Thread: Climategate
View Single Post
Old 12-01-2009, 08:28 PM   #250
HOZ
Lifetime Suspension
 
HOZ's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2001
Exp:
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by Bagor View Post
Reports continue to roll in..........

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8387137.stm






But there are contrary reports that climate scientists have been manually melting the ice and been observed jackhammering large chunks off.

and the conspiracy has now reached global pandemic proportions ....
Copenhagen is just days away. Got to ratchet up the hysteria. Did this report use CRU cooked data? Why....yes it did.

I hear polar bears are falling from the sky now!

SCANDAL
One theme, in addition to those already mentioned about the suppression of dissent, the suppression of data and methods, and the suppression of the unvarnished truth, comes through especially strongly: plain statistical incompetence. This is something that Henderson's study raised, and it was also emphasised in the Wegman report on the Hockey Stick, and in other independent studies of the Hockey Stick controversy. Of course it is also an ongoing issue in Steve McIntyre's campaign to get hold of data and methods. Nonetheless I had given it insufficient weight. Climate scientists lean very heavily on statistical methods, but they are not necessarily statisticians. Some of the correspondents in these emails appear to be out of their depth. This would explain their anxiety about having statisticians, rather than their climate-science buddies, crawl over their work.

I'm also surprised by the IPCC's response. Amid the self-justification, I had hoped for a word of apology, or even of censure. (George Monbiot called for Phil Jones to resign, for crying out loud.) At any rate I had expected no more than ordinary evasion. The declaration from Rajendra Pachauri that the emails confirm all is as it should be is stunning. Science at its best. Science as it should be. Good lord. This is pure George Orwell. And these guys call the other side "deniers".

******
Remember that this is not an academic exercise. We contemplate outlays of trillions of dollars to fix this supposed problem. Can I read these emails and feel that the scientists involved deserve to be trusted? No, I cannot. These people are willing to subvert the very methods--notably, peer review--that underwrite the integrity of their discipline. Is this really business as usual in science these days? If it is, we should demand higher standards--at least whenever "the science" calls for a wholesale transformation of the world economy. And maybe some independent oversight to go along with the higher standards.
HOZ is offline   Reply With Quote