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Scientists Step Down After CRU Hack Fallout
An anonymous reader writes "In the wake of the recent release of thousands of private files and emails after a server of the Climate Research Unit of the University of East Anglia was hacked, Prof. Phil Jones is stepping down as head of the CRU. Prof. Michael Mann, another prominent climate scientist, is also under inquiry by Penn State University."
The fact that this story is posted under Politics says a lot about what's wrong with the global warming 'debate' IMO.
Your cause may be correct, but your methods damage all of science as well as your cause.
True science should not hide data or pick data to support predefined conclusions. And dissenting papers with proper methodologies should never be suppressed. This is the only way to do science right.
Prof. Michael Mann, another prominent climate scientist is also under inquiry by Penn State University
Mann? Is he the same guy who said global temperature will go up exponentially like a hockey stick unless we cap and trade right now?
Science is not done by consensus. Science is done by showing your work so that others can see it and confirm that your data and methods make sense... sort of like the Open Source process. Only instead of a few million Windows computers getting botted, our very economy is at stake from the "warmers" and their political machinations.
--
"Open source is good." - Steve Jobs
"Open source is evil." - Microsoft
I prefer the term Warmaquiddick.
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
I know there are lots of whackjobs who are conviced that GW is a worthless topic, or that the scientists are all on someone's payroll, or that GW science is some kind of master plan to give a certain political party power (and that power will just evaporate if they lose the next election? I've never understood those kinds of consiracy theories). That being said, the issue that I have is more along the lines of scientists trying to "do what's right" to protect the planet (meaning it's not about science anymore for some of them, it's about protecting the planet).
At best, that attitude leads to behaviors like celebrating the death of someone who disagrees with you; at worst it leads to falsifying data to ensure that world sees things the same way you do. We know, for a fact, that the former has happened; the question to me is, how far towards the latter end of the spectrum is their behaviour? Release the raw data and let everyone take a look at it, until then I'll always have my doubts as to what is really going on.
So now we have hard working scientists who have their lives disrupted over this idiocy. This whole matter has been completely overblown. So people ranted and sent intemperate emails on a private mailing list? Wow. Newsflash: Scientists are not vulcans. The only thing that's even more shocking is the email where using a standard statistical technique is referred to as a "trick." If this is the grand conspiracy, it has to be the most pathetic grand conspiracy I've ever seen. A private mailing list of a few scientists that was mostly used productively and with an occasional whiny email or rant simply isn't that big a deal. People backbiting and such is really common. Welcome to academia.
Glad to see the cat finally coming out of the bag.
The reason this is under "Politics" is because, like it or not, this has become a political debate.
The science was thrown out long ago, as the emails prove.
The Earth undergoes cycles of climate change. We(humans) have a minimal affect on it.
We were not around for any of the previous hot or cold times, and they will continue to happen long after we're gone. To deny this is to deny historical fact.
The debate is indeed over. The proof is written in the stone, or the ice, as it were. ;-)
Even the WSJ article they linked to included the key word "temporarily". They relegated it to the subtitle, but it was there. (The WSJ, owned by Rupert Murdoch, also owner of Fox News, can be assumed to to take the climate-denialist position on everything.)
Temporarily stepping down is very different from an admission of guilt. It can be a way of allowing work to go on while investigations are under way, when a controversial figure attracts so much attention as to detract from the real work.
Maybe there are some real failures here, for which the guy does deserve to be removed from his job, but so much of what I've read about the hacked emails is hyped and deliberately misinterpreted that I'm unimpressed by this incident.
FALSE. All accusations of fraud have been addressed by the scientists in question, as well as outside sources. There is a reason this hasn't been getting much mainstream media coverage. For everyone's information: data was not manipulated, dissenting papers were not suppressed
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v462/n7273/full/462545a.html
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/12/cru-hack-more-context/
chillax137
After all Exxon is so broke...
Too fucking right! Those big money scientists are faking the whole global warming thing so they can rake in the big bucks.
Phil Jones, the man who just stepped down has received $22.6 million in grants since 1990.
Research has shown that when the Sahara was grassland it was due to a warmer global climate (including more CO2 in the atmosphere).
You're reaction is hilarious because you refuse to look at any facts or allegations. These e-mails show that only a few scientists were corrupt, but they happened to be the ones most influencing policy at the IPCC. The rest of the scientists just flock to grant money and worry about peer pressure.
