Talk:Scientific consensus on climate change/Archive 4

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Khandekar, 2007

Latest comment: 17 years ago96 comments11 people in discussion

I cut K. As far as I can see this is essentially a self-published trawl for "skeptical" papers by a skeptic (and not ashamed of it either: the search was for papers critical of the IPCC's politicised version of the science and the work is to the world-wide Climate-Sceptics community) and doesn't belong here. And "IPCC expert reviewer" is puff; anyone can be. Peiser isn't in here because his survey wasn't published; K doesn't belong either William M. Connolley 20:40, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

An annotated bibliography of recent peer-reviewed papers has been prepared by environmental consultant and IPCC expert reviewer Madhav L Khandekar.^[1] The bibliography was commissioned by Friends of Science^[2], a Canadian organization of global warming skeptics, in response to the Oreskes survey (below).^[3]

Khandekar selected and commented 68 papers which he claims question aspects of the current state of global warming science. He identified seven major areas of the global warming science and in each of these seven areas, briefly reviewed present understanding followed by a list of key papers which, according to the author, question the present assessment. The seven areas were
1. Temperature reconstruction using proxy data; the Hockey Stick Graph 2. Impact of solar variability on the earth’s climate 3. Sea-level rise, ocean surface warming/cooling etc. 4. Arctic and Antarctic temperatures: from Holocene to present 5. Impact of large-scale circulation patterns. 6. Extraneous influence on mean temperature trends: urbanization, landuse change etc. 7. Uncertainties in climate model simulations. There was also an eight section for miscellaneous studies.

Oh... and is there any special reason why K's opinion of these papers is more notable than my opinion that his review is of poor quality [3] prone to gross errors [4]? William M. Connolley 20:45, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Papers with allegations of erroneous data haven't been limited on this page before. "Bray and von Storch, 2003", "Oreskes, 2004", "Survey of U.S. state climatologists 1997", etc. So how is this different WC? The machine512 21:18, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see it as much different than Oreskes'. ~ UBeR 21:22, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

You don't see the difference between a publication in Science and something self-published? Come now. I expected better of you William M. Connolley 21:25, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Obviously different venues for publication. But I'm looking at content not publisher here. ~ UBeR 21:28, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

"Bray and von Storch, 2003" denied from Science, self published. "Survey of U.S. state climatologists 1997" self published. Both included in this article. "Khandekar, 2007" is no different. The machine512 21:46, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm not at all sure B&vonS 2003 belongs, but at least the caveats are noted. K 2007 is nothing but a septic trawl for papers that can be misrepresented as agreeing with his viewpoint. And, as I've pointed out, he makes some gross errors: this "quote" My lifetime study of Earth’s climate system has humbled me. I am convinced that we have greatly underestimated the complexity of this system. Global climate change predictions are mostly mental masturbation in the final analysis purportedly from Broeckner is faked William M. Connolley 21:58, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Then go ahead and present an objection in the article, aside from your blog. The machine512 22:07, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Von Storch is at least a competent scientist with a good track record. As William said, there are problems with the survey, but they are described. The CSE survey really should go, as it's ancient, full of misleading questions, and comissioned by an extremely biased organization. Khandekar does not even try to describe the scientific opinion, but explicitely looks for outliers (and even then he has to misinterprete quite some of them to fit his agenda). --Stephan Schulz 22:37, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

So now Von Storch is a competent scientist presenting erroneous data to the Science journal? Wow, if I asked you this last year you would disagree. I don't know about this guys. I am seeing an evolving standard being set that goes against your previous imposed rules. The machine512 23:22, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

This one is very simple...it is (or tries to be) a survey paper, not a survey. --Nethgirb 22:53, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Neither is Oreskes, 2004. So what's your point? The machine512 23:08, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

We include surveys, but survey papers are not appropriate. Oreskes is a survey. K is a survey paper. You might want to read about what survey and survey paper mean. And the fact that K is not a scientist does not help. --Nethgirb 02:25, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

It isn't even a survey "paper" because it was never published in a journal. The bottom line is that it's just an annotated list of articles that some guy pulled together, no more, no less. Raymond Arritt 02:31, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

"Dr. Madhav L Khandekar, a former research scientist with Environment Canada, holds a PhD in meteorology and has worked in the fields of climatology, meteorology and oceanography for over 45 years." The machine512 02:47, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, Khandekar does have qualifications in the field. He even has a modest publication record, mostly related to ENSO. Raymond Arritt 03:05, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

CE re-inserted K [5] with plz dont presume it is biaised. Of course its biased: as it says itself, it was a trawl for septic papers. Had it been reputably published as such, it might well be admissable. As it wasn't, its many errors (the faked masturbation quote, the many miscategorisations of papers) means it should n't be in William M. Connolley 16:05, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Ah, double standards. I'm still yet to see any real difference between what Oreskes did and what K did, except for the venue of publishing. Obviously that's not what's stopping it from being here, because several of the surveys on this very page aren't published in reputable literature. Therefore, it seems the only reason you guys are keeping it out is because you don't like what it says. If you have proof that quotes were faked or that errors exist, then those (assuming proper citation) can be in the article as well. Oren0 18:02, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

"We include surveys, but survey papers are not appropriate. You might want to read about what survey and survey paper mean. And the fact that K is not a scientist does not help." 1. Is including surveys but not survey papers an actual guideline or are you just now imposing it? 2. Obviously he is a scientist, as pointed out by The machine512 above. Oren0 18:06, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, Oreskes didn't fake any quotes about masturbation, as far as I can tell. Thats a difference. Do you think its an important one or not? William M. Connolley 18:11, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Do you have a source for that? And even if it's true, since when do inaccuracies take away from notability? Lots of inaccurate papers are all over Wikipedia. Oren0 18:53, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

There's a difference between "inaccuracies", and fabricating a spurious quote that embarrasses the person to whom it is ascribed. Raymond Arritt 19:15, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I've already given you the source; you'll find it in [6] William M. Connolley 22:16, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

In response to Oren0... This document set out to find papers that conformed to a particular result. In contrast, Oreskes started with a neutral group of papers and catalogued what the results were. Even if it has no inaccuracies, K's document is nearly useless as a way to gauge the scientific opinion on climate change. This is the same reason we don't include petitions.

