Climate snails study shows peer review continues to function as expected
Something is amiss in scientific peer review, claimed The Times this weekend. And not for the first time. This is the latest in a series of articles suggesting research downplaying the seriousness of climate change impacts is being suppressed by top scientific journals.
Last time, scientists dismissed the Times’ story as a case of peer review in action. It’s difficult to see what the difference is this time.
“False alarm”
Seven years ago, a conservation scientist in the Seychelles published a paper in one of the Royal Society’s journals, Biological Letters. It concluded the only known population of a type of snail was now thought to be extinct, after declining rapidly in the late 20th century.
In Saturday’s Times article, journalist Ben Webster said:
“[The research] was presented as shocking evidence of the damage being done by climate change: a species driven to extinction because of a decline in rainfall in its only habitat.”
Image - Ben Webster _snails (note)
In its recent report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned the fast pace of climate change could have consequences for many species. It concluded:
“A large fraction of both terrestrial and freshwater species faces increased extinction risk under projected climate change during and beyond the 21st century.”
But luckily for the snail in question, seven members of its species have apparently been rediscovered on a remote island.
The Times suggests this “prompts questions” over the Royal Society “raising false alarm” about climate change – despite the research in question being in a Royal Society journal, rather than a statement or prediction from the Society itself.
So have some plucky snails disproved climate alarmism and left a prestigious learned society embarrassed?
We contacted Justin Gerlach, author of the original paper. He acknowledged the new discovery but suggested the Times’ headline – “Snail ‘wiped out by climate change’ is alive and well” – may be overplaying the snails’ fortunes:
“I would dispute the headline’s ‘alive and well’ – alive yes, but just seven individuals when there used to be thousands is hardly ‘well’.”
“Refused to publish”
More seriously, the Times claims The Royal Society “refused to publish” an article criticising the research by Oxford University scientist Clive Hambler.
However, what the newspaper also makes clear is that Hambler’s rejoinder was “rejected following full peer review”.
This is a normal part of scientific publishing, where at least two independent reviewers – and sometimes four or five – provide comments on the quality and newness of the research, and recommend to the editor whether it can be published or needs to be revised.
The Times also hints at murky dealings, because the scientists who reviewed and rejected Hambler’s rebuttal paper “were the same referees who had approved Mr Gerlach’s paper for publication”.
But in a field as niche as climate change impacts on Seychelles land snails, this doesn’t seem that surprising. It’s reasonable to assume there are only a handful of scientists with the expertise to review such new research. In the case of a rebuttal to already published research, it might also make sense for those who reviewed the original paper to evaluate the merits of any criticisms levelled at it.
“Utterly, utterly normal”
Getting a paper rejected is not uncommon, as lots of scientists told us the last time the Times made a similar argument about research being “deliberately suppressed”.
One researcher told us it’s utterly, utterly normal” to have a paper rejected. Another described it as “nothing unusual” in a scientist’s career.
And journals aren’t averse to publishing research that challenges mainstream thinking. Quite the opposite, said Dr Bethan Davies from the University of Reading:
“[I]f a paper was methodologically sound with novel results, it would be published even if it did challenge the status quo â?¦ But only if the paper is robust. If the findings are overblown or over interpreted â?¦ these would all be standard reasons for rejection.”
Hambler doesn’t agree. He says he thinks the Times article was “a very carefully researched, accurate article, which has exposed some shocking problems in the process of ‘peer review'”.
A Royal Society spokesperson told us this morning Hambler had been invited to submit a new critique of the snails paper – but has so far declined.