Prof Trecek-King on Doing Your Own Research. What's the problem?

Recently SkepticalScience.com reprinted an interesting article: "Thinking is Power: The problem with 'doing your own research'” by Melanie Trecek-King Associate Professor of Biology at Massasoit Community College in Massachusetts, she also maintains the website Thinking is Power with a series called Don’t Trust Yourself.

The title and article caught my eye since I’m one of those who does a fair amount of my own “research” - someone who has also become leery of misleading labels and convinced of the importance of respecting definitions.  Too often a group of people will be tossing around a term with everyone investing it with their own poetic license. 

For example, poetically speaking I consider myself a “student of Earth,” but I don’t do any real research, any more than I’m a real Student. 

Fact is, I’m a lifelong enthusiast who does homework, trying to learn what I can about my subject of the moment.  It’s my honest curiosity that keeps me on the straight and narrow and defines the quality of my collective knowledge.

The serious college student, researcher, professor, scientist are on altogether different levels, ones that deserve to be recognized and respected by all enthusiasts.  After all, they do all the hard work, they digest the data, coherently report on it and share their efforts with the rest of us - that's how we learn.

That’s why I think Melanie Trecek-King words are overdue and should be part of any young student’s reading list.  They also belong on the enthusiast’s reading list because they make for a good self-evaluation checklist for those who fancy themselves lovers of learning and knowledge.

The professor’s article makes a fitting addition to my collection, and it gives me a chance to expand on her theme with the addition of some thoughts of my own, coming from the outside looking in, so to speak.

At first I wanted to select specific quotes, but her 900 word text is a concise whole that I couldn’t slice and dice without damaging, it deserves to be read in its entirety.  I thank Professor Trecek-King for allowing me to repost her excellent article.  

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The problem with “doing your own research”, 

by Melanie Trecek-King

The phrase “do your own research” seems ubiquitous these days, often by those who don’t accept “mainstream” science (or news), conspiracy theorists, and many who fashion themselves as independent thinkers. On its face it seems legit. What can be wrong with wanting to seek out information and make up your own mind?

The problems with “doing your own research”

1. That’s not what research is. 

Definitions matter. When scientists use the word “research,” they mean a systematic process of investigation. Evidence is collected and evaluated in an unbiased, objective manner, and those methods have to be available to other scientists for replication. 

Conversely, when someone says they’re “doing their own research,” they mean using a search engine to find information that confirms what they already think is true. We are all prone to confirmation bias, and the effect is especially powerful when we want (or don’t want) to accept a conclusion. 

Cc:  Definitions matter. 

Steven Koonin, liar for hire. A bibliographic collection - Student Resource

Let’s start with a couple short informed observations of why Steven Koonin’s “Unsettled: What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn’t, and Why It Matters”, is nonsensical claptrap.

There is no development of the arguments, no counter-points, no constructive back and forth, just the same arguments that they appear to have thought up once and never examined.

Personally, I like taking on smart criticisms. They help hone the science, clarify the arguments and point to areas of needed research. But there isn’t a single thing here worth taking on.

Dr. Gavin Schmidt, PhD

Director of GISS 

Climate scientist Ben Santer, (with appropriate links added by myself):

“It is simply untrue that Prof. Koonin is confronting climate scientists with unpleasant facts they ignored or failed to understand.” 

Dr. Ben Santer wrote in his resignation letter to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory: “The climate science community treats uncertainties in an open and transparent way. It has done so for decades. 

At LLNL, we routinely consider whether uncertainties in models, observations, and natural climatic variability call into question findings of a large human influence on global climate. They do not.”

 My question: Why has Koonin rejected honesty, learning and self-skepticism, which are the foundations of serious science?

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Time to finally get “Steven Koonin’s liar for hire, a bibliographic collection” posted and behind me.  I need to complete this, rather than simply blowing it off, because I’m driven by my utter incomprehension at the success of Koonin’s 2021 stale rerun of the same one dimensional anti-science rhetorical campaign strategy pioneered by the Father of Science By Slander, Fred Seitz back in the tobacco war days.

“Steven Koonin’s Liar for Hire, a Bibliographic Collection”

A Student Resource

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Steve Koonin Coasts On ‘09-’11 Obama Gig, Pens 'Unsettled,' a Pre-Re-Debunked Climate Denial Book

ClimateDenierRoundup for Climate Hawks and Kos, 2021,05,06

Five statements author Steven Koonin makes that do not comport with the evidence.   

Marianne Lavelle, May 4, 2021, ClimateNews.org

Koonin’s case for yet another review of climate science

Gavin Schmidt @ 15 June 2019, RealClimate.org

EPA - Here's the Obama energy guy that Pruitt might hire

Robin Bravender, E&E News reporter, August 7, 2017, eenews.net

Climate Science Is Settled Enough - The Wall Street Journal’s fresh face of climate inaction.

