Image source here
From Andrew Bolt’s blog at the Herald Sun:
Professor John Quiggin complains of smears by sceptics:
In recent years, science and scientific institutions have come under increasingly vociferous attack, with accusations of fraud, incompetence and even aspirations to world domination becoming commonplace… Scientists have been constrained in fighting back by the fact that they are ethically constrained to be honest, whereas their opponents lie without any compunction.
Ethically unconstrained, Professor John Quiggin smears a sceptic:
In writing my previous post on the “Climategate” break-in to the University of East Anglia computer system, I remained unclear about who was actually responsible for the break-in theft of the emails, which were then selectively quoted to promote a bogus allegation of scientific fraud. Looking over the evidence that is now available, I think there is enough to point to Steven McIntyre as the person, along with the actual hacker or leaker, who bears primary moral responsibility for the crime…
So, to sum up, McIntyre organised the campaign which led to the creation of the file, obtained information from the CRU file system by means he declined to reveal, received the stolen emails shortly after the theft and made dishonest and defamatory use of the stolen information. Whether or not he was directly involved in the theft, or merely created the opportunity and benefited from the proceeds is impossible to determine, and essentially irrelevant.
OK professor, let’s see your evidence beyond this missive.
Somebody needs to educate Quiggin on the CRU ftp security blunder that was “the mole”. He doesn’t get it, and then proceeds to use that as “evidence” against McIntyre. It’s comical.
Here’s Professor Quiggin’s page at the University of Queensland:
http://www.uq.edu.au/economics/johnquiggin/
http://www.uq.edu.au/economics/index.html?page=15898
Does it strike anyone else that Professor John Quiggin’s photo above looks like an inmate or PD dept. intake photo? Something The Smoking Gun or TMZ would have on their websites?
Is Professor John Quiggin projecting?
.
.
The prof claims,
“McIntyre organised the campaign which led to the creation of the file,”
THAT tidbit seems to reinforce the early assessment/speculation that the files were compiled to respond to a Freedom of Info Request! And someone at CRU did that compilation….
…all of which makes one wonder what else is still lurking in the archives….
By the way, has CRU EVER provided the files per the FOI request(s) and provided them to McI. etc.???
If not, they’re still on the hook to do so–and recent commentary from the UK says that’s the law. So, have they complied, or, are they still breaking the law?
comical
Keep talking good doctor, you are helping your cause SO much.
Wow. That just blows my mind. Do climate scientists have ANY sense of ethics whatsoever?
If I was Steve, I’d sue this guy for libel.
Er – aren’t there laws about making these sorts of accusations? Libel laws?
Is it just recent that the page http://www.uq.edu.au/economics/johnquiggin/ is entirely blank?
PS to last: Quiggen’s page at Queensland isn’t working. Shocker.
“sniff…sniff”
Nope, doesn’t pass.
Quiggins should not assume that because he wins every game of “Clue,” that he is capable of being an actual detective.
From my point of view the real question is why John Quiggin is focussing on smearing critics?
Obviously there is bias and an intention of misbehavior, considering the fact that the CRU emails gives critics more questions than answers.
John Quiggin should be focusing on invalidate these criticism’s and not try to deduct the real scientific challenge.
Now would be an excellent time to file a libel suit (assuming there is no support for the allegations). There is nothing like getting a bunch of people under oath answering questions to a good trial attorney to find out the truth of the matter. This is particularly attractive approach in a jurisdiction with the English Rule where the loser pays the winner’s legal fees.
Unlike McIntyre, Professor Quiggin seems unaware of the criminal genius of Macavity.
This sad soul is not a scientist. He doesn’t understand the word “evidence” If he is using wishfull thinking for data, what does he do research on? Wishfull data?
I can never remember which one is slander and which one is libel. Either way, I’m guessing that the statement “point to Steven McIntyre as the person” is going to land Quiggen in trouble.
I hope that either Steven McIntyre has a very forgiving character; or John Quiggin has very deep pockets.
They are desperate! It is obvious! Obama says “Overwhelming scientific evidence of Global Warming” in the most serious speech that he gaves every year, the State of the Union Address, and his words are received with *MASSIVE* laughter. That proves how close to defunction Mainly Man Made Warming is, expect the Krugmans, the Stiglitz, the Sachs and the other academics that perpetually tell us that we will reach the paradise if we give even more opressive power to politicians to come along with this nonsense.
It is more obvious than ever that Big Academia, Big Media and Big Bureaucracy is a gigantic machinery for promoting more opressive power for politicians & bureaucrats based on theories that are garbage or downright fraud. I do not mean that all Academia, Media and Bureaucracy are so, I say many of them perpetually promote giving even more opressive power to politicians and bureaucrats; making gargantuan amounts of money through political opression is maybe the oldest profession, having an insane lust for getting opressive power over people is one of the oldest and most destructive passions so if you want opressive power you speack about it in the press or you promote papers according to your point in Academia.
Quiggins personal web page is blank.
I think you have caused Prof. Quiggins web site to crash. Page loading from Australia takes more time, but an infinite wait is ridiculous.
Note to Professor Quiggin:
When someone takes something that they legally have a right to, IT’S NOT THEFT!! In addition, the fact that McIntyre used information that should have been available through the FOIA process does not make him a thief.
Methinks he (Quiggin) doth protest too much!!
Professor John Quiggin is pathetic.
Indeed, he does smear McIntyre with no evidence.
And, this guy is a scientist?
I mean the contents of the e-mails apparently has no impact on his thinking — all he cares about is smearing a reasonable sceptic that called out the fraud.
But it’s too late for a strategy of stonewalling or smearing to work.
That he would drag this out, once again, shows that he doesn’t have much to argue against the substantive points raised in the e-mails.
Hmm. It appears his University web page has been disabled. Here is the Google cached version:
http://74.125.93.132/search?hl=en&q=cache:http://www.uq.edu.au/economics/johnquiggin/&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=
Wow.
It was bad enough when ‘climate scientists’ were merely sloppy hacks and egotistical idealogues.
Add paranoid delusionals to the list.
The real question is – does his University allow this to stand, and thus put their imprimatur on the accusation?
McIntyre should look into getting some volunteer legal resources in Queensland and should immediately file suit for slander – not against Quiggin, but against the University and the University President for condoning this. (Silence implies consent, after all) And then offer to settle for court costs in exchange for Quiggin’s immediate termination.
And yes, that’s a serious recomendation.
LOL, nice juxtaposition Anthony. Obviously, Professor John Quiggin doesn’t believe that ethical constraint to be honest applies to him.
The link to his page (at the bottom) isn’t working.
So he is complaining that the FOI file that was to be released (allegedly) was stolen?
“Over the next few months, CRU started preparing a response to McIntyre which resulted in the creation of a file called FOIA.zip. Over the weekend beginning Friday 13 November, someone located and copied this file from a back-up server at the university’s Climatic Research Unit, and distributed it widely among anti-science blog sites, including McIntyre’s. It’s unclear whether the extraction of the file required sophisticated hacking, simple illegal entry to a poorly protected site, or McIntyre’s “mole”. What is clear, as this report notes is that going after FOIA.zip indicates that someone in McIntyre’s circle of supporters was responsible. As the report says”
http://johnquiggin.com/index.php/archives/2010/03/12/climategatethe-smoking-gun/
So the Information was ready to hand over but it was then stolen and published???
loutish, crude.
. Whether or not he was directly involved in the theft, or merely created the opportunity and benefited from the proceeds is impossible to determine, and essentially irrelevant.
So, it doesn’t matter whether the real world evidence supports your theory,?….
Yep. That’s sound like a climate scientist to me.
Wow! Steve is really under their skin. He’s made them irrational or should I say more irrational.
What a bunch of garbage. I can’t believe I wasted my time actually reading his whole blog entry. It is, however, written in the typical AGW proponent style: Provide an incredible story with anecdotal evidence and no references with which others can independently verify your story.
John Quiggin is trying so hard to cover his own incredibility, he’s spreading the wealth around.
He is not well regarded by inquiring minds in the land of Oz.
“He turned me into a newt!”
It’s comical … Yes, it would be if there were no consequences. Computer crime is punishable with hefty jail sentences in the US. So what what this guy does is accusing McIntyre in public of a fellony offense without any proof. If that’s not libelous, then what is?
Perhaps McIntyre is consulting his lawyers at this very moment, and good luck to him!
What can you add? The guy makes even Joe Romm sound concilliatory.
Anyway he is only an economist. Economists’ forecasts are about as good as those from climate models.
On Climate Realists site they would file this one under “you could not make it up”
McIntyre is the last person I would suspect. It has to be an inside job.
(and it is certainly not Charles the Moderator!) 😉
Seems that the Prof has being on a walkabout without his sun hat.
I think this fella has spent too much time in the outback. The sun’s gone and affected his mind!
This pinheads just don;t get it. It only matters to those who the emails look bad as to how the information was released.It’s the content that matters!
Sigh. Those in ivory towers can’t help but feel beyond accountability to us poor uneducated folk. Wjy don’t we just keep our place?
This fool should be sacked immediately
The scientific dictatorship promised by Aldus Huxley has failed. The power grab behind AGW fraud is laid bare for us all to see.
Treason is the crime and nothing short of proper justice will suffice.
As the pressure builds it becomes ever more easy to define between the real scientists and those who truly do have aspirations for a global scientific dictatorship by the NWO we have all heard about and was spoken about by George Bush senior and Gordon Brown.
Quiggin has every reason to be quakin’.
They’re never going to find the mole. That much is clear now.
Good looking chap. I’d rather have Quiggan on my side when it gets too hot than Bolt. He’s got his head screwed on the right way, that’s for sure.
Well,this is comic relief,but is it a good idea to even link to this creep?
Ok, everybody who’s ever typed in the address of a public ftp server, and copied a readable file, then looked, and shared the information it contained must immediately turn themselves over to the proper authorities for punishment of their heinous, heinous crime against humanity. Don’t just sit there dumbfounded! Go! NOW! Criminals!
If you read the blog, you’ll see Mr. Pete and several others made mincemeat of the Professor. The mole. Ha ha ha ha.
================
Comments are closed on Quiggin’s blog post. I guess he couldn’t handle the critisism…..
So asking for information makes one a thief of information. Quiggin prefers slander to truth.
Like blaming the pesky kids in Scooby Doo, or Toto for tugging away the curtain in The Wizard of Oz.
That’s how it work today.
Lies, lies and nothing but lies to white wash their crooked science and motives.
John Quiggin is participating in a world wide organized counter propaganda offensive and you can expect similar publications popping up all over the media.
Here is another example:
John Houghton about ecofanatics.
http://motls.blogspot.com/2010/03/john-houghton-about-ecofanatics.html
We all know the science is broken.
What’s left is raw propaganda and political force.
And political force is the new strategy to overcome the onset of the failed science
Today the Federal State of North Rhein Westfalen, the former center of the German “Wirtschaftswunder” announced a 95% reduction of CO2 by 20250.
As a consequence NRW will be forced to shut down it’s coal plants, all car fuel stations, stop the distribution of oil to heat the offices and houses and probably close down all it’s airports and CO2 emitting industry and agriculture.
The country sides are already littered with useless wind parks responsible for a rise in the number of power blackouts.
At a political level there is no chance to introduce nuclear energy.
Besides that, it will take at least 20 years to build a network of nuclear power plants. Nobody knows where the money has to come from to make any significant investment because at this moment in time NRW hovers at the brink of bankruptcy.
The brainwashed population has no idea of the consequences of such a decision
and keeps quiet.
But this can change overnight!
Few people remember the time after WWI when France occupied NRW to loot the region for war compensation payments.
The coal and steel workers became fed up performing their slave labor for France and anarchy broke out. They simply bombed France out of the country.
No police and no army was able to control them.
With the EU already taking the shape of the former centralized Soviet Government structure we will see a process of top down centralization which will end democratic rule and turn NRW into a social and economic wasteland.
I predict NRW will become one of the most dangerous places in the world if this Government does not change it’s policies.
You didn’t expect that the funny letter in “Academics fight back on climate issues” would be the only attack, right? Expect more of this quality from other self-defined “social-democrats”. btw., the German ultra-left names it “democratic socialism”.
Few contributors here have asked in the past to leave politics out of a science blog (anti-science blog, in Quiggin’s world). They may realize by now, latest, it’s all about politics, not science in AGW movement.
