And most regulars will recall William Connolley. Connolley’s likely best known for his hijinks as a former editor at Wikipedia. (See the WattsUpWithThat posts here, here, here, here, here, here here….and here.) But Connolley is also a former climate modeler with the British Antarctic Survey…plus a co-founder of, and former contributor to, the blog RealClimate, where he authored or co-authored a grand total of 14 blog posts from December, 2004 to March, 2008. Connolley now blogs at ScienceBlogs/Stoat.
WattsUpWithThat regulars will remember “Sou”, a.k.a. Miriam O’Brien. As Anthony Watts notes in his post My Blog Spawn:
Proprietor: “Sou from Bundangawoolarangeera” aka Miriam O’Brien of Mt. Beauty, VC, Australia
Some of Miriam’s skills: being a “a sixties-something woman with an interest in climate science“, sniping at WUWT, snark, Twitter snark, photography, business consulting, being on a board of directors.
Anthony continued:
Given her daily rants, she has now qualified for “Internet stalker” levels of infatuation and invective. Assigned to the permanent troll bin.
How do those two bloggers form the basis for an article?
More background: Connolley was the first troll to appear on the thread of my post I’m Retiring from Full-Time Climate Change Blogging. See his January 3, 2014 at 3:11 pm comment. But that’s not the subject of this post. This post is about Connolley’s first link in his blog post, one that serves as his reference for my work on the processes and aftereffects of El Niño and La Niña events—a body of work that includes more than 150 well-illustrated, data-based blog posts about El Niño and La Niña processes and one book solely about ENSO. Connolley writes. [I’ve removed his hyperlink attached to my name so that readers don’t get ahead of me]:
I hasten to add that RP Sr is not speaking of me, no, he is talking of renowned blogger Bob Tisdale.
Where would you have expected the hyperlink to lead? My blog? Maybe WattsUpWithThat? Maybe the exchange I had last year at SkepticalScience about the long-term effects of ENSO?
Give up? The hyperlink was to a post by Miriam O’Brien from HotWhopper. (I’m glad I hadn’t been drinking coffee when I clicked on that link.)
As a reference for his understanding of my work, Connolley linked Miriam O’Brien’s post Bob Tisdale is Perennially Puzzled about ENSO [Miriam hyperlinks to archives, not the original blog posts, so I’ve done the same here]. Miriam’s post is her response to my post titled SkepticalScience Still Misunderstands or Misrepresents the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). (The WattsUpWithThat cross post is here.) In that post, I provided graphs of a number of datasets broken down into logical subsets that contradicted the SkepticalScience representation of ENSO, and I challenged SkepticalScience to provide links to climate model-based, peer-reviewed papers that explained why those variables for specific parts of the globe responded as they did to El Niño and La Niña events.
Of course, Miriam O’Brien did not address the content of my post. She did not discuss the datasets I presented, as I had presented them. And Miriam quoted me out of context—nothing surprising there. Miriam could have saved herself a lot of time by simply noting that she agreed with Nuccitelli’s post and disagreed with mine–but she didn’t. Miriam O’Brien wasted her time creating a couple of illustrations so that she could restate Dana Nuccitelli’s misunderstandings and misinformation.
Miriam O’Brien fancies herself an expert on just about every climate-related subject. Yet she is only capable of using the Monty Python contradiction approach to argument, which is why I find her blog so amusing…and, at the same time, I find her blogging style pitiable because she doesn’t realize she’s become an embodiment of a Python caricature.
CLOSING
It’s quite telling that William Connolley, a co-founder of RealClimate, used Miriam O’Brien’s HotWhopper post as a reference for his knowledge of ENSO. It indicates his understandings of the complex coupled ocean-atmosphere processes and aftereffects of El Niño and La Niña events are as limited as Miriam’s. And if Miriam O’Brien serves as one of his scientific or technical experts, it also suggests Connolley’s arguments about human-induced global warming have grown as laughable as hers.
