Climategate: The Smoking Code

Line 8 appears to be missing from the listing.
Excellent article.

i guess Phil Jones leave of absence could be a long one

Thanks for the explanation for those of us who aren’t fluent in the various computer languages (I think I still remember how to write a BASIC program lets see 10 Print “Hello World”;20 goto 10 ) I figured the EMail uproar was just the first shot.
Medic1532

I believe the emails are acting as a distration for the media from a key topic of what what actually done with (to?) the data by way of programming. I found this explanation extremely lucid and hope it inspires passing journalists to review the Harry readme file. I’m not sure you need to be a programmer to understand that ‘Harry’ is not describing best scientific practice let alone programming!
Hopefully work such as this will lead to more detailed investigation of data analysis (manipulation?) techniques being employed by all the major climate data providers?

“It just shows that all of the data that was the chief result of most of the environmental legislation created over the last decade was a farce.”
The code is awful. But do we know that the output of the code discussed here was actually published somewhere? I didn’t yet find an explanation of what the significance of this program is, and how it has been used.
(should “cut-and-try” not be “cut-and-dry”?)

The end!!!
This following short analysis might be easy to understand the reasons why the ’so-called scientists’ would not release the code for scrutiny. If you can’t independently run the code and get the same results as the output the Fraudsters display, then something is wrong. If you can run the code and get the output displayed, then you only need analyze the software code to see what is wrong that produces the FAKED hockey stick. Easy for software engineers, not so easy for lay people — Which is what this is based on, fooling lay people into paying massive new taxes.

Off topic, but can we expect an update to the surfacestations work anytime soon? Papers were mentioned at the time of the mid-term census report?
I think more than anything it was the early results from the Surfacestations project that convinced me descriptions of ‘settled science’ were horribly compromized. While Climategate is rightly grabbing attention at the moment perhaps passing journalists would care to check out surfacestations.org for examples of how data collection and reporting should be undertaken. The hard work of the volunteers in collating the damning (IMHO) evidence about the temperature measuring network, and the transparency in which the data has been recorded and presented is commendable and should be given public recognition – we owe these people a debt of thanks. Most importantly it shows there is a way forward for climate science that can be believed, a breath of fresh air in an otherwise fetid atmosphere?

Well we all know that the code was realy the smoking gun. Hopefully the MSM will stop trying to gloss over the issue here and start truly attacking the guilty.

Now there is a thought:
Re-write the IDL into BASIC.
Lots of people understand Visual Basic, and could get it.

bitbutter – yes, this should be said loud and clear. And investigated before too much is built on it. Has anyone seen anything establishing the provenance of this code?

Sorry, I don’t know IDL. In the initialization of the array valadj, there is a ‘*0.75’ at the end. What does that accomplish? Multiply each initializer by 0.75? If so, then why not just put the proper values into the initializer string? Is it possible that the ‘fudge factor’ comment refers only to the 0.75 constant and not the entire array? Is there anything in the code that explains where the constants in the initializer string came from?
There are two ways to view this. One is they were sincerely trying to correct for something, the other is they were cooking the books to show a trend that did not exist.

It is precisely what data set scrutiny requires.
A type of public, objectivity and as you put it “uninterested” stance that leads to in depth analysis and results in conclusions which are accurate and that can be believed, Mr. Greiner.
People like yourself, a Physics grad’, familiar in Pure science, with no axe to grind and with other tech’ skills, are needed, fancy a job?…………There will be some going in East Anglia soon…………… I predict.
Trouble is……can you do it for altruistic purposes? After the scandal there will be no money in it, gov’ research funding has taken a big hit.

Wow everyday more and more is coming out.
slightly off-topic but this new oped on CIF is just shocking:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/libertycentral/2009/dec/04/climate-change-scepticism

It’s just gone mainstream here in UK!

“However, being part of the Science Community (I have a degree in Physics) and having done scientific research myself makes me very worried when arrogant jerks who call themselves “scientists” work outside of ethics and ignore the truth to fit their pre-conceived notions of the world. That is not science, that is religion with math equations.”
Don’t sugar coat it Pard, tell us what you think.I agree whole heartedly…

Hey, thanks for linking to my article 🙂
This website actually was what turned me on to the whole issue.
@Burch, the .75 and “fudge factor” array serve as kind of a guess-and-check hardcoded curve that forces legitimate data to look like whatever the hell the researchers wanted to. Likely the .75 and each individual data value in the fudge factor array were all tweaked little by little until the original data looked like a “hockey stick”, which is what Michael Mann hypothesized a decade ago.
It’s a simple case of falsifying data to fit a pre-conceived feeling.
excellent question.

Edb,
Aren’t we all?

Robert Greiner you state:
Line 8
This is where the magic happens. Remember that array we have of valid temperature readings? And, remember that random array of numbers we have from line two? Well, in line 4, those two arrays are interpolated together.
The interpol() function will take each element in both arrays and “guess” at the points in between them to create a smoothing effect on the data. This technique is often used when dealing with natural data points, just not quite in this manner.
The main thing to realize here, is, that the interpol() function will cause the valid temperature readings (yrloc) to skew towards the valadj values.
Lets look at a bit more of that code:
; Apply a VERY ARTIFICAL correction for decline!!
;yrloc=[1400,findgen(19)*5.+1904]
valadj=[0.,0.,0.,0.,0.,-0.1,-0.25,-0.3,0.,-0.1,0.3,0.8,1.2,1.7,2.5,2.6,2.6,$
2.6,2.6,2.6]*0.75 ; fudge factor
if n_elements(yrloc) ne n_elements(valadj) then message,’Oooops!’
yearlyadj=interpol(valadj,yrloc,timey)
;
;filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy+yearlyadj,tslow=tslow
;oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=20
;
filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy,tslow=tslow
oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=21
yearlyadj=interpol(valadj,yrloc,timey)
Does not this line give a yearly adjustment value interpolated from the 20 year points?
filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy,tslow=tslow oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=21
Does not this line plot data derived from yyy
;filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy+yearlyadj,tslow=tslow
;oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=20
The smoking gun line!!!!
Does not his line plot data derived from yyy+yearlyadj The FUDGED FIGURE
BUT…………
IT’S COMMENTED OUT!!
This is further backed up by the end of file:
plot,[0,1],/nodata,xstyle=4,ystyle=4
;legend,[‘Northern Hemisphere April-September instrumental temperature’,$
; ‘Northern Hemisphere MXD’,$
; ‘Northern Hemisphere MXD corrected for decline’],$
; colors=[22,21,20],thick=[3,3,3],margin=0.6,spacing=1.5
legend,[‘Northern Hemisphere April-September instrumental temperature’,$
‘Northern Hemisphere MXD’],$
colors=[22,21],thick=[3,3],margin=0.6,spacing=1.5
To me this looks as if ‘Northern Hemisphere MXD corrected for decline’ would have been printed in colour 20 – just the same as the smoking gun line. HOWEVER you will note that this section is commented out also.
So in my view this is code left in after a quick look-see.
Remember engineers ans scientist are human and play if bored and do not always tidy up.
have a look at:
http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/creatures/index.html

