Job openings for climate scientists?

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Are there any climate scientists out there who need a job? It looks like quite a few openings will be occurring very shortly. There's a huge scandal brewing.

Climategate: the final nail in the coffin of 'Anthropogenic Global Warming'?

(Telegraph - Nov. 20)

From the article:

If you own any shares in alternative energy companies I should start dumping them NOW. The conspiracy behind the Anthropogenic Global Warming myth (aka AGW; aka ManBearPig) has been suddenly, brutally and quite deliciously exposed after a hacker broke into the computers at the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit (aka Hadley CRU) and released 61 megabites of confidential files onto the internet. (Hat tip: Watts Up With That)

When you read some of those files – including 1079 emails and 72 documents – you realise just why the boffins at Hadley CRU might have preferred to keep them confidential. As Andrew Bolt puts it, this scandal could well be “the greatest in modern science”.

EDITORIAL: Hiding evidence of global cooling

(Washington Times - Nov. 24)

From the article:

It was announced Thursday afternoon that computer hackers had obtained 160 megabytes of e-mails from the Climate Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia (UEA) in England. Those e-mails involved communication among many scientific researchers and policy advocates with similar ideological positions all across the world. Those purported authorities were brazenly discussing the destruction and hiding of data that did not support global-warming claims.

. . .

Repeatedly throughout the e-mails that have been made public, proponents of global-warming theories refer to data that has been hidden or destroyed.

. . .

We don't condone e-mail theft by hackers, though these e-mails were covered by Britain's Freedom of Information Act and should have been released. The content of these e-mails raises extremely serious questions that could end the academic careers of many prominent professors. Academics who have purposely hidden data, destroyed information and doctored their results have committed scientific fraud. We can only hope respected academic institutions such as Pennsylvania State University, the University of Arizona and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst conduct proper investigative inquiries.

There's three places to submit resumes right in that last sentence.

I have a feeling this one's going to get really nasty.

Michael

[kalch]

ive been lurking but not posting.

The global warming conspiracy is, a bit of a hardline, radical view of what's going on today.

I'll just put out there that environmental and atmospheric chemistry is really not up for debate. A chemical reaction is a chemical reaction.

The issues at hand today and the lack of environmental damage seen today is zero, pretty much.

I look at the global warming fear mongering, like telling a 13 year old kid not to eat mcdonalds everyday cuz he's gonna die at 70 instead of 90 of a heart attack of heart disease.

We are in the infancy of the impact on the environment of the industrialization of the world, and the impact won't be seen for many many many thousands or millions of years, but we have to stop eating the cheeseburgers and fries today and make that timeline even longer...

Garbage is conveniently disposed of from your curb without understanding of the chemistry involved in breaking it down. Same with industrial and other waste.

A high school chemistry experiment of titrating pH or buffering an acid shows that even solutions with a high ability to be buffered have a point of no return. The atmosphere, comprised of essential gasses is exactly the same as a beaker full of acid or base or another solution that can be buffered with it's available ions.

If someone can provide me with the chemistry outlining a buffering sink that is endless in equalibrium, im all ears.

For the love of god, will someone please think of our great great great great great great great grandkids?

[Selene]

ive been lurking but not posting.

The global warming conspiracy is, a bit of a hardline, radical view of what's going on today.

I'll just put out there that environmental and atmospheric chemistry is really not up for debate. A chemical reaction is a chemical reaction.

The issues at hand today and the lack of environmental damage seen today is zero, pretty much.

I look at the global warming fear mongering, like telling a 13 year old kid not to eat mcdonalds everyday cuz he's gonna die at 70 instead of 90 of a heart attack of heart disease.

We are in the infancy of the impact on the environment of the industrialization of the world, and the impact won't be seen for many many many thousands or millions of years, but we have to stop eating the cheeseburgers and fries today and make that timeline even longer...

Garbage is conveniently disposed of from your curb without understanding of the chemistry involved in breaking it down. Same with industrial and other waste.

A high school chemistry experiment of titrating pH or buffering an acid shows that even solutions with a high ability to be buffered have a point of no return. The atmosphere, comprised of essential gasses is exactly the same as a beaker full of acid or base or another solution that can be buffered with it's available ions.

If someone can provide me with the chemistry outlining a buffering sink that is endless in equalibrium, im all ears.

