Climategate

[HOZ]

Forgot about this juicy little tidbit. From the Right Wing Propoganda machine called the Spiegel


The planet's temperature curve rose sharply for almost 30 years, as global temperatures increased by an average of 0.7 degrees Celsius (1.25 degrees Fahrenheit) from the 1970s to the late 1990s. "At present, however, the warming is taking a break," confirms meteorologist Mojib Latif of the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences in the northern German city of Kiel. Latif, one of Germany's best-known climatologists, says that the temperature curve has reached a plateau. "There can be no argument about that," he says. "We have to face that fact."
Even though the temperature standstill probably has no effect on the long-term warming trend, it does raise doubts about the predictive value of climate models, and it is also a political issue. For months, climate change skeptics have been gloating over the findings on their Internet forums. This has prompted many a climatologist to treat the temperature data in public with a sense of shame, thereby damaging their own credibility.
"It cannot be denied that this is one of the hottest issues in the scientific community," says Jochem Marotzke, director of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg. "We don't really know why this stagnation is taking place at this point."
Just a few weeks ago, Britain's Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research added more fuel to the fire with its latest calculations of global average temperatures. According to the Hadley figures, the world grew warmer by 0.07 degrees Celsius from 1999 to 2008 and not by the 0.2 degrees Celsius assumed by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. And, say the British experts, when their figure is adjusted for two naturally occurring climate phenomena, El Niño and La Niña, the resulting temperature trend is reduced to 0.0 degrees Celsius -- in other words, a standstill.
The differences among individual regions of the world are considerable. In the Arctic, for example, temperatures rose by almost three degrees Celsius, which led to a dramatic melting of sea ice. At the same time, temperatures declined in large areas of North America, the western Pacific and the Arabian Peninsula. Europe, including Germany, remains slightly in positive warming territory.


Nothing happening here. The church of Global Warming is not burning. Move a long. Move along......

The picture that emerges is simple. In any discussion of global warming, either in the scientific literature or in the mainstream media, the outcome is always predetermined. Just as the temperature graphs produced by the CRU are always tricked out to show an upward-sloping "hockey stick," every discussion of global warming has to show that it is occurring and that humans are responsible. And any data or any scientific paper that tends to disprove that conclusion is smeared as "unscientific" precisely because it threatens the established dogma.

[Kybosh]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern

While discussing pollution you guys have created pollution

Yeah, the levels of smug in this thread are through the roof.

[Billy Tallent]

Originally Posted by Jonrox

So based on the question I asked and Devil's informative answer, why is this scientist blaming global warming for this situation when we know Antarctica is being protected from global warming and the ice pack there is actually growing? He is flat out lying. This doesn't at all seem like responsible science or reporting.

He just knows there isn't a story here unless he blames global warming.

As has been stated, ice pack growth does not equal cold. Changing weather patterns could result in greater winter precipitation, but I'm guessing.

Also, if you go back to the original wiki link, and if you want, to the cited studies, you will note that the ice pack growth is not statistically significant (i.e. not big enough to be considered real). Furthermore, at 0.8% per decade, it is highly dependent on the time frame examined. Some periods show more growth, some show less, some show loss.

Short answer: The antarctic ice pack is not growing.

The scientist is not flat out lying.

[Jonrox]

Originally Posted by Billy Tallent

As has been stated, ice pack growth does not equal cold. Changing weather patterns could result in greater winter precipitation, but I'm guessing.

Also, if you go back to the original wiki link, and if you want, to the cited studies, you will note that the ice pack growth is not statistically significant (i.e. not big enough to be considered real). Furthermore, at 0.8% per decade, it is highly dependent on the time frame examined. Some periods show more growth, some show less, some show loss.

Short answer: The antarctic ice pack is not growing.

The scientist is not flat out lying.

I'll re-read it, but from the articles Devil's posted, it states the growth on the eastern side of Antarctica is very real and due to cooling caused by disrupted weather patterns due to the hole in the ozone layer. The western regions have warmed slightly, but the melting occurring there is not enough to offset the growth on the eastern ice pack.

