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Science Blogger Sued for Unfavorable Book Review

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Wed Aug 22, 2007 08:21 AM
from the hope-he-countersues-and-buys-a-nice-summer-home dept.
The Almighty Buck Science
tigerhawkvok writes "Recently, new author Stuart Privar provided Professor PZ Meyers of Pharyngula a copy of his book, Lifecode, for review. Over the course of the review itself and a few follow-ups, it became evident that the content was nonsense (including, among other things, ten-legged spiders and other phenomena strongly at odds with developmental biology). However, the common threat of lawsuits finally became a reality, and now Privar is suing Myers for $15 million. Can calling someone a 'classic crackpot' in the face of such incorrect data have any chance at making it to court, or even winning the suit?"
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Submission: Science Blogger Sued for Unfavorable Book Review by tigerhawkvok (1010669)
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  • When Wealthy Christians and Crackpots Attack! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by elrous0 (869638) * on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:23AM (#20317335)
    Contrary to this "this is the first time this has happened!" tone of this article, religious nutballs (as this Picar guy appears to be), frauds, and crackpots actually have a long history of suing when someone challenges them. The Church of Scientology has sued [wikipedia.org] many people. Uri Gellar sued [wikipedia.org] James Randi and others. Crackpots sue all the time (that part of what makes them crackpots). Some, like this Pivar guy apparently, have the financial resources to use their lawsuits to harass (like the aforementioned Scientologists). It's just a sad reality, here in the U.S. anyway (where we have no "loser pays" lawsuit system).

    • Re:When Wealthy Christians and Crackpots Attack! (Score:5, Informative)

      by pimpimpim (811140) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:31AM (#20317417)
      Not just in the US, in Netherlands [skepsis.nl] the society against quacks had to pay a considerable amount to a quack, by court order! And because of the 'loser pays' system, even had to pay for this quacks lawyer costs :( Face it: stupidity has settled itself in all social layers and is international, no way to run or hide from it anymore.

        • Re:When Wealthy Christians and Crackpots Attack! (Score:5, Insightful)

          by pimpimpim (811140) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @10:11AM (#20318573)
          Just click the link I put in the original post, they also have the text in Dutch. Somewhere half way they mention the lawsuit, they won for the lower court in 2005, and lost for the higher court in 2007. The whole lawsuit took about 7 years and 90.000 euro, since this all started when they made a list of 'biggest quacks of the century' in 2000. They lost because the higher court used the definition of a quack as someone who intentionally fools people with non-working remedies, and didn't thought the woman promoted her non-working remedies with the intent of doing so. Put otherwise, they probably assumed she was too stupid to know what she was doing. Personally, I don't think "intent" should be part of quakery, instead the guilt of quakery lies in the fact that you, knowingly or unknowingly, are a potential harm to people who are in real need for a remedy, and are not working within the rules that are laid out for medical treatment. Hospitals and medicine are institionalized for a reason!

          This court order defeats the centuries of learning by suffering that lead to the strict way medical treatment is organized.

        • Re:When Wealthy Christians and Crackpots Attack! (Score:5, Insightful)

          by pimpimpim (811140) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @10:21AM (#20318723)
          I think you are allowed to publish such statements, as you need to warn the general public about the scientific wrongdoing by this person. The person is publishing a book that is ment as a scientific-looking publication (that is why he searched a review from a university professor in the first place), and therefore has the responsibility to follow the scientific method. He did not do that, but used crackpot methods to write the book. Should the author have used crackpot methods for a book that was not _claiming_ to be a scientific book, it should also not been crackpottery but just nonsense. Noone will call a cartoon artist a crackpot just because in the cartoon the principles of physics are ignored. This case is different, though, as it was claiming itself to be scientific.

          Maybe the libel could have been avoided by not addressing the author as a crackpot, but instead calling the book a manifestation of crackpottery. Then it is not a personal attack, and should be safe from libel charges. This is just a form of newspeak, but if the laywers and courts agree with it, then so be it our new way to talk about crackpots.

