While Nature had turned the paper down because so many others had already shown the existence of the problem, this referee recommended rejection because no evidence for the problem existed.
– Ross McKitrick, discussing the difficulties of getting sceptical papers on climate change published in climatology journals. Read the whole thing.
Three quick asides:
Firstly, McKitrick is Professor of Economics at the University of Guelph in Ontario, and the partner of Stephen McIntyre in many of the papers that have questioned Michael Mann’s hockey stick. Basically, McIntyre is someone of considerable quantitative expertise whose actual career is (shudder) in the private sector (in the mining industry) and who has done the heavy lifting, whereas McKitrick has provided oversight and experience of academia and the academic publishing process. At least, such is my impression. If I have undersold his contribution, my apologies. That said, this doesn’t seem to have helped greatly in getting papers published in climatology journals.
Secondly, this kind of thing seems to have happened a lot with respect to people attempting to take a sceptical line on climate change. Papers have been submitted to journals, relatively neutral referees have come out in favour of publication, but the papers have ultimately been rejected on the basis that they are unsuitable in some way with respect to the journal’s editorial policies. Really, this reveals weaknesses of the peer review process. Ultimately it is the editor of a journal who decides if a paper will be published. If an editor thinks yes, then he will find a way for peer review to support this belief, either by choosing tame additional referees or by overruling negative referees on technical points. If he thinks no, the tactic of changing the referees and/or the terms of reference under which the paper should be accepted is an old one, and one that has been used a lot in this field. McIntyre and McKitrick’s 2004 submission to Nature, which attempted to question the methodology of the Hockey Stick is a classic example. Initially both referees argued that the paper should be accepted, but somehow it was ultimately rejected.
Thirdly, the fact that neither McIntyre or McKitrick are climatologists is highly relevant. I suspect, though, that the argument is about how it is highly relevant. The Global Warming alarmist camp would say that it is relevant because they lack expertise on climatology and/or they are funded by the oil industry, I suspect. The sceptical camp would say that it is relevant because they are not part of a captive clique. The libertarian camp would probably say that it is relevant because they (or at least McIntyre) are not directly funded by the state, and are not being therefore funded to advance a pre-decided agenda. I will leave decisions about the appropriate level of cynicism to the reader.
Link via Bishop Hill
