Wednesday
Dec092015
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill A state ideology
Dec 9, 2015 Civil liberties Climate: Sceptics Mark Steyn was breathtakingly good in his Congressional Testimony today.
Dec 9, 2015 Civil liberties Climate: Sceptics
Reader Comments (139)
Phil Clarke,
It looks like you 'argue' (hope?) that Michael Mann:
Did not select his data carefully, and chose what to include and not,
That he did not apply his decentered PC1-statistics when weighing his various proxies,
And that he didn't do this because he wanted to bolster the 'robustness' of his results.
But as I already noticed from your previous comment, you don't really know what you are talking about.
Consequently I asked why you brought your ignorant talking points here?
I think Phil Clarke and his ilk would offer up similar criticism of a journalist (if there are any left) reporting on a plane crash.
"Oh year?!??! Well let's see YOU fly one!"
The fact that 100 of Mann's peers found his work to be bad seems not to sink below the thin-skinned surface of the desperate AGW supporters. Instead they have to keep ressurecting him like Lazarus. I can't wait for Steyn's volume 2 revelations of more of those critiques of Mann's work. And these are only those who have had their criticisms actually revealed.
But apart from that, it takes a great deal of courage to stand up for principles and to fight for allowing truth and opinion to be debated. What Steyn is simply stating, and stating very well, is that if you're reduced to threatening the weight of court and government sanction to prevent free discourse, you have telegraphed loud and clear that your own ideas cannot stand on their own. He's absolutely correct. And fortunately for him, he's exactly in a position to say so. Dissenting science is being cowed by political bullies. Why are they so afraid of examining what others say? One can only assume they can't stand to see cherished "truths" and politics exposed to reality. We need more Steyns. And Currys and Happers and Christys.
I think Phil Clarke has just ducking canarded his own goose, and it is not even christmas yet.
By christmas, petrol could be below £1 a litre, which is excellent news for the peak oilers in Paris. I am sure I recall that some of the Grauniads best peak oilers had equal faith in Mann's integrity.
Only 3% of people still believe the 97% consensus.
The vulnerability of AGW Kool-Aid swillers on any given issue is directly proportional to the quantity of shrieks and moans emanating from their prevaricating pie-holes when that issue is discussed. Based on the number of whiney, illogical and misinformed comments here, their cause has just taken a rather large torpedo amidships. Maybe they'd feel better if they took a physic.
Interesting that ATTP quotes the wikimaniac Connolley approvingly when the Stoat is clearly being disingenuous. Curry and others were there to talk about the science and Steyn to talk about free speech, and Connolley knows that.
We are all wrong a lot of the time, but generally by accident rather than deliberately. However Connolley (who is far from stupid) seems to delight in being wrong on purpose as a debating ploy. Tedious in the extreme.
Phil Clark is being coy when saying that "Leaving aside the question of whether somebody who contributed to the IPCC which was collectively awarded a Nobel can legitimately claim a share of that prize, the Nobel in question was for Peace, so Steyn claiming it was used to falsely inflate scientific credentials is hilarious"
The thing is that all of those climate scientist that have used or are still using the Nobel Laureate title against the advice of the Nobel Institute never mention that the Nobel Prize that they claim to have been co-awarded never mention that it was the political Peace Prize awarded by bunch of retired Norwegian politicians. Hilarious yes, but most of all, a disgraceful attempt to mislead the public to think that their science is worthy a Nobel Prize.
Yes, I also chuckled when he described it as "Volume 1". The defense of the Hockey Stick will yet be the global-warmers Stalingrad.
I see ATTP the troll has appeared. Best to ignore.
Pethefin
abso-lutely - maybe it plays well to easily impressed provincial audiences - but Mann has never, ever shown any humility or self deprecation as far as I'm aware about the Noggie-Nobel business - as far as I'm aware he and his co-fraudsters are entirely happy for folk to believe they are recipients of a prize for outstanding scientific achievement in a way like Disneyland getting UNESCO world heritage status or something.
I think Phil Clarke fails to see the irony in quoting SKS articles defending Mann, when those articles have been substantially ghost written by Mann.
On the other hand of course, William M Connolley just helped found Real Climate, with Mann.
