I don’t have a lot to say about this, but I would suggest reading the comments over at the Climate Audit thread on the subject.
The acount of Richard Lindzen’s testimony in the report is interesting.
~ charles the moderator
UPDATE: Dr. Mann responds to the news in a video interview below.
H/t to Luboš Motl
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The PSU Final Report on MM is the strong evidence that it was primarily protecting itself from immediate loss of reputation. In the long run, though, they seem to be making their reputation suffer more severely by their protectionist actions. What happened in ‘Climategate’ will continue to be talked about critically by independent thinkers who are unaffected the bias of the ‘consensus’ bureaucrats, scientists, environmentalists, and politicians.
Mann is exonerated by this investigation and is also damaged goods.
Lindzen’s testimony is strong leverage for another investigation of MM.
John
Smokey said: “Read The Hockey Stick Illusion by A.W. Montford. It will force you to accept the conclusion, laid out in detailed chapter and verse, that Michael Mann and others engaged in scientific misconduct for money and status.”
Heh.
If your criterium is based on buying into somebody else’s ability to construct a narrative aimed at motivating you for their own purposes, you already richly deserve every political misfortune that overtakes you.
“Give me six sentences written by the most innocent of men and I will hang him with them” was said by Cardinal de Richelieu 400 years ago – yet you’re unaware of it and its implications. Why am I not surprised, given the state of the American body politic these days.
[snip – reference to sex act]
Curious.
Did all of the “peer” investigation jury members also hold large government grants or funding (included in the report was projects from DOE, NOAA, ONR, USAID), or prominent positions, and therefore surely guarded? That is, could there have been some conflict of interest involved? Seems they all came from the same university, namely PSU. Sure can’t call this an impartial investigation. This makes this whole hearing rather meaningless.
I hate the investigators labeling Dr. Mann as “outstanding” in the summary, I mean, even Capone was “outstanding”, though in a slightly different way, they both stand out and one killed people through tommyguns, the other by a hockey stick graph (and yes, people have already died because of this CAGW scare and others making devastating incorrect decisions based upon this CAGW conjecture with all of its scaremongering).
The investigators also seemed to awe at Dr. Mann’s ability to obtain large amounts of funding on so many different research projects from the government. And, solely because of the amount of money involved, the investigators see him as “exceeding the highest standards of his profession” and on that matter of obtaining funds I seem to lean toward dishonest, the smirks in his video says it all. I wish we could get him and many others behind an actual jury, one with real peers (“peers” properly means of equal age, education or social class, not of same profession, organization, group, or family), maybe one day.
I’m not trying to judge Dr. Mann, that is for others, but I personally don’t like what his involvement in the AGW fiasco has done and I have a deep gut feeling that he is but a puppet of some others much higher up the chain, but, that still doesn’t absolve him.
Bottom line, tenths-of-a-degree or millimeters-of-sea-rise doesn’t kill, other sometimes subtle things really do. That may be something for you AGW horn blowers to ponder from a contrarian view.
And Dr. Mann, I have zero funds from anyone, unlike you, no association to any group of any kind, unlike you. How dare you tack that on the end of your video!
Smokey, I pulled my numbers from the S&R post, not just out of the air.
You can’t accurately compare $4.2 million between 2006 and 2014 to the $2.8 billion between 2006 and 2009, because that $4.2 million is paid out in annual chunks, not all at the time the grant is awarded.
If you want to use the $4.2 million number, then you would have to estimate the amount of research dollars that Penn State will bring in in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2014. If we assume no growth in grant value, then we should use the 2009 grant number of $765 million for the next 5 years and add that to the $2.8 billion from 2006 through 2009. That’s a total of about $6.6 billion. $4.2 million divided by $6.6 billion is 0.06% again. It’s easier, more accurate, and less misleading to just look at the $4.2 million and determine how much of it was spent between 2006 and 2009.