It's true that K does have scientific credentials, which I didn't know before. He may or may not currently be a scientist as his primary occupation; the document lists him as an "environmental consultant". --Nethgirb 22:22, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Per William's line of reasoning, the IPCC would also be biaised and should thus not be included herein. As the IPCC self-describes, "The role of the IPCC is to assess (...) information relevant to understanding the scientific basis of risk of human-induced climate change, its potential impacts and options for adaptation and mitigation." [7] I dont see much focus about natural causes of warming in this mission statement. Yet, the fact is that despite this mission, we can presume that the IPCC conducts its business in a non-biaised manner as much as it can, and so should we presume of Khandekar. Same applies to Oreskes. Other than this, arguing that Khandekar's work is a type of survey and not some other type is pointless and tends to a censorship attempt. Let's be reasonable - it belongs in this section. Leave it to the reader to appreciate its worth. --Childhood's End 20:59, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

K deliberately set out to trawl septic papers, and has miscategorised papers to suit his preconceptions. Any kind of peer review would have picked this up; but of course since its an unreviewed self-published doc this didn't happen. The IPCC role is indeed what you say; but when you read the reports (you *have*, haven't you?) its clear that they take this to mean the obvious: to understand climate change you need to assess the balance of anthro and natural forcing. Let's be reasonable: K's stuff is non-notable tosh and should not be included William M. Connolley 22:16, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

If it has any notable flaws, then surely there are reliable sources that points them out, and I'm sure if we can be reasonable to follow Wikipedia's policy they can be mentioned accordingly. ~ UBeR 22:04, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Why would any notable sources (other than my blog, of course :-) both take notice of K's tosh? The very lack of commentary on it is evidence of its non-notability William M. Connolley 22:16, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I think a grey-lit paper which has not garnered any substantive attention (a few blog entries aside) or review does not qualify under WP:RS. In the interest of moving toward consensus, being unpublished research what evidence is there that this is a reliable source? The other issue I read above is whether this should be classified as a survey. My read is it is not a surevy in the sense used in the other studies; for reasons of parallel construction and clarity, I think it should probably be done differently (although I think RS needs to be established first). Please also note that the tradition is to discuss controversial changes before they are made. I would ask that folks refrain from adding the material back while the discussion is ongoing. --TeaDrinker 03:21, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Good point. Khandekar's writeup has attracted little interest. Many of the references are to WMC's criticism of it (!) and most of the rest are in obscure corners of the blogosphere. Typical of the caliber of these sites, one lists it under "Bibliography’s" (sic). An unpublished manuscript that appears to have been ignored both in the scientific community and the mainstream press isn't a WP:RS and doesn't deserve mention here. Raymond Arritt 03:45, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, the paper is written by an expert in the field (as I stated above, aside from claims by others). This would classify it as being acceptable under WP:RS if it was self published: Self-published material may be acceptable when produced by a well-known, professional researcher (scholarly or non-scholarly) in a relevant field. As for content, it has similarities with Oreskes 2004 in it being a categorized sample survey of published peer reviewed articles. However, it is not a traditional statistical survey producing numbers from the sample. However it is highly relevant to the topic at hand and if the fact that it is not a statistical survey is the issue at hand then I would suggest a re-categorization of it on this page. The machine512 04:11, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

But somehow I feel those critiquing it feel that there is something wrong with it (wink wink) but are unable to pinpoint what exactly it is. The machine512 04:18, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Let's also not forget that Khandekar's survey was conducted as a follow-up to Oreskes. Nethgirb reverting the material out saying that it is not relevant to the article was quite a statement. Now, even if William is right and not all the 68 papers cited are adequately annotated, the point is that Oreskes and the spin claimed "consensus proven" by finding zero article about you know what and thus from the moment that Khandekar found only a few , his work deserves mention here.

Besides, Oreskes is a history / social-stuff teacher, we know her inquiry was not all-comprehensive, and she got full worldwide press nonetheless as if she had the final answer to life and the universe. She's still cited herein. WP:RS must be very flexible... --Childhood's End 04:34, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflicted) Machine, I am not sure I follow your second comment, but in regards to the first, a retired meteorologist who everyone has to find through google is hardly the kind of well known scholar I think Reliable Sources is refering to. If he were well known and respected, I feel like this study would have made the media and recieved attention in the scientific literature (perhaps it will in the future...).

But discussing what the exact wording of the policy really means is perhaps further away from the goal of improving the encyclopedia. I suggest the purpose behind excluding unpublished or self-published works as we generally do is that published works attract attention the way posting a pdf on a website does not. In particular, it attracts critical analysis which is essential to becoming reliable. Some people are sufficiently notable that when they do post a pdf of their opinions on their website, people take note and critically analyze it. That rule--excluding unpublished/self-publsihed work which is not likely to recieve critical attention--I feel is a good one (in fact, I feel it is a basis for reliable sources). So I ask, is this particular researcher so notable in climate science that people would take note of everything he says (published or not)? I tend toward no, and the evident lack of critical commentary on it seems to agree with this. --TeaDrinker 04:47, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

To give a direct answer to a direct question, "no". Khandekar does have a track record of publications in the field but is far from one of the leading figures. He's not in the same league as people like Bob Dickinson, Brian Hoskins, Jim Hansen, et al. Raymond Arritt 05:08, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Come on now guys, that is the weakest argument. Since when has "being a leading figure" strictly limited content on wikipedia in the past? I could point out the many instances in the GW articles where this has never been the case. By the rules, nearly anything is acceptable as long as it is from a "professional" on the subject. Even WC's blog has been accepted in the past to critique articles. This bending of the rules is beyond any logic. The machine512 06:06, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

(moving back left) Machine, I feel you may have missed my point. We're talking about unpublished works, and you quoted the policy yourself. But the wording of the policy (whether it is "leading figure" or "well known professional researcher") is not my primary concern here. My concern is that a work which has not been published is not widely circulated nor likely read critically. If you think this paper has been, point me to where. If you think the author is notable enough that scholars in climate science would be aware of it and take note, say so and we can work from there. --TeaDrinker 08:04, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

TeaDrinker, yes it is an unpublished report and so is "Bray and von Storch, 2003". Where is the requirement for content represented on wikipedia to be published in a science journal? The paper has been circulated online in various locations but has not received very wide attention (mind it is rather new). And as for the author and his notability, according to one source, "Khandekar is a retired Environment Canada scientist. According to a search of 22,000 academic journals, Khandekar has published 19 pieces of research in peer-reviewed journals, mainly in the area of El Nino and climate.". The machine512 22:34, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Keep in mind it is also intended as a follow up to Oreskes, which would narrow its notability requirements. The machine512 22:47, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, the end of the paper itself indicates he has 40 peer-reviewed papers. At your suggestion, I did a bit of checking. He wrote a book in 2000, in fact, which was on climate change (most of his papers, particularly his well cited ones, appeared to be much shorter time scales). Titled Uncertainties in Greenhouse Gas Induced Climate Change, using ISI web of science, I can find no papers which cite it. So indeed it would appear that this is not his first foray into climate change, however his previous work does not seem to have attracted much attention. This, at least suggests to me that he is a minor character whose unpublished work will probably be ignored by most scientists in the field, thus will not attract substantive critical commentary. I may be wrong, but again, as you note, the paper itself is very new. Perhaps it would be wise to wait until people have commented on it.

