Steve McIntyre has returned from his holiday trip and points out how the American Geophysical Union (AGU) has taken up the Gleick tragedy at the 2012 convention, as if the prodigal son had never committed a crime. He writes:
If I was hoping to think about more salubrious characters than Lewandowsky, Mann and Gleick, the 2012 AGU convention was the wrong place to start my trip. All three were prominent at the convention.
…
But the most surprising, even astonishing, appearance was by Peter Gleick himself. Gleick did not simply return, but was honored by an invitation to speak at a prestigious Union session.
…
Although McPhadren had stated that Gleick’s “transgression” would not be “condoned”, AGU’s warm welcome to Gleick shows that McPhadren’s words meant nothing, because AGU has in fact condoned Gleick’s actions.
Full story here
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I left this comment at Climate Audit:
What a sad commentary on professional ethics, which seem to have gone the way of the Dodo.
In looking at the hallway photo, the first phrase that popped into my head was “pencil necked Gleick” with apologies to wrestler Freddie Blassie
“Blassie came up with his famous “pencil-neck geek” catchphrase early in his career to describe a fellow carnival performer known as “The Geek”, who bit the heads off chickens and snakes. Blassie described this geek as having a neck like a stack of dimes, and that he was a real pencil-neck geek.”
Readers may also recall the song.
I suppose the current circus isn’t far from “professional wrestling” where a wide variety of tricks are employed to ensure a predetermined outcome.
The matches have predetermined outcomes in order to heighten entertainment value, and all combative maneuvers are worked in order to lessen the chance of actual injury.[2] These facts were once kept highly secretive but are now a widely accepted open secret. By and large, the true nature of the performance is not discussed by the performing company in order to sustain and promote the willing suspension of disbelief for the audience by maintaining an aura of verisimilitude.
So, which character will be the AGU heavyweight champion this year? “Pencil Necked Gleick”, “Mighty Mann”, or “Lewy Lewy”?
@JC
>It is shocking how many believers still refer to the Gleick mess as a “sting operation”.
I thought of it as a ‘stink operation’. It is what polecats do, isn’t it?
Re ethics and morals: Virtues are the foundation of ethics and morals. Virtues can be taught. Would that we all had more of them 🙁
Which of us is better than the rest? We could just as well take our time to discuss something of value.
Thanks Heartland for the explanation of why there has been no prosecution. Curious, to say the least. Verily we are patient.
trafamadore:
At January 7, 2013 at 4:51 pm you say and rhetorically ask
No! Scientists are NOT “free to present their work there”.
Some scientists are allowed to present their work at an AGU Meeting but most are not.
Permission to present work at an AGU Meeting is an honour and a privilege awarded by the AGU.
Not awarding such an honour and privilege is NOT a “form of censure”. If it were then most members of the AGU would have suffered a “form of censure” from the AGU.
Gleick has provided no scientific work of exceptional merit but is a self-confessed criminal. Perhaps you would care to explain why you think any organisation should provide Gleick with an honour and a privilege.
Richard
richardscourtney says: “Gleick has provided no scientific work of exceptional merit but is a self-confessed criminal.”
Point 1: I suspect most scientists think Gleick no more a criminal than you think the people that hacked the Climategate files are criminals; what most scientists say publicly may not be what they think. However, before you judge them too severely, perhaps you should look in the mirror.
Point 2: Gleick has provided no scientific work of exceptional merit? Let’s see, the guy publishes regularly in top journals and has over 50 peer reviewed pubs, has been asked to talk to congress and the public. Sorry, that IS exceptional, very exceptional.
trafamadore:
You are being silly in your post at January 8, 2013 at 12:29 pm.
It provides your two fallacious points but not the explanation I requested.
So, I repeat, being enabled to speak at an AGU Meeting is an honour and a privilege. Perhaps you would care to explain why you think any organisation should provide Gleick with an honour and a privilege.
And I address your two points .
1.
The person who leaked the climategate emails is not a criminal.
But Gleick is a self-confessed criminal.
(And I don’t see a criminal when I “look in the mirror”).
2.
Gleick has published a lot of rubbish in several journals but he has published nothing of great merit, and you cite nothing of exceptional merit which he has published.
