Category Archives: Ethics

On admitting and correcting mistakes

by Judith Curry

Inside Higher Education (UK) has a lengthy article by Darrel Ince  entitled “Systems failure”, with the subtitle “A scandal involving clinical trials based on research that was riddled with errors shows that journals, institutions and individuals must raise their standards.”   An interview with Ince can be found here.  There is discussion of this on two threads at Bishop Hill (here and here).  The article and interview are very thought provoking, with relevance to the context of the climate debate.

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Lawyering up

by Judith Curry

Climate scientists, bloggers, and journalists are increasingly providing business for lawyers.  What’s going on here?

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Neverending Reflections on Climategate

by Judith Curry

Motivated by a post by David Roberts at Grist, there has been some interesting reflection on Climategate this past week.  Roberts’ post entitled “What we have and haven’t learned from Climategate” says:

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Hiding the Decline. Part IV: Beautiful Evidence

by Judith Curry

Continuing the themes of conflict prevention and best practices developed in Part III, I would like to discuss some pages from Edward Tufte’s book Beautiful Evidence, which was introduced here by Steve Mosher (seconded by MrPete).  Of particular relevance is a chapter entitled “Corrupt Techniques in Evidence Presentations: Effects Without Cause, Cherry Picking, Punning, Chartjunk.”

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Hiding the Decline: Part II

by Judith Curry

The significance of the debate over the hockey stick and “hide the decline” is the following:

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Hiding the Decline

by Judith Curry

To date, I’ve kept Climate Etc.  a “tree ring free zone,” since the issues surrounding the hockey stick are a black hole for conflict and pretty much a tar baby, IMO.  Further, paleoproxies are outside the arena of my personal research expertise, and I find my eyes glaze over when I start reading about bristlecones, etc.  However, two things this week have changed my mind, and I have decided to take on one aspect of this issue: the infamous “hide the decline.”

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On Being a Scientist

by Judith Curry

The National Academies has published a new edition of its book:

ON BEING A SCIENTIST
A GUIDE TO RESPONSIBLE CONDUCT IN RESEARCH

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Washington update: science integrity

by Judith Curry

Over the past week, there have been several notable events on the “Hill” of relevance to U.S. science policy, addressing issues of concern related to the integrity of science.  In a word, Bravo!

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Understanding conservative religious resistance to climate science

This post is a Q&A with Dr. David Gushee, who is Distinguished Professor of Christian Ethics at Mercer University, his personal web site is here and Wikipedia bio is here.

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What have we learned from Climategate? Part II

by Judith Curry

The previous thread is getting unwieldly, there seems to still be much interest in discussing this, and there are some new interesting articles that I’ve spotted:

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What have we learned from Climategate?

by Judith Curry

On this one year anniversary of the unauthorized release of the emails from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, there have been a number of articles reflecting on what the impact of this has been on both science and policy, and what we might have learned.

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Why engage with skeptics?

by Judith Curry

Many climate scientists have stopped engaging with skeptics, because they think it is either pointless or they don’t want to lend legitimacy to the skepticism. Those who think it is pointless seem mostly interested in protecting their time.  Those who view this as lending legitimacy to skeptics would seem to be acting in accord with IPCC/UNFCCC ideology.

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No ideologues: Part III

by Judith Curry

Some very constructive dialogue on the previous two threads.  The use of the word “heretic” in the Scientific American article just begged for the word “dogma” to be used.  Given its range of connotations, it seems that dogma or even dogmatism doesn’t really convey what I am intending to for many people.

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No dogma(tism): Part II

by Judith Curry

The dogma post seems to have a struck a nerve, but both sides seem be talking past each other.  One side sees the dogma as self-evident, the other side wants evidence.

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Ending the war with skeptics

by Judith Curry

As we approach the anniversary of Climategate, I am getting a lot of queries from reporters, which invariably includes the following question:

Is there any hope for ending the war between climate scientists that support the IPCC and skeptics?

My answer is “yes.”

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No dogma

by Judith Curry

My posts on positive feedback loops (here and here) have engendered some interesting discussions, particularly at Collide-a-scape and Die Klimazweibel.  While many are pondering the points I raise, most of the “insiders” don’t like the idea of “IPCC dogma.”

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Reversing the direction of the positive feedback loop: Part II

by Judith Curry

I can’t predict in advance when a thread will generate a lot of activity; I’m learning that anything with “climategate” in it is likely to have a lot of traffic.  Since the first thread  has almost 500 comments, I would like to address some of the questions and issues raised, and redirect the discussion.

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Reversing the direction of the positive feedback loop

by Judith Curry

I’m at Purdue University, preparing for a panel discussion with Andy Revkin and Roger Pielke Jr. on “Beyond Climategate.”  The following three questions have been posed:

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Heresy and the creation of monsters

by Judith Curry

I’m having another “Alice down the rabbit hole” moment, in response to the Scientific American article, the explication of the article by its author Michael Lemonick, Scientific American’s survey on whether I am a dupe or a peacemaker, and the numerous discussions in blogosphere.

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Recent challenges to the credibility of climate science

The unauthorized release of emails from the Climate Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia initiated extensive public scrutiny on climate research.

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