This is the final report, which has been embargoed until 5:01 PM PDT / 00:01 GMT March 31st.
Below is the emailed notice to MP’s sent with the PDF of the report.
Date: 30 March 2010 10:30
Subject: EMBARGOED REPORT: CLIMATE SCIENCE MUST BECOME MORE TRANSPARENT SAY MPs
To: [undisclosed recipients]
Phil Willis MP, Committee Chair, is available for embargoed interviews today. Please let me know if you wish to bid (I will be at the embargoed briefing until approx 1pm but will respond once I return).
Embargoed press briefing for science, environment and news corrs at Science Media Centre (21 Albemarle Street London, W1S 4BS), 11.30 am today.
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY COMMITTEE
Select Committee Announcement
[X]
31 March 2010
***EMBARGOED UNTIL 00.01 WEDNESDAY 31 MARCH 2010***
CLIMATE SCIENCE MUST BECOME MORE TRANSPARENT, SAY MPs
The Science and Technology Committee today publishes its report on the disclosure of climate data from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia. The Committee calls for the climate science
community to become more transparent by publishing raw data and detailed methodologies.
Phil Willis MP, Committee Chair, said:
“Climate science is a matter of global importance. On the basis of the science, governments across the world will be spending trillions of pounds on climate change mitigation. The quality of the science therefore has to be irreproachable. What this inquiry revealed was that climate scientists need to take steps to make available all the data that support their work and full methodological workings, including their computer codes. Had both been available, many of the problems at CRU could have been avoided.”
The focus on Professor Jones and CRU has been largely misplaced. On the accusations relating to Professor Jones’s refusal to share raw data and computer codes, the Committee considers that his actions were in line with common practice in the climate science community but that those practices need to change.
On the much cited phrases in the leaked e-mails-“trick” and “hiding the decline”-the Committee considers that they were colloquial terms used in private e-mails and the balance of evidence is that they were not part of a
systematic attempt to mislead.
Insofar as the Committee was able to consider accusations of dishonesty against CRU, the Committee considers that there is no case to answer.
The Committee found no reason in this inquiry to challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor Beddington, the Government Chief Scientific Adviser, that “global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity”. But this was not an inquiry into the science produced by CRU and it will be for the Scientific Appraisal Panel, announced by the University on 22 March, to determine whether the work of CRU has been soundly built.
On the mishandling of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests, the Committee considers that much of the responsibility should lie with the University, not CRU. The leaked e-mails appear to show a culture of non-disclosure at CRU and instances where information may have been deleted to avoid disclosure, particularly to climate change sceptics. The failure of the University to grasp fully the potential damage this could do and did was regrettable. The University needs to re-assess how it can
support academics whose expertise in FoI requests is limited.
Ends.
NOTES TO EDITORS:
Further details about this inquiry can be found at:
http://www.parliament.uk/parliamentary_committees/science_technology/s_t_cru_inquiry.cfm
Media Enquiries: Becky Jones: 020 7219 5693 Committee Website:
http://www.parliament.uk/science Publications / Reports / Reference
Material: Copies of all select committee reports are available from the
Parliamentary Bookshop (12 Bridge St, Westminster, 020 7219 3890) or the
Stationery Office (0845 7023474). Committee reports, press releases,
evidence transcripts, Bills; research papers, a directory of MPs, plus
Hansard (from 8am daily) and much more, can be found on
www.parliament.uk<http://www.parliament.uk/>.
Rebecca Jones
House of Commons Select Committee Media Officer Children, Schools &
Families; Health; Science & Technology; Northern Ireland; Scotland; Wales
===================================================
UPDATE:
Steve McIntyre has a few points to make, which I encourage reading here at Climate Audit
Well that is disappointing but not surprising. No mention of the software code that actually did the dirty deeds.
We are nice guys. We see the CRU failed to act more like gentlemen. That is to be regretted.
Holy whitewash Batman! I am going to invest in paints, because demand in Britain just sky-rocketted!
Well, it seems that the UK-HOC has bought into the AGW scam hook, line & sinker!!!!! Bad timing – the gig’s up.
The IPCC has hung itself and the UK-HOC seems hellbent on joining them. Talk about a house of cards. This one is built on a fault line that’s already quakin’.
The Arctic ice is ready to hit recent record hi extent, Nino’s over the hump, and the rest is lining up for AGW’s facing the music. The Big’s want to hit the ground hard – got it.
Seems like more global warming is falling in the UK …
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2010/03/global-warming.html
CLIMATE SCIENCE MUST BECOME MORE TRANSPARENT, SAY MPs
And therefore must be embargoed. What a farce.
“The Committee calls for the climate science community to become more transparent by publishing raw data and detailed methodologies.’ – Something that EVERYONE should be demanding from ALL scientists!
I wonder how many of the scientists will take this recommendation to heart?
“We therefore consider that climate scientists should take steps to make available all the data that support their work (including raw data) and full methodological workings (including the computer codes).”
Essentially a whitewash, but not unexpected. The real meat was Jones’s admission that there had been no “statistically significant” global warming for the past 15 years. This panel “found no reason in this inquiry to challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor Beddington, the Government Chief Scientific Adviser, that ‘global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity’.” In other words, they ignored the implications of Jones’s testimony.
Interesting choice of words, though: ‘induced’—not as strong as ’caused’, and more strong than ‘influenced’. Is that a sign of a softening of the government’s position?
/Mr Lynn
They have an election coming up and after the expenses fiasco just need to be seen to be doing something once in a while. There seems to have been a deal to let the University take the flak – merely an administrative bureaucratic thing.
They have absolutely no expertise to make judgements and no desire to rock boats when employment may be required and companies are seeking to profit from political largesse for ‘green’ activity. Even if they felt is pertinent they would not have stood up and risked rocking the boat.
In any case the UK Parliament and the associated government are of little consequence these days. The main decisions are taken elsewhere. They know it, so they can feel OK about getting away with as little involvement as possible. Just enough to justify a press release and gather a little publicity.
So , they kicked the question of scientific validity back to the university . Anyone care to venture a guess as to how that will turn out ?
breathtaking!!! what a whitewash!!!
Private emails? They were discussing their publicly funded research using their publicly funded email accounts..
I’d hate to think what the governments attitude would be towards “private” emails sent by their own kind. Whitewashed with the same brush?
Look at the committee votes opn pps.52-54. every single vote showed the same break up on the committee … yep they weren’t prejudiced 😉
I have flakey memory, so can someone remind me…
Didn’t the CODE prove they deliberately modified data to hide the decline and increase warming ?
I was under the impression that there was evidence that the code they wrote un-ambiguously proved they fixed the results ??
Can someone please remind me of the events regarding that ???
I wonder if this white wash will hold? There is now too much knowlege about the bad science behind the scare stories to simply put it all back in the box. This report is so easy to knock down, I wonder if there are a big enough group of journalists to undermine the findings.
Richard Sharpe (17:08:17) :
Seems like more global warming is falling in the UK …
===================================
Spring in Northern Ireland …..
http://www.u.tv/News/Weather-causes-chaos-and-power-cuts/0288e74c-15b2-46db-a258-3fffcce32ce8
next up, the same results from the IPCC investigation.
As I watched the videos of the committee hearing just after they were held it occurred to me that the committee members were, after al, just politicians . . .
I had the impression that they already sensed where the hearing would go. Any really astute politician would.
I thought at the time, sadly, that my expectations for the hearing outcome were high. But I was hopeful.
My hope did not entirely fail me. Some progress was made toward more open science in the future.
I am not surprised by the report from the committee, just disappointed.
KEY POINT for me was the terminology they used in the report. Will comment on that later.
John
Guardian: Climate researchers ‘secrecy’ criticised – but MPs say science remains intact
(N.B. LEAKED)Leaked emails from UK’s Climate Research Unit show scientists withheld information – but inquiry blames university
The MPs were unable to look in detail at allegations that data had been deleted by Jones
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/mar/31/climate-mails-inquiry-jones-cleared
Business Wk: Bloomberg: Alex Morales: U.K. Climate Science ‘Damaged’ by Leaked E-Mails, Lawmakers Say
The lawmakers also said that because a general election is due by June, they didn’t have enough time to hold an in-depth enquiry…
The lawmakers cleared Jones of dishonesty in one of the most widely-cited e-mails, in which he discussed a “trick” to hide the decline in one temperature record. Graham Stringer, one of the four members of the panel who attended the hearings and a lawmaker from the ruling Labour Party, voted against that conclusion. He argued that not enough evidence had been heard…
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-03-30/u-k-climate-science-damaged-by-leaked-e-mails-lawmakers-say.html
31 March: Norfolk EDP: Tara Greaves: UEA chief ‘cleared’ over Climatgate scandal
But one of the committee members, Graham Stringer, underlined the point that he had taken a dissenting view, and that he was less inclined to exonerate Prof Jones because he felt the committee should have made a more comprehensive inquiry into the whole issue…
http://www.edp24.co.uk/content/edp24/news/story.aspx?brand=EDPOnline&category=NewsSplash&tBrand=EDPOnline&tCategory=xDefault&itemid=NOED30%20Mar%202010%2019%3A19%3A49%3A333
UK Express: CLIMATE COVER-UP PROFESSOR CLEARED OF DISHONESTY
But one committee member, Labour MP Graham Stringer, said: “The committee has gone further than it should have done in trying to exonerate Professor Jones.
“And it went further than it should have in not saying we’ve found evidence that he had done things wrong.”..
A statement from the university added: “It is a matter of regret to us that the theft of emails and the misrepresentation of their contents has damaged the reputation of UK climate science.”
http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/166157/Climate-cover-up-Professor-cleared-of-dishonesty
NYT: AP: U.K. Panel Calls Climate Data Valid
At the same time, the lawmakers stressed that their report, written after only a single day of oral testimony, did not cover all the issues and that two other inquiries into the integrity of the science would be more thorough. ..
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/31/science/earth/31climate.html
31 March: UK Times: Ben Webster: Climate-row professor Phil Jones should return to work, say MPs
An MP on the committee told The Times that, before this month’s public hearing, the members had agreed not to question Professor Jones too closely because of his fragile condition… http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7081921.ece
Independent: Leading article: Climate change fightback, part 1
But one thing is certain, judging from the select committee’s report: the consensus on global warming remains. It is a reality, and human activities are more than likely to be largely responsible. We owe scientists like Professor Jones a debt of gratitude for pointing this out.
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/leading-articles/leading-article-climate-change-fightback-part-1-1931449.html
Not a total whitewash, but pretty damn close…
It takes a while to read 65 pages. Regrettable that.
But it is clear they didn’t want to find anything and came very close to the goal.
Well played.
LOL, considering that the committee only had proponents (one had to quit, another should have quit) and didn’t call the skeptics that DEALT with the CRU’s dishonesty, I mean “standard climate science practice that needs to be changed”, this is hardly surprising. I did though like how they are using “consensus” while ignoring all the tampering with peer review mentioned in those emails.
From the minutes at the end, it seems that Graham Stringer was always a dissident on contentious wording.
Seems that there were 3 warmists and 1 denier. These whitewashes are a joke. It will be interesting what Stringer says of the report.
What a limp-wristed whitewash!
Did we expect any other conclusion! Really!
Professor Jones almost committed suicide without any reason! Really!
Excellent cover up operation.
Typical for these kind of inqueries. They have to focus on the important part, ie withholding of data and code. It is an absolut that can be addressed. The rest, e-mails, deleted data etc. will not matter in the long run.
After all if they are forced to reveal data and code, then we’ve got them, right?
Scientific research demands reproducable results. If they deleted it, it ain’t reproducable hence has to be tossed or redone.
Free access to all of the data and code, is the big price, lets stay focused on that.
The most important thing to come from this , is that once and for all, climate science will now be under scrutiny by all of us. No more hiding under the cover of ignorance.
This will undoubtedly take years to sort through , and in the end, when the world realizes that mankind is not contributing to natural global warming , all of this fiasco will be forgotten, and will be nothing more than a footnote in history like the many other doomsday scenarios we have been subjected to in the past 50 years.
All the best guys :
Ian
It’s not for nothing that this is being called the most corrupt parliament in living memory. The inquiry specifically ruled out inquiring into the science and then once the sceptics were unable to provide evidence that demonstrates the lack of science, they then went and got some lacky from the Met Office to state the science was fine and then simply repeated this unsubstantiated “fact” as having proved the science to be safe.
It’s all a bit like the second homes. The rules didn’t specifically rule out making huge sums from switching homes, so they went and did it even though most people think it was corrupt. Similarly the behaviour of the “scientists”, are better judged by ordinary people who have integrity than by politicians whose standards leave a lot to be desired.
Unfortunately, all this report will do is to entrenched people’s views on both sides and so further diminish the standing of MPs & scientists in the public’s eyes.
How can they say there was no purposeful attempt at obfuscation of the data then say that data was deleted in order to avoid disclosure? The report contradicts itself.
I read about half of that.
Whether white or eye it is certainly being washed.
How do these ignorant weenies attain high office anyway ?
Professor Jones told us that the published e-mails represented only “one tenth of 1%” of his output, which amounts to one million e-mails, and that we were only seeing the end of a protracted series of e-mail exchanges.
1 Million Emails?
1 MILLION Emails? This guy IS a “loon” of the highest caliber.
Let’s say 1 minute per Email. Hum, 10^6/(24*365*60)/.3 = 6.4 years of work..presuming Dr. Jones was writing Emails at the rate of 1 per minute for 8 hours a day.
Realistically, most people spend about 45 minutes a day on Emails. That’s a factor of 11 times more time to generate that 1,000,000 Emails, or about 70 years.
Yeah, I forgot…silly me, the DARPAnet was up in 1940. British invention, right? And Dr. Jones IS 90 years old. Right?
So I guess he DID produce those 1 million Emails.
At least every one can be sure that a eurocrat inquire will be soundly political correct.
Although even when it does so to the extreme, as in distinguish between to trick once and to hide a decline once, and to systematically do so. And as far as the letter tells it they pretty much just made the bad results once each.
Did anybody really expect anything different? I’m mean really? No matter what side of the AGW issue you’re on, this report is exactly what you would have expected. This is pretty much a non-story…move on.
why am I not surprised, nothing to see here, move along…what a farce
By point #46 the report is hopelessly absurd.
And after #47 this reader had no more amazement to express.
No need to inspect CRU data because other independent sets exist?
And no, not two more groups as usually stated, but five….
Moving to #47,
47: “This has substance if one considers CRU’s work in isolation. But science is more than individual researchers or research groups….”
Translated: “It is true. But we don’t care. If you do you don’t understand. And since you are so stupid we will explain it exactly as Professor Jones explained it to us.”
I always urge readers to examine the source when they can. Read it……
“On the accusations relating to Professor Jones’s refusal to share raw data and computer codes, the Committee considers that his actions were in line with common practice in the climate science community but that those practices need to change…”
…and until the data and code have been made public and have been checked, all scientific studies based on them must be regarded as unsafe.
Syl, I don’t expect what Stringer knows to go away. It’ll still take time, but the truth outs itself eventually. It can’t help it.
==========
GGM (17:21:19) : Didn’t the CODE prove they deliberately modified data to hide the decline and increase warming ?
No.
Sceptics have not been surprised to find that almost all the members of the ‘Climategate’ inquiry are committed advocates of global warming
http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=5440&linkbox=true&position=7
Now we know why they switched to latex on on Stevenson screens. Supply constraints on whitewash.
The only surprise is that they had any critique to offer at all. When the faith of AGW has been the UK gov’t’s sustaining belief system for almost three decades it would be unthinkable to offer up anything that would dislodge the central tenets of their religion. Remember it was the UK that first embraced AGW and will now defend it to the death. As the old saying goes, they’ll go down with the ship in full salute.
Disgusting.
All the MPs have to do is make data and methodology transparency a condition of government research grants and the problem will be solved. That they didn’t even mention this tells me they have no intention of taking their own conclusions seriously, and neither will anyone else.
I’ve said it before. No one is going to get burned on any of this. All whitewash. Also, the U.S. taxpayer is going to get cap and trade and $3-5 gasoline plus higher electric bills. Then, our IRAs will get tapped and then if you are a sportsman and like to hunt or fish you will probably lose those rights too. I really believe we are at a “tipping point” with a rather robust situation looming.
I guess a wee dram of scotch is in order.
Wow. They investigated the meaning of ‘hide the decline’? What a joke.
Slightly OT but the reason I feel discouraged is because the real issue is avoided here there and everywhere.
The question to answer is this, is man made CO2 responsible for climate change?
Temperature going up, not relevant. Temperature going down, not relevant. Data collected this way or that way, not relevant. The physicists are silent. The current climate model is not disputed. Why?
“We have again concluded that snowfall in Britain is a thing of past.”
Starting the day after tomorrow.
http://www.snow-forecast.com/maps/static/europe/next3days/snow
The English have been famous for their stiff upper lip. Are they now courting fame for limp excuses?
The University needs to re-assess how it can
support academics whose expertise in FoI requests is limited.
In other words, it’s regrettable they broke all the rules.
Solution: They will now look into changing the rules to allow them to hide things.
Wow, that’s some paint job.
‘There, that outta do it. We’re better now, Stanley.’
Definition of an honest politician—- One who stays bought.
I guess these are honesty politicians because they are staying bought despite any facts shoved into their faces. Be interesting to find out who owns this set of slimy politicians… follow the money.
A thank you to Graham Stringer for his efforts to introduce objectivity into the report. This piece of political theater must have been a very frustrating experience for him.
I’m at a loss for words. Actually, I’m not, but the words on the tip of my tongue would probably get me [snipped]. The committee members are either ignorant or corrupt. I hope the subjects in the U.K. recotgnize this and hold Parliament accountable.
