Climategate II

Well, in view of the extreme agenda drive I would suggest the following solution [adopted from a respected scientific publication "Organic Syntheses" regarding the submissions they publish]: any "greenpissing science" is not to be accepted until and unless it is replicated by independent [and greenpissing-free] checkers. Till then it is to be provisionally designated as politically-driven charlatanism.

This one was worse. Your source has outright lied to his readers about what Prof. Jones wrote. He has spliced together two completely separate emails and presented them as one. That is lying.

It seems the contagion of Taqqiya has spread from the creationists.

No, its alright to do this in this case.

When you're trying to save the world economy from destruction by the "climate change zealots" any lie can be safely overlooked as a necessary evil.

Okay, you're lying when you say this, right?

You're attempting to melt down my little computer brain, but there's got to be some logic in there somewhere. I'll get it sorted out.

It's like one of those Star Trek episodes, where captain Kirk gets the evil computer in a hard loop and they escape again, until next week.

It's OK to lie in order to save the world from those global warming climate change weather people. And it's OK to lie in order to save the world from those evil capitalist coal oil natural gas burners. Repeat.

This one was worse. Your source has outright lied to his readers about what Prof. Jones wrote. He has spliced together two completely separate emails and presented them as one. That is lying.

The first two sentences come from this email.

Dear Thomas,
I hope you are enjoying your new job! Apologies in advance
for upsetting your morning!
Below there is a link to Climate Audit and their new thread with another attempt to gain access to the CRU station temperature data. I wouldn't normally bother about this - but will deal with the FOI requests when they come. Despite WMO Resolution 40, I've signed agreements not to pass on some parts of the CRU land station data to third parties.
If you click on the link below and then on comments, look at # 17. This
refers to a number of appeals a Brit has made to the Information Commissioner
in the UK. You can see various UK Universities and MOHC listed. For UEA these
relate to who changed what and why in Ch 6 of AR4. We are dealing with these,
but I wanted to alert you to few sentences about Switzerland, your University
and AR5. Having been through numerous of these as a result of AR4, I suspect that someone will have a go at you at some point. What I think they might try later
is the same issue:
Who changed what and why in various chapters of AR5? and When drafts of chapters come for AR5, we can't review the chapter as we can't get access to the data, or, the authors can't refer to these papers as the data haven't been made available for audit. Neither of these is what I would call Environmental Information,as defined by the Aarhus Convention.
You might want to check with the IPCC Bureau. I've been told that IPCC is
above national FOI Acts. One way to cover yourself and all those working in AR5
would be to delete all emails at the end of the process. Hard to do, as not everybody will remember to do it.
I also suspect that as national measures to reduce emissions begin to affect people's lives, we are all going to get more of this. We can cope with op-ed pieces, but these FOI requests take time, as the whole process of how we all work has to be explained to FOI-responsible people at each institution.
Keep up the good work with AR5!
Cheers
Phil

The issue was inquiries about who changed what and why in AR5. He was talking about protecting the privacy of deliberations.

The other two sentences are from this email.

Dear All,
Here are a few other thoughts. From looking at Climate Audit every few days, these people are not doing what I would call academic research. Also from looking they will not stop with the data, but will continue to ask for the original unadjusted data (which we don't have) and then move onto the software used to produce the gridded datasets (the ones we do release).
CRU is considered by the climate community as a data centre, but we don't have any resources to undertake this work. Any work we have done in the past is done on the back of the research grants we get - and has to be well hidden. I've discussed this with the main funder (US Dept of Energy) in the past and they are happy about not releasing the original station data. We are currently trying to do some more work with other datasets, which will get released (as gridded datasets) through the British Atmospheric Data Centre (BADC). This will involve more than just station temperature data. Perhaps we should consider setting up something like this agreement below
http://badc.nerc.ac.uk/data/surface/met ... ement.html
I just want these orchestrated requests to stop. I also don't want to give away years of hard effort within CRU. Many of the agreements were made in the late 1980s and early 1990s and I don't have copies to hand. I also don't want to waste my time looking for them. Even if I were to find them all, it is likely that the people we dealt with are no longer in the same positions. These requests over the last 2.5 years have wasted much time for me, others in CRU and for Dave and Michael. Some of you may not know, but the dataset has been sent by someone at the Met Office to McIntyre. The Met Office are trying to find out who did this. I've ascertained it most likely came from there, as I'm the only one who knows where the files are here.
See you all later.
Phil