Raymond T. Pierrehumbert, slate.com/technology

A New Book Feeds Climate Doubters, but Scientists Say the Conclusions are Misleading and Out of Date

Marianne Lavelle, May 4, 2021, InsideClimateNews.org

Steven Koonin to Step Down as DOE Science Honcho

Adrian ChoNov. 9, 2011, ScienceMag.org

Ben Santer: Climate Denialism has no place at Lawrence Livermore Nat'l Lab

Ben Santer, May 25, 2021, SkepticalScience.com and Union of Concerned Scientists

A critical review of Steven Koonin’s ‘Unsettled’

Mark Boslough, June 1, 2021, SkepticalScience.com and Yale Climate Connections

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Senator Sheldon Whitehouse - Calling Out Democrat's Timidity. Pleading for the need to inform and engage.

Back in the 1960s and '70s, society and its leaders where confronted with the reality that the more we consumed and polluted, the faster our children and grand children would face horrific consequences.  It's 2021, yet the disregard continues, even as the consequences dance before our eyes.

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse has a message for Democrats, leaders and voters, that we need to listen to and heed, or what's left of our democracy will disappear.  

https://www.whitehouse.senate.gov

I have a too tiny readership, though it does span the globe.  That's why I feel like I should apologize for my overly American-centrist tone.  

What can I say, this is my homeland, where I grew up, and where I've done most all of my traveling, where my friends and family and most of my memories exist and where I'll die, so it is what it is.  If anyone would care to share their perspective regarding these matters, please do leave a comment. 

We in America have been watching a ‘hostile takeover’ being waged upon our government.  Actually, too many have been oblivious to it.  This ‘hostile takeover’ attempt traces its roots to a reactionary rejection of both environmentalism, and human rights improvements by a few of the world's billionaires and tons of Dark Money.  

Why, because investing in the future threatened their gluttonous short term profit dreams.

It was a direct reaction to the increasingly successful human rights, and environmental movements of the '50s, '60s, ‘70s.  Back in the '50s scientists finally began to gain a realistic globally holistic, big-picture appreciation for Earth's interconnected complexity and harmony.  Plate tectonics, evolution, DNA and unraveling biological secrets, deconstructing atoms along with all their cascading implications and impacts.  

In the '60s this growing understanding received a slap in the face and kick in the butt, with the realization that the mathematical real-earth observational data regarding current trends was not looking good.

Koonin's "Unsettled"? Ill-advised, or liar for hire? (reviewing Boslough's review)

 I’ve been haphazardly collecting and reading some articles regarding the latest media darling of the climate science denial crowd, Steven (he’s a real, if dishonest, scientist) Koonin.  It’s to be a followup to Ben Santer’s article and intended to be a bibliographic Student Resource for those curious about the disingenuous game Koonin has been playing for years.

Then a couple days ago I read the following “critical review” - at SkepticalScience.com, it was reposted from Yale Climate Connections and written by the respected Mark Boslough - and it’s been haunting me since, so I’ve decided to purge it from my system by posting Boslough’s unedited article, with a few additional thoughts of my own.

Boslough, admits to being a good friend of Koonin.  Indeed his review, is more about understanding and forgiveness for Koonin’s unfortunate excesses, along with K’s failures in judgement and character.  Rather than an critical examination of the malicious lies Koonin repeats like a wind up doll.  

Where Boslough sees an unfortunate, to be pitied, I see a malicious liar for hire.  

Someone who should be exposed and shamed for his wanton disregard for honesty and our children’s futures.  Instead, we get yet another example of dancing by the contrarian’s drum beat.

I share the article as written thanks to their generous CreativeCommons repost permission.  I did add bold and red highlights to single out specifics.  I also share a few thoughts of my own in green print.

This is intended for students who are sick and tired of old white guys getting away with this sort wanton deception.  Students who are already busy trying to figure out how to confront the fire hose of disinformation … (continued after Boslough’s article) (edited June 5th, PM)

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A critical review of Steven Koonin’s ‘Unsettled’

Posted on 1 June 2021 by Guest Author at SkepticalScience.com

This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Mark Boslough

I would normally ignore a book by a non-climate scientist promising “the truth about climate science that you aren’t getting elsewhere.” Such language is a red flag. 

But I’ve known the author of “Unsettled” since I took his quantum mechanics course as a Ph.D. student at Caltech in the 1970s. He’s smart and I like him, so I’m inclined to give his book a chance.

But smart scientists aren’t always right, and nice guys are still prone to biases – especially if they listen to the wrong people. 

Steven Koonin Lecturing Climate Scientists at Lawrence Livermore Nat'l Lab? Seriously? Who's in Charge?

It is simply untrue that Prof. Steven Koonin is confronting climate scientists with unpleasant facts they ignored or failed to understand.   Atmospheric Scientist, Ben Santer PhD

I haven't done much on the climate science denial front lately, since it's gotten too depressing, especially for those of us who pay attention to the increasing imbalance and the ongoing and unsustainable degradation of our Earth's biosphere.  

