Some things must be done. Today, I must criticize Christopher Monckton for his appalling behavior toward Arthur Smith, and suggest Christopher apologize to Arthur.
Normally, I don’t like to play “Mom” and suggest people apologize to those the injured. But, I feel that I can’t ignore this rude behavior and then later post to discuss the substance of Arthur’s rebuttal.
So, now, onto the pleasant task!
What did Moncton do?
In a letter posted at RabettRun, Arthur tells us:
I see you have publicly posted your “rebuttal” to my draft comments:
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/monckton/monckton_rebutted.html
This includes in full the article I sent to Physics and Society, but I did not grant you permission to post this. My article was a draft and is still under revision – I sent it to you as a courtesy.
Yikes! Monckton posted a draft article sent to him by the author, Arthur. This is just not done. Period.
Not only is this not done, Monckton may well have violated copyright when posting the draft.
Finally, what Monckton did was utterly stupid. There is never any need for quickly rebutt an unpublished draft paper. It would have been far wiser to read the draft, write a draft rebuttal, set the rebuttal aside and review it later on.
Heck, if Monckton were Machivellian, he might have circulated his draft rebuttal among the well organized, well funded cabal of denialist conspirators we often read of at climate blogs. Maybe one of them might have helped Monckton craft detailed responses to some of Arthur’s points. Failing that, members of the often discussed cabal might have crafted quick rebuttals to post as soon as Arthur’s rebuttal appeared.
Yes, if the cabal existed, that would have been the crafty sort of thing one might expect of one who advised Maggie Thatcher. Instead Monckton took a step that was rude, possibly illegal, and stupid.
Now that this whole thing has blow up, Monckton’s next step should be to do something both wise and polite:
May I suggest the apology go something like this:
At this time I formally apologize for the unfair and blind-sided treatment of Dr. Arthur Smith and his rebuttal letter. Only had I also been inaccurate, would my response have equaled the offensive and egregious treatment, I received from certain leaders of the American Physical Society, from which I have yet to receive any apology — formal or otherwise.
Also telling — that RabettRun was the response vehicle. A good bet would be that this choice was made only because a response hosted by Dr. Smith’s preferred RealClimate, would have validated the more biting criticisms of Lord Monckton’s retort.
And yeah, it was stupid to repond prematurely to a (courtesy) draft.
Where will this soap opera go next — will the APS step up and diffuse this honorably, given their role since inception?
McCall–
Bad apology. It violates all the rules of apologies.
I agree the APS– as an organization– treated Monckton badly.
However, Arthur is not the APS and Monckton owes Arthur, a private individual, an apology. Lots and lots of people are behaving badly in this. It’s a real mess.
Apologizing is the right thing for Monckton to do. I could say more. If I were conversing privately with Monckton, I would. 🙂
Arthur Smith’s points were just the usual kneejerk reaction. Defend the models, maintain there has been warming over the last several years. All nonsense. But I suppose if one can’t try to silence Monckton by criticising the Substance, one can fall back on Bad Form (Old Boy). As McCall points out above, the Warmers are living in the RealClimate World Bubble. Any alternative view must be suppressed by whatever means (ironically reaction to that suppression is the reason for the existance of Climate Audit, and I suppose indirectly your own esteemed blog). And if you think Monckton is playing dirty, how about the widespread with-holding of climate data, the suppression of dissent via the Peer Review and IPCC Processs, And how about lying to the US Congress, and to the NAS. Does that qualify for the Bad Form Old Boy treatment?
MarkR–
Yes, at least some of Arthur’s points can be engaged directly. I’m waiting for the final version of Arthurs post, because, there are a few points I suspect I will engage when he finalizes.
But look at this from my point of view. I like and respect Arthur. He is presenting his points in the context of a debate. But, before Arthur even formally presents his points, Monckton flips his wig and acts like… well… not something rational.
So, when Arthur does finalize, how in the world am I to engage the substantive points but pretend Monckton didn’t do something uncalled for?
Arthur deserves an apology. After it comes, we can all focus on the substance of the debate.
I don’t generally agree with Arthur Smith’s opinions but I have to respect the fact that he has engaged skeptics in a sincere discussion about the issues on a number of forums. I have definitely learned from his postings. I also found Monkton’s tone in his response to Arthur to be conscedending and uncalled for and I agree that he owes him an apology.
Lucia,
I’m rather apathetic on the issue of a call for an apology. If Monckton were remorseful he would have already apologized. Without remorse, an apology lacks meaning.
Arthur deserves an apology. After it comes, we can all focus on the substance of the debate.
If no apology is forthcoming, can we still focus on the substance of the debate?
Where in this debate are there apologies from the AGW alarmists? Is Smith going to apologize for the following sneer?
Should Monckton have published? Maybe not. Was he told that it was private and that it was a draft? Can you claim privacy when the paper was being circulated? Given the track record of the people slandering Monckton I think you may be jumping the gun.
FWIW Monckton could have put up his reply without including Arthur Smith’s complete manuscript. That would have been unethical (science/journalism) but not against the civil copyright law.
The link
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/monckton/monckton_rebutted.html
gives a 404 error. Has the rebuttal been withdrawn?
This what you are looking for Steve?
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/monckton/monckton_rebutted.pdf
His response to Gavin Schmidt might have some bad urls out also. It is here:
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/monckton/chuck_it_again_schmidt.pdf
His response to Gavin is hardly civil either. The last part is particularly painful to read…
My curiosity was pricked by the reference to a “..tendentious blog, funded by a convicted internet-gaming fraudster who owns a solar-energy corporation…” Wow! Does anyone know which blog he was talking about?
Yes, he has not behaved well at all, or even effectively, and should know better. But one has to say that the way in which opponents of AGW, including him, become targets for a tirade of knee jerk abuse, is one of the most unattractive aspects of the AGW movement. Its reminiscent of hackneyed Party rhetoric in Party journals during the worst periods of the Soviet system in Eastern Europe. Rabbett’s blog and Deltoid are particularly poisonous, Tamino encourages quite a lot of it. Real Climate comments is full of it. A classic example is that the main people keeping the ‘Plitdown Man’ slur alive are the fanatic AGW-ers. Its a bit like the only people who remember Michael Dell’s remarks about closing Apple and returning the money to the shareholders are the Mac fanatics who lose no chance of regurgitating them.
However, descending to their level is absolutely not the answer, and yes, he should apologize. Which is more than he will ever get from them in similar circumstances, but that’s the point.