You could digitize the output graph that they have published and get the data if they published one with the raw values. If not you could write some code using this code and back calculate the raw values.
Somebody smarter then me could do it. My training as and expert witness and being around a lot of smart lawyers tells me we could get the raw data from what we have.
I would bet the raw data is somewhere on a HCRU computer just sitting there. They whistle blower as I remember when this all started has more data to release or am I remembering incorrectly.

I have queried one of the folks who is familiar with this code and who is a major name in this mess, and he defended the code as follows:
The opening comment: “Apply a VERY ARTIFICAL correction for decline!!” indicates this is not a computer run that would be used in a paper, but is merely one of many runs used to understand how the model operated under different scenarios. He argued that no one could identify a single peer-reviewed paper that relied on this code.
I can believe that one might want to play around with a model to understand how sensitive it is to various scenarios, including presumptions about temperature curves. One would not be looking at the graph, but would be looking at what the forcings would have to be to generate such a graph. This would allow a better understanding of the power of various forcings. It would help tease out which forcings have the greatest significance to model outputs.
There would surely be other ways to reach the same understanding, but one can’t account for how any particular scientist goes about his or her business.
I am forced to reserve judgment until I see how this code was actually used and whether it was used to support a specific academic contribution.

So the data output from this program will be the result of an interpolation between (essentially a combination of) the actual temperature data for each period of time and a list of increasing values that have been artificially incorporated into the program. The list of values was intentionally skewed to reflect higher temperatures in the later periods and to conform with periods of increasing CO2 levels.
In other words, this computer program is producing bald faced lies.
This is without any doubt a criminal fraud.
How else can anyone justify such a manipulation of data?

“NOTE: This is an actual snippet of code from the CRU contained in the source file: briffa_Sep98_d.pro”
[snip]

There’s a problem with your analysis:
– the ‘yearlyadj’ fudge factor isn’t used in this code!
– if you look a couple of lines further down you can see that the lines which would adjust the data, filter it & then plot it out are actually commented out using ‘;’s
”
;filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy+yearlyadj,tslow=tslow
;oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=20
”
and code that does the actual plotting doesn’t use the ‘yearlyadj’ fudge factor
”
filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy,tslow=tslow
oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=21
”
– so, in this example at least, the fudge-factor isn’t used, even if it looks a little suspicious.
– perhaps it was just some test code, or Briffa changed his mind about using it….
Actual code:
;
; Apply a VERY ARTIFICAL correction for decline!!
;
yrloc=[1400,findgen(19)*5.+1904]
valadj=[0.,0.,0.,0.,0.,-0.1,-0.25,-0.3,0.,-0.1,0.3,0.8,1.2,1.7,2.5,2.6,2.6,$
2.6,2.6,2.6]*0.75 ; fudge factor
if n_elements(yrloc) ne n_elements(valadj) then message,’Oooops!’
;
yearlyadj=interpol(valadj,yrloc,timey)
;
;filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy+yearlyadj,tslow=tslow
;oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=20
;
filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy,tslow=tslow
oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=21

Great post. Small and simple enough to be used by media. Something like this:
“Look how they waterboarded computer programs these pseudo scientists to cheat YOU with the tale of global warming”

Something seems to be missing in this explanation at the end. Showing an example of how the interpol() function actually adjusts a table of number would help.
What becomes apparent is that the subtle allure of modeling has crept into the simple display of basic data. Models let you tweak the data to get an expected output. It isn’t a big leap to apply the same rationale to adjusting the data because it’s not up to your expectations. When the practice becomes standard operating procedure, you no longer see its flaws.

is this a joke?
“I’m coming to you today as a scientist and engineer with an agnostic stand on global warming.”
then,
“It just shows that all of the data that was the chief result of most of the environmental legislation created over the last decade was a farce.”
Then,
“I tried to write this post in a manner that transcends politics. ”
unbelievable. As a long time ‘skeptic’ and avid supporter of S. McIntyre, Lucia L., and the likes, all I can say is this dialog has reached a new ‘low’.

What’s really hilarious is how blatant the programmer was…
Apply a VERY artificial adjustment for decline!!
Really??? This is just completely bizarre

This code fragment is meaningless unless without the context in which it was used. You need to have evidence that it was used to unjustifyably distort temperature data which was subsequently published. PS. I’m a sceptic, but without context this code is definately NOT a smoking gun.

It just shows that all of the data that was the chief result of most of the environmental legislation created over the last decade was a farce.
I’m having trouble parsing this. “All of the data”? What? All climate data is keystoned off tree-ring data? I had no idea. “that was the chief result of most of the environmental legislation created over the last decade”? What? I thought the chief result of environmental legislation was stuff like cleaner air and cleaner water.
By the way, the following lines of this file are:
;filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy+yearlyadj,tslow=tslow
;oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=20
;
filter_cru,5.,/nan,tsin=yyy,tslow=tslow
oplot,timey,tslow,thick=5,color=21
“;” indicates a comment line. So in this file, yearlyadj isn’t used in the version of this file. Huh.
(It does appear to be used in briffa_sep98_e.pro.)

This code is too well documented. It must be fake. Line 2 is such a nice description

Here’s a link to the released documents in case you haven’t seen it elsewhere.
http://junkscience.com/FOIA/

The author of the post has done what the lab should have done. Made every attempt to falsify their conclusion. Once they have made every effort to do that, only then should they publish the raw data and code for others to replicate. This blog and the above post, and other blogs, have done the work for them. Now let them return to their labs and try again (maybe with one or two pink slips in the mail boxes?).

OK, there’s no way they left this on an open directory for someone to find. This had to be a hack or a whistleblower. No way in hell I’d let anything this incriminating out in an FOI request.
When can we start using the f-word?

