CERN: "Don't interpret the CLOUD experiment results"

“Don’t think of a pink elephant! Or else!”
Heh.

The money train is slowly derailing.

N. Calder says, “1) The results must be favourable for Svensmark or there would be no such anxiety about them.”
Rolf-Dieter Heuer says, “The results will be published shortly. I have asked the colleagues to present the results clearly, but not to interpret them. That would go immediately into the highly political arena of the climate change debate. One has to make clear that cosmic radiation is only one of many parameters.”
– – – – – – – –
I do not see Calder’s conclusion follow from Heuer’s statement unless we invoke a deep cynicism; a cynicis that is likely to be counterproductive on healthy skepticism. We could just wait for the CERN results to be published shortly.
That said, Nigel Calder’s statement could force a more clear statement from Heuer about his full meaning. That would be helpful.
John

The obvious conclusions…should they be obvious…will be posted to blogs like this one for all to see. Whether the physicists can talk about it or not.
Marvin Gellar (noted AGW commentator and professor at my institution – Stony Brook University) – published a review paper with a number of colleagues on solar climate variability as we knew it back in 2009. He didn’t cover any cumulative impacts of solar variability, but he did show rather convincingly that sunspot cycles appeared to be linked to cloud cover amongst other things. A quick Google Scholar search will find that paper if you are curious what it actually contained.
I think at this point it’s pretty clear that solar climate variability is significant to cyclical patterns of warming and cooling on decadal time scales. Hopefully the CLOUD project will help us make that better accepted.

“That would go immediately into the highly political arena of the climate change debate.”
What?! So there IS a climate change debate after all?? But hey, Al said there isn’t! And just recently, after a long and courageous denial of a pause in global temperature rise, they are now explaining WHY there is this (non existent) pause in the temperature rise. Anthropogenic global pause of anthropogenic global warming… As soon as Wallis the hitman of Outside Organisation is arrested they can’t stay on message any more.
Oh dear dear, who and what am I now to beleive?

S/B It seems to me, as an outsider of these groups, it would be easy eliminate such organized corruption by NOT supporting them.
… and
TO stand out from the clutter….
Too much coffee in the arteries…. 🙂

Here is the comment I just sent to “the reference frame” —
Perhaps Boss Heuer’s intentions are to prevent CERN from becoming involved in the kerfuffle of global warming, climate disruption, climate change, or bi-polar climate syndrome. Several organization in the USA have lost respect because they have made their interpretations of unsettled science support a “green” agenda. There is no good reason for CERN to become involved. Asking the researchers to present their findings without delving into the politically charged issue of rearranging the developed nation’s economies seems prudent.
Compare, for instance, the USA’s census activities that show increasing numbers of “Hispanic” folks in the country. The researchers of the Census Bureau can report the numbers without involving themselves in the establishment of policies for the border of Arizona and Mexico. After every census there is criticism of under-counting because Congress, in its collective wisdom, has directed dollars to follow the numbers. Sometimes a few thousand more folks in a census area means a few hundred thousand more dollars (per year) flowing into the local budget. The census statisticians generally stay out of this mess.
There will be much more going on at CERN that I haven’t a clue about but if the boss is just trying to keep the scientists above the fray, so to speak, I don’t think that is a problem. He hasn’t asked that they not report their findings – has he?

The truth will out.

The truth has been the least important aspect of AGW over the years. Nobody will listen.

In the Warmists world, “we will publish shortly” means quite the opposite. It means that data will be “homogenized” until it conforms to the desired result.

They are, apparently, hinting that they will release the underlying data without interpretation.
That seems better than the standard practice of releasing interpretations while hiding the data.

The CLOUD experiment was allowed to go forward for the expressed political purpose of putting an end to Svensmark’s theory of droplet formation. Now that the results have been tabulated, there is mild panic that the outcome is the exact opposite of what was anticipated. One can only conclude that the moratorium on interpretation is necessary to provide some breathing room while the powers that be formulate their political response to purely scientific results.

Would that the IPCC would be so reluctant to draw conclusions about their massaged data and papers tinged with confirmation bias.

So… truckloads of money to repeat what is essentially a Wilson cloud chamber (circa 1911) and they are afraid that their might actually prove that GCR’s can cause vapor nucleation.
Yeah… a lot of integrity there.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_cloud_chamber

BREAKING NEWS!
Greenhouse effect “Deniers” Vindicated!
(This simply can’t wait to see if lukewarmer WUWT deem to post this as an article- so I apologise for the OT posting, BUT this story is huge….)
BREAKING NEWS :Greenhouse Gas Theory Trashed in Groundbreaking Lab Experiment by John O’Sullivan, guest post at Climate Realists
Monday, July 18th 2011, 10:58 AM EDT
Greenhouse gas theory of global warming is refuted in momentous Mexican lab experiment. Results mean epic fail for doomsaying cult and climate taxes.
Professor Nahle of Monterrey, Mexico backed by a team of international scientists has faithfully recreated a famous experiment from 1909 to confirm that the greenhouse effect cannot cause global warming.
Astonishingly, the 1909 greenhouse gas experiment first performed by Professor Robert W. Wood at John Hopkins University hadn’t been replicated for a century. This despite over $100 billion spent by the man-made global warming industry trying to prove its case that carbon dioxide is a dangerous atmospheric pollutant.
The analogy had been that greenhouse gases (e.g. CO2) act like the glass in a greenhouse trapping heat in Earth’s atmosphere and if they build up (due to human industrial emissions) the planet would dangerously overheat.
http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=8073#post_comments
also download Nahle’s experiment here :- http://www.globalwarmingskeptics.info/forums/attachment.php?aid=378