Firstly, I think Monckton’s tone has become very unhelpful to the sceptic community. I agree with the general sentiments by Fred (comment 4581). This just adds more fuel to the fire, and doesn’t further our understanding.
I’m curious about one thing though: the evidence Lucia presents is insufficient (IMHO) to demand an apology. It very much depends on the ambiguity in Arthur’s original communication. If Arthur made it quite clear that this was a draft (i.e. either the original e-mail, or the article itself, contained something along the lines of “draft only – do not cite or quote”), or had copyright restrictions (“copyright 2008 Arthur Smith”), then yes Monckton did wrong and should apologise.
If the original communication was ambiguous or unclear as to the status, then I don’t see why an apology would be necessary (although removing the article after these matters were highlighted would be the correct thing to do).
Lucia, to make this claim, I guess you must have seen either the original communication or the document itself (which I have not, so I am in no position to take a view one way or the other). It would be helpful if you could indicate such supporting evidence in your post.
Yes. If one can’t fault the substance, object to the tone or the timing. That’s the ticket. By the way, if Arthur’s (delicate flower that he is) criticism wasn’t intended to be published, what was it for? My guess is that he wanted to do enough to get the Journal to print its silly disclaimer (send them the draft), whilst preventing Monckton from replying (can’t publish a reply to a draft old boy, bad form).
Meanwhile, the rest of the world has a reality check:
“As western nations step up pressure on India and China to curb the emission of greenhouse gases, Russian scientists reject the very idea that carbon dioxide may be responsible for global warming….”
http://www.hindu.com/2008/07/10/stories/2008071055521000.htm
I would say it is obvious that Monkton did not understand it was an unpublished draft; whose fault that is – the sender or the reciever – is not clear to us on the outside and hence I find it not very useful to require an apology from the reciever.
As for apologies, NASAs employee Gavin Schmidt wrote a piece at realclimate, in itself less than polite and not very flattering to the authors (making simple mistakes and missing the whole point is, eh, well, not reassuring Gavins abilities). But he also links to bloggs that are defamatory and full of bad language (Monkton is full of crap we learn, no less). Bloggs written by people who mistakes a model for reality (Tim Lambert) and couldn’t care less for upholding a scientific debate.
A government (or at least a government employee not recieving reprimands) attacking a private person Ad Hominem is disgraceful. There are better ways to direct the calls for apologies.
However, if we return to the science, Gavins claim that models failures with respect to data may be due the quality of the data (“And of course, he ignores the evidence that the temperature changes are in fact rather uncertain, and may well be much more in accord with the models than he thinks.” makes you wonder what data he thinks validates his models in the first place. Making predictions based on a model of a chaotic system, whose all forcings we have yet to discover, far in the future, that is itself not validated nor even based on good data is ludicrous.
I think both sides (pro AGW and skeptics) are guilty of this behaviour. Its all getting a bit out of hand. However.. its better for people to be fighting about climate than religion or politics. It ain’t all that bad.. imagine living in the middle ages! I read Mocktons rebutall against the APS, I think it was very lucid and properly explained. BTW Gavin at RC and rabbit are very abrupt and rude as well.. but as I said I think both sides are going over the top on this. In The end the data will count.. and so far as I can see no warming! sorry
Re previous:I could add that both Climate Audit and Watts up with that are very professional and they do not insult people as RC does (they in fact do not allow it) stick to the science please….
Wow, that’s an ugly mess. I gotta agree with Mom.
Give me a break. Denialists accuse Hansen and Schmidt–or even all of climate science–of fraud on a daily basis. Denialists like Monckton deserve the insults they get, he’s an arrogant, ignorant liar. And the fact that denialists think he knows squat about science tells you all you need to know about the validity of their view.
Geez. Arthur Smith’s responses are full of substance. Are you kidding me with remarks like this? Does pretending that no one is responding really work as a strategy in your mind?
Boris, can you please point to any serious climate scientist on the sceptic side that accuses Hansen or Schmidt of fraud without merit? What I’ve seen is valid critisism of failure to disclose data, methods and algorithms but I’m willing to listen to any examples you may have.
The point here is that the well-funded, government employed, IPCC-big wigs routinely smear or belittle Ad Hominem any critics. We should be able to agree that when the power people hit the outsiders, it is not a symptom of a scientific culture.
And by the way, if substance was the thing, why didn’t Schmidt address the key points?
@raphael–
Yes. We can focus on the substance even if Monckton doesn’t apologize. But it’s important to recognize that it’s difficult for someone like me to simply ignore what Monckton did and then address those points in Arthur’s rebuttal that are, in the opinion poorly supported. So, in essence, I need to comment on all this junk surrounding Monckton.
@Eli–
Oddly, I’m not sure posting a manuscript *always* violates copyright. We have pretty wide latitidue copying a lot of stuff if the purpose is comment. I think E Volokh did a post on the legality of “full Fisking”, which involves pretty much copying 100% of what you Fisk. I can’t find the post– but I think in the US that’s basically legal.
The difficulty is this document was in a very limited circulation and not yet officially published. On the other hand, it was more public than say, a diary entry. I don’t know if either matters, or what precisely does matter.
Still, regardless of the legality under US copyright law, Monckton should have waited. Or, failing that, he should have emailed back and asked Arthur if this was a published document.
@Spence_UK & Avfuktare
I don’t know precisely what was in the email Arthur sent Monckton along with the draft. In the US, we don’t need to write “copyright” to create a copyright anymore. Our laws were changed to conform with international law. Basically, you should assume everything is copyrighted.
I did see the response by Monckton. I know he took the page down after Arthur sent a second letter pointing out the possible copyright violation.
@KunhKat & MarkR
Arthur’s criticism was intended to be published later in the APS newsletter. He was circulating it as a draft for comment. At Arthur’s site, http://www.altenergyaction.org/Monckton.html you can see the draft includes insertions like: See below on the “many other climate phenomena”. [[[ Real Climate reference needed ]]].
So, he’s still inserting citeations etc. I’ll be commenting on Arthur’s full argument when it’s finished. I’ll be commenting on the very first criticism of Monckton soon. (The problem is I couldn’t bring myself to comment on that without first criticizing Monckton!)
@Zeke–
You managed to get to the last part of his response to Gavin? Read the front, and the first paragraph! (There are blogs where I ordinarily can’t get past the first paragraph either. )
@Fred
I suspect Monckton is channeling a rumor that Real Climate is funded by George Soros. I suspect Monckton has no evidence suggesting the funding tie. If he did, he’d tell us!