Just what I expected. Nothing much at all and plenty of whitewash.
Oops! My mistake! I thought this enquiry was intended to address the concerns of the sceptical community. While the report talks about problems with the public’s perception of climate science, it’s done nothing but compound the problem. Did they not know that we’d poke the holes in this report? Do they not understand that they’ve just handed the sceptics a fresh batch of kindling? As if we didn’t have enough to play with already!
Knowing what we know (and we bloody well do know what we know. We DID READ the emails, WE DO KNOW the history here, and we bloody well DO know the implications of dropping inconvenient segments of Briffa’s rings and retaining the rest), I’m not sure, any more, what the enquiry was supposed to achieve.
Climatology is a new science. It’s an entirely self-moderated group. A group that singularly failed in its obligations to the integrity of science in the broader sense.
The UEA clearly let the CRU do its thing, and supported it in whatever it wanted to do while ignoring all its scientific transgressions, because the bottom line is that it brought in buttloads of cash to the university.
As for the independence of the data sets, the report’s conclusion is idiocy. There is a clear case of incest between all the scientists producing these so-called “independent” value-adjusted datasets, and these datasets are demonstrably NOT independent at all. To suggest that the CRU’s work is independently verified by the existence of, and correlation with, these other datasets is an insult to our intelligence.
Oh man, I could go on for hours!
[snip]
The committee found that there was no evidence of scientific wrongdoing, and no systematic attempts to mislead. What makes you think you know so much more than they do? You would have accepted no other outcome than your preconceived notions of “guilty”, typical of conspiracy theorists. Tell me, is the New World Order influencing parliament now?
Please remember these are class conscious politicians. Results as expected.
Fabulous report,” In line with the common practise in the climate science community.”Exactly why they are not, cannot be scientists. Scientists by definition practise science by use of the scientific method. As the committee did not examine the science, why would they feel compelled to make these statements?Climate science? A wonderful idea. When might we taxpayers see some? 2010 just keeps getting better.
I found the report robust.
“…the Committee considers that his actions were in line with common practice in the climate science community but that those practices need to change…”
Gee. Let’s see. Its common practice for thugs to commit assault and battery, breaking and entering, extortion and other crimes. Those practices need to change but since its so common the committee sees absolutely no real problem. The thugs should simply be more polite when they commit their crimes.
The Committee has made themselves and accessory to the scientific fraud after the fact. They are just as guilty as anyone of the so called scientists who defrauded the public by accepting grants and cooking or inventing the data to fit their claims.
Now what would the Mad Queen in Alice’s Wonderland have to say about this?
Sickening! To conclude that “lack of transparency” was only an institutional policy shortcoming for which Dr. Phil should not be held accountable is simply breathtaking in its mendacity. With not a word about the good doctor’s conspiracy to stack the “peer review deck” or any of the other egregious, actions revealed in the CRU E-mails the review can only be seen as a whitewash. This report reflects the same contempt for the intellect of the general public we now see rampant in in our own U.S. government actions. Apparently, we are considered children who are to be herded like simple-minded cattle with the aid of fairy tales and bogeymen couched in voodoo scientific terms and sophisticated statistical blizzards of bull dung.
OFF WITH THEIR HEADS!!!!
If only they used their heads for purposes other than a whitewash…
OT, but it looks that not many thing left without global warming involvement
From Fox news
Plague Proof
As Christians begin to observe Holy Week, scientists are claiming that they found physical evidence of the 10 biblical plagues described in the Old Testament.
If you are wondering how the story belongs in The Meltdown, here’s your answer: Researchers say global warming was to blame for the plagues. The London Telegraph reports, “The scientists claim the plagues can be attributed to a chain of natural phenomena triggered by changes in the climate.”
And since they didn’t have SUVs in and around the year 1213 B.C., I guess humans are not to blame for global warming after all.
source: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,590091,00.html
“leaked e-mails”
So that’s it?!!! Finality; they were leaked, not hacked?
We skeptics expected this report to be a whitewash (it is), but some of the critical conclusions are applicable to the wider Climate Science community, and certainly apply to US players, including James Hansen and Michael Mann.
I would like to see an official re-examination of the actions of NASA GISS in altering their assessment of 1934 vs 1998 temperature data six times between July 1999 and August 2007 in an apparent attempt to show that 1934 was not warmer. (See the graph and image of GISS internal email. ) This attempt to make the warmth of 1934 disappear may be as eggregious as the manipulation of data by Michael Mann to make the Medieval Warm Period disappear in what Phil Jones of the UK Climatic Research Unit (CRU) correctly called “Mike’s Nature trick … to hide the decline”. Both unscientific data manipulations were done by US scientists using US public money.
Despite its timidity, the UK Parliamentary report comes to three correct and damaging conclusions:
1) The CRU’s “refusal to share raw data and computer codes … were in line with common practice in the climate science community but … those practices need to change.”
This is an important statement of principle that applies to the wider climate science community, including the important part of it in the US.
2) “Climate science is a matter of global importance. On the basis of the science, governments across the world will be spending trillions of pounds on climate change mitigation. The quality of the science therefore has to be irreproachable.”
This is not ordinary science where some honest mistakes and later correction are normal. In the case of climate science, the results are triggering worldwide expenitures of trillions of dollars, so the science must be absolutely solid and undeniable.
3) “… the focus of the inquiry is the implications of the disclosures for the integrity of scientific research … It is not an inquiry into global warming.”
This report does nothing to confirm (or deny) the role or level of human activities in global warming.
BOTTOM LINE: Although this UK Parliamentary inquiry has undoubtedly been easy on the climate scientists at the heart of Climategate, it does conclude that the entire climate science community has, by “common practice” refused to share data and computer codes, in violation of the accepted scientific processes and these practices must change, particularly in light of the tremendous amounts of public expenditures that hang on the results.
John Norris (19:09:15) :
“leaked e-mails”
I’ve been thinking on this for a while, on and off.
I think both sides should accept the phrase “harvested emails”. Neither negative nor positive connotations (unless you’re a Quatermass fan), and could have been done internally or externally.
/ Insert 2c to continue..
“We therefore consider that climate scientists should take steps to make available all the data that support their work (including raw data) and full methodological workings (including the computer codes).”
But, what about the data, methodology and codes that DOESN’T support their work!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH
ac patriot (18:47:30) :
[snip]
The committee found that there was no evidence of scientific wrongdoing, and no systematic attempts to mislead. What makes you think you know so much more than they do? You would have accepted no other outcome than your preconceived notions of “guilty”, typical of conspiracy theorists. Tell me, is the New World Order influencing parliament now?
————————————–
Reply:
I don’t recall a single instance in the past 15 years where Phil Jones has admitted that there has been no statistically-significant warming.
Now, call me a prude if you want, but I would certainly call his lack of candor considering the amount of money involved to be
….A SYSTEMATIC ATTEMPT TO MISLEAD!
Well, they failed to hide themselves hiding the decline. Lets see how they do with hiding the collapse!
Once again the point is missed. It is not that they used the word “trick” it is what the trick was. It figures politicians would not care about tricks.
The “committee” is absolutely full of crap. The leaked info destroys any possible way to take the supposed climate record or the supposed warming of the last 150 years seriously. It shows that a significant portion of the supposed warming or perhaps a significant majority of it is the product of fudge factors and deliberate data manipulation.
In addition it proves a manipulation of the peer review process and a corruption of scientific method that hasn’t been seen since Lysenko.
Phil Willis should be deeply embarassed and ashamed or should at least have to pass a middle school level test on scientific method. Perhaps that would be enough to stop them from saying things that are this stupid.
ac patriot (18:47:30) :
The committee found that there was no evidence of scientific wrongdoing, and no systematic attempts to mislead. What makes you think you know so much more than they do? You would have accepted no other outcome than your preconceived notions of “guilty”, typical of conspiracy theorists. Tell me, is the New World Order influencing parliament now?
Hmmm…. a patriot who certainly knows his place is to never question authority… ac, it was a white wash, another form of hide-the-decline and yes, most of the regular readers of this blog do know far more than those all-wise, all-knowing solons in the Thames, which is why we can recognize Sawyeresque handiwork.
As far as conspiracies and the New World Order influencing Parliament, I’d urge you to read C. Wright Mills’ The Power Elite for a start and then check out the following:
http://climateaudit.org/2010/03/24/globe-international/
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2010/3/24/globe-a-vehicle-for-avoiding-foi.html
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2010/3/25/globe-page-at-the-house-of-commons.html
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm/cmallparty/register/memi328.htm
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/7530961/Can-we-trust-the-Climategate-inquiry.html
http://www.globeinternational.org/
Develop some critical thinking and learn to connect the dots. Now click your heels and salute…
“The Committee found no reason in this inquiry to challenge the scientific consensus… that “global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity”. But this was not an inquiry into the science produced by CRU and it will be for the Scientific Appraisal Panel, announced by the University on 22 March, to determine whether the work of CRU has been soundly built.”
So, they weren’t actually looking at the “science” but are confident in saying there is no problem with the aforesaid “science.”
Ron Broberg
“GGM (17:21:19) : Didn’t the CODE prove they deliberately modified data to hide the decline and increase warming ?
No.”
The answer to this question is clearly yes. why would you post such a simple bald faced lie?
Basically they just repeated what Jones said. In fact, they tended to put a better spin on it than Jones did. Jones said, for example:
“[The three groups] are all working independently so we may be using a lot of common data but the way of going from the raw data to a derived product of gridded temperatures and then the average for the hemisphere and the globe is totally independent between the different groups.” In other words, we start with much the same data, but we screw it up differently. At the same time he said most researchers prefer to start with the “corrected” data. No mention of the common climate models.
The reports quotes him, but then characterizes it as different groups using different data coming to the same conclusion. They also quote a CRU submission that claims all of their data modifications have been publicly documented! If that were true, then we would have access to the original data just by removing the “corrections.” This on the same day that NASA says their data is worse than CRU’s
Other than a bunch of lousy data that has been “modified” and computer models that come up with exaggerated results, produced by a small clique of newly minted climate scientists, what is there to worry about?
Will this obvious whitewash lead to some more “leakage” from “Harry”?
For the, apparently ever suffering U.K. citizens, just a few things to note come election time: Remember these names.
Amendment proposed, at the end of line 5 to insert “Given the increasingly hostile attitudes of both sides on this issue, it is vital that these two inquiries have at least one member each who is a reputable scientist, and is sceptical of anthropogenic climate change”.—(Graham Stringer.)
Question put, That the Amendment be made.
The Committee divided.
Ayes, 1
Graham Stringer
Noes, 3
Mr Tim Boswell
Dr Evan Harris
Dr Brian Iddon
Or how about this little beauty:
Amendment proposed, after “answer” in line 3 add “Within our limited inquiry and the evidence we took, the scientific reputation of Professor Jones and CRU remains intact.”—(Dr Evan Harris.)
Question put, That the Amendment be made.
The Committee divided.
Ayes, 3
Mr Tim Boswell
Dr Evan Harris
Dr Brian Iddon
Noes, 1
Graham Stringer
Question put, That the paragraph, as amended, stand part of the Report.
The Committee divided.
Ayes, 3
Mr Tim Boswell
Dr Evan Harris
Dr Brian Iddon
Noes, 1
Graham Stringer
Paragraph 138 read and agreed to.
Also:
Question put, That the summary be added to the Report.
The Committee divided.
Ayes, 3
Mr Tim Boswell
Dr Evan Harris
Dr Brian Iddon
Noes, 1
Graham Stringer
And Finally:
Motion made, and Question put, That the Report be the Eighth Report of the Committee to the House.
The Committee divided.
Ayes, 3
Mr Tim Boswell
Dr Evan Harris
Dr Brian Iddon
Noes, 1
Graham Stringer
Resolved, That the Report be the Eighth Report of the Committee to the House.
Politicians become concerned, based on anecdotal chit chat, that mankind is impacting the climate due to industrial activity.
They spend billions of taxpayer dollars over the years to fund studies to find evidence of this impact.
Science, wallowing in all this largesse, “finds” the evidence.
Now, when these same scientists are exposed as cutting corners, the politicians “investigate.” And what, I wonder, do they find? Ahh, the scientists were a tad naughty, but their science is fine, there’s a consensus, it’s all agreed, so we can continue on with business as usual. We haven’t been made fools of, after all. Let’s cut ’em another check to find more evidence of global warming.
+++++++++
About as expected. Wouldn’t want themselves to be revealed as fools and dupes. Hey — they got what they paid for.
Gail Combs (18:21:42) :
“Definition of an honest politician—- One who stays bought.
I guess these are honesty politicians because they are staying bought despite any facts shoved into their faces. Be interesting to find out who owns this set of slimy politicians… follow the money.”
Well said….and worth repeating, which is why I posted it here.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
On the much cited phrases in the leaked e-mails-”trick” and “hiding the decline”-the Committee considers that they were colloquial terms used in private e-mails and the balance of evidence is that they were not part of a
systematic attempt to mislead.
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
I guess you should never leave it to a politician to decide what is right and wrong.
As Pilate derisively said, “What is truth?”
As soon as they tried to maked the Medieval Warm Period disappear, they were in trouble. Now, in addition to rewriting history in order that it not discredit the science, they are trying to rewrite the dictionary so that it does not discredit the cover up? What does “hide” mean again?
1.to conceal from sight; prevent from being seen or discovered: Where did she hide her jewels?
2.to obstruct the view of; cover up: The sun was hidden by the clouds.
3.to conceal from knowledge or exposure; keep secret: to hide one’s feelings.
–verb (used without object)
4.to conceal oneself; lie concealed: He hid in the closet.
–noun
5.British. a place of concealment for hunting or observing wildlife; hunting blind.
—Verb phrase
6.hide out, to go into or remain in hiding: After breaking out of jail, he hid out in a deserted farmhouse.
Patrick Davis (20:06:24) :
Depends on if enough line has been let out and the hook securely taken. The really big boys need bigger fish to toss under the bus. Then Harry may sing more.
Mr Lynn (17:14:54) :
Essentially a whitewash, but not unexpected. The real meat was Jones’s admission that there had been no “statistically significant” global warming for the past 15 years.”….
=======
Real meat? You might think that if you don’t know what “statistically significant” means.
On the mishandling of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests, the Committee considers that much of the responsibility should lie with the University, not CRU.
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
After all the CRU guys never did tell anyone there was one. Making it ignorance is 0% of the law.
All in all one of the best efforts of whitewashing I’ve seen in my life, maybe the best.
No real surprise, since the UK has come to this: click
As somebody said “lots of smoke but no gun.” I expected cries of “whitewash.” People say that when things don’t turn out their way. It’s kinda like those who say we would have won the game , but the refs cheated.
Wouldn’t that be something. It’s too much to hope for, I guess.
Ron Broberg says this:
“GGM (17:21:19) : Didn’t the CODE prove they deliberately modified data to hide the decline and increase warming ?
No”
Paul has given the succinct reply but this denialism needs to be rebutted in more detail. But where to start given the overwhelming detail available; Briffa’s little saga is as good as any; years of obfuscation and when inadvertant revelation occurs we find data so constrained and tortured as to be of no meaning except to support a pre-ordained conclusion; on second thoughts Paul’s approach is the best; anyone who can reach Broberg’s conclusion is beyond rational persuasion.
Have any of you people ever considered the possibility that perhaps the explanations that have been offered, and accepted by this committee, were true? No? thought not.
Have any of you people ever considered the possibility that perhaps the explanations that have been offered, and accepted by this committee, were true? No? thought not.
Good point.
Hmmm.
Mmm.
Mmm.
Nah . . .
Wren (20:23:17) :
As somebody said “lots of smoke but no gun.” I expected cries of “whitewash.” People say that when things don’t turn out their way. It’s kinda like those who say we would have won the game , but the refs cheated>>
But… they did cheat. and lie. and make up new rules as they went along. What? Disclosing data is standard in science? WELL, this is CLIMATE science, we have our OWN rules. What? Sticking two completely different data sets together and calling it one isn’t standard in science? Well, this is CLIMATE science, we have our OWN rules. What? History doesn’t support the theory? Well, this is CLIMATE science. We write our OWN history. What? We were caught using words like “trick” and “hide”? Well, this is CLIMATE science, we have our OWN meanings for those words. What, the temperature record shows no statisticaly significant change for 15 years? Well, this is CLIMATE science we have our OWN definition of significant. What? The polar ice is increasing, snow extent is increasing, ocean heat content is decreasing? Well, this is CLIMATE science. We have our OWN meanings for those things, and they mean the world is getting wamer. If we have to define 17 degrees C as being warmer than 18 degrees C, well by golly that’s what we’re going to do, this is CLIMATE science where the conclusions have been made and the data had better pay attention because in CLIMATE science that’s the rule, the theory dictates the data.
Really Wren, you are a wonderful source of amusement. I think there are two possibilities. Either YOU think WE are dumb enough to buy all that, or…..
My apologies to ACTUAL climate scientists, I know you are out there. It is unfortunate that the white wash attempt winds up looking more like tar and it gets on everyone.
They may have been given a pass by politicians but there is still the court of public opinion where right and wrong does matter.
Wren (20:17:16) :
I don’t know, but I think I just spotted a unit root O.O
From today’s guardian.uk
“US oil company donated millions to climate sceptic groups, says Greenpeace”
ExxonMobile? Nope.
Koch Industries
According to the article, Greenpeace reports Koch giving $73m to climate sceptic groups ‘spreading inaccurate and misleading information’.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment
Max Hugoson (17:51:21) : “1 Million Emails? Let’s say 1 minute per Email. Hum, 10^6/(24*365*60)/.3 = 6.4 years of work..presuming Dr. Jones was writing Emails at the rate of 1 per minute for 8 hours a day….”
