Canadian Climate Scientist Wins Defamation Suit Against National Post 297
Layzej writes A leading Canadian climate scientist has been awarded $50,000 in a defamation suit against The National Post newspaper. Andrew Weaver sued the Post over four articles published between December 2009 and February 2010. The articles contain "grossly irresponsible falsehoods that have gone viral on the Internet," and they "poison" the debate over climate change, Weaver asserted in a statement at the time the suit was filed. The judge agreed, concluding "the defendants have been careless or indifferent to the accuracy of the facts. As evident from the testimony of the defendants, they were more interested in espousing a particular view than assessing the accuracy of the facts."
This is the first of several law suits launched by climate scientists against journalists who have published alleged libels and falsehoods. Climate scientist Ben Santer suggests the following explanation for these types of defamations: "if you can't attack the underlying science, you go after the scientist."
This is the first of several law suits launched by climate scientists against journalists who have published alleged libels and falsehoods. Climate scientist Ben Santer suggests the following explanation for these types of defamations: "if you can't attack the underlying science, you go after the scientist."
Good (Score:5, Insightful)
The denialists do not understand science, but they damn well do understand money and lawyers. It's a pity that in this day and age we have to cater to those who are either still thinking in the stone age, or have pecuniary interests in reality being suppressed, but when the lies they spout are easily provable, it's time to see you in court, denialists, not to prove or disprove the science, but to expose your duplicity.
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You should have read the article because it says as well such a suit would have been rejected in USA.
“Libel law in Canada is often seen as the most regressive in the English speaking world today,” Bill Kovarik, professor of communication at Radford University and a 2009 media fellow at the University of Western Ontario, told The Yale Forum. “A case like this, based only on political criticism, would likely be dismissed on a motion for summary judgment in the U.S. In Canada, the burden of proof is on the defendant, not the plaintiff, so the National Post (one of the most conservative papers in Canada) is going to have to prove their claims are either true or fair comment, and this will be difficult in the Canadian system.”
The comment is not insignificant since Andrew Weaver is also a political personality in British Columbia, he as been elected in 2013. So, when does he sustain an political argument and when does he sustain a scientific one?
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So what? In the US you can get away with very outrageous lies unless the person you libeled has tons of money to sue (Carroll Burnett vs National Enquirer) to set the record straight - and even then, they don't care - it's part of the cost of doing business as usual.
The old Midnight Magazine (now defunct) used to make up stories that were unbelievable, like alien abductions. In one case, they clamed a 101-year-old woman had just given birth. They gave her name and state. Of course it was all made up, so th
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At 105, she was still kicking, and got her judgment.
So, how's her alien baby doing?
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So, how's her alien baby doing?
Batboy is just fine, and has retired in Florida following plastic surgery in Los Angeles.
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The hasn't been any updates in the news lately but rumor has it that he became a scientist and politician in canida and has sued some newspaper for libel.
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“Libel law in Canada is often seen as the most regressive in the English speaking world today,” Bill Kovarik, professor of communication at Radford University and a 2009 media fellow at the University of Western Ontario, told The Yale Forum. “A case like this, based only on political criticism, would likely be dismissed on a motion for summary judgment in the U.S. In Canada, the burden of proof is on the defendant, not the plaintiff, so the National Post (one of the most conservative papers in Canada) is going to have to prove their claims are either true or fair comment, and this will be difficult in the Canadian system.”
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
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The government's pockets are so deep and grant money comes in such a torrent that when I left my job as a scientist funded by government grant money to work a similar job in private enterprise my salary only doubled.
This blew up my sarcasm detector.
Some people seem to think that working as a scientist from government grants is a gravy train. It is not. Competition is significant: typically, out of every 5 to 10 grant applications, only one gets funded. Scientists spend a great deal of time writing proposals that never get funded.
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Yup. And even if you do get the grant, you don't just get to pay yourself whatever you want. Your salary is fixed by the institution you work for and the grant money goes to equipment, students, techs and materials that you very carefully justified in your application.
