Climategate II

The data has not been collected to redesign the economy. It has been collected to understand the climate.

That may have not been the reason these folks entered the field of science. But that is what their jobs have become, that is why they receive their levels of funding, and why they have become international superstars of the rich and powerful. And more, the climategate e-mails show they KNOW they are in the catbird seat, and have been willing to bend and sometimes break laws to prevent questioning of their conclusions.

It is not simply people looking over the scientists shoulders. It is malicious people attacking their integrity ....

And their integrity has been shown wanting.

Those "malicious" people aren't doing what they do because of sheer evil. They, I believe correctly, view AGW as a key justification for oncoming abuse of the people at the hands of governments worldwide, and are seeking any way possible to stop it.

This is political warfare, and the scientists exposed by these e-mails are it's foot soldiers. They should thank the godz that they were born in a day when such foot soldiers were merely harassed and mocked in public, rather than had various limbs removed from their bodies by broadsword.

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.

The law (this is UK FOIA law, btw) does indeed make a distinction between reasonable requests and vexatious ones. It also makes an exemption for information that can be gotten readily somewhere else, like all of the raw station data for instance, which has always been available. It also provides an exemption for requests that will require more than a certain time frame to accomplish, unless the person asking is willing to pay for it. You seem to think that anything and everything that is done with any connection to public money is automatically covered under FOIA requests. They aren't.

I've precious little doubt that you feel that the ends justify the means, given your sympathy for their ideology,

It's the acceptance of the science, not sympathy for any ideology, that's the issue. Maybe you're thinking of your own rationalizations instead?

in light of all this nonsense.

The "climategate" crap is nonsense, especially the cavalier way "skeptics" have twisted them in an attempt to destroy the scientists involved. Take this one for example:

"There shouldn't be someone else at UEA with different views - at least not a climatologist."

That was supposed to be Jones not wanting different views at his university, except it had nothing at all to do with that. He was emailed by someone in the PR department at the UEA this:
(email 1788)

"Hello All,
Next Monday night the "Tonight with Trevor Macdonald" show will be about
climate change. Dr David Viner is going to be featured on the show,presenting his view that recent extreme weather is due to global warming. I have received a call from David Reddings who is part of the show's team, asking if we have a climate expert who has a different view to Dr Viner -perhaps believing that recent weather has not been caused by global warming but is merely part of the 'natural variability' of the weather. Do we have someone at UEA?
Regards,
Melissa.
Melissa Murphy
Communications Assistant
ress & PR Office
Communications Division
University of East Anglia"

He responded with this:

"Melissa,
There shouldn't be someone else at UEA with different views - at least not a climatologist. It would also look odd if the two people interviewed with opposite views were from UEA. Maybe you should reply and say we can't find one, saying that most climate experts would take the same view as Dave. The programme could easily dredge someone up, but they wouldn't be an expert on the climate. This is the whole point of the debate recently. The people the media find to put the contrary view are not climate experts.
Phil"

It had nothing at all to do about who should work at UEA or the CRU. He was being asked if there was someone at the UEA who could be a counter to Dr Viner on a TV show. He thought there wasn't.


Or this one from Phil Jones:
email 3062

"We don't really want the bullshit and optimistic stuff that Michael has written...We'll have to cut out some of his stuff"

Oh no, he wants only the pessimistic news about AGW, right? Uh, not quite...

"Hopefully by the end of next week, or early the week after we'll be sending out a draft of the Wengen paper. Keith, Tim and I are just finishing it off. We'd given up on you sending us something on low-resolution terrestrial proxies. This didn't matter, but a month ago we got sent a couple of pages (attached) on marine low-res proxies (from Michael Schulz who was at Wengen). In the next few days, can you write a couple of pages on terrestrial low-res proxies - varves mainly. We don't really want the bullshit and optimistic stuff that Michael has written that sounds as though it could have been written by a coral person 25 years ago. We'll have to cut out some of his stuff. What we want is good honest stuff, warts and all, dubious dating, interpretation marginally better etc."

