Dr Lydia Messling

📣New paper with @ChristelvanEck and @KHayhoe about how it’s a myth to think that climate science can be ‘neutral’. I’m not going to say it’s ground breaking, but apparently it still needed to be said and we have ideas about what to do next. nature.com/articles/s4416…

💡NEW REPORT: We summarise our recent research on how the public currently feel about climate change – what action they want and what they find frustrating – and offer three priorities for policy makers that will help achieve better climate action. 1/5 climatecitizens.org.uk/new-report-pri…

@jrgptrs @ChristelvanEck @KHayhoe We believe it is possible to engage in activism and have top notch science. Transparency, including in peer review, is essential for the production and assessment of scientific knowledge. This transparency should include mention of your values.

@jrgptrs @ChristelvanEck @KHayhoe Defining neutrality is central and, as Christel said, wholly different to objectivity. Activism does not automatically mean biased science. Indeed, not engaging in activism also does not mean there hasn’t been biased science created. 1/2

@jrgptrs @ChristelvanEck @KHayhoe Because his solution won’t work - it’s based on ‘neutrality’/trying to avoid values completely (which is impossible, as well as not what we want), not the filtering of acceptable and unacceptable values.

@ChristelvanEck @L_messling @KHayhoe It biases the research questions we pose, the analytical decisions we take and the patterns we see in the data. As you say, every scientist is human. Traditionally, science handles this via scientific debates. But if the vast majority is in one camp, that makes a problem.

@MaibachEd @ChristelvanEck @KHayhoe @ClimateActionSN Thanks so much @MaibachEd !

3. This was a joy to write because my co-authors were brilliant, patient, and kind. As were our reviewers - immense respect for how thorough, gracious and encouraging they were. This experience has emphasised for me that we can do better thinking when we host others well.

What rhythms/habits of communication could scientists adopt to help make their communications and values easy to understand? What about a spectrum of communication roles a scientist can reference they’re trying to communicate in (sorry, couldn’t resist - that’s my old thesis)?

📣New paper with @ChristelvanEck and @KHayhoe about how it’s a myth to think that climate science can be ‘neutral’. I’m not going to say it’s ground breaking, but apparently it still needed to be said and we have ideas about what to do next. nature.com/articles/s4416…

@jrgptrs @ChristelvanEck @KHayhoe We explicitly say that we agree with Büntgen about the creation of biased science. Totally with you on that. But we don’t think activism is problematic in the way that Büntgen describes. Sure, activism still can still cause sticky situations, but Büntgen’s solution was not good.

@ChristelvanEck @L_messling @KHayhoe ...are activists and that affects the *rigour* of scientific results in the very first place. If a scholar sees in the data what they want to see in the data... it's a bad thing, right? To me, that was Büntgen's main point. But perhaps I'm wrong.

@KHayhoe @gvacchiano @MichaelEMann @SamuelFinnerty @Lacertko @ChristelvanEck

@KHayhoe @gvacchiano @MichaelEMann @SamuelFinnerty @Lacertko Thanks again, @KHayhoe! @gvacchiano - more than happy to chat more if it would help. I agree with your points, and we need to help the scientific community straighten this out.

@KHayhoe @SamuelFinnerty @ClimateHuman @ChristelvanEck Not yet, but will do now!

@SamuelFinnerty @L_messling @ClimateHuman @ChristelvanEck love this so much! BTW are you all on BlueSky yet? I feel it has all the pluses (and nearly the same format) of the old Twitter and, to date, few of the negatives. Many scientists, little trolling, and no CEO who publicly ridicules climate activists. I'd love to see you there!

@KHayhoe @SamuelFinnerty @ClimateHuman @ChristelvanEck and I are writing a few papers on this topic and have bookmarked this paper! Would love to chat more sometime @SamuelFinnerty

@SamuelFinnerty @ClimateHuman Very cool, thank you for sharing! Did you run into Lydia Messling’s work while you were doing your research? She looked at a similar topic for her dissertation at Reading a few years back.

@billywhizz1970 With respect, that’s not what I say. Nor what I have spent the last decade doing. I’m criticising the framing of the article. Tone policing has nothing to do with what I have written and I actually end with advocating listening more to scientists feelings.

@L_messling the article was pretty clear on how many responded and that many of them were speaking in a personal capacity. the time for tone policing scientists expressing genuine alarm is long over i think.

This is dangerous journalism: beware of conflating opinion with prediction. Remember where scientific expertise lies if you’re going to leverage it. (And oh my daysss do something about these emissions). linkedin.com/posts/activity…

@billywhizz1970 That's 'dangerous' because it can undermine the authority of scientists' other communications if you're not making it clear that this is their informed-citizen-opinion and not the scientific community's elicited position.

@billywhizz1970 It seeks to 'borrow' the credibility these scientists have as experts to give authority to their views about things that are not quite within their realm of expertise (i.e. policy, not natural science). Not worlds away from asking a vet to do the odds for the Grand National.

@arguedasortiz Boundaries of expertise is SUPER fuzzy though, and deliciously complex. But looking at the extreme, it's dangerous to try and sound like a leading expert when you're not (even though you might have related expertise). See the debate around Jim Hansen and his economics statements

@arguedasortiz Re. domain expertise: there's a difference between understanding and communicating the *consensus view* of that area (outside your specific expertise), and voicing your own take (and having people think that you're an expert in it).