@Anthony Zeeman:
I’ve covered that problem a few times. Mostly with a more technical bent. Lately, I think I’ve come up with a way to explain it that anyone can “get”:
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2014/01/05/calorie-counting-thermometers/
The basic fallacy of the Global Average Temperature is that it can somehow count the energy gain or loss of the planet. IF that were true, then using an average of your oral and armpit temperatures could tell you if you ate too many calories and were going to gain weight…
(Yes, the Earth is also a self regulating temperature system, like a human body, complete with water driven heat dumping. The analogy holds.)
The much more technical version is here:
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2011/07/01/intrinsic-extrinsic-intensive-extensive/
And I’ve covered it a couple of other times in earlier forms. From pointing out that this is a large calorimetry experiment where we don’t know the mass, specific heat, latent heat, enthalpy changes, and more; and keep changing the number and location of thermometers (which any Chem major can tell you breaks your calorimetry) to one of my earliest postings about “Mr. McGuire would not approve” where I touched on it while pointing out (less precisely then) that you can not remove systematic error with an average, only random error, so the average can NOT have greater precision than the original measurements, which means at best +/- 1 F degree for all USA and all older UK / British Empire data (which is one heck of a lot of the old data…).
So the point has been presented; but most folks don’t seem to care about it. Even though it means that the Global Average Temperature is at BEST “a polite fiction” devoid of meaning… useful only for propaganda.
Then you’ll appreciate my stripped-down description of ENSO:
ENSO acts as a chaotic, naturally occurring, sunlight-fueled, recharge-discharge oscillator, where the La Niña phase acts as the recharge phase and El Niño acts as the discharge phase.
Analogue: Always accurate, never precise.
Digital: Always precise, never accurate.
Thanks to Bob T and AW.
(btw I did go to the “Sage of the Outback’s” ( or should that be the Witch) web site as someone suggested, her site’s a little confusing.there are a few 404’s
You know, watching this thread, a thought wandered by…
Wherever the AGW folks show up, quality leaves; then eventually the bulk of the normal folks leave too. Doesn’t matter if it is the Weather Channel (as the related post points out: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/01/11/directv-to-drop-weather-channel/ ) or Wiki (where the likes of Mr. Con-oily have made it a political swamp of festering bias). As soon as the “organizing communicators” show up with their Agenda; it goes to pot. Then folks leave. (I used to use the Wiki a lot. Then, when I posted an article with a reference to Jevon’s – and that wiki was IMMEDIATELY rewritten to a Politically Correct but technically wrong article, I saw the light. Now it is at best a secondary reference and only on non-climate and non-political things).
The AGW web sites dwindle to low numbers.
Current TV goes to Al Jazerra.
TWC is useless, even for the regular weather.
Wiki gets a very bad black eye for not avoiding politically driven severe bias.
The list goes on.
There ought to be a name for that process. Like with money, where Gresham’s Law says that “Bad money drives out good”. Bad people drive out good. Bad ideology drives off the thinking person. Propaganda drives away the free minded person. PC Ranting drives out thoughtful discussion. Insult drives out discourse. Perhaps Smith’s Law Of Thinking. “Bad ideology drives out good cogitation”?
And the people just move on…
Being a basically polite person, I’ll not join the rant at Mr. Connolley. I don’t want to get my cogitation soiled… IMHO the facts speak for themselves. A person is known by their deeds, and those of Mr. Connolley are there for all to see. Especially the political hack job on wiki. Oh well, it was a nice idea before it was turned into a garbage heap.
Stoat Baiting.
The wonderful thing is that statistically speaking (given the relative size of the WUWT readership compared to his own circles), more people loath the Stoat than love him.
And he keeps letting us KNOW just how much this really really annoys him!
Ah…the pleasures of blood sport.
E.M.Smith says:
January 11, 2014 at 7:28 pm
++++++++++++
Well stated by quite a gentleman Mr Smith. I generally feel obliged to donate to sources where I derive value or where others derive value that believe is important. When I go to Wikipedia, and they ask for money, I only feel the smallest bit obliged – but it’s as small as the CO2 signal is to AGW – so I will not pony up a red cent to Wikipedia. I generally go to Wiki to see what they say, not as an end-all, but as a point of reference.
I also listen to NPR and AM radio on my way to work so I can be exposed to all sides of stories (instead of listening to music). I’ll never give them a red cent (other than the tax money that was taken from me via the IRS).
