Everybody does it

RP Jnr links to a review of the Climategate story by Der Speigel and has a fascinating discussion with his readers in the comments thread below.

The point at issue is Mike's Nature Trick and the question of whether it amounts to scientific fraud. Der Spiegel describe the trick as follows:

Click to read more ...

More radio

I've just returned from Edinburgh where I did an interview for the Newshour show on the World Service. Listeners in the UK should be able to hear it again on the iPlayer shortly. They are also going to use a clip on the 1800 news too (presumably Radio 4).

The interview went much better than the last time. I made the point that the scope of the panel missed key allegations and cited Ross McKitrick's point that Jones had inserted baseless statements into the IPCC reports.

The interviewer came back asking whether sceptics would ever be satisified. I said that we would, if presented with evidence that the allegations were false. For example I pointed out that Ross McK had listed the evidence that would have to be produced to disprove the allegation that Jones had fabricated parts of the IPCC report.

At this point they cut me off, which was a pity, because I wanted to point out that the panel's point that the IPCC had misrepresented CRU science was risible, the IPCC authors in question being CRU people anyway.

Still, all in all, I'm not too unhappy with my performance.

George signs off

There is a curious article by George Monbiot in the Guardian, in which he looks at the question of whether requests for Phil Jones' data were vexatious and concludes that the data should have been out in the open anyway.

What is interesting is that George suggests this will be his last article on the Climategate affair.

This is probably the last piece I'll write on the hacked emails saga. Unless the two remaining inquiries throw up something unexpected, there is not a lot more to say.

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Fred Pearce

Fred Pearce has one of the more interesting responses to the Parliamentary report, picking up on some interesting omissions and contradictions in what our elected representatives had to say.

His points on the "Nature trick" are less informative though. He points to statements by Sarah Palin and Senator Inhofe on the subject and rightly points out that the idea that CRU were trying to hide the "fact" that temperatures are not rising is false.

Of course they weren't.

So. Now we have, yet again, disposed of this canard, can we get on to the real accusation, namely that Jones hid the decline from policymakers so as to make the proxy reconstruction of the Medieval Warm Period look more reliable than it actually is?

Fred?

Public sector efficiency

On August 12, 2009 Nature reported on attempts by Climate Auditors to obtain Phil Jones data and Jones' response:

Although Jones agrees that the data should be made publicly available, he says that “it needs to be done in a systematic way”. He is now working to make the data publicly available online and will post a statement on the CRU website tomorrow to that effect, with any existing confidentiality agreements. “We’re trying to make them all available. We’re consulting with all the meteorological services – about 150 members of WMO – and will ask them if they are happy to release the data”, says Jones. But getting the all-clear from other nations could take several months and there may be objections. “Some countries don’t even have their own data available as they haven’t digitized it. We have done a lot of that ourselves”, he says.

The letter to SMHI requesting permission to release their data was dated December 2009.

I wonder what CRU were doing in the intervening five months?

Josh 7

More cartoons by Josh here.

What Jones said about station data

Here's the bit from Jones statement that was bothering me:

Stringer: Well I will plug on because I've got one of the quotes from your emails which says "why should I make the data available to you when your aim is to find something wrong with it."...to Hughes. Now that's your email. Now that's the nature of science isn't it, that scientists make their reputations by proving or disproving what other scientists have done previously. Your statement there appears to be anti-scientific and the books that people have written around this issue have persuaded me that you have not provided all the information - the programs, the weather stations, - all the information available so that people can replicate your work, and to say the data is freely available in the United States doesn't enable anyone to go through your workings and agree with you or disagree with you.

Jones: Well the list of stations, we did make that available in 2008, so that has been on our website...

Stringer: How long had people been asking for it at that time?

Jones: Erm

Stringer: You're talking about some papers from 1990 aren't you, that have been kept secret?

Jones: No. There was a paper in1990 and we were asked for the data in that paper, which I was talking about in the previous question, that was made available straight away. The list of stations was made available after about six months, from the first FoI request in about early 2007.

