7 ms·

Claims of Himalayan glacier meltdown based entirely on a single short phone call

40 points by miked 17y ago

cwan 17y ago
Irony: "Rajendra Pachauri, the IPCC chairman, has previously dismissed criticism of the Himalayas claim as "voodoo science"." More on Pachauri here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/6847227/Questions-over-business-deals-of-UN-climate-change-guru-Dr-Rajendra-Pachauri.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/6847227/Questions-over-busin... Between stories like this and the release of the emails / climategate, you really have to wonder especially about the validity of some of the most alarmist claims. On one hand, I wonder how much of this is because of confirmation bias but how much is the result of outright fraud? Something else that I've been reading more about lately (because of another story here) is the reporting by Gary Taubes on 'Good Calories, Bad Calories' and I can't help but wonder about what supposed scientific consensus means and the importance of skepticism. Obviously there's a massive body of work out there when it comes to climate science and it would be ludicrous to dismiss it all, but surely it's time to agree that we need a lot more skepticism especially when these claims are being used to advocate policies that will at least cost hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars.
- dantheman 17y ago
  I think we only see scientific consensus when experiments can't be done. You don't hear about scientific consensus in physics because people can check...
  - electromagnetic 17y ago
    "Scientific consensus" is like a used car dealer saying "we're so trustworthy you don't even need to look under the hood!" There's a gaping hole where the engine should be, and no one wants to be asked as to why.
    - dantheman 17y ago
      I completely agree, in fact, I think it's hard to claim something is science without falsifiable experiments. And yes, I know all about the difficulty of the demarcation of science, but this is just my gut feeling.
      - DaniFong 17y ago
        Climate science has falsifiable experiments, predictions it's made and is checking. It also has a historical record. The trouble is that the truly alarming claims are equally disastrous to check. It's frankly astonishing that we, as a species, haven't figured out a better way to deal with dire risks in an unpredictable environment, but science has stepped up to the plate. We can model, in pencil and paper, in bits and bytes, and in neural firings, what might happen in reality, under certain circumstances. We can check these short term predictions against short term reactions (atmospheric scientists do this all the time, for example looking at temperature gradients as a way to show that the increase in temperature is a greenhouse effect, not from the sun brightening), we can check parts of the historical record against one another, and we can drill down into all of our results and strive for a model that encompasses all of it. And when we've run said model and somewhere in the future as a consequence of our actions it predicts a significant likelihood of disaster, it should give you pause. Not unlike how you can model, in your own head, the possible consequences of rush blindfolded across a busy highway, even if you've never actually experienced it. You get one shot. The scientific method is not for matters involving life and death. It is for the models we have of the world, our understanding, our plans. It is for trying, by way of modeling and analogy, what we might see given what we might do. But as for the decision, that requires judgment. Why can't people understand this?
        electromagnetic 17y ago
        > It's frankly astonishing that we, as a species, haven't figured out a better way to deal with dire risks in an unpredictable environment . . . As a species, and as part of all animal life, we have. It's called flight distance, we as humans are skittish as anything. A completely wild chipmunk can easily be attracted to sit in a persons hand with time and patience. Wolves, Bears and even Lions will allow humans to walk amongst them if the person knows how to handle themselves without the predators fleeing. I've managed to approach birds to a distance of feet, and I've managed to get wild hares not to run at only a yard. Humans, however. We're currently achieving fight/flight-like responses to stimuli we can't even recognize. The reaction to 9/11 was, biologically speaking, quite absurd. Humanity has invented a way to stimulate our base instincts that allow us to practice sheer terror to things that have no appreciable effect on our lives. Similar is occurring with the climate, people are physically worried about it, when realistically for 90% of the western population will likely not experience a drastic change to their environment for the next 100 years. As a species humanity needs to act calmly and collectively, not as panicked masses. This is where science needs to take its place.
  - DaniFong 17y ago
    Actually, the notion of scientific consensus arose many times in physics: the Copernican world view versus the Ptolemaic, gravity, quantum jumps, the statistical interpretation of entropy, the existence of electromagnetic waves, the notion of the atom, 'vortex theory,' the possibility of heavier than air flying machines, problems with the semiclassical theory of the atom, whether general relativity could possibly be right, the Ergodic hypothesis, the EPR 'paradox' -- the action at a distance that tormented Einstein, positivism, whether the Copenhagen interpretation were sufficiently comprehensive/actual described reality, Bells theorem, the validity of Feynman's interpretation of QED, the validity of renormalization, the validity of lattice approaches to QCD, gravitational waves, the existence of blackholes, whether string theory was even scientific, whether quantum computation was possible, whether information really was physical, the arrow of time, the understanding of mass, the 'holographic' principle, etc. etc. etc. Quite a few of these haven't even been resolved!