Even if multi-year research grants were paid 100% at the time of award (and again, they’re not), then Mann would have brought in only 0.15% instead of 0.06%. That doesn’t change the overall conclusion – that PSU has no monetary incentive to whitewash their investigation and every monetary incentive to make sure that the investigation is real – in any way.
I didn’t denigrate McIntyre at all. I said he wasn’t an expert in university policy, reputation, or funding, and given that his background is from industry and not academia, that’s an entirely reasonable thing to say. He isn’t an expert on everything, Smokey, and I have a hard time believing that he’d claim to be an expert on university reputations.
Your hypothetical isn’t logical – Penn State having to pay back $4.2 million would be a drop in the bucket – 0.06%. They’d make that up just in good press for the university, never mind additional research from companies and the federal government who were appreciative of how seriously Penn State took their duty to look at Mann.
I’m unwilling to ascribe Penn State’s behavior to some conspiracy when a simpler and more logical conclusion is available – that Penn State’s investigation was honest and no attempted whitewash took place.
Ron P: Where did you get your “only the facilitator was present” information? It’s not in the PSU investigation report, which says:
“On April 14, 2010, the RA-10 Investigatory Committee (Assmann, Castleman, Irwin, Jablonski, and Vondracek) and Candice Yekel interviewed Dr. Michael Mann.” (p7)
“On April 12, 2010, the RA-10 Investigatory Committee (Assmann, Castleman, Irwin, Jablonski, and Vondracek) and Candice Yekel interviewed Dr. William Easterling, Dean of the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, Penn State University.” (p9)
“On April 20, 2010, the RA-10 Investigatory Committee (Assmann, Castleman, Irwin, Jablonski, and Vondracek) and Candice Yekel interviewed Dr. William Curry, Senior Scientist, Geology and Geophysics Department, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.” (p10)
“On April 20, 2010, the RA-10 Investigatory Committee (Assmann, Castleman, Irwin, Jablonski, and Vondracek) and Candice Yekel interviewed Dr. Jerry McManus, Professor, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Columbia University.” (p12)
“On May 5, 2010, the RA-10 Investigatory Committee (Assmann, Irwin, Jablonski, Vondracek; Dr. Castleman was not available) and Candice Yekel interviewed Dr. Richard Lindzen, Professor, Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.” (p13)
Only once was any one of the investigators missing, and that was Castleman regarding the testimony of Lindzen.
chek @ur momisugly 2:49.
Ooh, a good one for my museum of ironies: “somebody else’s ability to construct a narrative aimed at motivating you for their own purposes.” The unconscious ironies are the best. Finger lickin’ good.
=============
Einstein said: “No amount of experimentation can prove me right; only one experiment can prove me wrong”.
There isn’t one experiment proving agw doesn’t exist; there are many. Miskolczi. Gerlich and Tscheuschner. Ernst-Georg Beck. Landscheidt.
But, the irony is the ice core data showing that temperature increases happen about 800 years before the CO2 increases. Game. Set. Match.
to Brian Angliss
Yes, thank you. I appear to have misread the listing of attendees by 180 degrees. Since I’m old, I’ll claim a senior moment (but the truth is I goofed).
Brian @ur momisugly 3:12
OK, I’ll take Richard Lindzen over Steve McIntyre on ‘university policy, reputation, or funding”: ‘I’m wondering what is going on here’.
Brian, yet another irony for my museum. I need a new wing. Laugh busters.
==================
kim said:”Ooh, a good one for my museum of ironies: “somebody else’s ability to construct a narrative aimed at motivating you for their own purposes.” The unconscious ironies are the best. Finger lickin’ good”.
Yep you may think so, except Montford et all don’t have a narrative for the disappearing arctic ice and other salient facts and depredations in their accountant’s worlds. Which kinda skewers them.
chek,
Credibility question: Have you read The Hockey Stick Illusion ?
Brian Angliss,
Did you follow the Muir Russell investigation? It was almost identical in form to Penn State’s: the fix was in before it started, and most everyone knew it.
