Bishop Hill Betts off
Dec 10, 2014 Climate: MetOffice Richard Betts has kicked off a small Twitter kerfuffle today, taking umbrage at Matt Ridley's Times piece yesterday.
@ProfMarkMaslin Exactly. If @mattwridley wants to criticise climate policy then he's got every right, but attacking scientists is wrong.
— Richard Betts (@richardabetts) December 10, 2014Matt has responded on his own blog today and I'm taking the liberty of reproducing his comment here.
After this article was published an extraordinary series of tweets appeared under the name of Richard Betts, a scientist at the UK Met Office and somebody who is normally polite even when critical. He called me “paranoid and rude” and made a series of assertions about what I had written that were either inaccurate or stretched interpretations to say the least. He then advanced the doctrine that politicians should not criticize civil servants. The particular sentence he objected to was:
Most of the people in charge of collating temperature data are vocal in their views on climate policy, which hardly reassures the rest of us that they leave those prejudices at the laboratory door.
He thought this was an unjustified attack on civil servants. However, if you read what I said in that sentence, it is that (1) people in charge of collating temperature data are vocal in support of certain policies – which is not a criticism, just a statement; and (2) that we need reassurance that they do not let that consciously or unconsciously influence their work, which again is not a criticism, let alone an attack, merely a request for reassurance. Certainly there is no mention of civil servants, let alone by name, and nothing to compare with an attack on me by name calling me paranoid and rude.
Is the first assertion true? I had in mind Jim Hansen, who was in charge of GISS, a data set for which serious questions have been raised about adjustments made that warm the present or cool the past, and who is prepared to get himself arrested in protest against fossil fuels. I also had in mind Phil Jones, partly in charge of HADCRUT, who also is not shy with his views. I was not thinking of Julia Slingo of the Met Office, because I do not think of the Met Office as a collater of temperature data, but perhaps I should have been. And then there’s Australia’s BoM. And indeed the RSS data, whose collater, Dr Carl Mears, fumes at the way “denialists” talk about his data. Hardly objective language.
Is my request for reassurance reasonable? In view of the Australian episodes, the GISS adjustments, the USHCN story from earlier this year (see here) – all of which raised doubts about the legitimacy of adjustments being made to the temperature data – then yes, I think I am. Do I think the data are fatally flawed? No, I don’t. I happily accept that all the data sets show some warming in the 1980s and 1990s and not much since and that this fits with the satellite data. But do I think such data can be used to assert that this is the warmest year, by 0.01 degrees, a month before the year ends? No, I don’t. I think people like Dr Betts should say as much.
As of this writing, Dr Betts’s latest tweet is:
If @mattwridley wants to criticise climate policy then he's got every right, but attacking scientists is wrong.
Well, if by attacking he means physically or verbally abusing, then yes, I agree, but I don’t do it. I don’t call people by name “paranoid”, for example. But criticizing scientists should be allowed surely? And asking for reassurance? Come on, Richard.
The WMO “re-analysed” a data set to get its 0.01 degree warmest year. What was that reanalysis and has it been independently checked? I would genuinely like to know. I stopped taking these things on trust after the hockey stick scandal.
The thrust of my article was that the reputation of the whole of science is at risk if bad practices and biases are allowed to infect data collection and presentation, and that science like other institutions can no longer take public trust for granted. A reaction of bluster and invective hardly reassures me that science takes my point on board. For the moment, I remain of the view that
The overwhelming majority of scientists do excellent, objective work, following the evidence wherever it leads. Science remains (in my view) our most treasured cultural achievement, bar none. Most of its astonishing insights into life, the universe and everything are beyond reproach and beyond compare.
But Dr Betts’s reaction has weakened my confidence in this view.
I must say, this seems a bit out of character for Richard, particularly his retweeting of the "Ridley is wrong because Northern Rock" thing put forward by Mark Maslin (the latter declaring, "North Rock the ultimate failure of neoliberalism", thus rather making Matt's about politicised scientists for him). I always laugh when scientists try to poison the well in this manner. It does so damage their own credibility.
