Canadian Politics Today

But you did not answer the question: are you willing to acknowledge that the "objective, impartial academic" is a myth and the biases of the academics matter in fields of knowledge where replicable experiments cannot settle scientific debates (i.e. the decision of what papers are "good" and what papers are "bad" comes down to a popularity contest among academics)?

So we're supposed to believe you instead?
Hahahahahahaha!
Step away, TimG.

Well, that is the problem. You see it as a religion where one is expected to place blind faith in the system and the humans who run the system. I see the system as flawed like any other human institution and reject the notion that we should have blind faith in it. I instead want to see checks and balances built into the system so we can better manage the problems created by flaw humans.

I read the review paper.
The checks and balances in scientific inquiry into climate change seem to be working quite well. The parameters for acceptable research are well defined. The 3% of papers with contrary findings were found to have flaws when assessed against those parameters; When the flaws were corrected, those findings became consistent with the 97% consensus.

All papers were published and referenced in the IPCC report. The flawed papers were not suppressed. They stand as examples of bad scientific methods.

Flawed or faked research results being flogged by the fossil fuel industry is an old story, getting stale and stupider all the time.

Your blind faith in fossil fuels is perhaps admirable but misplaced loyalty.

With the judiciary there is at least a public debate and parliament has tools to override some judicial decisions if the elected representatives decide differently. Furthermore, the principle that contrary views and juries of peers are an intrinsic part of the system of justice further mitigates any problem with bias in the judiciary.

There is also scientific debate, which on some level is better than so-called 'public' debate as it's necessarily informed by the specific subject matter.  Now, you WILL get people saying they're structural engineers and that the 9/11 commission was a scam and weathermen and geologists calling themselves climate scientists but still better on the whole. 

Justices still have the final say and that part of your argument is just not analogous in a way that helps either of our arguments here.

But you did not answer the question: are you willing to acknowledge that the "objective, impartial academic" is a myth and the biases of the academics matter in fields of knowledge where replicable experiments cannot settle scientific debates (i.e. the decision of what papers are "good" and what papers are "bad" comes down to a popularity contest among academics)?

Humans are subjective, so all systems need to be built around that.  The best you can do is create a culture that STRIVES for objectivity, which is why CBS/NBC/ABC of the 1980s and the newspapers will always be better than FOX news.

I even think that Climate Scientists show their tribalism in the leaked emails but you can't demand that people act above humanity.  I believe they thought they were against bad science.

I do feel the case has been made that human emitted CO2 is contributing to a warming planet that creates a risk that we should not ignore.

BFD! You refuse to accept/acknowledge that anthropogenic sourced CO2 is the principal causal tie to GW/CC... and you refuse to provide what you understand/interpret to be a/the alternative to anthropogenic sourced CO2 as that principal causal tie. Accordingly, you deny prevailing science - ergo, you are a denier!

My motivation for criticizing the field is that I honestly feel that the process to ensure objective outcomes is broken and it is not serving the public interest. I am open to ideas on how to fix but we have to start by agreeing there is a problem in the first place.

no - skeptical papers get published... many of them. Your motivation is to cast doubt and suspicion on honorable/reputable scientists and to sow discord in a system that accepts... and publishes so-called contrarian views. Again, your favoured contrarian views can't meet the test of peer response - nothing more, nothing less.

and you play right into the TimG denier narrative... by elevating the statements of a few into the, "TimG damning of the whole".

be better MH, be better!

Sorry, but you can't deny the humanity of the scientists by saying they weren't annoyed by their opposition.  They clearly were.

But it doesn't matter on the whole. 

1) I not asking them to not be human. I am asking you to acknowledge that the tribalism exists and scientists are not objective as individuals;
2) Almost every paper in climate science is a statistical analysis of one form or another that uses techniques and assumptions that could be criticized if someone was so inclined;
3) Because of 1) and 2) any paper that does not say things a scientist personally agrees with will be subject to criticism while papers a scientist agrees with will get a pass even if the exact same flaws exist;
4) 3) means very few scientists are going to bother trying to point out flaws in the consensus because it is not worth the abuse they will receive from the alarmist peers.
5) 4) means the consensus is artificial because no one is trying to be a contrarian and to explore topics that could undermine the consensus.

To re-iterate a point I made in other posts. Despite the dim view I have of academics working in climate science today I do feel the case has been made that human emitted CO2 is contributing to a warming planet that creates a risk that we should not ignore. My motivation for criticizing the field is that I honestly feel that the process to ensure objective outcomes is broken and it is not serving the public interest. I am open to ideas on how to fix but we have to start by agreeing there is a problem in the first place.