        • The guy who wrote the review looks pretty guilty to me.
          That's because you're a crackpot too.

        • Re:When Wealthy Christians and Crackpots Attack! (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 22 2007, @10:27AM (#20318787)
          The 100% effective defense against a libel or slander suit is (1) The statements are true (2) it is clear you are stating your personal opinion.

          If the blogger made a firm accusation, i.e. the writer kills baby seals, and that turns out to be knowingly false, then if written, that's libel, if it is said publicly, it is slander.

          However, It is clear that the blogger is expressing his "opinion" about the man and his works. He is 100% protected in his capacity as someone reviewing a work to form an opinion and state it publicly either verbally or in written form.
        • i searched the review linked in the article and couldn't find the word "crackpot". i don't think it's libel at all. the only thing the reviewer does is completely trash this guy's "science" and calls it "nothing more than a bunch of pictures". after reading the review, it's obvious that this guy came up with some completely outrageous theories and threw them into a book and called it "science".
        • Thankfully, he has to prove that this review is knowingly false, written with intent to harm, and actually caused harm to prove libel. It will never happen. I read the review and NOWHERE does PZ Myers make ANY malicious claims about the author of Lifecode. He writes factual statements about the book only. He never called the author a crackpot. Even if he had, crackpot has an accepted definition that actually applies to this author.

          He is, in fact, a crackpot. Saying so is not false. From wikipedia:

          Pejoratively, the term Crackpot is used against a person, subjectively also called a crank, who writes or speaks in an authoritative fashion about a particular subject, often in science or mathematics, but is alleged to have false or even ludicrous beliefs
          If it can be shown that his beliefs are false, which is completely trivial to do, then the label of 'crackpot' applies and is not libel.

        • Vulgar Abuse (Score:5, Funny)

          by giafly (926567) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @10:36AM (#20318927)

          Just because someone publishes something that is wrong, doesn't mean you're allowed to publish statements that they're a crackpot. It's libel.
          ShieldW0lf, you're a fucking retard! Vulgar abuse is not defamatory [lawteacher.net]. Thus you can't win a libel suit against me for calling you a fucking retard and the plaintiff in this case probably shouldn't sue for being called a crackpot.

        • Re:When Wealthy Christians and Crackpots Attack! (Score:4, Informative)

          by nasor (690345) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @11:08AM (#20319283)
          You don't seem to appreciate the distinction between fact and opinion that's an integral part of U.S. libel laws. According to U.S. law, statement of pure opinion cannot be libelous. You can print something like "John is a scumbag" without fear of libel laws, because that is simply an expression of opinion. In order for libel to occur you need to print a statement of fact, like "John is a ciminal." Calling someone a crackpot isn't a statement of fact - it's a statement of opinion, just like calling someone a "scumbag" or "oaf".

        • In philosophy, a subject in which I have specialized, we use a greek word qua frequently. Put simply, this word means, generally, "in the capacity of." I think it is fairly obvious that the author of this book qua biologist is demonstrably a crackpot. He writes on a very intensively studied branch of science, and proposes a number of theories which are blantantly contrary to well established and observed fact, on no better grounds than an active imagination. This, I would argue, is the very definition of crackpottery. Most sensible people in the modern world would call a doctor who proposed leeching as a panacea to be a crackpot for much the same reason--it is contrary to well established medical fact and commonly available evidence.

          In any case, it seems quite clear to me that PZ is describing this man as being a crackpot qua developmental biologist, and not qua businessman or any other number of things he might be talented at. As such, I believe this accusation is absolutely true and utterly defensible by anybody with a rational understanding of modern science.

          P.S. I would have liked to moderate this rather than reply, but none of the options seemed to adequately represent my feelings about it...

