April 1. A new anthropology paper looks at the Academic Ape and the way it guards its territory and resources, not surprisingly rejecting unpaid contributions from outside academia as a threat to their perceived status and income. The hypothesis predicts that the more qualified and erudite the outsider is, the more vicious the response will be, especially if the highly qualified outsider gives their labor freely.
The Academic Ape: Instinctive aggression and boundary enforcing behaviour in academia
Published on Amazon in Kindle version.
Two areas of territorial aggression are offered as examples — archaeology and climate (you couldn’t see that coming). This new paper looks at how the academic boundary enforcement compares to things like union disputes, and patterns of ape behaviour (See Table 1). An interesting paper.
The climate debate is so hostile people don’t even speak English — “denier”
There is no accurate definition of “denier” in English in a climate science debate, yet professors use it, and importantly other professors in virtually every other field don’t seem to mind. A survey of 5,000 skeptics shows almost all agree with most mainstream statements used in the climate debate — i.e. that CO2 is increasing, that it is a greenhouse gas, and the climate is warming.
Click to enlarge
“Denier” is obviously just a way to badger people into submitting to an idea that can’t be justified with rational discussion. It’s common use shows how far from scientific the academic world of “climate science” is.
Vitriolic attacks are like “union demarcation disputes”:
… issues such as climate, where outsiders have suffered vitriolic attacks from academics (e.g. Lewandowsky, Gleick, Mann, etc.) and where these attacks have been widely supported from academia, may have very little to do with the actual subject material or the relative state of knowledge or experience of the parties. Instead it is suggested that they can be likened to union “demarcation disputes” between the “academic union” on the one side and the outsider who is treated as “blacklegs” or “scabs”.
There are three conditions that generate aggressive boundary disputes:
This threat response appears to be heightened when three conditions exists. First against altruistic outsiders who give their labour freely and so not only threaten the academics perceived territory, but also undermine the economic value of academia. Second, outsiders who have a high level of qualification and wider experience than academia are seen as more of a potential threat. And thirdly, when outsiders formulate their contributions in the style, language and format suggestive of academic work, this in itself signals an incursion into the academic territory.
Thus, whilst academics often reject external work as being of poor quality, perversely, far from eliciting the expected intellectual response expected, work of the highest calibre, by those most qualified, and freely given, is most likely to be treated as a direct threat and stimulate the most hostile response from the “academic ape”.
Gatekeeping in peer review publishing is like scent marking to demark territory:
The system of peer review appears to be a form of gate-keeping mechanism. Thus suggestions that outsiders should have their work “peer reviewed” are disingenuous, particularly as in areas like climate peer review has not been the supposed hallmark of quality it is claimed. Instead it is suggested peer review should be seen as similar to behaviour like “scent marking”: used to demark the boundary, claim ownership of territory and attempt to establish authority.
The hypocrisy of qualifications
While academic insiders without any qualifications relevant to climate science are encouraged to speak out, and even to launch irrational personal attacks, outsiders who are more qualified than these same people are attacked as not-qualified-enough. The only explanation for this must be sociological in nature argue the authors (ahem, or economic thinks Jo):
Ad Hominem Attacks
One of the main areas of study resulting in the findings presented in this paper was carried out in an attempt to understand the appalling behaviour that led to the frequent use by academics of term “denier” which from this quote was clearly intended to portray sceptics as Holocaust camp detainees
Surely it’s time for climate-change deniers to have their opinions forcibly tattooed on their bodies.
Note, how this simultaneously suggests applying the Nazi style behaviour of tattooing people, whilst simultaneously asserting that climate sceptics are akin to Nazi “holocaust deniers”. And whilst given the anonymity of the on-line debate, whilst it is often not possible to link comments with individuals, it is possible to say that overwhelmingly similar ad Hominem attacks originate from those supporting the academic viewpoint. Haseler (2013)
Moreover, given the high profile attacks by individuals like Lewandowsky, Mann, Gleick, Hansen, etc., who have launched many attacks against sceptics and applaud any who attack sceptics, and given the utter silence of all but a handful of academics against their appalling behaviour, these attacks are clearly condoned by many and likely an overwhelming majority of academics.
However, whilst qualifications are usually cited as justifying such attacks (BBC) when a survey was completed of sceptics it shows that most were very well qualified in science and engineering and around 50% had a second degree (Haseler 2015a).
Indeed, in terms of qualifications, it is often the academic “insiders” who feels able to attack outsiders who are unqualified. Notable examples are Lewandowsky a Psychologist. Sir Paul Nurse, a geneticist (Tallbloke 2014) & Sir Mark Walport a medical scientist (IPCC report 2014). However despite their lack of qualification to speak on atmospheric physics and the relevant qualifications of most sceptics, unqualified academics have been given an “open door” by news outlets like the BBC to launch hostile, false and vitriolic attacks on qualified, experienced sceptics who are then usually denied any form of redress even to correct the false assertions about sceptics own views. (See: Haseler, 2014c).
Curiously archaeology appears to have found a kind of solution to the territorial dispute:
However, unlike climate which as of present is still an area of much hostility, archaeology, through the Portable Antiquity Scheme seems to have largely resolved the boundary dispute by creating a form of ritualistic submission of the finds from outsiders to the authority of academics. This “submission” seems to have satisfied the “academic ape” allowing fairly harmonious relations.
I see little hope for peace in the climate arena. This paper has a lot of offer as the start of a novel branch of study. I think the only thing that will change the hostility of climate academics are massive external effects eg. 1. a significant undeniable (unadjustable) cooling. or 2. A major financial collapse (whereupon who will have time to care about esoteric climate issues). or 3. The rise of true conservative political parties (largely for other reasons) which cancel funding for politicized and pointless research. (At that point “climate scientists” will mostly reappear with different job titles, a different scare will be The Thing, and academia will quietly want to forget what the fuss was. Remember Global Cooling?).
