe and the inevitable triage which would have to be effected. They agreed that they wouldn’t fancy being sceptics at that moment...
Funny how the fantasies of psychotics are so boringly similar.
I think Ben Pile summarized it nicely when he pointed to this clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4GUMMx4sK8
"It's hard not to draw the conclusion that Lewandowsky simply isn't very bright -- and is not far off what I would read as a satire.[...] Lewandowsky either massively overstates his own faculties, or he underestimates the rest of the world's."
Wow Geoff - it's his complete political manifesto.
Shades of Ted Kaczynski - with a cast of thousands.
President Mbeki, Rupert Murdoch, Fox News, Andrew Bolt, Sister Souljah - they all get a bit part.
I'm trying to work out whether you and I are the evil pushers of denialism, with the blood of 330,000 Africans on our hands - or just the "sick and desperate people who turn to the purveyors of denial to deal with their tragic illness" who "deserve not contempt but compassion".
Neither option seems very attractive but, on balance I'd think I'd rather have a massacre pinned on me than have to rely on Prof Lew's "compassion".
I thought this phrase was particularly illuminating:-
Mr. Bolt has referred to me variously as a global warming evangelist or smearer. Despite those obvious failings, Mr. Bolt publicly distanced himself from the “Galileo Movement.”
I'm sure one of his psychologist colleagues could get a paper out of that alone.
Seriously, this guy has issues and needs help.
I'm not going to post over there again - after that rant, it feels like mocking the mentally impaired.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/jul/31/1
survey Of 1,000 British adults in Jul 2008. The online poll, by film company 20th Century Fox
· 1 Area 51 exists to investigate aliens (48%)
· 2 9/11 was orchestrated by the US government (38%)
· 3 Apollo landing was a hoax (35%)
· 4 Diana and Dodi were murdered (32%)
· 5 The Illuminati secret society and masons are trying to take over the world (25%)
· 6 Scientologists rule Hollywood (17% )
· 7 Barcodes are really intended to control people (7%)
· 8 Microsoft sends messages via Wingdings (6%)
· 9 US let Pearl Harbour happen (5%)
· 10 The world is run by dinosaur-like reptiles (3%)
Sceptics come out quite sane by comparison.
Dubito, ergo cogito, ergo sum
A thanks to Andrew for posting this.
Won't go into a lot of detail right now, but suffice to say the intent was not necessarily to gain useful scientific knowledge, which as many have noted is very difficult with the issues inherent in the original survey, but rather to replicate the overall process of the original survey and create a more transparent and broad data set. To do that requires this effort be based on the original survey's questions as written.
The conclusion from the data obtained is not necessarily the important benefit, as it will be affected by the same biases and issues with the original survey. There are however a lot of pretty interesting things being learned in recreating the process, along with a few experiments that have been suggested as offshoots.
Thanks to all who are participating. At minimum this effort has brought well needed attention to the issue of quality of research and about confirmation bias, peer review and the like.
I have not participated in the WUWT survey because essentially, all open online surveys are junk. It is possible to conduct valid targeted online surveys (ie targeted to individuals or representatives of organisations), but in an open survey it is impossible to control for skewing of responders - and that's not even taking into account gaming, jokesters etc.
While qualitative surveys (where you have to write in your own words why you believe X to be true) are slightly better, even then you will never be able to control for self-selection of responders.
The new survey at WUWT cannot "replicate" Lew since it uses a different scale (1-5 with a neutral option, rather than 1-4 with forced choice), and of course neither survey has any control over respondents.
However, it may still be interesting to compare the range of responses with what Lew reported.
fwiw, the Lewpaper survey is now being defended with a bizarre new ranting post by the Lew himself.... who does not address any substantive points but instead resorts to smearing critics wholesale. He reads like a guy mentally unstable and veering toward breakdown. Perhaps Univ. of Western Australia needs to look at what he's done with the funds they provided to start that blog, which does not seem to serve any legitimate academic or public interest under the Lew's leadership.
