Laying To Rest The Ghost Of Climategate
On November the 19th 2009, the first batch of emails and other files hacked from the University of East Anglia’s (Climatic Research Unit) servers were distributed across the internet from a server in Russia. Climategate – a term first suggested by a commenter at WUWT and subsequently popularised by James Delingpole – was born and has refused to die ever since, much to the annoyance of the climate consensus establishment. They’ve attempted on a number of occasions to exonerate those involved and to remove the lingering stains which Climategate left when climate scientists’ dirty linen got aired in public. With limited success. The main reason being – the emails speak for themselves.
I remember November 19th very clearly, not because of Climategate, but because my beloved German Shepherd dog Jade, rescued by my family from Battersea Dogs Home in 1998, then rescued by yours truly from my then fractured family home in 2000, passed away. I had no idea of the momentous events taking place across the internet, nor would I have even cared. I was not even a climate change sceptic who would have celebrated the revelations of such poor behaviour among climate scientists.
But here we are 10 years later and I predict the Final Push from the man-made climate change establishment. I predict a huge concerted, coordinated and exhaustive attempt to finally exorcise the ghost which has bedevilled the consensus climate establishment ever since that fateful day. I predict a huge media-focused whitewash exercise aimed at finally dispelling the notion that climate scientists could ever be involved in such shady practices as attempting to conceal data, falsify data, massage data, in order to exaggerate man-made global warming.
They will say that, if there was ever any doubt in 2009 about the seriousness of the climate crisis, there is absolutely no doubt whatsoever now. ‘Deniers’ then might have successfully exploited a few illegally obtained emails to sow doubt, but they cannot do the same now. The evidence is ‘overwhelming’ and the need to act is more urgent than ever. So we should all now stop raking over the long dead coals of Climategate and get on with saving the planet – they will say.
The BBC will soon be airing a program where they interviewed Steve McIntyre and Ross McKitrick and (of course) Michael Mann. They cut McKitrick’s contribution to the programme entirely and we shall have to wait and see how much they edited McIntyre’s. My guess is that the whole thing will be hugely biased and ultimately dismissive of Climategate. Like this Guardian article which paints the whole episode as some sort of fossil fuel conspiracy to delay action on climate change:
Note also that since Climategate we have had eight of the warmest years on record; carbon dioxide emissions have continued to rise inexorably; and Arctic sea ice levels in summer have reached record lows over the past decade. Occurrences of heavy rainfall and heatwaves have also increased dramatically. The world has continued to heat up dangerously. Yet humanity has done very little to tackle the crisis.
Climate crisis fanatics will use this 10th anniversary of Climategate to try and finally lay to rest the ghosts of the Jones/Briffa/Osborn/Hulme emails which have haunted establishment climate science for so long. We shouldn’t let them. Let’s make sure the buggers keep getting haunted and then get haunted some more because the ‘science’ which underpins the current alarm is still the same ‘science’ which the climategate conspirators deliberately tried to exaggerate for political and/or personal gain 10 years ago. It hasn’t moved an inch in that time, just accumulated more layers of mainly BS.
Climate Scepticism 
But they will fail. Relying on nihilistic XR and St. Greta will not work. Not in the long run against the simple fact that there is no climate crisis.
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Robin Mackie’s article asks what we have learnt. In his case the answer is nothing at all.
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This weird article in today’s Observer says that Michael Mann says that climate eschatonanism, which he calls ‘doomism’, is (a) new and (b) a product of the ‘denial machine’.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/nov/09/doomism-new-tactic-fossil-fuel-lobby
Mann on doomism:
That variety of climate doomism/eschatonanism has been influential for fifteen or twenty years. See Dark Mountain, Guy McPherson, etc. Are they part of the Big Oil ‘denial machine’?
Earlier in the article, Mann attacks those who attack prominent climate activists for their hypocrisy, saying that although personal behaviour is important it isn’t really all that important, really.
That’s a currently upward-trending argument that was launched last month by XR’s open letter signed by (occasionally misspelled) ‘celebrities’ who owned up to being hypocrites:
https://rebellion.earth/2019/10/16/celebrities-backing-extinction-rebellion-say-yes-we-are-all-hypocrites-in-open-letter-to-media/
I can’t see it lasting for much longer. If you fly a lot and say that other people shouldn’t fly at all then you’re a Berkeley, end of.
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In fact the clueless McKie has written two articles on the same day. The other one (linked by Vinny) claims that the ‘deniers’ have encouraged the doomsters. The opposite is the case, it’s climate ‘scientists’ like Kevin Anderson who created the doom cult, as shown in the previous post.
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These people make it up as they go along. Detecting the less than favourable reaction to the attempts by activists to get people to change their personal behaviours and habits, they are now saying that this is bizarrely an attempt by ‘deniers’ to deflect attention from the real culprits – the big fossil fuel companies! Lucas echoed this convenient conspiracy theory on Marr today I think. Says Mann:
“We should also be aware how the forces of denial are exploiting the lifestyle change movement to get their supporters to argue with each other. It takes pressure off attempts to regulate the fossil fuel industry. This approach is a softer form of denial and in many ways it is more pernicious.”
‘Forces of denial’. Dark conspiracies. He’s barking. But not that barking that he realises that a campaign by climate activists – not the shadowy ‘forces of denial’ – has seriously backfired and climate catastrophists must change tack quickly. Realising also that the doomsday cultists have overplayed their hand and now effectively inculcated a sense of hopelessness and inevitability in the populace, they’re trying to wind their necks back in and again, utterly absurdly, they invent a conspiracy theory to explain how the ‘doomsters’ are really fossil fuel shills deliberately trying to derail climate action by making it seem pointless.
They’re desperate to remain in control of the Frankenstein monster they created whilst maintaining the aura of scientific credibility which will be needed to justify what will be hugely unpopular policies. But they’ve lost control of the climate cultists they helped create and their attempts to cling on to scientific credibility look increasingly like clutching at straws, e.g. the ludicrous efforts to ‘sex-up’ up the latest climate models and ‘sex-up’ extreme weather.
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“Climategate – a term coined by James Delingpole”
wrong, coined on WUWT, as Delingpole himself acknowledges
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“The BBC will soon be airing a program where they interviewed Steve McIntyre and Ross McKitrick and (of course) Michael Mann. They cut McKitrick’s contribution to the programme entirely and we shall have to wait and see how much they edited McIntyre’s.”
unless you have the unedited tapes, you won’t know. Frankly my interview went so long I can’t recall all the things I said. Pretty sure they will edit it since they don’t have hours to explain to the whole affair
and it needs hours. A true skeptic would want to see ALL the unedited tape before deciding how
fair the editing was.. meh.
You’d think that sceptics would get off their asses and fund a documentary themselves.
Interview Willis, Anthony, Charles Rotter, Holland, McIntyre etc.
But they won’t. There is another piece coming out. I encouraged the writers to contact some skeptics
The skeptics refused to be interviewed. That makes it easier to claim a piece is unbalanced after the fact.
jeez they missed a chance to debate the interviewer.. it was actually fun.
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The crackpot climate cult needs pantomime villains to hold itself together. Actual evidence of human caused effects can’t do it, because there isn’t any.
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Move on, move on, there nothing to see here. Just the oikophobia tearing the Empire apart while the barbarians mass at the gate.
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… metaphorically speaking of course.
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‘climategate’ was coined by a commenter at Watts Up With That. A regular called Bulldust (Crugate, warmergate were also tried out but climategate stuck)
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/19/breaking-news-story-hadley-cru-has-apparently-been-hacked-hundreds-of-files-released/#comment-206920
“What happened was that on the Thursday when I picked up the story from the Watts Up With That website I noticed in the comments that someone called Bulldust had said: ‘Hmm how long before this is dubbed ClimateGate?’ I took Bulldust’s ball and ran with it using the Climategate headline in all the stories I wrote thereafter.”
https://www.spectator.co.uk/2009/12/watching-the-climategate-scandal-explode-makes-me-feel-like-a-proud-parent/
James certainly popularized it!
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Thanks for the history lesson Barry.
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Yep, important history from Barry there. Jaime’s right that the story first broke on 19th November 2009, as shown by the date in the URL of the breakthrough Watts Up With That thread from which Delingpole cleverly filched the Climategate moniker. Warmergate, being one character different from the original Watergate, had its supporters but James popularised right. Climate is what this -gate was all about.