With regard to your second point, I am not sure where you're getting that this is a response to Oreskes; maybe I am missing it (?). I did not read extremely carefully. But no matter, if you could point out where and how he says this, it would be useful. Thanks for the continued discussion and hard work, --TeaDrinker 02:25, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

TeaDrinker, thanks for the comments and research. I've also found from one source he has written at least four books [8] on climate. As for being a response to Oreskes, the source website holds the details on that. [9] The machine512 02:49, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Actually, most of these "books" seem to be 35-50 page government brochures. As far as I can tell, only one is from a recognized publisher.--Stephan Schulz 23:12, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for noting that; I didn't really check out the FoS website. I am still hesitant to include the paper, since it is not clear that it is particularly notable. What it comes down to for me is this: Significant papers which argue against a widely held view are usually criticized. I don't see any evidence Khandekar is a major scholar that anyone in the scholarly community should note of his unpublished views (a few books on climate/weather topics don't seem to me to place him at the center of research). So I propose we hold off on including Khandekar's paper until it recieves some coverage in published sources. My strong suspicion is that it is just going to be ignored (although I may be wrong), and if it is not worth the time of any academic to give it critical attention, we should not give it attention either. --TeaDrinker 22:36, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps I could throw in that Oreskes is not even a scientist in the field and nonetheless got full press coverage worldwide. We must admit, I think, that there is some kind of a double standard going on in the coverage that someone may get depending on whether they support or not AGW. I would urge some caution before requiring that Khandekar gets "some coverage" before being included. Further, again, the relevance of his paper is mainly that it proves Oreskes wrong. That he may have misclassified 1 or 2 papers out of 68 is beside the point imho. --Childhood's End 00:49, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

(moving back left) Well, I guess I don't see the same double standard. I tried to restrain myself from specifically criticizing Khandekar's paper, since it's not relevant to my concern (however I would be happy to discuss it as an aside, if you're interested). The difference I see between Oreskes and Khandekar is the publication status. The former was in Science, the premire American weekly science journal, while the latter was simply posted on the web. I think if the Khandekar were in any major publication, we would not be having this discussion. --TeaDrinker 01:40, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) CE, I'm glad to see you point out that the relevance of K's paper is as a criticism of Oreskes. Originally it was in the article as a stand-alone piece in the survey section although it was not a survey, and that's what I was objecting to: as a stand-alone piece it does not help gauge the scientific opinion on climate change.

Now as a rebuttal to Oreskes, it could be relevant if it were reliable. There is not a double standard here: the standard is WP:verifiability. For questions of science, the gold standard for verifiability is publication in a peer-reviewed venue. This is why Oreskes got coverage, regardless of her qualifications. Similarly, regardless of K's qualifications, if his paper were published in Science then we would cover it here, and I expect the media would as well. I think TeaDrinker is saying that an alternate way of establishing verifiability (the silver standard? copper standard?) is the author's significant notability in the field. So, that would actually be lowering the standards for K. In my opinion, any rebuttal of Oreskes that we include needs to come to a similar level of verifiability, which most likely means the criticism would also have to appear in a peer-reviewed scientific publication. --Nethgirb 01:55, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Your idea that only peer-reviewed journal papers can only be included. Even if I agree that it should, even our most pretentious article allows blogs for science! Even if it seems like commonsense to use the most dignified suorces for scientific material there were those few people who begged to differ with that logic. ~ UBeR 02:04, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't know what the situation is at the GW article...but we're talking about a particular issue with this article. Note that I didn't say "only peer-reviewed journal papers can be included". I said that rebuttals of Oreskes should be held to at least the standard that Oreskes is...i.e., publication. When we have sources of similar reliability which are in conflict, we should report on them both. When we have one source that is highly reliable and one that is unreliable, it makes sense to go with the reliable one. --Nethgirb 02:24, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

TeaDrinker, yes, K's survey was posted on the web while Oreskes was published in Science. But K's survey was undertaken at FoS's request, so it seems natural that it was posted on their website. From there, it seems unlikely that it will be published in Science.

Nethgirb, I think that K's survey can stand alone as it does not seem less reliable than the Oreskes. At least he has the scientific knowledge necessary to understand and assess the papers, and he went farther than the mere abstracts. Now, out of 68, he may have misinterpreted a few, but this has yet to be shown, and even then, that does not make his study any less worthwhile than Oreskes'. As for publication in Science, we know that there are at least claims that skeptics have a harder time getting published [10] (let's not discuss whether right or wrong these claims are, let's just admit that they exist). Uber's point then becomes important ; although it may seem logical to require that standard, we should not blindingly apply it, and WP:verifiability does not make it mandatory. Double standard or not by Science, the fact remains that we here have a situation where Science decided to publish a survey of abstracts conducted by a non-scientist in the field with a flawed search query, while a survey of papers made by a scientist in the field has not received such publication. Yet, Khandekar's survey is likely to be such information that a neutral reader without an opinion about AGW will want to find here along with Oreskes.

Finally, as for your point about reliability, Khandekar is presumably reliable because of his scientific status, not because of his publication venues. Oreskes has been made presumably reliable by her publication venue, not by her scientific status. We can hardly hold them to the same reliability assessment exam. --Childhood's End 13:48, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Very little of that makes sense. K is unreliable because you can read it and spot the obvious flaws. Of the 6 papers in his first section, I give him a score of 0 or 1 depending on how you apply his ill-defined criteria. What exactly do you base your "may have misinterpreted a few" on? Have you checked? And let's not discuss whether right or wrong these claims are, let's just admit that they exist - no, lets just admit they have no evidence at all and will only be raisd by those seeking to bias the discussion. Khandekar is presumably reliable because of his scientific status - no William M. Connolley 20:35, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Let's see...

