> >Now if someone did a survey, and 95% of scientists agreed on a point,
> >we could arguably call that a "consensus" (as we have done on
> >evolution: 95% of all scientists (not just biologist) surveyed
support
> >Darwin's theory, and well over 99% of biologists.
>
> Another sneaky tactic; it's unlikely anyone will survey
> scientists about global warning, so you can safely say
> "we have to be open-minded until then".
Stan, this is simply incorrect. There have been at least 2 different GW
surveys, and one of them was added to the Wikipedia by someone other
than me:
See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change
The survey shows an even split among scientists on whether the GW theory
is true. This is far from the "consensus" that some GW theory proponents
claim exists.
The fact that a survey contradicts the political views of the Clinton
administration and of the UN climate panel, should be in the Wikipedia.
...unless, of course, someone genuinely feels that a mean score of 4.8
on a scale from 1 (agree) and 7 (disagree) represents a "consensus" of
agreement!
Uncle Ed
> Are you really suggesting that "most scientists find Theory X to be
> beyond reasonable skepticism." is not an acceptable standard for
> the exclusion of Theory X from a supposedly scientific
> encyclopedia?
Hold on, hold on. We're not talking about excluding Theory X from the
encyclopedia - Theory X in this case only appears on the article
about [[SEPP]], as one of the claims SEPP makes or made. What we're
talking about is how we phrase our description of the fact that
scientists mostly reject Theory X. I'm happy to agree with Jimbo that
we should be a bit more sympathetic, but the reader should be left in
no doubt that scientists do indeed reject Singer's claim.
--
Allan Crossman - http://dogma.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk
PGP keys - 0x06C4BCCA (new) || 0xCEC9FAE1 (compatible)
> This bit is important -- it might be that "within the field" of
> postmodern literary criticism (for example), some idea 'X' is
> accepted as a matter of course, and that no one within that
> field questions it. But outside the field, others may find reason
> to dispute it vigorously.
No, that's not a fair example, as postmodern literary criticism is
just one camp in the study of literature. But if all camps - that is,
nearly everyone who was an expert in literature - accepted some
particular claim about literature, then that claim could probably be
stated with no qualifiers (I suspect there are very few such claims
in literary study...)
Here the question is - does nearly every expert in whatever field
"global warming" falls under (environmental science, or whatever)
accept William Connolley's claim? I don't know yet.
--
Allan Crossman - http://dogma.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk
PGP keys - 0x06C4BCCA (new) || 0xCEC9FAE1 (compatible)
Alan,
We should not bother disputing dead issues like the Flat Earth
hypothesis. Everybody already knows that mainstream science has held
that the earth is ball-shaped for centuries. Say rather that Joe Bloggs
believes the "discredited [[flat earth]] hypothesis", or simply that
Bloggs believes in a [[flat earth]]. I assume your Joe Bloggs is an
athlete or actor, or someone equally clueless about science.
But in the debate over the environment, there is no consensus. Some
scientists think one thing, while others think another. The viewpoint of
the UN's climate panel, which was a plank in the Democratic Party's
campaign, is that THERE IS A CONSENSUS FAVORING GLOBAL WARMING THEORY.
However, this is merely a politically motivated claim. The asserted
"consensus" does not exist. Many prominent scientists disagree;
therefore, there is no consensus.
So we should divide scientists, scientific agencies, and political
entities into:
(a) those that assert GW theory is true, and
(b) those that assert that GW theory lacks sufficient proof
I'm labelling William Connolley as one of the pro-GW camp, along with
the UN's climate panel and the Clinton administration's EPA. Lindzen,
Balunias and others get labelled anti-GW because of their skepticism.
What could be simpler?
Ed Poor
Alan asks:
> Here the question is - does nearly every expert
> in whatever field "global warming" falls under
> (environmental science, or whatever) accept
> William Connolley's claim? I don't know yet.
That's precisely the question we've been trying to answer, and the two
points of view are:
* The Democratic Party of the US, along with the Clinton EPA and the
UN's climate panel (IPCC) say that "nearly every expert" accepts the GW
theory (which William also supports).
* Others, like Bush (a politician); Lindzen and Balunias (scientists),
Singer and Seitz (retired scientists) that that "less than half of all
experts" accept the GW theory.
So there is a dispute over whether there is a consensus about a theory.
Is that clear now?
Uncle Ed
Probably I should stay out of this one, but oh well, here goes...
