Gleick and the green factor$

Well, I’m still waiting, as are others, for the MSM luminaries – who were so quick to publish what has now been unequivocally established as the contents of an obvious forgery – to apologize for their ethical failure in not verifying the provenance of the document purported to have originated from The Heartland Institute (HI).

So, I thought it might be interesting to stroll down some avenues that others do not yet appear to have explored.

I wonder if these journolites™ happened to see Dr. Judith Curry’s Feb. 24 post, in which she had posed the question: Why target Heartland?. This post resulted in an E-mail from HI’s Joe Bast, which Dr. Curry subsequently appended to her post with the observation that:

With virtually no effort on my part (beyond reading an email, cutting and pasting into the blog post), I have uncovered “juicier stuff” about Heartland than anything Gleick uncovered. Okay, maybe the HI are actually the baddest guys in town from the perspective of the alarmists. The irony of Gleick committing professional seppuku over getting information about stuff that is either generally known or suspected or regarded as no big deal. When all he had to do was ask Joseph Bast some questions, and he would have told him all sorts of things (just not the names of the donors, which aren’t all that interesting anyways.) [emphasis added -hro]

So why did Gleick do it?

That he had a rather longstanding dislike of the very fact of the perfectly legal activities and existence of “think tanks” is not in dispute. What has reinforced this particular conclusion, apart from his venom towards HI – or indeed any who do not share his view of the world – is the very high praise he had uttered via twitter for the contents of a blog called “Climate Ethics“.

His tell-tale tweet:

Sun 1/22 10:46 – Tweets “Fantastic analysis and essay on climate ethics here: http://rockblogs.psu.edu/climate/ – http://twitter.com/#!/petergleick

This page might best be characterized as the extension of the “Protocols of the Elders of Climate”. You would not believe the extent to which the author stretches in his mission to demonize “think tanks”. No wonder Gleick thought it was a “fantastic analysis and essay”. Here’s an example:

This is the fourth and last entry in a series that has examined the climate change disinformation campaign as an ethical matter. The purpose of this series has been to distinguish between responsible scientific skepticism, an approach to climate change science that should be encouraged, and the tactics of the climate change disinformation campaign, strategies deployed to undermine mainstream climate change science that are often deeply ethically offensive.

Gleick’s Feb. 20 “confession”, as I had mentioned previously was very carefully crafted and wrapped in a fog of creative ambiguity.

Needless to say, since the 20th, those in the skeptic blogosphere have been amazingly productive in sweeping the virtual scene for more “fingerprints” – and much has been discovered, with plausible narratives emerging. I did my own chronology a few days ago, after Steve McIntyre had posted the chain of correspondence between HI’s Jim Lakely and Gleick.

Gleick and HI’s James Taylor both write blog columns at Forbes (although I doubt that Gleick is still writing for Forbes). On Jan. 12, in a comment on Taylor’s post, Gleick had challenged Taylor to provide HI’s list of donors – a list which, IMHO, should have been none of his business; but, as Steve had noted:

On Jan 13, Jim Lakely of Heartland invited Gleick to participate in their forthcoming 28th Anniversary Dinner, a dinner that would be attended by Heartland’s supporters and donors. It would presumably have been an opportunity for Gleick to persuade his opponents. Heartland offered Gleick a charitable contribution of $5,000 to the charity of his choice

Gleick replied on Jan 16th; he neither accepted nor declined the invitation, but he thought he’d make another attempt to get HI’s list of funders. His response included:

In order for me to consider this invitation, please let me know if the Heartland Institute publishes its financial records and donors for the public and where to find this information. Such transparency is important to me when I am offered a speaking fee (or in this case, a comparable donation to a charity). My own institution puts this information on our website.

Lakely replied on the 17th – reminding Gleick that:

I’m sure you’ve seen James M. Taylor’s response to the funding questions at Forbes.com – a question he has answered publicly many times. In short: We used to publicly list our donors by name, but stopped a few years ago, in part, because people who disagree with The Heartland Institute decided to harass our donors in person and via email.

[and]

as you know, we are under no legal obligation to release a detailed list of our donors – nor is any other non-profit organization. Our 990 forms are in full compliance with the IRS. [emphasis added -hro]

Gleick took a full 10 days to “give serious consideration” to Lakely’s invite before declining.

He chose to completely ignore Lakely’s reasonable explanation of why HI does not disclose the names of its donors.

Here’s Gleick’s primary “reason” for his Jan. 27 … uh … decline:

Perhaps more importantly, the lack of transparency about the financial support for the Heartland Institute is at odds with my belief in transparency, especially when your institute and its donors benefit from major tax breaks at the expense of the public.

No doubt in the “ethical” world according to Gleick, it’s OK for his non-profit organization’s donors to “benefit from major tax breaks” but not for HI’s. But that aside, I certainly do wonder what might have been going on behind closed screens during Gleick’s ten days of “serious consideration”.

Jan. 27 appears to have been a somewhat busy day for Gleick. He turned down an invitation to debate; a “debate” which on Feb. 20 he declared needed to happen. In so doing, he also declined a perfect opportunity to meet and greet the funders whose names had become so important to him.

That same day, Gleick published a whine on his Forbes blog. Evidently, he wasn’t very happy that the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) had chosen to publish a letter from Dr. Richard Lindzen and 15 other scientists. And – no doubt adding insult to injury – according to Gleick, the WSJ had dared to decline to publish a missive from Gleick and 254 friends.

But what Gleick conveniently neglected to mention is that this allegedly declined missive from the gang of 255 pertained to an article published in Science on May 7, 2010. Funny that he doesn’t mention this date during the course of his whine, eh?

Nor did he give any reason on Jan 27/2012 why the WSJ should have been obliged to publish the piece from the gang of 255 on May 7/2010. If you read the 2010 article, it’s merely an attempt to bolster the – by then – rapidly declining credibility of the IPCC. It began with a recitation of the big scare:

For a problem as potentially catastrophic as climate change, taking no action poses a dangerous risk for our planet

and continued with a repetition of the mantra that salvation of the planet depends on action now, along with the frequently repeated unsubstantiated allegations of “harassment” etc. of these poor beleaguered “climate scientists”.

