"Skeptical Environmentalist" Rebuked

mpsmps writes "The "Skeptical Environmentalist", reviewed in slashdot here has been rebuked by the Danish Committee on Scientific Dishonesty for shoddy, politically motivated science. Are they being valuable watchdogs, or are both sides driven by politics rather than science?"

Comments

I know you are, but what am I?

[FrostyWheaton]

This kind of conversation never goes anywhere it seems. Anyone challenging the status quo is part of the anti-establisment conspiracy, pushing their agenda. Anyone upholding the status quo is part of the nebulous "they" who don't want anyone to know the truth.

My bet is they are both politically motivated groups using science to furthertheir cause. Who is right? I leave that to the philosophers.

Rebuking the rebuker's rebukers

[Spamalamadingdong]

The Economist editorial is also content-free, providing no factual basis for the criticism of the Danish committee.

If you want to know why Lomborg's book is such a crock, you have to go through it. I admit that I have not read the entire thing, but unless the book is a great deal more comprehensive and balanced than the extremely shallow and biased excerpts I've had the time to read, I think that the Danes are spot-on with their rebuke.

Not that every knee-jerk response to Lomborg is necessarily any better, but you can't give either side a free pass in these matters.

Re:Rebuking the rebuker's rebukers

[neocon]

You're trolling right? Far from being `content-free', the chapter you choose to cite (on Forestation) has eighty-six footnotes citing a very wide range of sources. This in a chapter which runs only eight pages.

Quite seriously, are we really supposed to take your complaint seriously, when the only thing you find to say is that one particular eight-page chapter in the midst of a five-hundred page large-format trade paperback does not have more graphs? Really?

Incidentally, if you'll actually read those footnotes (on pages 375-378 of the paperback edition) you'll find that in addition to citing a range of sources, they add considerable discussion of the subject at hand.

And your next complaint is what? That he doesn't interrupt a chapter on oil supplies for a disquisition on mideast politics? I thought you were alleging that his book was political -- in truth it seems that it is your criticism which is politically motivated, through and through.

Again, provide us any evidence either that his data is wrong (something which even his critics have not suggested), or that his conclusions are unwarranted (something his critics have suggested without providing examples or counter-arguments). Otherwise you're just blowing hot air.

Re:Are they?

[DaveOnNet]

A fool sometimes has a good idea and a wise man sometimes has a foolish one. Do you eat poison because the fool tells you not to?

If it is politically motivated, it's worth less, is that the idea? Certainly, a little less, but politics does a great job of making people talk about important issues. It is a shame when we interrupt the discussion of those issues to discuss the fact that people are not always motivated purely by a search for the truth.

Re:Pot Calling the Kettle......

[jeramybsmith]

The book is pretty much self explanatory. The majoroity of the content is _not_ in dispute. The critics of the book that I found most provocative were is a skeptic magazine. I read them and Lomborg's response. Most critics can only find a few cases in the book where they challenge Lomborg's methods. In other words, just read the fricken book. If someone does faulty research, and someone else points it out, then someone else points out that person who pointed out said errors didnt consider another study, doesn't make the study in question any less faulty.

Re:Are they?

[elmegil]

In this particular case, truth is really all that matters, and the truth is obscured by all the gorilla dust being thrown by both sides, motivated by politics.