date: Mon, 29 Sep 2003 09:29:00 +0100
from: "Mark New" <mark.new@geography.oxford.ac.uk>
subject: RE: letter to PiPG
to: "'Mike Hulme'" <m.hulme@uea.ac.uk>

   Mike,



   Thanks.  I wrote to the Editor some time ago, saying...



   Mark



   -------------------

   I was alarmed to see the 'Global Warming' review by W. Soon and S. Baliunas in the latest
   issue of Progress in Physical Geography (PiPG).  You may be aware that these authors have
   been the subject of heated debate in the climate science community, and in the public media
   (for example, Appell 2003).  The recent publication of an article in Climate Research (Soon
   and Baliunas 2003) where the authors claimed that 20^th century warming is not the largest
   climate anomaly in the last ~1200 years prompted (i) the resignation of several editors
   from Climate Research because they felt the publication of the article had violated the
   peer-review process, and (ii) a strong condemnation by leading scientists in EOS (Mann et
   al. 2003) who were concerned that the flawed conclusions in Soon and Baliunas (2003) had
   entered the public record in the US Senate as peer-reviewed science.


   There is ample scope for criticism of the extent to which of Soon and Baliunas's review
   accurately and fairly 'documents the quality' of General Circulation Models (GCMs) in PiPG,
   and the article may well stimulate comments from experts in the field.  However, I am more
   concerned about the wider implications of appointing scientists who have consistently
   received criticism for the methodology and conclusions of their peer-reviewed work (see for
   example, Risbey 2002; Karoly et al. 2003; Mann et al. 2003) to publish review articles that
   are not subject to peer review.  PiPG has a wide audience, most of whom are not specialists
   in climate science, and therefore unable to make critical judgements about the accuracy of
   a review such as this.  Moreover, many of your readers are likely unaware that subject
   updates/reviews in PiPG are not subject to peer-review.  Similarly, such articles can
   easily be portrayed to the uninformed as being a publication in a "peer-reviewed journal",
   which is substantially different to the article itself being peer-reviewed.


   Without prior knowledge of where Soon and Baliunas sit on the Global Warming issue, their
   PiPG review has the potential to seriously mislead a reader about the current capabilities
   and limitations of GCMs: their 'review' is a catalogue of real and perceived limitations in
   GCMs rather than a balanced review of achievements as well as problems in GCM modelling.


   I have no objection to minority and non-consensus views being published: healthy debate is
   to be encouraged and forces those involved to think more critically about their science.
   However, reviews should be balanced and reflect the full range of opinions, and Soon and
   Baliunas's article does not satisfy these requirements.


   For future reviews (and this may be appropriate for all subjects), I would suggest that at
   the very least you include a note from the editor stating that (i) the article is not
   peer-reviewed, and (ii) the article reflects the opinions of the authors rather than
   consensus in the discipline.  A more rigorous approach would be to subject these articles
   to the normal peer-review process.


   Sincerely,


    Dr Mark New

   Climatology Research Group

   School of Geography and the Environment

   University of Oxford


   References


   Appell, D. (2003). "Hot words - A claim of nonhuman-induced global warming sparks debate."
   Scientific American 289(2): 20-22.

   Karoly, D., et al. (2003). "Comment on Soon et al. (2001) 'Modeling climatic effects of
   anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions: unknowns and uncertainties'." Climate Research 24:
   91-92.

   Mann, M., et al. (2003). "On past temperatures and late-20th century warmth." EOS 84(27):
   256-258.

   Risbey, J. (2002). "Comment on Soon et al. (2001) 'Modeling climatic effects of
   anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions: unknowns and uncertainties'." Climate Research
   22(2): 185-186.

   Soon, W. and S. Baliunas (2003). "Proxy climatic and environmental changes of the past 1000
   years." Climate Research 23(2): 89-110.

   -----Original Message-----
   From: Mike Hulme [mailto:m.hulme@uea.ac.uk]
   Sent: Friday, September 26, 2003 6:13 PM
   To: p.jones@uea.ac.uk; mark.new@geog.ox.ac.uk
   Subject: letter to PiPG

     Phil, Mark,
     For your interest, this is the letter I am sending to PiPG on Monday.  Phil - which
     issue of EOS was Mike Mann's article in?
     Thanks,
     Mike
     ____________________________________________
     29 September 2003
     Professor B.W.Atkinson
     Department of ???????????
     Queen Mary College
     University of London
     London ????????????????
     Dear Bruce,
     I am writing to resign from my position as Editorial Adviser for the journal Progress in
     Physical Geography.  I do this reluctantly since I believe the journal continues to
     fulfil a useful and important niche in the geographical sciences  I remember my relying
     heavily upon the journal as an undergraduate geographer more than 20 years ago.
     I reached this decision after seeing the September 2003 issue of the journal in which I
     noticed that Willie Soon and Sallie Baliunas have been asked to provide the annual
     progress reports for "global warming" for the journal  and after reading their first
     contribution.
     This choice of authorship truly baffles me.  Both authors are in a department of
     astrophysics.  Neither author is a geographer or climatologist by training.  Neither
     author has published extensively in the field of human-induced climate change.  And one
     of the relatively few scientific peer-reviewed articles they have published in the field
     of climate change - Soon, W., and S.Baliunas, "Proxy climatic and environmental changes
     of the past 1000 years", Climate Research, 23, 89-110, 2003  seriously questions their
     credentials to provide accurate and authoritative reviews in the area of "global
     warming" (see article published a few weeks ago in the AGU weekly EOS: "On past
     temperatures and anomalous late-20th century warmth" by Mann,M.E., Ammann,C.M.,
     Bradley,R.S., Briffa,K.R., Crowley,T.J., Jones,P.D., Oppenheimer,M., Osborn,T.J.,
     Overpeck,J.T., Rutherford,S., Trenberth,K.E., Wigley,T.M.L.; and also the editorial from
     the publisher in the journal Climate Research by Otto Kinne "Climate Research: an
     article unleashed worldwide storms",  vol. 24:197-198; I attach copies of these articles
     for your interest).
     You will gather that I strongly disagree with your choice of author(s) for this annual
     review.  Given that my views as an Editorial Adviser to the journal  presumably invited
     into that capacity to cover the general area of climate change, although maybe I presume
     too much  were not even sought, let alone listened to, I utterly fail to see the point
     of my continuing in this role or my name being associated with the journal.  I would of
     course be interested to hear of your selection criteria and of your process that led to
     these two authors being invited to provide the "global warming" review for the journal.
     Might I ask that you copy my letter to the member of Arnold publishing staff who is
     responsible for PiPG.
     Yours sincerely,
     Professor Mike Hulme