- tlack 17y ago
  +1. This, along questions of the validity of other forms of science and journalism--such as Errol Morris' recent work in the NYT about the trustworthiness of photojournalism--has been bouncing around in my head nonstop. How much of what we believe, and the framework of what we decide to believe, is really very fragile?
  - lucifer 17y ago
    http://pilotsfor911truth.org/amrarticle.html http://pilotsfor911truth.org/amrarticle.html
- sailormoon 17y ago
  And look at the "correction": Professor Murari Lal, who oversaw the chapter on glaciers in the IPCC report, said he would recommend that the claim about glaciers be dropped: "If Hasnain says officially that he never asserted this, or that it is a wrong presumption, than I will recommend that the assertion about Himalayan glaciers be removed from future IPCC assessments." In other words, we'll remove this particular Jenga block in our little tower of preconceived conclusions, but everything else is AOK. What he should be doing is ordering/performing an immediate review of the origins of all similar "evidence" in the IPCC reports, and a close examination of process to ensure this kind of balls-up can never happen again. Honestly, the IPCC has less credibility than Wikipedia. Maybe they should just ask Wikipedia to do the research for them - at least the WP admins have shown some basic ability/willingness to do due diligence on what gets published. And the worst thing is, we only shine the spotlight on the IPCC because climate change is a controversial subject. How many other government departments are practising this "well I read this in a magazine somewhere" style of policy-making? All of them?
  - electromagnetic 17y ago
    His words, to me, sound worse than you attribute to them. IMO it sounds like "We're going to remove this, if this fuss keeps being made, and only if we really have to." It doesn't even sound like he cares that part of his report might have been based on nothing more than thin air. It sounds like he cares more about having to do work to undo his gross incompetence.
    - femfacalifornia 17y ago
      he should be fired and never be allowed to work in the scientific community again. i just read his cv though and he's got more experience than god, which means, he knew just exactly how wrong what he was doing was. what a fool. maybe he's losing his mind. he is 61 years old. and arrogant? his reviewers challenged some of his assertions in his paper and they got his paper back with him saying things like "i can't find the data to support this right now.. have to give it to you later." or "corrections made" when nothing had been changed. that is arrogance!
  - 17y ago
- Padraig 17y ago
  > Obviously there's a massive body of work out there when it comes to climate science and it would be ludicrous to dismiss it all, but surely it's time to agree that we need a lot more skepticism especially when these claims are being used to advocate policies that will at least cost hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars. The problem is that more skepticism means less action, and it's obviously very important to act soon. None of these news stories call into doubt the fundamental science (global warming is real, man made and has dire consequences) and we've been doing nothing but debate these established facts for the last 20 years. George Bush (Senior) knew it in 1989 http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=17765 http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=17765 well before those emails were ever written...
  - anamax 17y ago
    > The problem is that more skepticism means less action, and it's obviously very important to act soon. It wasn't important enough to get the science right the first time.... > None of these news stories call into doubt the fundamental science (global warming is real, man made and has dire consequences) Actually, they do. > we've been doing nothing but debate these established facts for the last 20 years. Actually, during 10 of those years, we've had stable to decreasing temperatures, which CO2 has increased. The models used to argue for global warming don't predict that. > George Bush (Senior) knew it in 1989 In what universe is Bush an authority that I should accept? However, by asserting that I should accept him as an authority, you've accepted him as an authority. I'll keep that in mind for future discussions. What? You're not willing to accept him as an authority?
- DaniFong 17y ago
  The idea of skepticism is all well and good, but think about this: which psychological force is more powerful, intellectual honesty or human laziness? How much work have you personally done to try to understand our climate? While you are being skeptical, are you living with less consumption than you had before the possibility was as public, staking a middle ground between two possibilities, or are you continuing on as usual? This is a global issue. You will find hyperbole and mistaken predictions, and yes, fraud, on both sides. Nature doesn't care. The question is: by how much can we alter the planet's ecosystem before it is unsafe? The IPCC's models predict about a 2C temperature rise in the 2090s from the 1990s if we have 450 ppm in the atmosphere. That temperature rise is further predicted to be the point we had better not go past, to avoid more severe damage. We are currently at 385 ppm, over 280 ppm from before the industrial revolution. That means we've used up 60% of the slack we had towards a pretty hard (and hardening) limit. Clearly, with the knowledge we have about the physics of greenhouse gases, there is some amount of CO2, some amount of radiative forcing, that is beyond what the world can handle without risking severe changes to the ecosystem and our way of life. It is not enough for skeptics to claim 'we don't know what that amount is, we have our doubts,' if it is followed by words or actions that support business as usual. There must be some agreement towards an acceptable limit to the dumping of a disruptive chemical, in massive quantities, into a finite atmosphere on a finite planet. For what it's worth, I think it's more likely that carbon reduction policies will create a positive, rather than negative, effect on the economy.
