Revkin on the Hockey Stick

Andy Revkin is interviewed on America's NPR on the subject of the aftermath of Climategate. A transcript can be seen here. During the course of the interview, a member of the public asks AR about the Hockey Stick.

The original paper was riddled with caveats, all these could, would, might, to be sure, kind of phrases. And it - but then it quickly got spun, including by the IPCC in 2001. In the illustration they derived from it, they removed the gray bands that showed you the error, the possible up and down error. And as you go farther back in time, the range of possible error in these estimates is much, much higher. So that was where the problem was. The National Academy of Sciences did a study that assessed this. And largely, there were some problems that they raised with the way it had been done. But since then also, the main thrust of that work has been repeatedly replicated by other groups of scientists.

So the idea that we're in a period of unusual warming in the last 50 years has not been erased. The - what's been returned is - for the original paper - the sense that it's important to be sure you talk about the things we don't know, even when you talk about what's been learned in climate science. And if you don't do that, then you can be accused of, kind of, oversimplifying things.

All very strange. Can Andy really be unaware that Mann was a lead author on the paleoclimate chapter of the Third Assessment Report? Does he also not know that the "repeated replications" mostly rely on the same faulty data as the Hockey Stick itself? And I can't say I was aware that the IPCC had removed the error bars from the graph either (perhaps he means in the spaghetti graphs?).

A baseless attack on Leake

By strange coincidence, the story of an another attack on the Sunday Times' Jonathan Leake. An organisation called the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) has emailed a number of journliasts claiming that Leake breached an embargo.

Click to read more ...

Nature on public relations

Reading more like a something from PR Week than a premier scientific journal, Jeff Tollefson's article in Nature describes how better PR is going to do the trick for the global warming movement.

At Climate Central, a non-profit organization based in Princeton, New Jersey, scientists work with journalists and writers to develop climate stories in partnership with media outlets. The idea came together in 2008, backed by high-profile scientists such as Jane Lubchenco, who oversees much of the nation's climate science as head the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

See also the accompanying editorial.

David Shukman in the Guardian science podcast

A podcast interview with David Shukman, the BBC's science and environment correspondent. Shukman says the media has failed to report the uncertainties in climate science properly and says we are in a new era for climate reporting.

Audio starts from about 14:30 at this link.

Tee hee

Poor old Louise Gray...

UEAPR

The Times Ed Supp reports that the University of East Anglia has had a surge of positive online coverage since the breaking of the Climategate affair.

Some mistake, surely?

Josh 19

More cartoons by Josh here.

Fun and games at Wiki

There's lots of fun and games on the discussion page for the Hockey Stick Illusion at Wiki.

Airtime in the USA

Yesterday I did a long live interview for the Dennis Prager show, a syndicated radio programme broadcast from California. I think there is a podcast available. It seemed to go OK although as a sales pitch for my book I could have performed better. Dennis was kind enough to plug it several times.

Also a friendly review from Seth Roberts, who is Professor of Psychology at Qinghua University in Beijing and a successful blogger too.

If only I had a US publisher to enable me to take advantage!

Skeptic alerts

This is a guest post by Barry Woods.

The number of people contributing to online climate change articles and the various blogs has shot up since the Climategate story broke. One strategy for dealing with sceptics, seen on a 'climate change' lobby group website, might explain why.

Click to read more ...

Thought for the day

Does anyone else find it a bit odd that almost all of my big media appearances have been in what would generally be considered left-wing outlets?

• Prospect
• BBC
• The Courier  (I think - can't imagine a right wing paper would sell much in Dundee)

There have been citations in right wing outlets - Spectator, Telegraph, and so on - but the interviews and reviews have all come from the left.  Isn't that strange?

Times debate

I'm doing an online debate for the Times website tomorrow at 3pm. The theme is "The Climategate inquiry: can we trust the outcome". Opposition is to be confirmed but I understand they're trying to get Bob Ward.

Courier feature

This is the feature about yours truly that appeared in the Dundee Courier a couple of weeks ago.

Climate of change

TAKE AN ice hockey stick and lay it on its side. The now horizontal shaft, according  — while the blade, pointing practically straight upwards, is temperature over the last few decades. Accelerating, running away, threatening the planet.

Click to read more ...

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.

Click to read more ...

Wiki on the Hockey Stick Illusion

There is now a Wikipedia article on the Hockey Stick Illusion.