The emails have gotten most of the attention…for now. They are a lot smaller than the data sets, and most people can go through the emails and put together a time line. We still haven’t heard from the techies yes who undoubtedly have started breaking down the data sets and code. It will be interesting to see if they can replicate CRU’s outputs and then be able to explain what CRU did. But even if they can, that is only half of the story; the other half is what the output should have looked like if it hadn’t been tampered with. That will take some time.

In the past 20 years, how many BILLIONS of dollars wasted for this fraud and how many MILLIONS of lives could have been saved if the money would have been better spent?????

Please check some of these comments above
THE CODE WAS COMMENTED OUT
IT WAS NOT USED at the point this image was taken
Check out this comment from the original post location
http://cubeantics.com/2009/12/the-proof-behind-the-cru-climategate-debacle-because-computers-do-lie-when-humans-tell-them-to/comment-page-1/#comment-664

If you think that this commented section just means that they could have used it to fudge the data then you would also have to take into account all the code that briffa deleted and even the code that doesn’t exist.
This is beyond ludicous!

May be that this is off topic but check out Real Climate… Here is what Gavin had to say in his latest piece…
*************************************
Unusually, I’m in complete agreement with a recent headline on the Wall Street Journal op-ed page:
“The Climate Science Isn’t Settled”
*************************************
Gee.. I could have sworn that Gavin said it was…..

But what about the code or data that was supposedly deleted? If it is in fact destroyed that would be just as much a smoking gun in my eyes.

All the discussion about whether this is “actual proof that the CRU was deliberately tampering with their data” is a distraction. Yes, the “fudge-factored” data may not have been used to produce any graphs. Yes, that array may not have even been used within this program. That’s all beside the point.
The Hockey Team could put this away for good by merely releasing their data and analysis, as they should have done in the first place. All they have to do is explain themselves. The fact that they won’t, and that we have to guess, is incriminating in its own right, and sufficient reason to reject their result. Mann, et.al. and his successors and colleagues have attempted to turn paleo-climate research on its head with their research, purporting to disprove the Roman optimum, Medieval warm period, etc. THE BURDEN OF PROOF IS ON THEM, NOT US. This isn’t a criminal prosecution; there isn’t any presumption the defendant is correct.
The fact that the Hockey Team can’t or won’t disprove the allegations is all we need to reject their results. Whether they committed any actual crimes is a question for another venue, with a different standard of evidence.

The reason you have a fudge factor like 0.75 is to allow you to scale the curve arbitrarily. You only have to change the fudge factor, rather than the entire array you see.

If the CRU gave us the raw data and the algorithms they used to plot their graphs we could have a proper argument about this situation. They won’t because they can’t – they’ve “lost” the raw data.
They are as convincing as Joseph Smith saying he lost the original of the book of Mormon.

Bill, you’re fighting a losing battle. Make the decision now to reanalyze your position and you will feel a lot better.
The following is probably how they eliminated the medieval warm period:
see: documents/osborn-tree6/summer_modes/pl_decline.pro
;
; Plots density ‘decline’ as a time series of the difference between
; temperature and density averaged over the region north of 50N,
; and an associated pattern in the difference field.
; The difference data set is computed using only boxes and years with
; both temperature and density in them – i.e., the grid changes in time.
; The pattern is computed by correlating and regressing the *filtered*
; time series against the unfiltered (or filtered) difference data set.
;
;*** MUST ALTER FUNCT_DECLINE.PRO TO MATCH THE COORDINATES OF THE
; START OF THE DECLINE *** ALTER THIS EVERY TIME YOU CHANGE ANYTHING ***
;
…
;
; Now apply a completely artificial adjustment for the decline
; (only where coefficient is positive!)
;
which is accompanied by a similar array, etc.
as well as:
;
; Now fit a 2nd degree polynomial to the decline series, and then extend
; it at a constant level back to 1400. In fact we compute its mean over
; 1856-1930 and use this as the constant level from 1400 to 1930. The
; polynomial is fitted over 1930-1994, forced to have the constant value
; in 1930.

How can anyone claim that this is a smoking gun without knowing definitively whether this code was used to produce the charts found in the literature and/or the IPCC reports?
I believe Gavin has already claimed that it was simply test code.
More sleuthing needs to be done.

Sorry, but to me this analysis looks out of context and ridiculous. I don’t think it’s possible to conclude anything based on that code. (I’m a computer programmer myself and I have some training in physics and math, and have done modeling in the past.)
I am a “climate skeptic” and a long time reader of WUWT and CA. Unfortunately, the quality of “climategate” discussions is starting to deteriorate and approach that of AGW propaganda at an alarming pace. If this trend contiunues then I’m afraid I’ll have to switch camps.
Still I’d like to thank Anthony for his hard work and for publishing quality materials.

>THE CODE WAS COMMENTED OUT
>IT WAS NOT USED at the point this image was taken
In that particular source file, yes it was commented, but as noted elsewhere, in the file ‘briffa_sep98_e.pro, it IS used, twice. I cannot comment on whether the results of any particular version were used to create published graphs.
As a reminder, the array ‘valadj’ is the “artificially corrected” element.
And remember, it’s really easy to comment or uncomment a line and rerun the code, so we would need to correlate published data to this line of code to know if it was, or was not, used to influence the results.
That said, it is suspicious that it exists at all.
—–
;
; APPLY ARTIFICIAL CORRECTION
;
yearlyadj=interpol(valadj,yrloc,x)
densall=densall+yearlyadj
————- And later
;
; Restore the Hugershoff NHD1 (see Nature paper 2)
;
xband=x
restore,filename=’../tree5/densadj_MEAN.idlsave’
; gets: x,densadj,n,neff
;
; Extract the post 1600 part
;
kl=where(x ge 1400)
x=x(kl)
densadj=densadj(kl)
;
; APPLY ARTIFICIAL CORRECTION
;
yearlyadj=interpol(valadj,yrloc,x)
densadj=densadj+yearlyadj

Phil,
So NASA corrected the published data before Steve M brought it up? Do you have a link for that, because that is not how I remember it. I am calling BS here.
Not to mention that no such analysis occurred or can occur on the CRU data set. So the only *reliable* data we have shows that the thirties were warmer than the ’90s, as any history book which deals with the period will corroborate. The claim that the global numbers don’t show this argument carries a *ton* less weight in light of the facts that have come out recently.
The word “unprecedented” is gone, and it ain’t coming back without a lot of extremely careful and transparent work. My guess is that if the reanalysis is done carefully, the thirties will be found to have been warmer, and the only answer you have right now is that I should trust Phil Jones.

