On Saturday, 17 May 2014 19:24:59 UTC+1, prodata wrote:
On Saturday, 17 May 2014 18:11:23 UTC+1, Ian Bingham wrote:

Prof.Bengtsson of Reading University put under "enormous pressure" for



daring to say that Global Warming may have been exaggerated. I don't carry



a brief for either camp and keep an open mind, but that really is



deplorable. Do we have a scientific community motivated by the spirit of



scientific enquiry, or do we have The Spanish Inquisition? His paper was



rejected because the editor said it contained errors, but that sounds mighty



like a rationalization to me; he just expressed an opinion that was out of



favour. The scientific community has sunk pretty low when that sort of



thing can happen.



What? Where does this analysis come from because it certainly doesn't chime with the reality of scientific life.



Other professionals might want to chip in with their percentages and views, but at a rough guess I'd say that the breakdown was as follows: Only 1 in 3 papers submitted get accepted for publication with only minor revisions; another 1 in 3 only get accepted after substantial rewrites to correct serious criticisms from the peer review process; and the final third - as apparently in this case - never see the light of day at all, because they contained major flaws which the author(s) weren't either willing or able to address. Been there, done that myself for the last one!



That's not to say that the peer review process is perfect - it does make some mistakes as the recent row-back by the BMJ on the paper exaggerating the side-effects of statins shows. But this was actually an error of judgement where the peer review was too lenient on letting a flawed paper pass. IME if the conclusions of a paper are at all controversial then the relevant editor will try hard to give the paper a fair hearing (eg by calling in extra referees if the initial opinion is split) and may well publish against their better judgement rather than be accused of blocking some controversial elements. But the paper still has to stand up scientifically.



To imagine automatically that the Bengtsson paper was rejected for ideological reasons is ill-informed to put it mildly. That really isn't typical of how the scientific process works, despite skeptic propaganda.



From Simon Buckle

Policy Director, Grantham Institute for Climate Change, Imperial College London


"Professor Lennart Bengtsson's resignation from the GWPF Academic Advisory Council has received wide coverage and raises important issues.

Whatever anyone's views are on the role, motivation and integrity of the GWPF in this matter, it is up to individual academics whether or not to associate themselves with it in an advisory role.

It is regrettable that perceived political stances on the climate issue are apparently so affecting academic activity. The Grantham Institute at Imperial has always opposed such behaviour, believing that scientific progress requires an open society. We try to engage with a wide range of figures, some with radically different views on climate change.

The outcome in this case is probably a reflection of the "us and them" that has permeated the climate science debate for decades and which is in part an outcome of - and reaction to - external pressure on the climate community. But we must be clear: this is not a justification. Concerted external pressure - if that is what it was - on Professor Bengtsson to resign from his GWPF role was wrong and misjudged."



That's from an actual climate scientist.