For the love of god, will someone please think of our great great great great great great great grandkids?

Watson:

As I remember, you were favorable to objectivism, but were a secular Jew and thought there was a whiff of religion with the big "O" jectivists and now in the face of the largest fraud perpetrated since the earth is flat psychos, you want us to treat this incredible living breathing planet like a self contained test tube?

OK. Explain to me how the intrusion of a massive statist system based on fraudulent data will effect that 8 generations or 240 years from now when the calendar hits 2249.

Adam

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I got this off of Drudge this morning. But I just remembered a long thread over on SOLOP (which I rarely look at) where a poster, Marcus, keeps up a running series of posts. They are usually news stories about global warming, but there are sometimes comments by others.

I just looked and saw that they have been having a field day over this hacker thing for a few days now. So it's a good source if anyone wants to read up on it.

Here is a link to one of the more recent posts by Marcus (called "Climate change scientists face calls for public inquiry" and dated Nov. 24, 2009). You can go before and after, depending on how interested you are. I am linking to a specific post instead of the entire thread as a reference mark so folks will be able to find it later when the present posts have disappeared into the ether of forum-land.

Michael

[Dragonfly]

Here is a link to one of the more recent posts by Marcus (called "Climate change scientists face calls for public inquiry" and dated Nov. 24, 2009). You can go before and after, depending on how interested you are. I am linking to a specific post instead of the entire thread as a reference mark so folks will be able to find it later when the present posts have disappeared into the ether of forum-land.

The curious thing is that when I click on links to posts on SOLO I always get the begin of the thread, never a particular post. For some reason those links don't work here (no such problem with other forums).

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Watson,

Hi.

This isn't either-or. I can't think of anyone who is in favor of destroying the planet or the human species. I think it is wrong to paint opponents of junk science as unconcerned with human welfare or totally indifferent to the long-term planetary effects of industrialization.

People don't have to swallow lies to be truly concerned.

The real issue for people like me is galloping government control, corruption, and using junk science as an excuse to destroy good things.

The best way to deal with long-term results is with study and education. The worst way is to allow some government bureaucrat make scientific forecasts and pass sweeping laws that shackle everything—good, bad and indifferent.

If we must make restrictive laws to avert long-term destructive effects (and I do not deny that some may exist from industrialization), I say they should be based on facts, thorough studies, and nothing more. Obviously the real aim will be to protect the rights of all individuals, both born and our unborn generations.

In other words, laws don't save or destroy the planet nor should they. They don't even make a hamburger. Laws deal with human rights.

People truly interested in long-term results should get out of the law business and do a hell of a lot more in the education business, starting with cleaning up the junk science many of them are teaching and preaching.

Michael

[Selene]

Settled Science?

<h2 class="subhead">Computer hackers reveal corruption behind the global-warming "consensus."</h2>By JAMES TARANTO<h3 class="byline"> </h3>"Officials at the University of East Anglia confirmed in a statement on Friday that files had been stolen from a university server and that the police had been brought in to investigate the breach," the New York Times reports. "They added, however, that they could not confirm that all the material circulating on the Internet was authentic." But some scientists have confirmed that their emails were quoted accurately.

The files--which can be downloaded here--surely have not been fully plumbed. The ZIP archive weighs in at just under 62 megabytes, or more than 157 MB when uncompressed. But bits that have already been analyzed, as the Washington Post reports, "reveal an intellectual circle that appears to feel very much under attack, and eager to punish its enemies":

In one e-mail, the center's director, Phil Jones, writes Pennsylvania State University's Michael E. Mann and questions whether the work of academics that question the link between human activities and global warming deserve to make it into the prestigious IPCC report, which represents the global consensus view on climate science.

"I can't see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report," Jones writes. "Kevin and I will keep them out somehow--even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!"

In another, Jones and Mann discuss how they can pressure an academic journal not to accept the work of climate skeptics with whom they disagree. "Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal," Mann writes. . . .

Mann, who directs Penn State's Earth System Science Center, said the e-mails reflected the sort of "vigorous debate" researchers engage in before reaching scientific conclusions. "We shouldn't expect the sort of refined statements that scientists make when they're speaking in public," he said.

This is downright Orwellian. What the Post describes is not a vigorous debate but an attempt to suppress debate--to politicize the process of scientific inquiry so that it yields a predetermined result. This does not, in itself, prove the global warmists wrong. But it raises a glaring question: If they have the facts on their side, why do they need to resort to tactics of suppression and intimidation?