cosmic radiation is only one of many parameters.
Hmm, sounds familiar. Does not fit with the mantra “fossil fuel CO2 caused most of the warming”, though.
The CERN Director General may be able to gag CERN experimenters, but the results will get interpreted once they’re out in the blogosphere.

The link to the original German story is now a story about antimatter – no reference to the cloud study at all. Perhaps the link is in error…this is the Google translation of the link mentioned in the article.
John :-#)#

I can’t see the problem. CERN is not involved in climatology, and if it interpreted the results then it would be accused of partisanship and, quite possibly, incompetence. And why would we want the results ‘interpreted’? Isn’t that what ‘hide the decline’ is all about?
Let’s just have the clear presentation of the results we’re promised. I for one don’t want to see an ‘interpreted’ version of the CERN results, just the results please, presented clearly. So I applaud the approach taken by Rolf-Dieter Heuer in wanting to give us the results, but not wanting his staff to get involved in issues and interpretations that would risk CERN’s reputation.
All data ends up getting interpreted, so let’s just have the results so that we can detect whether someone’s interpretation is plausible.

@John Whitman
> I do not see Calder’s conclusion follow from Heuer’s statement
> unless we invoke a deep cynicism; a cynicis[m] that is likely to be
> counterproductive on healthy skepticism.
That’s a bit harsh. A cynic is someone who has a negative attitude for the sake of having a negative attitude. I don’t think you need any negativity at all to see the implications in Heuer’s words, just a bit of healthy skepticism.
The words Heuer used per se are harmless, but their implications are not hard to see. Here, let me translate for you:
“That would go immediately into the highly political arena of the climate change debate.”
Why would they fuel debate? There would be no “debate” if the results supported the AGW/CAGW hypotheses. This certainly hints that the results (whatever they are) appear to stir the debate up a bit, in the “wrong” direction.
“One has to make clear that cosmic radiation is only one of many parameters.”
Again, a strong hint that the results are pointing in the “wrong” direction. Why not say the same about the CO2 record? Surely a rising CO2 level is only “one of many parameters”, so let’s not draw any hasty conclusions about rising CO2 levels, shall we?
😐

That is OK. If the high priests of so-called “science” are forbidden to think and interpret data, then we crowd-sourced actual scientists will do it for them. That is, if they don’t conceal the data in clay jars in a cave somewhere.
Science…has become perverted by activists. CERN is not immune to activism.

” I have asked the colleagues to present the results clearly, but not to interpret them,…”
LOL!!!
From the annals of “non-interpreted climate science” I offer Hansen et al. (2007)…with abstract bolded for your reading pleasure…
Hansen, J., Mki. Sato, P. Kharecha, G. Russell, D.W. Lea, and M. Siddall, 2007: Climate change and trace gases. Phil. Trans. Royal. Soc. A, 365, 1925-1954, doi:10.1098/rsta.2007.2052.
Paleoclimate data show that the Earth’s climate is remarkably sensitive to global forcings. Positive feedbacks predominate. This allows the entire planet to be whipsawed between climate states. One feedback, the “albedo flip” property of water substance, provides a powerful trigger mechanism. A climate forcing that “flips” the albedo of a sufficient portion of an ice sheet can spark a cataclysm. Ice sheet and ocean inertia provides only moderate delay to ice sheet disintegration and a burst of added global warming. Recent greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions place the Earth perilously close to dramatic climate change that could run out of our control, with great dangers for humans and other creatures. Carbon dioxide (CO2) is the largest human-made climate forcing, but other trace constituents are important. Only intense simultaneous efforts to slow CO2 emissions and reduce non-CO2 forcings can keep climate within or near the range of the past million years. The most important of the non-CO2 forcings is methane (CH4), as it causes the 2nd largest human-made GHG climate forcing and is the principal cause of increased tropospheric ozone (O3), which is the 3rd largest GHG forcing. Nitrous oxide (N2O) should also be a focus of climate mitigation efforts. Black carbon (“black soot”) has a high global warming potential (~2000, 500, and 200 for 20, 100 and 500 years, respectively) and deserves greater attention. Some forcings are especially effective at high latitudes, so concerted efforts to reduce their emissions could still “save the Arctic”, while also having major benefits for human health, agricultural productivity, and the global environment.
—
Yep. Straight-up science there…And this was published back when Hansen and his gang were being “muzzled” by the Bush Administration [LOL!!!].