This was also the day he embarked on his phishing expedition during which he cast his net several times: first on Jan. 27 and finally on Feb. 6. Hmmm …. another 10 day time lapse. Feb. 8 Hmmm … a twelve day time lapse.

UPDATE: It’s worse than I thought! Above edit 02/29/2012 07:58 PM PDT [h/t Paul Matthews' "Copner's Gleick Timeline"]

At any time along the way, he could have checked his moral compass (assuming he has one) and seen that he was sailing in the wrong direction. Had he done so, he would have headed back to port, contacted HI and turned himself in! But this was not the choice Gleick made.

Yet on Feb. 17 – a mere 3 days after the botched virtual Valentines Day massacre – out of the blue, the U.K. Guardian very obligingly made available* the undated “An Open Letter to the Heartland Institute” purportedly written and signed by 7 noble climate scientists (with Gleick’s name being as conspicuously absent as those of the CRU crew on the 2009 Statement in the immediate aftermath of Climategate).

This “open letter” not only echoed the claims in the forged “strategy” doc, but also laid out the false equivalence to Climategate, interspersed with what some might consider to be a restatement of the May 7/10 article allegedly rejected by the WSJ – incorporating the “principles” and buzzwords offered by what Gleick might well have gleaned from the “fantastic analysis and essay” he had spotted on Jan. 22.

* http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-files/Guardian/documents/2012/02/17/heartland.pdf

There’s something else that’s rather odd about this very speedily written “Open Letter”. In his analysis of the forged document, Joe Bast notes:

I always capitalize the “T” in “The Heartland Institute,” the author of this [forged] memo did not.

The undated “Open Letter …” at the Guardian contains no actual signatures, just a list of 7 names and their academic affiliations. Yet there are 9 instances throughout this document of “the Heartland Institute”. Hmmm … Must be coincidence.

Some have postulated that Gleick was driven by “anger” or “fear”. Indeed his own “confession” suggested such a rationale for his behaviours. But I think it may be something completely different.

Consider the following from their respective Form 990 “Return of Organization Exempt From Income Tax”

The Heartland Institute, founded 1984. 2010 Revenue $6,074,947 [Source]

Pacific Institute, founded 1987. 2010 Revenue $2,288,518 [Source]

Until his recent self-aggrandizing escapades which probably began circa August 2011 with his active involvement in l’affaire Wagner (as noted in my earlier post) Gleick was a relatively unknown little pisher in the Big Green Pond.

His claim to “international expert” fame was as a “water” man, not a “climate” guy. And his organization‘s “mission” gives the impression of being far more dedicated to “sustainable development” than to pushing the putative perils of “dangerous” climate change.

Considering the extended timelines I noted above, I fail to see how a credible case can be made that Gleick had reached a “tipping point” and that his behaviours can legitimately be construed – as he and his army of apologists lamely attempt to portray them – as the consequence of a mere temporary lapse of judgment.

Could it be that – notwithstanding his MacArthur “genius” status (which makes him “too smart to get caught”) and his apparent lack of a functional moral compass – Gleick is afflicted, if not driven, by chronic green envy?

From pisher to phisher in less than a year. What a legacy, eh?!

A tale of two interviews: candid Curry vs mythmaking Mann

In light of all the mealy-mouthed apologia and statements from individuals and organizations finally feeling the heat from Gleickgate, it was a very refreshing change to read a candid and balanced interview with Dr. Judith Curry.

James Stafford of OilPrice.com asks series of questions to which her answers give one cause for optimism. Here are some excerpts (all emphases are mine -hro):

The IPCC May Have Outlived its Usefulness – An Interview with Judith Curry

Mon, 27 February 2012

OP: What are your personal beliefs on climate change? The causes and how serious a threat climate change is to the continued existence of society as we know it.

JC: The climate is always changing. Climate is currently changing because of a combination of natural and human induced effects. The natural effects include variations of the sun, volcanic eruptions, and oscillations of the ocean. The human induced effects include the greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, pollution aerosols, and land use changes. The key scientific issue is determining how much of the climate change is associated with humans. This is not a simple thing to determine. [...]

OP: You are well known in climate and energy circles for breaking from the ranks of the IPCC and questioning the current information out there. What do you see as the reasons for the increase in skepticism towards global warming over the last few years.

JC: Because of the IPCC and its consensus seeking process, the rewards for scientists have been mostly in embellishing the consensus, and this includes government funding. Because of recent criticisms of the IPCC and a growing understanding that the climate system is not easily understood, an increasing number of scientists are becoming emboldened to challenge some of the basic conclusions of the IPCC, and I think this is a healthy thing for the science.

[...]

[OP] [...] Do you believe that the organization as a whole needs to be assessed in order to better serve progress on climate change? What suggestions do you have on how the organization should function?

JC: The IPCC might have outlived its usefulness. Lets see what the next assessment report comes up with. But we are getting diminishing returns from these assessments, and they take up an enormous amount of scientists’ time.

But if self-promoting hype is more to your liking, try TIME magazine’s interview with Michael Mann.

I’m not going to sully my blog with quotes from an article headlined: “A Climate Warrior Puts it All On the Line — Including His Life”. But suffice it to say … Mann seems to be in competition with Peter Gleick for nomination as ‘martyr of the month’ or as Dr. Roger Pielke Jr. noted in a tweet:

No nuance or complexity here — Time’s hagiography of Michael Mann, what next, Mt Rushmore? Sainthood?

Perhaps Walsh should consider interviewing Dr. Michael Kelly, whose recent letter to the U.K. Times includes [h/t Bishop Hill]:

The interpretation of the observational science has been consistently over-egged to produce alarm. All real-world data over the past 20 years has shown the climate models to be exaggerating the likely impacts — if the models cannot account for the near term, why should I trust them in the long term?

I have noticed a tendency on the part of some journalists – and Walsh is one of them – to shift the focus of Gleick’s culpability by referring to events since Feb. 14 as the Heartland Affair.

Stafford gets it right, though. In his intro he wrote:

The IPCC, the onetime unquestioned champion of climate change, has had its credibility questioned over the years, firstly with the climategate scandal, then with a number of high profile resignations, and now with the new “Gleickgate” scandal (1) (2) – One has to wonder where climate science goes from here?