Here Jones is complaining about how the work required to answer these inquiries comes out of grant resources that were intended for other purposes. These vexatious inquiries are interfering with the ability of a small unit like the one Jones headed to do their job. They don't have the resources to handle these inquiries without compromising what they are supposed to be doing.

Gummy, I'm sure you did not know about the splicing. But there is no way that the writer of this article could be described as honest. This is a perfect example of quote mining.

Well, yes, so it would seem. It strikes me both unfortunate and superflous. Unfortunate in that this sort of quote salad is exactly what is so obejctionable in creationists' argumentation, and superflous in that there is enough in the emails casting a shadow over the process without having to get creative.

It's like one of those Star Trek episodes, where captain Kirk gets the evil computer in a hard loop and they escape again, until next week.

It's OK to lie in order to save the world from those global warming climate change weather people. And it's OK to lie in order to save the world from those evil capitalist coal oil natural gas burners. Repeat.

Sorry, no.

What distinguishes human beings from other animals, is the ability to communicate. Contingent on that ability, and vital to its essence, is accurate communication.

I am aware that communication theory involves error-checking and an equivalent of irony, but at its most basic, it includes getting the necessary bits across the line.

Lies are corrupted signals, indistinguishable from noise.

In the Philosophy of Bob, noise sources are to be eliminated. Speak Truth, or speak not.

It's like one of those Star Trek episodes, where captain Kirk gets the evil computer in a hard loop and they escape again, until next week.

It's OK to lie in order to save the world from those global warming climate change weather people. And it's OK to lie in order to save the world from those evil capitalist coal oil natural gas burners. Repeat.

Sorry, no.

What distinguishes human beings from other animals, is the ability to communicate. Contingent on that ability, and vital to its essence, is accurate communication.

I am aware that communication theory involves error-checking and an equivalent of irony, but at its most basic, it includes getting the necessary bits across the line.

Lies are corrupted signals, indistinguishable from noise.

In the Philosophy of Bob, noise sources are to be eliminated. Speak Truth, or speak not.

I didn't realise that sarcasm tags were necessary in my post.

I didn't realise that sarcasm tags were necessary in my post.

I kinda figured that, but then a few more bodies fell on me.

I didn't realise that sarcasm tags were necessary in my post.

I kinda figured that, but then a few more bodies fell on me.

A little more sarcasm is what fell.

I didn't realise that sarcasm tags were necessary in my post.

I kinda figured that, but then a few more bodies fell on me.

A little more sarcasm is what fell.

I am the victim of fell circumstance.

At Fox News:

Making that case in 2009, the then-head of the Research Unit, Dr. Phil Jones, told colleagues repeatedly that the U.S. Department of Energy was funding his data collection -- and that officials there agreed that he should not have to release the data.

“Work on the land station data has been funded by the U.S. Dept of Energy, and I have their agreement that the data needn’t be passed on. I got this [agreement] in 2007,” Jones wrote in a May 13, 2009, email to British officials, before listing reasons he did not want them to release data.

Two months later, Jones reiterated that sentiment to colleagues, saying that the data "has to be well hidden. I’ve discussed this with the main funder (U.S. Dept of Energy) in the past and they are happy about not releasing the original station data.”

At Fox News:

Making that case in 2009, the then-head of the Research Unit, Dr. Phil Jones, told colleagues repeatedly that the U.S. Department of Energy was funding his data collection -- and that officials there agreed that he should not have to release the data.

“Work on the land station data has been funded by the U.S. Dept of Energy, and I have their agreement that the data needn’t be passed on. I got this [agreement] in 2007,” Jones wrote in a May 13, 2009, email to British officials, before listing reasons he did not want them to release data.