Please, having worked with CERN as a member of an external group taking part in experiments for over 30 years and having spent about 7 of those years in CERN , and sat in various decision making committees, I can assure you that the Director General of CERN has no control on what the groups publish in any way.
Even if he could “advise” the groups under him on how to publish and comment on results, he has absolutely no power over the individual groups taking part in the experiments from universities and research institutes the world over. The collaborations decide what and how they interpret and publish results If ( and I doubt he could do it) he does not allow a research result to go out as a CERN preprint, there are all the other groups involved that have the data and can publish them.
No panic.

JJohn Day says:
July 18, 2011 at 10:35 am

John Whitman says,
I do not see Calder’s conclusion follow from Heuer’s statement unless we invoke a deep cynicism; a cynicis[m] that is likely to be counterproductive on healthy skepticism.

“”””That’s a bit harsh. A cynic is someone who has a negative attitude for the sake of having a negative attitude. I don’t think you need any negativity at all to see the implications in Heuer’s words, just a bit of healthy skepticism. “”””
—————-
John Day,
Thanks for your reply.
Speaking, hmmmm, John-to-John it is just that I am concerned with what seems to be a default negative view of virtually all postings on many blogs populated mostly by skeptics (I prefer to call them independents). Therefore, my statement about cynicism being unhealthy. Unhealthy if it is a default setting on our comment response mode selector.
NOTE: Likewise, I find cynicism rampant of blogs focused on supporting IPCC so-called consensus climate science. So, it makes me uncomfortable to act like them . . . we can be better?
Take care,
John

I could do without recommendations of people defining, a priori, the Great Divide between “healthy skepticism” and “deep cynicism.”
History shows that even “deep cynicism” is usually not deep enough to describe the cynicism of Academia mountebanks who make good living off ignorance and superstition.

I’m not overly concerned by this revelation. I’m quite happy to accept that these CERN scientists are probably good experimentallists, and know how to fire particles at water vapor laden pseudo atmospheres, and record, whatever the heck they think they observed..
I’m also happy to accept that they can probably write up their results so that other scientists and even us lay folks can read and understand what they observed.
That to me gives no inference that these researchers, are necessarily the best persons to interpret for the theoretical community, the meaning of their observation results.
So let’s not all panic. Tell us what you found, and maybe some of us, can even decide for ourselves what WE think YOUR observations mean.
So nothing to see here folks, so move along now. And get a move on in getting those experimental reults out where WE can see what YOU observed

It’s probably true that the results support Svensmark, but even if they didn’t it’s wise for an organisation of experimental physicists to provide the data to those that can interpret it rather than have either side of this slanging match saying you don’t have the expertise to say what the effects of the data you’ve collected will have on the climate.

John Robertson, I tried your link to the Google translation of the link mentioned in the article and found the cloud-study quotes right there, two paragraphs below the Pleiades photo.

Oh yawn. It won’t matter in the least. Once the results are out, others will write their own journal papers around them, citing them for authority. And surely the press and blogs will go to town.
Since CERN isn’t really full of climate scientists anyway, in fact it is probably better to let others do the analysis, because to do it well will require integrating those results into other data sets that the CERN folks are not nearly so expert at.

Gary Krause says:
July 18, 2011 at 9:08 am
Just like all the other elite non-science organizations, they are licking their chops for the money they can milk through their mantra that mankind is the root of all climate “events.”
…
If 33,000 other scientists sign a petition against the premise of man made global disaster causing CO2, why are any scholars providing support to organizations such as CERM?

Shooting from the lip there, Gary. CERN (not CERM) is “… an international organization whose purpose is to operate the world’s largest particle physics laboratory, which is situated in the Northwest suburbs of Geneva on the Franco–Swiss border (46°14′3″N 6°3′19″E / 46.23417°N 6.05528°E / 46.23417; 6.05528). Established in 1954, the organization has twenty European member states.
The term “CERN” is also used to refer to the laboratory itself, which employs just under 2,400 full-time employees/workers, as well as some 7,931 scientists and engineers representing 608 universities and research facilities and 113 nationalities.
CERN’s main function is to provide the particle accelerators and other infrastructure needed for high-energy physics research. Numerous experiments have been constructed at CERN by international collaborations to make use of them.” Wikipedia.
It was induced, after years of trying, to perform the ‘CLOUD’ experiments testing Svensmark’s hypothesis. It is about as far from an AGW-promoting group as you can get — pure physics. That’s why many here, like Calder, suspect heavy pressure has been brought to bear to keep it from endorsing Svensmark too explicitly.

Alexander Feht says:
July 18, 2011 at 11:10 am
””I could do without recommendations of people defining, a priori, the Great Divide between “healthy skepticism” and “deep cynicism.”
History shows that even “deep cynicism” is usually not deep enough to describe the cynicism of Academia mountebanks who make good living off ignorance and superstition.””
– – – – – –
Alexander Feht,
Hey, Alexander, I represent your remark. : )
Having had, since at university 40yrs ago for an engineering degree, only an interaction with scientists and engineers involved in industry then I have not developed a much of a taste of a cynical view of academia.
But I am willing to taste/lick the [my words] ‘hairy underbelly’ of cynicism associated with the academic arena. Lead on.
John

Will James Hansen decry this muzzling of The Scientist by The Administration ?.

