Dear Dr. Rao,
The paper by Mu and Mu gave me such concern that I had to respond. The reasons for my concern are twofold: First, the text/narrative is almost incomprehensible to this native English speaker/writer and, second, the work appears to be poor science extrapolated to a specious conclusion.
I should not have to figure out what the authors meant to say in their convoluted textual choices, or have to attempt to extrapolate from fractured language what the point of the “scientific” argument is. The English should be such that an intelligent readership (especially a scientifically literate readership) should be able to follow along easily to understand what the authors are saying. I recognize that English as a Second Language (ESL) presents difficulties to foreign authors; however, this should not relieve those authors from the standards applied to all other authors. Whatever editorial/translation services (if any) were used by the authors did not serve them well.
Some examples of the poor language choices follow; the words are exactly as printed in the original journal paper, the italics (for emphasis) are mine.
“On the mechanism of change of climate, it is humans’ endless exploit of fossil energy that caused the destruction of thermal insulation and sealing of Earth's crust, and it is the increase of terrestrial heat flow that caused rises of geotemperature and sea surface temperature that finally caused the change of climate, which is often ignored by humans.”
“Coal, oil and oil-gas are just the earth's subcutaneous fatty tissue and guarantee not much emission of the earth's internal heat to the surface, making the biosphere always have proper temperature condition.”
“Heat flow increase caused by fossil energy mined on a large scale has the same heat as the fossil energy total quantity mined by human regurgitation to the earth's surface all the time. The heat makes a climatic system response.”
Conclusions appear to be based on “accidentally made objective and prolonged scientific experiments on thermal insulation of coal, oil and rock, thus presenting a striking contrast.” The experiment in question being an observation that a Han-dynasty tomb coated with “white plaster mud containing grease” preserved the contents of the tomb after being buried for more than 2100 years. In contrast, up to six layers of white marble of the hardest fabric used in the construction of the Ming dynasty Ding mausoleum did not preserve the host of the tomb; emperor Wanly's corpse had corrupted to the nail in less than 400 years and only a withered skeleton was left behind.”
“No matter how thick the mausoleum and no matter how hard the rock, they can't avail against even normal heat flow, let alone ever-increasing heat flow. This fully indicates that coal and hydrocarbons have efficient, sustained thermal insulation.”
“... if a combination of white plaster mud and charcoal perfectly seals up Mawangdui No. 1 Han dynasty tomb, then a combination of coal, oil and oil-gas perfectly seals up the crust.”
This is arrant nonsense! Such sweeping generalizations have no place in the JA&WMA.
My one regret is that of noting a point of potential scientific interest: that of the possible contributing effect to climate change of the long-term extraction of fossil fuels from the earth; that is, the physical removal of these fuels from many subsurface reservoirs (and the loss of some degree of thermal insulation?), not the eventual combustion of these same fuels. My intuition based on long-term reading and experience suggests that this factor is likely a minor, if not insignificant, one given the mass/surface area of the earth, but I don't have the facts to support this thesis. Thus, it may not be the red herring I suspect it of being. Unfortunately, the paper does not provide much in the way of believable facts and plausible causation to bolster a degree of personal understanding and acceptance.
To end with the final paragraph of the paper: “We focus on how many holes, how big the crack is, and how much the amount of heat flow increases as a result of human extraction of fossil energy above the sealing layer, instead of on how large the crustal heat-resistant sealing layer is. It will take a million years, ten million years, even a hundred million years of geological age to repair these holes and cracks by nature. Climate change is taken seriously in the globe, and international society has taken many measures to fight it; however, all attempts are not to the point that current endeavors work to no avail.”
How did this paper get through the peer-review and editorial review processes? What technical standards were applied to determine the apparent merit of its contents so as to justify its inclusion in a reputable journal? What standards of English were applied that would allow the presentation of this badly worked document to an English-speaking readership?
As a onetime environmental consultant who prepared hundreds of reports for diverse clients, I take exception to the poor quality of the language used in this entire paper and its conclusion. This standard of writing would have been unacceptable in my former profession.
Sincerely,
John W. Russell, QEP