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Climate Scientist to Revkin: "we can no longer trust you" to carry water for us.

Okay folks, here comes a new e-mail from the climate community yesterday that I did not hack (I was copied on it), and it is a case study in not getting it.  Back story: Ever since Chris Horner and I were at a conference together with warmenist Michael Schlesinger of the University of Illinois a couple years ago, Chris and I have been included on Prof. Schesingler's e-mail distribution list, which usually consist of flagging climate news stories.  Yesterday we got copied on this message Schlesinger sent to science reporter Andy Revkin:

Andy:
Copenhagen prostitutes?
Climate prostitutes?
Shame on you for this gutter reportage. [Emphasis added.]
This is the second time this week I have written you thereon, the first about giving space in your blog to the Pielkes.
The vibe that I am getting from here, there and everywhere is that your reportage is very worrisome to most climate scientists.
Of course, your blog is your blog.
But, I sense that you are about to experience the 'Big Cutoff' from those of us who believe we can no longer trust you, me included. [Emphasis added.]
Copenhagen prostitutes?
Unbelievable and unacceptable.
What are you doing and why?
Michael

So what so annoyed Schlesinger? Here's Revkin's offending blog post, which among other things passes along the amusing story of Copenhagen prostitutes offering free sex to climate campaigners (I'll leave to Mark Steyn the suitable lip gloss on this story), along with some other news items that the climate campaigners don't want reported. Judge for yourself if this constitutes "gutter reportage" and deserves censure from the climate science community. I'll add that one of the CRU e-mails I read mentioned that Revkin is not always reliable from their point of view; I can't now find it, but recall it vividly for the presumption that reporters are supposed to serve as mere transcribers for the climate campaign.

This raises another small but perhaps significant point that I didn't have room to comment on in my Weekly Standard article: How is it possible for a group of smart people to write over 1,000 e-mails over the course of a decade without a single shred of wit or humor in any of them? There isn't the tiniest hint anywhere that any of these guys ever grin.  It jives with my experience of environmentalists for 20 years now that they are the single most humorless slice of humanity on the planet. (My favorite: I had a top greenie lawyer for the Audubon Society once say at a conference that "I regard the National Association of Home Builders to be every bit as evil as the National Rifle Association." My comeback was: "I can understand why you'd think that about the home builders, but what's your problem with the NRA?" The guy didn't even crack a smile.) And here we see Andy Revkin threatened with a "cutoff" because he writes--on a blog--something mildly amusing about Copenhagen.

Categories > Environment

Discussions - 90 Comments

The fact that Schlesinger would say such things openly says volumes. They have no shame and have lived so long within the bubble of the academic world where everybody thinks like them, that they can only react hysterically when someone dares to challenge them.

A bit like the queen in Alice in Wonderland.

The feeling goes both ways. I will not believe ANY so-called primary climate data unless it comes from sensors that these people didn't place and don't have any hope of altering the data. They have proven themselves to be fundamentally dishonest.

This is the post-modern scientific method.

I believe that they are humorless, and thin-skinned, because they know that their "science" will not stand up to the slightest scrutiny, not even the funny kind.

"It jives with my experience...."

The word is "jibes," and that's no jive.

Excellent story though.

At this point, I don't believe scientists,any scientists. They view themselves as infallible priests of some religion. They tend to be a very arrogant lot. I don't trust their data since they lie. I don't trust their research since they lie. I only trust the technology that I can verify by public use.

This is how the top "made guys" within any organized crime organization or academic institution think. They have had their asses kissed by their subordinates for so long that they think they are the end all, be all of everything. By their mere words they think they can turn lies into truth, turds into pearls, sewage water into wine. They have enjoyed having the "juice" for so long that they no longer have any other skill set.

Confront them on their bullshit and they get mad. Really mad. And then rather than reconsider their point of view, they plot revenge. The naysayers and others who would dare to disagree with them must be punished and put back in line. And that, dear readers, are what we are seeing here.

Hey, that's a bit unfair. Say what you want about ClimateGate and climatologists, but I am a conservation scientist, and I have a sense of humor!