Two months later, Jones reiterated that sentiment to colleagues, saying that the data "has to be well hidden. I’ve discussed this with the main funder (U.S. Dept of Energy) in the past and they are happy about not releasing the original station data.”

I am confident this statement is entirely accurate.

The entire email, in context:

"Dear All,
Here are a few other thoughts. From looking at Climate Audit every few days, these people are not doing what I would call academic research. Also from looking they will not stop with the data, but will continue to ask for the original unadjusted data (which we don't have) and then move onto the software used to produce the gridded datasets (the ones we do release).
CRU is considered by the climate community as a data centre, but we don't have any resources to undertake this work. Any work we have done in the past is done on the back of the research grants we get - and has to be well hidden. I've discussed this with the main funder (US Dept of Energy) in the past and they are happy about not releasing the original station data. We are currently trying to do some more work with other datasets, which will get released (as gridded datasets) through the British Atmospheric Data Centre (BADC). This will involve more than just station temperature data. Perhaps we should consider setting up something like this agreement below
http://badc.nerc.ac.uk/data/surface/met ... ement.html
I just want these orchestrated requests to stop. I also don't want to give away years of hard effort within CRU. Many of the agreements were made in the late 1980s and early 1990s and I don't have copies to hand. I also don't want to waste my time looking for them. Even if I were to find them all, it is likely that the people we dealt with are no longer in the same positions. These requests over the last 2.5 years have wasted much time for me, others in CRU and for Dave and Michael. Some of you may not know, but the dataset has been sent by someone at the Met Office to McIntyre. The Met Office are trying to find out who did this. I've ascertained it most likely came from there, as I'm the only one who knows where the files are here.
See you all later.
Phil"

(email 1577)

Key part: "CRU is considered by the climate community as a data centre, but we don't have any resources to undertake this work." The email is a complaint about the vexatious FOIA requests that were being made that required them to spend time and resources doing data collection "on the backs of the research grants" they received to do other things. That extra work needed to fulfill the FOIA requests is hidden. Jones has said last month that most funders are aware of the issue:

‘Hidden’ refers here to some of the work on data collection and management. This is a common issue in some areas of climate research and refers to issues of an operational nature and research aspects. An obvious example is updating earlier data sets within a new project. Most funders are fully aware that this is common practice.

http://www.uea.ac.uk/mac/comm/media/pre ... sexplained

It should be noted, again, that the CRU never have been in charge of the storage of the raw temperature data. That data is held in Met offices around the world, and could at any time have been asked for and accessed by anybody who wanted it. If any of the so-called "skeptics" had actually wanted to test the CRU temperature product, they didn't need to go to the CRU to do so - all you need to do is get the raw temperature data from the Met stations (or places like the NCDC that have large collections of it) and do your own analysis. You don't need the exact stations used (though all of this is now available this year and most had been anyway). "Skeptics" are not interested in doing this - hell, they have all of the CRU's data as of this year and they haven't done squat with it; they had over 90% of it for a number of years and never showed an interest in doing anything with it.

As with most of the "climategate" emails, the reality is a lot different than the "skeptic" distortion.

It should be noted, again, that the CRU never have been in charge of the storage of the raw temperature data. That data is held in Met offices around the world, and could at any time have been asked for and accessed by anybody who wanted it. If any of the so-called "skeptics" had actually wanted to test the CRU temperature product, they didn't need to go to the CRU to do so - all you need to do is get the raw temperature data from the Met stations (or places like the NCDC that have large collections of it) and do your own analysis. You don't need the exact stations used (though all of this is now available this year and most had been anyway).

No.

If I'm trying to verify a scientist's work -- *especially* if I'm trying to vet it because I suspect he may have played fast and loose with his data or methodology -- I need the whole shebang. It's not enough to just be told, "here's my model, and my data is some (massaged) combination of some of the data from over yonder".