But Max, a million is only 10² or 10³. Al Gore, the famous scientist, says the temperature of the Earth is millions of degrees. The estimated temperature of the core is about 10,000 degrees R, so a million must be roughly 100 to 1000, to climatological accuracy. Thus, under postmodern science and Newspeak mathematics, Dr. Jones only wrote at most 1000 emails. That’s what he meant by “a million.”
Science is dead, and justice has just been fatally wounded.
I think the problem is that someone has switched out the whitewash with white latex paint which is IR transparent. This causes them to experience warming when none actually exists.
davidmhoffer (20:39:00) :
Wren (20:23:17) :
As somebody said “lots of smoke but no gun.” I expected cries of “whitewash.” People say that when things don’t turn out their way. It’s kinda like those who say we would have won the game , but the refs cheated>>
But… they did cheat. and lie. and make up new rules as they went along. What? Disclosing data is standard in science? WELL, this is CLIMATE science, we have our OWN rules. What? Sticking two completely different data sets together and calling it one isn’t standard in science? Well, this is CLIMATE science, we have our OWN rules. What? History doesn’t support the theory? Well, this is CLIMATE science. We write our OWN history. What? We were caught using words like “trick” and “hide”? Well, this is CLIMATE science, we have our OWN meanings for those words. What, the temperature record shows no statisticaly significant change for 15 years? Well, this is CLIMATE science we have our OWN definition of significant. What? The polar ice is increasing, snow extent is increasing, ocean heat content is decreasing? Well, this is CLIMATE science. We have our OWN meanings for those things, and they mean the world is getting wamer. If we have to define 17 degrees C as being warmer than 18 degrees C, well by golly that’s what we’re going to do, this is CLIMATE science where the conclusions have been made and the data had better pay attention because in CLIMATE science that’s the rule, the theory dictates the data.
Really Wren, you are a wonderful source of amusement. I think there are two possibilities. Either YOU think WE are dumb enough to buy all that, or…..
My apologies to ACTUAL climate scientists, I know you are out there. It is unfortunate that the white wash attempt winds up looking more like tar and it gets on everyone.
======
I like the way allegations based on suspicions boomerang on the alleger. That’s justice.
Wren (20:23:17) :
“As somebody said “lots of smoke but no gun.” I expected cries of “whitewash.” People say that when things don’t turn out their way. It’s kinda like those who say we would have won the game , but the refs cheated.”
UH HUH….but there are plenty of times when refs’ bad calls queer the game, Wren….so your point is nonsense!
As far as your expected cries of “whitewash”….what if it really WAS a whitewash??
Would it matter then whether or not things turn out “their” way or not??
Reasonable minds in search of the truth would not care if it turned out “their” way or not, right, wren? As long as the truth came out??
The problem is here…is that the truth has not come out.
The best part about it is, wren, the truth WILL always eventually surface.
The question is…will people who are blind and loyal to one cause or the other, not be able to examine the truth for the truth’s sake???
Given this quote from the report, which I will leave you with, I don’t think so:
“The Committee found no reason in this inquiry to challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor Beddington, the Government Chief Scientific Adviser, that “global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity”.
Retarded, backwards, assumption-dominated Groupthink at its worst.
Maybe this is a reason that the British Empire faded….and the USA one is not far behind.
DUH!
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Am I the only one that is chilled by the statement,
Note the finality of the word “will”, not might or may but “will”.
Even in this (marginal) reproach of the shameful actions of Jones and the CRU there is the brazen grab for the public’s wallet.
Climate science is a matter of global importance. On the basis of the science, governments across the world will be spending trillions of pounds on climate change mitigation. The quality of the science therefore has to be irreproachable. What this inquiry revealed was that climate scientists need to take steps to make available all the data that support their work and full methodological workings, including their computer codes. Had both been available, many of the problems at CRU could have been avoided.
====
I agree. The science should open for all to see. Of course that may increase the cost, but it will be worth it.
Wren (20:50:50) : “I like the way allegations based on suspicions boomerang on the alleger. That’s justice.”
Huh? What boomerang? What is your motivation here? Is it logic? Or is it some emo “that’s justice” BS?
What boomerang, Wren? Nothing really has changed.
In your mind, maybe.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Robert E. Phelan (19:51:14) :
“a patriot who certainly knows his place is to never question authority”
I’m a US citizen, so I hardly think my patriotism would influence me on a matter regarding British Parliament. Quite the opposite.
“I’d urge you to read C. Wright Mills’ The Power Elite for a start and then check out the following”
Umm, sounds like a good book, but not relevant here. I’m not appealing to authority, my point is that the committee has had access to and reviewed all the evidence, including lab books and unpublished data from the lab. As an outside observer, I’m more inclined to trust their opinion than that of the group of commentors from an AGW denial blog.
As for your links, again i don’t see the relevance to the House of Commons Science and Technology committee, or its report, which is the topic at hand. None of the committee members are listed as members of Globe International,. since I don’t plan on spending the rest of my night following up, perhaps you can enlighten me as to what your point was? That is, if you’re talking about the subject at hand. Let’s not get sidetracked here, your links seem to focus on the separate University Inquiry.
Finally, I have to wonder whether you question the climatologists simply because they are experts? You have every right to question them, but if you want to be taken seriously you’d better quit your day job and start doing some real research in the area. It’s quite easy to postulate from ignorance, its another thing altogether to really study a subject and come up with legitimate new ideas. Keep in mind that the scientific method that produced AGW is exactly the same one that resulted in electricity, the industrial revolution, and the internet, all of which I can be reasonably sure that you rely on every day.
Wren (20:44:23) :
According to the article, Greenpeace reports Koch giving $73m to climate sceptic groups ’spreading inaccurate and misleading information’. >>
Ah, yes, that paragon of virtue whose own founder quit in disgust of what they have become, Greenpeace, has done a study. I read the article and I read the list of donations and what they were for.
Can you, or Greenpeace, provide one solitary single scrap of documentation to show that there was an agreement to mislead that was being paid for? Is there a single email or letter talking about “hiding” things or perhaps one about a “trick”? When you holler really loud do you conclude that a few moments later someone mocks you from far away by repeating what you say?
The code provided looked pretty damning, but there is nothing to say they used it, AFAICT. “We just wrote that code, but we never used it.”
In other words, it is like someone sneaking around the back of the bank at midnight with drills, explosives, and a crowbar, and saying they were just out for a stroll in the cool air. The crowbar? the explosives? Exercise, man! Weight training! Stop being so suspicious!
Hang on, let me take that back. It is actually more like being caught the day after the bank breakin with all the breakin materials and with cctv proving you took them around the back of the bank the night before.
Here’s one Wall Streeter’s take on it, from bloomberg.com. If this proposed transparency actually happens, the whole thing will fall apart thanks to people like Anthony et al here. But transparency is often promised.
The two other enquiries noted would also help, if they happen.
March 31 (Bloomberg) — “Britain’s global warming scientists damaged their reputation by “unacceptable” withholding of data in response to freedom of information requests, said a panel of lawmakers who probed the so-called climategate scandal.
Parliament’s Science and Technology Committee said the University of East Anglia’s “culture of non-disclosure” in relation to its climate research may have broken freedom of information laws by failing to publish data sought by critics of global warming theory.
The 59-page report is the most detailed look by lawmakers into the controversy that erupted in November when thousands of e-mails were hacked from the school’s computer servers shortly before world leaders met in Copenhagen to discuss a treaty aimed at keeping a lid on climate change.
“What was reprehensible is that this area of science is of such global importance economically and politically that there was not a culture of releasing all the data and methodology as a matter of course,” panel Chairman Phil Willis said in London before the report was released today. “That is how things should be in the future.”
The e-mails from the university’s Climatic Research Unit allowed global warming skeptics, including U.S. Senator James Inhofe, a Republican from Oklahoma, to question data making the case that humans are causing worldwide increases in the temperature.
‘Damaged the Reputation’
“The disclosure of CRU e-mails has damaged the reputation of U.K. climate science and, as views on global warming have become polarized, any deviation from the highest scientific standards will be pounced on,” the committee wrote.
The lawmakers also said that because a general election is due by June, they didn’t have enough time to hold an in-depth enquiry.
They cleared Phil Jones, head of the school’s Climatic Research Unit, of wrongdoing, saying he acted “in line with common practice,” in not publishing all his methods and computer codes.
Jones stepped aside from his post in December pending completion of an investigation. In one e-mail, he wrote of deleting files rather than handing data to skeptics. In a Nov. 24 statement, the school said no record had been deleted or altered.
Jones Cleared
The lawmakers cleared Jones of dishonesty in one of the most widely-cited e-mails, in which he discussed a “trick” to hide the decline in one temperature record. Graham Stringer, one of the four members of the panel who attended the hearings and a lawmaker from the ruling Labour Party, voted against that conclusion. He argued that not enough evidence had been heard.
The members of Parliament said there was “prima facie” evidence to suggest Jones’s research unit has breached the U.K. Freedom of Information Act of 2000 and that responsibility for this lay with the university, not the climate unit.
The university said in an e-mailed statement that it recognizes the need for it to reassess how it deals with freedom of information requests and that it will provide more support to its academics. The school said it welcomed the lawmakers’ “largely positive” report.
“There was a culture of not being cooperative with people that they thought were trying to undermine them,” said Evan Harris, a Liberal Democrat lawmaker who serves on the committee. “The take-home message from all of this is there must be a culture of openness.”
Two further enquiries are being following the e-mail leak: one to review the science published by the University of East Anglia, and another into the content of the e-mails themselves.”
“Hiding the Decline . . . . not part of systematic attempt to mislead.”
Well one thing is for sure the masses aren’t going to buy that.
They will shrug it off with a chuckle and mark it down as just yet another governmental committee made up of a bunch of over-aged and senile dunces that got the job because of being political hacks.
Some of the “Great” is gone out of Great Britain. One can only hope the call for transparency is retroactive.
Wren – Greenpeace “says” many things. And The Guardian prints them. If you really followed the money it would not take you where you obviously want it to go. Just the opposite.
I expected whitewash. I did not expect whitewash mixed with bleach. Wow.
@ davidmhoffer (20:39:00):
lol
Dave N (17:19:15) :
Private emails? They were discussing their publicly funded research using their publicly funded email accounts..
———
The University of East Anglia is a “public” research university in Norwich, England. In the United Kingdom, all universities are funded by government teaching and research grants except for the University of Buckingham. However, unlike in Continental European countries, the British government does not own the universities’ assets and university staff are not civil servants. United Kingdom universities are therefore better described as independent institutions with public funding, rather than public universities per se.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_university
Most of UAE income and assets are private, from endowments, tuition, contract work, running student housing and meals, etc.
http://www.uea.ac.uk/polopoly_fs/1.138770!signed%200809%20accounts.pdf
CRU Professor and staff emails are as private as those of BP’s top scientist, Steven Koonin, or CEO Dr. Hayward. Stealing Dr. Hayward’s embarrassing emails from 1990 onward is just as illegal as stealing Dr. Jone’s emails. Even when the British Government owned BP (as the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company) the public did not have a legal right to access BP executive files and phone calls.
Even if exposing crimes,
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7062669.stm
it is best to lay low after stealing information. That’s why the CRU “whistle-blower” has remained hidden – they could still be prosecuted.
ac patriot-“Keep in mind that the scientific method that produced AGW is exactly the same one that resulted in electricity, the industrial revolution, and the internet, all of which I can be reasonably sure that you rely on every day.”
LOL
ac, in the spirit of the committee’s report, that makes eminent sense..
Of course they are going to side with AGW – to do otherwise they would have to admit the massive carbon taxes imposed are illegal and need to be rescinded. Plus they would expose themselves for the fools they are.
“Can you, or Greenpeace, provide one solitary single scrap of documentation to show that there was an agreement to mislead that was being paid for? Is there a single email or letter talking about “hiding” things or perhaps one about a “trick”? When you holler really loud do you conclude that a few moments later someone mocks you from far away by repeating what you say?”
Yeah….Wren….show one single email in the of impropriety on the “other” side.
Let’s see it. Show it.
The burden of proof….is on you.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
This is the state machine in action, they are the perfect representation of a state machine looking after the states interests.
The truth is buried and the facts manipulated to suit their own agenda, they care nothing for the truth and they care even less for the long term reputation of science.
Science is merely a tool to be used for political means and ends by a political class so used to lying and getting away with it that they actually believe themselves to be untouchable.
Dissapointing? Certainly. Unexpected? No.
The lying state at work, the state that has lied to us for so long now lost in a fog of lies of its own making that they can no longer recognize their precarious situation.
The lying state no longer sees that the lies they spread are no longer believed, so immersed in lies they are now even lying to themselves. When a state begins lying to itself there is no hope for that state.
The truth is emerging as the sun in the morning, it cannot be stopped by the lying state anymore than the tide can be held back by state diktat. We should rejoice at this report, the state has lost its way and its moral authority and more importantly is being seen by all to have lost those things.
We are seeing the lying state for what it has become, we are seeing what lurks behind the curtain of lies and it truly is a pathetic sight, let them continue to lie, to themselves and us because every single lie now betrays them, they are destroying themselves now with every word they utter.
“According to the article, Greenpeace reports Koch giving $73m to climate sceptic groups ’spreading inaccurate and misleading information’.”
As usual, Greenpeace supplied no facts at all, just allegations. Just what was inaccurate and misleading – other than the Greenpeace press releases?
I don’t see why there’s an uproar. WTF did you expect?
The committee isn’t in a position to judge the science. Their job was to determine whether or not CRU was operating grossly inconsistently with UEA and/or the community as a whole.
They concluded that CRU/UEA were operating consistently but bluntly stated that they didn’t like it. It reads like a reprimand; bear in mind the lack of authority of the committee itself.
This is a win.
Wren — According to the article, Greenpeace reports Koch giving $73m to climate sceptic groups ’spreading inaccurate and misleading information’.
Oooooh. 73 *whole* million? Wow.
Good heavens, this isn’t even the daily budget for the AGW machine. Maybe you ought to look up the greenpeace budget.
“Wren (21:00:58) :
I agree. The science should open for all to see. Of course that may increase the cost, but it will be worth it.”
How so? Other “science” isn’t more expensive because it’s open for all to see.
@ac patriot (21:05:27) : “I’m not appealing to authority, my point is that the committee has had access to and reviewed all the evidence, including lab books and unpublished data from the lab. As an outside observer, I’m more inclined to trust their opinion than that of the group of commentors from an AGW denial blog.”
That’s absolute nonsense! There is nothing in the report that suggests they did any such thing. Quite the contrary; they said they did not review the science. They clearly did not interview any skeptics. And all their “data” is simply regurgitated quotes from Jones and CRU. Under the circumstances, there is no reason whatever to trust their opinion.
Manipulating data, covering up the truth, plotting against your opposition—usual fare for politicians. So how would they be able to see anything wrong here?
DCC – Exactly. Just what “innacurate and misleading” information was ‘spread’ ?
So much for that tired old ‘Big Oil’ conspiracy theory.
On the other hand, there is abundant evidence of a conspiracy to spread bogus and very scary information by Big Green Inc., as usual.
So , they kicked the question of scientific validity back to the university
No UAE members will assess CRU scientific validity.
Private emails? They were discussing their publicly funded research using their publicly funded email accounts..
Which email accounts did they use?
The redacted address from the leak/hack is:
p.jones@xxxxxxxxx.xxx
Clearly the X’s replace the real letters. Does this fit with Phil Jones’ University email address? The university address is:
…XXX@uea.ac.uk
Regardless, private correspondence, even on the University email account, is not public property. No personal correspondence is, of any type. The water cooler and the corridor in which it sits is likewise publicly funded. Conversations around it are likewise not public property.
Didn’t the CODE prove they deliberately modified data to hide the decline and increase warming?
The code was not used for any published product. It was used to test data (not to adjust it) and not incorporated into final analyses.
Wow. They investigated the meaning of ‘hide the decline’? What a joke.
Seeing as this was one of the most widely quoted excerpts – perhaps the most widely quoted – it’s quite responsible of them to investigate the meaning. Imagine the response here if they hadn’t.
In other words, it’s regrettable they broke all the rules.
The report makes quite clear that it is not able to judge whether FOI rules were broken, agrees that there is prima facie evidence of wrongdoing, and refers the matter to the following inquiries.
In a court of law, innocence is presumed until otherwise proven. The court of public opinion has no such standard, unfortunately.
How can they say there was no purposeful attempt at obfuscation of the data then say that data was deleted in order to avoid disclosure?
They do not say that data was deleted, just that ‘information’ may have been deleted. Most of the email correspondence on deleting emails was not about station data.
That there was a culture of non-disclosure to persistent skeptics is not in doubt. Whether any actual station data (or millennial reconstruction data) was deleted from emails remains to be seen.
With not a word about the good doctor’s conspiracy to stack the “peer review deck”
Did you read a different report? Page 21 of the report is titled “Perverting the peer review process.”
Sceptics have not been surprised to find that almost all the members of the ‘Climategate’ inquiry are committed advocates of global warming
That article you linked is about a different report and names no one from the House of Commons report – the subject of this thread.
So, they weren’t actually looking at the “science” but are confident in saying there is no problem with the aforesaid “science.”
No. They said:
Who would be comfortable with politicians determining the validity of science?
But, what about the data, methodology and codes that DOESN’T support their work!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
Spencer, Christy, Soon and Baliunas etc are at liberty to make all their code open access. If they have not, flooding them with FOI requests seems to work.
