BPSDB
So Solid CRU
– ride wid us
- The Frame
- Sun Tzu
- Habeas corpus
The story so far:
- CRU research computer hacked, many emails copied, claims are made that they reveal broad scientific fraud;
- Emails released, much sound and fury told by idiots, claims seem to be all innuendo and speculation;
- More and more nothing as people search for something, anything of substance in the emails.
The climate change science community was caught off guard by this for obvious reasons. Initially most were quite understandably not willing to comment until they had at least seen the evidence. Now we have seen the evidence, or all that we know exists.
Aside: apparently what has been released is about 1/2 of the total copied from CRU. We do not know if what has been released is cherry picked and the remaining material fills in the blanks exhonorating everyone of any wrong doing, or if there is more to come. According to RealClimate, whatever is there, it will not be evidence of scientific malpractice such as tampering with data, and that’s good enough for me.*
*[UPDATE: some freepers are using this statement as evidence that I am “Accepting unsubstantiated statements, on faith and faith alone.” Yup, and clear about it too … not pretending that unsubstantiated statements are fact.
I could turn out to be wrong, but at least I am not lying to anyone else about what the basis for my position is. And if there is a subsequent release and it contains actual credible evidence of data tampering, I will say so]
The frame
Since seeing the emails we have been responding by:
- pointing out that while some (and only a few) of them sound dubious, there’s no actual evidence of anything;
- attempting to point out that in every case there are also perfectly innocuous interpretations;
- putting these sorts of discussions in context*
*Carbonfixated’s Newtongate: the final nail in the coffin of Renaissance and Enlightenment ‘thinking’” is a brilliant example of this. Many climate bloggers have impressed me, surprised me, delighted me, but this is the first time I have felt actual envy … I wish I’d done that piece. 😦
Sun Tzu
Four problems with this strategy:
1) It’s not a strategy, it’s a tactic, and not even a good one. “Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” Sun Tzu
2) It assumes that “the problem” is a scientific one. Pretty natural concern for the science community, but it is increasingly clear that the science is in no way affected. The battle going on now is political, not scientific, and we have to fight it as a political battle.
3) To date the Deniers are annotating the emails with “helpful explanations” ie total fictions making outrageous claims about the context. As such they are dictating the narrative and we are responding to them within that frame.
They keep throwing punches and all we do s try to block them. No matter how good we are, some will land; hence Sun Tzu’s dictum.
4) The problem with offering reasonable interpretations is that they are always going to sound apologetic and never quite convincing. Particularly as most of us were not actually there. As certain as we can be that there are perfectly innocent explanations, we do not know for certain that the explanations are innocent.
Take the example below: In the picture we see an Eco-fascist rally for world government. Pretty clear, isn’t it?
Eco-fascist rally for one world government.
Denier Version: Eco-fascists rally for World Dominance!
Of course given the context of this blog every reader knows that “Denier Version” is not what is actually happening here, but before moving on please decide what is really happening.
Seriously, what are they doing? Given this picture, what would a naive (ie uninformed person) think? What would you tell them if they found this picture on a Denier site and asked you about it?
What if I tell you that it really is a climate change rally of “tree hugging greenies?” and that it’s not photo-shopped? does that change anything? What do you think? Can you prove it? When you suggest it, does it sound defensive? uncertain? apologetic?
Does it sound like we sound responding to the Deniers wrt to the CRU hack?
Reality Version: rather more mundane
Jump to 20 sec mark for answer
My point is that while everyone can see the video in this example, until they do that picture really is kind of creepy and disturbing. (and btw, I fully expect some Troll to repost that picture as if it really were an actual Eco-fascist rally. The Deniers really are that pathetic.)
But of course with the edited email snippets no one is ever going to see the full story, because short of 24/7 videos of the last 20 years of the principle 
characters lives, the Deniers will always claim that the “crime” is just off screen.
As long as we go along with the Denier frame and narrative we are going to sound like defensive apologists. We need a strategy. We need to be the ones on the offensive, dictating the narrative and setting the frame. We need attitude.
Habeas corpus
One of the many holes in the Denier narrative is that they take it as a given that the climate science is false and that all that was left to do was to find the culprit. Their language is completely framed in terms of that assumption, hence the histrionics that the alleged “smoking gun” of the CRU emails seals the case.
Quite understandably the climate rationalist response has been to point out that the “gun” isn’t a “gun”, and it’s not smoking. Clearly Jones got hot under the collar at times, and different people were pretty steamed up about certain other people, but no smoking gun. That may be clear to us, but it’s not satisfying to the general public.
I suggest that we have change our response to “smoking gun? who cares? show us the “body!” Of course there is no “body”, or even “bullet holes” anywhere … ie no evidence that anything actually happened.
We need to switch from seeming to be defending the supposed culprit to demanding actual evidence of a crime, any crime. We need to be asking:
“Which studies were compromised, how? be specific. Cite papers and data sets. What is the evidence? where is it? what work is affected? how? show me the evidence that says so.
This supposed scandal involves perhaps a half dozen people, how does it affect the work of the 3,000+ others who’s work makes up climate science?
How does it affect the work that was done before the alleged culprits graduated from univeristy? the work from before they were born?
Of the 30,000(ish) studies that make up climate science, which ones are undone? where is the evidence? be specific … show us exactly how and why?” etc
because of course another hole in the Denier frame is thier certainty that the CRU hack topples climate science. Naturally they are taking advantage of the bobbhead credulity and the public naivete, which does work, but it also makes them vulnerable to it being challenged on it.
“You are certain it topples climate science? how? where? which studies? what evidence? You don’t know? then how are you certain?
Please run through a list of the studies you believe are affected? Hockey stick? what’s that? please refer to specific papers and studies.You don’t know? then how can you be certain?
Ahhh, Soandso 2004? so just how is it compromised? what part of the work? I thought you were certain?”
We need to hammer that and keep hammering it. Push hard, and not only the Deniers, but the media drones who brainlessly echo the Denier memes. Not hysterically or in anger, but with relentless defiant decency and certitude. Make it clear that they do not understand the science, and in fact have no idea what they think the emails actually mean.
We have to be the ones asking questions and demanding answers!
There’s a smoking gun? where’s the body?
(ie kids already listen to this stuff all of the time, but be advised that parents will be offended &/or corrupted) 😉
Related:
- ClimateGate reveals nefarious conspiracy!
- Climate contrarians spinning hard with stolen email files
- Climate Scientists’ Emails Hacked, Posted;
So What Does it All Mean for the Climate?
“Over the 20th century, ocean temperatures in the North Atlantic main development region warmed during peak hurricane season, with the most pronounced warming occurring over the last four decades.” Earth GaugeWe give our consent every moment that we do not resist.
Comment Policy
Comments that are not relevant to the post that they appear under or the evolving discussion will simply be deleted, as will links to Denier spam known to be scientific gibberish
- The “Mostly” Open Thread” is for general climate discussion that is not relevant to a particular post. Spam and abuse rules still apply;
- The “Challenging the Core Science” Comment Thread is for comments that purport to challenge the core science of anthropogenic climate change.
Greenfyre's 
Here is the deal dear so called sceptics who are better named deniers, find 150 people to go on a two week long fast to oppose the climate justice fast. Do we have a deal?
Excellent idea. I already started using this strategy before reading this post, but this has clarified it. They are alleging scientific fraud. That’s a very serious accusation to make without evidence, and so far the attempts to spin this into evidence of fraud have not been substantive.
What do you think of the strategy of directly attacking deniers and media outlets for their irresponsibility in making claims of fraud without evidence?
Given the stakes, spinning this as proof that AGW is false when it clearly isn’t is by far the most immoral act associated with this episode, more immoral even than the criminal hacking and certainly much worse than anything these scientists are alleged to have done.
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It’s clear that the inactivists are just going to ignore any questions from you and keep yelling their vague insinuations of fraud while asserting that ‘the evidence speaks for itself’.
— bi
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Good advice. I’ve already written a few of times in reply to a pasted sentence from the emails, “So? How does that refute the *science*?”. No coherent response to date.
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The deniers are in the propaganda industry, not science, not PR or spin but propaganda. Take a lie, put in just a little truth and keep repeating the lie until the population just accepts that it is true.
You know they will be cherry picking quotes and deliberately misinterpreting what has been written for some time to come.
Perhaps they do not truely realise just how bad it is going to get. But you cannot look at that many papers, that much data and conclude that all will be OK.
In so many ways we are in so much trouble.
Greenfyre, excellent advice. I had actually used a similar tactic when bombarded with McIntyre’s Yamal stuff. “Show me which papers have had to be withdrawn because of the findings of this auditor [McIntyre].” No response was forthcoming.
Maybe the scientists should sue for defamation? Let’s start up a legal fund!
It doesn’t refute the science but it increases the question mark over there being a ‘consensus’.
These emails contain instructions to delete correspondence (what do they have to hide)? They also declare they won’t share data, rather they would rather destroy it (once again, why?). They appear to only want ‘like’ thinkers to peer review their work, they sideline anyone who they think are skeptical or they are unsure of. They appear to have subverted the peer review proces to their advantage. They threaten boycots and sackings of journals and editors that dare to publish views that contradict their own.
All in all it doesn’t look like a very open minded scientific viewpoint, it does appear the facts have been fitted around the policy.
Sadly it appears the truth doesn’t actual matter to you.
If it doesn’t refute the science, then it doesn’t refute the science.
Of course, as long as there are climate cranks who insist on using non-scientific, logically-challenged arguments like “the climate’s changed naturally in the past, therefore there’s no man-made climate change”, there won’t be a “consensus”. But it’s not the duty of science, facts, and logic to be convincing to cranks.
— bi
It doesn’t refute ‘all’ the science, it doesn’t prove it either. It makes things even murkier. What is spin, and what is real? Trust becomes the issue.
When the gatekeepers of knowledge become so convinced that they are right and everybody else is wrong then ‘science’ becomes dogma.
The people involved in this email saga are the group responsible for the presentation of the climatic history. If we can’t trust the climatic history how can it be said that recent warming is ‘unprecedented’?
Statements like below should make us all shudder…
Keith Briffa to Michael Mann, Phil Jones et al
“I know there is pressure to present a nice tidy story as regards ‘apparent unprecedented warming in a thousand years or more in the proxy data’ but in reality the situation is not quite so simple.
…I believe that the recent warmth was probably matched about 1000 years ago. I do not believe that global mean annual temperatures have simply cooled progressively over thousands of years as Mike appears to and I contend that that there is strong evidence for major changes in climate over the Holocene (not Milankovich) that require explanation and that could represent part of the current or future background variability of our climate.”
We all want a better planet, it’s not the scientists that many in the skeptic camp have a problem with it is the politicization of the issue. When politics influence science, once again we should all have an issue with that.
> It makes things even murkier.
No. It only hardens the certitude of the wingnuts that there’s a global conspiracy that plans to take their SUVs, $0.49 burgers and handguns off them.
The overwhelming response to these emails – outside of the wingnut-o-sphere – has been “Is that it? … What shall have we for dinner tonight?”
And if you’ve missed the entire point of the article up top of page, how does any of it refute the science? Specifically? Which stones of the pyramid that makes up climate change theory have been destroyed? Rhetorical question: none of them.
The only politicisation – desperate and determined – is by you Deniers. Behind the thin veneer of scientific learning (“Science is not determined by consensus!”), all that’s spinning around your heads is “Cap ‘n’ trade! Fedrul guvmint! Al Gore! UN power grab! B. Hussein Obama!”. No matter how focused a ‘debate’ is on the science, it’s guaranteed that a Denier will switch to the politics once he has exhausted his “Vikings grew grapes on Greenland!” list of talking points.
As if to prove the point, you make a fiat declaration that the science has been directed by politics – without a shred of evidence for the assertion. For anyone with a passing familiarity of the science, it flags you out as some combination of immensely ignorant and batshit barmy.
Tighten the tinfoil, bubba!
“And if you’ve missed the entire point of the article up top of page, how does any of it refute the science? Specifically? Which stones of the pyramid that makes up climate change theory have been destroyed?”
Clearly you haven’t been paying attention.
The area most affected by this is the climatic history of our earth as derived by the proxy data. Mann and Briffa were editors of the relevant IPCC chapters in this area and it’s due to them we have the ‘unprecedented warming’ conclusion. This area has been most influential in (supposedly) demonstrating how unusual recent climatic events are. If this area has in fact been, let’s be polite, ‘engineered’ then policy is being formed on incorrect information.
Too much goal seeking going on, I find it disturbing that you don’t seem to have a problem with that.
“As if to prove the point, you make a fiat declaration that the science has been directed by politics – without a shred of evidence for the assertion.”
You can’t be serious? The IPCC is a political body, Copenhagen is a political meeting and the ETS is a political agreement. But don’t take my word for it….
“Hi Mick,
It was good to see you again yesterday – if briefly. One particular thing you said – and we agreed – was about the IPCC reports and the broader climate negotiations were working to the globalisation agenda driven by organisations like the WTO.
…
All the best,
Paul
—————
Paul V. Horsman
Oil Campaigner
Greenpeace International Climate Campaign
Greenpeace””
I’ve been paying careful attention to this ‘debate’ for years – and reading about the science almost daily in that time as well. And one thing became very clear very quickly: there are a mass of scientifically illiterate half-wits on the internet who are believe that their knowledge and ability is a match for any PhD who has dedicated their career to studying the science. This unshakeable belief is built on having read a few blog posts by a melon-headed radio weather presenter and a myopic mining executive.
> The IPCC is a political body, Copenhagen is a political meeting and the ETS is a political agreement.
There’s really no need to keep confirming that you can’t separate the science from the political implications.
How does your copy pasta refute any of the science? Specifically? Point out just one peer-reviewed paper that has been falsified as a result of anything in these private emails?
Or you can provide another evidence-free rant. Whichever you think will be more effective.
I’m not disagreeing that reputable scientists do believe in AGW, nor do I think they are necessarily wrong. There are just as many who are more circumspect, whether or not the IPCC wishes to recognise them or not.