This is my 18th year of post-secondary science research. This year my salary will increase for the first time in five years (it's been all cuts before this) and I will make 80% (not adjusted for inflation) of what my friend made in 1998 aft
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The government's pockets are so deep and grant money comes in such a torrent that when I left my job as a scientist funded by government grant money to work a similar job in private enterprise my salary only doubled.
One of the funniest arguments of the denialists is the money argument, where they seem to think that scientists are paid millions, and get millions.
I haven't seen the figures, but my suspcion is that the denialists outspend the science a bit.
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In most sciences a lot of money gets spent on hardware and in climate science particularly there is a lot of expensive hardware and research. So there may be more money spent on climate science than by the anti side. But how much does it cost to design, build, launch and process the data from a satellite? How much does a super computer cost? How much does it cost to launch nearly 4,000 Argo floats? What's the cost of mounting a research expedition to some remote place? How much of that government mone
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
My aren't we a bit of the old narrow minded?
Corporations in search of profit are the only arbiters of good and useful in this society? You seem to live in peculiar, shallow and sterile world. But whatever floats your boat.
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You need to realize that even if many times scientists funded by governments do not produce something useful to you in your day to day life, they do create knowledge which is essentials to scientists who work in the private sector. Without government funded scientists, you'd still live like an Amish.
But then again, maybe that's what you wish for...
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It's interesting that you've listed all inventors and engineers. What the OP was pointing out is that basic science doesn't always have an immediately obvious application, but is used extensively by people like the ones you listed in order to produce things that do. Edison and Telsa wouldn't have been able to do any of the things they did if it weren't for basic research in electricity and materials done by people before them. The Wright brothers were the latest thing to come along after a hundred years
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My point was, anyone with a conflict of interest shall not be trusted when they advocate for an option, that benefits them.
Still, despite governments preferring that AGW wasn't true, scientists come up with the opposite view.
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The AGW scaremongering is a huge enabler for those who wish for more/expanded government power and higher taxation.
So, how much has for instance GW Bush increased taxes using AGW scaremongering as excuse ?
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This is Canada, we have a right wing pro-oil government who fires scientists who are climate scientists unless they come up with research showing climate change is non-existent. A lot of scientists are now out of work. Whole libraries of science have been burned and still the scientists stick to their research.
Our government has bet the farm on oil exports at high prices, claim they're finally going to re-balance the budget after blowing the surplus 8 years back and running a deficit for the last 8 years (t
Re: Good (Score:3)
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Lol.. so much history revisionism in your post that it is no wonder there are deniers.
The established science of the time took the IQ of the jews into consideration already. Eugenics took a lot of other factors into consideration too.
Galileo was not persecuted because he disagreed with the bible, he was persecuted because he made personal insults against the pope and church leaders when the correctly told him he could not present his theories as fact without more evidence. And as we know, his theories neede
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Hottest by 0.02C (Globally) with an error possibility of about 0.1C.
Also the only truly global data sets (satellites) do not rank it as the hottest.
And finally, with a temperature difference of barely 0.05 on average for the last 18 years, the warming is basically nonexistent.
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Also the only truly global data sets (satellites) do not rank it as the hottest.
Satellites don't measure surface temperature. They may be truly global, but they aren't particularly accurate.
Ad Scientist Attack (Score:2, Flamebait)
In the new World, with a few exceptions, information is freely available to an average World citizen. It would be difficult to bottleneck the pipeline without appearing to be despotic these days.
What's a person or group with an agenda to do? Flood the places people develop their opinions with facts that are friendlier to their goals. Shitty, clever, malevolent basta
Debate? What debate? (Score:2)
I thought this was settled science. Now not only are you trying to tell us that there is debate but also you're making money off of it? What kind of climate scientist are you, anyway?
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No, there's no debate.
Lies are something different.
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"Settled Science"? Is that some new religion? It certainly has little in common with the falsifiable research basis of the science I used in school..
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Not really the same thing. Gravity's effects are well known but the causes are not understood, yet you don't see masses of people pretending to understand it demanding that obscene amounts of money be spent in an effort to counter the effects. Then again, if that were the case, we might have flying cars by now or easy access to outer space.
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OF course there's a debate! There are gaps in the science that scientists refuse to acknowledge!
