Oh my head is spinning. Looks like the discussion of plagiarism is evolving into a discussion of copyright at The Bunny, Climate etc. (Judy Curry) and Eduardo’s post at Die Klimazwiebel.
Let me interlace a few discussions. At Eduardo’s, Georg Hoffmann said…
Compared to that Wegmanns case seems standard since copyright issues happen from time to time.
If I read examples like the following I can at least understand that editors are interested in that affair.
http://rabett.blogspot.com/2010/10/auditing-assessing-climate-change.html
I’d already read the article at The Bunny’s. The bunny seemed to be describing letters from Rapp to Bradley and possibly someone at Elsevier. Wegman is mentioned in the letter, but it’s not clear that the Elsevier guy is contemplating litigation against Wegman. It’s not clear what he is contemplating at all. He ends with “Bit of a head scratcher.”
There may be a very good reason to scratch one’s head over what sort of litigation Elsevier might have a chance to win, and how long it might possible take. Because, believe it or not, someone suggested there might be a US Constitution issue that could affect copyright as it applies to Wegman’s report.
Yes, blogs being what they are, the “speech and debate clause” of the constitution is mentioned by commenter at Judy Curry’s who tells us he is an attorney:
RickA | October 10, 2010 at 11:43 pm
You asked: “I don’t know how the lawyers will actually interpret all this.â€
I am a patent attorney.My thought is what impact the speech or debate clause of the constitution has on this issue. …
This clause not only covers things said in the well of the senate (or the house), but also covers reports made for committees.
It is my understanding that the Wegman report was prepared for a Congressional committee and therefore, even if plagiarism is shown, does it even matter?
To your point that this report wasn’t prepared as a journal article – I agree and point out that it was prepared for a Congressional committee with speech and debate immunity.
dhogaza | October 11, 2010 at 1:04 am does volunteer:
Immune from any prosecution based on that.
Since my recollection of the speech and immunity cause is dim, I went to “the source which Boris thinks may never be cited in scholarly work” (i.e. Wikipedia) and found this:
The Speech or Debate Clause is a clause in the United States Constitution (Article I, Section 6, Clause 1) . The clause states that members of both Houses of Congress
“ …shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony, and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their attendance at the Session of their Respective Houses, and in going to and from the same, and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.
Wikipedia discusses a number of cases. It appears that the clause applies to Congressional representatives. Some protection is extended to Congressioal aids under Gravel v. United States.
I notice that Wegman is not a member of Congress. He’s not Congressional aid. So, even having edu-ma-cated myself reading Wikipedia, I don’t know what details would affect whether the clause extends to protect Wegman for his report. But RickA says it covers reports, so maybe that is so.
If any legal eagles are reading, maybe they explain further to the rest of us.
But even if we resolve the speech and debate clause, there is another complication: RickA | October 10, 2010 at 11:53 pm adds
As an attorney, another issue that springs to mind is fair use, which is a defense to a claim of copyright infringement.
That defense may also come up with regard to this issue – as the use of the material, if actually plagiarism, may be fair use, because it was used in for a Congressional report.
Now plagiarism is not technically a crime, or an actionable legal issue, but is more of an ethical issue for scholars – but fair use may come up by analogy to copyright infringement.
So, maybe the fact that this was presented to Congress might give Wegman more protection against a copyright claim than if the report was a textbook put up for sale or a journal article.
In answer to Eduardo’s question to those speaking of litigation (and some are):
But what would be the point of litigation ? will a court be able to distinguish if Wegman just copied and/or distorted or whether he also contributed with his own analysis and to what extent ? Will a court decision be accepted by all parties as fair?
It seems the case might be thrown out, and the questions might just decree it doesn’t even have to figure out whether Wegman copied because even a huge amount of copying might fall under fair use in this situation. If that happened the PR spin for the court case might be, “Wegman cleared of copying!”
Of course, maybe a judge would think neither fair use nor the speech and debate clause applies to Wegman’s report and a copyright trial would go forward. Maybe we’d see endless appeals of all rulings with various sides arguing about fair use and the speech and debate clause and lawyers would to take the case to SCOTUS.
If that happens, the case would take years and we’d see a continuous blog eruption. Not that there is anything wrong with that. . .
When I first read about the suggestion of litigation, it was my assumption that the university had completed its initial investigation, and the Wegman was the one considering legal action (either against the consequences or against the publication of what he may consider to be libelous material).
Do we know that this is not the case?
Lucia,
When you quote from Wikipedia, pu-leeze don’t cite or reference it!!
Jason–
I don’t know who might be considering litigation. Some might be pursuing libel cases; some might be pursuing copyright cases. The fact that Wegman is the one hinting in the USA Today article suggests to me that Wegman or someone he knows is pursuing litigation, but that’s really only a guess.
It’s difficult to make a libel or slander case stick in the US. Our courts are hard on plaintiffs and easier on defendants. On the other hand, Mashey and Deep wrote a lot of stuff. So, who knows what sort of case a clever libel law attorney might be able to work up. Also, Deep Climate is rumored to be Canadian. I don’t know how that affects possible libel or slander suits.
Libel law in the US is _usually_ not about making it stick (and indeed is usually applied in instances where it would NOT stick). It is about preventing the supposedly libelous behavior in the first place.
Certainly in this instance, Wegman would be much more interested in modulating the language used by the university, than in extracted some sort of monetary damages.
But going back to my question, I was just confused by seemingly universal assumption that the University has delayed its initial investigation beyond its original time frame, and that a party other than Wegman has initiated or threatened legal action. I’m not (yet) aware of any reason to prefer this interpretation over the alternatives.
Jason–
The university hasn’t said anything bad about Wegman yet. Don’t you think their language will be fairly moderate anyway? They are in a position where the could anticipate suit related to unfair termination or discipline of some sort. So, I’d expect GMU’s lawyers will go over language with a fine tooth comb.
The USA Today article said that early on, a representative of GMU said he expected the committee to report at the end of September. It’s Oct. 11. So there may have been a little slippage on that. I think this is where people think the University has gone beyond its original time frame.
I don’t think exceeding the time frame tells us much. It’s a university committee. Who is surprised they didn’t know when they’d be done with something rather touchy like this?
The Rapp letter post at the Bunny’s ends with
So that suggest Rapp might be getting ready to sue someone.
I assumed Wegman was suing Deep for insinuating that Rapp ghost-wrote the report.
ad–
We won’t know until more is revealed.
Sorry for dragging copyright into this issue – but Judith Curry did ask what a lawyer might think about all this.
As to whether reports are covered by the Speech or Debate clause, check out Doe v. McMillan, 412 US 306 – Supreme Court 1973, which can be found here:
http://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=16664819708581322628&hl=en&as_sdt=2&as_vis=1&oi=scholarr
This case makes it clear that “To the extent that the Committee report is printed and internally distributed to Members of Congress under the protection of the Speech or Debate Clause, the work of Congress is in no way inhibited.”
So reports are covered – but apparently all bets are off when the report is then further distributed to the public, outside the halls of congress (which is clearly the case here).
I have no idea whether there was plagiarism in the Wegman report, or whether there is civil copyright infringement, or whether fair use applies to the facts of this matter – but the facts did make me wonder if anybody had given these issues any consideration.
I just raised my issues as a lawyer reading Judith’s website, and quickly dashing off my thoughts based on her question.
Wikipedia shouldn’t be cited, it’s sources should be. Otherwise it’s kinda like a student writing a paper and referencing another student’s paper that was referencing a book-Silly.
Whenever Wiki’s claims are well referenced, they are probably relatively (but not absolutely) reliable, and so they can be used, BUT it is always better to go back to the original source. When Wiki’s claims are NOT well referenced, they could be complete BS, or correct, or somewhere in between, so those claims should NEVER be used. If you think a point not well referenced at wiki is correct, you’d better find an actual source that happens to say the same thing.
RickA–
First, I’m glad Judy asked, I’m glad you answered and brought these things up. Litigation and copyright are both being discussed at other blogs. Often, what applies to copyright is being confounded with what applies plagiarism and vice-versa.
Does it matter who distributes them? Wegman gives it to a Congressman. After that, what the congressman does may be out of Wegman’s control. Protection is pretty meaningless if these things are always distributed by Congress.
I didn’t see anyone mention them until you did.
lucia, elsEvier, not Elsivier
of course no need to publish this comment, just correct it before you get attacked for a wrong attribution 😉
lucia: “If that happens, the case would take years and we’d see a continuous blog eruption. Not that there is anything wrong with that. . .” Not sure how it would impact on any other legislation which was seeking to progress and which included, or required, the Wegman Report as part of their case.
Andrew_FL
People cite derivative sources in scholarly work all the time. You can cite an encyclopedia, which give references. You can cite Santer for his equations describing how to estimate uncertainty for a series that is assumed AR(1), that method isn’t original to him. He cites … Von Storch(?). Some aspects of the method aren’t even original to Von Storch. There isn’t a “rule” that says you have to find the very first paper where a method was discussed.
You can cite Handbooks– those also cite underlying material.
Of course a student would be foolish to cite another student’s paper as the source for a fact the other student looked up. But the same student could very well cite a Master’s thesis published by a slightly different student the year before, or they could cite a text book that cites underlying material. They could even ask an editor how one cites class handouts, and things could be cited. (There are conventions for citing letters, emails etc. Ephemera may and is cited in some scholarly work. )
What kind of grade might you get? That depends on the course, and what the instructor expects. Might a few people turn their nose up at you– sure.
But, the best rule is: Cite the source you actually used. If Wikipedia is the source, admit it. Cite it.
Most rational people (that is: no longer first or 2nd year graduate students in charge of busting the chops of undergrads) will understand that the real rule for Wikipedia is similar to the rule about splitting infinitive in English:
Don’t rely on Wikipedia– unless it happens to make sense to cite Wikipedia.
Similarly– don’t split an infinitive, unless it really makes sense to do so.
In both cases, there are people who adhere to the notion that there is a “rule” and will think badly if you break it. The “rule” is fictional. Sometimes it makes no sense. When it does make sense to cite Wikipedia instead of something else, it’s usually also possible to explain why it makes sense in a particular instance.
curious
The outcome of the November election will have a larger income on climate legislation over the next 2 years. I don’t think the Wegman report is going to affect many people’s voting decisions this year.
It’s not affecting my decision on Giannoulious(D) vs Kirk(R) for Senate, Quinn (D) vs Brady (R) vs “the other guy” for Governor etc.
I was thinking more about the press suggestion that a large part of Cucinelli’s efforts relied on Wegman. I haven’t followed that up and my initial reaction was “well, Gerry North is on the record as having agreed with Wegman’s findings” but maybe the SNA stuff is exclusive to Wegman and perhaps Cucinelli is using that as part of his case for requesting emails. As I say, I haven’t followed up on this so it could be way off the mark.
This is what’s known in the trade as a SLAPP suit.
Wegman was simply responding to a request from Congress. No civic minded individual, particularly someone of Wegman’s standing, should be intimidated like this. Democracy and science depend on participation. The Team, once again, wants to inflict harsh consequences upon anyone who disagrees with them.
mpaul (Comment#53997) October 11th, 2010 at 5:01 pm
Very well said. Exactly.
Lucia (Comment#53993),
Written like someone who actually was at one time a second year grad student in charge of busting the chops of undergrads….. like Andrew.
mpaul (Comment#53997) October 11th, 2010 at 5:01 pm
“Wegman was simply responding to a request from Congress.”
for a hatchet job.
“to inflict harsh consequences upon anyone who disagrees with them”
Ha!
Hehe, got my chops busted all right.
I will say that my words were meant to convey what I think one should do. Of course, it is not a completely hard and fast rule. But in my experience, wiki is generally more discouraged than encouraged.
I also did not mean to say that one should avoid derivative sources. I meant one should avoid potentially unreliable sources, such as uncited claims in Wiki, which could be something Joe Blow just made up. If it is cited, I would still favor wiki’s source over wiki itself, but I wouldn’t insist on going to the source of wiki’s source. I guess I should be clear that when I said “original source” I was not quite meaning it in the purist sense of the word. 🙂
Andrew_FL
Of course it’s discouraged for all sorts of good reasons.
FWIW, the Elsevier guy thought he had a good claim against Wegman, but was not sure about Rapp because he assumed Rapp had copied from Wegman. Eli thought that was pretty clear.
HOWEVER, given the comment by Wegman quoted in Rapp’s letter, that he KNEW that Rapp had not plagiarized, another possibility arises, that Wegman had an early draft of Rapp’s manuscript and used that, with or without permission. In that case (and this is only a wild assed guess at this point) Rapp is the one who Elsevier should go after, and Wegman is third in the chain.
To say this in a diagram, it has been assumed that
Bradley –> Wegman –> Rapp
but it could have been
Bradley –> Rapp –> Wegman
As DC said, is your head spinning yet?
Eli
Oh? What claim did he think he had? Legal claim? Academic claim? And was he right?
If all you have is Rapp’s letter to Bradley I don’t really think you know much about what the Elsevier guy thought.
As DC said, is your head spinning yet?
Not really.
I think you are jumping to a lot of conclusions. Wegman’s saying he knows Rapp did not plagiarize means Wegman thinks Rapp did not plagiarize. The likeliest is Wegman thinks Rapp having all the “According to Wegman (citation)…” type call outs makes Rapp’s stuff not-plagiarism.
The license on Wikipedia requires that if you copy (quote) text from it, you either apply the GFDL or CC to give credit (cite or reference).
Rapp quotes Fedor from Elsevier as writing
“This is a bit of a complicated scenario. Dr. Edward Wegman (author of the Wegman Report) originally plagiarized from Bradley, and from what we can tell, some of that same content was then used by Rapp without attribution. The details can be found in the links below. Once you’ve had the opportunity to investigate this further, please let me know how best to proceed. We’ve yet to hear back from George Mason on the Wegman situation. I’ve had the misfortune of having to manage plagiarism throughout my career, but this is the first triangular instance. If Rapp did plagiarize, he did it from a report that isn’t ours, but some of the content in that report is ours. Bit of a head scratcher.”
Which is pretty clear
a. Fedor states that Wegman plagiarized from Bradley
b. Fedor states that Rapp plagiarized from Wegman
c. Since Elsevier owns the copyright for Bradley’s book, they have a copyright claim against Wegman.
d. They are not sure that they have one against Rapp, since their understanding is that he copied from Wegman, not Bradley directly.
Eli has raised the possibility that Rapp plagiarized from Bradley and Wegman copied from Rapp, but, be that as it may Fedor is very clear and your playing coy is the kind of nonsense one expects from the Watts and Moshers of the world.
Copying without giving credit for the original text is plagiarism.
Giving a source for a fact only supports the fact.
1. The author of a research paper is both a wordsmith and a researcher.
2. Citing the source of a fact credits the researcher.
3. Identification of the author of copied text credits the wordsmith.
Also, whether someone else’s material may be reused at all depends upon the publication environment. An anthology of recent original poetry won’t allow an author to submit a 200-year-old poem as his own work. A comedian can slap “We have nothing to fear but fear itself” into a routine without having to give credit nor source.
A politician can use a famous quotation in a speech, if used in a way where everyone can be assumed to recognize it. Politicians have gotten in trouble for reading the text of someone else’s speech as their own speech. Do congressmen expect the text in a Treasury report to not be a copy of a USA Today article, unless the text is labeled as being a USA Today article?
1) Litigation has nothing to do with me or DC.
Elsevier copyright folks (like Fedor) have teeth and use them.
“We’ve yet to hear back from George Mason on the Wegman situation.”
Note: publishers care about copyright, and copyright = litigation, so one can thank Rapp for revealing that.
The “headscratcher” is simply that in many years of dealing with plagiarism/copyright, he’d happened to see a 3-stage case like this.
The McShane,Wyner(2010) case is sort of similar, although there they plagiarized Wegman’s plagriarized/mangled text, but then fabricated a reference to Bradley, SSWR A.12, even copying the WR’s mispell of Bradley’s title, to add insult to injury.
Of course, the SNA folks (Wasserman, Faust(1994), deNooy, Mrvar, Batelgj(2005), both via Cambridge University Press) are ahead: they have 3 3-stagers:
SNA => WR => Said, et al (2008)
SNA => WR => Sharabati dissertation (2008)
SNA => WR => Rezazad dissertation (2009)
The ethanol plagiarism in Said’s dissertation (2005) is unconnected, except for style. A similarity amongst all 3 dissertation is that each got the departmental “best dissertation of the year” award.
One can see the entire plagiarism net, page-by-page in SSWR A.0.
The SNA flow is shown in W.2.3, especially fllow the hilarious “statues”: around. There is more discussion in W.5, including comments from a real SNA researcher, Garry Robins. Wegman&co were clueless about real SNA. I could have gotten more top SNA folks to comment, but dead horses need no more beating.
2) One item few have twigged to is the *far worse* trouble of Said(2008), which ack’d 3 separate government agencies for funding … none of whose missions seem to involve doing:
a) low-grade SNA [and if someone doesn’t think so, they should talk to good SNA people as I did]
b) To leap to unwarranted conclusions against climate scientists
c) Using plagiarized material.
In particular, NIAAA (alcoholism), part of DHHS seems a very odd source. I’m not sure about the 2 Army contracts, but the DHHS ORI is well-known to be fierce, and if a university demonstrates it can’t handle research misconduct, including possible mis-use of funds, it is Not Good, especially if DHHS is your largest research funder, as it is for GMU. DoD is #2.
This was a rare self-refuting paper, as they claimed Wegman’s style of social networks was less prone to abuse in peer view than the paleo folks. Of course, this fine paper zipped through from received to accept, with no revisions, in 6 days. I’m sure it’s just coincidence that Wegman was an advisor for 20 years, and Said (at +2 years past PhD) an Associate Editor.
But, all this is just the tip of the iceberg, the easiest part for someone to understand without knowing anything about the science or statistics. Section 4 has a nice menu of 30 issues, although not all of those are for the Wegman Report.
3) Rapp has been threatening to sue people for 10 months.
I suggest looking at:
http://home.earthlink.net/~drdrapp/
http://www.spaceclimate.net/
http://deepclimate.org/2009/12/17/wegman-report-revisited/#comment-1807
and especially, with “braying donkeys” and “Taliban of climate change”:
http://deepclimate.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/rapp-comment-2010-01-01.pdf
He is at USC, University of Southern California
http://www2.isi.edu/research/prj-serc/prj-serc_organization.htm
People ought to think hard about the mindset of anyone who would post his email at USA Today… that includes:
“By the way, this is what Wegman had to say in a recent email: “It is my opinion that Dr. Rapp has not plagiarized anything and I hold him harmless†and claims that these are “wild conclusions that have nothing to do with realityâ€.”
Wegman’s lawyers have told him not to comment, but I guess emails to strangers don”t count.
Enough for now, but there is *so* much more…
I don’t know. This all seems like academic hand waving to me. The key question in my mind is: Are the conclusions made in the Wegman report valid? If not, why not? Reworking someone else’s material doesn’t necessarily make his conclusions invalid.
I’m thinking that the point of this meaningless exercise is: You don’t have to respond to his conclusions if you muddy the waters enough.
IANAL, but I deal with intellectual property issues all the time, and this is my layman’s understanding only: I’d be very surprised if a copyright infringement claim could many simple reasons (even putting aside the congressional immunity question):
1. The material copied has to be a substantial proportion of the worked allegedly copied from, or it has to be a substantial proportion of the work copied to.
For example:
(a) Assuming you’re writing a big fat text book – if you copy into your book, a sentence from a 5 line poem, that’s pretty bad – 20% of the original. But if you copy a sentence from a 500 page novel into your book, that’s a tiny proportion, and you’re almost certainly in the clear.
(b) But if you’re writing a 1 page report. If you copy half that page from a 500 page novel – even though you’ve only taken a tiny proportion of the novel, a substantial proportion of your report is copied from this source, so you infringe.
Now, the key things to note are
(i) that this analysis is done separately for every allegedly infringed work. So if Wegman is alleged to have copied a few sentences from say 100 different works, the amount of infringement of any individual work is tiny.
(ii) Before you do the comparison analysus, you’re supposed to eliminate things that are uncopyrightable, known as “scenes a faire” (i.e. commonplace) or “merger material” (where idea/expression is so closely intertwined as to be inseparable – copyright only protects expression, not the idea). Basically in this kind of case, the copyright doesn’t protect facts, proper names, dates,, terms of art, ideas that can only be expressed one or a few ways, etc.
2. Look-up the 4 criteria used for fair use in the US. You can win on this defense without necessarily being strong on all 4 criteria – but Wegman actually looks pretty strong on all 4.
3. No damages – his copying (as opposed to perhaps criticism) hasn’t adversely affected the market for the journal articles that he’s writing about. In short, his report isn’t a substitute for the allegedly infringed works.
Also, I’d be surprised if he’s profited directly from any alleged infringement – it’s not like he’s standing on street corners hawking copies of his report.
4. Who’s going to sue him?… remember a person only has standing for their own allegedly infringed work(s).
5. de minimis non curat lex
With all this brouhaha, does this mean that the Wegman Report conclusions are wrong?? Or is it simply a last “Battle of the Bulges” of the AGW army?
I ANAL? That’s a new one for me.
With all this brouhaha, does this mean that the Wegman Report conclusions are wrong??
.
No, they are irrelevant, but we already knew that.
.
Now we are looking at what were the pre-determined motivations for reaching those particular conclusions, and everyone involved. If the y had played by the rules, the report would have been entirely different (and thus not useful to the delayers).
.
You have been played, but apparently loving it so much that you continue to identify with your kidnappers. What do they call that? Stockholm Syndrome, or something like it.
Neven,
I Am Not A Lawyer
A very useful phrase.
Been reading around a bit and I keep seeing people writing that the Wegman Report isn’t the cornerstone of the no-AGW tribe… And that made me curious.
What is the cornerstone of the no-AGW tribe?
And then I thought some more…
What is the cornerstone of the Lukewarmer Tribe?
Or maybe a better question is: what are the cornerstones of these tribes?
Anyone know? I’ve asked here several times about Lukewarmer literature. I assume it’d be some paper on climate sensitivity… But I have never seen it (or them).
And who are the lukewarmers?
Well, Watts went and cut Keith Kloor out of the Warmer Tribe – I know, very sad – so not Keith Kloor anymore… Though I suppose Keith should really decide on his own (I don’t think he actually wants to be in a tribe).
But presently the ones I am Aware of are: Lucia, Mosher, Carrick, Tom Fuller, Watts (apparently), Judith Curry, and lots of other people that post here and on Judith Curry’s blog. I asume Mr McIntyre is… Can’t think of anyone else, but my understanding of who’s in and who isn’t is poor.
Nathan (Comment#54047) October 12th, 2010 at 4:03 am
What is the cornerstone of the no-AGW tribe?
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Those 95 thesis that got nailed by sticky to the top of a prominent skeptic blog this week? No lesser authority than the self styled worlds best science blog has spoken voce ex cathedra to anounce the arrival of a new Martin Luther for their science.
Dorlomin…
Which blog? Watts? I thought he was a Lukewarmer… Oh well Maybe I was wrong!
If Watts and Fuller are lukewarmers, I’m Mahatma Gandhi.
Lol, way to get on with all the Catholics out there.
I know, AGW is real, but there is so much garbage out there that muddies the waters.
Neven
I guess the Lukewarmer Tribe is a little non-specific… A lot like their claims.
MAYBE it’s a kind of postmodern treatment of climate science, where they don’t have any narrative of their own, but rather stand in opposition to all narratives.
From Republicans who don’t like AGW, don’t you mean.
Recently I posted a fantasy debate between a 10:10 button pusher and skeptic.
I could not find an author, and so I merely put quotes around the cut-n-paste. Being in a hurry, I did not specifically state it was a quote. I thought the ” ” would be enough.
So of course the rest of the thread was not about the quote I posted but about how wicked I am for not attributing it .
The people complaining were just looking for a reason to avoid commenting about what I posted.
Then I realized that the citations would not have mattered. The true believers never actually engage anyway.
Wegman is like this: His work was done years ago. Not one MSM forum paid any attention to the report at all.
But now that the HSI is actually being read, and McIntyre is withstanding attacks, suddenly Wegman is being attacked- not for his work, but for his use of of material in the summary information he provided in a report.
Since the attackers have not questioned the substance of his work, I can only conclude they accept his points that the HS is crap and that they are just ticked off about it.
And too cowardly to deal with it.
Eli
What is equally clear:
a) Fedor is using the word plagiarism and plagiarism is not a legal issue. Copyright is.
b) Fedor is asking for guidance.
c) We have no idea what claim Fedor is hoping to “pursue”.
Does the Elsevier guy think he has a claim that is good enough to pursue? Is that claim a legal claim? An academic claim? Against whom? We don’t know.
hunter (Comment#54062) October 12th, 2010 at 5:56 am:
Not only that, from what I can see; all of the attackers and accusers know who the material is or should be attributed to anyway (they are all on the same team don’t you know!) it’s not as if Wegman was trying to pull the wool over their eyes or anybody else’s. And everyone and their mother can find out what the correct attribution or original source is (or any information they read about the HS or AGW for that matter) with an internet connection and a click of their mouse.
I do this all the time when I read or hear something coming from a Congressional hearing before I make an opinion!