Why, just this morning I told the one about the Nun, the Priest, and Bartender.....

Mike,

You shouldn't paint all scientists with such a broad brush. I think it's pretty clear that the climate scientists in East Anglia are unscrupulous, but then the fact that they wouldn't release their primary data, their models, and their methodology should have been public knowledge long ago. If they say "go to hell" when you ask them for their data, they're not really practicing the scientific method, which depends on openness and honesty.

I for one have always been skeptical of climate modeling, especially because it's so speculative. We can't accurately model the weather more than a few days out. We don't know all the inputs to climate and we surely don't know how they interrelate to each other.

All we do know is that climate, like weather, is a chaotic, complex system that feeds back on itself. Weather is described in complexity theory as being "sensitive to initial conditions". Small inputs can be amplified or squelched in a way that's inherently impossible to predict.

You can simulate complex systems but only to get a general sense of the range of possible behaviors, not to make specific predictions about how they WILL behave. The uncertainty in the models grows with each iteration until it's too great to be of any predictive value whatever.

I think if this were more widely known, the funding for climate modeling would dry up in a hurry, and that the CRU idiots know it. They've made unsupportable and very specific predictions about the climate, and the real world has refused to cooperate by obligingly growing warmer in a nice, steady fashion. This caused them to panic, trying everything they could to explain away the results, rather than to acknowledge that making such specific predictions based on computerized climate models is FUNDAMENTALLY UNSOUND. And now the chickens have come home to roost.

By the way, if you want to read a really interesting book about the role of subjectivity in science, I suggest "The Mismeasure of Man" by Stephen Jay Gould. Although it is not about climate science, its lessons about how easily people can allow their prejudices to throw off their scientific conclusions is highly illuminating.

Fortunately, the nature of science is that charlatans and frauds eventually do get found out. It may take a lot longer than anyone likes, but it's really hard to keep pulling the wool over people's eyes if you can't produce your original data, and if other people can't reproduce your results.

AND......... ;-)

Are you REALLY surprised that leftists are humorless? I think not.

Typical "group think" If you do not parrot everything they want you to then your are the enemy.

Just look at the want ads where companies are looking for "team players"What ever happen to innovation and the individual? Science is no longer the quest for knowledge but the appeasement of authority.

For someone who was inclined to buy the AGW party line, I've always though Revkin was a pretty fair guy. Can't wait to see what his response is going to be.

Mike,

Most scientists respect the scientific method.

These AGW guys? Not so much.

See why their claims are:

FRUIT OF THE POISON TREE, TARTS FROM THE POISON FRUIT

https://naturalfake.wordpress.com/2009/12/03/fruit-of-the-poison-tree-tarts-from-the-poison-fruit/

Humorless? Well, sure, but on the whole these jokers in East Anglia and the U of PA are giving my wife and I endless laughs.

Can anyone explain to me how AGW is any more credible than Creation Science at this point?

Schlesinger's just sensitive because he doesn't think the whores attending the conference need any more competition.

"I'll add that one of the CRU e-mails I read mentioned that Revkin is not always reliable from their point of view; I can't now find it, but recall it vividly for the presumption that reporters are supposed to serve as mere transcribers for the climate campaign."

Here it is:

At 17:07 27/10/2009, Michael Mann wrote:

Hi Phil,
...
p.s. be a bit careful about what information you send to Andy and what emails you copy
him in on. He's not as predictable as we'd like
https://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=1062&filename=1256735067.txt

You have to realize that this is big bucks to these scientists. I see the same in my field. It's all about grant money and status at meetings. There is money on the speaking circuits as well. Challenge their view and you are challenging their whole life.

"How is it possible for a group of smart people to write over 1,000 e-mails over the course of a decade without a single shred of wit or humor in any of them? There isn't the tiniest hint anywhere that any of these guys ever grin."

The inference being drawn by most people is that whoever released the emails purged the ones with nothing but jokes, youtube links, dinner invitations, and other personal chit-chat.

My understanding is that Marxism uses its own science and that it is their goal to discredit real science.