This report is a curious collection — it’s worth reading the Aquatic Ape section if you haven’t already heard of that dispute. p 9. Always seemed like a sensible idea to me that our lack of fur and extra subcutaneous fat suggested our ancestors lived on the beach and swam a lot.
Academics, all experts on climate,
Close ranks when others paradigm it,
Who behave in their group,
Like apes in a troop,
In a manner befitting a primate.
— Ruairi
REFERENCE
Lirpa Loofouy MSc. PhD FRS, Mike Haseler BSc. MBA. (2016) The Academic Ape: Instinctive aggression and boundary enforcing behaviour in academia, Produced for free by the Institute for Research into Academia, PDF. Published on April 1, 2016.
motto: Let knowledge be free.
Many a true word spoken in jest!
111
I think people gain seniority and tenure in their profession. They become invested in the axioms of that profession and anyone threatening to bring the whole temple down will receive a hostile reception. More importantly, similar people but in different areas will reflexively support that reaction tacitly, since an exterior threat could similarly undermine their whole life’s work.
Pointman
321
All or nothing! The mark of personal inadequacy.
60
What I have to laugh about is TEMPERATURE is a man made concept that was to see if we need a jacket or shorts outside. All the different processes that are facts are not in consideration.
Same sentiment as a tree and a forest…a forest is a concept that we use to describe many trees…
So much theories that governments have misconstrued to be facts because it is their professional advsors and they do not check their accuracy.
74
Of course! If you feel the need for professional advice, then you employ a Professional person to give you that advice, and having done so, you accept the views of that Professional person almost without question, for to question their professional advice, is to also question your choice of selection of the Professional person in the first place.
What we really need, is professional advice in regard to which Professional persons should be selected to give Professional advice on any particular subject in any professional field.
With such a structure, we can introduce instability into the professional services system to the point where the whole self supporting edifice collapses under it’s own weight.
Now you, and Jo, may not agree with that. But I present the above as my professional opinion, stated as a Professional person.
220
Butt kisser are you not? Professionally speaking…
We have a system that is a total disaster in what the government imposes and tell you how you must think and what you must accept no matter if their is many mistakes.
90
I didn’t think that the /sarc tag was necessary.
50
Rereke Whakaaro I apologize. There was no intention to be offensive or hurtful in my post.
20
No offense taken Joe. I am rarely, if ever, serious about anything that other people feel seriously serious about.
And that especially applies to those people working in government, or the journalism industry, or the artistic expressionism industry. If those people were all lined up, nose to tail, I would not be surprised at all.
90
“If those people were all lined up, nose to tail, I would not be surprised at all.”
Good start!! Now to keep them just that way,perhaps in one circle with each head spouting only to the tail just ahead!
All the best! -will-
50
Will,
Ducks cannot digest meat. They will eat it, but it passes straight through their intestinal tract.
So you can tie a length of fishing line onto a piece of meet, and feed it to a duck. Since ducks will eat most anything, they will swallow it. Sometime later the meat will appear from the rear of the duck, whereapon you can wash it and feed it to another duck, and so on.
This is the best way that I have heard of, for “Getting all your ducks in a row”.
I guess you could feed the same piece of meet to the first duck again, and have them waddling in circles. Apply that thought to my original comment at 3.1.1.1, and you have a good metaphor for how the world is actually the way it is.
70
Read and weep at #11.1.1.1.1 🙂
10
RW,
“What we really need, is professional advice in regard to which Professional persons should be selected to give Professional advice on any particular subject in any professional field.”
Exactly……….. not related to science BUT serves as an example.
Years ago after my location went from septic tanks to main sewers an “expert” plumber told me I would have to replace both toilet bowls and cisterns in my house. A quick phone call to what was then Melbourne Water, and my ST toilet bowls were no problem. some 30ish years later I have still not replaced them. “Expert” plumber was fired and another consulted.
In the same vain I did not believe the initial reports of AGW so I did a lot of reading on both sides of the “camp” and decided that CAGW was “Crap” (a.l.a. Tony abbot).
R-COO- K+
111
Ron, that’s just a primitive way for an incompetent and/or crooked “expert” to extract money from a sucker. You were not a sucker, but that’s how your plumber #1 made his living. As do thousands of motor repair shops when rego inspections are due.
As for professional advice. Rereke’s scenario looks to me pretty much what we have. So how do we trigger the collapse?
I thought I heard in the last few days that Sydney Uni is dropping 130 courses. The best news I have heard for 40 years. Can we hang on till the new crop of graduates arrives, or will they be too late?
30
Yes – experts in any field. Before retirement, My wife and I consulted a ‘Financial planner’ who planned my pension in such a way that I would be completely broke by the time I was 80. (That’s not so far off now). But, we can work a spreadsheet, and it showed that the ‘adviser’ was either incompetent or crooked. So now, I manage my own pension funding, and my ‘boep’ (Afrikaans)is showing that I live well. I wonder why so many of the sheeple (who must be reasonably educated) are still falling for the CAGW hogwash?
10
What you learn is, professional means primarily, getting paid for it
00
In the same sense as temperature is man made, so is “climate” in the term “climate change”, being a mathematical derivation of human measurements of various factors and results produced by local weather. All in an attempt to predict what the local weather will do in both the short and long term, and it has resulted in a huge industry with similar credibility to the seers and sages of the past who consulted crystal balls and sheep’s guts in their temples – three fifths of five eighths of damn all.
30
Academic apes? Hmmm. Nice term. Gives me bad a vision of the next phase in the corrupted thinking of many academics these days – equal rights for apes. This is not a joke. It has already been discussed among some of them.
As for “professional advise” there’s a problem. Even among the professionals there is often much debate in all areas of study. So the advice one gets depends on the giver of that advice; hence it’s worthless without one studying and analysing the said advice using real evidence. Each has to make up their own mind. Most people are lazy so they don’t bother to think and just believe what one single “professional” tells them. This can be dangerous to one’s health when the advice is in relation to doctor. That’s why second and third opinions (and in fact as many as one can muster) are required. Even then the consensus opinion can be and often is wrong. That’s where people need to think but that’s a very scarce function these days.