The discussion thus far has dealt with several, separate topics: (1)
the appropriate role of "experts" vs. "non-experts", and of William
Connolley in particular; (2) global warming; (3) chlorine and the
ozone layer; and (4) the bona fides of S. Fred Singer (Ed Poor's
favorite authority on topics the topic of global warming).
With regard to the problem of "experts" vs. "non-experts," my own
expertise (ahem) comes from having written a book that is titled
(with ironic intent), "Trust Us, We're Experts." In it, my co-author
John Stauber and I make the point that many seeming "experts" are in
fact people with undisclosed conflicts of interest that skew their
points of view in ways that the public doesn't always see. For this
reason, it behooves us all to take experts with a grain of salt
rather than merely deferring to their claims of superior knowledge.
Nevertheless, the fact is that experts _do_ exist in many areas who
have more knowledge than lay people in the area of their expertise.
If I am trying to decide whether to have brain surgery, I think I am
probably better off taking the advice of a physician than of my uncle
Byron (even though the surgeon MAY have a profit-related motive for
wanting to influence my decision).
Ed seems to be saying that since William Connolley is an expert in
his field of climate science, Connolley should therefore be treated
as someone with a "point of view." Here, Ed is making a category
error. It is true that experts frequently have strong opinions
related to topics in their field of expertise. However, non-experts
ALSO frequently have strong opinions related to topics in their
fields of NON-expertise. A case in point here is Ed himself, who
clearly has a strong opinion about the topic of global warming, even
though he is not an expert in that field. (I'm not saying this to
disparage Ed. He's acknowledged himself that he is not an expert in
the field, and for that matter, neither am I.)
I see no reason whatsoever to believe that non-experts in a field are
better able to arrive at NPOV formulations than experts in a field.
If anything, experts are _better_ able to do this. Consider, for
example, the following summary of a news story that appeared awhile
back in the New York Times:
>New research indicates that incompetent people tend not to know they
>are incompetent. Not only that, they also tend to be very confident
>that they know what they're doing -- even more confident of their
>own competence than people who really do know what they're doing.
>
> The New York Times reports that Cornell University psychology
>professor David Dunning reached those conclusions in a study he
>conducted with a graduate student, and wrote about his findings in
>the December 1999 issue of the Journal of Personality and Social
>Psychology.
>
> The researchers concluded that one reason incompetent people do not
>know how much they do not know, is that the cognitive skills
>required to be competent are also required for recognizing actual
>competence.
>
> Researcher Justin Kruger told the Times that the incompetence of
>incompetent people "robs them of their ability to realize" they have
>a problem. It also makes it difficult for incompetent folks to
>recognize competence in others.
>
> By the way, the researchers say they also noticed that people who
>can't tell a joke tend not to realize that they're not funny -- and
>as a result they persist in telling jokes badly.
SOURCE:
http://www.truthinjustice.org/incompetent.htm
I think as Wikipedia continues to mature and becomes better regarded
as a credible information resource, it is likely to attract more and
more contributors with expertise and credentials. We ought to welcome
this development (without, of course, excluding the participation
non-experts). But if we start declaring that the experts'
contributions must be labeled as "their point of view," we will be
effectively giving experts second-class status compared to
non-experts, which is precisely an ass backwards way of doing things.
What Ed is really saying here is that he, Ed, disagrees with some of
William Connolley's edits. Rather than try to insist that Connolley's
edits all be flagged as "Connolley's point of view," Ed should deal
with this the same way everyone else does when they have a
disagreement: He should try to work it out with Connolley in a
mutually acceptable way. If Ed is simply feeling out-gunned by
William Connolley's expertise and thinks that Connolley is a BIASED
expert, the proper solution is that Ed should try to find ANOTHER
expert with a point of view more to Ed's liking, and recruit that
expert to participate in working on the global warming article.
(Maybe he can recruit S. Fred Singer to speak for himself.)
(2)
I'm not going to say much about global warming, other than to point
out that it is a completely different topic than the issue of
chlorofluorocarbons and the ozone layer. The only thing the two
issues have in common is that they both relate to atmospheric science
and that environmentalists are concerned about both of them, while S.
Fred Singer thinks that they aren't much of a problem.
The other point that should be made about global warming is that it
is a topic that has been discussed two arenas, namely the arena of
scientific investigation, and the arena of public opinion. The
scientific investigation has been conducted in peer-reviewed
scientific journals, which is where scientific investigatiosn SHOULD
take place. The public debate has played out in newspapers,
magazines, political parties and other fora. It is appropriate that
both arenas exist, but it is important to avoid confusing the two.