Missing from the story: why were you copied on this?
I ask because this seems bad enough in a personal email- is this Prof. Schlesinger really so unsocial as to think that such a threat is acceptable public behavior? Does he think that he can create a 'chilling effect' beyond the NYT by making this email non-private?

For that matter, this *is* the New York Times. Trash that paper all you want (and believe me, I do) BUT: they do not have a history of allowing themselves to be strong-armed.

In 1890’s, Arrhenius built upon Fourier’s assessment of atmospheric properties plotting CO2 and temperature data collected in industrialized England. Arrhenius’ plots and calculations related CO2 and ambient temperatures. Callendar (1930’s) extended the analysis using long term observations from 200 stations reiterating the relation between CO2 and climate warming. Keeling (1950’s) began collecting atmospheric CO2 samples at Mauna Loa Observatory, Hawaii which is the most complete record.

USGS reports all volcanic activity produces nearly 200-million tons CO2 annually; although much less than human activity production. Mauna Loa, near the Observatory and the world’s most active volcano, had major eruptions in 1950, 1975, and 1984. Atmospheric CO2 levels measured at volcanoes indicate the degree of activity and estimated heat flow from one volcano are reported at140-mW/m2. Correlating CO2 and temperatures data collected near active volcanoes should be significant but not show a cause and effect relation; however, correlating world-wide data significantly shows CO2 lagging temperature by approximately two years. Arrhenius and Callendar analysis similarly could be significantly biased owing to urban heat-island effects and extensive coal burning at the time, as CO2 is an abundant byproduct of burning.

Apparently, no laboratory control experiment to date, such as in a biodome, has shown CO2 levels influencing ambient temperatures. Tyndall (1861) measured the absorptive characteristics of CO2 followed by more precise measurements by Burch (1970). Absorbance is a measure of the quantity of light (energy) absorbed by a sample (CO2 molecule) and the amount of absorbed energy can be represented as specific heat of a substance. Specific heat of CO2 ranges from 0.791-kJ/kgK at 0-degrees F to 0.871-kJ/kgK at 125-degrees F and average atmospheric concentrations are 0.0306-percent. As revealed, the specific heat of CO2 increases as ambient temperatures increase showing CO2 likely is an ambient temperature buffer.

The atmosphere contains from 4-percent water vapor in the troposphere to 40-percent near the surface. Specific heat of water vapor relatively remains constant at 1.996-kJ/kgK. Water absorbs energy (heat) and evaporates to water vapor. During condensation (precipitation), latent heat is released to the atmosphere thus increasing ambient temperatures. Water vapor holds the majority of atmospheric heat and regulates climate and temperature more than any compound. Historically, however, water vapor characteristics as related to climate were much less appreciated, but investigations concerning the significance water vapor plays in global climate-dynamics are just beginning.

Energy not stored in the atmosphere is released into space through radiation. Re-radiation is the emission of previously absorbed radiation by molecules. Specific heat of water vapor and CO2 molecules shows that water vapor reradiates significantly more energy back to the surface and this case further is justified by quantities of each compound. Thus, this synopsis and other publications suggest that minute variations in atmospheric CO2 concentrations likely results in an insignificant affect on climate; whereas water vapor likely is the significant factor. Nevertheless, this argument easily could be rectified with an appropriate biodome-type control experiment.

Also, we must remember that the bigger the lie, the more people will believe it!

When and where will the next big lie and manipulation occur? Maybe with job creation, our economy, or the financial and monetary systems?

I'm a believer in evolution but I often toss that one back at those ridiculing creationism.

One big difference is that Creation Science advocates are not demanding that we raise taxes, strangle the world economy, and transfer power and wealth to the UN to redistribute to those unable to produce. Obviously creationists have a far more benign religious belief than warmers.

No humor in the emails?

Search for the word *puke*

Well, then let's provide some humor:

EACliSci#1: "Do you know AGW is a Scam?"

EACliSci#2: "No, but hum a few bars and I'll fake it"

ehmoran,
Interesting comment. I've been thinking a lot about heat flow and GW since climategate surfaced. You hit the nail on the heat about relative abundances and the specific heat of water and CO2. At 380 parts per million I can't see how CO2 could store enough energy to have much more than an insignificant effect on global temperature.