70
In most cases, the actual practice is that professional advice givers tell the advice takers what the advice takers want to hear.
This is obviously the case with somebody like Obama, who already had his own opinions based on political expediency, rather than empirical evidence. Somebody who is more or less scientifically, economically, and mathematically, illiterate is not equipped to distinguish between real evidence and model results, or between actual facts and opinions.
70
So true. In January 2015 my doctor looked at me sadly, told me not to waste my money on surgery and gave me two months to live.
After a second, then third opinion I found a surgeon. Here I am.
100
You know how that argument goes. The national governments will just say that the IPCC’s advice represents a first, second, third, 10th, 20th, 254th, and 255th opinion of the climate doctors, not including the “thousands” of co-authors of papers that are cited.
The argument from consensus is mistaken no matter how it is dressed up.
You didn’t believe the third doctor merely because 3 was your quorum for a consensus. You wanted to believe the third doctor because they told you a conclusion you wanted to hear, but you probably had enough confidence to escalate their prediction to the next level by committing money and effort to it because what that third doctor told you was a fundamentally different argument from the first two. Factors the first two didn’t mention would have been important in the third opinion.
Worse than that, the IPPC’s advice is separated from actual scientific opinion by a wall of bureaucrats. Two hundred and fifty-five scientific contributors to AR5 had no opportunity for discrepancy by design. If there ever was a second opinion about man-made global warming you won’t see it in the Summary For Policymakers.
You are lucky there was no IPCC between you and the doctors.
20
Equal rights for apes? wouldn’t PC moral outrage have a field day with this.
I’ll be first with movies, Charlton Heston now says “Take your stinking paws off me you damn dirty academic!”
80
There is a difference between advice and opinion, but when we talk to “experts,” we tend to assume they are the same. Regardless of whether or not they are “experts,” without data support, their opinion is just opinion, whether they call it advise or “just blowing smoke.” Academia lives in a world that we created for them, and we need to take back the meanings of the words we used to describe them since they have bastardized their meanings, and we need to disassemble the ivory towers we created for them from which they view their own lives. They are the results of the cult that we created for them.
110
We didn’t create this system…We were born into it and it was “The Generosity” of big oil and bankers who built these Universities and created what is to be taught and how.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySnk-f2ThpE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsqGR31zoVA
50
Joe – I don’t “do” youtube videos. I prefer the written word, and plenty of references, to someone telling me what it is all about. I am not sure how many other people feel the way I do, but all this linking to youtube isn’t convincing me, at least, of anything. Especially when statements like “were born into it and it was “The Generosity” of big oil and bankers who built these Universities and created what is to be taught and how” are made.
00
The difference between scientists of today and those of the old era such as Isaac and Einstein is most of them today have a habit of thinking quickly as though their lives depended on it. The old generation took lots of time to think through their ideas before they opened their mouths. Quick thinkers are like bulls in a China shop – they rarely offer any real value and only destroy other people’s thoughts of their own if they have any. Same applies to many jobs today where the pressure is “to perform to produce results quickly” when in fact what they really mean to say is “just get on with it and shut your thinking brain down as it only slows down your job”. We are turning into a generation of zombies, and that’s what the public school system is doing. So the point I’m trying to make is there is no difference between advice and opinion these days. They are in fact the exact same thing, which is sad and wrong. I feel we are like the people in THX1138 rushing through the corridors to and from work after taking drugs under law to dumb us down as part of the “work ethic” of the day. The drug in question today is not necessarily a chemical drug but are things like “smart” phones (they are anything but although I do use one), TV shows, sports and the like. It’s all feeding into our brains to “dumb us down” for the common work effort demanded on us by the corporate world. As a result any true thinkers are becoming an extinct species.
101
The whole process is competitive.
I agree with you, in that there is precious little time to think things through to a conclusion (meaning no more needs to be done). But the conclusion you reach is invariably because you have run out of time, and are aware of competing points of view that are also racing to a conclusion, and the first to publish, takes the high ground.
I am often asked for “an opinion”. I usually respond with, “Do you want to know my first impressions, based on my feelings, and without any research? Or would you like me to undertake some research and give you a considered conclusion?”
Invariably the person asking is under time pressures, and wants my first impressions, which will have little or no scientific basis whatsoever, and they will go with that.
On a few occasions, I have done some follow-up research, and have had to admit that my first impressions were no better than chance. But you know what? The decisions have already been made and acted upon, and nobody wants to know.
00
April Fools?
30
Your handsome…does that count?
Aprils Fools! lol
20
Are you saying that he owns “handsome”?
20
Who’s an April fool?
20
Anybody who plays April fool jokes.
10
Always seemed like a sensible idea to me that our lack of fur and extra subcutaneous fat suggested our ancestors lived on the beach and swam a lot.
They must gave ridden pushbikes as well:
Will global warming make you fat?
All these horizontally challenged folks waddling around when global warming causes food shortages.
Undeniably the Fattest Apocalypse. Ever.
60
‘our ancestors
livedlive on the beach andswamswim a lot.Look at any blessing of the waters race for the cross and witness the truth!
I had an epiphany and no one believed me, well slap me silly and call me Cassandra.
40
The nub of the global warming debate is the difference of opinion as to whether CO2 controls temperature increase, and the chart shows that about 99% of sceptics, who are relatively well qualified as engineers and scientists, disagree with the proponents who seem to have a background in law, arts or economics. I shudder in disbelief hearing the comments made by our former PM, Ms. Gillard, around the introduction of the carbon tax.
122
Robert O,
The proponents happen to be the vast majority of the World’s climate scientists, where do you get your stats from ?. The typical sceptic is not a scientist, let alone a climate scientist.