But it is difficult to separate the two (science and politics) as unfortunately the science and political ramifications are now wedded.
Unfortunate because the ‘solutions’ being put forward politically are so stupid that many people do feel compelled to refute the science purely to stop being steamrolled into bad policy.
One only needs to open a paper or listen to a government speech to be threatened with catastrophe if we don’t implement an ETS and new global government.
The solution proposed won’t do anything for the problem, one of the reason why I think the problem is exaggerated for political benefit to begin with.
I have never claimed anything has been falsified (yet) although individual findings may need to be reviewed.
Questions certainly need to be asked as to the change in the IPCC reports of the MWP in 2001 from the previous report (adoption of the hockeystick over the previous climate graph showing a much higher MWP). So once again I’ll make the claim… the historical climatic record as adopted by the IPCC is biased and inaccurate.
> So once again I’ll make the claim… the historical climatic record as adopted by the IPCC is biased and inaccurate.
So, you went for the evidence-free rant. As expected.
I have never claimed anything has been falsified (yet) although individual findings may need to be reviewed.
They were. Three years ago. By the NAS.
As for the correspondence, if you don’t know the Stephen McIntyre saga, you aren’t in any position to ask “what have the got to hide.”
Good use of so-solid!
(fish biologist and weekend bad-boy)
;o)
In the RealClimate comment section of CRU Hack see comment 789 by pjclarke. He gives a brief synopsis and rebuttal of 15 of the emails. It makes a useful reference list.
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Now comment #829 (page 17)
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And I forgot to add, I think Greenfyre’s (and other’s strategy) is well based. It is no less than what we’d expect in a court room, and that is the lower standard compared to the scientific standard. Nothing wrong with refuting the denialist interpretations if it is part of a larger strategy–i.e. “Show me…”
You say Deniers. This is the same rhetoric I hear for any ’cause’ dreamed up by the establishment. [1]
For example:
Tea Baggers, Deniers, Racist.
Think for yourselves a minute. Ask yourself these questions: “Does my argument really stand on it’s own, unless I use these catchphrases against my enemies? [2] Am I thinking before I pass on the statements I hear or see others make, in some emotionally charged rampage? [3] What’s left of my argument if I remove the emotions I’ve received with it?” [4]
My friends, you were born unique. Think or yourselves and realize that you are being used as tools to pass a globalist agenda for a 1 world order. CO2 is part of life. Plants breathe it. It’s no more dangerous than Oxygen or Sunlight.
Global warming is one of of the biggest HOAXes ever played on humanity and that is so as so FACT as is and always will be a FACT. [5]
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“It’s no more dangerous than Oxygen or Sunlight.”
Yes, sunlight is completely harmless. Giggle.
And, of course, oxygen is always completely harmless.
It’s amusing that someone can complain about the term “denier” and “catch phrases” and “emotionally charged rampages” and then immediately dive into tirades like “Global warming is one of the biggest HOAXes ever played on humanity and that is so as so FACT as is and always will be a FACT” and “you are being used as tools to pass a globalist agenda for a 1 world order.”
On second thought, it’s not amusing.
WatchfulEye,
Nice work. Worthy of Denial Depot.
Erm Watchfuleye and Oxygen etc.
Everything can be dangerous. How many times do nutters like you have to be told that anything can be a poison or have adverse effects??
If Oxygen is ‘safe’. Try breathing in an atmosphere with the wrong pressure or parts per million of the stuff.
This science issue is about understanding the boundaries that are suitable for us to live in and making sure we don’t break those boundaries.
WatchfulEye, Water is necessary for life, also. But too much of it will drown you.
Since humans have burned 320 billion tons of carbon, the level of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased from 280 ppm to 384 and climbing.
That’s a 40% increase already.
You don’t have to be a scientist to recognize that we have fundamentally altered our environment, and since the present day forms of life, both animal and plant, evolved slowly over many generations to live in the environment that existed before we changed the atmosphere, that’s a problem.
And you don’t need an advanced degree to understand that the oceans are absorbing much of the CO2 we release when we burn fossil fuels, and that they are becoming acidified. When it gets to the point that shells are dissolving – and it will get to that point – the entire food chain will collapse.
Did you know that we get most of the oxygen we breathe from life in the sea?
You will change your mind if you watch this:
http://witsendnj.blogspot.com/2009/10/you-cant-fish-and-not-have-hope.html
Which studies are faulty? Hockey sticks that use tree rings. Non-tree-ring hockey sticks that rely on literally pasting the instrumental record on the end to “hide” the fact that the proxies themselves have not been updated or in fact fail to skyrocket. If the proxy data ends too soon to show AGW then it quite simply means that the proxy data itself FAILS TO SHOW AGW and we must rely on scaling of the tree ring variance to match temperature variance with MUCH less confidence. I’m not saying it’s wrong, just that the conclusion become much more speculative rather than definite.
You would think the literal end of the world as we know it would be reason enough to update proxies, so it’s a bit suspicious that the most important scientific question of all time has been neglected in this manner.
Here is Mann’s non-tree-ring chart:
Take away the instrumental lines at the end and one must agree with Briffa that T was just as high 1000 years ago:
“For the record, I do believe that the proxy data do show unusually warm conditions in recent decades. I am not sure that this unusual warming is so clear in the summer responsive data. I believe that the recent warmth was probably matched about 1000 years ago.”
My biggest beef though is explained by a chart I made that nobody has addressed despite my posting it far and wide asking for feedback, namely the use of HadCET to extend HadCRUT3 back in time:
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NikFromNYC, ever heard of a “Stevenson Screen”? Know what it is for? Know when it was first used?
Your “graph” shows a remarkable leveling off around the time the Stevenson Screen first came into use. Think that is coincidence or not?
Nik – I explained that lovely (bogus) picture at S&R yesterday when you posted a very similar comment. You said at S&R “I’ve posted this far and wide with not a SINGLE valid critique resulting. Silence seems to be the only response on sites full of true believers.”
But I responded with:
“I can tell you why people ignore it, Nik – it’s a single thermometer, measuring a single point on the surface of the planet. And as such, it has no statistical value in and of itself. Anyone could choose a single thermometer anywhere else on the planet to make whatever claim they wanted.
At best, that graph is statistically meaningless for global conclusions. At worst it’s cherry-picking. And yes, those are completely valid arguments against that image, whether you think so or not.”
So I guess I did explain it using a valid argument, yet you continue to claim no-one has, that the response has been “silence.”
Care to retract your BS statement?
Oh, and after a quick Google search on that image link, Nik, I found that you’ve been pasting it almost exclusively at denier sites that agree with you. And of all the sites I visited where you posted, you didn’t even bother to respond to any criticism.
I guess the reason you hear only silence is the fact you’re deaf.
For someone trying to spread FUD, you’re not particularly good at it.
“Care to retract your BS statement?”
I wont retract it since you are the first to respond.
But it’s not a “bogus” graph since a simple plot of data is not “bogus”.
And indeed it’s a single thermometer. That’s why I hesitated to present it until I *confirmed* that it matched OTHER thermometer records that however do not go back quite far enough to show the huge upswing in the 1700s. I can’t average them since they vary so much in when they start.
But though it’s a single thermometer the point is that it is in fact a THERMOMETER and not much goes wrong with thermometers. Compared to tree rings? What other data back 350 years do we have that is less controversial than an actual thermometer?
And right on top of the plot I compare it to the very well accepted global average. It bloody well matches! It also matches quite well other long running records in *other* areas. That’s the link I included on it.
That it MATCHES the “instrumental record” makes your claim of it being non-representative of the global average a very thin excuse for UTTERLY discounting it as you have shown you so far do.
The question is though, even if is only one site, how on earth can it fail to show any response to “global warming”? If it *did* I guess the diehard skeptics out there would scream “urban heat island”. But it doesn’t, despite being in the area of London itself.
It’s *not* cherry picking to search for the longest running charts available. It simply isn’t.
There simply are only 2-3 sites that go back far enough to really show many cycles of natural variation prior to the industrial age.
When I find time I will take your criticism to heart and try to improve my chart by adding another one that averages data from other sites as that data became available from 1700-1800 or so. I want to stick to only long running charts though.
By the way, your tone is rude as could be imagined. You are chock full of spite, considering people with simple questions to be both idiotic and scheming. That’s a sad outlook on life and it tells me it’s very unlikely that I will receive an actually useful and reasoned response from you. You for instance have already IGNORED that fact that I plotted HadCRUT3 on top of my “cherry picked” plot. Dude, if it didn’t match so well I would not have presented it to you!
I’m a Ph.D. chemist trained at Columbia and Harvard. What I’ve learned the most is to utterly doubt my own results as much as I am skeptical of the results of others. And when I discover that temperature records go way back and very inconveniently show no AGW signal I’m afraid I detect a profound problem with how AGW is presented as being extremely certain instead of highly speculative. At best I can accept that T sensitivity to CO2 is may be dangerously high but has been caught early enough to control. But to claim T has already going crazy is a HIGHLY SPECULATIVE statement.
I included a link to all the other long running temperature stations. They also match quite well what the longest one shows. If this is upsetting to you don’t blame me. I’m only the messenger. Yell at the data all you want. I’m as curious as you are as to *why* there is such a mismatch between AGW proxy plots and evident signs of glacier retreat etc. with actual thermometer records. It certainly would advance the case for AGW if this issue was addressed. BUT IT HAS NOT BEEN. Screaming “cherry pick” is not an argument if OTHER stations also fail to show the AGW signal.
I must thank you though for staying on topic instead of hitting me with a barrage of unrelated content. But you comment is unproductive since cherry picking is only a problem is one cherry picks an outlier temperature series that happens to randomly give the result I want. I merely picked the longest one. My confidence in it is how well it matches dozens of stations all over Europe in the full period from 1850-present. So suddenly it’s not a small region at all but quite a big one.
Care to retract your own BS statement?
It’s good though that you did comment since my homework is now assigned. I must add a chart at the bottom that removes the cherry picking claim by crunching the data together from all other stations that go back less and less far in time. I’m afraid you wont like the result since I’ve already seen how well they match CET by eye and it’s a near perfect confirmation that CET indeed ACCURATELY reflects the temperature of the entire region of Europe all the way up to the Netherlands.
I present a very serious problem with AGW theory and you just scream at me like I’m an idiot. Do you think ignoring my supporting evidence and spewing bile at me counts as a response worthy of retracting instead of reinforcing my original statement that I have not received any serious response to my graphic argument?
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So,Nik,have you got a history of the site and its instrumentation changes? The data may be sound ,but the caption is pure contention,isn’t that obvious? If you have a serious problem with AGW theory,then you should be the first to handle your graphic with due weight.
Nik,
1. This thread is about the CRU hack, not AGW theory;
2. So, genius, write a paper and get it published.
“I’m a Ph.D. chemist trained at Columbia and Harvard”.
Wow! Evidence that eminent universities do not prohibit its alumni to stay (or become?!) ignorant. That’s a lot of money your family wasted!
Anyone who has to claim they are a PhD chemist from Harvard etc either is lying, or making a fool of themselves. Which is it, Nic?
What are these cycles of natural variation? Can you tell us how they work?
[…] smoking gun? Where’s the body?’ November 22, 2009 — Richard by aubergene CRU Hack, time to hit back … hard: [Via Greenfyre's] So Solid […]
Wonderful to see the military terms of strategy and tactics.
Deniers are pawns in a tiny squabble of distraction.
Deniers are more defined as distractionists, delayers, de-railers…
Who do the represent? and just Who is the enemy?
The rational enemy is inexorable global warming and our increasingly unsustainable environment. (But we are not ready to declare war on global warming [pity, too])
The irrational enemy is ourselves, because we are cursed by cupidity, stupidity and timidity. ( And worse we are not yet committed to change.)
We should define the Enemy as that which is about to destroy us as a species – not as individuals. (and I see that as global warming)
The attack made on the process of science… is only an attack on the human expression of global warming. The data can go up in smoke, but the events will still unfold as they must. Words mean little to physical laws. Email less. This is a PR tactical struggle that influences humans, not the physics of global warming.
Deniers, skeptics, delayers, de-tractors, derailers are preventing humans from mitigating and adapting. Our tradition of tolerance and free speech commands us to give them undeserved respect and attention.
One can easily see their allegiance to carbon consumerism and anti-taxation, anti-government authoritarian capitalism. With a blyth disregard of thermodynamics, they most fear government extraction of wealth by taxation. This is classic US history repeating itself.. Ideology and demagoguery trumps rationalism. To deny a seen – but yet not fully expressed danger is an easy sell to preserving any emotional – political stance.
However, as AGW progresses, for the increasing number of humans facing real struggles, the deniers will present themselves as a dangerous obstacle to human survival.
Pretend we are in battle and deniers are posted on guard duty to watch for signs of the enemy (you know the enemy we defined as global warming)
In a war, the act of deliberately overlooking danger, or refusing to recognize the enemy would clearly be defined as treason. But we have not yet declared ourselves in a war.
When we do, deniers will become suddenly silent, much like the strongly expressive groups in the US just prior to WWII.
Your observations on strategy and tactics are great. When we look at the tactics of deniers, can we surmise their strategy? Their goal seems to be to keep carbon usage flowing, avoiding taxation. Their tactic is to remove the scientific connections to the issue. They want to delay any action that limits carbon usage or taxes or increased government control over destructive commerce.
Tactically – in the short term – they have be remarkably effective. Delaying responsible reaction that could have rationally started back in 1965 – and quite possibly have avoided much of this present mess. Deniers have been (and still are) heavily supported by the carbon fuel industries. They have been tolerated by governments – who do not want to be accused of abandoning the security of citizens. Citizens will demand protection. Many nation’s military are in preparation; the insurance industry is ready; banking is ready, having hoarded all the money they can… everyone is getting ready except the common citizen, who shall be the last to know. Nice to have mass media help with that one.