Science is dead. And the 'scientists' killed all fields through greed and politicization.
They're about as honest as a rotten board.

Steven Hayward:

"How many AGW believers does it take to screw in a compact fluorescent lightbulb?"

Prof. Schesingler:

"That's not funny."

Someone else may already have said this, but the reason the AGW-mongers are so humorless and touchy is that the skeptics are messing with their meal tick...er, grant funding.

And the reason "the science is settled" and "the time for debate is over" is that Al Gore is out billions if they aren't.

Sadly, the folks at COP15 are still taking this stuff very seriously. It is also hilarious that they are playing "whack a mole" with the blog postings on their website. Pages of "article deleted" interspersed with gushing praise for the conference. Worth a read just for comedy value.

I am a scientist, a chemist. And your response is exactly what I warned colleagues about several years ago as the AGW stuff began to look fishy, that if this were not on the up and up, the casualty would not be a handful of bad actors, but rather, public trust in science.

I can't say that I blame you.

Nothing exposes a false authority like humor. Nothing makes a funnier joke that exposing false authority. I'm pretty sure that is why we've evolved with a sense of humor, it can unify people against the status quo.

Humor is like a small match, normally something trivial, but much more significant when you are knee deep in gunpowder.

The relatively new SuperFreakonomics has a whole chapter on gobal warming called: What do Al Gore and Mount Pinatubo have in Common?
Quite solid. Hilarious bits: " most of the warming seen over the past few decades, might actually be due to good environmental stewardship."-Nathan Myhrvold "everybody turns their knobs so they aren't the outlier, because the outlying model is going to have difficulty being funded."-Lowell Wood.

The fact is there's a tremendous amount of money tied up in Governmental ponzi-schemes associated with Global Warming, especially given their ability to tax entire national populations - and that's what Government's do, create open-ended self-perpetuating ponzi-schemes driven by tax monies.
A few billion her and a few billion there and pretty soon you're talking real money - and there's nothing funny about that, just ask George Soros.

Meanwhile the humorless Left demonizes the Oil companies, they're like Carry Nation calling for prohibition.

I find it telling that the left are so accustomed to controlling public discourse that they can "cutoff" a non-complisant reporter.

The debate is over- Al Gore is a liar.

A friend of mine who went to Bryn Mawr College told me a joke that made the rounds there. Feel free to modify this as needed for environmentalists.
Q: How many feminists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: One. And THERE IS NOTHING FUNNY ABOUT IT!!!

I am a scientist (molecular genetics) and have been looking at the GISS data for a while with my son. It struck me that all the cities looked warmer and the rural sites did not. If something is global then everything should be affected. We made a little video you might find interesting. We compared US paired urban and rural sites with readings going back 111 years. The urban sites have been warming but the rural sites are not. Look up "Global Warming Urban Heat Effect" on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/user/TheseData#p/a/u/1/LcsvaCPYgcI

So Simple a Sixth Grader Can Understand It!

Time for a ‘who’s who’ of open-source luminaries to sign a declaration of climate research principals:
(a) ‘rejection’ of cargo cult science … https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult_science
(b) ‘open’ data
(c) ‘open’ meta-data
(d) ‘open’ data calibration methods and traceability back to national international prime standards
(e) ‘open’ code
(f) ‘open’ software configuration management
(g) ‘open’ programmatic design reviews (program as in like ‘new product development’ program management)
(h) ‘open’ algorithms
(i) ‘open’ publication of results with side-by-side ‘open’ publication of ‘pseudo-anonymous’ reviewers feedback
(j) ‘rejection’ of all data, meta-data, code, algorithms, results, etc etc that is ‘not-open’

Rev 0.0.1 list of luminaries: Tim O’Reilly, Linus Torvalds, Larry Wall, Brian Behlendorf, Eric Allman, Guido van Rossum, Michael Tiemann, Paul Vixie, Jamie Zawinski of Netscape, and Eric Raymond. Yep – i copied & pasted from wiki article; however, I want to get the ball rolling sooner rather than later. Would be nice if Steve Wozniak would sign on.