Some celebrity told me that AGW causes autism, and I for one won't stand for it!
You must see that this will backfire, no? (Score:3)
You're upping the bid to lawsuits. You must realize that a the court process can be a painful and expensive procedure even for the innocent.
Consider that these same scientists could be sucked into serial lawsuits regarding undisclosed emails, methodology of data filtration/smoothing, disclosure of raw unmodified data which in some cases doesn't exist anymore, detailed explanations of climate models, etc.
Look... you really don't want to open this book. The legal system especially in the US has been successfully used as a bludgeon against people for over a generation. You open this door and lawyers are going to be knocking on the doors of both sides begging them to let their law firm represent them in one lawsuit or another.
Turn on American TV and you'll see all sorts of ads for various lawyers... they say "SUE YOUR BOSS!"... they'll say "were you injured EVER, sue the other guy! FUCK HIM!" They'll say, did you ever use this product? Call us so we can send you a check for 2 dollars, your share of a class action lawsuit that netted our firm a hundred million dollars!" They'll say "Are you the member of any politically advantageous minority? Black, Hispanic, female, gay, transgender? Call us and we'll help you sue people for being bigots!"
And some bright spark thought it would be a good idea to bring the trial lawyers into this shit storm? Okay. *gets more popcorn*
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"
Consider that these same scientists could be sucked into serial lawsuits regarding undisclosed emails, methodology of data filtration/smoothing, disclosure of raw unmodified data which in some cases doesn't exist anymore, detailed explanations of climate models, etc.
Scientist's emails are beside the point. It's what they say in their published, peer reviewed papers that matters. As far as the rest of that, methodology is in the published papers, raw data has not been deleted* and the source code for several of the major climate models is freely available for download. If scientists get sued over any of that they'll win easily.
* Back in the 1980's when the cost of storing data was much higher than it is lately the CRU threw out some data that they no longer needed b
Problem solved. (Score:5, Funny)
The judge agreed, concluding "the defendants have been careless or indifferent to the accuracy of the facts. As evident from the testimony of the defendants, they were more interested in espousing a particular view than assessing the accuracy of the facts."
And now that is sorted out, just like when Dr. Andrew Wakefield [wikipedia.org] was discredited for his fraudulent research that the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine caused autism, rational thinking can now prevail and we can all get back to ... oh wait.
It has worked (Score:3)
At least in the UK, the discrediting of Andrew Wakefield does seem to have worked. MMR vaccination rates have recovered, and are now at their highest ever level. Of course some people still believe him or have other reasons to continue the fraud, but the decisive judgments and associated publicity have changed public opinion back.
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Hmmmmmm.... Haaaaaahummmmmm...... What could it be? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm......... Huuuuuuummmmmmmmmmmmmm.....
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm........ Huhmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.... Ummmmmm.... Hmmmm.... Huuuuuuuummmmm...
newspaper
newspaper
newspaper
NEWSPAPER
WAIT, I think I've got it! It's a NEWSPAPER!
Oh looky here, they have a website too! http://www.nationalpost.com/index.html [nationalpost.com]
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Saying "Its a newspaper" is inadequate - the National Enquirer qualifies, so does the New York Times.
Conrad Black founded the National Post (while in charge of Hollinger) and writes for it now. He appears to have been in prison when the offending articles were published.
Re:WTF (Score:5, Informative)
Saying "Its a newspaper" is inadequate - the National Enquirer qualifies, so does the New York Times.
Why is it inadequate? The New York Times has been known -- and not infrequently, I might add -- to publish stories of a quality similar to the National Enquirer. Especially when it comes to climate change, I might also add.
Also, libel and defamation laws in Canada and the UK are very different from those here in the U.S.
Re:WTF (Score:5, Insightful)
WTF is the National Post?
Anyway the people that need to be sued over climate change are the fossil fuel companies.
Yeah, sort of.
But I look at this as a shot across the bow. If denialists want to lie about the research, or misrepresent scientists, they can do so at their own risk. Because the science is a bit harder to get through some folks heads, but duplicity and personal attacks against scientists isn't. And since denialist cherry picking tends to end up in lies, I say speak to them in their own language - money.
