“Many would, however, argue that spending minimal effort researching the subject matter is more *rational* than doing nothing and blindly believing what others say to you, and is something you *should* do if you feel strongly about something…”

Indeed. If someone would actually take the amount of time objectively researching this area for the amount of time shills has looked for polls or argued about what an appeal to authority is, certainly they would be capable of actually having a discussion of the facts and data instead of over what other people think.

I will warn you however, that your new line of logic is even worse than the first.

“No. That is an important difference. The difference is the assertion of certainty, necessity– something I don’t do. I am not saying that the experts are right, only that the evidence and confidence outweighs that of the skeptic’s evidence.”

That’s not your argument at all! You aren’t weighing any of the actual evidence, you’re fucking appealing to the authority to weight the evidence for you. For the love of god man.

“In such a situation you have no certainty, but given you have to make a decision which side seems to be doin’ better? Is it more rational to go with the side that is supported by a lot of evidence and confidence or the other side that does not?”

Again, depending on who you talk to the “a lot of evidence” means varying degrees of things and even switches sides from the skeptical to the pro-AGW side. Thus, you need to actually make a logical and factual argument and not rely on what some group of people think. Alos, there is not the level of confidence you wish there to be.

They didn’t just “slip up a bit” they printed a finding that had ZERO data to back it up. This isn’t me saying something is significantly different, but I forgot to mention to what P value, or some minor oversight. This is a large fundamental finding with ZERO data to support it.

>You say: ‘Which is shown by the basically, “meh, maybe” responses by scientists in the field when being asked about the ability of models to predict future warming, etc?’CHerry pick much? <

Cherry pick? Again this is a very fundamental question. You claim that the consensus implies a lack of doubt, but the very survey you point to shows the scientists have quite a lot of doubt despite a consensus. Anyway, it appears we are reaching the end of your intellectual capabilities if all you can do to respond is blindly claim “cherry pick much.”

“The Himalayan glaciers blunder doesn’t negate the claims of drought, flooding. What is your etc?”

Oh, gosh, the etc is quite long. Such as the increasing rate and intensity of tropical storms, floodings and heat waves (if anything its been cold snaps) are also BS. I honestly haven’t seen any body check on the drought claims though.

“The flaw was a lack of practicality to my untrained understanding.”

So its not practical to prove that the common line of thinking (whether it be in data collection, data analysis or interpretation) is wrong? Before we can go forward we at least have to get rid of the BS. To my understanding, it seems like Briffa was looking for anything to dispute this paper, including claiming it didn’t offer something better. Though that seems odd to me. Proving something doesn’t work that is being used is just as important providing something that works. In the 1500’s many times the treatments to disease were just as bad as the disease itself. Certainly it would have been nice if someone would have proved that bleeding someone with a bacterial infection was bad, even if they didn’t also prove you could cure bacterial infections with antibiotics….

And, speaking of laymen and consensus…

Take a look at this article:

http://www.detnews.com/article/20100128/LIFESTYLE14/1280467/1409/METRO/Study–Global-warming-means-wacky-weather-near-Great-Lakes

The article basically tries to argue that harsher winters are sure signs of global warming, which is hilarious by itself, but that’s beside the point. Look at the opening paragraphs:

“In coming years, global warming will have a bizarre, seemingly incongruous impact on winters here in the Great Lakes region: shorter, milder cold seasons coupled with bigger winter storms. That is the consensus among researchers involved in a National Wildlife study titled “Oddball Winter Weather: Global Warming’s Wake-up Call for the Northern United States.”

Care to guess how many researches were involved in the study and stand behind that consensus? Two.

Want to bet that a lot of people will misread / extrapolate this to some kind of a global consensus speaking in favor of catastrophic AGW? I thought so.

Thinking for yourself is never optional.

