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How Blogs Are Changing the Scientific Discourse
quax writes "Mainstream media always follows the same kind of 'He said, she said' template, which is why even climate change deniers get their say, although they are a tiny minority. The leading scientific journals, on the other hand, are expensive and behind pay-walls. But it turns out there are places on the web where you can follow science up close and personal: The many personal blogs written by scientists — and the conversation there is changing the very nature of scientific debate. From the article: 'It's interesting to contemplate how corrosive the arguments between Bohr and Einstein may have turned out, if they would have been conducted via blogs rather than in person. But it's not all bad. In the olden days, science could easily be mistaken for a bloodless intellectual game, but nobody could read through the hundreds of comments on Scott's blog that day and come away with that impression.'"
Climate change
Home on the range
Though it's buried in snow
Vice suds, for a change
Burma Shave
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
While blogging might be good for long-established academics, younger academics might just be undermining their own careers by posting their thoughts on blogs. They can prove a distraction that slows one down from publishing, and if you post a novel thought or promising research direction on your blog, it might just be picked up by one of your fellows who beats you to publishing first.
Considering that one's ideas, namely the publications arising from those ideas, are what one is judged on when getting grant funding and tenure, why give them away for free?
Who else will agree with everything they say, if not sock puppets?
"climate change deniers"?
Ah, where would we be if we couldn't put others down ... makes you feel good, huh?
This is an interesting discussion. On the one hand, more people can follow or even contribute to scientific debates when they're online, on blogs. Otoh, the amount of noise can become incredible, obscuring the debate for those who can't judge who's credible and who's not. What do we think of a world where it's not the best scientist who "wins", but the one who's most persuasive in online debates.
no, I don't have a sig
Grrr. If you can't (won't?) state your opponent's point of view accurately, then why would you ever expect to have a decent conversation?
"We receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us" - Faraday
I don't agree with the premise. Yes we hear about the conflicts more than we used to because conflicts are what people tend to talk about. Modern media devotes attention to the disagreements, even when there are lots of agreements. There are serious considered discussions taking place, but you don't hear about them because modern media ignores them. I imagine that there are thousands of conversation every day but only 1% of them are vocal disagreements. Now fill all the blogs with that particular 1%. Many people would get the impression that its all disagreement and conflict. But that is simply not true in general. Blogs aren't changing scientific discourse. Blogs are pulling disagreements and conflicts on scientific topics into modern media.
The difference with Bohr/Einstein was probably something to do with the fact that nobody's multi-billion dollar industry's reputation had potential to be damaged by the results.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
I figured there would be a backhanded comment directed at people that don't believe the climate change mantra. First sentence in! Surprised they didn't use the old standard statement of "those that don't believe the FACT of climate change". Then to say it's a small group that doesn't believe in it? Ah yes. The old "this is how it is, but don't research it, because then we will have to shout you down, cause that's how science works!"
our secrets are killing us? everybody? http://www.globalresearch.ca/weather-warfare-beware-the-us-military-s-experiments-with-climatic-warfare/7561
we fail to honor our genuine heros,, ominous (very nearly fatal) 'welcome home' from our 'civil' servants http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=scott%20olsen&sm=3
so we pretend even more accounting problems still http://rt.com/business/us-unemployment-economy-crisis-assistance-006/
Climate denial is the insistence that the climate science as accepted by mainstream is entirely incorrect based solely on the fact that it means that we cannot continue with the current scheme of huge financial interests in fossil fuels and must change.
And when you're at the top, change is bad. Since there are far more ways to go down than to go up.
And when you're THAT rich and powerful, it's not the money, but the relative money that matters, so if you gain money but someone else GAINS MORE, then you've "lost".
So change is bad.
And since climate science inevitably leads to "Burning fossil fuels is a shit idea and we must stop now", they can't claim "BUT I WANNA BURN IT!" so have to deny the evidence that informs the scientists.
They deny the climate.
For example, how would you tell if the climate were changing? You retards all "accept" that "climate has always changed" but you're entirely unwilling to accept any evidence that climate is changing now. "Oh, that's just weather!". Well, climate is weather, in gross.
When you deny that the shit weather is evidence of AGW, you're denying climate change, because climate is the average weather, and the average weather is the weather you have, each event. So the weather is evidence of cliamate. And the weather is changing. That means the climate is changing. But you'll deny it because it means your current career choices have been poorly made and that's unpossible.
Anyone using the phrase "climate change denier" obviously does not understand the scientific method.