1) They are as objective as one could hope for.  Judges aren't objective although they try.
2) "Could be criticized" ... well of course that is true.  Statistical analysis, coupled with the known physics of the greenhouse effect is pretty solid.  The best criticisms have been accepted but they didn't turn out to be true.
3) Theoretically that's true but your example isn't really applicable to real life - no two papers could have completely symmetrical flaws in that way.
4) Theoretical also.  I would look at the few papers published by climate scientists that DIDN'T agree with the consensus.  The publishers weren't pilloried as far as I can tell.  I don't think they are mentioned in Climategate.  I know of a few - and will look that up when I can.
5) Your thinking on this presumes that papers exist that are valid, and that are being shut down. 

Your closing paragraph unfortunately endears you to me as reasonable so I will have to shake that off as I search for the papers above and the (loud sigh) Climategate papers... (secondary sigh)

2) "Could be criticized" ... well of course that is true.  Statistical analysis, coupled with the known physics of the greenhouse effect is pretty solid.

Those are two unrelated things. i.e. paper making claims about the influence of climate on storms can be complete nonsense even if the basic physics is correct. I call this kind of lazy thinking the 'bait and switch'. i.e. people take something that is well supported by science and then use it to claim that unrelated claim must also be true. It is nonsense. Science does not work that way. Each claim is evaluated on its own merits.

The best criticisms have been accepted but they didn't turn out to be true.

You can't prove a statistical analysis is false unless you can do experimental replication. All you can do in climate science is criticize the methods which is a purely subjective exercise. That is why it is so easy for alarmist scientists to dismiss skeptical papers. There is always some quibble that they can use as an excuse to declare it "debunked". The fact that their own papers have similar issues is shamelessly ignored.

Theoretically that's true but your example isn't really applicable to real life - no two papers could have completely symmetrical flaws in that way.

You miss the point. Someone claimed a skeptical paper was wrong because it did "curve fitting" but the same criticism applies to almost every paper produced by alarmists like Michael Mann but his papers are taken seriously. The only difference is Mann supports the alarmists narrative so his crappy statistical methods are ignored. It is a painfully obvious double standard.

I would look at the few papers published by climate scientists that DIDN'T agree with the consensus.  The publishers weren't pilloried as far as I can tell.

We don't know what goes on behind the scenes but scientists like Judith Curry and Robert Pielke have talked about the abuse they received from colleagues  for talking a less alarmist approach. Both decided to leave the field rather than put up with it. You, of course, will argue that they are lying or not representative but you have no evidence to support that belief. I am saying that they are credible enough that their claims of inappropriate pressure should not be dismissed and we should want to have some external authorities investigate how bad it is really is. There is the story of skeptical scientist that was sacked by his university for daring to dispute the alarmist narrative. The university claims his views had nothing to do with it but a court dismissed all of the universities defenses as nonsense: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-04-16/jcu-scientist-peter-ridd-sacking-unlawful-federal-court-judgment/11021554

I know of a few - and will look that up when I can.

The problem is the chill in the current environment that could lead to paths of research being dropped as soon as the academic realizes it would be impossible to get it through the alarmists who are the gatekeepers at many journals. We can never know if these paths exist or not. We can only know is that if these did exist we would never hear about them because academics have a strong incentive to self censor. That is why I think more skeptical papers would mean we have more confidence in the consensus. As it stands the number of skeptical papers is simply too low to justify given the uncertainties inherent in the methods available to climate scientists.

5) Your thinking on this presumes that papers exist that are valid, and that are being shut down.

I am saying that your claims of absolutes (valid or not valid) do not apply when dealing with complex statistical methods applied to dubious datasets. All papers are flawed in some way. Why should alarmist papers be taken anymore seriously if these flaws were show stoppers?

Your closing paragraph unfortunately endears you to me as reasonable so I will have to shake that off as I search for the papers above and the (loud sigh) Climategate papers... (secondary sigh)

I would not spend a lot of time on that. If a skeptical paper has been published I have probably read about and am aware of the criticisms. Sometimes I even agree with the criticisms. My pet peeve is with the extremely bad alarmist papers which are treated as gospel because they support the narrative. I would he happy if people would learn to understand the limitations of the methods available and the kind of certainties claimed are not legitimate.