Once again the point is missed. It is not that they used the word “trick” it is what the trick was. It figures politicians would not care about tricks.
They define what they think trick means and leave the scientific exploration of that issue to the scientific inquiry. Who would be comfortable with politicians doing science?
————————————
There seems to be a fundamental miscomprehension of the remit of the House of Commons review and of what is contained in that document.
ac patriot (18:47:30) :
Nice personal attack, but you’ll be happy to know that my day job as a university professor is quite secure, I have spent several years researching AGW, I lecture on the scientific method and have a professional interest in society and technology with thirty years of business and computer technology experience. Some people even take me seriously.
Umm, sounds like a good book, but not relevant here
The book and the links deal directly with your sneering reference to conspiracy theorists and the New World Order influencing Parliament. It’s obvious you have never heard of the book, let alone read it, have no idea of either its significance or what the nature of “conspiracy” really is. The references were intended as a sort of homework assignment to round out your education, but since you have decided that they are not relevant and choose to remain vincibly ignorant then go in peace, but try to be accurate in your raving: my point is that the committee has had access to and reviewed all the evidence, including lab books and unpublished data from the lab; in point of fact they did not access those and if you had bothered to read the report you will see that they listed all of their sources of information. Lab Books and unpublished data are not among those sources.
I was intrigued by a memorandum to the inquiry forwarded by Dr Sonja Boehmer-Christiansen.
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/cmsctech/memo/climatedata/uc2602.htm
She is openly admitting that her her choices for publication are guided by her political views, and seems to be surprised that her journal is characterised as a journal of choice for climate skeptics.
E&E is a social science journal.
“Greenpeace reports Koch giving $73m to climate sceptic groups”
Who is giving money to Greenpeace and how much?
They couldn’t clean someone that dirty as Phil Jones is. While sweeping it under the carpet they smeared themselves. The political representatives of EU are not trustworthy any more. Their legitimacy is in doubt. One cannot believe he lives in a democracy but it suggests EU is a corrupted Union of corporative states establishing some kind of a carbon socialism. It is a bad luck to live in a country like my home Czech Republic that became a prey of fascistic National Socialism, later fell under bondage of communistic so called Real Socialism and now a green dictatorship of €U Carbon Socialism removed it instead!!!
Wren (20:23:17) :
“As somebody said “lots of smoke but no gun.” I expected cries of “whitewash.” People say that when things don’t turn out their way. It’s kinda like those who say we would have won the game , but the refs cheated.”
UH HUH….but there are plenty of times when refs’ bad calls queer the game, Wren….so your point is nonsense!
As far as your expected cries of “whitewash”….what if it really WAS a whitewash?….
=====
Usually, refs are right, aren’t they?
Patrick Davis (21:52:30) :
“Wren (21:00:58) :
I agree. The science should open for all to see. Of course that may increase the cost, but it will be worth it.”
How so? Other “science” isn’t more expensive because it’s open for all to see.
==============
That’s what you think. Ask someone working on proprietary research to share what he knows with you.
Tom Sawyer and a fence would feel real comfortable with this report.
“Greenpeace reports Koch giving $73m to climate sceptic groups”
Who is giving money to Greenpeace and how much?
You mean you don’t know?
Whatever the case, your rejoinder purely is tit-for-tat. If GISSTemp received money from a solar panel corporation, how impressed would you be when someone rejoined with “but look at Koch’s funding!”
It wouldn’t matter who funded any mainstream climate science. Governments? Agenda-driven. Corporations? Profit-driven.
What funding source for climate science would skeptics consider reasonable? Answer – none. Any source would be grist in the skeptical mill.
Seems to me that this particular committee could never produce anything stronger about the science than it did. ‘Nor reason to challenge’ is not the same as ‘exonerated’, and I think they were being substantially honest in effectively admitting that they aren’t qualified to judge the quality of the work..being politicos with no science training (bar Stringer’s dissenting voice).
But the harsh words about secrecy should send a chill down the warmists spine. No UK based researcher will ever be allowed or expected to conceal their data or code in future, and with M&M and Anthony’s and the Bishop’s great examples, there will be many willing and skilled people who will voluntarily examine it in detail. And any flaws will be out in the open and debatable.
The gatekeepers of the journals and the blogs (eg Real Climate) will no longer have the power to stifle dissent that they have had. Peer review by three referees will crumble in the face of 1000 knowledegable critics..with real data and real code to work with.
My personal doubts about climate change have always been focussed on the sloppiness of the ‘science’ employed. This report may come to be seen as a huge step in getting all parties to clean up their act and for the true state of affairs to become apparent.
So a muted two cheers from me.
Wren (22:57:58) :
That’s what you think. Ask someone working on proprietary research to share what he knows with you
Wren, the public nature of science is probably the most important element of science. Research that is not published for examination, replication and comment by the science community is not science. Research paid for from the public purse is not “proprietary”. Phil Jones has received almost a half million dallars from the US DOE alone. Researchers should be given a reasonable amount of time to analyze and publish, but failing to release the data and methods (and code is “method”) is not science. When trillion dollar decisions are being made on the basis of your research and analysis, “proprietary” doesn’t cut it.
“We therefore consider that climate scientists should take steps to make available all the data that support their work (including raw data) and full methodological workings (including the computer codes).”
What about the data that don’t support their work?
“Wren (22:57:58) :
That’s what you think. Ask someone working on proprietary research to share what he knows with you.”
How is taxpayer funded work, errrmmm, proprietary? Or do you mean property of the taxpayer?
Why, if there has been nothing untoward, no purposeful deception, did Guardian’s most vehement alarmist George Monbiot demand Jones step down??
With so many egos, and trillions of dollars in carbon trading at risk – the wash arrives via politicians protective of manicured turf.
*** SURPRISE ***
””Wren on March 30, 2010 at 10:57 pm -That’s what you think. Ask someone working on proprietary research to share what he knows with you.””
Wren,
You picked the moral/professional low road on ‘open science’theme. Do you think that the cost of the CRU failure to comply with the FOI requests is less than complying promptly would have been?
We are never going away, the pressure on openess will escalate and we will be at higher and higher levels of vigilance for those scientists with hidden info. The resistance to comply with FOI requests will be increasingly more expensive in the future than just promply complying.
John
But the harsh words about secrecy should send a chill down the warmists spine.
I tend to go along with the consensus view of climate change (which makes me a ‘warmist’, I guess) and I rather hope that data and code are all made open – if this can be done without overly delaying ongoing research. If CRU ask for more funding for this, hopefully it won’t be used as a pretext to complain about bigger budgets for climate research.
Robert E. Phelan (22:18:06) :
“Nice personal attack”
I never attacked you personally.
“You’ll be happy to know that my day job as a university professor is quite secure, I have spent several years researching AGW, I lecture on the scientific method and have a professional interest in society and technology with thirty years of business and computer technology experience”
Really now, in what field may I ask? That is a confusing array of work. Are you a climate professor? Business? Computer Science? Did your research on AGW result in peer-reviewed papers disputing the scientific consensus?
The book and the links deal directly with your sneering reference to conspiracy theorists and the New World Order influencing Parliament.
Nonetheless they are still irrelevant to the committee’s report. You give no evidence that Globe had any influence on the members of the committee.
It’s obvious you have never heard of the book, let alone read it … The references were intended as a sort of homework assignment to round out your education
Obviously, I glanced over the references, and as I stated found nothing of interest to the discussion. It seems that you’re unable to point out their relevance other than they might help me in some general manner. I’ll put them on my reading list, at the bottom.
Actually, the book sounds genuinely interesting, although after reading its synopsis on amazon I think I would interpret it quite differently than you have. The three prongs of power mentioned, the military, corporations, and political elite, have vested interest in suppressing news of AGW, not promoting it. Moreover, it is a book about America and I doubt a good reference for the workings of British Parliament.
if you had bothered to read the report you will see that they listed all of their sources of information. Lab Books and unpublished data are not among those sources
Good point, I had assumed that it followed along the lines of a typical University inquiry, incorrectly. However, my main point stands that they had access to more information, directly from the source, than the readers of this blog.
savethesharks (20:52:52) : UH HUH….but there are plenty of times when refs’ bad calls queer the game….
Nice point, worth making, Chris.
‘Within our limited inquiry and the evidence we took, the scientific reputation of Professor Jones and CRU remains intact. We have found no reason in this unfortunate episode to challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor Beddington, that “global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity”. It was not our purpose to examine, nor did we seek evidence on, the science produced by CRU’ conclusion 23.
Note the last sentence. They did not examine the science produced by CRU. So they took the word of Prof. Beddington, whose department has been a global warming fanatic for a decade, as to what the scientific concensus is.
The only way to determine the concensus is to measure it directly. That they did not do. So they can draw no conclusions at all on that.
Professor Beddington’s opinion is one of self-interest. His position must be taken with great skepticism.
This report means nothing. It has been brought out before the election as New Labour try to lie their way to re-election.
The arguments were won last year. Now they must be forced home. And those who resist them must be thrown out of politics. Just like the expenses fiddlers are being thrown out. The new code on MPs’ expenses for the UK is not perfect, but it’s nigh on perfect. If it is implemented fairly. A similar root and branch reform of climate science is necessary and only practicioners who subscribe to proper rules of science can participate.
End of story.
Parliamentary Report:
“[T]his was not an inquiry into the science produced by CRU and it will be for the Scientific Appraisal Panel, announced by the University on 22 March, to determine whether the work of CRU has been soundly built.”
Sky News headline:
“‘Climategate’ Prof ‘Did Not Distort Data.'”
http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/UK-News/Climategate-Prof-Phil-Jones-University-Of-East-Anglias-Climate-Research-Unit-Didnt-Distort-Data/Article/201003415589450?lpos=UK_News_First_Home_Article_Teaser_Region_0&lid=ARTICLE_15589450_Climategate_Prof_Phil_Jones_University_Of_East_Anglias_Climate_Research_Unit_Didnt_Distort_Data
“I think I’ll delete the file rather than send to anyone. Does your similar act in the US force you to respond to enquiries within 20 days? – our does ! The UK works on precedents, so the first request will test it. We also have a data protection act, which I will hide behind. Tom Wigley has sent me a worried email when he heard about it – thought people could ask him for his model code. He has retired officially from UEA so he can hide behind that.” – Phil Jones
“…the Committee considers that his actions were in line with common practice in the climate science community but that those practices need to change…”
As do child abuse practices covered up by the church need to change. i.e. The whole community is corrupt. This is committee wordsmithing to make malfeasance sound normal. And to protect the $billions$ of dollars riding on the fiction of global warming. Read Jones’ emails. He hangs himself – which is just.
David Q. (17:44:58) :
After all if they are forced to reveal data and code, then we’ve got them, right?
Scientific research demands reproducable results. If they deleted it, it ain’t reproducable hence has to be tossed or redone.
Free access to all of the data and code, is the big price,
lets stay focused on that.
Can some one please apply this to the MLO record.
You stand a better chance of getting such in the USA than we do in the UK.
I wonder if Graham Stringer wandered “into this” in nievety.
Maybe he thought the science was robust,
so saw no problems in asking the questions he did.
He did look shocked at the replies he recieved,
and then went quiet.
If researchers working for Exxon had tried to “hide the decline” in a report the way the thousands of climate scientists that collaborated on the IPCC report and excluded the embarrassing tree ring data, hid the decline, the Exxon researchers would be considered lying criminals by the climate scientists. But when environmentalists do something like that, then it’s just a legitimate disagreement about what data should be used and how it should be analyzed. This is why their conclusion that the evidence is overwhelming cannot be trusted, because their bias is so intense that they can’t see straight enough to fairly evaluate the evidence, no matter how well intentioned they are.
What about the data that don’t support their work?
I said this above but it bears repeating, seeing as the question has come up again.
Spencer, Christy, Soon and Baliunas etc are at liberty to make all their code (and data) open access. If they have not, flooding them with FOI requests seems to work.
The raw data is available.
ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/v2/
http://dss.ucar.edu/datasets/ds570.0/
Both the raw and the adjusted data are available in the first link. I’d like to see a skeptical analysis of the raw global data compared with global adjusted.
They did not examine the science produced by CRU. So they took the word of Prof. Beddington, whose department has been a global warming fanatic for a decade, as to what the scientific concensus is.
Beddington has correctly identified the consensus view. You can argue about what consensus means, but there is no doubting that there is one. If in doubt, check the IPCC report, which, while it’s a UN-backed, corrupted, agenda-driven, socialist reformative political document, nevertheless also reflects the consensus view.
Polls are popular here, so you can check some recent ones answered by climate scientists showing >90% agreement with Beddington’s description.
There are greater than 10 000 scientists working on climate or climate-related science. If you can find 101 of these that disagree with Beddington’s description, you may have something. Maybe.
Let me stress, they have to have published in the field of climate, or climate-related studies. This wipes out a number of well-known petitions, and Inhofe’s famous list, which is neither a petition nor a poll (it’s a collected of unsolicited quotes), and which includes scientists who agree with Beddington’s view.
Best of luck meeting those requirements.
“Most recently, the sceptics have been particularly intrigued by the background of the man chosen by the university to chair an assessment of the CRU’s scientific record. Lord Oxburgh declared on his appointment that he is linked to major wind-farm and renewable-energy companies. He admitted that he advises Climate Change Capital, which manages funds worth $1.5 billion, hoping to cash in on the “opportunities created by the transition to a low-carbon economy”, in a world market potentially worth – its website boasts – $45 trilllion.” Christopher Booker, UK Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/7530961/Can-we-trust-the-Climategate-inquiry.html
The following comment by the Chairman of the enquiry was reported in the Daily Telegraph on 23 January, before the enquiry started:
“There are a significant number of climate deniers, who are basically using the UEA emails to support the case this is poor science. We do not believe this is healthy and therefore we want to call in the UEA so that the public can see what they are saying.”
No surprise, then.
This is totally unsurprising to me, as a non-UK citizen. The great majority of politicians in the UK have no idea about ethical behaviour in politics, let alone science. Tiliting at the establishment in the UK is, sadly, a Quixotic enterprise at best as it is now very clear that the UK has the best politicians money can buy. A few who can think for themselves and have a handle on ethics, such as Mr Stringer are, sadly, wildly outnumbered by greedy troughists.
The parliamentary expenses scandal and the revelations that serving MPs who are former Cabinet Ministers have not only prostituted themselves by acting as insider-lobbyists, but boasted about it demonstrates the malaise that infects Westminster.
“..this was not an inquiry into the science produced by CRU and it will be for the Scientific Appraisal Panel, announced by the University on 22 March, to determine whether the work of CRU has been soundly built.”
Their job was about the stonewalling not about the science.
Who’s in the Scientific Appraisal Panel ?
Is there one skeptic on that panel?
Hey Guys what did you expect!. Only 4 MPs voted against the climate change bill and it was hardly debated. What do you expect of a loaded committee: they were hardly likely to come to any other verdict because they would have to admit that they might be wrong about climate change and embarrassed about the climate change act.
I think most of us will be relieved at the vote of confidence in the honesty of Phil Jones and his team at CRU.
While evidence of dishonesty would not necessarily have affected the conclusions of climate science as a whole, it would certainly have cast a shadow over the reputation of climate science, and perhaps by association, all science.
Now Jones will be able to return to his lab with head held high and a renewed determination to make this world safe for his grandchildren.
The inquiry results have angered the weather gods: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/topics/weather/7540107/Motorists-rescued-from-snow-as-winter-storms-batter-Britain.html
The report will certainly disappoint folk who think MPs are independent honourable men.
This has long ceased to be the case.
The MPs have an election coming up within months and certainly do not want to rock any boats.
The MPs have recently been involved in widespread expenses scandals where criminal proceedings are pending.
A particularly notorious example is Stephen Byers MP who sets a new low standard by which most bent politicians would seem like Saints.
He headed the department which on hearing of the 9/11 massacre issued an e-mail saying “that now was a good time to bury bad news” that is if the department had to publish something that would put it in a bad light, issue it now and nobody will notice, because of the worlds preoccupation with the tragic events.
He is known in the UK as a serial liar but unfortunately for him he is not very clever and most times gets caught.
One of his side jobs is President of Globe International an alarmist platform with Al Gore a previous past president.
Of course there are a few honourable men/women in Parliament one such is Frank Field MP
We are content that the phrases such as “trick” or “hiding the decline” were colloquial terms used in private e-mails and the balance of evidence is that they were not part of a systematic attempt to mislead.
So either trees are not good thermometers or thermometers are not good thermometers and covering up this “minor issue” is just business as usual so far as the committee is concerned.
It appears to be a colloquialism for a “neat” method of handling data. That is certainly one way of looking at it. That reconstructions are wrong or current instrumental “products” are wrong and Jones [et al] hid this from public and peers is another.
Not sure what they have concluded regarding FOI other than “leave it for somebody else to sort out”. I would have liked a clarification, before the cameras, of at least …
“All our FOI officers have been in discussions and are now using the same exceptions not to respond – advice they got from the Information Commissioner.” Which seems to include just about everybody in the FOI chain.
Ian (17:45:08) :
The most important thing to come from this , is that once and for all, climate science will now be under scrutiny by all of us. No more hiding under the cover of ignorance.
Not quite sure what you believe has changed. Apart from a slight wobble everything is now back on track, exactly where it was last November. Jones gets his office back on Monday and everyone maintains their share in The Great Carbon Swindle.
How many of the original FOI requests have been satisfied ? In what way are the CRU more open and transparent? Business as usual as far as I can see. Decline hidden, sceptics sidetracked, time purchased, heist on track.
