Roger Tattersall Responds To “Grubby Accusations”…”Mother Nature Will Be Our Judge”

An attempt by a group of climate science skeptics to perhaps bypass climate-science gate-keeping and marginalization used against their scientific hypotheses has taken a turn for the worse, with accusations of “nepotism” within the peer-review process at the PRP journal.

Jo Nova has a new post on the situation, implying that peer-review is a mere formality that’s subject to corruption and that in the end “science is not done by peer or pal review, but by evidence and reason.”

Given the corruption and gate-keeping we’ve seen in climate science over the past 2 decades, We can be glad that we have real data and observations. But even some of those are being massively tampered with. Such is the sad state climate science has devolved to.

Roger Tattersall, one at the centre of the controversy, has reacted to the accusations of peer-review “nepotism” at the PRP journal as follows:

Pierre, thanks for adding the links. Martin Rasmussen’s excuse for shutting down the journal have shifted from “PRP was never meant to be a platform for climate sceptics.” to “the editors selected the referees on a nepotistic basis, which we regard as malpractice”

This grubby accusation remains a vague and unsubstantiated smear. The Handling Editor, Nils-Axel Morner is mystified, and has made an official complaint to the EGU, which publishes many journals through Copernicus. We await developments. Meanwhile, lukewarmer website Wattsupwiththat has rushed to judgement, finding the editors of the PRP special edition, myself included, guilty. Watts has emailed me to say I am ‘now a Pariah’. Mother nature will be our judge, when in due course she shows whether our dynamical model, which successfully hindcasts 1000 years of solar variation, remains on course or not in the future. Experimentum summas judex – Albert Einstein.”

I can certainly understand the frustration on the part of some scientists with regards to the known pal-review corruption and gate-keeping at some renowned journals and at the IPCC, and the overall difficulties encountered to get alternative views out. And God knows the hostile environment skeptics in Germany have had to deal with. Yet I agree with the expectation that the ethics of peer-review process must be upheld and lived by on all sides. There’s no other way.

But on the other hand, let’s not forget that peer-review is not the universal Stamp of Final Truth and that the real test is time and scrutiny. As I said, damn good thing we have data and observations.

 

16 responses to “Roger Tattersall Responds To “Grubby Accusations”…”Mother Nature Will Be Our Judge””

  1. Jo Nova

    Pierre, I didn’t say that peer review is a mere formality. I discussed peer-vs-pal review and said neither is necessessarily rigorous, and skeptics should not lose sight of the big picture.

    Peer reviewed papers may be gems or junk but we won’t know which by discussing who reviewed them.

    Official Peer Review is not a Law of Science, nor a magical tool for getting to the truth. Nor is it a fight skeptics should put much effort into (or inflict much collateral damage over).

    Peer review is just a bureaucratic process, it is not worth glorifying, and nor is it the only way science advances. Sometimes the line between who is peer or pal is very blurry. Sometimes pals do a better job, sometimes enemies improve a paper more than any friend.

    The peer review game is defined by people who hate skeptics, and who don’t even stick to their own rules themselves. We don’t have to play that game. There are other ways to advance ideas and publish results.

    1. Pethefin

      Thanks Jo for your analytical take on this mess. I agree that peer review is just a thumbs up from a small number of members of the scientific community, a kind of certificate of the plausibility of the scientific findings presented in a paper. Unfortunately some are eager to use that certificate as some kind of evidence of that the scientific findings present verifier thruth of the matter. Such use of the peer review as a demarcation line between scientific and unscientific is useless form of formalism. By playing the formalistic game, they are hoping to avoid to have to deal with the actual content of the papers that were published in violation of the rules of peer review-certification. This is the reason why the AGW-camp is making so much noise at the moment and luckily overdoing it. As you pointed out, we should reject such formalism and focus on the evaluation of the actual content of papers/publications in any form. This is of course a lot more time consuming, which is why the scientific community prefers peer review.

      There is a bright side in this messy episode. Now that the AGW-camp has made co much noise out of this and overreacted by axing the entire journal, we can now demand the same standard to be applied to pal reviewed climate science. A number of climategate episodes comes in mind.

  2. Buddy

    “science is not done by peer or pal review, but by evidence and reason.”

    ABSOLUTELY AGREE. That is what science is all about….observation, measuring, testing, evidence, and observed outcomes.

    The Arctic ice sheet CONTINUES to melt, the Antarctic ice sheet continues to melt (measuring the ENTIRE ice sheet, not just the smaller ice shelf), glaciers continue to melt in mountain ranges around the world, oceans continue to warm, oceans continue to rise.

    So I am glad you finally see the light:) So now that you have finally seen the light, maybe some of the deniers will get on board and help to provide cleaner forms of effective energy going forward.

    Welcome aboard:)

    1. DirkH

      “The Arctic ice sheet CONTINUES to melt, the Antarctic ice sheet continues to melt (measuring the ENTIRE ice sheet, not just the smaller ice shelf), ”

      Well, we should point to the evidence, shouldn’t we Buddy.
      http://wattsupwiththat.com/reference-pages/sea-ice-page/

      Oops, Global Sea ice area above average from 1979 to now.
      Buddy, why is this the opposite of what warmist science predicted? Is the theory wrong?

      TIA.

    2. Mindert Eiting

      The deniers will get on board ? Do you mean the Ship of Fools?

    3. John F. Hultquist

      Dear Buddy:
      ? wind towers !
      http://transmission.bpa.gov/Business/Operations/Wind/baltwg.aspx

      Check the green line in the chart. That shows the contribution to the electric grid during our current cold week here in Wash. & Oregon. Thanks to hydro (aka dams)(aka falling water) and an odd assortment of paper mills and landfills (thermal) we are still warm. Nuclear and coal work well for base load (no cost spikes) and gas is okay but cost ramps during cold and hot weeks.

      Now, sir, stop trying to hijack the topic.

  3. John F. Hultquist

    A. W. at WUWT uses the word “predictable” to describe this mess. The sense is that it could easily have been prevented and then the science could have gotten a fair hearing. That is not now possible. Sad for all.

  4. Stephen Richards

    The Arctic ice sheet CONTINUES to melt, the Antarctic ice sheet continues to melt (measuring the ENTIRE ice sheet, not just the smaller ice shelf –

    So 50% more multi year ice in 2013, Antarctic ice extent at record. How in your maucky little world does ice melt when the temperature never rises above -20°C ?

    You just continue to make yourself look really stupid.

  5. mwhite
  6. mwhite

    The problem

    “New paper asks: ‘Would the ‘real’ temperature dataset please stand up?’; finds ‘We have no ability to know’ the true temperature data ”

    http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/new-paper-asks-would-real-temperature.html

  7. Pointman

    Let’s fight one war at a time …

    Pointman

  8. Iren

    “A. W. at WUWT uses the word “predictable” to describe this mess. The sense is that it could easily have been prevented and then the science could have gotten a fair hearing. That is not now possible. Sad for all.”

    I haven’t read the article at WUWT but I can categorically state that under no circumstances would be science have gotten a fair hearing. If not this then some other excuse, cum red herring, would have been unearthed. Anything to avoid a far hearing for the science.

  9. Loodt Pretorius

    Peer-review is short-hand for ‘has it been passed and approved by the central politics bureau?’ Something all who grew up in the good old USSR will recognize. It is only since the wall came down that I came across this BS term.

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