For those of you who didn’t pay attention to the post Wegman discussion on blogs:
1. The Wgeman report is generally correct on statistics, but those problems with MBH98/99 did not affect the results. (Example: yes, Mann’s algorithm creates hockey sticks. However, they have tiny magnitudes and are sometimes upside down.)
2. The social networking stuff in Wegman is nonsense.
3. The Wegman report is obsoleted by Wahl and Ammann and subsequent studies.
Lucia
“a) Fedor is using the word plagiarism and plagiarism is not a legal issue. Copyright is.”
That’s like saying taking things is not a legal issue, but theft is. So when someone is saying ‘they took my thing’, it is a legal issue see?
Nathan–
It is a simple fact that “copyright” is a legal issue. Plagiarism is not a legal issue. Also, the acts that constitute copyright violation differ from those that constitute plagiarism.
I’m not going to find a bunch of citations for this. It’s well know.If you don’t know this, you need to educate yourself.
But given the analogy you posted, I gotta’ ask this: Is your understanding of language really that poor?!
Yes, theft is theft. But we have all sorts of words to distinguish types of theft. Burglary differs from robbery. English has words that make distinctions like that. Robbery does not become burglary just because both are theft.
Similarly, even if copyright and plagiarism are both forms of theft, copyright differs from plagiarism. You also can’t call “copyright” “burglary” even though both are theft.
Other examples where English language has some more precise words for things that also share a less precise word:
Oranges are not apples. You can’t decree an apple is an orange because “fruit is fruit”.
Cats are not dogs. You can’t decree a cat is a dog because “mammals are mammals”.
Lucia,
Do you think Nathan appreciates reductio ad absurdum?
Neven
I agree the plagiarism doesn’t mean the conclusions are wrong, and it doesn’t mean the findings were ever irrelevant. They either are correct of incorrect. They either were or are relevant to some issue of interest to someone.
It’s clear that the report’s finding that the methodology was flawed is correct. Plagiarims accusations can’t change that.
It is also clear that the question about methodology was important to some at the time the report was written. Absent the large amout of work done later issues that might affect interpretation of the amount of uncertainty in the results of MBH were important questions for Congressman who might need to decide what actions to take then and who might wish to know how much weight to give to papers that had been published.
So, even if some scientists doing resesarch, but not in the position where they have to make decisions would value answers to other quetions more was a good question whose answer was relevant to decision making. That means: The report was relevant to pressing questions.
It’s also clear the later reconstructions differ from the one based on the method examined. Also, based on things Eduardo is posting, all methods seem to underestimate variability in the past. I think this means we ought not to be weighing results of any of them much. But this was not known at the time of the WR report. The report correctly highlighted something very true: Decisions makers should not be putting much weight on these reconstructions. Showing this was relevant in the context of the reconstructions being used as icon– to the extent of being used as posters used a backdrops when discussing other things.
Of course, the reports findings are now irrelevent in this sense: The methodological flaw it demonstrated is now widely accepted. That conclusion will not change based on any alleged or real plagiarism. Also, we have a greater understanding of the uncertainty in reconstructions– and in particular, the public does. That won’t change. Also, no matter what the finding on the plagiarism accusation, work is continuuing in that area.
Oh? What would copying text decribing what social networks are from wikipedia time tell us about pre-determined motivations? Bupkiss. Nada. Nothing. It tells use something about laziness with respect to certain portions of reports that aren’t the part that is the original contribution of the report writers. It tells us something about some report writers understanding of proper citation (it’s bad.) But that has nothing to do with “pre-determined conclusions”. Plagiarism, when it happens, almost never has anything to do with “pre-determined conclusions”.
Huh? The investigators would still have shown that the methodology used in MBH is not robust to red noise. Also, by paying better attention to paraphrasing and inserting a few sentences that note that the issue of CO2 fertilization is not often discussed in text books, but some experts believe it might matter, they might have written their prose to make an even clearer case about both the divergence problems and the difficulties with teasing out any possible independent contributions of CO2 fertilization and temperature on tree rings.
Nathan
I don’t know. Where did you use someone mention the no-AGW tribe? Who is in it? Is there only one tribe? Why don’t you return to the comment thread and ask whoever made a claiim about what is or is not the corner stone of this no-AGW tribe?
Also, I’m pretty sure if you talked to Judy, you would find she is a warmer, not a lukewarmer. She may well agree there is lots of uncertainty, and she doesn’t vilify people who disagree with her. But that doesn’t make her a lukewarmer.
As for the term lukewarmer– we’ve discuss this a lot here. There are people who are clearly “coolers” who want to call themselves “lukewarmers”. Some comment here. I’ve pointed out their definition a) doesn’t make sense, and b) doesn’t comport with the coinage.
“What is the cornerstone of the no-AGW tribe?”
I’m pretty sure it’s that there’s no AGW.
Andrew
AnonyMoose
Of course. I haven’t suggested otherwise. Eli is suggesting that Wegman’s saying he knows Rapp didn’t plagiarize might be evidence of all sorts of oddball things, including that Wegman plagiarized Rapp.
In fact, the simplest theory is that Wegman thinks (a) Rapp got the material from Wegman, (b) notes Rapp did cited Wegman repeatedly and (c) Wegman doesn’t think he plagiarized that material.
You, Deep, Eli, Mashey and whoever and think Wegman is mistaken about his own plagiarims. But even if he is, that would hardly provide any evidence for Eli’s fanciful notions about Wegman knowing Rapp didn’t plagiarize because Wegman copied from pre-print of Rapp, and then Rapp put in all sorts of citations to Wegman!
John
Of course publisher’s ought to care about copyright. But we don’t know if they really have figured out if they have a copyright case from Fedor’s words. What we know: He thinks there is plagiarism. He hasn’t heard back on GMU’s plagiarism case. So, we can conclude he is interested in the case.
But we can’t know what Elsevier’s lawyers or Fedor have concluded about the strength of any copyright case against anyone and we don’t know whether they are really planning to file one.
We know they are interested in this issue and are trying to figure out what the fact pattern might mean vis-a-vis a claim.
That’s the headscratcher Fedor discusses in the letter Rapp revealed to us.
If the only information about Elsevier’s thoughts is what we have in that letter, we don’t have sufficient evidence to know if that headscratcher is the only head scratcher. There may be one of more additional head scratchers. With respect to copyright, there other head scratchers that include whether the copying by either Rapp or Wegman might fall under fair use, how presentation to congress migh affect that and/or how the speech and debate clause might affect any copying by Wegman.
We have no idea what the legal beagles at Elsevier might think. Fedor doesn’t say. (Why should he? He’s probably writing to people at Elsevier, so why would he explain all these other issues to them? He’s asking them for guidance on the bit he is looking into.)
As for the rest of the stuff, it looks like it’s very tangential to what Fedor might think of know about any copyright case against Wegman or Rapp!
Is there anyone here who seriously believes, with everything that is coming to light, that the Wegman Report is an “independent,impartial, expert†report by a team of “eminent†statisticians, as it was repeatedly presented to Congress?
“Is there anyone here who seriously believes, with everything that is coming to light, that the Wegman Report is an “independent,impartial, expert†report by a team of “eminent†statisticians, as it was repeatedly presented to Congress?”
Neven,
I do.
Andrew
lucia (Comment#54080) October 12th, 2010 at 7:46 am
AnonyMoose
Copying without giving credit for the original text is plagiarism.
Of course. I haven’t suggested otherwise. Eli is suggesting that Wegman’s saying he knows Rapp didn’t plagiarize might be evidence of all sorts of oddball things, including that Wegman plagiarized Rapp.
In fact, the simplest theory is that Wegman thinks (a) Rapp got the material from Wegman, (b) notes Rapp did cited Wegman repeatedly and (c) Wegman doesn’t think he plagiarized that material.
You, Deep, Eli, Mashey and whoever and think Wegman is mistaken about his own plagiarims. But even if he is, that would hardly provide any evidence for Eli’s fanciful notions about Wegman knowing Rapp didn’t plagiarize because Wegman copied from pre-print of Rapp, and then Rapp put in all sorts of citations to Wegman!
Taking Wegman’s word about whether or not Rapp plagiarized is unreliable since Wegman by his writing and that of his grad students clearly doesn’t know what plagiarism is.
Phil
I agree with you that Wegman may be entirely wrong in his assessment of what constitutes plagiarism. But that is somewhat irreleveant to the point I am trying to make.
Here in comments, Eli is suggesting that Wegman’s statement that Rapp did not plagiarize might mean what, at his blog, Eli intimates “some” might say
What I am saying is that the simplest explanation of Wegman’s words is not that Wegman got an early draft of the book, which Wegman plagiarized. The book cites Wegman’s report. So, it would be really weird for Wegman to get a draft of the book, copy stuff out and for Rapp to later edit to cite Wegman as the source.
That’s such a weird complicated thing that it is easier to assume that when Wegman says he knows Rapp didn’t plagiarize, Wegman’s thought process is this:
Wegman, (rightly or wrongly,) thinks Wegman did not plagiarize, Wegman think Rapp got information from Wegman and Wegman thinks Rapp properly cited Wegman.
You, Eli, Deep, Mashey or other think Wegman is incorrect about his own plagiarism wouldn’t change the fact that this is the simplest explanation of what Wegman means when he assures Rapp that Wegman knows he didn’t plagiarize.
Talk of a copyright case seems to me more than a bit overblown. Copyright is a financial issue, and cases are brought primarily based on a presumption of lost revenue due to the infringement (some professor hands our photocopies of a bunch of pages of a $200 chemistry text to a class of 400, for example). Sometimes a copyright case might be brought to set an example, like action against some teenager who has downloaded hundreds of music CD’s. But Wegman’s use of the book would not seem to be a financial issue. What damages would the publisher ask for? How many copies of the book did not get sold as a result of Wegman’s use of some pages? If Wegman had put quotes around the appropriate words and attributed the book in each case of use, would that have led to more book sales?
The charge of plagiarism, IMO, ought to be simply left to GMU’s investigation. It appears to me motivated mainly by animosity toward Wegman…. I don’t think Bradley would be up in arms about this if it had been Tim Osbourn who used some slightly reworded pages from Bradley’s book without proper attribution. I expect an email exchange or phone call would have resolved it. Or what if Wegman had concluded that MBH98 used rock-solid methods instead of concluding there were statistical errors in MBH98?
If Wegman is unhappy with the findings of the investigation, he could (of course) bring a lawsuit against GMU. If the investigation more-or-less absolves Wegman of plagiarism, then he may bring defamation suits against people who have accused him of plagiarism. There is obviously a lot of personal animosity involved here. Which is why I have not made many comments on this issue. Angry people do lots stupid things.
I went and looked at Deep Climate’s comparison of the Wegman report and the Bradley book, and was not impressed.
First of all, Wegman did cite to Bradley papers, and even summarized a Bradley paper in the appendix.
Secondly, it looks to me like a person who has read source material and then reworked it in his own words.
That is by definition not plagiarism.
My understanding is that plagiarism requires copying material from another’s work without attribution (i.e. citation).
The other allegation is that Bradley material was used and then twisted to disagree with Bradley.
I am sorry, but whenever someone disagrees with a paper, they summarize their understanding of the paper and then proceed to explain why they disagree with it.
That is not plagiarism either.
I went and looked at the Wikipedia social networking article and didn’t see that it looked exactly like the material in the Wegman report on social networking – so I am not sure about the allegation of the wholesale copying of Wikipedia text into the report.
However, if that is actually what happened, it does seem that a citation, either to Wiki or the references relied on by the authors of the Wiki article should have been made.
So to the extent the report failed to cite references for the social networking material, it can properly be criticized, although that is not the same thing as conceding plagiarism.
But the Bradley plagiarism allegation is simply wrong in my opinion, based on my review of the material.
RickA, if I may ask a personal question (just curious here). What is your position on the theory of AGW? Are the global atmosphere and oceans warming? Is it caused by the excess of CO2 emitted due to human activities?
Thanks Lucia, that’s what I’ve been thinking about but you’ve worded that much better than I ever could.
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In my layman’s opinion the only reason why the AGW Army is now bashing the (in their own words) irrelevant Wegman report is purely trying to 1) rehabilitate Mann, 2) discredit the AGW sceptical camp and their motives. There’s absolutely no drive from the AGW Army to achieve a better climate science understanding or to cooperate with contrarian thinking scientists. It’s exclusively trying to save and keep the old climate science dogma’s.
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For that matter the new initiative of Kerry and Rothman is a MUCH better way to go: http://www.realclearmarkets.com/articles/2010/09/20/rescuing_climate_science_from_agenda-driven_politics_98675.html
In my layman’s opinion the only reason why the AGW Army is now bashing the (in their own words) irrelevant Wegman report is purely trying to 1) rehabilitate Mann, 2) discredit the AGW sceptical camp and their motives.
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Nope. Speaking for myself I’d like the lukewarmers and the people on the fence to see how the denial machine works. There are still people who believe it doesn’t exist, like Lucia. Others like you are simply unconvince-able, even if Jesus and his Apostles would come knocking on your door to tell you it is really true.
Neven:
Then there are nuts like you who see conspiracies behind every tree.
Neven,
Be cautious about who you claim is “unconvince-able”, lest you too be so described. There is a lot of denial on all sides of this debate; not surprising for a politically charged issue.
Then there are nuts like you who see conspiracies behind every tree.
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If I would, I’d say AGW theory is an attempt “to rule our lives and crush our spirits through the anti-human, anti-capitalist agenda run by the United Nations to stop Freedom….” (copyright Nathan)
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Every conspiracy theory should be judged on its own merits. There clearly is a conspiracy in this one.
Be cautious about who you claim is “unconvince-ableâ€, lest you too be so described.
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No need, I’m quite convinced that the real missions of the Wegman Report were: #1 claim the hockey stick broken and #2 discredit climate science as a whole.
Neven:
Dude, get help. Or adjust your meds. Or stop smoking the wacky weed.
There is no conspiracy here, you really are nuts.
Neven Comment #54093.
Happy to satisfy your curiosity.
My position on AGW is that the global atmosphere and oceans have warmed, both since the LIA and during the last century.
From my reading on this subject, I do agree that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, and expect further warming of approximately 1.2 degrees C by 2100.
What I do not agree with is the climate sensitivity number which is currently predicted by some to amplify warming to 3-6 degrees C by 2100.
I am very skeptical about whether we actually understand the climate, both historically and currently, enough to actually predict the climate at 2100 or 2200 etc.
I also believe that our latest warming period is not unprecedented over the last 1000 years, 2000 years, 3000 years or 8000 years.
In other words, I believe that natural variation of the climate (i.e. not caused by human release of CO2) has caused the climate to vary to greater warmth than we are currently experiencing, many times over the past 8000 years.
Given that, I am skeptical that humans undoubted release of massive amounts of carbon is the only, or even a very significant factor in warming since the LIA or even over the last century.
It seems to me that it is still probable that we are within the margin of natural temperature variation and just happened to hit a warm period, right at the peak of the interglacial.
I also think we need better climate data, and would like to see past data cleaned up (get rid of any errors which have crept into the data) and a whole lot of new instruments properly deployed to gather data worldwide (both in the atmosphere, surface and in the ocean) to get more comprehensive better quality data over the next 30 years (and indefinitely into the future).
I do expect further warming until 2100 (around 1.2 degrees C) – but not enough to require trillions of dollars and massive regulation to switch our economy (and the world economy) over to a non-CO2 producing economy.
I think that would be a mistake.
First, it doesn’t even seem possible to me to do this with wind or solar alone – as these energy sources simply cannot provide baseload power (i.e. 24/7 365 days a year).
Second, I would rather see us invest in new energy production technology, rather than regulation limiting carbon emissions.
For example, I like the idea of space solar – which could provide 24/7 365 baseload power, be beamed down to earth as microwaves, and then be converted to electricity.
As we increase the efficiency of the conversion of microwaves to electricity, we could provide a lot of baseload power to the world using space based solar (without using very much real estate – hey those solar panels will take up a lot of space to produce all the power the world needs!).
But that is far in the future.
For the near term (next 30 years), I think nuclear is the way we will have to go – either with hybrid fusion/fission plants, which better utilize the radioactive materials in the rods and thereby reduce waste (to about 1/10 of current waste)(I just heard about these in a Naked Scientist podcast), or recyling the waste materials, like they do in France (I read about this in a book I think was called Terrestrial Energy).
Nuclear is baseload power, we have the technology right now, and it doesn’t emit CO2. The question is whether the waste issue outweighs the carbon emitted by other forms of power – and I don’t think it does. Plus I think we can reduce nuclear waste and make it less radioactive, again with better technology.
Personally, I think we need to increase nuclear from 20% of the power we generate (in the USA) to 50% over the next 30 years.
Once regulation is modified to permit new Nuclear plants, I suspect we will be building a lot of them over the next century, and storing the waste regionally, rather than all in one spot, after it is recycled.
So to summarize, I do believe in AGW – but not CAGW. I suspect current warming is partly caused by human emission of CO2, but also partly natural. I don’t know the percentage of each (human/natural) and I don’t think the scientific community has answered that yet either. Short term, I think we should increase nuclear power and long term go to space based solar.
Neven – I hope that my explanation of my position helps to satisfy your curiosity.
Neven,
Are political parties or politically advocacy groups “conspiracies”? If not, then what to you constitutes a conspiracy? I really do not understand your POV.
Neven – I hope that my explanation of my position helps to satisfy your curiosity.
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It sure did. Thanks a lot, RickA!
“the lukewarmers and the people on the fence”
Neven,
Have you ever considered you may be on the wrong side of the fence?
Andrew
There does appear to be a bit of a conspiracy-theory level of beginning understanding by the people pushing this. That is why we get the idea that Wegman plagiarized Rapp, even though it is not an obvious explanation. They start with the idea that Big Oil is behind everything, and go from there.
Neven
I think there is exactly as much evidence for Hoi Polloi’s “AGW army” that acts in some concerted manner as for your “Denial Machine”.
In the past, when people have brought up specific allegation for some specific activity by this alleged “Denial Machine”, I’ve pointed out lack of evidence for their case. I do similarly for the “AGW army”.
So, for example: I don’t know what “AGW army” is doing whatever it is Hoi thinks they are doing. There is no doubt that DC and Mashey, and the small circle of individual who tend to chatter at The Bunny’s blog believe there is plagiarism in Wegman, Rapp, Said etc and they are all hopin’ mad.
I don’t think that’s the result of some sort of conspiracy or organization. It’s a bunch of individuals who happen to talk to each other publicly, the discussions are facilitated by the internet, and they are speculating about things of interest to them, and collecting what they believe to be evidence.
They have a right to do so. I wouldn’t characterize this group as acting like “an Army”. Army’s are organized, have leaders, give orders to enlisted men etc. That’s not what’s going on here.
Similarly, lots of past accusations of things done by “the denial machine” or the existence of said “denial machine” often involve noticing that people are discussing things on blogs. Many have similar opinions and some of them take actions. This is not what I would characterize any of this behavior as being similar to what we would see emanating from “a machine”.
For what it’s worth: As far as I can tell, since the inception and growth of blogs, forums and other web based discussions, the most politically effective activities seem to involve almost zero top down organization. They are nearly all honest to goodness bottoms-up things and cannot be characterized as machine-like or army-like.
Formal attempts by “leaders” to crowd-source have tended to have almost no impact. (See “Age of Stupid”, or even the 10:10 groups attempt to gather together bajillions of people under their banner. Their plan was to make 10/10/2010 “the largest day of positive action on climate change ever.” Anything much happen on Sunday? )
I think whatever funded top down “denial” efforts there may be have failed similarly.
There is no conspiracy here, …
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I tend to agree. More like a closed social network with reinforcing friendly peer review and mutual plagiarism. 😉
Anything much happen on Sunday?
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Yeah, it was my birthday. 😉
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I think whatever funded top down “denial†efforts there may be have failed similarly.
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The Wegman Report looks to become a case in point.
Neven,
Oh? I can sort of see the Wegman Report is top down– after all Joe Barton was a powerful congressman heading a committee so it’s hard to see that as “bottom up”. But, didn’t a base of base of bottom-up chatter existed before he did anything?
Also, I don’t see how the Wegman Report was “funded”.
The only funding I see is a salaried Congressman was acting like a Congressman. He didn’t fund Wegman.
Also, I would have thought you major objection to the Wegman Report was that it succeeded in doing that which you wished it had not done. If it had failed, I don’t think anyone would be going after it.
After all, it’s unlikely anyone in what you call the “Denial Machine” is likely to dig around to figure out if the 10:10 catastrophe of a video has some plagiarism, copyright, or financial irregularity issue. The 10:10 group was funded by various groups. Their was failure. It was intended to encourage people to do whatever the 10:10 group was hoping to do on 10/10/2010. It didn’t work.
People laughed at the lunacy that must exist within 10:10. The video will be brought up as an example of how not to do PR for years to come. That’s a funded top down effort that failed.
PR Analysis Question For Lucia:
Not Engaging People With Different Views-
http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.com/2010/10/hiding-behind-bob-ward-at-lse.html
Good PR or Bad PR? Failure or Mistake? 😉
Andrew
They start with the idea that Big Oil
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You are right. It’s not just Big Oil. In the mix there is also some good old libertarian/free-market fundamentalist/extreme right-wing ideology. There’s a snuff of contrarianism by nature, especially by old people who fear a lack of attention and believe that in the past everything (science, society, people, barbecue sauce) was better.
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But it all started with tobacco-style derailing tactics through think tanks and scientists for hire. The Internet, like Lucia points out, was another step further, with people spreading disinformation and misinformation for free.
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In that way, AGW is an interesting test case (regardless if it’s true or not). What we are witnessing here, means that if ever something really serious pops up, something that is propped up by a lot of evidence, but with a lot of uncertainty on how bad it could turn out, and people need to change their behaviour as an insurance policy, etc, all of that could easily be confused, delayed, derailed with minimal effort.
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A WUWT would pop up with infuriated commenters, a Steve McIntyre would start digging into a minor aspect and not let go for years, a Lucia would be playing messy word games, a Monckton would spout complete drivel and get away with it. And so on, and so on.
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This means that if ever something really serious comes along, we are so incredibly f*cked. If AGW and all the other global problems, from resource wars to financial bubbles, from top soil erosion to ocean acidification, from the diabesity epidemic to peak oil, aren’t really happening of course.
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I don’t know about you, but I find that scary.
Neven,
Your comment #54115 is simply bizarre. It looks to me like you see even more huge right wing conspiracies than right wing loonies see huge left wing conspiracies. You (and they) are imaging things. I urge you to try to separate politics from your analysis. Politics is not conspiracy.
Neven:
OMG, free marketers! The horror.
Re: Andrew_KY ,
If someone is paying Bob Ward hoping he will drum up good PR, they are wasting their money.
Neven
How do you know the barbecue sauce wasn’t better in the 40s?
Lucia,
“How do you know the barbecue sauce wasn’t better in the 40s?”
LOL
The same way (s)he knows about all those conspiracies, of course.
Neven, I’m a guy who has no deep fundamental beefs with the consensus/IPCC view of climate science. I think I understand your concerns, but they seem to be the concerns of a younger feller. Things aren’t organized enough! They aren’t efficient enough! They aren’t changing fast enough! And they won’t. Constructive change is almost always evolutionary. It took almost 50 years from the invention of the light bulb to US rural electrification and phone service. 130 years later, many parts of the world still don’t have either. If there some solution to AGW that is technically, economically, and politically feasible (and I haven’t really seen either), then it will be adopted over time.
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Even most of the extreme climate consequences suggested are endurable – small parts of the planet rendered uninhabitable by humans, 200′ of SLR, increasing extreme weather events, overall loss of arable land. These are not extinction events even if the costs eventually overwhelm the ability of modern civilization to cover them. Unless the oceans slips into anoxia, we are likely to endure.
RE: RickA (Comment#54104)
Bravo RickA! A voice of reason in a mixed up world. Considering all that we can actually test, measure, observe or understand about climate change, your outline would make a fine summary report for IPCC AR5.
Politics is not conspiracy.
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It is if it isn’t transparent. BTW, I don’t believe so much in the left/right distinction. That’s just a façade. And even if it wasn’t, it is absolutely clear that conservatives are needed to solve things because of their pragmatic and can-do mentality. Unfortunately they are actively engaged in other purposes, such as making the ultra-wealthy even ultra-wealthier. That’s painful.
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How do you know the barbecue sauce wasn’t better in the 40s?
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:-B
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Even most of the extreme climate consequences suggested are endurable – small parts of the planet rendered uninhabitable by humans, 200′ of SLR, increasing extreme weather events, overall loss of arable land. These are not extinction events even if the costs eventually overwhelm the ability of modern civilization to cover them.
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Ron, sure, I agree. But I’m more focussed on the human suffering when the crisis cocktail really gets going.
“But I’m more focussed on the human suffering when the crisis cocktail really gets going.”
Neven,
What area of current non-imaginary human suffering that is actually happening are you focused on?
Abortion?
Poverty?
Sickness?
Crime?
Andrew
Neven:
Here’s the breakdown of US tax revenue by income bracket, Neven:
Top 1%, 40%
Top 5%, 60%
Top 10%, 70%
These are 2007 numbers…post Bush tax cuts.
Similar numbers for 1999:
Top 1%, 36%
Top 5%, 55%
Top 10%, 67%
I don’t have problems with the ultrawealthy becoming even wealthier. Wealth creation benefits everybody.