He was saying the opposite of how it was quote-mined. He wanted "good honest stuff, warts and all, dubious dating, interpretation marginally better etc.", not stuff that was too optimistic about the uncertainty. How could the person/people who released the fragment of the email not have known this? Why did they make it look so different than what he actually said? Why did they cut his wanting good honest stuff?

There was one from Mann that was quoted as:

We certainly don't know the GLOBAL mean temperature anomaly very well, and nobody has ever claimed we do'

The full context makes it clear he was talking about paleoclimate data, not temperatures over the last century or so. Most of the paleo-reconstructions are for the NH, not globe. :
(email 0077)

"Hi Richard,
Thanks, that sounds reasonable. Let me respond to one point, though. I rebuked Cuffey for asking the wrong question.
I pointed out to him that we certainly don't know the GLOBAL mean temperature anomaly very well, and nobody has ever claimed we do (this is the question he asked everyone). There is very little information at all in the Southern Hemisphere on which to base any conclusion. So I told him that of course the answer to that question is *no* and it would be surprising if anyone answered otherwise. But, as I proceeded to point out, that's the wrong question. I pointed out that a far more sensible question is, "do we know the relative temperature anomaly for the NORTHERN HEMISPHERE to within that accuracy, and that we almost certainly do know that."

Oh, at the bottom is a real nice quote that wasn't widely disseminated (I wonder why? lol):

"So please let me know if that would be ok ... As noted above, I want to get the science right, and if you think appropriate, go ahead."

He wanted to get the science right. I'm shocked, shocked that the "skeptics" haven't been posting this scandalous passage all over the internet.

Most of the rest are like these. Take a snippet, delete the real context and insert the context you want people to think there, and pound chest in indignation at the duplicity of those bad, bad climate scientists. It's just a continuation of the creationist playbook. Apparently the playbook still, works, unfortunately.

Most of the rest are like these. Take a snippet, delete the real context and insert the context you want people to think there, and pound chest in indignation at the duplicity of those bad, bad climate scientists. It's just a continuation of the creationist playbook. Apparently the playbook still, works, unfortunately.

Well, yes. And not only do some here swallow it hook, line, and sinker, they actually cite Confirmation Bias™ as an "oh well" excuse against searching deeper.

Here's one that explains some of the CRU data stuff:
(email 1192)

> Phil and Ben--
Thanks for writing. I appreciate very much what you're saying.
I'm going to be posting some entries on this matter on the Climate Science Watch Web site. I'm sure others will weigh in on it in various venues (Steve Schneider has supplied me with an on-the-record quote), and I suppose that a more formal response by the relevant scientists is likely eventually to become part of the EPA docket as part of their rejection of the CEI petition. But that will drag on, and meanwhile CEI and Michaels will demagogue their allegations, as they do with everything. No way to prevent that. But I would like to expedite documenting some immediate pushback, helping to set the record straight and put what CEI and Michaels are up to in perspective.
I have taken the liberty of editing what you wrote just a bit (and adding some possible URL links and writing-out of acronyms), in the hope that, with your permission and with any revisions or additions you might care to make, we could post your comments. This requires no clearance other than you and me. I would draft appropriate text to provide context. Please take a look at this and RSVP:

Ben's comment:

