[zenhack]

Can't speak for the OP, but for myself: I am not qualified to evaluate the evidence in this case; I just don't have the biology background. But sometimes when you get some out-there questionable sounding stuff research, and you spend a minute googling, you quickly find out that the journal the thing is published in is chaired by the author and itself has no credibility, the author is selling some form of snake oil directly supported by the dubious claims, and similar. Sure technically their argument ought to stand on it's own anyway, but there are so many quacks out there and so little time. It's a useful optimization.

[thinker912345]

> I am not qualified to evaluate the evidence in this case; I just don't have the biology background.

A "background check" does not change this fact, nor does your point actually negate the comment you are responding too. No one here is arguing that you must listen and believe everything that someone has written in a paper, but things must be proven and disproven.

"Background checking" in any form is not science. It might help you make a decision. But that does not make the decision a scientific one even if you consider it "an informed" decision.

To be completely honest, it has become silly that things like this need to be said and reirerated so often on HN.

[catears]

Most things that climate change deniers post are factually accurate. If you would target the basis of their claim with the data they provide, you will always lose. Being a climate change denier when you only have access to facts that don't support climate change is only logical.

To disprove them requires you to have even greater subject matter knowledge than they do, which is unfeasible for most normal people. Even at a top university you would need several years to become a subject matter expert. Clearly not a feasible strategy for every commenter on HN.

So what can we do? Most "Climate Skeptics Science", while not being factually disproven, can lose a great amount of credibility by background checking things like authors, what scientific conferences or journal a paper has been submitted to, if it is peer reviewed, etc. In fact, with enough loss of credibility it becomes the burden of the author to prove that they/their paper is credible (see what I did there?).

If there was a clear bias in the authors' background, this would call into question the credibility of the paper. Humans are well-equipped to understand bias without a university degree, less so with bioengineering.

To summarize: HN commenters are generally ill-equipped to prove/disprove arguments in a scientific paper. Like in most sciences this isn't always necessary since you can put the credibility of the authors up for test. If they fail that test, they must prove their credibility before their scientific argument carries any weight. Most HN-commenters are adept at judging other peoples biases.

[Natsu]

The problem is that this... methodology... works for both true & false claims. Pure credentialism held up Lysenkoism, among other things, for quite some time, after all. I mean, I read this:0

> If there was a clear bias in the authors' background, this would call into question the credibility of the paper.

And I can't help thinking how there would always be a "clear bias" of people who weren't strongly in support of the Party against Lysenkoism, so it just puts people into a stronger bubble, it doesn't defend any truth.

I think that those not capable of defending a position scientifically shouldn't attempt to do so and should leave it to those who can. I think this because I see these failed attempts as a way of weakening the point they're attempting to support.

> To summarize: HN commenters are generally ill-equipped to prove/disprove arguments in a scientific paper.

I disagree strongly with this, we have a lot of good scientists here who are better equipped than the vast majority of sites. Maybe not everything can be written into a single post, sure, but most of the people here have blogs or what have you and it's not uncommon to see someone post a rebuttal on their blog and for that to make the front page of HN.

[catears]

I think I understand your argument, but I think you misunderstood me. I agree that just looking at credentials isn't the way to go. It does create these echo chambers where only those wearing "my colors" can be correct (when perhaps people need to see and hear those without "their colors"). But my argument was never to resort to pure credentialism. Looking at someones background is an important tool in our toolbox for finding the truth. My argument wasn't that a background check should replace scientific debate.

> I think that those not capable of defending a position scientifically shouldn't attempt to do so and should leave it to those who can.

Exactly! And to the 95+% of people who commented or clicked the opening link who do not have a background in bioengineering, how could they take a critical and informed stance to what the paper claims? The claim of the pandemic being man-made affects them, wheter they can fully understand the scientific discussion or not! I never meant to say that there is no-one on HN that cannot have the scientific discussion. I meant to say that most people simply have other skills than bioengineering in their toolbox, but they do have the ability to judge someones character if they find background information about them.

Maybe I should have put more emphasis on "generally" when I wrote it, but I hope I have clarified my point here and that you see it is very much in line with your thinking.

[Natsu]

That's better, I just find that when things get political, it's best to focus on facts. People can have completely opposite views about a particular party's credentials. Here, for example, someone might reject authors that are Chinese because "of course" they'd defend the CCP vs. other people who think just the opposite.

I feel that pure facts helps take away the "heat" of an argument. Things that shouldn't be even remotely political--like wearing masks--have turned into political footballs and adding more "heat" to the issue only hardens people to bad positions that hurt everyone.

[philwelch]

As a non-expert, if someone says something unusual that would require expertise in the field to say with credibility, I have every right to verify their expertise. Or to at least verify whether or not they have a history of things like “being convicted of fraud” or “being barred from practicing medicine due to publishing fraudulent papers in the Lancet”.

[chris_wot]

The reliability of those who write papers is fairly important. How do I know that data hasn’t been falsified? How do I know what is correct?

There are reasons why some publications are treated more seriously than others. Reputation is very helpful for the layman. The very fact that most scientists have said they feel it was a natural outbreak speaks volumes to me. This paper is just a vast chain of speculation, and I think it needs to be treated with a great deal of caution.

[aaron695]

Do you think pagerank works?

Do you think it's unscientific?

Should we look at websites in random order after a search?

Don't confuse the fact h-index has significant issues with the idea it is useless.

[matwood]

A background check does help though. If a paper written by or on an anti-vaxx site for example, I have some idea what I’m dealing with right away. It makes me less likely to be charitable on any questionable claims.

Also, swamping people with already settled arguments that they have to continue to prove or disprove is a disinformation tactic. A background check helps avoid giving those situations any air.

[DanBC]

How do you make sure this doesn't lull you into a false sense of trust?

Here's a discussion about a paper by respected scientists working in a respected organisation. The paper is probably bad science. https://twitter.com/DiseaseEcology/status/128386841036377702...

[matwood]

I said it makes me less likely to be charitable. I try and read every paper with a skeptical mind.