From his web page: Why I think that Michael Mann, Phil Jones and Stefan Rahmstorf should be barred from the IPCC process
by Eduardo Zorita, Scientist at the Institute for Coastal Research, specialist in Paleoclimatology, Review Editor of Climate Research and IPCC co-author.
Short answer: because the scientific assessments in which they may take part are not credible anymore.
A longer answer: My voice is not very important. I belong to the climate-research infantry, publishing a few papers per year, reviewing a few manuscript per year and participating in a few research projects. I do not form part of important committees, nor I pursue a public awareness of my activities. My very minor task in the public arena was to participate as a contributing author in the Fourth Assessment Report of the IPCC.
By writing these lines I will just probably achieve that a few of my future studies will, again, not see the light of publication. My area of research happens to be the climate of the past millennia, where I think I am appreciated by other climate-research ‘soldiers’. And it happens that some of my mail exchange with Keith Briffa and Timothy Osborn can be found in the CRU-files made public recently on the internet.
To the question of legality or ethicalness of reading those files I will write a couple of words later.
I may confirm what has been written in other places: research in some areas of climate science has been and is full of machination, conspiracies, and collusion, as any reader can interpret from the CRU-files. They depict a realistic, I would say even harmless, picture of what the real research in the area of the climate of the past millennium has been in the last years. The scientific debate has been in many instances hijacked to advance other agendas.
These words do not mean that I think anthropogenic climate change is a hoax. On the contrary, it is a question which we have to be very well aware of. But I am also aware that in this thick atmosphere -and I am not speaking of greenhouse gases now- editors, reviewers and authors of alternative studies, analysis, interpretations,even based on the same data we have at our disposal, have been bullied and subtly blackmailed. In this atmosphere, Ph D students are often tempted to tweak their data so as to fit the ‘politically correct picture’. Some, or many issues, about climate change are still not well known. Policy makers should be aware of the attempts to hide these uncertainties under a unified picture. I had the ‘pleasure’ to experience all this in my area of research.
I thank explicitely Keith Briffa and Tim Osborn for their work in the formulation of one Chapter of the IPCC report. As it destills from these emails, they withstood the evident pressure of other IPCC authors, not experts in this area of research, to convey a distorted picture of our knowledge of the hockey-stick graph.
Is legal or ethical to read the CRU files? I am not a lawyer. It seems that if the files had been hacked this would constitute an illegal act. If they have been leaked it could be a whistle blower action protected by law. I think it is not unethical to read them. Once published, I feel myself entitled to read how some researchers tried to influence reviewers to scupper the publication of our work on the ‘hockey stick graph’ or to read how some IPCC authors tried to exclude this work from the IPCC Report on very dubious reasons. Also, these mails do not contain any personal information at all. They are an account of many dull daily activities of typical climatologists, together with a realistic account of very troubling professional behavior.
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The difficult and hopeless postion these people have, Jones et al, is the only way for them to salvage their careers is to expand their deceit even futher in hopes of somehow reversing the damage done by their prior offenses.
Gavin Schmidt’s conduct represents that futile attempt.
” I am not a layer” ? (1st line,last para.) must mean lawyer unless he is broody.
One very brave man. I wish him luck with keeping his job and getting funding.
Jones, Mann and company have caused a tremendous amount of damage.
As this seeps out into the general population, (and it is), people will second guess anything coming from the IPCC or this topic well into the future.
Keith Minto (18:53:37) : ” I am not a layer” ? (1st line,last para.) must mean lawyer unless he is broody.
I consider he has every right to be broody, too.
I am looking forward to the chickens…
Well, more specifically, their judgment, sense of ethics, and competence isn’t credible any more. Their removal is a good first step, but I doubt it will change the quality of IPCC assessments.
He’s downplaying it a bit, but he is saying it…….. “…a realistic account of very troubling professional behavior.”
Journalists now need to follow wherever this mess leads…. It would be good just to get most of these partisan news outlets to even admit there is a mess with the climate science. That would be a good first start.
LBJ lied, John F. Kerry lied and lies still, Bill Clinton lied and lies more, Al Gore lies big time, will lie more, B. Obama lied to get in office and will lie about man made global warming soon and will often.
What do they all have in common other than they are world classless liars.
use “D” as your clue, sort of a hockey stick graph….data set.
There is a point in time when the “agenda” becomes so important that nothing else matters. For a Gavin Schmidt truth is not important, only “getting people to believe” matters. If enough people “believe” which allows a goal of the agenda to be attained, then that is a win, if not it is a loss.
That is the only thing these people care about.
So-called “post normal” science is an exhibition in subjective reality.
Ok, maybe something will happen…
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8383713.stm
I think it’s going to be a lot harder for “Them” to punish dissenters now, it’s too hard to cover up now.
Also, remember when the press used to preen about heroic investigators revealing the dastardly secrets of state and store? Do you think they ever really believed that, or was it always about political enemies?
I’ll give Zorita credit for appreciating the “credibility” issue. However, I thought his “I’m just a small cog in this big machine” was a pretty thin evasion of responsibility for having participated all this time without understanding the game.
I repeat:
“I’m being enormously entertained watching the “emergency exits” at the Grand Global Warming Theater. I see little rat noses tentatively poking out all over the place. Meanwhile, Michael Mann takes to the stage with his magic act once again in a desperate effort to stem the panic.”
CH
Keith Minto (18:53:37) : ” I am not a layer” ? (1st line,last para.) must mean lawyer unless he is broody.