Here’s the link again to his interview with Dr. Curry.

A Gleickgate “teleconnection” or coincidence?

In my recent post on Gleickgate (also known as Fakegate), I had written:

He certainly succeeded in generating enough blog and MSM coverage that at the AAAS Annual Meeting held in Vancouver – which just happened to end Feb. 20 – the AAAS president was sufficiently “alarmed” to echo and amplify Gleick’s “concerns”.

[Excerpt from the Guardian]

Was AAAS president Federoff one of [Gleick's] 15 “fences” – or perhaps one of the 15 had “teleconnections” to Federoff?!

In January of this year, Jeff Condon at The Air Vent had made a valiant attempt to warn the National Center for Science Education (NSCE) that appointing Gleick to their board was not a wise move – and that they would come to regret this decision.

NSCE had decided to expand its mandate and jump into the climate wars, in order to combat the forces of darkness etc. in the schools of the nation.

Included in his Feb. 23 post, is a press release from NSCE in which one finds inter alia:

The scientific community is applauding NCSE’s new initiative. Said Alan I. Leshner, CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)

“Teleconnection” or coincidence?! You be the judge!

No, I am not suggesting that either Leshner or Federoff was one of the 15 “fences”. However, YMMV, but I do consider the AAAS “amplification” of the new, improved warm-side mantra to be somewhat, well, alarming!

In the meantime … while I have seen no sign that Revkin, Goldenberg, Hickman or Black have apologized for their role in promulgating the contents of Gleick’s forgery, the Chicago Tribune has an editorial worth reading:

Climate madness

Skulduggery undermines the case for global warming

Earlier this month, the Internet lit up with a tantalizing whodunit. Someone had leaked to bloggers confidential internal fundraising and strategic documents from the Heartland Institute, a Chicago-based think-tank that questions global warming orthodoxy.

The apparent goal: to discredit and embarrass those who raise doubts about the science behind climate change.

Heartland officials cried foul, asserting that at least one of the documents was forged. They vowed to track down the leaker and pursue charges.

This week, Peter Gleick saved them the trouble of a search. He confessed that he had assumed a false identity to obtain some of the documents and then leaked them. That sounded plausible: Heartland had said last week that someone got the documents by calling its Chicago headquarters and posing as a Heartland board member seeking information, the Tribune reported.

[...]

[Climategate], too, was an embarrassment to serious scientists who warn about the dangers of climate change. RIP, any chance for global climate action.

Now this fresh climate madness, with Mr. Ethics stalking his Chicago-based foes from afar.

Gleick may have thought he could undercut Heartland and thereby advance the case for global warming. Instead, he fueled doubts about which side is right in this long-running debate.

That’s a shame. Science relies on multiple layers of honesty. They include the honorably conducted gathering and analysis of facts, a perpetual quest for irrefutable evidence supporting conclusions — and trust that everyone is acting with integrity.

When scientific truth becomes sufficiently compelling, it matters little what the critics or skeptics say. It doesn’t matter if everyone doesn’t believe. Doubters cannot make the Earth flat.

But stunts such as Gleick’s — this effort to sully opponents with dishonest tactics — undercuts scientists around the world as they marshal evidence to convince an increasingly skeptical public about the dangers of global warming.

From the ashes of Gleickgate a new mantra is born

Cartoon by Josh: Feb. 21, 2012

There was a time in days of olden
When ’twas said that silence is golden
Yet thanks to a scientist, an expert on water
Who dared not speak, though many thought he oughtta
His inactions are leading to conclusions unvarnished
That Gleick, by his silence, has glitter much tarnished!

-hro, Feb 18, 2012 at 9:39 AM (GMT):
a contribution to the speculations on the identity of a forger.

What a difference a few days makes in the fast-moving world of the blogosphere. One might, perhaps, summarize these momentous events as the “Fall and Rise of Peter Gleick” … on the wings of a forgery purporting to be a “confidential” document he claims fell into his lap, but which has turned out to have Gleick’s unmistakeable “fingerprints” all over it. Although he may well have had a hidden but helping hand from one of DeSmearBlog’s frequent contributors, mashup artist par excellence, John Mashey.

Steve McIntyre has diligently documented the background and timeline since Gleick – with the assistance of 15 cheerleading chums – launched what they may well have hoped would be a virtual Valentines Day massacre of those at whose views on climate change, aka global warming, they so dearly love to sneer and smear.

Sneering and smearing are not exactly my idea of the best way to win friends and influence people – nor to convince any thinking person of the righteousness of one’s “cause”, let alone one’s science. But what do I know, eh?! After all, I’m not a self-declared – or MSM fabricated (e.g. railroad engineer, and man of many hats, IPCC Chair Ranjendra Pachauri) – “climate expert”.

OTOH, Gleick (at least in the world according to Gleick, and that’s the only one that matters, isn’t it?!) is an “internationally recognized climate and water expert [who] works at the intersection of science and policy, including issues related to the integrity of science”. I learned this important detail about Gleick back in October, when I came across his “review” of Donna Laframboise’s The Delinquent Teenager Who Was Mistaken for the World’s Top Climate Expert (TDT).

I can’t vouch for any other books Gleick may or – may not – have read; but based on his “review” of TDT, as I had noted in my post, he gave no indication that he had read TDT, or that he had the slightest clue what the book is about. Drive-by sneer and smear rant, followed by a few temper tantrums elsewhere is probably the most apt summary of his abysmal, disrespectful and unprofessional performances.