@Steve–
Yes. The rebuttal was withdrawn by Monckton. This is yet another reason why his behavior was stupid. Had he waited for Arthur to formally publish, Monckton’s response to Arthur’s rebuttal would remain posted. As it stands, whatever points Monckton made are only available to those who bothered to download the document. (I suspect I have it in my download logs because I did read it before I even knew Moncton has jumped the gun on publishing Arthur’s paper.)
@Vincent & ll those who pointed out many blogs are venomous:-
Yep. Both sides are guilty of arguing by insult.
For some reason, some bloggers and blog commenters seem to have developed the odd notion that inserting a snide remark, insult, eye roll or sigh into an otherwise substantive post makes the argument stronger. It doesn’t. It makes it weaker because people suspect the insult was inserted to distract from the lack of evidence.
Currently, Monckton is particularly bad. But others named above are also habitually bad.
Hmm. Admittedly, I have a way-more-agitated-than-appropriate comment on Monckton’s rhetorical strategy in his rebuttal to Dr. Schmidt on my blog. However, I think this entire episode shows Monckton’s fatal flaw: the man is not a scientist doing extensive scientific work. It seems he’s more of a propagandist whose purpose is to stir up trouble rather than settle it. Although all players in this debacle (myself included) are at fault for the invective being flung around, it seems that this was Monckton’s purpose.
I don’t think he knows the rules for scientific discourse. Plain and simple. He doesn’t understand what peer review is, and he doesn’t understand the formal rebuttal process. And frankly, I think his behavior illustrates that he’s not interested in it. He’s more or less a global warming pundit dabbling in the realm of global warming scientists.
No, I can’t.
Fun aside, I didn’t say serious scientists had accused Hansen or Schmidt of fraud. I said denialists had.
Blogs like newsgroups allow people to “act out” without having to deal with the consequences that you would have to in a face to face confrontation, such a bloody nose. Similar to the effect that driving a car (which provide a similar anonymity) has on some people who drive aggressively but would never act that way when on foot.
Exactly. Where is the outrage and condemnation over remarks by luminaries such as Hansen? This is like watching pro wrestling where the ref never sees the bad guy do anything but always sees the good guy when he tries to retaliate.
Well, what remarks in particular do you think deserve outrage and condemnation? Surely, Hansen says some pretty controversial things, but most of the time it’s all just rhetoric; it’s not supposed to be confrontational. Monckton is different from Hansen in particular in this debacle because Monckton is essentially fabricating things to bolster his side. He continues to insist that his paper submitted to the Physics and Society newsletter was peer-reviewed; it wasn’t. He continues to insist that this is a ploy by the APS to embarass or humiliate him; it isn’t. Monckton is basically attempting to assert that a core tenet of AGW theory is incorrect, and he’s thumbing his nose at anyone who dare attempts to rebut or rebuke him, no matter what choice of words and rhetoric they make.
Not to say that Hansen is clean as a whistle. It was pretty dumb for him to accuse oil executives of crimes against humanity at his testimony earlier this month. But does his behavior fall in the same category as Monckton’s? In my opinion, not at all.
counters says:
“Not to say that Hansen is clean as a whistle. It was pretty dumb for him to accuse oil executives of crimes against humanity at his testimony earlier this month. But does his behavior fall in the same category as Monckton’s? In my opinion, not at all.”
I agree. Hansen’s rhetoric is not in the same category and is actually much much worse because he seeks to use the power of the state to silence people who disagree with him. Monckton may be thin skinned and insulting but he does not seek to supress debate.
Well counters,
Hansen did say that the trains that take coal to power plants were like the trains
that took jews to death camps.
Which is not a very nice thing to say about the guys who actually have to load and unload coal cars,
since essentially you equate them with the SS.
So that would be an example of something that would be outrageous..
Now, I suggest you be very very very careful before your defend his behavior in this regard.
because if you do, you will beclown yourself. And I won’t tell you how until you do.
So, take your choice. defend hansen or deny hansen. Go ahead. make my day.
Hint: if you defend hansen there is a nasty surprise coming your way. think ahead…..
defend or deny. take your choice.
counters
You must have missed remarks like “Court Jesters” , equating AGW skeptics to Holocaust deniers, equating coal trains to death camp trains. Raven’s point is well taken also. Hansen has taken this beyond a scientific debate into wanting to use the State to silence scientists who disagree with him. He’s gone way beyond insulting and I don’t see the AGW camp disagreeing all that much.
Just take some of the posts at Open Mind or Real Climate and assume that rhetoric was being used by non-AGW scientists. I’m sure you would be outraged, but that verbiage being spewed at people like McIntyre, Pielke and Spencer and I don’t see anyone on the AGW side condemning it.
Raven:
It’s funny that you should mention that, seeing has Hansen and many others within the current bureaucracy serving underneath the Bush Administration have been the victims of “us[ing] the power of the state to silence people who disagree with [them].” Are we not still seeing stories every month of scientists being censored in their recommendations re: climate policy and environmental policy? Hansen’s rhetoric seems more facetious than anything. After all, his testimony was in the realm of politics – Hansen would not be the first person to overstep proper rhetorical bounds by sensationalizing and hyperbolizing, would he?
Steven Mosher:
Your dichotomy is false. One doesn’t need to “defend” or “deny” Hansen; one simply needs to point out that on occasion he – and many, many others – tend to greatly exaggerate things. As a Jew, I’m not at all offended by his “death camp train” metaphor; it’s hyperbole, and further more, it’s stupid. You are going much further than Hansen’s poor metaphor when you extrapolate it as you just did. You see, it’s a null issue. Hansen invoked Godwin’s Law which immediately compromises his argument here. It was stupid rhetoric to begin with, and stupid rhetoric it remains; ’nuff said.
As a general statement, this “a or b; make your choice” discussion style is disingenuous at best. I’ll go right on and defend Hansen because, logically speaking, defending the man is not the same as defending his rhetoric or his arguments. Some of the stuff he said in this latest Congressional testimony was downright stupid and I absolutely question why the heck he even brought any of it up; it only serves to continue to polarize what should be an easily compromisable issue. However, let’s own up to our own faults – you’re reading way too much into his stupid nazi metaphor. It’s the type of thing where casually asking “He’s invoking Nazi’s and the Holocaust in a climate change testimony? Did he miss his medication this morning?” is more than enough to address the statement.