Mann's supporters keep writing about conspiracy theories, clearly with good supporting evidence.
Reference Tony Heller (Goddard) and his charts. Disregarding his rants (awful) and gun liking, I am still looking for somebody showing that Heller is picking NASA/NOAA charts and changing them before he compares before and after. Even Judith Curry yesterday referred to the pressure in NOAA (and presumably NASA)
"One problem is reflected in an email70 I recently received from a scientist employed at NASA:
“I was at a small meeting of NASA-affiliated scientists and was told by our top manager that he
was told by his NASA boss that we should not try to publish papers contrary to the current
global warming claims, because he (the NASA boss) would then have a headache countering the
“undesirable” publicity”.
So Karl will be OK here with his adding warming to ARGO floats returns to help Obama in Paris, but Heller should be attacked ad hominem for trying to unravel what same NOAA are up to with all their "virtual" recording stations and "adjustments". Dr Carl Mears RSS has obviously been told to declare that Satellite temperatures are not as reliable as ground based readings although some years ago he voiced the opposite opinion. Has he been told to toe the line or lose his job?
Why does anyone bother supporting Mann's Hockeystick?
It's holed beneath the waterline. Two US Congressional inquests found it was junk. Climate Audit lives off the fact that it proved it was junk.
It's a joke now because it was junk, then and always.
But I ask again, even of it wasn't junk pseudoscience, why does anyone bother supporting Mann's Hockeystick?
It's so damaged that it could be let go.
Instead the rest of the solid science made by scientists of an ethical reputation who will release their code (even schoolchildren know that not showing you working is bad practice)... that could be promoted.
It could be promoted, if it existed.
But the junk science is all they've got left.
And so the fanatics defend it to the last.
Further to disingenuous arguments...
http://legaltimes.typepad.com/files/michael-mann-complaint.pdf
Paragraph 2: “As a result of his research, he and his colleagues were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.”
Paragraph 5: “…to attempt to discredit consistently validated scientific research through the professional and personal defamation of a Nobel prize recipient.”
Paragraph 17: “The work of Dr. Mann and the IPCC has received considerable accolades within the scientific community. In 2007, Dr. Mann shared the Nobel Peace Prize with other IPCC authors for their work in climate change, including the development of the Hockey Stick Graph.”
It is quite clear that Mann was trying to use a Nobel Peace Prize to inflate his scientific chops, on occasion even leaving out the "Peace" part. Even he (or his lawyers) subsequently realized the mistake and had to re-file the legal document.
Yes, it is hilarious, but not quite in the way Phil intended.
Some here are being unfair on Mark, saying his grasp of the science was out of his depth, if that is the case why is Mann taking him to court? Actually Mann really has very cold feet on taking Steyn to court and is purposely in cahoots with Obamas groupie incompetent female judges and now trying to stall the whole process. So saying that Mark has been threatened by the American liberal hierarchy via its legal system and had every right to be there as did the president of the Sierra club who has already shown that he knows infinitely less than Mark. Bravo Mark , you was fearless yesterday, in fact you were magnificent.
M Courtney, have you noticed that aTTP does not waste anyone's time here (his included) on Mann's fabricated Hockey Stick?
Perhaps aTTP ought to have a quiet word with Phil. There are some dead horses that are not being flogged for public consumption in Paris.
Well what can I say, well said Mr Steyn a very reasonable statement putting forward a true representation of what this is all about... a storm in a tea cup blown out of all proportion.
The science is far from robust and no matter how much the likes of Phil Clarke, who ever he may be, wail, gnash and incessantly moan that fact is not going to change to those of an intelligent nature who are prepared to listen to all arguments.
Lawrence13, not many people here are having a go at Steyn. The fact, as noted above, is he is NOT trying to argue the science.
Mann took Steyn into legal action. Mann is the one now resisting the Court proceeding. Presumably many others were thankful not to have another disaster before Paris. Hopefully climate science will have another disaster early in the New Year.
Jeepers, Phil. Read what Robert Way from SkS says about Mann's work:
http://climateaudit.org/2013/11/20/behind-the-sks-curtain/
Okay? This is what they really think. His work was wrong, it was badly wrong, and he fought like a dog that no one would be able to check it.