The actual release of the emails though was 17th November. The whistleblower (who later called themselves FOIA but here was ‘RC’) simply said A miracle just happened on Climate Audit having also hacked into RealClimate and dumped the zip file on a server with a Russian domain the same morning. And nobody noticed. And the 17th is my birthday. A memorable present that I, like everyone else, apart from FOIA, only spotted a few days later!
(I put these details up partly to refresh my memory and partly for correction. Mosher would remember, as of course would ‘the auditor’ himself, as he was called with venom in the emails. It was all about Steve and his amazing work, with some help from his friends on CA. That’s not been emphasized in any report I’ve seen so far.)
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Steven Mosher, thanks for clarifying that the BBC talked to you – I was wondering who they meant when they said “all the key players”. Steve Mc said that the BBC told Ross he’d been cut completely, so I guess if you haven’t heard anything, at least some of your stuff will be in it. My guess is that you and Steve Mc will be cut to about 1 minute each, with 58 minutes for Mann, talk about the inquiries exonerating the scientists, and of course another pile of climate disaster porn.
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Does anybody know what caused the sudden global warming in the late 20th century, which now appears to have stopped? Most of climate science seems to be focused on the “Standard Model”, involving Greenhouse gases, but how did those gases suddenly wake up around 1980, and then suddenly went back to sleep around 2005?
10 more years of flat-lining temperatures might make future documentaries much more interesting.
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Mosh: Sorry that you must have been caught in moderation until after I wrote my previous comment. Or, more strictly, you were caught in moderation, and thus not visible to me, without using my admin privileges, which I didn’t think of doing, before I began my comment. In other words, someone may have released your comments as I was writing. And that’s a minor chronological complexity compared to sorting out all that went on from 17th November 2009.
I was hoping for your correction of my very short summary more than most.
I’m very glad to hear that the BBC also interviewed you. As you imply, the final product will have involved a fearsome editing challenge, even with the best will in the world.
You also say:
Can’t you be more specific about which sceptics – sorry, the spelling is a house style thing – and whose piece they refused to be part of? I often feel you lump together all of us who self-identify as sceptics (guilty as charged) as if we’re all the same and are responsible for the worst sins of the worst elements. And yet aren’t lukewarmers, at the same time, so very individual? Mosher, Ridley, your co-author of The CRUtape Letters who is also a member of the team at Climate Scepticism … actually I don’t have the full list. But I’m sure you get what I’m trying to say.
I’m not saying you’re wrong to be critical of the sceptics who refused to take part in this case. But we want names and who they refused. Thanks.
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Yes Paul, I was relying upon Steve’s statement that McKitrick had been informed by the BBC that they would not be using his interview.
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Jaime: Here’s the tweet and the start of the tweet stream that I’ve noticed from Steve on the subject:
Note that McIntyre didn’t mention that Mosh had been interviewed on 30 Oct. He may not have known the full list or the 280 character limit made his own editing choices hard!
It’s an impressive humblebrag by Pielke Jr. that, it’s worth noting in passing. Not that anyone would say that Roger is a central character in the Climategate drama but, as Venn diagrams go, that’s up there. Clearly a dangerous man.
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I was unaware that Mosh’s comments had gone into moderation. I’m not sure why. Somewhat surprised to see them suddenly appear.
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Hi Jaime.. I don’t mean to ‘correct’ you.. but an “alarmist” narrative is the ‘climategate’ name was cooked up by James to make a scandal out of nothing, so important to counter, just some wag in the comments suggested it, other names like warmergate or crugate had been mentioned aswell. the climategate one stuck. in part thanks to James who read it, and used by Andrew Bolt, Jo Nova, and others.
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‘sceptics’ get off their asses and fund… don’t know if you believe in big oil funding.. but us ‘sceptics’ have gott sweet f all money.. are not a ‘group’ and have sod all experience in doing a documentary, and nobody would show it… don’t collectivise people , who are all just random strangers, that met on a blog (ie here)
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There are thousands of emails. One I find particularly interesting is scientists agonising over what to put “in the box” to satisfy their audience:
The “box”-debate:
A recognition that regional projections of climate change are not robust but that regional climate change is really what policy makers are interested in, naturally, and the pressure to provide something – anything – is intense. Regional projections of climate change are still pretty crap. But who won the argument?
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I’ve amended the text Barry, thanks.
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IPCC AR4 WG1. I think this answers my question:
https://twitter.com/RogerAPielkeSr/status/1193611515867254785
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Calling XR a “lifestyle movement”, which Mann chooses to call XR is a disgusting euphemism. XR is to “lifestyle” what the Khmer Rouge was to “country living”.
It is strange and somewhat disturbing but Scottish SF author, Ken McLeod writes about radical greens destroying British society. While the universe he creates is quite different, the danger of radical greens is eerily similar.
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Speaking of blaming Big Oil for hobbling climate activism, Exxon went to trial last week defending against New York AG accusation of investor fraud (because #ExxonKnew, don’t you know). It did not go well for the prosecution, and in the end two of three charges were dropped, the Judge dismissing them with prejudice. My post with the details is
https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2019/11/10/new-york-ags-disgracefull-exxon-trial/
This photo was taken of climate activists storming the bastion of Exxon Mobil, seen without their shareholder disguises.
https://rclutz.files.wordpress.com/2017/06/celts-storm-exxon.png?w=1000&h=643
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“Can’t you be more specific about which sceptics – sorry, the spelling is a house style thing – and whose piece they refused to be part of? I often feel you lump together all of us who self-identify as sceptics (guilty as charged) as if we’re all the same and are responsible for the worst sins of the worst elements. And yet aren’t lukewarmers, at the same time, so very individual? Mosher, Ridley, your co-author of The CRUtape Letters who is also a member of the team at Climate Scepticism … actually I don’t have the full list. But I’m sure you get what I’m trying to say.
I’m not saying you’re wrong to be critical of the sceptics who refused to take part in this case. But we want names and who they refused. Thanks.”
Nope. Also Tom Fuller, Not Ridley was co author. I get the rationale the individual expressed.
They didnt trust the interviewer. That’s another way of saying they dont know how to handle an interviewer.
I would think Heartland, or cato, or heck billy bumfuck with a video camera could sit down
and interview Anthony, Charles, Ross, Steve Mc, Holland..10 year anniversary doesn t come every day ya know. and add Judith too.
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Steve, thanks. I meant to list three examples of self-defined lukewarmers: yourself, Matt and Tom. I hadn’t got your co-author wrong. Memory’s going but not that fast!
I agree with you, probably, that the decision to decline was the wrong one, given the importance of the ten year anniversary. But if we knew the name of the person(s) we’d be able to quiz them too on their reasons.
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Jaime, great post and great comments. In the latter, you might want to put long quotes inside blockquote tags, rather than em or i tags, for readability. (Italics are legible, but unreadable.)
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Mosh,
thanks for the advice. Why are you helping us?
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Yep, it is.
Except, it works fine on the wordpress comments page, but not on the cliscep website page. I give up.
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Hmm. We all seem to be granted different editors to work with (thanks a lot, WordPress) so I can’t say for absolute sure but when I am writing a post, under the ‘Visual’ tab, there is a symbol of opening quotation marks, as in:
”
only much bigger, of course. They enclose the selected HTML inside quotes called blockquote, with a less-than sign on the left of the word ‘blockquote’ and a more-than sign on the right. I often have occasion to manually type the entire blockquote tag, which is a pain (it’s a long sequence of characters for such a common task!) but well worth it, typographically speaking.
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They can lay the ghosts to rest by throwing the bad actors under the bus. Unless they do that, the banquet-ruining banshee of Banquo will be a repeat visitor.
They’ll never throw the bad actors under the bus, of course, because then they’d have nobody left.
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@ Jaime Jessop
how did you find out this BBC prog was due to air?
@Mosh – see your point, but you know Steve Mc would never self promote or be party to a attempt to that (or have the people with money & tv time to air it).
do you remember –
https://climateaudit.org/2006/03/16/server-crash/
https://climateaudit.org/2009/03/09/the-climate-audit-system-upgrade-help-needed/
expected to see your name in the comments (maybe to early for you)
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“thanks for the advice. Why are you helping us?
I have a long history of volunteering to assist the helpless.