What particularly amused me is that Prof. Quiggan’s link about halfway through his post, at ‘what is clear, as this report notes’, neatly contradicts his most egregious allegations. It’s as if the Professor didn’t read his own link, or didn’t think anyone else would.
Just desserts all around over there. Heh.
=================
Hey Quiggen, 1880 called and they want their beard back!
Isn’t this the same guy who tried to tie alleged shuffled papers to the vast “CRU Conspiracy”. I know Australia has a high tolerance for the mentally ill and all, but letting this guy pretend he’s a scientist is taking it a bit far don’t you think?
re, _Jim (05:21:24),
I also noticed his image but I saw a different picture. I see an angry hippy.
As to weather McIntyre did this, I very very highly doubt it. But who ever did it is a hero in my book.
I’d say that beard looks like he’s preparing for the next ice age, not the next Global Warming.
But really, is this the logic of someone who does “climate science”? Wait, I just answered my own question. No wonder they’re making insane accusations and writing book-sized letters.
The sad thing is that our tax dollars are supporting this circus.
Theft is a tricky term under English law anyway – if you ‘steal’ a car for ‘joy riding’ – it is not legally theft!!!
From here… http://www.sussex.police.uk/infocentre/text_version/content.asp?uid=449
“Theft – Definition of Theft
A person is guilty of theft if: he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it.
Reference: Section 1 of the Theft Act 1968.
Last Updated: 25/7/2008”
Orwellian.
John Quiggins page is now here… http://www.uq.edu.au/economics/index.html?page=15898
Anybody out there know how to nominate people for the Nobel Peace Prize?
I would like to nominate the person who courageously made the CRU E-Mails public.
I bet his University lawyers never approved that statement. If it can be funded, I also think going legal would be good. It’s a serious accusation and there is no evidence.
As for venue, this is the information age so would suggest the UK. We have a generous libel system and there seems to be precedence that being read in the UK means published in the UK to give jurisdiction. Might even prompt Norfolk constabulary to announce their findings. I know life in Norfolk is slow, but the investigation does appear to be dragging on.
Inhouse Fighting!
This could bring out some actual words of incrimination or finally some uncorputed data if they want a media fist fight. Split the scientists into two sides of scientists who want to come out and others holding their funding and careers.
True research side against the uncaring funding grabbers who don’t care what the data really produces side.
We don’t know that anybody committed a crime in revealing the ClimateGate emails, or if they did commit a crime but are protected by whistle-blower laws.
We don’t know the emails were stolen or misappropriated. Certainly somebody at CRU had the compile the files. Were the files found at a publicly accessible location? That would hardly make downloading the files a crime, would it?
Quiggin’s mighty facial hair deserves respect.
Quiggin wrote: I think there is enough to point to Steven McIntyre as the person, along with the actual hacker or leaker, who bears primary moral responsibility for the crime…
A ‘break-in theft’ becomes a leak. Why not a whistle blow? Something *is* very wrong at the heart of CRU.
I am coming to the conclusion that the green-lobby has successfully convinced so many politicians and scientists that sceptical science is a massive Big Oil funded nemesis that they just cannot help be utterly defensive, craven to politics and shoddy with their methods.
The constant alluding to a shady leviathan funding contrarian science is what has allowed billions of tax dollars and pounds to flood the pockets and bank accounts of policy friendly scientists.
As I said, a world wide coordinated warmist counter propaganda campaign.
Gore is back and he’s got Global Warming with him the MSM too!
http://bigjournalism.com/acary/2010/03/13/albert-arnold-gore-jr-is-back-and-hes-got-global-warming-with-him-the-msm-too/
I really think their campaign will back fire.
This summer there will be a follow up meeting to the Copenhagen meeting in Berlin followed by a meeting in Mexico at the end of this year.
The suicidal commitment of North Rhein Westfalen to reduce CO2 95% CO2 emissions by 2050 is nothing more but a political signal making the impression
real commitments are undertaken but on a Global Level the AGW doctrine is a dead horse.
I think the time has come to do research where the money comes from to finance this campaign and start sacking the responsible politicians!
Fraud is fraud and lies are lies, it’s as simple as that.
The comments made in the linked article are intellectually dishonest. The DDT one strikes me as being especially so. It is true that its use is not banned. It was re-introduced in South Africa of recent and the number of cases of malaria radically decreased. But for most of the balance of Africa, it is forbidden in the terms of our aid packages to give them DDT. Yeah, they can use it. Its just that they cannot buy it. No you didn’t starve the guy to death, you just made it illegal to sell him food. A distinction without a difference.
This “scientist” obviously understands evidence in the same context as Michael Mann.
Every day we have more and more evidence confirming that IQ of some of the “climate scientist” is within the range of max and min temperatures on the equator.
@ Jeroen (05:29:35) : From my point of view the real question is why John Quiggin is focussing on smearing critics?
Because it’s now a drag-’em-out, hang-’em-high street fight as per Ehrlich last week. Any sense of fair play–if it ever existed–is now out the window. And it’s going to get a lot worse before it gets better.
Perfect example of the “Mind Projection Fallacy”; applied not to Nature, but to the issue at hand.
“Once one has grasped the idea, one sees the Mind Projection Fallacy everywhere; what we have been taught as deep wisdom, is stripped of its pretensions and seen to be instead a foolish non sequitur. The error occurs in two complementary forms, which we might indicate thus:
(A) (My own imagination) –> (Real property of Nature)
(B) (My own ignorance) –> (Nature is indeterminate)“
Our AGW promoter friends are whining about only receiving 85% soft ball questions instead of 100%.
I am sure that, as the tulip mania crested, those who had made fortunes selling tulip bulbs were angered that the skeptics said the tulips were over priced.
– After all, the tulips still bloom and everything, so nothing had really changed.
The reality is the AGW community is going through the stages of mourning.
Anger and denial, as represented in the essay this thread is based on, is typical of early stage mourning.
Wow, I wonder if the Prof is aware that the UK has a ‘Freedom of Information Act’ and that it is commonly referred to as FOIA, as opposed to it being anything to do with the US FOIA, or as he likes to put it: ‘An abbreviation often used for the US Freedom of Information Act, it suggests again that the leaker was familiar with the attempts by US bloggers and others to get release of tree ring and similar data.’
I really hope this guy’s prof-ship was due to a freebie giveout and not for actual work, as if this is anything to go by, in his work he must be making black=white and 2+2 = an orange.
Such commentry is unworthy of anyone irrespective of what side of any arguement they are on, frankly it makes them look very silly.
Must we be concerned for the students at the University of Queensland if this is representative of their professors and their teaching – massive assumtion, relative little or no background study and massive smears – not good
[snip]
I don’t have any doubt that Steve McIntyre’s revelations acted as a catalyst for someone. But to accuse Steve of criminal activity for speaking out is simply ludicrous.
The person(s) most responsible for the “break-in” are Jones, Mann, Briffa, Santer, et al, for their grossly unethical activity. It’s obvious that someone on the inside saw all this and decided enough was enough.
Apparently, the professor at Queensland sees no irony in his tirade against McIntryre whilst bemoaning allegations of “fraud and incompetence.”
@INGSOC (05:49:48) :
————————-
“He turned me into a newt!”
————————-
“I got better” 😉
A civil action probably would yield little redress. However, the power of subpoena, would give awesome power to obtain documents otherwise unattainable. Some very awkward questions could also be directed at some major players. It would be great entertainment and a good education for the public. GK
I nominate Steve McIntyre for a Nobel Prize (if he is reponsible for Cimategate).
As for who “benefitted” … please all you AGWers, give back the trillion dollars you conned people out of!
Actually the FOI Laws were upheld. The other parties were in breach.
No one has ever said the emails release was illegal.
Just saying. It was public property.
I reckon merminks done it.
and Quiggins a goose, always has been.
Gordon Ford says “Quiggins personal web page is blank.”
The sentence should be shortened to say “Quiggins is blank.”
Wait i just looked at the Google cache of this twits web page he looks to be an economist. He also seems to have a distinct left ward tilt in his thinking. Wow climate science marches on seems they can’t attract real scientists, you know the kind that use empirical data rather than conjecture and supposition to base their world view on.
This from the link to the Professor Quiggin’s further statement:
In fact, as the U Penn investigation found, these claims were baseless.
Fitting that the “expert sleuth” doesn’t have a clue even on the basics.
“In FACT” – “U Penn” is the University of Pennsylvania, located in Philadephia.
“In FACT” – Michael Mann is employed by Penn State, in University Park, PA.
“In FACT” – Michael Mann may have worked at the University of Virgina, when his original alleged problematic actions were taken. So they would not likely be subject to review by his later employer, Penn State.
Rather than finding that many of the claims against Michael Mann were “baseless,” many of Mann’s alleged problems, stated in the first 3 Questions, were likely beyond the scope of a narrow administrative review of his employment at Penn State. Further, Mann’s alleged problems while he was employed at U of Virginia would not likely be subject to review by the Penn State administrator’s much more limited review.
“In FACT” – Penn State formed an entirely new committee of scientists to review some of the most serious allegations against him. Again though, their review would be limited to his time at his current employer and not to the serious allegations against Michael Mann prior to his employment at Penn State.
Below is Penn State’s “Decision 4” which widened the investigation of Michael Mann’s actions while he was at Penn State, via a New Committee, consisting of Scientists, instead of Administrators. Again note, this is investigation is NOT likely to deal with any serious alleged problems of Michael Mann’s actions, while he worked for the U of Virginia:
Decision 4. Given that information emerged in the form of the emails purloined from CRU in November 2009, which have raised questions in the public’s mind about Dr. Mann’s conduct of his research activity, given that this may be undermining confidence in his findings as a scientist, and given that it may be undermining public trust in science in general and climate science specifically, the inquiry committee believes an investigatory committee of faculty peers from diverse fields should be constituted under RA-10 to further consider this allegation.
Whilst the page listed above has been taken down, his university unit webpage is here:
http://www.uq.edu.au/rsmg/director
Note potential hockey stick in his cumulative citation graph (uptick commences 1986/7)
Professor John Quiggin should be more careful, under current British Laws on Defamation Steven McIntyre could sue for libel in the UK – simply because this can be read in the UK.
So unless the professor can prove his claims in court he should think hard about what he is writing.
The ruling was FOI breach, statute of limitiations over rode punishment.
But the ruling was FOI breach.
People all over the world can say what they say. That is the ruling.
He looks different here. Is this the same guy?
April Fools….oh, wait….
Hey I have a suggestion, lets require all climate scientists be honest. Not too much to ask is it? That way they can make their data, methods and results freely available, and not feel like they are betraying their granters purposes.
Why is it so common amongst leftist to blame the second person. McIntyre had no control over what people do. He certainly didn’t ask for it.
I didn’t know Anthony had this post so I wrote my own response.
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2010/03/15/believers/
Quiggin demonstrates the Climate Science Method- state the ‘fact’, model the evidence.
It’s like a guy being angry with his wife for catching him having an affair.
One thing I notice is this “climate scientist” has absolutely no science background whatsoever. He also has no psycology background or perhaps he would notice that he and the AGW religionists are projecting their own actions and ethics onto their opponents.
The crime to him is the release of what should have been available to begin with both according to scientific method and the law. He is untroubled apparently by the clear evidence of deceit, fraud, blind political ambition, and lousy scientific method that is represented by the CRU files.
This so called professor looks just like the Unabomber.
Show us the data
show us how you measured the data
Show us the code
That’s all I have to say any more.
John Quiggin forgot to say that he is Steve McIntyre himself. Just add a beard and a wig to Steve and you will see that the debate is over. He’s revealed this top secret that as his alter ego, he hacked the CRU servers, in order for his brother Elvis Presley to get some extra attention.
It doesn’t really matter much whether Elvis Presley lives in Tora Bora or on the Moon – the effect is the same. 😉
Aelfrith,
the same laws apply in Australia.
The law makes no distinction in excuse.
Especially from a position of media or Authority.
He has an issue also in science ability, and if he used the University’s letterhead or authority we understand why his page is down.
QU has a very good law department.
Wow, How ‘1984’ of him.