50 K against an obscure newspaper isn't much money. But its just showing the end of passivity in the face of duplicity.
Re: WTF (Score:5, Informative)
The National Post is hardly an obscure newspaper. It is one of two national newspapers in Canada, and the one decidedly on the right. Basically it is the Fox News of Newspapers in Canada.
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Canadian columnist Alan Fotheringham (aka "Dr. Foth") refers to it as The National Pest.
Re:WTF (Score:5, Informative)
The National Post isn't an obscure paper though:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
The National Post is a Canadian paper based out of Toronto, and was the flagship paper of PostMedia, one of Canada's major media conglomerates. It is in direct competition with The Globe and Mail (the other major paper title). It used to be a major National title, but its readership dropped off about the same time it started doing strong "partisan" editorials on topics with strong pro-Israeli/anti-muslim content (including the 2006 Iran controversy). In the past decade, they have not been strangers to coloring their reporting, sometimes past the line of believability.
Re: WTF (Score:2)
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Can you provide links to the stories of these "skeptic scientists" (isn't that redundant?) Are you talking about people with peer-reviewed papers being fired because their boss didn't like the results of the work? Or are you talking about people who couldn't get properly-done science published because a peer-reviewed journal had it in for them?
Or are you talking about "scientists" that had strong opinions NOT backed up by science of the kind that can pass peer review?
Even that is fine; firing people for
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Can you provide links to the stories of these "skeptic scientists"
Canada does not now support science, or at least only a conservative politically correct version of it
http://www.vice.com/en_ca/read... [vice.com]
http://hour.ca/2006/04/20/catc... [hour.ca]
http://ottawariverkeeper.ca/ne... [ottawariverkeeper.ca]
http://scienceblogs.com/confes... [scienceblogs.com]
http://www.thestar.com/opinion... [thestar.com]
And in a happy flashback to the KGB monitoring it's people The Government actually sent people to MONITOR Canadian Scientists at an international polar conference!
http://www.cbc.ca/news/technol... [www.cbc.ca]
http://ottawariverkeepe [ottawariverkeeper.ca]
"Exploding heads" (Score:2)
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Later (Score:2)
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Are you trying to associate me to the anti-vaccine movement?
tsk tsk. You really are desperate.
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Are you trying to associate me to the anti-vaccine movement?
To an outside observer there isn't much difference between you two. Both groups seem to believe that an evil cabal of scientists is trying to trick them. Why should we can which paranoid delusion you believe in?
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"Passivity"... REALLY!?!?!?!?\
Alarmists and green organisations are DOWN RIGHT AGGRESSIVE. They always have been.
They call for no less than:
- The death penalty
- Jail time for people expressing their opinions
- Murder
- Exploding heads of those who dont tow the line (look at the propaganda video)
Citations please. Especially the alleged "propaganda video."
Re:WTF (Score:5, Informative)
The Video in question:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Jail for deniers:
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/p... [newsbusters.org]
http://dailycaller.com/2014/03... [dailycaller.com]
Murder:
Comment by Bluecloud
https://twitter.com/RichardTol... [twitter.com]
There are many more... some directly from Greenpeace. But I'll let you do your own research.
Death penalty:
https://tallbloke.wordpress.co... [wordpress.com]
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How quick they say "Citations please. " then the silence is deafening when you do.
Re:WTF (Score:4, Informative)
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And I quite like your ad hominem attacks.
It is indeed hilarious that you would dismiss climateaudit because of your preconceived bias, instead of look at the article, and original study and make up your own mind about the facts.
You're spouting nonsense propaganda and slandering a website in a thread about defamation and slander.
CLIMATEaudit is a blog about climate science (be it skeptical or not) it has nothing to do with Big Tobacco and you know it. There are no BIG tobacco articles on that site.
Calling a
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Also, the green companies and scientists that distort the facts to make it sound like apocolypse is coming, that the earth will be under water in 50 years, yada yada yada, when really the worst that will happen is the earth gets a tiny bit warmer and oceans are a lttle bit higher. And it can't even be proven that it has anything to do with anthropogenic cause.