As an aside, guess where most job creation occurs in the US? (Hint: It’s not in the lower 50%, and it’s not large corporations.)
If I had a problem with some on the right wing, it’s their unwavering faith in large corporations, rather than in their belief that wealth creation is not evil.
Some fodder for thought on job/wealth/economic growth.
Neven, please tell us what you think is going to happen. I predict in the next year, there will be a tornado. What exactly do you think is going to happen? You need to make a prediction like X ice sheet will melt in X years or something. Almost forgot, when a tornado does form, I am going to blame it on nitrogen and call for all farmers to quit. Additionally, I am going to claim that we are seeing increased lightning strikes due to too much plastic. Honestly, these arguments have devolved into a total mess and I think Lucia is having herself a good laugh. By the way Lucia, I caught the Maher show last night (at my friend’s house he made me watch it) and he had some British puff on with him and they were attacking Christine O’donnell. She said something like, “if we evolved from apes, why aren’t the apes still evolving?” They gave no rebuttal to this question other than to say that certain reptiles stomach’s evolved in a period of decades, which I don’t think is an answer. I would like your opinion on this question. Honestly, why aren’t the apes still evolving? Does evolution just stop at a certain point? Also, can you explain the exclusivity of humans? Meaning, why is our communication so much more complex, why can be build such complex structures, why do we ponder our existence, etc. The reason I ask you these questions is because I find it hard to believe any atheist giving any credit to global warming theory. I believe it is a larger leap of faith than believing in God.
Re: Dr. Shooshmon, phd. ,
A British puff? I suspect I’m going to have to ask you not to call people names.
I bet the correct answer is: “Apes are still evolving.”
Honestly, why do you think they aren’t?
No. But the answer is: It’s not lightening fast. You don’t see major changes when a population is fairly well adapted to it’s surroundings.
I don’t know. What do you mean by “exclusivity”. Also, I’m not sure I could explain the little I understand in a blog post. Why not ask an anthropologist?
Huh? Why do you think this?
Off to the gym…
Carrick,
Nice article. Thanks.
Based on your tax figures, if I could just move into that top 1%, I believe I would feel better about paying my fair share of Federal taxes.
Dr. Shooshmon, phd. (Comment#54135),
Thanks for the humor.
Carrick,
A serious question: Do you really think that Neven will be influenced by a reasoned article and factual data?
Thanks for the PDF, Carrick. That was an interesting read.
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Neven, please tell us what you think is going to happen.
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My logic tells me that as ecosystems come under increasing strain and start collapsing, our societies and economies will inevitably suffer. I see several signs that this is happening already.
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Added to this are internal economic difficulties that occur when you base your economy on the neoclassical economic theory of exponential and infinite economic growth. This is impossible for various reasons, the first one being that nothing is infinite in a finite system. The internal cracks are showing through recessions like the last one. A problem mainly caused by debts (which were created to artificially inflate the economy). It was solved by creating more debt.
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Add the external strain to the internal difficulties and the combination might cause societal collapse in parts of the world in the long run, or maybe even not so long run.
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I’ve watched a lot of documentaries on various subjects that brought me to these conclusions. I could be wrong. But I think the problems are there. Not knowing what could happen is maybe a comfort to you, but I don’t like to gamble on that basis.
OK, back to the Wegman Report. Is there anyone here (besides AndrewKY) who seriously believes, with everything that is coming to light, that it is an “independent,impartial, expert†report by a team of “eminent†statisticians, like it was repeatedly presented to Congress?
RE: Neven (Comment#54141)
In this emotionally charged debate over climate change I believe that the term “impartial” no longer exists.
Neven:
OK, back to the Wegman Report. Is there anyone here (besides AndrewKY) who seriously believes, with everything that is coming to light, that it is an “independent,impartial, expert†report by a team of “eminent†statisticians, like it was repeatedly presented to Congress?
Huh?
1. Independent? no Wegman was picked by republications. I would expect him to cherry pick the guy, just like peer reviewers are cherry picked.
2. Impartial: I expect him to come with bias, just like the guys who investigated Jones ( kerry Emmanual) come with a bias.
3. Expert: Wegman certainly has expert credentials, I give them no more regard than I give Mann or bradley. Credentials, mean I will listen to what you have to say and spend more time on your opinion than on say…Neven’s opinion
4 eminent: Same answer as #3
Wegman, for me has been useful for a quip the bad methods quip.
A. on the issues surrounding the HS, better work has been done by Jeffid, RomanM, JeanS, UC, and Mcintyre. Much better work. To their credit mann and others have moved on to better methods and better disclosure. To their detriment they refuse to give credit where credit is due.
B. On the SNA stuff. The mathematical description of the connections between the team are frankly boring. The mails do a much richer job of describing the incest. Now, incest is fun, so Im told, but the progeny belong in arkansas not in the best journals we have.
Well Lucia, I may have used the wrong words. It was certainly was not my intention to immitate the “Denial Industry” phrasing. Normally I use the word “Tamino Trolls” but that’s too limited in this case, therefore I thought it would be better to use the “AGW Army” (thinking of the “Holy Army”).
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Usually it’s the cheerleaders at DeepClimate, Smogblog, RC, Joe Romm and other trash that orchestrate the swift boat war against climate scepticism which now seem to be assisted by Mashey. So yeah, to me it’s an army with all the “verbrannte Erde”, take no prisoners tactics that’s attached to a dirty war.
So, who do you think is receiving these kazillions spent on windpower (to name aspect of our eco tax dollars)?
ivp0 (Comment#54124).
Thanks ivp0.
I appreciate the comment.
I was a bit worried about putting my views out there, in response to Neven’s question.
I thought I would get slammed – but so far I have not been.
Maybe my views are more middle of the road than I thought?
BTW Neve, did you already found them BigOil links to M&M?
Still hacking them servers, Hoi. The security is so tight they’re probably hiding something.
Neven (Comment#54141).
As to the statistics and the hockey stick – I do think that the Wegman report “is an ‘independent,impartial, expert’ report by a team of ’eminent’ statisticians”.
The social networking stuff was just Wegmans attempt to understand and explain the Mann group think.
SteveF:
I would love to have the curse of paying the high possible income tax rate due my income bracket.
carrick,
dont you know the wealthy eat and burn their money.
Is Edward Wegman a long time, well respected expert in the field of statistics? Yes he is. So yes to expert and eminent, no such thing as impartial here and independent probably follows impartial.
Of course I once heard of a senior scientist at NASA who was arrested for climbing a stack in Great Britain. Sometimes people can get a bit carried away and no one would accuse Hansen of being impartial. Here in the USA Wegman has as much right to express his views as Hansen whether we agree with them or not.
Neven,
I thought I’d ignore the obvious flaws in what you wrote and ask you to think about the flaws in the alternative economic/political structure you seem to favor. That North Korean/Soviet/Cuba model hasn’t been so great for the environment (or people either). And the Hitler/Mussolini version had a few of its own issues. Perhaps you’re a fan of the Ehrlich/Holdren forced sterilization model?
Given the alternatives, I’ll keep siding with the freedom model.
Neven,
I’ll bite. Why do these charges of plagiarism have any bearing on whether the Wegman report was an “independent, impartial, expert†report by a team of “eminent†statisticians?
RE: RickA (Comment#54145)
Rick,
I am not sure how the solar collector/microwave technology would play out, but in the absence of any major breakthroughs in our understanding of climate, I suspect your outline is pretty close to reality and future public policy.
Neven (Comment#54140)
“A problem mainly caused by debts (which were created to artificially inflate the economy). It was solved by creating more debt.”
And was the result of political machinations that were purported to “equalize” the populace and were the antithesis of the freemarket principles that you despise.
Is Edward Wegman a long time, well respected expert in the field of statistics? Yes he is. So yes to expert and eminent,
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But Congress was told ” a team of eminent statisticians”, whereas the team seems to have consisted of undergrads and one statistician (Said) with a 1 year old PhD, who probably is responsible for the 35 plagiarized pages in the report. I say probably because her PhD thesis gravely suffered from the same misconduct.
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Besides, how expert is a report when a substantial part of it has been plagiarized? They copied Bradley’s text, “but injected with biases, errors or changed meanings that often weaken or invert original results.” (quote from Mashey’s report)
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The social networking stuff was just Wegmans attempt to understand and explain the Mann group think.
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You could say that of practically any science, any faculty, any group of scientists in the world. No, I think the social networking stuff (which was the most plagiarized stuff of all, indicating their level of knowledge on the subject) was to discredit climate science as a whole and nothing else.
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no such thing as impartial here and independent probably follows impartial.
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Of course the report wasn’t impartial or independent. The report was ordered as such by Barton et al, and in Wegman they apparently found someone (via the social think tank network) who was willing to do what was asked: parrot McIntyre and McKitrick on some irrelevancies.
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The problem is that it was presented as independent and impartial to Congress. It wasn’t, on purpose, and thus it was highly misleading to say so.
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I’m reading through the hearings right now (fascinating stuff, but long) and one thing I notice is how they (Barton and his cronies) keep saying that Wegman did not receive any financial compensation. They say it so often that the conspiracy nut alarm bells are starting to buzz quietly over here. Was it just shared ideology, did they manage to make Wegman believe their conspiracy theories, or was there more in it for him? Hopefully we’ll hear about that soon.
Given the alternatives, I’ll keep siding with the freedom model.
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Please define freedom in your own words.
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Obviously communism didn’t work, and it never will. But there must be some alternative to the current capitalist growth-model, don’t you think? One that is more attuned to biophysical reality and doesn’t replicate diseased growth like cancer? The costs of this model are starting to outpace the benefits. Surely there is a more balanced and sane form of capitalism, one that makes the transition towards a more sustainable society possible.
Do you honestly not believe in evolution?
Neven,
“Of course the report wasn’t impartial or independent. The report was ordered as such by Barton et al..”
To me this line of argument just sounds naive. I doubt any Congressman has ever been fooled into believing that anything has been presented to them in an impartial manner. Their spouses and children probably have to lobby to get anything from them.
How many times has Al Gore presented his case before Congress? Compared to him, even the most scathing criticism of Wegman amounts to a towering example of eminence and impartiality.
We are talking about Congress. Some of its members think that small islands will capsize if too many people land on them. I wouldn’t doubt that Wegman was struggling so hard to find a way to help politicians understand statistics that he neglected the QC of his report. I am sure that he will pay a higher price than any of the corrupt dunces to whom he presented.
Steve Mosher,
“dont you know the wealthy eat and burn their money”
Yep, they eat at teh finest restaurants and burn a lot of diesel powered yatchs.
Mostly what this shows is that our AGW believers are getting a bit desperate.
I am looking forward to some enterprising skeptics reviewing the vast library of AGW papers for evidence of unattributed useage.
The end result of this will be another great example of AGW promoters being hoisted on their own petard, I bet.
Evolution? I thought the warmist religion was revolution, aided by scary stories, litigation and legislation.
On a prior thread, I opined that Deep Climate and John Mashey had provided blocks of text from the Wegman Report and from prior sources that looked, walked, and quacked like plagiarism. I don’t see why any independent critical thinker should excuse this (apparent) latest example of Bad Behavior.
I confess to have not read the report with any care. From DC’s post, here’s a link to it [the Wegman report] 92-page PDF. On page 50 are the four Conclusions and Recommendations.
What do commenters think of these conclusions and recommendations? Do instances of (likely) plagiarism in the social network analysis and elsewhere erode the authority of Wegman et al.? Questions of Authority aside: are the conclusions insightful and correct? Would implementing the recommendations likely lead to improved science and public policy?
I’ll go first.
Yes, plagiarism erodes any claims to authority that the Wegman Report had. Just as Mann et al’s prior Bad Behavior doesn’t change the science, so too Wegman’s doesn’t change the merits of the observations themselves.
#1 — I agree with Wegman, politicization is present and harmful. Scrutiny of the science behind important policy prescriptions should be high.
#2 — Agree on the importance of sharing of data and codes. Thanks to pressure and publicity, the situation is notably better in 2010 than it was in 2006.
#3 — Agree that statistical practices in paleoclimatology do not seem to have been up to the standards that are considered acceptable in other scientific fields, and that cross-discipline interactions would help to remedy this deficiency.
#4 — Agree on the caveat about the caution that is required when using proxies, especially those with no clear-cut physical meaning. Agree that research on the basic science underpinning of long-term data series and their suitability for use as proxies should be given added priority.
Admin: Edited in blue for clarity
AMac, I agree with points 1, 2 and 4. Point 1 is of course highly ironic in retrospect, and wrt point 3 I would think that things have improved a lot in paleoclimatological research. They already had between 1999 and 2006.
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Thanks for being consistent in your skepticism. Mosher and Lucia could learn a lot from you.
Neven– I think highly of AMac, but have no idea what specifically you think I could learn from him. I too have said that Mashey shows some blocks of text that show plagiarism.
This is such a mess that I don’t think that investors and legislators should be expected to make appropriate decisions based on any of it. Surely it is time to sweep this all to one side and move on! As for the plagiarism, they can blame the computers for not checking properly.
I’m sorry, Lucia, all those threads crisscrossing here and you using so many words to state that only the social network stuff looked bad and ‘boy, that Mashey report sure is messy’, gave me the impression that you were keen on downplaying the issue at hand.
Re: Neven (Oct 12 16:15),
IIRC, Lucia clearly stated that Deep’s and Mashey’s analysis made a convincing case for plagiarism in at least one instance. She has perhaps been more circumspect in her choice of words than others have been… I would be too. Considering it’s a damaging accusation, and sometimes people do explain seemingly-damning facts, and given the threats of legal action in the air.
As far as #3 — Mann08 used Tiljander because of shoddy procedures, including a crummy statistical approach. That’s the example I know best, but it seems certain that there are numerous others. If you want to defend that paper’s choices with respect to Tiljander, I would be delighted to offer you a guest-post on my blog to expound on the subject. So far, that proposal has met with crickets all around. And justifiably so.
Steve McIntyre has put up a post on the kerfuffle.
http://climateaudit.org/2010/10/12/copygate/
AMac,
A nice summary. One point I disagree with is: “Yes, plagiarism erodes any claims to authority that the Wegman Report had.” Whether or not plagiarism existed has on bearing on the authoritativeness of the findings. This is not a question of excusing bad behavior, but a practical point. In the business world, this a complete non-issue. If a junior analyst is asked to prepare a report on, say, the feasibility of creating a new rep office in Hungary and the report begins with an overview section on the Hungarian economy, no-one in business would care two hoots if the section was cut and pasted from Wikipedia or the Economist. In fact, that would be the logical and practical thing for someone to do. I understand that the standards for academic publications are different (and appropriately so). But a report doesn’t become less authoritative just because parts are “borrowed” from another source (provided of course that the other source is reliable).
AMac, I’m sure mistakes are still made in paleoclimatology, but I’m also quite sure that there is not a hoax being perpetrated by the entire field to get more research grants and in the process deprive us of our “freedom model”.
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I lack the knowledge and capacities to either defend or destroy the Tiljander issue, so you can add another cricket to your chorus. 🙂
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Wrt Lucia, I’ve had my first blogging experience this summer and I agree that you have to be more responsible (not because you might be sued per se, but because I think it’s a moral obligation). But if Lucia would really have been circumspect, I think she would not have used so many words what in my opinion was downplaying the significance of this issue.
Neven– I don’t think you really appreciate why there is discussion of the Mashey stuff. I’d wrote 1 sentence agreeing with Mosher’s one sentence. Then people started suggesting there was something not messy about it, so I responded as have others. The thing is messy.
There: I said the thing is a mess again. Why? Because you re-raised the subject.
If people re-raise a subject, I might very well answer.
This does not mean that I have suddenly changed my mind on the a totally unrelated subject. The evidence of plagiarism in the social network section is unaffected by the messiness of Mashey’s report. (The messiness has PR ramifications and has affected the evolution of discussions on blogs, but in the end, either there is plagiarism or not. Messiness doesn’t affect that.)
Now: To answer your other questions… You aren’t going to like this. My answer to do I think Wegman’s team was “independent,impartial, expert†is “Yes. It was ‘independent,impartial, expert’ according to any meaningful usage of that set of adjectives in the context of the creation of the Wegman report.
But I can’t help but wonder why you want to go off on this tangent. The question you ask has nothing to do with the plagiarism, and as far as I can determine, there is no positive evidence to support the answer you hope people will give you. (I assume you were hoping people would answer “no”. Am I mistaken.)
Now, do you really want me to answer the other questions– or would my taking to answering the irrelevant-to-the plagiarism issue questions you are asking be taken as wanting to minimize the plagiarism issue?
Neven
Where do you think I downplay the issue? Saying Mashey is messy is not downplaying the issue.
But I can’t help but wonder why you want to go off on this tangent.
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Because you’re a nice person and I want you to open your eyes and see the denial machine at work. I cannot force you of course if you do not want to see it, but this is an excellent opportunity for you to look through your confirmation bias and become a lukewarmer in all aspects. It would only be fair to others as well, because frankly your split personality with regards to the science on one side and the PR battle on the other is a bit confusing. And immoral too, to be frank.
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My answer to do I think Wegman’s team was “independent,impartial, expert†is “Yes. It was ‘independent,impartial, expert’ according to any meaningful usage of that set of adjectives in the context of the creation of the Wegman report.
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It wasn’t independent. It wasn’t impartial. Heck, it wasn’t even expert. It was a tailored report ordered by politicians at the local think tanks, delivered by a group of copypasting statisticians who mutilated the work they were criticizing to meet their own ends, heavily prompted by the politicians’ staff, just to mislead the Congress by claiming the hockey stick broken and discrediting climate science as a whole.
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Lucia, you are amazing. Is there no doubt whatsoever that this could be one of the most flagrant denialistic manipulations we have witnessed so far? Are you really purposefully closing your mind off?
Lucia
“As for the term lukewarmer– we’ve discuss this a lot here. There are people who are clearly “coolers†who want to call themselves “lukewarmersâ€. Some comment here. I’ve pointed out their definition a) doesn’t make sense, and b) doesn’t comport with the coinage.”
So what is the cornerstone of your Lukewarmer hypothesis? What is it based on? I have asked this question at least 6 times, and have never seen anyone answer it. I asked Mosher to define the Lukewarmer hypothesis, but he couldn’t as far as I can tell (I asked him as it seems that he coined the term). At the moment ‘Lukewarmer’ is more of a marketting term than a hypothesis.
“I don’t know. Where did you use someone mention the no-AGW tribe? Who is in it? Is there only one tribe? Why don’t you return to the comment thread and ask whoever made a claiim about what is or is not the corner stone of this no-AGW tribe?”
Sorry what? Why does someone have to have asked? I don’t know who’s in the Tribe (I guess Andrew_Ky is, probably Watts, certainly Ian Plimer, Monkton etc.) If you’d taken the time to read what I had written clearly, you’d know why I asked the question. If you don’t know the answer, don’t bother replying.
There have been comments about Bob Ward. Here is the latest between Pielke Jr and Ward:
http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.com/2010/10/hiding-behind-bob-ward-at-lse.html
All of those academics are too busy to debate. Yeah, right. An example of Grantham at LSE not getting its PR money’s worth.
Neven wrote: “But there must be some alternative to the current capitalist growth-model, don’t you think? One that is more attuned to biophysical reality and doesn’t replicate diseased growth like cancer? The costs of this model are starting to outpace the benefits. Surely there is a more balanced and sane form of capitalism, one that makes the transition towards a more sustainable society possible.”
I disagree with every one of your factual assumptions. But even assuming I didn’t, all you are offering is “hope and change” with you eyes closed tight and wishing on a star. Good luck trying to sell hope and change a second time around. And I doubt that wishing on the star will get you far.
You don’t like command from above (communism, Plato’s Republic, monarchy) and you don’t like individual freedom from below (democracy). You’re quickly running out of options.
Again, stan, give me a definition of freedom. In your own words.
Nathan (Comment#54186) October 12th, 2010 at 5:27 pm
So what is the cornerstone of your Lukewarmer hypothesis? What is it based on? I have asked this question at least 6 times,
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
So far as I can tell that the currently measured temperatures are running on the low side of the models. Seems a pretty solid place to stake your claim if its so, hence I dont have any real objection to it.
My personal take on it is a luke warmer is somone who sees the total increase in temperatures for a doubling of CO2 as below about 2C, or between 1.3C (the CO2 only increase) and 2C, the widely claimed ‘safe’ limit’. Offcourse each ‘luke warmer’ will have their own view of it. I do suspect many of those whos opinion is based on a predisposed political view rather than any really well staked out view of the science would like to use the term ‘lukewarmer’ as a ‘flag of convinience’ if you will.
If people find my previous post a little unclear and would like clarification I’ll be happy to reply. The grammer was not brilliant.
You can be a lukewarmer on the science, and you can be a lukewarmer on the PR battle. Simple.
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Copygate doesn’t really cut it, does it? Despite attempts to frame it this way. Skepticgate is a bit dull. I’ve seen ClusterPuck and Regurgi-Gate, but these are too elaborate. Perhaps wait a while and hopefully call it BartonGate. That’s a good name.
Dorlomin, so for you the ‘cornerstone’ are the observations over the last 30 years? And this, you assume, gives a climate sensitivity of <2?
That's it? That's all?
I guess a lukewarmer on the science would say no C in CAGW, so a climate sensitivity of <2.
Nathan (Comment#54193) October 12th, 2010 at 6:12 pm
Dorlomin, so for you the ‘cornerstone’ are the observations over the last 30 years? And this, you assume, gives a climate sensitivity of <2?
That's it? That's all?
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Not me, I was merely answering your question with my observation of what I thought a luke warmer was.
My position is one of a state of some degree of alarm. While there is a wide range of possible outcomes from the current state of the science, the possibility of exceeding 2C warming with a doubling of pre-industrial levels of CO2 is well above merely likely. And that is not an acceptable risk for me. "Catastrophist" I believe is the vougish term…..
A lukewarmer on the PR battle would be a bit like Keith Kloor, but eventually labelling karma point people like Watts and Singer and Wegman and you name ’em for what they are: irrelevant, disinforming delayers. Most journalists can’t do that, because they need ‘balance’.
I think that’s an accurate summary of a position that doesn’t make rational sense. (Part A, climate sensitivity of <2, does not get you reliably, or, really, at all, to Part B: no C.)
Discussion here: http://theidiottracker.blogspot.com/2010/09/between-science-and-hard-place.html. Also here: http://theidiottracker.blogspot.com/2010/09/between-science-and-hard-place-part-two.html.
Robert,
From the site you link:
Looks like just the sort of unbiased, unopinionated discussion that’s perfect for discussing what makes “rational sense.”
… a smattering of pro-science folks.
What a crock of sh*t.
> … a smattering of pro-science folks.
Robert, I’d like to invite you to do a guest post, defending the use of the Tiljander data series in the paleoclimate reconstructions of Mann08. I have been very critical of this aspect of paleoclimatology, which makes me a denier. You would, I think, add a valued pro-science perspective to my blog.
Sometimes things are as simple as they seem, and the debate over AGW is certainly one of those cases.
To get back to the subject at hand, did the <a href=" http://home.earthlink.net/~drdrapp/"😉 modern scientist general Rapp copy from the prince of statistics Wegman or did Wegman copy from Rapp? Did they exchange Valentines? Who plagiarized Bradley? Where did that social network analysis come from? Are their little elves still running about getting PhDs?
These are some of the exciting questions Eli is wandering about. But in the course of history, it really does not matter much, John M and others think Rapp copied from Wegman. They have good arguments. Eli rather likes the converse, if only for the entertainment value. It also has the virtue that then neither Wegman nor Rapp would be stone liars, merely misleading trash.
Stay tuned and pass the popcorn. All hot rumors to http://rabett.blogspot.com
Thanks for the interesting read, Robert. I didn’t know the scientific side of lukewarminess was so fragile.
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AMac, I don’t know that much about the Tiljander data series. Does it tell us something about paleoclimatology or the hockey stick? Or is it just about Mann not wanting to admit that he’s wrong about something or other?
Re: Neven (Oct 12 20:34),
The Tiljander story speaks to the fragility of the paleoclimatology consensus, concerning reconstructions of the past two millenia.
The major point of Mann08 was to show that the hockey stick (a term used by both sides, so I guess I can use it too) did not depend on tree-ring proxies, but was robust. And indeed, the paper and its supplementary information did show that a hockey stick shape would be produced by reconstructions that included non-tree-ring proxies, and even by reconstructions that entirely omitted tree rings.
It turns out that the Tiljander proxies were important parts of these non-tree-ring reconstructions. Exactly how important is still not clear to me. McIntyre says “very” and Jeff Id indicates “somewhat”, with respect to the shapes of the paleotemperature traces. Once their unsuitability for use as proxies became evident, Gavin Schmidt adopted the line that they “don’t matter.” Deep in a RealClimate comment thread, he did note that the Mann08 non-tree-ring reconstructions failed to validate prior to 1500, if the Tiljander series were not used.
So the use of the Tiljander not-temperature-proxies “doesn’t matter”, but is essential for validation of pre-1500 non-tree-ring reconstructions. An odd combination.
As far as Prof. Mann, the editors of PNAS, and unwary readers are concerned, the use of the Tiljander data series in Mann08 was and is proper. Claims to the contrary are “bizarre.”