  - anamax 17y ago
    > The question is: by how much can we alter the planet's ecosystem before it is unsafe? The IPCC's models predict about a 2C temperature rise in the 2090s from the 1990s if we have 450 ppm in the atmosphere. That temperature rise is further predicted to be the point we had better not go past, to avoid more severe damage. What definition of "unsafe" are we using? What effects are you assuming? (Ice has been growing in the artic since 2007.) (I can't find my reference to the non-existent sea-level increases....) As many have asked, what is the "correct" temperature? Is it the one during the medieval warming period? The one during the depths of the little ice age? Now? 1934? We know that Earth has had considerably higher CO2 concentrations in the past. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Phanerozoic_Carbon_Dioxide.png http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Phanerozoic_Carbon_Dioxide... (from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleoclimatology http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleoclimatology )
akamaka 17y ago
This seems extremely serious, much more than the leaked email affair. The claim in question has been very widely cited. PBS Frontline even chose this glacier story to lead off their 2 hour special on climate change: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/heat/view/1.html http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/heat/view/1.html (see Chapter 1, 3:30-6:30. The actual claim is at 6:00 in the video)
- cwan 17y ago
  While serious, I don't think the ramifications of this are greater than the leaked emails - more on that here: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100022157/how-climategate-killed-peer-review/ http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100022157/... (I suspect the words "peer review" will be treated with considerably greater skepticism in the future) They can and will likely chalk this up to some administrative error, but the underlying contents of the leaked emails, charges of fraud of some of the most prominent authors of the IPCC reports is far more significant. More from a (formerly?) strong supporter of the IPCC reports here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/nov/25/monbiot-climate-leak-crisis-response http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/nov...
  - Padraig 17y ago
    That a couple of scientists said some dumb stuff in private emails does not call into question the entire peer review system.
    - cwan 17y ago
      It's not about calling the entire peer review system into question - it's about being skeptical about whether or not results can be trusted on the sole basis they've been peer reviewed - particularly in areas of scientific controversy. From the linked article: "As Climategate has shown, [the process of peer review] became compromised – causing an instability. As seen in the leaked emails, many within the climate establishment were interrelated and working together to ensure their message of global warming wasn’t diluted. There were even desires to redefine the peer review literature to punish journals that published skeptic’s papers." It's not just climate science (as I've been reading on nutritional science with Gary Taubes and Robert Lustig).
hzzn 17y ago
It's odd to hear all this victory hooting over a single hyperbolic prediction with so many glaciers in retreat all over the world (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retreat_of_glaciers_since_1850 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retreat_of_glaciers_since_1850). Ah, but I suppose every claim on the page linked above is also attributable to equally bad science, or perhaps the citations were merely planted there by members of the Shadowy Underworld Global Climate Change Cabal.
- alexgartrell 17y ago
  I feel that, if this were the only article showing failures on the part of climate scientists, there would be no victory hooting. However, every week there's a new story about these scientists employing suspicious science to arrive at more profitable [1] conclusions. I don't know that victory hooting is necessary here, but a certain amount of "WTF?"ing is definitely called for. Whether or not global warming is a real and man-made phenomenon (vs. a natural cycle or just overinflated numbers), it's important to call attention to the fact that someone is more or less pissing on our leg and telling us it's raining. I maintain though, as I always have, that the reduction of carbon dioxide waste is a POSITIVE aim as is anything seeking to minimize the effect of ourselves on our environment. The only things I'm calling into question are the tactics currently being employed. If this data-munging is a universal thing, I'd argue that the ends do not warrant the means. This should be a scientific debate, not an emotional one (as it has become). [1] I say profitable because it's hard for contrarians to get grant money as they are generally believed to be 'quacks'.
  - dejb 17y ago
    > I say profitable because it's hard for contrarians to get grant money as they are generally believed to be 'quacks'. The energy sector and other carbon emitters would have enough available money to make the government grant money look like small change. Imagine how much it would be worth to them to discredit man made global warming. I'm sure they do fund many of the contrarians one way or another. But the fact that they aren't able to fund reputable research that supports their position really does say something about how quacky the contrarians are regarded as being.
nfnaaron 17y ago
"Some scientists have questioned how the IPCC could have allowed such a mistake into print." Curve fitting?