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oceans are a lttle bit higher.
If you take a boat out into the Gulf of Mexico, you can float over sites that used to be Indian villages and that's pre-AGW. More than a "little bit".
And it can't even be proven that it has anything to do with anthropogenic cause
Nor can it be proven that smoking causes cancer. Some things have so many roots that a single cause simply cannot be laid straight to an effect. Just that when the statistics begin to line up, it might be prudent to act like there is such a relationship. Instead of, say, standing on a small island and pretending that the water isn't going to keep rising becaus
Re:WTF (Score:4, Funny)
[...] and hurricanes will become more frequent along with droughts, and flooding, as rainfall will go up [...]
"...and the wolf will shack up with the lamb, the leopard will go down on the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together, in the climacticus, calamitous tumult of the wicked Anthropocene, and acne, AIDS, poppy/opium genocide, elder death, the end of Africa, hostile weed takeovers, airplane crashes, more Al Qaeda/Taliban, allergies, alligator migration and sex-ratio disruption, anxiety, asteroid strikes, jellyfish attacks, worse beer, brain shrinkage, brothel shortages, return of the black plague, cannibalism, cataracts, cat love, reduction in circumcisions, cougar attacks, thin and healthy rich people, gingerbread house apocalypse, end of golf, no more outdoor ice hockey, no more pasta, maple syrup shortages, pirates, rapes, redhead extinction, sea snot, sexual dysfunction, pug and other short-nosed animals' extinction, new shrimp sex patterns ever weirder than before, giant spiders, alarmingly small spiders, murders, fewer truffles, UFO sightings, noisier oceans, violin extinction, drop in GDP..."
SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE
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Its interesting that you brouht up costs and how it would effect geographical areas. The current so called solutions will do the same too. The difference is largely the timescale involved. We either see the change over a generation or two and watch the rich lose some land or we take action right now to ptotect the mega corporate farms and the rich's land holding and see the costs increase in a decade of less.
One of those scenarios- hmm. Never mind. We can just get government to magically take care of all th
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We either see the change over a generation or two and watch the rich lose some land or we take action right now to ptotect the mega corporate farms and the rich's land holding and see the costs increase in a decade of less.
While the Dutch people may be on the rich side world-wide (and by median maybe even by US standards), I'm no so sure about the Bangladeshi. But hey, there only 150000000 of them, and most of them are on the brown side...
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The NOAA estimated the cost of mitigation to be .06% of GDP growth/year. Climate change hurts the poor far more than the rich.
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Which is why real estate in New York and Miami is at an all time low...
Oh wait, that's what my model said. I checked it against reality and it appears there may be a flaw somewhere.
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But ... but only by a little, right? We'll just die a little.
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WTF is the National Post?
Anyway the people that need to be sued over climate change are the fossil fuel companies.
The National Post is Canada's right wing national newspaper. The left leaning one being The Globe and Mail.
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Even with the shady journalism discussed in this story, I think The National Post would have better judgement than to publish anything said by Ezra Levant for example.
Ezra Isaac Levant (born 1972) is a Canadian media personality, conservative political activist, writer and broadcaster. He is the founder and former publisher of the Western Standard, is a broadcaster and columnist for Sun Media tabloids and television, and has written several books on politics and public policy. He has become involved in several legal and other controversies on free speech issues. Other issues that he has dealt with include multiculturalism, immigration, and economic deregulation. He published the book Ethical Oil: The Case for Canada's Oil Sands in 2010 and Groundswell: The Case for Fracking in 2014 through McClelland & Stewart. Levant has been successfully sued for libel on two separate occasions.
Re: WTF (Score:3, Insightful)
No one should be sued.
How can we have an open debate when one side censors the other, through lawsuits, censorship, or even making discussion outright illegal (see Holocaust denial)?
It doesn't matter how ridiculously wrong the other side is. Doesn't matter if they are NAMBLA, Neo-Nazis, ISIS, whoever. Let them speak their mind and let the people figure out that their arguments are largely full of shit and let the people reject them on merit. Or, if they choose to, accept them.