212
Skeptics can name more scientists than believers can. Petition Project v 2. 31,500.
Data to the rest linked in the post.
91
Jo, the PP has hardly any climate scientists as signatories, and few possessing the relevant expertise. A very unprofessional survey.
But then again , you consider being an expert irrelevant.
[Frank, Can you provide a rigorous universally accepted definition of what constitutes a “climate scientist”, something with the weight of the qualifications required to become an MD for instance? No one on the sceptic’s side of this debate thinks expertise is irrelevant. But a degree does not an expert make. When Einstein wrote up his relativity theory he was an obscure patent office clerk. You are on thin ice.] AZ
04
AZ,
You constantly attack the expertise of those whose views you disagree with and particularly the peer review process. The number of sceptics with adequate skills and education is small compared to the warmist camp and its a bit grandiose to link yourselves to the exceptional Einstein.
[snip mod discussion – Jo]
05
As usual, Frank makes big statements with zero to back it up. We’ve provided lists and surveys of scientists showing skeptics outnumber believers in every way. Skeptics have real Nobel Prizes in Physics (not “peace” ones) and they have real achievements (eg three walked on the Moon). In climate science skeptics were the ones who worked out how to use satellites to estimate temperatures. Believers have models that don’t work, and predictions that failed. Skeptics not only outnumber believers, they arguably outrank them too.
The only reason that experts in electron tunnelling say were not able to “understand” and comment on climate science is because it is a religion, not a science.
91
Jo,
If “sceptics outnumber/outrank believers in every way” then we really are in the grip of the greatest global scandal in history and I apologise.
What you need to do with this dynamite data is enlighten the scientific community with it, otherwise it’s useless here.
13
Wrong again Frank. Skeptics outnumber and outrank believers but that doesn’t prove we are right. It’s not “data” about the climate, it’s data about problems with the cultural, socioeconomic, and funding mechanisms for the human industry we call “science”.
You can’t help by argue from Authority can you? At least you are consistent with your fallacies.
21
“enlighten the scientific community”
Its not the scientific community that needs enlightenment, many already are………
…. its the political community that provides the funds to keep the AGWers in food and lodgings, they are the ones we need to get through to, and those financial brick walls are very strong, and adverse to reality.
21
Outrank believers?? What rank are you jo?
01
Jo,
Politicians and society are to blame for getting climate science wrong but has left most of the other sciences alone ?.
Is the whole scientific arena broken ?. Again, this should be broadcast out in the real world if it had any merit.
Regarding appeals to authority, in the end we all do it , even you. If nearly all the relevant authorities are in consensus then the fallacy is weakened.
What is a glaring fallacy is appealling to irrelevant authorities.
04
1. False binary choice. I didn’t say all the other sciences were perfect or free of confirmation bias.
2. In areas where science is 100% govt funded, and money/fame/power depend on the outcome, it’s likely or coming. In other areas, I don’t know. Might be fine.
3. No I don’t. My arguments on climate science are based on climate data. I talk about qualifications when I’m discussing the socio economic factors, history, or to show you how doubly wrong you are.
4. There is no such fallacy.
40
Jo,
1. Sorry for strawpersoning you.
2. Quite fallacious to assume govt funding is unlikley to arrive at the truth, many other fields get funding too.
3. I think climate scientists look at the data too, it’s their job. That’s how they’ve come to their consensus view. The sceptics’ attempts at getting any decent evidence through the peer review process has to date been woeful.
4. You are on thin ice, how do mathematicians, psychologists, biologists, geologists, engineers, etc ( the bulk of sceptics) outrank climate scientists ?
[To answer your last point – it is my personal opinion that the physical sciences must be based on published raw data, that is has not been homogenized or otherwise tampered with. It must also be available to any person who asks for it, irrespective of their profession and qualifications. Processes used to “correct” that raw data, to allow for anomolies also need to be published in exactly the same way. There is nothing proprietory about climate – we all experience weather. Likewise, the mathematics underpinning the models should be published. If I can model the flow of wind, over the sail of an Americas Cup yacht, I should be able to understand the general principles of the climate models. -Fly]
[How much more do you want to waste our time, Frank? Jo answers you over and over, the moderators answer you over and over and nothing gets through to you. We’ve exhausted the available explanations and it is you who’re on thin ice. The key here is evidence, not manipulating data, not who funds the work, not degrees or any kind of credentials but data that actually shows that what you claim is happening, is in fact happening. You don’t have it. If you did you could show the whole world of sceptics what you have and shut us up immediately. But you want it to be your way so badly that you can’t bring yourself to take an honest look at your cause. The most pathetic man in the world is the one who has eyes and can see but will not see.] AZ
01
Frank, the mods have been around so long they are bored with this logical road to nowhere. I’m grateful though that you put up arguments that others may be thinking, so I can shoot them down, as long as we don’t go through the same cycle too often. Thank you.
1. Thanks.
2. Read my point again. It’s conditional, you missed the conditions.
3. Since mainstream climate scientists look at the data in order to adjust it to fit their theory, they are not scientists. The raw data fits with skeptical scientists. The fiddled data fits with unskeptical scientists. Getit?
4. We already did this. Climate scientists have no track record of predictions that work, and get “peace” prizes. Real scientists get real prizes, they make planes fly, find minerals, and put people on the moon.
40
The “attacks” as you call them are not aimed at the individuals per se. But on the Science being presented as settled.
Your comment on being adequately educated is very disrespectful to all those great pioneers who have come before, and who without an institution to tell them that they are “qualified” to operate in their field, seemed to have enlightened many of us.
As I recall the Wright brothers were not leading scientistsof their day yet still understood the dynamics of flight.
For the lay person being told CO2 drives the climate and yet at the same seeing evidence to the contrary is bound to lead to skepticism.
20
“The typical sceptic is not a scientist, let alone a climate scientist.”
Both.
You seem to be neither, maybe you are a sociologist?