"K is unreliable because you can read it and spot the obvious flaws." POV, please describe the obvious flaws so that we can agree or disagree with you
"lets just admit they have no evidence at all and will only be raisd by those seeking to bias the discussion" POV
"Khandekar is presumably reliable because of his scientific status - no" POV (and a funny one)

Got anything else?

I've already pasted in the masturbation quote. Are you defending that? For the rest, I could paste in the text from my blog, but you wouldn't bother read it, so why bother? Your silly anti-Science innuendo was pointless, as is this entire exchange which is going nowhere, as usual William M. Connolley 21:09, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

I must say that your occasional lack of objectivity (the latest being that Khandekar's scientitic status does not give him credibility) does not encourage me to bother read your opinions regarding a paper that goes against your beliefs. Perhaps I can accept that you so openly presumed that I wouldnt care (although perhaps I would have nonetheless... I might even take a look at your blog about this). --Childhood's End 13:12, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, you're avoiding the rather clear point I've just raised: are you defending the M quote or not? You have *read* K, haven't you, so you know the bit I mean? William M. Connolley 17:04, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, to list a few, before I got bored:

Starting with the trivial: The Random capitaliZation does not Really evoke an Impression of comPetency.

...have appeared in peer- reviewed International scientific Journals...
This Document presents...

Speaking of peer-reviewed papers, but including the Wegman report and papers from Energy and Environment can only be considered a bad joke.
In section 1, Moberg's paper deals with hemispheric temperatures, and hence cannot contradict MBH98, which deals with global climate. Likewise, and more extremely, Mangini et al deals with the alps only.
Von Storch disagrees with this interpretation of his paper, and the claim that Moberg has replaced the Hockey Stick is not even funny - see e.g. AR4 WG1 p. 467.

--Stephan Schulz 21:43, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Since we are all airing our greviances with the paper, I will add that with regard to refuting Oreskes, the paper fails miserably. Oreskes is a survey of a larger population of literature (easily more than 10,000 papers); even if Khandekar found 70 papers which went against the finding of the survey, there would still be a consensus. It would be a bit like sampling a town's population and finding everyone eats wheaties for breakfast. If you can find a few residents who support eat cornflakes, you've not disproven the first result (which did not demonstrate unanimity, just overwhelming support). In fact if only .7% of papers went against the dominant view, I think Oreskes's results of consensus are pretty sound.

But again, my primary concern is that there is no critical review of this work among scientists. I think it would irresponsible to include a paper which (a) goes against a widely held view and (b) is so minor it does not even attract professionally published critism. --TeaDrinker 22:42, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Huh? She surveyed 905 abstracts, not 10,000 papers. Maybe I'm confused about what you're saying, or your numbers are horribly off. ~ UBeR 00:56, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

You both may be right, in a way. I've seen numbers like 10,000 or 11,000 bandied about as the total number of articles in climate-related fields over the past 20 years or so (this seems reasonable or a bit low, given the typical number of articles per journal issue, number of relevant journals, and so on). So it's one might say that she "surveyed" a population of some thousands of articles and found 928 that matched her keywords. Raymond Arritt 01:15, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks RA, as usual stated more eloquently than I could. I read Oreskes as a sample of a larger population of papers (a letter replying to Oreskes mentioned the number 11000 papers). The precise number of papers on "climate change," of course may be difficult to define, but that is not really the point. My point was that having a few counter-examples does not really invalidate a survey. At least as far as criticism of Oreskes, I think that is Khandekar's biggest flaw. I don't want to dwell on this, however, since my own critisms are much less relevant than the lack of outside review. --TeaDrinker 01:51, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

(reset) Perhaps RA omits that Oreskes surveyed abstracts, not papers, for whatever it matters. Also, please correct me if I am wrong, but my understanding is that Oreskes really analyzed 928 abstracts, no more - those 928 were sorted out from her query "global climate change" in the ISI database. Whatever has been left out by such a query is open to question. Shen then analyzed those 928 abstracts and concluded, with the help of her scientific background in climate science, that "none of the papers disagreed with the consensus position". Whatever this may prove, it was published in Science and reported worldwide.
I must disagree (if I'm allowed) with TeaDrinker's last statement since what made the story of Oreskes is that she claimed that "no" paper disagreed with the consensus view. If Khandekar found a few, that seems a relevant criticism of Oreskes.
Anyway, as WMC pointed out, this discussion seems to be going nowhere, for reasons that we may disagree with. To me, we end up with Oreskes still having the last word despite the flaws of her work while Khandekar must be proven flawless before being included here, despite the fact that he probably brought a relevant criticism of Oreskes' core conclusion. That's a problem which the publication venues do not solve properly.
I conclude from TeaDrinker's view that if K's survey was covered by a notable venue, it could be worth including here. We cant expect it to happen, but if that's the "consensus" view, let's abide by it I guess. --Childhood's End 13:40, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

What consensus? I count 9 people that have commented in this section, and it seems to be 5-4 against inclusion (For inclusion: The machine512, UBeR, oren0, Childhood's End. Against: WMC, Stephan Schulz, Raymond Arritt, Nethgirb, TeaDrinker). I could make a comment about classifying opinions and false consensuses, but I'll refrain. The point is that I'm not convinced that there's general agreement not to put it in yet. It seems to me that if Oreskes concludes that not one paper disagreed with the IPCC, and someone finds even one, that's a pretty relevant criticism of her conclusions. Oren0 16:29, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I put "consensus" between quote marks... I agree with the whole. --Childhood's End 17:05, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

She took at 928 papers and looked at 905 of their abstracts. Less than 1.5% explicitly agreed with the IPCC and none disagreed. That's a pretty apt description of her paper. ~ UBeR 16:20, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

To me it comes down to "something published in Science" versus "something that a guy with an ax to grind posted on a web site." Raymond Arritt 16:40, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

From WP:SPS:Self-published material may be acceptable when produced by a well-known, professional researcher (scholarly or non-scholarly) in a relevant field. These may be acceptable so long as their work has been previously published by reliable third-party publications. The question, therefore, isn't the venue but whether K is well-known, professional, and previously published. I don't know enough at this point to comment on that, but I'm sure some of you guys do. Oren0 16:56, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