Just read back through my history of telling skeptics where the best arguments are ( ECS, microsite)
It’s pretty simple. I’m a conservative. For the past 12 years I have watched my fellow conservatives
make the wrong arguments. Stupid arguments ( c02 is a trace gas, all the temperature data is a hoax,
c02 leads it doesnt lag, models suck, its a socialist conspiracy, we can’t get published) that destroy your credibility. Some folks ( Nic Lewis) get it. make your arguments where the science is most uncertain.
make your arguments IN THE ARENA THAT COUNTS, make your arguments about things that matter,
about things that drive policy. As a conservative I think its important to enter the coming policy fights
with the best weapons, not sticks and stones. I see all the brain power of the skeptical side wasted
on stupid arguments while only a few work on the critical argument. Here is a clue. you will be judged
by your worst argument, not your best. Because in the fray your opponents will focus on your
worst blunder: I have said this many times and my favorite example is Chris dardin and the OJ glove.
Bad argument. Bad blunder. and that one blunder wiped out all the better arguments.
so why do I help? why do you open the door for old ladies?
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DF Hunter: See my comment yesterday for what I think any of us know about the BBC programme, plus the fact that Mosher has been interviewed. And I’ve just taken a look at the whole evening on BBC 4. It’s really not looking hopeful.
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“expected to see your name in the comments (maybe to early for you)”
2006 would be too early for me. I joined in 2007
Sometime before June 2007
https://climateaudit.org/2007/06/28/noaa-and-the-three-monkeys/#comment-93607
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““thanks for the advice. Why are you helping us?’
as a footnote my suggestion to people ( using Chris dardin as an example again) is that whne making a case you want to avoid asking questions that you don’t already know the answer to. Unless your socrates.. looks around.. nope he is not here. And further that you should avoid trying to argue by asking
questions, rhetorical or otherwise.
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Steven,
“It’s pretty simple. I’m a conservative. For the past 12 years I have watched my fellow conservatives
make the wrong arguments.”
So you wouldn’t help us expose the problems with The Science(tm) if we were liberals?
Bizarre.
(In case this is news to you, half of us here at cliscep are, in fact, izquierdistas. But our political disunity doesn’t bother us, because we’re skeptical of The Science(tm).)
“Here is a clue. you will be judged
by your worst argument, not your best.”
So why does anyone believe the climate alarmists?
“why do you open the door for old ladies?”
I don’t. What do you think I am, a morally redeemable human being? I’m a climate skeptic for fox ache.
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“I agree with you, probably, that the decision to decline was the wrong one, given the importance of the ten year anniversary. But if we knew the name of the person(s) we’d be able to quiz them too on their reasons.”
Ah perhaps I can Help.
I was contacted by the producer. During the course of doing the arrangements for the interview I did what I did with the BBC. I gave them a list of names that I thought they should interview.
They said they tried to contact X but he didnt respond.
They then asked me if I could persuade X to give an interview. I contacted Y and asked Y to interveen
and plead with X. Y said X refused because he was concerned about “agendas”, ‘editing’ and such.
I also Asked the producer to consider Y, but Y refused for similar reasons. I dont know if Steve Mc
was interviewed for this. He was on my list to them of folks they ought to interview. I have not heard
from them about whether it will air. At one point it got pretty heated when the host got some basic
facts wrong about FOIA requests. That will probably be edited. At some points during all interviews I mention Holland and explain thta if they dont tell the Holland story they have missed the most important
episode. No one ever discusses it. They all get balled up on ‘hide the decline” and other shit we knew
without the mails. So, via heasay ( from Y) I learned that X refused because he was concerned about
the editing. Fair enough concern. Shit back in the day I had half a dozen interviews where None of
what I said was aired. Thats just part of the game. Play or sit the bench.
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“So you wouldn’t help us expose the problems with The Science(tm) if we were liberals?”
Of course I would, the pathetic come in all political persuasions.
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OK, think I got that. Genuine thanks from us all for suggesting relevant people.
“I dont know if Steve Mc
was interviewed for this”
We do know he was (see here) and that he expects at least 50 seconds of that to be aired.
(Actually I made the 50 seconds up, based on Jaime’s estimate. But Steve’s not very hopeful.)
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So why does anyone believe the climate alarmists?
Simple, because their worst arguments are better than your best. duh.
( psst see my advice about arguing with questions, it takes skill”
What do you think I am, a morally redeemable human being?
Err no I assumed you were already redeemed or perhaps even one of the elect.
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““I dont know if Steve Mc
was interviewed for this”
Sorry I was unclear I mean the second series that I was interviewed for.
There were two. BBC and weather channel. When I am talking about a skeptic refusing to be interviewed, Im talking about the weather channel one.
These things work like this. Take Red Pill america. The producer writes me, I tell him who I think
should be interviewed. He says, I got X, got Y, Why person Z?
List to it
It is one example of skeptics covering the story.. Views ~500
Same with BBC. I think there Steve mc told them to include me. I tell them
who I think should be interviewed. Same with weather channel. So I will say “If you want the complete
story include X, y, z). Steve Mc probably does a similar thing.
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Mosh,
And yet when I asked you to what we owed the boon of your munificence, the first two facts you listed after the prefatory “It’s simple” were
— your political persuasion
— the (identical) political persuasion of the pathetic people who needed your help
Including the arguments you’re telling us we should prioritize, I presume? They’re worse than the worst alarmist arguments, are they? They’re worse than the argument from consensus? Worse than the precautionary principle? They’re worse than the Barbara Boxer Argument (“our children are choking on all the carbon dioxide”)? They’re worse than “even if the science is wrong, acting as though it’s right will result in cleaner air and allow our children to finally breathe”?
They must be real stools then.
Er, if I were arguing with you, you’d know it.
What I’m actually doing, with my questions, is a thing called asking. I’m soliciting your answers.
Not that I’m necessarily entirely clueless myself. For example, I’m pretty sure I have an adequate solution to the mystery of why anyone believes the alarmists if, as you say (and I tend to agree), we’re judged by the worst arguments we make.
I was just hoping you’d have an even better answer than mine. (Oh well, it was a long shot.)
But rest assured, I’ll take your advice (“only ask questions you already know the answers to”) the day I decide to be disingenuous. Thanks in advance.
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So Brad
‘“So you wouldn’t help us expose the problems with The Science(tm) if we were liberals?”
Some examples might help you.
I tried to help liberals when they used Mann’s stupid HS. Bad argument.
And circa 2007 I tried to help liberals who tried to use the massive loss of ice as an argument
also bad argument. There are other example.
Bottom line. you probably want your opponent to use his Best arguments ( and should help him do this)
and you want your side to use the best arguments they have. Another hint. Philosophy of science aint
on the list of best arguments
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I wish they’d listened to you, because it was a damn effective argument. A dishonest one, but a damn effective one.
Correct. That’s a corollary of skepticism. (If by “best arguments” you mean “most valid,” not “most compelling to the mob.”) Sorry if it wasn’t clear that I agreed with you about this to begin with.
Yet denial of the philosophy of science is the mainstay of alarmist discourse.
Besides, promoting a comprehension of the philosophy of science (even if it amounts to pissing against the tsunami of disinformation from the anti-science alarmist academy) is more important than winning the climate debate. It’s a mitzvah to all mankind, regardless of whether it’s enough to push my “side” in this particular squabble over the line.
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Haha… in rē your advice, Steven…
…it just occurred to me that the last time we met, under the line on my essay ‘Oreskes, Harvard and the Destruction of Scientific Revolutions,’ you regaled readers with what I can only assume was supposed to be a kind of demonstration of your leet skill:
Did your micron-deep understanding of the OP betray an encyclopedic ignorance of the “philosophy of science” you claim is not in the top-10 arguments for skepticism?
Are you precisely the sample of mankind in most desperate need of the mitzvah of free tuition therein?
Did my response leave you with a supernumerary anus that almost elicited my pity, especially given that the thread closed before you could stammer out a defense of your honor?
Don’t mind me, I’m just asking questions I already know the answers to.
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“And yet when I asked you to what we owed the boon of your munificence, the first two facts you listed after the prefatory “It’s simple” were”
And its equally simple why I helped Liberals find better arguments. I want my opponent to use his best argument. This really isnt that hard. Unless you are determined to misunderstand.