    • Re:When Wealthy Christians and Crackpots Attack! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Goaway (82658) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:34AM (#20317451) Homepage
      Scientologists aren't crackpots, though. They're a very deliberate scam. The things they teach are a mixture of self-help material and crackpottery, but don't think for a second that the leaders actually believe in any of it.

    • Re:When Wealthy Christians and Crackpots Attack! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by faloi (738831) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:38AM (#20317489)
      Just a quick question... On what basis do you claim Pivar is a religious nutball? I've read most of the connected articles and it sounds like he's just a regular nutball, religion isn't mentioned anywhere that I've seen. Unless you're just inferring that because he's putting up something contrary to real evolutionary theory (which I would maintain makes him a regular nutball).

    • "First time" tone? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Selanit (192811) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:41AM (#20317519)

      The parent quoth:

      Contrary to this "this is the first time this has happened!" tone of this article,

      Huh?

      In the article I read, the author starts out like this:

      There comes a time in every debunker's life when they are threatened with a lawsuit. It's the bar mitzvah of skepticism.

      How is that a "first time this has happened" tone? Or maybe you were reading a different article?

    • I'm confused why you point out Christians in your subject. There is no indication that the author of the book is a Christian, or that its content is motivated by Christian principles. Nor do you mention Christians in your text, let alone wealthy Christians. I'm not denying that there aren't Christian nutballs, because there definitely are, but it is simply an off topic jab.

      Either way, I agree with everything else you said.
      • I was wondering the same thing. I'm actually getting rather tired of this particular knee-jerk. Yes, there are Christian crackpots in the world. No, not all crackpots are Christian nor are all Christians crackpots. Faith in a deity is tangential to the search for truth through the scientific method. Only where one allows the two to become entangled does crackpottery arise.

          • Re:When Wealthy Christians and Crackpots Attack! (Score:5, Informative)

            by Llywelyn (531070) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @10:09AM (#20318551) Homepage

            So someone who belives in god (aka invisible friend) isn't a crackpot, as long as they accept science is the best way to the truth about the universe?

            To quote Stephen Jay Gould [stephenjaygould.org]:

            To say it for all my colleagues and for the umpteenth million time (from college bull sessions to learned treatises): science simply cannot (by its legitimate methods) adjudicate the issue of God's possible superintendence of nature. We neither affirm nor deny it; we simply can't comment on it as scientists. If some of our crowd have made untoward statements claiming that Darwinism disproves God, then I will find Mrs. McInerney and have their knuckles rapped for it (as long as she can equally treat those members of our crowd who have argued that Darwinism must be God's method of action). Science can work only with naturalistic explanations; it can neither affirm nor deny other types of actors (like God) in other spheres (the moral realm, for example). Forget philosophy for a moment; the simple empirics of the past hundred years should suffice. Darwin himself was agnostic (having lost his religious beliefs upon the tragic death of his favorite daughter), but the great American botanist Asa Gray, who favored natural selection and wrote a book entitled Darwiniana, was a devout Christian. Move forward 50 years: Charles D. Walcott, discoverer of the Burgess Shale fossils, was a convinced Darwinian and an equally firm Christian, who believed that God had ordained natural selection to construct a history of life according to His plans and purposes. Move on another 50 years to the two greatest evolutionists of our generation: G. G. Simpson was a humanist agnostic. Theodosius Dobzhansky a believing Russian Orthodox. Either half my colleagues are enormously stupid, or else the science of Darwinism is fully compatible with conventional religious beliefs--and equally compatible with atheism, thus proving that the two great realms of nature's factuality and the source of human morality do not strongly overlap.
      • The very real danger to the book's reviewer is that he may be placed in the position of defending rationality before a jury comprised of people who find it perfectly reasonable to symbolically eat the flesh of a cosmic Jewish zombie and telepathically implore him to save them from the consequences of a snake-deceived rib-woman's consumption of magic fruit.

        Which is to say, in our rapidly medievalizing former republic, crazy nutbag plaintiffs are granted a decisive advantage.