As I see it, there are two key issues here.
First, the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) and Pat Michaels are arguing that Phil Jones and colleagues at the CRU [Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, UK ] willfully, intentionally, and suspiciously "destroyed" some of the raw surface temperature data used in the construction of the gridded surface temperature datasets.
Second, the CEI and Pat Michaels contend that the CRU surface temperature datasets provided the sole basis for IPCC "discernible human influence" conclusions.
Both of these arguments are incorrect. First, there was no intentional destruction of the primary source data. I am sure that, over 20 years ago, the CRU could not have foreseen that the raw station data might be the subject of legal proceedings by the CEI and Pat Michaels. Raw data were NOT secretly destroyed to avoid efforts by other scientists to replicate the CRU and Hadley Centre-based estimates of global-scale changes in near-surface temperature. In fact, a key point here is that other groups -- primarily at the NCDC [NOAA National Climatic Data Center] and at GISS [NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies], but also in Russia -- WERE able to replicate the major findings of the CRU and UK Hadley Centre groups. The NCDC and GISS groups performed this replication completely independently. They made different choices in the complex process of choosing input data, adjusting raw station data for known inhomogeneities (such as urbanization effects, changes in instrumentation, site location, and observation time), and gridding procedures. NCDC and GISS-based estimates of global surface temperature changes are in good accord with the HadCRUT data results.
The second argument -- that "discernible human influence" findings are like a house of cards, resting solely on one observational dataset -- is also invalid. The IPCC Third Assessment Report (TAR) considers MULTIPLE observational estimates of global-scale near-surface temperature changes. It does not rely on HadCRUT data alone - as is immediately obvious from Figure 2.1b of the TAR, which shows CRU, NCDC, and GISS global-mean temperature changes. As pointed out in numerous scientific assessments (e.g., the IPCC TAR and Fourth Assessment Reports, the U.S. Climate Change Science Program Synthesis and Assessment Report 1.1 (Temperature trends in the lower atmosphere: steps for understanding and reconciling differences), and the state of knowledge report, Global Climate Change Impacts on the United States, rigorous statistical fingerprint studies have now been performed with a whole range of climate variables -- and not with surface temperature only. Examples include variables like ocean heat content, atmospheric water vapor, surface specific humidity, continental river runoff, sea-level pressure patterns, stratospheric and tropospheric temperature, tropopause height, zonal-mean precipitation over land, and Arctic sea-ice extent. The bottom-line message from this body of work is that natural causes alone CANNOT plausibly explain the climate changes we have actually observed. The climate system is telling us an internally- and physically-consistent story. The integrity and reliability of this story does NOT rest on a single observational dataset, as Michaels and the CEI incorrectly claim.
I have known Phil for most of my scientific career. He is the antithesis of the secretive, "data destroying" character the CEI and Michaels are trying to portray to the outside world. Phil and Tom Wigley have devoted significant portions of their scientific careers to the construction of the land surface temperature omponent of the HadCRUT dataset. They have conducted this research in a very open and transparent manner -- examining sensitivities to different gridding algorithms, different ways of adjusting for urbanization effects, use of various subsets of data, different ways of dealing with changes in spatial coverage over time, etc. They have thoroughly and comprehensively documented all of their dataset construction choices. They have done a tremendous service to the scientific community --and to the planet -- by making gridded surface temperature datasets available for scientific research. They deserve medals -- not the kind of deliberately misleading treatment they are receiving from Pat Michaels and the CEI.

Phil's comment:

No one, it seems, cares to read what we put up on the CRU web page. These people just make up motives for what we might or might not have done.
http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/
http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/

Almost all the data we have in the CRU archive is exactly the same as n the GHCN archive [Global Historical Climatology Network, used by the NOAA National Climate Data Center].
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/ghc ... /index.php
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/res ... ngrid.html
If we have lost any data it is the following:
1. Station series for sites that in the 1980s we deemed then to be affected by either urban biases or by numerous site moves, that were either not correctable or not worth doing as there were other series in the region.
2. The original data for sites that we adjusted the temperature data [Phil: for known inhomogeneities, or what?] in the 1980s. We still have our adjusted data, of course, and these along with all other sites that didn't need adjusting.
3. Since the 1980s as colleagues and NMSs [National Meteorological Services] have produced adjusted series for regions and or countries, then we replaced the data we had with the better series.
http://www.wmo.int/pages/members/index_en.html
In the papers, I've always said that homogeneity adjustments are best produced by NMSs. A good example of this is the work by Lucie Vincent in Canada. Here we just replaced what data we had for the 200+ sites she sorted out.
The CRUTEM3 data for land look much like the GHCN and GISS [NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies] data for the same domains.
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/

Apart from a figure in the IPCC AR4 [Fourth Assessment Report, 2007] showing this, there is also this paper from Geophysical Research Letters in 2005 by Russ Vose et al. Figure 2 is similar to the AR4 plot. [Vose et al paper]

All best,
Rick

Rick Piltz
Director, Climate Science Watch

Phil Jones responded:

Rick,
What you've put together seems fine from a quick read. I'm in Lecce in the heal of Italy till Tuesday. I should be back in the UK by Wednesday. The original raw data are not lost either. I could reconstruct what we had from some DoE reports we published in the mid-1980s. I would start with the GHCN data. I know that the effort would be a complete wate of time though. I may get around to it some time. As you've said, the documentation of what we've done is all in the literature. I think if it hadn't been this issue, the CEI would have dreamt up something else!