ScientistForTruth says:
July 18, 2011 at 10:29 am
All data ends up getting interpreted, so let’s just have the results so that we can detect whether someone’s interpretation is plausible.

ScientistForTruth is absolutely right. The only thing the experimenters should do is honestly report the results of their experiment with enough details that someone else can replicate those results (or not). Anything more is bull crap.
I agree with Freeman Dyson that our understanding of the climate is weak. People on both sides of the debate are claiming an expertise well beyond what they actually have. Once they go out on a limb, their arguments are easily refuted.
The experiment’s results, by themselves, will be robust. That’s what we need. Any possible interpretation by the experimenters can only hurt the credibility of the experiment as a whole. The interpretation should be left to others (there will be no shortage).

As a (now non-practising) nuclear physicist, I am confident that CERN will have the results published as cleanly as possible – along the lines of ” x flux of quasi-cosmic rays produces y density of precipitating nuclei” .
What they won’t do is the red-top headlines “Svensmark for the Nobel” or “Svensmark for the Bastille”. Happily. Given the data, others can interpret.

Brian H says:
July 18, 2011 at 11:44 am

…
It was induced, after years of trying, to perform the ‘CLOUD’ experiments testing Svensmark’s hypothesis. It is about as far from an AGW-promoting group as you can get — pure physics. That’s why many here, like Calder, suspect heavy pressure has been brought to bear to keep it from endorsing Svensmark too explicitly.

Of course; I completely agree. Never should a top-notch scientific laboratory underscore the results of an experiment as truth. A simple report of the results is asking way too much! /sarc off.

John of Kent says:
July 18, 2011 at 10:03 am
The atmosphere is most assuredly not encapsulated by glass. Dog in car analogy comes to mind.
AGW is an epicyclic hypothesis, being encapsulated in mythological glass.
So, this is really about how much CRF makes how much cloud.

Hesitant to state agreement with a commentor who goes by “commieBob”, but in this case, I agree with his POV. Publish the data, all of the data, and then let the dueling intrpretations begin.

Move along, nothing to see here.

“I have asked the colleagues to present the results clearly, but not to interpret them,” reports veteran science editor Nigel Calder on his blog. Why?
Because, Heuer says, “That would go immediately into the highly political arena of the climate change debate. One has to make clear that cosmic radiation is only one of many parameters.”
*******************************
The original German is better translated as “only one of very many parameters” (“nur um einen von sehr vielen Parametern”). Seems like strong words to me.

How shrewd! Nothing like a gag order to garner attention!
Very clever!

CERN has been getting some good results from the CLOUD experiment, but is nervous again about whether or not the experiment will continue to be funded. Most people in the know seem to agree that the chances of getting continued government funding in climate research, solar research (and now cosmic ray/atmospheric cloud research!) are greatly increased if a disclaimer is included stating that the current results do not indicate that climate change is caused by anything but mankind. That is why virtually all government-funded-climate-research journal articles contain such a disclaimer. CERN would be happy with a slightly less blatant version of the standard disclaimer, namely “We can’t say whether or not our findings have any relevance to climate change.”

“I have asked the colleagues to present the results clearly, but not to interpret them”

I’m not clear why folks are complaining about. The way I see it, a nice, clean, dataset, sans interpretation, and/or speculation, is as good as it gets.
Just show me the data. I’m ok with that.

Experiment on the Cause of Real Greenhouses’ Effect – Repeatability of Prof. Robert W. Wood’s experiment
(Article by Nasif S. Nahle)
GENERAL CONCLUSIONS:
The greenhouse effect inside greenhouses is due to the blockage of convective heat transfer with the environment and it is not related, neither obeys, to any kind of “trapped” radiation. Therefore, the greenhouse effect does not exist as it is described in many didactic books and articles.
The experiment performed by Prof. Robert W. Wood in 1909 is absolutely valid and systematically repeatable.
In average, the blockage of convective heat transfer with the surroundings causes an increase of temperature inside the greenhouses of 10.03 °C with respect to the surroundings temperature.
http://www.biocab.org/Wood_Experiment_Repeated.html
(tips and notes doesn’t seem to be working)

Bob the swiss says:
July 18, 2011 at 12:54 pm
“”””Switzerland and all other european countries give a lot of money to the CERN. Without this money the CERN is dead.
European and swiss politics are driven by ‘greens’. Media continues to talk about global warming (they still not have evolved in to climate change).”””
————–
Bob the swiss,
You, unfortunately, make sense.
Being American with little European experience, I cannot be critical of your comment.
Thanks for your insight.
John

Stephen Rasey says:
July 18, 2011 at 1:04 pm
How shrewd! Nothing like a gag order to garner attention!
Very clever!
****************
I agree. This guy seems to understand the publicity game rather well.

– Svensmark is not the originator of the theory that Cosmic Rays influence cloud formation.
– The idea is not contentious. The theory is popularly accepted even though there is considerable uncertainty about the mechanisms involved.
– Svensmark’s contentious assertion is that Cosmic Rays are dominant in modern warming. This is shown to be false by the data.
– The CLOUD experiment at CERN explores the mechanism that Rays influence cloud formation. It does not asses the scope of influence that Rays may or may not have in modern warming. That is dealt with by comparison of direct measurements of rays and climate data.
– Comparing data for Rays vs climate shows very plainly that correlation between the two breaks down in modern times and affirms that CO2 is currently the primary driver of contemporary warming.
But if some of you guys ~ Calder included ~ want to keep on believing in a great big conspiracy, knock yourselves out.