It became quite obvious that substantiating his assertions is a lesson Gleick seems not to have learned during the course of his brilliant career. But, to be fair, it’s a lesson that seems to have eluded many of the leading lights on the warm-side. And, as Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. reminded us in a recent post, Gleick (in conjunction with Kevin Trenberth and John Abraham) is never loath to cast unwarranted and malicious aspersions on those whose work does not support his own view of the world:

[...] the recent behavior [...] of Peter Gleick, co-founder and president of the Pacific Institute for Studies in Development, Environment, and Security in Oakland, California, involving the Heartland Institute is just another example of the often vitriolic and unseemly behavior by some to discredit what are appropriate alternative viewpoints on the climate issue. Unfortunately, the attitude towards the Heartland Institute displayed by Peter Gleick is just another example of an attitude that pervades a significant number of individuals in the leadership of the climate science community. [emphasis added -hro]

It is sad, but not surprising, that after reviewing Trenberth, Abraham and Gleick’s September 2011 very public ‘hatchet job’ on Roy Spencer and John Christy, Dr. Pielke had concluded:

Roy Spencer is hardly discredited because there are papers that disagree with his analysis and conclusions. This will sort itself out in the peer-reviewed literature after he has an opportunity to respond with a follow on paper, and/or a Comment/Reply exchange. Similarly, John Christy can respond to the Santer et al paper that is referred to in the Trenberth et al article.

What is disturbing, however, in the Trenberth et al article is its tone and disparagement of two outstanding scientists. Instead of addressing the science issues, they resort to statements such as Spencer and Christy making “serial mistakes”. This is truly a hatchet job and will only further polarize the climate science debate. [emphasis in original -hro]

The Climategate emails revealed another aspect of this brilliant diamond in the rough, as I had discovered a few weeks ago. In Gleick’s world (shared by such luminaries as Phil Jones, Michael Mann and the late, great communicator, Stephen Schneider), the professional and scientific response when learning that a journal peer reviewer has requested data and code is: “Yuck“. FWIW, from Jones’s reply, there may well have been “consensus” on this.

Unlike the NYT‘s Andrew Revkin, or the U.K. Guardian‘s Suzanne Goldenberg and Leo Hickman, for whom fact-checking and provenance confirmation is – for all intents and purposes – anathema when it comes to matters enironmental, Megan McArdle of the Atlantic has been following this story and <gasp> asking questions, as a journalist should.

McArdle readily acknowledges her green-tinted glasses; but she does not permit her vision to become as clouded and biased by advocacy as Revkin, Goldenberg or Hickman. Here are some excerpts from McArdle’s thoughts on Gleick’s “confession”:

Peter Gleick Confesses to Obtaining Heartland Documents Under False Pretenses

Feb 21 2012, 5:36 PM ET

[...]
The very, very best thing that one can say about this is that this would be an absolutely astonishing lapse of judgement for someone in their mid-twenties, and is truly flabbergasting coming from a research institute head in his mid-fifties. Let’s walk through the thought process:

You receive an anonymous memo in the mail purporting to be the secret climate strategy of the Heartland Institute. It is not printed on Heartland Institute letterhead, has no information identifying the supposed author or audience, contains weird locutions more typical of Heartland’s opponents than of climate skeptics, and appears to have been written in a somewhat slapdash fashion. Do you:

A. Throw it in the trash

B. Reach out to like-minded friends to see how you might go about confirming its provenance

C. Tell no one, but risk a wire-fraud conviction, the destruction of your career, and a serious PR blow to your movement by impersonating a Heartland board member in order to obtain confidential documents.

As a journalist, I am in fact the semi-frequent recipient of documents promising amazing scoops, and depending on the circumstances, my answer is always “A” or “B”, never “C”.

It’s a gross violation of journalistic ethics, though perhaps Gleick would argue that he’s not a journalist [...]

[...]
Gleick has done enormous damage to his cause and his own reputation, and it’s no good to say that people shouldn’t be focusing on it. If his judgement is this bad, how is his judgement on matters of science? For that matter, what about the judgement of all the others in the movement who apparently see nothing worth dwelling on in his actions?
[...]
After you have convinced people that you fervently believe your cause to be more important than telling the truth, you’ve lost the power to convince them of anything else.
[emphasis added -hro]

Is it not about time that Revkin, Goldenberg and Hickman – not to mention the BBC’s Richard Black – began asking themselves whatever happened to their practice of journalistic ethics. Or is it the case that they are also so dedicated to “the cause” that objectivity and due diligence prior to publishing just don’t occur to them when it comes to environmental matters?

Instead of uncritically echoing and acting as virtual cheer-leaders for Gleick’s unconscionable forgery, why aren’t they investigating and reporting on the funding, budgets and mission of the BIG players with such BIG bucks in their pockets, that they probably wouldn’t even miss the dollars Heartland has at its disposal if someone were to abscond with the funds.

Surely Laframboise’s The Delinquent Teenager … an exposé of the IPCC and/or Andrew Montford’s Nullius in Verba, a review of the descent of the U.K.’s Royal Society, are far more deserving of being brought to their readers’ attention than pretending that the contents of a slanderous document, the provenance of which they didn’t even bother to check are worth promulgating.

So much for “journalistic ethics” at the New York Times, the Guardian and the BBC.

As for Gleick’s “ethics” and “integrity”, I think Dr. Judith Curry summed it best when she wrote:

When ‘Heartlandgate’ first broke, I saw no parallels with Climategate. Now, with the involvement of Gleick, there most certainly are parallels. There is the common theme of climate scientists compromising personal and professional ethics, integrity, and responsibility, all in the interests of a ’cause’.

On the one hand, Climategate involved a large number of people that were involved in the IPCC. Apart from the FOI avoidance that was arguably criminal, everyone seems to have been ‘cleared’ by the various investigations. On the other hand, Gleick is only one person, but his actions are far more serious, particularly if they involve fabrication of a document. [emphasis added -hro]

Dr. Curry then provides an example of the “response” from Gleick’s good buddy, Scott Mandia of the “Climate Rapid Response Team”:

…”Heartland has been subverting well-understood science for years,” wrote Scott Mandia, co-founder of the climate science rapid response team. “They also subvert the education of our school children by trying to ;’teach the controversy’ where none exists.”He went on: “Peter Gleick, a scientist who is also a journalist just used the same tricks that any investigative reporter uses to uncover the truth. He is the hero and Heartland remains the villain. He will have many people lining up to support him.”

Lining up to support him, eh?! Wow! What a guy! Such integrity and high “ethics”. And because he’s a both a scientist and a “journalist” no doubt the “tricks” take on a whole new and wholesome meaning. But Mandia is definitely “on message” … Gleick should probably be a candidate for beatification on account of his dedication above and beyond the call of duty.