I take your choice and bury it. Sorry, but you don’t get to frame the discussion that easily.
I meant to stick around to carry on the discussion, but I have to get on a plane. I’ll try to check back in over the weekend.
Fair enough, but I don’t see how you can claim Monckton acted improperly if you cannot ascertain the situation from his perspective.
Just to be clear, I didn’t raise that from the legal perspective – if Arthur wishes to sue Monckton for loss of earnings due to copyright infringement, that’s fine by me, and I’m sure the courts and lawyers will resolve the issue far better than you or I – I’m just trying to understand if there was anything indicating that Monckton shouldn’t “show his workings” from what he had been given.
If it appeared to Monckton that Arthur’s work was in a completed form and was intended to be made freely available on a public website, then claims regarding improper acts or copyright infringement are a little unconvincing.
If there was something – anything – indicating that this was not the case, and a copyright notice would be a pretty clear indication that you don’t want what you’ve written published, just as a “draft” indication would. I checked the copied version and there was no indication of any of these things. Of course, they may have been in the accompanying e-mail, or not copied across, so I’m keeping an open mind.
I think I’d rather have the full information before demanding an apology from someone; but that’s just IMHO.
Counters–
Gentiles have a right to offended at being likened to the SS who were also gentiles.
Was Hansen’s metaphor just hyperbole? Hyperbole or not, metaphors– and hyperbole are powerful, why is he picking this particular metaphor? Do you think invoking Goodwin’s law means we can’t criticize Hansen for resorting to this sort of ridiculous behavior? That’s just silly.
Obviously, as long as Hansen’ keeps his death camp train metaphors posted, and keeps heaping on other silly hyperbole, people are going to point out he’s doing it. After the death camp metaphor came the call to try CEO’s for crimes against humanity.
Hansen is adopting the classic tactics of demagogues– these include hyperbole. However, it’s pointless to ask him to apologize to anyone in particular, because, like skilled demagogues, he knows better than to target named individual. In any case, if he keeps this up, I suspect his ability to persuade anyone undecidd will drop to zero, and very quickly, those who are only slightly convinced will tend to suspect that if Hansen believes something, it’s likely wrong.
So, he’d be wise to cut all this ridiculous hyperbole.
I spent a number of years working with lawyers, lobbyists and politicians. I used to think the most obnoxious people on earth were mostly lawyers (mea culpa) but that was before I started following climate debates.
Monckton’s original APS paper was not snarky. Whatever the quality of his mathematical demonstrations (and I am persuaded they were defective in several important respects) his central points (a) that the quantities assigned to CO2 forcing and climate sensitivity in general are more assumed than tested or verified by the models and (b) that some necessary events predicted by the models (tropical tropospheric warming in particular) have not taken place were entirely reasonable and substantive.
Gavin Schmidt’s response was needlessly snarky and ad hominem. Monckton’s even more snarky reply was correct in that Schmidt did not directly address the 2 key issues. The offhand claim that radiosondes are missing tropospheric warming would be more persuasive if (a) the satellites were contradicting rather than affirming those measures and trends and (b) what the radiosondes are allegedly missing were not just discrete quantities but trends. And I often get the impression that throughout, models were being cited to validate other models. A scan of the abstracts of what Schmidt cited confirms that.
Given the tacky, politicized APS handling of the matter and the level of vitriol from the defenders of the climate apocalypse across the blogosphere, it is easy to see how Monckton might have perceived Smith’s comments as an authorized voice of climate orthodoxy and forged a response in the heat of battle. That the tone of the Monckton reply was so peevish and snarky is disappointing.
The exchange was skewed in that Monckton’s flawed attempt to mathematicize his objections created the impression that he was assuming a burden of proof when his main point was that the alarmists have relied upon constructions and assumptions but passed them off as empirical truths and thus not met their own burden. I think it was a mistake to go beyond that and try to out-Tamino the high priesthood of AGW with a treatment of their own models. As they ably demonstrated in response, only they know what the models really mean which ought to be troubling.
It would have been nice to have had a debate in which the issue was about what is fact, what is inference and what is speculation to simply clarify and refocus the issue.
How much wiggle room is there really in the curve-fitting that produced the 3.7 Watts/sq. meter or whatever the canonical CO2 forcing measure is now?
How is it that man-made aerosols (whose forcing properties are poorly understood) always have a net negative forcing almost exactly equal to any predicted warming missing from the actual data?
What is or is not a “fingerprint”? Does it matter?
What is the correct use of the term “feedback”? Is it worse to make a non-canonical use of the term “feedback” in order to make an otherwise substantive point than to make a correct use of “feedback” while using utterly bogus quantitative assumptions?
The facts are:
1. The American Physical Society, in the person of one of its editors, invited me to submit a paper on climate sensitivity to Physics and Society, a learned newspaper of the Society.
2. After discussions with the commissioning editor as to subject matter and degree of technical detail required, I submitted the paper in good faith, and did not ask for or receive any honorarium.
3. A professor of physics, also an editor for the American Physical Society, reviewed the draft of my paper, indicated that he was pleased with it, and recommended some amplifications.
4. I made all the additions requested, whereupon the American Physical Society, in the person of the editors, accepted the paper for publication.
5. The paper was published, but, a week or so later, the President of the American Physical Society, without my knowledge or consent, ordered a mendacious and discourteous disclaimer to be added.
6. I wrote asking that the offending disclaimer be removed. It was not removed. It was altered, and was then posted additionally above another paper in the same edition of Physics and Society.
7. A paid official of the American Physical Society wrote a letter of purported rebuttal of my paper, and sent it to me from an email address at the American Physical Society.
8. The letter bore no copyright slug reserving the copyright. At law, therefore, the copyright therefore belongs to the American Physical Society, to which its official had submitted it for publication.
9. I wrote to the editors asking whether they intended to publish the APS official’s letter or my refutation, which I had sent to them. They replied that they had not yet decided.
10. The APS official runs a propaganda website that links to the propaganda website RealClimate. The APS official’s letter of purported rebuttal says he had sent it to one Joel Shore for comment.
11. Joel Shore is one of those who commented on an ad-hominem purported rebuttal of my paper at the RealClimate propaganda website, which the APS official’s own propaganda website links to and recommends as though it were scientifically reliable.
