ClimateGate and the Climatati

[eyeball]

That said, the scientists managing these datasets understand that ad hoc adjustments are something that could be criticized by their collegues and sceptics so they look for a way to demonstrate that they are likely to be right. One easy way to prove the credibility of your adjustments is to demonstrate that the results are the same as other data sets. What this means is these data sets end up being adjusted to look like each other over time.

Is there any reason to believe your economic disaster alarmists don't do the very same thing?

[Battletoads]

From what I have seen this whole "issue" was created by taking a few lines, out of thousands of emails, totaly out of context.

[Riverwind]

From what I have seen this whole "issue" was created by taking a few lines, out of thousands of emails, totaly out of context.

Then you need to do more research. UEA would not have forced Jones to resign if it was just a little misunderstanding. The ethical and possibly legal violations are extremely disturbing.

[Shady]

From what I have seen this whole "issue" was created by taking a few lines, out of thousands of emails, totaly out of context.

LOL. that may be the understatement of the year!

[August1991]

There is no such thing as truly independent temperature dataset since there is only once source for the raw temperature data collected over the last 400 years. Where the datasets differ is in what weather stations they choose and what adjustments they apply to the data to "correct" any errors in the data.

I found a good explanation of this point (quoted below) but it largely states the same as you:

It is reassuring to think that even if the CRU data are shown to be distorted (either wittingly or unwittingly) other independent sources of data are at hand. But that belief may not be entirely accurate. Besides the CRU temperature data, there are two other leading sources used by the IPCC, one created by the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), and the other by the National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) National Climatic Data Center (NCDC).

While it is true that the scientific groups are independent, as University of Colorado climatologist Roger Pielke Sr. (and father of Pielke Jr.) observes, the temperature data sets are not all that independent. Pielke cites the 2006 U.S. Climate Change Science Program report which noted, "Since the three chosen data sets utilize many of the same raw observations, there is a degree of interdependence." The report further observed, "While there are fundamental differences in the methodology used to create the surface data sets, the differing techniques with the same data produce almost the same results." In 2007, Pielke and his colleagues reported, "The raw surface temperature data from which all of the different global surface temperature trend analyses are derived are essentially the same. The best estimate that has been reported is that 90–95 percent of the raw data in each of the analyses is the same (P. Jones, personal communication, 2003). That the analyses produce similar trends should therefore come as no surprise."

One of the leaked emails from CRU’s Phil Jones appears to confirm this data interdependence: "Almost all the data we have in the CRU archive is exactly the same as in the Global Historical Climatology Network (GHCN) archive used by the NOAA National Climatic Data Center." Given this interdependence, Jones’ appeal to correlation with other data sets to support the validity of the CRU data is less convincing than one would hope. To the contrary, the fact that the three data sets correlate so well may instead provoke concerns about the validity of all three.

Reason

[Battletoads]

LOL. that may be the understatement of the year!

I agree lets all assume that these emails some russian hackers `legitimatly` obtained are true and lets take them at face value.

Makes perfect sense.

[Shady]

I agree lets all assume that these emails some russian hackers `legitimatly` obtained are true and lets take them at face value.

Makes perfect sense.

So is it your opinion that the emails are false? Or are they just taken out of context like you previously stated? Which one is it?

[BubberMiley]

So you feel that having editors of peer reviewed journals fired for accepting dissenting papers is not newsworthy?

How do you know the emails are real and it's not a hoax to make it look like a hoax? Or even a hoax to make it look like a hoax to make it look like a hoax.

[JB Globe]

It's incredibly disappointing to see that several scientists have stooped to the level of the coal & oil industry and other groups which are trying to manipulate the public into thinking that human activity is not affecting the climate.

As we all know, the deniers have no ethical code to uphold - they can misrepresent, lie, manipulate, misquote, over-emphasize, down-play to their hearts content and no one will hold them accountable - because that's what propagandists do.

Scientists however, simply don't do this, they're held to a higher standard.

No one said it as easy fighting fair when your opponent is going for low-blows, but in the end, no one really likes a cheater.

