Geoff Chambers has left this typically thoughtful and provocative comment on the Has the BBC’s review of science reporting been cancelled? thread:
Everyone commenting here has formed his opinion on climate change by looking at both sides of the argument. If you or I want to find out about a subject, we borrow a book from the library, or go on the net. Not so the BBC chiefs, newspaper editors, MPs, and other opinion leaders. They are highly intelligent, sure of their judgement, but very busy. On a subject outside their own field, they ask the opinion of people like themselves with the requisite expertise. Are the papers Phil Jones recommends the right ones to look at in order to judge the quality of his work? Ask Sir Martin Rees [President of the Royal Society]. Is the science journalism of the BBC above reproach? Ask a journalist-scientist on the Telegraph.
Look at your letter from their point of view. Just a “boring obsessive rant” (Professor Steve Jones’ characterisation in the Telegraph) from the green ink brigade. One of them wrote a book? All nutters write books. Possibly someone at the BBC will get one of their underlings to read it, or browse through the Harmless Sky and Bishop Hill blogs for half an hour (the time that the officials at UEA spent browsing through Climate Audit, according to Phil Jones).
Are we winning the argument? Well, yes, in some Platonic universe where only ideas have reality. In the real world, the argument hasn’t begun, and the BBC, like the rest of the media, has little interest in seeing it begin. This is not a conspiracy, simply the way society conducts discussion. Without the adversarial context and equality of evidence provided by an election or a court of law, it may never begin.
The crux of Geoff’s argument is in the last paragraph when he says, ‘This is not a conspiracy, simply the way society conducts discussion’, and I would take issue with his conclusion.
The BBC is not ‘society’ but it is, and has been for over half a century, a pillar of the British establishment. It’s role as an opinion former as well as a source of information has long been recognised, and to some extent it has become the barometer of public opinion too. But a barometer that at times measures conditions that it has played a part in creating.
That is why, in theory at least, the way in which it conveys factual output is so strictly controlled by legislation. These controls were put in place because of the obvious risk that the influence of the BBC – and make no mistake, Auntie is still tremendously influential – could be hijacked for political purposes; particularly by an entrenched government.
I have no opinion about the way ‘society conducts discussion’, but over the last few years I have had a very bleak insight into how a beleaguered establishment conducts discussion. One of the main tools in this process has been the supposedly independent and transparent inquiry; or ‘review’ if you are trying not to raise people’s expectations. Perhaps it started with the Franks Inquiry into the Falklands War, which now seems to be generally discredited. It certainly applied to consideration of the disastrous management of the 2001 foot and mouth disease epidemic, with Tony Blair announcing no less than four inquiries simultaneously, in the certainty that any inconvenient issues would drop through the gaps between their terms of reference.
Most conspicuous in recent years has been the succession of inquiries focused on the Iraq War, which seem to have come to conclusions that are not well supported by the evidence. There is no need to add any comments here about the three UK based inquiries into Climategate other than to say that in each case one side of the argument received a far better hearing than the other, in spite of the inquires having been made necessary by the actions and arguments of the critics who were relegated to a minor role. Andrew Montford and Steve McIntyre, among others, have made the failure of the inquiry panels to establish the true extent of the allegations against the climate community, and the evidence supporting it, figure in their deliberations.
John Mortimer, in his guise as a barrister, and the son of a barrister, once said in an interview that a piece of advice from his father had stood him in very good stead when he was practising law rather than writing novels. ‘Never ask a witness a question”, the old man said, “unless you are quite sure that you know what the answer is”. In the case of the Russell and Oxburgh inquiries, great care seems to have been taken to make sure that those who had made allegations against the CRU and the IPCC process were not asked any questions at all, possibly for the same reason. The BBC seem determined to give Andrew Montford and I the same treatment.