It is hard to see how this is anything less than a definitive refutation of the popular press's contention that global warmism is settled science--a contention that both the Times and the Post repeat in their articles on the revelations: "The evidence pointing to a growing human contribution to global warming is so widely accepted that the hacked material is unlikely to erode the overall argument," the Times claims. The Post leads its story by observing that "few U.S. politicians bother to question whether humans are changing the world's climate," and that "nearly three years ago the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded the evidence was unequivocal." (As blogger Tom Maguire notes, this actually overstates even the IPCC's conclusions.)

The press's view on global warming rests on an appeal to authority: the consensus among scientists that it is real, dangerous and man-caused. But the authority of scientists rests on the integrity of the scientific process, and a "consensus" based on the suppression of alternative hypotheses is, quite simply, a fraudulent one."

Has anyone found the Nobel Peace Prize Oscar winner?

Adam

[Alfonso Jones]

In one e-mail, the center's director, Phil Jones, writes Pennsylvania State University's Michael E. Mann and questions whether the work of academics that question the link between human activities and global warming deserve to make it into the prestigious IPCC report, which represents the global consensus view on climate science.

"I can't see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report," Jones writes. "Kevin and I will keep them out somehow--even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!"

In another, Jones and Mann discuss how they can pressure an academic journal not to accept the work of climate skeptics with whom they disagree. "Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal," Mann writes. . . .

Mann, who directs Penn State's Earth System Science Center, said the e-mails reflected the sort of "vigorous debate" researchers engage in before reaching scientific conclusions. "We shouldn't expect the sort of refined statements that scientists make when they're speaking in public," he said.

This is downright Orwellian. What the Post describes is not a vigorous debate but an attempt to suppress debate--to politicize the process of scientific inquiry so that it yields a predetermined result. This does not, in itself, prove the global warmists wrong. But it raises a glaring question: If they have the facts on their side, why do they need to resort to tactics of suppression and intimidation?

Pretty disgraceful stuff, from academic scientists. Critics castigate Rand for being "too much of a moralist." Look at this example of behaviors - and watch well the public reaction to the behaviors. Let's see if the public raises an outcry, and increases the speed of their turning away from accepting the global warming hypothesis as established science.

Bill P

[Robert Campbell]

There have been some informative posts about the massive leak of CRU material over at Watts Up with That:

http://wattsupwiththat.com/

Although no one besides the person or persons who publicly released the material knows for sure, a plausible hypothesis is that this big package of emails and programs was prepared in case the CRU was going to be required to turn it over under British Freedom of Information laws. They weren't—at least not on this occasion—but a whistleblower with access to the package could easily have made it available elsewhere.

According to Declan McCullagh

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/11/24/taking_liberties/entry5761180.shtml?tag=contentMain;contentBody

some of the most damning content consists of comments in programs to analyze climate data, and complaints from a programmer.

These make it appear that constant finagling was going on.

Robert Campbell

[Selene]

Bob:

In one of the e-mails that I heard about, a top line scientist at the English facility was thankful that few in England new about the F.O.I.L. [Freedom of Information Law], but if they ever find out, "Il am preparing to hide behind the British Protected Document Act."

Looks like it is going to get a lot worse.

If some clever, enterprising Federal or State prosecutor decides to go after them with the R.I.C.O. Federal or State law and make a national name for himself...it might stick from what I am seeing.

Adam

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Robert,

From my underworld days, I witnessed a kind of different reason for centralizing stuff like that. You make 1 file and 1 file only, and ask that everyone else get rid of their copies. Then if things get hot, you only have one thing to dispose of.

Quick and easy.

The downside, of course, is when something like that falls into the wrong hands.

There's even another possibility I find plausible. A serious attack of dumbassedness.

These dudes are no strangers to the arrogance that blinds...

Michael

[Selene]

Guys:

This is an excellent tactic.

"Climate Gate" Development: CEI Files Notice of Intent to Sue NASA

By Chris Horner on 11.24.09 @ 9:46AM

"Today, on behalf of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, I filed three Notices of Intent to File Suit against NASA and its Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), for those bodies' refusal - for nearly three years - to provide documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act.