Thus, I consider that the Tiljander saga is informative about paleoclimatology and the hockey stick. I think it illustrates concusions 1, 2, 3, and 4 of the Wegman Report, summarized and linked upthread in Comment#54173.
But how important are they? If it is somewhere between “somewhat” and “not” this is all just about Mann and The Team not admitting errors to people they don’t respect. Which is understandable considering the history and the fact that the critics have so far done nothing, absolutely nothing, to further science. All they did was obstruct because they do not like the implications of the AGW theory.
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Maybe the critics could write a scientific paper stating their case for how important the Tiljander date series are? Is that a weird question?
I am grateful to AMac for his quote of the conclusions and the recommendations of the Wegman report. We heard a lot about the fact that North agreed with these conclusions. We heard a lot less about these conclusions.
(Let’s set aside for the moment the fact that North said he had not read them beforehand, that he meant to agree mainly about the PC stuff, and that this agreement about the PC stuff does not square well with these conclusions as described here.)
AMac asks us two questions:
> [A]re the conclusions [of the Wegman report] insightful and correct? Would implementing the recommendations likely lead to improved science and public policy?
Let’s start with the second question. I believe that these recommendations would likely lead to improved science and public policy. I also believe that I just stated a truism.
If that is a truism, it would interesting to understand how are these recommendations following from the “conclusions” of a scientific report. (To see that is a truism, it suffices to ask oneself if these recommendations would help solve most of the problems behind your favorite epic novel.)
Here is what I think about the first question. The relationship between the conclusions and the report itself is also intriguing. Is there a part where conclusion #1 was obtained after a scientific inquiry? What about conclusion #2? And #3? And 4? Quite frankly, I am at loss to connect the two parts of the Wegman report with these conclusions. And so the idea that these conclusions are correct is tough to understand: correction entails some kind of connection, a connection I still fail to grasp.
And so one can argue that the recommendations are independent from the conclusions, and that the conclusions are independent from the report itself. Maybe that’s one sense in which one could argue that the Wegman report is the result of an independent process.
Re: Neven (Oct 12 21:20),
The concept of science as presented in that comment doesn’t align with the one espoused by Richard Feynman.
I think a paper on the Tiljander proxies would be a fine idea. It might be difficult to achieve publication in a peer-reviewed journal due to the restricted and subsidiary nature of the subject matter. (“Subsidiary” in that it is not the series themselves that are important, but their use in Mann08, Kaufman09, and Mann09, and the subsequent phenomenon of the AGW Consensus community closing ranks about such uses.) I don’t see it as a step that is either necessary or sufficient to an understanding of the facts. If there are reasonable counter-arguments to the ones I’ve made, they can also be presented, either without or with the imprimatur of peer review.
Re: willard (Oct 12 21:35),
You lost me, a couple of times. E.g.
> I also believe that I just stated a truism.
Here’s the paraphrase of Conclusion 2 (we could do the exercise for the others as well).
That’s a description. It may be largely correct, somewhat correct, or mostly in error. But it isn’t a truism.
Again, that isn’t a truism. Perhaps you mean to argue that federally funded research agences need not develop a more comprehensive and concise policy on disclosure — because the current polices are adequate, or because the need isn’t there, or because there are countervailing factors that ought to be considered (e.g. climate data and code as personal possessions, protection of intellectual property rights).
I think it’s useful to state what is meant in plain terms.
I don’t see it as a step that is either necessary or sufficient to an understanding of the facts. If there are reasonable counter-arguments to the ones I’ve made, they can also be presented, either without or with the imprimatur of peer review.
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Sure, but first it needs to be established how important Tiljander is, right? Because if it doesn’t change much in way of the ‘hockey stick’ (like the Wegman Report), then what would be the use? If the research is so flawed as McIntyre implies, it will be cited less and less, and that way science corrects itself, right?
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Of course, if it is really important, discussing it at your blog is not sufficient. No, McKitrick and McIntyre (or Shane and that other Guy who regurgitated the Wegman Report) should really put their minds to something useful for a change and write a paper on the Tiljander flaws, but even more importantly: come up with a valid alternative to the current reconstruction. You know, show how it should be done. They could do that if they wanted to, right?
Re: Neven (Oct 12 21:58),
> Because if it doesn’t change much in way of the ‘hockey stick’
According to Gavin Schmidt, Mann08’s non-dendro reconstructions validate prior to 1500 with Tiljander, but fail to validate without Tiljander. That strikes me as a change.
> it will be cited less and less, and that way science corrects itself, right?
It sounds as if you dislike the detection and discussion of errors in published science–that being cited less and less is a preferable way for science to correct itself.
> even more importantly: come up with a valid alternative to the current reconstruction. You know, show how it should be done.
This is not the challenge facing scientists, as Feynman described it.
Beyond that, if Mr. X claims to be a fortuneteller of extraordinary ability, and you should happen to doubt his supernatural gifts: you need not come up with a valid alternative method of fortunetelling. Showing that Mr. X relies on the standard sleight-of-hand used by stage magicians would suffice. As would a statistical analysis demonstrating that Mr. X’s prophecy record was not superior to one produced by chance.
So you mean to say that paleoclimatology is useless? Why didn’t you say so in the first place?
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The idea that we do not have an indication of what temperatures in the past were, is not really appealing I find. I think an effort should be made to find out, as best as possible. If the thing that caused the MWP or the Roman Warming could possibly come on top of the CO2 forcing, it’d be good if we know beforehand. And also know what to expect in case it happens.
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It sounds as if you dislike the detection and discussion of errors in published science–that being cited less and less is a preferable way for science to correct itself.
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No, but I’d like to see some progress made in a positive way. And not the negative blocking we have seen so long now. What bothers me especially about that is that it’s still the same old people, allied to their ideological think tanks, who clearly have a problem with the implications of AGW. That is their sole motivation to keep obstructing and not doing anything constructive, not because they have a problem with paleoclimatology in itself. It’s becoming more and more obvious, especially when you have things like Wegmangate popping up all of a sudden.
To people who say the plagiarism charge doesn’t impact the content of the report, since he is a professional statistician, I say, read the report. The Social Network Analysis dominates. If this is starting from a plagiarism, and a plagiarism from Wikipedia, then how much weight should be given to the report?
Possibly Gavin Schmidt finds AMac’s obsession with the Tiljander proxies simply tedious, given that the mainstream climate science view of what’s happening to Earth’s climate and why, doesn’t stand or fall on MBH’s work, as I believe Dr. Schmidt has written more than once?
Just guessing. You’d have to ask him.
> And not the negative blocking we have seen so long now. What bothers me especially about that is that it’s still the same old people, allied to their…
I generally refrain from discussing your motives, because (1) I don’t know you, and (2) I’m more interested in the ideas that you write here, than in speculation as to what’s in your heart. Human nature being what it is, you yourself might not even have a full and complete view of the matter.
Human nature being what it is, you yourself might not even have a full and complete view of the matter.
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And what would that be? That AGW theory is a hoax?
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I realize I might not have a full and complete view of the matter, but I did and am still doing my best to find out as much as I can with regards to the PR battle. I make an effort for the science too, but that’s more difficult.
re: AMac (Comment#54210) October 12th, 2010 at 10:26 pm
>According to Gavin Schmidt, Mann08′s non-dendro reconstructions >validate prior to 1500 with Tiljander, but fail to validate without >Tiljander. That strikes me as a change
Could you clarify this with a reference? Mann08 shows a clear MWP, but this is now invalid without Tiljander?
Neven:
Right, goofball… that’s the only option.
MikeA, I’m sure AMac can give you more detail on the various exchanges about this if you want, but here’s a link to where Gavin admitted it (I recommend ignoring what he says about McIntyre, as it is garbage): http://www.realclimate.org/?comments_popup=4431#comment-183182
The issue is the hockey stick fails without tree ring data and Tiljander, not just without tree ring data. If you keep one or the other, you still get a hockey stick.
The original hockey stick claimed to be robust to the removal of tree ring data. This claim was found to be false. Mann08 claimed to be robust to the removal of tree ring data. This claim was found to be true only if you included the Tiljander series in an incorrect fashion.
People say MBH doesn’t matter because of how paleoclimatology has advanced since then, but to me it doesn’t seem that different.
MikeN –
I think you make two errors in your #54213.
1. Social Network Analysis (SNA) does not dominate the report. SNA is mentioned in exactly one of the 10 Findings of Section 6. AMac’s post upthread (#54173) presented the 4 conclusions of the Wegman report. SNA is indirectly referenced in the final sentence of conclusion #1: “In the present example there was too much reliance on peer review, which seemed not to be sufficiently independent.” Which conclusion could have been reached without using SNA at all; the SNA approach was apparently intended to quantify the situation.
2. Moreover, Wikipedia material is not key to the argument, as you allege. The plagiarized text (from Wiki, or quite possibly it came from a predecessor of the Wiki article) is used solely to introduce the subject area of SNA — sure to be unfamiliar to most readers of the report — and definitions of its jargon. It’s all basic textbook stuff; there’s nothing original in the content.
I’m not going to defend word-for-word copying without an attribution. But suppose Wegman had done the correct thing and added a single sentence at the beginning of section 2.3, Background on Social Networks: “The following description of SNA and its jargon is from XYZ.” Just that one insertion. Then there wouldn’t be all this to-do, or at least not about SNA. Do you really think that the observations of the report hang on the omission of that sentence? Think about that before throwing the baby out.
Re: Brandon Shollenberger (Comment#54220) October 12th, 2010 at 11:56 pm
Brandon thanks for that, nasty combination of logic and mathematical proof, I see it this way:
a)Some people feel the dendro in MH98 is invalid because there is no MWP.
b)MH08 does show a MWP but only validates if the dendro or Tiljander (also under cloud) proxies are included
c) Therefore the MH08 conclusion of a MWP b) is invalid because of a)
I don’t think this is really anything to do with hockey sticks, as there are enough around for a whole team, but it goes explain the lack of popularity of the MH08 one, thanks!
What you have to realize is MBH was the first major iteration of the hockey stick. That studies followed it with similar results means little when you realize how often they used similar data. Every paper sees the same thing. A small amount of data contains a hockey stick signal. Most of it doesn’t. Depending on how you select and weight data, you may or may not get a hockey stick.
Mann08 was supposed to be a massive improvement over MBH. Ten years had passed, and people said MBH didn’t matter because it was so old. Paleoclimatology was supposed to have advanced so much in that time.
Instead, we saw more of the same. The paper’s conclusions were dependent upon a small amount of data, the validity of which was questionable. The methods and mistakes were different, but the result was the same thing. We can’t make any real claims about the MWP, no matter how much people may want to.
As for your lettered points, you seem to be very confused. MBH, Mann08, and paleoclimatology in general all say there was no MWP. You seem to have gotten it exactly backwards. Also, the two Mann papers had different authors. Typically they are referred to as MBH (which is actually the combined results of MBH98 and MBH99) and Mann08.
What if the mysterious litigation, that seems to have been mentioned by Wegman himself is a libel acton?
So, still members of the Lukewarmer Tribe are unable to define what Lukewarmer is…
Oh well…
An unbiased, unopinionated discussion of anything is not, typically, worth much, even if you can find one, and even if you can stay awake while reading it. But the passage was unnecessarily judgmental:
Better this way, I think.
According to whom? As I discussed, being critical of one or even a large number of findings in climate science does not make you a denier. This passage offers some insight:
It’s not the specific question about the specific data set that puts you in that category; it’s the immediate flight to a new contrarian hobby-horse when the old one is debunked. The frantic chasing after new objections to a theory you find odious when the old objections fail, without any notable period of reflection that you might be wrong about the theory . . . that’s the cornerstone, if you will.
Amac
I agree with willard. The recommendations aren’t affected by the plagiarism, but that’s because they are unconnected with the report. Certainly not with the PCA analysis, and scarcely with the SNA. They just seem to come from nowhere.
The statistical method used on Tiljander was sign invariant. It didn’t matter which way was ‘up’, the method used just automatically adjusted for that.
Re: Robert (Oct 13 04:32),
You are either putting your notions to paper without much thought to how they read, or you are carefully smearing me. By inviting the reader to agree that you have demonstrated how I immediately fly (1) to a new contrarian hobby-horse (2) when the old one is (3) debunked (4). That I frantically chase after new (5) objections to a theory I find odious (6) when the old objections fail (7)… and so on.
1. A cite to where I “fly”. It’s “immediate”, so easy to quote.
2. Be clear on what you think the new contrarian hobby-horse is.
3. Passive voice — state who has made this compelling argument.
4. Cite or quote for the debunking.
5. “Frantically chase” — a quote or cite to justify the pejorative phrasing.
6. Defend your mind-reading by defining the theory you are discussing and the evidence I find it odious.
7. Passive voice again; provide a cite to what the old objections are, and to who has made the compelling argument as to their failure.
And so on.
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Perhaps this is simply late-night dorm-room keyboarding on Robert’s part. Elsewise, it is an instance of deliberately lowering of the tone and substance of this discussion.
Re: bugs (Oct 13 05:00),
> The statistical method used on Tiljander was sign invariant. It didn’t matter which way was ‘up’, the method used just automatically adjusted for that.
Ouch. Here is Part One of a two-part discussion that covers this point, among others.
Bugs, I extend to you an invitation to write a guest post, setting forth these and other defenses of Mann08’s use of the Tiljander data series.
1. Politicization. Wegman would know all about that, as he was a big part of it, doing the anti-science republicans a favor.
2. Data and information is freely shared, if people are actually being a part of advancing science or making genuine queries. Much of the demands for information was little more than data mining for information that could be used to undermine science and slander people.
3. As the Clear Climate Code people have demonstrated, when approached with an open and honest attitude, help is greatfully received.
4. The Paleoclimate reconstructions are not the case for AGW, but just part of an ensemble of supporting information. The case for AGW stands completely independently of the rest of the supporting evidence.
Wegman is wrong every time.
“I know,†Barton replied. “But let’s make the sonofabitch deny it.â€
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:-p
bugs,
You only look like you have been eating alum in this one.
Toss in the towel. You are not going to win this one.
You AGW true believers are losing, and you need to do something new and innovative besides trotting the old ghg = AGW oxymoron. People have that one figured out.
Dredging up Wegman- years after you guys pretended it was nothing- only shows desperation on your part.
But hey, maybe someone can get you one of those little red buttons and you can settle a few accounts more….directly.
Re: MikeA (Oct 12 23:39),
What Brandon Shollenberger said in Comment#54220. Not valid prior to 1500, by Mann08’s and Mann09’s standards of validity. Also, see the link I offered to Bugs, supra. The Climate Audit post The No-Dendro Illusion is devoted to exploring this point.
The main problem with Tiljander isn’t its upside-down use, but the fact, that the most recent part of the data shouldn’t have been used at all due to human-made disturbances in the proximity of the lake.
Since serious researchers just ignored it. I asked a climate researcher what he thought of the paper, and he really didn’t know anything about it. It just doesn’t register on their radars, since it has nothing of substance to add, and was just created for purely political reasons. The recommendation from the recent inquiry into the IPCC was to make sure it ignores all ‘gray’ literature. I’ll agree with that.
The mathematical method used was sign invariant.
Re: bugs (Oct 13 05:28),
> 1. Politicization. Wegman would know all about that, as he was a big part of it, doing the anti-science republicans a favor.
What did Wegman do prior to the Wegman Report that would lend credence to this notion? In any case, tu quoque can’t invalidate Wegman’s observations, any more than Steve McIntyre’s discovery of copying by pro-AGW Consensus advocates excuses Wegman’s conduct in that matter.
> 2. Data and information is freely shared, if people are actually being a part of advancing science or making genuine queries.
Sharing among friends and allies is not the issue Wegman addressed.
> 3. As the Clear Climate Code people have demonstrated…
CCC is great, and offers a model that should be emulated by citizen-scientists. But Wegman’s point 3 concerned the inadequacies of the statistics used in paleoclimate reconstructions.
> 4. The Paleoclimate reconstructions are not the case for AGW… The case for AGW stands completely independently of the rest of the supporting evidence.
One might claim that paleo is not important to the case for AGW, or that it is important. It’s the see-sawing that raises eyebrows.
Your position is not generally accepted. Prof. Mann, for instance, thinks that the work of the reconstructors is very relevant to the case for AGW — and that this connection explains why his work has come under scrutiny. In this comment at Judy Curry’s blog, I link to material from the CLIVAR collaboration, which employs paleoreconstructions to validate and improve GCMs.
Re: bugs,
And when the math was applied to include the proxy, the method “flipped” the proxy in a direction that made no logical sense. This isn’t too surprising since the proxy is contaminated. But a careful research team might have noticed the way it was used made no sense and investigated why. Then, even if they handn’t know the proxy was contaminated before trying to include it, they would have included it. And they would have never presented any reconstruction that included a contaminated proxy.
Those who understand this issue would never talk about reconstructions including a flipped over Tijander as telling us anything at all.
This is not difficult to understand. Why anyone with two brain cells would think saying “The mathematical method used was sign invariant.” makes any sense tat all is a mystery to thinking people.
Bugs, what about the bigger of Tiljander problems, no comment? Or did you read only the first part of my first sentence and responded with your copypaste “sign invariant”?
Re: bugs (Oct 13 06:40),
> The mathematical method used was sign invariant
This is a talking point, not a coherent argument. It is also incorrect, inasmuch as Mann08’s EIV and CPS reconstructions used different routines (MikeN looked, here). As EW notes, it is also irrelevant, as there is no “correct” way to calibrate an uncalibratable data series to the instrumental temperature record.
Gavin Schmidt and other scientist-advocates have discontinued making this “sign-invariant” assertion, presumably because it is embarrassingly indefensible.
Bugs, I repeat my offer of a guest-post at my blog, where you can marshal and present the evidence in favor of Mann08’s treatment of the Tiljander data series.
Bugs,
“…The statistical method used on Tiljander was sign invariant. It didn’t matter which way was ‘up’, the method used just automatically adjusted for that…”
No, no, no. CPS is not sign invariant. (EIV is, but as Lucia points out you get a nonsensical answer). In the calibration period test under CPS, the proxy can only be fed in one way. There is no “auto flipping” that occurs mathemagically. And Mann fed in the series upside down relative to the a priori physical meaning postulated by the series creator. It is really that simple. Why do you continue to defend the indefensible?
AMAc,
The recommendations, as stated in your excerpt, are so general and obvious that it would make no sense to contradict. Show me a case when implementing the recommendations you underlined would not lead to improved science and public policy.
The description you chose in #54208 is a conclusion, not a recommendation. The conclusions surely describe something, but not the result of the report itself. There is nothing in the Wegman report that discusses and investigates the politicization of academic scholarly work, the sharing of research materials, the isolation of communities and the understanding of the **physical** mechanisms.
In short, the conclusions and the recommendations do not follow in any way from the report itself.
PS: Lucia, this message errors appears at the end of the …!
memory usage (true) =23855104
memory usage (false) 23302728
You don’t have to be a friend or an ally. They handed over plenty of information to people who were quite clearly enemies, till they failed to see why they should bother.
All proxies will be contaminated, it’s just a matter of degree.
Re: willard (Oct 13 07:00),
> The recommendations, as stated in your excerpt, are so general and obvious that it would make no sense to contradict.
Glad you think so. As I said earlier, they are not truisms.
> Show me a case when implementing the recommendations you underlined would not lead to improved science and public policy.
That isn’t the only issue, or even the main issue. Rather, those recommendations should have been unnecessary because they had already been internalized by the field. For instance, we can consider other areas of applied science, where public policy is strongly grounded in experimental and theoretical work. Drug regulation, medical-device regulation, structural engineering, aeronautical engineering, and mission-critical computer coding (e.g to run a power plant) are common examples. For each of these:
1. Politicization of academic scholarly work leads to confusing public debates…
Such instances are the exception, rather than commonplace. The release of Climategate-like communuciations are occasions for outrage. E.g. tobacco-funded studies. Hiding of damaging information on Vioxx’s association with higher incidence of heart attacks. The Baltimore/Imanishi-Kari/O’Toole immunology fraud case.
2. Sharing of research materials, data, and results is haphazard and often grudgingly done…
Not generally an issue to my knowledge. However, this point is complicated in some of these examples by the need for confidentiality of medical records, and by the protection of trade secrets and other commercial interests.
3. As statisticians, we were struck by the isolation of communities such as the paleoclimate community that rely heavily on statistical methods, yet do not seem to be interacting with the mainstream statistical community…
Not an issue in those fields, to my knowledge.
4. While the paleoclimate reconstruction has gathered much publicity because it reinforces a policy agenda, it does not provide insight and understanding of the physical mechanisms of climate change except to the extent that tree ring, ice cores and such give physical evidence such as the prevalence of green-house gases…
There are no parallel issues in those fields, to my knowledge.
Willard–
Thanks. I intended the memory usage notes to come after the …! So, I edited. 🙂
Ok… I know you probably want explanation because it does look like a mistake. 😉
If you go back to September, you will notice a fair number of posts discussing issue about hosting. I actually am monitoring peak memory usage, and it’s convenient for me to print it out so I can scroll down and see. I’d put wrap it in a comment, but then I’d have to “reveal source”, and read the source to see those numbers.
(BTW: Memory use is factor of 3 higher than if I used nifty new habari software to run the blog. But when I tested habari, a lot of plugins are buggy. People at the habari forum told me that many plugin authors have worked to get their plugins working for Habari 0.7, but Habari 0.7 is not ready. So… I am using Habari 0.6. When Habari 0.7 is ready, I’m going to check out how that works a bit more and hope I can reduce memory usage here. But for now,that’s on the back burner. If your curious and want to see memory use when the blog is run on Habari, go here: blog imported to habari. Scroll down. Read the memory use. )
The ‘…’ stuff is more mundane. It’s printed out to help me see whether I ever break the template in some weird way. There are better ways to do this, but you’ll sometimes see this sort of thing in bloggers templates because it’s a simple low effort way for the author to force themselves to notice problems when they visit their own blog.
Bugs, if you want a forum to make your case, just say so. The offer’s still good.
Re: AMac (Oct 13 07:16),
I wrote re: #4,
> There are no parallel issues in those fields, to my knowledge.
On reflection, this requires amendment. One of the biggest issues in medical diagnostics concerns the use of “Biomarkers” in clinical trials (“surrogate endpoints”) and by physicians (“IVD kits” and “LDTs”). For the majority of biomarkers, there is no clear-cut mechanistic connection between their presence (or absence) and the clinical condition under consideration.
All stakeholders acknowledge that this is an important issue. While the debate — and regulatory decisions — are often found to be unsatisfactory by some parties, the debate is far more informed and constructive than is the case in the climate change arena. It is more scientific, as Feynman would have viewed the concept.
“All proxies will be contaminated, it’s just a matter of degree.”
BUGS! DID YOU READ THE TILJANDER ORIGINAL PAPER?
If not, just say so as there’s no point to continue discussion. All proxies may have problems. Or not. But in this particular paper the authors know exactly what happened and why and explicitly warn against making any conclusions from the last part of the data.
AMac,
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Perhaps this could clarify things. You ask two questions. The second one is:
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> Would implementing the recommendations likely lead to improved science and public policy?
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I suspect that this question can only be answered one way. The question leads to one answer. This answer seems to me a truism. It would be tough to find someone who disagrees that implementing these recommendations will likely lead to improved science and public policy.
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I can understand that you argue that this is not so. It is always be possible to argue that it is not a truism, strictly speaking. Strictly speaking, there are no truisms, unless someone comes up with a very innovative notion of synonymity. Nevertheless, considering commonsensical clauses regarding the way we do things with words (e.g. Wegman is not recommending to do bad deeds), your question seems, at least to me, to ask for the obvious.
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Thus I believe this is only a rhetorical question. I am not condemning this rhetorical question. I am merely observing that it is rhetorical.
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Since you insist on discussing your question, I can clarify in what way I find this figure of speech of yours interesting in our discussion. If I am right and your question is rhetorical, and that implementing Wegman’s recommendations will likely lead to improved science and public policy, then we must inquire about the relationship between these recommendations and the pandemonium we are witnessing for so long.
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For comparison’s sake, it might be a good time to quote Steve’s own summary of his statement during the 109th Congress House Hearings:
> 1. little reliance can be placed on the original MBH reconstruction, various efforts to salvage it or similar multiproxy studies, even ones which do not use Mann’s principal components methodology;
> 2. peer review as practiced by academic journals is not an audit, but something much more limited. Scientific overviews, such as ones produced by IPCC or the NAS panel, are nearly entirely based on literature review rather than independent due diligence.
> 3. much work in dispute is funded by the U.S. federal government. Some very simple administrative measures under existing policies could alleviate many of the replication problems that plague paleoclimate.
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Source: http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=109_house_hearings&docid=f:31362.wais
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Comparing Steve’s summary with Wegman’s conclusions and recommendations would no doubt be a rejuvenating exercise. And it will come, no doubt about that. Beforehand, I believe we could find what can form a basis of negociation for all the parties involved.
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Interestingly, one could claim that Wegman’s own recommendations could fit this bill. Realizing that implementing the recommendations can only lead to improved science and public policy is a good argument for that claim. After all, who’s against improving science and public policy? ; – )
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Let’s also not forget that you asked two questions. This was the second one.
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PS: Thanks for the detailed response, Lucia!