In conducting it’s review of science reporting, the BBC may seek to consult those who will provide palatable responses, and exclude those who may require them to confront problems that they would prefer not to think about. If this is their intention, and even in the face of all the present evidence I very much hope that it is not, then that will not be the end of the story. As we explained in our letter, both Andrew Montford and I have acquired considerable archives on the BBC’s reporting of climate change. Some of this is already in the public domain, but there is a great deal that is not but is likely to become relevant when their report is published.
Geoff’s other point is that the establishment are very much inclined to seek advice from other members of the establishment, and I am sure that he is right about this too. Informing yourself by those means must be tremendously reassuring, but it is no way to conduct an inquiry if your intention is actually to find out what is happening. Membership of the establishment does imply a certain mindset, and a reluctance to rock other people’s boats.
This point is well illustrated by the Bloody Sunday inquiry. Taking over a decade to complete, and costing tens of millions, this was conducted within the context of a judicial process and finally dug down to truths that seem to have satisfied everyone. In other circumstances these would probably have been passed over. This was an exercise that took place beyond the reach of the establishment, unlike the Iraq War, foot and mouth disease, and Climategate inquiries. No one seems to be impugning the credibility of the findings.
Going back to the BBC’s review of science reporting, I have little doubt that the mandarins of the BBC Trust see Andrew Montford and the proprietor of this blog in precisely the unflattering way that Geoff suggests. But as he makes clear, there is a commonality with the attitude of Phil Jones and his colleague’s to climate sceptics. I actually posted about the dangers of the BBC not learning from the CRU’s mistakes some time ago here: Is this the BBC’s Climategate?. Dismissing the views of bloggers out of hand may be tempting, but it is not wise unless you first make quite sure that they do not have a valid point of view.
The House of Commons Science and Technology Select Committee, Sir Muir Russell, and Lord Oxburgh seem to have taken the same line on dealing with climate sceptics as the CRU, and as a result their inquiries have failed in their objectives; to draw a line under the Climategate scandal. But in the case of the Russell Report there is at least one section that rings true.
At the end of Chapter 5 of the Russell Report , the authors acceptthe tge that the blogoshere is here to stay, that it is now influential in forming opinion, and that those for whom this is inconvenient must adjust to living with the new dispensation. Not even Sir Muir Russell can get everything wrong all the time, and a similar message comes from the Royal Society, via the BBC’s very own Roger Harrabin, when reporting on dissent among the Fellows about the Society’s published position on climate change:
… it seems that message has not seeped through to all quarters. And one Fellow of the Royal Society said there’s the whiff of “end of empire” in the air as establishments strive to protect their authority as it ebbs away into the blogosphere
The BBC would seem to have some catching up to do, but in fact they were discussing very much the same problem back in 2007.
At that time the BBC Trust published its blockbuster report on impartiality, From Seasaw to Wagon Wheel. In spite of the extraordinary choice of title, this shows every sign of being a conscientious attempt to address an undoubtedly complex and difficult subject fearlessly, despite the need to rake over some severe criticisms and unpalatable evidence. The following is taken from the penultimate chapter:
GUIDING PRINCIPLE ELEVEN
Impartiality is a process, about which the BBC should be honest and transparent with its audience: this should permit greater boldness in its programming decisions. But impartiality can never be fully achieved to everyone’s satisfaction: the BBC should not be defensive about this but ready to acknowledge and correct significant breaches as and when they occur.
When it was made clear that the impartiality seminar held in London last September was going to be streamed live on the Governors’ website, there was a certain amount of sucking of teeth – and not just from within the BBC. Did we really expect top executives and broadcasters to wrestle with real dilemmas […..] The seminar was criticised afterwards by one or two members of the then Board of Management for, in effect, washing the BBC’s dirty linen in public. One said it had been ‘extremely damaging’ to the BBC.
That is very much ‘old thinking’. It is true that impartiality always used to be discussed behind closed doors at Broadcasting House and Television Centre […..] The reality is that you can’t close the doors any more.
Information has proliferated so fast in our broadband culture that audiences know almost as much about the decision-making process as the broadcasters. […..]