Reader Comments (338)
aTTP
If you don't think you ever said the maths and science was simple, is that why the computer models and predictions are wrong?
They all seem to have relied on tax payer funding. They all seem to be very consistently wrong, which is why they have been used to verify each other. But they are still wrong.
I do not think that the private sector would have been allowed to get away with it.
Never before, in the field of scientific history, has so much, been wasted by so few, owing billions to so many.
Latimer Alder
In climatology (=applied statistics) the commercial model will get us a lot further.
And whoever thought academics were the right guys to work on it needs their bumps felt. The nature of the problem is not well suited to academic investigation.
Well put Latimer.
A commercial forecast is one that a business is prepared to compensate the client if it is wrong. Therefore a huge amount of effort goes into ensuring it is is very unlikely to be wrong/
An academic model, isn't even a real forecast but a "what if" projection with no real idea of how good it might be nor any real care about whether it is fit for purpose by anyone. And it is done in the false belief that there's no come back if it is wrong.
Academics just don't understand that it is an entirely different discipline. I could produce a commercial forecast because I understand enough of the science and the needs for a quality output .... and to be frank how to qualify it so that I'm not saying anything that cannot be substantiated by the evidence.
In contrast, academics don't have a clue. They talk of "unequivocal" warming when we know temperature sensors are sitting in car parks. They increase certainty at a time previous predictions are clearly failing. And perhaps the worst crime of all - they ignore good advice.
Mike Jackson: ‘As I understand him, Mike Haseler is positing an organisation ... whose sole function is to read what thermometers say ... You say that such an organisation "would hardly be desirable."’
In principle, I support the notion of separating out the recording from the interpretation of temperature as a way of increasing confidence in the record (although we already have a quasi-separation through the different agencies handling temperature data and the surface and satellite measurements).
What I had in mind was the potential confusion brought about by separate authorities, especially when it comes to communication. I’ll relate a minor anecdote to illustrate my point. A few years ago, the temperature record of my home town was featured briefly on some sceptic blogs (not sure if that included BH).
Back in the 1920s, the measuring site in my town was moved a couple of kilometres, resulting in a quite marked fall in measured temperatures. I remember some commentators expressing disbelief that such a minor site change could cause such a fall.
What these commentators had not taken into account was the topography. In some parts of the world, moving a few kilometres can result in a substantial change in altitude (in this case 120m).
Presentation of the raw data would not take these factors into account, and if it did, we’d be back to square one with complaints about manipulation.
‘I dispute your "data doesn't speak" argument.’
I gave an example of contextualising the data. Taking your example, just saying 6 deg C doesn’t mean a lot of some people – our American cousins, for instance. Just as I now struggle with, say, 79 deg F.
And if the data speaks, then the meaning of this sequence of numbers should be clear: 909 1
aTTP: you certainly have commandeered the pompous arrogance corner of this site for yourself, haven’t you? Such a monumental lack of humility and charm is not leavened by anything close to wit, scientific rigour or factual analysis, which might have made your boorishness a little more bearable. It truly astonishes me why anyone would want to try to engage with you, let alone continue to do so, unless it is through a sense of pity.
Mike Haseler: ‘Given the complexity of modern society, there may as you suggest need to be a group of people who are "scientists" but also "activists" (my words).’
I don’t know where you got the idea that I suggested a ‘need’ for scientists to be ‘activists’.
By the term ‘activists’, it sounds like you mean that their activities are undesirable. I don’t agree. I think scientists in general should be able to speak about their work and any implications for society, if relevant.
In fact, when it comes to climate science, in some circumstances sceptics are very vocal in demanding that climate scientists speak out about their science.
‘So campaigning inevitably leads to confirmation bias and those who campaign are unlikely to be able to do impartial science.’