I need *his* datasets -- the ones he actually ran through the model, sufficiently complete that I can get his same results (or know why the hell not), and I need the original raw data and an explanation of how exactly his "cleaned up" data came about from the universe of potential raw data he picked and chose from.

And if he *can't* easily lay his hands on this data (if he hasn't kept a good "paper trail" of his work), why the fuck should I trust *any* of it? Good recordkeeping, and the ability to reproduce your *own* earlier results, not to mention give other people sufficient information to follow your exact footsteps, is one of the cornerstones of solid science.

If you're unable or unwilling to "show your work", especially in this era of computers, something's terribly fishy. Either you're hiding something, or your work is performed so sloppily that even *you* shouldn't have any confidence in it.

"No.

If I'm trying to verify a scientist's work -- *especially* if I'm trying to vet it because I suspect he may have played fast and loose with his data or methodology -- I need the whole shebang. It's not enough to just be told, "here's my model, and my data is some (massaged) combination of some of the data from over yonder"."

Yes, you really don't need to get the exact raw data set they used. It damn well is enough to go to the Met offices and get the raw data yourself and independently test the temperature analysis of someone else. That's what the BEST team did - they used over 39,000 stations as opposed to the normal range of say 4K-5K. They came up with essentially the same trends that the CRU got and the other places like GISS and NCDC got. As do the satellite reconstructions for the post-1979 period (the start of the sat era). Why? Because it's what the data says - it's what actually happened. Not *their* data - but the data that was collected by Met offices around the world. They don't own the data and never did. That said, over 90% of the raw data that the CRU used was already available. All of it is available now, except for one or two countries that refuse to let the CRU release it. You have to go to those countries to get their data (or go to the NCDC website, which I believe has most of it too). The CRU (or any of the other places doing temp reconstructions) couldn't hide the raw station data if they wanted to - they don't and never have controlled it.

Most "Skeptics" have absolutely no inclination to do a damn thing with the data; they would have by now if they really wanted to. They're full of shit.

Ichny,
As I understand it, McIntyre and followers sent a very large number of requests with a lot of people asking for different bits of data. That is they organized their requests in such a way as to, by intention or not, maximize the effort required to answer them. If you really want information the sensible thing is to make it as easy as possible for others to give you that information.

The CRU had very limited resources to answer these questions. If requesters really wanted the data they should have offered to pay for the resources required to obtain it without disrupting the work of the CRU.

And of course the people at the CRU did not believe that the requests were made in good faith. The requesters did not seem to be capable of being satisfied. For an example remember that Ghengis was one of them. Do you believe that anyone could satisfactorily answer his requests or that he would always find something to complain about no matter what they did.

Ichny,
As I understand it, McIntyre and followers sent a very large number of requests with a lot of people asking for different bits of data. That is they organized their requests in such a way as to, by intention or not, maximize the effort required to answer them. If you really want information the sensible thing is to make it as easy as possible for others to give you that information.

The CRU had very limited resources to answer these questions. If requesters really wanted the data they should have offered to pay for the resources required to obtain it without disrupting the work of the CRU.

And of course the people at the CRU did not believe that the requests were made in good faith. The requesters did not seem to be capable of being satisfied. For an example remember that Ghengis was one of them. Do you believe that anyone could satisfactorily answer his requests or that he would always find something to complain about no matter what they did.

I spent some time working on avionics software that was to be certified by the FAA. In their audit process you were required to have an examiner in the building ordering you to produce the requirements for any few lines of code, all of it's modifications, how it was unit tested, the results, and more. If you couldn't do that pretty much instantly, then by-by certification.

We're studying stuff that will be used to justify altering the economic system of the planet. Wouldn't it be a good idea if the people doing the work were able to put their hands on their source data as easily? And more, that it should be public information where everyone could put their hands on it as easily?

If not, it's worthless for it's intended purpose of redesigning the economics of the planet, should be entirely thrown out, start over.

Ghengis and others have done the planet a favor by demonstrating the utter incompetence of these people in handling large datasets, a thing absolutely required for any kind of confidence in the result.