Again, I haven't done all the reading that you likely have, I'm just looking at this from what I think is a common sense point of view. Which I why I need to ask, if ice pack growth doesn't equal cold, why does ice pack shrinkage equal warm (every article I read states it does)? If colder temperatures don't mean more ice freezes, why do warmer temperatures mean more ice melts?

This leads me to think you're suggesting some other factor is affecting both the growth and shrinkage occurring at the ice caps.

Just so I'm clear, I'm still on the fence regarding global warming. That's why I ask these questions... just looking for more information and opinions on which to come to my own decision. I currently think it is a real phenomenon, but is only one of many factors contributing to changes we are seeing around the world. I just think it's getting too much attention and too much is being blamed on it, that we may be failing to give other factors enough attention and will pay for these mistakes down the road.

[Billy Tallent]

Originally Posted by Jonrox

Just so I'm clear, I'm still on the fence regarding global warming. That's why I ask these questions... just looking for more information and opinions on which to come to my own decision. I currently think it is a real phenomenon, but is only one of many factors contributing to changes we are seeing around the world. I just think it's getting too much attention and too much is being blamed on it, that we may be failing to give other factors enough attention and will pay for these mistakes down the road.

That's fine, you should educate yourself as much as possible. Certainly the problem with discussing these sorts of topics, especially with people without scientific training, is that they become politicised, and the basic science gets lost.

Regardless, my comment is always this. We have a vested interest in keeping global temperatures where they are. Our civilization (food, water supplies, etc.) have been built around a very narrow range of average temperatures. Rapid change will force us into a period of of serious instability and difficulty, as we attempt to adapt, if we can, especially if you consider the impact on food supply. Arable land is expected to decrease if the climate change projections are correct, whereas the population will increase 50%. To put a Calgary spin on it, the prairies are one of the most arid places on the planet. One of the main reasons we can grow crops here in spite of this is that its freezing much of the year, trapping what little winter precipitation we get. If it gets warmer, we lose that moisture. Southern Alberta becomes unsuitable for agriculture. At least it will be without irrigation, but the Bow Glacier is expected to be depleted in about 30 years, so finding the water could involve some serious effort.

Maybe climate change will turn out to be incorrect (admittedly, I don't believe this, but for the sake of argument...), in which case the money spent on countering it will simply result in a more efficient, more environmentally friendly civilization. If it's real and we don't spend the money, we end up with too many people and not enough food or water. You decide what happens next.

[Billy Tallent]

Originally Posted by Jonrox

why does ice pack shrinkage equal warm (every article I read states it does)? If colder temperatures don't mean more ice freezes, why do warmer temperatures mean more ice melts?

It could be lots of reasons. It could be warmer on most of the planet, but this may cause a change in weather patterns elsewhere (read: Antaractica), with localized colder temperatures. An example is last winter. It was quite cold, and Europe saw remarkable snow fall, and people suggested that this was evidence that climate change was wrong. But a number of models suggested the opposite. They indicate that SOOO much arctic ice has melted that it has kick started convective cooling in the Atlantic, and that we're in for a few more cool years before before warming picks up again.

At the end of the day, there are a lot of variables involved, and scientists are just trying to understand them as best as they can. You can always find outliers, or faults in any data set, but that doesn't mean you throw the whole hypothesis out. You make the best conclusions you can from the data and then you design new experiments to explain the exceptions.

[HOZ]

Norwich...we have a problem!

I can’t say I am spectacularly surprised at the emerging scandal over private e-mails obtained from the servers of the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit, which is at the heart of the process that produces IPCC reports on climate change. Some of the controversial practices revealed by the leaked e-mail corpus, such as fidgeting with visual presentations of statistics in order to make them as impressive and sensational as possible, are just evil habits that nonetheless form part of the standard operating procedure of applied science. But others—ignoring requests for data sets from one’s scientific adversaries, playing politics with scientific editorial boards, denouncing criticisms as not being peer-reviewed while working behind the scenes to ensure that those same criticisms are shut out of the peer-reviewed literature—were already known parts of the climate-panic industry’s playbook.

[Bagor]

Back to the freedom of information thingy and what IMO is abuse of it.

These e-mails do tell their own interesting story of how little actual science the key skeptics do as their main objective/tactics seems to be harassment of other scientists for the sake of harassment for data they can readily acquire themselves.