List to the podcast Brad. Listen all the way. Listen to Anthony,he gets it.
here I have cued it up for you in case you can’t listen to the full hour
Pretty simple I help liberals because they are my enemies and I want to beat their best arguments
I help conservatives because they are my friends and I want them to bring the best arguments.
Nic Lewis gets it. Anthony gets it. McIntyre gets it. The Arena is Publsihed science. All three play on that field. They do science, not theatre. Other folks? ya blogs are fun, arm chair psuedo philosophy is fun.
sarcasm is easy. science hard.
Tell you what next time folks want to interview me about climategate I will suggest they talk to you.
Not.
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Steven, I think you are generally correct about making good arguments. However, you include almost as an afterthought the models. However, even Hansen realized the climate models were the “weak point” of climate science. There is very rigorous science and experience that more or less proves that climate models on the grids used have very large numerical errors. Running any CFD on very course grids is quite wrong and the entire CFD literature shows exactly that. The only way to achieve skill in these circumstances is to use your tunable parameters to cause these errors to cancel out for some of the output parameters. Other outputs have no expectation of skill. That’s why regional climates are not predicted by current models.
Schmidt’s post on CMIP6 I think shows that he distrusts this new set of models. They may have improved the cloud models without compensating to keep the cancellations of errors in the older versions.
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Clue brad. When folks don’t know science, they resort to philosophy of science which they have even les of a grasp on.
Mcintyre gets that you have to do science to change science. Nic Lewis gets it. Anthony gets it.
I’d like to think me an my co authors got it. Mails dont change science. Philosophy doesnt change it.
ya I got a honors in Philosophy. Summa cum laude. meh. Never met a philosophy argument that settled or even dented a science argument, but then I’m a Quinean.
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So Brad if you are confused as to why a philosphical argument will always fail to win
here is a clue
1. C02 is a ghg
2. Any philosophical argument you choose to make arguing against #1.
#1 wins. Kinda like a Moorean Shift. you know Moore. Or maybe less.
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Ignoring the road kill of careers and suppressed papers really puts a dent in the idea that the climate issue is all about the science. Klein and Oreskes ain’t scientists, but they don’t seem to be attacked too much by “scientists”.
And as we watch larger issues unfolding in real time, it seems pretty clear that the climate madness is for sure a symptom and contributor to larger issues.
But kudos for actually conversing in more accessible and less delphic terms.
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SM,
Your assertion that the worst arguments of climate extremists are better than the best skeptic arguments is interesting. Care to parse that out better…definitions are everything…
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And if your point is to repeat that CO2 is a ghg, you are being less than serious or sincere.
Unless you are demonstrating that simple answers attract simple minds.
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Steven,
Your last comment would have been less irrelevant had I ever used a “philosophical argument … against [C02 is a ghg]”—or hell, even so much as disagreed with [C02 is a ghg]—in my life.
“When folks don’t know science, they resort to philosophy of science which they have even les of a grasp on”
They do? Oreskes certainly fits the bill, but that’s [counting on fingers…] one data point.
Even if your data-poor generalization is true, however, it doesn’t do anything for your case, since the arrow of implication points the wrong way.
But you claim you did an honors year in Philosophy, so why do I have to explain this to you? (No, really, why?)
If only you’d done it at the University of Reading you might actually understand my WUWT post, or my approximate position on climate change, or my choice of targets for philosophical argument.
Hint: Oreskes and her consensualist epigones don’t even put ‘scientist’ on their tax returns. They claim to be philosophers, historians and assorted other species of scholar.
But as you’ve demonstrated, claims are cheap.
“Mcintyre gets that you have to do science to change science.”
Yawn.
1. McIntyre does mathematics.
2. Oreskes managed to change (interfere with; adulterate; illegitimately molest; sabotage) science without doing it.
3. Science doesn’t need changing, because it ain’t broken. Or rather it wasn’t, until certain non-scientists within the climate movement fixed it.
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PS
4. The topic you’re preoccupied with (and frankly bores me a little) is climate science, not science.
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Steven,
how did I miss this gem?
Liberals are your enemies?* Why on heck? And why aren’t you on a political blog arguing the merits of conservatism versus the evil ideology that drove masked men to gun down your family in front of your eyes as a child, or whatever it is “liberals” did to earn your enmity?
Is the climate debate just a proxy for a partisan political grudge in your mind? Because that would explain quite a lot.
*Note the use of question marks (?), not argument marks, indicating that the writer (yours truly) is “asking a question,” as the expression goes.
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Interesting exchanges here. Thanks to all involved. As Brad notes, more akin to a question and answer session than a full blown argument, but it’s getting there.
Steven’s perspective is steeped in the entrenched political divide between conservatives and liberals which frames the whole climate science and climate change mitigation debate over in the States. Hence he can’t resist interjecting politics into a debate primarily about what constitutes a good or bad argument in (climate) science. Brad’s concerns go beyond (climate) science to encompass science more generally and I share his concerns. Post normal climate science is merely the most egregious (and hideously costly) manifestation of the dumbing down of the scientific method. There are others.
We here in what little is left of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and
Northern Ireland(and isolated European enclaves) are less inclined to colour our views on matters which should be unrelated to politics with our views on politics. I think that might be also the case in Australia too, perhaps to a lesser extent, I don’t know. Besides, there are no conservatives here in Britain, just Conservatives, LibDems, Labour, Greens etc. who all share the same basic political outlook and who all adore Liberal Climate Science.Mosh says criticising models is a bad argument. Then criticising climate science must be a bad argument. Ergo, sceptics have no good arguments.
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Meanwhile, on Twitter, the scientists involved in Climategate are actually patting themselves on the back on their ‘Yeoman’ efforts to counteract the hysteria and conspiracy-making of the warmist inspired conspiratorial “forces of denial”. Post normal science does not advance, nor do its practitioners learn lessons from history. As with the climate model hindcasts, they shoehorn history into conforming to their expectations, making adjustments to the raw data as necessary.
https://twitter.com/HG54/status/1194046742997741570
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There were two separate releases of CRU e-mails and after the second it was evident that there were probably more outthere, even if those still to come would simply add greater context. I would have thought a tenth anniversary might have been a suitable time to stir the pot again. A week to go? We can hope.
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“Mosh says criticising models is a bad argument. Then criticising climate science must be a bad argument. Ergo, sceptics have no good arguments.”
Err no.
First its a bad argument because the science doesnt rest on models. It rests on physics.
All models do is provide some limited guidance to policy makers about the potential magnitude
of the problem. Second its a bad argument because on balance the models are pretty damn good
as far as models of complex phenomena go.
Let me put this a little differently because maybe the word bad is too harsh. It’s not your BEST argument.
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“There were two separate releases of CRU e-mails and after the second it was evident that there were probably more outthere, even if those still to come would simply add greater context. ”
There were 3. A few of us have all 220K mails.
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Hence he can’t resist interjecting politics into a debate primarily about what constitutes a good or bad argument in (climate) science.
Politics has nothing to do with what constitutes a good and bad argument.
As for PNS. my bet is you can’t even describe (without googling) what the precepts are.
For Grins try this. This is the first thing we learn as Philosophy students.
Its called explication.
task A. Explicate the argument for AGW
task B. Explicate the argument for PNS
For a guideline on how to do one, here are my friends notes
https://legacy.earlham.edu/~peters/courses/explicat.htm
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Yo yo Jaime
A yeoman’s work is never done.
What are the preferred pronouns for a scientist who identifies as a yeoman but hasn’t had the surgery yet?
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“Liberals are your enemies?* Why on heck? And why aren’t you on a political blog arguing the merits of conservatism versus the evil ideology that drove masked men to gun down your family in front of your eyes as a child, or whatever it is “liberals” did to earn your enmity?”
Why would I waste my time arguing with a liberal on a political blog. Jesus. Liberals need to be defeated
at the ballot box. Why are they my enemies? simple. they want to tax me.
I am begining to question the old wisdom that there are no dumb questions.
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“Is the climate debate just a proxy for a partisan political grudge in your mind? Because that would explain quite a lot.”
Not a proxy. As you should know my co author Tom fuller is full blown bleeding heart liberal.
Again. this is simple. in argumentation its called the principle of charity. Look it up, pretty sure you have to
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Oreskes ?