The venue is crucial and the poor quality of the work argues against relaxing the criteria in this case. If K were indeed producing a professional quality product he wouldn't have fallen for the masturbation quote or miscategorised more than half the papers in his first section. Note that Oreskes searched a large number of publications and selected only 925 to work on based on certain criteria (clearly defined even if mis-published the first time, but thats corrected now). By constrast, K's criteria, and how many papers he searched, are unclear. Even the PR bit is clearly not true, since he includes Wegman and E&E William M. Connolley 17:04, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

The venue is not critical from the moment that it disproves Oreskes. Now, does it? You say that the work is of poor quality. I looked at your blog to get an idea of your points. I see that you talk at lenght about the masturbation quote and Khandekar's first section, but do you have issues with the rest of his work? You certainly dont want to make an argument out of hasty generalization? Do you claim that he did not find a single paper, against Oreskes' finding of zero, not supporting the "consensus view" ? --Childhood's End 17:12, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

"The venue is not critical from the moment that it disproves Oreskes." That's it in a cocked hat, isn't it? "As long as it supports my POV, we can throw all other criteria out the window." Raymond Arritt 17:35, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

The venue is crucial? And you raised that complaint about Von Storch? I don't see what the big argument is about, its not like having this in the article is going to compromise the integrity of it. It provides a counter argument to Oreskes and that is the main issue. The machine512 17:51, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I think that WP policies, to name only this, have been cited to you well enough so that you can understand that the venue is not critical. However, if I may paraphrase you, your position seems to be "as long as it supports my POV, I can throw in any criteria irrelevantly of what WP policies or others say". --Childhood's End 17:53, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

(in reply to CE earlier): I got bored after the first section, but there is just as much cr*p later. I notice you don't dispute my assessment of the first section or the M mis quote. If you say K is reliable its up to you to assert that the first section is reliable too: in which case I'd be interested to see your counter arguments. Or we could just agree this is pointless and give up William M. Connolley 17:35, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you make a good case that K's first section is flawed. But so is Oreskes' survey. Yet this is not the point. Flawed or not, K's can be relevant if it proves Oreskes' finding of zero wrong by finding that there are actually papers that do not support the mainstream assessment. --Childhood's End 18:06, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, good: K's first section is flawed. As is the last bit, obviously. So much for K being reliable, as asserted earlier. Oreskes survey, however, isn't flawed (in fact I dont know what you mean by flawed, but certainly not in the sense of clearly misquoting people or mischaracterising papers). And I'm sure I could go through and show that all the other sections in K are flawed too, but I'm not going to bother (unless you care to nominate any one section which you assert is flawless and will stake your reputation on). So K is a flawed self-published trawl for septic papers. Why should we include it? Its not notable, it hasn't been published in a reliable venue, etc etc William M. Connolley 18:20, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

I cannot assess whether you prove or not that K's first section is flawed, that's why I said 'perhaps'. I go as far as giving you the benefit of the doubt until valid counter-arguments are made, which may or may not happen. As for Oreskes, my understanding is that the process she followed to come to her conclusion is flawed. First, her restrictive query probably left out relevant papers. Second, she analyzed abstracts and I am more than uncertain that her scientific knowledge about all climate aspects allows her to draw firm conclusions about 1000 papers from their abstracts alone. I appreciate that this does not proves that she miscategorized a paper, but it leaves you (or me, at least) wondering how consensus could be considered proven from this. Now, perhaps you disagree with my assessment for some reason, and I welcome your objective view about this. --Childhood's End 18:35, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

K: I think you are providing further evidence of non-notability. O: what you describe as flaws are your own opinion, so this is all irrelevant to changing the article. My similarly irrelevant reply was that her search terms left 928 papers to read the abstracts of, and that is quite enough. If any of those 928 did indeed dispute t' consensus, I'm sure skeptic would have gleefully pointed it out. And lastly, of course O doesn't *prove* consensus William M. Connolley 19:57, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

K: see discussion below about WP:SPS ; O: my opinion yes, about her research methodology, just like it is yours on K about his scientific statements. Ironically, I think you provide further evidence of K's relevance from the moment that you also agree that O doesnt prove consensus. Actually, consensus is implied by her study or is the outcome generally understood or vehiculed. K doesnt prove that there is no consensus per se, but he does prove that O wasnt on the money unless it is shown that all the 68 papers are mischaracterized. --Childhood's End 20:38, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure whether I fail to disagree with that or not. Whether K's contravention of Oreskes' statement on consensus (or lack thereof) invalidates her findings, I'm unconvinced as to the relative merits of his argument with respect to how many papers he surveyed before making his final cut as to which ones he would assess for contradicting the IPCC's major findings. Given that it was a SPS he had a special burden to have clarified at the outset the specific rationale that he used to differentiate the contributions as well as the scope of his preliminary assessment regarding inclusion. At least Oreskes gave objective criteria for her first-cut filter. Raymond Arritt 20:53, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, if it has serious flaws, then I'm sure there's a source that fits under WP:RS that points them out. Wikipedia's here to report verifiable comments, which need not be necessarily true. "It demeans the purpose of an encyclopedia, which is not to advance a particular theory, but to present the browser with the current state of knowledge. Wikipedia is not here to say what is the truth, it is not here to evangelize your idea, it is here to provide a summary of what is being said—even if you don't like it." ~ UBeR 23:37, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

(moving left) I don't know. Whenever something comes to a question of what exactly the policy says, we have lost sight of the real issue. When faced with such questions, the best thing I think we can do is ask what makes for a better encyclopedia? My contention is it would be a bad idea to cite a paper which is not sufficiently well circulated to attract reliable discussion. I am not aware of any mention of this paper, much less a careful and critical review, which meets WP:RS, and (rightly or wrongly) don't expect there to be one. As I said earlier, I see faults in the paper (and I am happy to discuss them), but that is a seperate discussion to me at least. Again, I propose that we hold off on including Khandekar's work until it is carefully reviewed in a reliable source. Any objections to this? --TeaDrinker 21:48, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Having been reviewed doesn't determine if it's a reliable source or not. WP:RS makes this fairly clear. ~ UBeR 22:33, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I think this discussion is going nowhere. I suggest we follow CE's lead and call it a day. --Nethgirb 23:01, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I am still sensitive to TeaDrinker's suggestion, but OrenO has since adequately pointed to WP:SPS, and I am not sure that TD is right to question what the policy says... it seems pretty clear in this case, as it is also indicated by UbeR. Thus, although I would also prefer that K's paper was reviewed or circulated by another source, I think it is unfair to require it for the reasons mentioned above (the work was done at FoS's request and thus published on their website) and since this is not required by policy, I dont see why we would deny it in this article. Remember that including it would not mean that we hold it as a flawless work, just like we do not for Oreskes. We merely inform the reader of its existence and general scope. --Childhood's End 13:40, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