Let’s see, his reasoning goes something like this ” A – McIntyre was among the first to question and criticize Mann and Jones, this led to B – other people criticizing Mann and Jones, which led to C – other people ‘breaking in’ to East Anglia to expose the truth, therefore McIntyre is ‘morally’ responsible because, if he had never started this questioning and criticizing thing, no one would have thought to ‘break in’.
What a wonderful piece of Soviet ‘Gulag’ style of reasoning.
Very similar to Dr Mann’s opening ‘conspiracy theory’ worthy reasoning in his recent ‘Discover Magazine’ interview. http://discovermagazine.com/2010/apr/10-it.s-gettin-hot-in-here-big-battle-over-climate-science/?searchterm=where%20does%20climate%20science%20go%20from%20here
“Ever since his “hockey stick” graph of rising temperatures figured prominently in Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth, Mann has been at the center of the climate wars. His e-mail messages were among those stolen and widely published last November.
Let’s talk about the hacked e-mails and the ensuing climategate scandal. What happened?
My understanding—and I only know what I’ve read from other accounts—is that hackers broke into the Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia and stole thousands of e-mail messages, which they then proceeded to distribute on the Internet. They even tried to hack into a Web site that I help run, called RealClimate.
Does anybody yet know where the attack came from?
No. There are many of us who would really like to know because obviously this is a serious criminal breach. And yet there’s been very little discussion, unfortunately, about the crime.
Who might have done the hacking?
“It appears to have been extremely well orchestrated, a very professional job. There also appears to have been a well-organized PR campaign that was all ready to go at the time these e-mails were released. And that campaign, involving all sorts of organizations that have lobbied against climate change legislation, has led some people to conclude that this is connected to a larger campaign by special interests to attack the science of climate change, to prevent policy action from being taken to deal with the problem.”
Yikes!
This poor fellow is going to feel like he has gone and kicked a beehive, if he dare faces his email tomorrow morning in Queensland.
Quiggin down under . . .
Interesting that he didn’t suspect Ross McKitrick — a fellow economist.
Quiggin needs to read Maruice Strong’s early speeches and writings on why he wanted to create the IPCC. Then note the criticisms of the IPCC first and second technical reports, in particular, the mention of the MWP. He could then explain why the exposed email from CRU mentioned their concern about the MWP period being a “problem” for the movement and how — magically it seems — Briffa knocks out a paper saying the coldest year in the millennium occurred during the MWP, only to be followed by Mann’s hockey stick.
. . . a very public apology from Quiggin to McIntyre is in order. If not, calling someone a thief in such a manner is slanderous and libelous.
Defamation:
1. A false and defamatory statement concerning another;
2. The unprivileged publication of the statement to a third party;
3. If the defamatory matter is of public concern, fault amounting at least to negligence on the part of the publisher; and
4. Damage to the plaintiff.
If McIntyre can show damages, he’s got a winner! The Herald Sun, as publisher, can be held accountable as well. Perhaps they should quickly print a retraction to protect themselves.
Ben (06:58:51),
Here’s an interesting interview with Judith Curry, followed by Michael Mann: click
I’ll leave it to others here to decide how Mann comes across.
Go to Quiggin’s cached page as by jondipietro {5:43:05}
http://74.125.95.132/search?q=cache:dTl_mHs2xjMJ:www.uq.edu.au/economics/johnquiggin/index.html
Click on some of the links.. you’ll see he is a “SOCIAL Scientist’ and a ‘statist’. For example he states that future employment hinges on the ‘service sector’. And only the state can provide enough employment in the service sector to make a dent.. especially for the academic graduate.
Which gets to the heart of the whole issue. Carbon being easy to tax and ubiquitous, the fraud having been discovered threatens society itself.
Not hard to understand, we all do understand, don’t we?
Here’s one of his books:
http://www.uq.edu.au/economics/johnquiggin/Books/WFA.html
Interestingly, he draws on a 1945 white paper as a preface.
Do we all recall the intervening post-war facts? Stunted economic growth in Oz, by low available labor force… which almost induced me to emigrate from the states.
Wasn’t he Prince Vultan in Flash Gordon the Movie?
http://sleevage.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/09/brianblessed_flashgordon_vultan.jpg
ThomD (07:10:03) : “It’s like a guy being angry with his wife for catching him having an affair.”
How to you know?
First we had “new math”. That led to a generation of public school graduates who couldn’t balance a checkbook and legislators who thought $ billions was chump-change. Then we had “new science”. That led to temperature hockey-sticks and vanishing historic warm periods.
Now we have “new ethics”. That leads to the following trail of logic:
1) I question your conclusions and demand proof.
2) You hide the evidence.
3) Someone else finds your “hidey place”.
4) Someone else releases that evidence to the public without your permission.
5) I’m a thief.
I suppose this is what is meant by “scientists fight back”.
However, Professor John Quiggin’s statement is prima facie libelous, because he has accused McIntyre of having commited a crime, while at the same time admitting that he has no evidence.
Professor Quiggin, please note that where the subject of an accusation is a public figure, like a university professor, truth is a defense against the accusation of slander or libel.
By now Mr McIntyre is a public figure. So if you had produced some evidence to support your accusation, that would be your defence. But you have already stated that you have no evidence. Hence you have no defence at law. I would advise you to consult with legal staff of your university.
By contrast, in peer-reviewed papers published in reputable science journals, McIntyre has accused at least one researcher of malpractice while at the same time documenting in detail what the accused did and did not do that constituted the malpractice. The content of the released e-mails supports what McIntryre has argued for years and the content of the e-mails has not been disavowed by the authors. Mr McIntyre would argue that the truth of his accusations is his defence.
I once taught a graduate course in statistics and mathematical modeling, including principal components analysis, the object of Mr McIntyre’s criticism and his most valuable contribution to scientific auditing. I have also applied principal comonents analysis to satellite imagery. I can confirm from my own experience that McIntyre has identified true flaws in the Hockey Stick modeling.
What may never be proven is whether the malpractice results from incompetence on the part of the researcher or deliberate misuse of the technique.
I do not understand exactly what Professor Quiggin is objecting to. Does he think that malpractice by academics should not be exposed? Does he think that the exposure was not in the public interest?
Substantial public money is involved both in financing climate research and in implementing policies advocated by the recipients of the research. This means that the public is entitled to have the research audited.
Is this not obvious?
Unfortunately, the IPCC has shown itself to be biased by advocacy. McIntyre and McKittrick make a strong case for this too. They have urged that a “B-team” is needed to audit the work of the “A-team”. Their argument is that the IPCC member governments appoint delegates that are already compromised by their posts in national environmental agencies seeking to increase their budgets. Thus, governments cannot rely on their IPCC delegates to be unbiased.
Independent auditors are needed, as in the world of finance and business.
Member governments should be just as concerned about the direction of the ADB and World Bank and their own development cooperation agencies.
Consultants who work on projects financed by the ADB and World Bank can confirm that both organizations assume mitigation of climate change is both necessary and possible.
Their terms of reference for consultant’s go far beyond the science. These organizations are now paying for feasibility studies based on “climate science fiction”.
As an example, scientists do not claim that present models are good enough to make predicions on a regional or country basis. But the ADB and World Bank and bilateral agencies are gearing up to finance mitigation and adaptation projects based on these models.
Junk science spawns junk investment and the taxpayers of developing countries get to foot the bill. Moreover, even the poorest developing countries are being led to borrow money from international banks and to raise money by taxation to speculate on projects that have low probablilities of contributing anything at all to local economies.
The bottom line is that the quantum of money going into climate change demands better auditing of the science and better auditing of the institutions advocating policy and promoting public investments based on the science.
If it were not for McIntyre, most of us would still accept the Hockey Stick. Thanks to him we now realize that the graph is advocacy masquerading as science. Is that what Professor Quiggin objects to?
Check out http://www.uq.edu.au/rsmg/jq-journals . Look at what this guy is writing 200 papers on. Scary! Food, water, agriculture, insurance, trading …. Yeah, he’s a climate scientist, scarf. And check who gave him top honors, Thompson (ie trading & Wall Street).
Expect more of these attacks now that funding for “climate change researchers” is starting to be cut.
http://www.metronews.ca/toronto/comment/article/477381–demise-of-canadian-climate-research-would-impact-global-initiatives-scientists
“The 2010 federal budget, unveiled this month, offered no new cash to the decade-old Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences, a group that has been financing research on everything from melting glaciers to drought on the Prairies to the thawing permafrost.
The disappearance of a foundation that has made contributions to global initiatives on climate change is worrying for some in the international scientific community.”
Very worrying if their research grants are affected I’m sure.
Looks like the Quiggin’s pages at the Uni. have been pulled offline. All of them. Trouble with the lawyers and Criminal Defamation laws in Australia?
One can’t get away with publically accusing others of criminal activity (e.g. conspiracy to commit theft) unless they’ve been convicted by a court of law.
Steven McIntyre, had Quiggin bothered to do his homework before making the accusation, needed only to wait for the due processes of FOI in the UK (or their EU masters) to either get the data, or for prosecutions for violation of FOI to commence.
…………….Stef (05:32:34) :
I can never remember which one is slander and which one is libel???
————————————-
I can answer this Stef. Thankyou everyone. Stef: It’s very easy in this case…….
It’s the guy in the picture for both of them!!!!!
I wonder where this story would be if they had just followed through with the FOI request?
Good Mr. Quiggin says:
So the evidence points to “McIntyre’s circle of supporters”, because the “leaker was familiar with attempts by US bloggers …”. Thus are exposed as double agents all those boffins in the AGW blogger family (realclimate, parties to the climategate emails) who were also “familiar with attempts …”.
John Quiggens blog – comment away:
http://johnquiggin.com/index.php/archives/2010/03/15/monday-message-board-167/#comments
How does someone this stupid and unethical get to be a professor?
What did Professor Quiggin think he was going to achieve with this?
Did he even read it before making it public?
He hasn’t a shred of evidence, makes a charge and can’t imagine the blowback?
This is the act of a pompous ass who’s arrogance overrides honesty and ethics.
And it’s yet another piece of the desperate tantrum the AGW academia is engaged in.
Along with their futile campaign to put the cat back in the bag.
Just imagine how deeply, personally offended many of them are from being challenged by non academics.
So McIntyre is guilty because he questioned authority? He created the situation which led to the (alleged) theft?
How many of you read Solzhenitsyn’s Gulag Archipelago? Does this accusation sound familiar to you?
What’s next, a show trial with a guaranteed conviction and a sentence to a reeducation camp or state-run mental asylum?
Room: 551A Colin Clark Building, St Lucia
Phone: +61 7 3346 9646
Fax: +61 07 3365 7299
Email: j.quiggin@uq.edu.au
Personal Website
Qualifications
BA(Hons),BEc(Hons),MEc (ANU), PhD (UNE)
Profile
John Quiggin is an Australian Research Council Federation Fellow in Economics and Political Science at the University of Queensland. Professor Quiggin is prominent both as a research economist and as a commentator on Australian economic policy. He has published over 750 research articles, books and reports in fields including risk analysis, production economics, and environmental economics. He has also written on policy topics including unemployment policy, micro-economic reform, privatisation, competitive tendering, and sustainable management of the Murray–Darling system. He was awarded the Thomson ISI Australian Citation Laureate for Economics in 2004. He is a Fellow of the Australian Social Science Academy, the American Agricultural Economics Association, and the Australian Institute of Company Directors, and a Distinguished Fellow of the Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
Selected Publications
TOP 10 SELECTED RESEARCH PUBLICATIONS
Books:
Quiggin, J. & Chambers, R.G. (2000), Uncertainty, Production, Choice and Agency: The State-Contingent Approach, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Quiggin, J. (1996), Great Expectations: Microeconomic Reform and Australia, Allen & Unwin, St Leonards, NSW.
Quiggin, J. and Langmore, J. (1994), Work for All: Full Employment in the Nineties, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne.
Articles:
Quiggin, J. & Chambers, R.G. (2004), ‘Invariant risk attitudes’, Journal of Economic Theory, 117, 96–118.
Grant, S. and Quiggin, J. (2002), ‘The risk premium for equity: implications for the proposed diversification of the social security fund’, American Economic Review, 92(5), 1104–15.
Quiggin, J. (2001), ‘Environmental economics and the Murray–Darling river system’, Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics 45(1), 67–94.
Quiggin, J. and Chambers, R. G. (1998), ‘A state-contingent production approach to principal–agent problems with an application to point-source pollution control’, Journal of Public Economics 70, 441–72.