Now I would be grateful if someone would check the transcript for me, but Jones' legendary email in which he rejected Hughes request for data was in early 2005, so I'm struggling to see how the list of stations was released "straight away" in early 2007. Am I missing something here?

The hearings - UEA

Two more to go

16:52 Harris cites IoP submission. Do emails reveal anything that make Jones vulnerable? Jones says only seen a fraction of his emails. Says there is nothing in them to show that he has perverted the peer review process.

16:51 Harris asks about peer review process and manipulation thereof. Jones says they were already published and he was just commenting that they were not good papers. Asks about complaints to Peiser and E&E. This is Sonia B-C. Jones doesn't answer the question. Harris lets him get away with it.

16:49 Harris asks if there are issues of inter-group rivalry preventing disclosure of data.

Click to read more ...

Acton analysis

I've now had a chance to cast an eye over Sir Edward Acton's contribution to the Parliamentary Select Committee's inquiry into CRU. Like many commenters, I'm not impressed.

It's every man for himself

The contribution is billed as as being submitted by Sir Edward, "with additional comment provided, where indicated, by the University's Climatic Research Unit". It's interesting to note, therefore, that the controversial sections are attributed to the CRU rather than to Sir Edward, so there's a strong hint that the UEA boss is not confident enough of what Jones et al are saying to want to put his name against it. Joint and several liability is a dangerous thing when giving evidence to one's political masters, it seems.

Click to read more ...

Jones in Sciencemag

There is an extended interview with Phil Jones in Sciencemag. I think it's fair to say that people are going to take issue with some of the things he has to say.

Hiding the decline

Keenan responds to Jones

Doug Keenan has taken issue with the way Nature has described his complaint against Phil Jones co-author Wei-Chyung Wang. In particular they seem to have missed the point that the evidence Wang cited didn't actually exist.

His comments are here.

A comment from Roger Harrabin

Roger Harrabin, writing in the comments to this thread, has clarified the arrangements for his interview with Phil Jones. You may remember that there was a rumour that although the interview appeared to have been undertaken in writing, there was in fact a recording as well but that this had been squashed by the BBC bigwigs because Jones didn't come over well.

Roger H's comment is as follows:

Professor Jones agreed the interview with me on the strict condition that it was not broadcast. I pressed to do TV and radio but was refused. The university say he is not well enough to do a broadcast interview. The BBC kept the deal. For the BBC news website interview I sought questions from several prominent climate sceptics.

Make of it what you will.

It's in the Nature of the beast

A couple of interesting climategate postings over at Nature's website - some more statements from Phil Jones, the most startling of which is this:

I don't think we should be taking much notice of what's on blogs because they seem to be hijacking the peer-review process.

Golly. I can't imagine for a minute which journals have had their peer review process hijacked by us motley band of sceptics.

Then there's this piece by Daniel Cressey, who does a reasonable job of rounding up the developments on the Russell Review and the latest errors from the IPCC. He then blows it unfortunately by suggesting that readers head over to RealClimate to get a good dose of truth, which looks slightly foolish given that these are the guys who are being investigated.

Unless Daniel Cressey, like his boss Philip Campbell, knows something about the outcome of the review already.

Was there a recording of Phil Jones?

There are a few little stories floating around at the moment which I'll post here.

Cool Dude in the comments reports a rumour that Roger Harrabin recorded an interview with Phil Jones but decided not to run with it since Jones came over so badly.

Sources have told me there was a recorded interview and it was decided at high level not to use it because Jones didn't come across very well.

I hope someone from the BBC will comment here because if true this will smack strongly of the BBC playing at a PR service to the environmental movement rather than news reporting on behalf of the licence fee payer. The BBC Trust is soon going to begin a review of the corporation's perceived lack of neutrality on the climate change issue, so a suppression of Jones' interview after the announcement of this review would look very bad and moreover positively reckless.

Perhaps Roger Harrabin could head off this kind of criticism by posting the raw footage on the BBC website.