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19 comments:
"Clarifications About Current Research..."
I thank the Fitzcrow and the others who are part of the Fitz Pack Trick, for letting us know that, even though they were asking for donations to study and "preserve" a species that has not been seen in many decades, we can rest assured that their research and media techniques are credible.
Initial thoughts:
I notice that they didn't deny that Fitzpatrick had said their "perched ivorybill" was "likely a branch stub." As far as I know, it has never been denied. If it hasn't been denied, he almost certainly said it.
They apparently were very offended Jackson had said that the publication of Gallagher's book and the orginal Cornell paper were "arranged to coincide with the announcement." Yet they go on to say: "Release of The Grail Bird (Gallagher 2005) was delayed indefinitely, and the publishing house (Houghton Mifflin) forwent advance publicity, pending acceptance and publication of our paper." In other words, they waited so the book would come out immediately upon the publication of the paper. "Advance publicity" is nothing compared to the incredible "free advertising" from the "birding discovery of the century." Whether or not the money involved (speaking engagements, fund raising, Sparling bird tours, two or three books from the Team and family members etc.) affected the science is unclear, but "money changes everything."
Cornell says "It is reasonable to expect that if Luneau had videotaped an abnormally plumaged Pileated Woodpecker, we would have encountered it repeatedly as well, given the amount of attention paid to that area since March 2004."
I say: "It is reasonable to expect that if Luneau had videotaped an Ivory-bill, Cornell would have encountered it repeatedly as well, given the amount of attention paid to that area since March 2004."
To the best of my knowledge, Jackson and Sibley and most other experts believe the Luneau video shows a normal pileated, but that the abnormally plumaged Pileateds likely accounted for some or all the other "Ivory-bill sightings."
As far as Cornell's claim that Cornell and the Nature Conservancy have not profited from the IBWO "rediscovery," its not through lack of effort. Maybe they could be charged with "attempted profiteering." Actually, if the IBWO had actually been sighted, I believe it would have been legitimate for both organizations to use the rediscovery for fundraising. If.
Cornell says "Regarding the relative sizes of Ivory-billed and Pileated woodpeckers, which Jackson argues to be indistinguishable from a distance, all available data and numerous written descriptions by naturalists familiar with both species demonstrate that the difference is considerable. Jackson himself even noted the following in an earlier work, referring to side-by-side specimens of the two species (Jackson 2004:3): 'By itself the pileated was impressive; next to the ivory-bill it was puny.'
Right, and Cornell saw these two birds side by side, right? WRONG. If you don't have the birds side by side, Jackson's point is completely valid. They go on to say how size can be used to tell the raven from the crow. Sure, to a degree. But I know crows and ravens about as well as anyone, and still often confuse them at first glance, which is all Cornell was getting.
Cornell: "Jackson (p. 7) is incorrect in stating that funds allocated by federal agencies toward the Ivory-billed Woodpecker recovery effort represented 'a re-allocation of funds from other budgeted projects, including ongoing efforts on behalf of other endangered species (Dalton 2005), resulting in cutbacks to those projects.' "
I guess it depends on what your definition of "is" is.
They go on to say: "The above-named sources explained that unallocated funds available for preventing extinctions, species recovery, law enforcement, and migratory bird management within the USFWS FY 2005 budget-and not earmarked for other species -were allocated to initiate Ivory-billed Woodpecker recovery efforts."
So there were no new funds. The IBWO "recovery" DID take funds from other conservation projects, including projects for the preventing extinctions of known threatened species. That's the point, isn't it?
The bottom line is that Jackson was saying, in effect, "you spoke too soon." He published his letter months ago, realizing Cornell would almost certainly fail to document an IBWO because there were no IBWOs in Arkansas to document.
Jackson was right.
”Although stated authoritatively, this does not constitute scientific evidence and is supported by virtually no data….”
Fitzpatrick et al. make the above statement in reference to Jackson’s claim that he has observed double raps in other woodpecker species and follow that with a comment that Jackson’s observation is “supported by virtually no data from the woodpecker literature”. They provide this criticism of Jackson without a trace of irony or self-awareness that their own multi-million dollar research and conservation effort was based on observers who could state something with authority while producing virtually no data and that their “rediscovery” was supported by virtually no data from the woodpecker literature.