I know if I was in the science business I would bristle at the thought of anyone looking over my shoulder, trying to second guess every action. I probably wouldn't be able to handle it actually. But providing hard justification for radical planetary government is the job these people are presuming to do. It's serious business, and they are incompetent at it, because a primary requirement is that it must be open for inspection.

The CRU had very limited resources to answer these questions. If requesters really wanted the data they should have offered to pay for the resources required to obtain it without disrupting the work of the CRU.

And of course the people at the CRU did not believe that the requests were made in good faith.

"Good faith" is absolutely, 100% irrelevant to the FOIA, as are "limited resources". Imagine a world where a President didn't deem it necessary to release anything at all to anyone remotely considered hostile, since they lack the requisite "good faith". Or perhaps they'd simply claim "limited resources" as the reason for dropping any pretense at transparency.

Anyway, if you don't want to play by The Man's rules, FOIA among them, the answer is simple - don't take The Man's money.

I am starting to wonder just how the heat content of the Earth's crust/oceans/atmosphere is actually assessed and how any minor changes in that content translates into the weather and climate.

I wish I was a whole lot younger ....

I was wondering if the guys who claimed to have measured the speed of neutrinos to be superluminal refused to share their raw data and data processing code, and claimed that such requests were burdensome, and not in good faith, would anyone pay any attention to their claims?

How about if they emailed their collaborators and suggested they thwart FOIA requests by deleting emails?

The CRU had very limited resources to answer these questions. If requesters really wanted the data they should have offered to pay for the resources required to obtain it without disrupting the work of the CRU.

And of course the people at the CRU did not believe that the requests were made in good faith.

"Good faith" is absolutely, 100% irrelevant to the FOIA, as are "limited resources". Imagine a world where a President didn't deem it necessary to release anything at all to anyone remotely considered hostile, since they lack the requisite "good faith". Or perhaps they'd simply claim "limited resources" as the reason for dropping any pretense at transparency.

Anyway, if you don't want to play by The Man's rules, FOIA among them, the answer is simple - don't take The Man's money.

This was a deliberate misuse of FOI in order to harass. McIntyre and co actually followed the letter of the law while violating its intent. They organized a swarm of requests. Many of the requests were denied as not being things that the CRU was required to supply under the act.

The CRU's job is climate research. Time spent answering these requests was time not spent doing their job. I find your claiming resources are irrelevant to be very strange.

Most of those making the requests seemed to have no intention of using the information to help their own or anyone else's understanding. They wanted it as a way to attack.

I do not have a high regard for ideologically motivated attacks on people's integrity wherever the ideology is. And if it is an ideology I am sympathetic to I am especially annoyed.

I spent some time working on avionics software that was to be certified by the FAA. In their audit process you were required to have an examiner in the building ordering you to produce the requirements for any few lines of code, all of it's modifications, how it was unit tested, the results, and more. If you couldn't do that pretty much instantly, then by-by certification.

We're studying stuff that will be used to justify altering the economic system of the planet. Wouldn't it be a good idea if the people doing the work were able to put their hands on their source data as easily? And more, that it should be public information where everyone could put their hands on it as easily?

If not, it's worthless for it's intended purpose of redesigning the economics of the planet, should be entirely thrown out, start over.

Ghengis and others have done the planet a favor by demonstrating the utter incompetence of these people in handling large datasets, a thing absolutely required for any kind of confidence in the result.

I know if I was in the science business I would bristle at the thought of anyone looking over my shoulder, trying to second guess every action. I probably wouldn't be able to handle it actually. But providing hard justification for radical planetary government is the job these people are presuming to do. It's serious business, and they are incompetent at it, because a primary requirement is that it must be open for inspection.

There are multiple data sets of gridded temperatures. They show good agreement and where they disagree the reasons are known.

Science does not depend on any single data set. To be confident in their results scientists want multiple types of evidence. I think your experience encourages you to look for a single conclusive proof with the sort of logical demonstration of its correctness that you can have in a computer program, or rather that is held up as an ideal in programing. You tend to think that models are likely to fall over if a single assumption is wrong. But that seldom happens. Theories are seldom abandoned because of a single discrepant fact, Usually if a theory is abandoned it is because of an accumulation of evidence against them. And I cannot think of any example of a well supported comprehensive mature theory that has been productive in making predictions for a considerable time being completely abandoned. You aren't the only person here whose intuitions are misleading them this way.