Dowrick, S. and Quiggin, J. (1997), ‘True measures of GDP and convergence’, American Economic Review 67(1), 41–64.
Quiggin, J. (1982), ‘A theory of anticipated utility’, Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 3(4), 323–43.
Quiggin, J. (1981), ‘Risk perception and risk aversion among Australian farmers’, Australian Journal of Agricultural Economics 25(2), 160–9.
Correct me if I am wrong, but isn’t McIntyre Canadian?
Guys… take a step back a moment….
I think pursuing Quiggin at this time would be the wrong reaction from McIntyre. To pursue Quiggin and win would require McIntyre to prove damages. Quiggin shot his mouth off, and we have good reason to believe he’s wrong, but winning a libel case requires you to prove resulting personal damages. That would require McIntyre to prove professional damage (far more difficult for a retiree) or loss of income (also difficult for a retiree).
Since the truth is that, as noted here often, Quiggin is a wild-haired Grizzly Adams with an even wilder claim, the case would also have to take into consideration the credibility of Quiggin.
I’m firmly of the belief that, right now, even if Steve were to pursue Quiggin legally, the criteria for proving his case would cause the case to fail – specifically the inability to prove damages and lack of Quiggin credibility – and so the case would collapse. This failure to make the case stick would be taken and run with, by the crazy people, to mean that Quiggin was right and Steve was guilty.
Right now, the correct response is passive ambivalence. I think he’s looking for a sceptic tirade directed at him, and I think his intent is in some way to prove that sceptics are the wild-eyed lunatics in this exchange. He’s posted his opinion and, though he says he has evidence to support it, he hasn’t presented it.
I believe in the philosophy of giving someone enough rope to hang themselves, and my gut says that allowing Quiggin to get it all out of his system and then let QU sort him out.
ThomD: “It’s like a guy being angry with his wife for catching him having an affair”.
Sums it up nicely. But what was the affair with? Why did if cause them to have to hide the decline?
.. sorry.. last sentence.. my gut says *it’s better to allow* Quiggin…
Indeed, Dr. Quinn looks like a man with a mission.
His picture begs a Dr. Suess caption. “I am the Lorax. I speak for the trees!”
Would someone please get this guy his medicine?? I mean, if this is his PUBLIC photo portrait….!
Really, Steve was doing very well before the email disclosures, skewering the lot with their own faulty statistical treatments. I don’t think he particularly needed the information released in Climategate emails, except as validation that this bunch were not very professional.
I’m sure curious to know who the ultimate Climategate leaker was! The original statement posted with the emails seemed to imply that there was more out there, I wonder when the next shoe drops?
This is like Clinton blaming the media for the Lewinski scandal.
Also that photo looks like it could be labeled; “son of Manson”.
“Over the next few months, CRU started preparing a response to McIntyre which resulted in the creation of a file called FOIA.zip. Over the weekend beginning Friday 13 November, someone located and copied this file from a back-up server at the university’s Climatic Research Unit, and distributed it widely among anti-science blog sites, including McIntyre’s.”
Was not one of the first “anti-science” blogs to receive this the BBC? 🙂
As for it being a collection for Steve McIntyre, the contents always gave me the impression that it was what they would want to hide from him and anyone else for that matter. It was hidden away on an obscure server that only a mole could find is another line of speculation that works for me?
For the Record, regarding timing:
Michael Mann worked at the University of Virginia from 1999–2005.
As such, the bulk of the alleged Hockey Stick-related problems tied to Mann likely happened before Mann worked at Penn State and would likely be beyond their reviews.
Mann’s “Hockey Stick” Graph data problems, his problematic involvement with the UN IPCC’s 2001 report and his refusal to submit his data for standard scientific review, would be likely outside his employment at Penn State and therefore unlikely to be part of the first review by Penn State Administrators.
In addition, Penn State’s ongoing investigation of Michael Mann, covered in their Allegation 4, is to be conducted by scientists, not administrators.
Because Mann worked at the U of Virginia from 1999-2005, the ongoing Penn State review by a committee of scientists, is not likely to cover Mann’s “Hockey Stick” related problems, the ethics of Mann’s editorial actions with the UN IPCC’s 2001 report or the breach of scientific method procedures, due to Mann’s multi-year refusal to release his data for standard scientific review.
RealClimate was reportedly created in 2005, so Mann involvement with their alledged problems may or may not be while he worked at Penn State.
A google search puts him in the School of Economics at the University.
Lets not push him over the edge. His green investments are doing poorly, carbon prices are falling, his life’s work down the crapper. Poor guy cant even afford to buy a razor.
If Steve sues him, he better do it soon.
Rich D.
The offending accusation appears to have been removed, or it was certainly not there when I looked just now.
Quiggle-word “moral”, meaning that even if McIntyre had nothing to do with the crime, Quiggin holds him morally responsible.
No slander, there. McIntyre bears “moral” responsibility in the same way that I bear “moral” responsibility for slavery, due to the fact that I am a Caucasian American. People spew pseudo-ethical garbage like this constantly, without fear of retribution, because there’s no real allegation of wrongdoing. Just guild by association.
Which is just utter, cowardly crap. Obviously.
to paraphrase Dr. Quiggin:
“SM is responsible for the CRU whistleblower incident bc he created an environment where people wanted to reproduce climate scientists findings. I am the Lorax. I speak for the trees.”
Quiggin’s leap of faith on Steve may explain his belief in catastrophe; that and the teat of gov’t funding.
“Scientists have been constrained in fighting back by the fact that they are ethically constrained to be honest, whereas their opponents lie without any compunction.”
Should have cut to:
“Scientists have been constrained in fighting back by the facts”
I know where I’ve seen this guy before !
He’s Captain Haddock out of Tin Tin !!!
s/guild/guilt
Monday, post-DST timechange. Double whammy.
I’m not sure exactly what bit of this would be libellous, he doesn’t actually accuse McIntyre of very much substantive.
His blog;
http://johnquiggin.com/
This guy is a bit behind the main herd, he’s only at stage 2
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2010/2/24/josh-4.html
The higher up the Ivory tower these good professors go, the less oxygen is available for them to breath, the more delusional and paranoid their personalities become and the more we get to laugh at theses morons.
Ya ya ya . . I know it is not PC to laugh at mentally handicapped people, but these guys have a bad case of self-inflicted wound syndrome and it is funny to watch them come apart at the seems, to make fools of themselves.
Or maybe he is auditioning for the Comedy Network?
Makes sense actually. You see, there is no true evidence of AGW, yet he still believes it as fact. And there is no evidence of his accusation, but he believes it as fact.
Dr. Quinn looks a lot like some backwoods survivalist in that photo. All you need is a flannel shirt and an ax to make it complete.
Duck Xing, thanks for the background on Dr Quiggin. Frankly. I am more dismayed than before now that I knowing how eminent he is in Australia.
In fact, your description of the man is a big shock. What shocks me is that he is so lacking in common sense. He apparently either does not know enough science to understand McIntyre’s criticisms or does not care enough to read what McIntyre has published.
If he publishes a written statement calling someone a criminal for his scientific research, he should at least study the published papers. I have. And I know enough about principal components analysis to believe what McIntryre claims. So did Prof Wegman. Resume here: http://www.galaxy.gmu.edu/stats/faculty/wegman.resume2.pdfl
Simon H: If Oz’s libel laws are like the UK’s, it is the defendant who has to prove his case (ie Quiggin would have to prove his accusation is true) — I believe that in the US it is the Plaintiff who has to prove his case.
Sounds to me as if he has a kangaroo loose in the upper paddock. He seems to think that what he’s saying makes sense when even a cursory analysis reveals it as contradictory dross. The idea that SMcI’s legitimate requests for the information could be construed as art and part of any subsequent crime is peurile. He ignores completely the right to access principle that was obstructed by the CRU, and that there is a reasonable case for categorising the hacking or leaking of the FOI covered material in such circumstances as highly moral and legal – regardless of the conclusion any establishment investigation might reach. His summing up in the 2nd paragraph of his earlier confused assertions is just as unclear. What is clear is that here we have one more University professor whose mind is a bit messy and whose conception of morality is decidely suspect. And any scientific, economic or political views or research published by this guy are probably worthless – if the above paragraphs are any guide.
Comments on his blog about the very article we are discussing here;
http://johnquiggin.com/index.php/archives/2010/03/12/climategatethe-smoking-gun/#comments
@ Ben (07:49:00) : Because Mann worked at the U of Virginia from 1999-2005, the ongoing Penn State review by a committee of scientists, is not likely to cover Mann’s “Hockey Stick” related problems, the ethics of Mann’s editorial actions with the UN IPCC’s 2001 report or the breach of scientific method procedures, due to Mann’s multi-year refusal to release his data for standard scientific review.”
Yes, but could they (or would they) contact UVa or UMass?
Those making comments would do well to read the reasoning behind the assertion, left out by Anthony for reasons of space:
http://johnquiggin.com/index.php/archives/2010/03/12/climategatethe-smoking-gun/#more-8331
And the newspaper report that lead to his assertion;
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/04/climate-change-email-hacker-police-investigation
The face of Reason
Environmental organizations joining the new propaganda effort:
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2010/03/face-of-reason.html
At this stage, who cares, I say good on him. The real robbery would have been if we were saddled with taxes on bases of the false representation of data.
I’m confused.
UEA were putting a file together as pe FOIA to be handed over in response to Steve McIntyre’s request and before they had chance to just hand it over, perhaps Steve stole it? Why wouldn’t he have just waited for them to hand it over – he seems to have waited a saintly long time for it in the first place.
I do hope this guy is axed for trying to defend the indefensible.
Evo1
The “acceptance” stage is not far away now…
the pro-agw have been through the other stages of the Extended Kübler-Ross Grief Cycle: Shock, Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Testing,
Looks to me like Quiggin performed a clever “trick” by splicing fiction onto fact ….
He’ll be able to take credit for a new famous Australian phrase….
“That’s not a hockey stick…THIS is a Hockey Stick!”
Graphite (06:21:01) :
Theft is a tricky term under English law anyway – if you ’steal’ a car for ‘joy riding’ – it is not legally theft!!!
From here… http://www.sussex.police.uk/infocentre/text_version/content.asp?uid=449
“Theft – Definition of Theft
A person is guilty of theft if: he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it.
Reference: Section 1 of the Theft Act 1968.
Last Updated: 25/7/2008″
By that definition, there was no theft.
No one intended to permanently deprive the owners of the data, rather the person intended to liberate it to the owners, the taxpayers. The person who had “primary moral responsibility for the crime” was Jones. McIntyre simply (and with due process) created the responsibility to comply with the law. Since there has been no compliance, the statute of limitations surely cannot have run its course.
John Quiggin and the Smoking Gun
http://johnquiggin.com/index.php/archives/2010/03/12/climategatethe-smoking-gun/
John Quiggen has published a simply shocking whirlwind
of facts and revelations.
However, having read both his timeline for Climategate
and the released CRU emails/data set/program there
are logical fallacies in his exposition.
Last July the CRU/Met reasoned that raw reports of
station data/temps from outside Great Britain they’ve
used as CRUTEM data were subject to non-disclosure
or restrictive use agreements between Met Office/CRU
and some of the various 170-plus reporting weather
organizations.
Although the data sought might be covered by such
agreements, the agreements themselves must be
government documents, and as such it is fitting and
proper for them to be published upon FIOA requests
if they aren’t already available to the public.
To obtain copies of these simple agreements, some
participants in Climate Audit and other blogs sent in
a grand total of 62 FOIA requests
Symbols of fallacy::
Not one of the thousand plus emails
released, not a single set of data included, and no
purloined program, in whole or in part can be
considered responsive in the legal sense
to the Climate Audit readerships’ cut and paste
“spam” FOI campaign.
Also, despite these very specific FOIA requests, the
CRU/Met has failed to produce a single restrictive
use agreement with the numerous data supplying
organizations dated prior to November, 2009.
The leading CRU/Met actors have failed to proffer
such publically cited agreements at various investigative
sessions while they were under oath and even when
entering such agreements would have been of
considerable benefit and assistance to the investigators.
Thus John Quiggin’s conclusion:
is demonstrably false.
Dr. John may have found something smoking.