As Dr. Curry had concluded:

The climate insanity factor has just jumped upwards a big notch.

My own take on this “confession”? First some thoughts on the role of the press:

What I find most ironic about Revkin’s reporting of Gleick’s “confession”, is his failure to acknowledge his own role (along with that of his U.K. counterparts) by jumping to publish the original story without any due diligence or attempt to verify. Although, as Steve McIntyre note in his timeline Revkin did subsequently “disappear” his post – and at least one “tweet”.

Does he seriously think that media reporting on climate/environmental/sustainability issues has not also sustained a deep self-inflicted wound?! From his response to one of the comments on his post, I’d say he’s oblivious:

[Gleick] has done excellent analysis of water issues and I’ve credited him for daring to blog on skeptic turf in Forbes.com. I’ve cited him off and on literally for decades. But he’s undone much of this here, to my mind. He handed his enemies a huge heap of raw meat with this act and they’ll feed on it — through our polarized politics — for a long time to come. It’s tragic, to my mind. [emphasis added -hro]

Will we ever see acknowledgments and apologies from Revkin, Hickman, Goldenberg, Black and their ilk? So far, they seem to be carrying on – pretending that there is no egg on their respective faces.

Here’s my brief translation of Gleick’s very carefully crafted “confession“: It seemed to be written in the unmistakable – and ubiquitous – “key of Mann” i.e. ‘Well, yes, I was wrong to do this; but it doesn’t affect the “truth” of my claims about the evil forces of darkness (which I’m repeating here just for good measure)’.

As an aside, speaking of Michael Mann … I’m not sure what mode of transportation he’s beein using, but he’s been popping up all over the place, flogging his latest opus which, based on what I’ve read or heard him say, would be more aptly titled: Portrait of the Artist as an Aggrieved Mann. But I digress …

On the blogs, there was considerable surprise that Gleick had “confessed” to obtaining the Heartland Institute’s documents by impersonating a board member but neither confirming nor denying that he was the forger. Some wondered how he could be so stupid as to do this. But I agree with Steve Mosher (who found most of Gleick’s “fingerprints”) and also observed:

Gl[ei]ck isn’t intelligent. He is a genius. That means he thinks he is too smart to get caught. Dumb people fear getting caught. A dumb person would say ” I dont know enough about computers, I might get caught”. A genius, a gold star winning genius on the other hand, thinks he knows everything. Thinks he is too smart to get caught.

Contrary to his plea that it was “frustration” that made him do the dastardly deeds, Gleick’s self-inflicted wounds can be attributed (with a high level of confidence by IPCC standards) to his very high opinion of himself – along with his very low opinion of those who happen to disagree with him.

This became quite clear to me from his behaviours pursuant to his “review” of The Delinquent Teenager Who Was Mistaken for the World’s Top Climate Expert.

Add to this his very vocal, arrogant, pit-bull and longstanding antipathy towards Heartland and the over-riding lack of humility in his “confession”, such as it was – not to mention the conspicuous absence of any specific details pertaining to his transgressions, compared to the repetition of the ‘truth’ of his claims regarding the evil forces of darkness.

How should one translate “At the beginning of 2012″ from Gleick-speak? And when did he do his impersonation act? Surely some dates would have been helpful – and would have added a modicum of credibility to the protestations in his “confession”.

Yet – totally out of character for one who so readily and frequently appeals to his own authority, and expects others to defer thereto – he seems to have been advised to opt for the (more sustainable?!) plausible deniability conferred by his frequent use of creative ambiguity.

Was his impersonation act conducted via landline, cell or E-mail?

And why did he not disclose the names of the “set of journalists and experts working on climate issues”? How very noble of him to protect the 15 … uh … “fences” he probably (as defined by the IPCC) knew he could count on to peddle his forgery and/or stolen goods, eh?

He certainly succeeded in generating enough blog and MSM coverage that at the AAAS Annual Meeting held in Vancouver – which just happened to end Feb. 20 – the AAAS president was sufficiently “alarmed” to echo and amplify Gleick’s “concerns”.

Consider the Guardian‘s banner:

Attacks paid for by big business are ‘driving science into a dark era‘

Researchers attending one of the world’s major academic conferences ‘are scared to death of the anti-science lobby’

[and underneath pic of obligatory polar bear:]

The vast majority of scientists on both sides of the Atlantic say rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere threaten to increase temperatures to dangerous levels.

[...]

Most scientists, on achieving high office, keep their public remarks to the bland and reassuring. Last week Nina Fedoroff, the president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), broke ranks in a spectacular manner.

She confessed that she was now “scared to death” by the anti-science movement that was spreading, uncontrolled, across the US and the rest of the western world.

“We are sliding back into a dark era,” she said. “And there seems little we can do about it. I am profoundly depressed at just how difficult it has become merely to get a realistic conversation started on issues such as climate change or genetically modified organisms.”

Was AAAS president Federoff one of the 15 “fences” – or perhaps one of the 15 had “teleconnections” to Federoff?!

YMMV, but I see nothing in any of the above that gives me any reason to believe that Gleick’s carefully crafted “confession” consists of the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Looks like he still thinks he’s “too smart to get caught”.

Mind you, I still think Gleick may have had a helping hand from Mashey in pasting together the obviously fake memo with his very own “fingerprints” all over it – regardless of what he may (or may not) have received in the mail “at the beginning of 2012″

So what might have precipitated Gleick’s choices, apart from his very high opinion his robust mastery of the skills of deception which would, no doubt, shield him from getting caught – at least in his opinion? And of course, in the event that he did get caught, and could not smother the questions with his silence, well … he could simply excuse himself by blaming those he was targeting via recycling a recitation of his fabrications.

Hey, it’s always worked in the past for these noble climate scientists. Why should it stop working now? Gleick knew he could count on his 15 “fences” to come to the aid of his party. They will step up to the plate and eliminate the negative while manufacturing the positive … hmmm … kinda like many actions on the part of some climate scientists and their army of willing apologists! But this is a subject for another post on another day!