Take a look at this article:

http://www.detnews.com/article/20100128/LIFESTYLE14/1280467/1409/METRO/Study–Global-warming-means-wacky-weather-near-Great-Lakes

The article basically tries to argue that harsher winters are sure signs of global warming, which is hilarious by itself, but that’s beside the point. Look at the opening paragraphs:

“In coming years, global warming will have a bizarre, seemingly incongruous impact on winters here in the Great Lakes region: shorter, milder cold seasons coupled with bigger winter storms. That is the consensus among researchers involved in a National Wildlife study titled “Oddball Winter Weather: Global Warming’s Wake-up Call for the Northern United States.”

Care to guess how many researches were involved in the study and stand behind that consensus? Two.

Want to bet that a lot of people will misread / extrapolate this to some kind of a global consensus speaking in favor of catastrophic AGW? I thought so.

Thinking for yourself is never optional.

“No. That is an important difference.”

I guessed right…

As I said, if you want to go nuts on that and say “a statement is more likely to be correct if it is made by a person or source that is commonly regarded as authoritative” is actually true, we can’t save you.

Nobody ever measured the degree of correlation between having authority and being right. The reason people still use having authority as a shortcut for being right is that they don’t have time to pay attention to the question at hand and they don’t have anything else apart from authority to lean upon. This last bit is really what makes it, if you don’t have any thoughts about a particular subject, there is nothing you can do but borrow thoughts of others.

If you reworded your point and said that “laymen” have nothing to lean upon besides authority, nobody would disagree. Many would, however, argue that spending minimal effort researching the subject matter is more *rational* than doing nothing and blindly believing what others say to you, and is something you *should* do if you feel strongly about something…

I don’t use ’should’ because it has a moralistic character.

Anon You are the first person to actually attempt an explanation of why it is a logical fallacy. Wally has never done this, he just says it is, like your example above shows. So guys, quit accusing me of being unnec. repetitive.

But I disagree with you.

You say: ‘If you want to nitpick on “correct” above, you can replace it with “more likely to be correct”, the definition will still hold. ‘

No. That is an important difference. The difference is the assertion of certainty, necessity– something I don’t do. I am not saying that the experts are right, only that the evidence and confidence outweighs that of the skeptic’s evidence. In such a situation you have no certainty, but given you have to make a decision which side seems to be doin’ better? Is it more rational to go with the side that is supported by a lot of evidence and confidence or the other side that does not?

You said you looked up the Wiki on it. So did I:

‘The fallacy only arises when it is claimed or implied that the authority is infallible in principle and can hence be exempted from criticism.’

‘The more relevant the expertise of an authority, the more compelling the argument. Nonetheless, authority is never absolute, so all appeals to authority which assert that the authority is necessarily infallible are fallacious.’

‘Many trust a surgeon without ever needing to know all the details about surgery themselves. Nevertheless, experts can still be mistaken, wilfully deceptive, subject to pressure from peers or employers, have a vested financial interest in the false statements, or have unusual views (or views that are widely criticized by other experts) within their field (this makes the majority of experts right, and thus the renegade expert is wrong), and hence their expertise does not always guarantee that their arguments are valid.’

‘An appeal to authority cannot guarantee the truth of the conclusion, given the nature of truth and the Consensus theory of truth, because the fact that an authority says something does not necessarily make it so.’

‘In informal logic, the fact that a majority of experts in a given field believe X—for example, the fact that nearly all medical scientists think that HIV causes AIDS and reject AIDS denialism—makes it more reasonable for a person without knowledge in the field to believe X.’ — sounds similar to my claim.

@ Wally:

You say: ‘In science you don’t say anything you can’t support. In most fields you’d get slammed in peer review for making one erroneous statement that goes beyond the scope of your data. ‘

They are getting slammed. They do fix mistakes. If you assume an organisation of humans should never slip up a bit than I think your expectations are too high.

You say: ‘Which is shown by the basically, “meh, maybe” responses by scientists in the field when being asked about the ability of models to predict future warming, etc?’

CHerry pick much?

You say: ‘t is out there actually. You know, haven’t you heard of the IPCC retracting its Himalayan glaciers will melt by 2025…etc…?’