“The Committee found no reason in this inquiry to challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor Beddington, the Government Chief Scientific Adviser, that “global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity”. But this was not an inquiry into the science produced by CRU and it will be for the Scientific Appraisal Panel, announced by the University on 22 March, to determine whether the work of CRU has been soundly built.”
So why mention it then???
It’s perhaps helpful to recall that Richard North (of EUReferendum.blogspot.com) commented some while ago that only those who had never seen a UK Parliamentary Select Committee in action were inpressed with those institutions.
CRU set up and funded by Government to find evidence to support CAGW.
CRU find (concoct?) evidence the Government needs.
Government Inquiry gives CRU a pat on the back and blames UEA.
Government will fall as the whole CAGW house of cards crashes!
Politicians are stupid.
Is it really a surprise that a bunch of crooks found another bunch of crooks not guilty.
If you are unlucky enough to live in the UK under this government then these enquiries, and their results are a joke , what a scandalous waste of money!
Banana Republic of Couldbegreat Britain
Note the difference in how the thrust of coverage changes from
the BBC report:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8595483.stm
to what the Associated Press is feeding to American readers:
http://apnews.excite.com/article/20100331/D9EPF5K00.html
We don’t need no stinking investigations in the U.S.
Again, nothing to see. Please move along.
I think I’ll take up weather & climate change prediction as I got that result 100% right!
barry: “I tend to go along with the consensus view of climate change (which makes me a ‘warmist’, I guess) and I rather hope that data and code are all made open”.
Parodoxically, before climategate I really wanted to know what was happening to the world climate, because irrespective of the many lies in this area it seemed to matter, now however, I don’t think I care at all, because even the politicians seem to care so little that they are perfectly happy to have the whole credibility of climate data resting on the most discredited people with a known propensity to upjust the data.
Whilst this is no victory for the sceptics, for the climate forecasters it is a complete disaster! It hasn’t given them the kick up the backside they needed to mend their ways and stop treating the subject in such a partisan way that the public will not believe them.
You’ve got to be cruel to be kind and this is the equivalent of taking the bottle of vodka away from the alcoholic with a small slap on the wrists, and then leaving them unsupervised in a brewery, where no one is going to notice “just one little drink”.
By treating this whole thing as being entirely insignificant, the message they are sending out is not that the climategate forecasters have been vindicated, but that climate forecasting is such an unimportant subject that it really doesn’t ,matter whether those involved can be trusted!
In the first item of its “Conclusions and Recommendations”, the Report says: “Professor Jones told us that the published e-mails represented only “one tenth of 1%” of his output, which amounts to one million e-mails”.
Let’s be very optimistic, and say 3 mins per email, and an eight-hour day, with say 240 work-days in the year. So:
0.05 hours per email –> 20 emails/hour
x 8 hours per day –> 160 per day
x 240 days/year –> 38,400 per year
So, time to 1 million –> 1,000,000/38,400 –> 26 years.
When did he ever have time for any real work, or even for answering others’ emails? Or is this another example of being economic with the actualité?
And did no-one on the Committee have sufficient knowledge of simple arithmetic to check this claim? If not, then what does this say about their capability for assessing slightly more complex matters?
Why wasn`t “Harry” part of this enquiry?
barry: “…What funding source for climate science would skeptics consider reasonable? Answer – none. Any source would be grist in the skeptical mill.”
Barry, this is not about climate “science”, it is about climate forecasting. The two are very different, as different as nuclear physics and nuclear weapons.
It is entirely reasonable that climate forecasting should be government funded, because long-term weather/climate forecasts are essential information for the long-term policy of a government.
It is also entirely reasonable to pay for good quality research to improve the quality of climate forecasters.
What I object to is (using the analogy), “nuclear scientists” who take it into their head that as nuclear scientist they are the people who should not only fly the nuclear armoured bombers, but decide who to bomb!
Climate scientists should stick to scientifically investigating the climate using a variety of techniques, these various strands should then be brought together by climate forecasters to make forecasts based on all the science and not just some special interest group and then policy makers should analyse the implications of apolitical climate forecasts to work out political action.
We need clear demarcation, and the lack of this clear demarcation is the rotten core to this whole rotten corrupt business!
AND IT HAS JUST STARTED SNOWING AGAIN!
“The Committee found no reason in this inquiry to challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor Beddington, the Government Chief Scientific Adviser, that “global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity”. ”
Well, I never would have guessed at that outcome.
Summary para 2 “We believe that the focus on CRU and Professor Phil Jones, Director of CRU, in particular, has largely been misplaced. Whilst we are concerned that the disclosed e-mails suggest a blunt refusal to share scientific data and methodologies with others, we can sympathise with Professor Jones, who must have found it frustrating to handle requests for data that he knew—or perceived—were motivated by a desire simply to undermine his work.”
What has “sympathise” to do with this affair? Would a judge “sympathise” with a burglar because he was “frustrated” that he couldn’t afford a plasma TV and was only behaving like other burglars?
Para 4 “We are content that the phrases such as “trick” or “hiding the decline” were colloquial terms used in private e-mails and the balance of evidence is that they were not part of a systematic attempt to mislead. Likewise the evidence that we have seen does not suggest that Professor Jones was trying to subvert the peer review process. Academics should not be criticised for making informal comments on academic papers.”
Tree ring data didn’t match the temperature record from 1960 so the tree ring data from then was replaced by the temperature record. That was misleading with a clear result that the divergence problem was covered up and so the presentation supported the AGW theory.
The use of the words balance and systematic are weasal words (spin) to divert the reader from the truth that the “trick” was deliberately misleading.
The mere existence of the the “trick” e-mail is indicative of something systematic ie it is a process and it has a purpose.
Of couse some may say it’s unfair to compare with burglary and I would agree in the sense that the law against burglary does not expire after 6 months of the offence unlike with Freedom of Information Law which is there to prevent the public being deprived of data and knowledge instead of plasma TVs.
Two things came up when somebody from the committee was interviewed on radio 4 was that:
a) CRU has only 3 members of staff
b) Russia and Japanese data confirmed CRU’s findings
Any comments?
R.S.Brown (03:15:35) :
Note the difference in how the thrust of coverage changes from
the BBC report:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8595483.stm
to what the Associated Press is feeding to American readers:
http://apnews.excite.com/article/20100331/D9EPF5K00.html
We don’t need no stinking investigations in the U.S.
Again, nothing to see. Please move along.
——————————————————-
R.S. Brown, politicians will only agree that AGW was a scam, when polar bears are roaming through the ice-covered streets of London and come to bite their sorry asses.
Hmmm, let’s see. Government enquiry finds government funded scientists are good.
I have been in contact with the office of the opposition leader M. Cameron a
I have been in contact with the office of the opposition leader M. Cameron and I’m afraid that the “Doing something is better than doing nothing” brigade are everywhere.
There will be no movement away from AGW anytime soon and no movement toward ‘real science’ either.
The dangerous part of having lifelong political class AGW leaders like Gore is that they have co-opted fellow politicians.
Gore may not be bright, but he is clever. GLOBE, and endless conferences in world class resorts means that in effect we have spent tax payer money to brainwash politicians.
A Wod: “Two things came up when somebody from the committee was interviewed on radio 4 was that: a) CRU has only 3 members of staff”.
I once joked it only took three people in a pub to create the HadCrut data: one to run the spreadsheet, one to upjust the figures and one to order the beer. It was supposed to be a joke, but the real joke was that it was true!
This was supposed to be the biggest problem facing mankind and as such we should have expected due levels of resources to be input to ensure the “science” was cast iron. But the more we saw the less people were really part of this overwhelming science until in the end at the climategate trial, we discovered that it was some nutty professor and presumably some underlings whose main task appears to have been making coffee and finding the data he was so apt to loose.
But, seriously it is pretty scary if you discover that your part time hobby represents a significant proportion of the total science effort in an area where trillions are being spent … even more scary when you strongly suspect from they got it wrong!
“We the jury find the defendant (us) innocent of all charges.”
Having read the report, I begin to suspect that the requirements of British national pride worked their way into the findings. CRU has global importance and reputation, and surely Parliament is mindful of that fact.
I detect the workings of this phenomenon chiefly in the handling of the FOIA history. The reasoning given for the admittedly unfortunate state of affairs there are that the world class British CRU scientists who are bent on saving the world were ill-served by the UEA FOIA bureaucrat wonks who should have advised them better.
That it was clearly the CRU people who lead the FOIA bureaucrats down the garden path of obfuscation and stonewalling, providing and arguing for the rationales justifying it, is handily ignored.
Dear ac patriot:
“the committee has had access to and reviewed all the evidence, including lab books and unpublished data from the lab. ”
Ummm… NO they did not. They most certainly did not have access to all of these things, and they most certainly did not review them. The SCIENCE review is being left to the University of East Anglia.
This particular Parliamentary committee looked at exactly ZERO of the things you claim that they looked at.
So….they will keep it on working, it´s too much “at risk”, too much money (most surely money from bailouts too) has been invested, and the “welfare” of humanity is in play; as WE are supposed to be the saviours of humanity we must enforce our “most dear and superior principles” as soon as possible.
Just don´t get nervous, the majority of people don´t know a thing, apart from a few bloggers-deniers who will soon disappear as intelligent measures about the internet be implemented (to many risks of hacking should be avoided, you know….) and it will be change into a new internet which will deliver the right and progressive content as it should be….
stephen richards (05:11:10) :
I have been in contact with the office of the opposition leader M. Cameron and I’m afraid that the “Doing something is better than doing nothing” brigade are everywhere>>
This Post Normal Science claptrap is everywhere. The matter is urgent, the science uncertain, the consequences disastrous. We are urged to take action, “just in case”.
The population of Earth has risen to 8 or 9 billion on the back of high carbon consumption. High carbon consumption fuels intensive farming practices that produce vastly more food than ever possible before, at lower cost. It fuels the transportation systems that deliver raw goods, food included, to the population centres that need them from the places that produce them. The high carbon economy supports three or four times the population that a low carbon economy is capable of.
So, in the interest of PNS, the matter is urgent, the science uncertain, and the consequences disastrous. Adoption of a low carbon economy will not, as claimed, redistribute wealth to the poor. It will only ensure that the rich can afford food, and the poor cannot. It will ensure that those who are starving will seek to take by force of arms from those who have food. Billions will die either in strife over dwindling food resources, or from starvation.
So, in an ubandance of a caution, based on the best PNS principles, faced with a calamity of extreme proportions, we must act upon the precautionary principles.
Drill for oil.
stephen richards: “I have been in contact with the office of the opposition leader M. Cameron and I’m afraid that the “Doing something is better than doing nothing” brigade are everywhere.”
Is that everywhere as in “all over the place” like Jones data, or is that everywhere as in all sitting in their one small political bunker ignoring the general public who they then expect to vote them into office?
Or is that “everywhere” as in conservative policies are everywhere and no where and if anyone finds one they get a prize?
The U.S. Senate will be investigating Jones for his conduct in administering any and all grants awarded by the U.S. government to UEA CRU. Including the $300k DOE grant currently administered by Jones. The Brit Parliament may be willing to led Jones slide, the US Senate may not.
Wren,
“It’s kinda like those who say we would have won the game , but the refs cheated.”
That does happen. About 10 years ago our local 3rd division soccer team got through to the FA cup semi-final to be played against a premier league team. Our team “scored” a winning goal which the ref immediately disallowed because it did not appear to cross the line. When the footage was shown on tv it was proved that the ball did cross the line and our 3rd division team was denied its rightfull history making place in the FA cup final.
No cheating perhaps, just a case of bad refereering. (Maybe he was under pressure to conform to the script.)
evanjones,
“Have any of you people ever considered the possibility that perhaps the explanations that have been offered, and accepted by this committee, were true? No? thought not.”
Yeah, like the findings of the Hutton enquiry are true – ie Tony Blair did not mislead parliament over weapons of mass destruction. Oh wait – nobody believes that anymore.
Hmm.
Brendan H (02:24:43) :
Who is “most of us?” Delusions like that bring a smile to my face. Every poll shows most people are skeptical of the AGW scare, and the number of skeptics is steadily rising.
Jones is corrupt, as anyone reading the emails to and from him can plainly see. The comment about making the world safe for his grandchildren was a nice touch, though. It almost made me want to put my hand over my heart… until I remembered that this whole episode is about a corrupt clique being caught trying to convince a skeptical world, through devious shenanigans, that an increase in a harmless trace gas from 0.00038 of the air to 0.00048 – over 95% of which is not produced by human activity – will bring about runaway global warming and climate catastrophe. And the only fix is money. Lots more money, to battle the evil “carbon.”
As numerous commneters here pointed out over the past several months, this was set up as a whitewash of CRU corruption from the get-go. The committee had an agenda o fulfill, and were carefully chosen accordingly. They could be counted on.
If they had wanted the truth, a simple adversarial system, where skeptical scientists were able to question the CRU crew in front of the committee, would have produced the truth for all to see, and it would have destroyed the CRU and fatally damaged the bogus AGW scare. But that would have constituted a threat to their money, status and power. It could not be allowed to happen.
This is just politics, no more and no less. We predicted for months that it would end exactly this way. Some things are easily predictable.
davidmhoffer (06:43:12) : You are right. As Dr.Ravetz´s “post normal science” dictates (and he himself does not apply it to its own traditional principles), every measure it is being considered and applied, by the UN´s organisms, as for example all means of population control, from and the “day after pill” given to school girls above 14 years of age (as was done in Chile), free contraceptive pills for “poor women”, changes in legislation to allow abortion to “festivals of tubal ligation”(as were held in Peru ), from “specially formulated “vaccination” to keeping the DDT prohibition in the majority of countries,(which has provoked the reappearence of Dengue and Malaria illnesses all over Africa, South America, and last but not least, the egyptian mosquito in Central Park ,N.Y.included), non-reproductive sex promotion (gay marriages), pedophylia, etc.
All these measures will decrease the numbers of those carbon based nasty creatures which reproduce in growing numbers on that planet.
Be our most saint Ban Ki Moon praised for scaring to death the people of that planet with the menace of the AH1N1 virus so as to oblige goverments to enforce this, by all means, blessed vaccination, which will guilelessly propagate the 2001 chicken virus so as to make disappeear a lot of these inferior beings, etc.,etc.
We will debate you only if you meet the requirements set out by us. What a yellow bellied, chicken (snip), gutless, ( I got a lot worse but would obviously get snipped), way to weasel out of a debate. We would debate you, but you do not seem to be wearing the appropriate foot wear for the debate. Weaker than weak. Lamer than lame.
Barry,
“There are greater than 10 000 scientists working on climate or climate-related science. If you can find 101 of these that disagree with Beddington’s description, you may have something. Maybe.”
Who are these 10,000 scientists? Name them please.
Oh wait – you just made that up.
So, they found that Jones et al were only guilty of bad scientific practice, but that is endemic in Climate Science. UEA/CRU are sloppy and unprofessional, but so is all of Climate Science.
Those who pursue these aims, if not lucky, would probably have to suffer future, unpleasant for them, retributions from the people they so candidly and graciously affected. Our advice, in order not to repeat history, should be:
Just cool it down babies!!…ya know, what goes up must come down…and you threw up too far and away your actions, so beware.
“”” GGM (17:21:19) :
I have flakey memory, so can someone remind me…
Didn’t the CODE prove they deliberately modified data to hide the decline and increase warming ?
I was under the impression that there was evidence that the code they wrote un-ambiguously proved they fixed the results ??
Can someone please remind me of the events regarding that ??? “””
GGM, I believe if you review the history, you will find that there were code sections that were vividly described by those who wrote them, as being the tools for fudging the numbers. There might even have been a comment that specifically mentioned the routine that “hid the decline”.
These code sections were apparently commented out, as coding geeks pointed out to us.
But any user wanting to “hide the decline” merely had to remove the semi-colons or whatever the comment delimiters were, to invoke the routine before running the raw dat through the fudge factory; and then replace the semi-colons after getting the results.
And since evidently Jones also lost a lot of the raw data; well they simply didn’t have any desk draw space to put the tape reel, so they “got rid of it to make room”; there is no way to retrace their steps, and prove which operations were performed on which raw data to produce which fudged ouput.
The very existence of those code sections; whether used or not; should be regarded as a breach of “proper procedure”.
Yes it stinks.
OT – Poll of UK Guardian readers shows that they are gullible idiots and most likely to vote liberal: http://www.guardian.co.uk/sustainability/sustainability-green-survey
Liam (07:55:20) :
So, they found that Jones et al were only guilty of bad scientific practice, but that is endemic in Climate Science
Is there such a “Climate science” or it is just an art?. To be frank it has become (and as such should be considered in any curricula) a branch of political science, under the social/communist chapter.
@Brendan H
I’m curious about diverse views, I’m curious why you see it that way.
I’m also curious why you disagree with apparently most people posting here. I mean, doesn’t that make you curious? Doesn’t it make you curious why most everyone here sees the climate science as pretty unreliable?
How do you explain it?
My weak faith in government is further weakened. I would like to trust officials who hold positions of trust, but it is very hard to square their conclusions with the facts.
I started last night being serious annoyed by this report, but as the day has progressed my whole mood has lightened until right now when I’m really happy with this report.
People are reading it the wrong way!
Imagine if you will, an inquiry into a doctor whose conduct has lead to the death of several patients and it reports: “the doctor didn’t intend to kill the patients and whilst there are a few minor areas that need improvement … no need for real action.”
You can’t imagine it can you! No inquiry into something as serious as the death of a patient would ever take the stance that “the lowest common denominator standards of science apply”. Only some unimportant subject accepts the lowest lowest standard. Something important, something supposedly affect the life and death of millions would clearly require standards far higher than the one-to-one doctor-patient standards.