“The proponents happen to be the vast majority of the World’s climate scientists”
roflmao… you only get called a “climate scientist™” if you “BELIEVE”. !!!
Other scientists who actually understand meteorology, atmospheric physics etc.. ie REAL science.. can NEVER become “climate scientists™”.
100
I am a geologist currently reconstructing paleoclimates of the Palaeozoic in the Canning Basin. I have been doing this for the most of the other geological periods starting from the Archean. Geologists have been doing this since the nineteen century.
Now we have the climate scientist that did not exist 20 years ago and suddenly they are the experts. Judging by their record I would not employ any of them.
100
Who cleans the latrines?
20
I’ve tried (in vain) to point out that the Geo-sciences have been doing ‘paleoclimatology’ long before any so-called “climate scientists” crawled out from under the rocks they used for concealment. The “Frank”-‘s and “Harry TwinOtter”-‘s and “blackadderthe4th”-‘s of the world accuse us of cherry-picking our data, when all they ever see is some 200 years (give or take) of temperature data, become apoplectic about it, and call us that ‘D-word’ that gets your post sent straight into moderation (not that that is a bad thing).
Frank is welcome to run a cross-correlation of Veizer’s paleotemperature data (about 500 m.a. worth), and Berner & Kothavala’s GEOCARB III data, but I know he won’t, since no one either can, or will, going onto about forty times I’ve issued the challenge to warmist/alarmists. Somehow, the scientific precept that correlation is a necessary, but not a sufficient, condition for causation is beyond the typical warmist intelligence.
Maybe ‘Frank’ can tell us why, or publish his cross-correlation within a few hours.
I shan’t hold my breath … … …
Vlad
[This was inadvertently caught by the spam filter.] ED
00
‘… a significant undeniable (unadjustable) cooling…’ plus a trend. This will take a few years but we should have plenty of opportunities to point out the extraordinary weather.
If Ted Cruz becomes president we might see some fireworks, especially if there is a clear downward temperature trend, but this will be no walkover because the warmist zealots have half the population of the Western World on their side.
Likewise with a universal economic collapse the AGW juggernaut will only be slowed.
A nasty change in the weather, which clearly illustrates its not new and humanity has been here before, is our best chance for outright victory and a complete humiliation of all those academics who feathered their nests for material gain.
The peer review system needs revamping.
71
You think a lot about this, don’t you Gordo? Possibly a little too much.
01
I’m Cassandra, and so is my wife !
Cassandra is my second nom-de-plume, adopted due to having coments such as “I see little hope for peace in the climate arena” due to the sheer weight of MSM propaganda supporting academia combined with public ignorance described here as “cynical”
Now we see gullible optimism being slowly cast aside without acknowledgment.
Cassandra is used to that – it’s the point of the Curse from Zeus.
40
Meant to add:
All may not be entirely lost
http://media.breitbart.com/media/2016/04/Screen-Shot-2016-03-31-at-2.31.11-PM.png
Very heartening – softy, lefty, EU bureaucracy, city-centric cant is being smashed by widespread popular vote. There is some small degree of optimism that this may have a real effect. The graph linked to is actually compiled by The Economist in sorrow, so it may even have some degree of accuracy.
40
The new academic territory is always the one with the most money, especially to a new generation of totally inappropriate PhDs. An ancient kangaroo PhD, an industrial chemist PhD, a PhD engineer who put rubber tyres in a blast furnace and another BA with a Masters in Industrial Relations. Senior members of your Australian Climate Commission funded to $5.4million over 4 years. Climate experts. Not one a meteorologist.
While possibly no one is paid specifically to create and promote Global Warming, the reality is that it is well funded. The 350 scientists at the CSIRO are not fighting for territory. They were directed by their political masters to prove Global Warming/Climate Change and now to find solutions for what is already history, except that no one can identify it. At what point did this $90million a year produce any result of benefit to Australians? Then there was the recent CSIRO international conference in Hobart on Ocean Acidification even though no ocean is acid. Then you get an amazing class of psychologists who use the miracle of surveys to address questions of science. Carpetbaggers.
Around the world we are talking of tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of people who take an unproven, unlikely and disproven man made CO2 driven Gobal Warming Seas rising story (4 separate hypotheses, all unproven) as the reason they get out of bed. Who pays for all this research and promotion and all the salaries? You do. The academics exist to give support to it, because that is where the money is. How many of these academics see their qualifications as anything more than a chance to enter a very profitable area simply because they have degrees in something so they know all about science. Then how does Sir Paul Nurse, a Nobel Prize winning geneticist argue with authority about climate?
I still remember Tim Flannery when recommending is favorite and disastrous hot rocks scheme ($93Million in government funds, all the directors on $400k pa) said “the technology is straightforward”. Whatever made him think a Science PhD in kangaroos meant he was qualified to offer advice on any and all engineering and science.
No these are territory shifters, invading any region looking to establish new territory, refugees from irrelevance looking for fame and cash. They are ably abetted by the communist United Nations, that great sinkhole for money for destitute little countries like Costa Rica. Christiana Figueres, the anthropoligist leader of the Climate Change business is the daughter of the founder of Costa Rica and two times president. Her brother was president too. International Cooperation in Peaceful Uses of Outer Space has Mercedes Peñas Domingo, First Lady of Costa Rica. There are many more and they want your money. To prevent Global Warming apparently. Academics are simply useful and they work from within countries, giving credibility to the incredible.
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Given that the vast majority of ‘Climate Scientists’ who spruik climate change and generally make their living from it, almost none are meteorologists or atmospheric physicists. The one famous French weatherman who spoke up immediately lost his job. Dr Murry Selby instantly lost his very senior job in Climate Science for saying CO2 and temperature were not directly connected. As for Al Gore, he has no qualifications at all in any science. So I would call these people either opportunists or highly adaptable academic/economic refugees. They appeared from nowhere and lectured us as if they were experts on our duty to save the planet from hell fire and pay carbon taxes. Druids and swamis. Cult leaders. Hardly a relevant scientist among them and none in the Green parties. The Greens are a parched desert for science, apart from the occasional medical doctor who rises to the top because he has some idea.