12. The APS official has given me written permission to circulate his letter (which had not been marked as a draft) and mine, provided that I make it clear that in writing it he was acting in a private capacity unconnected with his employment in the information technology division of the APS. This I am happy to do. In the meantime the official in question is assisting me by compiling a list of what he considers to be the errors in my paper. I shall of course be interested to study it and to learn from it.
Standing the above facts, it may occur to you and your readers that perhaps it is the APS that owes me an apology, and not the other way about. – M of B
Nice counter counter.
Have fun on your trip. lets keep lucia’s place tidy and not have food fights. We can pick it up
when you get back.
Christopher VCM–
First, thanks for clarifying.
Second, I agree the APS also owes you an apology. Many of my readers agree. They owe this to you for their actions up to the point you number 6. I think the APS has acted horrible in all this.
Unfortunately, after that, things went south.
Arthur works for the APS. I don’t think that fact transfers copyright for what he writes to the APS. My employer doesn’t hold copyright over everything I write. They do hold copyright for things written in the course of employment. If the law were otherwise, I wouldn’t even own the words I post at my own blog!
If Arthur has now given you permission to publish, then that should settle the copyright matter. It also should take care of any mis-understanding vis-a-vis the original publication at your site.
Having posted on Schmidt’s site it became immediately apparent that he would allow the AGW supporters to insult the skeptics to their heart’s content. But if the skeptics retaliated in kind, he wouldn’t post it. It also became apparent that Schmidt would only post a skeptic’s opinion if he thought that he could discredit it or if he thought that one of the site’s warming proponents would discredit it. I have no respect for Schmidt, and I would say that Monckton ows him nothing. I don’t know enough about Arthur Smith to reach a conclusion. What I do know is that warmers have a habit of taking a holier than thou attitude. And I very much appreciate that fact that Monckton is no shrinking violet when confronting them. I agree with Monckton that their motive is not pure science, and I see no reason to respect anyone trying to promote a political position while trying to pretend that it is a purely scientific position. One can claim that Monckton’s attitude isn’t helpful. But that would only be true if the people he was debating were genuinely interested in having a debate that led to truth, clarity, and understanding. Everything that we have seen from the warmers indicates that they are much more interested in cutting off debate, cutting off freedom of speech, and in many cases, hiding their data. Just look at Briffa and his refusal to archive his data. Look at Mann and his refusal to update his proxy series, as well as his refusal to recognize the implications of Lenah Ababneh’s work. The idea that these people are trying to do transparent science is a joke.
Lucia (and those who commented) – thanks.
To be absolutely clear, my primary complaint is not on the copyright infringement itself (though I’m quite familiar with the law, and Monckton broke it), nor on the premature publication of an incompletely polished draft (though that is rude), but on Monckton’s addition of “Dr. Arthur Smith, American Physical Society” to the beginning, as if I had claimed that as my affiliation, and as if this was in some way an official response from the APS. I did not claim that affiliation, and my work was emphatically not approved or supported by anybody at APS other than myself, and it was done on my own time, not APS’s. Since the work is indeed unpublished at this time I have no public venue, other than discussions such as this, to correct this falsehood. He further compounds this by repeatedly calling me an “official” of the society, as if I was doing any of this for my paycheck, and not in my hours after work that I should be spending with my wife and children. His claims that I did this as part of my work are utterly false; I made no such claim in my original correspondence on the matter, and I clarified it further when he responded to me the first time.
Monckton – I’m glad you made your 12 “points” from your private email to me public here since they are now open for discussion…
On my main complaint: precisely what is your definition of “official”? According to various dictionaries I have consulted, an “official” of an organization is a person appointed or elected to an office within the organization, or appointed or authorized to act as the organization’s representative in some manner. There may be some nuances in the definition under which I might qualify as an “official” – for example, I have been authorized to attend certain meetings on computing technology in my capacity as an Information Technology manager, and I sit on one advisory committee to the directors of the editorial office. But as far as an “office”: I have an office where my desk is, if that’s what you mean! The nearest actual officer of the society to myself is three levels of hierarchy above me. Calling me an “official” in this context is absurd. Furthermore it seriously misrepresents the volunteer effort I put into writing the document you have so freely redistributed.
I’m really not expecting an apology, merely a correction of your false claims about my relationship with APS (and it wouldn’t hurt if you would cut the conspiracy theories about my relationships with anybody else). Wishing for the best, especially for a return to discussion of the science issues,
yours,
Arthur Smith
Dear Lord Monckton:
I find myself rather confused by some of your 12 points but will focus in particular on 10 and 11 that involve me. Why exactly is the fact that I provided Arthur with comments on his draft and that I have also posted comments at the Real Climate website such a pertinent fact? Is there something illegal or unethical in doing this or does it simply demonstrate some sort of grand conspiracy…and if so…can you please fill me in on the details? And, since you have suggested elsewhere that we are part of, or somehow connected with, “a very small, very well-funded clique,” could you please provide me with more details about this like the names of the funders so I can contact them and inquire why their checks haven’t been getting to me?
Am I to be subject to the same derision for also having commented on Anthony Watts’ website. Or, are websites only “propaganda” when they actually subject your scientific arguments to some serious critique?
Sincerely yours,
Joel Shore
[duplicate deleted]
The idea of APS apologizing to Monckton is rich. How about Monckton apologizing for claiming that his paper was peer reviewed–or at least acknowledging that he doesn’t know what a proper peer review entails? Or how about apologies from whoever it was (Monckton or Daily Tech or some intermediary) who claimed that the APS had changed their view on AGW? That was repeated breathlessly in the denser realms of the blogosphere (hint:AW). If denialists would stop spreading falsehoods about their own work or the positions of learned organizations then perhaps they’d get more respect.
Lucia,
I note that you decided not to show my posting yesterday. You are the blog host: your prerequisite is of course acknowledged. I think that while “mosher” may not have intended his comment above this way, fact is when you open up a food fight [as in to paraphrase ” Monckton broke the rules of fair fighting”] in your kitchen, the strangest things can and do happen. Lesson learned, no doubt.
Re: 4621
Boris,
The global temperature data from the various acknowledged [predominantly “non-adjustable”] sources is starting to come in for 07/2008: anomalies are down yet again, continuing a now decade long trend… Strange, that. Not? Please do consult for yourself the various sources [UAH, RSS, Hadley and it would seem even GISS] before you next “ad hom” me here or elsewhere.
Reply to Tetris Hi Tetris– I don’t know why your comment didn’t show. It’s not in the spam filter and I didn’t moderate it. Sorry.