Please provide the requested explanation because your doing that would wipe the egg from your face.
Richard
What allowing Gleick to speak has done is convinced me that “Science” in the USA should be defunded as soon as possible. It has convinced me to such and extent that I will start doing my best to make sure it happens including seeing a Congressman I am friends with this week.
It has also convinced me that all the science groups promoted/ supported by the US government like the Chemical Society (I quit in disgust) should also be disbanded.
We need to cut spending well, there is a nice big useless bit of spending we can now cut. Let the Peter Gliecks go work for a living for a change…. Oh that is correct he has a consulting business that includes a Shell oil VP.
Well, well, if it isn’t trafamadore – who has repeatedly been snipped in the past due to providing invalid email addresses.
Gleick is a self admitted liar and deceiver. Why you would want to defend him is between you and your conscience.
But the AGU went further than that. They “rehabilitated” him and gave him a podium – which, as Richard C. and others have pointed out, is not available to everybody. This was within months of him having to resign as head of their ethics committee because of admitted unethical behaviour.
The contortionism required not to “get” the point here is worthy of Cirque de Soleil.
richardscourtney says: “The person who leaked the climategate emails is not a criminal.
But Gleick is a self-confessed criminal.”
Well, there are different ways to look at this. The people responsible for the data breach at the University of East Anglia may be heros to you, but the Norfolk police are looking for them, or at least were, and I suspect those “brave” people remain anonymous because they wish not to be prosecuted. Gleick, on the other hand, stepped forward.
In following their consciences, both did wrong, but Gleick gets some credit for not being a coward.
trafamadore:
I see you are still wriggling at January 8, 2013 at 8:05 pm.
I yet again repeat
Being enabled to speak at an AGU Meeting is an honour and a privilege. Explain why you think any organisation should provide Gleick with an honour and a privilege.
You have abandoned one of the two ‘red herrings’ you introduced to evade providing the explanation. But you continue trying to equate the legal action of the climategate leaker with the self-confessed criminal actions of Gleick. If that ‘red herring’ were true – it is not – then it would be irrelevant.
I again ask you to justify your support of Gleick being permitted to speak at the AGU Meeting. And I thank you for your continued evasions which are sustaining attention on the matter.
Richard
PS Are you Gleick?
Trafamadore-
Gleick did not bravely step forward. He tried to conceal his identity in such an incompetent way that he was identified and forced to admit wrongdoing.
Gleick used impersonation and deception to steal documents from a private organisation, including private personal information, and passed them on for publication. Regardless of his ability as a scientist he should answer for this in a criminal court.
“Remember the old adage you can lead a horse to water but a pencil must be lead.”
richardscourtney says: “I again ask you to justify your support of Gleick being permitted to speak at the AGU Meeting.”
Well, I would haf to see the abstract he submitted to judge that, maybe you can find it for me. For a conference, the chair of a session has the only semi “honored” position and he or she selects speakers for the session based on the abstracts. It would seem that someone disagrees with your hypothesis that Gleich has done nothing of interest lately.
You know, the guy works on water, what could be more boring than that? And he gets Nature and PNAS papers? I bow to him.
And I find it hilarious that you have difficulty equating stealing documents from East Ang. and Heartland. All you have convinced me of is that Gleick is not a very good crook.
trafamadore:
At January 9, 2013 at 6:30 am
1.
You persist in your refusal to provide any justification for your assertion that the AGU was right to give Gleick the honour and privilege of addressing an AGU Meeting.
2.
You continue your laughable attempt to equate the actions of the climategate leaker with Gleick’s fraudulent misrepresentation, theft, and dissemination of a forgery.
3.
You do not answer the question as to whether you are Gleick.
In the light of Gleick’s past behaviour, your ignoring the question of (3) together with points (1) and (2) add credibility to the hypothesis that you are Gleick. Hence, until you state your true identity such that it can be checked, I shall adopt the working hypothesis that you are Gleick: i.e. a contemptible and self-confessed liar, fraud and thief.
Richard
richardscourtney says: “I shall adopt the working hypothesis that you are Gleick”
I am honored.