This in itself has become a major scandal, not least Dr Jones's refusal to release the basic data from which the CRU derives its hugely influential temperature record, which culminated last summer in his startling claim that much of the data from all over the world had simply got "lost". Most incriminating of all are the emails in which scientists are advised to delete large chunks of data, which, when this is done after receipt of a freedom of information request, is a criminal offence.
If you have something that you dont want anyone to know, maybe you shouldnt be doing it in the first place -Eric Schmidt
Citing realclimate.org doesn't help your cause. Several contributors to that site have been implicated in the leaked emails.
With regards to the content of your post, the data was most certainly manipulated. Have you not taken the time to discover the coding travesty documented in the HARRY_READ_ME file that was leaked along with the emails? Here are a couple good links to start with.
I'm not popular enough to be different.
Homer Simpson, The Simpsons
Thank you for the links, best article I've read all day.
A couple of quotes from the Nature editorial for the TL;DR crowd:
(Emphasis mine).
There is far, far too much politics in science. I don't know why Dr. Jones decided to step down, but I'm inclined to believe (after reading the Nature editorial) that the reasons were almost entirely political.
Obligatory Soundbite Catchphrase
Sadly, they don't have the raw data. They threw it away. Worse, they probably have threw it away much more recently than they originally stated.
We'll never see it because they've deliberately destroyed it.
Based on my reading of the e-mails, which are available on Wikileaks for your own inspection, combined with this more recent information about the destruction of the raw data, I'd have to say they are very far towards that latter end of the spectrum.
My blog
"We've arranged a global civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces... I worry that, especially as the Millennium edges nearer, pseudoscience and superstition will seem year by year more tempting, the siren song of unreason more sonorous and attractive. Where have we heard it before? Whenever our ethnic or national prejudices are aroused, in times of scarcity, during challenges to national self-esteem or nerve, when we agonize about our diminished cosmic place and purpose, or when fanaticism is bubbling up around us - then, habits of thought familiar from ages past reach for the controls. The candle flame gutters. Its little pool of light trembles. Darkness gathers. The demons begin to stir." - Carl Sagan, Demon Haunted World (Science as a candle in the dark).
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Remember Ike's warning about the Military-Industrial Complex? In that same speech, he also said:
(http://www.h-net.org/~hst306/documents/indust.html)
Think about that the next time someone tries to discredit research because it was funded by an oil company.
Ike's warning has been borne out. Public policy has become the captive of a scientific-technological elite, who, unsurprisingly, are a bunch of dishonest frauds.
For everyone's information: data was not manipulated
Oh, for crying out loud. Not only was it manipulated, they threw out both the raw data and any audit trail.
"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 ... Climate change sceptics have long been keen to examine exactly how its data were compiled. That is now impossible. "
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6936328.ece
I hope you're at least getting a paycheque for throwing out nonsense so easily proved wrong.
fyi realclimate.org should be viewed very skeptically. In the leaked emails the fact that realclimate.org is essentially run by these very scientists is discussed in detail
http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=622&filename=1139521913.txt
I wanted you guys to know that you're free to use RC in any way you think would be helpful. Gavin and I are going to be careful about what comments we screen through.... We can hold comments up in the queue and contact you about whether or not you think they should be screened through or not, and if so, any comments you'd like us to include.
[T]hink of RC as a resource that is at your disposal.... We'll use our best discretion to make sure the skeptics don't get to use the RC comments as a megaphone.
Obviously there is plenty of monetary motivation to deny AGW, but what is the motivation to fabricate it? I just don't see it. At best you could say that these scientists were duped into believing that AGW was real and, now that they know the "truth," are trying to hide that they were wrong, but this is far from compelling considering the sheer number of scientists involved all trying to dupe each other.
What am I missing?
But then I realized the cable was blue, so I only gave it one star. I hate blue.
In a commencement speech at Caltech he said:
It is interesting, therefore, to bring it out now
and speak of it explicitly. It's a kind of scientific integrity,
a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of
utter honesty--a kind of leaning over backwards. For example, if
you're doing an experiment, you should report everything that you
think might make it invalid--not only what you think is right about
it: other causes that could possibly explain your results; and
things you thought of that you've eliminated by some other
experiment, and how they worked--to make sure the other fellow can
tell they have been eliminated.
Details that could throw doubt on your interpretation must be
given, if you know them. You must do the best you can--if you know
anything at all wrong, or possibly wrong--to explain it. If you
make a theory, for example, and advertise it, or put it out, then
you must also put down all the facts that disagree with it, as well
as those that agree with it. There is also a more subtle problem.