While some can excuse this group earlier excess; attributing it to the excitement of the “rediscovery”. Fitz et al. now need to show that their level of self-delusion is not so high that they are unable a conduct a reassessment in the cold light provided by the last two field seasons. We are still waiting for signs that they possess that level of maturity
Interesting that this has gotten no media coverage. I think that tells you who has been playing the media like a violin, and who has been doing science and trying to gather data.
It's time for the CLO people to resign en masse. This article is a disingenuous attempt to put the mud on Professor Jackson's back.
The CLO Spin Doctors reign supreme.
He didn't screw up, you did.
This was agnoy for the Carpentario to read ... the carpenterio feels like a mounring warbler that has just bounced off a plate glass window. Stunned and amazed.
This cloud of squid ink excreted ny the Ancient Ornithologist et. al. it is too much to bear.
The headliner here is "peer review" which was by all parties admission, "rushed", but in no way comprimised. And the audacity, to claim that their peer review was real while Jackson's piece "which was itself not peer reviewed" is beyond the pale.
The Carpinterio said it before, he'll say it again, Dear Dr. Fitzcrow et al, Jackson's article WAS your peer review. Jackson is "peer" ... get it.
At this junture it is time for Jack Hitt to put down all his Eudora Welty novels and write the story of how a powerful group of ornithologists hookwinked the editor at Science into skipping peer review.
Fitzcrow isn't taking calls, Don Kennedy at Science stopped taking calls a while ago ... dear press ... run the story.
And don't get me started about 33.3 - the bird isn't perched on the side of a tree, Fitzcrow doesn't have a "wrist to wingtip measurement" and the whooie about the flap rate is just flap.
Someone explain how that got "peer reviewed?"
Makes me feel all kind of double knockie inside.
Mas Tardes Skepticos.
The Carpinterio
The beauty of this is that the rebuttal comes out just as this year's search comes to naught.
Fitzcrow et al are looking really really bad now.
The thing that really gets me is LSU. Maybe it's just Remsen in silly land, but Fitz is taking down everybody's reputation.
Well, that it. There will not be any more buttals, rebuttals, clarifications, or such. The journals are finished with such nonsense untill Elvis comes back fom the dead for real.
This is the stage where Cold Fusion researchers were waking up to the fact that they would have to go to France to continue their "work".
So if you think about it, CLO staff should swap places with LSU. That would be their "France". LSU staff could take over the CLO and get it back to science. All except Remsen, of course, he'll have to stay behind and do penance.
Yes, French speaking southern Louisiana. That's just the place for the CLO "to get it's groove back".
F.B.I. Finds No Trace of Hoffa and Calls Off Search
What?! Call off the search after only two weeks. Giving into the Hoffa skeptics that quickly? What about the people who have dreamt about finding Hoffa ever since they were in grade school? Their dreams are now dashed by cynical skeptics who somehow thought the FBI might want to use limited funds to fight recent crime rather than dig up a 30-year-old body.
Didn’t the Explorer’s Club already give a President’s Award to the person who provided the tip about where to dig? Now will he have to give the award back? Thank God the people over in Mafiaforum will keep the dream alive. Someone who is posting there has been digging holes in abandoned farms in Illinois and Indiana. He has photos of one gangster he dug up that looks something like Hoffa – though it also looks like most other larger vertebrates would look after 30 years underground.
Just because Hoffa wasn’t at this one farm in Michigan doesn’t mean he isn’t someplace. So far the search has covered <<0.001 percent of the Midwest. Don’t give up Hoffa believers! This is the biggest crime story of the century!!
,,,Yeah,,,but Lord Lucan is STILL missing. :)
Anon wrote:
Interesting that this has gotten no media coverage. I think that tells you who has been playing the media like a violin, and who has been doing science and trying to gather data.
__________________
Now now now CLO lover....don't you think that it is possible that CLO didn't deliver their 6.02 X 10 ee23 press releases on this?
