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Less than half of scientific papers support Gorebal Warming?

POSTED BY: BARNSTORMER
UPDATED: Friday, September 21, 2007 06:50
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Thursday, August 30, 2007 1:05 PM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up


Quote:

Originally posted by rue:
Back to the papers - usually they come with a list of key words/ search terms. No one could possible read though all those papers, or even skim through them. Not only that, but services/ programs that do literature searches don't search the papers - they test key word lists, or at best, abstracts.

It would be interesting to see exactly how each was done, but I suspect it was through literature search programs of key words and/ or abstracts.



Here's Dr. Oreskes' entire description of her methodology, and results, from the report cited in an earlier post.

Quote:

That hypothesis was tested by analyzing 928 abstracts, published in refereed scientific journals between 1993 and 2003, and listed in the ISI database with the keywords
“climate change” (My note: later errata indicates the keywords used were actually"global climate change")
The 928 papers were divided into six categories:
explicit endorsement of the consensus position, evaluation of impacts, mitigation proposals, methods, paleoclimate analysis, and rejection of the consensus position.
Of all the papers, 75% fell into the first three categories, either explicitly or implicitly accepting the consensus view; 25% dealt with methods or paleoclimate, taking no position on current anthropogenic climate change. Remarkably, none of the papers disagreed with the consensus position.
Admittedly, authors evaluating impacts,
developing methods, or studying paleoclimatic
change might believe that current climate change is natural. However, none of these papers argued that point.



We'll have to wait for Dr Schulte's paper to be published, but given that it has been submitted for peer-review, I'd have to suspect that his methodology is described in quite a bit more detail.


"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Thursday, August 30, 2007 1:15 PM

RUE

I have a vote and I'm not afraid to use it!


"Does that mean you have to have a tantrum at your kid when they're having a tantrum????"

No. That's just my personal reaction after being reasonable about it for so many years.

***************************************************************
"Global warming - it's not just a fact, it's a choice."

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Thursday, August 30, 2007 2:39 PM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up


Quote:

Originally posted by SignyM:
I'm assuming that there is a substantive paper somewhere that will be ferreted out in time.



Might be fallacious assumption, given that the only article in the UCSD list of publications by Dr. Oreskes which relates to her 'consensus' analysis is the Science Magazine essay.

http://historyweb.ucsd.edu/oreskes/pages/publication.html

By the way, here's a series of letters between Dr. Benny Peiser and Science Magazine.

http://www.staff.livjm.ac.uk/spsbpeis/Scienceletter.htm

Dr. Peiser replicated Dr. Oreskes' analysis, based on her criteria in the previous Science Magazine article, and came up with quite different results.

Science first asked him to shorten his letter, and then decided not to publish it because, in their words, "the basic points of your letter have already been widely dispersed over the internet..."

Rather than post the whole exchange, I'd ask you to read mr. Peiser's transcript with an open mind.


"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Thursday, August 30, 2007 3:00 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


What this author did was divide the db into eight categories:
1. explicit endorsement of the consensus position
2. evaluation of impacts
3. mitigation proposals
4. methods
5. paleoclimate analysis
6. rejection of the consensus position.
7. natural factors of global climate change
8. unrelated to the question of recent global climate change

What he found was

1117 abstracts
13 (or 1%) explicitly endorse the 'consensus view'.
322 abstracts (or 29%) implicitly accept the 'consensus view'
10% of the abstracts (89) focus on "mitigation".
67 abstracts mainly focus on methodological questions.
87 abstracts deal exclusively with paleo-climatological research unrelated to recent climate change.
34 abstracts reject or doubt the view that human activities are the main drivers of the "the observed warming over the last 50 years".
44 abstracts focus on natural factors of global climate change.
470 (or 42%) abstracts include the keywords "global climate change" but do not include any direct or indirect link or reference to human activities, CO2 or greenhouse gas emissions, let alone anthropogenic forcing of recent climate change.


So one of the categories that should have been included the origial study was "irrelevant" (Perhaps the term "neutral" refers to this category. If that is the case, its a misleading label) Maybe it's like Google: 50% of what you pull up using keywords is crap? So if you eliminated the irrelevent, what would you get is ...