There are so many lines of evidence supporting our current understanding of the climate. Some people here are looking for the piece of evidence that will show that AGW is not a serious problem or even is not happening. But science seldom works that way. Doubters have to come up with alternative explanations for a range of phenomena. Attacking current theories is not enough. They have to replace them, preferably with something simpler. But most of what I see is hand waving non explanations. Natural cycles without specifying what those cycles are is a non explanation. Current climate science explains climate in terms of known factors.

The problems with the data management seem to be the result of systems being created by a small number of non specialists in data management and growing like Topsy. And of course their systems are being asked to do what they were never designed to do.

The data has not been collected to redesign the economy. It has been collected to understand the climate. If it had been collected to redesign the economy I would be very worried. But as a result of of understanding the climate the scientists have become convinced that our civilization is facing what i would describe as the second worst threat it as ever faced. The worst was the risk of the Cold War turning into a nuclear world war. If you believe that there is that sort of threat should you not try to warn people? Should you remain politically inactive? I disagree with much of the politics that you find in academic environments. But people will try to solve a problem with the tools that they think work. If you think that they will not work then you have to explain why alternative solutions are better. You cannot do that if you deny that there is a problem

It is not simply people looking over the scientists shoulders. It is malicious people attacking their integrity because those making the attacks are unwilling to recognize integrity in people who disagree with their politics. It is attacks by people who let political sides become part of their identity rather than something that they support because on balance they think that they have the better policies. This is what really makes me angry. People who let their politics determine their opinions on science and because they do that they cannot recognize when others do not.

"Good faith" is absolutely, 100% irrelevant to the FOIA, as are "limited resources". Imagine a world where a President didn't deem it necessary to release anything at all to anyone remotely considered hostile, since they lack the requisite "good faith". Or perhaps they'd simply claim "limited resources" as the reason for dropping any pretense at transparency.

Anyway, if you don't want to play by The Man's rules, FOIA among them, the answer is simple - don't take The Man's money.

Actually, you are very wrong about that. There are restrictions on the type of requests that can be made, based on cost and whether the requests are vexatious, or if the information is available elsewhere. In this case the raw station data is (and was) available elsewhere. The CRU never has been the gatekeeper to any of the raw station data. What they didn't do, and in hindsight they should have done, was keep records of the specific station data they used. It wasn't considered a priority because real scientists never ask for that anyway; they go to the Met offices directly or places like NCDC that have large collections of station data and then they do their own analyses. The CRU didn't imagine that scientific geniuses like Genghis would some day ask for that which could be gotten elsewhere. The CRU also had specific agreements with some agencies about the dissemination of the data to third parties; this resulted in their being unable to release about 5 or 10 percent of the station data when they set about reconstructing what they had done. Earlier this year, they finished this task and they have released all of the raw data of the stations they used, except for I believe two countries they couldn't get the permission from. You can still go to those countries and get all their data if you want to, you just can't get it from the CRU. What have the "skeptics" ever done with this data? Bupkis.

The vast majority of the stations used by the different groups are the same, because they look for stations that have long, stable records. That narrows things down some. The BEST group had a much wider criteria and subsequently used many times more stations than anybody else. What they gained in quantity they probably lost in quality however. The point is, everybody is selecting from the same large data set of stations, and that set isn't going to change because the observations are what they are. They can't be redone; it isn't an experiment. This isn't anything like the group claiming faster than light neutrinos; their data was crucial to replication because there would be no way to test it otherwise. With the temperature data, if you have access to the raw station data (all of it is in fact available), you can make your own analysis using either the methods from say the CRU or GISS, or you could use your own statistical methodology and selection criteria. This would be a much better test of their results.