It appears he inhaled, deeply.
edit
Anthony, ctm, other:
Could you please add a note beneath my above
R.S.Brown (08:33:37) :
indicating that Mr. Quiggin has revised his “Smoking
Gun” article, and eliminated the logical link between
the FOI campaign and the creation of the foia.zip file.
He made a lot of modifications to the article after
slipping in some snide remarks about the quality of
Mr. McIntyre’s supporters, and sealing the thread from
additional comments.
See above: jaymam (21:42:40) :
/edit
No one actually did deprive, permanently or otherwise, anyone of any data.
At most, this was a transfer of IP.
The peculiar thing about Quiggin’s poorly-considered decoupage of events is that the FOIA requests were after DATA, and the FOIA.zip was (as far as I’m aware) primarily composed of emails.
Which is not the same thing as data. Quiggin, in a sober moment, may come to see his mistake.
JQ’s comment as he shut down comments on this story says a lot:
March 13th, 2010 at 09:06 | #35 Reply | Quote
I think we’ve seen enough to demonstrate the intellectual and moral quality of McIntyre’s supporters. I’m calling a halt here. Comments on this thread are closed.
It is pretty amazing and grossly inaccurate summary of 137 comments. We all know Mr. Pete, who is invariably polite and temperate, and his inclusion is sufficient to give lie to the comment.
Paul Hudson of the BBC got the CRU e-mails a month before everyone else.
By this guy’s logic that should make HIM the prime suspect.
“…Whether or not he was directly involved in the theft, or merely created the opportunity and benefited from the proceeds is impossible to determine, and essentially irrelevant…”
Arguing (or, more accurately, ranting) from ignorance. Quigs is a leftist blogger, evidently hasn’t read the UEA emails, and is not primarily a physical scientist, based on lists of his publications.
A miasma of decay and desperation has settled over the CAGW movement. This smear indicates the level to which they’ve already sunk, and it’s going to get even worse. At some point, moral responsibility will be assigned, but not in the way that Mr. Quigs assumes.
If Quiggin can substantiate his allegations he should contact Norfolk Constabulary and provide them with whatever evidence he has.
If not, he would be well advised to get himself a damn good solictor.
Damages for defamation dont come cheap in the English legal system…
Professors like Quiggin lose all their credibility with posts like that one.
Is he a liar or a fool — no matter which, I can’t trust anything he says scientifically, either.
Proclaimed intellectuals should, at a minimum, try to sound intellectually honest and objective in their public statements.
Of course his blog does say “Commentary on Australian & world events from a social-democratic perspective”. I guess that absolves him.
It’s not IP if it does not enable anyone to make or use something that was secret know-how before. It’s just an ugly insight into a groupthink so extreme that it became a scam.
If McIntyre can invoke English libel laws (by saying that the harm was done to his reputation in the UK) he could presumably have a good case against Quiggin.
Saying that McIntyre, by asking a FOI request, was the cause of leaked data, is like saying that I, by putting all my jewellery in one box, caused my house to be robbed.
One of Quiggen’s comments at the link I provided;
“Since various commenters seem to have missed a basic point, let me restate. Gaining unauthorised access to someone else’s emails and publishing them is a crime.”
jack mosevich (05:57:48) :
Anyway he is only an economist. Economists’ forecasts are about as good as those from climate models.
Exactly! Real economists know their projections/forecasts are guesses. Anyone who says they can make solid future projections about economic or financial systems is full of crap and there are literally hundreds of years worth of research to back me up on that statement.
As someone who studied Economics, it is also the (main) reason I am a skeptic. No matter how many billions we pour into GCMs, it will never compare to the funding and motivation for predicting financial markets and that is still all about “as useful as an areshole right here * points to elbow”
I know everyone loves to hate Economists, but the good ones I met always prefaced any theory with “this is how we think it works” – it is the ultimate fuzzy science.
The parallels between Economics and climate science are everywhere, and just as in Climate Science you have snake oil salesmen trying to convince people that they know it all, or can explain it all, or can make predictions that are actually useful… all they’re really doing is describing trends, ascribing/attributing causation, and extrapolating the relationship in question.
A healthy dose of humility should be a prerequisite for anyone who calls themselves a Climate Scientist or an Economist… and while the latter has a long and well documented history to justify institutional humility (again, not accounting for the idiots who profess to know it all), the former does not seem to have learned that lesson yet.
To put it another way, it should be the exception in Economics for someone to say they can make hard and reliable forecasts… and the rule that a forecasts are stated as, more or less, one step removed from guesswork. For Climate Science it is the rule to overstate the confidence with which projections are made, and the exception (mainly from folks like Christy, Lindzen, Spencer, etc) that uncertainty is communicated.
I have no problem with us (metaphorically) throwing crappy Economists under the bus, but there are plenty of good ones out there too.
Francisedwardwhite (At 7:28:33): Great comment. Really incisive and correct on all points, IMHO. No system can pretend to stability (i.e. integrity) over any length of time without an error-correction (reality) function. If there is no accountability, no auditing, it is inevitable that the system will be consumed by its own BS at an accelerating rate. This happens in business. It happens with governments. It happens with any human institution. When we begin to ask “Why can’t these people understand this simple point?” it’s a sign that the rot is widespread; that these people can and do understand the point, but they desperately don’t want to.
I also resent Quiggin’s remark about “scientists” and “opponents”. Like, none of the skeptics (am I still allowed to use that word?) might be scientists too? And that ONLY scientists have any ethical standards.
ANGRY now.
Mcintyre shpuld sue.
Subsequent discovery might uncover more.
“the mole” should come forward.
Organizations such as UEA should be reminded heavy handedly that
their publicly funded research belongs to the public.
This type of malfeasance should be publicly reprimanded and this Quiggin
should suffer some consequences.
Government bodies around the world should be publicly
and definitively informed of the meaning of the documents in question and the questionable nature of the science and methods involved and all legislation
or international or intranational financial agreements created to punish the public should be promptly canceled.
It beggars belief that an “academic” could be so careless of facts that he will go into print accusing Steve McIntyre of causing the leaking of the files and emails by asking for them.
Do you know the more these guys put themselves in the public eye the more I see advocates who can’t engage in reasonable discourse.
Quiggins is being rather foolish. By making allegations about what occurred in East Anglia (located in Britain) he has laid himself open to a libel suit in the UK. That is very silly of him as the libel laws in the UK are notorious. It is the world’s absolutely worst jurisdiction to be sued for libel in.
Perhaps the posters here should be well inspired to visit an informative site such as “deepclimate” to appreciate the good aussie is not alone in his accusations…
It always pays to know your foes and appreciate their tenacity.
Quiggin (from his comments):
Oh, that’s a bit more specific. And possibly litigable. I’m not sure that McIntyre ever received anything other than a link.
If someone posting a link to comments constitutes receipt of stolen property, I think a great many people are in trouble.
So the reason AGW is busted is because……………of leaked emails(?). Gordon Bennett! I agree. McIntyre owes this guy no response. This guy has to earn the right to be responded to and he has not. Like CO2, he’s Irrelevant. Enjoy the freedom of not even having to respond. It’s a new day in the world and the model writers who wrote the models of how to invoke polictical power will have to go back their drawing board out-of-date drawing boards.
To the unknown leaker: ……..we salute you!
Graphite (06:21:01) :
Theft is a tricky term under English law anyway —
A person is guilty of theft if: he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it.
Since posting the CRU emails does not deprive CRU the use of them, it cannot be theft, then.
I understand that Prof Quiddich is an Economist. It would appear that, unlike most Economists, his economies appear to extend to the truth
Agree with other on this site. Golden opportunity for libel suit. Good trial atty could legally mine much information.
I have not read all the comments so this point may have been raised already.
To steal, theft, perloined or whatever other word you may choose means to take AWAY or as a police officer once told me ” to deprive the rightful owner of the use of the item “, At no time was the information taken away and the CRU was never for a milisecond deprived of its use therefore it could not have been stolen. If it was copied in violation of a confidentiality agreement this is a civil matter and there is no criminal activity in this case.
@R. de Haan (08:15:08) :
The face of Reason
Environmental organizations joining the new propaganda effort:
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2010/03/face-of-reason.html
—————————————————————-
Face of Reason??? – “Look at those snappers!”
(Romancing the Hockey stick (1984))
I grew up in a communist country under relentless indoctrination, ideological instilment, enlightenment towards bias approach considered to be only universally moral attitude, and all of these were reputedly scientific, objectively proved, and who don’t comprehend it he is not only immoral but also stupid with low cognitive capability to appreciate the scientific base of the unambiguous true. While attending a technical university I had to take in for examinations in scientific communism etc. to obtain an engineering degree. I was sorry for the time I had lost studying the catechism.
Now I appreciate it. My immunity against ideology and evangelization doctrines mocked as a science is very useful. The Carbonari doctrine and the carbon-socialisms into which it leads us are very obvious. The similarities of AGW doctrine and the scientific communism are so flagrant to guffaw me regularly as no real life buffo can beat them. Well, these Carbonari responses to Climategate are comic masterpieces to me. No comic could create such a parody of Red Commissars like the smearing CRU advocates as e. g. the Quiggino clown.
If you follow Quiggens’ dubious logic back, you will see that it was not Steve McIntyre who was responsible, but the people who caused Steve to take the action he did, so in Quiggins book, the finger should point firmly at Mann et al.
The headline “McIntyre accused by University of Queensland Prof of CRU break in” belies what Professor Quiggin said.
“I think there is enough to point to Steven McIntyre as the person, along with the actual hacker or leaker, who bears primary moral responsibility for the crime…”
“Whether or not he was directly involved in the theft, or merely created the opportunity and benefited from the proceeds is impossible to determine, and essentially irrelevant.”
Professor Quiggin is voicing his suspicion of McIntyre just as some voice their suspicion of Jones and Mann.
Perhaps he thinks what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.
Wade (07:57:44)
To continue the Monty Python parade:
He’s a lumberjack, and he’s okay.
He sleeps all night and he works all day.
😛
Mods no harm no foul if you want to snip
What is it about guys with big black beards that make them super sensitive to criticism and want to lash out violently for the slightest reason?
From Patchi to this guy to sundry Talibans, Hamas, Hezbollah and Iranian clerics, the message is one of hate for anyone who dares offer the slightest criticism or any kind of alternative view. The self appointed purveyors of extreme versions of scientific or religious ‘truth’ know their continued existence depends on the constant scaring of the masses.
As a student, I grew a beard, the girls hated it, so I shaved it off and everything returned to normal. Probably not relevant, but it left a lasting memory – beards are not cool.
What a load of hockey pucks!
The headline “McIntyre accused by University of Queensland Prof of CRU break in” belies what Professor Quiggin said.
“I think there is enough to point to Steven McIntyre as the person, along with the actual hacker or leaker, who bears primary moral responsibility for the crime…”
“Whether or not he was directly involved in the theft, or merely created the opportunity and benefited from the proceeds is impossible to determine, and essentially irrelevant.”
Professor Quiggin is voicing his suspicion of McIntyre just as some voice their suspicion of Jones and Mann.
Perhaps he thinks what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.
Ian H (09:59:53) :
Quiggins is being rather foolish. By making allegations about what occurred in East Anglia (located in Britain) he has laid himself open to a libel suit in the UK. That is very silly of him as the libel laws in the UK are notorious. It is the world’s absolutely worst jurisdiction to be sued for libel in.
==============
Is a suspicion the same as an allegation?
My wife always says, “How stupid can they be?”
And I reply, “They are trying so very hard to show you, dear.”
Idiot: one who is unaware of their surroundings.
John Galt (07:40:07) :
John – Steve is indeed Canadian. I am Canadian and Australian. John Q makes me embarrassed to be Australian.
A smug, sanctimonious, government employed economist somehow considers that he has the right to lecture engineers and scientists about climate change??
And without full disclosure: “I, John Quiggin, do personally declare that I wholly, totally and irrevocably support with the whole of my being, the control by government of the production and distribution of all means of modification of the wealth of society.”
That OK, John?
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that McIntyre fans have a double standard.
Allegations of wrongdoing based on suspicions are OK if directed at Jones and man.
Mere suspicion of wrongdoing is outrageous if directed at McIntyre.
Why can’t people just be honest?
Hey, Quiggins – the emails were unjustly being sequestered but now have been out. Even the IOP chastising CRU for not conforming to the FOIA dictates and who knows where the criticism and investigation will end. The IPCC nearly completely discredited. On and On.