To elaborate a little further…for this code to mean anything, it needs to be shown how it effects the output/final result. Mr. Greiner has not done that. I would not bother posting this stuff unless you can determine a little more precisely what effect the suspect code has on the output. If the answer is “none”, then there really isn’t necessarily a problem.

Interesting AlGorithm.

Love the commenters to this site — even the alarmists like Phil, because most everyone tries to make sense. Looking at this, it’s code for some unknowable purpose, and hopefully the EAU investigation is not a whitewash and looks at the code written over the years at CRU and more importantly why code was written. Was this code a benign ‘test run’ to see if data would react as predicted, so actual model results would be reliable? or was this code part of the 1990s scam to manipulate data? Only a thorough real investigation will reveal that. Based on the Mann code manipulations, the Briffa data nonsense, CRU evading legitmate FOI demands et al, strong suspicion of adjusting data to match model results is clearly warranted. Time will tell, but investigations by government and private grant givers is essential, whistleblowers would be a helpful resource.

The most damning thing is the very comment “; fudge factor”. What the heck kind of comment is that to put in code? The point of comments is to explain what the coder is doing and how; it makes the code useful to anyone (including the programmer himself) who comes after to understand the logic and to debug and correct if necessary.
“fudge factor” is, whatever the rationalizations offered by the Mann contingent, NOT a technical term in climatology, the meaning of which would be obvious to anyone using or reading this code; and it’s not a useful comment to anyone reading the code for scientific purposes.
What it sounds like is “This is the adjustment we need to make it come out the way we want; I told you I’d need to apply a ‘fudge factor’ when we discussed the data in person.” So SOMEONE, or some people, in addition to the coder, probably knew what it meant, but no one else in on conversations before the coding would know–and no one else would be meant to know for sure.

This post shows a “smoking gun” and it does not matter if the guy with the gun in his hand says he just used it to kill a passing by bird…That will be a matter of investigation. It’s too late now.

James, Billy.. we need to go to court and put these programmers in fear of 5 year sentences..
then the truth will come out!

My contribution, with two (de)motivational posters 😀
http://www.flickr.com/photos/45273160@N06/sets/72157622809522485/

Ed Fix (07:23:34) : and others
I agree Ed.
But that has always been the problem; lack of replication to verify results because the original code and data is not published. The release of these documents should in the very least force the release of original data and code (if available) so that people can determine if fudge factors were included. This is what the skeptic community should argue for vehemently. If code is not released, it should be readily apparent to even the most ardent alarmists that there is genuine f***d.

I found this comment in calibrate_correctmxd.pro
; We have previously (calibrate_mxd.pro) calibrated the high-pass filtered
; MXD over 1911-1990, applied the calibration to unfiltered MXD data (which
; gives a zero mean over 1881-1960) after extending the calibration to boxes
; without temperature data (pl_calibmxd1.pro). We have identified and
; artificially removed (i.e. corrected) the decline in this calibrated
; data set. We now recalibrate this corrected calibrated dataset against
; the unfiltered 1911-1990 temperature data, and apply the same calibration
; to the corrected and uncorrected calibrated MXD data.
Could it be possible, they used ‘value-added-data’ later on, so there was no need anymore to apply the artificial correction?

I agree w/ BB above:
“Unfortunately, the quality of ‘climategate’ discussions is starting to deteriorate and approach that of AGW propaganda at an alarming pace.”
The skeptic side needs to get a grip or run the risk of coming across as tinfoil-hat types.
Here’s some food for thought. Think about this logically. If their intent was to just fudge some numbers and never let anybody see the raw data, why would they need a computer program to do it? Why not just make up a bunch of numbers? Obviously, there is some method to the apparent (to some) madness of the program in question, otherwise why bother? I agree that the AGW side should be completely open with their raw data and with any algorithms for massaging it. Certainly, their secrecy contributes to suspicions. But that doesn’t mean that everything they do is sinister.

As someone who has programmed for a living for the past 15 years may I just point out that you write code to a spec – find who specced the application – there is the clue as to who is guilty of fudging the figures.

So far the code reviewers have demonstrated that proxy values have been blended with instrumental temperatures contrary to what Michael Mann has publicly stated is NEVER done by real scientists.
Beyond the the frustration of exhibited in the Harry Read Me file, we don’t as yet have any smoking guns with respect to similar manipulation of the temperature record.
It is quite clear from comparison of previous versions of the global temperature record that CRU, NASA, and others have been reducing past temperature and raising modern ones to accentuate the warming, but so far we have not seen this code or the methods used. This, if it exists, will be the goods that can shut down these clowns.
My advice to the code reviewers is to keep digging.

This code fragment was mentioned on page 8 of Monckton’s fire and brimstone paper that you linked to earlier in the week.

Anthony – please pay attention to the comments above. Leaving this post up with no caveat damages the credibility of your blog. Many will be passing by here without the time/interest to read the comments in detail. Unless this can be shown to produce production output to call it “smoking code” is disingenuous.

This is one of the most important finds.

@Bill, I responded to you on my site.
As I said before, this proves that the CRU data can’t be trusted. Let’s get the results re-run and go from there.

g hall (08:57:10) :
J. Bob (08:56:09) :
John Galt (08:43:01)
JJ (08:39:45) :
david (08:14:07) etc. etc.
The smoking gun is commented out (see the “;” = comment). Why cannot you see this?? It is obvious.
The code is written by scientists for a 1off use. Why would you clean it up and make it presentable. They are not going to sell it to others.

“Am I right in saying that? Is Jones’s goose pretty much cooked already, no matter what?”
No, unfortunately. I fail to see an easy way out of this very tangled mess for anyone involved, and they’ll try to salvage every last bit of their pride they can. This is, I believe, perhaps the biggest conspiracy in history, and everyone’s going to do whatever they can to detach their name from it. Their is simply too much pride involved for people and institutions and governments to admit they were wrong openly and frankly.

Here’s an interesting file – jones-foiathoughts.doc – entire text below. Take note of the last line. How professional!
———————–
Options appear to be:
1. Send them the data
2. Send them a subset removing station data from some of the countries who made us pay in the normals papers of Hulme et al. (1990s) and also any number that David can remember. This should also omit some other countries like (Australia, NZ, Canada, Antarctica). Also could extract some of the sources that Anders added in (31-38 source codes in J&M 2003). Also should remove many of the early stations that we coded up in the 1980s.
3. Send them the raw data as is, by reconstructing it from GHCN. How could this be done? Replace all stations where the WMO ID agrees with what is in GHCN. This would be the raw data, but it would annoy them.