So, reading between the lines, what the MPs are trying to tell us is that they accept our view on this subject: that this subject is now considered so unimportant in the realms of government that it is best just sweeping the whole episode under the carpet. OK, we can argue the toss about that as an end game, but …
If climate “science” had a future, if it was life & death important, then we would have seen the sparks flying as the MPs did all they could to apply the highest standards appropriate to the importance of the subject
The fact they didn’t bother much with the future standards of climate “science” clearly shows they really don’t think it has a future!
You knew they would never give up the quest for trillions in taxes, didn’t you?
Whitewash … it looks bad in government, almost as bad as giving grants for the science we want does.
ac patriot (00:18:08) :
I’m not ignoring you, yet, but it’s going to be a jungle of a day (literary reference) and I haven’t decided just how much of my life I care to share with someone who hasn’t the courage to use his own real name. Let it suffice for now that I am not the foam chap at Trinity.
As for your other blithe assumptions about who would want to suppress AGW… keep in mind that ENRON was a leading promoter of cap-and-trade. I’m reminded of the time I sat one booth over in my local diner from the pastors of the various churches in the area having their Sunday afternoon strategy session. The Episcopal priest made a remark to the effect that St. Paul’s Episcopcal was “where God worships…” The others were suitably irritated, but they nonetheless continued planning their coordinated outreach efforts.
As a sort of extra-credit exercise, take a look at the names of the submitters of statements on the parliamentary report and compare them to the names of commenters on this blog and then tell us again how the committee is so much more reliable than mere blog readers. And if you come across a a know-it-all troll that calls himself Leif Svalgaard (as if that is a real name), tell him he has no right to be so opinated since he is just another blog reader.
I don’t know about what y’alls think about this whole fiasco; or how you plan to proceed from here; but I believe I am simply going to ignore the whole thing (but NOT forget it).
Just think about it; this whole donnybrook has had the net effect of elevating the CRU output (izzat HADCRUt) to the status of the pinnacle of climate science; ahead of even the IPCC.
Having stirred the governmental conscience of one of the once Great world Nations, to give its blessings to Phil Jones and his merry band of tinkerers, and their now “not quite” Peer reviewed climate proclamations; they have elevated this whole global temperature anomaly gathering ritual to the status of real science. Well I prefer the Japanese view of it; as somewhat akin to ancient astrology. And my apologies to ancient astrologers.
The idea that some 150-60 years of somewhat erratically gathered recordings of some temperatures in some places on this planet; offset; by some assumed average behavior of each thermometer (location); and then arbitrarily applied to some vastly larger area of the planet, than is even mildly rational; and used to compute by some physically unsupportable model, a supposed mean global temperature (or anomaly); and then assert that this is a harbinger of the climate of planet earth, and somehow relates to the flow of energies about the environment; is totally ludicrous.
Apart from grossly violating all the laws of sampled data systems; there simply is no physical relationship between any mean temperature calculation; whether valid or not; and the way different areas of the planet manipulate energy flow, into and out of the planet.
Ocean environments at 288 K do not behave the same as arboreal forests at 288 K not of alpine meaodws at 288K, or even a tropical arid desert at 288 K.
So the fudged output of Dr Phil Jones and his team; is NOT the Rosetta Stone of world Climate; it offers no explanation as to why the earth remains always within a comfortable temperature range, that is clearly regulated by some powerful feedback loop that simply will not allow any catastrophic thermal runaway to occur, and hasn’t allowed that for over 600 million years.
So let’s quit wasting our time on Jones and his caper. Regardless of how they arrived at what they publish for public and governmental consumption; that output itself is on no value whatsoever in determining how earth’s climate system works.
It’s like watching the Dow Jones (another Jones trap) Industrial average, go up and down, and then believing that somehow, that is how people get rich in the stock market.
HADCRUt and GISSTemp, are quite irrelevent, in answering the question of how earth’s climate works.
Hey! IT’S THE WATER; STUPID !
So get over it; Climategate is a storm in a teacup; well it does show us that crooks with an agenda, unrelated to the health of world climate, are loose, and working against freedom; but it has little to do with climate science.
Phil Willis MP, Committee Chair, said:
“Climate science is a matter of global importance. On the basis of the science, governments across the world will be spending trillions of pounds on climate change mitigation. The quality of the science therefore has to be irreproachable.”
Er…actually…what you mean to say Mr Willis is “governments across the world will be spending trillions of OTHER PEOPLE’S pounds..blah…blah…blah”. Governments of the day continue to treat the electorate as ill-informed push-overs. We must trust in the commonsense instincts of the crowd.
The UK government accrue £billions through this carbon fraud. Of course an inquiry is going to be a whitwash
just imagine a statement from the committee explaining that the CRU was devious and fraudulent at every stage of climate science, for the sake of putting the desired result before the scientific procedure. They would have to admit that the billions they receive in Tax revenue were a fraud and that the scare propaganda campaigns were all a bluff. The Royal Society would have to recant and say that they were in the wrong, and by implication – as we live in a globally interconnected world – the rest of the proponents of this supersition would go into abeyance.
@barry (23:33:53) :”What funding source for climate science would skeptics consider reasonable? Answer – none. Any source would be grist in the skeptical mill.”
Governmental and foundation support for “climate science” (which you apparently equate to the study of AGW) is wide spread and well-accepted. So you got that completely backwards. What funding source for disproving AGW would warmists consider reasonable? Answer – none, despite that being a critical factor in the exercise of scientific investigation.
Who are these 10,000 scientists? Name them please.
There’s no database for it. I’ve read similar or much higher figures in various places (a million even, somewhere, including all related fields, but I think a small fraction of that number would have actually published), and I did some simple math, extrapolating from the paper lists at the bottom of the latest IPCC report chapters, which I examined for repeats and such and rounded down. The figure was around 6000 (about 40 authors per page IIRC, if you want to check). That is by no means a full list of published climate and climate-related scientists worldwide, and it includes some deceased authors. AR4 was reviewed by 2500 scientists, of which just over 600 were lead authors. Considering I’m including climate-related scientists in my challenge upthread (they have to have published at least one climate-related paper in their field), I’m very confident 10 000 is a low-ball figure.
I’ve got a cite for you.
An invitation to participate in the survey was sent to 10,257 Earth scientists.
I’m not saying that report is definitive re numbers. The survey pool was wider than the one I’m thinking of (must have published at least one climate-related paper). This is not the total number of Earth scientists, obviously. 4% of respondents came from 21 countries aside from the US and Canada. IPCC was attended by climate and climate-related scientists from 130 countries. I feel pretty confident with the 10 000 figure.
So, if anyone can come up with 101 Earth scientists, who have published at least one climate-related paper, who disagree with the mainstream view (as the HoC review quotes Beddington), then there’s maybe an argument for a lack of consensus.
(But I’m playing along with a meme, here. In truth, consensus isn’t arrived at by taking a vote. Understanding spreads. If it gathers weight, it sticks. It took about as long for consensus on AGW to arrive as it did for evolution theory: ~90 years)
Oops – link format didn’t work for the cite.
George E. Smith (08:39:10) :
Climategate is a storm in a teacup
I would like to share your optimism, I suspect they consider the whole planet their teacup, and will stir it as they please. Hope in the mean time it dies of boredom but if not it doesn’t it could end in anything we could imagine.
Bishop Hill..
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/p006x9l4
This is pure PR: every newspaper titles “CRU scientists exonerated”.
The radicalisation is coming up orchestrated by politicians. Only one MP was courageous (see climateaudit analysis), the rest were lemmings. The time bomb is ticking… Eco-totalitarism is alive and well.
barry (09:42:03),
“An invitation to participate in the survey was sent to 10,257 Earth scientists.”
Yes, and how many of those actually responded? Typical responses to mailed surveys are in the neighborhood of 6%. Anyway, besides being bogus propaganda, your link is well over a year old. It claims that 58% of the public believes that AGW is a problem. But times have changed, and the large majority in all current polls put concern for global warming at or near the bottom of the list.
It’s fun watching you try to back and fill over your invented statement about 10,000 “Earth scientists.” The number of IPCC scientists you cite – 2,500 – are political appointees with their AGW marching orders, so they can be discounted as worthless opinions.
And your 10,000 are taken from over twenty countries, while the OISM Petition, for example, which had to be printed out, signed, and mailed in, and which was limited to U.S. residents only, now has over thirty thousand scientists endorsing the statement that…
That is a clear, definitive statement.
Finally, you don’t get to set the parameters of the debate. The already falsified CAGW hypothesis that you’re trying so desperately to defend is so weak that you feel compelled to make silly constructs like:
“So, if anyone can come up with 101 Earth scientists, who have published at least one climate-related paper… & blah, blah, etc.”
101, eh? What orifice did you pull that number out of?
I hate to say this, but the comments from the Planet Zarg contingent on Real Climate are generally more interesting than the ones here, as they demonstrate just how twisted and distorted the views of the purveyors of bad science have become.
You witness something akin to the bigoted zeal of the newly converted – the flag bearers of the ‘only truth’ – in the comments.
If you have a strong stomach, spend a few minutes reviewing the Real Climate posts on the subject of the British whitewash.
As a great person once said: Don’t confuse me with the facts, my mind is made up.”
Fed up (02:45:34) :
“Is it really a surprise that a bunch of crooks found another bunch of crooks not guilty.
If you are unlucky enough to live in the UK under this government then these enquiries, and their results are a joke , what a scandalous waste of money!”
Agreed! Just like Public Enquiries and Public Consultations – a joke, a foregone conclusion in every case.
stephen richards (05:11:10) :
I have been in contact with the office of the opposition leader M. Cameron and I’m afraid that the “Doing something is better than doing nothing” brigade are everywhere.
There will be no movement away from AGW anytime soon and no movement toward ‘real science’ either.
————————————
Exactly! This is the whole problem: almost the whole political establishment is supportive of the scam.
That fact alone tells us a lot.
In means that if we vote for one of the ‘major parties’ NOTHING WILL CHANGE once they get in, because they all sing from the same hymn sheet.
But of course, some people on this thread would tell us there is no conspiracy of any kind, The politicians are all just well meaning people doing the best they can to help the rest us, they care about our future, our children’s future. That’s why they’re doing all this green stuff. It’s the greatest threat humanity has ever faced, don’t you know?
Smokey: “Who is “most of us?”
I guess I mean people who would be disturbed to find that a person in a position of trust had abused that trust through dishonesty.
We rely on “experts” of all sorts to do the right thing, since through their expertise they are in a position of influence, and can make a major difference to our lives.
“…the number of skeptics is steadily rising.”
But that’s been happening since the early 1990s, and all the while the numbers supporting AGW have also risen.
Stefan (08:22:41) : “Doesn’t it make you curious why most everyone here sees the climate science as pretty unreliable?
How do you explain it?”
You’re asking me to impute motive. I think AGW scepticism involves some genuine doubts about the science against a background of ideological and political worldviews. How the mix pans out depends on the individual sceptic.
But these motivations say nothing for or against the science.
“Professor Jones told us that the published e-mails represented only “one tenth of 1%” of his output, which amounts to one million e-mails, and that we were only seeing the end of a protracted series of e-mail exchanges.”
If Professor Jones has been sending emails 365 days a year including an extra day for leap years for twenty years (before which Tim Berners Lee had not invented the worldwide web) he would have dispatched more than 135 emails a day. Assuming that each email, on average, takes two minutes to compose and send, we are talking about four and a half hours a day sending emails. When did he get time to do any serious research?
Were none of the HOC sufficiently numerate to question or at least comment on such an obvious false statement?
Brendan H (11:18:07) :
Stefan (08:22:41) : “Doesn’t it make you curious why most everyone here sees the climate science as pretty unreliable?
How do you explain it?”
You’re asking me to impute motive. I think AGW scepticism involves some genuine doubts about the science against a background of ideological and political worldviews. How the mix pans out depends on the individual sceptic.
But these motivations say nothing for or against the science.
—————————
Brendan, when you say “I think AGW scepticism involves some genuine doubts about the science against a background of ideological and political worldviews”, which ideological and political world views do you mean?
Please name them.
What are you trying to say? If you can just put it in plain words that would be great.
“British Parliament: Climategate scientists’ actions ‘in line with common practice'”
This is outrageous. Since when does any real science have “common practices” that are completely outside those of any other real science, much less have the audacity to defy the Freedom of Information laws?
The key email in all this mess was the reason given to one researcher for not sending him the original data: “You’ll just try to find something wrong with it!” Duh. That’s the smoking gun that proves these people are not real scientists. There’s very little chance that forcing them to make their data, methodology and programs public can correct that basic flaw. Jones has trained himself in disorganized efforts for years.
BBC Parliament
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/playlive/bbc_parliament/
Phil Jones live until 21:00 BST
The terminology of the report by the committee is suggestive.
1) No use of the word ‘denier(s)’ in the report.
2) Of the ~15 times that the word ‘sceptic(s)’ was used in the report, the committee used it themselves 6 times. The other ~8 uses were by newspapers or people testifying or from submittals to the committee.
3) I find that none of the 6 uses of the word ‘sceptic(s)’ by the committee were in anyway derogatory. It seemed respectful to me.
4) Respect was shown towards the anthropogenic case and people by the committe report.
My take on this is that the committee was purposefully cautious toward sceptics. I surmise it is because they did not want the report to appear outwardly biased toward an anthropogenic case and against any sceptic case.
The report, however, was completely sympathetic toward the antropogenic case.
Some fear by the committee of sceptic reaction to the report was a factor in the terminology used in the report. I consider that a positive sign. We did not see that kind of behavior a year ago.
John
Barry,
” It took about as long for consensus on AGW to arrive as it did for evolution theory: ~90 years.”
Well let’s compare the too timelines shall we? It was around 1845 that Darwin began writing out what became the Origin of Species. It was Darwin’s observations of related species that led him to conclude that they evolved traits due to selection pressures of the environment. But at that time there was no know physical/biological mechanism to account for this interesting deduction.
In 1865 Gregor Mendel discovered by experiment that traits were inherited in a predictable manner, although his work was unknown to Darwin at that time. Whem it became widely known in the early 1900’s it led to a major disagreement over the rate of evolution predicted by early geneticists.
The apparent contradiction between Mendel’s work and the early Darwinists was reconcilled in the 1920’s and 1930’s by Haldane, Wright and Fisher who set the foundations of “population genetics.” Even then, no biological mechanism was known that could account for the theory.
In the 1940’s the discovery of DNA by Avery, and the double helix by Watson and Crick in 1953 finally demonstrated the physical basis for inheritance. Since then, genetics and molecular biology have become core parts of evolutionary biology and have revolutionised the field of phylogenetics.
Thus we see the inception of a hypothesis based on observation, through 150 years of rigorous debate and challenges, of more and more evidence from fields as diverse as taxonomy and molecular biology until, brick by brick, an edifice is built of one of the most enduring and solid theories of science.
Now Global warming. Where to start? Tyndall and Fourier in the early 19th century? I think we have to start with Ahrrenius with his paper in the 1890’s in which he calculated a temperature sensitivity of the climate to doubling CO2 of about 5C. In 1906 he then recants and changes the sensitivity to about 1.5C.
From 1906 until the 1930’s nothing much happens. Then in 1938 Callendar publishes “The Artificial Production of Carbon Dioxide and Its Influence on Temperature,” He concluded that the trend toward higher temperatures was significant, especially north of the forty-fifth parallel; that increased use of fossil fuels had caused a rise of the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere of about ten percent from nineteenth century levels; and that increased sky radiation from the extra CO2 was linked to the rising temperature trend.
Unfortunately for Callendar, he made his measurements during a naturally warming period in the early 20th century and missed the cooling decades through to the seventies.
Since then we have had seen a ton of papers written documenting circumstantial evidence but no solid evidence that CO2 is a major driver. Indeed, the theory has several flaws, not least in that it cannot account for previous warm periods or even ignores the evidence.
So AGW and evolution are not comparable. AGW does not have an unbroken lineage back to Ahrennius but is patchy, with large gaps. AGW is not a theory built from observation as evolution is, but is an ideology looking for evidence. The only evidence based thread was added by Callendar, but he had the misfortune to be measuring during the warming decades only.
A more appropriate comparison for AGW is with Lamarckism – and we all know how that turned out.
I bet those commons don’t have enough “common sense”☺
“The quality of the science therefore has to be irreproachable.”
Given the complexity of climate, how realistic is that?
Canadian MSM coverage of Jones’ glowing vindication:
“‘Climategate’ inquiry largely clears scientists”
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20100330/uk_climategate_100330/20100330?hub=TopStoriesV2
“Willis said the lawmakers had been in a rush to publish something before Britain’s next national election, which is widely expected in just over a month’s time.
“Clearly we would have liked to spend more time of this,” he said, before adding jokingly: “We had to get something out before we were sent packing.””
They don’t even mention Jones’ egregious plans to vandalize 1940s data – which is the primary reason why some of us (who don’t give much of a hoot about e-mails & related petty gossip, but care deeply about data integrity) have been so assertive in protecting future researchers from needing to do complicated data-manipulation audits, knowing that Jones’ story on the 1940s is INCONSISTENT with observed cloud, wind, & Earth orientation parameter (EOP) patterns.
NONNEGOTIABLE: Jones must NOT be allowed to vandalize the 1940s data. He is willfully blind of confounding of variables. I see no evidence that he has even considered that ship-measurement pattern changes are confounded with major cloud, wind, & EOP patterns.
I suggest strategic focus on this core value. After the glowing vindication (& associated sigh of relief), are the odds of a bold & brazen assault on the 1940s data increased? Based on the judgement we have seen from Jones, I certainly hope some of his colleagues have enough knowledge of the confounding of which I speak to keep him in RIGID check. I wish Professor Jones no harm; this is about protecting data integrity for future researchers who seek only to know fine details of the complex truth about nature.