Internal investigations are always a sham; either used to get rid of undesirables, or to exonerate wrongdoers. True justice requires a jury, cross examination, and each side calling their own witnesses.
None of that took place in either of these internal investigations, and the outcomes were never in doubt. But I forgive you for believing otherwise, because you’re hopelessly naive about human nature. ☺
Not that it is a surprise to anyone, but it still makes me want to puke.
As a student, this intentional coverup of a man who has led students astray and lied to the US Government and stolen tax payers money for nothing should be going to prison, however he and his cronies continue in their smug ways.
chek @ur momisugly 3:52.
More amusement: “salient facts and depredations’.
Sure it’s been warming. What’s that got to do with CO2? Prove it.
===========
That’s Dr. McIntyre to you and Penn State’s “expert” inquiry.
Hu,
As I said at CA the most damning aspect of this report it what it does to the credibility of academic research.
However, your joke is also telling. How could they have possibly performed a complete investigation without knowing the credentials of the players involved?
Just me, or is Mr Mann paranoid much? I am still waiting for my Big Oil paycheque… been waiting a while now.
I must say the overall impression of the guy is that I would not buy a used car from him… heck even a used pencil…
Phrasing my questions so that folk don’t simply accuse me of appealing to authority…
How many commenters on this thread have completed the work to earn a PhD in climatology?
How many commenters on this thread have completed the work to earn a PhD in any science discipline?
How many commenters on this thread have completed the work to earn a Masters in climatology?
How many commenters on this thread have completed the work to earn a Masters in any science discipline?
If the commenters on this thread cannot answer at least on of the above questions in the affirmative, what makes them believe that they have sufficient exposure to or understanding of the processes of analysis employed by Mann, and indeed by the PSU investigation, that they are able to claim that there has been a covering up of inappropriate behaviour?
Heck, putting educational acheivement aside for a moment:
How many commenters on this thread have ever worked professionally in climatology?
How many commenters on this thread have ever worked professionally in any science discipline?
If folk cannot even answer the last question in the affirmative, how is it that they believe that they have the facility to understand anything of the science involved? This last is itself a serious question, because it is folk such as would have to respond negatively to all of the previous questions that are most likely to exhibit the oft-cited Dunning-Kruger effect, and in their ignorance not comprehend that they have completely the wrong end of the stick.
As someone who is able to respond in the affirmative to three of the questions I posed, I see a lot of people here who are grasping the wrong end of the stick, and who are prepared to beat others with their woody bits without any real understanding of why they are completely in error in so doing.
Angliss,
Congratulations on your quantitative analysis for what the truth is.
Bernard J.,
Mr. Steve McIntyre has shown that he is more knowledgeable regarding climatology than Dr Michael Mann. That is true whether you like it or not.
So much for your little chest thumping polemic.
Based on a quick “Climategate” Google News search, it appears that many in the elite news media are now celebrating the ‘exoneration’ of the climate scientists. I note one headline of the day reads: “If Only Oil Spills Would Evaporate Like Climategate.” They only seem to be lamenting that it has taken so long for the ‘truth’ to come out.
I personally feel these ‘exonerations’ were the predictable as the only politically correct outcome allowed.
Bernard J,
Your arguments are an appeal to authority.
I have one simple question, although you may be as technical as you like in your answer. What evidence causes you to believe that the majority of recent warming is anthropogenic? No where that I have looked has this question been answered except in the BBC interview with Dr Jones. Let’s just say that his answer, that we can’t think of any other reason, was unconvincing.
Smokey says:
July 2, 2010 at 4:43 pm
Internal investigations are always a sham; either used to get rid of undesirables, or to exonerate wrongdoers. True justice requires a jury, cross examination, and each side calling their own witnesses.
VILLABOLO RESPONDS:
Does that apply to Lord Monckton? You know, the Skeptic who:
1) Cut up a temperature chart, the UAH Globally Averaged Satellite Based Temperature . . ., right on 1998 in order to give the impression of Global Cooling?