That said, unless you're being emotional and/or dishonest about this, there is no rational way you can say that the actions of several scientists are representative of the greater group of thousands of climate change scientists. They are most surely the exception.

If we use this rule of "several exceptions make the rule" than I suppose we will have to rule, for example, that all family-values conservatives are really closet homosexuals - it just doesn't make any logical sense, which is exactly why no one but conspiracy theorists and anti-climate change zealots are holding this up as "the nail in the coffin" of climate change.

[Riverwind]

How do you know the emails are real and it's not a hoax to make it look like a hoax? Or even a hoax to make it look like a hoax to make it look like a hoax.

The emails have be available for 2 weeks now and no one has disputed any of the text in any of the emails. One of the scientists involved was forced to resign yesterday. The most plausible explanation is it was a whistleblower because the last email was dated the day before the FOI rejection was sent to Steve McIntyre. The timing suggests the FOI rejection triggered the leak.

[Riverwind]

It's incredibly disappointing to see that several scientists have stooped to the level of the coal & oil industry and other groups which are trying to manipulate the public into thinking that human activity is not affecting the climate.

Do you really think that lying and misrepresenting the sceptical position actually helps your case?

Scientists however, simply don't do this, they're held to a higher standard.

They are being held to the standards of any professional asking for the public trust. In this case, the have been shown be liers, manipulators, blackmailers and possibly criminals.

The question you should be asking is why anyone should trust these people now.

Edited December 2, 2009 by Riverwind

[Pliny]

tit for tat...the reichwing wants to label everyone who disagrees with them as liberals, socialists, Union reps, Journalist, Arts Degree Graduates, commies...anything but address the issue..I'm happy to play their childish game too...

I guess I'm right. Union rep!

You act like being asked if you are a socialist or Union rep is disparaging, which is all I asked. I happen to think it is not completely irrelevant to the issue. Why is it that socialists hate being called socialists?

It seems you wouldn't be happy with just an acknowledgment that AGW is a fact. The whole of civilization must change to coincide with your global world view - Otherwise we all die, right?

That is nothing but alarmist crap.

I think your world view of controlling uneducated, ignorant hillbillies is more the issue with you and environmentalism is the key to subjugating all the nasty people.

Environmentalism is simply what totalitarian socialism has morphed into, not just socialism but "totalitarian" socialism.

[Pliny]

How do you know the emails are real and it's not a hoax to make it look like a hoax? Or even a hoax to make it look like a hoax to make it look like a hoax.

We really know nothing! Is that what you are really trying to say?

[Pliny]

Scientists however, simply don't do this, they're held to a higher standard.

Because they are held to a higher standard is why they are being questioned on their ethics. Scientists don't do what they have admitted to doing in their e-mails.

It is nothing less than scandalous. A pox on the scientific community. It is an obvious grasp at creating a personal legacy encouraged by political opportunism.

[waldo]

So you feel that having editors of peer reviewed journals fired for accepting dissenting papers is not newsworthy?

Since your scurrilous accusation was quoted again - recently... already discussed - already dispatched in previous MLW posts:

- reference your claims towards editor Saiers and the journal GRL - here

- reference your claims towards editor de Freitas and the journal Climate Research - here & here

[jbg]

However, you'll have a difficult time proving that someone in a forum, who you don't know, and can't see, is a hillbillie or reichwinger (whatever that is).

A horrific example of Godwin's Law at work.

[Riverwind]

Since your scurrilous accusation was quoted again

A little hint: "he deserved it" is not a defense for murder and "the paper was junk" is not a defense for blackmailing journals.

[Battletoads]

So is it your opinion that the emails are false? Or are they just taken out of context like you previously stated? Which one is it?

Could be fake

Could be some real emails with fake ones thrown in

Could be real

Either way most of the things people are talking about have been taken out of context.

[waldo]

So you feel that having editors of peer reviewed journals fired for accepting dissenting papers is not newsworthy?