Do please note that FOIA exemptions will no longer be a defence for witholding climate data and that science will be more open in future. Other future enquiries will focus on the science.
george e smith; does this do it for you?
Gary,
I appreciate that reading these notes is tedious, time consuming and more than you want. But F. Levin claimed that he explained the “Hide the Decline Trick as a standard, statistical calculation. The following Emails disclose the true nature of the “trick”. Extensive, intensive manipulation of the crummy data is evident. This was no “ho-hum” math exercise.
FOIA\documents\HARRY_READ_ME.txtOH FUCK THIS. It’s Sunday evening, I’ve worked all weekend, and just when I thought it was done I’m
hitting yet another problem that’s based on the hopeless state of our databases. There is no uniform
data integrity, it’s just a catalogue of issues that continues to grow as they’re found.
FOIA\documents\osborn-tree6\mann\mxdgrid2ascii.proprintf,1,’Osborn et al. (2004) gridded reconstruction of warm-season’
printf,1,’(April-September) temperature anomalies (from the 1961-1990 mean).’
printf,1,’Reconstruction is based on tree-ring density records.’
printf,1
printf,1,’NOTE: recent decline in tree-ring density has been ARTIFICIALLY’
printf,1,’REMOVED to facilitate calibration. THEREFORE, post-1960 values’
printf,1,’will be much closer to observed temperatures then they should be,’
printf,1,’which will incorrectly imply the reconstruction is more skilful’
printf,1,’than it actually is. See Osborn et al. (2004).’
FOIA\documents\osborn-tree6\summer_modes\data4sweden.pro
FOIA\documents\osborn-tree6\summer_modes\data4sweden.proprintf,1,’IMPORTANT NOTE:’
printf,1,’The data after 1960 should not be used. The tree-ring density’
printf,1,’records tend to show a decline after 1960 relative to the summer’
printf,1,’temperature in many high-latitude locations. In this data set’
printf,1,’this “decline” has been artificially removed in an ad-hoc way, and’
printf,1,’this means that data after 1960 no longer represent tree-ring
printf,1,’density variations, but have been modified to look more like the
printf,1,’observed temperatures.’
FOIA\documents\osborn-tree6\combined_wavelet_col.pro;
; Remove missing data from start & end (end in 1960 due to decline)
;
kl=where((yrmxd ge 1402) and (yrmxd le 1960),n)
sst=prednh(kl)
FOIA\documents\osborn-tree6\mann\mxd_pcr_localtemp.pro; Tries to reconstruct Apr-Sep temperatures, on a box-by-box basis, from the
; EOFs of the MXD data set. This is PCR, although PCs are used as predictors
; but not as predictands. This PCR-infilling must be done for a number of
; periods, with different EOFs for each period (due to different spatial
; coverage). *BUT* don’t do special PCR for the modern period (post-1976),
; since they won’t be used due to the decline/correction problem.
; Certain boxes that appear to reconstruct well are “manually” removed because
; they are isolated and away from any trees.
FOIA\documents\osborn-tree6\briffa_sep98_d.pro;mknormal,yyy,timey,refperiod=[1881,1940]
;
; 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
(…)
;
; APPLY ARTIFICIAL CORRECTION
;
yearlyadj=interpol(valadj,yrloc,x)
densall=densall+yearlyadj
Quote:
“Which email accounts did they use?
The redacted address from the leak/hack is:
p.jones@xxxxxxxxx.xxx
Clearly the X’s replace the real letters. Does this fit with Phil Jones’ University email address? The university address is:
…XXX@uea.ac.uk”
Phil Jones used UEA email account. Some examples from emails covering many years:
0837094033.txt (Thu, 11 Jul 1996 10:07:13)
0970663670.txt (Wed, 04 Oct 2000 08:47:50),
0981859677.txt (Sat, 10 Feb 2001 21:47:57),
1069630979.txt (Sun, 23 Nov 2003 18:42:59 EST),
1188557698.txt (Wed 8/29/2007 16:51)
1258053464.txt (Thu, 12 Nov 2009 14:17:44)
They, and there are dozens more, contain Phil Jones email: p.jones[AT]uea.ac.uk
That seems to fit rather well with the *@uea.ac.uk format.
Phil Willis MP, Committee Chair, said:
“Climate science is a matter of global importance. On the basis of the science, governments across the world will be spending trillions of pounds on climate change mitigation. The quality of the science therefore has to be irreproachable.”
So presumably if it was a question of the end of life as we know it they would have found two days rather than ONE day to take evidence.
Oh , but wait , it is the end of life as we know it. Isn’t it?
Supposedly the biggest problem facing humanity gets dealt with in one afternoon and looks at 15 “pieces of evidence”.
The would have done better to “embargo” the release until tomorrow , at least we could have mistaken if for a joke.
Can’t be a snow job, what with all this global warming around, eh?
Vincent — A more appropriate comparison for AGW is with Lamarckism – and we all know how that turned out.
It turns out he seems at least partially correct. Try to keep up.
Whoops. The link didn’t copy. Try again.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/mar/19/evolution-darwin-natural-selection-genes-wrong
Robert E. Phelan (08:31:05) :
I haven’t decided just how much of my life I care to share with someone who hasn’t the courage to use his own real name
Fine, but then don’t pose as an expert on AGW unless you are willing to back up your credentials. I’ll have to assume that at most you are a business professor who has studied the economics of AGW, and who is hardly an expert on climatology. And don’t call me a coward simply because I chose to post semi-anonymously. My identity is not relevant, because I do not call myself an expert on climate science, nor would anyone know me or have heard of me. I’m going to take the high road and refrain from turning the ad hominem attack back on you.
keep in mind that ENRON was a leading promoter of cap-and-trade.
Surely you can do better than Enron! Of course there are some corporations that could benefit economically from that law, as would be true for just about any economic law. On the other hand, I can present you a list of corporations that are actively working to discredit the science of AGW in a non-scientific manner. I say actively because Enron is, you know, defunct, and has no influence in politics):
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/global_warming_contrarians/global-warming-skeptic.html
Big surprise, they include Exxon Mobile and BP, two of the largest energy corporations in the world! These two examples will dwarf anything you can throw at me, and I’m sure I can include the other supermajors in this group. I doubt I have to relate to you the ties between big oil and the government who ran the US during the first decade of this century. I know near nothing about UK politics, but if it’s anything like the US I’d bet that BP has considerable influence.
It all comes down to common sense: Since controlling CO2 emissions will undeniably have a large detrimental economic impact on the world’s largest corporations, and these people are mostly without morals, they are going to work to discredit the science using any methods possible. Since they can throw more money around than anyone out there, they have the most influence in politics. The amount of money they have dwarfs the money given to scientists to study AGW, and I seriously doubt you can come up with a corporation that would benefit from limiting CO2 that can compete with these guys.
Bottom line is that the majority of the people in power are actively attacking global warming scientists. That’s why we still don’t have reform, even though the science has been settled for some time.
Despite the expected whitewash, there are some small victories here. Years ago, a report on the Challenger disaster largely whitewashed the problems at NASA. However, there was a dissenter on the committee, a Dr. Feynman, the physicist, who wrote an attachment to the report. He cut through the pleasantries to focus on the unpleasant truths about what happened and why. Today his views are widely accepted as the only credible ones about this disaster.
In the current case, one MP had the courage to register his dissent for some of the committee’s conclusions. More impressive still is that this MP is a member of the ruling party in Great Britain.
Common colloquial terms from http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/a.html
A drop in the bucket
A feather in your cap
A diamond in the rough
Back to the drawing board
Break a leg
Cart before the horse
Dead as a dodo
Hand over fist
But, “Hide the decline” ? I don’t think so.
And it’s not listed in the referenced source. Nor for that matter is “Mike’s nature trick”.
However, “cook the books” is listed.
As I commented several weeks ago – ‘climategate’ is a mountain out of a mole hill. Too many changes verified by multiple sources point to change consistent with AGW.
The science is clear ( unless you are addicted to the idea that CO2 isn’t a green house gas and hence can affect the climate ). The UK report is clear that none of the science is refuted by the media storm .
Areas of greyness and uncertaintity exist but the fundamentals are clear .
It was around 1845 that Darwin began writing out what became the Origin of Species…… Watson and Crick in 1953 finally demonstrated the physical basis for inheritance…… Thus we see the inception of a hypothesis based on observation, through 150 years of rigorous debate and challenges
I’m not terribly good at maths, but 1953 minus 1845 seems to be about 108 years. And seeing as Darwin didn’t publish until 1857, it’s hard to imagine how the scientific community could debate and challenge the thesis in the preceding years. I get about 90 years until consensus arrived within the scientific community on natural selection – although evolutionary modification was broadly accepted in the halls of science (and to our credit, amongst the GP) within Darwin’s lifetime. You could argue that consensus on evolution emerged within 30 years, but we’d be picking nits. I go with 90.
Arrhenius published in 1896. After wrong turns, a largely empty 40 years and then a re-analysis of the structure of the atmosphere, AGW reached a consensus in the late 80s – 90s. A bit more than 90 years all up.
You are correct that Arrhenius downgraded his estimate of temp change from a doubling of CO2 to 1.6C. At the same time he calculated that including the water vapour feedback would raise that to 2.1C. His estimate is remarkably close to modern values. However, he though a doubling of CO2 would take 3000 years, as he imagined CO2 emissions would continue much the same rate as in his lifetime.
Anyway, this is all a bit academic. There is a consensus on AGW, Beddington describes it fairly accurately (minus the IPCC caveats), and the MPs are only citing him for a description, to say that they see no reason to challenge it based on the emails, and within the limited remit of their task. That is for the scientific inquiry to determine.
PeteM,
Bad science is only bad science.
The fact politicians who commandited that science are now exonerating those who committed this bad science only shows AGW is a deep political, economical game using bad science for cover.
The fundamentals are so clear that the meteorological evolution of the last 50 years does not confirm AGW. Educate yourself before parrotting, truly it helps.
Mike Haseler (08:25:22) : I started last night being serious annoyed by this report, but as the day has progressed my whole mood has lightened…
Nice take, Mike. You note many of my own feelings on the implications of this report, and the feelings of some in previous comments on this thread. Even so, neither praise nor damnation is an obvious reaction for me. An open-minded puzzlement best describes my feelings.
What I am certain of is that it is essential to keep the pressure applied to all concerned; even if sometimes unfairly. The opportunities for harm to humanity at large are too great. We must neither relax nor resign; and this is where the world owes Anthony and his ilk — and even bit players like myself who can do little more than encourage from the sidelines — a massive debt of gratitude.
I noticed a few commentators taking issue with the ‘million’ emails the review said Jones wrote. This is based on a miscalculation on the part of the review.
IIRC, there are ~1000 emails in question. This would amount to a million emails all up (“one tenth of 1%”).
This works if the assumption is that Jones wrote every single one of them.
Some intrepid auditor might like to count the emails actually written by Jones and redo the math.
My apologies in advance to Anthony, our host, CTM, Evan, the Honorable D.B. Steeley, and the endlessly patient Willis Eschenbach who believes in Road-to-Dasmacus moments.
ac patriot (15:10:08) :
…don’t pose as an expert on AGW unless you are willing to back up your credentials…
That’s a good example of a strawman argument. I never claimed to be AGW expert. My response to your earlier remark that I should take the time to learn. I did. I’ve spent quite literally hundreds of hours, but there are quite a few people on this site whose depth and breadth of knowledge, not to mention their command of detail, far exceed mine.
…I’ll have to assume that at most you are a business professor who has studied the economics of AGW
I’m sure the economists here will appreciate the slight, but in my case, you’re wrong again. I am a full voting member of the American Sociological Association and the American Anthropological Association and teach courses in Deviance, Criminology, the Community, Sociology of Religion, Organizations, Social Problems, Religion and Cultural Anthropology. My comments were directed at your “conspiracy” comments, another trollish strawman frequently used by people like you to put the deniers in their place and which betray an utter incomprehension of the actual workings of social and cultural systems.
…I can present you a list of corporations that are actively working to discredit the science of AGW in a non-scientific manner…
And so you refer me to a progressive political lobbying group that calls itself the Union of Concerned Scientists and their trashy “Smoke and Mirrors” diatribe. If you take the time to examine and compare the reports of say Exxon and a noble, progressive company like GE, you’ll find a great deal of overlap. Examine their annual reports: Exxon is spending some hundred million dollars in “carbon sequestration” technologies.
The amount of money they have dwarfs the money given to scientists to study AGW, and I seriously doubt you can come up with a corporation that would benefit from limiting CO2 that can compete with these guys
GE is ranked by Forbes as the largest company in the world, ahead of Exxon and BP. GE’s charitable contributions are more than ten times larger than Exxon’s. The US Government is the largest funder of AGW research and mitigation technology. Jo Nova cites an SPPI report suggesting that the U.S. Government alone has spent $80 Billion on demonstrating AGW and directed virtually nothing to skeptics….. of course, we can discount THAT report because it was prepared by a bunch of evil deniers, right?
Bottom line is that the majority of the people in power are actively attacking global warming scientists
That, of course, is just plain nonsense. The majority of those in power are actively promoting AGW. The political elites, the business elites, the financial elites, the media elites and the academic elites all see this as a revenue stream and a means to leverage themselves into power and influence. It is estimated that the carbon market could become the world’s largest trading system. Businesses and financial organizations are all positioning themselves for a share in that market. Governments everywhere are facing massive financial shortfalls and see AGW mitigation efforts as a massive revenue stream that will bail them out. There are trillions of dollars at stake and you believe Exxon and BP don’t have an interest?
the science has been settled for some time
You quite clearly know nothing about science or the details of climate science in particular. It is completely beyond my comprehension how someone so out of his depth can waltz into a site like this and presume to instruct people like Anthony Watts, Steve Mosher, Geoff Sherrington, Steve Goddard, Warwick Hughes, Jeff Id, Ryan Maue and a host of others too numerous to name. I learn something everyday from these people and the stellar scientists who often honor us with a visit and a discussion. Ben Kingsley’s character in the Last Legion had a quote that sums up most of the readers here: “I’m just a seeker after the truth. You’d never understand.”
I’m done with you. If you should happen to have a road-to-Dasmacus moment and want to learn something rather act as an inept missionary, I’m sure another here will be happy to accept your tuition.
Patrick Davis (21:52:30) :
“Wren (21:00:58) :
I agree. The science should open for all to see. Of course that may increase the cost, but it will be worth it.”
How so? Other “science” isn’t more expensive because it’s open for all to see.
——–
Like medical science ?
Good luck getting the “raw data” and “methods” from drug companies, especially on controversial drugs like Celebrex.
How about materials science and electronics research, like seeing what Seagate is working on for future disk drives? Whoops, corporate, proprietary science. Can’t see that.
Oh, you mean publicly funded science ?
Like military research ? Oh, national security, can’t see that.
That eliminates about 70% of research, right there.
So, you mean publicly funded, non-national security, non-corporate-extended research ?
Try to find out what some random Professor at your closest University has been working on for 3 decades with public money. Maybe the mating habits of Galapagos turtles, whatever. Formally ask the University to see all his/her data and methods for 2 or 3 decades.
Record the hysterical laughter from the University staff to share with us.
Welcome to the world of overworked, underfunded Professors.
Kitefreak (11:32:56): …”which ideological and political world views do you mean?”
What I have in mind are views that are associated with the conservative/libertarian end of the political/ideological spectrum.
That doesn’t mean that all conservative and libertarians are anti-AGW, or that there are no climate sceptics of other political persuasions, but my impression is that the dominant view among anti-AGW people can be described as conservative/libertarian.
Robert E. Phelan (21:40:48) :
I never claimed to be AGW expert.
Robert E. Phelan (22:18:06) :
… my day job as a university professor is quite secure, I have spent several years researching AGW
Ah, Robert. Surely you see how your earlier statement could lead someone to conclude you are posing as a AGW expert? It wasn’t a straw man on my part.
I teach courses in Deviance, Criminology, the Community, Sociology of Religion, Organizations, Social Problems, Religion and Cultural Anthropology… You quite clearly know nothing about science or the details of climate science in particular.
Okay, so you’re a sociologist. You’re pretty far afield when arguing about climate science, then. As for me, my Ph.D. in Physics (earned last month) says that I know a little bit about science, so try to be a little more cautious in your presumptions. Climate science is also not my field of study, but I’d wager my competency is above yours, since I study physical science. Of course that isn’t really relevant, but you’re the one who brought up my background. Sociological research, perhaps?
And so you refer me to a progressive political lobbying group that calls itself the Union of Concerned Scientists and their trashy…
That’s a mischaracterization. UCS is an advocacy group founded by scientists with a large scientific membership. It really is a union of concerned scientists, it doesn’t just “call itself” that. Regardless, everything listed on the page I linked is factual, if you bother to follow up (Funny how you attack the credibility of UCS, when you directed me to a couple of conservative blogs and the conservative Telegraph.) The Global Climate Coalition was real, and Exxon was a member, along with BP, most of the rest of the US oil companies, and the US Chamber of Commerce:
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Global_Climate_Coalition
As for GE, you’re right they are a big company, and since their 2003 PR fiasco they have portrayed themselves as pro-environmental. However, according to your Fortune, they are dwarfed by Exxon who has double their profits and revenues:
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/global500/2009/full_list/
not to mention BP, Chevron, and ConocoPhilips. Plus, GE doesn’t exactly have a lot of credibility in the area:
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/peter-sasso/2008/07/03/former-general-electric-ceo-jack-welsh-global-warming-skeptic
That about does it for GE, and I guess you couldn’t come up with any other corporations that could compete with big Oil. I can’t comment on “Jo Nova” and the report without seeing it, other than you should know better than to bring in discredited bloggers to the conversation.