If you want to look at this chart and figure how ingenious his TRICK to ALTER the chart and create a false DECLINE is, please see the chart duplicated by Roy Spencer at the beginning of Anthony’s article: “June 2010 Temperature, cooling a bit as El Nino fades.”
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/02/june-2010-temperature-cooling-a-bit-as-el-nino-fades/
2) Consistent misquotation, distortion and fabrication of scientist’s statements in order to give the impression that they support his views.
3) Outright falsehoods that are the photographic negative inversion of the facts, such as stating that the 5 major global temperature data sets prove his claim of Global Cooling when the exact opposite is true. (statement located at 1:23 on the following video) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ne-X_vFWMlw&feature=related
It hardly matters what one believes about Global Warming or Cooling. What matters is that he is stating the exact reverse of what those data sets, like the one posted on the El Nino thread, states.
If this is the “science” by which one makes decisions of major importance (and please don’t bore me with “Cap and Trade” which many educated “AGW” do not support) then who is calling for the imprisonment of people like Lord Monckton who are the ones supported by the Oil Companies such as Exxon Mobil and the Koch brothers?
You are always projecting what you are guilty of unto others. Slandering an entire scientific profession of being in it just for the money when there are many other ways of making more money is a measure of moral torpidity. Do you even know that only 34% of Climatologists are employed by the Federal Government (Bureau of Labor Statistics: http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos051.htm#emply)?
Why not go ahead and declare the Moon landing a fraud based on this “Government Employees and Administrations are faking things to get funds” logic.
You want to talk about the REAL MONEY? Look at those who deal in hundreds of billions of dollars instead.
Bernard J. says:
How many commenters on this thread have completed the work to earn a PhD in climatology?
Um, I’m sure lots of other folks will point out the LACK of PhD Climatology among the major “climate researchers” such as Hansen… So I’ll just point out that it is considered “Age Discrimination” to demand a degree in a relatively new field from folks when attempting to hire for a position.
In Computer Science, we must advertise for “or equivalent” since most folks my age can not have such a degree. They did not exist then.
Similarly, I would expect that “Climate Science” as a distinct field is fairly new (having largely been part of Geology, Meteorology, et.al. prior to becoming a fad.) It would be very interesting to find out just WHEN the first “Climate Science” degree was handed out by that name.
So if you want to be an age discriminator, go right ahead.
BTW, it is typical in most fields to have a LOT of interdisciplinary folks looking at complex systems problems as each helps fill in holes in the other specialists knowledge. In my case, I’m a “computer guy”, so I’m fully qualified to critique the computer skills applied in, for example, GIStemp. And they are pretty poor.
How many commenters on this thread have completed the work to earn a PhD in any science discipline?
Quite a high percentage, from what I know of the biographies of commenters here.
How many commenters on this thread have completed the work to earn a Masters in climatology?
Again with the age discrimination and too narrow focus thing. You really need to work on that.
How many commenters on this thread have completed the work to earn a Masters in any science discipline?
Well, a heck of a lot. Now if you allow the “or equivalent” you get even more folks. Like me. I ‘tested out’ for an ICCP certification that is treated by the State of Washington as the equivalent of a masters. Oh, and there is that small matter of about 25 years of professional experience in the field of computing… Oh, and my college level teaching credential in Data Processing and Related Technologies.
How many “climate scientists” have a masters level in computer science and a teaching credential in it? None? A couple? GEE, maybe we ought not to let them use computer models then…
If the commenters on this thread cannot answer at least on of the above questions in the affirmative, what makes them believe that they have sufficient exposure to or understanding of the processes of analysis employed by Mann, and indeed by the PSU investigation, that they are able to claim that there has been a covering up of inappropriate behaviour?
Oh, now we’re back to the Appeal to Authority thing.
It’s called a Jury of Peers. You grab 12 folks off the street and they get educated about what is going on in a case and render a verdict. The lawyers typically are not specialists in what the Perp did either.