Seriously,
1. C02 is a GHG
2. Oreskes makes a stupid argument
3. Brad attacks oreskes.
Brad never learnt the principle of charity.
Basically, you doing exactly what I describe above. For example, I tell my liberal enemies that the consensus argument is dumb. Its a dumb argument made by dumb people. However, you don’t defeat a science by noting or taking down the dumbest arguments.. You take on the best.
That takes more than you got. Cause if you had it you’d be in the arena and not in the cheap seats.
But hey come on this dumb old english/philosophy major has a couple papers under his belt. You can do it brad baby.. come into the ring.
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Steven
“Let me put this a little differently because maybe the word bad is too harsh. It’s not your BEST argument.”
You mean, it wasn’t Koch funded? Or it wasn’t limited to the last 250 years? Explanate.
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Steven,
“However, you don’t defeat a science by noting or taking down the dumbest arguments.. You take on the best.”
I’m not remotely interested in taking down a science.
“That takes more than you got. Cause if you had it you’d be in the arena and not in the cheap seats.”
Gee, maybe if I made a “stupid argument” like Oreskes I’d be writing Forewords to Papal Encyclicals?
“Again. this is simple. in argumentation its called the principle of charity. Look it up, pretty sure you have to”
This is after I’ve already stated that I agree with the principle of charity, going so far as to call it a corollary of skepticism, if I recall correctly.
I used to assume you could read better than you could type, but as this sentence is already in violation of the aforementioned principle I think I’ll stop myself here.
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Steven,
“First its a bad argument because the science doesnt rest on models. It rests on physics.
All models do is provide some limited guidance to policy makers about the potential magnitude
of the problem. Second its a bad argument because on balance the models are pretty damn good
as far as models of complex phenomena go.”
The science is grounded in physics. Physics forms the basic core of the models. The ‘science’ of man-made dangerous global warming rests firmly on the models. The models, though grounded in physics, incorporate very much more than indisputable physics. It is this huge layer of uncertainy, estimations, parameterizations, approximations etc. built on top of the basic physics which renders ‘climate science’ open to criticism. You said it yourself: the models give an estimate of the potential magnitude of the problem and if the ‘problem’ is anything like that estimated by Nic Lewis using very much simpler models and relying more upon historical observations, then there isn’t really a ‘problem’ which merits the description ‘Climate Emergency’. That’s the whole point of AGW ‘scepticism’ – not scepticism of the physics, not scepticism even of the potential for there to be a problem, but scepticism of the way in which the ‘problem’ has been defined to be a definite problem when there exists such large structural uncertainties in the construction of the models used to define the ‘problem’. Rather than address those uncertainties, or even admit to them, the ‘science’ appears now to be shifting the Overton Window to give scientific credibility to the assumption that estimates of the ‘problem’ – which previously ranged from ‘not a lot to worry about’ to ‘eek, we’re gonna fry’ – now span the categories ‘it looks bad’ to ‘Christ on a bike, we’ve only got 50 years before Earth enters the Antropo-Thermocene!!’
The “models are pretty damn good as far as models of complex phenomena go”. Alas, complex phenomena are pretty damn good at giving the models a good kicking and all climate scientists seem to want to do is patch them up and send them on their way to keep convincing people that there’s a ‘problem’.
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Jaime,
Yup.
The handicap excuse by the climate-science community is a bit like an Olympic diver who misses the pool, lands on a spectator, kills the spectator’s dog/kid, and says “but on the other hand what I was going for there was a 6.5 Degree of Difficulty so that’s gotta count for something, right?”
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SM,
ECS to CO2 ranges between 1oC to 5oC. Despite unlimited funding to tighten it. In fact the new 5oC just came from the UK. So it seems that the physics of CO2 remains a bit uncharted. And when I read someone claiming that the climate models are based on physics and are therefore unassailable I am reminded of Dr. Pielke Sr. who pointed out that the models are actually more like engineering models, subject to significant errors since they make assumptions about the application 9f physics.ne’s. Boeing for instance relied on models, software and motivated thinking to develop the 737 Max 8. But it is the skeptic’s fault for the idiocratic policies, the failed predictions, Greta, XR (embraced by many academics) the climate imperialism in Africa, the lies about disappearing islands, the death of the GBR, the ridiculous electricity prices, etc.
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‘But hey, the mechanics of the springboard are like, basic physics, so you can’t argue with that’.
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SM,
Reading you, and reflecting on that podcast(which I have listened to before) raises an interesting question.
Near the start Steve McIntyre raises the point that that the arguments by the climate consensus are basically like those of religious fundamentalists. So how does one rationally debate and discuss with a fundamentalism so pernicious and pervasive?
Especially when the response by the fanatic is “the physics of CO2”. That is the equivalent of “It’s in the Bible, that settles it”.
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“There were two separate releases of CRU e-mails and after the second it was evident that there were probably more out there, even if those still to come would simply add greater context. ”
“There were 3. A few of us have all 220K mails”.
Hardly a third release if people involved, like myself, have no access to the third “release”. I still live in hope that I will eventually learn more of what my colleagues did and said.
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Steven,
“First its a bad argument because the science doesnt rest on models. It rests on physics.”
What the science rests on is a somewhat moot point when the purpose of the science is to make a prediction. Since the problem is one of evidence-based decision-making, the argument rests upon the strength of evidence required to justify making a particular decision. Since, as you say, “All models do is provide some limited guidance to policy makers about the potential magnitude”, such models become central to the question. Furthermore, the question whether there is enough evidence to justify making a particular decision is always a political one driven by levels of risk aversion, uncertainty aversion and stakeholder interest. All stakeholders of such a decision have a right to comment upon the policies that frame the decision-making, and no amount of bluster and chiding on your part will alter that fact.
The “Y’all need to do better science” line will always miss its mark with certain sceptics because it isn’t what the science rests on that matters, it is what the decisions rest on.
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In reply to Mosh:
Y’all need to get better evidence. Y’all need to stop making up evidence too.
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Judith Curry has an excellent post up on the 10 year Climategate anniversary.
While I personally think Delingpole’s article is a superb analysis, it would not surprise me if the ‘establishment’ media in the UK is looking to rewrite history and cement the ‘exoneration,’ especially with this forthcoming one hour BBC special Climategate: Science of a Scandal, set to air November 14.
https://judithcurry.com/2019/11/12/legacy-of-climategate-10-years-later/#more-25412
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One door may close but the visitor logs to another may open …
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Michael Mann writing in Newsweek today:
Ten years ago, hackers with links to Russia and Wikileaks broke into an email server in the U.K., and released stolen emails in a massive, carefully orchestrated disinformation campaign designed to impact the upcoming Copenhagen Climate Summit of December 2009. Words from the emails were disingenuously rearranged and taken out of context (for example, the word “trick”—a term used by mathematicians and scientists to denote a clever short-cut to solving a problem) by climate change deniers to misrepresent both the science and the scientists.
In the decade since, we have now largely overcome outright climate denial. The debate has, at least in honest quarters, moved squarely beyond the question of whether we have a problem to what to do about it. But it’s late in the game. Extreme weather events have been made more frequent, destructive and deadly because of climate change. Yet those same events are also now mobilizing the public and an increasing number of policymakers to act, making it clear that the danger is already here and needs to be addressed now. Sea level rise combined with more destructive hurricanes are now threatening coastal communities in Florida, triggering Republicans there to begin taking the issue seriously as sea-side real estate falls increasingly underwater.
LOL
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Jaime, What on earth is there to LOL about. The way Climategate is being projected today as an orchestrated manipulation is a worrying tactic. My recollection is that it took almost a week before even the e-mails were admitted as being genuine, and by then the disinformation strategy was unveiled.
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I know I should watch the programme this evening, but I can’t put myself through it. It’s already obvious that it’s going to be a greenwash, a re-writing of history. Here’s the Radio Times summary:
“In 2009 the scientific world was rocked when the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia was hacked and thousands of emails went viral, appearing to cast doubt on its work, and giving grist to the mill of climate change deniers. Although the culprit has never been found, the scientists affected, who speak in this fine documentary in frank detail, have little doubt about why it happened: one is blunt, saying, “Climategate was a very organised misinformation campaign.” But by whom?”
That’s just about as inaccurate a summary as it’s possible to imagine in terms of the events in question, but no doubt it accurately summarises the line that will be taken by the BBC programme.