In the past, many editorial decisions could be taken in the comfort of knowing that audiences could judge programmes only by what they had heard or seen on air. […..] So paternalism will no longer wash: broadcasters have to be ready to explain their decisions. And trust works both ways: if the BBC expects to retain the audience’s trust, it must also trust the audience by ‘letting daylight in on magic’.
A lot of this debate is actually about the role of the institution – a fear that maybe the BBC won’t be infallible and that we’ll show our fallibility. I think that if we had more courage about being transparent in the decision-making process, inviting the audience into the debate, a lot of these ills would be cured. David Schlesinger, Reuters
Impartiality itself is a process. There is no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, but the search never ends. […..] It should always be ready to share its decision-making with the audience: this should be part of its contract with the licence-payer. If it tries to close the doors, the information will leak out sooner or later, and the BBC will end up looking defensive or worse. But if it keeps the doors open, it will help the audience to understand how impartiality works, and trust will grow. […..] The greater prize is the maintenance of the audience’s trust.
That trust is the BBC’s most precious resource. While it remains publicly owned and funded, it is essential. Whatever slings and arrows of outrageous fortune have winged their way to the BBC, the basic level of trust has endured. That should give the BBC courage not to be defensive about every hostile headline in the press – but also to be ready to acknowledge and correct breaches of impartiality whenever they arise, as they undoubtedly will. [……]
Impartiality in today’s world must be a transparent process. […..]
I have edited these extracts heavily to save space, and I strongly recommend reading the original in full. The message is inescapable: if the BBC is to keep its reputation in the digital age, then the old, tried, and tested ways of the establishment must be abandoned. There are no doors to close on private assessments of matters that are of public interest.
It is also worth glancing at the Forward on page 2, in which Professor RIchard Tait endorses the report on behalf of the BBC Trustees. I wonder if he remembers what it says now?
The BBC’s Richard Black has been forced to change his RiceGate story.
For several day this story mis-represented a study of rice crops. Richard initially claimed that the study showed rice production had been falling for 25 years because of global warming. He changed his story now to reflect the findings that rice production has been increasing (not falling) in the period.
The study claimed that the rate of increase was slowing in some areas – because of AGW. Richard has no science background and probably sees acceleration and speed as one and the same thing. The summary of the study does seem alarmist and over-hyped.
The study itself has been trashed on WUWT.
Going back to the impartiality theme – this is very hard when the BBC “experts” have no expertise. Richard has to rely on press releases and his chums in enviro groups to answer his questions. It’s all second-hand.
The story of the correction to the BBC’s rice story (see Jack Hughes #51) is at
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/08/12/bbc-to-issue-correction-on-rice-yields-story/
together with Black’s generous thank you letter to Anthony Watts.
Surely it will be impossible for the BBC to ignore blogs after this, whether in articles or in the Jones impartiality report?
Geoff, Jack, re the journalists/blogosphere interface, I think it has been undergoing vast changes, especially over the last 10 months or so (another fallout from ClimateGate).
The answer, surely, is that the BBC and other traditional media outlets just cannot ignore blogs now; it would be like mid-20th century radio-based media corporations ignoring television (Fiona Fox’s “blogs are not real journalism” assertion notwithstanding.) The television analogy is not a good one, I admit, as it leaves out the whole interactive, crowdsourcing aspect of blogs, which are their not-so-secret weapon. It’s like the difference (to use another clumsy analogy) between an old-school army and a loose organisation of guerrillas/Taleban.
We’ve seen, to put it plainly, that bloggers can be better journalists than the journalists. Which does put a question mark over the roles and continued existence of many professional journalists, especially in these straitened times and the even more straitened times which are probably to come. There will be an uneasy co-existence and a blurring for a while, but ultimately I think we can expect a radical shift away from the old authoritative top-down model of reporting.