Mario
Wow WC says he has a different reality.
But his own wiki is locked.
His own wiki says:..a 2009 Wikipedia arbitration in which it was concluded that Connolley had used administrator privileges to his own advantage in content disputes, and these privileges were removed.[26]
So ‘editorship’ and ‘admin privileges’ just need to be swapped. Funny how hostile the arrogant are when wrong.
William Connolley says:
January 11, 2014
“Officially, I’m banned here.”
So you posted anyway.
“So the claim this is an “open forum” is distinctly dubious.”
Open forum does not imply the absence of rules.
“You people really aren’t thinking.”
Strike three, troll.
Miriam O’Brien sniping at WUWT as well as linking to articles by Karoly? Priceless!
William Connolley is the most execrable individual I ever encountered on Internet.
It is sort of an achievement, because there are quite a few execrable individuals out there.
I keep wracking my brain to come up with some simple explanation for such behavior. It seems like childlike behavior, but from those that are obviously adults by age. The thought that keeps coming to mind is “arrested puberty”. The Mann’s, Connolley’s and O’Brien’s of our age seem to have never graduated puberty! Teenagers, still playing the “Knockout Game”.
a.k.a. Politics.
Which brings into focus the difference between smart and clever. Smart, who figured out “landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth”, is walking to the bush latrine at a safari campsite. Clever is waiting in the jungle for Smart to shoot through. Clever then leaps on Smart’s back and rips him/her apart.
Clever wins!
But will Clever ever be Smart enough to get to the moon?
Our host said @ur momisugly Bob: “I’ve always thought the Earth’s climate could be far better modeled by an analog circuit than a digital construct. Most of Nature is analog.”
I do agree – but then there are those superb programs (like Aimspice) that can almost exactly simulate circuits such as old (vacuum tube) Leak Amplifiers, feedbacks and all. I had a couple of Leaks some years ago: if you set them up with a signal generator input and oscilloscope to view the output, Aimspice reproduced the output exactly at all audio frequencies…
Mario Lento,
I agree with your comment above. E.M. Smith’s posts are always worth reading.
Thank you dbstealey.
I’m afraid that I’m still not seeing anything substantive I could attempt to rebut, only insults. There’s BT’s original mistake I suppose:
> telling that William Connolley, [used] HotWhopper post as a reference for his knowledge of ENSO
No. I used HW as a ref for BT, not for ENSO.
I could try rebutting an error made on BT’s original post, where it was said:
——-
> *You are a Ph. D. de facto; Einstein’s doctorate from Oxford was “honorary.”
Einstein had an earned doctorate from Zurich: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein#Academic_career
> B(nT):
Oh come now. You can’t possibly imagine that NSF would fund this stuff, can you?
And as for cowardly: here I am. Under my real name, not hiding as anon.
——-
Alas, that comment was so terrible that it had to be censored at BT’s blog (http://bobtisdale.wordpress.com/2014/01/03/im-retiring-from-full-time-climate-change-blogging/#comment-14503), making the stuff about cowardliness somewhat ironic. However, the bizarre comparison to Einstein and the failure to realise that Einstein did have an earned doctorate, seemed worth noting. I really can’t account for RP’s suggestion that BT’s stuff should be funded by NSF though.
Alexander Feht says:
“William Connolley is the most execrable individual I ever encountered on Internet.”
True dat.
And as we see, Connolley the Coward hides out from the debate challenge @4:28 pm above.
Too bad. Lord Monckton would do an ethical job of moderating the Wikipedia articles on climate. Unlike Connolley.
> Connolley the Coward hides out from the debate challenge @4:28 pm above.
I’m here, if M wants to talk. Where’s your man?
Perhaps people could tone down the name-calling and ad hominem attacks and get back to issues of climate..Just saying’…..
A Watts says:
@ur momisugly Bob I’ve always thought the Earth’s climate could be far better modeled by an analog circuit than a digital construct. Most of Nature is analog.
Nice idea, but I don’t think you would be able to make or specify all the physical properties of the components as accurately as you can model them numerically.