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Brown was not a Medical “Doctor”. He had a bachelor degree in medicine and surgery. Not a proper doctorate.
20
Both Bob Brown and Richard Di Natalie were General Practicioners.
You are right in that it is a colloquial term reserved by law for accredited practitioners of medicine. The other meaning of doctor is the most senior graduate in research from the University, nominally in philosophy but in any discipline now and some quite odd to say the least. One I know from Monash obtained PhD in the lyrics of the Beatles. Some people hold both qualifications and even multiple doctorates. A Doctor of Science is above PhD but is an special award which recognizes a lifetime contribution in a field.
However Global Warming and Climate Change are entirely hard science subjects. You would think there would be little room for Bachelors of Arts like Flannery and Gore or even for geneticists and so called computer ‘scientists’ and journalists, but everyone likes their say. Tim Flannery is particularly annoying when he talks about computer models and hard science and engineering. He can talk about kangaroos all day.
As an aside, most medical doctors change from Doctor to Mr when obtaining specialist qualifications in surgery. This was because without anaesthetic or antibiotics doctors were not respected as today and their patients often died but the surgeons wanted to join a guild. The only guild who would have surgeons as members were the barbers, the ones who pulled the teeth and did minor surgery (thus the red/white/blue poles, red for blood). The barbers’ guild reluctantly agreed on the one condition that surgeons no longer called themselves doctors, as that would bring hairdressers into disrepute! More recently new doctors like Opthamologists do not change to Mr when they qualify by rigorous examination to join the Royal Australian and New Zealand Opthamologists association. No barbers in this group.
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” However Global Warming and Climate Change are entirely hard science subjects. You would think there would be little room for Bachelors of Arts like Flannery and Gore or even for geneticists and so called computer ‘scientists’ and journalists, but everyone likes their say.”
Many folk consider Meteorology a science! It is not! These are the folk that got kicked out of the Astrologer’s Guild for being incompetent!
———————–
I find Mike’s article well written and well worth reading and considering. Some points:
…1) Seems insulting of Apes in general, and Chimpanzees! Try roaches or armadillos!
…2) Little is mentioned of the competence of practitioners in a particular field of endeavor, or that of managers of institutions or organizations within that field. Competence and personal integrity seem to be of the highest order in Archeology (the librarians of the past), so assistance in discovery of the past may very well be encouraged.
Perhaps you can see where this is going with my consideration of the academia in Meteorology and Climatastropy! The brainwashing of innocent children!
All the best! -will-
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Academics, all experts on climate,
Close ranks when others paradigm it,
Who behave in their group,
Like apes in a troop,
In a manner befitting a primate.
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I think we discovered the Ruari Howler, bravo. 🙂
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10
That was meant to be some smilies
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The pity of it all is that we don’t pay them peanuts…
Cheers,
Speedy
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Warrmists are always quick to call us “deniers” but how often do you hear them point out what we’re denying? Never, right? It’s just an easy way for them to shut down debate. And as far as the 97% consensus goes, here is a video of Roy Spencer saying that he is part of John Cook’s 97% consensus (go to 8:30): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oN_oynx1D8w The 97% consensus includes skeptics. That is something that everyone should be aware of. It includes anyone who agrees that human greenhouse emissions have, to quote Spencer “some influence on the climate”.
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“some influence on the climate”.
Spencer is a lukewarmer, a different camp to the denialati.
20
Wouldn’t a little humility go a long way in solving the Academic Apes problem? Very simple, very elegant and all it takes is the discipline to treat the other guy the way you would like to be treated. Seems to me someone once taught that very thing thousands of years ago. I guess we haven’t mastered it yet. 🙁
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The problem, as I see it, is that the Academic Apes have forgotten how to climb trees.
You can see much further, and understand much more of the world around you, from up a tree.
You are also exposed to the elements of nature, as the weather changes, and the seasons pass. But you do see the world in an holistic way.
But now that they have come down from the trees to dwell in the caves of Academe, they forget the world around them, and all they now see, is only visible in the flickering light of the fire, and all they now feel is the warmth of the fire, and the illusion of heat from the ever increasing level of carbon dioxide, as they all recycle their own words.
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Sheer indisputable poetic genius.
Are you sure you aren’t an academic?
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Good point, you dumb ape.
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Last comment aimed at Roy Hogue, not ‘Kinky’.
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The fences round territories might have to get higher
“List of the Damned.”
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2016/04/list-of-the-dam.html
and link
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This whole ‘denier’ thing, reflects back on the sayer, as all judgements do. This one too. Am sure most of the regulars here feel it every time we try to even whisper evidence or data, where cagw cc rhetoric resides. Eyes glaze over, we get ignored, or labelled deniers. Perhaps with great fervour, particularly if there is no face to face. I never denied anything, just didn’t agree with the new enemy when they gave it to us. It was obviously not real, yet less embarassing to the.. agreers, acceptors, enablers.. but cui bono? Sometimes illusions benefit both the profiteers and the, ehem, deniers, but not this time.
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The March UAH V 6 update is 0.73 C , that’s 0.1 C lower than February. Roy seems to think we may see cooling now as the next la nina starts to develop later this year.
I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/04/uah-v6-global-temperature-update-for-march-2016-0-73-deg-c/
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global governance?
1 Apr: Reuters: Huw Jones: Global regulators eye climate risk disclosure for listed companies
A global task force unveiled plans on Friday for all listed companies to disclose in financial reports how climate-related risks could hit their bottom line.
The planned regime will be voluntary, but companies could use it to comply with existing mandatory disclosure rules in most G20 countries on material risks to a company, including from climate change.
The Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) was called for by the Group of 20 economies (G20) and set up by the G20’s Financial Stability Board (FSB)…
Mary Schapiro, a member of the task force and a former chair of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, said the aim was to help investors compare companies within sectors like agriculture, energy or finance.
“We are going to be sector specific in order to make the disclosure really useful,” she said…
Chaired by former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, the task force said it was working on a standard for all listed companies and companies that issue securities like bonds, as well as listed and unlisted participants in the financial sector like asset managers…
“We would be hopeful that our framework will work across the entire spectrum,” Schapiro said…
The Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change (IIGC), which represents investors managing $13 trillion, said there are significant gaps in existing disclosures…
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-g20-climatechange-accounts-idUSKCN0WY4Y9
1 April: HuffPo: Why Companies Shouldn’t Hide The Financial Risks Of Climate Change
A formidable group, led by billionaire Michael Bloomberg, is pushing for more transparency.
by Shahien Nasiripour, Chief Financial and Regulatory Correspondent
The threats posed by climate change could become as ubiquitous in companies’ financial reports as their earnings and sales information, if Michael Bloomberg has his way.
The challenge? Getting disparate companies and industries to agree on a common set of standards that would allow the public to compare them against one another…
Few have pushed for more transparency, leading environmental groups to fear a collective corporate reluctance to tackle the issue in the face of increasing evidence that climate change has begun to damage the environment.
But a change in corporate attitudes could eventually benefit the global economy if companies, their creditors and investors worldwide more accurately measure climate change risks, according to a ***report (LINK) Friday by a group of executives led by Bloomberg, the billionaire and former New York City mayor…ETC
http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/entry/companies-urged-to-report-climate-change-risks_us_56fe7911e4b0a06d58057057?section=australia&utm_hp_ref=mayor-bloomberg
***links to PDF: 64 pages: Phase 1 Report of the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures by Michael Bloomberg
Presented to the Financial Stability Board 31st March 2016
(page 7) There is also increasing agreement in the business and financial communities that some degree of
climate change is inevitable, and that its impacts, both physical and nonphysical, may present material
risks and opportunities that span both adaptation and mitigation strategies. In the runup to COP21, 350
investors representing more than US$24 trillion in assets under management called on world leaders to
forge a meaningful and ambitious climate agreement, in recognition of the risks that climate change
presents to their investments.3 The Montreal Carbon Pledge,4 with 120 investors representing over
US$10 trillion in assets, commits investors to undertaking and disclosing the carbon footprint of their
investment portfolios. And, the CDP (formerly the Carbon Disclosure Project) signatories—with more
than 822 institutional investors representing over US$95 trillion in assets—asked companies worldwide
to disclose their carbon emissions and how they are managing climate-change issues…
00
comment #(Bloomberg’s report to the FSB) has gone into moderation.
Bloomberg’s “partner” with Steyer in Risky Business, Hank Poulson, talks of the developing world leapfrogging fossil fuels & “moral” imperatives! LOL.
31 Mar: Reuters Blog: Time to harness power of green trade
By Henry Paulson
(The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own)
A green financing agenda was initiated at the G20 talks in Shanghai last month. The G20 Trade and Investment Working Group meeting in early April in Nanjing would be a good occasion to push toward a breakthrough in buying and selling green products more easily around the world.
Environmental goods are among the most obvious to open up to freer global commerce. They have tangible economic and social benefits for all countries, ***particularly those that may leapfrog traditional fossil fuels as part of their Paris climate commitments…
It defies economic – and environmental – logic for governments to deprive their own citizens from accessing the best, most effective clean tech products and services at the lowest cost.
Eliminating tariffs would remove one of the main stumbling blocks to adopting such technologies…
The good news, though, is that there is already a vast array of environmental technologies that can perform many of the tasks required and which are suitable for emerging markets…
Making green technologies affordable is a global responsibility, ***a moral imperative and makes solid economic sense…
http://blogs.reuters.com/breakingviews/2016/03/31/time-to-harness-power-of-green-trade/
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What you dont want to discuss is how the paper could possibly include yourselves, any good scientist would play the devil’s advocate and consider the contrary viewpoint.
You could also look at the amount of OT triva posts if you seriously wanted to maintain a credible site, offer an alternative to WUWT.
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Go for it Frank, consider the contrary point of view, be a good scientist then…
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“any good scientist would play the devil’s advocate and consider the contrary viewpoint.”
Ahhh…. that explains why YOU never have.
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Nice zinger there, you almost won me over.
Well, lets see, on one hand there’s the avalanche of evidence from every reputable scientific body and on the other a small number of narrowly focused scientists whose evidence can’t pass peer review. Instead of coming up with some real evidence all you do is attack peer review and say climate scientists are [snip, not credible]. We do need experts.
[Editorial discretion applied.] AZ
15
All the REAL experts on atmospheric physics are NON-believers.
In fact, they think the whole AGW hypothesis is a load of cods-wallop.
Anyone who works with CO2 for a living, eg laser scientists, knows that the wholeCO2 warming hypothesis is nothing but a meaningless JOKE. !
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Sigh, no Andy. If that were true, the worlds governments would be talking and meeting with the ‘non believers’ setting up world conferences to discuss their ideas not the actual climate scientists. This is not an opinion. This is a provable fact. Again, sorry. It’s just the current reality. Warm, isn’t it?
03
AndyG55 April 3, 2016 at 5:37 pm –
(“All the REAL experts on atmospheric physics are NON-believers. In fact, they think the whole AGW hypothesis is a load of cods-wallop.”)
“Sigh, no Andy. If that were true, the worlds governments would be talking and meeting with the ‘non believers’ setting up world conferences to discuss their ideas not the actual climate scientists. This is not an opinion. This is a provable fact. Again, sorry. It’s just the current reality. Warm, isn’t it?”
Your reality seems to be a computer generated model of some very very elsewhere! Do you have even one piece of evidence that any government in this world would even consider a conference that “might” disagree with that governmental point of view.
