

Journal pulls paper due to “legal context” created by climate contrarians - MBCook
http://arstechnica.com/science/2014/03/journal-pulls-paper-due-to-legal-context-created-by-climate-contrarians/

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JackFr
Alternate title: Grown-ups at Psychology Journal Remind Authors about
Defamation Laws.

To be clear this paper has nothing to do with climate science, it is entirely
about marginalizing people with whom they disagree.

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yrochat
This is so funny: non-conspiracy posts in this thread are currently being
downvoted.

Thus I feel the need to comment your post: Frontiers recognised the scientific
value of this paper, but had to retract it because of persons like you, that
only know censoring the others when it comes to discuss ideas. Science cannot
go forward with that kind of attitude.

~~~
JackFr
Who the hell do you think you are? Rather, who the hell do you think I am? I
assure you, you do not know enough about me to boldly and indignantly assert
that "Science cannot go forward" with the kind of attitude held by "persons
like [me]".

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Tycho
If you question the AGW theory you're a 'denier.' If you call shenanigans on
an article you're a 'conspiracy theorist.'

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AnotherDesigner
I'd love to see a study on privilege and libertarianism because that would
explains the views of so many on Hacker News. If your field of study is
computer science, you don't get to tell climate scientists that have
extensively studied something that they're wrong because it might
inconvenience your lifestyle.

~~~
Turing_Machine
Climate science is utterly dependent on computer models, so computer
scientists may, in fact, be perfectly qualified to criticize those models.

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Alex3917
So basically some journal published a sensational article to make money, but
then pulled it when they realized it could cost them money. And yet though
don't understand how so many people could doubt the integrity of science.

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Xcelerate
The funny thing about science is that you don't have to take someone else's
word for it. You can look at the evidence and see for yourself that it's true.
The problem is these "conspiracy theorists" never actually bother to do that.

~~~
gus_massa
Looking at the evidence is not enough. You really must repeat the experiments.
If you want to measure the gravitational constant, it's easy. If you want to
measure the changes in the global temperature is much more difficult.

Let's pick a less controversial example. If I want to verify the existence of
the Higgs boson, I need a pick a shovel and start digging a 10 mile circle.
Then ... ??? There is an unknown particle that is a very good candidate to be
the Higgs boson and I believe that in a few years the existence of the Higgs
boson will be confirmed. But I don't have any chance to measure it myself.

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dhimes
_Looking at the evidence is not enough. You really must repeat the
experiments_

As you point out, repeating the experiments is sometimes not feasible, at
least in the near term. Often, as technology and understanding develops you
can perform _other_ experiments to try to render a theory false (which is all
you can ever do- you can't prove a scientific theory true, after all).

But until that time comes, which may be decades off, you need to be able to
independently analyze the evidence.

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res0nat0r
You know you are grasping at straws if you try to suppress any logical
evidence you happen to disagree with (and don't have an actual way to refute
what is being said).

~~~
JackFr
Or perhaps if you need psychologists to marginalize your intellectual
opponents, maybe your science isn't quite as good as you think it is.

Notwithstanding the fact the bulk of social psychology research, while not
outright bullshit, is hardly of a piece with physics, chemistry or medicine.

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gamerdonkey
Are you suggesting that these psychologists are conspiring with climate
scientists to influence the debate?

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JackFr
I see what you did there...

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dhimes
This is a totally gutless response by the journal. If they want to show there
is any value in the fee structure for the 'journal' system, they need to step
up and defend the freedom of ideas. Otherwise, GTFO.

Nauseating.

EDIT: Perhaps by being 'open access' they shouldn't be the object of my
rant...but it still rubs me the wrong way. I'm not exactly sure what 'open
access' means.

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ChuckMcM
If I were to start a band, I would consider naming it "Recursive Fury" :-)

But to add something of substance to the debate. The challenge of talking
about conspiracy theories is in fact their recursive nature. That our legal
system doesn't know how to deal with that, that is another matter entirely.
And I agree it is rather mean spirited in its essence.

~~~
dhimes
And the only people who would disagree with this are those who are part of the
conspiracy.

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Florin_Andrei
So... the forces of darkness have won this round?

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yrochat
Seems so. By the way, it looks like some of them have found this thread.

~~~
thaumaturgy
HN has a long and sordid history of skepticism towards climate science. It
first came to the forefront around 5 years ago, during the CRU email
controversy
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climatic_Research_Unit_email_co...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climatic_Research_Unit_email_controversy)),
and it was the first time I was sorely disappointed in the HN community.

But not the last.

I was one of only maybe three or four people at the time that vocally
supported the consensus conclusions of climate science.

