Steve McIntyre finds yet another instance where Mann applies his special “secret hot sauce” to data, selling the sizzle, rather than the steak. It is another familiar tale of data holdback, gatekeeping, obfuscation, and cherry picking by The Team. One wonders just how long the rest of science will stand idly by.
From Climate Audit:
Mann et al 2008
Fisher 2002 (Holocene) carried out a principal component analysis on a wide variety of proxies for the 210 year period from 1761-1970 when the proxies were all available. Fisher created an archive of these proxies for the period 1761-1970, one of which was Law Dome (LAWA210.ANT). This was obviously only a fraction of the available data but was the portion used in his analysis.
Even though Mann had a current and much longer version of the Law Dome O18 series that he/Jones had obtained from van Ommen, Mann et al 2008 substituted the truncated version used in the Fisher principal components analysis. The difference in the two versions is shown below.
Figure 3. Law Dome versions. red- 2003 version; blue – Mann et al 2008 version ( truncation of 1997 version to 1761-1970).
It would take a while to calculate the effect of Mann’s use of an obsolete and truncated version of the Law Dome series on his SH reconstruction, but no one should assume that it didn’t and doesn’t “matter”. My guess is that this decision had a material impact.
Full story here
After reading the posts in this thread it’s apparant that nobody here understands scientific reasoning, or the scientific process. It’s a sad commentary on education that so many people can be so ignorant of basic reasoning skills. I think it’s safe to assume that if anyone has read any of the Mann papers that they rail against, they didn’t understand them. Try reading the original material people. Don’t rely on the falsifications that appear on this and other scientific denier (not a referrence to Nazis Anthony) sites.
REPLY: I’ll assume you must be a student at your university, because I seriously doubt a staff member would act as you do. – Anthony
Supposedly this site is committed to exploring alternative theories. Unfortunately if one criticizes McIntyre, their post is scrubbed. Forget that the title of the post is gratuitously name-calling. That doesn’t fly when one legitimately criticizes the fraudulant McIntyre paper that was completely debunked in Nature. As with most scientific neo-phytes, if this site can’t argue facts, it’ll argue by eliminating dissent. Good luck with that.
REPLY: You are welcome to criticize, but the language you used was inappopriate and violates site policy – Anthony
There’s a point at which it is no longer sensible to assume good faith by people like Mann.
Actually it’s not Mann but those who allow him to operate this way who are the real criminals. And I mean criminals, because if you obtain money by deception this way it is a crime.
“There’s a point at which it is no longer sensible to assume good faith by people like Mann.”
This statement is more accurate if you replace “Mann” with “McIntyre.”
REPLY: At least Mr. McIntyre publishes his full name with his criticisms, something you have not the courage to do. – Anthony
Andy said: “…it’s apparant (sic) that nobody here understands scientific reasoning, or the scientific process. ”
You mean this reasoning?
“We will keep them out somehow — even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!” , director of CRU to Michael Mann.
Is that how the scientific process should work?
Two comments:
1) I know of no other scientific discipline where it is acceptable to maneuver data like this.
2) Phil, really? You can’t look at the graph and tell what it is? The 6th grader in my house figured it out…
So…. all that derision I mistakenly heaped on Tom Murphy?
Please read it again as if it were addressed to Andy.
As if to prove my point:
Andy;
That doesn’t fly when one legitimately criticizes the fraudulant McIntyre paper that was completely debunked in Nature. As with most scientific neo-phytes, if this site can’t argue facts, it’ll argue by eliminating dissent. Good luck with that.>>>
I read all your comments Andy, and nary a fact amongst them. Some name calling, some reference to some article in some journal, but an actual factual discussion of the science itself appears nowhere in any of your comments. Thank you for making my point.
Andy, since you are still at the university, try taking some advanced statistics in the next couple qtrs/semisters. You then can understand how Mann is a liar. Lying by omission is still a lie, especially in statistics. Not publishing your data and models is just writing a story of fiction. For the ethical statistician, you worry that you missed something that better explains your results, never try to fit the results to expectations/desires, and mourn your model’s demise when it is falsified and move on.
I see a lot of criticism of Steve McIntyre in comments here but not a whole lot of substance in the reasons why. Upset that he’s just called out “your boy” once again for being a snake oil salesman, and backed it up, once again, with data?
You want to call out Steve, great. You better have some data to back it up. Otherwise, you’re just a whining, bitter, SOB…
Andy says:
“Forget that the title of the post is gratuitously name-calling. That doesn’t fly when one legitimately criticizes the fraudulant McIntyre paper that was completely debunked in Nature.”