It may be worth following up (for those so motivated) to inquire if the Vice Chancellor or members of that Editorial Board support the dubious uses to which Lewandowsky is putting their communal blog. Lew is recklessly undermining both the spirit and stated policies of the blog which was funded for start-up by both the Univ. of Western Australia and Murdoch U. Does he actually need to get editorial approval from two people to post his rants (see policy below), or is he privileged as one of the co-Principals to post any article he likes, no matter how uncivil and non-substantive? He's no mere "member of the public" so perhaps he can post any nonsense he pleases. Still, the more sober academics on their list of blog authors and Editorial Board members ought to re-consider their involvement with such a 4th-rate enterprise.
Compare Lew's recent output with stated blog policies there:
Blog policies for ShapingTomorrowsWorld
Editorial Policy
Shapingtomorrowsworld welcomes submissions from members of the public, for posting on our discussion board. However, all submissions will be reviewed by at least two members of the editorial board and acceptance cannot be guaranteed....
Comment Policy
Our comment policy is rigorous. Although we welcome debate, we set very strict parameters on what we consider civil and substantive. If in doubt, a comment will be deleted....
Funding
Shapingtomorrowsworld was made possible by a grant from the Vice Chancellor of the University of Western Australia and by the support of the Institute of Sustainability and Technology Policy at Murdoch University.
will not waste time with the survey on WUWT, because i'm more interested to see whether Sage Publications' Psychological Science will ACTUALLY publish the Lewandowsky et al rubbish. surely not. however,
Sage Publications: Psychological Science: Acknowledgment
The Associate Editors and I wish to acknowledge the invaluable aid provided
by guest reviewers of manuscripts submitted to Psychological Science in
2009. We are deeply grateful for their generous, conscientious,
knowledgeable, and constructive help. -Robert V. Kail
(lengthy list includes) Stephan Lewandowsky
http://pss.sagepub.com/content/21/12/1925.full
I once worked in an institution which attempted (frequently but not always successfully) to re-socialise violent and disturbed teenagers; Professor Lewendowsky seems to have a similar world-view to those young people, and I now have sincere doubts about the staff selection procedures in some Australian universities. I am aware it has been said before, but this case really does make one wonder if the lunatics have finally taken over running the asylum.
whilst National Geographic didn't take over scienceblogs til 2011 and, whilst i'm not suggesting any direct connection between Hoofnagle and Lewandowsky, i do wonder if Lewandowsky got his idea for his survey, begun in 2010, from the following:
26 May 2009: scienceblogs: denialismblog: Mark Hoofnagle: Denying AIDS – A book by Seth Kalichman
Kalichman’s book is well-written, timely, thoroughly researched, and to his great credit he uses my definition of denialism...
He also has inspired me to conduct a kind of experiment. Simply put, denialism is an outgrowth of a certain personality type that is dysfunctional. These people with suspicious/paranoid beliefs, a tendency towards conspiracism, and lack of critical reasoning skills are all over the country and all over the world. They interpret events in a predictable manner. I ask the readers to consider world events from this perspective. Let’s see if, in the face of a crisis or other major event, we can predict what those with this conspiratorial mindset will come up with as an explanation. I’m curious to see if we can come up with their unique conspiracy theories before they do. Maybe the next time we see something big break in the news if we can successfully conduct this experiment here at denialism blog...
http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/2009/05/26/denying-aids-a-book-by-seth/
even Wikipedia credits Hoofnagle as one of the originators of the CAGW deniers' meme, something which he boasts about himself:
30 April 2007: scienceblogs: denialismblogs: About
Examples of common topics in which denialists employ their tactics include: Creationism/Intelligent Design, Global Warming denialism, Holocaust denial, HIV/AIDS denialism, 9/11 conspiracies, Tobacco Carcinogenecity denialism (the first organized corporate campaign), anti-vaccination/mercury autism denialism and anti-animal testing/animal rights extremist denialism...
