Bishop Hill UEA hearings redux
The big news while I was away was the announcement of a further invitation to a member of staff at UEA to appear before the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee. We have already had Oxburgh's appearance, and knew that Sir Muir Russell was to appear with Sir Edward Acton at the end of this month. However, it now appears that UEA's Trevor Davies will also be making an appearance. Davies, as regular readers know, was not only Phil Jones predecessor as head of CRU but, more importantly, appears to have been a pivotal figure in the organisation of the "independent" inquiries into CRU. All three men will appear on Wednesday 27th October.
Alongside the announcement of the hearings, the committee has published a number of letters it has received on the subject of the inquiries from interested parties:
00 University of East Anglia
01 David Holland
02 Douglas J. Keenan
04 Lord Oxburgh
05 Bob Critcholow
06 Mr.& Mrs. L. Black
The Oxburgh correspondence is particularly interesting. It deals with follow-up questions raised by committee members after Oxburgh's appearance. These questions were:
Can you explain where the list of eleven papers came from?
Did the list arrive with the panel before the Royal Society had been consulted?
To which Oxburgh replied:
1. The list of papers came to us from the University as a representative sample of the work of CRU that would offer us a way into the subject. We had no direct or detailed knowledge of the origin of the list but understood that the RS was involved in its production. We made no special inquiries on this matter and attached no particular significance to the origin of the list at the time, nor did we later. It in no way restricted our examination of other publications or material.
2. I think that this is very unlikely but we have no way of telling.
I think he had no choice but to 'fess up to the first point. The fact that he misled Parliament and the public by saying the papers were chosen "on the advice of the Royal Society". It is interesting to note that a rather different impression is gained by reading Trevor Davies' email to Rees and Hoskins on 12 March 2010, in which the UEA man writes that Oxburgh is comfortable with the idea of telling the public what papers were to be looked at, but that Oxburgh is keen that they can "say that it was constructed in consultation with the Royal Society".
His response to the second question is odd. He must surely know when the list of papers was circulated to panel members. And it is a matter of public record when the panel was consulted: it was on 12 March 2010. I'm not aware of any allegation that the list went out to the panel prior to the consultation with the Royal Society, so I find the question rather intriguing. No doubt all will be revealed next week.
Reader Comments (19)
I'd hope that both Oxburgh and Davies be asked specifically about that email, since it simply does not square with what Oxburgh has been saying. And if Oxburgh really didn't know where the list came from, why did he not ask? Not to do so reveals a remarkable lack of curiosity from someone supposedly leading an inquiry.
Acton's opinion piece makes his case for FOI limits on emails claiming that those leaked from CRU & now proven to be innocent show the need for those limits. The question in my mind is however, why they were leaked (Acton says hacked). Either someone somewhere thought they contained information of some importance or it was some freak set of unknown circumstances that revealed them. The latter seems unlikely because of their recipients and ultimate resting place. Someone was sending a message and it was not, IMHO, that all climate scientists are honourable. Do subsequent investigations disprove that? I don't believe so. Substitute hacked for leaks and the whole issue becomes more complex, even sinister, but the message remains the same.
Absolutely correct simplyseekeraftertruth. Someone on the inside was aware of the shenanigans, didn’t like it and leaked the mails. Now the culprit who they must know or have a good guess at can‘t be booted out because of the possible fallout making things worse than the actual leak.
I liked Bob Critcholow's term "climate wackos". Now we have something catchy to call them. It's the wackos VS the deniers!
The University and Police seem to have gone very very quiet about the evidence that the emails were 'hacked'.
Odd that, considering how confidently they proclaimed it, both then and now.
Hmmm.
"climate wackos" has a ring to it. There's something wacky about the various hysterical claims that have been made and shown to be baseless and the contortions to fit the recent cold winters in the NH into the CO2 narrative. History will judge the Global Warming mania in the same light as Tulip Mania and the South Sea Bubble, which were outbreaks of mass hysteria. Back in the day "Tulip Wackos" would have described investors in tulips very well.
The contrast between the suffocatingly obsequious UEA submission and the blunt Gillian Duffy-like indignation of Mr and Mrs Black is so stark. Establishment v the Citizen Jury.
Will Fiona Fox and Bob Ward be available to help them out? Them being those asking the questions aswell as those answering them.
The Times They Are A-changin’
Graham Stringer is now an opposition MP. The coalition have just announced major public spending cuts and politics is all about timing?
He may well remind UEA of one of the original committee conclusions:-
"Need for a single review"
134. The process of two reviews or inquiries is underway. In our view there is the potential for overlap between the two inquiries—for example, the question of the operation of peer review needs to examine both methodology and quality of the science subject to review. The two reviews or inquiries need to map their activities to ensure that there are no unmanaged overlaps or gaps. If there are, the whole process could be undermined.
A very unusual statement, politicians showing excellent foresight. I wonder if on the 27th they will do anything about it?
"Finally, may I draw Members’ attention to the recently-published book Merchants of Doubt by Oreskes and Conway (appendix H). I share the view expressed by many commentators that it represents an important contribution to our understanding of the changing nature of the public debate about climate change."