As a person very experienced in IDL programming, I would like to clarify a little, and summarize.
1) Think of the data in the variables yrloc and valadj as a series of (x,y) points on a graph. In this case, the 19 points are (1400, 0.0), (1904, 0.0), … (1994, 2.6*0.75). What the “interpol” function does is to draw straight lines between these points on a graph, and then pick off values for a different series of x values (the years in the variable “timey”). This is done because the dataset you want to add this function to has a different set of x values than the “fudge” function has. The whole point is to get the “fudge” values for the same set of years as some other data set, so you can add the “fudge” to that other data (called “yyy” here). Saying that this processing is making a “guess” might mislead some readers – better to call it an “estimate”, an “interpolation”, or a “resampling”.
The author of this article really should have included an “x vs y” plot, instead of what he has, to better show what’s really going on. It actually is even more of a “hockey stick”. Anybody with Excel could make such a chart pretty easily by typing the yrloc values in one column, the valadj in another (remember to include the “*0.75”), and then making an x vs y plot from those two columns.
BTW, the “fudge” is more appropriately called a “term” than a “factor” because it is added in, not multiplied.
2) As far as the ethical considerations, this can only be called “suspicious”. From the comments, and the variable name, it’s clear that the author of the code does not like being ordered to add this “fudge” in there AT ALL. Also, the “*0.75” (which multiplies all the numbers within the square brackets by 0.75) suggests some trial-and-error tinkering even with the “fudge” – as do the several leading zeros at the beginning of valadj (which have no effect). Without knowing where the “fudge” numbers come from, one can’t say for sure how legit it is or not, but IF the author of the code really understood what was going on, their commentary makes it likely that something unsavory was going on.
We also don’t know how this code was used. If the results never saw the light of day, then it’s no big deal – just somebody being unsuccessful in trying to pull something (maybe for internal use).
3) The insider explanation offer by David Schure (06:30:57) is such an obvious exercise in blowing smoke You-Know-Where that it is really very insulting. It would make me even more suspicious, but I know that guys like that spew BS as a reflex, whether there’s something to hide or not.
4) As to the point about the code that uses the result being commented out, that’s a total red herring. The semi-colons can be added or deleted in a few seconds (I do this all the time). The fact that the code was written in the first place tells you that somebody used it at one time. The fact that it was commented out only tells you that the extra “fudged” curve on the plot wasn’t included the LAST time the code was used. The fact that the commented-out lines were not simply deleted tells you that the author thinks they might need to include them back in again later, or that the author wanted to be able to refer back to see how a prior result had been obtained. People who say “it means nothing” because it’s commented out are “conveniently” ignoring the obvious question as to why it would have been written in the first place.
4) In summary, we know that fudged data was included on a plot over the strong objection of the programmer, but that it was subsequently (if only temporarily) removed. How bad this is depends on where the “fudge” numbers came from, and how the output might have been used. It’s very suspicious, but we need to know more to really prove something.

Brent (09:17:09) :
But, but, but . . . commenting out lines of code is just for simplicities sake. On when you need/want it, off when you don’t. Commented out or not, what is it doing in there at all?
The gun is smoking alright.
I hope you’re kidding!!!!!!!!!!!
Why not castigate briffa for all the fudge factors that he or someone else MAY have written but didn’t!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
As someone else said – why bother with the code why not just draw the line you want?

Stay calm people. In my opinion this code doesn’t quite rise to the level of a “smoking gun”. I would liken it to gun smoke in the air. It certainly raises a lot of interesting questions.
Why was this code written?
Where and how was it used?
Please, people, hang on to your skepticism. Don’t rush to judgment and declare this code “evidence of fraud.” That would be too much like declaring “the science is settled.” Let’s not make that mistake.

The smoking gun:
Everyone is looking at all the smoking guns,
and totally missing what I think is the most obvious one.
If you believe CRU, “most of the raw data was destroyed when we moved in 1980”
Then no matter what the current head of it says:
I destroyed it.
I will destroy it.
etc etc
He (CRU director Phil Jones) was not there.
Jones did not work for CRU in 1980.
If you believe CRU, what this really says is that all of Jones’ work, every computer climate program/model….
….everything was built on their “adjusted” data.

JohnSpace nails it:
The “smoking gun” is that CRU, et al did not make their raw data, metadata, code, etc freely available for others to examine, and supposedly “prestigious” “scientific” journals accepted their papers without requiring the supporting materials to be archived. That is not real science, it’s cargo-cult science.
James: To elaborate a little further…for this code to mean anything, it needs to be shown how it effects the output/final result. Mr. Greiner has not done that. I would not bother posting this stuff unless you can determine a little more precisely what effect the suspect code has on the output. If the answer is “none”, then there really isn’t necessarily a problem.
Well, James, if you’ll provide us the actual data and code used for CRU and Mann’s various papers, I’ll bet we can determine a lot of things “a little more precisely”. Anyone who believes Mr Greiner has got it wrong, feel free to provide him with the actual materials. Since CRU at the very least suppressed their data, we are free to draw whatever conclusions we can from what IS available. If CRU (or you, James) objects, hand over the data and code which will refute Mr. Greiner’s and other commenters’ conclusions.

Just a summary, the code was commented in the fragment posted in the middle of this thread. It has been noted by others that it was used in other runs. Burch also noted that it was used in another area. As a note, when I spend a lot of time on a piece of code, I may save it in comments in the file. The really dumb part of this is commenting the use of the adjustment, but not commenting the code to generate it. If you don’t use the calculation, normally you comment it out too as it waste cpu cycles and storage. Only if you plan to use it elsewhere would you leave it running. hmm.
To address – “translate to VB… it would be just as obscure.” Arrays in VB can be even funkier, so it would not do any good, especially without the code for Interpol().
The Fudge Factor… this was done with the adjustment hard coded . Each element in the array is statically defined. It is 0 for the first 5, dips for the next 4, then jumps up steeply.
=[0.,0.,0.,0.,0.,-0.1,-0.25,-0.3,0.,-0.1,0.3,0.8,1.2,1.7,2.5,2.6,2.6,2.6,2.6,2.6]*0.75
The multiplier lets the coder have one number to change to change the slope of the adjustment. *1.0, steeper, *.5 shallower. You can see the results by changing it. A real developer would have used a variable and that way would not have to scroll into the code to change it (just change the decl in the header or definition file.)