It is somewhat telling that Kevin Knobloch, President of the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) – who have done much to promote the so-called “overwhelming scientific consensus” – echoing Gleick, gives away the new, improved, advocacy message with his take on the matter which, apart from repeating the claims derived from Gleick’s forgery,

Gleick’s Actions Don’t Excuse Heartland’s Anti-Science Campaign

Dr. Gleick is among many climate scientists who have been targeted by ideological groups that are eager to attack the messengers of scientific findings. And he is a strong advocate for the important role science plays in society. It’s unfortunate that the bitter, personal attacks on his colleagues and their work contributed to what he called a lapse of his own personal judgment and ethics.

Doesn’t your heart just bleed?! But, notice how the message has been reframed!

Gone is “overwhelming scientific consensus” which appears to be yielding to a new, improved mantra:

The science about climate change is clear, but the debate about how to respond to it is broken

Knobloch evidently has:

more than 30 years of experience in public policy and advocacy. He is an expert on a number of environmental and national security issues, including climate change, nuclear weapons, natural resource economics, clean energy, and efficient vehicle policy and legislative strategy. He holds a master’s degree in public administration, with a focus on economics.

Was it his “30 years of experience in advocacy” or his masters in public administration that made him an “expert” on climate change, so that he could declare so confidently that “the science is clear”. Oh, well, maybe he developed his “expertise” by osmosis via press releases from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). But I digress …

I wonder how long it will take before the mantra is abbreviated to the shorter, punchier “The science is clear, but the debate is broken”.

And I’m not entirely sure how:

• a subject so clouded miraculously became “clear”
• a debate that Gleick and other activists and advocates been doing their very best to avoid – if not declare “over” – can be “broken”

But I’m not holding my CO2 in anticipation of an explanation that would, well, hold water:-)

In the meantime … isn’t it good to know that (according to the UCS, and given their connections to the approved climatalogical luminaries, they should know), those who do dare to differ – or Gaia forbid, dissent – are no longer funded by Big Oil, but by evil-minded anti-science lobbyists who are funded by a cartel of heretofore unknown Big Business.

Also, evidently, the d-word has lost its efficacy. Henceforth, dissenters (and probably those who dare to question the newly pronounced “clarity”) are deemed to be “anti-science”.

Clearly, as a teachable moment, Gleickgate – not unlike Climategate – did not make the cut for those on the warm-side.

Science is not enough … Invitation to an “exceptional” AAAS live webcast

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is holding its Annual Meeting here in Vancouver.

From Conference Website

The theme this year is, evidently, “Flattening the World: Building a Global Knowledge Society”:

The focus of the 2012 meeting, then, is on using the power of electronic communications and information resources to tackle the complex problems of the 21st century on a global scale through international, multidisciplinary efforts. We have a model already in the scale and scope of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). But that’s just the beginning. The interconnections among, for example, climate change, agriculture, and health are as yet poorly understood; predictive modeling is in its infancy.

The ability to approach global problems through global collaborations depends on an educated populace and on substantial scientific and technological sophistication throughout the world. Thus building the global knowledge society depends on advancing education and research, the engines of the knowledge society, everywhere. This task is facilitated, but not accomplished, by the existence of electronically accessible open educational resources. There remain limitations of language and culture, of poverty and access.

Oh, my … the IPCC as a “model”?! This does not bode well. However, a reader (MCS) has alerted me to the details of one particular session that will be held on Saturday, Feb. 18 from 5:00 to 6:30 p.m. PST. This will be a plenary panel, advertised on the conference site as:

An exceptional plenary panel will arm scientists, educators, and students with finely worded messages to influence public perceptions and debate about science-related global challenges. The panel will be moderated by Frank Sesno, an award-winning American journalist, former CNN correspondent, anchor and Washington bureau chief, and director of the School of Media and Public Affairs at George Washington University. [emphasis added -hro]

Just what the world needs now: more “finely worded messages”! It seems that the AAAS will share the insights of the speakers with the world via webcast and questions to the panel may be live-tweeted.

Panel participants are James Hansen, to whom I’m sure readers will need no introduction; but if you do AAAS offers one here, where one can also find intros to the other two panelists: the brilliant and enlightening Hans Rosling – whose perspective I first discovered two years ago – and Olivia Judson, Imperial College, London, whose next book is entitled Dinosaur Eggs for Breakfast.

One wonders what the panelists might think of the recent efforts containing some not-so-finely-worded messages from Great Persuaders such as the Vancouver-based PR outfit that runs the activist website DeSmogBlog – which might more accurately be named DeSmearBlog.

[Update 02/17/2012 04:52 PM PST An excellent example of DeSmearBlog in action is offered by The Atlantic's Megan McCardle McArdle in a follow-up to her analysis of their recent activities:

The high probability that the memo is fake makes this response from Desmogblog, one of the first places to post the memos, all the more disappointing:

After citing text found in this "response", McCardle McArdle observes:

The first two links are to my post, and they are an egregious misrepresentation of what I said [emphasis added -hro]

Yep! Egregious misrepresentation seems to be the forté of the great and grand “science” communicators at DeSmearBlog]

My mouse and I plan to participate and we might even tweet. How about you?!

A profusion of panels and pronouncements en route to Rio+20

The U.K.’s Fred Pearce is probably one of the more respected (albeit green-tinted) MSM commentators on climate change, aka global warming, and other matters environmental (or, as is appearing to be more au courant, these days, “sustainable development”). So I found it somewhat surprising that he provided no primary source(s) for a Feb. 10 article of his that appears on the NewScientist website:

Earth Summit is doomed to fail, say leading ecologists

We can forget about fixing the planet’s ecosystems and climate until we have fixed government systems, a panel of leading international environmental scientists declared in London on Friday. The solution, they said, may not lie with governments at all.

“We are disillusioned. The current political system is broken,” said Bob Watson, the UK government’s chief environmental science advisor, who chaired the meeting.

The panel, all winners of the prestigious Blue Planet prize, often seen as the Nobel prize for environmental science, were meeting to prepare a statement for the Earth Summit 2012, to be held in Rio de Janeiro in June – 20 years after the original Earth Summit in that city.
[...]
No one held out much hope that the forthcoming summit would usher in a new era. Politicians do not seem interested. [...] But this year’s event will last just three days, and so far China’s president Hu Jintao is the only head of state scheduled to attend.
[...]
The top priorities, according to Watson, are ending the fossil-fuel era to curb climate change, and investing in limiting population by making contraception available to all.
[...]
The laureates said leadership was most likely to come from local government, NGOs and corporations, rather than national leaders or the UN. [...]