Which is the APS employees propaganda website?
I still do not understand how sending someone an email with a half baked or at least a not fully baked criticism can be construed as a courtesy. Sending someone who you are criticizing an “incompletely polished draft” seems rude to me.
“My article was a draft and is still under revision – I sent it to you as a courtesy.”
Hmm, just goes to show that it is better to get both sides of the story first hand before wading into this sort of stuff.
I don’t think you’ve quite picked up the nuance of the copyright issue that Monckton was making. The way I read it (and I could be wrong here!) is that it isn’t so much the employment, but the submission for publication that could indicate a transfer of copyright.
Your blog is a great example again here. As you note, you own the copyright for the material you post to this blog. But how about the comment that I type in here? Certainly neither of our employers own that either 😉 but do I own it? If I did, then your publication of my comment on your website would be a breach of copyright.
In practice, the very fact that I submitted my comment to your website means I have implicitly given you permission to publish it, and in fact I may have ceded the copyright fully to you (I don’t know the full legal status for comments on blogs).
This was what I was alluding to above. If it appears to Monckton that the paper was submitted to a freely available public website, and no explicit copyright notice is given, the copyright is not as clear cut as you think it might be. Again, I have no strong views – I’m not an expert in the area, I’m just saying: it might not be obvious. And I don’t feel like paying solicitor/lawyer/barrister rates in order to try and find out 🙂 If it matters (and I don’t think this aspect was important to Arthur judging from his comment), then it is always best to be explicit.
As a parting comment, probably my last on this post, I would add that this kind of thing is typical of climate science. Whether the debate be political, scientific or somewhere in between, pettiness ensues. The real scientific discussion is just lost in all of it.
Arthur Smith – did you indicate to Monckton that you considered the material you sent him as copyrighted? If not, stop your whinging.
Boris:
“How about Monckton apologizing for claiming that his paper was peer reviewed–or at least acknowledging that he doesn’t know what a proper peer review entails?”
Obviously it means checking off on the work of your buddies without checking the accuracy and meaningfulness of the material – as Steve McKintyre proved about the quality of the peer reviews that were done on Michael Mann’s temp reconstructions.
SpenceUK–
I’m 99.99% sure submission for publication does not transfer copyright ownership under US law where transfer of copyright ownership must be done in writing. Some non-written actions can result in a permission to publish or post– but that’s distinct from ownership. (The difference is, whoever owns the copyright can grant a third party permission to post. But, someone who is granted permission to post in some venue does not later obtain the right to grant a third party the right to publish.
So, for example, it appears to be generally held that when you type a comment here, it can appear in comments here. I think you aren’t even permitted to revoke the license– but who knows?
That said, I don’t have any idea what might happen if I published the comments threads in book form. I’m not sure whether your posting grants me ownership of the copyright.
I don’t know what happens in UK law.
I work (as an IT manager) for the actual peer-reviewed journals of the American Physical Society, where we receive tens of thousands of unpublished manuscripts every year, submitted for publication in our journals from scientists around the world. Authors always hold the copyright until publication; if we don’t publish the article, the author retains the right to publish somewhere else. We would have quite an uproar if merely sending us the article implied transfer of copyright as well. Even if we publish it, we don’t hold the copyright ourselves unless we have received a signed transfer of copyright agreement (online or paper).
If anybody in our office would take an author’s unpublished manuscript and post it on the internet somewhere for all to see outside of the journal publication process and without that copyright agreement, there would also be quite an uproar. Authors are free to do this themselves, but we have no such right. It might prematurely disclose mistaken results that are still being resolved between the authors and referee process and embarrass the authors, it might give competing scientific groups a leg up on some new result (and this is a concern of authors with peer review, where their manuscript is sent to several anonymous scientists as referees), it might invalidate patent applications and other processes that depend on the actual date of publication, it might include distortions of the content or context (as Monckton has done with my article) with no recourse for the author other than through the copyright laws. This is a serious matter, not at all taken lightly in our office.
Physics and Society is a newsletter, not one of the peer reviewed journals, and run out of a completely different organization within the society; nevertheless, articles submitted to it fall under the same copyright laws and similar considerations about premature publication. It is just not done. Monckton may not be familiar with scientific etiquette or US law in these matters, but since he has been informed of the problem, he should at least act responsibly given the facts. I am hopefully awaiting a resolution.
“7. A paid official of the American Physical Society wrote a letter of purported rebuttal of my paper, and sent it to me from an email address at the American Physical Society.
8. The letter bore no copyright slug reserving the copyright. At law, therefore, the copyright therefore belongs to the American Physical Society, to which its official had submitted it for publication.
9. I wrote to the editors asking whether they intended to publish the APS official’s letter or my refutation, which I had sent to them. They replied that they had not yet decided.
10. The APS official runs a propaganda website that links to the propaganda website RealClimate. The APS official’s letter of purported rebuttal says he had sent it to one Joel Shore for comment.
11. Joel Shore is one of those who commented on an ad-hominem purported rebuttal of my paper at the RealClimate propaganda website, which the APS official’s own propaganda website links to and recommends as though it were scientifically reliable.
12. The APS official has given me written permission to circulate his letter (which had not been marked as a draft) and mine, provided that I make it clear that in writing it he was acting in a private capacity unconnected with his employment in the information technology division of the APS. This I am happy to do. In the meantime the official in question is assisting me by compiling a list of what he considers to be the errors in my paper. I shall of course be interested to study it and to learn from it.”
Arthur Smith can you please provide a detailed reply to the above.Your comment above mine is too general for me to be convinced that you were actually wronged.Lord Monkton seems to claim that he got it from the APS and that it was NOT marked as a draft or that a copyright claim is posted on it.
Did he actually know that your “letter” was actually an unpublished manuscript?
Thanks for your patience in this.
Is British copyright law the same as American? Does it matter where Monckton published it?
BarryW– My understanding is British and US copyright are largely similar, but have some differences. Depending on precisely the chain of events, legally it could matter where he posted. But other issues don’t matter. The American Physical Society is American, and I think Arthur is American, and so it’s clear that Arthur currently owns the copyright to his draft article. The APS has no ownership of that.
On the other hand, it’s not clear Monckton could have known that when he acted. It appears Arthur used his APS email address in his initial communication to Monckton.