And also brings up the question of claiming data from competitors where the owner still has an invested interest for future work.

Ben Santer Jan 2009.

I have spent the last two months of my scientific career dealing with multiple requests for these model datasets under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). I have been able to do little or no productive research during this time. This is of deep concern to me.....

.....The bottom line is that any interested scientist has all the scientific information necessary to replicate the calculations performed in our IJoC paper, and to check whether the conclusions reached in that paper were sound.

Neither Mr. Smith nor Mr. Stephen McIntyre (Mr. McIntyre is the initiator of the FOIA requests to the U.S. DOE and NOAA, and the operator of the "ClimateAudit.com" blog) is interested in full replication of our calculations, starting from the primary climate model and observational data. Instead, they are demanding the value-added quantities we have derived from the primary datasets (i.e., the synthetic MSU temperatures).

I would like a clear ruling from DOE lawyers - ideally from both the NNSA and DOE Office of Science branches - on the legality of such data requests. They are troubling, for a number of reasons.

1. In my considered opinion, a very dangerous precedent is set .... The intellectual investment in such calculations is substantial.

2. Can any competitor simply request such datasets via the U.S. FOIA, before we have completed full scientific analysis of these datasets?

3. There is a real danger that such FOIA requests could (and are already) being used as a tool for harassing scientists rather than for valid scientific discovery. Mr. McIntyre's FOIA requests to DOE and NOAA are but the latest in a series of such requests. In the past, Mr. McIntyre has targeted scientists at Penn State University, the U.K. Climatic Research Unit, and the National Climatic Data Center in Asheville. Now he is focusing his attention on me. The common denominator is that Mr. McIntyre's attention is directed towards studies claiming to show evidence of large-scale surface warming, and/or a prominent human "fingerprint" in that warming. These serial FOIA requests interfere with our ability to do our job.

As many of you may know, I have decided to publicly release the synthetic MSU temperatures that were the subject of Mr. McIntyre's FOIA request (together with additional synthetic MSU temperatures which were not requested by Mr. McIntyre)...... I have no desire to be "taken out" as scientist, and to be involved in years of litigation.

Time will tell how many publications Mr McIntyre produces in the future based on this data he so desperately coveted. I'm going to guess ...zero. Or more likely ... how many blogs. Guessing again ... more than 1.

Mann Sept 2009.

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.

Andrew Revkin Sept 2009

tom crowley has sent me a direct challenge to mcintyre to start contributing to the reviewed lit or shut up.

I'm eagerly awaiting his publications now that he is in possession of another scientist's data. Half the work (data gathering) is already done so it should be quite easy to do an analysis.

Mann again Sept 2009

I'm sure you are aware that McIntyre and his ilk realize they no longer need to get their crap published in legitimate journals. All they have to do is put it up on their blog, and the contrarian noise machine kicks into gear, pretty soon Druge, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and their ilk (in this case, The Telegraph were already on it this morning) are parroting the claims. And based on what? some guy w/ no credentials, dubious connections with the energy industry, and who hasn't submitted his claims to the scrutiny of peer review.

But then again it's all fixed so McIntyre can't publish. He's forced to blog. That's why he needs all that data .... for his blog. Or ... maybe it is crap?

I'm sure you're aware that you will dozens of bogus, manufactured distortions of the science in the weeks leading up to the vote on cap & trade in the U.S. senate.

^^Looks like Mann's model was fairly accurate there but was missing the hacking variable. If only he knew ......

Basically this thing is one side doing science and another side criticising the science without actually doing much of their own.
Personally I think there is a lot of good that can come out of this. The critics can have all the data they want (not that they haven't already got more than enough) and start producing solid science to refute the claim rather than hiding behind a blog or producing such touted crap (taken from a link in Hoz's article which he has undoubtedly read) hoping for their 15 minutes of media fame and is so bad an editor resigns and the owner of the journal admits that it was rubbish.

One of the most damaging emails was sent by the head of the climatic research unit, Phil Jones. He wrote "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!"One of these papers which was published in the journal Climate Research turned out to be so badly flawed that the scandal resulted in the resignation of the editor-in-chief. Jones knew that any incorrect papers by sceptical scientists would be picked up and amplified by climate change deniers funded by the fossil fuel industry, who often use all sorts of dirty tricks to advance their cause.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environmen...risis-response

At the end of the day the character and personal conduct of Jones has been severely and rightly IMO called into question but just as it was before the centre was hacked nothing has changed. The evidence for change is still strong. The evidence against .... blogs, media releases and harassment for data they have no intention of using.