“We do believe that the political system can be reformed, and that there will be technical solutions. But time is not on our side,” Watson said. [emphasis added -hro]

Hmmmm … Bob Watson, sorry, “Professor Sir Robert Watson FRS” (which means that he’s a jolly good Fellow of the Royal Society) has a long string of chairmanships to his name – including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), where he preceded Rajendra K. Pachauri, and during its gestation, the IPCC’s waiting-in-the-wings younger sibling, the IPBES.

Few will be surprised to learn that Watson is also Professor of Environmental Sciences; Director of Strategic Development, Tyndall at the University of East Anglia (home of the Climatic Research Unit [CRU]). Nonetheless, considering his other day job, that of DEFRA Chief Scientific Advisor (i.e. someone very close to the U.K. government), this particular panel’s proclamations are somewhat surprising. But perhaps Watson was speaking through wearing a different hat.

OTOH, there is much to be said for this panel’s recognition that “leadership” is unlikely to come from the UN – an organization that does not seem to believe in practicing what it preaches, particularly in the accountability and green departments.

Nor is “transparency” an over-riding concern at the UN’s highest planning echelons. Evidently, Ban Ki Moon and his top advisors held a “closed door retreat”, last October, as George Russell of FoxNews reported a few days ago:

At a closed-door retreat in a Long Island mansion late last October, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and his topmost aides brainstormed about how the global organization could benefit from a “unique opportunity” to reshape the world, starting with the Rio + 20 Summit on Sustainable Development, which takes place in Brazil in June.

A copy of the confidential minutes of the meeting was obtained by Fox News. According to that document, the 29-member group, known as the United Nations System Chief Executives Board for Coordination (CEB), discussed bold ambitions that stretch for years beyond the Rio conclave to consolidate a radical new global green economy, promote a spectrum of sweeping new social policies and build an even more important role for U.N. institutions “to manage the process of globalization better.”
[...]

When it came to global issues, the U.N. chieftains were encouraged to think well beyond the environment and the international economy into a wide variety of social spheres, from human rights to health and education, where there was a “need for a global framework and national frameworks” for the development of new policies. The national policies “should be derived from the core values and norms that the U.N. system embodied, to ensure coherence between national level and global goals and aspirations”.

For some of those present at the gathering, those values seemed to include a heavy reliance on populist methods to push the U.N.’s Rio message to a global audience, bypassing member governments along the way.

There is a link to these confidential minutes from Russell’s article; however, each page is a scanned image. As a public service, I have downloaded a copy of these minutes and (using OCR) have converted the 15 image pages to text in a pdf, which makes it more convenient for searching and citing.

The first thing I noticed when reviewing this “Confidential Summary of Discussions” was:

In his introductory remarks, the Secretary-General welcomed [...] Mr. Janos Pasztor, Executive Director of his High-Level Panel on Global Sustainability, whom he had invited to join this discussion.

Hmmm … The “High-Level Panel on Global Sustainability” certainly rings a familiar bell, which is not surprising since I wrote about this panel’s pronouncements not too long ago! A few highlights from the paragraphs I had excerpted from their Jan. 30/2012 report, just to refresh your memory:

• sustainable development is fundamentally a question of people’s opportunities to influence their future, claim their rights and voice their concerns
• peoples of the world will simply not tolerate continued environmental devastation or the persistent inequality which offends deeply held universal principles of social justice
• governance across the world must fully embrace the requirements of a sustainable development future, as must civil society and the private sector
• Achieving sustainability requires us to transform the global economy. Tinkering on the margins will not do the job. The current global economic crisis, which has led many to question the performance of existing global economic governance, offers an opportunity for significant reforms. It gives us a chance to shift more decisively towards green growth
• Governments should establish price signals that value sustainability to guide the consumption and investment decisions of households, businesses and the public sector
• To achieve sustainable development, we need to build an effective framework of institutions and decision-making processes at the local, national, regional and global levels. We must overcome the legacy of fragmented institutions established around single-issue “silos”
• As international sustainable development policy is fragmented and, in particular, the environmental pillar is weak, UNEP should be strengthened

Remember the silos? Funnily enough they also appear (pp. 6, 10 and 12) in the “Confidential Summary of Discussions”. One instance appears on p. 12. But first some context …

Mr. Harris took the floor to present the HLCP report on “Moving towards a Fairer, Greener and More Sustainable Globalization”. He apologized for the delay in sharing the document with CEB members and added that it was in a large part connected to a very collaborative effort, taking into account the extremely comprehensive inputs and subsequent comments received from all agencies.

He emphasized that the report was not a reflection of the specific contributions of every agency to sustainable development or globalization, but rather a reflection on how to manage the process of globalization better. He outlined the focus and content of each [of the three sections].

“Mr. Harris” is evidently Elliott Harris, Vice-Chair of the HLCP. Assuming that Google has not led me astray, though, it would appear that the HLCP is the “UN Systems’ High Level Committee on Programs” (not to be confused with the “UN Systems High Level Committee on Management (HLCM)”). And what the world definitely needs is, of course, a warm and fuzzy “Fairer, Greener and More Sustainable Globalization”, right?! Now that this has been cleared up … back to the “Confidential Summary” … Mr. Harris’ report continues [text reformatted for ease of reading -hro]:

Global institutions had proven unable to deal effectively with some of these key global issues, in part because of silo-based implementation and the absence of effective mechanisms for global level coordination.

The crisis provided an opportunity to review the process with
1} a renewed recognition of the role of the State;
2) an acknowledgment that social policies had positive economic and development consequences; and
3) an appreciation of the value of collective and coordinated action at the global level.

The reflection had also shown that adopting policies that ensured that globalization generated fairer, greener and more sustainable outcomes also fostered sustainable development.