This is important when considering Monckton’s perception of who owned the copyright. Had Arthur written the document in connection with his employment, the copyright might well belong to APS. (Consult a copyright attorney before taking my word on this though. I’m not sure if this transfer only happens after signing paper work when taking a job, or if it’s automatic.)
So, Arthur’s use of his APS email contributed to some of the mis-steps here. While many people do use their work email for personal reasons, and many businesses don’t mind, in this context, it might not be unnatural for Monckton to conclude Arthur, with his APS email, was speaking for the APS. That said, I’d need to read the contents of the letter Arthur ‘ccd Monckton on to see if the first letter made it clear this was a draft and Arthur was not an APS official. (That would be the letter Monckton refers to in his point #7 above.)
It would have been wiser for Monckton to check a bit about the manuscript. The truth is Arthur is a private individual, and holds the copyright. (Still, depending on other factors, Monckton may be legally justfified in posting under fair use! It all depends.)
Lucia (comment 4635)
I wasn’t referring to copyright ownership in the sentence you quote but the transfer of copyright rights, which are not required in writing. I did go on to talk about ownership with respect to blogs comments (where I was trying to take things to extreme, to show how complicated it could get), and in that regard you are right, but my point about transfer of rights wrt article submission is quite valid.
My main point is that it really isn’t as simple as it is made out to be. At each of my posts I’ve stressed that I wouldn’t want to guess at who was right and who was wrong; I don’t have anywhere near sufficient information (e.g. original communications, submissions rules, extensive knowledge of copyright law, precedent and case history) – and from what I’ve read here, not many others do either. Plenty of people seem to think they do, but that is another matter…
Arthur Smith, you say: Monckton may not be familiar with scientific etiquette or US law. Please give specific examples of these breaches. Your posting of “A detailed list of the errors in Monckton’s July 2008 Physics and Society article”
http://www.altenergyaction.org/Monckton.html
and your whining on Rabett Run, are good examples of breaches of etiquette IMO.
SpenceUK–
I discussed a) ownership and b) permission to copy. Which other copyright right exists?
In American law, Arthur submitting a document to the APS for consideration gives them no rights to publish the document themselves. None. When we submit documents to journals, they are given the right to read it, review it etc. The paper work either a) granting the journal the right to publish or b) transferring ownership is always done formally, and that formality is required by law!
Moreover, Arthur’s emailing a document to the APS would certainly would not give the APS the right to give Monckton permission to publish.
If this were to rise to a legal matter, Monckton’s defense would need to rely on a provision called fair use. He might actually have a legal claim to fair use under the circumstances. US law permits much more under fair use than most countries– as required by the first amendment to our constitution.
So, oddly enough, while it’s very clear that Monckton is wrong about the APS owning the copyright, he might have had a legal right to copy the article!
Apologies in the AGW discussion are as rare as virgins in Pattaya. Somehow, reading this whole soap, I get the feeling that Monckton was framed.
Hoi Polloi. The reason there is always a kerfuffle when Monckton surfaces, is that the Warmers are terrified that someone (like Monckton) will actually get traction with the Media and the Politicos. The Warmers always turn it into a food fight cos they don’t want to discuss the merits of the argument. And why is anyone paying any special attention to Arthur Smith It Manager’s hurt bloggy feelings? Cos his is criticism of Monckton is confidential, or not? So What? If you want confidentiality, don’t blog. And don’t be Partisan in the affairs of your non Partisan Employer, using your non Partisan Employers time and email address.
Lucia,
I discussed a) ownership and b) permission to copy. Which other copyright right exists?
You write it; you right it. 🙂 Though there is a registration process to take care of legal formailities.
Exclusive right to do, and authorize others to do:
Reproduction
preparation of derivative works
distribution
public performance
Public display
Any or all can be transferred or authorized, in whole or in part. Transfer of rights requires a contract. Copyright is determined by country of origin. Fair use is rather subjective. But there are guidelines. (which I can’t remember off the top of my head)
That said, I don’t have any idea what might happen if I published the comments threads in book form. I’m not sure whether your posting grants me ownership of the copyright.
I don’t put anything on the internet I would consider registering so I never bothered asking. There are several limitted copyright authorizations which would apply. And I doubt any ownership is transfered, as such requires a contract.
Quote
On my main complaint: precisely what is your definition of “officialâ€? According to various dictionaries I have consulted, an “official†of an organization is a person appointed or elected to an office within the organization, or appointed or authorized to act as the organization’s representative in some manner. There may be some nuances in the definition under which I might qualify as an “official†– for example, I have been authorized to attend certain meetings on computing technology in my capacity as an Information Technology manager, and I sit on one advisory committee to the directors of the editorial office. But as far as an “officeâ€: I have an office where my desk is, if that’s what you mean! The nearest actual officer of the society to myself is three levels of hierarchy above me. Calling me an “official†in this context is absurd. Furthermore it seriously misrepresents the volunteer effort I put into writing the document you have so freely redistributed.
Leave it to a bureaucrat to look in a dictionary to see what the definition of “official” is. The bottom line, in my opinion, is that you mislead and were deceptive to Monckton.
No surprise there, since it’s ilk like you that will go to any length to propel this anthropogenic climate change hoax.
H.L. Mencken said it best:
The aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.
“On my main complaint: precisely what is your definition of “officialâ€? According to various dictionaries I have consulted, an “official†of an organization is a person appointed or elected to an office within the organization, or appointed or authorized to act as the organization’s representative in some manner. There may be some nuances in the definition under which I might qualify as an “official†– for example, I have been authorized to attend certain meetings on computing technology in my capacity as an Information Technology manager, and I sit on one advisory committee to the directors of the editorial office. But as far as an “officeâ€: I have an office where my desk is, if that’s what you mean! The nearest actual officer of the society to myself is three levels of hierarchy above me. Calling me an “official†in this context is absurd.
How Clintonesque!
Guys, Arthur is helping Moncky out. He apparently doesn’t know what an official is. Apparently you fellas are having some trouble yourselves. Why do you mock the help you receive?
I agree with that. The answer to this not to engage in it yourself. Not to jump in discussions like that and state a thing like: “But the other side is worse!”.
P: I agree too. Maybe but they (AGW) should check the data ( of course the other side (AGW) would say same) but more polite and civil!
Lucia (comment 4648)
As I’ve noted here, I’m not an expert in copyright law (heck I’m not even an amateur), and I’m caveating everything I say carefully, and I would advise you to do similarly. Oddly enough, in my university course, I covered contract law, tort law and company law; I didn’t cover copyright law or employment law (both of which would have been very valuable).
