The natural sciences produce knowledge. Not necessarily because they do experiments, or because they use precise measurement devices, or because they investigate reality, but because they have developed highly conservative epistemic cultures whose members are overwhelmingly concerned with what the community thinks. My purpose in this chapter is to support this claim as one component of more general conception of disciplinary knowledge, a species of knowledge of which both the natural sciences and the humanities have historically been able stewards. If we use the natural sciences as a model for what real knowledge looks like, the question, “Do the humanities create knowledge?” turns not so much on the degree to which the humanities employ the Scientific Method, but on the degree to which they partake of the social processes by which disciplinary knowledge is achieved.

This chapter outlines the process of IPCC report writing and discusses, through specific examples, how these reports are produced within, and shaped by, political and scientific contexts. The IPCC produces Assessment Reports, Special Reports, and Methodological Reports, which are central to the institution’s operations and perceived impact. There are also sub-elements of these reports – Summary for Policymakers and Technical Summaries – which fulfil important standalone roles. The process of writing these reports is well-institutionalised and involves maintaining a balance between scientific credibility and policy relevance. The reports produced are therefore accountable to, and co-produced with, scientific and policy communities. The chapter shows how the framing of IPCC reports has changed over time and continues to evolve. This also raises questions about the future of IPCC reports in relation to IPCC processes and in response to diversifying audiences and new media.

Ordinary people’s intuitive thinking about readers of journal articles typically focuses on the scientific community. The four real-life cases, Seth, Tim, and Chris, Singer and Willett, suggest that readers are important, diverse, complex, and broad. Among various types of readers, peer reviewers and science journalists are two special and critical groups of readers. To publish our manuscripts successfully, four practical suggestions are offered: understanding readers and always have our readers in mind before or after we prepare our manuscripts; understandingreviewers and always have peer reviewers in mind before we write a manuscript; and understanding journalists and always have scientific reporters in mind after we publish a journal article.