I assume you are speaking here of the risks of such confirmation bias in your proposed ‘jury’ of retired engineers and scientists. But if campaigning ‘inevitably’ leads to confirmation bias, then such a jury would be tainted from the get-go. (And you don’t need to be a campaigner to suffer from confirmation bias.)
And from a wider perspective, your ‘inevitably’ is self-defeating. The Bishop Hill website is a campaigning instrument. Does that mean that the commentators here are unlikely to be able to do impartial science?
True, but I'm afraid I have little interest in advice about how best to behave online from people who are regular commenters here.
Dec 12, 2014 at 6:50 PM | Unregistered Commenter...and Then There's Physics
So you are a borderline Aspergers ...Am I right?
Martin A.,
Just out of interest, why would what I said have lead you to ask that?
Brendan H, you've started criticising sceptics and whether we can do science rather than talking about ways to improve science.
"Does that mean that the commentators here are unlikely to be able to do impartial science?"
Unfortunately, it would be difficult for me to comment as I I carried out an extensive survey of sceptics and their professional background, but was unable to obtain funding to complete the analysis so you will not be able to judge the quality of my work. Moreover, I'm currently 12,000 words into a new scientific explanation of the ice age cycle, so again I might be biased.
However, then again whilst Chairman of the Scottish Sceptic association (SCEF) I was also an environmental campaigner and figure head of the save Lenzie Moss campaign (see: http://www.kirkintilloch-herald.co.uk/news/local-headlines/we-don-t-want-scrum-thing-to-happen-to-beauty-spot-insist-campaigners-1-2314238, and the website: http://savelenziemoss.org.uk), so even if I am biased, it's not a clear cut decision whether I would be biased for environment, for scepticism, or indeed since they are not incompatible whether I might be biased toward both.
All I can say, is that unlike most people on the other side who seem to have decided to take their stance and make money from their "concern" I and many other sceptics had no real choice because having looked at the evidence our education and training compels us to our view irrespective of the personal cost.
Latimer Adler
Trying to change your opinion would be wasted effort. You are probably wrong, but nothing is likely to convince you. In Tyrone you would be called thran.
attp:
Take a look at the characteristics of somebody with borderline Aspergers. Recognise anyone?
@entropic
'Trying to change your opinion would be wasted effort. You are probably wrong, but nothing is likely to convince you. In Tyrone you would be called thran.'
But I note you didn't even try. This is a reasonably lively thread, and there are probably 10 x as many 'lurkers' (hi there M&M!) as there are active participants. They too will have been reading our exchanges - just as many more watched Question Time than actually spoke. They may have seen my request to you:
'So, can you please try your best to persuade me and others that we should dampen our underwear, even a teensy bit, about sea temperatures in 2114 being 0.5-0.9K above where they are today, and the sea level being 9-12 inches above today's level?'
and be wondering about the answer too. It is just an extrapolation from your excellent energy budget calculation.
Surely one who can produce such detailed flawless logic can do better than 'you're probably wrong' when considering its implications.
Mark Haseler: ‘... you've started criticising sceptics and whether we can do science rather than talking about ways to improve science.’
I’m not criticising sceptics. I’m trying to understand your argument.
You introduced the subjects of campaigning and confirmation bias. You appear to be arguing that campaigning leads to confirmation bias which in turn makes impartial science ‘unlikely’.
Is that what you are arguing?
Well, I'm very late to this party, for which I apologize. However, our host had introduced the topic (from which ATTP has being doing his very best to diverge!) with a concluding observation:
My own experiences of attempting to engage Richard Betts in dialogue have been considerably less than salutary.
Most recently on the heels of his totally unjustified (and unjustifiable) attack (for want of a better word!) following Owen Paterson's presentation to the GWPF - during which Paterson had introduced the (IMHO, right on the mark) concept of "the Green Blob" [See my comments of Oct 21, 2014 at 5:24 AM and Oct 22, 2014 at 3:55 AM in The snail paper and Betts' "responses" and/or lack thereof]
So, in light of the above, in which Betts quite freely engaged in (unjustifiably) criticizing an MP - and former member of the U.K. Cabinet - I'm desperately seeking a phrase other than sheer hyprocisy (and/or double standard) by which Betts can justify his claim to the effect that a member of the HoL should not be criticizing a climate scientist who happens to be a public servant - notwithstanding the simple fact that Ridley had not done so!