AMac,
It is interesting that you bring up biomarkers as a parallel. As you say, this is a much debated issue with a high degree of science. However, I disagree that a biomarker where the mechanism of action is not well understood is regarded as an acceptable proxy. In my experience (admittedly on the pharma, not the medical device side), the FDA is loathe to accept any surrogate endpoints. To the extent they do, there will need to be a well documented and well understood link between the biomarker and a traditional endpoint. We have seen some spectacular failures on surrogate endpoint trials – torcetrapib being a high profile example. Even some “obvious” biomarkers as shrinking tumors and lower cholesterol are not always associated with a reduction in M&M statistics. There are risks in using all proxies but a proxy without a physical explanation is to be treated with great caution.
Re: willard (Oct 13 08:15),
I think — though it’s hard to be sure — that your main point is that Wegman’s recommendations are truisms, because “It would be tough to find someone who disagrees that implementing these recommendations will likely lead to improved science and public policy.”
Regarding the other applied sciences I mentioned (e.g. drug regulation), I would argue that the consensus within the field embraces Wegman’s four points (with the exceptions as noted earlier). Variances from those points are widely seen as potential departures from best practices, and must be justified in light of other important requirements (e.g. patient confidentiality, trade secret protection).
As far as the standards adhered to by most paleoclimatologists at the time of the Wegman Report, the argument is that they did not reliably embrace these four points.
Thus, rather than marginal improvements to the practice of applied science that would result from incremental further adoption of these points, paleoclimatology has the opportunity to substantially improve its performance. Especially as it is relevant to public policy questions.
This is a significant difference in degree. Again, it does not represent a truism, in my opinion.
History started when I was born. Lightning, earthquakes and volcanos? No, no, no. All manmade, not natural. All from evil co2 emissions. Lucia, did you delete my post? Me thinks you did, I think it is a very legitimate question though. For someone who portrays themselves as cautious or questioning of societal norms, you really give the global warmers nut jobs way too much credit. They have a few of the really popular science magazines, they have the guy that goes on wikipedia and changes stuff (I think that’s absolutely hilarious and wish I had his job) they have tons of news outlets to push bogus stories and they have more money. This reminds me of a fine revision I attempted to make to World War II. I posited that there was no Holocaust and no Hitler. Instead, an evil dragon came from a far away unknown land to steal all of the chocolate from Germany. I was very proud of my factual revisions and had been going at it for a good hour when a bunch of the computers next to me in the college lost the internet connection. Then, I received a message on my computer and I got kind of nervous and left the library.
Also, I would like everyone to please check out some lady running for office named Krystal Ball. Ms. Ball alleges that she is the first person to have raunch facebook pictures used to denigrate her. Furthermore, they had her on psmnbc to talk about double standards between men and women….what the hell! Women get labeled “whores” because idiots like this lady dress up like whores, and then post the pictures on facebook!
I think I’m going to spend all of my money and become homeless! I could land a spot on Kramer’s Mad Money and be praised for being very intelligent, wisely spending my money.
Re: brid (Oct 13 08:30),
Great comment. Without venturing too far off topic, I’ll add that brid states one pole of the current debate very well. The other is that analytically- and clinically- validated biomarkers can be useful in evaluating trials and in patient care. “Oncotype DX” is one such diagnostic, where components are weighted on the basis of correlation with clinical outcome, rather than on a mechanistic basis. The recent “IVDMIA” and ongoing “LDT” controversies are concerned with such issues.
While acrimonious at times, these debates seem like exemplars of teamwork and good cheer, when compared to pretty much anything in the AGW arena. There is a common notion of what “science” is, and isn’t, that is lacking here.
Similar themes have been raised repeatedly by (seemingly) expert commenters from this and other applied-science disciplines, in a number of recent threads at Judy Curry’s blog.
Amac quoting Willard
Now? Or two years ago? The fact is, we found plenty of people who disagreed with the notion that ” implementing the recommendations [of the Wegman report would ]likely lead to improved science and public policy”. Among the reasons advanced why wider sharing of data/codes etc would degrade or impede science included that scientists would be so busy doing this they wouldn’t have time for science.
Clearly, Amac’s question can’t contain a truism because a) some people can and did answer “no”, b) they gave reasons why though thought the “truism” was not true and c) the debate over this sparked blog wars.
Re: Dr. Shooshmon, phd, “seer”. ,
I’m unaware of deleting any of your posts. Your posts will be moderated as coming from a “new” person whenever you change your name or email. I’ve released the comments using your new title of “seer”. There were two, so later posts should clear.
Re: Dr. Shooshmon, phd, “seer”. , WTF? (comment-54257–) Maybe I should delete your posts.
I have to admit I really don’t get this issue. I understand that Wegman criticized St. Mann so he is by definition a bad man who must be punished if the opportunity arises but beyond that, I don’t see the significance.
I also don’t grasp why using (but failing to give full attribution) to a text that presumably has an [i]imprimatur/nihil obstat[/i] from the academic high priesthood of AGW diminishes the credibility of the report. This material was supposed to be the uncontroversial boilerplate summary of the science prior to Wegmann’s own statistical analysis and was presented as such.
1) Wegman has a fairly strong Fair Use argument if there is a copyright claim: it was for a non-profit public purpose; he expressly did not claim to be a climate scientist or create a competing climate science text; he presented the work as the common knowledge understanding of the state of the art for paleoclimate studies; admits in more than one place that the source was Bradley; used only a small portion of the work, and; there is no plausible claim for economic harm. I can understand the publisher taking a run at him anyway because unattributed use is a prima facie violation but it would not be a slam dunk for them if the thing were litigated. Why bother?
2) The university is most likely looking at the charge of plagiarism solely from the standpoint of academic rules and standards (not copyright) and are dragging their feet because they do not want to have issue a technical slap-on-the-wrist judgment because it might be fodder for a copyright claim or otherwise entangle them in litigation. Who needs that? I don’t see any reason for their reviewers/attorneys to rush.
3) The speech and debate clause defense is a stretch. The protection narrowly applies to statements originating with members of Congress. Any legal defect in documents and materials members did not create but merely rely upon would not be cured by that reliance.
Amac, Thanks – that is a very good synopsis of the pro arguments. I agree climate science can learn much from the biomarkers debate.
AMac,
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Your second question is a rhetorical question. This figure of speech is not even a question: it’s a statement in disguise. The way to see this is to consider it as a truism. IMHO, it is a truism. It does not depend on any specific “regulatory decision”. The recommendations only state best practices that, as you say, “should have been unnecessary because they had already been internalized by the field.” This is to say that they are quite obvious. The only plausible room for disagreement would be about the specific regulatory decisions, not the recommendations of best practices. No regulatory decision is recommended in the Wegman report.
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To **state** that these recommendations are not unnecessary would not be a truism. This statement would depend upon the very specific regulatory system under consideration, i.e. the institutions of paleoclimatology. That these best practices have not been internalized is is not what the Wegman report studied, unless we wish to interpret the network-analysis in a very liberal way. The Wegman report at best argues for this necessity in a very indirect way. (What was Wegman’s mandate, again?)
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I believe we can answer your question without presupposing anything about the state of the institutions of paleoclimatology. In any case, if that’s the point of contention, this should be made explicit. I believe that taking that presupposition for granted is as entertaining as it is unnecessary.
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So, yes, we should implement Wegman’s recommendations; so far, so good: in itself, it’s obviously a truism. This truism does not imply that everything else does. “We should implement such and such” does not deflate into “such and such”, or worse “such and such, because this and that”. I wish I was eating cake does not mean I am eating cake now, nor does it mean that the reason is because I am hungry.
Lucia,
> Among the reasons advanced why wider sharing of data/codes etc would degrade or impede science included that scientists would be so busy doing this they wouldn’t have time for science.
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I disagree about your interpretation. We should make data free: so far so good. But how? That’s where lies the rub.
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Everybody agrees on implementing basic principles. At least we should. The problem is always how to do that. That’s when emerge problems related to allocation of resources, conflict with other rights, etc.
.
Besides, we must distinguish passive-agressive whining from genuine concern. So let’s not discuss climate porn here.
Re: willard (Oct 13 09:24),
Your style of writing is very florid.
I’m not sure that there is a point that I can productively respond to, that hasn’t already been discussed upthread.
I will note that AGW Consensus partisans sometimes mock me for focusing on a matter as small as the Tiljander data series (e.g. Steven Sullivan, upthread.) You present the flip side, offering your opinion that my question
lacks substance because it is too general.
You claim, “It is a truism. [Because] It does not depend on any specific ‘regulatory decision’.”
In my view, I have followed the AGW debate for long enough to be able to offer a focused opinion on the Wegman Report’s conclusions, without having to bolster it with a tie to a specific regulatory decision. I rather doubt that you regularly hold fellow pro-AGW Consensus opinionators to this strict “specificity” standard.
willard-
You disagree with my interpretation of what? What people thought, said and did? Or the definition of “truism”?
They didn’t when Wegman wrote his conclusions. I’m not entirely sure everyone agrees even now.
Are you familiar with discussions in the past. Lots of people disagreed with the notion that the data, or research materials (like codes) should be made “free” at all. Lots disagreed that requiring it would improve science.
You may agree with Amac that they should be free and the only argument is how. You may think that them being free is the only right thinking position. You may think that everyone must agree with this position, and that the position is so obvious that everyone must always have agreed with it. they always have.
But your thinking this does not mean everyone always agreed with this notion– the fact is some didn’t, said so vocally, and rather recently. For example, you will find that Mann wrote this in a letter to Rep. Barton:
“http://www.redstate.com/repair_man_jack/2009/12/01/harry_read_metxt/”
It also bears emphasis that my computer program is a private piece of intellectual property, as the National Science Foundation and its lawyers recognized.
Mann violently opposed the notion that codes should be shared and certainly did not agree that science would be improved by sharing.
Jones was violently opposed to sharing the actual data and research materials underlying CRU’s temperature product. He quite famously refused to provide lists of stations used.
Many blog commenters supported these people in the notion that they did not have to share some subset of data, some particular materials or information that permitted others to know what scientists has really done to come up with final results.
Lots of people advanced the notion that all that was necessary was for scientists to share with some subset of other scientists of their own choosing. Or that it was ok to not share data for a period of time– which was rather long and permitted withholding data from the public many years after papers were published.
I happen to think following the Wegman recommendations would improve science; quite a few people agree with me. It appears you do.
However, the definition of “truism” is that the truth of the observation must be obvious to everyone. Since many people disagreed that following Wegman’s recommendations would improve science, it cannot be a “truism” that following those recommendations would improve science.
tru·ism — noun \ˈtrü-ËŒi-zÉ™m\: an undoubted or self-evident truth; especially: one too obvious for mention.
Lucia,
.
A truism is something that is obivously true, i.e. not worth agreeing or disagreeing about: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truism . You and AMac don’t like this word. So let me take another route.
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Suppose we should implement Wegman’s recommendations. How do we do that exactly? I would like to know if there anything in the Wegman report that can help us implement these recommendations. If there no implementation details discussed in the Wegman report, my bet is that it would be hard to disagree on the bases of the recommendations.
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I am not saying that it’s impossible to find persons who said they disagreed about these recommendations. But what was the matter of disagreement? From what I have seen, details that do not pertain to the recommendations themselves. So in effect, disagreeing about Wegman’s recommendations is more precisely disagreeing about some implementation detail. If you don’t have any implementation detail, what could be the nature of the disagreement?
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Saying that we should follow those recommendations would mean something if there was something to follow. (And even then, Wittgenstein disliked the idea.) If we don’t know what to implement, there is nothing to follow. If what we need is to follow a recommendation, we need to know now to implement them. So I would suggest that all interested parties should fill out some implementation details first, instead of trying to debate on general principles, emptied of any “user case.”
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The only positive outcome of discussing AMac’s question is to realize once again that reaching an agreement is tough for people. A negative one would be to realize that blog discussions tend to divide people in the name of principles that are quite empty, on the face of it.
Here’s a truism I’ve discovered:
AGW IS A Hoax
Andrew
> You and AMac don’t like this word.
I like the word “truism” just fine, even after re-checking the definition.
Your writing style remains very florid.
Lucia has provided examples of controversies surrounding Wegman-style observations and recommendations. I guess I can add, “What she said.” A laundry list of detailed implementations is truly necessary to move those observations and recommendations out of the Wittgenstein category of uselessly, unimplementably vague?
A similar conundrum can be posed about any scientific or policy controversy.
“You’re too nonspecific! === You’re getting lost in the details!”
Willard,
I think the stronger case is that all the products of publicly funded research ought to be public property. When I work as a technical consultant, the products of my labor are the property of the company that pays for my work, as defined by a legally binding contract. I can’t imagine a company would fund my consulting efforts under any other conditions. There some scientists (like Michael Mann) who obviously disagree with this “you own what you pay for” proposition WRT public funding. But the conditions of public funding are a matter of law, and laws (we hope) reflect the public’s interests and priorities.
If governments require complete and timely public disclosure of all data and codes related to research publications as a condition of receiving public funding then there is no need to convince researchers of anything. It becomes a matter of law, and that is that. Researchers who do not like the public disclosure requirements can find funding elsewhere. That is not so easy to do, so my guess is that nearly all would continue to accept public funding and make the required disclosures.
Willard
I think the word is splendid and that you are mistaking something that is not a truism for a truism. That fact that many people think something is untrue, say so vociferously, and explain why it is not true, means that thing cannot be obviously true.
That thing may, of course, be true. You, Amac and I may agree it’s true. We may marvel that the truth of the statement is not obvious to others. But, if the empirical evidence shows that the truth of the statement is not obvious, then that truth is not a “truism”.
You may well have not seen everything. The reason I asked you if you followed the arguments in the past is that many people disagreed with the recommendations precisely at the level of generality in Wegman. The disagreement had nothing to do with the details left out of Wegman.
Over time, as those people clearly began to lose the argument, they shifted to the details. But there were many who insisted that forcing scientists to share data, methods, code or anything would harm science. The number or reasons were vast– and included things like: Setting up any formal process or method disseminate data would syphon funding from scientists to do “real science”. Forcing them to share when no such process exist would rob time. Scientists have intellectual property rights; taking that away from scientists would harm science. Blah, blah, blah.
It wasn’t a matter of figuring out how to improve sharing. There have been plenty of very vociferous people who insisted that forcing scientists to share data, methods, codes by any method at all would harm science.
This is nonesense. If we can first agree that following the recommendation would help science and we agree helping science is worth we can move to the next step: Developing methods to implement the recommendations.
The reason people didn’t move on to that step is that many vociferously disagreed that insisting on openness and sharing of data, methods, code etc. was a worth step.
I’m repeating a bit because I’m puzzled. You obviously are not suggesting Wittgenstein didn’t like the idea of following Wegman’s recommendations. What are you suggesting by inserting Wittgenstein?
Willard,
What is and what is not a truism:
Is: “Climate blogs are often contentious.”
Is not: “Publicly funded researches should release all code and data.”
No need to argue about this.
Lucia,
.
You’re suggesting that it makes sense to follow a recommendation without agreeing about its implementation detail. At best, saying so makes sense, but does not say much. For what does “implementation” mean exactly without any specific stuff about how to get things done?
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One could argue that it does not mean anything. Wittgenstein was one of them: for him, the idea that when you do an addition, you are simply following a rule, can’t mean anything. Empty words devoided of any force. Let’s be more charitable than Wittgenstein. In any case, do not worry, I don’t invoke him too often. (You can follow his tweets, if you want: @WittTweets.)
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Let’s take the first recommendation. Ok, so academic work should have a more intense level of scrutiny and review. Fair enough. What does it say? Not much, at best. Why not agree with it, then?
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Let’s suppose that some might argue that no, academic work is alright as it is. Do you really want to argue with them? I bet not. But if you do, would you insist to talk about this kind of principle? Would you wait to speak to them until they agree over this principle, or would you try to be a little more specific about what we should target as levels of “intensity”, “scrutiny” and “review”?
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So people have been against that: a cite would be nice. And they lost that argument: join the bandwagon! Why have they lost? Wouldn’t it be because it makes no pragmatic sense to be against that? Who can really be against the principle to have a more intense level of scrutiny and review? Perhaps those who do not wish to presume that there is something rotten in the state of paleoclimatology, that Wegman was right all along and vindicating Steve, are disagreeing over questions of principle only because they don’t want to take for granted that they lost previous blog wars?
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Is that was the question was all about?
SteveF,
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Working my way up. I am not sure that Wegman recommends that publicly funded researches should release all code and data? I think he said that federally funded research agencies should develop a more comprehensive and concise policy on disclosure. This is not exactly the same thing. One can be for a better policy to that effect without being for everything open and free.
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Again, who’s against the idea that federally funded research agencies a more comprehensive and concise policy on disclosure? And if one can find somebody who does, what are the reasons?
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I would be for everything open and free. At least in principle. Let’s see what that entails. Let’s turn it over to lawyers.
Re: willard (Oct 13 12:25),
> Perhaps those who do not wish to presume that there is something rotten in the state of paleoclimatology, that Wegman was right all along and vindicating Steve, are disagreeing over questions of principle only because they don’t want to take for granted that they lost previous blog wars?
Could you phrase this idea in an easier-to-understand fashion, please?
Willard–
First– I am saying that plenty of people disagreed that making scientists share data,codes and methods would improve science. So, your claiming that the idea that sharing would improve science is not a truism. That fact is: People disagreed, and it wasn’t merely about details of how they disagreed that this should be done even if we could devise a method.
For what does “implementation” mean exactly without any specific stuff about how to get things done?
Uhmm… once you agree something should be done, you sit down and try to brainstorm methods of how it could be done, then if any appear feasibable you try to pick a method to do it. At that point, you have a list of “how” it will be done.
For example: Early on, I could advise my niece that once she has a stable job, is married and gets ready to have children, she should buy a house. This is a recommendation. There are no specifics describing how she should do it.
She can either agree or disagree with my recommendation.
If she agrees it’s a good idea, she can start figuring out how. If she thinks it’s a bad idea, she won’t figure out how. But not having an action plan does not mean she can’t decide whether the recommendation is good or bad.
If Wittgenstein thinks people can’t decide or at least have an opinion on whether a recommendation is right or wrong without a list of how to implement it, he was a very silly man. It is true you can’t do much to implement the recommendation in it’s entirely until you figure out how. But it is perfectly clear that you will likely have to decide if a recommendation is right or wrong before wasting the time developing a full, precise concrete action plan to do it.
Well… you not invoking him in mysterious ways is probably wise. Also, he tweets? I thought he died in 1951. I guess Wikipedia is wrong?
Do you mean would I want to argue with them back in 2006-7, when we were arguing about whether academics should be required to make be more open about methods and data? Well, you would lose your bet because people did argue that this should not be required. Argument was required to convince people otherwise.
Huh? No. I would argue with their position until they agreed on the principle. How in the world could we move on until we could get agreement that the current system was lacking. After all, their position is that the current system was lacking and that the required increase in intensity, scrutiny and review was exactly zero and they said so very vociferously.
Well, I cited Mann’s letter to Barton. I agree that you might be more convinced if I went around trying to find specific comments, but I’m going to budget my time and not do it.
Wouldn’t it be because it makes no pragmatic sense to be against that? I think their position made no pragmatic sense. Yet, they held it. So, the opposite position — the one that made pragmatic sense– was not a “truism”. It needed to be stated, and it needed to be stated over and over. It was argued over. It’s not a truism.
I’ve re-read this several times. Translation please?
Now I’m really lost. Is that what which question was all about?
Willard
From Wegman:
Some people disagreed that federally funded work — including code– should be made available to researchers upon reasonable request. One, at least, insisted it was the intellectual property of the person who wrote the code and they should have every right to withhold it. (See Mann to Barton above.) That code had absolutely zero commercial value.
Lucia,
“That code had absolutely zero commercial value.”
Yes, but it sure helps you with CYA and frustrating Steve McIntyre (and others)!
“Publicly funded researches should release all code and data.â€
No need to argue about this.
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All code and data? Nope.
National security trumps public curiousity.
So now we have one exception already.
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How many more exceptions could/should/would be carved out?
Sarah Palin’s campaign wardrobe?
Climate research?
Ron Broberb,
NOBODY is taking about military research here (national security, etc.).
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The most obvious red herring I have seen in some time.
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“How many more exceptions could/should/would be carved out?”
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None.
[quote]I’ve re-read this several times. Translation please? [/quote]
Really? That difficult? I read it as:
To engage the argument on *your* terms, requires accepting *your* premises, which ‘some’ find faulty.
Lucia,
.
I like your example. Here it is:
.
> Early on, I could advise my niece that once she has a stable job, is married and gets ready to have children, she should buy a house. This is a recommendation. There are no specifics describing how she should do it. She can either agree or disagree with my recommendation. If she agrees it’s a good idea, she can start figuring out how. If she thinks it’s a bad idea, she won’t figure out how. But not having an action plan does not mean she can’t decide whether the recommendation is good or bad.
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Let’s suppose your niece does not want a stable job, get married, get ready to have children, or buy a house. She wants to be a nun. Knowing that she can talk to you straight, she says she disagrees with you, and tells you she wants to be a nun. What do you do?
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***
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You could believe that she’s “out of her mind”, i.e. that she is holding a position that makes no pragmatic sense. I suppose you do believe that it makes pragmatic sense, in some way. Since this idea of becoming a nun makes pragmatic sense, that means that getting married, for instance, is not a truism. Yet you say:
.
> [T]he opposite position [the so many people who disagreed with W’s recommendations] — the one that made pragmatic sense– was not a “truismâ€.
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This means that it’s easy to identify a claim that is not a truism: some may disagree with it. But I thought that a truism was so obvious, that to deny it makes not pragmatic sense. If it’s possible not to make pragmatic sense by disagreeing on a claim that is not a truism, one has to wonder how to find any truism at all. If that’s how we are to conceive what a truism is, I don’t mind talking about “not making pragmatic sense” instead.
.
***
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Now, suppose you don’t agree that it makes sense at all to become a nun: you really believe that a girl should get a stable job, a husband, children, and a house. You know that your niece is disagreeing with your recommendation. Would you be arguing with your niece’s position until she agreed on the principle? I don’t know what you’d say in this specific context, but let’s adapt this related answer in another context:
.
> I would argue with [her] position until [she] agreed on the principle. How in the world could we move on until we could get agreement that [she needs to get a stable job, a husband, children, and a house].
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Your niece might reply: “well, let’s see if by becoming a nun I will fulfill the general principles underlying your recommendation. Let’s see: I’ll enter vocation, that’s a very stable job, in a way; I’ll be married to God; my children will be the ones that needs my attention; my house will be a convent.” (She could even add, with a wink: “I now see that your recommendation was really a truism after all”…)
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Does that mean that she’s following your recommendation? From your point of view, that’s not what you meant at all. You meant a real, steady job, a real husband, real children, a real house that she owns. From her point of view, she did fulfil your recommendation perfectly. It IS very stable; God IS an ideal husband; there ARE lots of children in the world that needs care; a convent IS a house. Whatever way you look at it, if you want to argue with your niece, you’ll both have to agree about what your recommendation entails. You should be able to talk with your niece about this recommendation, whether you agree or not. That is, it should be possible to agree to disagree.
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***
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Let’s pump our intuitions one last time. We now have seen two opposite ways to interpret your recommendation. You might not like the way your niece is playing with words. In any case, since she believes you want her well-being, she believes that your recommendation was expressed in good faith. So even if she disagrees with the way you are interpreting your recommendation, and some of the values behind it, she’s trying to understand your good intention. The most charitable way is to consider that, in general, for most of the girls, it’s the right recommendation. It’s not the right one for her, at least not the way you interpret it. She would not go as far as to say that the recommendation is wrong, it’s simply not right for her. You’re her aunt, after all.
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This work of interpretation comes before knowing exactly what the recommendation entails in the most definite levels of details. You don’t need to know the prayer that she’ll recite at her “wedding” to decide if this recommendation is right. On the other hand, this work of interpretation comes when both of you agree about how to get married, to get a husband (you feed him), to have children (does adoption count?), and to buy a house (what about a condo?). You must both know what the recommendation **means**, in a very rough and steady way. There is no need to know everything to commit: it might take a few years trying as a novice for your niece to know if this plan was right for her.
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I think this last extension of your example helps me show how I interpret this:
.
> It is true you can’t do much to implement the recommendation in it’s entirely until you figure out how. But it is perfectly clear that you will likely have to decide if a recommendation is right or wrong before wasting the time developing a full, precise concrete action plan to do it.
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It never was my intention to say that you need a full, precise list of concrete actions to decide if a recommendation is right or wrong. What I am saying, though, is that one needs to be made aware of enough concrete actions to have a very good idea of what a recommendation entails; you simply need to know what it “means” to agree or not. If the example is not a truism, you know which actions don’t satisfy it. If the example is a truism, you know that what you will do will satisfy it, almost out of necessity.
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Until you know enough about what your recommendation entails, you can’t judge if it’s really right or wrong, be it a truism or not. You don’t need to decide everything beforehand: you let the court determine the tougher cases. You don’t have to judge if it’s right or wrong: you have to agree on it. we’re dealing with commitments, not eternal statements.
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***
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Before returning to our case, let’s recap. In my humble opinion: a recommendation can be considered a truism if someone disagrees with it shows this someone does not make any pragmatic sense; to agree on a recommendation, one must know what it basically means, i.e. you must know what kind of actions satisfies it. To know if a recommendation is right or wrong, one needs to know if the actions that satisfies it are right too, which means that you will have to make educated guesses, most of the times.