[Bagor]

Originally Posted by Jonrox

I'll re-read it, but from the articles Devil's posted, it states the growth on the eastern side of Antarctica is very real and due to cooling caused by disrupted weather patterns due to the hole in the ozone layer. The western regions have warmed slightly, but the melting occurring there is not enough to offset the growth on the eastern ice pack.

FYI

A report from TIME suggesting a decline in the eastern shelf.

http://www.time.com/time/health/arti...rss-topstories

Does this mean anything at this time? Maybe, maybe not. It would be hypocritical to suggest that after a couple or 3 years this represents an overall trend. Nonetheless it's something to keep an eye on from a sea level POV.

Ice loss as a whole in Antarctica is also discussed in yesterday's released Copenhagen diagnosis (page 28) with ice loss increases "estimates" at "104 Gt per year for 2002-2006 to 246 Gt per year for 2006-2009". Interestingly enough the report describes the eastern shelf as being in "a pattern of near balance" (as opposed to what's reported in the above time article). Uncertainties are acknowledged.

I'm guessing TIME has picked up on one publication and ran with it.

http://www.copenhagendiagnosis.org/

[Pastiche]

So where are the deniers now after reading this thread? Updated your opinion or do you still believe that science can't be trusted and it has a motive?

[Flames Draft Watcher]

Originally Posted by TheU

honestly a few years ago i downloaded 2 movies to watch when i was bored; an inconvenient truth, and, the great global warming swindel. i really liked al gores movie, then, i watched the great global warming swindle (coming into it with a very skeptical mind) and was blown away. it was very convincing because it presented data, graphs, scientists and professors, while truth was a politician selling a point of a view like a politician. after that i did some online reading and i was pretty much sold. this last summer a friend of mine who has a math degree from u of c and now is in UBC law got annoyed with all my chirping and we spent an hour googling data from the last 150 years people have put into graphs and reports etc. he was a staunch climate change guy, i mean hard core. in 60 mins he went from being hard core "this is our problem we made it happen" to "well maybe we didn't cause it but perhaps our co2 is not letting it slow down like it should be". not exactly a huge turn around but when people take the time look at the graphs, data, read about the hockey stick graph, its really hard to say that people are solely to blame (if it all).

and thats really what im driving at here... humans really didnt cause this last warming, imo.

Lol I love it.

This sums up your post to me, "We watched a movie and did some research for an hour and now we know the truth and all you fools, and half the scientists are wrong."

You might be right dude, but you have some serious problems with the way you are trying to convince people. Your claims of certainty about humans not causing it seem bold given your expertise on the subject.

[Calgaryborn]

It's pathetic how many of you are trying to twist this story to make it about the big bad sceptics. Fraud has been committed. A conspiracy to silence opposition to the man made global warming theory has been uncovered. These scientists exist on the public dole and should be accountable for their actions. Get a grip!

[T@T]

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

It's pathetic how many of you are trying to twist this story to make it about the big bad sceptics. Fraud has been committed. A conspiracy to silence opposition to the man made global warming theory has been uncovered. These scientists exist on the public dole and should be accountable for their actions. Get a grip!

Religion and God has been exposed too...doesn't seem to bother you.

There!! see what it's like being on the other side of a "drive by" ??

[HOOT]

Finally finished the thread, or I guess caught up, and the things being said are hilarious!

Personally I think the world is just going through a natural cycle like it has for millions of years and it just happened to be when man was creating the most pollution so it is an easy target. I have no proof, no links, no nothing besides my opinion. Could it be wrong? Probably. But I would rather live in my magical world and convince myself my V6-300HP car isn't really that bad.

[Bagor]

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

It's pathetic how many of you are trying to twist this story to make it about the big bad sceptics. Fraud has been committed. A conspiracy to silence opposition to the man made global warming theory has been uncovered. These scientists exist on the public dole and should be accountable for their actions. Get a grip!

