The Simon Singh case illustrates how laws restricting free speech WILL be misused.

Not MAY be misused. WILL be misused.

Laws against libel were introduced to prevent scoundrels besmirching the reputations of innocent people. Who can be against that?

But powerful people and institutions can use these laws to squelch reporting of their wrongdoing. The result is that people like the late newspaper baron, Robert Maxwell, was able to loot his employees' pension fund with impunity.

See: http://www.libertarian.co.uk/lapubs/legan/legan032.pdf

QUOTE

By far the worst abuse of the libel laws in recent times was the case of Robert Maxwell. He was notorious for the number of times he threatened to sue people for libel if they criticised his business practices, and he was rich enough to make his threats credible. The result was that it was not until his death that anyone realised he had embezzled £400 million from a pension fund.

END QUOTE

Scientologists too are notorious for their use of laws against libel, and laws protecting religion, to intimidate their critics.

With the 'brain drain' in recent history, we are DAMN lucky to have the scientist we have (although we almost lost all of them to the US too).

Sadly our top national researcher CSIRO is trying to figure out how to make 'clean coal' because it was lazily blurted out as a PR stunt by our former Prime Minister.

I think we need our scientific institutions to be a lot more independent (or accountable to a WIDER but larger body than the government ministry of the day)

One area in which scientific research is discouraged in academia and kept out of the public print media is to do with the tremendous problem of illiteracy and failing readers in English speaking countries. Although psychological and educational researchers have demonstrated the role of unnecessary difficulties in English spelling. e.g. Seymour, Goswami, and Paulesu, academic research in how this basic element in modern communications technology may be improved is held back by 19th century English views that the only way is radical phonemic reform, which is impossible.
We do not even observe how most other modern langauges have reformed their spellings in major or minor ways in the past hundred years.

All the arguments and assumptions against reform of Englishspelling point the way to how it can be improved – that whatever helps learners must help readers as well, that reading is visual as well as auditory, that families of words must be recognisable, cultural value, the ‘Chomsky’ line, the importance of an international vocabulary, even etymology.
It is posibl to cut out the unnecessary dificulties in English spelling and keep the general appearance of print, changing about 6% of letters in text and omitting about 8%. This would not require reprinting of all that is currently in print to remain accsessibl.
http://home.vicnet.net.au/~ozideas/spelling.htm

English is the world’s lingua franca for historical reasons. It cannot remain so unless something is done about its spelling. This is not a field for humorous subeditors. It should be a thriving field for academic research, aided by the Internet.

Yess wee must doo sumthing abowt English spelling. English speekurs arr not as intelleejent as Chinees peepul hoo hav 2 lurn 1000s of ideeograms. Compaird 2 Chinees peepul wee arr ideeogramless idyots.

Scientist who reject the evolution myth have been muzzled for decades despite the gigantic faith steps needed to believe this fairytale.

stevenlmeyer is one of those who ridicule without investigation. Verbally able people like stevenimeyer can learn any writing system. Those who are not struggle, and miss out on reading as a way of raising IQ. Statistics for adult learning are bleak. Chinese learners today start with pinyin, which is a consistent alphabetic script, and then when they have confidence, even the slow learners can start on the difficult ideographs. Previously a high proportion of Chinese remained illiterate. Similarly, Japanese start with hiragana, which is even easier, before they begin the difficult kanji. Both Chinese and Japanese ideographs have also been simplified since 1945.

The unnecessary difficulties in a writing system are a barrier to all vulnerable people. A scientific approach is necessary to English spelling as one cause of reading difficulties, which includes testing assumptions and making experiments.
But this is not being encouraged.

I agree with the author’s position but wish he’d been a bit more even handed in the examples he chose, which suggest to me an ideological bias.

Mann’s recent threat to sue Minnesotans for Global Warming, forcing them to withdraw a satirical video about Mann’s dodgy methods, hardly makes him a poster child for free speech

Here is a link to the satirical video:

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/04/26/climate-scientist-heated-satire-threatens-lawsuit/

Thank you for that Rhian.

It illustrates again the need to be forever on guard against anything that limits free speech. You never know when it will be used against you.

Laws that limit free speech WILL be abused.

For anyone who believes Michael Mann has been treated unfairly, I recommend catching the 'Watts up with climate' Australian lecture tour where climate commentator Anthony Watts provides a jaw dropping explanation about the tree which gave Michael Mann the hockey stick. Venue details at www.climatesceptics.com.au. Failing that, google 'climategate' for a reality check (especially recommended for the author of this article) or read a good book like 'Hockey Stick Illusion'. Galileo must be turning in his grave.

Yep, that's right, scientists should not be muzzled.

However, more than a few of them should be hung, drawn, & quartered, for lying to the public, & falsifying results, in the hope of gaining advantage.

No don't muzzle them, let everyone hear their screams. It might warn the rest of them we will not be so easy to con, in future.

Ozideas, that sounds double-plus good.

Thanks for the link, stevenlmeyer

I didn’t actually intend to make Mann the issue. Though I happen to believe his work is shonky, the best place to resolve the question of the quality of his work is through academic scrutiny and peer review, not through the courts. Satire has it place, too, though!

Both sides in the climate change debate contain both victims and perpetrators of the attempt to silence or discredit opponent using inappropriate means, including legal action, trying to oust people from their jobs, etc.

An article that lists only opponents of GM and proponents of AGW as targets of malign litigation looks somewhat tendentious to me.

If Mann submitted misleading evidence when he was in receipt of public money, how is he different from, say, someone who submits false claims to Centrelink?

I do believe that is the thrust of Cucinelli's investigation.

Rhian wrote:

"Though I happen to believe his [Mann's] work is shonky, the best place to resolve the question of the quality of his work is through academic scrutiny and peer review,.."

Agreed.

Again I have to say the issue of scientists being allowed their say cannot be separated from the more general issue of free speech. Mann should not be allowed to silence his critics through the courts and quacks should not be be allowed to use the courts to silence Singh.

On the other hand, if Mann has indeed been fudging his data - and there is ample reason for thinking that is the case - then the Virginia State attorney is justified in investigating.

I am disgusted with the scientific community for not reacting more strongly to the "climategate" revelations and am not at all impressed with the British Parliamentary inquiry that found no malfeasance. There is NO legitimate use of the word "trick" juxtaposed with the word "hide" in relation to the display of data.

While I understand the need for academic freedom, I would be reluctant to shield them from the consequences of their statements.

For example, there was study linking vaccinations to autism, this caused a massive move away from vaccinating children with the consequence of many unnecessary deaths.

Subsequently many millions were spent with the result that no link with autism was found, and the doctor who gained a fortune from his road show against vaccinations, was shown to have deliberately published data skewed to his view point.

While more than a decade later, he has de-registered, he has still profited from the misery he has inflicted on many.

As what they say carries weight, they have a responsibility to at least consider the consequences of what they say.

Scientists must not be muzzled, nor must they be protected from criticism in the form of peer review or public scrutiny.

The thing that stuck out to me about the video 4referenced earlier is that the current version is a deliberate attempt to try and get Mann to sue (after threatening to do so over an earlier one). One of the groups involved claims to be trying to get full disclosure from Mann which apparently a law suit brought by him would provide.

Scientists should not be muzzled nor should they hide the data and methods used to support their claims.

R0bert