The information sought is directly relevant to the exploding "ClimateGate" scandal revealing document destruction, coordinated efforts in the U.S. and UK to avoid complying with both countries' freedom of information laws, and apparent and widespread intent to defraud at the highest levels of international climate science bodies. Numerous informed commenters had alleged such behavior for years, all of which appears to be affirmed by leaked emails, computer codes and other data from the Climatic Research Unit of the UK's East Anglia University.

All of that material and that sought for years by CEI go to the heart of the scientific claims and campaign underpinning the Kyoto Protocol, its planned successor treaty, "cap-and-trade" legislation and the EPA's threatened regulatory campaign to impose similar measures through the back door.

CEI sought the following documents, among others, NASA's failure to provide which within thirty days will prompt CEI to file suit in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia:

- internal discussions about NASA's quiet correction of its false historical U.S. temperature records after two Canadian researchers discovered a key statistical error, specifically discussion about whether and why to correct certain records, how to do so, the impact or wisdom or potential (or real) fallout therefrom or reaction to doing so (requested August 2007);

- internal discussions relating to the emails sent to James Hansen and/or Reto A. Ruedy from Canadian statistician Steve McIntyre calling their attention to the errors in NASA/GISS online temperature data (August 2007);

- those relating to the content, importance or propriety of workday-hour posts or entries by GISS/NASA employee Gavin A. Schmidt on the weblog or "blog" RealClimate, which is owned by the advocacy Environmental Media Services and was started as an effort to defend the debunked "Hockey Stick" that is so central to the CRU files. RealClimate.org is implicated in the leaked files, expressly offered as a tool to be used "in any way you think would be helpful" to a certain advocacy campaign, including an assertion of Schmidt's active involvement in, e.g., delaying and/or screening out unhelpful input by "skeptics" attempting to comment on claims made on the website.

This and the related political activism engaged in are inappropriate behavior for a taxpayer-funded employee, particularly on taxpayer time. These documents were requested in January 2007 and NASA/GISS have refused to date to comply with their legal obligation to produce responsive documents."

If any of these suits gets to discovery - a whole lot of these pricks are going to have to make some real nice plea deals and turn over where the money came from. And quite a few should be going to Federal Prison.

See global warming will create jobs in prison towns and villages all across the freezing plains...

Adam

[Dragonfly]

In one of the e-mails that I heard about, a top line scientist at the English facility was thankful that few in England new about the F.O.I.L. [Freedom of Information Law], but if they ever find out, "Il am preparing to hide behind the British Protected Document Act."

Few in England new? Is Il new?

[Selene]

OK...so when do we approach Ron Paul to institute impeachment?

November 25, 2009, 9:38 am <h3 class="entry-title">Obama Will Go to Copenhagen</h3> By JOHN M. BRODER AND JEFF ZELENY President Obama will travel to Copenhagen next month for the United Nations meeting on climate change, a White House official confirmed Wednesday.

Mr. Obama, who had previously not committed to making an appearance at the summit, will deliver a speech on Dec. 9 en route to Oslo, Norway, where he will accept the Nobel Peace Prize on Dec. 10.

Mr. Obama had been under considerable pressure from other world leaders and environmental advocates to make the trip as a statement of American commitment to the climate change negotiations. The talks, involving more than 190 nations, are expected to produce a wide-ranging interim political declaration but stop short of proposing a binding international treaty.

Delegates are expected to commit to completing the treaty next year.

Mr. Obama has said recently that he would attend the session if his presence could help lead to a successful outcome. It is significant that he will appear at the beginning rather than at the end of the 12-day meeting. Most major decisions at such environmental forums come at the very end of the process.

Mr. Obama will tell the delegates to the climate conference that the United States intends to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions “in the range of 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020,” according to a White House official.

The administration has resisted until now delivering a firm pledge on emissions reductions because Congress has not yet acted on global warming legislation. But officials said earlier this week that Mr. Obama was now prepared to offer a tentative figure based on the work completed in Congress so far.

In June, the House passed a bill calling for greenhouse gas reductions of 17 percent below 2005 levels. Last month, a Senate committee passed a measure calling for a 20 percent cut, but that is expected to be weakened as the legislation moves through other Senate committees and onto the floor, perhaps next spring.

Keya Chatterjee, director the World Wildlife Fund’s climate program, said Mr. Obama’s decision was welcome, but may not be enough to affect the outcome of the talks.