I guess John Stewart is off their favorites list.

"Poor Al Gore. Global warming completely debunked by the very Internet you invented."

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgPUpIBWGp8

I'm not sure how you intended your citation of Gould's book to be understood, but the chief reason it is "illuminating" is that it illustrates how much Gould's politics influenced his interpretation of the science (for the worse). His claims in Mismeasurment have not withstood the challenge of recent developments in genetics.

Talking of the lack of humor, I am reminded of the joke about an accountant, statistician and physicist, which ends with the punchline: ... assuming a spherical horse.

Thanks chemman......

Bill Woods wrote: “The inference being drawn by most people is that whoever released the emails purged the ones with nothing but jokes, youtube links, dinner invitations, and other personal chit-chat.”

My speculative theory is different: The leaked emails are the residual emails of a batch which had *already been sanitized* from the CRU production email systems, in order to illegally prepare an incomplete response for a future FOIA request. The emails in question were *not* going to be provided under a FOIA request.

They were going to “leave in” the harmless small talk and less incriminating correspondence in the production email system to be produced under discovery for an FOIA. Remember, there was a request to delete emails.

Therefore the leaked emails form the residual from a sanitized batch which were foolishly or purposely archived on another system and/or discovered by an insider or whistleblower (perhaps the sanitizer himself). The insider then had pangs of conscience or an axe to grind and released them surreptitiously.

Linda,

There are numerous examples cited in Gould's book that are unrelated to genetics, but which demonstrate unambiguously the presence of unconscious bias on the part of researchers who were committed to a belief, set out to prove it, and whose original data was later used to refute the conclusions to which they came. See the sections on anatomists' attempts to correltate race, brain size and intelligence. Genetics doesn't enter into those observations at all.

It's striking how clearly early anthropologists misinterpreted their own data, but at least they had the cojones to publish their original research, unlike the CRU cretins.

Mann's joke about the Idso brothers being a circus act was funny. apologies to the Idso brother for pointing this out, but it was funny.

"There are numerous examples cited in Gould's book that are unrelated to genetics, but which demonstrate unambiguously the presence of unconscious bias on the part of researchers who were committed to a belief, set out to prove it, and whose original data was later used to refute the conclusions to which they came. See the sections on anatomists' attempts to correltate race, brain size and intelligence."

Actually, brain size and intelligence *are* correlated, so the example turns on its head. Gould didn't want to believe it, so he cherry-picked bad old studies and ignored the good studies, which went against his preconceptions. The guy was Marxist, wasn't he? His book is not just bad science, but also bad history--- don't believe what you read in it about even the older, primitive, studies.

It is worth keeping in mind that maybe people who say they don't believe in absolute truth and who believe that the most important things for scientists to do is to help people, not to advance science, actually mean what they say--- that a scientist has a duty to lie about his results if he thinks that advance social justice.

The humor point is really good. I hadn't seen that before. One sign of someone being a good scientist is that he's appalled when someone fakes results. But another one, I think, is that he likes jokes. Maybe I'm wrong, but my impression is that a big part of science is nerdy humor, and anybody who doesn't like The Far Side or Dilbert probably isn't a real scientist.

Why would that be? I think it goes with scientists thinking of themselves as a skeptical bunch who don't take material things, impressiing non-scientists, or conventional "real life" seriously since they are scholars, and who care more about eternal things-- meaning, for them, solidly established, permanent results.

But these climate "scientists" constantly argue from authority and care very much about convincing politicians and journalists of their results.

Jeff,

It's not just the CRU. It's James Hansen and Gavin Schmidt of NASA, Eric Steig of the University of Washington, the list goes on and on.

I don't think any of them will learn and correct themselves. They are so immersed in themselves they'll have to be isolated, separated from the rest of science and society and held up as examples of what not to do. I'm not holding my breath, though, not with so many fellow travelers in the Left.