The problem isn't that people have contrarian ideas and express them - but the authoritarian view that they shouldn't be allowed to.
that is why even climate change deniers get their say, although they are a tiny minority.
Right off the top? Classy.
True Believers are worse that vegans in their dampened ability to think straight through their dollops of misplaced, righteous outrage.
Overly emotional thinkers trying to assuage their human guilt. -It's not a bad thing to feel guilt, but without the ability to think rationally, it gets pinned on irrational things.
Proof of irrationality?
Just count the number of posts questioning climate change in any given story where the question comes up. Seems like a fairly even split to me. Not "a tiny minority". And some days, only the lunatic fringe are adamant about Global Warming.
And yes, for the record, they've shifted their position. It used to be "Global Warming". Now that we've had, what is it? 17 years of no warming according the last story from satellites sent up to measure global temperatures, the dissonant believers have shifted their story to fit the emotional demands. Now it's "Climate Change." -Which, yes, holly hell, there is climate change.
If you're going to get into a righteous huff and blame a sacrificial carbon goat, pick a windmill and stick to it.
And no, carbon emissions have nothing to do with why the weather is freaking out.
The peer review system for scientific journals is broken. It was supposed to ensure that only valid research which takes a field forward would actually get published. Techniques such as blind and double blind reviewing were supposed to help in ensuring that there was no bias towards specific researchers such as those who were considered to be leaders in the field. However what happens in practice is usually a long way from that ideal, vested interests and group think often result in new, fresh ideas not being published (older academics pulling up the ladder) and mutual back scratching is very common. Reviewing is rarely blind let alone double blind and so all the abuses those are supposed to prevent can (and do) take place. New approaches to publishing ideas and possibly even research results should be encouraged. Blogs are also far from ideal, but if it helps get ideas out to a wider audience then they're a step in the right direction.
Science articles are at best n-1 dimensional projections of n dimensional objects.
The only one who fell foul was a left wing "charity".
Most of those "charities" from the right wing jumped because they knew they were political lobby groups, not charities.
The remaining ones knew that they (at least intended) were charities, not political lobby facades. And the IRS agreed.
Howeer, this doesn't demonise Obama, and will be ignored.
"skepticism about their methods".
Which methods you have been told by someone ABOUT WHOM YOU ARE COMPLETELY UNSKEPTICAL ABOUT as being poor. Right?
"Here's the part that probably would be a head fuck for you since you're so smug and think you're so smart."
Nope, I AM smart. So smart that your follow on has nothing for me in illumination.
"and I use that term loosely, and I happen to be one of those "scientists", just in a different field, and know first hand how full of shit "scientists" typically are and how driven they are by money and ego and prestige "
Yeah, right. Bullshit. There are PhDs working at AIG who have CATEGORICALLY stated there is PROOF that TRex was a vegetarian in the Garden of Eden.
YOU are full of shit and driven by money, ego and presige, I can fully concur (you DO claim you are a scientist, and that all scientists do this as far as you are aware), but your attempt to slur anyone else because you're crass and venal cuts no mustard.
"and how you have to toe the political line because failure to do so is suicide for your career"
Ah, so tell me how when Shrub was in charge how all the climate scientists in the USA "toed the political line" or got shitcanned by the "oil baron" Shrub...
"Also, maybe being more open with their raw data would be a help too"
More denier bingo.
What more openness do you need? GISS. Google it.
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/
But you've heard from the shitstains of the blogworld how CRU wouldn't give McIntyre information
a) he already had
b) wasn't CRU's to give
c) Could freely get from the actual owner
d) was unpaid for by McIntyre, who was not a UK taxpayer, but wanting a handout at UK taxpayer expense.
and have just swallowed it whole like the credulous moron you are.
PS 9 investigations later: no fraud.
...one can then ALSO see the sorts of personal bias a scientist has.
This also helps identify if they're peddling some sort of politically-motivated mendacity.
-Styopa
"And no, carbon emissions have nothing to do with why the weather is freaking out."
Yup, this is climate denial: evidence you don't like is denied.
Well done.
PS IPCC was named what? And when?
Gilbert Plass' paper in 1955 was named what?
Frank Luntz said what to do to minimise the impact of Global Warming for his Oil Baron prez?
Well, I've read your posts, so this is not news, sad to say. Tell me, do you ALWAYS read what you think is there, and ignore what is said? Or is this merely your way of pretending to never have lost?