Cheers
Phil

The data wasn't destroyed, and other people could (and did) test their analysis. Right now. all of the CRU data is out there - he did go through the work to reconstruct what had been done, and the "skeptics" are twiddling their thumbs, just as he expected. It was never really about the data after all.

Most of the rest are like these. Take a snippet, delete the real context and insert the context you want people to think there, and pound chest in indignation at the duplicity of those bad, bad climate scientists. It's just a continuation of the creationist playbook. Apparently the playbook still, works, unfortunately.

Well, yes. And not only do some here swallow it hook, line, and sinker, they actually cite Confirmation Bias™ as an "oh well" excuse against searching deeper.

The law (this is UK FOIA law, btw) does indeed make a distinction between reasonable requests and vexatious ones.

And who determined, in this particular case, that the request was vexatious? Name names, please. What, if any, were the grounds for such a determination?

I've precious little doubt that you feel that the ends justify the means, given your sympathy for their ideology,

It's the acceptance of the science, not sympathy for any ideology, that's the issue. Maybe you're thinking of your own rationalizations instead?

Expecting transparency from those feeding at the public trough. Oh, yes, such tangled logic I insist on employing

in light of all this nonsense.

The "climategate" crap is nonsense, especially the cavalier way "skeptics" have twisted them in an attempt to destroy the scientists involved. Take this one for example:

I'm sorry, but they abandoned the right to control the message when they decided to engage in something less than full disclosure. I'm sure that their emails are being horrendously misquoted and twisted by those who are opposed to them for whatever reason - no sarcasm, I really believe that. But on the other hand, that's the sort of thing that happens in these cases - it's never the crime that gets you, it's the coverup. cf. Watergate, Iran-Contra, Whitewater, Monica Lewinsky, et cetera. Even if there's no crime there, and I doubt that there was in this case, you are just begging to be painted as a conspirator when this sort of thing leaks out. Which it always, always does.

"And who determined, in this particular case, that the request was vexatious? Name names, please. What, if any, were the grounds for such a determination? "

Since they actually have the data now and have done jack-shit with it, I'd say that settles whether they were vexatious. Besides, the raw station data was available from other places all along; that in itself was reason enough to deny the requests as per the law.

"Expecting transparency from those feeding at the public trough. Oh, yes, such tangled logic I insist on employing..."

Expecting an anal exam from every idiot like Genghis who sends an FOIA is indeed tangled logic.

" I'm sorry, but they abandoned the right to control the message when they decided to engage in something less than full disclosure..."

"I've precious little doubt that you feel that the ends justify the means, given your sympathy for their ideology..."

It's not hypocrisy when I do it!

[
And their integrity has been shown wanting.

Those "malicious" people aren't doing what they do because of sheer evil. They, I believe correctly, view AGW as a key justification for oncoming abuse of the people at the hands of governments worldwide, and are seeking any way possible to stop it.

No it hasn't. It had been attacked by people unwilling to recognize integrity in those who disagree with them. People have been told that if they act on their unmodified ideological preferences the result will be disaster. Their response has been to look for ways to attack the credibility of those bringing the bad news. They would rather believe that the bad news bringers are corrupt that that their ideological opponents might be right on some things. There is a, not unprovoked, hatred of environmentalists that clouds their judgment.

I think evil is word that is better applied to actions than to motives. I think that what is happening is people identifying with political movements to a degree that interferes with their loyalties to their nation and their culture. They see the principles and values of their preferred political movement as being the complete values of their nation and society and don't see that the values that their opponents are supporting are also part of the whole society's values. You are never at greater danger of doing evil than when you think you are fighting evil.

