Viewers won’t remember but one thing about this interview: that a UEA scientist called a skeptic an “assh*le” on live television. It reveals just how rattled they are there at UEA/CRU.
NOTE: Updated to the full length version which was put online about 5 hours after this story was first posted – better video quality in addition to the full context of the interview – readers may wish to watch a second time. Thanks to WUWT commenter “adamskirving” – Anthony
Professor Andrew Watson (whose emails are in the Climategate emails) also adds a nice touch when he rolls his eyes, see if you can spot it.
Marc Morano explains:
A professor who is accusing global warming skeptics of engaging in “tabloid-style character assassination” of scientists, called an American climate skeptic “an assh*le” on the December 4, 2009 live broadcast of BBC’s Newsnight program.
“What an assh*le!” declared Professor Watson at the end of the contentious debate with Climate Depot’s executive editor Marc Morano. A clearly agitated Watson had earlier shouted to Morano “will you shut up.”
Video of BBC “Asshole” clip is here. (short) and here (full length – best quality)
Full one-on-one BBC debate segment between Prof. Watson and Climate Depot’s Morano is here in two parts.
The remark was broadcast live on BBC and prompted an on-air apology to viewers from the BBC later in the program for the offensive language.
Watson (Email: a.watson@uea.ac.uk) is a professor at the School of Environmental Sciences at the University of East Anglia, which was the source of the disclosed files. Watson’s emails appear in the hacked Climategate files.
During the live debate, Morano challenged Professor Watson for being in “denial” over the importance of Climategate and noted that “you have to feel sorry for Professor Watson.”
“[Watson’s] colleague, [Professor] Mike Hulme at the University of East Anglia is saying this is authoritarian science, he is suggesting the [UN] IPCC should be disbanded based on what Climategate reveals,” Morano said.
“[UK environmentalist] George Monbiot is saying many of his friend in the environmental and the climate fear promoting business — as Professor Watson is part of — are in denial. You have to feel sorry for Professor Watson in many ways here,” Morano explained.
A clearly agitated Watson called Morano his “psychic colleague” and blurted out “Will you shut up just a second!?”
Morano summed up his views on what ClimateGate reveals during the debate. “It exposes the manufactured consensus. Your fellow colleagues are saying this,” Morano said to Watson.
Morano also noted that President “Obama is probably attending [the UN Conference] because they are circling the wagons because of the magnitude of this scandal.” (See: ‘Welcome to the delayers’: Obama’s ‘half-hearted climate efforts’ welcomed by skeptics – Nov.17, 2009)
“You have UN scientists turning on UN scientists. This is the upper echelon of the UN and it has been exposed as the best science that politics and activism can manufacture. Prof. Watson’s whole argument is ‘trust me, take my word for it,’” Morano added.
Professor Phil Jones, Watson’s colleague, has temporally stepped down pending an investigation into the Climategate scandal, which many observers say exposes data manipulation, suppression of peer-review process, blacklisting, data destruction, willful violation of Freedom of Information Act requests. [Editor’s Note: Climate Depot’s Morano, who BBC described as “one of America’s leading climate change skeptics,” is also cited in the released Climategate files. On July 23, 2009, AP reporter Seth Borenstein asked the Climategate scientist about a “a paper in JGR (Journal of Geophysical Research) today that Marc Morano is hyping wildly.” Penn State Professor Michael Mann (who is now under investigation) apparently wrote back to Borenstein: “The aptly named Marc ‘Morano’ has fallen for it!”]
Professor Andrew Watson of the University of East Anglia, the University at the center of the Climategate controversy, has come to the defense of his colleagues this week and is claiming that the whole email and data release is much ado about nothing.
But other scientists disagree. One of Watson’s colleagues at the University of East Anglia, Professor Mike Hulme, declared Climategate reveals climate science had become ‘too partisan, too centralized.” Hulme, a climate scientist who was listed as “the 10th most cited author in the world in the field of climate change, does not mince words on the magnitude of the scandal.
Hulme has even suggested that the UN IPCC has run its course. ”
“It is possible that climate science has become too partisan, too centralized. The tribalism that some of the leaked emails display is something more usually associated with social organization within primitive cultures,” Hulme wrote on November 27, 2009.
“It is also possible that the institutional innovation that has been the [UN] I.P.C.C. has run its course. “The I.P.C.C. itself, through its structural tendency to politicize climate change science, has perhaps helped to foster a more authoritarian and exclusive form of knowledge production,” Hulme explained.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
This is decending into side slapping British Farce….
I really don’t think the CRU gets Climategate at all… they feel protected from reality by the state run broadcaster [BBC] and the UK government… they really seem to live in Neverland… and the BBC attack kitten shouting down Marc Morano [at the end] is another priceless example of British broadcasting at its very best… no wonder the BBC website tries to block internet viewers from outside of Lilliput [the country previouly known as the United Kingdom].