Please have mercy on us and turn off this God-awful beta format!!!!
How does the rise of science blogs impact the central idea of Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions?
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
Anyone who uses "contrarian" as a synonym for the scientific method doesn't know what the scientific method, nor skepticism, is.
The problem is that contrarianism isn't skepticism, but you're damned sure going to pretend it is so you can stuff your fingers in your ears and go "LALALALALALA! CAN'T HEAR YOU!!!".
There is another way for people to get the real facts, the real science of climate change other than from the mainstream media. The Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) was formed by real American climate scientists and they have created their own extensive reports on climate change. Over 37,000 other scientsts have signed their name in support. http://nipccreport.org
This is an interesting discussion. On the one hand, more people can follow or even contribute to scientific debates when they're online, on blogs. Otoh, the amount of noise can become incredible, obscuring the debate for those who can't judge who's credible and who's not. What do we think of a world where it's not the best scientist who "wins", but the one who's most persuasive in online debates.
Your point is well-intended and I sympathize, but speaking as a [reasonably successful] tenured professor in a scientific discipline at a major research university, I would point out this is how science has always been. It's never actually been about who the "best scientist" is--that's very subjective--it's always been about who is most persuasive or popular. This was Kuhn's point, as well as that of other philosophers of science such as Quine or Feyerabend (who all came from very different perspectives).
There's always been this myth that science rises above psychology, sociology, and human nature, but nothing is further from the truth. I think some scientists aspire to that, but it's unattainable--something that some helpfully recognize but others unfortunately don't. The latter cloak themselves in vacuous arguments about "objectivity" and what's "more scientific" but it's meaningless and distracts from substantive arguments over important issues.
Science has always been most like the music industry--there's only a modest correlation between quality, popularity, and success. Many of the best scientists are overlooked or forgotten; many never receive funding; others are grossly wrong but are popular because they capture the zeitgeist of a certain era; and still others are financially successful and well-known and do good work. You have to sort of be willing to sacrifice yourself at the altar of science to survive, which is an ironic position to be in. To give one perhaps oversimplified example: why does everyone know about Darwin, but not Wallace?
Blogs and whatnot are complicating all of this by reinforcing the noise, as you say, but they are also focusing attention on issues such as the worth of peer review and formal publication. They're also giving outlet to some who might not otherwise have voices. But the fundamental phenomena are nothing new. In this regard, the question is: would you rather have infighting and manipulation with or without the communication afforded by the internet?
Could they be looking for a commonality for their thesis? Or that some obscure point they are missing? Or a validation of observation? rather then the funding, or tenure, could they be putting out the common counterpoint? Or could they be looking for the others in the same general field for guidance where there are limited studies? Or expanding the general knowledge of the subject is harmful to the the public.
Or could they have missed the latest announcement by their august luminaries of the field. Because of other commitments?
There are so many variables, once a quarter publish or die, was once considered the mainstay of "blogs", but now that leaves you out of the mainstream, well into fossil arguments and information passes so fast now, so how would one stay current without blogs, snailmail?
" I happen to be one of those "scientists", just in a different field"
"They don't have an accurate model, as is proven damn near every week"
Your own words betray both your bias and your inability. Just because someone in an expert in their field doesn't mean they are an expert in all fields. Their model has been inaccurate only in that it underestimated the time frame because they were being conservative. They've made adjustments in their outlook whenever they've received new information to warrant an adjustment, and then your ilk claims that means they are wrong when they are just doing real science and following the data. I'd be interested in knowing what major part of the science has been disproven or revised and has been published in a peer reviewed journal. It's really ironic you say all this when the initial "hockey stick" find was entirely unintended.
"full of shit "scientists" typically are and how driven they are by money and ego and prestige"
This statement is irrelevant to whether they have good data, in the private sector this would be called ambition. I work in the private sector and know quite a few people who fit this description. I'd wager it's something that encompasses many humans regardless of what they believe or where they work.
" "whoring themselves out for a grant" and found industry to be a lot more pure and clean"
I think there are many people in lower wage jobs that would disagree. It seems to be a white collar to think that they've got it terribly bad. Just watch any episode of a show beginning in "Real Housewives of..."
"maybe being more open with their raw data would be a help too. In most areas of science, if a researcher refuses to show their standard deviations, and refuse access to their raw data, they'd be considered two bit at the best and a fraud at the worst."