@ Dec 10, 2014 at 9:55 PM | Unregistered Commenter Stephen Richards
Please, for clarity, and honesty will you confirm, or deny that you are Stephen Richards the prospective UKIP candidate for Fareham?
Dec 10, 2014 at 10:41 PM | Registered Commenter Salopian
I hope Stephen Richards is not, because I was the said candidate in 2010. Note the spelling of the first name.
Any reason for asking?
@attp
Let me guess, you have no formal experience with academic research, do you? Am I right?'
My bio's been publicly available for the last four years at Climate Etc.
http://judithcurry.com/2010/11/12/the-denizens-of-climate-etc/#comment-11121
Yours?
Brendan H: You introduced the subjects of campaigning and confirmation bias. You appear to be arguing that campaigning leads to confirmation bias which in turn makes impartial science ‘unlikely’.
Is that what you are arguing?
I'm trying to be more sophisticated that asking for a blanket ban on academics expressing their own views (as soon as you express your own views you are not a scientist).
Let us suppose we had an institute for climate measurement. Let us also fund the thing with enough money to have a very robust network of sensor (so several £billion). Let's also suggest it has industry standard quality assurance to ISO9002 (I think that's the relevant standard not ISO9001).
I would then expect them to be pretty miffed if anyone suggested that their temperature measurements were inaccurate and I'd expect a very robust response citing their calibration regime, their periodic checking of data by external means and the testing program to assess the validity of historical temperature measurements.
However if someone were to say "we don't believe you should produce an average that way" ... they would likely say "here's the data - we welcome all users and will assist you if we can".
The next level is about trends and modelling of trends. It is important that we have a diversity of views so that we don't get a kind of "group think" or consensus. So, I personally would actively fund those who have divergence views - if everyone were a sceptic, I'd fund alarmists, and vica versa. And I would expect this group to have robust discussions about the validity of different interpretations of the models and theories.
But there does need to be a firewall between "theory" and "politics". As soon as this group start dabbling in politics they are demonstrating confirmation bias and suggesting there are "bad" models in a moral sense rather than in a scientific sense, and this will inevitably lead to attacks against the divergence tending to create a single homogeneous and very dangerous "consensus".
Models are tested by data, but they are also tested by having free, fair and open debate amongst experts. But as soon as politics is allowed into this area and some like Salby are ostracised, you stiffle free, fair and open debate.
Also we need this firewall between "academia" and "advice" because they are very different. Academics should be free to explore new ideas, publish theories that are tentative, and basically not be tied down too much. But giving advice is a very different expertise. If you give advice, you've got to accept that if that advice is wrong, people will suffer and they have a legal right to seek redress for bad advice. So, consultant who give advice for government need to be very aware of the cost to the customer of that advice and ensure they are very very confident what they say will stand up in court should the worst scenario occur - in the case of climate, if CO2 did not need to be constrained - unlike academics who can make models suggesting CO2 causes .... advisers have to be willing to compensate if those models prove to be wrong.
To use an example, an engineer building a bridge, does not need to worry if the bridge doesn't fall down. They don't need to worry about the typical behaviour of a bridge. Instead, they need to be certain, that if the worst came to the worst and it did fall down - perhaps unrelated to their own work - that when people have died, and they face a hostile court and jury - that what they did will stand up to scrutiny.
That is a very high standard - and it means engineers are very very reluctant to explore new ideas. If that same standard were applied to academia - which is what will happen if it starts dabbling in giving policy specific advice - then it will stifle academic creativity.
On the same principle as the engineering bridge, could the IPCC in the case where CO2 does not cause significant warming, really say that the advice it gave to more or less shut down the carbon economies of the world, would look robust?
