Category Archives: Pseudoscience

FAIL Better

Recently AT reminded us of FLICC, a taxonomy of contrarian tactics introduced in 2007 by MarkH. His bro’s Deck still shines. As a first post of a science blog, it does the job. As a permanent classifier, it deserves some … Continue reading

Posted in ClimateBall, how-to, Pseudoscience, SpeedoScience | Tagged , , , , , , | 13 Comments

Decoding the Gurus

Since I haven’t had much to write about, I thought I would briefly highlight a podcast that I’ve really enjoyed listening to. It’s called Decoding the Gurus, and is run by Chris Kavanagh, an anthropologist, and Matt Browne, a psychologist. … Continue reading

Posted in Pseudoscience, Research, Science, Scientists | Tagged , , , , , | 11 Comments

Science communication

I listened to one of Andy Revkin’s Twitter broadcasts with Randy Olson which discussed if science communication was worse now than it was 100 years ago. I’ve actually read most of Randy Olson’s book, where he introduces his 3-step model … Continue reading

Posted in Pseudoscience, Science, Scientists | Tagged , , , , | 48 Comments

Mind Your Units

With both sadness and joy I must report that the Sky Dragons cranks {1} invaded Roy’s. Joy, because I’m having fun. As an editor friend observed (pers. corr.): this place looks like the perfect Thunderdome for you. She’s not wrong. … Continue reading

Posted in ClimateBall, Pseudoscience, Roy Spencer, SpeedoScience | Tagged , | 553 Comments

Anti-Virus

There’s a new site called Anti-Virus: The Covid-19 FAQ. It’s a little like Skeptical Science, with articles that respond to common arguments made by Covid Sceptics (what Skeptical Science would call Climate Myths). On a related note, I have been … Continue reading

Posted in ClimateBall, Pseudoscience, Science | Tagged , , , , | 536 Comments

Propagation of nonsense

A couple of years ago, I had a guest post about Pat Frank’s suggestion that the propagation of errors invalidate climate model projections.. The guest post was mainy highlighting a very nice video that Patrick Brown had produced so as … Continue reading

Posted in Climate change, ClimateBall, Comedy, Pseudoscience, The philosophy of science, Watts Up With That | Tagged , , , , , | 55 Comments

A little knowledge

There is apparently a paper from a couple of years ago that is currently doing the rounds and that argues that the Molar Mass Version of the Ideal Gas Law Points to a Very Low Climate Sensitivity. The suggestion is … Continue reading

Posted in Climate sensitivity, Greenhouse effect, Pseudoscience, Science, The scientific method | Tagged , , , , , | 27 Comments

Nature Scientific Reports

Correction – 07/07/2019: I’ve been informed that the journal title is actually Scientific Reports, not Nature Scientific Reports. I’ve edited the text, but not the title. Michael Brown made me aware of a new paper in Scientific Reports by Valentina … Continue reading

Posted in Climate change, ClimateBall, Global warming, Pseudoscience, The scientific method | Tagged , , , , , | 274 Comments

If it seems obvious, it probably isn’t

There’s an interesting paper that someone (I forget who) highlighted on Twitter. It’a about when science becomes too easy. The basic idea is that there are pitfalls to popularising scientific information. Compared to experts, laypeople have not undergone any specialized … Continue reading

Posted in Pseudoscience, Research, Science, Scientists, Sound Science (tm), The philosophy of science, The scientific method | Tagged , , , , , | 44 Comments

Early 20th century warming

I’ve noticed that Judith Curry is discussing the early twentieth century warming. The idea is that there was a period of warming during the early twentieth century that was similar to the warming we’ve experienced since the second half of … Continue reading

Posted in Climate sensitivity, ClimateBall, Judith Curry, Pseudoscience | Tagged , , , , | 34 Comments