2% explicitly endorse humans as a driver
50% implicitly endorse this view
14% focus on mitigation
10% focus on methodology
13% deal with far distant past climate changes
5% reject or doubt that humans are the MAIN drivers
7% focus on natural factors of climate change

So according to this version 64% fall into the first three categories. Oreskes came up with 74%. Perhaps two people looking at the same abstract might interpret it differently and toss it into a different bin? I'm reminded of The Mismeasure of Man by Gould, in which the famous experiment of mesuring cranial sizes of racial groups using mustard seed was repeated and came up with very different results. Not only is it difficult to come up with relevant categories, it's even more difficult to make individual assignment. For example- what about papers that tackle more than one topic?


---------------------------------
Always look upstream.

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Thursday, August 30, 2007 3:24 PM

RIGHTEOUS9


Sounds like something pretty damn close to consensus to me. Only 6% of all papers surveyed reject man's role in global warming outright?

Where's the controversy? If there were such a thing in the community, I'd expect far more push-back from scientists looking to debunk the claim. Instead you have very few.

45 percent either explicitly endorse the theory of man's role in global warming, or do so implicitly.

48 percent are not weighing in, which could be for a number of reasons. their papers could have very little to do with trying to determine what is causing global warming, in which case, they may have chosen not color it with an endorsement one way or another.

It seems to me, that not very many scientists feel the need to publish studies adressing the current consensus in a negative light.

It is the going theory. You'd think somebody would want to do some real, honest science on the subject with the intention of debunking it.


instead, all the naysayers are forced to cite at nauseum the same 2 or 3 papers that they have been citing for the last 5 years.


Now, just because it's the consensus, doesn't make it right. Maybe the 6 percenters all conveniently associated with the likes of exxon, are the true Copernicus's, and everybody else is wrong...

but don't pretend that's not a consensus.

On edit...

why no category for those who implicitly reject the claim of man made global warming?


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Thursday, August 30, 2007 3:29 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


If the "neutral" papers are indeed "irrelevant" then the stats change from this...

Of 528 total papers on climate change, only 38 (7%) gave an explicit endorsement of the consensus. If one considers "implicit" endorsement (accepting the consensus without explicit statement), the figure rises to 45%. However, while only 32 papers (6%) reject the consensus outright, the largest category (48%) are neutral papers, refusing to either accept or reject the hypothesis.

to this....
15% explicitly accept the consensus
79% implicitly endorse the consensus
13% reject the consensus explicitly


A lot depends on the specific definitions and methodology. It's still a case of wait and see.



---------------------------------
Always look upstream.

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Thursday, August 30, 2007 3:46 PM

LEADB


Hi Causal! always glad to see a post by you! Not much to add to your observation, it does seem amazing how quick discussions degenerate to name calling, put downs explicit and implied. Still sticking in myself...
Quote:

Originally posted by canttakesky:
Back to the thread, I thought I would share a quote from my husband's boss (also a phd scientist) at the Dept of Energy on global warming:

"Anyone who says that the data conclusively shows that human activities cause global warming is not a scientist.
Anyone who says the data conclusively shows that human activities cannot be the cause of global warming is also not a scientist."

I like that; and its a lot of the reason I tend to push for sane solutions that have multiple benefits:
1) Wind; renewable, decreases dependence on mid east oil.
2) Reduce; motivate folks to buy efficient vehicles, same.
etc. What's the worst that happens if we -eventually- get 80% of our electric from wind (assuming that's reasonable, I don't know) in a manner where it is deployed in a non-disruptive way; and folks start driving 'primarily electric' cars? We let the Saudis sit on their ugly oil. If it helps reduce green house gasses, all the better; if it ends up not mattering, then perhaps we -still- have a somewhat defused middle east.

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Thursday, August 30, 2007 4:07 PM

LEADB


Quote:

Originally posted by SignyM:
In general I find MOST people "in the majority" are pretty reasonable people: HKCavalier {yes, HK) FredG, Soup, Fletch2, Mal4Prez, LeadB, SargeX, me

Woah. That almost slipped by... I'm in the majority? I thought I was the flaky deist, $5 / gallon fuel tax, give peace a chance, consider Ron Paul, nutty dude? This board is weirder than I thought! I mean, I've agreed with -Kaneman- on some topics!!!!!

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Thursday, August 30, 2007 4:13 PM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up


Quote:

Originally posted by SignyM:
A lot depends on the specific definitions and methodology. It's still a case of wait and see.



Yet I note that this doesn't stop you from torturing logic and making unsupported assumptions in the posts above to try and advance your opinion.

You already got all of Dr. Oreskes' input. If a student turned in such a paper, without some sort of explanation of methodology and list of data reviewed, they'd flunk the course. You're perfectly willing to accept it with no supporting data at all, yet want to 'wait and see' and quibble over what's relevent when anyone disagrees with her unsupported claims.

