In extraordinary news, the scientific journal Pattern Recognition in Physics has been unexpectedly terminated, a “drastic decision” taken just ten months after it started.You will not publish these ThoughtCrimes, citizen. You will not think these Unapproved Thoughts™
The publisher appears to be shocked that in a recent special issue the scientists expressed doubt about the accelerated warming predicted by the IPCC. For the crime of not bowing before the sacred tabernacle, apparently the publishers suddenly felt the need to distance themselves, and in the most over-the-top way. The reasons they gave had nothing to do with the data, the logic, and they cite no errors. There can be no mistake, this is about enforcing a permitted line of thought.
I must say, it’s a brilliant (if a tad expensive) way to draw attention to a scientific paper. It’s the Barbara-Streisland moment in science. Forget “withdrawn”, forget “retracted”, the new line in the sand is to write a paper so hot they have to terminate the whole journal! Skeptics could hardly come up with a more electric publicity campaign.
I keep thinking that we've hit bottom, and that I can't be shocked any more at the degraded state of climate science. Sadly, I keep finding that I'm mistaken.
9 comments:
The won't get any funding, either. Funding only comes to those who have Proper Thoughts.
How can these people call themselves scientists?
How can they even find themselves standing in the general vicinity of people who actually are scientists, much less stand in the same room?
And how can anybody take a scientific theory seriously, that is so weak and rotten that it takes the shutting down of entire journals to keep anyone from poking at it out of fear that the entire rotten structure will cave in?
If they have hit bottom, they're breaking out the shovels so they can keep digging.
Check out the federal government's attitude about marijuana (or Nancy Grace's) for the "don't annoy me with facts" mindset.
Huh. If nepotism in referee choice and controversial results are reason to cancel a journal, I think a few [most] in my field are in danger...
By the way, "peer review" is a misnomer; what most journals have is pre-publication anonymous veto. Peer review is what Newton had: you publish your work and your peers publish their review, if they disagree. So _all_ their reputations are at stake; makes for better dialog and frank exchanges.
Then again, they wanted to publish things to advance knowledge, then. Now, it's just a way to fill a bureaucratic requirement of some accreditation body or to have a footnote in a press release.
J
The journal was cancelled because it was a sham and made all scientists look bad. The standard of Peer Review was FAR from being met, which is not how you are supposed to publish research - so they didn't publish it. Watts has the story right (as usual with climate news).
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/01/19/the-copernicus-prp-fiasco-predictable-and-preventable/
The cause of the warming, the end of it, and why temperatures are headed down are offered.
Two primary drivers of average global temperatures explain the reported up and down measurements since before 1900 with 90% accuracy and provide credible estimates back to 1610.
Science says CO2 change is NOT one of the drivers.
The drivers are given at http://agwunveiled.blogspot.com/ which includes eye opening graphs and a plethora of links and sub-links to credible data sources.
I think I'm beginning to hear Chinese at the bottom of that hole... Sigh...
David, Anthony Watts wrote that the way the journal handled the issue was terrible, and I agree. If the articles were bad, then the solution is to publish them (and the data that they used) and let other scientists pick them apart.
But as Jose points out, that would be about advancing scientific understanding, rather than advancing a cause.
It's quite shameful to see a professional auto da fe and Index Librorum Prohibitum being run by those who fancy themselves as Children of the Enlightenment.
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