But I am curious as to the tests you plan to use to disprove your hypothesis,
or the alternate, that I am some other sort of scoundrel.
tr@fam@dore (probably Gleick):
I see that at January 9, 2013 at 8:17 am
you still fail to provide any justification for your assertion that Gleick deserved the honour and privilege of speaking at an AGU Meeting
and
you attempt another ‘red herring’ about the matter.
No rational person except Gleick could think Gleick deserved the honour.
So, please provide the justification for you asserting that Gleick (you?) deserved the honour.
And – to answer your question – I don’t need any additional evidence that you are a “scoundrel” than your attempts to post on WUWT using a false email address which repeatedly got you ‘snipped’ by the Mods.
When you have repeatedly misrepresented your email address then there is no doubt that you are capable of misrepresenting your identity. Gleick is a self-confessed liar and you have demonstrated that you are a liar (perhaps because you are one and the same).
When you provide the required justification of your assertion and some evidence of your true identity then you will have removed the severe doubt as to the reason for your assertion that Gleick (you?) deserved the honour and privilege which the AGU gave him.
Richard
@ur momisugly richardscourtney trafamadore is not Gleick, his IP traces to Michigan, Gleick is in Berkeley, CA
Anthony Watts:
Thankyou for the information you provide at January 9, 2013 at 8:54 am.
My hypothesis is disproved. Thankyou.
While writing, I take this opportunity to say I hope your business trip is proving worthwhile, and I ask you – for the sake of your family – to not over exert yourself.
Richard
Anthony Watts says: “trafamadore is not Gleick, his IP traces to Michigan, Gleick is in Berkeley”
Darn. Well, scoundrels do live in Mich…
richardscourtney says: “your attempts to post on WUWT using a false email address”
Well, it’s the same one I am using now; I think I might have accidentally used my uni email address sometimes (which is good as well), but I dont like to use it on unofficial business. Whatever. and “trafamadore” without the “L” is great, I like it thankyou.
In terms of Gleick and honors, it appears no matter what I say, you wont agree or, I suspect, even see my pt of view. I certainly dont know the person whom invited him to speak, nor do you, and so we will never know. You cant imagine a reason he could speak… but I can for the rather simple minded reasons I gave.
In terms of outright censure of Gleick, that is usually only reserved for falsification of data and other scientific crimes. Breaking and entering doesnt clear that bar.
In terms of the East Ang. robbers, whom you hold in high esteem, you seem to be incapable of believing the Norfolk police were investigating them for anything but to congratulate them. But they stole. like Gleick.
Now I dont think Gleick should have done what he did, but I think the way things go, that it was a brave thing to do, and I dont know if I would have come out afterwards if I had done the same thing, that is to say, I would probably be more like the skulking East Ang. robbers. And I must admit I might think the highly of the East Ang. robbers if we ever find out how they did it and who they are, even though I do not agree with what they did. You know the Boston Tea Party was basically stealing, yet many believe it was a good thing.
In both cases, it seems it is you who are incapable of seeing other people’s views, not me. Maybe you should lighten up a little.
trafamadore,
On January 7, 2013 at 5:02 pm
I challenged you:
You made an assertion. Now, name the hackers.
Of course, you didn’t answer the challenge because you can’t.
Clearly the Climategate I & II leaks were an inside job. Have you read the Harry_Read_me_file? Why would an outside hacker redact the names from the file if the ‘hacker’ was from outside?
No, it was an insider who was simply protecting himself. The same redactions were done in both Climategate dumps. You can go on believing your ‘hacker’ nonsense, but that only means you have no common sense.
You also say: “In terms of outright censure of Gleick, that is usually only reserved for falsification of data and other scientific crimes.”
Oh, really? So if Gleick committed armed robbery, or financial fraud, or was a child molester, he would still be welcome? Where, exactly, do you draw the line at wrongdoing? Which crimes does Gleick get a free pass on, and which get him barred? There are plenty of scientists who would love the opportunity to make a presentation, but not enough time. Why should the reprehensible Peter Gleick be rewarded at their expense?
The fact is that you are just an apologist and an enabler of wrongdoing that you would be squealing like a stuck pig over if it were done to you. Look up the definition of “hypocrite”, and maybe you will understand.