“We are pleased that President Obama will be in Copenhagen during the early part of the climate summit. It’s important that his words during this important moment convey that the United States intends to make climate change a legislative priority, not simply a rhetorical one,” Ms. Chatterjee said.

She added that if the talks appear to be bogged down, “we hope the president will be willing to return to Copenhagen with the rest of the world’s leaders during the final stages of the negotiations.”

[Selene]

<h1 class="tb22" style="margin: 0px;">'You've Taken the Words Out of My Mouth' </h1> "Peer review," scientific corruption and the New York Times. By JAMES TARANTO

(Editor's note: We plan to take off the Friday after Thanksgiving. See you next week.)

The massive University of East Anglia global-warmist archives are now searchable at>>>>>>> this site, and one particular email demonstrates the nexus between the scientific shenanigans and the popular press, on which most people rely for their information on global warming. This email, dated Sept. 29, 2009, is from Michael Mann of the University of Pennsylvania to New York Times warm correspondent Andrew Revkin. The crucial exchange begins with this question from Revkin (quoting verbatim):

I'm going to blog on this as it relates to the value of the peer review process and not on the merits of the mcintyre et al attacks.

peer review, for all its imperfections, is where the herky-jerky process of knowledge building happens, would you agree?

And here is Mann's response:

Re, your point at the end--you've taken the words out of my mouth. Skepticism is essential for the functioning of science. It yields an erratic path towards eventual truth. But legitimate scientific skepticism is exercised through formal scientific circles, in particular the peer review process. A necessary though not in general sufficient condition for taking a scientific criticism seriously is that it has passed through the legitimate scientific peer review process. those such as McIntyre who operate almost entirely outside of this system are not to be trusted.

In principle, Revkin and Mann are quite right. But as we noted Monday, one of the most damning findings in the archives concerns the corruption of the peer-review process.

In one email, under the subject line "HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL," Phil Jones of East Anglia writes to Mann: "I can't see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow--even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!"

In another, Mann--discussing a journal that has published a paper by skeptical scientists, puts forward a plan for such a redefinition:

This was the danger of always criticising the skeptics for not publishing in the "peer-reviewed literature". Obviously, they found a solution to that--take over a journal! So what do we do about this? I think we have to stop considering "Climate Research" as a legitimate peer-reviewed journal. Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal. We would also need to consider what we tell or request of our more reasonable colleagues who currently sit on the editorial board...

The scare quotes around "peer-reviewed literature" are Mann's. And it hardly needs to be said that peer review is a sham if papers that present alternative hypotheses are not even allowed into the process.

So how does Revkin, who two months ago took the words out of Mann's mouth, deal with this problem? Barely at all. In a Sunday amendment to a Friday blog post, he mentions it and quickly changes the subject:

[

UPDATE, 11/22:

Juliet Eilperin of the Washington Post explores some email

exchanges criticizing certain peer-reviewed papers and journals

and focused on excluding the papers from inclusion in the Intergovernmental Panel On Climate Change report. I'm running down tips and assertions related to the theft and hackings. It remains interesting that before they were placed on an ftp site and dispersed across the Internet, someone tried to plant them on

Realclimate.org

and publish a mock post linking to them. Needless to say, if anyone has information or ideas, feel free to email dotearth AT

nytimes.com

.]

Yesterday, he had another post, titled "Report Aims to Clarify Climate Risk for Diplomats." Here's how it begins:

A team of climate scientists, seeking to remind the negotiators who will hammer out a new climate treaty of what is at stake, has produced

The Copenhagen Diagnosis

, a summary of the latest peer-reviewed science on the anticipated impacts of human-driven global warming.

Revkin reports that the "latest peer-reviewed science" shows that "the case for climate change as a serious risk to human affairs" is "clear, despite recent firestorms over some data sets and scientists' actions."

What we now know about the "peer review" process in this field indicates that this is a predetermined conclusion. Revkin misleads his readers by describing it as if it were a real finding.