.
***
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To return to our case. I believe we can understand Wegman’s recommendations in a very direct way. The underlying principle is simple: doing science entails intersubjectivity. The recommendations we are discussing can be circumscribed to this single maxim: follow best practices. From that principle and the maxim, we can understand that: others should be able to reproduce your results; you should be able to share data with others, so others can verify your results; the publication process insures verification of everyone’s results; the verification is done by independent experts. The Wegman recommendations barely go beyond these very basic conditions for rational inquiry.
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If one disagrees with this very basic interpretation, it must be either because the principle or the maxim is not understood the right way, i.e. with the specific actions to satisfy them, or else because it’s possible not to make any pragmatic sense. Ideally, no disagreement over such and such action should compromise the agreement over the principle and the maxim. I simply don’t know how one can disagree with that and still do science; only that kind of conception could make Feynman happy.
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If there are disagreements about the Wegman recommendations, and I am being told there are, these must be about something else than these conditions for rational inquiry.
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I believe there is evidence that this is so: people disagree over details all the times. Details of some importance, but still details that should not doubt the conditions for rational inquiry.
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***
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I’ll try to adress the other issues another time. Please bear in mind that answering quote by quote easily can lead to an unmanageable conversation.
Re: willard (Oct 13 17:34),
The entirety of Lucia’s analogy-by-niece is
This is plainly written and easily understood. But I’m afraid I don’t get the point of your 10-paragraph extension.
I’m afraid that I cannot identify the main ideas that you are trying to communicate.
Are Wegman’s four conclusions and recommendations based on concepts of surpassing complexity and subtlety? He didn’t seem to think so. I don’t think so.
It ought to be within our reach to hold a conversation where each scientifically-literate person can readily grasp what every other scientifically-literate person has written on the subject of Wegman’s report and its conclusions.
Steve Sullivan,
So you think this
trhanslates to this:
So… who is “you”. Lucia Liljegren? It’s true that I don’t think there is something rotten in all of paleo climatology. But it is not true that I have thought “Wegman is right all along”. I haven’t given much thought to Wegman until WMU started looking into plagiarism. Plus, I didn’t lose the blog war about agreeing with Wegman’s recommendatinos.
So, the “you” in willard’s sentence can’t mean “lucia liljegren”.
Is “you” Amac? Is willard asking if Amac is “disagreeing over questions of principle only because ..[he doesn’t] don’t want to take for granted that .. [he] lost previous blog wars?
Amac didn’t lose a previous blog war.
So… so the sentence doesn’t make any sense if he is “you”.
Uhmmm… could you clarify your translation so I can understand what the heck willard meant?
You know, after reading Willard’s many posts, I remain totally confused about what he is trying to say. I give up.
Willard
I say, “Wow, Maggie. That’s news!”
But why do I care why she disagrees with me about buying a house. I can still note she disagrees, admit she disagrees and not develop theories about how it is not possible for her to agree or disagree because I don’t have an action plan for “how” she is to do it. If you can along and suggested that people thinking my advise is a “truism” because people must agree with my recommendation, , I could tell you you are obviously wrong “Uhmmm, no. People can disagree and Maggie did.
(I can also note that you have changed your reason why she cannot agree or disagree with my recommendation. Before your reason had something to do with not having a plan for how to proceed.)
For what it’s worth, I think becoming a nun makes absolutely no pragmatic sense. I think it is totally nuts. Those who follow this site know I am not making this up based on your choice of hypothetical.
Nevertheless, I know that Andrew_KY thinks it makes pragmatic sense, as would my mother. So, the fact that I know tons of people who think becoming a nun makes is absolutely, positiviely freakin’ insane I know that other disagree. So the idea that “becoming a nun is nuts” is not a truism.
As it happens, I never thought getting married was a truism, and my “recommendation” only become moot in this instance.
BINGO! Especially if many disagree with it. If many disagree with it a statement, it can’t be a truism.
No. Because I am not a control freak and believe she has a right to make her own decisions. My recommendation about buying a house becomes irrelevant.
I’m reading the rest but I’m still not seeing how any of this is is remotely relevant to the issue you brought up before. The fact is, people can decide if they agree or disagree with a recommendation as stated even if there is no action plan explaining “how” we will implement it.
Whether my niece follows my recommendation is not relevant to whether she agrees or disagrees it’s good. If the recommendation is moot because she doesn’t meet the contingencies doesn’t prevent her from agreeing or disagreeing.
In every hypothetical you suggest, Maggie could say, “I (agree/disagree) that in those circumstances, I should buy a house. That’s (good/bad) advice.”
That fact that you are coming up with all these hypotheticals that are utterly irrelevant to this point suggests something not particularly flattering about your ability to identify points.
Uhmm… if I recommended it for her this would be disagreeing with my recommendation, which would be fine. she gets to decide things about her life for herself. But with respect to the relevant issue we are debating: Yes. She can figure out whether she agrees or disagrees without my giving her an action plan explaining how to implement my recommendation…
Need I go on through all your hypotheticals, which are mostly really silly and irrelevant to the point?
AMac,
.
If Lucia’s niece figures she should marry, that’s because she knows what it means to marry. Lucia’s niece needs to welcome what it represents, what it provides, etc. She does not need to know everything about marriage, but she needs to know enough about marriage so that she’s not agreeing blindly.
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Also, Lucia’s niece needs to have an idea about what happens when you marry, enough to make sure that it should be good for her. If she does not, why would she agree to marry?
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Finally, if Lucia’s niece wishes to marry, she needs to commit to it. Commitment entails some planning: Lucia’s niece needs to agree to do stuff to marry, unless she’s hoping it will happen all by itself. Any planning will do, as long as it leads to marriage one way or the other.
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So agreeing to follow a recommendation entails, at the very least, that you know what to do to follow it, that you are able to do it, and that you commit to do it. Very basic action theory: let’s just say that you know **how** to do it.
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To argue otherwise is unwinnable. Consider someone who says that we should solve the Millenium Prize Problems. As a recommendation, this makes no sense.
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To say that Lucia’s niece does not need a “full action plan” is irrelevant. Nobody argued needed a full action plan. So not only Lucia’s conclusion does not obtain, it tries to refute something I do not hold.
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Finally, the main ideas are not in the example, but in the last paragraphs, the one following “to return to our case.”
Lucia,
.
You go on about hypotheticals without connecting anything you say. You’re not easier to follow.
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If you say:
.
> If many disagree with it a statement, it can’t be a truism.
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> Those who disagree with the statement makes not pragmatic sense.
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You’ve basically making my case: just switch “truism” for “not making pragmatic sense”. Meanwhile, try to find me one example of a truism according to your this “bingo!” criteria, beside very basic definitions: I am quite confident to find someone who disagrees. Don’t forget, we are on the Internet.
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***
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If you say that:
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> The fact is, people can decide if they agree or disagree with a recommendation as stated even if there is no action plan explaining “how†we will implement it.
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Perhaps, but I remind you that AMac’s question was about if we should agree about implementing recommendations, and you were talking about following recommendations. We are not talking about any kind of statements: we are talking about statements that are commitments.
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If you recommend to me to draw a portrait of a cat, you might not need to tell me how. But unless we’re talking about some metaphysical sense of moral permission, we need to agree as to how to do it. That is, I need to know what counts as a portrait of a cat, that I can draw this kind of portraits of cats, and I need to commit in some way to drawing the portrait of a cat.
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Wegman’s recommendations were not intended to be judged by passive blog readers. Some people will have to implement them. Those people will need to know what means to implement them. Those people will need to be able to implement them. Those people will need to commit to them.
.
Recommending entails more than stating.
Lucia,
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Why not spend my evening here. Here is what I meant by this:
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> Perhaps those who do not wish to presume that there is something rotten in the state of paleoclimatology, that Wegman was right all along and vindicating Steve, are disagreeing over questions of principle only because they don’t want to take for granted that they lost previous blog wars?
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This relates to AMac’s question: should we implement Wegman’s recommendations? I am wondering what it takes to answer “yes” to this question. If I say that we should implement W’s recommendations, does that mean that I should also believe that something’s rotten in the state of paleoclimatology? Does that mean that I should also believe that Wegman vindicated Steve? Does that mean that I should also believe that someone lost some blogwars?
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That interrogation was prompted by your reference to blog wars that “sparked.” If this was a debate over Wegman’s recommendations that have sparked blog wards, AMac’s question enters this political minefield. This question becomes a very different beast than a rational inquiry. It may be saddening Feynman, but such is life.
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No wonder then that we can find people that says “no” to AMac’s question. It would still be interesting to know who, beside the usual suspects. It might even be important, to make sure these “no”‘s are really about the recommendations themselves.
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Separating AMac’s question from the topics of my interrogation would be important to have a rational conversation. If AMac’s question takes part in an exercise of rational argumentation, I am quite confident that one can agree with the essence of Wegman’s recommendations.
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Holding that they are truisms is certainly not necessary for that exercise. But that’s the way I see them: some pretty basic stuff about best practices in science there. I really wonder how we can do science without them.
Well, All code and data should be released unless releasing it defeats the purpose of collecting it or writing it.
National security code ( err I held a TS/SAR clearance) should not be released, because releasing it defeats the purpose it was written for. Same for code for businesses who make money off the code.
Other code, like code written for paleo, is intended to establish a scientific case that will convince others and provide a foundation of knowledge for others to build on. That purpose is not subverted by the release of the code. so, free it.
I find it amusing that you call yourself a denier, but my endorsing that self-description is “smearing” you. Is this like a certain rude label for African-Americans? Is “denier” one of “your words”?
Clearly, given your flailing, complete with enumerated list of demands, I hit a nerve. Do you recognize yourself in a way that is not flattering? That’s too bad.
I’d be more than happy to write a guest post for you. Of course, I can’t promise to defend the proxy. Perhaps it’s bad. I can entertain that idea, being a skeptical person (in the real sense, not the Exxon-sponsored sense). Yet, even if I come to believe it is untrustworthy, that will not make me a “denier” because that is about a special, faith-based relationship to science, not whether you agree or disagree with a specific line of argument in a specific paper.
All this is rather ironic, considering the difficulty in understanding who Wegman used, and why, and what he borrowed or stole, and the dishonesty of the report itself (deleting two out of three of Hansen’s scenarios and so forth.)
But is this a good recommendation, regardless? It’d be nice, but there are complications. Late for work, will revisit that thought.
willard– I’m not sure why you are stuck on whether or not my niece marries. The recommendation does like this:
If you do X, then you should do Y.
So, the pattern:
If you want to improve science, then you should release code or data.
If you get married & etc., then you should buy a house.
Obviously, if climate scientists response to Wegman’s recommendations was, “We don’t want to improve science”, Wegman’s recommendation “Release code and data” is moot. We will have learned something.
If my niece doesn’t want to get married, then the recommendation about buying a house becomes moot.
Both recommendations had contingencies. I could have written my hypothetical without it, and then Maggie could disagree and give the reason, “No. I shouldn’t buy a house because I want to be a nun.” Then, she would simply disagree. The disagreement has nothing to do with your original objection which seemed to be that people need to decide how they are going to implement a recommendation before they can decide if they agree or disagree with it. They don’t need to do that.
You are very confused about the hypothetical. I didn’t recommend she marry. It was a contingency: If she does “X” (marries etc.) then she should do “Y”.
I could equally well pair this with “If she does Z (becomes a num), then she should not do Y”
You said they need to know how to do it. Since the recommedation is not “She should get married”, but “If X, she should do Y” with “Y” buy a house, in principle, according to you, she would need to know “how” she will buy a house. But that’s wrong. When deciding whether she agrees with the “If X, she should do Y”, she can defer that knowledge and figure out “how” to buy a house later.
Willard
Uhmmm… missing info: In what sentence do you want me to switch “truism” for “not making pragmatic sense”?
Do you want me to write:
> If many disagree with it a statement, it can’t be a “not making pragmatic sense”
or
> Those who disagree with the statement makes truism?
Those sentences aren’t even grammatically correct. What do you think writing either proves?
Maybe you can concoct the sentence you are suggesting I concoct and the actually reveal, in words, what you think that sentence proves?
Huh? Please explain what you consider to be the precise difference between “following a recommendation” and “implementing a recommendation”, and put that explanation in context of Wegman’s recommedations. The stuff you say afterwards is just jibberish.
Honestly willard, after reading your “translation” of your previous jibberish sentence, I’m not sure rational conversation is possible if you are involved. I admit that often, misunderstanding spring up because people write sentences that aren’t quite clear etc. But your stuff… wow!
I’ll let others continue, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the give up after trying to figure out what the heck you might even be trying to say. Have fun.
Isn’t it time to bet on the Oct. UAH? I’ve tried to be too clever by half the past couple of months, but would like to try again. I think it’s going to be a tough month to call.
Isn’t it time to bet on the Oct. UAH? I’ve tried to be too clever by half the past couple of months, but would like to try again. I think it’s going to be a tough month to call
Shoot! Yes. Let me get that up!
Re: Robert (Oct 14 04:38),
I’ve urged Willard to be as clear as possible in his writing. I will take some of my own medicine.
You closed your Comment#54227 by quoting me and writing
In context, “you” refers to me (AMac), and “that category” refers to “denier.”
I responded in Comment#54230,
The plain meaning is the intended meaning: if you are calling me a “denier,” then you are smearing me.
This is not a new concept; it’s been discussed extensively at The Blackboard (also at Collide-a-scape and Roger Pielke Jr.’s blog). On March 7, I noted
On May 12, I remarked to Boris,
On May 14, I responded to sod,
And on May 31, I again addressed sod,
Robert, your Comment#54227 continues in the “denialist” vein with over-the-top rhetoric, as I noted upthread in Comment#54230. This morning’s Comment#54300 serves up more of the same.
As I said back in March: I could spend my time thinking up ways to insult people with whom I am discussing science or math or policy, at a party or online. But why would I?
Why do you?
You are continuing to ignore the fact that you self-identified as a denier above:
Note you did not say “because of X, other people identify me as a denier.” Nope, you said you were one. Was that simply a lie? Or were you in fact trying to imply (rather clumsily) that the label of denier is attached to anyone who questions any aspect of climate science? That’s not accurate — in fact, it’s a self-serving smear.
Re: Robert (Oct 14 17:37),
> You are continuing to ignore the fact that you self-identified as a denier above
Robert, I had assumed from your writing that you are fluent in English. However, it seems that you have inadvertantly quoted me out of context. Here is that context, accompanied by in-line explanations.
– – – – – – – – – –
oliver (Comment#54198) October 12th, 2010 at 8:10 pm
Robert,
From the site you link:
Looks like just the sort of unbiased, unopinionated discussion that’s perfect for discussing what makes “rational sense.â€
[Explanation: Oliver is expressing his disdain for the material of yours that he quoted, employing irony (“the use of words to express something other than and especially the opposite of the literal meaning”). In other words, he is contesting the notion that the “Idiot Tracker” blog is well-suited to an unbiased, unopinionated discussion.]
– – – – – – – – – –
Carrick (Comment#54199) October 12th, 2010 at 8:12 pm
… a smattering of pro-science folks.
What a crock of sh*t.
[Explanation: Carrick is directly expressing his disdain for the material of yours that Oliver quoted. In other words, he is contesting the claim that you are among a smattering of pro-science folks at The Blackboard.]
– – – – – – – – – –
AMac (Comment#54200) October 12th, 2010 at 8:25 pm
> … a smattering of pro-science folks.
Robert, I’d like to invite you to do a guest post, defending the use of the Tiljander data series in the paleoclimate reconstructions of Mann08. I have been very critical of this aspect of paleoclimatology, which makes me a denier. You would, I think, add a valued pro-science perspective to my blog.
Sometimes things are as simple as they seem, and the debate over AGW is certainly one of those cases.
[Explanation: I am expressing my disdain for the material of yours that Oliver quoted, employing irony. In other words, I am contesting the claim that you are among a smattering of pro-science folks at The Blackboard. I am contesting your notion that a person who dissents from Consensus pro-AGW orthodoxy must be a “denier”. I am contesting the orthodox stance that the debate over AGW should be seen as the refusal of “deniers” to accept “settled science”.]
– – – – – – – – – –
I hope that clarifies matters.
I’m not sure why Lucia is getting stuck over “truism” and “how” and why she feels entitled to insult me.
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Anyhow, let’s return to what’s interesting: AMac’s question, which I answered by the affirmative:
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[WSIWR] We should implement Wegman’s recommendations (for science’s betterment).
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I said that this answer (henceforth abbreviated) was so obvious as being a truism: in my opinion, it would be tough not to agree, at least on principle. Lucia countered that some people did disagree with it, so it’s not a truism.
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Surprised, I asked Lucia to show me what would count as a truism to her; she never replied. On reflection, I realized that it does not matter much, as I don’t absolutely need to hold that WSIWR is truistic: “disagreeing with it makes no pragmatic sense” is strong enough. The difference is a matter of complexity to grasp the coherence of some position. Perhaps the latter is a bit weaker, but good enough for what I want to hold. And so I think me and Lucia can agree when she says:
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> I think their position made no pragmatic sense. Yet, they held it.
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Presumably, their position amounts to disagree that WSIWR. Persumably, “they” are enough in number to disprove the truistic nature of what bothers us right now. Yet, their position “made no pragmatic sense.”
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It would be interesting to see why people disagreed about WSIWR and what were the arguments against it. Since AMac asked the question, I believe he would like to know. So it would be interesting to see examples of arguments and reference to people holding these arguments against WSIWR, among other things to have a better idea about what is bugging them exactly.
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Apparently, Michael Mann replied to Barton that he won’t share his code because it’s his commercial property, or sohis lawyers are saying. Lucia condiders that claim is not true. However untrue this claim is, Michael Mann holds it. This disagreement between Lucia and Mann is about commercial matters, not WSIWR. Since Wegman’s first recommendation exludes commercial matters, I fail to see the relevance of Mann’s letter for our discussion.
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IMHO, the Wegman recommendations can be interpreted as a minimal, basic, natural, obvious, commonsensical, no-brainer way to make science work. I believe that not following the Wegman recommendations amounts to stop playing the “science” game. I believe that if Feynman’s conception of science is written in his books, we could find that disagreeing with WSIWR makes no pragmatic sense to him, except by some cargo-cult arm-waiving.
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Furthermore, I believe that if we ask to a representative sample of scientists who have no dog in this blog war, we’d find that almost everyone of them agree with WSIWR. They’re the ones who will be implementing the recommendations, so it might be crucial to know what they think of them, whether they agree or not, what “contingencies” they’re thinking of to recuse them, etc.
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***
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Taking my minimal interpretation of Wegman’s recommendations in #54288, I started to query people around me. I have yet to find someone who can understand how we can disagree with that way of doing science. They’re not a bunch of scientists, only people I know. I can report my findings if need be. Suffice to say for now that they all agree on principle.
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Interestingly, I often had to explain what “implementation” means. Coming from cognitive science, I used the software analogy: creating a piece of software that satisfies a (formal) specification. I used other images that is familiar to each of them, inspired by this definition: “to apply in a manner consistent with its purpose or design”. Thanks to Steven Mosher to remind that last subtlety, letting aside that “purpose” is a messy term.
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Was it the meaning of “implementation” we wished to convey? Googling “define: implement”, I see there are alternatives: to enforce, i.e. to ensure observance of laws and rules; to “follow through”, i.e. to pursue to a conclusion or bring to a successful issue. One can see that there are nuances. Let the reader explore more nuances by searching “define:follow”.
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***
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In my opinion, to implement something is to **do** something. I thought that following through Lucia’s example of her niece could help me underline that fact: marrying, having kids, buying a house are kinds of stuff you **do**. I can come up with many different situations to see what counts as an action: brushing your teeth (actionable, like implementing Wegman’s recommendations), losing weight (actionable, like bettering science), etc. Philosophy texts tend to recycle the same examples over and over again. So I sticked with Lucia’s niece.
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I used marrying as the action, whereas in the original example it was a precondition. Adapting the example helped me express many ideas I found noteworthy, which sadly will not be discussed (e.g. marrying God). I wonder why marrying should confuse anybody. Nevermind, my bad. Perhaps I should rephrase everything, replacing “marrying” with the original action: “buying a house”.
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Here it goes. Agreeing that Lucia’s niece should buy a house entails: that she knows what it means to buy a house; that she (knows she) can buy a house; that she commits to buying a house. If she does not satisfy those conditions (at the very least), her agreement is quite “moot”. Consider:
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– I should buy a house, but I don’t know what it means.
– I should buy a house, but I (know I) can’t.
– I should buy a house, but I won’t commit to it.
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It certainly is possible to say any of these three sentences, but I really wonder if that’s the kind of agreement we’re looking for. They would be quite moot. (Note that I did not used counterfactuals, as expressed in #54302, for which I see no reason. Also note that in “if X, one should buy a house” cases, the object is indefinite, whereas in AMac’s question it is definite: we’re not agreeing to implement any recommendations but Wegman’s.)
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Hopefully, this will suffice to show that to agree to do something implies some “know-how”: you can’t know what it means to do something otherwise. Not much know-how, perhaps, but enough to be sure that we’re not sell-pitching crooked contracts. Agreeing about implementing something without knowing what it means, knowing if we can do it, and knowing if we’re ready to commit to do it is only interesting insofar as we’re sitting in our confortable armchair, judging the fate of Science. Nevertheless, as entertaining as it may be, it can only lead to moot agreements.
Erratum: “bettering science” is not an action, but an outcome.
Willard,
Although I sometimes agree with you, you’re getting really boring.
Lucia, a significant minority of your regulars’ has an output consisting entirely of personal insults, jeering and sarcasm. While it’s natural to more readily appreciate the flaws, compositional and otherwise, in those with whom we disagree, it seems to me a little hypocritical the way you will look past pure trolling and abuse to castigate someone who is at the very least making an effort to have a rational conversation and answer point for point.
“have” not “has”
Missing the edit button.
Pots and kettles.
Robert–
Castigate? I wasn’t castigating.
I am simply pointing out that I absolutely cannot understand many of the things he writes. This falls under providing information. Often, I cannot understand sentences. Even more frequently, I cannot even begin to figure out what point he is trying to make. Because, I cannot understand what he says, I have a rational discussion with him. Whether or not he is trying to post rational arguments, I don’t think anyone can have a rational discussion with him because what he writes is incomprehensible.
Possibly, part of the difficulty is that he seems to like to advance arguments using rhetorical questions some of which contain multiple clauses, whose relationship to each other are obscure. I am finding these incomprehensible.
Willard is free to keep posting– as are you. But I want to let him and others know that I am bowing out of those conversations because he is incomprehensible.
FWIW: One of the informal rules around here is that people must avoid persistently arguing by use of rhethorical questions. The reason that is a rule is the technique is very confusing. Andrew_KY was put on moderation for persistent violations at one time and has learned.
Possibly, I should have diagnosed the frequent use of advancing arguments or explaining points using rhetorical questions, remembered that rule and told willard that he must follow it. But the diagnosis of “overuse of rhetorical question” did not occur to me, and it slipped my mind to mention the rule and explain why it is a good rule.
It would be interesting to have an example of a “rhetorical question.”
Willard–
Maybe I was mistake about questions being rhetorical. I thought this was rhetorical:
This seems to be one of many rhetorical questions in comment willard (Comment#54276)
It’s difficult for me to imagine you meant those questions as something other than rhetorical. You answered one yourself. I actually permit rhetorical questions if you answer them yourself. I discourage them just left hanging there.
Still, maybe you didn’t intend those as rhetorical.
Interesting enough, two people asked you for a translation of one of the seemingly rhetorical quetsions. You gave this answer:
It’s difficult for me to believe you were hoping someone would answer a question as silly as “If I say that we should implement W’s recommendations, does that mean that I should also believe that something’s rotten in the state of paleoclimatology?“.
I have no idea why anyone would think your thinking we should implement W’s recommendations would tell us anything about what you should believe about the any rottenness in the state of paleoclimatology. The question comes out of the blue, and it seems as logical to your question as to ask this obvious jibberish question, ” If I way we should eat chocolate ice cream for dessert, does that mean I should also believe there is something rotten about wearing designer blue jeans”?
The stuff that followed in that comment sounded similar to my example question. That is, it sounded like jibberish. If someone else understands what you are saying, you are free to post. They can discuss your notions with you.
But, I can’t because, to me, it reads like a disconnected mess.
Eli Rabbett discussed his view of the Wegman Report’s conclusions and recommendations over at Bart Verheggen’s blog, at my request (Thanks, Eli). He thinks very poorly of them, e.g.
So I think the conclusions are constructive, while Eli finds them malign. Therefore they are not truisms.
AMac,
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I think that Eli is talking about the conclusions, not the recommendations.
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In any case, the way you framed your question to Bart and Eli makes me believe I am not always talking absolute nonsense. Something seems to be getting though in spite of the lack of an edit button, the language barrier, and my background in humanities.
Lucia,
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I now see why you take them as rhetorical questions. In a way, they are. But I sincerely asked these to know what judgements must one presume to answer AMac’s pair of questions, which could very well sound like: “we won, you lost, get over it and come discuss your surrending terms.” Knowing AMac’s sense of diplomacy, I suppose that’s not what he would like to imply, yet he sometimes speak of inerrancy and cargo cult. We need to know what facts must be presumed before answering his questions.