BANZAI7 NEWS--A profession not known for giving freebies -- ever -- has decided to offer its services gratis, just in time for the COP15 climate conference in Copenhagen. When Copenhagen's mayor, Ritt Bjerregaard, sent off a message to local hotels urging them not to assist hotel guests in town for the event hooking up with... well... hookers, the pros struck back.

Country delegates will be awarded special bonus points ("PoPs") for submitting additional greenhouse gas reduction targets ("FaRTS"). The program is expected to result in a game changing World Climax Change conference. So far China and India are leading in bonus PoPs. President Obama is also planning to attend the conference with some surprise FaRTS in his back pocket.

Al Gore commented: "Why didn't I think of that! Excuse me, my travel agent is calling."

lol. it sure is. its also the post-scientific scientific method. :*)

Still waiting for Bill Ayers to come out talking about he is so dissapointed by Obama, How could he not follow through on Bill Ayer's teachings...

> Phelps
> Can anyone explain to me how AGW is any more
> credible than Creation Science at this point?

Yes, an interesting point Phelps. We know that evolutionary scientists like Dawkins would never argue from personal religious biases, or distort the science by inventing "selfish genes" and other bull turds. Dawkins refuses to debate Stephen Meyer to save the gullible public, not because he would have his backend haded back to him. Human nature was corrupt on the AGW side, but not corrupt in other "consensus" positions in science. So the peer review process across all other areas of science is alive and well. Yes, yes. Very good point Phelps. Thank you.

Remember that scientists aren't here to conduct science. They're here to uphold the Conspiracy.

Yeah right.

ehmoran
'Apparently, no laboratory control experiment to date, such as in a biodome, has shown CO2 levels influencing ambient temperatures. Tyndall (1861) measured the absorptive characteristics of CO2 followed by more precise measurements by Burch (1970). Absorbance is a measure of the quantity of light (energy) absorbed by a sample (CO2 molecule) and the amount of absorbed energy can be represented as specific heat of a substance. Specific heat of CO2 ranges from 0.791-kJ/kgK at 0-degrees F to 0.871-kJ/kgK at 125-degrees F and average atmospheric concentrations are 0.0306-percent. As revealed, the specific heat of CO2 increases as ambient temperatures increase showing CO2 likely is an ambient temperature buffer.'

I have often thought this myself but not being a physicist was not sure of all the properties of CO2. However, being a systems analyst the open-loop explanations given by climate alarmists didn't wash. The fact that the earth's atmosphere has survived for millions of years even through cataclysmic events means without doubt the earth's atmosphere is a robust closed-loop system.

When analysing systems you have to look at all inputs and outputs, and the cause effects.

However just taking these 3 simple facts:

1. The oceans are a huge CO2 store they absorb CO2 as they cool and release CO2 when they warm.

2. Ice cores show that temperature curve precedes CO2 curve by between 600 +/-400 years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_cores

3. Are the CO2 properties you describe above.

These 3 facts fit together well indicating a natural closed-loop system that also strongly supports CO2 as a negative feedback and not the positive feedback suggested by alarmists.

I am sure there is much more to this involved but I have not yet found anything to disprove CO2 as a negative feedback or that is has even been looked at in this way. It seems that CO2 causes GW is somehow a fact without any underlying science that demonstrates this is indeed the case.

"The first curse of the Almighty on those who deny Him is to deprive them of their sense of humor."

https://weblog.theviewfromthecore.com/2006_08/ind_005348.html

Absolutely correct. "team player" is a code word now for those that will willfully follow in lockstep with groupthink. I have seen this grow in halls of University to the point it is today...disgusting....furthermore...the groupthinkists don't ever seem to 'get it' ... good luck with that climate thing

The groupthink enforced by bullying is now a fixture in the academic landscape. Having been in the academic environment for 30yrs I can say that I have observed it growing progressing worse every year. If you are not part of the 'groupthink' you get the 'big cutoff' ... no joke-- it is real, it is calculated, and its intent is to garner resources for "the group" while denying them to "them".
humorless? you betcha !! Even a social libation can not elicit a joke that is not just plain nasty out of them. It is a sorry state that university community has sunk to....welcome to the 21st century.