(3)
With regard to the effect of human chlorine emissions such as
chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) on the ozone layer, this really _is_ a
settled matter. Even S. Fred Singer, who was stridently dismissive of
CFC-ozone theory in the 1980s and early 1990s, has largely dropped
the topic. The August 25, 1995 issue of _Science_ magazine quotes him
saying, "I'm now reasonably convinced that CFCs make the major
contribution to stratospheric chlorine, and what has convinced me is
the published data." He's hardly said a word about the topic since
1996, even on his own web site. His "Stratospheric Ozone" page
contains a slew of articles that he wrote up through 1995, the year
that the scientists who first warned of the ozone hole received a
Nobel Prize. After 1996, all Singer has on it site is a duplicate of
something he wrote the previous year grousing about the Nobel award,
followed by a single brief letter he wrote in 1998 that deals with
some tangential points but doesn't challenge any of the main points
in the scientific CFC-ozone consensus.
--
--------------------------------
| Sheldon Rampton
| Editor, PR Watch (www.prwatch.org)
| Author of books including:
| Friends In Deed: The Story of US-Nicaragua Sister Cities
| Toxic Sludge Is Good For You
| Mad Cow USA
| Trust Us, We're Experts
| Weapons of Mass Deception
--------------------------------
About this time last year, I remember a lot of people arguing with me that we must use the most common terminology when naming a page; has this convention changed? Wik continues to revert my move of [[extermination camp]] to [[death camp]] -- is there any usage of "death camp" which does not directly, or indirectly, refer to the death camps of World War II? Google finds 6 times as many death camp articles -- surely that makes it clear which is more common?!
Some would be mediators are trying to "compromise" by turning [[death camp]] into a disambiguation where they note, "Some people call prisons with execution chambers, as death camps" -- does not that very statement make it clear that "death camp" is the most common usage. -- In any case, while "death camp" is used to refer to non-death camps (such as the prison at Guantanamo) -- its really very clear that such comparisons are deragatory and not to be taken literally. Furthermore, such comparisons are not expressed, "Guantanamo is an extermination camp!"; I think its very clear that death camp is the most common name.
I have asked repeatedly how to get my messages to display properly in the mailing list, please inform me.
The thing I like about WC is that he will listen to reason. He softened
the claim, merely because of our conversation on the talk pages.
He does NOT read this mailing list, as far as I know!
He might not agree with my take on "the neutral way to write the
article", but I think we can all agree that he is unfailingly polite :-)
Uncle Ed
I can't revert it, because I promised Dr. Connolley I wouldn't engage in
an edit war with him. That doesn't mean I "accept it" as neutral, let
alone correct. I'm more interested in maintaining my good working
relationship with Dr. C. than in "winning" a point temporarily. I'm
thinking about the long-term good of the Wikipedia. I want William to
remain as a contributor and/or source. I also want the article to be
neutral and informative.
SEPP lists 4 points at ozonefranklin.html -- and claims that all 4 are
controversial, not just the one WC and I are discussing.
The big picture is:
* Some people say "the science is settled"
* Other people say "there is still a controversy"
I don't want Wikipedia to say Singer is right, or Moon is right, or the
UN is right. All I want is a nice clear neutral article which says what
everybody's point of view is.
Is that too much to ask for?
Wearily,
Uncle Ed
> I'm just saying that if he's going to edit a Wikipedia article to
> say that some POV he personally opposes is "clearly false",
> then he himself should be cited as the source of that POV.
So if I write "Joe Bloggs holds the clearly false view that the Earth
is flat" I'm violating NPOV? No I'm not, because in that case it
really is clearly false - though it could do with being rewritten for
a more sympathetic, encyclopedic style. But NPOV isn't the problem
there.
In order to show that William Connolley's edit is POV, you have to
show that the claim he says is "clearly false" is in fact a serious
point of contention in the relevant field.
NPOV is only an issue for claims that are not yet proven or disproven
to the satisfaction of the vast majority of the relevant experts.
You'll have to show that what William says is in fact in a serious
state of dispute in the field. It may or may not be. You've provided
no evidence on the matter.
Cheers,
--
Allan Crossman - http://dogma.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk
PGP keys - 0x06C4BCCA (new) || 0xCEC9FAE1 (compatible)