So, I suppose what I'm saying is that any form of campaigning by academics is a symptom of attempts to moralise science and enforce group think. And the more academics we see stepping into the political arena, the more likely it is that the subject suffers from group think.
And all sceptics are really doing is trying to restore the proper balance and respect for alternative viewpoints that no longer exists within climate.
Dec 13, 2014 at 9:40 AM Brendan H
Brendan,
Let me try to explain it, or at least explain my own my viewpoint.
First, it is a human tendency to take note of things that accord with our beliefs and to dismiss things that contradict our beliefs. I feel sure you'll agree with that.
In science, we need to search for things that disagree with our beloved hypotheses as well as things that tend to confirm them. If we don't, then we can be sure that our professional rivals will do so gleefully. But it's hard to do so, because of the human tendency I just mentioned.
(I remember that Charles Darwin noticed that he rapidly forgot ideas that disagreed with his developing theory, so he took steps to note them and then to give them further thought.)
If an experimenter (or gatherer of observational data) actively campaigns for something, then it is hard to avoid thinking their their experiments (or observations) will be biassed - perhaps unconsciously, perhaps at the semi conscious level. Or perhaps even at the conscious level eg using procedures that are not scientifically valid, to give obtain results they are comfortable with. We have seen a number of examples of that in climate science one well-publicised quite recently.
If scientists keep completely quiet about their political beliefs then, at very least, it provides some reason for thinking that they appear to have sufficient self-discipline to keep their personal views separate from their professional work.
I think you may not agree with what I've just said but does it make some kind of sense?
(Note that I class beliefs about what should be done about possible climate change as political beliefs.)
Surely one who can produce such detailed flawless logic can do better than 'you're probably wrong' when considering its implications.
Dec 13, 2014 at 7:26 AM | Unregistered CommenterLatimer Alder
Confirming yet again that EM is following a religion where belief is more important than real life observation.
radical:
Well said RR. Over at WUWT there is a thread about the best typo of the year - and of course, it came from the Gruaniad. I offered the comment that perhaps 'and then there's physics' is a tyro. <grin> One would hope that from the amount of free education he has received from this thread alone would help to raise him above such a level. I just wish he would stick to his own blog, but I guess he gets better traffic here.Thank you, Harry. I gave up with aTTP some time ago, as trying to pin him down is like trying to knit fog. He is a slippery fish, able to wriggle out of any situation you try to pin him down on; want an answer on something? Well, don’t bother, as the subject will be changed, or the discussion will be twisted until up becomes down in his argument (I am still waiting for an answer from him – and Raff, too – as to quite what evidence is obtainable from models other than whether or not the assumptions made in its creation were correct. The silence is deafening).
As you say, it probably does pander to his vanities on here, as he gets more feedback than on his own thread, yet he is unable to see the possible reasons as to quite why that should be.
Harry,
I saw that, very amusing. It is amazing that some people regard Bishop Hill and WUWT as anti-science, hate sites.
Latimer,
So, I was right, you do have virtually no formal experience with academic research. FWIW, it shows. In this instance my bio is rather irrelevant (although it's essentially what I describe on my own blog) as I'm not the one expressing strong opinion about how something, that I know little about, should work.
Martin,
There are a number of reasons why I think this is wrong. Firstly, it appears to be an attempt to disenfranchise people simply because of their expertise. Of course, if they're contractually obliged to not express these views, then they shouldn't. If not, they should be as free to express their views as anyone else. The other issue is that if you really think that people's political views are influencing their science, then it's hard to see why encouraging them not to express these views would change that. Not expressing an opinion, doesn't mean one doesn't hold one. Finally, and maybe most importantly, I would much rather that experts expressed their views than they didn't. That you seem to think otherwise makes me think that you simply don't like what they are likely to say and would rather they didn't, than you really worry that their views actually influence their research.
ATTP...