It's my understanding that when you apply to do research for the government, one of the questions you ask is what are they looking for in the ending data, and you do your research accordingly.

Me thinks we are becoming Druids... and the scientists are the High Priests..

1)
@mike
"At this point, I don't believe scientists,any scientists."
Wrong ! there's a lot of decent people, but they're silenced in the media by the likes of Hansen, Mann, Jones, Schlesinger etc. not mention that climatology is not all of science...

2) Revkin is a dork, but he may have a conscience

3) climate science, and similarly though to a different extent, evolution and AIDS research, have been hijacked by "consensus" politicized pseudotruths. this stifles debate and real progress. sadly.

Eric,

Brain size and intelligence are positively correlated? Care to cite some peer-reviewed research (other than the "Bell Curve"?)

Of course, in my case the correlation is positive. I wear an 8 7/8" hat. :-) But I might be an outlier.

Jeff

Vincenzo,

I'd be interested to know what aspects of evolution research you believe have been hijacked for political purposes. I hope you're not equating the groupthink that seems to be prevalent in climatology with the scientific consensus about the validity of evolution. There are very few theories in the history of science more thoroughly supported than that of evolution. It touches dozens of disciplines and the evidence for its having occurred is overwhelming.

As far as I am aware, the only political controversies involving evolution are promulgated by those who find it distasteful or offensive for religious reasons. The only arguments involving evolution in scientific circles involve the mechanism whereby it occurred, not whether it did or not.

As a former biologist I'm actually irritated at people like Richard Dawkins. I don't have any quarrel with the validity of his scientific views, but his attitude is so off-putting and derisive that he casts other scientists in a bad light. It would be nice if he would mellow out, but I guess that's just not his style.

Jeff

Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades. In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers. The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present -- and is gravely to be regarded.

Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.

--Dwight David Eisenhower, Farewell Address, 17 January 1961

Steve,

Here was the e-mail you referenced in your post here, re: the "not as predictable as we'd like" Andy Revkin.

It was included in the most recent set, having been written by Michael Mann on October 27th, and was written in the context of a response regarding the latest 2009 numbers.

Here it is:

At 17:07 27/10/2009, Michael Mann wrote:

"Hi Phil,
Thanks--we know that. The point is simply that if we want to talk about about a meaningful "2009" anomaly, every additional month that is available from which to
calculate an annual mean makes the number more credible. We already have this for GISTEMP, but have been awaiting HadCRU to be able to do a more decisive update of the status of the disingenuous "globe is cooling" contrarian talking point,
mike
p.s. be a bit careful about what information you send to Andy and what emails you copy him in on. He's not as predictable as we'd like"

Everybody knows the AGWers only use LED light bulbs now. CFLs only save half the energy and last 2 years. LEDs last 30, which is well beyond the AGW scientists retirement or the statutes of limitations for scientific fraud.

"As far as I am aware, the only political controversies involving evolution are promulgated by those who find it distasteful or offensive for religious reasons."

Arrgh, every pirate knows that the truth lies in Flying Spaghetti Monsterism, aka Pastafarianism. Life came about because Earth was touched by his noodly appendage...

You are hitting a very significant point when referring to the role of Co2 in the oceans. Co2 in the atmosphere is in equilibrium with bicarbonate in the upper surface layers in the oceans. When the solubility constant is exceeded due to high partial pressure of atmospheric Co2 limestone rock is precipitated, usually in warm shallow seas. Co2 concentrations in the atmosphere are nowhere near where they were during the Carboniferous. Every geologist, including myself knows that

Jeff Kirk:

Your comment regarding the problems of predicting long-term the behavior of complex (i.e. non-linear) systems is right on. I'm surprised and a little disappointed that more scientists and mathematicians have not been bringing this line of thought foreward. It seems to me that this argument completely destroys any certainty of AGW.

The creationists aren't truying to wreck the world economy or force sovereign nations to surrender their economic futures to the UN...so they're a lot less harmful than the AGW freaks.