Since your scurrilous accusation was quoted again - recently... already discussed - already dispatched in previous MLW posts:

- reference your claims towards editor Saiers and the journal GRL - here

- reference your claims towards editor de Freitas and the journal Climate Research - here & here

A little hint: "he deserved it" is not a defense for murder and "the paper was junk" is not a defense for blackmailing journals.

no journals were blackmailed - no matter how hard you try to distort the truth - the events.

- in the case of GRL/Saiers, the single hacked email speaks to following the available process that exists throughout peer-review, finding/gathering evidence of editor bias (if it existed) and suggesting it be brought forward through the proper channels within the AGU. All above board - all following the designed procedures, as intended, to bring forward suggestion that an editor might hold bias in which papers are being published. Was any of that actually done... since it's my latest understanding that Saiers actually completed his full term - i.e. was not fired. In any case, that "firing" wouldn't occur, if it actually did... without a full investigation and analysis by the AGU. I asked you previously - I'll ask again... are you prepared to state that the AGU itself was complicit in the firing of the GRL editor, Saiers (if, in fact, he was even fired)?

- in the case of Climate Research/de Frietas, no editors were fired... de Frietas was not fired. The publisher chose to stand behind his journals (improper) publishing of that infamous Soon/Baliunas paper. All thd editors that resigned, did so because they wanted the publisher to formally announce that the journal did not stand behind the paper... that's how bad the paper was. All this is layed out in the previous posts, including all the attempts to use that paper for political gain (Sen Inhofe / Bush admin)

why continue your charade?

[waldo]

I asked previously, and made pains to imply I was attempting not to offer an ad hominem... given Spencer's most controversial positions (directly outside of the climate science debate), not the least of which is his advocacy for Intelligent Design (Creationism), how difficult is it for most scientists, for most laypersons, to give credibility to much (anything?) Roy Spencer has to offer/contribute?

By resorting ad hom attacks on Spencer you demostrate cannot actually repudiate his science or his academic credentials.

so in spite of my expressed reluctance to entertain ad hominem, shall we play - a bit...

there's certainly no shortage of referenced material that generally calls into question any scientist who would subscribe to Creationism... and, of course, much has been written about Spencer's rather brash and most controversial statements. Does it play into the actual science he does, the results he brings forward, co-authored, or otherwise? How could it not... when he gives support to the notion that scientific results are simply a function of ideology - at what delineating point does ideology determine, or not, the actual science he does, the actual results he brings forward?

in any case, Spencer's overall contributions have to be (also) tempered with the realization that Christy has carried him in many cases and that Christy now, it is stated, actually distances himself from Spencer, given his Creationist position and statements. BTW, what was Spencer's role/contribution to the several significant corrections required to their UAH data? And... who was it that used the erroneous UAH data in testimony before the U.S. Congress, testimony attempting to cast doubt on the legitimacy and quality of GCMs (climate global models)... why... I do believe that was the infamous Christy/Spencer tag-team from the University of Alabama!

The data was believed to correct at the time. When errors were found the datasets were corrected. This is how science is supposed to work. In fact, the willingness to acknowledge and correct errors is one of the reasons why Spencer and Christy stand out as true scientists compared to the loons like Mann who insist to this day that there was nothing wrong with his papers.

The creationism/evolution debate has no relevance to AGW because creationism is not science. Primarily because it uses the 'god did it' excuse to explain away any inconsistencies so there is no incentive to expand our understanding by collecting new evidence and developing new theories.

this, one of your latest gems, is certainly enlightening, given one of your favourite go-to skeptic/denier boys, Roy Spencer is a prolific advocate for Creationism (amongst other controversial positions he holds to). Again, how do you rationalize your acceptance of Spencer's denier position - his claims... after all... it's you who would have Spencer, as you (now) state, "explain away any inconsistencies" with a "God did it" excuse... that Spencer would have no incentive to expand the understanding by collecting new evidence - by developing new theories.

oh wait - you accept the dichotomy because... it suits your agenda

on edit: there seems to be a Riverwind pattern here...