The Litigation Begins

Yesterday "the Competitive Enterprise Institute filed three Notices of Intent to File Suit against NASA and its Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), for those bodies' refusal--for nearly three years--to provide documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act," CEI fellow Christopher Horner announces at Pajamas Media:

The information sought is directly relevant to the exploding "Climategate" scandal revealing document destruction, coordinated efforts in the U.S. and UK to avoid complying with both countries' freedom of information laws, and apparent and widespread intent to defraud at the highest levels of international climate science bodies. Numerous informed commenters had alleged such behavior for years, all of which appears to be affirmed by leaked emails, computer code, and other data from the Climatic Research Unit of the UK's East Anglia University.

All of that material, and that sought for years by CEI, goes to the heart of the scientific claims and campaign underpinning the Kyoto Protocol, its planned successor treaty, "cap-and-trade" legislation, and the EPA's threatened regulatory campaign to impose similar measures through the back door.

A lawyer writes us that "'the purloined 'global warming emails' suggest several lines of legal inquiry":

Tortious interference.

For researchers and academicians, publication in peer-reviewed journals is important to advancement, raises, grant funding, etc. Wrongful interference with the ability to publish has monetary and reputational damages. If that interference is based not on editorial judgment of worthiness for publication, but rather on protecting reputations, scientific positions, political goals or "places in history" (as mentioned in one email), then it could give rise to liability in tort for the individual scientist and possibly for the university or organization for which he works.

Breach of faculty ethics standards or contracts.

Most universities and research organizations have ethics clauses in their faculty/employee manuals and in their contracts with faculty/researchers. If (as suggested by the purloined emails) these individuals cooked data or manipulated assumptions to achieve preferred outcomes, or denied others access to data essential for replication of result that is essential to the scientific method, they could have violated university or organizational ethics standards.

State-chartered universities.

Some of these individuals appear to work for state-chartered and state-funded institutions, and might well be classified as state employees (and thereby eligible for generous state benefits). The conduct suggested by the purloined emails might violate state ethics or funding policies. State governments and legislatures therefore might have a basis for inquiry and oversight.

Federal grants.

Federal grants typically have ethics/integrity clauses to assure that the research funded by the grant is credible and reliable (and to assure that the agency can avoid accountability if it isn't). As noted, the purloined emails suggest that data might have been cooked and assumptions might have been manipulated to generate a predetermined outcome. If true, and if the work in question was funded by federal grant, the researchers in question might well have violated their federal grant contracts--for which there are legal consequences. Inspectors general of the grant agencies should be in position to make inquiry if the data/assumptions in question could be linked in time and topic to a contemporaneous federal grant to the researchers in question.

This promises be a boon for comedians as well as lawyers. Here's our first effort:

Q: How many climate scientists does it take to change a light bulb?

A: None. There's a consensus that it's going to change, so they've decided to keep us in the dark.

We Blame Global Warming

• "Thousands of Bees Due to Die on Cold Idaho Highway"--headline, Associated Press, Nov. 24

• "How Electronic Hamsters Became the Hottest Toy This Holiday Season"--headline, AdAge.com, Nov. 24

[jeffrey smith]

There is apparently one other aspect that may turn out to be even more important

http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/archives/2009/11/the_real_problem_with_the_clim.php

The emails seem to describe a model which frequently breaks, and being constantly "tweaked" with manual interventions of dubious quality in order to make them fit the historical data. These stories suggest that the model, and the past manual interventions, are so poorly documented that CRU cannot now replicate its own past findings.

That is a big problem. The IPCC report, which is the most widely relied upon in policy circles, uses this model to estimate the costs of global warming. If those costs are unreliable, then any cost-benefit analysis is totally worthless.

The source she links to is this article

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/11/24/taking_liberties/entry5761180.shtml

[Steve Gagne]

Q: How many climate scientists does it take to change a light bulb?

A: None. There's a consensus that it's going to change, so they've decided to keep us in the dark.

It's about time someone recognized where this topic belongs....

[Selene]

Video: Al Gore Sued for Global Warming Lies by 30,000 scientists and Weather Channel Founder

Posted: 25 Nov 2009 09:38 AM PST

In the video, John Coleman, founder of the weather channel says he and 30,000 other scientists can't get on the air to debunk the hoax of global warming. Apparently,Al Gore won't have a debate because "it's settled science and the debate is over," so Colemanand the other scientists are suing Gore to settle the issue.

Coleman's arguments seems to have been given a boost in light of Climategate - the release of 160 megabytes of e-mails from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in England:

Related: "Climategate" -- Forget the Emails: What Will the Hacked Documents Tell Us?