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I’m with Alan. The climategate anniversary ought to be a chance for sceptics to score points, but so far, absurdly, it seems to be the other way round in the media, and the imminent BBC show won’t help.
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Watching it now… Steve McIntyre is on. Interesting how this segment is being framed – George Monbiot setting the scene by saying something about climate deniers desperately looking for ways to discredit the hockey stick… Michael Mann now saying something about Steve McIntyre losing one battle, moving on to “attack” the CRU…
Continuous ominous music… Hackers… hacking… hacked… Bob Ward on now….
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Best lies so far:
– there’s a consensus on catastrophic climate change.
– mainstream media highly hostile to climate science.
– hiding the decline was the most honest way to present the data
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At the 21:40 mark now – predictably, they’ve been focussing on explaining “hide the decline” as an innocent procedure, no mention of other and more damning material…
Now the focus is on the stress taking its toll on Phil Jones. Death threats… Tim Osborn being upset…
Ward and Monbiot framing the narrative again – ClimateGate becomes a “festival of destruction”. Nasty deniers on the attack…
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Watched the whole programme.
Is it just me or was there a definite implication that Steve McIntyre, pissed off by Jone’s resistance to FOI requests and desperate to discredit Mann’s HS, was behind the hacking?
Talk about victimhood as well. Osborn’s ham acting was simply awful.
Berkeley Earth: they implied that it confirmed Mann’s HS! Of course it bloody well didn’t, it just confirmed that the instrumental record since 1850 was probably correct – surprise, surprise, they used much the same data.
The entire program was a sham and ridiculously biased and I think definitely painted SM as a villain, or at least a potential likely villain.
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In actual fact Alan, the programme ended by concluding that Climategate didn’t have much of an impact on Copenhagen, which was destined to fail anyway. So Mann’s loopy conspiracy theory is at best irrelevant, at worst plain wrong. I think the programme gave more the impression that Climategate was initiated by disgruntled ‘climate deniers’ with a personal grievance against UEA and Jones in particular.
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One matter we should not deny nor hide and that is the truly obnoxious treatment Phil Jones and others at CRU received – death threats, absolutely vile and threatening messages at CRU and at home against them and their families. Phil Jones almost had a nervous breakdown and had to take sick leave. Not a particularly edifying example of sceptical reaction. Shameful actually. Their own shameful distortions later altered my own sympathy not long after.
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I’m glad to say, I didn’t watch the programme. I watched England beat Montenegro 7-0 on ITV. And I think I would have still enjoyed this more than the BBC’s offering even if I had been a Montenegro fan.
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John, very sensible! Overall, the programme was (predictably) manipulative, not only in what was said (and what was not said) but how it was said and how it was framed. The dark colours, the sombre, almost funereal music, the repetitive shots of that sinister, desperate-looking Anthony Gormley statue on the edge of the UEA library roof – man on the edge of a precipice…
Ah well, time for bed.
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think I read the opening “all the main players” correctly.
was Bob Ward or Monbiot a main player!!
remember this from him & other comments from https://www.thenewamerican.com/tech/environment/item/6757-climategate-george-monbiots-lament
“The New “Deniers” says George, so maybe a player after the fact.
the opening scene with Mann recalling the white stuff in the envelope almost had me in tears.
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Not as bad as Attenborough in April.
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“SM,
ECS to CO2 ranges between 1oC to 5oC. Despite unlimited funding to tighten it. In fact the new 5oC just came from the UK. So it seems that the physics of CO2 remains a bit uncharted.”
Classic Misunderstanding.
The Physics of C02. This is actually engineering. How do I know? Well because when I worked on
the YF-23 We had to calculate the expected effects (in IR) of the atmosphere and the bonus we could get ( in IR invisibility) by dumping c02 in the exhaust stream of the engines.
The Physics of c02 tells you that the additional WATTS /m^2 you will see from increasing c02 are this
W = 5.35*ln(C1/C2) Where C1 is the ending c02 concentration and C2 is the starting concentration.
So if you double from 280 you get 3.71 Watts.
Thats it!
Thats the physics of c02.
There is not much to argue with in this. it is basic engineering now.
Now, Whats more important is the rest of the picture. How is that forcing amplified?
What other forcings are there? When you increase Forcing ( from ANY CAUSE) how is that amplified?
When you increase by 4 watts ( again ANY CAUSE– could be solar, could be methane etc)
what is the temperature rise?
How much of the excess heat goes into melting ice? how much gets stored in the ocean?
how deep does it get stored? How much of the excess watts goes into heating the air?
Where? is it uniform? Does it go up automatically? or take time? How much time?
can other forceing counter act c02 forcing?
So many interesting complicated questions with uncertain answers
BUT SOME CLOWNS FOCUS ON THE SHIT WE USE IN ENGINEERING.
the shit that actually works.
So ya, physics of c02 . double c02 and you get about 3.71 extra watts of warming.
If you want to look at the code used in GCms for this go have a look.
Looks like the code we used in engineering. Heck its been benchmarked
agains the best enginering models available and observations. Ah fuck what do weapons guys
know about designing the gear that defends our freedom.
Note
This doesnt include feedbacks (complicated and not a c02 isue)
This doesnt tell you how much actual temperature changes (complicated and not a c02 issue)
But ya ya Co2 is a trace gas. It cant have any effect.
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Not satisfied with the programme, this is on the Science & Environment [sic] section of the BBC website today:
“‘Climategate’: Did a hacking scandal slow down action for climate change?”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/science-environment-50396797/climategate-did-a-hacking-scandal-slow-down-action-for-climate-change
“Ten years ago, hackers stole thousands of emails from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit. The scandal, known as ‘Climategate’, rocked the scientific world.
Now, for the first time, all the key players recount the events and what really happened.
The hacked emails resulted in a battle between the scientists and their critics over climate science and data transparency, which led to a media storm, a criminal investigation, multiple inquiries and death threats
Watch the full documentary ‘Climategate: Science of a Scandal’ on iPlayer here.”
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SM blames skeptics for the bs that the climate consensus comes up with regarding ECS.
And cuts and pastes his engineering resumé to call us unserious. SM defends the consensus the way Boeing at first blamed the pilots for the engineering of the 737 Max8. So let’s ignore the scientists talking about over lapping Spectra absorption. About the temperature records adjusted. About Peter Ridd in Australia and Pielke Sr. and so many others silenced for disagreeing. About the huge record of documented failed predictions.
Engineers I know don’t have to rewrite history to claim they are correct today. Engineers I know have to make predictions that, you know, come true before they claim success.
Engineers and scientists don’t rely on trumpeting their authority to silence thise who question them. Unlike SM.
It’s all on the skeptics according to SM
Let’s ignore SM toadying with the consensus, silent when their predictions fail because it’s all the fault of skeptics.
Big brave SM is here where he can safely pontificate, repetitively, ignoring the facts.
Pretending that the science is ok.
But blame the skeptics and dismiss them.
SM comes here and the other open forums where he can make his arguments from authority, endlessly repeat his his CV, blame skeptics and ignore the issues raised.
Predictable, reactionary, and puzzling. Go join Greta’s handlers or something equally suitable.
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There is something excruciatingly worse than the BBC4 programme and that’s The Guardian’s review of it:
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/nov/14/climategate-science-of-a-scandal-review-the-hack-that-cursed-our-planet
Could be used as a test for sceptics to find as many deliberate falsehoods there are within.
The Guardian at its sickening worst.
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Rereading SM’s post on ECS.
Wait, wait, there’s even less substance than usual in his latest post.
Now he tries, poorly, a bit of sleight of hand, ignoring the question with arm waving flurries of bs. The watts/m has nearly nothing to do with the temperature in the tiny ranges the consensus claims represents doom.
He never bothers to address the issue actually raised. For SM the skeptics raising the questions or pointing out the failed predictions, or quoting the consensus reports are the problem.
It’s so dysfunctional and predictable.
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Anyone who watched this(I was literally unable to
watch all of it) and remembers the classic Horizon
programmes from the 60s/70s/80s must be wondering
what the flip has happened to the BBC. Simply dreadful.
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“This doesnt tell you how much actual temperature changes (complicated and not a c02 issue)”
You heard it from Steven Mosher first: the temperature changes are not a CO2 issue! Not even we sceptics would go that far.
