Tag Archives: libel

Scientific spat and libel case in UK has Canadian connection

17 Replies

Neil Turok, Director of the Perimeter Institute of Theoretical Physics located in Waterloo, Canada, has been described as being insufficiently qualified to assess a fellow scientist’s work. Alok Jha, science correspondent for the UK’s Guardian newspaper, writes about the situation which includes a libel suit against Nature magazine in his Nov. 18, 2011 article,

A scientist who is suing one of the world’s most prominent scientific journals for libel compared himself to Albert Einstein in the high court on Friday [Nov. 18, 2011] as part of his evidence against the journal. Professor Mohamed El Naschie, also claimed that an eminent physicist brought in by the journal as an expert witness to analyse the value of his work was not sufficiently qualified to do so.

El Naschie is suing Nature as a result of a news article published in 2008, after the scientist’s retirement as editor-in-chief of the journal Chaos, Solitons and Fractals. The article alleged that El Naschie had self-published several research papers, some of which did not seem to have been peer reviewed to an expected standard and also said that El Naschie claimed affiliations and honorary professorships with international institutions that could not be confirmed by Nature. El Naschie claims the allegations in the article were false and had damaged his reputation.

On Friday, Nature called Professor Neil Turok, a cosmologist and director of the Perimeter Institute in Canada, as an expert witness to assess some of the work published by El Naschie.

…

In his evidence, Turok said he found it difficult to understand the logic in some of El Naschie’s papers. The clear presentation of scientific ideas was an important step in getting an idea accepted, he said. “There are two questions – one is whether the work is clearly presented and readers would be able to understand it. It would be difficult for a trained theoretical physicist to understand [some of El Naschie’s papers]. …  The second question is about the correctness of the theory and that will be decided by whether it agrees with experiments. Most theories in theoretical physics are speculative – we form a logical set of rules and deductions and we try, ultimately, to test the deductions in experiments.

There’s more at stake here than whether or not Turok is qualified or El Naschie’s work is up to the standards in his field, this is also about libel and libel laws in England. There have been some intended consequences from the current set of laws. Here’s an excerpt from the Wikipedia essay,

Libel tourism is a term first coined by Geoffrey Robertson to describe forum shopping for libel suits. It particularly refers to the practice of pursuing a case in England and Wales, in preference to other jurisdictions, such as the United States, which provide more extensive defences for those accused of making derogatory statements. According to the English publishing house Sweet & Maxwell, the number of libel cases brought by people alleged to be involved with terrorism almost tripled in England between 2006 and 2007.

Jha goes on to finish his first article on El Naschie’s libel case with this,

Sile Lane, a spokesperson for the Libel Reform campaign said: “Scientists expect publications like Nature to investigate and write about controversies within the scientific community. The threat of libel action is preventing scientific journals from discussing what is good and bad science. This case is another example of why we need libel law that has a clear strong public interest defence and a high threshold for bringing a case. The government has promised to reform the libel laws and this can’t come soon enough.”

I last wrote about the libel situation in the UK in my Nov. 12, 2010 posting, International call to action on libel laws in the UK.

International call to action on libel laws in the UK

1 Reply

I commented a while back (Sept. 21, 2009 posting) about UK and its libel laws in the context of Simon Singh, a physicist who criticized claims made by the British Chiropractic Society, and his subsequent legal travails. According to GrrlScientist’s Nov. 10,2010 posting, the British government is promising to revise libel laws. A campaign has sprung up to revise the laws in a fashion that is more equitable has requested that bloggers from all countries sign a petition. From GrrlScientist’s post,

English libel law is especially dangerous for blog writers, most of whom are independent and lack the support of publishers. Any blog writer, including independent “wildcat bloggers” can still be sued in London regardless of where they live and work, and regardless of where their blog essay was published. [emphasis mine] Yes, I am looking right at you, my fellow Americans, since this law is used as a weapon in the United States against American citizens who dare to exercise their constitutional right to free speech in their own country!

The freedom to criticise and question dolts and idiots, using strong terms and without malice, is the cornerstone of argument and debate, whether in scholarly journals, on websites, in newspapers or elsewhere. But British libel laws inhibit debate and stifle free expression. British libel laws discourage writers from tackling important subjects and thereby deny all of us the right to read and think deeply about these topics.

…

This repressive law is so biased towards claimants and so hostile to writers, scientists, medical doctors and freethinkers, that London has become known as The Libel Capital of the World. [emphasis mine] The rich and powerful specifically file their libel suits in London on the most ridiculous and implausible grounds (a practice known as libel tourism), because they know that 90% of cases are won by claimants.

…

But there is hope: the British government promised to draft a bill that will reform libel law, but it is essential that blog writers and their readers send a strong signal to politicians so that they are motivated to follow through on this promise. You can help do this by joining me and more than 50,000 others who have signed the libel reform petition. You can sign the petition whatever your nationality and wherever you live. In fact, if you live outside the UK, your signature will remind British politicians that English libel law is repressive, antiquated and is seriously out of step with the rest of the free world. You can also include a personal message to go with your signature, so what are you waiting for?

It’s called the Libel Reform Campaign and is being organized by (from the contact page),

The Libel Reform coalition brings together English PEN [Note: Margaret Atwood has long supported PEN, an organization devoted to the principle of free speech; they focus on writers in particular], Index on Censorship and our partner organisation Sense About Science to campaign to reform the libel laws of England and Wales.

You can go sign the petition here (I signed it this morning).