[Selene]

Interesting:

"Given his importance to the climate movement and all those involved including Nobel Laureate Al Gore, President Obama, and Congressional Democrats desperately trying to enact cap and trade legislation, it will be very interesting to see how this press release from Penn State gets reported in the coming days (h/t Anthony Watts via Marc Morano):

Adam

[Charles R. Anderson]

I have written about what I think is one of the most important things learned from the CRU data dump on my blog. The post is called:

Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming Evidence Was Not Even Evidence

The link is: http://objectivistindividualist.blogspot.com/2009/11/catastrophic-anthropogenic-global.html

[Selene]

I have written about what I think is one of the most important things learned from the CRU data dump on my blog. The post is called:

Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming Evidence Was Not Even Evidence

The link is: http://objectivistin...nic-global.html

Charles, very nicely argued.

It just seems to be getting precipitously worse for this little marxist coven in the green movement. Seems like the green illuminati just get rid of any date that gets uncomfortable.

From The Sunday Times November 29, 2009 <h1 class="heading">Climate change data dumped</h1> Jonathan Leake, Environment Editor SCIENTISTS at the University of East Anglia (UEA) have admitted throwing away much of the raw temperature data on which their predictions of global warming are based.

It means that other academics are not able to check basic calculations said to show a long-term rise in temperature over the past 150 years.

The UEA’s Climatic Research Unit (CRU) was forced to reveal the loss following requests for the data under Freedom of Information legislation.

The data were gathered from weather stations around the world and then adjusted to take account of variables in the way they were collected. The revised figures were kept, but the originals — stored on paper and magnetic tape — were dumped to save space when the CRU moved to a new building.

The admission follows the leaking of a thousand private emails sent and received by Professor Phil Jones, the CRU’s director. In them he discusses thwarting climate sceptics seeking access to such data.

In a statement on its website, the CRU said: “We do not hold the original raw data but only the value-added (quality controlled and homogenised) data.”

The CRU is the world’s leading centre for reconstructing past climate and temperatures. Climate change sceptics have long been keen to examine exactly how its data were compiled. That is now impossible.

Roger Pielke, professor of environmental studies at Colorado University, discovered data had been lost when he asked for original records. “The CRU is basically saying, ‘Trust us’. So much for settling questions and resolving debates with science,” he said.

Jones was not in charge of the CRU when the data were thrown away in the 1980s, a time when climate change was seen as a less pressing issue. The lost material was used to build the databases that have been his life’s work, showing how the world has warmed by 0.8C over the past 157 years.

He and his colleagues say this temperature rise is “unequivocally” linked to greenhouse gas emissions generated by humans. Their findings are one of the main pieces of evidence used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which says global warming is a threat to humanity.

Stunning coincidence, which, as the Sanskrit translation explains [coincidence] "....when traced back far enough becomes inevitable."

http://www.offa.org.uk/agreements/H-0117%20University%20of%20East%20Anglia%20Oct%2005.pdf

Looks like their budget is over 3 million pounds per year, but I am not sure.

Adam

[Christopher]

This is really sad news. It is disheartening to hear of fraud and dishonesty at such high levels in our society today.

I am a strong believer in massive transparency. Transparency is the only way that institutional bodies such as governments or gov agencies can be regulated. The Founding Fathers wrote about this as well. It is also the reason I trust no governments that are not transparent, and why I continue to have massive reservations of the actions by the Bush administration and the multiple timespans of deleted White House emails when Cheney was being investigated.

Never trust what anyone says, no matter how good it sounds, until you have the ability to judge their credibility. Judging credibility is, of course, a function of transparency.

[9thdoctor]

This is really sad news. It is disheartening to hear of fraud and dishonesty at such high levels in our society today.

I am a strong believer in massive transparency. Transparency is the only way that institutional bodies such as governments or gov agencies can be regulated. The Founding Fathers wrote about this as well. It is also the reason I trust no governments that are not transparent, and why I continue to have massive reservations of the actions by the Bush administration and the multiple timespans of deleted White House emails when Cheney was being investigated.

Never trust what anyone says, no matter how good it sounds, until you have the ability to judge their credibility. Judging credibility is, of course, a function of transparency.