Why not provide some information which would allow a better review of Dr. Oreskes' paper in the first place? If her paper is accurate, there should be something out there to verify it.

"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Thursday, August 30, 2007 4:19 PM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up


Quote:

Originally posted by SignyM:
If the "neutral" papers are indeed "irrelevant" then the stats change from this...

Of 528 total papers on climate change, only 38 (7%) gave an explicit endorsement of the consensus. If one considers "implicit" endorsement (accepting the consensus without explicit statement), the figure rises to 45%. However, while only 32 papers (6%) reject the consensus outright, the largest category (48%) are neutral papers, refusing to either accept or reject the hypothesis.

to this....
15% explicitly accept the consensus
79% implicitly endorse the consensus
13% reject the consensus explicitly



Or we could just cut to the chase and only accept 'explicit' opinions, where, per Peiser, 13 explicitly accept, and 34 explicitly reject, making it:

28% accept
72% reject

Consensus indeed.


"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Thursday, August 30, 2007 4:26 PM

RUE

I have a vote and I'm not afraid to use it!


This was included in the "reject" pile:



Review and Impacts of Climate-change Uncertainties
Fernau ME, Makofske WJ, South DW
Futures 25 (8): 850-863 Oct 1993
Abstract: This article examines the status of the scientific uncertainties in predicting and verifying global climate change that hinder aggressive policy making. More and better measurements and statistical techniques are needed to detect and confirm the existence of greenhouse-gas-induced climate change, which currently cannot be distinguished from natural climate variability in the historical record. Uncertainties about the amount and rate of change of greenhouse gas emissions also make prediction of the magnitude and timing of climate change difficult. Because of inadequacies in the knowledge and depiction of physical processes and limited computer technology, predictions from existing computer models vary widely, particularly on a regional basis, and are not accurate enough yet for use in policy decisions. The extent of all these uncertainties is such that moving beyond no-regrets measures such as conservation will take political courage and may be delayed until scientific uncertainties are reduced.

Personally, I would either call this a methodological paper or a neutral paper. It doesn't reject man-made global warming, it says it can't be distinguished.



***************************************************************
"Global warming - it's not just a fact, it's a choice."

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Thursday, August 30, 2007 6:17 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:

Yet I note that this doesn't stop you from torturing logic and making unsupported assumptions in the posts above to try and advance your opinion.
I'm not sure I'm trying to advance ANY opinion except to say that it's difficult to tell what the categories mean. Let me give you an example:

Global Warming's Next Victim: Wheat
Quote:

As a result of the supply squeeze, global inventories of wheat — which makes up one-fifth of the world's food intake — are expected to fall to their lowest level in 26 years, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.... And, if the world warms as expected over the coming decades, the terrible farming year of 2007 may be just the beginning. As temperatures rise, many studies predict that crop yields will decline, as the extreme droughts and floods that damaged this year's wheat crops become more common.... C02 is to plants what oxygen is to humans, and all things being equal, more CO2 should speed plant growth. Scientists believe a one-degree temperature increase might actually benefit agriculture. But if the planet warms by around three degrees — a distinct possibility before the end of the century, according to recent assessments by the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change...

www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1656570,00.html?cnn=yes The article doesn't say anything about "man made" global warming. But it DOES refer to increased carbon dioxide. So is it neutral? Mitigative? Implicit agreement? I can think of LOTS of articles on "global climate change" that have nothing to do with today's situation like Effect of global climate change on C12/C14 ratios of marine sediment that would pop up on a database search but could be termed either neutral or irrelevant, depending on how you want to think of it! When the official paper comes out and when I have time, I'll look at it more closely. For now it's going on the back pile because there's not enuf information to figure out if the headline is justified by the paper. (Example: 1934 was the warmest year!)

---------------------------------
Always look upstream.

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Friday, August 31, 2007 2:58 AM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up


Quote:

Originally posted by SignyM:
When the official paper comes out and when I have time, I'll look at it more closely.



That'll be fine, if you apply the same unbiased eye to Dr. Oreskes' paper. Or since it's already available, save some time and try that now.