This current Earth’s “physical” reality is that “the whole AGW hypothesis is a load of cods-wallop”, bunkum, balderdash, hog-swallow! The only experts in atmospheric physics are called ‘aeronautical engineers’ who design and construct objects that dynamically interact with Earth’s atmosphere, as it physically presents itself.
These folk have little interest in how this atmosphere interacts with itself, except to note that the air mass motion within a Cb cloud has sufficient inertia to violently rip the wings from any craft you may construct. Birds do not go there for a reason.
The whole endeavor of meteorology and climatastrophe is but one of self deception that can be used to promote some political goal of the current administration. There is no science there!
All the best! -will-
11
From reading the paper, the rejection of new ideas seems to be purely with reference to the existing academic mindset. This is best evidenced in the survey of the sceptic blogosphere. The alternative reasons for rejection seem not to be present.
– It is not new theory, but an opinion poll. The control standards were higher than in the surveys of “climate science” by Cook, Anderegg or Zimmerman, so quality control standards were not an issue.
– The authors’ lack of qualifications in conducting an opinion survey are not a disqualification, provided the methodology is clear. Peer-review should make sure that these quality controls are in place. It failed to do so on the above surveys.
– The questions allow for clear distinctions between the banal (CO2 is a greenhouse gas) or factual (both average temperatures and CO2 levels have risen in the last 100 years) with the policy-justifying predicted catastrophic effects. The above surveys did not do so.
To have the survey published would undermine the idea that an academic consensus had any meaning at all. Moreover it would have highlighted that the surveys of academics in the climate community did not ask the pertinent questions. The separation between the academic and the lay public in soft sciences or other academic disciplines is not necessarily on the basis of superior methods.
For new hypotheses it would demonstrate that any body of evidence can be explained by any number of mutually incompatible theories – what Steve Fuller (Kuhn vs Popper 2003) calls the Underdetermination Thesis.
In any academic discipline there will be gaps in the knowledge, and it is impossible for any one individual to understand all the arguments. Therefore, in relation to existing ideas and new ideas there needs to be some sort of reference to the existing body of opinion. But this must be coupled with the twin approaches of:-
– Developing the existing research program to remove bias, identify the limits of knowledge and advance of more rigorous statements.
– For universities to promote competition between different research programs, especially where the dominant research program has clear implications for public policy.
20
This is utter garbage.
I love the way they describe the …”appalling behaviour”… of climate scientists. Not a lot professional detachment there. But at least their cards are on the table.
Apes? Chimps? Yes, thank you, we get the picture.
You could pick this tosh apart paragraph by paragraph. But why bother. This insult to knowledge just doesn’t deserve it.
It is simply an attempt (and a rather amateurish one) to discredit peer reviewed science whilst suggesting ‘skeptic’ blog sites are a comparable and equal form of scientific enquiry. They are not.
It’s yet another example of If you can’t shoot down the science, shoot the scientist.
As for ‘The Institute for Research into Academia.’ (?) Complete Bollocks!
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Ross April 2, 2016 at 9:55 pm
I do not believe you can. You certainly will not be able to point to adherence to any professional standards of peer review in the pseudo-science of climatology.
40
Ross’s comment is actually a good example of trolling.
– He starts of with a provocative comment.
– Unsubstantiated standpoint is that climate is a professional scientific discipline.
– Does not allow that peer-review has failed as a quality control, instead being used as a means of enforcing conformity.
– The truth of his case is so obvious that it is beneath him to make the effort.
The other perspective is that he uses vitriolic comments to go away from the failures of the CAGW research program, along with the false claims to authority in matters of public policy and ethics.
The only way to tell the difference between a troll and a real defender of science is for him to substantiate his claims.
70
Let’s compare academic scientists to Apes. Even supply a photo of a Gorrilla, just to make sure we are on the same page. Gee Kevin, nothing provocative there, eh?
Google the esteemed Institute for Research into Academia, Kevin. How about you put your sceptic hat back on and do just a tiny little bit of research and then get back to me.
The institute is a fantasy the author uses to give this ‘paper’ some skerrick of credibility.
It is a rant, mate! Go and actually read the rubbish at Scottish Skeptic. He wrote the silly thing.
If you think calling me a troll bolsters your argument, whatever. If it helps you feel more ‘scientific’, knock yourself out.
14
Scottish skeptics co author Lirpa Loofouy appears to be product of his imagination as well. Nothing wrong with having imaginary friends. A pity real academics and scientists can’t get away with it. Maybe that’s the difference, eh Kevin?
03
Of course the whole thing could be an April fools joke. The problem is, as with any link on a ‘denialist’ blog, how could you possibly tell the difference? It ticks all the usual boxes, doesn’t it?
03
Poor Ross, “feeling” left out, are you ?
I have tried to find some actual content in any of your comments… seems to be sadly lacking, a garbled mess of nonsense.
The so-called “science” of global warming has been shot down so many times that even a zombie look lively in comparison.
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Denier another word for Destroyer of AGW research jobs
It would seem that Denier is just another term used to expose the current misguided research into AGW. But if you are researching “wives tales” and presenting them as facts !
perhaps it is time to get a divorce.
10
The case of John Harrison
This brings to mind the case of John Harrison 1693–1776) who was a self-educated English carpenter and clockmaker who invented the marine chronometer, a long-sought after device for solving the problem of calculating longitude.
His struggle was not just with the science of designing a timepiece, but became a battle with insitutionalized snobbery and descrimination.
00
Isn’t saying
argument from authority?
00
My (modern) OED defines denier in a single line:
denier: (n) One who denies a religion.
The last word is all the explaination necessary.
It does not contain denialist which is, therefore, a made up word and not English.
(OED = Oxford English Dictionary)
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Lirpa Loofouy. Fishing expeditions should be noted as such with keywords – although I must admit I am behind the times, especially where Aussie and Scots fishing terms are concerned.
Very enjoyable discussions, though.
00