And who determined, in this particular case, that the request was vexatious? Name names, please. What, if any, were the grounds for such a determination?

Since they actually have the data now and have done jack-shit with it, I'd say that settles whether they were vexatious. Besides, the raw station data was available from other places all along; that in itself was reason enough to deny the requests as per the law.

As others have pointed out, asking for any subsets of that data that formed their working material is certainly a legitimate request. And anyway, that's not what I asked - who made the determination, and on what grounds?

"Expecting transparency from those feeding at the public trough. Oh, yes, such tangled logic I insist on employing..."

Expecting an anal exam from every idiot like Genghis who sends an FOIA is indeed tangled logic.

There have been more than enough personal attacks - let us not also travel down that road, please. In any case, you declaring it vexatious is hardly relevant - did anyone in any position of authority at CRU do so, and on what grounds?

You are never at greater danger of doing evil than when you think you are fighting evil.

I don't think Churchill or Reagan ever said such drivel.

You are never at greater danger of doing evil than when you think you are fighting evil.

I don't think Churchill or Reagan ever said such drivel.

No, it's closer to Voltaire, who was brighter than both of them put together.

They lost their integrity within the scientific community some time ago and I don't see them doing a damn thing to try to get it back. Screw 'em all!

And, once again, conflating a person's views on the political abuse of the science with whatever "science" there may be is missing the point of the discussion.

Why don't we lock this thread too and come back in about 5 years?

You are never at greater danger of doing evil than when you think you are fighting evil.

I don't think Churchill or Reagan ever said such drivel.

No, it's closer to Voltaire, who was brighter than both of them put together.

Truthfully, sounds more Nietzsche than Voltaire. "Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."

Most of the rest are like these. Take a snippet, delete the real context and insert the context you want people to think there, and pound chest in indignation at the duplicity of those bad, bad climate scientists. It's just a continuation of the creationist playbook. Apparently the playbook still, works, unfortunately.

Well, yes. And not only do some here swallow it hook, line, and sinker, they actually cite Confirmation Bias™ as an "oh well" excuse against searching deeper.

LOL. Yeah. You're immune from normal human failures I know.

You are never at greater danger of doing evil than when you think you are fighting evil.

Good point. And it could be said that you are never at greater danger of suffering evil as you are at the hands of someone trying to "help" you.

And who determined, in this particular case, that the request was vexatious? Name names, please. What, if any, were the grounds for such a determination?

They had always responded to requests from other scientists who were going to use their data as well as they could. I doubt that there were many requests for the raw data from other scientists. The response would have been to point them towards where the original data was held in such cases, especially when they only had usage rather than distribution rights to the data. I know from my experience in other fields that that is how it is usually done.

From those emails that I've looked at it looks like they initially tried to be as cooperative as they could with McIntyre's requests but he never accepted any arguments for why he could not have exactly what he wanted. He always complained and asked for more even when it was pointed out that the data was available elsewhere. He was seen as a prima donna throwing tantrums. And then he organized a blizzard of FOI requests, done in a way that maximized their workload. As far as I can tell they had good reason to believe in his bad faith. They certainly did believe that the claims were vexatious.

I'm going by memory and it would take a while to dig up the quotes. I don't have the time right now.

We have one vote for locking the thread.

Do I hear a second?

Mod Coyote

We have one vote for locking the thread.

Do I hear a second?

Mod Coyote

It won't help.

The same discussion will just move to the next thread on the topic.

I find it fascinating that each side accuses the other of quote-mining and confirmation bias, and a lack of respect for honest researchers, while denigrating any and all attempts to criticize the methodology and procedures.

It's the Star Trek episode "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" all over again. "Are you blind as well as deaf?"

Yet still I hope to learn something from these threads.

For a moment, for just a moment, let us consider that "the other side" is correct in its assumptions. What should we do now?

I have not yet heard any credible refutation of the contention that the proposed national and international "solutions" will do anything more than coalesce more power in the hands of a few, while leaving the supposed threat unhindered.