The Himalayan glaciers blunder doesn’t negate the claims of drought, flooding. What is your etc?

You say: ‘What was the flaw? That is was too complicated for Briffa? That it only showed how the methods/results he preferred where a load of crap? And we should just wait? ‘

The flaw was a lack of practicality to my untrained understanding. None of what you have said is proven, so we wait and see what is proven.

“Well, there is no need to be exact, but when a vast majority of experts agree on something it means there is a great deal of confidence, lack of doubt, on the something.”

Which is shown by the basically, “meh, maybe” responses by scientists in the field when being asked about the ability of models to predict future warming, etc? You got some rosy glasses on here pal.

“When will you show me how I am making the appeal to authority logical fallacy? I’ve asked you like three times. You guys give me shit for repeating’ the same old stuff, well you ain’t much better.”

For the love of god. I’m not even going to address this anymore. Anon has put it pretty well anyway. If you can’t get this at this point I’m happy to just concede that I can’t explain it to you and/or you are just incapable of understanding it.

“Well Either way, if you care or not, how does this affect my argument? ”

It doesn’t effect the validity or truthfulness of your argument, but it points out that your argument is irrelevant to the larger issues at hand.

“Really how? If you and this blog have some good evidence than send it out there. ”

It is out there actually. You know, haven’t you heard of the IPCC retracting its Himalayan glaciers will melt by 2025…etc…?

“It sounds like they have found a flaw in the paper. They seem to be behaving unethically but the ind. investigation is still ensuing, so lets see what it says.”

What was the flaw? That is was too complicated for Briffa? That it only showed how the methods/results he preferred where a load of crap? And we should just wait? Is that what our democratic leaders or those at the IPCC really want us to do?

“It’s not a sign of a major widespread rigged system.”

So, several top scientists, who happen to reviewers for pretty much every major climate journal, engaging in unethical actions is not rigged peer review? And lets get away from subjective qualifiers such as “major widespread.” I would call this “major,” but not “widespread,” because it seems to have only effected a few individuals, but those individuals have a lot of influence in this area of science. However, you may disagree.

“What stats? Show us your evidence that the CRU guys are able to manipulate the entire scientific field in favour of one particular theory (directly or indirectly).”

Given that its been presented on this blog, I’ll leave it to you to find. I honestly don’t care to take the time to link to you the evidence if you’re just going to ignore it (the appeal to authority bit) or trivialize it without addressing it (just about any factual evidence I’ve brought up before).

“But you do need more evidence to convince us all that this widespread deception is happening.”

You should replace “us all” with “me.” At this point I don’t care about convincing you anymore. Its pretty obvious you’re either stubborn, stupid, bias or any combination. Thus far you can’t understand an appeal to authority, you minimalize unethical science, ignore that much of the data still being used today can’t be replicated (ie. the hockey stick lacking the MWP), etc. If you wanted to show me just how blindly people can follow they preconceived ideals, you’ve succeeded.

“How does a few badly sourced IPCC statements support your idea for a deception? Maybe the IPCC made a mistake, did that occur to you?”

By making statements that had ZERO research to prove them? That’s just “mistake,” like maybe I left the milk out? If its just a simple mistake, what’s that say about how much care went into making sure everything in that report had strong scientific evidence supporting it? How many other “mistakes” did they make? Sorry, this is pathetic. In science you don’t say anything you can’t support. In most fields you’d get slammed in peer review for making one erroneous statement that goes beyond the scope of your data. Well the IPCC reports have now demonstrated quite clearly that this kind of rigor was not used when they were being written. So, yeah, the whole damn thing is compromised by this. What else have the said that goes beyond the scope of their data?

“Dude, get your friends together and prove your point. If it is so obvious to you than why not create a case, until than, why should we believe you? sincere question, yo.”

Dude, yo. People are doing this (and yes that even includes pass peer review journals). I generally have my hands full contributing to an area of science that isn’t full of BS, so sorry. This about my limit of “speaking out.” Now if we can get you to think past what a consensus means or what kinds of forms an appeal to authority can take….