But strategically, denialists are dooming us all and giving an extra shot to themselves right in the foot. Without a serious response, warming will be worse and sooner. Note that in our atmosphere new carbon dioxide has a reactive half life of nearly 100 years hence – CO2 now will continue chemical reactions that long after emissions. We are doomed to feel continued warming and destabilization no matter what we do today.
This means that when humans choose to begin the war, our rational enemy will be far stronger than ever. Future actions and human reactions will necessarily be far more radical, restrictive, violent, disruptive than if we had been smarter at any time in the past.
In short, denialists are hurting all our futures, but they are assuring the actions we must take to survive will be far worse than if we had started yesterday. (as a species, not as individuals)
Pick just about any yesterday. Derailing the fire brigade means more water is now required to douse the flames. Further delay means more water. Turning ones back to the heat does not put out the fire.
At some time, denialists will be better labeled as obstructionists, and later still we will have conquered this irrational enemy.
Wow, you’re just scary.
Ever stop to consider that the apocalypse may not be approaching before your start rounding up anyone that questions your point of view?
Just ease back there fella the ‘truth’ doesn’t need a dictatorial policy to make it so.
“Deniers, skeptics, delayers, de-tractors, derailers …” just want the facts, not your version of the facts. I don’t think that’s too much to ask. We wouldn’t be in this mess if the pro AGW camp hadn’t pushed so hard with all ‘the science is in’ rubbish.
Mother nature may just have more up her sleeve than we currently account for, all sides acknowledge that there is much more to be understood. True scientists should be open to that point of view.
—-
Hey “Flats” How much are you paid for your postings?
It is called astroturfing, Very powerful in teenage bling markets and of course booze. But I hear the Green Coal movement is still looking for even more blog salters. They had a huge call for volunteers last year.
Must be lots of burn out. Do you do other issues and industries?
Your words read like a mid level functionary in PR. Maybe Bonner and Associates.
We all might want to know about the “Polluter Fraud Hotline” (1-866-363-4648), inviting average citizens or industry insiders to blow the whistle on any deceptive or illegal tactics that big polluters and their lobbyists are using in opposition to clean energy legislation. Citizens can also e-mail tips@polluterfraud.com.
http://www.nwf.org/news/story.cfm?pageId=808B8112-5056-A868-A047E255A695D30C
Of course, it is not illegal to log onto blogs try to guide casual conversation in specific directions.
Paranoid much?
Ever considered that thinking people may actually reach different conclusions to yourself?
I don’t venture down the dark alleys of these AGW blogs very often, but given the current hoo ha I thought I’d take a gander at the other side to see the reaction.
Face the facts, the science is inconclusive and the PR war was botched. Things would go a lot better for you if you stop insisting you know everything.
The venom of the AGW proponents is not something I understand but it’s quite unbecoming.
> The venom of the AGW proponents is not something I understand but it’s quite unbecoming.
Here’s another constant. After a Denier has exhausted its talking points and ranting about the New World Order, it starts bleating about how mean and nasty the realists are.
Here’s a suggestion: go to PZ Myer’s blog and state that there are no transitional fossils; go to Phil Plait’s and state that the solar system is geocentric; go to Dawkins’ and state that atheism was responsible for the Holocaust. Better keep a tight grip on your comfie blanket, ‘cos people are going to rip you a new one for being so dumb.
“it starts bleating about how mean and nasty the realists are.”
Actually it’s to try a keep the exchange civil. I tend to find those that reduce themselves to name calling and/or slurring tend to have a weak argument to begin with.
Constant use of the ‘Denier’ word is just stupid too. I do actually believe the man DOES have a big influence on the planet that needs to be minimised. I’m just not sure how much I’m going to drown by come the rising oceans (10m? 5m? 20cm?) Doesn’t seem like anyone has a clue.
Ice caps are melting, then expanding, then melting, it’s getting hotter, then it’s getting colder… sheesh. I’m sure glad you guys have it all figured out.
> Actually it’s to try a keep the exchange civil.
If you keep saying stupid things, you will eventually meet someone who will call you stupid. And by “civil” you mean that you want to be treated with respect, no matter what you say. Sorry, respect is earned, not demanded.
> Constant use of the ‘Denier’ word is just stupid too.
No, it’s not. It’s accurate and appropriate.
> I’m sure glad you guys have it all figured out.
I’m so often reminded when ‘debating’ Deniers of being eight years old and hearing playground taunts thrown around – “You think you know it all! You don’t! And you’ve got stupid ears!”
“The venom of the AGW proponents is not something I understand but it’s quite unbecoming.”
Have you ever tried imagining what might happen if you are wrong?
Perhaps it you did, you would understand a little better.
Eli – It’s exactly because I can imagine what might happen, that I find the “venom of the AGW proponents” a political and moral absurdity, as it invariably results in people being switched off the topic (read the latest polls if you believe otherwise) and good science prevented to become solid enough to stand on its own.
Ah… you’re just trying to make sure the science is sound and all that…
I’m sorry, I don’t find that credible.
Really? Maybe it’s because AGWSceptics believe and spread any old tripe, no matter how dishonest, contradictory, or delusional, and never, ever, apologise when it is shown to be dishonest, contradictory, or delusional, for the 100th time.
“Maybe it’s because AGWSceptics believe and spread any old tripe, no matter how dishonest, contradictory, or delusional, and never, ever, apologise when it is shown to be dishonest, contradictory, or delusional, for the 100th time.”
You mean like we’re going to be 70m underwater, or Polar Bears fall from the sky, or the big bad Carbon Monster is going to drown my puppy, or even ‘Ice Free Arctic this Summer’? You mean that kind of dishonest, contradictory, or delusional tripe?
I think you’ve all scared yourself silly.
It’s a bit hard to get any perspective when anyone who disagrees with your point of view is locked out of the discussions (or the journals).
—-
Flats,
I can show any number of examples of AGW idiocy.
Can you show any at all to support your case?
(Oh dear. Paranoia about the JURNULZ!)
Face the facts, the science is inconclusive and …
I was told there would be facts.
Nik, you said,
“Which studies are faulty? Hockey sticks that use tree rings. Non-tree-ring hockey sticks that rely on literally pasting the instrumental record on the end to “hide” the fact that the proxies themselves have not been updated or in fact fail to skyrocket.”
OK, but the status of tree-ring proxy studies is exactly the same today as it was a week ago. The “divergence problem” which the “Mike’s Nature trick” comment refers to has been known and extensively discussed for a decade. Yes, we know that tree-rings are not the most reliable source of data, that’s why Mann et. al. in this PNAS paper did their calculations separately with and without tree rings.
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2008/09/02/0805721105.abstract
“Recent warmth appears anomalous for at least the past 1,300 years whether or not tree-ring data are used. If tree-ring data are used, the conclusion can be extended to at least the past 1,700 years, but with additional strong caveats.”
Do you have any evidence that the data in that paper was falsified or manipulated? If not, then the scientific status of that statement has not changed even slightly.
As for your graph, let’s set aside for a moment the obvious fact that England is not the whole planet, and assume for the sake of argument that your graph is an accurate representation of global average atmospheric temperature.
There is still a major problem with your captions, which imply that there is no need to panic because of current warming. I would agree with you if the atmospheric temperature was all we have to go on. It’s a bit odd, but no cause for alarm.
But that’s not all we have to go on. We also have ocean data, melting glaciers, thinning of the Arctic ice sheet etc, all of which indicate that the total energy of the system is increasing. Now, you know that a change in surface temperature does not necessarily imply a change in total energy — just redistribute the heat in the ocean slightly, and you can get a large change in the temperature of the atmosphere. But that’s not all that is happening now.
We are accumulating energy.
If that statement doesn’t worry you a little bit, then I’m skeptical of your claim to be a chemist. You know quite well what it means. We are out of equilibrium, and until equilibrium is restored, we will continue to accumulate energy. That is likely to cause an increase in atmospheric temperature, but it is also likely to have far more profound and far-reaching consequences, such as thermal redistribution in the oceans.
Not only that, but the observations I mentioned are not all we have to go on either. We also have a well-established theory which does a good job of explaining the observations, and it predicts that total energy will continue to increase as a consequence of increasing concentration of GHGs. That’s the real problem. The warming we’ve seen so far is not much to worry about, but if it keeps on going… well, I’m a big fan of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, so I rarely panic, but I definitely consider it an all-hands-on-deck sort of situation.
Nik – if you’re not involved in what amounts to drive-by attempts to cloud science, and if you’re serious about trying to understand what it all means, then I apologize. The fact that you’d posted your image all over the place and had not, until your post above, bothered to respond to any comments, suggested that you were simply involved in spreading fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) rather than attempting to advance the science or understand it. And as my tone above makes abundantly clear, I have no patience or tolerance for those who try to spread FUD on climate disruption.
And you’re correct, if you’re attempting to use only temperature data that goes WAY back, then there are only a few direct temperature measurements, and most of them are in Europe. Using the only temperature series available isn’t cherry-picking, but it does carry with it a large number of problems that need to be considered very carefully.
Given Greenfyre’s comment policy, I’ll stop here and not threadjack this any further. If you’d care to return to S&R and clarify your concerns there, I’ll happily do what I can to address them.
Richard, that was a wonderful bit of perspective. I’m going to have to quote you on it, if you don’t mind.
Thank you for this. I’ve been playing apologist for the last few days, and it was rather infuriating not to have something to point people towards in response. Trying to explain how science works gets old after about the 10th time!
One thing I’m interested in, though, which has just come to light for me, is that there appears to be a general practice in the modeling field of not disclosing primary data and model code for published papers. I had been aware of the whole MBH vs. MM controversy about revealing data, but I didn’t realize that not releasing those things was a normal practice. I don’t do climate science myself, and this seems a bit odd to me.
Does anyone know why this is the practice? It seems like whatever you want to say about the motives of those involved — I can’t particularly fault them for protecting their information if everyone expects that information can legitimately be protected in that way — it does seem like a weird practice to have in place. Why not release the data and code?
Below I’ve included some excerpts from some of the e-mails I’ve sifted through where they discuss this. I certainly don’t mean to put them up here as a means to attacking these guys; it’s just that when I read statements like these I have no idea why this isn’t a bad way to do things. Any help would be very much appreciated!
“The papers that MM refer came out in Nature in 1998 and to a lesser extent in GRL in 1999. These reviewers did not request the data (all the proxy series) and the code. So, acceding to the request for this to do the review is setting a VERY dangerous precedent. Mike has made all the data series and this is all anyone should need. Making model code available is something else.” – Phil Jones (1074277559)
“One other thing about the CC paper – just found another email – is that McKittrick says it is standard practice in Econometrics journals to give all the data and codes !! According to legal advice IPR overrides this.” – Phil Jones (1075403821)
“The two MMs have been after the CRU station data for years. If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the UK, I think I’ll delete the file rather than send to anyone. Does your similar act in the US force you to respond to enquiries within 20 days? – our does ! The UK works on precedents, so the first request will test it. We also have a data protection act, which I will hide behind.” – Phil Jones (1107454306)
“One of the problems is that I’m caught in a real Catch-22 situation. At present, I’m damned and publicly vilified because I refused to provide McIntyre with the data he requested. But had I acceded to McIntyre’s initial request for climate model data, I’m convinced (based on the past experiences of Mike Mann, Phil, and Gavin) that I would have spent years of my scientific career dealing with demands for further explanations, additional data, Fortran code, etc. (Phil has been complying with FOIA requests from McIntyre and his cronies for over two years). And if I ever denied a single request for further information, McIntyre would have rubbed his hands gleefully and written: “You see – he’s guilty as charged!” on his website.
You and I have spent over a decade of our scientific careers on the MSU issue, Tom. During much of that time, we’ve had to do science in “reactive mode”, responding to the latest outrageous claims and inept science by John Christy, David Douglass, or S. Fred Singer. For the remainder of my scientific career, I’d like to dictate my own research agenda. I don’t want that agenda driven by the constant need to respond to Christy, Douglass, and Singer. And I certainly don’t want to spend years of my life interacting with the likes of Steven McIntyre.” – Ben Santer (1228330629)
“Finally, the fact that scientists (in any field) do not willingly share their hard-earned primary data implies that they have something to hide has no logical basis.” – Tom Wigley (1254751382)
Danny, I’m not a scientist but I can see why a researcher would view the very arduous task of collecting data – I saw a video yesterday of scientists swimming in the Arctic Sea! – as proprietary. They must publish or perish, and giving their data away so somebody else can publish first probably wouldn’t be welcome. Aside from the issues of it being distorted and their complaints that they would have to waste precious time responding to garbage.
Wait wait! Why would one of them write something like this:
“For the remainder of my scientific career, I’d like to dictate my own research agenda. I don’t want that agenda driven by the constant need to respond…”
when every denier worth his or her salt KNOWS that these scientists are involved in a conspiracy to execute a deliberate fraud! In that context, none of these emails make any sense.
Here’s an excellent analysis:
“Smoking guns in the CRU stolen e-mails: A real tale of real ethics in science”
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@witsendnj
Just to clarify, I’m definitely on board with the reasons that the scientists would personally rather keep the data and codes to themselves. The question is why this would be tolerated institutionally.
To put it another way: As an individual scientist, it is much more pleasant to have people take your conclusions at face value than to have them poking around in your work. But from the point of view of scientific progress in general, it’s probably better to have everyone’s feet being put to the fire to make sure that mistakes get caught before they cause problems. [1] As J.S. Mill put it:
“…being cognisant of al; that can, at least obviously, be said against him, and having taken up his position against all gainsayers–knowing that he has sought for objections and difficulties, instead of avoiding them, and has shut out no light which can be thrown upon the subject from any quarter–he has a right to think his judgment better than that of any person, or any multitude, who have not gone through a similar process.”
In practice, letting people throw a light on all aspects of your research is undoubtedly an excruciating process, as Santer’s e-mail points out. But are these reexaminations important for science? If they are, then it seems odd that people should be getting to take the easy way out here. After all, scientists are not paid to follow their dreams at the expense of the quality of their research. On the other hand, if the reexaminations are not important, then why can’t that point be made? In either case, it seems like this is a counter-intuitive practice to have in place, and it seemingly requires at least some justification. After all, it at least seems intuitive to think that transparency is a value in science, no?