When you have put a lot of ideas together to make an elaborate
theory, you want to make sure, when explaining what it fits, that
those things it fits are not just the things that gave you the idea
for the theory; but that the finished theory makes something else
come out right, in addition.
In summary, the idea is to try to give all of the information to
help others to judge the value of your contribution; not just the
information that leads to judgment in one particular direction or
another.
Unfortunately, many scientists in many disciplines do not follow this. They seek to prove their theories right, and ignore that which might cast doubt on it.
It's a complex issue and there are several opinions:
1) The climate is warming and humans are responsible and the consequences are severe enough to require action.
2) The climate is warming and humans are responsible but the consequences are not severe.
3) The climate is warming and humans are not responsible.
4) The climate is not warming.
5) Whether the climate is warming or not, we should encourage a shift to more renewable energy sources.
There are likely others, but I am sure you will find adherents to all of these at least.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
Obviously you didn't take the time to read the realclimate.org post. They cite evidence in their refutations, show that most of the claims are taken out of context, and explain certain terms and phrases that can be considered jargon for their community.
In response to the readme file. Yes, the coding is bad. They aren't fudging the data though.
chillax137
One thing you notice about the site is that the members include Micheal Mann, one of the scientists under fire here. Well, it is no surprise that he believes that he's right and says so. Ok but that doesn't prove anything. So if someone publishes a paper, someone else points out serious problems with said paper, well then I am not going to turn the person who wrote the first paper as one to refute the person who's criticizing him. Of COURSE he'll refute it, however that doesn't mean anything.
So to see a site that is run by Mann and others he agrees with supporting him, well that doesn't really say much, does it?
AGW isn't science, but neither is the competing movement of skeptics. This is all just politics, and the whole thing is awful, and everyone parading around with glee over this controversy is just as guilty of politicizing matters as the people they're lambasting. It's impossible to do proper science when both sides of the argument have become moralistic crusades, and the tainting influence of politics has basically made the entire subject a mish-mash of lies and nonsense on both sides of the equation.
Neither pride nor gloating have any place in science. Global warming needs to be evaluated solely on the evidence. Skepticism should be applauded wherever it's found, but the entire global warming debate has devolved into nothing but gross factionalism.
Bing did have 'climategate' as the top suggestion until today. In fact, just typing 'cli' would have netted you climategate as the top suggestion on Bing until today. Yes, it's disappeared completely today. See here and here for more details.
Do no evil, huh? At least MS isn't making any pretences...
Suggesting it might be better, based on scientific evidence, if industries didn't pollute in certain ways is NOT going "Pol Pot".
Let me refresh your memory:
Climate scientists suggest that if we reduce the amount of sulfates, we'll have less acid rain. Sulfates reduced; the amount of acid rain shrinks.
Climate scientists suggest that aerosols are hurting the ozone layer, and point to an actual growing hole in the ozone layer. We reduce aerosols, the hole in the ozone layer shrinks.
I'm not at all suggesting climate scientists are infallible - they should be questioned like anyone else.
But to suggest that reasonable restrictions on companies that produce pollution is "going Pol Pot?" FFS.
Maybe you're right, in a way - Midwesterners may tend not to believe pollution can damage the environment, if they live somewhere that's untouched by industrial waste. If that's the case, they should go live in New Jersey for a while.
The Invisible Hand of the Free Market is what punches workers in the nuts.
If it were only that simple. What the emails reveal, and what skeptics have been saying for a long time, is that the science is not independent, not reproducible and relies on the same flawed data sets and models used over and over, not multiple lines of evidence. In reality, the ice caps melt during summer and refreeze during winter and the arctic has increased in the last two years, in spite of the dire predictions of an ice free summer. The last 10 years is not the hottest on any records, not even the flawed ones, and is hardly unprecedented.
The hacked emails/data/code reveal plenty of disturbing things and in reality there is much more that has already come out that points to an even wider and more egregious perversion of science. It takes some serious cojones to use a data set that is known to diverge from the only unequivocal temperature record. You can't just hand wave the skeptics away by saying that the authors gave you a note allowing you to drop the data points that don't match up with your hypothesis ,everything after 1960, and which go a long way in raising doubts about their significance prior to 1960.
Your side is being routed at this point and it is only going to get worse. Wait until the public learns how the current temperature data sets are being massaged, using only a few stations, sometimes hundreds of miles apart, and averaging for the most increase. How the rise in temperature is predominantly in areas that have no thermometers. How one small part of Antarctica that is warming has been overlaid over all of Antarctica to present the worst possible scenario.
You are right about the laws of physics, but you are sadly mistaken if you think this is a tempest in a teapot.