Look, all it takes is a working brain and a willingness to work at it a bit.
Get over it.
How many commenters on this thread have ever worked professionally in climatology?
Oh come off it. “Climatology” only became a gravy train recently. Take a look at the papers being published. Loads of folks with Biology and Econ degrees hopping on the bandwagon too. Even failed railroad engineers.
This stuff isn’t brain surgery. Frankly, it’s a heck of a lot easier than many of the database systems I’ve had to design and vastly easier than compiler development. ( I ran the QA department for a compiler tool chain… FWIW, these “climate scientists” could use A LOT of help in the whole QA process department. They are rank amateurs when it comes to professional grade archives, QA suites, and code validation procedures).
How many commenters on this thread have ever worked professionally in any science discipline?
How many lawyers and judges have? You don’t need to be a con man to judge one. And you don’t need to be employed in a ‘science discipline’ to understand it. (And I’m not real sure what a ‘science discipline’ job would encompass anyway. Would it include the field of economics? All those fantasy predictions of the end of our economy from all sorts of fantasy climate ills? The predictions of a perfect world if only cap and tax were implemented? There is an awful lot of room under that ‘climate science’ tent… So I hope you are willing to accept a B.Arts as a ‘science discipline’ because you have a lot of economic hand waving from about that level being done by the ‘climate scientists’…)
If folk cannot even answer the last question in the affirmative, how is it that they believe that they have the facility to understand anything of the science involved?
It’s called ‘having a brain and using it’. It works rather well.
BTW, you may not realize it, but you are making the same class of argument made by the Popes toward Martin Luther and the Protestants. Everyone can read a Bible and make up their own mind what it says… they don’t need a Pope, a Bishop, or even a Father to tell them what to think.
So you can keep your Climate Popes and Cardinals too. (Take AlGore first, please… before he gets another massage…)
ShrNfr says: July 2, 2010 at 4:28 am
Is there any whitewash left for my fence? The pejorative word “stolen” with regard to the CRU emails gives the whole thing away. Sorry Charlie, Mann was a
You are correct the emails are not stolen. However a google on the British computer misuse act shows that they have been obtained illegally and the people releasing the data are criminals:
1 Unauthorised access to computer material
(1) A person is guilty of an offence if—
(a) he causes a computer to perform any function with intent to secure access to any program or data held in any computer;
(b) the access he intends to secure is unauthorised; and
(c) he knows at the time when he causes the computer to perform the function that that is the case.
(2) The intent a person has to have to commit an offence under this section need not be directed at—
(a)any particular program or data;
(b) a program or data of any particular kind; or
(c) a program or data held in any particular computer.
(3) 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
17 Interpretation (1)
The following provisions of this section apply for the interpretation of this Act.
(2) A person secures access to any program or data held in a computer if by causing a computer to perform any function he—
(a) alters or erases the program or data;
(b) copies or moves it to any storage medium other than that in which it is held or to a different location in the storage medium in which it is held;
(c) uses it; or
(d) has it output from the computer in which it is held (whether by having it displayed or in any other manner);
There is no provision for whistle blowing in this act. Unless the owners of the data gave permission for their release this is an illegal act.
Stolen emails is the wrong term but it is a lot shorter than “emails obtained by an unauthorised access offence”
Smokey says:
July 2, 2010 at 7:37 pm
Bernard J.,
Mr. Steve McIntyre has shown that he is more knowledgeable regarding climatology than Dr Michael Mann. That is true whether you like it or not.
So much for your little chest thumping polemic.
VILLABOLO RESPONDS:
Smokey, Bernard’s “chest thumping polemics” would indicate that many people are not in a position to know who a qualified Climatologist is.
villalobo,
Let’s see you reverse engineer secret Mannian algorithms like Mr Steve McIntyre did. Note also that Climatology is a subset of Meteorology. And just so you understand, that doesn’t refer to the study of meteors.