That said, a quick google works wonders, which I had done prior to making my last post. As Raphael notes above, copyright rights should be viewed as a basket of rights. There are various technicalities on how the rights may be transferred – either exclusively or nonexclusively, by assignment or by license. Only exclusive transfer of rights requires formal, written and signed documentary evidence to support it. Nonexclusive transfer can be done verbally, or by implied transfer of rights.
This is “a very good thing” otherwise we’d be under a mountain of paperwork just trying to run a blog legally. It is my view that my submission of this comment to your blog implicitly transfers copyright rights to you without any formal agreement taking place. (Under US law, it appears I have the right to revoke that at any time, although I cannot subsequently revoke rights to derivative works created prior to my revocation – assuming that forms part of the rights I transferred to you).
As an example, you could even publish a book through a publisher without formal written agreement, the transfer of copyright could be entirely legal. If it isn’t written and signed, it could not form an exclusive agreement (i.e. you could also transfer rights to another publisher at the same time, and probably most publishers would rather avoid that possibility!) but the transfer of rights has still taken place.
Note that nowhere have I insisted that such a copyright transfer did take place. I’m just pointing out that it could have done, just as I transfer copyright rights to you posting to this blog, and without more information it is very difficult to ascertain the true status. The blog submission is a good example; because there is not even a verbal or informal agreement, if a dispute arose, most likely a court would put in place an implied agreement. I’d hate to second guess what would go into that.
Raphael, is it true under US law a contract must exist between the parties? That would be interesting, under UK law there is no contract without consideration, and it is entirely possible that transfer of copyright could happen without consideration (again, posting at a blog is a good example), therefore no contract exists. That may change the nature of the relationship, but presumably not the details of the copyright rights. US contract law may differ here though, I know the view of consideration is not universal across legal systems.
SpenceUK–
First note: In my post I said it may well have have been illegal. “May well have” does not mean “did”. It means something might have happened. So, I don’t see any difference between your might not and my might.
On the idea of how the copyright would be transfered: What action do you think might have implied Monckton could have gained ownership of the copyright that permitted posting? I don’t even see any action that would imply the APS gained any rights under copyright. (And the derivative works bit, etc. Well… we aren’t debating those, are we?)
Yes. Some copyrights can be transferred by implication. Everyone knows the way blogs operate, when you type into the box, the comments are stored in a database and appear at the blog. That’s how the implied transfer to copy happens. At a minimum, there is an implication that the stuff you type can appear in the blog comments. Whether there are more rights transferred, I don’t know.
But, as we see, something about the behavior on the part of the copyright owner, and the custom and functionality of blog comments implies some transfer of copyright.
But Arthur didn’t post his paper into blog comments. He emailed, cc’ing Monckton, emailing and mailing are more private. It’s not like typing into blog comments. I seriously don’t see how any action we have read suggests there was any implied transfer of copyright to anyone granting permission to post publicly.
It may be Monkton had a right to copy and post – I suggested one myself. The right comes under fair use. (I think you guys call it “fair dealing”.)
But, it may be that Monckton had no right to copy. This translates to what I’ve consistently said: he may well have have violated copyright. It’s not certain, if you want to express the “may well have” as “may not have”, I see that as a distinction without a difference.
Lucia, you seem to have perceived a very narrow view of events that may be true, but there are other possible things that could have happened. Your narrow view may be correct, but given the limited amount of information, there are many other ways things could have turned out.
Firstly, according to Monckton, Arthur gave him written permission to publish, presumably in the private correspondence that you claim wouldn’t have counted as permission. It isn’t clear to me the exact content of these e-mails or when they were sent. The sticking point seems to be the attribution, which may be a different issue to a copyright issue.
For my second point, I’ll remove the individuals to make the point generally (which also helps to highlight I’m not talking about these parties, but a general case).
If person A writes an article, submits to publisher B to publish it, and person C wishes to make a copy of it, the normal way for person C to go about it would be to contact publisher B, who will (more often than not) be in a position to authorise copies (typically, but not necessarily always, at a fee). This is the normal course of events, certainly in the UK and I suspect the US as well, described at the UK copyright service pages here:
Person C can then get permission directly from publisher B – under most circumstances, person A may well get a royalty or similar, but depending on the agreement, person A may not even get to know about the transfer of right to copy from publisher B to person C. Of course Person C can choose also to go direct to Person A – which is what seems to have happened here – assuming person A has a nonexclusive agreement with publisher B. Nothing I’ve described needs to be done in writing (although, as always, it is best to get it in writing in case of dispute).
But since, on re-reading, it seems Arthur may gave given direct permission to publish, and his main complaint is one of attribution, this all seems moot – aside from my point that wading into assumptions about copyright law is very dangerous if you don’t know the stuff well enough…
Spence– The date of the written permission is posted at Eli’s. It’s after. As far as I know, you are simply saying we don’t know. I don’t know how that differs from what I said.
Your paragraph about party C contacting the publisher is irrelevant because APS was not yet the publisher! They hadn’t accepted the document for publication– or at least that’s what we learn from both Monckton and Arthur!
Well it appears that Arthus smith will not answer my question.
I remain unconvinced that Monkton was willingly breaking any laws.
Oh well.
It gets even stupicder
BTW, Arthur Smith granted provisional permission and Monckton and Ferguson did not fulfil the conditions.
Spence_UK,
It was exclusive rights which required the contracts. I lumped them all together without intent to spread disinformation. I have never transferred any copyrights, for “real writing”, without a contract. Not so much because of the copyright (which is still quite important), but rather because my agent likes to get paid. 🙂
I skimmed over the rather smarmy attack on Monkton at Rabbetts blog.
Still does really make clear that Monkton was deliberately violating Arthur Smiths rights.
Just as Mr. Smith has not presented a clear case.Neither has Eli Rabbett.
I am beginning to think this is a bogus complaint drive in order to divert attention away from Monktons paper.
Several scientists have already stated they do NOT think Smiths rebuttal is good.
Luici, “legal” issues aside, you are absolutely right to criticize Monckton, simply as a matter of common practice and courtesy. We don’t need laws to tell us when our actions breach well-known norms. What Monckton did was obviously unjustifiable and a betrayal of a courtesy that Smith extended to him by sending him a draft publication. Surely Monckton would object if anyone were to do the same with respect to an advance draft of a paper that Monckton had prepared and circulated for comment.