Can't resist sharing this classic here:

<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSL4ZpSk9Cc&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param'>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSL4ZpSk9Cc&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSL4ZpSk9Cc&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>

[Christopher]

That is a funny video. Good share

[Charles R. Anderson]

I have written about what I think is one of the most important things learned from the CRU data dump on my blog. The post is called:

Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming Evidence Was Not Even Evidence

The link is: http://objectivistin...nic-global.html

Charles, very nicely argued.

It just seems to be getting precipitously worse for this little marxist coven in the green movement. Seems like the green illuminati just get rid of any date that gets uncomfortable.

From The Sunday Times November 29, 2009 <h1 class="heading">Climate change data dumped</h1> Jonathan Leake, Environment Editor SCIENTISTS at the University of East Anglia (UEA) have admitted throwing away much of the raw temperature data on which their predictions of global warming are based.

It means that other academics are not able to check basic calculations said to show a long-term rise in temperature over the past 150 years.

The UEA’s Climatic Research Unit (CRU) was forced to reveal the loss following requests for the data under Freedom of Information legislation.

The data were gathered from weather stations around the world and then adjusted to take account of variables in the way they were collected. The revised figures were kept, but the originals — stored on paper and magnetic tape — were dumped to save space when the CRU moved to a new building.

The admission follows the leaking of a thousand private emails sent and received by Professor Phil Jones, the CRU’s director. In them he discusses thwarting climate sceptics seeking access to such data.

In a statement on its website, the CRU said: “We do not hold the original raw data but only the value-added (quality controlled and homogenised) data.”

The CRU is the world’s leading centre for reconstructing past climate and temperatures. Climate change sceptics have long been keen to examine exactly how its data were compiled. That is now impossible.

Roger Pielke, professor of environmental studies at Colorado University, discovered data had been lost when he asked for original records. “The CRU is basically saying, ‘Trust us’. So much for settling questions and resolving debates with science,” he said.

Jones was not in charge of the CRU when the data were thrown away in the 1980s, a time when climate change was seen as a less pressing issue. The lost material was used to build the databases that have been his life’s work, showing how the world has warmed by 0.8C over the past 157 years.

He and his colleagues say this temperature rise is “unequivocally” linked to greenhouse gas emissions generated by humans. Their findings are one of the main pieces of evidence used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which says global warming is a threat to humanity.

Stunning coincidence, which, as the Sanskrit translation explains [coincidence] "....when traced back far enough becomes inevitable."

http://www.offa.org.uk/agreements/H-0117%20University%20of%20East%20Anglia%20Oct%2005.pdf

Looks like their budget is over 3 million pounds per year, but I am not sure.

Adam

Thanks Adam.

Not only has the CRU not retained the raw data, but while they made negative land surface temperature corrections in the 1960s and early 1970s to the data, they made mostly positive corrections thereafter, as was the case with the NASA GISS data. This has the effect of lowering the start temperature and raising the later temperatures in the late 20th Century, setting up a "record" rate of temperature rise. It is strange that the main changes in the record of the land surface changes are positive when urban expansion continued with its positive local heat island warming effects. What is more, after 1990, many weather stations in Russia and the US were abandoned, mostly in more remote areas, where the readings were less affected by heat island effects. So, the CRU and GISS land surface temperature record in the 1990s is warmer than the more reliable sea surface temperature record and the satellite record. Is there any wonder why?

And, the fact that the temperature profile with altitude which should accompany a major CO2 greenhouse gas effect is missing should always have been a major reason for rejecting the idea that atmospheric CO2 concentrations were largely driving the climate. The recent improved understanding of the solar cycle effects is also providing arguments which seem to better explain what has been happening than does CO2. Before we wreck any economies and put large numbers of people out of work, let us learn more about the major natural forces which affect the climate and have brought on much more severe climate change than anything we have seen in our lifetimes.

Disclaimer: The expensive and unreliable electricity I expect to result from carbon cap and trade, from the EPA declaring CO2 a pollutant, and from energy restrictions mandated by the state of Maryland, may make it very difficult to impossible for my materials analysis laboratory to continue in business in the future. I have a livelihood interest in this matter. My work is also a matter of passionate importance to me. I am delighted that the catastrophic man-made global warming alarmist argument is collapsing on all fronts, despite being firmly embraced still by Obama and most Democrats in Congress and those environmentalists who hate mankind, such as Carol Browner and John Holdren.

Edited December 1, 2009 by Charles R. Anderson