If we allow this self-published source from an advocacy site, will we allow rebuttals from other self-published advocacy sites? Raymond Arritt 13:51, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, WP:SPS allows us to use our discretion to allow such rebuttals, provided the authors of said rebuttals are well-known, professional, and previously published. Oren0 14:50, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh, like what is alloud from RealClimate.org? self-published source from an advocacy site?--Zeeboid 14:40, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

AEB: New move by CE

So, considering all that's been said about Khandekar, Oreskes and WP policies, I think we are moving towards re-adding K's survey to the article, along with a short summary of any reliable/acceptable rebuttal that has been issued, in that event. --Childhood's End 13:09, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

I disagree, obviously. Summarizing the points: (1) as an independent way to gauge the scientific opinion on climate change, it does not stand since it's not a survey (2) as a response to Oreskes, it is definitely inappropriate because in comparison with O, K's manuscript is not a reliable source, and (3) as a response to Oreskes, it is likely inappropriate because the manuscript does not even mention Oreskes, so interpreting it as a rebuttal may constitute OR and at least requires more discussion of specific points which contradict O. Since we seem nowhere near consensus, if you still want to include this, maybe mediation is the way to go. --Nethgirb 13:25, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
I don't think it's a good idea to stick to WP:SPS. This is not a good policy for scientific wiki-articles. It's not used in any of the wiki science articles I've been editing. In fact, in some articles we don't even allow preprints that are very likely going to be accepted for publication. In some articles even recently published articles are not always allwed in. The reason is that you want to avoid a wiki article becoming an outlet for the latest (speculative and thus often flawed) news. Count Iblis 13:43, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
I move the opposite (as CE), for the same reasons I stated before. Apart from the atrocious quality of the article, and the fact that it is self-published and commissioned by a known shill outfit, the article does not describe the predominant scientific opinion, but what K (mostly wrongly) claims are attacks on it. It is non-notable and fails WP:WEIGHT. --Stephan Schulz 13:49, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
I guess we're all rehashing opinions here. Again, I'm for inclusion. I think we've reached the point that the group of us here isn't going to budge on this one and we're fairly evenly split. I agree with mediation. Get some more editors in here and what they say goes. Hopefully, someone will make this easier for us in the meantime by either publishing K or publishing a rebuttal of him. Oren0 15:23, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
I fail to see any issue raised here by Nethgirb or Stephan Shultz that has not been adequately answered to in the discussion above. Count Iblis brings a somewhat new argument, but whether a policy is appropriate or not for some articles or for some others should be reflected in the policy itself, not in ad hoc arguments. --Childhood's End 15:56, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
We go round in the tradiational circles: the article is non-notable, non-noted, not by an RS, and is full of flaws William M. Connolley 16:11, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
You can't be serious. Raymond Arritt 16:21, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
Certainly against this idea. I think we should follow policy as is possible (and to teh extent it makes for a good encyclopedia), however there seems to be dispute as to whether Khandekar is (to quote) "a well-known, professional researcher (scholarly or non-scholarly) in a relevant field." I do not believe, based on current evidence Khandekar qualifies. Instead of an unresolvable debate about the precise wording of this policy, I suggest the following compromise: If there is published, professional, and subtantive review of Khandekar's paper from a reliable source, then (and only then) should it be included. The discussion of the paper in a reliable sources will also give an idea of the prominence with which it should be placed, and how the professional community is recieving it. To use as a source something which is self-published, controversial, and in all likelyhood will escape professional notice is not consistent with the intent of reliable source policy, nor does it make for a good encyclopedia. --TeaDrinker 18:50, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
Support inclusion in article. It is relevant to the topic and more specifically to the Oreskes paper. It abides by all WP rules for inclusions, and thus far I haven't seen any substantial reasoning for opposition. So far the alleged reasoning has been (1) K is not a scientist. (2) K is not a leading scientist. (3) K's paper is not a survey. (4) K's paper has certain errors. (5) K's paper hasn't drawn wide attention. Nearly all of these arguments could be made with Von Storch, and aside from 5, these could also be made with Oreskes. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by The machine512 (talk • contribs).

You forgot (6) K's paper has not been published in a journal or other professional venue. (7) K's paper was commissioned by an organization seeking to promote a specific point of view. HTH. Raymond Arritt 03:21, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Which is allowed under WP:RS, BTW. ~ UBeR 04:06, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

NREP

Latest comment: 17 years ago18 comments5 people in discussion

The survey from National Registry of Environmental Professionals is interesting, but doesn't really belong under the "survey of scientists" category since registered NREP professionals are mostly managers, technicians, and engineers. Where should we categorize this one? Raymond Arritt 03:24, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

I removed it entirely, since I'm not at all sure it belongs, though I'm open to being convinced otherwise. Also there survey had a low response rate. Here it is:

National Registry of Environmental Professionals, 2006

The National Registry of Environmental Professionals (NREP) is the official nonpartisan, not-for-profit, non-government accrediting organization for U.S. managers, technicians, and other professionals working on operations and management related to regulatory matters such as compliance with air, soil and water pollution regulations. Total NREP membership is about 12,000. In November of 2006, the NREP published the results of a survey conducted among its membership on the issue of climate change. 793 responses were received from respondents in 47 states including Puerto Rico and Guam. ^[1]. Survey findings included:

82 percent think global warming is a real, measurable, climactic trend currently in effect
67 percent agree the U.S. is not doing enough to address the effects of global warming
66 percent consider the rate at which global warming may be occurring is a serious problem facing the planet
59 percent respond that current climatic activity exceeding norms calibrated by over 100 years of weather data collection can be, in large part, attributed to human activity.
40 percent consider the automotive industry the most important industry to regulate in immediate public policy steps to address global warming
39 percent rate carbon emissions as a whole to be the most important human activity to regulate as part of effective public policy response to global warming

William M. Connolley 08:32, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

I do not think it should be removed, as the NREP is made up of certified environmental professionals who, while not in academia, still conduct research, present findings and are involved in environmental science on a daily basis. These people aren't simply "manager, technicians, etc.", they are people who live and breathe environmental science. Moreover, since there are no surveys of scientists beyond 2004 cited, I think it is an important addition to the article. I added the section once again to the article. Zoomwsu 16:22, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Can you provide a reference to show that NREP members, in general, actively publish peer-reviewed research? --Nethgirb 17:04, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Formally peer-reviewed research is not as common a practice among professionals as academics, although a significant number of NREP professionals have academic backgrounds in which they published peer-reviewed research. The more common practice among professionals is to present published research at industry and professional conferences and for professional publications. Almost all papers presented at these conferences and published in these publications receive significant review, mostly by others in the profession. Professionals have a significant motivation to conduct quality, verifiable research due to the level of notoriety and publicity associated with such presentations. For the NREP's own conference website, visit here. This should qualify them for inclusion in this article.