Testing the results is the farthest thing from the minds of the "skeptics", however. They know the analyses done are on the up and up. The problem they have is with the results. They don't like 'em, and won't stop until they can either force the data to scream "cooling!" or they can sow enough doubt that the average Joe in the street thinks there's a big problem with the data. They know that their attacks are the equivalent of throwing their wrenches into the research machines; that's the point. Some people even think the entire subject should discontinued because the knowledge gained is dangerous. People on this forum. And people wonder why the climate scientists feel a little paranoid?

Testing the results is the farthest thing from the minds of the "skeptics", however. They know the analyses done are on the up and up.

Have to disagree with you on their knowing that the analyses are valid. I think that they have let their judgment be dominated by politics and they assume that everyone else is similar.

Testing the results is the farthest thing from the minds of the "skeptics", however. They know the analyses done are on the up and up.

Have to disagree with you on their knowing that the analyses are valid. I think that they have let their judgment be dominated by politics and they assume that everyone else is similar.

I'll grant you that for some of them (and especially for the rank and file posters to blogs). I don't think McIntyre really thinks there's a problem with the data, for example. His readers are a different story. They really do believe their is a big conspiracy to hide the data. For them I retract my point.

Testing the results is the farthest thing from the minds of the "skeptics", however. They know the analyses done are on the up and up.

Have to disagree with you on their knowing that the analyses are valid. I think that they have let their judgment be dominated by politics and they assume that everyone else is similar.

I'll grant you that for some of them (and especially for the rank and file posters to blogs). I don't think McIntyre really thinks there's a problem with the data, for example. His readers are a different story. They really do believe their is a big conspiracy to hide the data. For them I retract my point.

Those climate scientists such as Spencer and Lindzen that are striking sceptic poses are mostly defending odd theories. I suspect conceit. I think you underestimate the power of rationalization. I think the reaaly do believe it but arrived at their conclusions by dubious means.

The CRU had very limited resources to answer these questions. If requesters really wanted the data they should have offered to pay for the resources required to obtain it without disrupting the work of the CRU.

And of course the people at the CRU did not believe that the requests were made in good faith.

"Good faith" is absolutely, 100% irrelevant to the FOIA, as are "limited resources". Imagine a world where a President didn't deem it necessary to release anything at all to anyone remotely considered hostile, since they lack the requisite "good faith". Or perhaps they'd simply claim "limited resources" as the reason for dropping any pretense at transparency.

Anyway, if you don't want to play by The Man's rules, FOIA among them, the answer is simple - don't take The Man's money.

This was a deliberate misuse of FOI in order to harass. McIntyre and co actually followed the letter of the law while violating its intent. They organized a swarm of requests. Many of the requests were denied as not being things that the CRU was required to supply under the act.

The CRU's job is climate research. Time spent answering these requests was time not spent doing their job. I find your claiming resources are irrelevant to be very strange.

I find your advocacy for violations of the clear letter and intent of the law quite strange. Part and parcel of accepting government money is that one is subject to these sorts of requests, and therefore anyone with an ounce of sense - which apparently excludes the CRU - ought to devote some of that money to insuring that they are in compliance with the various regulations and laws that govern those who receive such largesse. I have no sympathy for a cavalier gang of cowboys who just jumped in and started winging it all without so much as a thought for the law.

Most of those making the requests seemed to have no intention of using the information to help their own or anyone else's understanding. They wanted it as a way to attack.

I do not have a high regard for ideologically motivated attacks on people's integrity wherever the ideology is. And if it is an ideology I am sympathetic to I am especially annoyed.

Do. Not. Care. It is not their position or their right to determine which FOIA requests they will deign to entertain, and which they will dismiss for lack of "good faith". The law does not make that distinction, and in attempting to do so yourself, you are effectively advocating and supporting lawbreakers. I've precious little doubt that you feel that the ends justify the means, given your sympathy for their ideology, but the law is clear, and it is not given to any of us, least of all the CRU, to determine which laws we will follow, and which we will disobey. Advocate for the law to be changed if you must, and good luck with that, in light of all this nonsense.