Yes, deny the absolutely copious amounts of data available. You can have a different opinion, but everyone has the same facts. Your absolute arrogance, coupled with your ignorance of basic logic has rendered you unable to make a salient point that can be supported in fact.
Based on your statements, your language, grammar, and complete inability to support your argument, I'd wager your claim that you're more scientifically literate than anyone is a bit overestimated. I could get my 4 year old daughter to speak to you, she can probably break down the science into words and concepts small enough for your to wrap your head around.
How cute, passive-aggressive commenting disguising a comment about nothing.
Climate science skeptic's are about the proper use of science to tax man. If you want to tax a carbon unit, should you use real science, or science fiction to do it?
The studies so far are based on science fiction, made up data, to make a model work, and then predict the future from it. So far the adjustments to the model don't work. therefore the thesis is wrong. But they want to change the world because there is too much carbon here. So they cut out,data points, changed the data to fit another variable, and said now, there is peril, because the carbon here has picked up another trick, It learned to read and understand, therefore it must be evil, we must sequester it.
Another model change, say the sun is constant in output, and it can be expressed as this certain number, never mind the cloud, or the changes in albedo during the orbit, or that the orbit is variable from the center-point, and not circular in motion, but elliptical, changing the amounts of energy received, But is a constant, never heard of a dampened furnace?
You people won't even look at other causes of global warming/cooling such as the sun, and instead have a vote saying that the Sun has nothing to do with global warming.. it is definitely AGW. You call yourselves scientists? Spend a moment and read on up on the other side of the debate by reading the NIPCC Reports. http://nipccreport.org/
The number of fanatics someone has screaming their message doesn't give credence to their argument. The problem with the moniker global warming is that people misunderstood it to mean that everywhere would get warm, which wasn't accurate. The whole planet IS warming, that's an irrefutable fact if we look at temperature norms for the planet over it's existence and your cherry picking of dates doesn't make that go away, the planet's temperature has risen almost .6 degrees since the mass introduction of fossil fuels. Climate change is a more accurate term based on what most people will see, and also significantly less sensational. I fail to see why changing the description of something based on new evidence or understanding is bad or incorrect. Please enlighten me.
"And no, carbon emissions have nothing to do with why the weather is freaking out."
Pray-tell then why is the climate "freaking out". Magic? The mystical sky fairy? The Earth using it's rocket engines to fly closer to the sun? Seriously you have no actual science to back up your argument. In closing, your argument is wrong, you are wrong, and your opinion is wrong and we have the science to back it up.
https://www2.ucar.edu/climate/faq/how-much-has-global-temperature-risen-last-100-years
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cag/time-series/global
Using the term denier to refer to climate skeptics is a blood libel invented by the Boston Globe in 2007 to deliberately compare those who question AGW theory to those who deny the Holocaust.
You are profoundly offensive. You should consider how you got to this point, speak with a therapist.
And don't ever use the term denier in such a flippant context again. Shame on you.
- NIPCC Reports
- Climategate
- Eco-tyranny
We need "moderation" (aka censorship) for blog comments so that readers only see the establishment view and think that they are the minority if they disagree.
Take the red pill and read the NIPCC Reports: http://www.nipccreport.org
Shazbot! We ran into some trouble getting the comments.
Try again... na-nu, na-nu!
Fuck Beta!
It's not a paper, it's several volumes: http://www.nipccreport.org
I think blogs are making it very easy for false (intentional or not) to spread as fact. By reading blogs, you would not know that less and less scientists agree on man-made global warming. I'm at a point where I'm skeptical about any science unless there is solid way to prove it, because often it seems scientists are being paid to get the results they want.
"Tiny minority"? Last study from Jan 17 says 23% don't think global warming is happening. This is what happens when scientists make predictions based on guesses, and are wrong every time. It was 16% last april, so the people who not believing it are going up fast.
In closing, YOUR arguments are wrong and WE have the science to back it up. You just choose to ignore and deny it.
http://www.nipccreport.org
Real science by credible people not funded by political organisations are what fuel our skepticism. Have you read the NIPCC reports? Didn't think so.
Your science vs our science. We debunk your AGW theories with peer reviewed science, and you claim to do the same to ours. It comes down to who you believe, and I believe the NIPCC. LALALALALALALA CAN'T HEAR YOU!!!!
Lior didn't think much of two recent articles in Nature Biotechnology and attempted the traditional reply route, but the journal declined to publish it - so he blogged it:
http://liorpachter.wordpress.com/2014/02/10/the-network-nonsense-of-albert-laszlo-barabasi/
http://liorpachter.wordpress.com/2014/02/11/the-network-nonsense-of-manolis-kellis/
Peer review doesn't mean "Get Screaming Mad Lord Monckton to look at it", dearie.