While the curve of the adjustments does correspond to the shape of Mann Hockey Stick, that is an incorrect comparison. The adjustment code shown appears to adjust smoothed temperatures from the 1930s onwards, not from hundreds of years ago.
Thus, this article is misleading.
No one yet knows the reason this code fragment exists (or similar code fragments in other files). The fragment raises good questions – but does not yet give a definitive answer.
Please be cautious in interpretation.
(I am also a s/w engineer.)

My great fear is that the investigation at UEA will focus on who got the files out and not on the conduct of the “team”.
Whether or not this particular snippet of code is a smoking gun or not, I say
there is definitely the stench of burned black powder in the air.

Eric Raymond, a guru blogger of programmers and of the open source movement exposed this code on Nov 24. http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=1447.
I’m told he had not commented on climate change in his years of blogging before this point. But it’s clear now, he had been watching and knew exactly what to look for.
Anthony, I’m sure Eric has been reading your blog and CA.
Eric (ESR) responds to questions on his site.
———-
“>The “blatant data cooking” is to use the actual thermometer data where it’s available, which, of course, shows no decline over those decades …
esr: Oh? “Apply a VERY ARTIFICAL correction for decline!!”
That’s a misspelling of “artificial”, for those of you slow on the uptake. As in, “unconnected to any f…. data at all”. As in “pulled out of someone’s ass”. You’re arguing against the programmer’s own description, fool!
In fact, I’m quite familiar with the “divergence problem”. If AGW were science rather than a chiliastic religion, it would be treated as evidence that the theory is broken.”
——
“>The program you are puzzling over was used to produce a nice smooth curve for a nice clean piece of COVER ART.
esr: Supposing we accept your premise, it is not even remotely clear how that makes it OK to cook the data. They lied to everyone who saw that graphic.”
——
“>I’m sure we’ll see a correction or retraction here any minute.
esr: As other have repeatedly pointed out, that code was written to be used for some kind of presentation that was false. The fact that the deceptive parts are commented out now does not change that at all.
It might get them off the hook if we knew — for certain — that it had never been shown to anyone who didn’t know beforehand how the data was cooked and why. But since these peiple have conveniently lost or destroyed primary datasets and evaded FOIA requests, they don’t deserve the benefit of that doubt. We already know there’s a pattern of evasion and probable cause for criminal conspiracy charges from their own words.”
———
This is damning code.
I toyed with it here.
http://joannenova.com.au/2009/11/cru-data-cooking-recipe-exposed/
Imagine what kind of reasons you might come up with for that VERY ARTIFICIAL adjustment.

This is not smoking code.
This is a fresh pile of steaming code.
This is the pile they were trying rub our noses in, to break our awful habit, of using the most cost efficient means of energy to heat our homes, produce goods and services, and transport us to work.
I look at this, and I know they know all about “peer-review” but don’t know the first thing about “code-review”.

I think that TKI’s comment points to an area where further investigation is warrented.
I agree with others that it is certainly possible that a programmer could leave uncommented code, but that never gets called, in a module. It just doesn’t seem very likely that it wouldn’t have all kinds of “DO NOT USE THIS FUNCTION IN PRODUCTION!” type warnings around it.

If it it’s in there but commented out or whatever, that’s standard programmer stuff. Just because it’s been commented out doesn’t mean it hasn’t been run and since THE ORIGINAL DATA HAS BEEN LOST then I am not willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

To all of those saying Anthony should take down this post:
Can we definitively prove that this code snippet was used to produce anything, no we can’t BECAUSE in all likelihood, CRU can’t even reproduce their own products and their refusal to release their “real” code, and that’s assuming this isn’t “real” code which is just a specious an argument as saying it’s not…
This has created a vacuum in which the leaked release is the only thing we have to go on, despite repeated requests and, IMO, improper denials through FOIA to see what is actually under-the-hood (a.k.a. access to allow the most basic aspects of the scientific method to be observed)
Self-censoring this post is not the answer, and I think Anthony’s note is more than adequate to explain the context of this code and analysis

The following text is copied from the JunkScience.com web site. I have not tried to independently verify the claims, but it makes sense.
——————————————
Update: It has become fairly obvious this archive was not “hacked” or “stolen” but rather is a file assembled by CRU staff in preparation for complying with a freedom of information request. Whether it was carelessly left in a publicly accessible portion of the CRU computer system or was “leaked” by staff believing the FOIA request was improperly rejected may never be known but is not really that important. What is important is that:
There was no “security breach” at CRU that “stole” these files
The files appear genuine and to have been prepared by CRU staff, not edited by malicious hackers
The information was accidentally or deliberately released by CRU staff
Selection criteria appears to be compliance with an or several FOIA request(s)
With some reluctance we have decided to host compressed archives of the hacked files and uncompressed directories you can browse online. Both are linked from the menu or you can simply point your browser to http://junkscience.com/FOIA/

Bill:

The smoking gun is commented out (see the “;” = comment). Why cannot you see this?? It is obvious.

It may be commented out in briffa_sep98_d.pro, but, as has been pointed out more than once here, it is definitely not commented out in briffa_sep98_e.pro (in the harris-tree directory) In this file it it used more than once.

bill (09:36:37) :
g hall (08:57:10) :
J. Bob (08:56:09) :
John Galt (08:43:01)
JJ (08:39:45) :
david (08:14:07) etc. etc.
The smoking gun is commented out (see the “;” = comment). Why cannot you see this?? It is obvious.
The code is written by scientists for a 1off use. Why would you clean it up and make it presentable. They are not going to sell it to others.

It’s called professional standards.
Do you take any pride in your work? Are you sloppy when you think nobody is looking? Cut corners when the boss isn’t around?

bill (05:58:43) :
Hang on a moment! This code is from 1998.
If this fudge were included in the Briffa etc. documents then there would be no decline.
So all those “hide the decline emails” would be irrelevant.
No, there was a decline and it was hidden in ipcc and other official documents – as described by Steve McIntyre and Jean S..
NOAA also even deleted the post 1960 Briffa data from its archive, as though there was no data to begin with!