40 points by miked 17y ago

cwan 17y ago

Irony: "Rajendra Pachauri, the IPCC chairman, has previously dismissed criticism of the Himalayas claim as "voodoo science"." More on Pachauri here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/6847227/Questions-over-business-deals-of-UN-climate-change-guru-Dr-Rajendra-Pachauri.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/6847227/Questions-over-busin... Between stories like this and the release of the emails / climategate, you really have to wonder especially about the validity of some of the most alarmist claims. On one hand, I wonder how much of this is because of confirmation bias but how much is the result of outright fraud? Something else that I've been reading more about lately (because of another story here) is the reporting by Gary Taubes on 'Good Calories, Bad Calories' and I can't help but wonder about what supposed scientific consensus means and the importance of skepticism. Obviously there's a massive body of work out there when it comes to climate science and it would be ludicrous to dismiss it all, but surely it's time to agree that we need a lot more skepticism especially when these claims are being used to advocate policies that will at least cost hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars.

dantheman 17y ago
I think we only see scientific consensus when experiments can't be done. You don't hear about scientific consensus in physics because people can check...
- electromagnetic 17y ago
  "Scientific consensus" is like a used car dealer saying "we're so trustworthy you don't even need to look under the hood!" There's a gaping hole where the engine should be, and no one wants to be asked as to why.
  - dantheman 17y ago
    I completely agree, in fact, I think it's hard to claim something is science without falsifiable experiments. And yes, I know all about the difficulty of the demarcation of science, but this is just my gut feeling.
    - DaniFong 17y ago
      Climate science has falsifiable experiments, predictions it's made and is checking. It also has a historical record. The trouble is that the truly alarming claims are equally disastrous to check. It's frankly astonishing that we, as a species, haven't figured out a better way to deal with dire risks in an unpredictable environment, but science has stepped up to the plate. We can model, in pencil and paper, in bits and bytes, and in neural firings, what might happen in reality, under certain circumstances. We can check these short term predictions against short term reactions (atmospheric scientists do this all the time, for example looking at temperature gradients as a way to show that the increase in temperature is a greenhouse effect, not from the sun brightening), we can check parts of the historical record against one another, and we can drill down into all of our results and strive for a model that encompasses all of it. And when we've run said model and somewhere in the future as a consequence of our actions it predicts a significant likelihood of disaster, it should give you pause. Not unlike how you can model, in your own head, the possible consequences of rush blindfolded across a busy highway, even if you've never actually experienced it. You get one shot. The scientific method is not for matters involving life and death. It is for the models we have of the world, our understanding, our plans. It is for trying, by way of modeling and analogy, what we might see given what we might do. But as for the decision, that requires judgment. Why can't people understand this?
      - electromagnetic 17y ago
        > It's frankly astonishing that we, as a species, haven't figured out a better way to deal with dire risks in an unpredictable environment . . . As a species, and as part of all animal life, we have. It's called flight distance, we as humans are skittish as anything. A completely wild chipmunk can easily be attracted to sit in a persons hand with time and patience. Wolves, Bears and even Lions will allow humans to walk amongst them if the person knows how to handle themselves without the predators fleeing. I've managed to approach birds to a distance of feet, and I've managed to get wild hares not to run at only a yard. Humans, however. We're currently achieving fight/flight-like responses to stimuli we can't even recognize. The reaction to 9/11 was, biologically speaking, quite absurd. Humanity has invented a way to stimulate our base instincts that allow us to practice sheer terror to things that have no appreciable effect on our lives. Similar is occurring with the climate, people are physically worried about it, when realistically for 90% of the western population will likely not experience a drastic change to their environment for the next 100 years. As a species humanity needs to act calmly and collectively, not as panicked masses. This is where science needs to take its place.