No mention of Tao's polymath projects? They missed the most interesting example.
The past several months we've witnessed remarkable progress on the twin primes conjecture take place on Tao's blog.
http://terrytao.wordpress.com/2014/02/09/polymath8b-viii-time-to-start-writing-up-the-results/
Calling any scientific skeptics "deniers" is an attack on science and scientific method. This should not be posted on slashdot unless slashdot endorses this attack on science. It doesn't matter how good were the intentions of the person trying to turn skepticism into a slur. It doesn't matter whether the skeptics are credible or numerable. They are an essential part of the process. And labeling them with a term that suggests otherwise is an unequivocal attack on science.
- www.thesunisiron.com/
- http://topdocumentaryfilms.com...
- www.answersingenesis.org/
The truth is out there people!!!
"blogging might be good for long-established academics, younger academics might just be undermining their own careers by posting their thoughts on blogs"
Younger academics need to learn to write about their subject, and blogging is a great way to improve writing skills.
"it might just be picked up by one of your fellows who beats you to publishing first"
If you blog about something, then you have written proof that you had that idea at that time. Conversely, if you don't blog then there's no evidence that you were first.
The mainstream media follows a journalistic model, not an editorial one. That means they record the opinions of Joe Nobody (at least you think they don't exist). I'm chagrined to think of the clueless bigots history will reveal us to be.
The blog is a terrible invention. It needs to be undone. The reason I say such as surprising thing is that blogs do not allow for nuance and flexibility is normal human discourse. Here on Slashdot we have the added tools to remedy much of the failings of blogs, even as dice.com wants to take them away in the interface now under beta. Many people don't realize why they hate the beta interface so much. I think it is because it is an intentional regression to the lack of features in most blogs for directing conversation at distractions and disruptions in conversations. The beta would move us toward the social media model at Facebook and Google which has the effect of crippling discussion.
The reason denialists have more power on blogs is the same reason trolls have more power on blogs and why marketers love blogs, because one person can disrupt a conversation on a blog much more easily than if it had more structure, such as threading, topic changes, contextual quoting and reply, all features that Slashdot is closer to and Reddit is even closer to. There are features that were available long ago to e-mail and listservs, and USENET newsgroups, and have been systematically abandoned by the current social media corporations, Facebook and Google, and others because the lack of structure makes it easier for business intelligence, for the Big Data application of being able to mine (spy) the data of billions of users, but this priority is making it hard for people to have useful discussions. It means that tiny minorities or committed partisans can ruin civil discourse. It also means that blog owners are thrust into a moderation role they never wanted.
So the changes scientists are facing due to running public blogs is that people whose agenda is obvious have to be dealt with. The problem is that running a blog gives such intrusions too much power to disrupt and usurp discussions. Even on social media sites, like Facebook, the people who read a presumably private thread have to self-censor and police themselves because the medium does not handle disruptions well. Disruptions would be better handled by contextual reply and change of topic.
The most glaring and unforgivable example of this degradation of communication and the capacity to support a discussion is Google. Google bought an archive of USENET postings that ran from its origins in 1985 untill past 1990. Those postings were created by newsreader programs that supported all of the features for discussion now lacking in most blogs, and yet Google went on to remove all of those features, consciously, in Google Groups and Google+ which have deteriorated into self-promotions, especially the latter, and all for the profit motive and to the loss of debate and discussion that we need to support democratic institutions in the world. True human conversation is far messier than any blog allows for, and the means to deal with it have existed long before the Web, long before social media, and we need to return to these tools.
My advice to any scientist is to not run a blog. They would be better off running a mailing list or a USENET-like newsgroup.
Actually, if you read a few history of science books what you'll see is that a lot of what we call "the scientific method" came out of arguments just like this. If you look at organizations such as The Royal Society in London in the 1600s they started out as glorified debate clubs arguing the new ideas of the day. Do you want to convince others you are right and win the debate? Better show evidence. Even better, show evidence that they can replicate for themselves. From this came the notion of more formal evidence which later evolved into "the scientific method". Optimistically, widened public debate via blogs might be the best thing that could happen to science, leading to more rigor on how best to validate and confirm new ideas.
Doesn't matter. First to publish gets the prize. Second place needs to find a new phd
Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.