Of course, I’m just pulling his leg. I know what he meant, just as I knew what Hunterson7 meant when he wrote “the physics of CO2”.
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My memory (which is failing) is that Moonbat’s initial reaction to the Climategate revelations was anger and disbelief that he was so mislead by CRU. Yet here he is, almost 10 years later, giving cover to the various malfeasances going on within the CRU building. Has the man no shame (or memory)? Does he not remember calling for Phil Jones to go?
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/nov/25/monbiot-climate-leak-crisis-response
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Alan, yes that is ironic. Here is Monbiot again, a few weeks later, calling for resignations
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/georgemonbiot/2010/feb/02/climate-change-hacked-emails
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Alan: Dead right on Monbiot. Even just as a story it would have been far more interesting to have had the Guardian man explain: “At first I called for Phil Jones to resign because I thought A, B, C. But later I realised he shouldn’t have because of X, Y, Z.”
There was also this similar hiding away from necessary conflict in the discussion of hiding of the decline:
However, despite this kind of egregious omission, nobody above has mentioned the last word given to Mosh and then Steve Mc by the editors. They were both allowed to make very important points – things far more sensible than anything said in the Attenborough. To paraphrase:
My verdict as a result of this and earlier good points: there was an element in the production/editing team that was sympathetic to both men, as Steve had believed from his interviews:
I thought the Bish was suffering from memory failure, in other words. Attenborough was far worse.
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Hi, I may have a comment stuck in moderation.
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Hunterson, sorry mate I don’t see it anywhere… could you repost it?
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Hunterson, I did rescue one this morning, the 9:06am one.
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I looked too. Nothing in Spam or Pending folders, or Deleted.
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Alan, that Guardian article is hilariously overwrought, even for the Guardian. The “hack that cursed our planet” indeed. It’s like Halloween never ended. Curses and witchcraft!
There’s a contradiction, most notably in the media. On the one hand the science is settled, there’s an overwhelming consensus, the public are demanding action, most politicians are nodding along, the media are on board, NGOs and the civil service and Hollywood and the United Nations are on message, everyone wants climate solutions, etc, etc.
On the other, shadowy dark forces of climate denial and vested interests are somehow dooming the planet and cursing attempts to put out the fire and threatening the science and influencing minds, even though dissenting voices have largely been silenced and no-platformed. How can this be? Occult powers? The Russians? Satan?
They can’t have it both ways. Which is it?
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Gavin Schmidt has joined the fray to defend the honour of his fellow climate
scammers‘scientists’ so wrongfully accused of wrongdoing then and now, 10 years later, accused of wrongdoing all over again on “troll farms and noise-generating disinformation machines on Facebook and Twitter” which apparently have replaced the “fever swamps of dueling blogs and comment threads”. I think not Gavin. Maybe Twitter and FB have augmented the erstwhile climate critical environment of denier blogs and dueling AGW blogs, but they most certainly have not replaced that medium. As evidence, I give you:Exhibit A: this blog, which Gavin has obviously read.
Exhibit B: RC blog, where Gavin is moaning about that which is written on this blog (in particular by Tony Thomas).
Exhibit C: comment threads beneath my post and Tony’s
The heat’s getting too much for Gavin on Twitter – he’s started blocking people. But he can let off steam at RealClimate and tweet about it relatively safely, having pre-emptively blocked those most likely to respond with inconvenient facts.
Like, I’m sure more than a few sceptical Twitter accounts might take him to task over this ridiculous statement:
The nominally serious ‘issues’ touched on by the email theft – how robust are estimates of global temperature over the instrumental period, what does the proxy record show etc. – have all been settled in favor of the mainstream by scientists plodding along in normal science mode, incrementally improving the analyses, and yet they are still the most repeated denier talking points.
‘Nominally serious’? Is he serious? The issues were very serious, they’re still serious. They have not been resolved or settled. They’ve festered and grown worse. This is some [not] nominally serious denial from Gavin. Soooo [not] nominally serious, I think RC might now reasonably be termed a ‘denier blog’. So what issues have been settled by scientists plodding along in [post] normal science mode then? Mann’s HS was crap and is still crap, but it’s still being wheeled out in various guises to prove that modern warming is ‘unprecedented’. Also, what did I say above? I said the Climategate deniers 10 years on will just turn around and say the ‘evidence’ of climate change is now incontrovertible and more pressing than ever – which is why they’ve added a blue flashing light and wailing sirens (i.e. crimson-robed XR protestors) and called it a ‘climate emergency’. Gavin proves my point admirably.
The bigger changes over the last 10 years have nothing to do with ‘issues’ in climate science either. The ‘facts on the ground’ have shifted dramatically. The warmest years on record, increasing influences of climate change on wildfires, hurricane intensity, heat waves, coastal flooding, coral bleaching, etc. have meant that outright denial of science isn’t as marketable any more as the wider conversation has moved to solutions.
Just two words in response to that latest paragraph: ‘total’ and ‘b******s’
Happy Birthday to Richard by the way!
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Thanks!
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“SM blames skeptics for the bs that the climate consensus comes up with regarding ECS.
And cuts and pastes his engineering resumé to call us unserious. SM defends the consensus the way Boeing at first blamed the pilots for the engineering of the 737 Max8. So let’s ignore the scientists talking about over lapping Spectra absorption. About the temperature records adjusted. About Peter Ridd in Australia and Pielke Sr. and so many others silenced for disagreeing. About the huge record of documented failed predictions.”
Huh? you read my posts more poorly than most people read the mails.
“SM blames skeptics for the bs that the climate consensus comes up with regarding ECS.
Ah err no. your notion that Nic Lewis’ work is BS is kinda funny. There are a range of values
heck just like the range of values people had for the sped of light until it was narrowed.
Real Skeptics like Nic do actual work. They make their best estimate given what we know.
And they engage in an on going debate.
Cut an paste my Resume? No, I just point to my experience. This is the same thing that Skeptic
JeffId did at air vent when he explained to readers that Yes, C02 is a GHG. This is well known.
Defend the consensus? HUH? I think you all misunderstand the consensus.
The consensus is not a reason to believe in AGW. The consensus is a fact that happens when
people examine the record.
1. Is C02 a GHG?
2. Are humans responsible for the increase in C02 Yup
3. Will increasing GHGs warm the planet rather than cool the planet? Yup
4. Will doubling c02 cause a rise in temperature between 1.5c and 6C? Yup
That as far as I can see it is the climate science consensus. Its just a fact about the state
of the best science.
Things get MORE interesting when you move outside climate science.
A) How much will we emit in the future? this aint physics, sorry
B) How much damage will warming cause? Economics and other voodoo.
So what you don’t get is that I am highly skeptical about emissions scenarios. I think
RCP 8.5 is a crock. As for damages? uncertain.
No some folks want to lump this all together and call it “climate science”. but projections
about future emissions aint a climate thing. And projected damages is an economic thing
yes climate science can tell us, IF it warms by X, then we will lose some ice. Other “sciences”
are needed to tell you how bad/good that will be.
Overlapping spectra. Sorry we solved that in the 1950’s had to for the safty of our nation.
Temperature records adjusted
1. Double blind tested Yes.
2. Yes the adjustment REDUCE the level of warming in global records. duh
Peter Ridd? Silenced? Nope I heard plenty of what he said. The shit that wasnt slagging his
work mates, was pretty pathetic. AND beside the point.
Pielke Sr? Silenced? FFS I cite his papers. he speaks plenty. I read his papers.
However, he cannot FORCE people to accept his work. If his work is good, it gets cited and used.
As for the “so many others silenced” sorry I am not seeing it. They speak, the problem
is NO ONE BUT YOU is convinced. If a skeptic makes a cogent argument, they get their day in
the journals. Mcintyre did, Watts did, Lewis did, Lindzen did, Spencer did. The problem is
NOBODY builds on their work. Heck all day long on twitter skeptics fire papers my way about
this and that issue. Silenced? nope. Just unconvincing.
Huge record of bad predictions? Sorry please dont refer to shit al gore says as a prediction.
you actually need to look at the predictions in the best science, not the worst MSM.
Like most skeptics your arguments are all over the map.