- DaniFong 17y ago
  Actually, the notion of scientific consensus arose many times in physics: the Copernican world view versus the Ptolemaic, gravity, quantum jumps, the statistical interpretation of entropy, the existence of electromagnetic waves, the notion of the atom, 'vortex theory,' the possibility of heavier than air flying machines, problems with the semiclassical theory of the atom, whether general relativity could possibly be right, the Ergodic hypothesis, the EPR 'paradox' -- the action at a distance that tormented Einstein, positivism, whether the Copenhagen interpretation were sufficiently comprehensive/actual described reality, Bells theorem, the validity of Feynman's interpretation of QED, the validity of renormalization, the validity of lattice approaches to QCD, gravitational waves, the existence of blackholes, whether string theory was even scientific, whether quantum computation was possible, whether information really was physical, the arrow of time, the understanding of mass, the 'holographic' principle, etc. etc. etc. Quite a few of these haven't even been resolved!
tlack 17y ago
+1. This, along questions of the validity of other forms of science and journalism--such as Errol Morris' recent work in the NYT about the trustworthiness of photojournalism--has been bouncing around in my head nonstop. How much of what we believe, and the framework of what we decide to believe, is really very fragile?
- lucifer 17y ago
  http://pilotsfor911truth.org/amrarticle.html http://pilotsfor911truth.org/amrarticle.html
sailormoon 17y ago
And look at the "correction": Professor Murari Lal, who oversaw the chapter on glaciers in the IPCC report, said he would recommend that the claim about glaciers be dropped: "If Hasnain says officially that he never asserted this, or that it is a wrong presumption, than I will recommend that the assertion about Himalayan glaciers be removed from future IPCC assessments." In other words, we'll remove this particular Jenga block in our little tower of preconceived conclusions, but everything else is AOK. What he should be doing is ordering/performing an immediate review of the origins of all similar "evidence" in the IPCC reports, and a close examination of process to ensure this kind of balls-up can never happen again. Honestly, the IPCC has less credibility than Wikipedia. Maybe they should just ask Wikipedia to do the research for them - at least the WP admins have shown some basic ability/willingness to do due diligence on what gets published. And the worst thing is, we only shine the spotlight on the IPCC because climate change is a controversial subject. How many other government departments are practising this "well I read this in a magazine somewhere" style of policy-making? All of them?
- electromagnetic 17y ago
  His words, to me, sound worse than you attribute to them. IMO it sounds like "We're going to remove this, if this fuss keeps being made, and only if we really have to." It doesn't even sound like he cares that part of his report might have been based on nothing more than thin air. It sounds like he cares more about having to do work to undo his gross incompetence.
  - femfacalifornia 17y ago
    he should be fired and never be allowed to work in the scientific community again. i just read his cv though and he's got more experience than god, which means, he knew just exactly how wrong what he was doing was. what a fool. maybe he's losing his mind. he is 61 years old. and arrogant? his reviewers challenged some of his assertions in his paper and they got his paper back with him saying things like "i can't find the data to support this right now.. have to give it to you later." or "corrections made" when nothing had been changed. that is arrogance!
- 17y ago
Padraig 17y ago