  • I see dollar signs (Score:5, Funny)

    by Sierpinski (266120) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:24AM (#20317339)
    If someone can be sued for their opinions... man I'm going to make a TON of money from my mother-in-law!

  • new business plan (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:30AM (#20317397)
    Aha, I see the floodgates opening now:

    1). Write ridiculously inaccurate book
    2). Send it to a well-known, respected scientist for review
    3). Wait for the scathing reviews to come in
    4). Sue
    5). Profit!

    But, at the expense of respect. Hey, who needs respect when you have 15 million dollars?

  • Bestest. Review. EVAR. (Score:5, Funny)

    by plover (150551) * on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:32AM (#20317427) Homepage Journal
    I love this quote:

    The doodles in this book bear absolutely no relationship to anything that goes on in real organisms, but after staring at them for a while, I realized what this book is actually about.

    This book is a description of the development and evolution of balloon animals.

    It's that bad. This is a book suitable only for use at clown colleges, and even there, I suspect the clowns would tell us that it is impractical, nonsensical, and has no utility in their craft.

    • Mod parent up (Score:4, Informative)

      by Fozzyuw (950608) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:51AM (#20317637)

      Bestest. Review. EVAR.

      For no other reason than getting people to RTFR (RTF-review) because the 2 images alone will probably make whatever liquid substance you're drinking come shooting out your nose. Lets hope it's not scalding hot coffee. This is one link /. readers need to read. =)

      Cheers,
      Fozzy

      • The chilling effect (Score:4, Funny)

        by mcmonkey (96054) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @09:02AM (#20317787) Homepage

        For no other reason than getting people to RTFR (RTF-review) because the 2 images alone will probably make whatever liquid substance you're drinking come shooting out your nose. Lets hope it's not scalding hot coffee. This is one link /. readers need to read. =)

        And now people are afraid to write a bad review of the review!

    • Re:Bestest. Review. EVAR. (Score:5, Funny)

      by Andrewkov (140579) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @10:06AM (#20318521)
      It's that bad. This is a book suitable only for use at clown colleges

      I would prefer it if you not refer to Princeton in that manner.

  • He's done himself no favours (Score:5, Informative)

    by Silver Sloth (770927) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:32AM (#20317431)
    If you look at the Amazon rating he's a solid 1 star based entirely on a 'scientists don't sue over disagreements'

  • hmm. (Score:5, Informative)

    by apodyopsis (1048476) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:35AM (#20317459)
    many brilliant men have been called crackpots by their contemporaries but have ended up being exonerated by history.

    however, on examination of the links from the article, this man looks like a crackpot with a capital C.

    my fave quote from TFA: "To Mr Pivar, I would suggest a simple rule. Theories are supposed to explain observation and experiment. You don't come up with a theory first, and then invent the evidence to support it."

  • Real scientists don't sue (Score:5, Interesting)

    by pzs (857406) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:36AM (#20317475)

    This may not be true in all cases, but people who actually know what they're talking about don't usually need the law to back up what they say.

    The other case of this was "Dr" Gillian McKeith [guardian.co.uk] a "nutritionist" who sells a lot of books about how you should eat less chips and more salad. This is all very well, but of course it also includes a bunch of quakery about eating leaves so that their photosynthesis can oxegenate your gut. As the article I link points out, that wouldn't work too well unless you had a torch up your arse.

    Naturally, McKeith is mighty litigious at people who point out that she bought her doctorate from the web.

    Peter

    • This is all very well, but of course it also includes a bunch of quakery about eating leaves so that their photosynthesis can oxegenate your gut.
      It's "quackery". "Quakery" is something to do with porridge oats.

    • Re:Real scientists don't sue (Score:5, Funny)

      by Joe Random (777564) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @09:26AM (#20318101)

      As the article I link points out, that wouldn't work too well unless you had a torch up your arse.
      Gotta love the subtle differences between British and American English. If you put a torch up someone's ass here in the states, it's wouldn't be quite as . . . illuminating . . . an experience. Well, not unless you were one of the bystanders. You could even have some marshmallows ready to roast over the soon-to-be bonfire -- if you're able to deal with your bonfire running around, flailing and screaming, that is.