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Maybe I should have asked more directly: what is the logical relationship between Wegman’s conclusions and his recommendations? Do we need to accept Wegman’s conclusions before discussing his recommendations?
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I believe that to maintain a rational discussion, we need to separate these recommendations from Wegman’s conclusions. If we can’t do that, I really doubt that people will leave their guns at the entrance of the bar. We’ll have the usual answers. People will start to endorse positions that make no pragmatic sense. There will be no way to tell if people disagree about the recommendations because they think it’s a political contest or because there are values at stake, because it sounds fishy, et cetera.
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Michael Mann’s letter to Joe Barton is a good example for what is not a rational discussion. The guy is fighting to save his face as a researcher. He’s arguing with lawyers beside him. Yet, this is the only example we have for now as someone who disagreed with Wegman’s recommendations. And I already said that we can doubt that Mann was even arguing about them. How could he, in a letter published before the publication of the Wegman report anyway?
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My personal belief is there is something that Eli, Mann, Wegman, you, Lucia, Feynman, me and everybody else share some principles of rationality in all our discussions. We all want (better) Science. I believe that some of conditions for (better) Science are at the core of Wegman’s recommendations. Surely, there is stuff in Wegman’s recommendations that might not appeal to everybody. I don’t like that commercial clause, for instance, which is not something that Wegman can talk from authority, but who cares: that’s not really important for now. Before tackling these contencious details, why not try to find something that could make everyone happy? Why are we arguing, if it’s not to agree on values and principles that we share?
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That seems to me the only way to discuss and getting somewhere. If I am wrong, I don’t believe that there can be a rational discussion over Wegman’s recommendations with a positive outcome. We can’t agree to disagree on principles of what constitutes a rational discussion.
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I apologize in advance if what I am right now saying makes no sense. I believed a simple thought experiment could help diffuse all obscurities surrounding what seems to me irrelevant here, but interesting from a philosophical point of view. It did not.
Willard
You don’t need to presume any of those things to answer AMac’s questions. Had you made this claim directly, people could have understood that you were making an obviously incorrect claim and told you that. But you didn’t.
I’m glad to learn they were rhetorical in some way. If they were not rhetorical, then they were idiotic questions. I was giving you the benefit of the doubt by assuming they were rhetorical.
Is that a rhetorical question? The answer to the latter is, “no, we don’t”.
In any case, the answer to the question is irrelevant to Amac’s original question, which one could answer without pondering all these other irrelevant rhetorical questions. So, I really don’t know why you are bringing them all up. The fact that you bring them up in the form of incomprehensible rhetorical questions only makes what you are trying to communicate even more mysterious.
Well, then maybe you should have said this directly instead of spewing obvious nonsense about truisms.
Now that you’ve spit this opinion out, I can simply point out that there is no reason Amac can’t first ask his question and find out whether anyone does disagree. If they don’t disagree, this issue you feel the need to ponder is utterly irrelevant. That is, the discussion you would like to divert us to would be a pointless waste of time. I think pretending an issue that may be pointless waste of time need to be delved before answering questions required to figure out if the issue is moot is idiotic.
So, if your goal is to have a rational discussion diverting discussion to that point is silly. Trying to accomplish the diversion by arguing by a series of rhetorical question is moronic because no one can tell what your point is and then explain why the issue you are trying to discuss may very well be moot.
In fact, Amac and I told you that people not only find them unappealing but flat out disagree. So, they cannot be truisms. Are you now admitting they are not truisms? Or what? (Real question.)
Are these rhetorical questions? Or are you hoping for answers? Which would you like answered first? (All could be. We may not agree on the answer. Yet.. you continue as if you assume we will all have the same answer.)
It seems to me you jumping in and labeling peoples question a “truism” is a tactic better designed to thwart discussion. So is your habit of asking rhetorical questions. Just how it seems to me.
Well… there are those questions that seem rhetorical for which you supplied no answers of your own.
Do you intend people to answer and discuss them? Or did you think the answers were obvious? Or what? If you want to have rational discussion on blogs, you will need to cut those out because this method of discussing things doesn’t work. (This is my empirical observation. It just doesn’t work. The person asking rhetorical questions, assuming everyone agrees with whatever answer they consider “obvious” merely manages to sound like an idiot spouting jibberish.)
What thought experiment? (Can it be named) What obscurities? Can obscurities surround something irrelevant? And in any case what do you think is irrelevant? (Can the irrelevant thing be named?)
I’m not sure I really want answers because I suspect the answers will be no clearer than that mystery closing sentence. I’m sure you are trying to be clear. But criminy !
Re: willard (Oct 15 17:05),
From Comment#54173, here are two questions I asked.
* Are the conclusions of the Wegman Report insightful and correct?
* Would implementing its recommendations likely lead to improved science and public policy?
I, a lukewarmer, think they seem like valid assessments and helpful suggestions.
The Bunny, a knowledgeable pro-AGW Consensus partisan, characterizes the conclusions as poison (the recommendations too, I’ll wager — though I didn’t frame my query with sufficient precision).
So the questions can be posed and readily answered. This is not a “let’s all get along” moment. This is not a case where better understanding will lead to a consensus. We already understand — and we disagree.
No need for analogies, complex grammar, or rhetoric. Simple, direct, and short seems adequate in this case.
Amac #54457
My standing question is, can you or anyone see how the conclusions relate to the body of the report?
I’ve said the conclusions seem sensible enough, though 3 is special pleading for the stats profession.
Nick Stokes (Comment#54463) October 15th, 2010 at 10:50 pm
No.
An error by Wegman himself
http://klimazwiebel.blogspot.com/2010/10/law-and-order-in-paleoclimate.html
What an ignoramus, and he is supposed to be providing expert information.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5569901
Lucia,
.
AMac asked two questions, first about the conclusions, second about the recommendations. It’s not unreasonable to suppose that the recommendations somehow follow from the conclusions, in a way that it would be irrelevant to discuss the recommendations without agreeing first on the conclusions. Logically connecting both questions would not be an obviously incorrect thing to do. The two questions are not as unrelated as eating ice cream and wearing jeans.
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***
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When somebody says in a conversation that something is a truism, he’s usually not stating a contingent, universal truth. He’s simply stating his opinion: he can’t do otherwise unless he surveyed lots of people. Trying to refute this kind of statement like it is a contingent, universal truth makes little sense. And I still don’t have an example of something that would be a truism to you. A simple research on the concept of “analyticity” should make you see that this is not a trivial matter.
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To refute a statement that it would be implausible that I have made, I’m getting Michael Mann’s letter. Its argument is not even incompatible with Wegman’s recommandations. Unless he had a time machine, Mann is not answering Wegman’s recommandations. Mann has not written this letter in the context of a rational discussion, so barely applies here. The only way I can make sense of invoking Mann’s letter here is to make sure that anyone who’d like to disagree with Wegman’s recommendations will have the great proviledge to stand next to Michael Mann. These are not unimportant concerns regarding this example. Yet the only reason we’ve been given so far not to have another example is that you’re going to budget your time.
.
***
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The thought experiment was about your niece. It adapted your example that is supposed to show that you don’t need to know what it is to buy a house to agree to buy a house. This makes little sense to me. If you don’t get by now that to agree on buying a house, you need some know-how, too bad. If you ever get an interest for that kind of stuff, just open an introduction to action theory.
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What’s relevant for our discussion is that to answer AMac’s question, I need to know what we must understand by “we should agree to implement Wegman’s recommendations”. My own interpretation renders it quite obvious. I now am pretty sure that’s not the way people interpret this.
Nick,
> My standing question is, can you or anyone see how the conclusions relate to the body of the report?
Heh. Fair enough. You’ve engaged in back-and-forth on this issue in a couple of fora, with Steve McI and others. My answers to your narrow question follow (caveat lector, I am not going to scan the WR instead of getting on with Saturday chores, in order to be sure they’re right).
#1 (upthread summary) — No. This concerns politicization. Wegman is entitled to offer an expert opinion on the subject.
#2 — No, I think. This concerns sharing of data and code. Another area where Wegman is entitled to offer an expert opinion. The hacked Climategate emails offer irrefutable evidence that this has occurred (IMO — I realize that nothing is universally agreed-upon in the AGW Wars. But then, Steve Mosher has repeatedly solicited benign interpretations of damning excerpts, and AFAIK no pro-Consensus partisan has ever offered a credible riposte).
#3 — Yes. The subject is the lack of interaction between the paleoclimate comunity and mainstream statisticians. The WR discusses the “short-centered” variant of principal component analysis that Prof. Mann and coauthors invented and applied to paleo problems. It was an invalid innovation that arose due to this isolation. The (seemingly-plagiarized in part) social network analysis indirectly addresses this point.
#4 — Unsure. This is about the disconnect between proxy correlation and understanding of mechanistic influence of climate upon proxy, and segues to a statement that it is important for research with public-policy implications to be careful and thorough. To me, the “disconnect” statement sounds like a truism (Willard!). Think Tiljander. A fit topic for Wegman to offer an expert opinion on, IMO. Likewise for the call for greater carefulness and thoroughness. But again, as this battle rages, no statement from any quarter can be anodyne or uncontentious.
Willard–
First: Once again, there are communication issues with your introductions. This remark has nothing to do with anything I wrote.
Second: I don’t really know what your point is. Which questions do you want to “logically connect”? If you think they should be logically connected, go ahead and describe the logical connection that you think exists. Don’t just posit that there is a logical connection.
Third: My ice cream and jeans analogy never applied to connecting recommendations and conclusions. It applied to the logical connection between thinking we should implement W’s recommendtions and believing something is rotten in the state of paleo-climatology. Scroll back to the comment where I used the analogy. It applied to this question you posted previously:
With respect to my first point: You can’t expect everyone to answer every one of your questions and I didn’t engage that one. In your most recent post, you asked many, many questions. I answered the second, not the first of
I don’t think we need to accept Wegmans conclusions before discussing the recommendations. (I don’t know why you would want a long analysis of the logical relationship between his conclusions and recommendations. If you want to write a dissertation on that and tell us what you think, feel free. I’ll probably think “Yawn”. But who knows? Maybe if you say what you think instead of trying to argue by rhetorical question you can manage to say something informative.)
If you call something a truism because you haven’t gotten out in the world and don’t have a clue what people think, that’s your problem. If others show you evidence that people (like Micheal Mann to congress) disagreed with the thing you consider a truism, you should give up your position that it is a truism instead of spouting nonesense based on your lack of knowledge of what people think. It may well be your opinion that something must be a truism, but that opinion was clearly based on lack of knowledge.
The fact that you can’t prove something is a truism does not mean you can’t prove something is not a truism. If you don’t understand this, your understanding is clearly lacking.
The term “pompous pedantic fool” springs to mind.
Ok… I’m bored with this… You continue to spout totally ridiculous things. I’m going to go eat breakfast with my husband.
Bugs re: Wegman and CO2 —
Ouch!
Lucia,
.
That there is something rotten in climatology was my florid way to speak of Wegman’s conclusions. Implementing measures to prevent that relates to Wegman’s recommendations. It’s very natural to connect Wegman’s recommendations to Wegman’s conclusions. If people disagree with Wegman’s conclusions, chances are they won’t wish to discuss Wegman’s recommendations. I think I’ve seen enough of the world to believe this.
.
Your proof of what is not a truism is spurious if your criteria on what constitutes a truism disqualifies about every statement people can make in a conversation. Even if I grant you this strict meaning of “truism”, this proof would not even relevant to what I am saying. Even if I grant you this strict meaning of “truism”, your proof is yet to be shown, since I still fail to see how Michael Mann’s letter to Barton relates to Wegman’s recommendations. And even if you were right, I don’t need “is a truism”, because I can settle to “making pragmatic sense”.
.
Enjoy your meal,
.
w
Willard
IMO: This way of speaking that fails to inform the reader of any coherent thought.
And yet, you make no effort to either connect them or discuss why you think they are disconnected. You merely wish to spout platitudes about what you think is natural.
So? Your first claim was that AMac’s question was a truism. This observation is irrelevant to that.
Possibly. But it appears you have not been out enough in the world to recognize a truism. As usual, your response consists of a series of non-sequiturs or red herrings.
My criteria does not disqualify every statement people could make.
To what are you referring when you say “this strict meaning of “truism” “? The one in all dictionary? If the common meaning of truism does not apply to what you mean when you claim something is a truism, then you cannot expect people to understand what you mean. It will be impossible for people to engage in rational discussions with you, and the problem lies in you.
I’m not surprised to learn you fail to see how Mann’s letter relates to Wegman’s recommendations but I attribute that to your manifest failures to see the obvious.
Mann disagrees with the notion that code should be shared. With respect to the notion that following or implementing Wegmans recommendation would benefit science being a “truism”, date of the quote is irrelevant: That Man thought code should not be shared at any time either means that a) He does not agree with Wegman’s implicit notion that scientists should want to improve science when possible or b) He does not agree sharing code will improve science.
So, unless we think Mann disagrees science should be improved when possible, we have an example of a person who thinks following the steps in Wegman’s recommendations would not improve science.
With respect to a discussion of whether or not Wegman’s recommendation is a truism– that is, something need to even be stated for everyone to recognize true– the date when Mann disagreed with the truth of the substance of the so-called-truism is irrelevant. If many people (especially well thought of ones who “count”) vocally disagreed with the statement ” X will improve science” until Wegman said it, and afterwards all slapped their heads, and said, “Aha! Now I see that what Wegman says is true”. then the statement ” X will improve science” is not a truism. Clearly, the statement’s truth could not be obvious because people not only did not recognize the truth but when presented with the notion denied its truth.
Maybe you should have settled many comments ago before posting “logical” philosophical arguments defending your notion of “truism” whose logic errors would be evident to clever 14 year olds. . .
Cherrios are great.
But seriously, it’s very tiring to deal with all the non-sequiturs, red herrings, weird language use, suggestions that if one one read about “analycity” they will recognize the non-trivial nature of points you think matter &etc. If your points are non-trivial, you should be able to say so. Anyway, that was another non-sequitur, I didn’t say the issue of your use of “truism” was trivial I said your use is clearly wrong.
AMAc,
.
> To me, the “disconnect†statement sounds like a truism (Willard!).
.
The predicate “sounds like a truism” might be considered a tactic better designed to label people. If you don’t wish to thwart discussion, you might prefer “makes no pragmatic sense.”
There must be a hundred ways to critique someone’s writing without saying that they make “rational conversation” “impossible.” If you don’t recognize that choice of words as insulting in the extreme, then I have greatly overestimated your command of the English language.
If willard is difficult to follow (I concede that point, by the way) you should simply say that, simply. I am still of the opinion that abusive language and personal attacks here do far more to discourage rational conversation than prose that is merely confusing.
No, I did not quote you out of context, “inadvertantly” or otherwise. Besides being unable to spell, you evidently do not know what it means to quote someone out of context. It’s not the same thing as interpreting literally what you tried (and failed) to express ironically:
Unfortunately for your failed attempt at wit I never said anything of the kind. Indeed, the passage you found so objectionable describes both deniers and lukewarmers, and gives no criteria for the former, certainly not the straw man argument you dreamed up.
Is this new self-description another trap? If we agree with you that you are a lukewarmer, are you going to be all wounded feelings that we have associated you with unappetizing food?
Still awaiting details on my guest post, by the way. Or was that another failed attempt at humor?
Have to go with willard on this one. It’s a perfectly clear and cogent thought. I realiz as an engineer this is not exactly your area. Maybe a lit class at your local college would make you more comfortable with figurative language.
But hey, could be worse, at least you know what “context” means.
Add an “e” in there.
Robert–
Every English language speaker over the age of 8 has heard the construction “something rotten in the state of ‘X'” and knows what it means. Each clause in the long sentence where that phrase appeared made sense as a “thought bit”. It was the concatenation of bits assembled together that made no sense.
Also– I’ll see about getting the editor plugin running tomorrow.
willard (Oct 16 10:31),
I apologize for giving offense in Comment#55478 by alluding to “a truism.” That wasn’t my intention.
Restated: Wegman’s conclusion #4 included the statement that “[paleoclimate reconstructions do] not provide insight and understanding of the physical mechanisms of climate change except to the extent that tree ring, ice cores and such give physical evidence such as the prevalence of green-house gases…”
That strikes me as obviously true. While I therefore might be tempted to label it a truism (pursuant to an upthread conversation), I should not: just about any statement that touches upon the validity of paleoclimate reconstructions meets with intense controversy–and thus isn’t a truism.
Re: Robert (Oct 16 16:45),
You seem to recognize that I think the moniker “denier” (“denialist” as well) are offensive.
“Lukewarmer,” by the way, is not.
In Comment#54526, you make an appeal for civility, which is refreshing.
Half a loaf is better than none, so I’ll leave it at that.
In Comment#54200, I wrote, “Robert, I’d like to invite you to do a guest post, defending the use of the Tiljander data series in the paleoclimate reconstructions of Mann08.” That offer is still good (or if you want to post on your own blog, I’ll write a short intro post, including a prominent link). My address is AMac.contact-at-gmail-dot-com.
It wasn’t clear to me at the outset. There are plenty of people who self-identify that way. I think your irony was lost on me in part because I never said anything remotely like “Anybody who questions any of the science in or around AGW is a ____.” In fact, my thinking is exactly the opposite: you can find scientists (sometimes a small minority, or even one or two people, but still) who espouse most of the ideas of the “skeptics.” It’s really the attitude towards those ideas, and especially embracing them uncritically and one after the other, that mark a certain mindset.
I have never been impressed by the logic that claims denier=Holocaust denier=beyond-the-pale smear. It’s clearly pejorative (as are “alarmist” or “believer”) but pejorative does not necessarily mean offensive or abusive (see “tax and spend liberal” or “Christian fundamentalist.”) But I don’t introduce it into the conversation here because it has been clearly identified as unwelcome.
Thank you for the address and I will send the post along.
@lucia: Learned a new word: “concatenation.” Cool.
Robert
Really? It’s funny what words people learn in different disciplines. That’s a word you can’t avoid learning if you had to program. There are “concatenation operators”. They are often used for strings. As in:
$thisString=”The beginning, “;
$thisString.=”the end.”;
The ‘.’ is a concatenation operator. If you print out ‘$thisString’ it will read “The beginning, the end.” See http://php.net/manual/en/language.operators.string.php
I read a new word this morning’s WSJ: matutinal. The author had an example showing how to screw up good writing by using to many adjectives:
“Let there be light, and there was a sort of matutinal,*, glowing phenomenon that slowly transfused, etc.”
At the bottom of the article, one found
* of or pertaining to morning; don’t use this word.
Lucia,
.
> If the common meaning of truism does not apply to what you mean when you claim something is a truism, then you cannot expect people to understand what you mean.
.
Here is what I expect from the reader:
.
First, I expect the reader to consult the Wikipedia I already have provided, and not to forget some words like AMac did earlier:
.
> A truism is a claim that is so obvious or self-evident as to be hardly worth mentioning, **except as a reminder or as a rhetorical or literary device** [my emphasis].
.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truism]
.
Second, I expect the reader to read on that same page that:
> The word may be used to disguise the fact that a proposition is really just an opinion.
.
Third, I expect people to recognize this trope the same way she does for the others, ranging from allegory to zeugma, and most importantly irony (Robert!).
.
Fourth, I expect the reader not to treat a claim that could very well be a rhetorical or litterary device **strictly** like a universal contingent statement with a crisp truth asking to be falsified.
.
Fifth, I expect the reader to realize that when you define a truism **strictly** as a claim that is so obvious as to be worth mentioning, using a truism self-defeats it.
.
Sixth, I expect the reader would prefer to read about Wegman’s conclusions and recommendations instead of the meaning of the word “truism”.
Obviously, I am missing a “hardly” between “be” and “mentioning”, in my fifth expectation.
Usually I enjoy the back and forth here, you know the “cut and thrust”* of spirited debate. However since I’ve been cooking clam chowder, I’ve had to refresh 5 times for not that much more information (Ok so I’m a slow cooker). Just saying the dialogue is getting a bit pedantic.
* Since these threads all stem from plagiarism charges, I’m trying to attribute the “cut and thrust” conjunction … sorry the best I have is Terry Pratchett.
Re: willard (Oct 16 21:25),
> I expect the reader to consult the Wikipedia I already have provided, and not to forget some words like AMac did earlier
I don’t recall the context to this charge, and I am not going to check. If it is central to your argument, you haven’t made that clear. Lengthy comments written in a complex style can obscure the key point, rather than highlighting it.
willard–
1. Everyone has consulted wikipedia’s defintion of truism, and it’s clear you don’t understand what a truism is. The thing you claim is a truism is not a truism because a) it is not self-evident, b) it is worth mentioning even when not used as a literary device. You can keep not processing the fact that people have told you this multiple times and given you proof what you claim is a “truism” is not self evident and explained why it is worth mentioning.
2.
Lucia,
.
Here is the example of a truism that the Wikipedia page:
.
> Under appropriate conditions, the sun rises.
.
Here is the statement that I qualified as a truism:
.
> We should implement Wegman’s recommendations.
.
Notice the first kind of statement: it’s a fact, readily observable by anyone, under appropriate conditions of course. The second one is a value judgement, about which it would be virtually impossible to find at least a few dissenters among the kingdom of rational beings. Thank you for pointing me out that these two statements are not the same kind of statement.
.
I sincerely apologize if I misled anyone into thinking that the claim that should implement Wegman’s recommendations was, under no circumstances, not worth mentioning the same way as one does not normally **claims** that the sun rises every morning.
.
That wasn’t my intention. My intention was to say that this looked like a rhetorical device. I still believe it does look like it.
Re: willard (Oct 17 08:47),
The Bunny — a prominent, scientifically-literate AGW Consensus advocate — sees the Wegman Report as poison. This includes its conclusions and (presumably) its recommendations.
It seems likely to me that the range of opinion among AGW Consensus advocates is centered near his sentments, rather than close to the ones I expressed.
AMac,
.
> If it is central to your argument, you haven’t made that clear.
.
I’m not sure what argument you are referring to here, but here is an example of what I mean by rhetorical device.
.
> (1) We should share data and code.
.
> (2) We should decide if we agree or not about (1).
.
> (3) Disagreeing with (1) makes no pragmatic sense.
.
Saying that this is a rhetorical device does not entail that it is not worth discussing. It does entail that the discussion’s central point is not agreement or disagreement, as I already said in #54270.
.
Perhaps I should have insisted on the fact that the Wegman’s was still worth discussing. For instance, we could discuss why (3) and what really means to implement (1).
And I expect the reader (i.e. you) of the wikipedia page to understand when the word truism is used to disguise the fact that the something is just the rhetorician’s opinion. Example: “It is a truism that I am always right”, might be used by a pompous fool to disguise that fact that his being right is only his opinion, claiming to elevate this notion to an obvious fact. Your usage is not one that comports with the “disguising the fact that you think what Amac said is an opinion.” It appears that you fail to meet my fairly low expectations.
I expect the use of the word “this” to refer back to something you previously mentioned in your comment. It appears not to do so.
Okie…. dokie….. Whatever.
No, Duh.
(Further discussion http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2713)
If you “expect this”, stop trying to defend your obviously wrong use of truism as correct instead of thinking it makes sense to insist you get the last word, that the last word is you are correct, and tell them you would rather talk about other things.
Otherwise, if you behave as you continue to behave, you will find your expectations do not come to pass. Oh, and even if you lecture water that you expect it to run uphill, it won’t. Saying “I, willard, expect” may make you sound like a nun holding a ruler ready to rap people’s knuckles, but it doesn’t mean your expectations are in anyway rational, reasonable or binding on others.
You use this word incorrectly. Period.
> This includes its conclusions and (presumably) its recommendations.
.
I personally believe that Wegman’s recommendations are quite obvious. My interpretation of them depends on at least three conditions: the spirit of Wegman’s recommendations do not depend on all its technical details; Wegman’s recommendations do not depend on his conclusions ; discussing Wegman’s recommendations should partake to a rational discussion.
.
Presumably, the Bunny does not believe some of these conditions obtain. That could explain why he only discussed the conclusions, why he questionned Wegman’s authority on these conclusions, and why he says that Wegman’s report is poison.
> I expect the use of the word “this†[trope] to refer back to something you previously mentioned in your comment.
.
Really? It’s funny what words people learn in different disciplines. When considered as a figure of speech, a truism is a trope:
.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Figure_of_speech
willard ,
With respect to your argument “No. Duh”.
You even explain how the wikipedia example differs from yours.
At least two who dissenters were quickly found. Do you think Eli and Mann are not citizens of the kingdom of rational beings? My impression is neither has been committed to the loonie-bin. We could find many more dissenters if it was extremely important to prove to you that your use of truism does not match that in the wikipedia definition nor that in the dictionary. But, even though I suspect it would be impossible to prove it to you
Well… it may come as a surprise to you, but that’s the general impression created when you suggest what someone said is a truism. It generally communicates more or less the same things as “Big Duh” in the cartoon above.
It looked like a question that could be answered. Some people would answer yes. Some no.
Amac knows that I frown on people trying to advance arguments by asking rhetorical questions, leaving the answer unstated and proceeding as if all who read the question agree on the answer. The reason I frown on it is that it doesn’t work.