> Obviously there's a massive body of work out there when it comes to climate science and it would be ludicrous to dismiss it all, but surely it's time to agree that we need a lot more skepticism especially when these claims are being used to advocate policies that will at least cost hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars. The problem is that more skepticism means less action, and it's obviously very important to act soon. None of these news stories call into doubt the fundamental science (global warming is real, man made and has dire consequences) and we've been doing nothing but debate these established facts for the last 20 years. George Bush (Senior) knew it in 1989 http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=17765 http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=17765 well before those emails were ever written...
- anamax 17y ago
  > The problem is that more skepticism means less action, and it's obviously very important to act soon. It wasn't important enough to get the science right the first time.... > None of these news stories call into doubt the fundamental science (global warming is real, man made and has dire consequences) Actually, they do. > we've been doing nothing but debate these established facts for the last 20 years. Actually, during 10 of those years, we've had stable to decreasing temperatures, which CO2 has increased. The models used to argue for global warming don't predict that. > George Bush (Senior) knew it in 1989 In what universe is Bush an authority that I should accept? However, by asserting that I should accept him as an authority, you've accepted him as an authority. I'll keep that in mind for future discussions. What? You're not willing to accept him as an authority?
DaniFong 17y ago
The idea of skepticism is all well and good, but think about this: which psychological force is more powerful, intellectual honesty or human laziness? How much work have you personally done to try to understand our climate? While you are being skeptical, are you living with less consumption than you had before the possibility was as public, staking a middle ground between two possibilities, or are you continuing on as usual? This is a global issue. You will find hyperbole and mistaken predictions, and yes, fraud, on both sides. Nature doesn't care. The question is: by how much can we alter the planet's ecosystem before it is unsafe? The IPCC's models predict about a 2C temperature rise in the 2090s from the 1990s if we have 450 ppm in the atmosphere. That temperature rise is further predicted to be the point we had better not go past, to avoid more severe damage. We are currently at 385 ppm, over 280 ppm from before the industrial revolution. That means we've used up 60% of the slack we had towards a pretty hard (and hardening) limit. Clearly, with the knowledge we have about the physics of greenhouse gases, there is some amount of CO2, some amount of radiative forcing, that is beyond what the world can handle without risking severe changes to the ecosystem and our way of life. It is not enough for skeptics to claim 'we don't know what that amount is, we have our doubts,' if it is followed by words or actions that support business as usual. There must be some agreement towards an acceptable limit to the dumping of a disruptive chemical, in massive quantities, into a finite atmosphere on a finite planet. For what it's worth, I think it's more likely that carbon reduction policies will create a positive, rather than negative, effect on the economy.
- anamax 17y ago
  > The question is: by how much can we alter the planet's ecosystem before it is unsafe? The IPCC's models predict about a 2C temperature rise in the 2090s from the 1990s if we have 450 ppm in the atmosphere. That temperature rise is further predicted to be the point we had better not go past, to avoid more severe damage. What definition of "unsafe" are we using? What effects are you assuming? (Ice has been growing in the artic since 2007.) (I can't find my reference to the non-existent sea-level increases....) As many have asked, what is the "correct" temperature? Is it the one during the medieval warming period? The one during the depths of the little ice age? Now? 1934? We know that Earth has had considerably higher CO2 concentrations in the past. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Phanerozoic_Carbon_Dioxide.png http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Phanerozoic_Carbon_Dioxide... (from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleoclimatology http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleoclimatology )

akamaka 17y ago

This seems extremely serious, much more than the leaked email affair. The claim in question has been very widely cited. PBS Frontline even chose this glacier story to lead off their 2 hour special on climate change: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/heat/view/1.html http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/heat/view/1.html (see Chapter 1, 3:30-6:30. The actual claim is at 6:00 in the video)

cwan 17y ago
While serious, I don't think the ramifications of this are greater than the leaked emails - more on that here: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100022157/how-climategate-killed-peer-review/ http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100022157/... (I suspect the words "peer review" will be treated with considerably greater skepticism in the future) They can and will likely chalk this up to some administrative error, but the underlying contents of the leaked emails, charges of fraud of some of the most prominent authors of the IPCC reports is far more significant. More from a (formerly?) strong supporter of the IPCC reports here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/nov/25/monbiot-climate-leak-crisis-response http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/nov...
- Padraig 17y ago
  That a couple of scientists said some dumb stuff in private emails does not call into question the entire peer review system.
  - cwan 17y ago
    It's not about calling the entire peer review system into question - it's about being skeptical about whether or not results can be trusted on the sole basis they've been peer reviewed - particularly in areas of scientific controversy. From the linked article: "As Climategate has shown, [the process of peer review] became compromised – causing an instability. As seen in the leaked emails, many within the climate establishment were interrelated and working together to ensure their message of global warming wasn’t diluted. There were even desires to redefine the peer review literature to punish journals that published skeptic’s papers." It's not just climate science (as I've been reading on nutritional science with Gary Taubes and Robert Lustig).

hzzn 17y ago

It's odd to hear all this victory hooting over a single hyperbolic prediction with so many glaciers in retreat all over the world (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retreat_of_glaciers_since_1850 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retreat_of_glaciers_since_1850). Ah, but I suppose every claim on the page linked above is also attributable to equally bad science, or perhaps the citations were merely planted there by members of the Shadowy Underworld Global Climate Change Cabal.

alexgartrell 17y ago
I feel that, if this were the only article showing failures on the part of climate scientists, there would be no victory hooting. However, every week there's a new story about these scientists employing suspicious science to arrive at more profitable [1] conclusions. I don't know that victory hooting is necessary here, but a certain amount of "WTF?"ing is definitely called for. Whether or not global warming is a real and man-made phenomenon (vs. a natural cycle or just overinflated numbers), it's important to call attention to the fact that someone is more or less pissing on our leg and telling us it's raining. I maintain though, as I always have, that the reduction of carbon dioxide waste is a POSITIVE aim as is anything seeking to minimize the effect of ourselves on our environment. The only things I'm calling into question are the tactics currently being employed. If this data-munging is a universal thing, I'd argue that the ends do not warrant the means. This should be a scientific debate, not an emotional one (as it has become). [1] I say profitable because it's hard for contrarians to get grant money as they are generally believed to be 'quacks'.
- dejb 17y ago
  > I say profitable because it's hard for contrarians to get grant money as they are generally believed to be 'quacks'. The energy sector and other carbon emitters would have enough available money to make the government grant money look like small change. Imagine how much it would be worth to them to discredit man made global warming. I'm sure they do fund many of the contrarians one way or another. But the fact that they aren't able to fund reputable research that supports their position really does say something about how quacky the contrarians are regarded as being.

nfnaaron 17y ago

"Some scientists have questioned how the IPCC could have allowed such a mistake into print." Curve fitting?