As far as Cap & Trade, again, you assume too much. I’m not in favor of it, I view it as a way to profit off of the threat of AGW without actually limiting CO2 emissions. It’s no surprise to me that companies like GE are pushing it. They are smart to do so. Cap and Trade is limited, and likely ineffectual. Also, keep in mind that Cap and Trade came out of the Kyoto protocol, which was initially fought (successfully) by all of the corporations mentioned above. Only after the public started seeing through their lies and IPCC presented a strong case did the corporations turn to Cap and Trade as a plan B.
I guess you’re “done with me”, so thanks, its been entertaining, and Power Elite really is on my reading list. To conclude, you haven’t shown me any good reason why the committee’s report should be discredited, nor any evidence of collusion between science and corporations to promote AGW. I’m satisfied. And yes, the science is settled.
Barry,
You wrote that AGW is comparable to evolutionary theory and gave a time line of 90 years. It was not my intention to dispute the value of “90 years.” Perhaps my post wasn’t as clear as it could have been, but I was drawing a contrast not between the length of time but with the research itself that occurred during that period.
Since the publication of Origin of Species, university departments took up the task of searching for evidence. By the twentieth century, there could hardly have been a university anywhere that didn’t have a departmental research team. Literally thousands of researchers scoured the world looking for taxonomical differences to support or refute Darwin. By the middle of the century, the field of exploration extended to molecular biology, population genetics and phylogenetics. There was a vast nexus of interconnected strands of evidence from many differences that all reinforced each other and strenghened the theory of evolution.
With AGW, we have two papers by one man, Arrhenius. Where were the research teams from universities examining the evidence after that? There was nothing until Callendar 30 years later. It was another 20 years before Keeling in 1958.
You wrote that AGW reached a consenus in the late 1980’s. I presume you are referring to Hansen’s testimony to Congress. I don’t know what constitutes a consensus in your eyes, but no such consensus was ever stated either explicitly or implicitly in the early IPCC reports. Indeed, it wasn’t until 2007 that the IPCC proudly proclaimed “2007 is the year that the question mark was removed over the matter of man made climate change.”
However, I don’t want to quibble over dates. Much more important is that although it took 90 years for evolutionary theory to build a solid and well understood body of knowledge and physical mechanisms, it should be obvious that climate theory must take much longer than that.
The evolutionary researchers had all the data around them to begin with. All they had to do was go out and collect it, examine it, update their theories, and bring in more and more evidence from multiple disciplines. And that took 90 years.
In climate science, we don’t even have the evidence to begin with. There is a thermometer record that goes back 100 years or so, but trying to study climate science with that is like trying to deduce a theory of evolution by studying the beak of 2 related Finches. It wasn’t even until the 1970’s that we got satellites to cover the globe and measure tropospheric temperatures and ice extents. We didn’t even get a system for monitoring ocean temperatures until 2003 and earth radiation until the 1990’s. We’ve hardly begun to build databases of humidity, cloud cover, ground albedo, atmospheric albedo. This data needs to be collected for hundreds of years before we are in a position to understand climate change. And I am pretty confident that the CO2 main driver hypothesis will have been tossed into the garbage can of history long, long before then.
Ira (19:19:47) : Well said.
Brandon Gough, the Chancellor of the University of East Anglia (UEA) used to be Chair of The Common Purpose Charitable Trust
There is a very close relationship between Common Purpose and the State in the UK. “Common Purpose has members in central and local government, Houses of Parliament, police, military, legal profession, BBC, NHS, church, many of Britain’s 8,500 quangos, education, social services, civil service, and regional development agencies. This makes lodging complaints against CP difficult because CP graduates and trainees are everywhere.” http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_5719.shtml
it is little wonder that the Committee reported as it did. The AGW scam is an ideal field in which Common Purpose can advance its aims. And what are those aims?
What Common Purpose says they are can be found at:
For an alternative viewpoint, see http://www.cpexposed.com/
with a more strident one at http://www.stopcp.com/
In a recent Telegraph blog, John Mitchell examined the ubiquitousness of Common Purpose in a whole variety of fields – including Climate Change http://www.cpexposed.com/documents/John_Mitchell_Telegraph.pdf
There people are not just found in the UK. They are expanding in Germany and 50 more countries worldwide. If they can get traction in the USA, they will be in so deep it will be difficult to find them.
For their plans for Europe and the surrounding areas on the Climate Change prospectus, see http://www.anped.org/media/actiononclimatechange-2008.pdf
I am not at all surprised that the Select Committee has published the ‘findings’ that it has.
I am holding in my hand the full Report of that Select Comittee (the Select Committee has kindly sent me two copies), and it is very obvious that this Report represents a legal – and not a scientific – understanding of ‘evidence’.
Simply, the Select Committee assessed information in the same way that a Court of Law would.
Legal ‘evidence’ is completely different from scientific evidence. Scientific ‘evidence’ is information obtained from observation of the real world.
Law Courts assess the credibility of opinions. They do not have the technical expertise to assess scientific arguments.
So, Law Courts assess the apparent credibilty of witnesses and decide which witness to believe. Governments have appointed AGW-advocates to positions of authority, and a Law Court will alway agree that such witnesses present the ’science’ that should be accepted.
For example, James Hansen is head of NASA GISS. He attended a criminal trial in the UK where a group of people were being tried for deliberately damaging a coal-fired power station. Hansen said the CO2 emissions from the power station were doing much more harm than stopping the power station could do.
UK law says that it is lawful to damage personal property as a method to prevent greater harm. For example, a person is entitled to smash a door that is preventing rescue of a child from a burning building and – according to UK law – the owner of the door has no right to object to the door being smashed.
Hansen’s testimony is not sustainable by scientific argument: there is no possibility that the power station is making (or could make) significant contribution to AGW even if the ‘worst case’ scenario for AGW were correct.
But Law Courts do not consider the merit of scientific argument. They only consider which expert they will agree is ‘right’.
And Hansen’s authority as an expert on AGW is proclaimed by the fact that the US Government has appointed him as head of NASA GISS. So, the Court decided – as it must – that Hansen’s evidence was the most credible ’science’. And there is no AGW sceptic in a similar position of authority whose testimony could dispute that (governments have removed all similar experts from their jobs for disputing AGW; e.g. Henk Tennekes).
So, on the basis of Hansen’s testimony, the Court decided to acquit the people who damaged the power station.
Indeed, another case was won by AGW sceptics but they only won because they understood that Law Courts only consider which expert the Court will agree is ‘right’: Law Courts do not assess scientific evidence.
The winning of that case prevented Mr Gore’s science fiction horror movie being shown in schools without explanation to the children that the movie is political propoganda. The government wanted to distribute the movie in schools as being a presentation of the scientific facts. But a UK High Court ruled that the government could not do that because the movie exagerated at least eleven statements by the UN Integovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
In this case the Court accepted that the IPCC is the expert authority that should be believed and, therefore, that Mr Gore was a lesser expert so his presentation in his movie should not be believed.
Simply, scientific evidence only consists of empirical facts but legal evidence only consists of opinions.
So, the ‘evidence’ examined by the Select Committee was the written and spoken information provided to it. And the Select Committee assessed (or weighted, if you prefer) that information on the basis of the assumed credibility of its suppliers: i.e. they assessed the ‘evidence’ as a Law Court would. This was very apparent in the cross-examination of witnesses: Benny Pieser and Lord Lawson were given a ‘rough time’ (especially Lawson) but the Met. Office and CRU representatives were treated very differently.
Hence, the result of the Select Committee report was a forgone conclusion.
Richard
Vincent (01:42:32) :
You’re confusing “mature science” with “useful science”.
In 1970, the U.S. Surgeon General required the following label to be put on cigarette packages: Warning: The Surgeon General Has Determined that Cigarette Smoking is Dangerous to Your Health
Medical science still does not fully understand lung cancer, heart disease, or emphysema at a molecular level, or in the context of the full genetic diversity of a population, or in the context of other health factors such as environmental chemicals, drinking alcohol, not enough exercise, or bad sleeping patterns. It could be centuries before medical science understands all this and can use it to make precise predictions and treatments.
But the warning in 1970 was still sound – and if a person ignored it in 1970, there’s a very good chance they are dead now. That person could have argued, in 1970, that “medical science doesn’t know everything”.
True, but not much consolation once they get lung cancer. You can’t go back four decades for a do-over. At least when that person dies a painful death, it was their own fault.
Trumped by the Troll with a shiny new Ph.D. up his sleeve. Whodathunkit?
To the greenpeace afficionados who “exposed” Koch millions.
“Between 2005 and 2008, the Kansas-based conglomerate that “most Americans have never heard of” spent nearly 25 million dollars to fund “organizations of the ‘climate denial machine,'” environmental protection group Greenpeace said in the report.
Between 2006 and 2009, Koch Industries and the family that founded and still controls the conglomerate spent 37.9 million dollars on direct lobbying on oil and energy issues –”
Let’s put these numbers in perspective:
The well publicized arctic specialist from University of Manitoba, Dr. David Barber of “rotten ice” fame here was leading a research program:
““Canwest Dec. 6 2008, Kevin Rollason: “Mr. Barber, who will present his preliminary findings at the International Arctic Change 2008 conference in Quebec City next week, was the scientist in charge of the Circumpolar Flaw Lead System Study (CFL), a $40-million Arctic research project.”
And to think that even Revkin NYT had this to say about the rotten ice paper that made the world tour of MSM except in his blog:
“The reason I didn’t write on Dave Barber’s paper when it came out (even though he was featured in our 2005 Discovery-Times “Arctic Rush” documentary and is a highly regarded scientist), is that I got a lot of pushback from a batch of Arctic Ocean ice specialists who immediately said that the Beaufort is a special case and cited various reasons to handle those findings cautiously. I may revisit and query Dr. Barber and them anew. That’s how I try to avoid what I call “whiplash journalism” (or blogging). Covering every paper can lead to real neck trauma when focused on the more complicated parts of climate science (even as the basics are clear). ”
And these $40 million research project is only ONE project…
How much does Gore spend to promote AGW? Who are his donors?
How much of official government money goes into AGW promotion? Copenhagen?
[snip]
Calling other posters/readers denialists is unacceptable.]
“”” navyjoe (13:31:58) :
george e smith; does this do it for you?
Gary,
I appreciate that reading these notes is tedious, time consuming and more than you want. But F. Levin claimed that he explained the “Hide the Decline Trick as a standard, statistical calculation. The following Emails disclose the true nature of the “trick”. Extensive, intensive manipulation of the crummy data is evident. This was no “ho-hum” math exercise. “””
I’m not sure of your point Gary; but thanks for collecting up those text sections. I haven’t read all 1000 or how many e-mails; and have better things to do than do that. But I have read what folks who have read allt hat have said, And I am comfortable with what they ahve reported.
Among the things that were reported on when this story first broke on WUWT, was that sizeable sections of computer code were published here (they’re in the archives) and people who write code (I don’t) explained just what those sections did; and point to the line by line comment of the code writers as to what the routines did.
It was also pointed out that those skullduggery sections were commented out. In which case it is not known (by me) whether any such sections were ever used, or if so, on what raw data they were used, and what published output resulted from that.
BUT, anyone using the program COULD remove the comment delimiters, and run the program with the sections operating, and then replaced the semi-colons or whatever after getting their ouptput. So no we don’t know if those sections were used; but we do know for sure that they were there and could have been used.
And in my view their very existence is contrary to good scientific practice principles.
So yes I think the whole thing stinks, and the perpetrators ought to be fired.
But my bottom line position is still that it is a storm in a teacup, because that output, and that of GISStemp, is of little consequence in explaining how the earth climate system works; it is of no more value than the average telephone number ion the Manhattan telephone directory; whcih you can calculate for yourself from that directory.
There is no simple physical link between the HADCrut output, and what it claims to have happened to the anomaly summary of the set of thermometers that CRU uses; and the net energy flow on planet earth. Each different terrain reacts to local temperatures in different ways, as to energy flows.
Ocean surface temperatures control evaporation, conduction, convection and radiation energy flows from that surface; whereas an arid tropical desert reacts quite differntly when at the same temperature as an oceanic surface.
So HADCRut, and GISStemp anomaly output; however they obtain it and process the raw data, is quite irrelevent to earth’s climate.
The total extreme range of surface temperatures on earth; sans volcanoes and other thermal hotspots runs from at least +60 deg C in the tropical deserts under noonday sun, down to -90 deg C at the coldest antarctic winter midnights in places like Vostok. And in principle, that total range of 150 deg C could exist all at the same time (it didn’t but it could).
So we should be concerned about a few hundredths of a degree C change over a year; a change not in the earth’s mean surface temperature, which we have no means of determining to that precision; but in a mathematical concoction of the outputs of a handful of poorly distributed thermomenters, and an equally poor historical range of those temperature readings.
We are just deluding ourselves that GISStemp and HADCrut have any scientific significance whatsoever.
Might as well go out and count the average number of animals per hectare (ant size or bigger), and report changes in that as a global mean wihtout regard for what sort of animals you are counting. Has about as much scientific value.
But as I said, thanks for the little tete-a-tete from those e-mails; I don’t plan on reading the rest of them.
“The Committee found no reason in this inquiry to challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor Beddington, the Government Chief Scientific Adviser, that “global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity”. But this was not an inquiry into the science produced by CRU and it will be for the Scientific Appraisal Panel”
” The leaked e-mails appear to show a culture of non-disclosure at CRU and instances where information may have been deleted to avoid disclosure, particularly to climate change sceptics.”
So, they didn’t have a brief to question the science of global warming but they agree with it anyway, and they found a culture of non-disclosure and deleted information aimed at sceptics, but do not give a reason why CRU wanted to do this. How odd. But anyone who thought that we would get anything other than a whitewash from Mr. Willis’s committee must have been dreaming. How could a lowly MP in the British House of Commons possibly dare to put his head above the parapet against the world governments, The United Nations, The EU and the very many organisations with vested ointerests. And perhaps more important than anythingl, what future had an MP in the House
sorry my blog above seemed to ‘submit’ without being finished as below.
“The Committee found no reason in this inquiry to challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor Beddington, the Government Chief Scientific Adviser, that “global warming is happening [and] that it is induced by human activity”. But this was not an inquiry into the science produced by CRU and it will be for the Scientific Appraisal Panel”
” The leaked e-mails appear to show a culture of non-disclosure at CRU and instances where information may have been deleted to avoid disclosure, particularly to climate change sceptics.”
So, they didn’t have a brief to question the science of global warming but they agree with it anyway, and they found a culture of non-disclosure and deleted information aimed at sceptics, but do not give a reason why CRU wanted to do this. How odd. But anyone who thought that we would get anything other than a whitewash from Mr. Willis’s committee must have been dreaming. How could a lowly MP in the British House of Commons possibly dare to put his head above the parapet against world governments, The United Nations, The EU and the many organisations with vested interests around the world. And perhaps more important than anything, what future had an MP in the House of Commons who dared to oppose the Prime Minister who appointed him, and thus be seen to becfome a member of the ‘flat earth society’
Having watched the proceedings, and read the transcripts, and heard the Chairman’s (and also Lawson’s) interview on the radio, I conclude that CRU and Climate-‘science’ are dead ducks.
The bonfire has been lit, and even if the subsequent Muir and Oxburgh enquiries try to suppress it, the truth is out.
And rather than have a cathartic pyre, it will likely smoulder away emitting a great stink that will do incalculable damage for science and to western culture.
Will Muir or Oxburgh, like Lawson and Monckton, do the right thing?
An extended interview with Phil Willis on Today in Parliament the Friday before Jones was due to appear left me in no doubt about the general tone of the eventual report; and I have not been surprised.
To sum it up in a regular BBC approach to matters they do not wish to report on as they go against their editorial policy “Move along there… nothing to see”
Phelan’s Law Number 27: There is no end to life’s lessons in humility.
I really, really, really thought I was done with the scientifically illiterate troll ca patriot but I’m wrong. Never give a troll the last word…. so I did a little research. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry, so I’m doing both. It turns out our trollish friend really does have a Ph.D. in Physics from a branch of the UC and is a blogger with a witty and sardonic sense of humor
http://fockingscience.blogspot.com/
and is rabidly progressive:
http://dakane.blogspot.com/
He is also a perfect example of why talking about conspiracy theories is so laughable. He knows everything that is currently known about carbon nano-tubes and nothing about science. He needs to add “false consciousness” to his topic list.
I’m a little behind on this particular subject.
As much as it makes me sick, it’s no surprise whatsoever.
You need to remember there is one over riding factor here.
The Parliament doesn’t really rule England anymore, it is a bunch of suckups to the EU and the UN.
what is the global agenda of the UN? To take over the world and take from the wealth of hard working nations and give it to the third world countries and themselves.
Parliament is just doing what it’s been told to do and no one has the lollies to stand up to people like George Soros or Obama or the UN General Secretary when it comes to things like this, they have to toe the line because they agreed to give up their sovereignty to the EU/UN. Who is Phil Jones working for? He’s reponrting to the IPCC/Pachauri and the UN, not the British government or it’s taxpayers.
And this is what Obama and Gore want to bring to our country.
Is it any surprise that the US Government hasn’t even gone this far in investigating Michael Mann for commiting perjury before the US Senate? Penn State did an investigation over the hockey stick incident and it was whitewashed as well. Students have begun a national petition drive to have him ousted from the University but we all know how that is going to turn out, a hearty pat on the back and a healthy bonus/raise.