5 general tactics are used by denialists to sow confusion. They are conspiracy, selectivity (cherry-picking), fake experts, impossible expectations (also known as moving goalposts), and general fallacies of logic...
http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/about/
just wondering.
lol, amusing comment was posted on the latest Lewandowsky article, probably can't last with all the snip-snip-snipping that is going on over there:
===============================================================
http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/lewandowskySouljah.html
18. LewPaper at 11:56 AM on 10 September, 2012
This blog's policies emphasize "civil and substantive" discussions and fostering "conditions for reasoned debate".
Do authors and members of the Editorial Board actually regard Professors Lewandowsky's last several articles here as "civil and substantive"?
Does the smearing of all sources of criticism foster "conditions for reasoned debate"?
Across the academic and policy worlds this blog is an extreme outlier, a locus of reckless ad hominems and slovenly discourse. Its sponsors and and contributors should be deeply ashamed of what Professor Lewandowsky has done to this forum. Thank you for your consideration.
=================================================================
Well I never heard of that frivolous blog before, and after this little fuss it is not likely anyone will care about it. Let them shape tomorrow's world in their own little hippie commune far away from all of us.
Sep 10, 2012 at 2:43 AM | Skiphil
But is this not the pattern we have come to expect from those "scientists" who wear their advocacy colours on their sleeves?! In addition ...
The opening gambit on his earlier post:
suggests to me that:
1. He lacks reading comprehension skills; or
2. He lacks critical thinking skills; or
3. He expects recipients of emails sent by his assistant - in which no mention was made of Lewandowsky's involvement - to be mind readers; or
4. He is intellectually dishonest.
I also wonder why it might have taken the better part of two years for his Magnificent Obsession to get from "research" to "publication" (or at least "In Press"). Perhaps he thought that he needed to put some time and/or distance between the initial criticisms of his "survey" and publication?!
It also seems to me that, Lewandowsky's responses (and those of his defenders) strongly suggest that we may need to add "conspiracy" to the growing list of words that have been ... uh ... "redefined" in the interest of advancing the "cause".
Hilary
I reckon you could replace all four of those characteristics with one:
He's thick!
And I've met several scientists in my life who were so intelligent their brains must have hurt. Outside their immediate and very limited disciplines they tended, by and large, to be .... thick!
(That's the Yorkshire word. I don't know whether the Canadians have a different one!!)
The sites they allegedly contacted have nothing to gain by being untruthful about it. It seems the evidence clearly shows a concerted effort has been made by a number of these sites to try and find the contact. The few that have turned up, show in my opinion, and grossly minimal effort to gain cooperation.
It seems that effort was first, largely an afterthought - made after Lewandowsky had already publicly discussed interim findings. Second, the evidence we have been able to see shows a weak effort at best, with little or no effective attempt to followup and gain cooperation.
This fits what one might expect from the author, considering the public comments he, and cohorts, have made over time.
It seems clear this "paper" was intended to serve one purpose - to provide the headline and basis for further attack and derision of those skeptical of AGW - in order to further their well defined agenda.
This is already occurring right on cue - see: How do people reject climate science?
... please check out the author.
Imagine that.
I have already seen this "paper" referenced by AGW alarmists in a number of places:
The Motivated Rejection Of Science. Here's an excerpt from Slashdot: ""New research (PDF) to be published in a forthcoming issue of Psychological Science has found that those who subscribed to one or more conspiracy theories or who strongly supported a free market economy were more likely to reject the findings from climate science as well as other sciences. The researchers, led by UWA School of Psychology Professor Stephan Lewandowsky, found that free-market ideology was an overwhelmingly strong determinant of the rejection of climate science. It also predicted the rejection of the link between tobacco and lung cancer and between HIV and AIDS. Conspiratorial thinking was a lesser but still significant determinant of the rejection of all scientific propositions examined, from climate to lung cancer. Curiously, public response to the paper has provided a perfect real-life illustration of the very cognitive processes at the center of the research."