Professor Edward Acton, Vice-Chancellor
University of East Anglia
2 September 2010
Whilst I'd love to hear how this book has influenced Prof. Acton's understanding of the debate, I do hope the Committee members will not spend too long on it when there are so many other interesting matters to discuss.
not banded yet--
This whole "Merchants of Doubt" theme that the Team has been on makes them sound like a bunch of wacko conspiracy theorists. To suggest that Big Tobacco is behind the questions surrounding their science comes across as unhinged to the average person
"climate wackos' it is!
I think Phil Jones referred to the Oreskes book too. What is with these people?
Imagine all these guys, reading Merchants of Doubt in the loo... watching ten-ten videos...
Wackos indeed.
cosmic wrote:
Ah, but thanks to the UNEP (dedicated purveyor of increasingly scary stories since 1972, and parent of the IPCC), there's a new kid on the alarmist block. Announcing (drumroll please):
I kid you not. And it comes with its very own mandate to provide "gold standard reports to government" ... along with requisite "offsets or other schemes to mitigate and/or compensate ..."
If I were a speculating person (which, of course, I'm not!) I might be inclined to think that we shall be hearing less and less from Rajendra 'hell no, I won't go' Pachauri and his "E-Team" and more and more from "Pavan Sukhdev and the TEEB team"
Read all about it at:
Move over IPCC ... here comes IPBES
hro001 -
here's pavan after flying to australia to speak at a left-leaning centre sponsored by an airline, and admitting that he travels a lot:
Centre for Policy Development: Pavan Sukhdev
What is the world worth? Putting nature on the balance sheet
3 August 2010, Sydney Opera House, Australia
You can watch the talk on the ABC’s Big Ideas
Miriam Lyons, Director Centre for Policy Development (CPD):
First to the people who made this event possible, the amazing CPD staff, the
Board, our volunteers, to, of course, our principle sponsor Qantas the major
event sponsors, KPMG and UTS Business -without whom tonight would not have
been possible…
He’s (Pavan Sukhdev )also the Head of the Green Economy Initiative, which is run out of the United Nations Environment Program…
And he is doing all of this while on sabbatical from Deutsche Bank. So, you
know, this is kind of a hobby for him and I think that we should all give
him an extremely warm welcome, a very big round of applause for all of the
work that Pavan is doing in his spare time…
Pavan Sukhdev, UNEP:
There’s been a lot of work, a lot of reading, a lot of writing and a lot of
travel, as you can see. And thanks to the CPD, the Centre for Policy
Development for organising this, because it’s not often that I get to visit
Australia – especially Sydney, a city I love, and North Queensland, where I
shall go after I finish with you guys, and where I bought a small block of
land many years ago when I started offsetting my footprint…
A calculation, a much bigger calculation like this has been done by a group
in the UK, a research group called TRUCOST…
Carbon tax emissions, guess what? You can make business out of bio carbon
offsets and the REDD+ scheme…
http://cpd.org.au/2010/08/pavan-sukhdev-sydney-lecture-transcript/
don't u love how pavan works for Deutsche "Banking on Green" Bank
http://www.banking-on-green.com/index_e.htm
our aussie climate bureaucrats can't stop flying either:
18 Oct: Herald Sun Australia: Ben Packham: VIPs' global swarming for climate change meetings
Department of Climate Change staff flew first class to 64 global climate change meetings in just 12 months at a cost of more than $4 million.
A Senate committee heard that 93 staff went to destinations including Greenland, the Maldives, Japan, the US and Bolivia.
The trips cost taxpayers more than $2.74 million in airfares and $1.6 million for accommodation and meals.
The Government's special envoy on climate change, Howard Bamsey, was the biggest spender, racking up $229,000 in travel costs during 2009-10.
He was followed by climate change ambassador Louise Hand, who spent $192,000 on travel over the same period...
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/vips-global-swarming-for-climate-change-meetings/story-e6frf7l6-1225940376755
nice work if u can get it! someone stop them please.
Pat wrote:
http://cpd.org.au/2010/08/pavan-sukhdev-sydney-lecture-transcript/
A most informative link. Thank you, Pat. Pavan seems much sharper than Pachauri, doesn't he? And TEEB seems to have all the "offsets and other schemes" quite well-covered. So that even if carbon taxes continue to flop, and/or "global climate disruption" doesn't whip up sufficient hysteria, it won't matter ... 'cuz they've got another scheme waiting in the wings.
And don't you just love the tagline: "If you can't measure, you can't manage" ... not to mention that "natural capital is actually the largest item on the balance sheet of the nation."
What I find most notable about the "wackos" views is their decidedly post modern idea of the truth.
Could we please drop all use of the term "wackos".
It comes across as an irritating, schoolboy insult, on the same level as "deniers".
I see neither need nor reason to insult those we don't agree with, no matter how misguided we believe them to be.
We're far more likely to be able to persuade any "Don't Knows" who have dropped by here at the Bish's by being scrupously polite. You can see how effective - and how persuavive - this technique is most weeks in The Economist, for example ("Mr. Hitler, a former German Chancellor, believed that by invading the USSR ... ")
Paul Boyce - I agree. One thing I have noticed on BH is, on the occassions when there has been media coverage of the Bishop's efforts, a couple of pretty naughty trolls turn up and pick food fights - anybody dropping in at these points in the discussions would find it hard to see the signal amongst the noise.