Here is a long review of two translations from the Latin of works by John Wyclif. (This is located at Academia.edu, which may be behind a paywall.) One is from the elite Cambridge University Press. According to the reviewer (Mark Thakker), each translation is shot through with errors. On pp. 361-2, he writes of one of them, “There are numerous typos, inaccurate dates, and faulty references, and the index, which was prepared by a professional, is poorly conceived and astonishingly incomplete.” Lengthy footnotes detail each of the problems he lists (such as spelling “Ronald” for “Roland”). And these are the trivial problems. The real problems come with the translations from the Latin.
Anyway, Thakker writes on p. 380, “The publication of work of such conspicuous incompetence is a poor advertisement for the peer-review process.” Although both works had anonymous reviewers, Thakker notes on 381, “And yet it should be obvious by now that neither volume was given even a cursory vetting by anybody who was up to the task.” (How is it that I never had such kind referees?) Thakker then goes on to complain about other reviewers who have published reviews praising these works. He names names.
Anyway, the weakness of peer review has been my big point about global warming. We are supposed to accept it because the science has been peer reviewed, but peer review varies widely, and I have no idea what quality of peer review was involved in articles dealing with global warming. If the equivalent of the authors’ brothers-in-law were doing the reviewing, why should we accept the results? Plus, I would like to see the articles that were against global warming that were rejected to see why they were rejected.
Instead of relying on peer review, we need a stronger process for such important matters as climate change. “Peer review,” in which one or two anonymous reviewers act as gatekeepers, is not good enough. We need a larger community doing the reviewing, one that includes skeptics as well as the true believers.
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