Stephen Wilde,
Check out this presentation by Jasper Kirby. YES, you are right that most everyone agrees that there are already enough atmospheric particles over land to make cosmic ray ionization superfluous to cloud generation – so the hypothesis is really concerned about the effect of cosmic rays on low cloud cover over the oceans (where air is much much cleaner)
This is explained in this presentation, which has only been watched by 1900 people! (a fact that I find shocking) As someone suggested above, everything suggests we are living in an era not so very different from Galileo, a time when preconceived notions dominated over critical thought. In fact, I am starting to apply a healthy dose of cynicism towards everything we currently “accept as givens in the West” – our democracy, our free press, our economic model, our free enterprise, our banking system….etc.

SteveSadlov says:
July 18, 2011 at 1:43 pm
That, and the results may place the AGW pig on a spit over an open fire.

“That would go immediately into the highly political arena of the climate change debate.”
To admit that the climate change debate is “highly political” just about says it all anyway. That alone is a huge admission.

I can’t imagine why Rolf-Dieter Heuer felt he had to speak out about this, as the results will either support Svensmark’s theory on cloud cover changes being caused by GCRs or will refute it – no interpretation is necessary. From what has already been announced, it looks like Svensmark has the results he wanted and his theory has not yet been falsified.
Politics have no place in science and only the truth is important. Observation has proved that the CAGW conjecture is already very shaky and hopefully this will be another nail in the coffin lid.
Meanwhile the sun is still in the doldrums and global temperatures continue to show no statistically significant warming. Make sure you have plenty of fuel stockpiled ready for the coming NH winter.

SteveSadlov says on July 18, 2011 at 1:43 pm

There could be concerns about panic being induced. Especially if the results point to GCRs and hence clouds as the “MOSFET” that turns on and off the glacials and interglacials. It could be that the actual situation with GCRs and clouds is rather disturbing and there is a desire to avoid panic buying of food, etc.

That has not fazed the media-pseudo-science complex before now … there have been predictions of returning to an ice age and then that we would all burn in the hell fires of damnation if we didn’t cut our carbon footprints … need I remind you?

This is much ado about nothing.
If the scientists “interpret” the forthcoming scientific results before publication, that will diminish the credibility of the results when they finally are published. Non-commenting on results in press is the best policy.

“If CERN (which is hardly a monolithic enterprise in the first place) wanted to prevent Svensmark’s theories from being tested, they would have not tested them.”
Let’s be clear, they did that back in1998 when CLOUD was first put on ice, only to be resurrected when Svensmark’s SKY experiment was successful in 2006 and replicated in CLOUD-06. Give Heuer a break; it’s his job to keep the stokers shoveling money to keep CERN going, and it’s politic to ask the CLOUD collaborators to not rub salt in the wounds of the alarmists (and in the wounds of their patrons in CERN member country legislatures and bureaucracies) in their journal submissions.

Took me a while to figure out how to approach this.
If this experiment was applied to the atmosphere of MARS, JUPITER, VENUS, SATURN, there would be NO hesitation of applying the results and “interpreting” them.
The EARTH is not “special”. We are a planet.
Thus the ‘Director’s directive” is pure cowardice. He should be fired. Period, he has no legitimacy now.
Max

You HAVE to interpret the results of an experiment.
Does the results of the experiment support the hypothesis that the experiment was set up to test.
It is basic science; the person/team that does the experiment interpret the result. Other scientists can then apply the hypothesis under test; replicate the experiment and INTERPRET the results of THEIR experiment.
It isn’t damn well science if the experimenter does not interpret the results.
The CLOUD experiment (as I understand it) is to validate the hypothesis that Cosmic Rays in certain energy levels DO create nucleation particles.
The results that have already leaked out have already confirmed that part of the experiment.
Do CR provide SUFFICIENT nucleation particles to cause clouds to form ? This is the part that requires interpretation. From a model (albeit a physical model rather than a computer model) we then could/can/will extrapolate to real world conditions.
The problem here is perhaps a mis-understanding of who means what by ‘interpret’.
Interpretation – science talk : x = y therefore if by experiment we can show that x happens; then y happens.
Interpretation – political style x (may) = y therefore z;q and famine and flooding and drought and the end of the world.
The Head of CERN will be talking POLITICALLY – unfortunately he is talking to scientists who will perhaps mis-understand and assume he is talking scientifically.
The one is of course correct – it is exactly what the CAGW scam is based on. No interpretation is good.
As an engineer I find the request not to interpret the results to be perverse and anti-science. But than I find the CAGW position perverse and anti-science for that very reason

Just one by-the-way clarification: AGW is not the greatest scandal and fraud ever to be perpetrated “in the name of science”. That dishonour belongs to Lyssenkoism, which after all caused thousands of scientists to die in the GULag. It is just the greatest fraud to be launched in the free world, by scientists not enslaved to the beck and favour of a tyranny. Morally, that makes it worse.

