Getting out of hand again

The pace of events is getting out of hand again and I'm struggling to keep up with the demands on my time and the regrettable need to earn a living. I must put a tip box up on the site some time.

The stunner for me today has been the Institute of Physics submission to the Science and Technology Committee, which is to the point to say the least. This is really starting to look very bad for the guys at UEA:

1. The Institute is concerned that, unless the disclosed e-mails are proved to be forgeries or adaptations, worrying implications arise for the integrity of scientific research in this field and for the credibility of the scientific method as practised in this context.

With retrospect, once the emails became public it was likely that some of the major learned societies might try to distance themselves from the climatologists. It may be that support for the CRU now starts to fall away. We'll see.

McIntyre has the full story.

Of course, there is also the story of the IPCC review, but that will require a more considered piece, which will have to wait for the morning. For now, the local hostelry is calling.

Comments

[Tom]

Well friends, sorry it took me so long to make the post... It seems the NWO folks have plan M1-B1 already in the works. They never want to turn the lights out when it comes to helping the unwashed masses and our plight as we live & die...

http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/022510_greeneconomy.pdf

[Jiminy Cricket]

@Frank

Sometimes it is best just to take the hit and move on. You cannot win every skirmish of every battle of every war.

With this IoP piece you lost. Totally. Absolutely. All I can say is deal with it.

Realclimate and the like, give the impression of having house trained all the important media and institutional bodies. When these organisations go 'off message' they howl and cry. The truth is a shock to them when they realise they do not pull all the strings.

Oh, but I forgot chaotic systems are not a forte of AGW proponents. You apply the forcing and the result is predicted. God forbid that there are any other overlapping cycles in play that might upset the nice planned results.

Society is a chaotic system just like climate,

[Richard]

The Institute of Physics has stated the obvious. The scientific research in the climate alarmism field is without integrity and the scientific method flouted by its proponents the IPCC and the Hockey Stick team, on the basis of which the IPCC has concluded that man is responsible for global warming in the past 60 years.

In school we were taught that the scientific method consisted of making observations, forming a testable hypothesis to explain these observations, deducing predictions from this hypothesis. Searching for confirmations of the predictions and, if the predictions are contradicted by empirical observations, to discard or modify your hypothesis.

Compare this with what the team does. It makes a hypothesis, modifies the observations and data to comply with its hypothesis, attacks all contradictions to its predictions, and ignores all evidence that does so.

[`ob nob]

Bish! Bish!....Biiiish!
Can`t believe what i`ve just seen on the BBC News,
Our World,The Rise of The Sceptics.
At least, i think i can`t believe it,i must check the Old Holborne for contamination.
So far ,well balanced, non judgemental with excerpts from chris moncktons aussie tour and curiously non-sneery interviews with the movers and shakers of the aussie sceptic crowd.
I`m sure there will be a few qualifiers by the end of the programme and no doubt an interview with a fundamentalist or two.But just the same,bloody hell!

[Phillip Bratby]

@'ob nob:

It's not given wide coverage by the beeb, but it's on again today at 14.30 on the News Channel. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00r9pxf

Now I wonder why it's not available on iPlayer?

[Sean Houlihane]

@Frank

Any experimental physicist will be well aware that if DATA can't look after themselves without being hidden, then there is something fundamentally wrong.
Physics has had it's share of research scandals and changes in consensus view. In physics, it doesn't matter who funded a critic, either they are a loon, and are dismissed (see Leif vs. solar barycenter 'wiggle-matchers') or they have a valid point.
Plenty of nay-sayers mis-use physics, but actual educated physicists are trained to take a view on the validity of any particular theory. If central arguments to a view are personal it dramatically weakens the view.
The IOP has not expressed any shift in it's stance on the likelihood of warming, the risks or the need to make dramatic changes in response. They have only pointed out that the scientific process to date has been focused on proving that warming is happening because of CO2, not investigating how much and why.