Who, exactly, on the Skeptico side has a freakin Press Office and a Press Officer in charge of IBWO information????? Whooooooooo! We are a rag-tag bunch of rebels not sitting in our ivory towers counting the dough we fleeced from showing people movies about the Grail Bird.
Wait, maybe I'm wrong, maybe we are a bunch of liberal scientists who control the liberal press - yeah, thats it.
The reality, any press that read this piece of schlock, comming on the heals of a big-fat-zero of a second season said the same thing....If the bird is there, why can't they find it? And why does every other paragraph start with "Jackson is wrong"?
Please leave the violins out of this, them and the other stringed instuments have nothing to do with this.
Oh yeah, by the way,
Knock Knock
Who's there?
Nothing.
The full time IBWO press officer is a very nice person. She is either a true believer or a great liar.
To accuse Jackson of playing the media is ridiculous. What else could he do, he was overwhelmed by the IBWO and Cornell and FWS and TNC and Audubon publicity and second tier publicity machines.
He was all alone, even Sibley and Prum were afraid to speak up after the August Bird Meeting in California.
Jackson should get the Profile in Courage.
Anon wrote:
Interesting that this has gotten no media coverage. I think that tells you who has been playing the media like a violin, and who has been doing science and trying to gather data.
________________________________
Well we know, and every poor soul who was exposed to the media in the last year knows, who has been playing the media like a violin? How could the media turn away from "the conservation story of the century"?
Is the poster implying that someone other than CLO/TNC has been conducting the media orchestra? That orchestration is the exact reason this lame "commentary" has gotten no press whatsoever.
As to who has been doing science and gathering data, I would suggest the 100's of serious researchers and conservationists trying to get by on limited funds working with species that actually exist. They would get my vote in that category. Who did the poster have in mind?
I am going to go through one paragraph at a time.....
Dr. Fitzcrow wrote:
Despite being neither peer- reviewed nor fact-checked by the Editor, that article was treated as a scientific contribution by the public media, a perception actively fostered by its author in public appearances and interviews.
____________________________
Just for the record, Dr. Fitzcrow et al., you have citations for at least 3 non peer reviewed pieces in this, you rebuttal to Jackson's aforementioned un-peer-reviewed piece. Oddly, several times you reference the ever-so-curious .....
LAMMERTINK, M., K. V. ROSENBERG, J. W. FITZPATRICK, M. D. LUNEAU, JR., T. W. GALLAGHER, AND M. DANTZKER. 2006. Detailed analysis of the video of a large woodpecker (the "Luneau video") obtained at Cache River National Wildlife Refuge, Arkansas, on 25 April 2004. [Online.] Available at www.birds.cornell.edu/ivory/rediscovery/ support/ intro.
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just for the record, while your page formatting and cool title effects may make it look that way, this is NOT A REAL PAPER! Don't you think you too are guilty of "actively fostering" the idea that this is a "scientific contribution" when really it is a sow's ear?
This is a piece of un-reviewed tripe which couldn't get into a journal unless you owned the editors. You JUST TRIED TO MAKE IT LOOK LIKE ONE!
Using this to shore up your case against Jackson is very lame, almost as lame as paying to have someone make a movie about you!
So your wife says... "I know you're cheating, - you must be sleeping with Sue." And you say, "That's utterly untrue", knowing full well that you're sleeping with Sally, not Sue. Should your wife's claim be dismissed due to factual errors? This is what Jackson's up against. Faced with a process built on secrecy and non-disclosure agreements, he's faulted for inaccuracy in reconstructing the chronology and the methodology of a process that has been intentionally concealed.
Fitz et al's "gottcha moments" are mostly semantic games that do nothing to address the central fact that their colleagues, Jackson and others, have found their evidence to be utterly unconvincing and questionably useful for setting policy.
There are a lot of gem's in this piece. I particularly like the one where they demonstrate that no funds have been re-allocated from the protection of other species by getting verbal assurances in personal communications with various agency spokespersons. Since when do you rely on a "spokesperson" for the facts on controversial matters?
Much of the USFWS funding involved is a zero-sum game. There have to be losers for IBWO to be a winner. This is why they make an issue of "unallocated" funds. Are we to believe there were no other worthy programs - and this money was about to go unspent? Or maybe they can say no funds were "re-allocated" because some changes came between fiscals years, not within fiscal years. Maybe this is a "shift in allocation priorities" not "re-allocation". Right, I get it.