The average reader here is familiar with climateaudit and McIntyre's work, even if you're not. Anyone who followed these stories from over there knows that you're reposting clueless talking points.
Tables turned: Scientist Judith Curry and Author Mark Steyn question, school Sen Markey on climate
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oh6zDbWMuP0
Climate Mob: Judith Curry, Mark Steyn call out 'RICO mentality' of AAAS and Nature science journals
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYsTqGbn16w
Not to get too far OT, but speaking of both the AAAS and integrity:
http://blog.chembark.com/2014/06/22/ucla-professor-patrick-harran-strikes-deal-with-prosecutors/
http://cenblog.org/the-safety-zone/2015/12/patrick-harran-elected-as-a-aaas-fellow/
The AAAS was "unaware of the charges".
ATTP: "A consensus doesn't have to be correct to exist."
I noticed he disappeared after this goof. Wonder if he forgot to hit "Preview Post" first?
Phil Clarke, so pleased you mentioned Wahl and Amman 2007. You do realize that W&A confirmed that the results in Mann 1998 had no statistical validity before around 1750 ?
Thus Mann's conclusion was in fact wrong. What's more, we know that Mann was aware of this when he published as he committed the academic scientific fraud of calculating a statistic (R2 in this case), cited it in the paper when it supported his arguments (the 1815 step) and yet ignored it when it contradicted his arguments and conclusions (all earlier steps). That is textbook fraud. So pleased you acknowledge that.
Oh, and BTW, the orientation of the sticks generated doesn't matter, Mann's algorithm automatically inverts them if they point down, so the orientation is irrelevant. That shows why your "source" for the criticism of McIntyre is ignorant of the process. This flipping is, as another nugget to assuage your ignorance, why Mann included in his 2008 paper the Finnish lake varves in 2 out of three cases UPSIDE DOWN ! Something by the way he has yet to issue a formal correction for. The collector of the varves states that thicker varves are the result of colder weather (more snow, more runoff, more sediment to summarize), so varve thickness (VT) up, temperature down. Mann included these records with VT up, Temp up. Ignoring as well the authors stated warning that after 1750 or so human agricultural contamination made the records unusable as temperature proxies.
Would you like to acknowledge this mistake, and the fact that this invalidates the conclusions ?
The consensus of honest commentors is that both Mann 1998/9 and Mann 2008 should be withdrawn as their errors make them thoroughly unreliable.
To the extent that the science was debated, admiral Titley won the debate.
ATTP, for once you are right: "A consensus doesn't have to be correct to exist." So why should we then care about the consensus-speak of the likes of you?
Dec 9, 2015 at 4:17 PM | Unregistered CommenterPethefin
In science history the consensus is always wrong.
Russell said
"To the extent that the science was debated, admiral Titley won the debate".
Was Titley at another hearing as well?
The key question to it all was how much of the accepted (non twisted NOAA and GISS Data) warming is attributable to humans as Curry asked and Steyn posed to Markey as to what percentage, which Markey couldn't answer and Titley side stepped.
As for Titley's recent tripe about national security Steyn totally shredded him and rightfully so.
Phil Clarke, so pleased you mentioned Wahl and Amman 2007. You do realize that W&A confirmed that the results in Mann 1998 had no statistical validity before around 1750 ?
Quotation? I think you made that up.
Thus Mann's conclusion was in fact wrong. What's more, we know that Mann was aware of this when he published as he committed the academic scientific fraud of calculating a statistic (R2 in this case), cited it in the paper when it supported his arguments (the 1815 step) and yet ignored it when it contradicted his arguments and conclusions (all earlier steps). That is textbook fraud. So pleased you acknowledge that.
I don't. I do acknowledge that the NAS panel said that r2 was a lousy stat for climate reconstructions, which makes Mann's eschewing of it rather sensible.
Would you like to acknowledge this mistake, and the fact that this invalidates the conclusions ?
Nope. Mountain. Molehill. The contamination was discussed and the reconstruction done with and without, with negligible difference.
The consensus of a vocal minority of blinkered idealogically motivated bloggers and obsessives is that both Mann 1998/9 and Mann 2008 should be withdrawn. The mainstream position is that nearly all subsequent wok confirm the conclusions of this groundbreaking study.