—-
I think this strategy applies to any denier argument about paleoclimate (e.g. hockey stick). Understanding past climates certainly helps, but it’s simply not relevant to our ability to predict future climate change. We don’t need to know what past temperatures were in order to know that putting obscene amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere will cause climate change. Any time deniers make an argument over supposed errors in past climate records, they need to explain why those errors, if true, mean that we can put CO2 into the atmosphere without temperatures increasing.
Greenfyre: if there is a subsequent release and it contains actual credible evidence of data tampering, I will say so
And that’s good enough for me.
After “ClimateGate” the consensus is still there, the AGW science is still there, COP15 will still take place, etc etc. What is dead is the notion that climatological alarmism is a nicely consensual necessary conclusion of an unbiased reading of the data, rather than a reasonable worldview based on observations but that might just as well be supplanted by a different one.
I just hope that in the eyes of all, “catastrophical AGW” is now a little less like “General Relativity” and a little more like “String theory”.
And even if the work of hundreds hasn’t been invalidated, still there is enough ongoing “power politics” activity at CRU (and elsewhere) to warrant a different approach to AGW skepticism. The problem is in fact not much in scientists that have an “ideology of science”, rather with scientists whose ideology involves stifling debate and censoring those who do not follow orthodoxy.
How many of those quoted would be prepared to “say so” if any “credible evidence of (dishonest) data tampering” were to surface?
Meaningless nonsense cloaked in rigorous-sounding gobbledygook. If the so-called “ClimateGate” doesn’t change the science, then it doesn’t change the science. Simple as that.
— bi
frankbi: anybody can respond “Meaningless nonsense cloaked in rigorous-sounding gobbledygook” to any comment written by anybody else.
Please provide some actual content to counter or support my point.
oops…I forgot to close the italicization. sorry!
—-
fixed
omnologos:
Sure, but the difference is that your comment is indeed meanigless nonsense cloaked in rigorous-sounding gobbledygook.
See, now you’re asking people to “provide some actual content”, when your post contains zero content.
Answer me this: What are the specific scientific hypotheses which were originally 90% certain, but which, due to “ClimateGate”, became (say) only 80% certain? And on what grounds? Which specific e-mails will be causing this drop in certainty?
What are the specific scientific papers whose findings have become invalidated as a result of this so-called “ClimateGate”? And why? Which specific e-mails reveal evidence that the conclusions of these specific papers will have to be totally rewritten?
None?
—
frankbi: Which part of “the consensus is still there, the AGW science is still there” didn’t you understand?
I have made no claim of the sort you have accused me of making.
What I have said is that it is now clear to all that AGW science as proposed by CRU (and others) is an interpretation of the data, and not simply the only thing the data could be interpreted as revealing us.
As such, it needs quite a deal of footwork in being proposed out, and even defended, with a choreography of interventions going from e-mails to journalists to making sure the “right” people review the “right” papers.
Even Greenfyre makes reference to a “climate change science community” that “was caught off guard“. I am sure you know very well that there is a “string theory community”, whilst there isn’t really a “general relativity community”, for the simple fact that the latter is much more established a theory than the former.
This says nothing (of course!) about how “true” string theory is. It only says that string-theory-skeptics cannot be put at the same level as general-relativity-skeptics.
Then what is an alternative interpretation of the data that suddenly becomes possible due to this so-called “ClimateGate”?
Go on, name one.
— bi
[tumbleweed, sound of crickets]
I’ve already mentioned this, is it too uncomfortable for you?
The historical temperature reconstruction as prepared by Mann, Briffa et al as used by the IPCC to propagate the position that we are experiencing ‘unprecendented warming’.
Belongs in the bin.
With “not following orthodoxy”, you mean deliberate tampering of the peer-review process (Chris de Freitas), setting up journals to allow flawed articles to get published with the by-line “peer-reviewed” (E&E), and having people who should know better repeat claims that have long been refuted (many of the ‘skeptical’ scientists). For example, Ian Plimer isn’t following standard scientific practices: if you make claims (example: volcanoes and CO2), then are slapped by the facts (no they don’t, here’s the data), you do not repeat the claim. Plimer does, and is still heralded by many ‘skeptics’.
Scientists are still actively trying to keep HIV/AIDS denial out of the news, due to the devastating consequences it has already had. Like the AGW-deniers, HIV/AIDS deniers cry that they are being silenced. Same goes for the creationist and cdesign proponentsist (no, that’s not misspelled) versus evolutionists. Keeping crackpots out of the debate is not silencing the debate. It is cleaning up the debate.
You call it “keeping crackpots out of the debate”, I call it “insulating climate science from the pressure of a free society”. What are you afraid of, Marco? And are you sure that only “crackpots” have been victim of the CRU behind-the-scenes machinations?
I call it “insulating climate science from the pressure of a free society”.
That’s nice. Climate science, like all science, must be insulated from the pressures of a society where one is free to buy content, which would reduce science to mere advertising.
The creationists use tactics identical to those described by Marco in their attempt to corrupt biological science. Why are you such a fan of corruption?
Is there any AGW believer in here capable to follow Greenfyre’s own guidelines, staying away at least once from the usual personal attacks?
It’s not a personal attack, it’s a question.
I’ll ask you again: why do you favor corruption?
It’s a question loaded with an insult. Feel free to stuff your own throat with it.
Can anybody seriously imagine Einstein, Dirac, Pasteur, the Curies, or even Barry J. Marshall and J. Robin Warren ask to be “insulated from the pressure of a free society”? That’s more than laughable.
Can anybody seriously imagine …
This is your standard of proof? I think I see the problem.
You supported the abuses Marco laid out. You said so yourself. So it’s not a loaded question, you’re just getting called out for supporting pseudo-scientific payola, sugar-coated as it may have been with glibertarian platitudes. Then you got scared and ran to your little fantasy world of Great Worthies who agree with you … right before you woke up in a puddle.
But the evidence is still right up there, above. Perhaps you could meekly email the blogowner and beg him to take down the evidence?
Omno-troll favours corruption because he is a political animal. He is Scretary of the UK Freedom Party. Tells us a lot doesn’t it?
He is trying to corrupt science so that it is in line with his venomous political view points.
Everything’s for sale, to people like that.
“Everything’s for sale, to people like that.”
Pot, meet kettle.
“Pot, meet kettle.”
I’m not sure you understood the point, flats. I don’t think it was intended to mean “everything’s for sale to someone who is a political animal.”
I think it was more like “everything’s for sale to someone who holds those particular political beliefs.”
There are other sets of political beliefs which do not hold that everything is for sale.
“Is there any AGW believer in here capable to follow Greenfyre’s own guidelines, staying away at least once from the usual personal attacks?”
OK, I’ll try but it’s difficult to make this point without it sounding insulting.
If science is subjected to the unadulterated pressure of a free society, it will necessarily come under pressure from powerful interests who have a financial stake in the outcome of the science, and who will therefore use their financial influence to pressure the science into producing their preferred outcome.
This happens way too much as it is, we should certainly not be trying to exacerbate the problem.
So maybe the appropriate question is this:
How do you propose to prevent financial interests from distorting the results of science without insulating science from the pressures of a free society?
What I am afraid of is the same situation as has happened with the creationists and cdesign proponentsists, as well as the HIV/AIDS deniers: crackpots getting serious attention, keeping people away from doing something constructive. In the case of HIV/AIDS denial we even have unnecessary suffering as a result.
And regarding your last question: yes. Just look at the papers that have been discussed in the e-mails: they really are appalling. E&E simply repeatedly violates just about all ethics about the peer-review process and proper scientific discussion.
[…] Your Hands If You’re Ready To Handle (Dishonest) Data Tampering 23 11 2009 (comment posted at Greenfyre’s) Greenfyre: if there is a subsequent release and it contains actual credible evidence of data […]
Has anyone else noticed that the new catchphrase (as articulated by omnologos) is Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming? I’ve seen this meme recently, as in, “Prove that CAGW is taking place.” Usually this entails a blurring of the lines between current and future warming.
Don’t know if it is the “new catchphrase” but the questioning of future catastrophes (rather than warming itself) has been in my Omniclimate “About” for a while now (at least since Mar 2008). In “Omnologos” there is a June 13, 2006 mention too, and I can dig out a Jul 30, 2003 blog of mine in a social network, along the same lines.
Omno-troll, I can assume you don’t live in Cumbria? I think the residents of NW England will have a slightly different view of “potential” climate change than you appear to have (of course your views are not based on science).
Ian – you may want to review your science (unless Connolley has been promoted to the “Denier” category too?)
Well Connolley is not a weather type climate scientist but his research is focused on Antarctica, a long way from Cumbria.
Here is what the scientists who are a lot closer to Cumbria have to say:
http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090619/full/news.2009.586.html
(note: this paper was published in June, 2009)
Now don’t come barking back that one incident can’t be tied to climate change. I agree, it can’t, the same way that if you developed lung cancer and were a smoker you cannot unequivocally say that the smoking caused the cancer. However, statistics say otherwise.
I’m sure the residents of Cumbria are rethinking their opinions of you deniers today. I hope that they get together and start a law suit against you despicable people.
Thank you for this valued addition to my collection, after “denier rubbish” and before “devious”. But truly, the only despicable thing in Greenfyre’s site is the insult-spouting obsession by people like you.
Note to self: please remember to be nice to holocaust deniers, creationists, and tobacco lawyers, or omnologos will waste more photons on some site or other.
Won’t somebody please think of the photons!?!?!?
Omno-troll, as I have previously told you, the truth about someone is not considered an insult, just the truth.
If you don’t like the truth about yourself being exposed then you should know what to do about it.
You are still despicable and I’m sure the residents of the villages and towns who were flooded out in Cumbria over the past few days wish that people in charge had not listened to deniers and delayers like you but had taken some proactive steps to minimize what happened. I’m sure that there will be a rethinking by politicians and other informed people so that trolls like you will be marginalized.
If I were a resident of Cumbria I would sure as hell like to know why this stuff can still happen in 2009 in a major industrialised country. Everything else is useless suppositions not even with the backing of the IPCC.
Omno-troll, why do you not realize that stalling tactics such as you keep on supporting will only result in more Cumbria type problems?
Since you are always concerned about cost of doing something about AGW (by the way how many here know that omno-troll is the secretary of the UK Freedom Party, a group that split itself off from the British National Party – enough said) do you not think that the costs of continual climate disasters like Cumbria will cost a lot more?
Your whole basis for being anti-AGW is that you are selfish and don’t care what happens to others. Despicable behaviour.
It’s not general, it’s just that people like McIntyre scream so much about individual cases that it seems general.
GISS Model E source and documentation is online, for instance.
Keep in mind that in the history of science, an internet open to all of humanity is a relatively recent event. In terms of using it to publish data, code, etc for easy access by other researchers (in most fields of science) or for feces-flinging high-school educated denialists like Watts, science and scientists are still catching up. Public repositories are being created, etc. But there’s a lot out there already, and has been a lot out there for years.
As to why in some specific cases data might be withheld … consider Briffa and the Yamal dataset, one which McIntyre’s been screaming bloody murder about for years.
1. Briffa/CRU doesn’t own the Yamal dataset, Russian researchers do.
2. One of the researchers is working on (or just recently completed) his Doctorate of Science using the data (in fact, they’ve been expanding the data, i.e. doing more coring, analysis, etc) and didn’t want the data out until his thesis was ready, or ready and defended. His motivation isn’t important, what’s important is that it’s *their* data and *not CRU’s*, and had been supplied to CRU under a non-distribution agreement. CRU *could not* legally give it to McIntyre.
3. When asked by McIntyre, Briffa told him to talk to the Russians.
SCANDAL! STONEWALLING! HIDING OF DATA! MUST BE CONSPIRACY.
Hopefully you get the picture?
‘Tis easy. When signing an agreement under which researcher A shares data with researcher B, researcher B is bound by the terms of that agreement.
If you want researcher A’s data, you must talk to researcher A, not researcher B.
The case with multiple national met services data provided to CRU is similar to the case with Briffa and the russian researchers. CRU’s been given data in many cases with the restriction that they can’t distribute it.
This was the basis of McIntyre’s FOI request being denied – the reviewer concluded that FOI interests were trumped by CRU’s interest in not breaking those agreements.
And the same time, the FOI rejection stated that CRU was working on getting agreements amended so that in the future CRU will be able to release that data (oh, the conspiracy! the hiding! the smoking gun!).
Also, back in the 1980s, back when storage was expensive, not being aware that they’d be subjected to feces-flinging “blog scientists” or FOI requests a decade or two in the future, didn’t bother keeping their *copies* of the raw data (the original data is with, of course, the individual national met services). They were only interested in their value-added product, so that’s what they’ve kept.
This is also the subject of a lot of screaming from denialist ranks …
I believe there are already guidelines for sharing all data in a field like Astronomy after a certain period of time, without compromising the researchers’ right to get papers out based on their often-very-hard work.
Hopefully we all agree that that should become the standard in every scientific field?
Depends on what you mean with “all data”. If I prepared a compound using a certain chemical procedure, measure its identity using a few techniques, am I to provide the raw data?
For science to advance, it is much more appropriate somebody tries to repeat my chemical procedure and measures his own product. It would show repeatability by others.
Moreover, in astronomy there is a very open data sharing, but don’t even consider taking data made by others without at the very least acknowledging them. In fact, co-publication is the norm.
The word “sharing” doesn’t mean “give away to be used to be attacked for making supposed mistakes”.
You cannot share with the disclaimer that your results cannot be “attacked”. That’d be a travesty of Science.
As for the chemistry examples, one would expect each field of research to have its own peculiarities, even if the underlying goal is to share as much as possible (no more, and no less)
You cannot share with the disclaimer that your results cannot be “attacked”
What do you know? A clipped quote!