I’ve just added a comment to the WUWT piece about this, which was on the 6am news this morning. It certainly woke me up!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-10955024
I notice that despite the ‘thinning ice’ that is the reason for his visit, he’s still worried about the ‘extreme cold’…
PeterM
Let me see if I can clear up the confusion in your 50.
What I think has emerged now is that properly conducted scientific research is already readily available in the literature, which refutes Mann’s hockey stick. His study was comprehensively discredited as a flawed statistical analysis of cherry-picked data as discussed earlier, and this invalidation was confirmed before a US congressional committee by Wegman and then confirmed by North and Bloomfield, both of NAS (a normal scientific and legal process, which you have strangely referred to as “vilification”).
But, even more importantly, Mann’s study has been made redundant and irrelevant by more recent studies, which show basically different results.
The links to the many independent studies from all over the world, using different methods, which all show a global MWP that was between 0.3C and 2.5C warmer than today have all already been posted by me on this site. If you would like me to re-post them, I will be more than happy to do so. Please let me know.
In his exhaustive study covering several locations, Craig Loehle used data from peer reviewed scientific papers. All the proxies he used were taken from peer-reviewed (and published) articles. In the abstract, Loehle concludes:
The “most recent tridecade” is the period of late 20th century warming frequently cited by IPCC, i.e..1976-2005.
Elsewhere in the study Loehle states:
This is apparently the source of your “1935” confusion (50).
Loehle goes on to state:
So you see, if you read it thoroughly, Loehle concludes that the warmest “tridecade” of the MWP was slightly warmer than the most recent “warmest tridecade” (and around 0.412C warmer than the tridecade centered on 1935), not slightly “warmer than 1935”, as you erroneously concluded.
If you want me to re-post the link to the Loehle study as well, I’ll be glad to do so. Just let me know.
Hope this has cleared it up for you. To make sure, I will repeat.
1. Mann et al. made a study using selected bristlecone pine data and a flawed statistical approach in a clumsy attempt to rewrite history on the MWP; it showed a “hockey stick”
2. The IPCC gave the “hockey stick” “central billing” in its TAR without doing any critical auditing of its validity and used it to demonstrate “unusual 20th century warming for 1,300 years”.
3. Mann’s “hockey stick” was scientifically (statistically) discredited by McIntyre and McKitrick
4. Wegman and later North plus Bloomfield of NAS have confirmed this before a US congressional committee.
5. Many subsequent studies from all over the world using different methods have shown that Mann’s conclusions were false, and that a global MWP existed, which was slightly warmer than today
6. A recent summary of many peer-reviewed studies by Craig Loehle confirmed a global MWP that was slightly warmer than today
7. In addition to the official falsification of Mann’s “hockey stick”, it has been made redundant (and irrelevant) by the many later studies.
Max
James P, re your #54, I caught the tail end of that interview on Radio 4 (will check iPlayer later) and in addition to global warming being mentioned, there was also the breakaway “ice island” mentioned as evidence of this; again meeting the same tacit acceptance that you mention in your WUWT comment. Re the Inuit, there’s plenty of interesting information here on Wikipedia, including the following:
“The warmer climate of North America in 1000 CE increased the amount of habitable territory in the Arctic and contributed to population growth.”
“From the beginning of the 14th century a gradual cooling occurred throughout the Canadian Archipelago and the Arctic Ocean coast of the Mainland. The period between 1550 and 1880, the so-called “Little Ice Age”, caused temperatures significantly lower than today’s in North America and Europe (with a brief period of higher heat around 1800). The effect of the drop in temperature upon the hunting- dependent lifestyle of the Thule was significant. Entire regions of the high Arctic were depopulated, partly by mass migrations but also by the starvation of entire communities.”
Which is the exact opposite scenario to the one Dr Leonard is assuming.
Thanks, Alex. The Beeb’s lack of enquiry seems to know no bounds – for one thing, the Inuit don’t live on the sea ice, they live in Greenland (the clue’s in the name) and they ‘rely on traditional hunting methods to catch the sea mammals that form their diet’ for which thinning ice would presumably be an advantage, especially if they are using their kayaks!