Of course, I do agree that glob
Re: WTF (Score:5, Insightful)
idk, when you have partisan media spreading actual defamation of people rather than debating on facts, then lawsuits are basically the only way to rein them in. It's especially a problem when the same large corporations have a stake in ALL your countries media, it's rare that you will get the "basic facts" in the first place.
Re: WTF (Score:5, Informative)
"I initiated the lawsuit in 2010 after the National Post refused to retract a number of articles that attributed to me statements I never made, accused me of things I never did, and attacked me for views I never held,"
That's is different than attacking someone's faulty science. (If you've looked at the hockey stick "science" you'd be laughing at it too.)
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If you've looked at the hockey stick "science" you'd be laughing at it too.
What parts of the hockey stick science do you find laughable? I could see someone possibly calling it 'flawed,' but is there really anything funny about it?
Re: WTF (Score:5, Informative)
Okay. So what do you do when you already have shown the opposing arguments to be false, and they keep making them. And then they resort to defaming your character, since they can't really counter your science. Some societies will go for a strict free speech approach that allows the liar to keep on lying and hopes that the effects won't be too bad. Other societies decide to put limits on how long you can keep spreading lies publicly. You may decide to think of this as censorship, but certainly there are degrees. Canada's certainly not coming down on the side of suppressing facts here... The US errs on the side of letting rich guys pay to spread lies. Which is the better approach?
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
The list are repeated because of wishful thinking. So long as all those evil commie climatologists are out to destroy America, nothing needs to be done about CO2 emissions or the industrialized world's addiction to fossil fuels. The minute AGW becomes widely accepted, something has to be done. And it isn't just the likes of the Koch Brothers trying to preserve their fortunes, it is the average person who believes they have some sacred right to not be out of pocket due to negative human influence on the envi
Re: WTF (Score:5, Insightful)
How can we have an open debate when one side censors the other, through lawsuits, censorship, or even making discussion outright illegal (see Holocaust denial)?
How can you have an open debate when one side uses lies and personal attacks instead of facts?
It doesn't matter how ridiculously wrong the other side is. Doesn't matter if they are NAMBLA, Neo-Nazis, ISIS, whoever. Let them speak their mind and let the people figure out that their arguments are largely full of shit and let the people reject them on merit. Or, if they choose to, accept them.
It DOES matter how ridiculously wrong one side is when their goal is not to win a debate but to DELAY ACTION. By manufacturing controversy where there is none, one side wins.
Re: WTF (Score:5, Insightful)
It is one thing to refute someone's research with other information that contradicts it, comes to a different conclusion or simply represents a different point of view.
It is a completely different thing if you can't refute someone's research and resort to slander and character assassination to keep him from being listened to.
I hope you can see the difference.
You are wrong sir (Score:2)
Open debate does not include the fallacy of ad hominem. It does not include defmation. In fact ad hominem and defamation are attempt to torpedoe the open debate and attempt to deflect the thematic away from science toward the persona of the people doing the debate. If you value open debate then you value stopping ad hominem and defemation.
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This is a libel case, not an academic discussion.
The National Post made scurrilous and untrue statements against Andrew Weaver.
The man has a right to protect his personal reputation.
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I havent seen the original articles.
However I agree with your statement. Published false statements against a specific person should be punished.
Too bad it doesnt happen with alarmist media or scientists slander sceptical scientists, call them shills or call for their murder in well respected newspapers.
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I think I did read the original articles, but I'm not certain and now it's going to take some work to dig them up again so I can re-evaluate my original conclusions in light of this law suit. How very clever of Mr Weaver to aggressively remove the undo key from my mental keyboard.
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The problem is that there is no data for faulty arguments. In fact, there were no arguments to be faulty. The claim is that the paper just completely made up bullshit and lies.
From the article: Weaver said, "I initiated the lawsuit in 2010 after the National Post refused to retract a number of articles that attributed to me statements I never made, accused me of things I never did, and attacked me for views I never held."
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Nice generalisation there.
It isnt because your bias makes you refuse to read sceptical scientific discussions that they dont exist.