The post’s title is a witty, double entendre, as opposed to gratuitously name-calling. An example of what Andy alleges would be, “Well, it’s the old line about getting into a fight with a pig – you’ll get dirty and the pig enjoys it.” In this quote, Mann was calling Marc Morano a pig in a March 2010 interview – http://tinyurl.com/76l6xzk (Climate Science Watch link) “…[Y]ou know, [it’s like] getting down in the mud with some professional climate change denier like Morano.”
And regarding the practice of “debunking” a peer-reviewed paper, you should read a pro-AGW web site’s recommendation for the “Debunking Handbook,” which states, “Don’t lead with the wrong view you’re trying to debunk, but rather, with the correct view you want to instill.” – http://s.tt/198DL (Desmogblog.com link). For Andy’s edification, the conclusions of M&M 2003 and 2005 were supported by the Wegman Report 2006 – http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/WegmanReport.pdf . That report (similar to the M&M papers) were spuriously and viciously attacked by Mann and his apologists in a deliberate and concerted effort to personally destroy the authors. This effort was richly detailed in the Climategate e-mails; all one needs is the courage to read them.
The irony with the above situation, though, is that Mann bleated petulantly about a right-wing, Big Oil conspiracy against him and other pro-AGW scientists without having offered a scintilla of evidence for its existence, while he and other pro-AGW scientists plotted and implemented (as detailed in the Climategate e-mails) a conspiracy against M&M and Wegman. And the response from most of the scientific community? The e-mails were taken “out of context” – how dutifully convenient for Mann – http://tinyurl.com/yzwdavp (Union of Concerned Scientists link). Mann 2008 just dismissed the M&M papers as “bizarre” and failed to address the very real shortcomings of his previous papers; Mann was apparently comfortable with the fallacious reasoning of appealing to authority vis-à-vis the whitewashings that he didn’t need to apply the scientific method.
Science to Mann means never having to say your data is flawed. Science to Mann’s supporters means blindly pledging allegiance to a man (as exemplified by Andy’s words).
Richard says:
June 5, 2012 at 9:52 am
“I wonder why they bother to get data at all. They make it up anyway.”
I can think of two good reasons: it’s cheaperto make the data up and it’s quicker – leaves more time to spend in Tahiti and such places.
Andy says:
June 5, 2012 at 4:31 pm
After reading the posts in this thread it’s apparant that nobody here understands scientific reasoning, or the scientific process. It’s a sad commentary on education that so many people can be so ignorant of basic reasoning skills.
You need to re-take English Comprehension 101 next semester and then go for Logic for Sophomores.
I think it’s safe to assume that if anyone has read any of the Mann papers that they rail against, they didn’t understand them. Try reading the original material people. Don’t rely on the falsifications that appear on this and other scientific denier (not a referrence to Nazis Anthony) sites.
I think it’s safe to assume you don’t know what you’re talking about. How is a relevant extract from a paper and commentary on that extract a “falsification”?
REPLY: I’ll assume you must be a student at your university, because I seriously doubt a staff member would act as you do. – Anthony
I concur.
For people like Andy, et al, who are quick to level accusations of being anti-science, biased, cherry-picking etc against those who dont buy the cAGW myth, I’ll tell you what first brought my attention to global warming. Having known about global warming, but never having taken more than a passing interest, I was aware of the theory that rising CO2 levels resulted directly in higher temperatures. Then, around 2009, I read a headline that said something like ‘2008 tenth hottest year on record’. That seemed odd because, whilst you would expect anomolous years due to variability, 2008 being tenth meant that 10 years of CO2 rise hadn’t raised 2008 above 1998. To cut a long story short, I then started looking deeper and doing my own research and dicovered what a load of unsubstantiated nonsense cAGW is. I have a physics degree and understand the scientific principle which, if applied properly, now demands a rethink of the CO2 warming theory because it doesn’t fit real-world data.
Andy says:
June 5, 2012 at 4:57 pm
This statement is more accurate if you replace “Mann” with “McIntyre.”
Obviously, you’re completely missing that McIntyre is very modest in his critique of the complete abuse/ignorance (make your choice) of statistical methods that Mann and several other climate scientists (the latest being Gergis et al in Australia) display.
I recommend that you take a course in statistical methods – then you may understand what a can of statistical worms you open up if you do statistics the Mannian way.
Jonathan Smith says:
June 6, 2012 at 12:05 am
I have a physics degree and understand the scientific principle which, if applied properly, now demands a rethink of the CO2 warming theory because it doesn’t fit real-world data.