Let me guess what you think is happening.

[Calgaryborn]

Originally Posted by T@T

Religion and God has been exposed too...doesn't seem to bother you.

There!! see what it's like being on the other side of a "drive by" ??

How do you expose someone who you don't think exists? Hmm?

And how can you accuse me of a "drive by" when you know damn well this is far from the first post I've made on this subject or in this thread?

You and Bagor are making a habit of posting snide remarks when the things you have your faith in are questioned. It's making you both look very small.

[ernie]

Originally Posted by Pastiche

So where are the deniers now after reading this thread? Updated your opinion or do you still believe that science can't be trusted and it has a motive?

I'm not going to wade into the global warming debate (or rather human induced global warming).

But no one should be so foolish to think that science has no motive, or rather SCIENTISTS have no motive. If they are that foolish, they've never published peer reviewed papers or seen the changes a journal takes when the editor and review teams for journals change. Many scientists are so damn sure what they think is right they will SKEWER a paper on review because it advocates a different theory or reaction mechanism (in chemistry for example).

It would be great if review teams and editor boards were these lofty perfectly balanced individuals with no biases who only want the data to shine through. But as much as they may try to do that it simply doesn't happen 100% of the time and perfectly good science and explanation can go ignored for years because it got buried in some sub-par journal (or not published at all). It does take significant cajones to go against the flow because you think the data is explained in a better way because there is a very good chance that you won't get published in significant journals and as a result you will lose funding. And if you lose funding it is not easy to get it back again.

[T@T]

Originally Posted by HOOT

Finally finished the thread, or I guess caught up, and the things being said are hilarious!

Personally I think the world is just going through a natural cycle like it has for millions of years and it just happened to be when man was creating the most pollution so it is an easy target. I have no proof, no links, no nothing besides my opinion. Could it be wrong? Probably. But I would rather live in my magical world and convince myself my V6-300HP car isn't really that bad.

Problem I have with that thinking is a natural cycle has always taken thousands and sometimes millions of years to run it's course, But our planet has changed considerably over the last 50 years. way too shot to be natural IMO

For example the earth was mostly a frozen ball for 900 million years (1600~2500 million years ago) and took the last 100 million of those years to warm mostly because of volcanism, plant growth and stabilization of the continents, this lead to the increase in CO2 levels in the atmosphere and warmed the planet.

Obviously there have been many cooling times and ice ages, recent ice ages are blamed on anything from polar shifts,collisions of comets/meteors to the suns activity but none has happened in a short period of time. Hell even when the big meteor killed the Dino's 65 million years ago they think it took 800 years to cool the planet enough to kill them off.

[T@T]

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

How do you expose someone who you don't think exists? Hmm?

And how can you accuse me of a "drive by" when you know damn well this is far from the first post I've made on this subject or in this thread?

You and Bagor are making a habit of posting snide remarks when the things you have your faith in are questioned. It's making you both look very small.

I'm not talking about this thread, I called you out a couple of times in threads talking religion and all you did was make a remark and never once answer a question put to you. Ignore,ignore and more ignore...######ing irritating.

I don't know about Bagor but I'm sure he feels the same way. Your all about "drive by" remarks with no backup. Personally there's nothing worst than someone who wont at least try to enter a discussion.

What are you doing in this thread anyway? you still think the planet is 6000 years old and had a great flood that Noah built an ark for...could it be anything science you want to slam?

[Pastiche]

But no one should be so foolish to think that science has no motive, or rather SCIENTISTS have no motive. If they are that foolish, they've never published peer reviewed papers or seen the changes a journal takes when the editor and review teams for journals change. Many scientists are so damn sure what they think is right they will SKEWER a paper on review because it advocates a different theory or reaction mechanism (in chemistry for example).

Well if the data and findings in that paper stood to merit then they wouldn't need to change the theory. That's the scientific method. Your findings dictate what you say. If those evil peer review editors with an agenda didn't agree with the findings then there probably something wrong with the experiment not that they were biased. Have you gone through this? Because I find your example hard to swallow. Maybe it happens in some incidences but there have been thousands of papers on anthropogenic climate change written. You think this is some global academic conspiracy to actively subvert the scientific method?

Conspiracy theorists. Best to not listen to them.