Peer Review, Publication in Top Journals, Scientific Consensus, and So Forth

The Independent Institute ^ | May 7, 2007 | Robert Higgs

[theBuckwheat]

In following the discussion of global warming and related issues in the press and the blogosphere, I have been struck repeatedly by the assumption or expression of certain beliefs that strike me as highly problematical. Many writers who are not scientists themselves are trading on the prestige of science and the authority of scientists. Reference to “peer-reviewed research” and to an alleged “scientific consensus” are regarded as veritable knock-out blows by many commentators. Yet many of those who make such references appear to me to be more or less ignorant of how science as a form of knowledge-seeking and scientists as individual professionals operate,...

Finally, we need to develop a much keener sense of what a scientist is qualified to talk about and what he is not qualified to talk about. Climatologists, for example, are qualified to talk about the science of climatology (though subject to all the intrusions upon pure science I have already mentioned). They are not qualified to say, however, that “we must act now” by imposing government “solutions” of some imagined sort. They are not professionally knowledgeable about what degree of risk is better or worse for people to take; only the individuals who bear the risk can make that decision, because it’s a matter of personal preference, not a matter of science....

In this connection, we might well bear in mind that the United Nations (and its committees and the bureaus it oversees) is no more a scientifc organization than the U.S. Congress...

[lepton]

One should also realize that, at least in regards paleoclimatology, that “peer-review” doesn’t mean any semblance of checking the work, or even looking over data, much less verifying that the methods employed might result in the specified conclusions. McIntyre (of hockey-stick debunking fame) has had more than one prestigious peer-reviewed publication’s editors proclaim to him that in decades of work as editor no one has asked for such basic information.

[Clive]

If peer review were the final determinant of the validity of scientific theory, then the earth is truly at the centre of the universe, the sun, moon and planets revolve around the earth and Galileo Galilei was flat wrong.

[Matchett-PI]

bttt

[yoe]

Let me put this analysis of the topic in very simple terms:

"The anthropogenic Global Warming myth is an attempt to promote global Socialism by mandating a MASSIVE "carbon tax" that would enslave the economy of the USA."

(The forgotten methane source)

More importantly:

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is the principal gas that trees and other plants need to survive, just like oxygen (O2) is the principle gas that humans and other animals require. Trees absorb CO2 and release O2-- animals inhale O2 and exhale CO2. See how nice this all works!

Before Earth's first vast, primitive forests made their prolific debut 300 million years ago, during the Carboniferous Period, the atmosphere held far more CO2 and far less O2. As plants depleted the supply of CO2 from the atmosphere the CO2-impoverished atmosphere became much less favorable for supporting plant life, and plant growth slowed dramatically.

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is not to be confused with its poisonous evil cousin carbon monoxide (CO), which can kill humans and animals in about two minutes. Life as we know it could not exist without carbon dioxide in our atmosphere.

Global warming is simply "Unstoppable"!