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Well, here we are, November 19th and it seems my prediction of a widespread media whitewash campaign was totally wrong. Hardly anything in the news about the 10th anniversary of Climategate, just lots and lots of electioneering rubbish about climate change. I’m tempted to hide the rapid decline of Climategate from the media spotlight by splicing in the data from the BBC documentary, but I don’t think I’ll bother. Quite happy to have been proven wrong. 🙂
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SM keeps bleating on about CO2 being a ghg.
No serious skeptic doubts that. The question is CO2 is a ghg to what effect?
And slipping in that now the ECS range has *widened*, not narrowed, as a result of climate science receiving basically unlimited funding.
In the world of post truth science widening uncertainty is acceptable apparently.
And yes, we do get to mix in fire, Greta, XR, etc. because as a group climate scientists enabled their science to be hijacked into policies that hurt everyone. Except the climate scientists and cronies profiting off the failed policies. And skipping over the part where Pielke Sr. was driven off, Pielke Jr. gets driven off for awhile, Ridd and so many others doesn’t improve SM’s argument at all.
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Jaime
Not the only one! But you’re partly a victim of Dominic Cummings’ relentless focus on achieving one thing at a time. (I know it makes it worse for you that the ‘one thing’ doesn’t fit your definition of what the one thing should mean. But I think it’s fair comment from the other guy’s perspective.)
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The media may have dropped the subject of the 10th anniversary of Climategate, but two of the key figures on the side of sceptics have not. Ross McKitrick and Steve McIntryre have published what looks to be like an excellent and very comprehensive summary of the events 10 years ago, which I’ve yet to read in its entirety, but here’s a couple of tasters:
“UK reporter Fred Pearce, who covered story for the Guardian and who, unlike Oxburgh or Muir Russell, had actually read the emails, wrote in The Climate Files:
The evidence of scientists cutting corners, playing down uncertainties in their
calculations and then covering their tracks by being secretive with data and suppressing
dissent suggests a systemic problem of scientific sloppiness, collusion and endemic
conflicts of interest, but not of outright fraud.
Given the importance of climate science in today’s society, all of us expect more of climate scientists than merely that they not commit “outright fraud.” Exoneration at such a low threshold would be small exoneration indeed.
However, rather than confronting the corruption and misconduct apparent throughout the Climategate emails, the climate academic community shut their eyes to the affair, eventually even persuading itself that the offending scientists were victims, rather than offenders.”
M & M neatly summarise the three main myths which the climate science community have been active in propagating and reinforcing in the public consciousness these last 10 years:
“Myth #1: The Climategate scandal arose because “cherrypicked” emails were taken “out of
context”.
Myth #2: The Climategate correspondents were “exonerated” following “thorough” and
impartial investigations.
Myth #3: Scientific studies subsequent to Climategate have “confirmed” and “verified” the
original Mann hockey stick.”
The BBC did its biased best to reaffirm these myths.
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Myth #4: climate data were adjusted legitimately
Myth #5: what attempts to stiffle opposition?
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Yes jaime, I was and am surprised by Schmidt’s very partisan and dishonest behavior on this paleoclimate issue. It’s tangential to his speciality and he really has compromised himself in my eyes.
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I read M&M’s latest to the end in one sitting but then I’m strange. For me it’s excellent but *not* comprehensive – and they freely admit this. Instead, it hits the main myths very well. But there is so much else in the emails and the *context* they still provide for some pre-existing controversies stirred up by the dogged persistence of Steve and his merry band at Climate Audit. (Of which I was not a part but a mere lurker, albeit an appreciative one, 2005-2009.) So not “taken out of context” at all.
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On people, I was struck again by the sterling contribution of Labour MP Graham Stringer as the one person with the wit and courage to expose the travesty of the official inquiries in the UK when UEA was called back to give account for itself by the Science and Tech Committee. I’ve always been mindful that in his retrospective on the Vote Leave campaign Dominic Cummings was coruscating about the ego and laziness of most MPs, mostly Tories, who were officially on the same side – but he singled out Stringer and a few others as notable exceptions. Something to do with Geoff’s strange line-up of the opinions of us sceptics again? And a small sign of hope that climate itself will be re-evaluated if Cummings and his mates win the day on Thursday?
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Being a slow reader, I’m only up to page 11 so far, but I am aghast at the revelations which M&M provide precisely by going into more detail on the context of the emails. The AGW community’s claim in Myth 1 that the emails were taken out of context in order to convey a false sense of wrongdoing is thus completely turned on its head and it is precisely the revelation of the context which exposes the full shocking truth of that wrongdoing. In my opinion, in the case of the Yamal data, the Briffa series and the Mann hockey stick, it is the revelation of the context which justifies the accusation outright fraud.
Richard may be correct that M&M’s summary is not comprehensive, but it is certainly very useful (to me at least) in providing detail on the main themes which resound throughout Climategate and importantly points out the still unresolved nature of these issues.
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It was very useful to me too. The mind can play tricks, a bit like Mike’s Nature trick, in removing some of the most significant details you once remembered from view. The final subediting though was also incomplete – Steve uses the first person ‘I’ at one point and Ross hasn’t picked it up! But it’s always been such a low-budget exercise on the dissident side. That’s what makes Climategate, and whoever did it, so special.
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SM has a real problem with having a balanced perspective about climate science and skeptics. Climate science has a much higher responsibility because they control the IPCC and the pipeline of information to decision makers. And they have a terrible track record. (See below).
On the issue of climate models predicting things, you can look at the Real Climate page to see that the track record is quite mixed.
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/climate-model-projections-compared-to-observations/
Here’s a comment crossposted from Climate Etc about some recent papers and results that show that Climate science has indeed had a denial problem for the last 30 years about lots of things. Tree ring proxies are just the most blatant example. I apologize for the formatting.
dpy6629 | December 7, 2019 at 9:54 am | Reply
The models do seem to generate reasonable global average temperature changes over the historical period but there are a lot of periods where there are large mismatches even here. But this is not what we need GCM’s to do. Energy balance methods do just as good a job. Figure 12 from this paper:
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019MS001829?af=R
In any case, at least a couple of climate scientists are now admitting pretty much what I said at Real Climate 10 years ago when I first commented at climate blogs. Basically, the truncation errors are too large to expect any skill except in those outputs used in tuning. Regional climate skill is very bad.
Click to access 1906691116.full.pdf
There is a huge amount of noise and rationalization and indeed misrepresentation by those who are selling the models and it’s another ethical issue with climate science. Denial of fundamentals of numerical analysis has been a prominent feature of model defenders at least since 1980.
BTW, McIntyre and Mckittrick have a great paper on climate gate that disassembles paleoclimatology very effectively. Basically, we should have little confidence in tree ring based reconstructions because the statistical methods used are invalid. Another field that needs fundamental reform of its methods.
Click to access Climategate.10YearsAfter.pdf
It all paints a picture of a field that really has a lot of baggage and a lot of ethical and bias problems. I do comment Palmer and Stevens though for their latest. It’s a good start.
Finally, Lewis and Mauritsen have some new work showing that observational estimates of ECS are NOT biased low because of the “pattern effect.” Another area of denial by many climate scientists. There have been hundreds of papers trying to find reasons why observational estimates must be biased low. Nic has done a good job of fending off this onslaught of weak science.
Click to access 5_nicholas_lewis_c.pdf
Steve Mosher, The picture is still one of a field in need of reform. Skeptic bashing does nothing to advance science or mankind’s wellbeing.
Robert I. Ellison | December 7, 2019 at 11:28 am |
“Atmospheric and oceanic computational simulation models often successfully depict chaotic space–time patterns, flow phenomena, dynamical balances, and equilibrium distributions that mimic nature. This success is accomplished through necessary but nonunique choices for discrete algorithms, parameterizations, and coupled contributing processes that introduce structural instability into the model. Therefore, we should expect a degree of irreducible imprecision in quantitative correspondences with nature, even with plausibly formulated models and careful calibration (tuning) to several empirical measures. Where precision is an issue (e.g., in a climate forecast), only simulation ensembles made across systematically designed model families allow an estimate of the level of relevant irreducible imprecision…
Sensitive dependence and structural instability are humbling twin properties for chaotic dynamical systems, indicating limits about which kinds of questions are theoretically answerable. They echo other famous limitations on scientist’s expectations, namely the undecidability of some propositions within axiomatic mathematical systems (Gödel’s theorem) and the uncomputability of some algorithms due to excessive size of the calculation.” https://www.pnas.org/content/104/21/8709
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