I guess the 'some people' - a suitably disingenuous and random stat plucked straight out of your bottom - are those at RC and SkS, who have done more for the destruction of science than any sceptic could have done. You and your warmist friends are down there in it - the deep, incestuous morass that used to be the science of Newton and Einstein, but which is now the snake-oil of men like Mann and Lewandowsky.PS: Hope you looked up tyro.
Harry,
Like I said, it is amazing that some regard Bishop-Hill and WUWT as anti-science, hate sites. Why would that be?
And then there is everything else.
=======================
This has to be one of the most commented on posts ever at BH.
Like Latimer Alder, the phrase "the science is Settled" was what really triggered my journey into the netherworld of climatology. That I had not seen or heard dissenting opinions of the AGW meme in the MSM had been unsettling but following that infamous phrase I started looking seriously for the "other side of the story". I found what many others have, a vipers nest of, manipulated data, naïve and/or fraudulent use of statistics, blind faith in GIGO models, plain stupidity and standing above all naked greed wrapped in the guise of moral superiority.
I'm at the point that I now just laugh out loud at the whole shebang, it's better than crying or throwing things around.
RB can you not comprehend how silly the graph of the "adjustment" of expected model output that you posted early in this thread really is? Nothing like placing your bet(t)s after the race is over eh? (The "Eh" demonstrates my final conversion from a Brit to Cannuck).
Are you blind to the consequences of the misappropriation of money and what it has, and continues to mean, for impoverished people? Next time your fingers are roving across your twitterati keyboard to respond to a perceived slight please pause and give a thought to those who struggle to feed their families every day, whilst, at the same time your peers demand huge sums to build super-computers to produce more and more garbage. I just want to yell at you grow up for heavens sake, you're too smart to continue down this path of self-immolation.
I'm looking forward to a year of more laughter in 2015 as the climate clowns continue their performance in the t(h)ree ring circus tent, oblivious to the fact that the tent is being slowly but inexorably dismantled around them.
The above didn't add anything to what has already been said by others, but I do feel better now.
@Dec 13, 2014 at 10:11 AM | Unregistered CommenterSteve Richards: "Any reason for asking?"
The reason I asked was that a namesake of yours has been regularly posting comments that seem to be more 'vote UKIP' than about the actual topic; e.g. this one, on a previous post:
"Let's hope the Brits vote properly next year. Voting UKIP will see the end of the Libtard organisation that is the BBC.
Come the UK, throw these a**holes on the unemployable list.
Dec 8, 2014 at 5:28 PM | Unregistered CommenterStephen Richards"
I have asked 'Stephen Richards' on several occasions to clarify his relation to UKIP and he has not done so. Perhaps you may wish to ask him similar questions?
Latimer Adler
Whether such a discussion is worthwhile rather depends on the mindsets involved. It would be wasted effort to debate most young earth creationists about deep time and evolution. Their personal Morton's Demons would automatically reject any evidence contradicting their beliefs.
When we discuss climate, am I discussing science or bouncing papers off your Demon? Past experience rather suggests the latter.
@entropic
'When we discuss climate, am I discussing science or bouncing papers off your Demon? Past experience rather suggests the latter.'
No idea what you mean
Seems pretty simple to me. I've looked at your excellent work and extrapolated forward 100 years. My conclusion from that extrapolation is that if there is a 'climate change' problem its a pretty small one. And I've given the reasons I think so.
We know that you have come to a different conclusion and that you think its a big problem. And I've asked you to explain why. Something a little more substantial than 'Latimer, you're probably wrong'
You're right to think that such a discussion is going to be a bit more contentious than me just saying
'Of course, Entropic, now you've told me I'm probably wrong I realise the error of my ways and will spend the rest of my days following in your footsteps and raising awareness of the terrible fate that awaits us'.
But maybe you do have some reasons for your belief beyond 'It is, it is, it is' like Mrs Doyle from Father Ted.
Please lay them out for examination and discussion. Otherwise some might think that the Demon was sitting at your keyboard, not mine.