Why am I not surprised?
Uh? What is a “clipped quote”?
Read what he wrote.
Read what you quoted.
They are not the same because you are not honest.
Not that anyone is surprised.
You can share with the disclaimer that your data will not be used with the express goal to be attacked. With McIntyre you KNOW his express goal is to attack any tiny error and make it into something huge, and even ‘fabricate’ errors. Note the quotation marks, in several cases the ‘errors’ are a result of McIntyre poorly understanding the procedures.
There’s a discussion in the e-mails about exactly this issue: several of the people involved openly willing to accept to be audited, but strongly doubting McIntyre to be the right person. After all, McIntyre harasses Ben Santer about (freely available) data and methodology, but does not do the same with the paper that Santer criticised (Douglass et al). Clearly, the self-proclaimed Climate Auditor has no intention to be an independent auditor.
I believe there are already guidelines for sharing all data in a field like Astronomy after a certain period of time
Really? Do these guidelines force you to share data with flat-earthers in the pay of nefarious interests for the purposes of raising bogus issues about the most obscure areas of of one’s research?
Because that would suck.
Please see McIntyre, Stephen.
I am sure no astronomer would be afraid to “share data with flat-earthers in the pay of nefarious interests for the purposes of raising bogus issues about the most obscure areas of of one’s research“. I would expect said astronomer to have a good laugh at any such purposes.
I would expect said astronomer to have a good laugh at any such purposes.
Aaaaaaaaaand now you know, finally, why we have such fun at the denialists’ expense.
Glad I could clear that up for you.
jamymoore – you have no “fun” and definitely no “laughs” at anybody’s expenses. Unless the definition of fun and laughs includes an unhealthy willingness to throw insults at random and fill up blog comments with bile.
you have no “fun” and definitely no “laughs” at anybody’s expenses
I’m not having fun? Really? Because I thought that watching these idiots steal emails that they were too stupid to read was an awful lot of fun. I’m pretty sure I’m having fun, having direct experience of said fun.
The bizarre standards of evidence you demonstrate here seem to be at the root of your problem.
I’m also fairly confident Phil Jones is not laughing. I hope he has a good lawyer.
Evan Monbiot is calling for his resignation, seems he has higher standards than you clowns.
The emails are not the only issue, it seems there are also molested code designed to “hide the decline” with notes describing the process.
Posted at CA.
“people are talking about the emails being smoking guns but I find the remarks in the code and the code more of a smoking gun. The code is so hacked around to give predetermined results that it shows the bias of the coder. In other words make the code ignore inconvenient data to show what I want it to show. The code after a quick scan is quite a mess. Anyone with any pride would be to ashamed of to let it out public viewing. As examples bias take a look at the following remarks from the MANN code files:…….”
—-
The emails are not the only issue
There’s an issue? Really?
Amazing, that the code would do exactly what the emails said they were going to do, and what they published about what they did over a decade ago.
Please, bring us more of your “issues.”
My pleasure.
function mkp2correlation,indts,depts,remts,t,filter=filter,refperiod=refperiod,$
datathresh=datathresh
;
; THIS WORKS WITH REMTS BEING A 2D ARRAY (nseries,ntime) OF MULTIPLE TIMESERIES
; WHOSE INFLUENCE IS TO BE REMOVED. UNFORTUNATELY THE IDL5.4 p_correlate
; FAILS WITH >1 SERIES TO HOLD CONSTANT, SO I HAVE TO REMOVE THEIR INFLUENCE
; FROM BOTH INDTS AND DEPTS USING MULTIPLE LINEAR REGRESSION AND THEN USE THE
; USUAL correlate FUNCTION ON THE RESIDUALS.
;
pro maps12,yrstart,doinfill=doinfill
;
; Plots 24 yearly maps of calibrated (PCR-infilled or not) MXD reconstructions
; of growing season temperatures. Uses “corrected” MXD – but shouldn’t usually
; plot past 1960 because these will be artificially adjusted to look closer to
; the real temperatures.
;
;
; Plots (1 at a time) yearly maps of calibrated (PCR-infilled or not) MXD
; reconstructions
; of growing season temperatures. Uses “corrected” MXD – but shouldn’t usually
; plot past 1960 because these will be artificially adjusted to look closer to
; the real temperatures.
OK …
… were you going to tell us why this is a smoking gun, or were we supposed to react the way they did on freerepublic?
Hellooooooo?
Were you going to tell us why this is so damning, or are you still mucking around CA trying to find someone to cut and paste?
Hellooooooo?
Helloooooo? CTRL-V troll?
Where oh where did you run off to?
You were going to tell us why you had the smoking gun.
Jaimymoore, “There’s an issue? Really?”
Laughing…uh ya there are issues. Like the credibility of not only this cabal (mann jones, et al) but climate science as it been (mis)presented.
You just tried to change the topic. We’re looking for you to explain why this snippet is important and what it actually shows.
I saw no point of flogging the post furthur, this “issue” has hit the big time and if you are unable to see the implications or continue the claim foul in the face of it…pity.
It’s hit the “big time” in all the usual hang-outs. Outside, not so much.
Another FAIL for the denialists.
Fox, Drudge, BBC, NYTs, LA Times…..thats millions of viewers.
Investigations called for in the US and England.
Fail?
So Ray bravely runs away.
FOX and Drudge? Wow, I never would have guessed that.
And just how is it being handled on BBC?
And Inhofe is calling for investigations, so what else was new? While you were falling off the turnip truck, Inhofe was claiming vindication because of … well no one’s really certain, really.
So: the usual nuts are screaming about this. Good. That lets respectable people know what’s up right away.
The problem is, none of the sources you cite has managed to provide an explanation of exactly why this code is supposed to be a problem. Everyone knows that this data was bad after 1960. It was published that this data was bad after 1960. If, after that, they had plotted this data after 1960, that would have been fraud.
You cannot explain, nor has anyone else, why not plotting data that is known to be bad is fraudulent.
As for investigations, yes, let’s have some, please!
I really really want to see Lord Monckton testify before the US congress. Pretty please? I’d pay good money to see it…
I love how you provide examples of this shocking, international conspiracy to lie about climate science.
Very convincing.
CBS has it and so does the WSJ, but again who are they but outside little publications….well there is Reuters and the AP too.
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/11/24/taking_liberties/entry5761180.shtml
Dang, whats that smell, its like something has hit the fan.
Did I mention I had some very nice rope I could stand to part with at a very reasonable price?
[…] Greenfyre’s: CRU Hack, time to hit back … hard […]
“Your whole basis for being anti-AGW is that you are selfish and don’t care what happens to others. Despicable behaviour.”
Ian, I don’t disagree. Deniers are not open to factual information in any discussions of the science and are unmotivated by compassion or stewardship.
omno-troll says he is concerned that climate science is ‘insulated from the pressure of a free society’.
Much handwaving. Yawn.
People genuinely interested in science already have a critical view of the historical development of science and its bureaucratization. He mistakes his simple-minded, politically-motivated opinions for critical thought. There is no conflict between a critical science, and the facts of climate change.
FYI he is not the press secretary of the U.K. Freedom Party. He is the self-appointed press secretary of the Italian People of Freedom (PdL), London circle, in support of Berlusconi.
Sorry — that’s press ‘officer’. 😉
Maurizio, my apologies for saying you were associated with the UK Freedom Party. I’m afraid i got my Freedom parties mixed up.
These Swiftboatings are getting out of hand.
—-
Here’s a link to one of the “skeptical” papers that got Mann and Co. all worked up: http://www.int-res.com/articles/cr2003/23/c023p089.pdf
For those of you out there who think that Mann and Co. were “out of line” to try to keep papers like this one from getting into peer-reviewed journals, can you identify any problems with this paper?
(Hint: there are “showstopper” problems with the paper’s methodology that would provide excellent material for exam questions in freshman statistics courses — in particular, the very type of exam questions that would ensure that the grading curve starts above “0”).
ah…the irony of it all! Getting so “worked up” to defend Mann and Co., one ends up smearing the reputation of two scientists (Soon and Baliunas), two scientific institutions (the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and the Mount Wilson Observatory), and a journal (Climate Research).
All of them guilty of allowing these “freshman statistics courses” errors to be printed out! How could they? The shock! The horror!
(It’s actually a good sign, really, as such a tactic can only end up in destroying pretty much every paper not written by Mann and Co., thereby invalidating the work of…Mann and Co.)
Keep up the good work, caerbannog!!
It is usually said that if you ignore trolls they go away.
It seems some trolls don’t get the message, I suppose one should be sympathetic.
Maurizio, I am willing to smear Soon and Baliunas again: they have published an article on climate change in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, a journal that is openly political (in a crackpot way) and has published a LOT of nonsense (due to exactly that political viewpoint). Scientists who want to be respected should stay far away from such venues. Add the many huge mistakes in the 2003 paper, and a REAL skeptic would have many misgivings when Soon and Baliunas publish yet another paper. It’s not like they did anything really novel, so they can’t even blame testing novel ideas, methodology or technology for making mistakes.
Of course, the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and the Mount Wilson Observatory cannot be blamed if two of its employees put out nonsense. They might want to review their procedures when hiring new people, but that’s it. Climate Research, as evidenced by the actions of the Editorial Board, and admitted by Von Storch, WAS to blame. Its review process was not stringent enough, allowing a lone wolf (De Freitas) to rig the process, resulting in an embarrassing paper published in Climate Research (and it wasn’t the first time).
What is missed in all this hot air is that global warming’s effects are happening now – the denialists are having a bureaucratic argument when we can see, from observation, the impact it is happening. They are asking us to turn our heads away from what we can see – and look though some old emails instead. Here’s a few examples from the last few weeks alone:
– Warming drives off Cape Cod’s namesake, other fish.
– Ravaged by drought, Madagascar feels the full effect of climate change.
– Kashmir’s main glacier “melting at alarming speed”.
– The Spread of New Diseases: The Climate Connection.
How do emails explain these? They don’t – it’s a distraction from what is already happening by the flat earth society and it stinks.
http://anarchist606.blogspot.com/2009/11/hacked-emails-reveal-nothing-much.html
This is not the work of “Trolls”
This page is a text book example of applied agnotology.
I’ve been thinking about strategy and Sun Tzu, and I think it’s always wise to check against Morihei Ueshiba, the founder of Aikido.
I admit I’ve been thrown off balance by the strength and viciousness of this attack — but the stronger the attack, the more it puts the opponent off balance. Keep one point, maintain equilibrium, and the opponent will defeat himself.
I tend to forget this in the heat of battle, but it is good to revisit it:
“If your opponent strikes with fire, counter with water, becoming completely fluid and free-flowing. Water, by its nature, never collides with or breaks against anything. On the contrary, it swallows up any attack harmlessly. ”
Perhaps instead of striking back, we should bend and flow and absorb this attack, allowing the opponents to throw themselves off balance and ultimately defeat themselves. Here’s a possible frame for that:
In science, we welcome all forms of criticism. Criticism and skepticism make science stronger. Let us, by all means, investigate this to the fullest extent, make all of the data and methods as open as possible, and we will see what the scientific conclusions are.
You want openness of data? By all means, let’s have openness of data. You want an investigation? Let’s investigate thoroughly. Let’s check and double-check the science and find out for sure what the evidence really shows.
If the science is sound (which it probably is), then the claims of fraud will be exposed for the unfounded lies that they are, and their proponents will look all the more foolish for jumping to conclusions without evidence.
A good example of how off-balance the opponent is right now was provided by Glenn Beck (who has not, in my opinion, been keeping one point lately):
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/23/fox-news-glenn-beck-on-climategate/#more-13123
“If your gut said, “Wait a minute, this global warming thing sounds like a scam.” Well, I think you’re seeing it now. We told you this was going on, without proof, because we listened to our gut.”
That’s an outright admission that he’s not living in an evidence-based reality, and that he makes unfounded accusations without proof.
Ironically, he seems to be getting this from Steven Colbert, who said this in a performance for the Bush administration:
http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/stephencolbert/a/colbertbush.htm
“it is my privilege to celebrate this president, ‘cause we’re not so different, he and I. We both get it. Guys like us, we’re not some brainiacs on the nerd patrol. We’re not members of the factinista. We go straight from the gut. Right, sir?
That’s where the truth lies, right down here in the gut. Do you know you have more nerve endings in your gut than you have in your head? You can look it up. Now, I know some of you are going to say, “I did look it up, and that’s not true.” That’s ’cause you looked it up in a book. Next time, look it up in your gut. I did. My gut tells me that’s how our nervous system works.”
Only Beck is serious!
Maybe we shouldn’t strike back. Maybe we should just keep on giving them more rope…
—-
I fully support Eli Snyder’s “frame” (from “In science, we welcome” to “conclusions without evidence“). If only we had had it from the very beginning!!!
Imagine if it were 2050 and with sea levels 10 meters higher we were to find that the reason all the conspiracy theories were so successful, and no action taken on time, were that Jones and Mann didn’t like McIntyre!!
Maurizio, you fail to see the pattern. What do you think McIntyre would have done with the data? He would NOT have made a temperature chronology, as he has openly acknowledged (unless paid to do so…). So, what’s the aim? Create doubt. Whether Jones or Mann refuse to give him any data or give him all data, he WILL try and create doubt. And he has received data on many occasions.
Want an example? Just look how he’s shifting goalposts in his attacks on Briffa. He couldn’t get his initial attack to stick properly (in part after admitting he had the data for 5 years already), so now he even makes up issues: he has no evidence of wrong procedures used, but makes the claim anyway. Creating doubt. That was also the tactic of the tobacco industry: simply create doubt. As long as there are sufficient people unsure, nothing will happen.
Marco – Let’s assume for the sake of argument that you are right about McIntyre. So what? Is there any reference in the FOI Act saying the Institution shouldn’t share data with somebody just in case he or she might abuse the data in the future?
And has the Institution got any right to withhold pretty much everything from everybody apart the closest friends and colleagues, just in case the data might fall into the wrong hands at some time in the future?