I agree with some others – I think CERN may actually be doing the right thing. As long as they publish the data there are plenty of smart people who can lend it an interpretation.
If they get mixed up in the ridiculously non-subjective politics of AGW they will lose no matter what. If they come across as being deniers, they could lose funding – and that would impact the ability to perform good science. If they try to put an unwarranted AGW spin on it (which I imagine many of them would) they lose all credibility with other people of science (as opposed to people of spin).
Report the data and let the facts fall where they may…

Kevin Trenberth thought it perfectly acceptable to hold a news conference touting all the AGW tripe about hurricanes despite it having zero evidence, leading to the resignation of Chris Landsea. The list is long for similar examples. Every “knee jerk” AGW proclamation no matter how weak gets public exposure and front page reporting by the water-boys-for-AGW journals.
Who can forget the Holy Pronouncement from Mike Lockwood at his press conference just before that U.N.(?) meeting; the “final nail in the coffin” meme.
@frank K
Here’s another for you:
Dessler et al
http://geotest.tamu.edu/userfiles/216/Dessler2008b.pdf

[23] The existence of a strong and positive water-vapor
feedback means that projected business-as-usual greenhouse gas
emissions over the next century are virtually guaranteed to produce warming of several degrees Celsius. The only way that will not happen is if a strong, negative, and currently unknown feedback is discovered somewhere in our climate system.

Oh yes, the virtues of pal review and IPCC transparency.

Just like the FASTEX experiment in 1997… that was supposed to demonstrate the primary control of altitude over lower layers weather… and ended up exposing the opposite. Plouf!

In October 2009 Rasmus at Realclimate was calling for an end to Svensmark’s funding…
Here is the comment I left then:
6. Antonio San says:
Your comment is awaiting moderation.
9 October 2009 at 1:16 PM
Meanwhile Willard Boyle, 2009 Physics Nobel Prize winner -a scientific award, not the political one…- described his days as a researcher for Bell labs, as the most exciting of his life… What is needed is “an appreciation for the free will, free spirit of scientists. Give them a chance to do the things they want to do.”
So Rasmus, who and in under what competence is to decide what Svenmark and/or others should research or not? You? How convenient!

So far not much mention about “Jasper Kirkby”, he is a good man and his results will be outstanding ……….. I have a feeling they will speak for themselves !!!
Watch and learn …………. http://cdsweb.cern.ch/record/1181073/
I strongly second this! I saw this last year, and it utterly destroys AGW (IMHO) without trying. It covers climate change in the pre-industrial period, and looks at sunspots, sea levels, etc. Even mentions the Livingston & Penn sunspot paper, where he questions why it was rejected (must have offended someone). Very comprehensive. Eventually he actually gets to the CLOUD experiment.
It is about an hour long so grab some popcorn. Bring the kids and grandma.
(Someone else may have posted a youtube version).
Anyone have a link to the slide pack he used?

Anyone up for a shot of double standards?

That would go immediately into the highly political arena of the climate change debate.

And who said climate science wasn’t politcal? … and so it goes …

Ulrich Elkmann says:
July 18, 2011 at 4:33 pm
Just one by-the-way clarification: AGW is not the greatest scandal and fraud ever to be perpetrated “in the name of science”. That dishonour belongs to Lyssenkoism, which after all caused thousands of scientists to die in the GULag. It is just the greatest fraud to be launched in the free world, by scientists not enslaved to the beck and favour of a tyranny. Morally, that makes it worse.
*********
Sorry but Lyssenkoism was not a fraud. Today it goes by the name of epigenetics. It also has been proven time and again. (actually the Darwinian Theory used as it’s proof the variation in finch beaks, which is now believed to be a result of rapid epigenetic changes rather than genetic mutations)
The problem was that politics entered the picture and corrupted the interpretation. In the Soviet Bloc the evidence corroborated Maxist Theories so anything else was Thoughtcrime. In the West, to do research into the science behind his theories was a political crime. So all that was taught (and researched) was Darwinism.
It was only after several generations had passed that Western biologists could investigate the theories without losing their academic positions. The result was spectacular, and had to be renamed to avoid refusal to publish. A biological trait can be acquired and handed down though a hundred generations. But change the environment and the trait disappears. All because of methylation on the chromosomes.

Nikola Tesla wrote in 1931
” My theory was strikingly confirmed when I found that the sun does, indeed, emit a ray marvelous in the inconceivable minuteness of its particles and transcending speed of their motion, vastly exceeding that of light. This ray, by impinging against the cosmic dust generates a secondary radiation, relatively very feeble but fairly penetrative, the intensity of which is, of course, almost the same in all directions.”
It is now rumoured that scientists have discovered such a ray and have found that it is changing the decay rates of radioactive materials, which were thought to be constants. If this is true we would have to change everything to do with radioactivity, and we could not use their decay rates as constants in physics!

OT…it would be SO helpful if comments were numbered so that you could read an exact number (say 50) and then come back later. i know they are timestamped, but that just isn’t as easy to remember as leaving off at a particular time would be.