Please lay them out for examination and discussion. Otherwise some might think that the Demon was sitting at your keyboard, not mine.
Dec 13, 2014 at 7:35 PM | Unregistered CommenterLatimer Alder
Let's make a proper debate of it. I'll start a discussion thread. We both post an opening statement laying out our positions on potential sea level rise. Then the discussion can begin. Agreed?
[Snip - go away]
@entropic
'Let's make a proper debate of it. I'll start a discussion thread. We both post an opening statement laying out our positions on potential sea level rise. Then the discussion can begin. Agreed?'
Whatever format you like. What you propose sounds eminently reasonable.
But remember that the question is 'why should we care'? So you need not only to cover 'how much? - and show why you come to your conclusions, but also consequences - and why you think them to be significant.
Two last caveats...it won't be sufficient (for our general audience) for you to merely list a string of papers. You need to lay out the arguments they use too so we can all follow. Not all have access to scholarly libraries. So if you rely on paper ABC14, tell us what ABC14 says and why. Just citing it is not enough. Be prepared to defend their arguments too.
And please don't use the 'because a model shows so' argument, unless you can produce experimental/observational evidence that the specific model in question has a track record of good predictive skill.
Let us know when your opening statement is up.
Latimer Adler
Discussion site up.
This should be a good test of both our abilities to debate science. Let's both demonstrate how it should be done.
.....some of the more common characteristics include:
⚫average or above-average intelligence
⚫difficulties in empathising with others
⚫problems with understanding another person’s point of view
⚫difficulties engaging in social routines such as conversations and ‘small talk’
⚫specialised fields of interest or hobbies.
Mike Haseler: ‘I'm trying to be more sophisticated that asking for a blanket ban on academics expressing their own views (as soon as you express your own views you are not a scientist).’
I think there are two major points in your long post:
1. There should be a separation of various functions in climate science. In principle, yes, in practice, the devil would be in the details.
2. Fund divergent views.
In regard to (2), the devil really would be in the details. What you are suggesting is that some funding decisions should be based on the category ‘divergent’. There are a number of problems with this proposal, but three in particular.
1. How do you decide which views are divergent? On the science, there is a degree of convergence between the parties.
2. The funding criterion should surely be ‘promising’ and/or ‘productive’ rather than divergent. Presumably you could get around that by creating a category of ‘promising divergent research’.
3. Having created the category of promising divergent research, you are then confronted with the task of sifting the wheat from the chaff for funding purposes, thus creating still more categories of divergent. You are now back to square one.
(On the matter of personal views, where does science end and personal views take over? It is my personal view that the earth revolves around the sun (despite my everyday experience and observations), but that is also a scientific claim.)
Let me propose a theory of scientific development based on evolution:
1. There is a diversity of views
2. The environment (data) selects those which are most fit
3. This new pool of ideas then "mates" i.e. is combined to create the next generation
4. NEW IDEAS ARE INTRODUCED AND NEW DATA TO MAINTAIN DIVERSITY
There is convergence only because of a rather nasty campaign of victimisation against academics of divergent views. So the campaigning condoned by academics is the largest problem in getting the "evolution."
And let me use the analogy with biological evolution to explain that it is well known that where a population has very little diversity it is unable to adapt to changing environment and lack of diversity (typical of small populations) can in itself cause extinction.
So, diversity is seen as valuable in biological populations but some how in climate it is now seen as a problem. The subject actively represses divergent views and pushes for "consensus" and the homogeneity that we know is bad in biology.
And like biology, we don't know what ideas are "good" or "bad" until we see how they fair when tested against the environment/data.
Instead you seem to have this idea of "divergence" as being a form of "picking winners" in commerce or "genetic modification" in biology.
Natural selection in ideas cannot be directed, it is the data that decides what is "good" not some grant body.
However, your response will likely be "but we can't have just any ideas".