This is EXACTLY the purpose of this garbage. To create this exact pre-planned - talking point. Which will now continue regardless of the controversy of the ridiculous results.
A big positive of the re-created survey is that it is continuing to generate generating awareness, visibility and more important fueling wide discussion of the serious flaws of Lewandowsky's work. It doesn't simply tell people about the issues it has allowed them to directly EXPERIENCE them first hand.
The authors I'm sure fully expected this issue slowly disappear and fade away ... not gonna happen - not this time.
That train has left the station.
Mike Jackson - thick as two short planks is the Oz version.
@ Rhoda
Maybe, just maybe we could get the other side to realise what the majority sceptic position is, as they do not seem to right now.
They know perfectly well what the majority sceptic position is, IME. They probably also largely agree with it. But since they want the taxes, the grants, the Nobel prizes, the international socialism and the police state, they pretend otherwise.
There have been agnostic archbishops of Canterbury and there have been active homosexual popes, but they all appreciated the perks of the position enough that they didn't quit on the basis of the principles involved.
http://pss.sagepub.com/feedback
If I get time I will provide feedback tonight to the journal, to warn the editors.
Might anybody else provide sensible feedback, ie quoting Steve Mcintyres work, or Tom Curtis concerns
there is at least one non arguable actual problem, claims in the paper that no sceptic blog published.
Yet Junk science did, and as JunkScience is a much higher ranked with respect to traffic than the majority of the 8 surveyed
You might expect a significan number of responses, more than the very low traffic Bickmore, ill considered, hot topic, and mandia blogs.
why was this data not included
Why was the false statement made
what happened to that data
what effect on the results is there when this data is included.
etc
As this is generating significant headlines, this issue should be addressed I belive before publication.
this is interesting.
http://chronicle.com/article/As-Dutch-Research-Scandal/129746/?key=TmJ3I1c3YidCYXFqNzZEbD1VaH1pMEh6NSYdOXF9bl1XFQ%3D%3D
@ A Scott
Point taken.
A more useful approach for Lewandowsky to have taken would have been to include a few loony theories that people like himself believe in. These might have included such gems as the propositions that GM crops are A Bad Thing; that homeopathy works; that organic foods are more nutritious than intensively-farmed foods; that increasing tax rates increases tax revenue; that immigration is never bad; and that Big Oil funds climate "denial". All are completely nutty and it would have provided an interesting comparison if, as I suspect, we had found that ecofascists tick all these boxes.
Perhaps as a control there could have been something in there about belief in ghosts and astrology. The number of people who buy those is about the same as those who buy CAGW and I suspect it is the same people.
The other key missing piece is the calibrating study of the population at large. If 10% if sceptics thought NASA hoaxed the moon landings but 30% of the wider population thought this then this would suggest that sceptics are more, well, sceptical than most.
Of course the study's objective was never to gather any useful information. All he has really established is that catastrophiles are dishonest, but we're at Bishop Hill so we kinda knew that already.
My comments at Lewandowsky's blog are being retrospectively snipped (for the crime of copying and pasting a quote from another blog)
http://shapingtomorrowsworld.org/ccc1.html#comments
as I was merely quoting Tom Curtis concerns at Skeptical Science.. nobody there can ever quote anybody again!!
The final denouement in Professor Lew's plan to Reshape the World……
Live and Let Fry
(final scene in Professor Lew's secret bunker……)
….. Geoff's taut, honed body writhed as he tested his bonds, but the stainless steel bands bit cruelly into the toned muscle - there was no escape.
Prof L "So, Mr Chambers - you thought you could come here and argue about my plans. I am about to teach you a lesson on your foolishness which you will never forget - although "never" in your case may be a very short time"
GC "Professor, if you will just let me argue my point - I can show you several flaws in your epistemological assumptions….."