Perhaps a simple caveat in the paragraph could indicate that much of the research conducted by these individuals does not go through a formal peer review process. Zoomwsu 03:45, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, the link above shows that the conference is mostly oriented toward training and continuing ed. I do see a reference to a technical conference with 50 presentations -- out of a total NREP membership of 12,000. Don't get me wrong, I think NREP is a good organization and their members do useful things, it's just that they aren't "scientists" as the term is used in the context of the present article. Raymond Arritt 04:02, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

It's not that I don't see your point, because I do. The problem is that when you search wikipedia for "opinion on climate change", this page is what you get. I think that the results of this survey are important to the discussion of authoritative opinons on climate change and don't see a better place to add this knowledge. Maybe a seperate subsection that has surveys of environmental professionals? Zoomwsu 05:18, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

The term "environmental professionals" is unhelpfully vague. I suspect there's very little overlap between the membership of NREP and, say, the American Geophysical Union or the American Meteorological Society, yet members of those organizations are just as much "environmental professionals" as NREP members. How would you characterize the members of NREP in terminology more precise than "environmental professionals"? Raymond Arritt 23:36, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

(moving left) If the description currently in the article is accurate—"U.S. managers, technicians, and others who work on regulatory matters"—then it would seem the members are not generally scientists. I can understand Zoomwsu's desire to put the survey results somewhere, but this does not seem to be the place. One solution would be to create an article for National Registry of Environmental Professionals and put the results there, and then link to that page from here as a See Also. --Nethgirb 11:24, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea William M. Connolley 11:34, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

I think this survey definitely belongs here. Numerous groups already on this page include engineering, geology, and meteorology groups, I don't see why those professionals are more likely to have published research than NREP members are. The page criterion is "scientific opinion as given by synthesis reports, bodies of national or international standing, and surveys of opinion among climate scientists." Assuming the NREP is a "body of national standing," I say this belongs here. If we don't want to allow professional groups, several other groups on this page should go as well. Oren0 19:48, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

A few responses: (1) NREP indeed has virtually no emphasis in promoting or publishing peer-reviewed research, unlike the AGU, AMS, and other organizations that publish journals. (2) A thorough look through NREP's web page shows that they have little to do with climate. (3) Typical questions from their sample accreditation quizzes give an idea of their focus:

"1. SARA Title III inventory forms must be submitted by (A) March 1. (B) September 1. (C) July 1. (D) January 1."

"8. Intake of a chemical by humans is usually reported as (A) mg/day. (B) lb/day. (C) mg/kg/day. (D) mg/l."

"6. Ten parts per million is equivalent to (A) 1,000 parts per billion. (B) 10,000 parts per billion. (C) 100,000 parts per billion. (D) none of the above."

"7. Where can federal environmental regulations administered by the EPA be found? (A) 49 CFR (B) 40 CFR (C) 21 CFR (D) 20 CFR."

Again, NREP performs a valuable accreditation service, and their members do useful things. But it's highly questionable whether they belong in a list like this one. User:Nethgirb's proposal is a sensible alternative. Raymond Arritt 20:19, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Whether you believe that their quiz is too easy (I assume that's your point) is 100% irrelevant. Whether they publish lit is also irrelevant (since when is that a requirement of being a scientist?). I'd like to WP:AGF, but I think I'm dealing with people who just want to censor results of a poll that disagrees with their POV. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Oren0 (talk • contribs)

Oren0, I hope you'll continue to AGF, as I have enjoyed working with you to improve these articles. Raymond's point was not the ease of the quiz, but rather its irrelevance to climate science. As for publishing in peer-reviewed venues—that is, in fact, the universal sign of being a scientist (try googling 'being a scientist' and you'll see the first hit refers to doing research; and the way you show that you are doing research is by publishing).

I rather dislike the argument that says X is good because X is similar to other stuff in the article. If there are problems with other parts of the article, we should fix those too, rather than introducing more problems. So, for example: unless someone convinces me otherwise, it seems that the Australian Medical Association entry is about as much a professional rather than scientific society as NREP, and whatever we do to NREP should also be done to the AMA. --Nethgirb 21:09, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Nethgirb's interpretation of my point regarding the quiz is correct. It's not that the quiz is easy -- I don't know the answers to questions 1, 8, or 7 myself. Apologies for not being more specific. As for not allowing things that we disagree with, the comparison of NREP to AAPG is illustrative. I don't agree with AAPG's (present) climate change statement but they belong here because they hold research conferences, publish specialist books, and so on. And they have a strong overlap with things like paleoclimate. Raymond Arritt 23:38, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Playing devil's advocate, it's almost better for a pro-GW person to say "the only group opposing consensus is the American Association of Petroleum Geologists" rather than saying that there are no groups. It furthers this myth that the only people who disagree are paid by oil companies. All the article requires is that a group be scientific, and especially when you consider that the NREP is in exactly the field in question, it seems to me that their opinion is relevant regardless of whether they publish research. Groups of professionals (rather than academics) who work in a relevant field should be included in this article. There's no reason to assume they're any less in the know than academics are. Oren0 03:12, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

You're making two points as I see it: (1) it's not necessary to be a publishing scientist and (2) regardless of whether they publish, NREP is in a related field. Regarding (1), we should be presenting organizations whose members have some qualification to assess the scientific opinion on climate change. Publishing scientists in climate-related fields are qualified because it is part of their job description to be able to assess the latest scientific research in their field. This is not true of professionals like those in NREP. Regarding (2), you seem to be basing this solely on the word "environmental". Looking at the sample exams [11] shows that, of the 81 questions, there are zero that require knowledge of climate science; there are zero that deal with recent scientific research; and there are just 2 that have to do with weather (AEP exam questions 1 and 5). The most common topic appears to be environmental toxins and associated regulatory issues. There are doubtless some highly qualified individuals in NREP but so far I haven't seen any evidence that as a whole, their opinion is relevant to climate science. --Nethgirb 06:05, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