[Phillip Bratby]

@FO'D I think you'll find most physicists are in tune with the IoP memorandum. I also think very few scientists would agree with the Royal Society's statement "Preventing Dangerous Climate Change". This latter statement was approved by the Council of the Royal Society and was prepared in consultation with 30 leading climate scientists. No real consultation there, just confirmation bias from those with a vested interest.

[Pogo]

"Physics is the only real science. The rest are just stamp collecting."

-- Ernest Rutherford

:-)

[per]

The IOP submission puts its case strongly, but it seems to share common ground with the submissions from the Royal Statistical Society, the Royal Society of Chemistry and the RCUK. The common ground is that data and code must be released, with certain caveats, and that this is a fundamental aspect of the proper process of science.

I think the committee will be able to form their own judgement as to whether the code and data from cru has been released, and the resulting conclusions will be interesting.

there appear to be numerous other points in the IOP, RSC and RSS submissions which are music to my ears. Things to do with checking published data, auditing published research and this gem from the RSC "The effect on other researchers working in this area such as independent researchers, as well as those collaborating with CRU, should be explored. " Err, steve mcintyre, anyone ?

Given that the RSC, the IOP, the RSS and RCUK have made key criticisms in common, the committee is going to find it very hard to avoid scrutinising these issues. CRU may well have a tough time here. They may be able to find salvation by hiding in the detail, and sowing confusion, but this looks a little bit tough when the major scientific organisations are making such straightforward comment.

splendid stuff !
per

[Rott]

I'm sure the climate scientists will discover that one of the IOP authors is a pedophile or rapist or something and declare their submission answered. Sadly, that's what passes for debate in climate science. Don't let their argument penetrate your belief system. Kill the messenger, put your hands over your ears and yell WAH WAH WAH!!!

[hunter]

AGW promoters hijacked climate science.
IOP is simply pointing this out.

[Eddie O]

I am now proud to call myself a member of the IOP again. Their support for the "consensus" in climate science has been unrelenting up to this point. I assume this is because the people at the top of the Institute are so wrapped up in the politics of science that they no longer have time to explore such deep rabbit holes as the Hockey Stick.

[oldtimer]

Submission 02 by Richard Courtney caught my eye. It can be found here:
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/cmsctech/memo/climatedata/uc0102.htm

I am neither a scientist nor a stistician so I should be grateful for comments on the thrust of his argument about MGT. It seems that Nature rejected his article when he submitted it.

In view of the Met Office proposal for a new temperature data set (mentioned here:
http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/022410_metproposal.pdf)
and the various work undertaken by independents on the existing data sets, it would be helpful if someone established a specification that provided a secure foundation for temperature records.

[Bernie]

I do not seem to be able to post a comment on the Oxford panel. Is something wrong on your end or is it my end?

[oldtimer]

...for "stistician" read "statistician".

[RichieRich]

Q writes

As a statistician I was disappointed by the dry and detached statement produced by the Royal Statistical Society.

My reading of the RSS's submission was that it was pretty damn forthright.

4. The RSS believes that the debate on global warming is best served by having the models used and the data on which they are based in the public domain. Where such information is publicly available it is possible independently to verify results. The ability to verify models using publicly available data is regarded as being of much greater importance than the specific content of email exchanges between researchers...

9. More widely, the basic case for publication of data includes that science progresses as an ongoing debate and not by a series of authoritative and oracular pronouncements and that the quality of that debate is best served by ensuring that all parties have access to the facts. It is well understood, for example, that peer review cannot guarantee that what is published is 'correct'. The best guarantor of scientific quality is that others are able to examine in detail the arguments that have been used and not just their published conclusions. It is important that experiments and calculations can be repeated to verify their conclusions. If data, or the methods used, are withheld, it is impossible to do this.

10. The RSS believes that a crucial step in improving the quality of the debate on global warming will be to place the data, the analysis methods and the models in the public domain.

Not sure it gets any clearer than that!

[Tony Hansen]

I do not seem to be able to post a comment on the Oxford panel. Is something wrong on your end or is it my end?
February 27, 2010 | Bernie

I have the same problem.

[Tony Hansen]

If I understand Frank correctly, the points in the submission are not as important as the names of the authors.

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