- you explain away the Christy/Spencer UAH (multiple) dataset errors as, as you state, "believed to be correct at the time". No problem (for you) that Christy/Spencer used that incorrect data before a U.S. Senate investigation... attempting, unsuccessfully, to attack climate change models. Why... some wag could step forward and claim, "squawk, data manipulation, squawk"!!!

- a while back we danced back and forth around some specious McIntyre claim, until you finally relented and accepted that McIntyre was wrong (you were wrong... for parroting McIntyre)... you sloughed it all off with a suggestion that, as I paraphrase, "McIntyre is human, he made a mistake, shit happens". Why... some wag could step forward and claim, "squawk, data manipulation, squawk"!!!

just a couple of examples, with undisputed, fully chronologically detailed events/circumstance around them... you know, as distinct from out of context hacked emails anally line parsed. Just a couple of examples that could, easily, be misconstrued towards suggestions of purposeful data manipulation to suit a skeptics/denier agenda. Oh the irony... the hypocrisy at play.

speaking of that data manipulation... never did see a response to this - still waiting:

That is rich considering the fact we have concrete evidence that leading climate scientists deliberately manipulated data so it better conform to their ideology.

let's get to it... support your claims of data manipulation. I'm heading out for dinner now but will certainly address your response, probably tomorrow morning. Thanks in advance.

Edited December 2, 2009 by waldo

[waldo]

It's incredibly disappointing to see that several scientists have stooped to the level of the coal & oil industry and other groups which are trying to manipulate the public into thinking that human activity is not affecting the climate.

As we all know, the deniers have no ethical code to uphold - they can misrepresent, lie, manipulate, misquote, over-emphasize, down-play to their hearts content and no one will hold them accountable - because that's what propagandists do.

Scientists however, simply don't do this, they're held to a higher standard.

No one said it as easy fighting fair when your opponent is going for low-blows, but in the end, no one really likes a cheater.

That said, unless you're being emotional and/or dishonest about this, there is no rational way you can say that the actions of several scientists are representative of the greater group of thousands of climate change scientists. They are most surely the exception.

If we use this rule of "several exceptions make the rule" than I suppose we will have to rule, for example, that all family-values conservatives are really closet homosexuals - it just doesn't make any logical sense, which is exactly why no one but conspiracy theorists and anti-climate change zealots are holding this up as "the nail in the coffin" of climate change.

Yours, is probably one of the most astute assessments to appear within these latest MLW threads... and it's the one that is prevailing within the thinking and objective. Unfortunately, it's not the thinking and objective that the denier campaign is targeting.

[waldo]

I find the phrase "CRU continues its world leading research" intriguing. If the CRU data is found to be faulty, what does that mean about this theory? Other commenters have noted how there are tens of thousands of research scientists around the world and other independent data sets. How true is that? How central is the CRU to this issue?

actually, the focus on CRU data predates anything to do with this hacked email concern and its related false accusations/claims. There's a significant lobby effort coming from the CEI group (the Competitive Enterprise Institute) that is arguing the U.S. EPA's climate policies rely on raw data that have been destroyed and are therefore unreliable. This NYT article from mid-Oct speaks to that CEI lobbying effort... and should appease your concerns over CRU data.

- CRU deleted less than 5 percent of its original station data from its database because the stations had several discontinuities or were affected by urbanization trends

- any of this deleted data (the less than 5% of total)... can still be retrieved from the source repository - from the [NOAA] National Climatic Data Center

- this, as you say, theory... as represented by the science, and presented on many levels, for example, the related conclusions of the IPCC assessment reports, are based on several data sets in addition to the CRU data (e.g. NOAA NCDC, NASA GISTEMP)

- CRU's major findings have been replicated by other groups, including the NOAA climatic data center, the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, and also in Russia.

most significant in any of this is the CEI lobby effort: CEI from Sourcewatch

It (CEI) postures as an advocate of "sound science" in the development of public policy. However, CEI projects dispute the overwhelming scientific evidence that human induced greenhouse gas emissions are driving climate change. They have a program for "challenging government regulations", push property rights as a solution to environment problems, opposed US vehicle fuel efficiency standards and been a booster for the drug industry.

as is proving out, CEI is behind much of the latest mainstream media stories (tied to this hacked email timeline) that claim, "destroyed data, climate change is dead/suspect"... and lo and behold, we see the CEI ties to both energy - here, and tobacco - here.

