Arguments
Facebook page to support John Abraham
Posted on 16 July 2010 by John Cook
There is now a Facebook page to support John Abraham. Specifically, it's called Prawngate: Support John Abraham against Monckton's bullying. Many thanks to Dan Moutal, creator of the Irregular Climate podcast and Mind of Dan blog.
The word I'm hearing is that St Thomas University is solidly behind John Abraham so I'd like to think all the support expressed at Hot Topic has made a difference. Nevertheless, I encourage everyone to drop by the Facebook and add your support.
For the record, Prawngate refers to Monckton's initial response to John Abraham's response. Most striking was this sentence:
"So unusual is this attempt actually to meet us in argument, and so venomously ad hominem are Abraham’s artful puerilities, delivered in a nasal and irritatingly matey tone (at least we are spared his face — he looks like an overcooked prawn), that climate-extremist bloggers everywhere have circulated them and praised them to the warming skies."
As Dan points out, it's quite extraordinary that someone can throw out an accusation of ad hominem while making an ad hominem attack in the same sentence. Hence Prawngate is born.
At least modern science doesn't work under Moncktonian logic!
Also, perhaps you can add some audio and animation to make it talk in a Mid-Western accent. ;-)
Monckton's appearance is supposed to have something to do with him having Grave's Disease. Making fun of an opponent's disability should be beyond the pale of acceptable discourse.
Don Moutal should have gone with "Sitck to the facts, ma'am, stick to the facts".
I thought I'd read that Monckton's miracle AIDS cure also cured Grave's disease... not sure where I picked that up!
Ok, he started it. I would still have preferred something a bit less flippant.
This will not stop me recording my support for John Abraham.
"At least 5 of Abraham's guest posts at skepticalsciece.com are no longer listed on the site. They have been redacted from the thread index and the thread archive."
Can you clarify please?
Passing Wind's comment
Abraham reply to Monckton
I'm sure there is a simple explanation and John will clarify when he is around.
Flippant? Yes, but frankly Monckton's ravings don't merit a serious response. If he can't behave like a grownup the best course is to laugh him off and move on.
It is a matter of opinion. I still think leaving all the flippancy and pique on the other side would establish much more effectively the difference between the protagonists.
It is true that Watts' site (to take one example) has descended into la-la land, with references to cockroaches and the impending doom of a Communist takeover ... all because someone called out one of their idols!!
I found 5 with Google from june 2 to june 11 (the "More results from"... link is my friend), including the one you mentioned, all in full working order.
I assume John is implementing the "nofollow"-thing or something alike, so the WUWTF-crew will have a slightly harder time tracking them, and we will have everything back in no time.
I expect they will reappear at some point.
On the plus side, having just made such a Large Personal Sacrifice (oh dear, there are the first friendship requests pouring in already... what is this? an ambush? shoo!), it'll probably be Extremely Appreciated, which is nice. :)
Part II
Part II
,a href="http://www.skepticalscience.com/Monckton-Chronicles-Part-IV-Medieval-Warm-Period.html"> Part III
Part I
june 2: Abraham shows Monckton wrong on Arctic sea ice
june 4: Monckton Chronicles Part II: Here Comes the Sun
june 6: Abraham reply to Monckton
june 8: Monckton Chronicles Part III: Acid Reflux
june 11: Monckton Chronicles Part IV: Medieval Warm Period
(the preview worked, hope the submit works too!)
A humble suggestion - support the University of St. Thomas
I use that search box all the time. It's a handy way of finding things when you want to search only the posts and not the comments (a google search for a commonly used term would bring up many threads in which that term might not have been used in the top post).
For example, using John's search box at upper left, a search for "icesat" shows five posts. A google search for "icesat site:skepticalscience.com" shows about 15, mostly people mentioning it in the comments.
Of course sometimes you're looking for stuff in the comments, in which case google is the way to go.
Abraham reply to Monckton
Facebook page to support John Abraham
Monckton tries to censor John Abraham
Podcasts interviews and Monckton bashing
Oh yes, that search box. (Speaking about hiding in plain sight.) :D
But it's still a nice example of different researchers using different means and data sets, and all arriving at the same conclusion (i.e. "John Abraham's posts are real and do exist"), just like AGW.
Until John gets this straightened out, I guess Googling Abraham site:skepticalscience.com is the way to go.
DarkSkywise, I'd say this is a nice illustration of how different methods applied to the same data set (the database of posts) can give inconsistent results even when nobody is deliberately tampering with the data!
Great post at Eli Rabett's. Really worth a read. Thanks.