Andrew Revkin of the New York Times wrote:

“The human influence is minimal and natural variations dominate climate variations on all time scale; While natural variations are important, the human influence is significant and involves a diverse range of first-order climate forcings (including, but not limited to the human input of CO2); The human influence is dominated by the emissions into the atmosphere of greenhouse gases, particularly carbon dioxide.”

I would amend that to say “but not limited to the human output of CO2” since humans exhale, and machines expend. This, given the Times’ usual agreement with global-warming alarmism, is heresy. The thought police were immediately alerted.

In Michael Schlesinger’s email to Andrew Revkin, Schlesinger threatens:

But, I sense that you are about to experience the 'Big Cutoff' from those of us who believe we can no longer trust you, me included. [Emphasis added.]

What the hell business is it of Schlesinger‘s? Or Michael Mann’s? Revkin can say anything he wishes, in the Times or on his own blog. He can claim that Mars is really just one gigantic cherry, or that there’s reason to doubt the “science” behind global-warming and CO2 emissions. Revkin had the spine to doubt. Perhaps he would profit from being “cut off” from the True Believers, given the garbage “science” and fraud they have passed on to the IPCC and have more or less made ubiquitous in the culture with the help of a compliant press.

As for the definition of oligarchy, as soon as I saw that term and its definition, I recalled the fictive tome in Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, Emmanuel Goldstein’s The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism. Phil Jones and his munchkins at the East Anglia CRU, Schlesinger, Mann, the IPCC, and all the others implicated in this episode must think themselves members of an Inner Party, one of whose functions is to harass, punish, and ultimately exterminate anyone who questions its authority and hegemony or who deviates in the least from goodthink.

Revkin, apparently, committed thoughtcrime. They don’t want to let him get away with it.

Sinister. It seems the Inquisition is readying itself for a comeback.

The 'Big Cutoff"? The "Big Cutoff'?!!! WTF! This reads like a tweet within the high school cheerleaders clique, not an email between a well-known scientist and a New York Freakin' Times columnist.

Unbelievable

I would like to know M. Schlesinger's email address at Uof IL. I would like to personally see if he has the integrity to answer my questions. I suspect that there are far more prostitutes (intellectual that is ) working in
the global warming con than are working in Copenhagen.

I assume you will soon be dropped from Schlesinger's distribution list, now that he's gone and stuck his foot in his own mouth...

Mike, you should not generalize so much. Many scientists are honest and hard working. These dishonest scientists are making the news a lot these days but we are talking about a handful of people vs. literally tens of millions of professional scientists.

Science itself is trustworthy and has contributed more to humanity than any other invention. What these scientists have done is medieval in my opinion. Castigate them but don't distrust the millions of others who outnumber them who are hard working and honest.

Pete

Here is the latest from Copenhagen. Watch all five parts, the source has a name conservatives can't resist: Lord Monckton. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZW-BF70TsI&feature=sub

Funny that you use the NRA as an example.

"Why do you carry a gun?"

"Because a cop is too heavy."

Not even a surpressed grin. Nothing.

Climate warming increases in direct proportion to the number of climate-o-logists working in the field.

The solution is to establish a climate cooling research field. My model indicates that once a threshold of 47.3 scientists working in that field is superceded, the trend will reverse itself. This to a confidence interval of, oohh, quite a bit, honest.

p.s.
an interesting contrast is the bio-chem field, where journals will not publish papers unless the data has been submitted before-hand to a scientific public database.

I really appreciate the kind of topics you post here. Thanks for sharing us a great information that is actually helpful.

Scientists are also political creatures and have individual feelings and opinions. If science could work without scientists, what you say might work. Otherwise, the potato remains hot.

what you say might work. Otherwise, the potato remains hot.

I just want to know what point does this really make?

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This post was mentioned on Twitter by JTlol: "How can a group of smart people write over 1,000 e-mails without a single shred of wit or humor in any of them?" https://j.mp/6ttozC Read More

Revkin: "Stuff that the Bush administration got involved in was a no-brainer getting that on the front page of the New York Times." I've said it before and I'll now say it again: Your go-to point man for everything significant on Climategate is Tom Ne... Read More


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