Now YOU face possible significant libel charges. I’ve heard and learned that fairly well one can judge a man by his friends. I suggest you apologize, take cover and seek redemption for an obvious number of sins.
“Scientists have been constrained in fighting back by the fact that they are ethically constrained to be honest, whereas their opponents lie without any compunction.”
——–
You can say that again!
barry moore (10:19:32) :
If it was copied in violation of a confidentiality agreement this is a civil matter and there is no criminal activity in this case.
Please have a look at the “computer misuse act 1990” A UK gov document :
“the access he intends to secure is unauthorised”
“A person guilty of an offence under this section shall be liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale or to both”
Looks criminal to me!
…………all roads lead to a hut in…………..
Do we know whether WUWT is deemed a ‘ANTI-SCIENCE’ website by the AGW proponents?
About Beards: my mum always thought those that wore beards were hiding something (and I don’t think a lice nest was what she meant!!)
Wren (10:46:50),
That is one of the most perfect examples of psychological projection I’ve seen here.
So this “FOIA” leak of emails was nothing more than a diversion.
Who doesn’t like a good lawsuit now and then?
“Wren (10:44:28) :
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that McIntyre fans have a double standard.
Allegations of wrongdoing based on suspicions are OK if directed at Jones and man.
Mere suspicion of wrongdoing is outrageous if directed at McIntyre.
Why can’t people just be honest?”
We ARE being honest.
Why couldn’t Jones be honest ?
Right and wrong ?
It is wrong to phony up the science. Wrong to refuse FOI requests.
Wrong to threaten to delete data rather than let others examine it.
Wrong to pervert the peer review and publishing process.
And I am not even commenting on the wrongness of doing publicly funded research and tailoring a set of scientific conclusions to suit a political agenda, and then declaring such shaky and badly constructed conclusions to be “settled” and begin international legislation based upon them.
That is all wrong.
Exposing such malfeasance and countering the wrongdoing with clear-headed statistical analysis ( Mcintyre) is not wrong. It is the high form of right.
Get straight on your definitions of right and wrong.
Typical academic demigod. Living in the Ivory Tower gives these people a huge disconnect from reality.
In a claim for defamation, the normal butden of proof is reversed, in that it would be up Quiggin to convince a court that his statement was true.
ie: It wouldnt be up to Steve to prove that it was erroneous.
Judgement decided on the balance of probabilities. Heard before a District Judge in a county court, but it still means fingerbowls, laws of evidence and a judge in wig and gown sitting beneath the Royal Cipher of Her Majesty…
Ew.
Really, Ick. Yuck. I’ve always tried to avoid aging, nasty hippy types. You just pointed me to a flock. A gaggle? A swarm. A toxic, festering pile.
Those type will never, EVER understand reality. And Quiggen has a fan club. Oh well, ONE of them had to leave the commune to make money, right?
I’ll try that again in English:
In a claim for defamation, the normal burden of proof is reversed, in that it would be up Quiggin, as defendent, to convince a court that his statement was true.
ie: It wouldnt be up to Steve to prove that it was erroneous.
Judgement decided on the balance of probabilities.
Heard before a District Judge in a county court, but it still means fingerbowls, laws of evidence and a judge in wig and gown sitting beneath the Royal Cipher of Her Majesty looking over his/her spectacles at you…
ML (06:34:53) :
Every day we have more and more evidence confirming that IQ of some of the “climate scientist” is within the range of max and min temperatures on the equator.
__________________________________________________________________
More likely between the max and min temperatures on Pluto.
–Wren (10:46:50) :
“…the fact that they are ethically constrained to be honest,..”
Oh Wren, you do know how to feed a good laugh..
Sceptics were astonished at the existence and content of the UEA/CRU emails; a much better feeling than..mortified.
Smokey (10:52:14) :
Wren (10:46:50),
That is one of the most perfect examples of psychological projection I’ve seen here.
—————-
Reply:
We shouldn’t be surprised. As the emails indicated, the “climate scientists” were wondering where their projected global warming went, so they used subterfuge to project a fantasy. What they’re doing here to McIntyre is just more of the same.
Phil Jones needs to open everything he’s done so far for examination.
Reality: Eating worms to survive.
Reality show: Eating worms as a game to kick someone off the island.
Legally responsible: The person choosing to eat the worms.
Morally responsible: The person sitting at home watching the contestants, who is lending their eyeballs to the advertisers.
Truly responsible: The person who is checking their children’s homework and helping them do better work.
Responsible for their homework: The children.
Meanwhile, as this little side show Peyton Place distraction is going on, everyday in March has been above the 20 year record for tropospheric temperatures. See:
http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/
This follows on the heals of the 6th warmest February ever globally, and the warmest February on instrument record for the Southern hemisphere. So far, January-February have been the 5th warmest on record for the planet, and we are running ahead of both 1998 or 2003 as the warmest year (depending on which data you want to use).
Also, if the arctic sea ice is going to make a run to get into some positive anomaly state this winter, it better hurry, as the spring melt is about to begin and, and with arctic temps generally running well above average, it promises to be one heck of a melt season. If the arctic sea ice does not make it into the positive anomaly range, it will mark the 6th year in a row that it has failed to do so, meaning the arctic sea ice will have been below average for 6 years, despite the longest and deepest soloar minimum in a century…
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.anomaly.arctic.png
The data continue to suggest the high probability that the AGWT is correct…
He remembers me someone whose name begins with Pacha… ummm I’m not sure … he was that guy in IPCC…
Quiggin looks like a -riggen convict. He should be bunged in behind bars with his mates where he belongs.
Surely he can be prosecuted for making these libellous allegations?
tfp (10:48:33) :
Please have a look at the “computer misuse act 1990″ A UK gov document :
“the access he intends to secure is unauthorised”
“A person guilty of an offence under this section shall be liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale or to both”
Looks criminal to me!
Please note that the alleged violation you are referring to is the act of acquiring access to the information – the law you’re referring to is essentially the computer/internet equivalent of breaking and entering. It has not been demonstrated that the person(s) responsible broke into anything.
The criminality of this event is a big question mark. Consider the following scenarios:
1.) If this were an internal leak, it would be a jaw-dropper if the whistle-blower protection was not granted (i.e. this would most likely be considered legal and immune from criminal or civil charges).
2.) If this information was left unprotected, it might be subject to specious civil charges (most likely without substance) but criminal charges would not apply since no “misuse” had to take place to gain access.
3.) If it was purloined somehow (hacked or cracked with a stolen password) then the Computer Misuse Act would apply to the gaining of entry, and civil charges for damages resulting from the release would carry much more water.
Only one of the three scenarios is “criminal”. I’d tend to say as well, and admittedly as my $0.02 on the subject, that it’s probably the least likely of the three. The point you raise is valid, the law in question could apply, but I don’t think it’s as much of a given that it does apply as you suggest.
Quiggin’s evidently chickened out on the comments thing at his site. Readers may be interested to know that he’s a regular poster at Crooked Timber (a sort of virtual senior common-room, for those who don’t know it, a marvellous little coterie of smugly superior leftist ivory-tower tenured academics, remarkable for their insular viciousness towards intruding hoi-polloi). Here’s his latest:
http://crookedtimber.org/2010/03/03/lindzen-and-no-statistically-significant-warming-since-1995/
Quiggin doesn’t control commenting at CT. You know what to do.
Wren (10:44:28) :
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that McIntyre fans have a double standard.
Allegations of wrongdoing based on suspicions are OK if directed at Jones and man.
BASED ON SUSPICION?
They put it in writing, how much more evidence do you need?
Have you read all of the emails?
” R. de Haan (06:14:37) :
[…]
Today the Federal State of North Rhein Westfalen, the former center of the German “Wirtschaftswunder” announced a 95% reduction of CO2 by 20250.”
No need to panic yet for the inhabitants of Düsseldorf, home town of Kraftwerk (or re-arranging The Robots to be played on goatskin drums):
it is only a suggestion of a Climate protection law coming from “several environment protection groups”; a report in german:
http://www.derwesten.de/nachrichten/politik/Umweltverbaende-wollen-neue-Kohlekraftwerke-verhindern-id2741803.html
A C Osborn is the typical rank and file wamer.
Never able to grasp the width and depth of fraud throughout the entire AGW movement.
Instead choosing to view all of it as unsubstantiated suspicion by an anti-science crowd funded by big oil.
The battle is raging with the Lubchecnos and Quiggins so confused and unethical they think they have a shot at salvaging the cause.
In reality they are only piling up the dirt next to their career graves until it fall upon them.
It appears to be an excellent example of “Inspector Clouseau” reasoning. “And I suspect you because I have no reason to suspect you!”
Big Fail.
Where does one begin the reading lesson for this man:
“By July 2009, CRU had advised McIntyre that climate data used in their work was available from the original sources, and that he should seek it from them.”
Really? Does this man not read the dates on things and the contents:
http://climateaudit.org/2009/07/24/cru-refuses-data-once-again/
McIntyre requested data that had been sent to Webster. This request was
mad June 26th. CRU responded within their mandated 20 day window.
On July 24th Mcintyre wrote the blog post and explains CRUs Claim:
the data CANNOT be shared because of confidentiality agreements.
Our good professor must have read this blog, because he notes what followed:
“24 July 2009: McIntyre organizes a spam FOI campaign against CRU, asking his supporters to send requests nominating five countries whose data they wanted of the form:
I hereby make a EIR/FOI request in respect to any confidentiality agreements)restricting transmission of CRUTEM data to non-academics involing(sic) the following countries: [insert 5 or so countries that are different from ones already requested]
(unsurprisingly, his supporters ignored the request to stick to new countries, and sent multiples of the same request)”
Now, read that. In front of him he has the request. It’s a request for confidentiality AGREEMENTS, not data. AGREEMENTS. And why agreements?
because the data was supposedly “confidential”
Reading Comprehension: F.
hey he is in Australia, Why dont you guys down under go write his bosses.
Check the employee guidelines. When did he blog? personal time or work time? Have fun
Can you imagine a world government with this kind of people in power?
Crooked timber has closed comments.
Hey, this is gunna be fun.
Isn’t it obvious? The real breaker-inner must have been Quiggin. He’s just accusing McIntyre to deflect suspicion away from himself.
Re: Simon H (07:42:16) :
…winning a libel case requires you to prove resulting personal damages. That would require McIntyre to prove professional damage (far more difficult for a retiree) or loss of income (also difficult for a retiree).
—
Not in the UK. First prove defamation, which should be straightforward given Quiggin’s stated he has no evidence. Damages are then assessed once defamation is proven, and in the UK can be considerable, especially if Justice Eady is a sceptic. As for loss of income, Steve mentioned he’s doing some consultancy here:
http://climateaudit.org/2010/03/08/pdac/
mining data can be extremely valuable and people working with that data need to be trustworthy and credible. Accusing someone of hacking or releasing data without authority could be very damaging. Read Climate Audit or the Hockey Stick Illusion and I think it’s easy to see Steve’s behaved with integrity and ethically throughout this long saga. The poor ethical standards are very much in the public doman post CRUTape, and are on the side of the self righteous.
Litigating this in the UK would seem a slam-dunk, especially with our current libel laws. Not litigating keeps the moral high ground, but these kinds of baseless personal attacks are damaging to careers and reputations. Litigation may not help move the CRU investigation along and may not discover much. Quiggins would need to prove his statements correct and he couldn’t necessarily rely on evidence from CRU or Norfolk Police.
Quiggens;
“March 13th, 2010 at 09:06 | #35 Reply | Quote
I think we’ve seen enough to demonstrate the intellectual and moral quality of McIntyre’s supporters. I’m calling a halt here. Comments on this thread are closed.”
re: Hu Duck Xing’s posting of Quiggin’s dossier:
I was rather shocked to realise that this is the Quiggin associated with anticipated utility; this is a very well-known contribution.
I think we’re seeing an example here of eminent (or at least prominent) insularity. It is fascinating to see the way he digs his heels in and doesn’t give an inch. No interest at all in looking at the situation in any way other than thru a received narrative. From the thrust of his remarks, he must still believe in the hockey stick.
NickB. (09:52:19) :
jack mosevich (05:57:48) :
Anyway he is only an economist. Economists’ forecasts are about as good as those from climate models.