Going back to my last point…if the world is going to become a much more troublesome place within our lifetimes, is it really now the time to quibble about what McIntyre might or might not do, to argue that there are IPR or data property rights, to waste any time figuring out how to get around the FOI Act?
Who’s going to tell the children of 2050, “sorry! we could have had everything clarified in 2008 or before, and prevented the disasters you are witnessing now, but we really couldn’t. You see, Anthony Watts was too much of a smart ass, and we wanted to get money out of our IPRs!!!“???
Actually, the FOIA exemptions can definately be interpreted as such, as in “adverse effects” and “public interest”. McIntyre’s abuse of data and methodology would adversely affect the ability of CRU to provide valuable information about the state of the climate and inform the public.
There is no “might not do”. McIntyre’s past actions show exactly what he would do with this data: obfuscate. With “plausibly deniable accusations” (Mike Mann). And don’t think the raw station data would be enough (most are even available through GHCN), McIntyre is known to keep on harassing people when he has the data (see also Briffa). He wants people to hold his hands while he tries to find the one mistake that he can trump as evidence it’s all wrong…
You’re still missing the point, which is this: it is unrealistic to think that the denier attack would go away or even be slightly blunted by any amount of openness, releasing of data, or general cooperation on the part of science.
Plenty of data and evidence has been available from many sources for a long time, and it hasn’t stopped them at all.
Manufacturing uncertainty is not difficult.
Hmmm… just realized I may be contradicting myself. I’ll have to think about this some more.
OK, I’d like to clarify. I don’t think that any amount of releasing data and making methods available etc will stop deniers from making their attack.
However, I think that greater openness will reduce the effectiveness of that attack, at least among the reality-based community, by showing it to be spurious.
It would have been pointless, from an Aikido perspective, to employ this strategy earlier, because in Aikido you never attack, only defend. So you have to wait for the opponent to make their attack before you respond.
There, I hope I’ve resolved any contradiction I may have created.
Eli, I beg to differ. Making as much data as possible available will just mean that people will play around with data they do not fully understand and make claims that don’t follow from that same data. They will then proudly announced that the data had not been made available because the analysis was wrong. It changes nothing.
Remember the mantra of the deniosphere (of whatever issue): creating doubt. It’s all that is needed.
I don’t know, maybe I’m being overly optimistic — but I think the trick at this point is to allow deniers to push themselves farther and farther away from reality in obvious ways, so that moderates who still base their beliefs on evidence will stop listening to them.
I mean, if NAS were to do a thorough audit of the data and methods and officially announce that everything checks out and the science is fine, and then McIntyre and Watts put out a statement saying they’ve gone over the data and it was all faked — who are moderates going to believe?
Maybe wishful thinking, I don’t know. I’m not sure, just hopeful.
What on Earth are you talking about? The reason the deniers are so successful is that they are ruthless, politically savvy, and they have wishful thinking on the part of the general public on their side.
I think McI must have copied a tactic from the creationists: they find a gap in the fossil record and ask, “What goes there? If they are shown a fossil to fill the gap that just gives them a new gap either side to ask about.
From McI’s corespondence with CRU, you can see that he just asked for finer and finer detail, even when the data that we wasn’t getting was about 2% of the whole record. No wonder they were fed up with him.
McI is so unware that he was being annoying that he posted the correspondence here: http://www.climateaudit.org/correspondence/cru.correspondence.pdf
—-
Mr. Gore has been saying for years that the science is settled and steadfastly refused debate. I consider myself to be open minded and willing to examine all evidence. I don’t see that other side has made a “game over” argument. How about we work for clean energy without the fear, taxes, and extra layer of government?
—-
Perhaps Bill can propose a way to work for clean energy which does not involve government?
It would be great if it’s possible, but as long as economical arguments are the make-or-break factor, there’s no way to get around government-imposed regulation. Sadly.
Would the French nuclear model work for you? Standardized design, zero carbon.
LOL! At current usage, there is 80 more years of uranium (source: World Nuclear Organisation). Imagine we’d take a mere 50% of our energy from nuclear plants. That’ll be ten times more than now. That makes it 8 years. Eight.
Sounds promising…
Went last week to a speech on nuclear power (will blog about it shortly) – what I got from it, is that the only reason to go back to nuclear is to avoid emitting GHGs. For all other intents and purposes, it’s a dead technology, also due to the enormous length of time it takes to get authorizations, and to get it built.
We have a saying in Italian that applies perfectly to nuclear power, “avere un grande futuro dietro le spalle“, that I’d loosely translate as “to be full of unfulfilled (and unfulfillable) promises“…
Where do your numbers come from? Even Wikipedia says world reserves are 100-300 years WITHOUT reprocessing! If you go to the Industry sources they say 85 years known reserves with an expected 500 additional years readily available. The use of Thorium could greatly enhance that. Based on 2006 consumption levels. The US gets about 21% of it’s electric production from nuclear. So if we tripled that and used a mid-ground estimate that is 67 years, still without reprocessing. Frankly, I am a big advocate of recycling, so I would reprocess and then we have hundreds of years. Hopefully more than enough time to gracefully move into the next paradigm. Nuclear is a good compliment to wind and solar.
The enormous length of time it takes to build a plant is purely a governmentally imposed artificial creation. I think the permit period is 14 years, assuming no legal challenges.
Look…I believe in conservation and personally do everything I can to conserve. High mileage car, CFLs, timers, solor clothes dryer :-), Energy Star everything… but you can only conserve about 25% without very expensive retrofits (which I am considering). What the hell are we expected to do today? Nuclear is out, coal is out, oil is out. We can’t drill for natural gas and even transmission lines and wind farms are a problem with some.
The industry indeed mentions 500 years of reserves “readily available”. That means: “we have good reasons to believe it is there, we only need to find it, and start mining it, and process it, and then move it to the places where it is needed”. I also know there is new technology, but it is nowhere near to rapid implementation, and we don’t even know if it works. It’s at least another 10-15 years of research before we have a good answer. It’s at best *part* of the solution.
And while you may do what you can to reduce your CO2 emissions, a LOT of people and industries do not. They don’t even want to take the simplest actions, like switching off the light after they left the toilet.
Mr. Gore has been saying for years that the science is settled and steadfastly refused debate.
Duh.
I don’t see that other side has made a “game over” argument.
Well, friend, the miserable fact about the world is that some people in it wouldn’t recognize scientific evidence even if it was drunk and playing with their zipper.
I guess regular linking doesn’t work:
—-
Ok let’s try again. Google IPCC reports if this doesn’t work
Here you go — grade A 100% pure evidence, the best science that money couldn’t buy, from the best scientists around the world, recognized as such by every scientific organization bar none, and all of it assembled into one easy place so that no one has an excuse not to find it.
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_and_data_reports.htm
If that evidence doesn’t do it for you, then you’ve mistaken science for religion or magic.
So laughable. The UN is and all of its organs are so horribly tainted. I will spare you the litany…unless you want it. The “best evidence money can’t buy”? lmao! How much funding do they get from the many governments of the world. If they said, “nope, no problem here” would their funding continue? The taint of money is on both sides. So my next question is, when does history begin? The earth has spent the previous 2 million years cycling between ice age and thaw. Maybe my lack of a PhD makes me too stupid to speak in here but how can anyone observe such a cycle and then expect/demand for the long term climate to be static. That is the height of foolishness. There is an impressive list of scientists (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming) [1] who think this is a natural cycle or that human influence is overstated.
YOUR side has treated this issue like the 10th century church. I laughed again seeing you acusing me of confusing science with religion. Religion is what best describes the alarmists. One other thing to choke on….a theory is described as a generally accepted idea to explain an observed fact. What is the observed fact? That the world temp has increased by .4 C in 30 years After cooling most of that amount during the previous 30 years?
I am all for cleaner living and weaning ourselves off of fossil fuels. So let’s start building nuclear plants, wind farms, tidal generators, geothermal, solar, and anything else you can think of. Just cut the fear and supression. I bought into the whole global cooling in the mid 70s. Good thing we didn’t agressively combat that problem huh? One idea was scatter soot all over the ice caps to warm and melt them. The Soviet union tried it small scale on a Siberian glacier…it worked.
—-
Lordy this is fun.
“If I don’t know any facts, don’t try to fake it”
That’s the point…nobody on either side has slammed the door. I do apologize…in my original post I meant to say “I don’t see that other side has made a ‘game over’ argument.” which does change the tenor a bit.
Anyways…I have had enough in here as it is clear contrary views are not welcome and it’s just antagonism for all. I will leave you to your reality where the sun is not part of the climate!
—-
So laughable. The UN is and all of its organs are so horribly tainted.
Yeah, sure, whatever you say, but the IPCC didn’t do any of the science and the scientists who did are not organs of the UN, they are organs of Soros. Good luck in your future endeavors!
It is interesting to read the FOI correspondence that McI has on his site here: http://www.climateaudit.org/correspondence/cru.correspondence.pdf
Here’s one that I find most interesting:
2nd East Anglia Refusal, Apr 12, 2007
“In regards the “gridded network” stations, I have been informed that the Climate
Research Unit’s (CRU) monthly mean surface temperature dataset has been constructed
principally from data available on the two websites identified in my letter of 12 March
2007. Our estimate is that more than 98% of the CRU data are on these sites.
The remaining 2% of data that is not in the websites consists of data CRU has collected
from National Met Services (NMSs) in many countries of the world. In gaining access to
these NMS data, we have signed agreements with many NMSs not to pass on the raw
station data, but the NMSs concerned are happy for us to use the data in our gridding, and
these station data are included in our gridded products, which are available from the CRU
web site. These NMS-supplied data may only form a very small percentage of the
database, but we have to respect their wishes and therefore this information would be
exempt from disclosure under FOIA pursuant to s.41. The World Meteorological
Organization has a list of all NMSs.”
So only about 2% of the data was not available from public sources,. The FOI officer also explains why it wouldn’t be appropriate to supply this NMS data yet McI carried on with his requests and insinuations that something fishy was going on.
No wonder Jones et al were not very enthusiastic about responding to his request.
BTW the correspondence I link to is not from the hacked data. It’s been up there for a long time. It also has the full text of the often (mis)quoted Warwick Hughes “25 years” letter, which is also not very damning when seen in context.
The FOI officer also explains why it wouldn’t be appropriate to supply this NMS data yet McI carried on with his requests and insinuations that something fishy was going on.
See for yourself how McI “carried on with his requests”: http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=6623.
I actually have nothing against McI. I think he’s a decent man, reminds me of every other “trainspotter” I’ve known in real life. Don’t get me wrong; CA is barely better than WUWT most of the time, stark raving stupid. But where other people see feelings of intense dislike in his dealings with climate scientists I see a guy with no charm: he’s just “weird.” Still, I think in his smallm roundabout way that he’s exerted a positive influence on climate science – not just by beating the drums for transparency (he’s actually a Johnny-come-lately to Open Science) but also by strengthening the consensus position, paradoxically. There should be a place in the world for people like him in science. He might not be able to formulate an original scientific hypothesis and research it (neither can I!) but hey, we have technicians, so why not auditors?
[…] Gavin Schmidt (of RealClimate) exhibits the patience of a saint in responding from a scientist’s perspective to the masses of comments. He is doing a tremendous amount of work to repair the damage being done to the perceived credibility of climate science. Respect. In summary, there are probably some minor lapses in there, but everyone who has read any of the emails is already guilty of something worse and there’s no firm evidence of major crimes. (James’ empty blog) I have no idea what exactly those words meant. Neither do you. Every single thing in those messages could be misinterpreted because we are missing the context. (…) This episode is not a window into how climate science works. It’s a window into how electronic communication has altered our standards and the way we work. (Maribo) One of the issues with how the UEA emails are perceived is whether the reader understands the context of the dubious pseudoscience and constant harassment the field faces. If you understand that, the emails are understandable and mostly excusable. If you don’t, if you think that normal science is being stymied, then you come away with a very different impression. (Only in it for the gold) The frame: – pointing out that while some (and only a few) of them sound dubious, there’s no actual evidence of anything; – pointing out that in every case there are also perfectly innocuous interpretations; – putting these sorts of discussions in context (Greenfyre) […]
“According to Hazel Moffatt, a partner in the litigation and regulatory department at the law firm DLA Piper in London, deleting emails subject to a FOI request is a criminal offense in the United Kingdom, punishable with a fine. “It’s quite naughty to do that,” said Ms. Moffatt.”
Norfolk constabulary: 0845 456 4567. Knock yourself out.
90% certainty: from this
“Quote:
” This is pretty obviously the same station (well OK.. apart from the duff early period, but I’ve
got used to that now). But look at the longitude! That’s probably 20km! LUckily I selected
‘Update wins’ and so the metadata aren’t compared. This is still going to take ages, because although
I can match WMO codes (or should be able to), I must check that the data correlate adequately – and
for all these stations there will be questions. I don’t think it would be a good idea to take the
usual approach of coding to avoid the situation, because (a) it will be non-trivial to code for, and
(b) not all of the situations are the same. But I am beginning to wish I could just blindly merge
based on WMO code..
the trouble is that then I’m continuing the approach that created these broken databases. Look at this one:
…
Here, the expected 1990-2003 period is MISSING – so the correlations aren’t so hot! Yet
the WMO codes and station names /locations are identical (or close).
******************************
What the hell is supposed to happen here?
Oh yeah – there is no ‘supposed’,
I can make it up.
So I have 🙂
******************************
If an update station matches a ‘master’ station by WMO code, but the data is unpalatably
inconsistent, the operator is given three choices:
You have failed a match despite the WMO codes matching.
This must be resolved!! Please choose one:
1. Match them after all.
2. Leave the existing station alone, and discard the update.
3. Give existing station a false code, and make the update the new WMO station.
Enter 1,2 or 3:
You can’t imagine what this has cost me – to actually allow the operator to
assign false WMO codes!!
But what else is there in such situations?
