EDITORIAL: Hiding evidence of global coolingJunk science exposed among climate-change believersBy
THE WASHINGTON TIMES Scientific progress depends on accurate and complete data. It also
relies on replication. The past couple of days have uncovered some
shocking revelations about the baloney practices that pass as sound
science about climate change.
It was announced Thursday afternoon that computer hackers had
obtained 160 megabytes of e-mails from the Climate Research Unit (CRU)
at the University of East Anglia (UEA) in England. Those e-mails
involved communication among many scientific researchers and policy
advocates with similar ideological positions all across the world.
Those purported authorities were brazenly discussing the destruction
and hiding of data that did not support global-warming claims.
Professor Phil Jones, the head of the Climate Research Unit,
and professor Michael E. Mann at Pennsylvania State University, who has
been an important scientist in the climate debate, have come under
particular scrutiny. Among his e-mails, Mr. Jones talked to Mr. Mann
about the "trick of adding in the real temps to each series ... to hide
the decline [in temperature]."
Mr. Mann admitted that he was party to this conversation and
lamely explained to the New York Times that "scientists often used the
word 'trick' to refer to a good way to solve a problem 'and not
something secret.' " Though the liberal New York newspaper apparently
buys this explanation, we have seen no benign explanation that
justifies efforts by researchers to skew data on so-called
global-warming "to hide the decline." Given the controversies over the
accuracy of Mr. Mann's past research, it is surprising his current
explanations are accepted so readily.
There is a lot of damning evidence about these researchers
concealing information that counters their bias. In another exchange,
Mr. Jones told Mr. Mann: "If they ever hear there is a Freedom of
Information Act now in the UK, I think I'll delete the file rather than
send to anyone" and, "We also have a data protection act, which I will
hide behind." Mr. Jones further urged Mr. Mann to join him in deleting
e-mail exchanges about the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's
(IPCC) controversial assessment report (ARA): "Can you delete any
emails you may have had with Keith re [the IPCC's Fourth Assessment
Report]?"
In another e-mail, Mr. Jones told Mr. Mann, professor Malcolm
K. Hughes of the University of Arizona and professor Raymond S. Bradley
of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst: "I'm getting hassled by
a couple of people to release the CRU station temperature data. Don't
any of you three tell anybody that the UK has a Freedom of Information
Act!"
At one point, Mr. Jones complained to another academic, "I did
get an email from the [Freedom of Information] person here early
yesterday to tell me I shouldn't be deleting emails." He also offered
up more dubious tricks of his trade, specifically that "IPCC is an
international organization, so is above any national FOI. Even if UEA
holds anything about IPCC, we are not obliged to pass it on." Another
professor at the Climate Research Unit, Tim Osborn, discussed in
e-mails how truncating a data series can hide a cooling trend that
otherwise would be seen in the results. Mr. Mann sent Mr. Osborn an
e-mail saying that the results he was sending shouldn't be shown to
others because the data support critics of global warming.
Repeatedly throughout the e-mails that have been made public,
proponents of global-warming theories refer to data that has been
hidden or destroyed. Only e-mails from Mr. Jones' institution have been
made public, and with his obvious approach to deleting sensitive files,
it's difficult to determine exactly how much more information has been
lost that could be damaging to the global-warming theocracy and its
doomsday forecasts.
We don't condone e-mail theft by hackers, though these e-mails
were covered by Britain's Freedom of Information Act and should have
been released. The content of these e-mails raises extremely serious
questions that could end the academic careers of many prominent
professors. Academics who have purposely hidden data, destroyed
information and doctored their results have committed scientific fraud.
We can only hope respected academic institutions such as Pennsylvania
State University, the University of Arizona and the University of
Massachusetts at Amherst conduct proper investigative inquiries.
Most important, however, these revelations of fudged science
should have a cooling effect on global-warming hysteria and the
panicked policies that are being pushed forward to address the unproven
theory.
I found this story from a number of different sources. It appears to be true....