Exactly! Real economists know their projections/forecasts are guesses.
——————————-
And the WHO and their forecasts of rampant pandemic swine flu spring to mind also. Level 6 my arse.
So, yes, they’re all ‘at it’.
W. Richards (12:06:11) : Hey, you are most probably right!, he is desperate, and by acussing McIntyre he attracts the attention of the police. He makes a good candidate for a whistleblower. 🙂
I hope Steve consults legal counsel on whether Professor Quiggin has committed an actionable libel/slander, and if counsel so advises, takes action. I would contribute to the legal fund to pursue it, tho hopefully pro bono representation might be forthcoming.
What a stunning lapse in judgement to write a libelous accusation like this. Then again, perhaps the AGW religion is producing it’s own brand of suicide bomber. A legalistic suicide bomber who straps a liable and slander vest on and blows himself up along with the good reputation of the victim.
As Teal’C would say, “Indeed.”
Note what Quiggin has written and posted on his website, for example:
John Quiggin is a member of William Connolley’s band of wikipedia thugs. This guy is an unhinged nut – a fact his photo makes abundantly clear.
Wren (10:30:46) :
The headline “McIntyre accused by University of Queensland Prof of CRU break in” belies what Professor Quiggin said.
“I think there is enough to point to Steven McIntyre as the person, along with the actual hacker or leaker, who bears primary moral responsibility for the crime…”
“Whether or not he was directly involved in the theft, or merely created the opportunity and benefited from the proceeds is impossible to determine, and essentially irrelevant.”
Professor Quiggin is voicing his suspicion of McIntyre just as some voice their suspicion of Jones and Mann.
Perhaps he thinks what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.
===============
Or maybe good for the Quiggin and to hell with goose and gander? I guess for some it all depends on how many column inches one can claim or how much air time comes one’s way.
Whether that is JQ’s objective I have no idea but what I have read so far seems to offer an odd interpretation if media exposure and opportunity was not the primary objective.
Notice Quiggin’s well-poisoning in the matter of Lindzen. Has he yet pointed out that Roy Spencer is an advocate of Intelligent Design?
No doubt he will, when he has a bone to pick with Spencer.
Mr McIntyre
Quiggin’s comments are libellous. Happy to discuss how we go after him under E
Simon H (07:42:16) :
Guys… take a step back a moment….
I think pursuing Quiggin at this time would be the wrong reaction from McIntyre. To pursue Quiggin and win would require McIntyre to prove damages. Quiggin shot his mouth off, and we have good reason to believe he’s wrong, but winning a libel case requires you to prove resulting personal damages.
Being attacked by a rabid economist in this manner can only *enhance* Mr. McIntyre’s reputation.
That is, if further enhancement of 24-carat gold were possible.
Steve Oregon (11:51:28) :
A C Osborn is the typical rank and file wamer.
Never able to grasp the width and depth of fraud throughout the entire AGW movement.
Steve, please carefully read what I wrote!!!!!!!!!
“They put it in writing, how much more evidence do you need?”
I am deeply offended at being called a “rank and file wamer”, I have never wamed in my life.
Or supported any AGW statements.
Kay (05:25:40) asked: “Wow. That just blows my mind. Do climate scientists have ANY sense of ethics whatsoever?”
Quiggin is not a climatologist.
Oh, I might as well mention that Quiggin featured in a blog post I wrote recently about the “reliable sources” in wikipedia:
http://pediawatch.wordpress.com/2010/03/05/reliable-sources-in-the-world-of-wikipedia-wow/
Doh! You aren’t supposed to give the Quiggin attention. Don’t feed the Quiggin!
I am not a big fan of the litigation route but this slandering ‘scientist’ must be sued out of principle and to put an end to this assault.
It would make a spectacular example to the rest of the IPCC gang and, even better, the examination of the ‘facts’ here would be very revealing.
In the meantime, this desperate and pathetic outburst is very revealing in itself.
R Gates,
Your statements border on the ludicrous, to state that feb temps are the “6th warmest ever” is misleading. How many times have we heard the ‘warmest ever’ quote while the actual timeline is missing.
How many years does the record go back and what source are you using and what is the actual anomoly?
You also state that the southern hemisphere temperature for jan/feb is the fifth highest on record, but again how long does the record go back and what source are you quoting from? Does it not occur to you temperatures are actually falling when you make statements like “fifth highest on record”?
Your silliest quote however regarding arctic temperatures being “generally running well above average” and yet again you provide no actual temperatures to back up this frankly wierd assertion(I wonder why?) more important is your apparent inability to comprehend that small rises in arctic air temperatures while still below the freezing point of water cannot melt sea ice. This statement leads you to speculate that this will lead to “one heck of a melt season” although quite how you can make such a wild assumption escapes me completely unless you are from the ‘wishing it makes it so’ school of thought.
I can understand your reluctance to provide substantial evidence to back up your cherry picked claims but here is a challenge for you.
Please provide the actual average temperatures of the arctic you claim are running well above normal so we can compare the actual difference.
The final statement that arctic ice levels “have been below average for six years” is specious because the records you quote are only 31yrs/21yrs long, quite how you can extrapolate such certain conclusions with such a tiny timeline is beyond me.
So here is another challenge to you, please provide the supposed artic sea ice maximum average and the actual 2010 ice maximum so we can see exactly how far short 2010 is from the 30yr mean and the 1979-2000 mean.
Your use of cherry picked data does you no credit, I for one would be more amenable if you provided actual details of timelines,temps and differentials.
You saved the best quote till last regarding the solar minimum, the AGW consensus does not recognize the influence of solar cycles on polar ice cover levels.
Does it take someone like me to point out that the solar maximum/minimum cycle theory states that the cycles take several years to have any effect on actual global temperatures and sea ice levels so in fact if the theory is correct which many in the AGW camp deny there would be a delay of several years before any solar minimum had any discernable effect.
Dear Mr McIntyre
My view is Quiggin’s comments may be libellous. I’m happy to discuss the terms upon which we might sue him and the University. It’s time to take apart “scientists” like this.
Keep up the excellent work.
Kind regards
Kevin Oram
Sometimes you just know there’s still ample room for the pharmaceutical industry to make so much more profit.
McIntyre need do nothing except let these attackers have enough rope to hang themselves.
Quiggins has a lot of egg on his tie right now and there isn’t a queue to thank him for his intervention from either side.
Presumably to prof has as much evidence for this particular claim as he does for agw……
The current “state of the art” at a glance then.
I can’t believe you’ve wasted a whole thread on John Quiggin. He’s a nobody.
Ignore him. He is self-evidently a complete jerk. There are far bigger and better battles to fight than wasting time and energy on such an irrelevant mental pygmy..
Speaking -er, writing – as a retired lawyer (and with an extremely sparse acquaintanceship with the law of defamation) I think Quiggin has been somewhat clever – whether by design or by accident I cannot say. He does NOT accuse McIntyre of actually being the hacker/leaker or of being a co-leaker/hacker or of planning the action or of explicitly inciting it. Instead of making accusations of legal/criminal wrongdoing, he has written a nasty smear using innuendo, omitting salient facts and misstating others.
The little nugget in the midden is his confident statement that the e-mails/documents were internally assembled in order to respond to the FOI requests. While many have speculated on that, he states it as a known fact. Does he have sources that have provided that info???
Reason for further FOI requests to track down the source??? ( I am assuming that Australia has such legislation.)
But what the poor kings and queens in their ivory towers don’t understand, is often they actually are incompetent.
It is now fully morphed into the EMOTIONAL realm and completely out of the SCIENCE and REASON realm!
“Quiggin down under” is a scientist (?) who promotes personal opinion over factual data in the “global warming” discussion.
He’s listened to, why?
I mean, I know why he’s listened to by GW alarmists – he fits the mold.
But the rest of us?
Dunno
Grant (11:28:51) :
–Wren (10:46:50) :
“…the fact that they are ethically constrained to be honest,..”
Oh Wren, you do know how to feed a good laugh..
Sceptics were astonished at the existence and content of the UEA/CRU emails; a much better feeling than..mortified.
====
Call me skeptical of people who call themselves skeptics. A true skeptic is evenhanded.
http://nobelprize.org/nomination/nomination_facts.html
Janice Baker (13:29:52) :
Speaking -er, writing – as a retired lawyer (and with an extremely sparse acquaintanceship with the law of defamation) I think Quiggin has been somewhat clever – whether by design or by accident I cannot say. He does NOT accuse McIntyre of actually being the hacker/leaker or of being a co-leaker/hacker or of planning the action or of explicitly inciting it. Instead of making accusations of legal/criminal wrongdoing, he has written a nasty smear using innuendo, omitting salient facts and misstating others.
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No he doesn’t, but the headline says he does.
” McIntyre accused by University of Queensland Prof of CRU break in”
Libel ?
“Sou (06:09:15) :
Good looking chap.”
Come on at least try to be believable.
Quiggen is actually a well respected economist and with an impressive list of publications (I count 5 in the highly prestigious AER alone). Having said that, there is no excuse for his blog posting. Its lack of accuracy is matched only by its lack of honesty and ethics. Anyone with a shred of integrity would correct and apologize. Let’s see if Quiggen does the right thing.
WHY not check out the CRU data for yourself? I made it available on my website, I know from my stats that lots of you go there, but I also know you dont actually look. What does this tell me?
http://www.knowyourplanet.com/climate-data/
Quiggin has been altering his post in what looks like an attempt to make it less defamatory. Quiggin already shut down comments after it was pointed out in his thread that his post was likely defamatory.
Google’s cached version of the page from March 13th is here (I have this saved in case google updates their cache):
http://tinyurl.com/ygvn9bo
Quiggin’s current version of the post is here:
http://tinyurl.com/ydad7hm
Some differences. The latest version adds the following sentence to the first paragraph:
“It seems unlikely at this point that the hacker/leaker wll be identified, so as far as criminal liability is concerned, we will probably never know.”
In the original version Quiggin stated:
“there is enough to point to Steven McIntyre as the person, along with the actual hacker or leaker, who bears primary moral responsibility for the crime.”
Which he subsequently changed to:
“there is enough to point to Steven McIntyre as the person (along with the
actual hacker or leaker of course) who bears primary moral responsibility for the crime.”
(“of course” is new).
In the original version Quiggin stated:
“Whether or not he [McIntyre] was directly involved in the theft, or merely created the opportunity and benefited from the proceeds is impossible to determine, and essentially irrelevant.”
Which has been changed to:
“Whether or not he [McIntyre] was directly involved in the theft, or merely created the opportunity and benefited from the proceeds is impossible to determine, and essentially irrelevant in moral terms.”
(“in moral terms” is new).
In the current post he states
“Note: I’ve updated this to correct some errors.”
I don’t think these changes constitute error-correction.
Kitefreak (12:16:38) :
And the WHO and their forecasts of rampant pandemic swine flu spring to mind also. Level 6 my arse.
So, yes, they’re all ‘at it’.
Until I started spending a good amount of time here, I never really took note of the concept of “post normal” science. IMO, this is not science at all – it’s all FUD. Guys like Quiggin have more in common with Witch Doctors than they do Einstein.
Come up with a sensational frightening scenario, use statistics and models as a replacement for the scientific method and generate “projections” that are not reproducible or falsifiable, call it consensus, and then latch on to scary trends and (no matter how short term they might really be) extrapolate EXTRAPOLATE EXTRAPOLATE for dramatic effect.
I’ve been trying to come up with a historical corollary for such behavior. There are definite tones of paranoia (Jim Jones?), scapegoating (name an oppressive dictatorship in the 20th Century that didn’t do this), orthodoxy vs. heresy (pick a religion), and personal esteem/gain at the cost of integrity (politics anyone).
Whatever it is, it is most assuredly not science… not anything more than the vestigial trappings of it at least.
“Quiggen is actually a well respected economist and with an impressive list of publications ”
He is also known for his appearance on Geico commercials.
“Quiggen is actually a well respected economist and with an impressive list of publications (I count 5 in the highly prestigious AER alone).”
Hmmmm. I suspect he is highly invested in carbon trading and green stocks. A smart economist would know the elite want this to be the next bubble. Perhaps this desperate smearing is a sign of the think tanks reconsidering going ahead with carbon legislation.