I have no science degree, but I understand English and I understand the dictionary (the Oxford English Dictionary, to be specific) definition of the scientific method: “a method or procedure…consisting in systematic observation, measurement, and experiment, and the formulation, testing, and modification of hypotheses.”
Nothing I have seen from the CAGW side conforms with that definition. What I *have* seen from that side is supercilious disparagements, noisy declamations, spurious appeals to emotion, data skewed or cherry-picked to fit the hypothesis, and flat-out lies.
Andy, why don’t you spell out for us exactly what we’re missing and why we’re wrong, since we’re all obviously so stupid….
This is a question, not an accusation.
Isn’t that a very good example of fraud?
I’m not scientific, but if i tried that in high school i’d have been severely reprimanded.
And failed.
@Andy – If your one of Manns students I mourn for your furture, might want to learn the phrase “Do you want hot sauce with that?”.
REPLY: I’ll assume you must be a student at your university, because I seriously doubt a staff member would act as you do. – Anthony
Based on the behavior we’ve seen, even right here, from university staff members, I think that’s not a safe assumption to make.
TonyG says:
June 6, 2012 at 10:38 am
Based on the behavior we’ve seen, even right here, from university staff members, I think that’s not a safe assumption to make.
Based on our host’s reply, I’d guess that Andy’s IP originates from an institution whose staff still maintains a modicum of scholastic integrity.
HOCKEY STICK RECIPE
By: just some guy
Ingredients:
– Hundreds of random data from tree ring samples
– 1 tree ring sample shaped like a hockey stick*
– “short-centered PCA” (or other method to mine hockeysticks)
– 1 gallon of Mann’s Secret Hot Sauce
– Pre-cooked GISS temperatures data
– Five or Six AGW peers
Step 1: Mix tree ring data together, along with the 1 hockey stick tree ring data.
Step 2: Cook data for a three weeks
Step 3: Add short centered PCA
Step 4: Continue Cooking data for 1 month, stir frequently, make adjustments as necessary.
Step 5: Add Mann’s Secret Sause
Step 6: Check mixture to see if it resembles a hockey stick, if not, repeat steps 2-4.
Step 7: Remove from oven, attach pre-cooked GISS data to the “blade” of the stick
Step 8: Stir in peers, let sit for one week.
Step 9: Serve
*These can be difficult to find, one has been reported in the Yamal region of Siberia.
Note: For even better results, make a copy of the one hockey-stick data sample, than repeat steps 1 through 6 several times, using variations of the remaining data. Place multiple hockey-sticks together on the same graph, to give the impression of “repeatability” and “robustness”.
@Andy the Student
I find it intersting that your basic ‘point’ to be scored is that you feel people do not read and understand the works of M Man; that we don’t ready his papers and we do not undesrtand where the leaning is and where the props are located. You argument, such as it is an argument, will not fly with this audience – in fact it makes you look as if you are locked in hero-worshipping mode. You are addressing people who don’t care to tow any party line and carry no truck with the endless nonsense perpetrated by the AGW alarmist community, fattened at the public trough as it is.
Take a break from the team’s papers and read well beyond them. Look into the works where real science is done and proper accounting shown, where the correct application of difficult maths is to be found. Mann’s hocky stick paper has to be the most influential example of bad math that was ever deliberately and knowingly published in the Common Era. Do you understand that? Can you follow what happens when a non-reviewed, uncorrected misunderstanding of principal components analysis is applied to real data? Do you know what PCA is? Can you comprehend the billions of dollars that have been wasted chasing a CO2 influenced pipe-dream, their waste promoted by the endless repetition in print of that infamous and incorrect graphic?
People who do read and understand these papers, many of them here, are rightly appalled at the abuse of position, title and heritage that has been our common misfortune to witness. The coverups are examples of the serial failure of the ‘safety nets’ of science that should be prosecuting the crooks out of academia. Please don’t waste your student days lauding and defending the Lettered and Awarded. Abandon the kingom of Names and inhabit, rather, the fastness of Truth and the humble plain of Honesty.
Oh, hockey sticks, hockey sticks,
Hokey in every way!
Oh, what fun it is to make
Hockey sticks all day!
Hockey sticks, hockey sticks,
Hokey in every way!
Oh, what fun it is to make
Hockey sticks all day!
And for an even spicier uptick, try Mann’s Extra Extra Hot Super Secret Sauce. It’s guaranteed to get your 20th century boiling, mmm mmmmmm good!
Mann’s….. It’s peer reviewed!