Technical nit about the description of line 4: The IDL findgen(n) function generates a one-dimensional array of n elements, stepping from 0 to n-1. (So findgen(6) goes from 0.0 to 5.0, and not to 6.0 as listed above.)
Thus, the findgen(19) generates a 19-element array going from 0 to 18 in integer steps, which, after being concatenated to the initial value, makes yrloc a 20-element array as stated (and the ending year for yrloc that you list is correct).

WAG (10:00:06) :
Anyone see this?
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=2300282
Apparently Climategate was only one of several organized efforts to break into universities and steal data.
Reply:
Sounds like media spin to make skeptics look like criminal kooks. There is no one to refute his story so it is a very safe spin.
I will believe that AFTER I see a police report dated several weeks ago. At this point I do not believe him and I doubt the media will bother to check if his story is true. Chances are there is a University police department so even checking with the police does not necessarily prove he is telling the truth.
The MSM showed faked film footage of a major riot at Purdue University just after the Kent state riot to get the governor off the hook for the murder of four students. The film was shown nationwide but the riot never happened. I have not trusted the MSM ever since. The Kent State riot was about the town not allowing married adult Vietnam Vets the right to vote if they were students and NOT about protesting the war. However denying voting rights would have drawn a lot more criticism so the story was changed and the riot at Purdue fabricated. (based on first hand evidence by me and my boyfriend we were at the “riots”)

you guys realized that the variable you are talking about is never even used in the code in that file?
here is the code: http://www.di2.nu/foia/osborn-tree6/briffa_sep98_d.pro
they use this data in the interpolation and get this yearlyadj
and that variable is never used.
i think the CRU data is very incriminating, this is just a very bad example.

George (10:16:34) :
Just a general comment on the code and comments from various links above.
I saw the numbers in the Excel file for grant dollars. If this crap data was in such a state, why the heck did they not use some of the grant money to hire a grad student, even in Computer Sciences, to get them a real database? They could have created a SQL database from all these crap flat files and made life so much easier. Guess I have been in the corporate enterprise world too long and just do not understand acedemia at all. It does not address the raw data issue, but it could have preserved it and made it easier. sigh.
Any database would do, even one of the various open-source databases available. Imagine the analysis that could be done if the data was properly stored in a well-designed database?

Bill, Tim,
I doesn’t seem a coincidence that the “correction” corresponds almost exactly to the 2.3 degree temperature fall over 35 years in Briffa’s 1998 paper. This paper was based on 400 trees across the whole N hemisphere; much more meaningful that the later narrow selections. It would have been a great embarrassment to the CRU at the time.

To all the nerds dissecting the code like some cadaver down to the cellular level get friggin’ real. Tell this to the Inuit’s who for centuries have lived and prospered as an indigenous population as they watch their homes sink into the methane excreting bog that was frozen for milleniums…no snow on Kilamanjaro, glaciers receding around the planet while the desertification belt expands, bird migrations changing and most improtant, something quite easily measureable…duh…the acidification of the friggin’ oceans. Seems the biggest carbon sink of all may sooner than later not be drinking any carbon at all. Rock on number freaks you’ve really proved it now.
Suggestion get out into the real world once in a while…smell the roses tatse the bitters ;(

It’s the code stupid.
Thanks Anthony for reminding us all not to get to polarized before we see the entire code warts and all. Context is everything here. I wonder how many commentors actually read your note. All we need are the raw data and the naked code. Surely the FOIA will eventually allow qualified individuals to examine the data in question and all will be made clear. That is my hope. The truth has a way of muscling in and establishing itself. Be patient grasshoppers, strength is gained first through knowledge.

“I can’t comprehend their justification for this obvious blatant fraud. What was Mann thinking when he manipulated this data in this manner?”
He was thinking about all the millions in grant money that he stood to lose as well as the long-term damage to his career, that’s what.

NickB. (11:00:41) :
You post amounts to nothing more than – “In the absence of data, we are free to make up whatever fits our preconcieved conclusion”
That is Teamspeak, and should not be practiced here.
No one is asking that Anthony take down this post, only that he tone it down so that the conclusions drawn are supported by the data presented.
We do not (yet) have sufficient information to declare this code snippet a ‘smoking gun’ or anything of the sort. We need to keep digging, instead of going off half cocked.
Anthony should tone down the conclusory tone of this post, until the above questions are relaibly answered.
Incidently, for those of you who think ‘It was commented out!’ is some sort of definitive resolution to this issue – It Aint. When we programmers ‘comment out’ code like that, we do it so that we can comment it right back in if we want. If we have no intention of ever running that code again, we dont comment it out. We delete it. That the code was commented out is no proof whatsoever that it was never used.
We need to know what this code does, what the data in it represent, to which data it was applied, what the results were, and how the results were used. Absent that, this is just an interesting lead that needs to be followed. Pretending otherwise is hypocritical, and can backfire in ways that could be used to smokescreen the objects of legitimate criticism that we are seeing in the whistleblowers data.

JJ (14:14:08) :
Admittedly, maybe I misread the following comment:
____________________________________
slow to follow (09:16:30) :
Anthony – please pay attention to the comments above. Leaving this post up with no caveat damages the credibility of your blog. Many will be passing by here without the time/interest to read the comments in detail. Unless this can be shown to produce production output to call it “smoking code” is disingenuous.
____________________________________
That said, this is a repost of the original here: http://cubeantics.com/2009/12/the-proof-behind-the-cru-climategate-debacle-because-computers-do-lie-when-humans-tell-them-to/
As a re-post/guest-post, I’m not sure how exactly Anthony could “tone it down”. It’s my understanding that in this situation the only options are caveat/disclaimer (which he had already done) or removing it entirely
Other than your summary of me that “In the absence of data, we are free to make up whatever fits our preconcieved conclusion”… that’s not what I meant to say and I don’t think that’s what I said.
What I was trying to get to is that these out of context snippets are the only pieces of the puzzle available, so the feeding frenzy should not come as a surprise. This is red meat but without context cannot definitively prove anything. No disagreement on that

Since there are nearly 200 responses here, and it’s a pain to read through ALL of them, let me repeat this point for those who missed it above. Yes, the use of the array is commented in the exemplar file. However, it is NOT commented, and used twice, in a different source file. ‘briffa_sep98_e.pro’
That said, this does not prove that the offending code was used in any published examples. Only that it could have been.
This is just one more bit of the puzzle to ponder.