FTFY.
Out of interest, how many posters here have read Dr Mann's Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars book?
Russel:
With your typical lack of comprehension you will have missed the fact that Steyn's presentation was about the DOGMA of Climate Change, not the science (he actually said that) . No matter, when you take the trouble to read (notwithstanding your difficulties with comprehension) Steyn's full submission to the Committee you will see that Steyn completely eviscerated Titley's - not to mention a few others' - contribution. But then, I really don't expect Sksballs like you to have understood the argument.Phil Clarke: You're channeling me! I asked you earlier if you'd read our host's "The Hockey Stick Illusion" (no response) and now you ask:
- which I shall read when I find time - like you - in my extra-busy schedule.The context of the hockey stick is important due to it being published near the time of the Kyoto climate conference. It was highly desirable that the inconvenient MWP be disappeared to 'smooth' the way for treaty ratification.
Mann was only an assistant professor back then, now he is a revered scientist with his own Twitter account.
Is Admiral Titley a climate scientist, or just an expert on sea level when viewed from a ship?
The Arctic sea ice has always been a useful hiding place for submarines, especially those equipped with nuclear weapons. Current evidence suggests they can continue to hide beneath the ice, even if the President of the US has been told to worry.
Looks like Steyn is the right man for the job, total control over proceedings that I have seen so far no wonder ATTP is quaking in his books....
esmiff, having disappeared the MWP, Mann was hoping to do the same with the Arctic sea ice. Computer Adjusted Climate Science helps adjust the past, but struggles with the present and future.
Nothing to say, really. Just wanted you lot to know how important I am.
Radical Rodent (Nobel Laureate)
Pompous Rodent
'Nothing to say, really...'
Duly noted.
Pompous Rodent, congratulations on your Nobel Prize. Did it take any longer than Mann to copy the correct type face, etc? Some of those signatures are a lot easier with computer adjusted calligraphy. Does it need to be printed on proper vellum? I am sure some UK MP's could 'find' some for extra authenticity. MP's are very good at that sort of thing.
Golf Charlie: oh… you want proof, do you? Well, just believe me. It’s true. Honest.
(p.s. which MP would you recommend?)
Radical Rodent (Nobel Laureate)
Read what Robert Way from SkS says about Mann's work:</I>
Is that all you got?
Point 1 has to be that reproducing private correspondence without permission is never ethical.
Point 2 is that Way at no point disagrees with the basic conclusions of the study
Mann’s science is mostly good and I certainly think that his papers have discussed most of the caveats.
Personally, I can live with that. The point is to be correct. To state accurately as possible what is the case. The PCA thing is an utter and total red herring.
Point 3 is that Dr Mann acknowledged that less than optimal methods were applied back in 1999. People seem to forget just how groundbreaking this stuff was, of course it was not perfect, however it has not been refuted anywhere credible. It will not be popular around here but the reality is that the graph has withstood all of the criticism and, still today, stands as a perfectly accurate picture of climate over the past millennia.
Here is Gerald North, head of the NAS panel charged with investigating climate reconstructions:-
There is a long history of making an inference from data using pretty crude methods and coming up with the right answer. Most of the great discoveries have been made this way. The Mann et al., results were not 'wrong' and the science was not 'bad'. They simply made choices in their analysis which were not precisely the ones we (in hindsight) might have made. It turns out that their choices led them to essentially the right answer (at least as compared with later studies which used perhaps better choices). </I>
North is spot on. It is useful to identify flaws in any work, however one needs to differentiate between a flea bite and a showstopper. Steve McIntrye might just lack a sense of proportion.
This is what we are dealing with and shows its nothing to do with science. Released tonight from 'Climate Progress' left wing Obama type sloganizing against Mark Steyn's Washington contribution.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/12/09/3729959/mark-steyn-said-some-weird-things-at-this-hearing/
Note the author 'Samantha Page' has no comments link just pure left wing rhetoric . I actually doubt that she is real or exists.
Phil Clarke, if Mann's Hockey stick is so good, how come it is so wrong? Or do you continue to dismiss the MWP, LIA and PAUSE, as being anecdotal?
I think you might just lack a sense of reality.
It is a bit like asking a group of art forgers to comment on the authenticity of a 'masterpiece' that one of them produced last year.