So you interpret what is not out to interpret. That is equally silly if not seriously stupid.

I think a few people (Calder included) are reading more into this than is necessary.
One of the first things I was told as a researcher is that there is no such thing as bad data, just incorrect interpretation.
As such, it is essential that the data obtained in an experiment is reproduced as accurately and as ‘raw’ as possible (i.e. only really subject to quality control checks and corrections relating to instrumental drift or similar experiment-related inaccuracies).
CERN was the facility where the experiment was undertaken, but it was not their experiment. As such they should be avoiding interpretation of the results as far as possible (at least until the CLOUD team have had the opportunity to evaluate and interpret THEIR data).

G. E. Pease says:
July 18, 2011 at 1:30 pm
…
CERN would be happy with a slightly less blatant version of the standard disclaimer, namely “We can’t daren’t say whether or not our findings have any relevance to climate change.”

There, fixed it for you.
😉

bushybestbushy says:
July 18, 2011 at 9:00 am
It is of no import. There are many competant folk champing at the bit. The truth will out.

Many of us are competent spellers, even!
;p

Sometimes WUWT is on the money sometimes it’s not … this is a not case.
Perhaps some of you might hit the studies on the subject and find out what happened in 2009.
Lets see if I can give you a few hints try wikipedia and perhaps go to the very bottom of the page and read the last entries. Next try cosmic ray and something big happened in 2009/2010 … try actually reading and doing some study. You may want to then cruise over to icecube nuetrino observatory which WUWT actually mentioned but really missed the whole point and actually read around.
CERN doesn’t allow publication on Flat Earth or any other theories based on defunct and disproved ideas either. The problem with the whole cloud seed reporting is it is based on defunct models proven to be wrong not through any fault of the groups involved the physics they relied on was fundementally wrong, no conspiracy not because the groups wanted to mislead it was just plain wrong.
The stand has been taken until the fundemental models are fixed which should occur with data from AMS-2 and the LHC reports all they are doing is adding confusion into the debate.
There is a effect no one will deny but to publish papers on climate science while the fundementals are in dispute is just crazy and hence the temporary blocks on publications.

Oh no’s!! This is horrible news.
Now manmade electromagnetic fields from power generators and electricity transmission lines is affecting cloud formation, leading to EVEN MORE WARMING, suffering and tragedy. Of course this means that we need to stop all electricity usage immediately, especially things that broadcast, such as radio, television and cell phones. This is just another example of how mankind is destroying the planet. The United Nations needs to assume control of all broadcasting, clearly. We can limit broadcast signals to only those found appropriate under UN guidelines. It’s for your own good. Oh, and it’ll create millions of green jobs too, of course.
Kidding of course, but I wouldn’t be surprised to read something like that from Gavin.

@ P.Gosselin, if not those who did the experiments, you’d rather have climate expert to interpret these results. So would you trust Trenberth and consorts…?
I know I don’t.

ferd berple says:
July 19, 2011 at 6:41 am

anna v says:
July 18, 2011 at 10:53 am
… I can assure you that the Director General of CERN has no control on what the groups publish in any way.
Then why would the Director make such a statement?

He expresses his wishes, and he might prevail on a direct employee of CERN, though I have never heard of such censoring having happened. Psychological pressure for grade advancement etc might play a role on making his wishes known. But the CERN group is one of over ten groups, many of them climate meteorology and environment departments and he cannot have any say there.
LdB says:
July 19, 2011 at 8:24 am
CERN doesn’t allow publication on Flat Earth or any other theories based on defunct and disproved ideas either.
That is not the way HEP research works. I have never seen “allowed and not allowed” lists for CERN preprints and yellow reports,which are the only CERN publications. There are editorial boards and committees that would approve a submission for a CERN preprint , but the DG is not involved in that.
Research results go the way of the usual submission to a peer reviewed appropriate journal, and the DG again has absolutely no say there and the non CERN groups cannot be censored..
You do not know what your are talking about.
Stark says:
July 19, 2011 at 2:39 am
Anna V. From your inside experience, what would you say the impact of going against the DG’s guidance would to to researchers’ prospects of future projects at CERN ?

If expressed orally very little influence on submission of proposals to the SPSC and approval of them . If a written directive is sent out I suppose the usual promotion of employees of CERN might be influenced and then also the committees approving the experiments. BUT if something like that, written directive censoring, happened there would be great unrest and upheaval in the HEP community and it would probably be revoked. Herding physicists is like herding cats.

davidg says:
July 19, 2011 at 9:45 am
“””John, you are one of the people old PT Barnum talked about coming along every minute- Suckers, if you forgot the word! Cynicism indeed! If you can’t tell black from white go see an eye doctor!”””
——
davidg,
Appreciate you commenting.
Fun and games at the blogs is the norm and debate/argument is quite stimulating. A lot of learning too. I think we all benefit no matter what side of any debate one is on.
I have found skepticism a rational position offering healthy discourse. BUT NOT SO WITH CYNICISM. It seems of little value except to hint at something in some pejorative sense about something/someone in an discussion..
I am sometimes in automatic cynical comment mode. I should not do that so often.
Take care
John

UnfrozenCavemanMD
July 19, 2011 at 2:08 pm
As far as the budget of CERN goes it is decided with the treaty of the member states at a high political level as a percentage of the GDP of each country. In the next few years no new money will be requested, as happened with the LHC, certainly not within in the contract time of this DG (5years -.2 since his appointment). It probably reflects his ignorance on matters of climate except at a political level.