Especially when dealing with a ‘Master’ database of dubious provenance
(which, er, they all are and always will be). ”
_____________________________
No. We have Phil Jones stating clearly it cooled between 98 and 05.
We have outright instruction to DELETE information LAWFULLY REQUIRED be turned over.
It’s criminal and it’s long since past unethical.
(1) some comments in a file
(2) ???
(3) Phil Jones says it cooled between 98 and 05.
Massive, speechless fail.
Out of Context? Please give a reasonable interpretation of the below other than PJ was aware of a “lack of warming” and a cooling trend since 1998.
**********************
From: Phil Jones
To: Tim Johns , “Folland, Chris”
Subject: Re: FW: Temperatures in 2009
Date: Mon Jan 5 16:18:24 2009
Cc: “Smith, Doug” , Tim Johns
Tim, Chris,
I hope you’re not right about the lack of warming lasting
till about 2020. I’d rather hoped to see the earlier Met Office press release with Doug’s paper that said something like – half the years to 2014 would exceed the warmest year currently on record, 1998!
Still a way to go before 2014.
I seem to be getting an email a week from skeptics saying
where’s the warming gone. I know the warming is on the decadal scale, but it would be nice to wear their smug grins away.
**********************
Regardless of what any other of the leaked/hacked info says, this one admits to knowledge of a “lack of warming” and that their own findings point to that. What need for any other discussion, since the basic premise of AGW is exactly the opposite to their own results. Maybe I missed it, did the AGW come out and publicly state the world was cooling?
The real scary side is the disturbing insight to this in that he states “I hope you’re not right about the lack of warming” and “I’d rather hoped to see … something like – half the years to 2014 would exceed the warmest year currently on record”. What possible other context could there be? This would seem to indicate that he wants (or at least hopes for) Global Warming, regardless of the death and the destruction that by your own predictions will happen. Nice. Who is going to tell the children of 2050 that Phil Jones wished this misery upon them?
I consider myself to be open minded, and until a few years ago, I could have been counted amongst the believers. It was only after Al Gore’s fantasy film, with so many obvious flaws and generalizations, that I had my first doubts. The believers and their fanatical defense of it gave me further cause for concern. It was that anyone who didn’t accept the whole thing as absolute truth was in league with the prince of darkness himself. This attitude is still apparent in the commentary above.
This prompted me to look at the 98% of data available publicly and draw my own conclusions. Guess what? The data shows temperatures peaked in 1998 and has been dropping since. There was a Medieval Warming Period and a Little Ice Age. There is a correlation between CO2 levels and temperature, but levels in the past have been higher, followed by a cooling period. These are all facts. Look them up for yourself, this is what the publicly available data shows. I can only surmise that the remaining 2% available only to the AGW, IPCC and CRU contains all the evidence that is to the contrary (%’s provided above by Turboblocke).
All I can see now in the AGW, IPCC and CRU are the very things you denounce. Their goals are the same as big government and big business, power and wealth. A small elite group of people, scaremongering their way to global domination by screaming ‘science’ and all others to be ‘pseudo-science’, because only they are the enlightened ones.
Maybe I need one of your 63 million scientists (minus 0.0005%) to rattle my zipper as you put it and tune me in. Strange how the 0.0005% can provide observable, empirical and measurable evidence, while your group cannot. (aaah-blasphemy!) Strange how IPCC folks jet around the world to all kinds of exotic locations for their meetings, their gigantic carbon footprints stomp around the planet as they deride poor Brazilian farmers who convert jungle into farmland simply to survive.
So go ahead, please continue to call me and others like me names, a denier, a trainspotter, a climate crank, racist, delayer, de-tractor, derailer, defiler etc. A wise man told once me that name-calling is a sure sign of someone losing an argument.
—-
“Guess what? The data shows temperatures peaked in 1998 and has been dropping since.”
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/wti/last:139/trend/plot/wti/last:139
No names, just a suggestion – learn some basic statistics.
—-
Sure, that shows a (slight) upward linear trend even if you include 1998. Change that start point and you get a different slope.
The Daily Mash reports that the ice shelves are returning to where they broke off from:
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/environment/climate-change-emails-stop-glaciers-from-melting-200911252254/
—-
😆
excellent, i especially like:
“This is the smoking iceberg that fires a polar bear of truth between the eyes of hysteria and communism.”
@Flats: Why does it make you shudder? There’s nothing secretive about it. I could’ve told you that. I once analyzed data from Mann & Jones (2003) and said the following:
I haven’t been following climate science debates recently, but the recent hoopla caught my attention. It looks like nothing more than quote-mining for the most part. Much ado about nothing. I’ve seen this before in the autism science world.
I do think openness of data is important, but I’d say climate science is ahead of the curve on this. In other fields, you don’t find as much raw data.
After hearing all about the supposed horrors of science fraud to be found in the CRU global warming researchers’ emails hacked 5 days ago, it occurred to me that they were actually a roadmap of denialist abuses, not of scientific fraud. I’m currently over on Usenet sticking them up denialist butts; so far they are simply gobsmacked. It’s great fun… =)
One example: http://tinyurl.com/y8f73m4
I’m convinced that in more capable hands than mine, this event can be an ideal opportunity to chronicle these abuses for the world.
For anyone who doesn’t have the files, they can be searched at
CRU emails
Inherent in the concept of auditing is that auditors must be honest and objective.
McI does not qualify. [1]
—-
I learned a lot from what you wrote which I think is great and have used it in this:
This is an excerpt from the Guardian about Professor Phil Jones, at the centre
of the CRU email storm:
Quote
But he stressed that he has never wished to get drawn into the political
debate about climate change, saying: “I’m a very apolitical person, I don’t
want to get involved in the politics, I’m much happier doing the science and
producing the papers. I’m a scientist, I let my science do the talking, along
with all my scientific climate colleagues. It’s up to governments to decide
and climate science is just one thing they have to take into account with the
decisions they have to make.”
Unquote
I can well believe that this is what Professor Jones wants but he is
hopelessly naive if he believes that he can have what he wants. Climate
science is deeply unsettling in its implications for everyone on planet
earth, for every parent of a child because of what it says about their
future, for every business whose production involves a huge amount of carbon
energy in its input and particularly for businesses which sell carbon
energy…It is patently obvious that millions, perhaps billions of people
would prefer not to believe climate science and for these people Professor
Jones is the bringer of thoroughly bad news.
Does not everyone knows what happens to people who bring bad news? Clearly not
– in which case Professor Jones and scientists like him are lacking in a
certain aspect of their education.
According to the Guardian Professor Jones has now received personal threats
and has asked the police to investigate – as well he might. Ibsen pictured an
almost identical situation just over a hundred years ago in his play ” An
Enemy of the People”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Enemy_of_the_People
While Phil Jones gets the police to defend his personal safety perhaps it is
worth thinking about how he and others like him are going to defend
themselves intellectually. For there is a breathtaking innocence if they
think that they can just “let the science speak for itself” against the
thunderous clamour of a carbon money based PR machine which bases itself on
the wish of a large part of the public to look away from the reality of an
exceedingly unpleasant future.
In this regard let us start with the observation, which ought to be obvious
but clearly isn’t, that the science can only “speak for itself” fully to
other scientists operating in the same peer group as Professor Jones. To the
overwhelming majority of the population the science doesn’t speak to them at
all – they can’t make head nor tail of it.
Indeed we can go further. This very unwelcome set of messages is probably
perceived by many as coming from those kind of people who they think they
remember from school – who rather than caring about enjoying themselves, who
instead of being normal and caring most about sex, drugs, rock and roll,
football and fashion, spent all their times in their bedrooms swotting and
thought rather too highly of themselves for being clever – geeks and anoraks
in fact, f**ing kill joys. To this group of people the science says these
people are still kill-joys, they still think they know better, they are still
up their own ar**
Let me give a deeper explanation of where some of these kind of intense
emotions come from. Every one of us has the experience when we grow up of
“feeling small” when we are small – and particularly
when in the presence of somebody who ” knows what is in our best
interest “. All the way through life we put ourselves in the hands of
people who have an expertise and knowledge that we do not have –
because it is quite impossible to know everything. Frequently, moreover
the fact that other people have knowledge that we do not have puts us
in the position of having to follow their advice, or even their direct
instructions or orders. For a lot of people this is problematic
emotionally. It makes them acutely sensitive about their social status and
powerlessness. It is out of this that being patronised and condescended
to is so emotionally tricky. There are situations where we have to act
on advice where we feel unqualified to evaluate it and this leaves us
uneasy – even worse if “the expert” pronounces in an insensitive
fashion. This can easily reawaken our childhood feelings of
humiliation, condescention, inferiority and powerlessness.
Now it is true that when scientists tell us ” what we have to do ” in
regard to climate, they are, of course, not telling us what they
personally want us to do but what nature, as shown in the science,
requires us to do. This is completely impersonal. But that is not how
it may feel at the emotional level for some people. The traffic warden may
also be telling us completely accurately what the rules say – and what makes
it particularly galling for some people is that this person otherwise has no
status at all and certainly would not otherwise have the ability to tell
us/me what I should be doing….As far climate scientists – the emotional
level it may feel like a power grab by scientists for influence, power,
research grants….. their right to tell “us” (as opposed to them) what we
should be doing….
To many people the fact that scientists, those clever bastards who did
well at school, are telling us what is required is not something that
they are going to accept just like that. This thought was sparked in
my mind when an acquaintance wanted to recruit me to an odd medical
idea and described her motives as being ” subversive ” in relation to
the medical establishment. The idea that one might come across some
very simple notion which has not occurred to all the medical
scientists is appealing – despite all their clever knowledge and
training ordinary people “with common sense” can make up their own
cures – this would certainly “put all those clever doctors in their
place”.
Now the point about these resentments and emotions is that while climate
scientists are playing cricket and “letting the science speak for itself” the
PR and advertising agencies, the spin experts and many politicians understand
these issues of mass psychology intuitively and play them very skillfully.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_(book)
When they do so they also connect up to may people’s money worries. We live in
a society where the mass media constantly tells us that success is to
be measured by how much we are able to buy, to consume. At the same
time it is usually stressful and difficult for most people to actually
earn the money to buy and consume at the level people are told they
should aspire to. Parallel to all this the people running businesses
are trying to make as much money as possible. Then along come these
scientists and appear to be working with governments to tax away all
this hard earned money. Of course the idea that climate change is a
scam for governments to tax people more is rubbish – what it shows is
what is uppermost in many peoples minds – money. This is part of
climate change denial too.
Climate change denial thus contains a good dollop of bloody-mindedness
against the “know whats best for yous” – which includes not only the
scientists who are “too clever for their own bloody good” but the
governments who think they have the right to take “our” money away
from us and “think they know better than we do” how it should be spent
– in this case on that “climate mitigation nonsense” that
head-in-the-clouds scientists gabble on about.
I suspect then that many of the climate change denier advocates are
deliberately hooking into this notion of ” the commonsense of the
ordinary man and woman ” which trumps head in the clouds science – as
well as their prevalent monetary worries. There is a deeply rooted
bloody minded anti-intellectualism here created by the emotional
dynamics that arise in a society in which knowledge is power … and
money is power too. In this case the fact that we are dealing with
science that is not even addressing a clearly visible current problem
but something that scientists and politicians say will happen decades
in the future adds a further twist. Climate change becomes an ideal
target for rabble rousing journalists and fringe politicians to whip
up and play on a particular mass emotional complex – this is not just
denial pure and simple – it is contrarianism – where “to be contrary”
is both an intellectual AND an emotional response of rejection – this
is a topic which many people can and do understand in a way which is
emotionally structured by a toxic mixture of their inferiority
complexes combined with their money worries.
So, what is to be done about this? Well, for a start we can notice that we are
dealing here with the inferiority complexes of the masses – and the rather
nasty emotions that they give rise to – a compensatory hatred which allows
people to feel secretly that there are, in fact, superior to these scientists
in their understanding – even though they the scientists have spent years
studying the issues while the sceptics have read two articles and seen three
television programmes and are now instant experts. Almost all of these
amateur experts when confronted with real expertise and authority in their
lives – eg when they actually go to their doctors – wouldn’t say boo to them,
but will do exactly as they are told. The flip side of an inferiority complex
is that people are actually very sensitive to being made aware that they
hardly know a thing – so the correct approach for climate science is to rub
the noses of the sceptics in their own ignorance, just in the same way that
you rub the nose of a puppy in its own mess.
So climate scientists have to stop thinking that the science will speak for
itself. They have to stop playing cricket. If we want to use that metaphor
they have to start playing rugby. This is well expressed in a recent blog
that followed the CRU revelations which called on the scientists to go on the
offensive by aggressive questioning of the sceptics. The aim of this exercise
is to reveal the shallowness of their attack:
“Which studies were compromised, how? be specific. Cite papers and data
sets. What is the evidence? where is it? what work is affected? how? show me
the evidence that says so.
This supposed scandal involves perhaps a half dozen people, how does it
affect the work of the 3,000+ others who’s work makes up climate science?
How does it affect the work that was done before the alleged culprits
graduated from univeristy? the work from before they were born?
Of the 30,000(ish) studies that make up climate science, which ones are
undone? where is the evidence? be specific … show us exactly how and why?”
“You are certain it topples climate science? how? where? which studies?
what evidence? You don’t know? then how are you certain?
Please run through a list of the studies you believe are affected? Hockey
stick? what’s that? please refer to specific papers and studies.You don’t
know? then how can you be certain?
Ahhh, Soandso 2004? so just how is it compromised? what part of the work?
I thought you were certain?”
https://greenfyre.wordpress.com/2009/11/21/cru-hack-time-to-hit-back-hard/
As the GreenFyre Blog puts it very well, :climate scientists have got to
learn “ATTITUDE!” and stop being so bloody pathetic about the “science
speaking for itself” – otherwise the PR industry funded by carbon vested
interests will continue to make mincemeat of them.