I think he is a fryer. But now out of the frying pan and into the fire.
[Fixed, thanks. ~dbs, mod.]
“James F. Evans:
For a Gavin Schmidt truth is not important, only “getting people to believe” matters.”
For a Gavin Schmidt, truth is not important, only ‘survival’ matters.
Fixed it.
JimB
your post made the tears flow…
Eduardo Zorita: “My voice is not very important.”
Yes it is! With enough honest scientists speaking up, this scam can’t be ignored. Here’s another one speaking out, saying there is “proof of fraud”: click
Climate scientists are starting to realise that the AGW hoax will unravel soon, and when it does – there will be a reckoning, there WILL be consequences, which will involve jail sentances and/or huge fines for the most serious frauds that have been committed. The public will demand it., and MOST importantly – the politicians and media will need scapegoats to cover up their own participation in the crime of the century.
I suspect the silent majority of scientists who sat on the fence, are about to jump to one side in a very vocal way. Those that dont, are fools who will pay the price for the dishonesty of the likes of Jones, Mann et al
Apologize in advance for a somewhat off-topic post: I am engaged in a “debate” with someone on a left-oriented site. I am trying to summarize what climategate is about and how it undermines the credibility of global warming true believers. Have I stated the case effectively?
The data that was “hidden” was part of the proxy data that was supposed to reconstruct climate history for the time period before there were thermometric measurements. This data was obtained from tree rings, ice cores, sediments among other sources. There was a period of overlap between the the proxy data and thermometric data. This was used to calibrate the proxy data as the thermometer data is more reliable. However, there were periods where they records diverged. The thermometer data showed temperature increased while the proxy data showed a decrease. The problems then are:
How reliable is the proxy data? Do factors besides temperature affect tree rings, for example?
Was climate variability in the past greater than published proxy data suggest? Perhaps our recent warming is not as extreme as we have been led to believe. Note that recent comparisons indicate that proxy data may understate temperature which would mean that the past was warmer than we currently understand.
Finally, the climate simulation models are not closed in the sense that they require real world historical data for tuning. Even if the simulation models are based on rigorous physics, if they are tuned to a faulty climate record they cannot be expected to produce a credible result. And it turns out that much of the data set in question was used in part for this purpose.
I get very suspicious when government experts tell me that there is a crisis and we must act right now. It happened with Iraq, with the banking system bailout and its happening with Iran and climate change.
After finding a few rotten apples at the top of a barrel, it is a poor farmer who convinces himself that there are no more further down.
Eduardo, you were a cute child, but to seemingly blame the change on HvS – I don’t think that’s fair. And it costs € 826 to receive 4 volumes of Climate Research during 2010. I think I’ll ask for a stimulus grant so you can double the print run and we’ll send copies to interested students. That would be good for you and them.
Seriously, the entire IPCC process ought to be shut down. Getting rid of a few science-trained folks with questionable ethics allows the process to seem cleansed and it can then go on its merry way. Better to get rid of the IPCC and clean up the science “tricks and/or fraud” also.
Just posted on RealClimate:
Climate science hasn’t been unfairly restricting access. The authors of RealClimate demonstrably have been unfairly restricting access to raw data as their own email conversations make perfectly clear. Don’t confuse “climate science” the discipline with “RealClimate” the indiscipline.
Oh and for the record, it’s not too long since Michael Mann was protesting to Congress that the data and methodology used to produce MBH98 was his private property and no-one (including Congress) had any right to see it.
Who to believe? RealClimate or our own lying eyes?
Deleting lots of emails that were the subject of FOI requests is a criminal offense in the UK as well as the US. Plotting to unseat editors and conspiring against journals who publish work that criticises the work of RealClimate authors as well as gaming the peer review process are all gratuitous breach of scientific ethics which may well get a number of them fired.
Its no use claiming that the emails and documents were unfairly obtained – so were the Pentagon Papers and those were Top Secret.
It’s time for RealClimate to come clean. For there’s more at stake than the academic careers of a few key individuals indulging in sordid unethical behavior.
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I have tried to sent the story about the Google/Wikipedia cencoring to Foxnews, but i think other people are trying to sent news also 😀
The following story is about a french scientist who also reconstructed mean tempratures for europ and america. No warming since the 40’s. Read also the second comment about a scientist that was threatened with his job. The scientist are comming out of hiding!
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fpcomment/archive/2009/11/26/skewed-science.aspx
Roger Carr (18:59:13) :
Keith Minto (18:53:37) : ” I am not a layer” ? (1st line,last para.) must mean lawyer unless he is broody.
I consider he has every right to be broody, too.
I am looking forward to the chickens…
I think the Chickens aren’t going to be roosting at Zorita’s Phil Jones might consider nesting boxes and a little egg scratch for his office decor,however..
He is just saying it is far worse than it looks. The careful reader will be rewarded with light.
“The CRU-files… depict a realistic, I would say even harmless, picture of what the real research in the area of the climate of the past millennium has been in the last years.”
“editors, reviewers and authors of alternative studies, analysis, interpretations,even based on the same data we have at our disposal, have been bullied and subtly blackmailed.”
“Some, or many issues, about climate change are still not well known. Policy makers should be aware of the attempts to hide these uncertainties under a unified picture.”
I find most disturbing the stories of Ph D candidacies and papers being politically tampered with. That is the heartbreaker for me. I strongly suspect this goes on across all of the disciplines.