Prof L "Silence! You're not here to argue Mr Chambers - you're here to die!…….. Men! Put him in the Gas Chamber!…………In a moment, Mr Chambers my assistants will open a valve and admit precisely one thousand parts per million of deadly carbon dioxide gas into the chamber where you are restrained………. and I shall take enormous pleasure in watching your agony as you combust! Bwhaaaaahaa……………"
Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss………………………………………
Prof L "Men! Why is the denier Chambers laughing at me? Why is he not burning?…………. bring me the climate scientists Mann, Schmidt & Jones!"…………………… Mann ….. why is he still alive, you said he would burn in agony?"
Mann "Well, Professor it isn't quite that simple ….. these things can take time……"
Prof L "How much time?"
Schmidt " It all depends really …….. a few decades……"
Jones "…….or centuries……."
Mann "….depending on the error bars….."
Schmidt "…and the missing heat of course"
Prof L "Centuries! Error bars! Missing heat! ……… where is this "missing heat"?
Mann "Dunno really …… under the sea maybe"
Jones " Yeah…could be"
Prof L " Fools! Charlatans! - you promised me the entire human race, except for my followers and I would roast in agony,……….. drag the denier Chambers out of the gas chamber and throw him into the piranha tank……… and the useless climatologists with him!……..Where's the guy who knows how to start earthquakes?"
@foxgoose
You fiend in human form!
You have bugged my hidden lair and heard my innermost secrets and fears!
I have been soundly betrayed by a conspiracy of disloyal servants and climateers. And sceptics and deniers. Even worse some of them are Pommy bastards too.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvs4bOMv5Xw
Treachery, infamy....they've all got it in for me.........
Meanwhile, back at Uni, its time for an academic staff meeting
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_f_p0CgPeyA
To avoid confusion I should point out
1. that the comments above were relayed to me directly from Prof. Stefan Lewandowsky via the mechanism of 'teleconnections'
2. In the clip above from Monty Python, the part of Prof. Lewandowsky is played by an actor.
3. The University of Wolomoloo refused to comment about the future employment status of Prof. Lewandowsky when contacted.
Foxgoose 12.19pm
What you have there is the lost script of my strip cartoon CO2MAN the Contrarian. It came to me in a dream during a well deserved siesta here in my Mediterranean retreat.
My dream was peopled by mysterious figures from some Tale of the Orient - An East Anglian Night’s Fantasy
There was Trenberth the Travesty, Overpeck and Underpeck, Jones the Graph (aka Excelman) with his faithful dog Briffa, and in the midst of them, the Mann himself - the Incredible Hocke. They formed a circle around him and he began to chant:
You put your bristlecone in
Your bristlecone out
In out, in out, you shake it all about
You do the Hockey Pokey and you turn it round
That’s what it’s all about.
Then all together they murmured in a terrible monotone
Oooh, do the Hockey Pokey
Oooh, do the...
I woke up in a cold sweat. In a feverish wine-fuddled haze I wrote it down, only to see the pages borne away over the purple waves I knew not where by an unseasonable Sirocco breeze. Thank Gaia they fell into your trusty hands.
I have sent instructions to His Grace our beloved Leader (praise be to him in his wisdom!) on how to return them to me. My gratitude will know no bounds.
Geoff
For God's sake - lay off the local plonk before it's too late!
I know it seems quaffable when you're sitting under an olive tree nibbling your antipasto, but don't be deceived - the signs of irreversible brain damage are becoming apparent to those who know you.
If it's retsina of course - all hope is lost.
Anyway - it's a bit much having you stretched out in a hammock on a beach somewhere scribbling your poncy verse, while the rest of us are stuck in the mud & blood of the trenches - fighting off the advancing hoards of climate psychologists.
Typical bloody officer class.