Brian Davey
This is seeming more and more like the anti-vaxers and creationist harassment and demonizing of scientists. A depressing number of the comments on the right wing blogs are broad-spectrum in their attacks on science in general – ignorant comments on astrophysics, general relativity, the age of the sun (!) and what it’s made of (!!!!!!).
I’m starting to think that it’s not global warming, oil depletion, or war that will decay our civilization. It’s this kind of thing. A loss of confidence in the values of the enlightenment, on both the left and the right. I have friends on the left that are every bit as bad as you are, but about different stuff – vaccination, spooky chemicals, etc. But hey, science changes, and scientists are people, so who’s to say they know any better than what your cousin the ciropractor says about modern medicine, or what an accountant or retired oil field geologist says about the atmosphere?
Everything becoming one big fishbowl of a horrific reality tv show, levelling it all out to the lowest common denominator. Idiocracy here we come.
—-
It is a binary argument.
Either one thinks that every object is in universal interconnection… and each person can influence and is influenced by everything else in the cosmos. Hence accountable…
Or
One holds that individuals are essentially disconnected… alone and do not influence or affect much of anything else in their world. Nor should they be held responsible for actions.
Greatly distilled, but one difference this chasm of understanding.
Tamino appears in 18 of the CRU e-mails. Here I demonstrate that he fakes charts on his web site, [but see NikFromNYC’s correction here] in this case to try to whitewash the exact chart of Central England that I took so much heat here for posting. It was called “bogus.” Well…let’s see what bogus really is, shall we, from the blog of [edit] (Tamino):
His version:
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2008/04/28/central-england-temperature
So if my chart is so meaningless why does one of the people in the CRU emails have to FAKE his presentation in order to demonstrate that fact?
My comments about this were moderated in his thread.
—-
Nik,
Three comments.
1. Your top two graphs aren’t aligned or scaled properly, you are 20 years out at the start and ten years out by the mid 1800s.
2. Could you explain the deviation between the black & red lines in the first graph (neither line has a legend – the only graph of the three provided without one)
3. I remain unconvinced that tamino has placed the 2007 point in the 1970s from this evidence.
1. Your top two graphs aren’t aligned or scaled properly, you are 20 years out at the start and ten years out by the mid 1800s.
Yeah, when I first made it I just started visually aligning the data and didn’t notice the scale problem on the left so on the left I’m aligning data and on the right the date. Clumsy I know.
2. Could you explain the deviation between the black & red lines in the first graph (neither line has a legend – the only graph of the three provided without one)
The black is the unaveraged yearly temperatures (i.e. the raw data). The red is a 30 day moving average. Any deviation is just the way a simple 30 day MA comes out. Such a long average is expected to have some lag to it since a 10 year upswing in T is still being influenced by 20 years of non-upswing before it.
3. I remain unconvinced that tamino has placed the 2007 point in the 1970s from this evidence.
I’m not convinced either but my 30 day MA matches the variations in his exactly so I know it’s the same data. And my original yearly plot is an exact match of one on his page too.
I can re-do the top one to align the axes by date instead of arbitrarily. Ah!…I had a detail wrong. He didn’t compress the data, he just moved it to the WRONG DATE:
Had he not done this he would have had a flat line instead of an upswing at the end. Claiming to truncate the 30 day average when NO TRUNCATION was done indicates dishonesty and not a simple mistake, in my opinion.
1. Clumsy & wrong – you need to have sorted this sort of error out before trumpeting it around the internet.
2. So you’re saying that your smoothing method does not explain the recent temperature trend – what does that say about your method? (I must admit I can’t see how a 30 day smooth will miss the actual measurements by that much).
3. If you are plotting a 30 year moving average, by definition, your last point should be 30 years before the end of the record. The moving average is bound to match the smoothing curve – they are the same data.
It seems to me that it’s your smoothing method that must be out of whack.
I think this belongs in the Challenging the Core Science” thread – but a couple of points:
[1] When Tamino uses moving averages he plots the centre point (so the value for e.g. 1980 is the “average value for the 30 years centred on 1980”). This is standard practice, and explains why there’s a 15 year gap at each end of his graph.
There is some useful discussion about moving averages in the comments on Tamino’s post.
[2] When Nik uses “day” I think he means “year”.
Nothing here to see after all…
I was not aware of the use of centered moving averages, so I painfully and clumsily reversed engineered it, decided correctly that it was done purposefully, and made a fool of myself by jumping to conclusions. “Climategate” got the better of me.
Thanks! I’m glad I came here first before indeed spreading it around the Internet like some mad fool. This is actually a useful site to get bad ideas sorted out.
I now see Tamino’s treatment as fair play, though I disagree with his conclusion other than the obvious one that it’s the hottest decade in centuries.
—-
Oops…I broke a Hockey Stick.
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2008/04/28/central-england-temperature/
—-
What’s funny:
Nik’s latest graph is still a hockey-stick. 🙂
What’s understandable:
Nik’s graph is different to Tamino’s. Since neither of them published their parameters I can only guess – but I think Tamino was probably using a quadratic function whereas Nik was probably using a quartic.
What’s really strange:
Nik’s highs and lows using the Savitzky-Golay filter don’t coincide with his results using a moving average.
A moving average is really just a special case of the Savitzky-Golay method, so your major peaks and troughs using either method will usually coincide – unless you’ve got it wrong.
Nik’s don’t.
“Nik’s highs and lows using the Savitzky-Golay filter don’t coincide with his results using a moving average.”
Indeed, with it’s lowest order setting Savitzky-Golay matches the moving average but also extends out to the very ends unlike a centered moving average. The reason the Savitzky-Golay paper is one of the top cited of all time is that with higher order settings than Tamino used it does not quash peaks like a moving average does. Tamino uses the very lowest (1st) order setting in dishonest manner: he uses it to destroy peaks except at the ends. That’s why my higher order plot fails to follow the moving average: it alone clearly follows peaks in the raw data whereas the moving average doesn’t. This filter contains two settings that serious software (OriginPro) allows. The period (Tamino = 30) and the order (Tamino = 1st). Those settings reproduce his concluding graphs (“Tamino’s Hockey Stick”). Yet only higher order (2nd-5th) settings give honest curve fits to all manner of sample input. It still has end effects though so it’s best to upgrade to FFT convolution smoothing. Doing so does produce a Hockey Stick. A backwards one with the blade firmly planted in the 1700 instead of 2000.
I’m afraid your side will have to relinquish Central England after all. This was a case of check, check, checkmate.
I came here and posted a plot of the longest T record that exists to dangle a thermometer in front of your proxies. I was told Tamino had already debunked my point. Doubt seized me but then I noticed something wrong with his concluding graphs then struggled to pin it down. I’m glad it’s been amusing so far but he who has the last laugh wins: http://i49.tinypic.com/24cfeas.jpg
I agree that Central England alone doesn’t discredit AGW theory. It’s fakery by CRU e-mailers like Tamino that does that. I hadn’t heard of “end effects” before. It’s mentioned in at least one CRU e-mail. Now I know how they can be used to lie about inconvenient data.
” Applying the correction in real time in the future will mean that we will always be slightly changing approximately the last 15 years data – because of the filter end effects. Best would seem to be to maintain the present version we have and apply this variance correction every few years ( eg the IPCC cycle !).” – Phil Jones, former director of the CRU (http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=116&filename=929044085.txt).
Awaiting moderation of on Tamino’s site:
NikFromNYC // December 1, 2009 at 7:10 am | Reply
I don’t need homework to BELIEVE MY EYES: the raw data plot does not support his claim. His smoothing doesn’t follow the peaks except at the ends. I have done more homework and with a bit of help from John Ray I have reproduced Tamino’s work from raw data. The two graphs used to prove his point show the opposite of what honest analysis shows. Not knowing how the black box works didn’t stop me from using sample data to see how setting the big knob on top to its lowest setting effects its behavior:
http://antigreen.blogspot.com/2009/11/central-england-temperature-series-very.html
Using Savitzky-Golay smoothing of higher order confirms my point since the filter then follows peaks in the middle instead of hides them:
Print the raw data plot and ask a kid to trace it with a big red marker to see if he comes up with a Hockey Stick. I can’t. Can you?!
Not one of the 280 comments mentioned the term “end effect”. Computers were not very fast in 1964 so Savitzky and Golay at Perkin-Elmer who makes spectrometers had to figure out a way to smooth noisy spectra without much computing power. Their paper became one of the top sited of all time. From David I. Wilson’s “The Black Art of Smoothing”: “The SG filters suffer from end effects, but requires minimal storage.”
Overwhelming evidence may support AGW, but honest analysis shows that the longest running thermometer record does not.
I want to pay tribute to GreenFyre for letting me post here, despite moderation. I know cowards. He is not one. Seems to me he’s about one of the only ones around who isn’t, on your side of the debate.
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Agreed.
So Nik, you are accusing everyone on Greenfyre’s “side”, other than Greenfyre, of being a coward?
I suggest you reconsider.
[…] appears to have been written before people really started to go through the code files in depth, Greenfyre discusses how climate change proponents should be responding to sceptics’ claims about the hacked/leaked material from the Climatic Research Unit: I […]
This is all Teabagger Science so far. The Teabagger shepherds don’t really care about being plausible – sheer endless repetition, mostly on fertile soil but then trying to leverage that out into neutral venues, is the tactic. Repetition. As their guru Frank Luntz said, it’s when you’re tired of repeating the propaganda, sick to death of it, that your targets hear it for the first time.
That’s why the only countertactic for Morano spammers is indeed deletion – it’s a very hopeful sign when apparently some venues get that. In fact, people are less immunized to Morano-spam than they are to make money fast or other more traditional commercial spam.
One thing that needs to be clarified is that usually it’s institutions, not individuals, that insist on the proprietary nature of data, and for the same reason an early presentation may be embargoed. The idea that it’s used to let people do black box science is laughable.
McIntyre v. Briffa is actually a paradigm example of when not to share data:
1. it’s not your data and you got use of it with a binding agreement that you wouldn’t release it to 3rd parties.
2. The demand is part of a coordinated campaign of vexatious and harassing litigation on the part of a dedicated, corporately funded propaganda and disruption network.
3. The demand is fraudulent, because the person harassing you has already gotten the data from the primary source, after the first request of you for it, because they knew all along whom to ask, that there’d be a delay, etc. – but they are sociopaths, not scientists.
and
4. Most of the requests aren’t for data – they’re for access to every bit of your research, updated hourly, and an opportunity to libel you editorially in the guise of a request for information.
Most amusingly, nearly all science denialism comes from market fundamentalists. But the only science they regard as appropriate – privately contracted science – is the most secretive, and for the longest time, because being first with science is a lower priority than patents – the world of corporately funded research has a heavy selection bias and no culture of sharing information whatsoever. The more privately funded research, the more there’s no money next year for the research that doesn’t please the tobacco or energy lobbies, and above all, the more secrecy agreements.
If science had operated all along on corporate research lines of secrecy, we’d still be in the year 1600 scientifically now.
It reminds me of the radical capitalist fanatics who want everything on Earth deregulated and privatized, whose response to the current fiscal crisis is nonetheless that the Fed is to blame because “it’s a private bank.”
It also reminds me of Phyllis Schlafly’s son andrew, who leveraged a bunch of high-school aged homeschoolers into Conservapedia, and demanded “the raw data” for a paper showing bacteria had evolved a new ability to digest a novel chemical. The researcher responded that the raw data was pounds of bacteria.
The russians should have sent mcintyre some pine trees –
C.O.D. – and said, here you go, #!$@#.[1]
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Marion,
From salon.com, which attributes the quote to ‘Nature’. Quite a good article on the whole matter IMO.
If 58 requests in 5-6 days isn’t vexatious and harrowing, what is?
Marion: “…it also reminds me….”
Humanatarian: It reminds me of Obama’s transparency task force meeting behind closed, locked doors.
there are a mass of scientifically illiterate half-wits on the internet who are believe that their knowledge and ability is a match for any PhD who has dedicated their career to studying the science. This unshakeable belief is built on having read a few blog posts by a melon-headed radio weather presenter and a myopic mining executive
It strikes me reading all of the comments on this blog that the accusers are just as bad as the Deniers.
I just wanted to point out that most so called deniers do not deny climate change, but deny that the ‘prime’ cause is human activity. [1]
Since humans have burned 320 billion tons of carbon, the level of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased from 280 ppm to 384 and climbing.
A disconnected statement and like the finger pointing at the Deniers, not scientific especially in the light of much higher levels in Earth’s history.
There seems to be an assumption that Deniers are not interested in the Earth and it’s future. WRONG!
BTW if you want to tax carbon, why not have a sliding scale of electricity charges. That would be much fairer than this ludicrous replacement of incandescents with ecologically unsound CFLs and a blanket charge. [2]
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Many also deny that any warming has taken place whenever they:-
a. cherry-pick data to “show” either cooling or a cessation in warming;
b. attack the veracity of the data.
(Of course they manage to ignore the contradiction: a Denialist signature.)
Who are the “accusers”? If you mean those of us who call liars and wingnut delusionals what they are, then count me in!
[…] about a scientific case that has been built up over 20 years or so of peer-reviewed science. As Greenfyre puts it, “Which studies were compromised, how? Be specific. Cite papers and data sets. What is […]
[…] a scientific case that has been built up over 20 years or so of peer-reviewed science. As Greenfyre puts it, “Which studies were compromised, how? Be specific. Cite papers and data sets. What is […]
[…] about a scientific case that has been built up over 20 years or so of peer-reviewed science. As Greenfyre puts it, “Which studies were compromised, how? Be specific. Cite papers and data sets. What is […]
[…] On a couple of science blogs, I commented how eerily familiar a lot of the drummed up conflict and attacks in the last dozen or so years are to An Enemy of the People, a play by Henrik Ibsen about a small coastal Norwegian town in the late 19th century. It’s available at Project Gutenberg here. I note that right here on Greenfyre, commenter Brian Davey said much the same thing. […]
[…] hippie FriedGreen goes all street and wants to hit back, hard. So much for peace and love, […]