You appear to use the method often, it lends your “arguments” a level of incoherence that is difficult for others to equal. The fact that you try to use “argument by rhetorical question” often may be why you tend to suspect its use. My advice: Don’t use “argument by rhetorical question”. Learn to try to state your claims directly. If you suspect a question is rhetorical, ask directly. Go out and talk to a linguist and ask them to explain what a truism is, and how it is used. Learn that if you want to drop a subject (like your absurd use of the word “truism”) you have to drop it. You don’t get to repeatedly lecture people, in your view that you are correct, explain that you would rather talk about something else, suggest that is the last word, and then hallucinate that they don’t get to respond. (And no, telling people you “expect” them to do silly sounding things that would please you may sound to you like a firm lecture coming from some wise age, but it comes off like a 3 year old stomping their feet lecturing the earth that they “expect” it to stop revolving. Everyone will just giggle at you.)
> You use this word incorrectly. Period.
.
Big Duh.
Willard– Your writing is even more incomprehensible than I imaged. I do recognize truisms as a figure of speech and even as a trope, a word I know and have known since I attended a little all girl high school back when I was a girl.
Now that you have clarified, “this trope” refers back to the word “truism” I am mystified for two reasons:
1) While you do discuss the word “truism”, there is no truism inthe previous bit of your comment. It contained no trope. So, maybe, since you were not referring to any particular trope, you meant “a trope”?
2) I am also mystified why you would wear out your finger tips adding that to your long list of expectations.
It’s a bit like my writing a long list of things I expect from you, and inserting some weird irrelevancy like,
“Third, I expect people to commenting at this blog to understand the effect of caffeine on insomnia”.
Other than as an example of the sudden insertion of something idiotic in a list of expectations, why would I add that to the list? The disconnect between that suggestion and everything else made it really difficult to imagine the trope you were referring to was the truism. Oh well…whatever.
Oh well… off to visit big sis, popsie-wopsie, gorgeous niece and gorgeous nieces cute dad (sisters’s husband.)
Have fun.
willard
So, referring back to the cartoon, are you saying you think it is inconsequential or worthless to point out you use a word incorrectly? Even if the word is one you keep insisting you use correctly? Is it inconsequential to point out your misuse because you misuse words so constantly that no-one ought to be surprised. Or is there some different reason?
Hmm… Time to fluff and fold, then leave for Highland Park. Have fun. 🙂
Lucia,
.
I typed too fast. What I should have written was:
.
> The second one is a value judgment, about which it would be virtually impossible **not** to find at least a few dissenters among the kingdom of rational beings.
.
Otherwise the difference I want to make between a trivial statement of fact and a statement of value makes no sense.
.
I want to know who these dissenters are and why they disagree about Wegman’s recommendations. If AMac is not asking a rhetorical question, that is not only possible to do, but the main point of asking the question.
.
I’d like to read about what the Bunny thinks of the recommendations.
Lucia,
.
I sincerely believe that it is both inconsequential and worthless to try to argue that I used “truism” to mean that:
.
> We should implement Wegman’s recommendations.
.
is as obvious as
.
> Under appropriate conditions, the sun is rising.
.
and certainly can’t mean that
.
> “We should implement Wegman’s recommendations” is a rhetorical device.
.
where I already said in #54253 explicitely that I believed that AMac’s question seems rhetorical to me. Not because I believe they are so obvious as not to be worth mentioning and discussing, but because I believe it is very difficult to make sense of someone who tries to disagree with them. You said it yourself: it makes no pragmatic sense to disagree with Wegman’s recommendations.
.
I think you’re wrong, but yes, big duh. There are more interesting questions than if I use “truism” correctly.
> While you do discuss the word “truismâ€, there is no truism in Wthe previous bit of your comment. It contained no trope. So, maybe, since you were not referring to any particular trope, you meant “a tropeâ€?
.
In the sentence:
.
> Third, I expect people to recognize this trope the same way she does for the others, ranging from allegory to zeugma, and most importantly irony (Robert!).
.
I thought that “this trope” could refer to a truism-taken-as-a-rhetorical-device, since this is the subject of my first and second points. The “others” are the other tropes, that range from allegory to zeugma.
Re: willard (Oct 17 10:37),
> I’d like to read about what the Bunny thinks of the recommendations.
You can ask him at his blog, or he’s been commenting at the Skeptic-gate thread at Bart’s. You could also get a sampling of pro-AGW-consensus-advocate opinion at Deep Climate (if you haven’t already), or at RealClimate, or at Stoat.
I don’t recall anybody saying, “the report is lousy, but the recommendations are sterling, and worth adopting in any case.” That’s just an impression; I could be wrong.
> I don’t recall anybody saying, “the report is lousy, but the recommendations are sterling, and worth adopting in any case.†That’s just an impression; I could be wrong.
.
I have the same impression. I could be wrong, but I believe this creates a problem when one wishes to build a questionnaire testing independent variables.
The report builds a massive mountain out of a small molehill. It over eggs the cake. It blows the issue out of all proportion.
Re: bugs (Oct 18 01:22),
Bugs,
If you read pages 50 and 51 (C’s and R’s) as an anonymous stand-alone document, would that essay strike you as perceptive, with four generally-correct conclusions, and four generally-good recommendations for changes in how paleoclimatology should be practiced and funded?
Bugs,
.
Suppose you can abstract away the fact that Wegman’s recommendations seem to follow his conclusions. If you can, imagine that these recommendations were not coming from a Congree House hearings, but coming from the spirit of Richard Feynman after a Ouija session. Would you agree that these recommendations would improve science?
.
If not, what are the specific words in these recommendations that are ticking you off? I want to know what you and I can agree about these recommendations.
.
Please note that I am not asking you if they are necessary conditions to do science. So please read the “should” as a “should”, not a polite way to say “must.”
.
I have been told to be inclined to galimatias, non sequitur and red herrings in the past, so if you need me to rephrase, feel free to ask.
bugs,
.
Let’s clarify this question:
.
> Would you agree that these recommendations would improve science?
.
What I have in mind may be phrased better like this:
.
> Should you agree that these recommendations would improve science?
.
The “should” there is not a “must”. The “would” is not a “will” either. I would never want you to make you prophecize anything. Just go with your gut feeling.
.
Feel free to say if anwering this question could have an impact on some of your work, and if revealing your identity could make your publications the subject of a similar Congress House hearings (here, less confusing orthograph).
.
Thanks!
1) See SSWR, appendix W.7, which comments briefly on recommendations and conclusions.
The WR exhibits pervasive factual errors, serious lack of knowledge of the field,mostly written by a new PhD with no relevant experience, It effectively dismisses Greenhouse Effect/post-1850 temperature rise as spurious correlation. 35 of 91 pages are mostly plagiarized, but there is plenty of misrepresentation/fabrication as well.
2) In real world, people ignore recommendations from those obviously unqualified to make them. At best, one gets vague recommendationst one might agree with, but have no use.
For example, suppose that someone with zero software experience offers the sage advice that software has bugs and should be tested.
People with decades of experience writing, testing, shipping software, setting up software Q/A departments, designing function and regression tests, creating automated test harnesses, etc, might not be impressed by this pearl of wisdom.
3) And in any case, the WR ignores most of what it recommends when applied to itself. They certainly did not do peer review, they didn’t even get sensible comments from associates …like Grace Wahba, who got 3 days to look at a 91-page report and then they ignored much of what she said. Wegman&Said almost certainly broke peer review at CSDA (See Appendix W.5.6).
John
With respect to your numbered paragraphs.
1) When you say “the field”, which field do you accuse Wegman as misundstanding. He was brought in for expertise in statistics and to discuss statistical arguments. He appears to understand statistics. Your report does not make a convincing case for this claim of yours “35 of 91 pages are mostly plagiarized, but there is plenty of misrepresentation/fabrication as well. ”
2)
Maybe. But many people also can read a recommendation and decide whether they agree with it without regard to who made it. Doing so is considered admirable by many. Moreover, Wegman appear perfectly qualified to make recommendations about steps climatologists might undertake to avoid stupid statistical errors in their papers. His likely lack of expertise in radiative physics would be fairly irrelevant there, and I think most people would recognize that.
Sure, software engineers might not listen to advice about software engineering from a plumber with no background in software engineering. But if they won’t listen to a plumber’s advice about plumbing, because he doesn’t know software engineering, that would be rather stupid of the software engineers.
3) Since when do reports to congress need peer review as defined by academic journals? The notion is silly. Moreover, applying it might violate the spirit of the 1st amendment to the constitution. When reporting to Congress, the person reporting has every right to represent the findings he believes to be correct, irrespective of what some anonymous peer reviewer at some journal might wish he said. If that peer reviewer wants to comment, he has a right to comment.
The whole line about peer review applied to reports to Congress is idiotic. It is idiotic even if Congressman who don’t know what it is asked questions, which Wegman tried to answer as completely as he could. (Which he appears to have done.)
John Mashey,
As far as the question I asked Bugs about the merits of the WR’s conclusions and recommendations (5 comments up): you don’t seem to hold them in very high regard. Would that be a fair (under)statement?
Are all four of the recommendations vague suggestions that are good ideas to the extent that they are implementable?
I agree with you that “Software has bugs and should be tested” is a vague statement.
“Mission-critical software has bugs, and should be tested with greater rigor, consistency, and traceability than is currently standard practice in the industry” is also a vague statement — but quite different.
The WR’s Recommendations track the second construction more closely than the first.
To return to your software analogy, there are a lot of reasons why people might dissent from the “more testing” recommendation. (Apart from who made the suggestion, what preceded it in a report, and so on.)
“Mission-critical software is already fully tested.”
“There are costs as well as benefits to extensive testing; industry has the balance about right.”
“Switching more resources to testing will disrupt software development.”
“Testing should be integrated into the development process, rather than tacked on after the software is complete.”
And so on.
.
It seems to me that pro-AGW Consensus advocates are being vague as to how the content of the WR recommendations should be interpreted. Sometimes,
(A) “The recommendations would be good (if they weren’t so vague).”
And other times,
(B) “Implementing these recommendations would be harmful to the science.”
Which is it? Surely not both. (A) can be cured by an editor with a blue pencil (or by more attentiveness on the part of the reader). Not so for (B).
John Mashey (#54811): “For example, suppose that someone with zero software experience offers the sage advice that software has bugs and should be tested. People with decades of experience [in software development] might not be impressed by this pearl of wisdom.”
But this is not a good analogy. A better analogy would be to consider a CPA who, having learned how to program, created and marketed an accounting program he wrote. The software professionals, with their decades of experience, would likely have valuable advice about software qualification testing, configuration control, etc., even though they knew only the basics of accounting.
Hi, lucia, I’m pasting this from CA, Re: Speech and Debate Clause:
lucia:
Yes, I am an attorney but, no, I don’t normally practice Intellectual Property law. Your points of law seem correct, but the application of facts will be determinative.
Re: Speech and Debate:
When determining what the language of a portion of the Constitution really encompasses, courts will look to the original understanding and purpose behind the text.
In the case of this clause, the purpose is to allow members of Congress to do their job of legislating, without fear of reprisals from the executive branch. The clause reinforces separation of powers.
If a Senator / Representative defames, lies, or gives away state secrets during a legislative function – he’s protected from prosecution / lawsuit. [Note that the Constitution allows each house of Congress to punish their otherwise-protected, offending Members.]
If a regular Joe is testifying falsely before Congress – he doesn’t get the protection. Ask Roger Clemens.
The doctrine has been expanded to include Congressional staff, under an agency theory. Again, look to the purpose of the clause. Members can’t function without their staffers. Allowing broad prosecution of staffers would undercut the Congress – so it is limited.
It is not my understanding that Wegman was acting as Rep. Barton’s employee / agent, so my interpretation is that the doctrine would not expand to cover Wegman. Barton doesn’t need Wegman to function as a legislator – so Wegman doesn’t merit any special protection. My understanding of Wegman’s participation is that it was invited, expert testimony. [Not too different from testimony on steroids in baseball…]
Congressional committee reports are, likewise, protected, because to do otherwise could prevent the operation of Congress.
Note the subtle distinction, here.
Wegman co-wrote a report [which, I believe, is not protected]. Wegman’s report was, subsequently, released as part of the report of a Congressional committee [which is protected – at least for distribution to other Members of Congress].
Wegman was not the publisher of the document that the Congress released. He had no control over what the committee would publish. I believe that he wouldn’t be subject to a copyright-infringement claim for his words within the Congressional report.
Wegman was president of the statistical section of NAS, however. Wasn’t his report released in parallel by NAS ? He must have some sway, there. Assuming infringement occurred, I believe Wegman could have some exposure for reports published by NAS- although the actual party sued would probably be NAS, itself. Reports circulated separately by NAS would not be covered by the speech and debate clause.
Fundamentally, as with other Constitutional protections, the clause is a shield against prosecution by the Executive branch. It does not protect against the ethics investigation of a private university.
jim edwards
Mine too.
JimA wrote:
What I was imagining (as a non-lawyer) was that maybe it went like this: The report would be immune from things like claims of copyright violation, but not for anything like lying to Congress (perjury.) After all, no one in the steroids case was charged with using steroids, rather for lying to congress.
But it looks like you think the report is not protected. (I have no knowledge of my own. I’m just asking the various attorneys who show up!) But then….
So, you do end up with a theory where it isn’t going to get him into a copyright dispute.
I don’t know. I was trying to figure this out after RickA mentioned the issue about extra congressional releases. I can’t find any such release of the report by other avenues. Ross has a link on his web page. Otherwise, the link is to a congressional page.
Agreed. I’ve always said that. The clause is irrelevant to plagiarism, which is not a legal issue in any case.
Lucia #55073:
My comments about the speech or debate clause were directed to copyright infringement allegations, and occurred to me because the Wegman report (I believe) became a a committee report.
So I agree with Jim about any sort of copyright infringement allegation – and this doesn’t even consider fair use arguments, which provide a defense to copyright infringement wholly apart from the speech or debate clause.
For example, it is considered fair use to quote extensively from a copyrighted work for scholarly criticism, which Wegman’s report certainly qualifies as. Whether the citations are up to snuff is an academic issue, having no bearing on fair use as a defense to an allegation of copyright infringement.
On the other hand, if Wegman perjured himself (for example) in his oral testimony, there would be no protection (like Jim’s baseball player example) – so I agree with Jim about that aspect also.
I also agree with Lucia that the speech or debate clause has no bearing on what a private university decides with regard to its own plagiarism policy – which is not a legal issue, but rather an academic policy issue.
By the way – I skimmed over the discussion on SOL (statute of limitations), and it is my understanding that it begins to run from the alleged copying and not from the publication of the copyrighted work.
RickA–
Thanks.
Even as a non-lawyer, I agree on the perjury stuff. Obviously, we wouldn’t read of these perjury cases in the paper if the speech and debate clause permitted witnesses to commit perjury.
Thanks on the SOL stuff. If it starts from the date of publication, that would make it roughly 4 years for the Wegman stuff. (Though SOL would be moot if a fair use covers it anyway. Still, I have no idea what order attorneys would present this stuff. For all I know, the SOL stuff would close off the case immediately, so the argument over fair use would then never come up.)
I agree on the fair use in scholarly. I base this on my vast experience explaining the general differences between copyright and patents on knitting lists. 🙂 (Many knitters will start claiming someone has a “copyright” on teaching people “their” technique to bind off toes of socks in some way. And I mean they think someone can copyright the technique itself, not just their video or book containing their words. Adding insult to injury, the technique usually older than dirt, as in, I can find crumbling old knitting books discussing it.)
lucia:
I think your legal instincts are good.
Wegman might be insulated from liability [assuming his report excessively copies] – but the insulation wouldn’t come from the Speech and Debate clause.
Imagine I write a letter to a friend. The text of my letter borrows excessively from a published author. Without asking for further permission, the friend decides to publish my letter. Am I liable for copyright infringement for my friend’s book ?
I’d argue not. But if I later published my own book with the offending letter in it, I could incur liability for that act.
An author might be liable for copyright infringement but a publisher will be liable. In the case of the Wegman report, it appears that electronic copies were “published” by the Congressional committee – so liability, if any, would lay at the feet of the committee. Congress typically exempts itself from liability, which means that there is likely no liable party for this act.
[As a related tangent, there is no ‘natural right’ to intellectual property. It is a creation of Congress, so Congress can limit the extent of its protection – without creating a 5th Amendment ‘taking’. This limitation has absolutely nothing to do with the Speech and Debate clause.]
Any subsequent paper copies of the committee report for broad distribution would have been “published” by the GPO [Gov’t Printing Ofc.]. If the statute allows GPO to be sued for copyright infringement, GPO would be the relevant defendant [not Congress, or Wegman…].
Assuming infringement occurred, Wegman would only incur liability for separately published copies of the report. Like you, I am not sure if Wegman had anything to do with publishing additional copies.
P.S. – If you don’t have them, already, here are the 4 factors listed by the Copyright Office for the determination of ‘fair use’.
1. The purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes
2. The nature of the copyrighted work
3. The amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole
4. The effect of the use upon the potential market for, or value of, the copyrighted work
Rick A, lucia:
As I read it, SOL begins either with copying, preparation of a derivative work, or with distribution. [those are three separate violations…]
Title 17, section 507 says the statutory period for copyright infringement is three years.
I found this analysis, which was interesting:
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/policy.html#27
“The copyright statute does not expressly include congressional use of copyrighted works as a fair use. However, both the House and Senate Reports on the Copyright Act of 1976 include the “reproduction of a work in legislative or judicial proceedings or reports” among examples of fair use.[fn 27] The legislative history also contains an observation that publication of copyrighted material in Congressional documents would constitute fair use “[w]here the length of the work or excerpt published and the number of copies authorized are reasonable under the circumstances, and the work itself is directly relevant to a matter of legitimate legislative concern…” [fn 28]
Thus, in an infringement action, a court might regard the publication of copyrighted material in a Congressional document for legitimate legislative purposes as a “fair use.” If, however, the use is outside of such legislative purposes, it is possible that a traditional fair use analysis might result in liability for copyright infringement. Wider dissemination outside the confines of Congress would further complicate the “fair use” question. [fn 29]
The copyright laws do not contain an exemption from copyright infringement for unauthorized use of copyrighted materials by the U.S. Government. Subsection 1498(b) of Title 28 of the U.S. Code provides that the exclusive remedy of a copyright owner for copyright infringement by the United States is an action against the United States in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims “for the recovery of … reasonable and entire compensation … including the minimum statutory damages ….” Speech or debate clause immunity is not waived under § 1498(b); however, activities outside of the legislative sphere would not be shielded from a copyright infringement action. [fn 30]
[fn 27] See H.R. Rep. No. 1476, 94th Cong., 2d Sess. 65 (1976); S. Rep. No. 473, 94th Cong., 1st Sess. 61-62 (1975) quoting REPORT OF THE REGISTER OF COPYRIGHTS ON THE GENERAL REVISION OF THE U.S. COPYRIGHT LAW, 87th Cong., 1st Sess. 24 (Comm. Print 1961) (hereafter REGISTER’S REPORT).
[fn 28] See H.R. Rep. No. 1476, Id. at 73.
[fn 29] Moreover, if CRS products were generally available to the public, the construction of these products may be affected, with the potential consequent loss when material, such as copyrighted maps or graphs, may be withheld in the writing of the paper with the foreknowledge that the paper could be widely disseminated and thereby subject to different “fair use†guidelines than those applicable to work for legislative use only. Therefore, public availability may perforce shape selected CRS products so that their contents no longer bring to bear the best information and analysis to assist Members in their decision making.
[fn 30] As originally enacted, § 1498 applied only to suits for patent infringement against the United States. In 1960, Congress amended § 1498 to give its consent to suits for copyright infringement against the United States; Section 2 of Pub. L. 86-726 provided:
Nothing in this Act shall be construed to in any way waive any immunity provided for Members of Congress under article I of section 6 of the Constitution of the United States. Section 2 was added to the House bill by Senate amendment in order “to emphasize the fact that no immunities for Members of Congress under article I of section 6 of the Constitution shall be waived by the enactment of this legislation.” See S. Rep. No. 1877, 86th Cong., 2d Sess. (1960) as reprinted in 1960 U.S.C.A.A.N. 3444. Presumably, speech or debate clause protection would protect Congressional use of copyrighted material that is used to further legitimate legislative activities that are part of the legislative processes (e.g., copyrighted material inserted into the Congressional Record or congressional document). See Copyright Office Memorandum of May 26, 1958 reprinted in 1960 U.S.C.A.A.N. at 3456. Congress did not waive its speech or debate clause immunity when it amended § 1498. However, insofar as activities outside of the legislative sphere (e.g., political activities or public information activities) are concerned, it would appear that § 1498(b) would not shield Congress from a copyright infringement action.
jim edwards,
I agree. Based on this reasoning– and a bit of what RickA said, I hunted for ‘publication’ of the wegman report. I found a copy hosted at Ross McKitric’s and one on a .gov site. There isn’t any link on Wegman’s faculty page, and I don’t think any journal published it in its entirety.
This has been my thinking.
Wegman, is non commercial to present to Congress. I don’t know if one would say to “educate” them. But it strikes me that one could see it that way.
I’m never quite sure what this means.
With respect to Bradley’s claim of copyright and/or plagiarism, Bradley seems to be complaining a textbook was copied from. The copying (if it’s even that) is paraphrasing. Text on the same issue appears in journals articles and is substantially similar. To a large extent, this appears to me to now be a question of whether one considers the at most paraphrased information that now appears in text books is “copying”.
My thoughts are: Word for word copying of substantial amounts of text would be copying. Paraphrasing of things appearing in multiple sources– I hope that’s not a violation. It doesn’t make sense that it would be to me. (If I were writing a text, I’d consult an attorney, of course. But reassembling facts know to many strikes me as “not copying”.)
Generally small bits relative to any copyrighted work. (Possible exception: The Wikipedia social network stuff. I would have to know what’s considered a lot to really say.)
Amount of Bradley paraphrased or copied by Wegman would not affect sales of Bradley. Won’t affect potential market for Wikipedia.
lucia:
Re: Wikipedia:
That appears to me to be a mess. Let’s assume Wegman copied 80% of the ‘social networking’ wiki.
Who has standing ?
William Connelly can’t sue Wegman; the Wikipedia Foundation has to hire its own attorney and go after Wegman.
What work is copyrighted by Wikipedia ?
If the wiki is the copyrighted work, Wegman used too much. If the online encyclopedia is the copyrighted work, Wegman’s use is insubstantial.
Can a squatter evict another squatter ?
In attacking Wegman, Wikipedia might enable a ruling that Wikipedia, itself, had violated others’ copyrights. That could leave it open to slam-dunk lawsuits, under the doctrine of collateral estoppel. If Wegman can show that Wikipedia created nothing, and lifted all, Wikipedia could lose big.
jim edwards–
I’d be stunned if wikipedia went after Wegman.
Now I need to go look up “collateral estoppel”. 🙂
I can’t remember the scuttlebut on this theory. Wikipedia does try to avoid copying verbatim, but really, there is very little to prevent it from happening for at least a period of time.
collateral estoppel is a doctrine similar to res judicata [the thing’s been adjudicated] that prevents a party from disputing the truth of an issue that they have litigated elsewhere, when the prior court made a factual determination.
It sounds like we all agree, talk of suing Wegman may be good PR for some, but unlikely to actually result in anything.
jim edwards–
Losing would then be bad pr because no-lawyers would have trouble distinguishing the legal outcome from anything happening at GMU, blogs etc. The legal outcome would “seem” more meaningful to many. Reality is that copyright and plagiarism are different things.
Wikipedia is not going to sue anyone in this. Plagiarism of Wikipedia is relevant only insofar as unattributed use of Wikipedia is undergrad-level incompetent scholarship, showing someone is trying to act informed, but can do no better than cut-and-paste from Wikipedia. Remember this was widely touted to Congress as “expert” work by a team of “eminent statisticians.”
It is easy enough to see the extent of just the plagiarism, wlahtough it is the least of problems, although it is the easiest for people to recognize.
See SSWR, Appendix A.0, which is pp.47-48 in V1.02.
The major multipage plagiarisms are:
*2.5 pages derived from Bradley
2.5 pages from several texts, relatively smaller.
**5 pages from Wasserman&Faust and deNooy, et al.
plus misc slices of Wikipedia.
Anyone can report plagiarism, and Bradley did, March/April, so they had the 7.5 pages asterisked by then.
There is of course a network of re-plagiarisms that even amazes experienced publishing people:
WR => Rapp, and WR => MCS12010 (McShane, Wyner) for Bradley
and
WR => [SAI2008] and 2 PhD dissertation for SNA
on the next page, the Said ethanol plagiarism is separate.
Also, I didn’t break out the 17 different papers that go into WR Appendix C.
if you don’t believe that, read SSWR W.11.1, then as much of W.11.8 as you can stand.
Copyright is distinct from plagiarism, which is why I listed them separately on p.34, *only* listed copyright for items 2,7, 11, 13. of those, the first two are publicly known to be under way via Elsevier.
Bradley informed GMU of items 6, 10, 12.
But again, plagiarism is just the tip of the iceberg, or the breakin at Watergate (cringe, but this is actually a good analogy for a change).
Mashey,
Did you just transcribe some crude notes from the back of an envelope?
Jim Edwards and (separately) John Mashey,
Thanks for the summaries of the topics you are discussing. Informative.