Here is Dr Roy Spencer on clouds.

The Great Global Warming Blunder: How Mother Nature Fooled the World’s Top Climate Scientists
April 20th, 2010
“The most obvious way for warming to be caused naturally is for small, natural fluctuations in the circulation patterns of the atmosphere and ocean to result in a 1% or 2% decrease in global cloud cover. Clouds are the Earth’s sunshade, and if cloud cover changes for any reason, you have global warming — or global cooling.
How could the experts have missed such a simple explanation? Because they have convinced themselves that only a temperature change can cause a cloud cover change, and not the other way around. The issue is one of causation. They have not accounted for cloud changes causing temperature changes.”
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/04/the-great-global-warming-blunder-how-mother-nature-fooled-the-world%e2%80%99s-top-climate-scientists/

I believe that CERN had kept out of the politcally-motivated scientific debate, until now.

“Intriguing. Are you admitting that their previously was a correlation?” – Mooloo
Yes. A strong one. This isn’t controversial. Neither is the idea that Cosmic Rays may have been a significant driver of some past climate changes. What is very controversial is the idea that Rays are driving contemporary warming, it’s controversial because we have the data and the data doesn’t show that.
There’s doesn’t have to be a physical mechanism, it might just be coincidence. But because the correlation is strong it suggests that it’s worth investigating – hence the CLOUD project. If the CLOUD project reveals a physical mechanism then that’s a good thing because it helps sure up our understanding of the multi-faceted beast that is climate. But it doesn’t alter the fact that climate and cosmic rays have been heading off in opposite directions for several decades now. That’s because something else is currently at the reigns.

Good way to discourage any further research into areas that might disprove AGM theories: You can’t make any conclusions or predictions based on your own research, leaving such fame-producing statements for others to make, stealing from you the recognition and professional standing you deserve.

This is why we had a ‘cold war’ for about 50 years. Bad translations and misinterpretations of them.
As I see it, the general meaning was: tell the results in plain language without any additional comments that could be misleading and/or forcing a scientific/political war.
That’s it!

http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/tesla/esp_tesla_7a.htm
The Nunn report, in addition to outlining Aum’s large international membership and massive finances of over US$1 billion, also revealed the cult’s fascination for Tesla weapons.
The Senate report describes Aum’s visits to the New York based International Tesla Society (ITS), where they sought to obtain a number of his books, patents and papers. However, they must have been at least a little disappointed in what they were allowed to access, as we shall see.
A representative of the ITS told Senate investigators that Aum’s interest focused on Tesla’s experiments with “resonating frequencies,” in connection with artificially “creating earthquakes.” Significantly, the report also states that Tesla claimed “…with his technology he could ’split the world’ in two.”
This astonishing assertion closely parallels remarks made by Soviet Premier Krushchev to the Presidium in 1960, where he referred to “…the advent of a new class of Soviet Superweapon, so powerful it could wipe out all life on earth if unrestrainedly used.” 4 The comment, made at the height of the cold war, clearly did not refer to nuclear weapons – already an integral component of the feared Soviet arsenal.
Not least, the Senate report mentions Tesla’s development of a “ray gun in the 1930’s, which was actually a particle beam accelerator,” and which was said to be able to “shoot down an airplane at 200 miles.” 5 Following Tesla’s death in 1943, the US government seized his papers and research notes, placing them under national security lock and key.
An undoubted genius during his life, Tesla’s papers curiously remain highly classified today – 53 years later.
In addition to visiting New York’s ITS, Aum personnel also traveled to the Tesla Museum in Belgrade. Their studies here included researching the so called “Tesla Coil” (below image) – a device used for alternating currents.

Note that Dr. Heuer said this in an interview to be carried by the international press. If he merely wished to communicate these views to the the scientists writing the paper(s) on the CLOUD experiment results, he could have done so privately via email. That would have bothered me a lot!
His message was clearly designed for public consumption. To whom was it directed? I can only speculate, but it seems plausible that this statement was directed to the politicians that lead the countries that fund CERN – politicians who are mostly publicly heavily invested in AGW. I think that Dr. Heuer was telling them that CERN will avoid becoming involved in the AGW morass, other than as a provider of basic physics data on cloud nucleation. In other words, ‘Please don’t shoot the messenger – CERN is not a combatant.’ I can’t say that I blame him for his caution.
As Lord Acton said, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” The more that science is funded by governments with agendas that go beyond the pursuit of truth (often par for the course), the more science will tend to be corrupted.

I saw that William provided some pointers to work by Isreali Astrophysicist, Nir J. Shaviv. Here is another article of his, which seems directly applicable to the topic:
http://sciencebits.com/CosmicRaysClimate
Chris Shaker