Stop reading media crap or rebuttals by propaganda sites and, just for your educational purposes, read some scientific sceptical sites and make up your own mind.
How the hell are you supposed to tell if you are being told the truth if you will not read the dissenting voices?
Again, DO NOT (except after the fact) read the rebutal blogosphere first. Go to the source, then research o
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I'm going to steal that list. It's spot on.
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The media's job is to find two opposing points of view and present them as equals.
1. You're conflating "journalism" and "media".
2. Your statement is untrue for either. However, it is a standard recipe for "infotainment".
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find two opposing points of view and present them as equals
That's not it.
Methinks you need to take your sarcasmometer back to the shop for readjustment...
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This is isn't the first time that they have blatantly printed false information [wikipedia.org].
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He practically patented
Patent has lost some of its meaning lately, but not that much.
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No, he informed people about what other people already knew.
He does not have the superpowers some people seem to think he has.
Re: A talented man (Score:5, Funny)
Become a president.
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You underestimate how many people take print media as gospel, especially from a publication that is *usually* as respectable as the National Post.
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You underestimate how many people think that anything that was published in a science publication is gospel.
Like using acid baths to produce stem cells.
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Libel isn't dissent. That's not a particularly difficult concept to grasp.
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>>I'm looking forward to passage of an amendment to the square-cube law that will allow a concrete block to fly.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wi... [wikimedia.org]
Next problem?
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I said fly, not drop. Passing the amendment I had in mind would allow porcine self-delivery to markets, taking a significant amount of truck congestion off the roads
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Michael Mann has sued columnist Mark Steyn for mocking the hockey-stick curve.
Wrong. If that were the case, the judge wouldn't have said the following when denying Steyn's motion to dismiss:
For the record, I'm neutral on climate. I trust the scientific method to come up with the truth.
What do you think they've been working on for the past decade and a half (or longer)?
Are you also neutral on quantum mechanics? Gravity? Germ theory? Tell us, oh wise one, what other fields of science do you feel neutral about?
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You cite the words of a judge, not a scientist, a person more used to evaluating arguments among celebrities than deciding the value of opposing scientific hypotheses. Scientists accuse each other of manipulating data all the time, as do political columnists. This is traditionally handled by applying the scientific method to marshal facts and test contending hypotheses. If Mann is confident of having science on his side, why should he be afraid of a lowly editorialist?
And yes, I'm proudly neutral on all sci
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You cite the words of a judge
Of course, who else is better suited to demolishing your bullshit allegation of Mann filing suit over "mocking the hockey-stick curve"?
not a scientist, a person more used to evaluating arguments among celebrities than deciding the value of opposing scientific hypotheses.
Shifting the goal posts after an own-goal isn't going to help you.
Scientists accuse each other of manipulating data all the time,
[Citation Needed]
Challenging interpretation of data, methodology, etc. is not the same as allegations of fraud. Anyone with a basic understanding of either science or ethics is aware of this. You seem to lack either.
This is traditionally handled by applying the scientific method to marshal facts and test contending hypotheses. If Mann is confident of having science on his side, why should he be afraid of a lowly editorialist?
He's suing over allegations of fraud. He's done the science, it's been reviewed and corrobor
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Introduction of the lawsuit as an element of the scientific method is underway in the Land of the Formerly Free also. Michael Mann has sued columnist Mark Steyn for mocking the hockey-stick curve. I'm looking forward to passage of an amendment to the square-cube law that will allow a concrete block to fly.
Mark Steyn didn't mock the hockey-stick curve, he called it fraudulent. That's pretty clearly defamation.
Now in both cases it was more a case of the publishers implying that they thought there was malfeasance, rather than implying something had been proven, though I still think there's a case to be made for the lawsuits. In neither case was there any actual evidence of the wrongdoing that was implied, the articles were simply published with the intention of character assassination.
For the record, I'm neutral on climate. I trust the scientific method to come up with the truth. Greens, go ahead and force us to "believe" (another newly introduced element of the scientific method) in apocalyptic warming. Just don't get in our way when we build the new reactor fleet it will take to replace fossil fuels.
This has nothing to do wit
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