As to the ‘adjusted’ data not being used anywhere, the following code comment snippets appear to suggest otherwise.
From abdlowfreq2grid.pro:
; HUGREG=Hugershoff regions, ABDREG=age-banded regions, HUGGRID=Hugershoff grid
; The calibrated (uncorrected) versions of all these data sets are used.
; However, the same adjustment is then applied to the corrected version of
; the grid Hugershoff data, so that both uncorrected and corrected versions
; are available with the appropriate low frequency variability. There is some
; ambiguity during the modern period here, however, because the corrected
; version has already been artificially adjusted to reproduce the largest
; scales of observed temperature over recent decades – so a new adjustment
; would be unwelcome. Therefore, the adjustment term is scaled back towards
; zero when being applied to the corrected data set, so that it is linearly
; interpolated from its 1950 value to zero at 1970 and kept at zero thereafter.
From calibrate_correctmxd.pro:
; We have previously (calibrate_mxd.pro) calibrated the high-pass filtered
; MXD over 1911-1990, applied the calibration to unfiltered MXD data (which
; gives a zero mean over 1881-1960) after extending the calibration to boxes
; without temperature data (pl_calibmxd1.pro). We have identified and
; artificially removed (i.e. corrected) the decline in this calibrated
; data set. We now recalibrate this corrected calibrated dataset against
; the unfiltered 1911-1990 temperature data, and apply the same calibration
; to the corrected and uncorrected calibrated MXD data.
and further on in the same file:
; Now verify on a grid-box basis
; No need to verify the correct and uncorrected versions, since these
; should be identical prior to 1920 or 1930 or whenever the decline
; was corrected onwards from.

SunSword (14:14:57) :
Why didn’t they use some of those grant dollars to hire one or more people trained in IT? Hire a real programmer, a real DBA, and buy a real database? Well…
(1) They are self-centered narcissists who think they are so smart they don’t need to hire anyone because they are so great they can do anything at all, or
(2) Because it is very CONVENIENT that the original data has been “lost” and that the model code is a rats nest of unintelligible spaghetti.
Or perhaps both.
———————————————–
There’s a third option. Their approach to data management and code isn’t much different to that of a lot of other research establishments. Mainly writing code as one-offs and they don’t have IT professionals, or won’t use them for the reasons you suggest. In most cases, no one cares whether the analysis in some routine paper is backed by proper IT procedures. The paper just doesn’t matter outside the field and if it’s found to be rubbish, it will simply reflect on the workers and the establishment.
The importance of this work grew, partly through their own political efforts, and they got away with far too much because dubious peer review took the place of verification. It changed from doing one-offs into performing a process and the expectations of QA, and development disciplines are very different. Also, it’s quite reasonable to insist that the quality of work used to inform huge policy decisions is impeccable.
They ended up holding a tiger by the tail. I can’t say I’ve got a lot of sympathy for them because it’s too serious and there’s too much evidence that they’ve behaved badly, but I can see how these things can come about bit by bit until someone finds themselves in the most unbelievable mess.

chris (13:56:53) :
no snow on Kilamanjaro
glaciers receding around the planet
while the desertification belt expands
the acidification of the friggin’ oceans
Got any more arrows in your quiver?

As a “global warming/climate change/whatever they’re calling it this week” skeptic, I’ve been going round and round with Warmers who keep trying to play the classic Wizard of Oz “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain” strategy.
But my bottom line argument is always this: If the East Anglia data is on the up-and-up, why did the so-called scientists refuse to share it (and threaten to delete it), even in response to an FOIA request? Why did they feel it necessary to ignore, silence and even press for the firing of ideological opponents? And if the original data really wasn’t destroyed, why hasn’t it been publicly released in order to shut up the skeptics once and for all?
Make no mistake: This is bigger than one university, and the Warmers know it. The entire global warming movement hangs in the balance.
As Lord Christopher Monckton pointed out, there are only four major data sets for global temperatures, and this was one of them. But the other three are interrelated, either technically or socially (i.e., the e-mails reveal a close kinship between the scientists). So it really isn’t a case of this being only one of countless databases.
And speaking of interrelated, the East Anglia data underpins the IPCC report, which is what convinces politicians to allocate billions of taxpayer dollars to “saving the planet” and sign treaties such as the Copenhagen Agreement.
That, I believe, was the endgame of the global warming hoax: As the Copenhagen Agreement reveals, the Warmers wanted to extort billions of dollars from industrialized nations and create a transnational agency with power over the countries that signed the treaty.
In other words, like so many scams through history, it all boils down to money and power.
Funny, I don’t recall ever hearing about Albert Einstein refusing to share the data behind his theories. That’s because real scientists have no reason to destroy their data, bully opponents, or — in the case of pseudo-scientist Al Gore — cancel speeches and hide from the public.
P.S. In answer to a previous question … actually, the correct term is “cut-and-DRIED,” not “cut-and-dry.” But perhaps “cut-and-try” was what the author intended.

NickB. (14:41:45) :
“As a re-post/guest-post, I’m not sure how exactly Anthony could “tone it down”. It’s my understanding that in this situation the only options are caveat/disclaimer (which he had already done) or removing it entirely”
He can first change the title. He can also emphasize the caveat with reformatting. When you said that he had posted a caveat I did a double take, as I had not seen it. I went up and looked for it, and still missed it. Finally found it … it essentially amounts to fine print buried at the bottom, when the large font head and subhead are sensational. The caveat needs to be BEFORE the poorly reasoned, inflammatory ‘guest post’. He can also make better choices as to what to feature on this blog, frankly. This ‘guest post’ is beneath the quality I expect form this site.
Note the automatically generated ‘Possibly related post’ immediately below the caveat. It links to a blog where someone rips this ‘guest post’ apart and uses it as a broad brush to paint all of us as ‘accusers’ who quote mine and are taking everything found in the leak out of context. This is exactly what I was warning about.
Somebody put their neck on the line to get this stuff out of East Anglia. We owe it to them to not waste it with bullshit ‘red meat feeding frenzies’.

“We also don’t know how this code was used. If the results never saw the light of day, then it’s no big deal – just somebody being unsuccessful in trying to pull something (maybe for internal use).”
Why, if this is someone tinkering, was it sitting in a FOIA file?
Sorry, but when I did FOIA requests I trashed anything that was just me jotting notes to myself. Normally they were destroyed as I went along, of course, not at the time of the FOIA because they were never meant to be anything but ephemera. When lawyers do discovery, they present finished documents or at least drafts intended for consideration by others, not every half-arsed revision along the way.
I just don’t credit that this can be anything but an important step along the way for CRU. It might not be the finished article, but I find it difficult to believe it is some random musings.