The kind of mindless blather Quiggen spouted is exactly the sort of thing one observes in people that learn some cherished religious viewpoint is wrong (e.g. a cult victim charitably “deprogrammed” via family intervention), but cannot, yet, accept the true facts (vs. the “facts” imposed via cult programming). It’s an early stage of grieving.
Unfortunately, the natural response is to devote more mental energy to holding onto the cherished belief…which, if it succeeds, leads to an even more rabid & irrational fanatic….
Thanks to Steve McIntyre, we aleready knew quite a lot of the content of the e-mails. “Hide the decline”, yup, already observed that. “Mike’s tricks”, yeah, already knew about them.
It’s all bad news for the “robustness” of some studies and some milieus relied upon by the IPCC, and the emails only confirmed what was known (well OK, there was more of course).
Now they can’t wish away the bad news, so they go for the messenger.
But no legal action is needed. Only popcorn. After all it’s great fun to watch how the alleged elite can make a complete fool of themselves.
Kay (08:11:01) :
@ Ben (07:49:00) : Because Mann worked at the U of Virginia from 1999-2005, the ongoing Penn State review by a committee of scientists, is not likely to cover Mann’s “Hockey Stick” related problems, the ethics of Mann’s editorial actions with the UN IPCC’s 2001 report or the breach of scientific method procedures, due to Mann’s multi-year refusal to release his data for standard scientific review.”
Yes, but could they (or would they) contact UVa or UMass?
The small review group is not a court. They would have no way to subpoena input from outside of Penn State from the IPCC, the U of Virginia or Yale, where Mann worked before Virginia.
The review group could not compel individuals outside of Penn State to present information or records and they couldn’t put them under oath to answer honestly. Nor would a university administration likely sanction a review of another universities’ internal problems. Mann’s alleged problems, from before his time at Penn State and those from Mann’s actions in outside groups like the UN IPCC, probably won’t be mentioned at all.
That could lead to the same kind of misinterpretations we saw after the first report. Their scope appeared to be narrowly defined. Yet some are making much more broad sweeping claims. Hmmm… a lot like their AGW claims?
Professor Quiggin is a “research” economist. Enough said.
For those with strong character: http://www.johnquiggin.com is his blog site. Used to have a bright red masthead but now morbid black.
Quiggin is very quick to sue people who slander him on blogs – tried that with Jennifer Marohasy’s commentators some years back. (Slander is short term defamation, like a verballing, while libel is long term, such as a written opinion).
Much like Richard Dawkins, Robyn Williams (of the Oz ABC) and similar fellow travelers on the AGW waggon – mean spirited.
Quiggin is notorious here in Australia for tendentious statements on environmental issues. He keeps trying to exonerate the Greens for opposing DDT use against the mosquito vector of malaria in the Third World. Quiggin stridently repeats that DDT wasn’t banned for this purpose. True, but unfortunately its use was discouraged by other means. Charities would only supply other insecticides which didn’t work. Loans were made conditional on not using DDT. The method of DDT application for anti-malaria purposes was spraying on the inner walls of houses, not indiscriminate spraying all over the environment. There was no rational basis for opposing this method. Yet for a long time it was opposed by Quiggin’s Green friends. Millions are estimated to have died as a result of this error.
Took the time to read some of his work – “sub-prime no problem” “Iraq disaster”
and a load of redistributive blather. Another Erlich-in-progress. They are
remarkably consistent. Even about being consistently wrong.
If facts aren’t your friend go ad hominem.
Jonathan Baxter (14:19:40) :
“Quiggin has been altering his post in what looks like an attempt to make it less defamatory. Quiggin already shut down comments after it was pointed out in his thread that his post was likely defamatory”
—————-
Well spotted. A sign of panic, perhaps?
Professor Wolfman
I am a Doctoral student at the University of Queensland. If I sight Professor John Quiggins of the School of Economics and Political Science on campus, I might pop over and ask him a few questions.
Do McIntyre defenders know if he is the person who organized a campaign that harassed the University of East Anglia with FOI requests?
The University of East Anglia received 58 FOI requests of similar nature asking for details on confidentiality agreements with different countries, many of which were identical except for the specific countries mentioned. Apparently, this was an organized effort, but the following rather amusing request was from a participant who failed to follow instructions:
“I hereby make a EIR/FOI request in respect to any confidentiality agreements)restricting transmission of CRUTEM data to non-academics involing the following countries: [INSERT 5 OR SO COUNTRIES THAT ARE DIFFERENT FROM THE ONES ALREADY REQUESTED]
1. the date of any applicable confidentiality agreements; 2. the parties to such confidentiality agreement, including the full name of any organization; 3. a copy of the section of the confidentiality agreement that “prevents further transmission to non-academics”. 4. a copy of the entire confidentiality agreement.”
Note: Words were put in caps for emphasis.
—–
The 58 FOI requests can be seen at
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/25032/response/66822/attach/2/Response%20letter%20199%20100121.pd
What a laugh!
http://www.uq.edu.au/economics/johnquiggin/news/2006-07-06-AFR.htm
Off topic, but Salinger in NZ appeared yesterday at the Board of Enquiry hearing for the Turitea wind farm. He was buried alive and the Board did not ask him one question about his AGW alarmist nonsense.
Graphite (06:21:01) :
They invented a whole new crime to cover what theft left out.
Taking without the owners consent.
The computer misuse act which relates to hacking contains a caveat that if no harm to the computer system it becomes a civil offence. I am willing to be corrected on this as it is a long time since I looked at it.
Either way. They are both summary offences & subject to the same 6 month statute of limitations as the FOI violations.
DaveE.
I suggest that we let Quiggin’s comments go through to the wicket-keeper: that is, ignore them! They really are not worth commenting upon; writing about his outburst in the manner we have, does not, in general, do our attempts to focus on demonstrating the falsity of the AGW hypothesis any good. The nature of Quiggin’s comments indicate that he does not appear to understand the science querying the AGW hypothesis; indeed Quiggin’s absence of crediting McIntyre with demonstrating the spurious methods used by Mann and co-workers in formulating the “hockey stick” time-temperature diagram could also indicate that he does not understand the tools, i.e. advanced parametric statistics, deployed by McIntyre and McKittrick in such a demonstration.
I believe that Steve McIntyre, through Climate Audit, gains stature from Quiggin’s outburst – McIntyre’s analytical approach in falsifying important elements of the AGW hypothesis, and his reasoned and dispassionate control of discussion on Climate Audit – is a good example for all of us – and it is McIntyre’s gain because it contrasts so dramatically with the emotive nature of Quiggin’s comments.
I feel that Steve McIntyre should not do anything about Quiggin – just continue to lead by example – and let Quiggin’s comments go through to the wicket keeper.
For some reason, I cannot take economist-turned wannabe-detective Quiggin seriously. To point the finger at McIntyre as having primary “moral” responsibility for the “crime” is to ignore the thousands of skeptics (most working independently of McIntyre) who have been crying foul against the AGW alarmism, and the proposed (costly) solutions. Quiggin’s second most outrageous comment on his blog states “That attempt failed and the files were then widely circulated to anti-science sites.” (An obvious reference to AGW skeptic sites, and is a use of Disinformation rule no. 5: “Sidetrack opponents with name calling and ridicule”.)
Quiggin’s makes repeated use of the phrase “stolen e-mails”, suggesting that they and all backups were deleted from CRU’s server(s), thus depriving their owners
of their property.
Please send a small donation to John Quiggin with a suggestion that he use the funds to purchase for himself an Oxford dictionary with which he should consult for the proper definition of the word “stolen”.
McIntyre would do best to simply ignore this Australian version of Inspector Jacques Clouseau.
“anti-science blog sites”
This is the criminal accusation…
The mentality that leads so-called intelligentsia to declare climateaudit.org an anti-science blog is a travesty, and very dangerous… As we speak the Intelligentsia Panel is formulating it’s version of “Inquisitional ‘Anti-Christ/Climate’ Witch Hunts”… Beware their wrath, they see you as all Evil incarnate…
They believe only they understand the Spirit of Science…
JimAsh (11:00:02) :
“Wren (10:44:28) :
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that McIntyre fans have a double standard.
Allegations of wrongdoing based on suspicions are OK if directed at Jones and man.
Mere suspicion of wrongdoing is outrageous if directed at McIntyre.
Why can’t people just be honest?”
We ARE being honest.
Why couldn’t Jones be honest ?
Right and wrong ?
It is wrong to phony up the science….
=====
That allegation against Jones is a good example of an allegation based on suspicion.
Why not be honest and call a spade a spade?
I can’t help feeling that Quiggin’s entire post is one long temper tantrum because he’s being ignored and his favourite apocalyptic fantasy is swirling around the plug-hole of history.
So Steve McIntyre bears “moral responsibility” for the leaking of the CRU emails?
Does he also bear responsibility for the scientific misconduct revealed in those emails and if not, who does Professor Quiggin? Does he bear responsibility for the FOIA requests made which were illegally and criminally rebuffed?
Quiggin’s rant reminds me very strongly of the sort of complaints made by fundamentalist Christians against atheists/non-believers for denying the Day of Judgment and atheists somehow bearing responsibility for sending so many people to Hell.
Like the tantrums that my young children sometimes act out (occasionally in the supermarket) the best advice I can give is just ignore the tantrum and get on with life.
I’m amused that a few are noticing that Prof. Quiggan shut down his thread after it was pointed out that it might be libelous, and is now modifying his post. Apparently pointing out to him that he was a fool wasn’t enough.
=====================
Is there any proof that McIntyre organized the FOIA form letter campaign?
The link in Grizzley Adams’ blog post just post to other blog posts that allege he’s behind it.
They really think SM is the friggin boogey man – AHAHAHAHAHA
He’s the new Exxon!!!!!!
DJ Meredith (08:22:14) :
Looks to me like Quiggin performed a clever “trick” by splicing fiction onto fact ….
—-
You are confused. The splice was the lying headline “McIntyre accused by University of Queensland Prof of CRU break in.”
That lie was spliced onto Quiggin’s “I think there is enough to point to Steven McIntyre as the person, along with the actual hacker or leaker, who bears primary moral responsibility for the crime…”
Why can’t people be truthful ?
Wren (15:14:30) :
Wow, aren’t you a clever little fellow? I am shocked, shocked I tell you that that “torrent” of 58 requests was organized in such a way. Who would have thought of such a thing?
Why, look here inspector, how would I have ever found it if it weren’t for you sharpies being on the job?
http://climateaudit.org/2009/07/24/cru-refuses-data-once-again/
(The phrase “hidden in plain sight” might come to mind, but that’s already been taken.)
Of course, referencing this directly runs the risk of people actually being exposed to the background behind the “torrent” of requests.
Couldn’t have that, now could we?
HGI (14:13:18) :
Quiggen is actually a well respected economist and with an impressive list of publications (I count 5 in the highly prestigious AER alone).
Well respected by who? He’s his own greatest fan.
The man is a blathering idiot.
R Gates
Surely you have been hanging out here long enough to realise that the temperature data is of dubious quality?
Is he wearing that beard for a bet? I’d probably believe the climate was warming if I had a great furball insulating my face.
“Wren (15:14:30) :
Do McIntyre defenders know if he is the person who organized a campaign that harassed the University of East Anglia with FOI requests?[…]”
No, Wren, i don’t know that.
I’m still laughing at the kangaroo loose somewhere in the upper paddock. Sometimes the best part of this blog is the comments.
Just another frustrated economist forever stuck in academia making another baseless allegation on an issue he has no idea about.
The CRU files were LEAKED they weren’t hacked. This is the ‘history deniers’ way of trying to smear again. IT experts investigating the leak have confirmed that a hack into the system, especially with such selectivity was impossible.
The ‘history deniers’ cannot bear to think that one of their own would rat on them and betray their ’cause’. So in their eyes, the best defence is to attack after all. Isn’t that right Al, James, Paul, Rajendra, Stephen, Kevin, Mike and Phil?!
And isn’t that right Professor Quiggin?
This terrible harassment of the keepers of climate secrets must stop… Stop I tell you!!!!
Do you really expect these scientist saviors of our perilously fragile planet to take even ONE moment away from their important work to answer a question?
Believe them… they only have your best interests at heart…
John M @ 16:03:23
Shhh. Wren’s much more fun naive.
================
ack – not my university. I think I’ll have to find a way to complain through the alumni organisation.
Why do academics from other disciplines keep getting involved in this business?