If you needed to model something with a resistance, would the stray capacitance or the inductance of the physical component have any meaning to climate or introduce spurious artefacts?
BTW Connely is a failed climate modeller. If you dig out the papers he co-authored they are all about how they _failed_ to get anything close to reproducing the ocean currents in the Southern Ocean that they were working on. He imagines that makes him an “expert” on climate.
After that he failed to get elected as a Green on the local council in Cambridge UK. At the same time he was abusing the processes as a Wikipedia editor to ban contributions from those who did not agree with his politics.
His WP profile page which he frequently used to justify himself as a climate “expert” did not point out that he was a failed ex-expert and currently a political activist seeking to get elected.
More of a weasel than a stoat but I suppose if he called his site weasel it would give the game away.
David says:
>> Con nolley’s likely best known for his hijinks as a former editor at Wikipedia.
Con nolley still edits at Wikipedia, with about 1000 edits in 2013. A quick reckoning shows he made about 420 edits to 108 climate related articles or article discussions. To be fair, some of these edits were just reverts of ‘vandalism’, but he clearly still monitors a vast array of climate related wiki material.
====
Very good point. A lot of people seems to think, oh it’s OK finally he got removed. He did not , he got a _temporary_ removal of his admin rights and a _temporary_ ban from certain climate topics.
What Con nolley calls ‘vandalism’ is anything that may damage the AGW cause. So don’t dismiss those when counting.
The reason it took that long for _anything_ to be done and why nothing is done about the rest of GW zealots patrolling Wikipedia is because James Whale wants it that way. He is complicit.
That is why his “encyclopaedia” is unreliable crap for many topics.
PS. ( “Wiki” is the free software project used, not the encyclopaedia, which is just its most famous user).
Billy Connolly, hilarious comedian.
William Connolly, hilarious …. oh, wait.
Talk is cheap. Yes or no?
“The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.” Oscar Wilde.
Somewhere, a stoat is chuckling.
I do not like to stoop low to personal attacks but in this case I have taken a special course of bending and stretching exercises to enable me to do so.
He is the sociopathic Alberich of the “climate” Internet world. Master of the arrogant ,unsupported, condescension-dripping drive-by , just clever enough to be dangerous. Strange, twisted, driven by forces one hesitates to speculate upon. A low-rent hollow-cheeked masochistic Moriarty.
I wonder sometimes if he even subscribes, in the privacy of his own head, to the validity of the stuff he promotes or whether it is merely a platform to enable him continue with his , at times, deeply distasteful and spiteful contributions.
A bile-filled Rubik’s cube puzzle for the studiers of the incorrigibly damaged, and one which makes you want to wash your hands afterwards. I frequently blench on the reminder that I share a country with him.
He is a one-off, that is for sure. Please do not ban him. I take a guilty pleasure from observing his antics and his sheer startling rudeness is a wonder to behold.
Thanks Bob.
Connolly seems to want a fight without the reality weapons to help him win. Let him fight and sink in his own mire.
William Connolley:
At January 12, 2014 at 12:05 am you say
Clearly, you choose to only see that which fits with what you want to assert.
For example, in this thread you have repeatedly claimed that you are “banned” from posting on WUWT. Clearly, anybody with at least two brain cells to rub together can see that your claim disproves itself: if you are banned from posting on WUWT then you cannot post any claim in this WUWT thread.
This is a clear demonstration by you that you live in a view of the world which only exists in your mind. And you are infamous for harming Wicki by using your editing rights to distort information on Wicki so it concurs with your deluded views.
David wrote at January 11, 2014 at 4:58 pm listing your many recent Wicki ‘edits’ by subject. And E.M.Smith wrote in his post at January 11, 2014 at 7:28 pm explaining how editorial distortion on Wicki has trashed that enterprise saying
And when your misbehaviours are pointed out you pretend the points are “only insults”. Your pretence may convince yourself because it is part of your delusion”: it only fools you and not others.
Importantly, your pretence that criticisms of your execrable behaviours are “insults” obtains the well-deserved contempt which you obtain from so many people.
I hope this explanation is helpful to your understanding of your delusional world view so you can start to correct your errors.
Richard