Besides, seems to me it's not a problem with climate sciences, or the scientists who do it, we have achieved a plenty good at understanding the mechanisms unfolding within our global heat and moisture distribution engine and biosphere.  (Just need to be willing to do your homework and honestly learn about it.)

The problem is with the delusional thinking people love to wrap themselves within.  

Which is why I've move on a bit and why I undertook: Donald Hoffman Playing Basketball In Zero-gravity, my book review and student resource building project.

Interestingly, lately I've been thinking about Ben Santer and how he's been doing these days - since his case, seemed to me, one of the first where climate science denialists showed their complete willingness to engage in no holds barred, malicious, ruthless misrepresentations, character assassinations, and dirty tricks.  Then I read the following and figured why not give it a little more web presence, it's worth reading and thinking about.   

This is why I'm sharing this important PSA that I read at SkepticalScience.com.  For more on Ben Santer: My Climate Story - Ben Santer, also:

IPCC: the dirty tricks climate scientists faced in three decades since first report

August 27, 2020 - TheConversation.com

The Relentless Attack on Climate Scientist Ben Santer

May 16, 2014 - BillMoyers.com

The consensus-building process of the IPCC

February 12, 2012 - SkepticalScience.com

Close Encounters of the Absurd Kind

February 24, 2010 - RealClimate.org

Dr. Ben Santer: 'Climate Denialism Has No Place at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory'

Posted on 25 May 2021 by Guest Author, Ben Santer

This is a repost of Dr. Santer's statement via the Union of Concerned Scientists blog and we thank UCS for this permission.   (As I thank Skeptical Science and Union of Concerned Scientists for making my reposting possible!  Cc)

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) has invited Professor Steven Koonin to give a seminar on May 27, 2021. Professor Koonin’s seminar will cover material contained in a book he published on May 4. His book is entitled “Unsettled”. Its basic thesis is that climate science is not trustworthy.

Professor Koonin is not a climate scientist. I am. I have worked at LLNL since 1992. My primary job is to evaluate computer models of the climate system. I also seek to improve understanding of human and natural influences on climate.

In collaboration with scientific colleagues around the world, our research group at LLNL has identified human “fingerprints” in temperature changes at Earth’s surface, in the atmosphere, and in the oceans. We have also found human fingerprints in rainfall and moisture. LLNL’s fingerprint research is one small part of a large body of evidence that contributed to scientific findings of a “discernible human influence on global climate”.

I have interacted with Professor Koonin since late 2013. Back then, he argued that uncertainties in climate science were large and were not fully acknowledged by climatescientists. In his view, climate science was not sufficiently “mature” to be useful to policymakers. Similar claims are advanced in his new book.

It is simply untrue that Prof. Koonin is confronting climate scientists with unpleasant facts they ignored or failed to understand. 

It’s Not A “Body-Mind Problem” - It’s An “Ego-God Problem.”

(updated January 1, 2022)

Among the lessons I’ve taken away from my Hoffman adventure is that as I’ve followed the philosophical roots of “dualism” back through Descartes (1600s) and on past Anselm (1000s), one thing has become clear. the entire philosophical edifice of this Mind-Body “Problem” was formed from within that Abrahamic God-fearing mindset that gave us the three major religions, with their self-serving patriarchal mentality, heaven and hell, along with branding dualism’s hard boundaries and need for a sense of certitude into our imagination and onto our expectations.

The Abrahamic worldview perceives people as isolated objects, not only from this planet, but each other, even from ourselves.  The creatures we live with and the landscapes we exist within are treated with contempt and wanton waste.

Regarding the “Mind-Body Problem.”  

Dr. Solms makes a wonderful analogy that highlights the error being made:

Question:  Was it lightning or thunder that killed the man?

It’s a meaningless question.

Lightning and thunder are simply different aspects of the same phenomena.

Our Mind and consciousness is the interior reflection of our living body (both its interior housekeeping and external interaction with the environment).  We simply cannot have one without the other.

We are embedded within an interconnected web of life and are the direct products of Earth’s Pageant of Evolution.

Why isn’t that reflected in modern philosophical discourse? 

Learning to appreciate the deep-time pageant of Evolution puts an entirely different richer light upon our interior existence.  An awareness that encompasses the whole of time and this planet that created us.

It also gives us a deep appreciation for the continuity of life.  Life is good, life is precious, but death is no enemy, painful though it may be.  Death is part of the cycle that brings forth new life.  Revel in the pageant you are blessed enough to be witnessing.  While you can. 

As for God?  

Who is “God,” but a creation of our unique complex human minds dealing with our day to days?   

Where did God come from?  

Diary, "INDIVISIBLE" webinar & networking. All hands on deck, they say. What do I have to offer?

A few days ago I attended a “Indivisible Colorado Action Network & Rural Colorado United” webinar about effectively organizing and messaging in rural communities!  It was a call to civic duty and a networking opportunity because networking is key to success.

In that spirit of reaching out, I want share what I have to offer to other activists.