Pompous Rodent, some of our MP's do have experience of reproducing and backdating documents they were to try and rely on in court. Receipts from Tescos and Argos were only for the beginners, more experienced truffle hunters would go for more elaborate travel locations, but only in places with a warmer climate than the UK.
Noted fiction writer and jailbird Jeffrey Archer can also advise on cash transfers, in brown envelopes, but I am not sure whether the colour of the envelope is more important than the colour of the bank notes inside.
Celebrated Nobel prize winners get to collect their prize from the "Blue Room" of Stockholm City Hall. It helps to convey authenticity if you know that the "Blue Room" is not painted blue.
I find it difficult to believe that anyone thinks Mann is a person with integrity, even if they believe his science.
That probably explains why bodies like the IPCC don't use his work any more.
In the meantime
Arctic ice is up
Antarctic ice is up
Polar Bears are Up
Harry: I watched the proceedings live, gavel to gavel. Having nown Titley since he was Oceanographer of the Navy, I think it very brave of Chairman Cruz to set an ambush at odds so even as 3 to 1.
Pethefin
Some few of the IPCC peace prize winners , like Crutzen, are science laureates in their own right
The issue of the rather farcical Norwegian "Peace" prize (farcical considering to whom and what it has been awarded in recent times) ought to be an embarrassment to Mann and anyone else attempting to associate themselves with it. Even worse if they are trying it on by proxy.
However, the well know concept of "prestige" is at play here. Prestige by association, prestige by excessive PR. Prestige by 15 minutes of fame on TV. The concept of prestige is much diminished from where it once stood in recent times but is still able to attract admiration in some quarters from some people.
People seeking prestige hope that they will, as a by-product of the association - become untouchable.
More correctly they should become unbelievable.
Let's seek out the origin.
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/prestige
Origin
"Mid 17th century (in the sense 'illusion, conjuring trick'): from French, literally 'illusion, glamour', from late Latin praestigium 'illusion', from Latin praestigiae (plural) 'conjuring tricks'. The transference of meaning occurred by way of the sense 'dazzling influence, glamour', at first depreciatory."
The original intended usage seems more appropriate than ever as time passes.
'...when you’ve got so few scientists you’re willing to listen to that you’re obliged to invite Mark Steyn to speak, then you’re the one pushing Dogma.'
I've read this a hundred times - but it still makes no sense!
Charlie, if you buy a climate science texbbok, and read it once , your dyslexia will abruptly improve.
That probably explains why bodies like the IPCC don't use his work any more.
Dr Mann was appointed an expert reviewer of the 2013 IPCC report, Mann et al 2008 is plotted along with other reconstructions (IPCC AR5 WG1 Chapter 5 p409) and here is an extract from the references for that chapter
Mann, M. E., J. D. Fuentes, and S. Rutherford, 2012: Underestimation of volcanic cooling in tree-ring-based reconstructions of hemispheric temperatures. Nature Geosci., 5, 202–205.
Mann, M. E., S. Rutherford, E. R. Wahl, and C. Ammann, 2007: Robustness of proxybased climate field reconstruction methods. J. Geophys. Res., 112, D12109.
Mann, M. E., Z. H. Zhang, M. K. Hughes, R. S. Bradley, S. K. Miller, S. Rutherford, and F. B. Ni, 2008: Proxy-based reconstructions of hemispheric and global surface temperature variations over the past two millennia. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A., 105, 13252–13257.
Mann, M. E., et al., 2009: Global signatures and dynamical origins of the Little Ice Age and Medieval Climate Anomaly. Science, 326, 1256–1260.
Situation normal. Why post stuff that can be proven false in less than a minute?
No point debating hockey sticks with P. Clarke or any other troll since he obviously doesn't even believe what he writes. He now should know, even if he didn't before, that all modern reconstructions, including those of Mann and those of PAGES2K which have had their egregious errors fixed, show the MWP to be as large as the present warming. To continue to defend a hokey-stick which even it's author has superceded and which most paleoclimatologists are now embarrassed about (and even thought was crap at the time according to the climategate emails), shows that like many of these climate warriors, he isn't looking for debate, accuracy rapprochement or realism, he just likes a fight!