I have it on good authority that Team Elvis is feeling as righteous as ever. Do not mistake the relative silence of the Elders for conceding anything. Jerome Jackson actually did them a favor by setting himself up for a counterattack. This has allowed them to deflect attention away from their ultimate mistake. It's only halftime, people. They have the lead and they have the ball whenever they decide to come out and play again.
I continue with paragraph 2
________________________
Errors of fact.-Jackson is incorrect in suggesting (p. 2) that the timing of our original publication (Fitzpatrick et al. 2005) and book (Gallagher 2005) was "arranged to coincide with the announcement." All members of the Big Woods Conservation Partnership had agreed for more than a year that no public announcement would occur in the absence of a peer-reviewed article accepted by a respected scientific journal, in which our evidence and interpretations would be available for technical and public scrutiny. Release of The Grail Bird (Gallagher 2005) was delayed indefinitely, and the publishing house (Houghton Mifflin) forwent advance publicity, pending acceptance and publication of our paper. Contrary to Jackson's account, announcement of the rediscovery and release of the book took a back seat to the scientific process and the timing thereof.
____________________________
In this paragraph doesn't the good Dr. Fitzcrow admit that the book was delayed to coincide with the announcement? It seems he does. How then is this an error of fact? Those books were printed and sitting a warehouse someplace long before the announcement. Yes, methinks Jackson wins on paragraph two.
What, in the Lord God's Name does the last sentence even mean! That they were "doing science" and that that is what delayed the book? That they were "doing science" and that is what delayed the announcement? Too bad they didn't do just a little more science and step outside their incestuous "Team" before they finished "doing science" and had their "announcement".
Oh, as to their smugness....the snickering behind their backs at the AOU meeting in Mexico will be audible all over the hemisphere - it already is. Their smugness is their own trap.
Obviously, snickering among their professional peers does not phase this bunch. Nothing is penetrating into their senses. They probably won't even be in Veracruz to hear the murmuring- they'll be gearing up for the next season of IBWO patrols. Meanwhile, they are brazenly advertizing their demolision of Jackson's commentary. Some sort of more serious censure is going to be necessary.
To continue where previous anonymous posters left off, paragraph 4 of team Elvis’s letter states that “Our article was fully peer-reviewed following standard editorial procedures…and received official acceptance plus editorial and referee comments on 26 April.” That’s an error of fact: the published date of acceptance for all to read is 27 April. Why is this important? Because they are trying to claim the rapid path to publication didn’t compromise the process. But it did. It is most irregular for a paper to be given official acceptance at the same time as editorial and referee comments. Moreover, because of the leak they mentioned starting on the 25th of April, the timing was becoming more urgent. Repeating their error, team Elvis go on to state that “On the afternoon of 26 April—after the paper had been accepted following normal procedures—the editorial staff at Science graciously agreed to expedite the article’s publication…” That’s not normal procedure, and, again, the paper was accepted 27 April not on the 26th; it was published 28 April. The main point made by Jackson, not the one targeted by this mob, was correct.
And before we move on to other errors, I don’t see anyone mentioning a further problem back in paragraph 2 about delaying the book publication. Because Gallagher had a book deal being withheld until publication of the scientific paper, he had a conflict of interest, a vested interest, that went undeclared in the published paper in Science. This is a serious breach of ethics.
Paragraph 6: What about the estimated 7s and 10s sightings proving Jackson wrong once again? To me, these fall into team Elvis’s own category of “although stated authoritatively, this does not constitute scientific evidence.” These are surely over-estimates. Jim Fitzpatrick, claimant of the 10s sighting, apparently only raised his binoculars at the 7-8s mark (by inference from his description). If you see something interesting, like a possible Ivory-bill, try to standing your ground that long without raising your binoculars. Ridiculous. His observation was probably equally as brief as the video, which was the main point made by Jackson. It hardly seems worth debating the 4s video versus the 7s sighting, the first verifiably recorded, the second merely a human estimate made in retrospect (not verifiable).
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