I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

"Phronesis seems to have a problem with things not mentioned, but is carefull not to mention a few things himself. I'll come to that, but first lets look at Doran and Zimmerman (2009). Phronesis dismisses that as a survey of just 75 people, but that is false. It was a survey of 3,146 scientists. Among those scientists, overall 82% answered yes to question 2:

"Do you think human activity is a significant factor in changing mean global temperatures?"

That question is closest to the proposition tested by Cook et al (2013). That low figure is because most scientists asked were not specialists in the relevant field, and consequently had little more knowledge on the topic than any non-scientist. Of the small portion of the those surveyed who were specialists in climate science, and actively publishing in the field so that they had up to date information, 97.4% agreed with question 2. There were only 77 of those, but they were part of a much larger sample.

Turning now to Farnsworth and Lichter (2012), we find that it is a survey of scientists, 50% of whom were members of the AMS, and 50% of whom were members of the AGU, and all of whom were listed in the American Men and Women of Science. Their 489 respondents are therefore comparable to Doran and Zimmerman's 3,146 respondents, not to the 77 publishing specialists in climatology. Further (the relevant fact Phronesis did not reveal), only 41% of those 489 actively research in any aspect of global climate science.

It is not clear how those 200 scientists compare to Doran and Zimmerman's classification. For Doran and Zimmerman, and active publisher must have published at least 50% "... of their recent peer-reviewed papers on the subject of climate change". That is, by a reasonable measure, at least 50% of their research must be on the topic. In contrast, the 200 scientists from Farnsworth and Lichter need only have actively researched on any aspect of climate science, ie, greater than 0% and need not have brought the research to publication. Nor need they be specialists in climatology. They are probably best equated with Doran and Zimmerman's active publishers. For the other 289, however, the closest category would be Doran and Zimmerman's non-publishers/non-climatologists.

From all of Farnsworth and Lichter's respondents, 84% responded yes to the question:

"In your opinion, is humanly induced global warming now occuring?"

Assuming Farnsworth and Lichter's non-researchers resonded at the same rate as Doran and Zimmerman's non-publishers/non-climatologists (ie,76.6% affirmative), that represents 221 affirmative responses. That leaves only 190 affirmative responses to come from Farnsworth and Lichter's researchers, meaning that 95% of them responded affirmatively.

Given the low bar on expertise set by Farnsworth and Lichter, and the strong correlation between expertise and current topic knowledge and acceptance of AGW found by Doran and Zimmerman, that 95% is surprisingly high. It shows, however, that the results of Farnsworth and Lichter is entirely consistent with those of Doran and Zimmerman, and also of Cook et al, (2013).

Phronesis may rightly reject the assumption that Farnsworth and Lichter's non-researchers affirmed AGW at the same rate as Doran and Zimmerman's as speculative. The implication of that, however, is that no comparison can reasonably be made between their results and those of Doran and Zimmerman because they do not survey groups with the same demographics. Farnsworth and Lichter would then provide information about general scientific acceptance, but not specifically about acceptance by those with specialist knowledge in the field.

Finally, Phronesis misrepresents the results of Farnworth and Lichter on expected outcomes. The question put, and results were:

"Overall, if present climate trends continue, do you regard the likely effects of global climate change in the next 50 to 100 years as: Trivial to Catastrophic 1–3 (NET) 13 4–7 (NET) 44 8–10 (NET) 41 Don’t Know 2 Mean 6.6 "

Thus, less than half (but only just less than half) think the results of current climate trends will be catastrophic, or near catastrophic. Slightly more, but still less than half think the results will be moderate, while only 13% think the results will be trivial or near trivial."

-- From a comment.

I'm done arguing over this, whether or not the specific number is 97% is not the issue here. The issue is falsely equating two sides of a debate as only existing to preserve their own existence when only one of the sides is actually supported by science.

>As I am a big proponent of free speech online, your implication of what I should and should not be able to say has been quite vexing to me, hence my annoyance.

See

>Stop reading so far into it.

and

>Be civil. [0]

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

I think the OP has made his point quite well already, and I understood him. No need for added outrage.

You're welcome! One last thing, I noticed that you referred to OP using a gendered pronoun. Given that women (and other genders too!) are allowed to use the Internet in many countries [0] it is best to not gender pseudo-anonymous entities who have not explicitly signaled their gender or preferred pronouns. Unlike in Portuguese, Spanish, or whatever your native tongue may be, in English there are gender-neutral pronouns available. Two possible alternatives are singular they [1] or the Spivak pronoun e [2]. Defaulting to masculine pronouns as you did creates an environment that is unwelcoming and hostile for some, so to foster a welcoming space for all you should default to gender-neutral language. Overall your English is pretty good, keep practicing! Just wanted to clear that up, and thanks again!

[0] https://www.itu.int/net/wsis/docs/geneva/official/dop.html

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_they

[2] https://books.google.com/books?id=SK3VRr7bFVkC&pg=PA138#v=on...

Here you go, conflating sciences again and making false equivalences.

First of all, do you have evidence that there was scientific consensus on the idea that egg yolks are "bad" for you? Because there's been quite an upheaval in dietary science recently, in particular the idea that there is "bad" cholesterol and "good" cholesterol. Google torcetrapib if you're interested.

And with this argument, you're shifting the goalposts to validating medical science that is completely irrelevant to the topic at hand.

These aren't "scientific opinions" we're talking about here. These are the conclusions that knowledgeable, educated professionals in the field have come to after peer-reviewing the data of others and frequently doing their own research into the subject as well. Global warming has very little to do with opinion and nothing to do whatsoever with egg yolks and medical science.

In closing, I'll make an appeal to a different argument here: even if global warming is a hoax or conspiracy or whatever you think it really is, isn't a renewable future still something we should strive for as a country that can achieve it? Imagine what New York City would be like without air pollution. You'd be able to see the stars at night! Regardless of whether or not global warming is an existential threat to humanity, (and it is) a future where we no longer pump clouds of sooty black ash and oily smoke into the skies above us is surely a future we can all agree is better than the situation we have now.