I want a healthy planet with a thriving and joyous population. What procedures should be implemented to accomplish that?

And even before you answer, I will admit a bias that suggests to me that our energy policy should not be tilting at windmills.

When the other side starts advocating for realistic reform (like nuclear power) that doesn't include returning to the stone age or at the best the early 19th century for the vast majority of mankind, while a super elite maintain their status and power over the new peasant class they seek to create through political scare tactics then we might have a basis for discussion. Until then screw them.

Plus I am not convinced that warming, if it is occurring, isn't good or the planet and humans in general. So double screw them for ruining paradise planet in favor of a 19th century winter crap fest.

Is it too much to ask that the energy of the future not be powered by government subsidies?

Is it too much to ask that the energy of the future not be powered by government subsidies?

The liberal plan is to cut down the amount of energy available for use, forcing us into a 19th century lifestyle. Subsidizing power doesn't make much sense for that.

When the other side starts advocating for realistic reform (like nuclear power) that doesn't include returning to the stone age or at the best the early 19th century for the vast majority of mankind, while a super elite maintain their status and power over the new peasant class they seek to create through political scare tactics then we might have a basis for discussion. Until then screw them.

Plus I am not convinced that warming, if it is occurring, isn't good or the planet and humans in general. So double screw them for ruining paradise planet in favor of a 19th century winter crap fest.

You can't influence the debate in favour of nuclear power if you keep claiming that the dangers making it necessary are not real. And if there is a danger from AGW then it is real whether those pointing it out come up with good solutions or not. What you suggest plays into the hands of your opponents.

When the other side starts advocating for realistic reform (like nuclear power) that doesn't include returning to the stone age or at the best the early 19th century for the vast majority of mankind, while a super elite maintain their status and power over the new peasant class they seek to create through political scare tactics then we might have a basis for discussion. Until then screw them.

Plus I am not convinced that warming, if it is occurring, isn't good or the planet and humans in general. So double screw them for ruining paradise planet in favor of a 19th century winter crap fest.

You can't influence the debate in favour of nuclear power if you keep claiming that the dangers making it necessary are not real. And if there is a danger from AGW then it is real whether those pointing it out come up with good solutions or not. What you suggest plays into the hands of your opponents.

The main reason for nuclear power is that it takes pressure of nonrenewable sources. That it does not contribute to global warming is just one of many advantages. The greenpissers show their true agenda by protesting nuclear power as they stop oil drilling and wail about CO2 buildup. They betray their own side with their hypocrisy.

You can't influence the debate in favour of nuclear power if you keep claiming that the dangers making it necessary are not real.

Not true. Nuclear power is worth pursuing for economical and safety reasons alone. Nuclear power produces more power at lower cost with less radiation dispersal in the atmosphere than excavating, transporting, and burning coal.

And if there is a danger from AGW then it is real whether those pointing it out come up with good solutions or not.

But giving credence to an argument favoring a false solution also empowers those who would intentionally mislead. The truth test in this regard means that only true solutions can be accepted for true problems. False solutions to true problems are as useless as false solutions to false problems.

What you suggest plays into the hands of your opponents.

Not true. This attempt to silence criticism plays into the hands of the global control freaks. All attempts to force real solutions to existing economical, efficiency, and safety problems should be encouraged, whether they also solve potential or imagined problems or not.

You can't influence the debate in favour of nuclear power if you keep claiming that the dangers making it necessary are not real.

Not true. Nuclear power is worth pursuing for economical and safety reasons alone. Nuclear power produces more power at lower cost with less radiation dispersal in the atmosphere than excavating, transporting, and burning coal.

Agreed but it has not been enough to overcome fixation on the rare serious accident, worries about waste storage and concern about nuclear weapons proliferation. If you say its opponents assessment of comparative risk is bad I will concur. The problems that they are concerned about are real and cannot be waved away. You have to get them to see them in proportion to the alternatives. Getting them to see it as part of the solution to major problems is the only way I know that is likely to get them to seriously look again at the options for energy supply. And you cannot do that if you don't take the environmental danger of continuing as we are seriously.