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Opinion piece in today's WSJ claims that SNA shows that the scientists
whom agree on global warming are all a tightly-knit group -- a mutual
admiration society -- that dismiss all contrary findings without
consideration.
Here is an excerpt... Wall Street Journal; July 14, 2006; Page A12
> In addition to debunking the hockey stick, Mr. Wegman goes a step
> further in his report, attempting to answer why Mr. Mann's mistakes
> were not exposed by his fellow climatologists. Instead, it fell to two
> outsiders, Messrs. McIntyre and McKitrick, to uncover the errors.
> Mr. Wegman brings to bear a technique called social-network analysis
> to examine the community of climate researchers. His conclusion is
> that the coterie of most frequently published climatologists is so
> insular and close-knit that no effective independent review of the
> work of Mr. Mann is likely. "As analyzed in our social network," Mr.
> Wegman writes, "there is a tightly knit group of individuals who
> passionately believe in their thesis." He continues: "However, our
> perception is that this group has a self-reinforcing feedback
> mechanism and, moreover, the work has been sufficiently politicized
> that they can hardly reassess their public positions without losing
> credibility.
>
> In other words, climate research often more closely resembles a
> mutual-admiration society than a competitive and open-minded search
> for scientific knowledge. And Mr. Wegman's social-network graphs
> suggest that Mr. Mann himself -- and his hockey stick -- is at the
> center of that network.
Since this has become a political issue, is the opposing group also an
echo chamber? Similar to the red-blue political divide we see in the
USA?
Would be interesting to run Mark Newman's community algorithm on all
scientists/papers involved in global warming, eh?
Valdis
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