I have a suspicion that Dr Leonard knows this, but is smart enough to keep quiet when he knows that his funding relies on the ostensible link to GW…
BTW, Alex, I didn’t hear an interview – just a news item. Contrary to appearance, I love the BBC (well, Radio 4 anyway) but their problem with AGW does make me a lot more sceptical of their other reportage, which is a shame, as I’m sure most of it is sound.
Hugh Sykes’ pieces from Iraq, for instance, have me lost in admiration, and it seems grossly unfair that such reporting should get devalued by soi-disant science correspondents like Roger Black, who can’t even read a press release properly!
Eek! I meant Richard Black, of course. Roger Black is the athlete who was also in the news today and what passes for my brain conflated the two. Sorry.
James, the BBC is actually less alarmist than the Sydney Morning Herald, which has: “Rush to record Inuit tongue doomed by global warming”.
‘”Climate change means they have around 10 or 15 years left,” Dr Leonard said. “Then they’ll have to move south and in all probability move in to modern flats.”‘ (And doomed to get their groceries at Iceland, I further speculate.)
Like you, I still kind of like the BBC, and they did and do produce some quality programmes; just find it exasperating that they continually and uncritically slip into the “everything points to global warming” default mode. Also not to worry about the slip – once I kept referring to him as “Richard Harrabin”.
Perhaps they’re the same person! :-)
Alex, JamesP
If Richard Black and Roger Harrabin are not the same person, they should get together with Mark Lynas and form an eco-recycling group. They could call it “Black/‘Bin/Lynas”
Delingpole here
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100050622/morituri-te-salutant/
is doing his usual trick of trying to sound stupid while making some extremely perceptive comments, this time about the “institutional left-liberal bias of the BBC”. He says:
My politics are at the other end of the spectrum from Delingpole’s, but I agree entirely with his last point.
Geoff, James P, yes it does seem a bit like indoctrination, as Mr Delingpole suggests; my own take on the situation is that the BBC’s avuncular presence and influence (is there an adjective denoting “Auntie”-like?) in the lives of all of us born and brought up here seems completely normal and reasonable. It’s a family thing – it’s what we’re used to!
Re #62, good one! They could also form a band – it’s said, after all, that much music nowadays is recycled…
Geoffchambers has quoted Delingole in arguing that the BBC’s position is not neutral but is essentially of the left.
I guess readers of the Spectator, the Mail, the Express might well think that. Also in the USA readers of the WSJ , the New York Times, and the Washington Post may agree too.
Maybe they can all offer some advice to the BBC on the question of impartiality?
For instance, what is the correct response when faced with a request by 255 leading scientists to publish this sort of thing?
http://www.pacinst.org/climate/climate_statement.pdf
Of course it should be rejected! Any idiot, even a Delingpole, can see at a glance just how this is dangerous left-wing nonsense. And you’ll be pleased to know that the three bastions of US impartiality, above, did just that. I wonder if the right wing UK papers would be equally impartial if faced with a similar request from the fellows of the Royal Society?
Tempterrain #65,
to be clear, I don’t agree with Delingpole that the BBC has a leftwing bias. I think they (and the media in general) have a centrist bias, eliminating or filtering opinions, and sometimes news, which fall outside a certain range of “political correctness”. Opinions on a scientific subject which contradict those of the Royal Society will get little attention, whether or not they are they are held by eccentric right wing journalists on the Mail and Telegraph.
I don’t know what point you’re making by linking to yet another chain letter from scientists. Maybe the US papers ignored it because it’s not news. Or maybe because of the absurdity of hundreds of scientists signing up to a letter which states “the scientific process … is inherently adversarial”. To which the only sensible response would be a letter signed by one single scientist saying “No it’s not. It’s inherently consensual”.
Geoff: ‘… the only sensible response would be a letter signed by one single scientist saying “No it’s not. It’s inherently consensual”.’