  • the power of the web... (Score:5, Informative)

    by apodyopsis (1048476) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:40AM (#20317511)
    Seems like word gets around, already the book reviews are flooding in....my word, he has really not done himself any favors here - I sense another internet laughing stock in the making.

    from: http://www.amazon.com/LifeCode-Theory-Biological-S elf-Organization/dp/0976406004 [amazon.com]

    I do not own this book. I do not propose to read it. My "rating" is based solely upon the fact that the author has chosen to sue a reviewer for "Injury - Assault, Libel, and Slander", because he didn't like the review. (Unlike the author, the reviewer is a professional biology professor who actually understands this subject.) No reputable scientist would react in this way - indeed the whole point of science is to prove things wrong! (As Richard Feynman wrote, "We are trying to prove ourselves wrong as quickly as possible, because only in that way can we find progress.") So caveat emptor...

    A 164 page book for $60?
    And from an author without any doctorate in the sciences he purports to write about? With a non-peer-reviewed 'theory'?
    Don't waste your money.

    The reviewer above wrote everything I intended to, but I just thought I would add my voice here. By sueing a critic of his theories, the author of this book threw away any claim he might have had to any kind of scientific credibility. A scientist might argue with his critics, but the fact that this author has instigated a lawsuit against someone for criticizing his theories suggests to me that even he is aware that said theories have no merits to argue.

  • Professor's mistake? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by aadvancedGIR (959466) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:45AM (#20317561)
    I really don't want to support Stuart Privar, but didn't Professor PZ Meyers made a mistake by accepting to review that book, apparently at the request of Stuart Privar or its publisher, without the security of a contract?

  • I feel a class action suit coming on... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Analogy Man (601298) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:46AM (#20317573)
    If a reviewer can be sued for an unfavorable review, can the poor suckers that go to the "Movie of the Year - five stars!" file a class action suit against the lame-o reviewer for their $7.50 + $1M in emotional anguish?

  • Won't get far (Score:4, Insightful)

    by faloi (738831) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @08:51AM (#20317647)
    As one article points out, the bar for libel is pretty high in the US, especially for public or semi-public figures. The author of the book has put themselves in the public view multiple times, for many different things. I'd expect it never makes it to court.

    • Re:Libel is about incorrect factual statments. (Score:4, Interesting)

      by pimpimpim (811140) on Wednesday August 22 2007, @10:02AM (#20318477)
      Just check out the link I posted somewhere earlier on in this thread: a similar case in the Netherlands worked out all wrong. The "society against quacks" called someone a quack who wrote a book with very dubious statements about human psychology (even going into nonsenical racial disciminations). This society lost their defence when being sued for libel because the higher court took the definition of a 'quack' as someone who *intentionally* promotes wrong ideas. The court probably assumed the author was just stupid and therefore not knowing about how wrong she was. She wrote the nonsense without intent of writing nonsense, this didn't make her a 'quack' and therefore calling her a 'quack' an incorrect factual statement: libel!

      This happened in 2007! A sad 0:1 in the competition of reason versus idiocracy, the defeats keep on coming :(

    • Re:Suing for fun and profit (Score:5, Informative)

      by plover (150551) * on Wednesday August 22 2007, @10:55AM (#20319135) Homepage Journal
      Unfortunately, in truer Slashdot form, the author of the article summary got it completely wrong. The actual review never referred to the author as a 'crackpot', classical or otherwise. He did not attack the author personally, but he shredded the contents of the book from cover to cover.

      That's not to say that any educated reader wouldn't draw his own conclusions and consider Pivar a crackpot after having read the tripe.

      Anyway, you should read the review. It's hilarious.

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