The CRU remind me of the infamous British newspaper headline:
Fog in channel, Europe isolated but on a global scale…
I guess this is the climate science “wardrobe malfunction” moment. ;->
He doth protest too much…
UEA is coming across as a nest of vipers.
They should have their accreditation removed.
What an asshole indeed. Not sure who Mr. Morano thinks he’s impressing with that kind of behavior.
Don’t you just hate an academic who thinks he’s so superior to everyone else.
Interesting that Morano is the one who apologizes for simply raising his voice (easy to do in a heated exchange) whereas Watson is the one who unapologetically says to “shut up” and uses base language. I do not believe you can assign insincerity to these professors as a whole, but such exchanges do show that you don’t have to think logically to get in higher academic circles (what is the deal with Watson’s comments on “openness” when this is just what skeptics want?). Furthermore, high position does not assure that you understand the debate (whether it has been warming is not the the same debate as whether man is causing any warming). Surely, wisdom is justified of her children. Thanks for posting the informative clip.
Poor Prof. Watson,
The T.V. news segment doesn’t lend itself to wordy discussion. You have to make your point and move on.
Moreno needs to shut up defending the sceptic point of view. He is a liability.
Dan Weiss, Ed Begly Jr., Andrew Watson; AGW have any more representatives they’d like to put on tv? These first three worked out great!!
Climate scientists… what is the story? What is the hypothesis? Professor Watson says the key issue is has the earth warmed in the last 100 years. That’s a vague generalization. That fact alone does not justify draconian taxes, wealth transfer, and restrictions on personal travel.
NO! The key issue, in terms of the larger context which Professor Watson is invoking, is whether or not CO2 from industry and transportation are the drivers of catastrophic global warming, and how much the proposed remediation issues will reduce the earth’s temperature. We can start with air travel.
It is of vital importance that the integrity, provenance, and accuracy of the temperature records and the software used to process and interpret this data are audited in an impartial way. As a scientist, that should be your number one concern as this is what is owed to society at this time — not special pleading that consensus excuses you from due diligence.
I am more troubled by the apparent advocacy and shallowness of the interviewer than I am of Mr. Watson’s limited vocabulary.
@nofate
Of course he’s cancelling. He’s got to make some time to off load some stocks and shares if it all turns sour!
The Agwers are relying on the temperature records to prove the greenhouse theory and their models correct . Under scrutiny , the records fail to do this without some manipulation . As I said in a comment on another thread , plausible but largely unproven theory eventually becomes conventional wisdom and conventional wisdom eventually becomes dogma . Unfortunately , far too many people – scientists , politicians , the media and the general public – bought into what has become dogma too quickly . Climategate has pulled the rug out from under them . So the last resort for these a-holes is to call anyone who disagrees with them an asshole . Ironic , ain’t it .
P Wilson,
I’d be interested in seeing your plots of the GHCN with the “Urban Heat Island” effect properly subtracted from the recent values, instead of being a depressing effect on the historical values.
Both were as bad as each other but Watson was right on one point – Morano did act like an a**hole. It was a debate he could have won – but he didn’t due to his childish behaviour.
In complete contrast was Ross McKitrick’s conduct on Channel 4 News the other night. That was a debate he could not have won because he was barely allowed to get a word in edgeways but what little he did manage to say was measured and left the listener wanting more. That’s as good as you’ll mange in a 20-second slot.
Someone needs to take Morano to one side . . .
I thought the Brits said arse for a–.
Shouldn’t he have said “arsehole”?
It takes one to know one.
No sir. the issue is not whether there has been any warming in the last 100 years but what caused it.
royfomr said at (08:34:24) :
It appears that Mike Hulme, mentioned above, has been thinking a lot recently.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/04/laboratories-limits-leaked-emails-climate
We live in interesting times!
—————————-
I am fascinated by the TWO (2) Shell adverts accompanying that piece!
Perhaps Professor Andrew Watson is fully qualified to call someone “an assh*le” considering the amount of “S.H.one.T” data they are processing each year and depositing on us mere mortals… now i understand the “fudge factor” 🙂
To be fair, Moreno did come across as an asshole. Deliberately chosen, I suspect: this was on the BBC, after all.
Folks may find this interesting. If you compare the raw CRU temp profiles against the AGW models (which is the right method to assess the models) you discover AGW cannot exist. What CRU has been doing is taking temp profiles that don’t show a hockey stick and adding in hockey stick, which magically matches those models that assume a hockey stick will show up in the Temp data. Climategate just proved AGW as a theory is wrong.
http://strata-sphere.com/blog/index.php/archives/11732
His exasperated request “Will you shut up!”
was none too classy either. Rather juvenile, I’d say.
Marc Morano was probably just having too much fun.
Anyway, is that it?
No other scandals in those e-mails?
Ruddy outrageous. But why did he use an American swearword when we have a British equivalent? This is further evidence for my hypothesis that Brits who swear in American are perfect t@ssers.
None (08:46:14) :
or Svaalgard for example.
might not be the best choice