[waldo]

There is no such thing as truly independent temperature dataset since there is only once source for the raw temperature data collected over the last 400 years. Where the datasets differ is in what weather stations they choose and what adjustments they apply to the data to "correct" any errors in the data. In many cases the adjustments will change the trend significantly. Now many of these adjustments are unambiguous and scientifically justified but others are ad hoc adjustments based on what the scientist thinks is right (e.g. the adjustments to deal with warmer temperatures caused by growing cities).

That said, the scientists managing these datasets understand that ad hoc adjustments are something that could be criticized by their collegues and sceptics so they look for a way to demonstrate that they are likely to be right. One easy way to prove the credibility of your adjustments is to demonstrate that the results are the same as other data sets. What this means is these data sets end up being adjusted to look like each other over time.

Here is an analysis for laymen of the issues with GISS dataset - the major competitor to the CRU datasets. The bottom line is all of the datasets are suspect and we need to have a new dataset redeveloped from scratch in an open forum. Here is his lament in the comments over what he believes is evidence of deliberate manipulation to create a warming trend when there is none:

Interesting to note the bio of your go-to guy offering comment and judgment over the NASA GISS... has an economics degree... and some community college courses! But hey... that's more than McIntyre has

In regards your statement, "There is no such thing as truly independent temperature dataset since there is only once source for the raw temperature data collected over the last 400 years"... globally, yes... but there's also the U.S. (only) USHCN and Arctic SCAR; (whether as subsets or not).

But what sense is there in talking of the independence of the single global repository of "raw data"... it's the only one... what does it have to be independent from? The independence aspect reflects upon the multiple processed datasets created from the repository... the degree of that independence further reflects upon the separate groups/agencies involved in creating the disparate processed datasets, the differing types of data selected by each respective group/agency and the distinct processing methods used by each respective group/agency. That the same processing results are attained from these disparate processed datasets... that all results show upward trending decadal temperature increase... in the face of differing selected data (from the global repository) and distinct processing methods used, speaks to the independence and the integrity of the overall result.

Unsubstantiated claims of deliberate manipulation to create warming trends... are nothing more than unsubstantiated claims. GISS has been wide-open for some time... if the deniers have a claim to make... what are they waiting for? Should we put the NASA Goddard Institute on notice... should we give them a heads up?

[Riverwind]

no journals were blackmailed - no matter how hard you try to distort the truth - the events.

The emails were clear. These "scientists" decided that they did not like the papers published a journal because they supported a sceptical point view and they decided to threaten the journals and editors instead of doing what any ethical scientist has done in the past: publish a rebuttle.

It does not make a difference if they honestly believed the papers were bad (it is just their opinion).

It does not make a difference if the followed the "process" (lawyers follow the "process" all of the time to blackmail companies into settling bogus lawsuits).

They choose to attack the journals and editor instead of doing science.

Gavin actually said that they did this because the papers were being "misused" in the media and they needed to get rid of them instead of simply ignoring them as scientists usually do. IOW - they admit their actions were driven by politics and not science. Any attempt to defend their actions as scientifically justified is absurd.

These scientists are not not objective and they corrupted the peer review process.

Edited December 2, 2009 by Riverwind

[Riverwind]

Unsubstantiated claims of deliberate manipulation to create warming trends... are nothing more than unsubstantiated claims. GISS has been wide-open for some time... if the deniers have a claim to make... what are they waiting for? Should we put the NASA Goddard Institute on notice... should we give them a heads up?

Well, I think such allegations need some serious investigation since we have evidence that leading climate scientists are liars, manipulators, blackmailers and possibly criminals. Dismissing them at this time is quite premature since sceptics are frequently vindicated when they find evidence that the books are being cooked. Edited December 2, 2009 by Riverwind