To that I would suggest that what we want is that on average an academic over their lifetime produces more good ideas than bad. But I would also suggest that unless some actively propose bad ideas, then we cannot get the diversity of ideas we need to maintain a healthy population of ideas.
So, whilst I wouldn't propose a mass free for all funding anyone who comes along, I do think that climate fails to promote divergence and fails to tolerate failure.
So, e.g. why is it such a big deal that the models failed to predict the climate?
And the reason is very simple: the academics dabbled in politics, put theirs and every other "scientist's" reputation on the line, and now it is nigh on impossible for them to admit they were wrong ... which is a very necessary step in order to move on and improve.
And this is another reason why academics must not dabble in politics. Because by doing so you are inviting political criticism, and that so raises the stakes that you cannot admit you are wrong and the whole subject ends up backing one idea with its entire reputation until that idea fails and their reputation is ruined.
Martin A: ‘I think you may not agree with what I've just said but does it make some kind of sense?’
To a degree. I will explain.
1. The original comment I took issue with was about trust. Matt Ridley spoke of the lack of reassurance he experienced when people who collate the temperature data are ‘vocal in their views on climate policy’, ie are campaigners.
2. I think you are talking primarily about confirmation bias (‘it is hard to avoid thinking their experiments (or observations) will be biased’).
3. Conformation bias is about interest, whether scientific, material, political, personal. (By interest, I mean something of importance to the person concerned.)
4. Interests are an aspect of campaigning – we usually only campaign for something we think is important – but the two shouldn’t be conflated.
5. You don’t have to be a campaigner to be swayed by interests.
So confirmation bias will exist regardless of whether or not one is a campaigner.
As for the virtue of keeping quiet about one’s ‘political’ beliefs, that may be evidence of self-discipline. On the other hand, the campaigner may claim that it is his duty to speak out.
Mike Haseler: ‘Let me propose a theory of scientific development based on evolution...’
I assume you are addressing me, Mike. As a metaphor for scientific research there are two major drawbacks to the evolutionary process: it has available an immense amount of material and time and is extraordinarily wasteful.
Scientific research is conducted within a finite amount of time and with finite resources. That’s why it must be directed, and that’s where consensus comes in. A consensus enables time and resources to be focused in the most promising direction.
Yes, there have been ‘rogue’ geniuses who defy the consensus and forge a new direction. But they are the exception, and you can’t plan for them.
My contention is simply that making ‘divergent’ the distinguishing criterion is mistaken. The criterion should be that something is ‘promising’/‘productive’, not just different. But certainly, independent thinking should be encouraged.
Brendan, I've given enough reasons why academics shouldn't dabble in politics or campaigning. So, perhaps we might call it a day.
Because to go into why directed research is often a poor strategy would take quite some time, however I would contend that throughout human history we see an evolution of ideas based on a form of natural selection - but obviously more complex in that ideas come together in more complex ways than simple DNA permuations.
And it's not as simple as saying an evolutionary strategy is always better in the same way that diversity is not always a good idea in biology - sex works as a strategy for the more complex organisms, but if you are a amoeba living in the slime - asexual reproduction leading to a lack of diversity seems to work better.
So yes if your area of research is simple like that of an amoeba :) then directed research may be the best strategy.
But if your research is complex, then a degree of "sex" might improve the diversity and robustness of the research. So sex or "diversity" is provenly beneficial to more complex organisations, so that strongly suggests that the more complex the area of research, the more we need diversity and the less we want "directed research".
However, even that is complicated by the nature of the research. E.g. there is clear evidence that "directed research" or "breakthrough" as the author called it was a failure compared to incremental (bricolage as they refer to it) strategies in the early development of wind electricity. Likewise in other renewable energy development we see a similar pattern whereby academic led research failed whereas engineer led research succeeded. Or perhaps the real reason was that engineering research with real customers had a stronger and more appropriate selection criteria ensuring "survival of the fittest" was based on real-world selection criteria and not the inappropriate "directed research" criteria of academia.
Mike