This short video sequence illustrates your last point well, I think.
PeterM
Yeah. Geoff and Alex are right.
You essentially “shot yourself in the foot” posting the chain letter signed by “hundreds of scientists”, alluding to a witch hunt but, in effect, expressing their unease with the fact that the (taxpayer-funded) work on the politically and economically important issue of AGW is being scrutinized a bit more closely and openly than before (as it should be).
(Sort of reminds me of a pouting child, who has had his hands slapped for reaching into the cookie jar, whining that he is being physically abused.)
A mutually signed “consensus” that “science is adversarial” is a joke in itself, of course, as both geoff and Alex have remarked.
Max
Max,
I would suggest that what may offend any fair minded person wouldn’t be the contents of the letter by the 255 scientists, which they may or may not agree with, but that they were denied the opportunity by leading US journals to express their opinion.
It is quite routine for publications like the WSJ to run op-eds on climate change written by unqualified personnel. As a result they are riddled with errors but no corrections are allowed to be made. The Wall Street Journal has refused all invitations to visit NASA’s GISS HQ and it is claimed that their reporters are under instructions to have no contact with people like Gavin Schmidt and James Hansen.
Those instructions can only come from the top. From their owner Mr Rupert Murdoch. The same Rupert Murdoch who is totally opposed to the existence of organisations like the BBC. The BBC may not be perfect but it doesn’t need to take lessons in impartiality from the likes of him or his hirelings.
PeterM
You opined:
Lots of folks are “denied the opportunity by leading US journals to express their opinion”. This does not “offend” me in the least; it’s life. More often than not, these are folks that are “going against the PC message of the time”.
Most recently this “PC message of the time” is
This message has been far easier to get published by the MSM (in the USA as well as the UK and other countries) than the “non-PC” message
There have been “letters” by groups of scientists on both sides of the debate and whether or not the journals of the MSM see fit to publish these is up to their editorial policy and has nothing to do with fairness.
Max
tempterrain #69
The failure of the left-leaning New York Times to publish the letter can hardly be due to pressure from Murdoch. Besides, it was widely reported that the green views of Mrs Murdoch were behind the Sunday Times’ climbdown over Amazongate, so it’s not evident that Mr Murdoch would counter his wife’s opinions by leaning on the WSJ. Surely the letter was ignored because it’s basically not very interesting.
I do agree with you when you say that the BBC doesn’t need to take lessons in impartiality from the likes of Murdoch. It’s a mistake in my opinion to confuse the issue of BBC bias over climate change with its method of funding. The same following of the party line, the same blind parroting of catastrophic press releases, is found in the privately owned press, both left and right.
Just a quick update re my #37 – I’ve had a look at the abstract of that BMJ study (here) re heart attacks related to temperature change.
Its conclusions: “Increases in risk of myocardial infarction at colder ambient temperatures may be one driver of cold related increases in overall mortality, but an increased risk of myocardial infarction at higher temperatures was not detected. ”
Among the listed results is: “Heat had no detrimental effect.”
Naughty, naughty BBC!
Mind you, this article is worse!
Geoffchambers,
Maybe Mrs Murdoch can prevail on her husband to give the CSIRO scientists in Australia, and the NASA scientists in the states what we here would call “a fair go”. It would be good if she could, but I’m not holding my breath.
The Amazongate Sunday Times retraction was begrudging to say the least. I had to look pretty hard to find it.
http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/jono/pub/cc/pcc-st/
What should be the link to the retraction on their website gives you:
http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/uk_news/Environment/article322890.ece
Max,
You say the decision of what Journals, and by extension the whole of the media, has nothing to do with fairness. What about impartiality? Does that figure too? And incidentally we aren’t just talking about “some folks” here. We are talking about the collective opinion of the leading members of the National Academy of Sciences.
Agree with it or not, its got to be news, surely!
Should be in above:
You say the decision of what Journals should publish