"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Friday, August 31, 2007 3:50 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:

if you apply the same unbiased eye to Dr. Oreskes' paper. Or since it's already available, save some time and try that now.
Somewhere back in my posts I already addressed Oreskes' paper: She (and all researchers) should have created an explicit category called "irrelevant". (Do a find on this page: "irrelevant". It'll pop up.) Without that category the final values aren't interpretable. In other words, though widely cited her essay isn't robust enough to be included on whether or not there is a consensus on man-assisted global warming. Peiser's re-study does include a category which does not include or cite this keyword subset: human activities, CO2, greenhouse gas emissions. That 42% is remarkably similar to the 48% "neutral" papers cited by Schulte. Unless we know what that rather large subset means, it's difficult to tell whether that subset is "irrelevant", "neutral", "implicit disagreement", a combination, or something else. Schulte's study- being a published paper- may have more definitive information.

-------------
Fortunately, we're not limited to these papers. The following scientific organizations explicitly support the consensus statement
Joint science academies’ statement 2007, 2005, 2001
U.S. National Research Council, 2001
American Meteorological Society
American Geophysical Union
American Institute of Physics
American Astronomical Society
American Association for the Advancement of Science
Stratigraphy Commission of the Geological Society of London
Geological Society of America
American Chemical Society
Engineers Australia (The Institution of Engineers Australia)

There are two non-committal statements
American Association of State Climatologists
American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)

There are no scientific organizational dissenting statements since the Petroleum Geologists re-wrote their statement.

The latest international SURVEY of working scientists
http://downloads.heartland.org/Bray%202.pdf indicates that they increasingly believe that global climate change will have a serious impact on some societies, and that mitigation- not adaptation- is the only way to proceed. (Mitigation assumes that human activity has enough of an effect on global climate to make a difference should it be implemented.)

The lack of robust dissent indicates a consensus.

----------------
Now, I know a lot of global-warming deniers are going to change tacks and sputter about suppression of dissent, the lure of research grants, the lemming-like behavior of scientists, the irrelevance of scientific consensus and so forth. I also tend not to look for scientific consensus myself, and prefer to stick to discussion of the science behind the consensus. As I mentioned before, there is another driver that I have a very scientific "gut feeling" is important, and that is SOOT. Specifically, MAN-MADE SOOT. There is a significant decrease in incident visible light worldwide. In other words the world is getting significantly dimmer and it's NOT tied to solar output. www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0513-01.htm You don't hear too much about it- it's one of those quiet scientific anomalies. But researchers are just now beginning to look at the effect of soot on cloud reflectance (lower), rainfall (less), air temperature (higher), snow albedo (lower) and I suspect that when they track back that dimming and it's implications it's going to cause some anal puckering. I could be wrong of course.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.

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Friday, August 31, 2007 9:03 AM

RAZZA


Quote:

Originally posted by rue:
BTW - the reason I don't let slagging go is b/c - as expressed on different topic elsewhere - silence is consent. As long as people feel free to throw hate around I'll feel obligated to throw it back.



And this is why so many have a problem with some of your posts Rue. You are allowing hate to beget hate. There is no end to that circle. Better to let it roll off your back or if unable to do that, take the higher ground and respond without the vitriol those hate spewers are hoping to elicit from you.

-----------------
"There is not such a cradle of democracy upon the earth as the Free Public Library, this republic of letters, where neither rank, office, nor wealth receives the slightest consideration."
---Andrew Carnegie

"Doing research on the Web is like using a library assembled piecemeal by pack rats and vandalized nightly."
---Roger Ebert

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Friday, August 31, 2007 9:22 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:

And this is why so many have a problem with some of your posts Rue.
I have problems with LOTS of people's posts and some of these people are just plain trolls... or Repuglican plants! But the answer to that IMHO is to either ignore it... nothing frosts a troll worse than not getting a rise!!... or to simply stick to the issue and NOT let the discussion get derailed. And the reaosn why I choose that is because the tactics that work for a campaign are not the same for a discussion board... especially one where people get to know each other over a long period of time. Can't say I've been entirely successful, but that's been my MO for about the past six months or so. So who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks???

So... whaddaya think about the SOOT hypothesis, eh? It's my very own!

---------------------------------
Always look upstream.

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Friday, August 31, 2007 9:57 AM

LEADB


Quote:

Originally posted by SignyM:
So... whaddaya think about the SOOT hypothesis, eh? It's my very own!

It's a filthy, ugly... dirty! hypothesis. Sorry, couldn't resist. Sounds interesting; write up your proposal and see if you can get a grant.

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Sunday, September 2, 2007 4:30 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:

It's a filthy, ugly... dirty! hypothesis.
HAHAHAH!!

You know.... maybe I will....

---------------------------------
Always look upstream.

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Friday, September 7, 2007 2:56 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


=

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Friday, September 21, 2007 6:50 AM

FREDGIBLET

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