This page isn't limited to climate groups. What about the Stratigraphy Commission of the Geological Society of London, Australian Medical Association, American Chemical Society, American Quaternary Association, and Engineers Australia? These all have less to do with climate than NREP, but I don't see anyone fighting for them to all be kicked out. As written, this page is for all scientific groups, therefore NREP stays. A little consistency on this page would be nice. Oren0 07:07, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

As I wrote above, I do think that the Australian Medical Association doesn't belong. Possibly the same with Engineers Australia, though I haven't looked into it. As for the others you list, there are two reasons that they should be considered qualified to hold an informed opinion on climate science. First, there is some overlap between climate science and most (all?) of the other physical sciences; for example, the Stratigraphy Commission of the GSL overlaps with climate science in paleoclimate, as is evident if you read their position paper or search Google Scholar for Stratigraphy climate which yields "about 30,200" hits. See also RA's similar comment above regarding AAPG. Second, those groups are scientific groups, so as I argued above we can expect them to be informed about recent scientific evidence. On the other hand, NREP appears to be both comparatively unrelated to climate, and not a scientific organization, which separates them from two of the key parts of the title of this page, namely scientific and climate. You again are asserting that NREP is a scientific group but I don't see any evidence. --Nethgirb 07:51, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Section break - NREP and Page Criteria

Latest comment: 17 years ago13 comments5 people in discussion

I don't know why WMC had to remove NREP yet, we're clearly not done discussing. It seems to me that we have two options: (a) Leave the criterion for this page as is: "scientific opinion as given by synthesis reports, bodies of national or international standing, and surveys of opinion among climate scientists." "Bodies of national or international standing" does not require that a body be purely scientific, but that it represent "scientific opinion" as defined by the title of this article. Professionals such as those in NREP clearly fit under this category as they are scientifically trained; whether they actively publish research is irrelevant. (b) Restrict the criteria to entry to those groups which actively publish research in the climate field; this will pare down the current list considerably. There really isn't a middle ground under which it is reasonable to exclude NREP but include some of the ridiculous groups on this list that easily have less to do with climate than the NREP does. Oren0 17:07, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

The criteria you refer to in (a) apply to reports and formal statements. Separate criteria are given for surveys, namely "surveys of opinion among climate scientists" (which excludes NREP). I do favor your option (b) -- we should remove the Australian Medical Assoc and maybe one or two others. Regarding your final point, I don't see how it's possible for a group to "have less to do with climate than the NREP does" unless the group is of a totally nonscientific nature (accountants, musicians, whatever). Raymond Arritt 17:29, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

So you're really arguing that the Australian Medical Association or Engineers Australia have more to do with climate than the National Registry of Environmental Professionals? Oren0 01:57, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

AMA no, Engineers Australia yes. Check out the Engineers Australia web site, where you will see that (a) they publish scholarly journals and reports (unlike NREP), and (b) some of those are specifically on the topic of climate change (again, unlike NREP). Raymond Arritt 02:22, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

This should be for scientific bodies, so AMA goes (unless they are research doctors) William M. Connolley 19:14, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

I added a section headline titled "Surveys of Other Experts." Hopefully this is a fair compromise. We should endeavor to be inclusive of relevant content, rather than exclusive. Regardless of your opinion of the status of the NREP, their opinion is highly relevant to the topic at hand. If anything, the information should remain on the public page until this issue is settled. Zoomwsu 01:00, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

It's been settled -- the page is for scientific organizations (see above). The Australian Medical Assoc and NREP thus are not to be included here. Raymond Arritt 01:08, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it has been. I think this information is clearly relevant to the topic at hand. I think the headline I placed it under is a fair compromise. I think deleting the entry would not be following the spirit of building up knowledge that is core to Wikipedia. Reference WP:BRD. Zoomwsu 02:55, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

We've been through the BRD cycle. We have reached the point where WP:BRD runs headlong into WP:STICK. Raymond Arritt 02:59, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

I apologize for not being active while the previous phase of the debate was taking place, but I was the one who posted this initially and only now was able to check back. I'm not beating a dead horse, but rejoining a discussion I initiated. There is still another issue to address when discussing the placement of this section. Perhaps it is a flaw in the nature of Wikipedia, specifically with where to catalog the information. Nonetheless, it remains a fact that the articles Global warming consensus and Global Warming Survey redirect to this article. Furthermore, hundreds of articles (Special:Whatlinkshere/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change) link to this page when referring to expert opinion on the issue. Many of these articles do not make the subtle distinction between "expert" and "scientific," nor do they necessarily mean "scientific" in the narrow sense that is argued on this page to support the omission of the NREP study. Because of this "fuzziness" I describe in the Wiki community's casual references to authority on the subject, I believe that it is entirely within reason to include a survey of, while not purely scientific, environmental experts, one that happens to be more up-to-date than any other survey mentioned on the page. The argument I'm making is quite reasonable and I think is a fair compromise between the desire to separate purely scientific opinion from other authoritative opinion and the general goal of building the knowledge base of Wikipedia with informative content. If you don't put the NREP study back, I will. Zoomwsu 04:58, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Why do my additions keep getting deleted??? Zoomwsu 03:26, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Because you completely ignore established consensus, instead of trying to build a new one? --Kim D. Petersen 05:52, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

The problem is, the current "consensus" does not seem to be able to handle the addition of relevant knowledge. What good is "consensus" if it is inadequate? Furthermore, who ever declared "consensus" to mean "immutable"? Cannot the "consensus" be challenged with new information? If my challenge of this "consensus" is not enough, how many other people need to voice their support of my position before it is? Who gets to decide when this threshold is met?

This stifling of contribution is seriously making me somewhat disillusioned with the whole concept of Wikipedia. You know, this is the first article I've actually felt interested enough to make a serious contribution to? I think I have much to add here and, even more so, I have the willingness to do the research to create quality knowledge. If I, like I have done so far on this article, spend hours researching, writing and discussing a topic only to have my work quickly deleted, what incentive do I have to continue making contributions? Don't you see how this goes against the spirit and values of Wikipedia? I thought we're supposed to encourage participation, not stifle it.

BTW, I find highly ironic the parallels of your use of the term to stifle my meaningful contribution to the broader issue of "consensus" among the scientific community on this issue. Zoomwsu 06:22, 21 June 2007 (UTC)