Unfortunately (as I had noted in my earlier post) not all of the minutes of the High-Level Panel on Global Sustainability (HLPGS) are available for public perusal. So I cannot confirm this, but it does not seem unreasonable to assume that Janos Pasztor (Executive Director of the HLPGS) carried the “secret” message from Mr. Harris regarding the lack of effectiveness of the “silo-based” approach.

14 instances of “green economy” are found in this “Confidential Summary”. There are a few occurrences which would suggest at least one reason why Achim Steiner – who happens to be the head of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and who, evidently acted as “moderator” for the session – had determined
that the proceedings would not be made public [text reformatted and emphasis added -hro]:

On the green economy theme, [Mr. Sha] stated that Rio+20 should be the catalyst to integrate the economic, social and environmental pillars of sustainable development, energize implementation of the sustainable development agenda, and lead to coherent policies and programmes at all levels – integration, implementation and coherence.

He stressed, however, that reaching a common understanding on the meaning, scope and implications of the green economy had been generating considerable debate. Many agreed that the Conference should first clarify what the green economy was not, in order to help define what it could be. He outlined that it was not an one-size-fits-all approach to development, an excuse for green protectionism in trade or for green conditionality in aid and fmance, a way to put nature under corporate control, or a model of tinkering at the margins of “business as usual”.

It should be based on the set of principles agreed upon at Rio 1992, including the concept of common but differentiated responsibility, and seen as a way to help accelerate progress towards sustainable development and poverty eradication. It should re-orient public and private decision-making to reflect and respect natural capital, synergize growth and environmental protection, and include the poor as main beneficiaries, as well as active participants in building such a green economy.

The (al)most sensible voice at the table seemed to be that of Mr. Panitchpakdi (who may – or may not – be the Secretary-General of the UN Conference on Trade and Development [UNCTAD]) who:

stated that the peer review (! -hro) concept within a revised global institutional governance mechanism for sustainable development was good but premature given the fact that there was as yet no common agreement on a definition of the green economy. He also renewed his call for caution about adding yet new institutional layers. When a sectoral structure and silo approach still prevailed within the system, he advocated for renewed efforts at syncronization and harmonization of existing structures, rather than the creation of new ones.

So the alarmists and green-growthers of the world have been yammering on for years about the need for a “green economy”, yet it would appear that even those at the the highest echelons of the UN have not yet agreed on a definition!

The astute reader, however, will notice that this did not seem to prevent Pasztor from picking up yet another expression (“tinkering at the margins”) and dropping it on the table of the HLPGS.

One other excerpt from this “Confidential Summary” is rather noteworthy. It was part of Harris’ report (p.12):

The UN also suffered from a double perception problem – a general scepticism as to whether the UN was the appropriate forum for timely decision-making; and a feeling that the UN only dealt with development and was not relevant to all its member countries.

Perhaps all these panels should consider skipping the pronouncements … and singing a different tune … Let’s call the whole thing off?!

Nobel history of a scientific “trick”

One of the more contentious issues that arose from the release of the Climategate emails is the confirmation from Phil Jones that:

I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temperatures to each series for the last 20 years (i.e. from 1981 onwards) and from 1961 for Keith’s to hide the decline.

Various attempts have been made to explain away that which appears to be an innovative – but inherently dishonest and deceptive (IMHO) – “technique” of data presentation (which Andrew Montford noted in The Hockey Stick Illusion is “fraught with difficulty”). These scientists, who like to rest on the laurels of their sharing a Nobel Peace Peace Prize in 2007, would have the public believe that this is a documented and accepted practice.

One might reasonably question such an assertion on their part. But it seems that this “trick” does, in fact, have a documented antecedent. As Lawrence Solomon noted in an article in today’s yesterday’s National Post:

The fallout of the Nobel scam of 1946

Scientist’s radiation cover-up might have cost thousands of lives

Why do most people today, scientists included, believe that small doses of radiation are harmful to human health when no proof for this theory exists, and when mountains of evidence show the opposite — that small amounts of radiation actually promote health? After years of sleuthing into historical records, a scientist at the University of Massachusetts has found a smoking gun, involving a scientific scam in 1946 at the very highest echelons — the Nobel Prize ceremonies in Stockholm.

In an august Nobel hall one year after the end of the Second World War, the scientific world was knowingly misled by Hermann J. Muller, winner that year of the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine. This is the verdict from a forensic review entitled Muller’s Nobel Prize Lecture: When Ideology Prevailed Over Science, just published by the Society of Toxicology in the Oxford University Press’s Toxicological Sciences. Had Muller spoken the truth and revealed the existence of contradictory research in the world’s most prominent scientific gathering, we might today have an entirely different view of radiation and its effects, preventing immense human suffering and the loss of countless lives.
[...]
Muller was in the ascendant “no safe dose” camp that claimed that there is no threshold below which radiation stops being harmful. As he told the distinguished attendees in Stockholm in accepting his Nobel Prize, the evidence now leaves “no escape from the conclusion that there is no threshold dose” of radiation. It was a convincing performance in the world’s most prestigious scientific gathering, except Muller himself knew that statement to be unsupportable. The historical evidence, as uncovered by Edward Calabrese, the author of the forensic review, leaves no escape from the conclusion that Muller was engaged in duplicity [emphasis added -hro].

Calabrese’s paper suggests that Muller’s strategy for blocking the publication of contrary evidence was somewhat more genteel than that performed by the likes of Jones and Mann et al, but it amounts to the same thing. Of equal interest though, is the “trick” that Calabrese reported:

Muller neglected to point out key limitations of the Ray-Chaudhuri experiment (Calabrese, 2011b; Ray-Chaudhuri, 1944) such as poor temperature control, changing the strain of fruit fly midway through the study, and yet still combining data of the two strains to gain statistical power without providing any justification. There was also insufficient detailing of research methods, inadequate data on quality control parameters, as well as a failure to provide information on age selection criteria for males, sex ratios of offspring, and rates of sterility and fecundity as well as data on lethal clusters, all of which are important in this type of study. [emphasis added -hro]

Interesting parallel (and precedent), don’t you think?! Although my guess is that back in 1947, the scientists were actually doing real experiments, rather than the post-normal computer-generated outputs that climate scientists would have us believe are worthy of being called “experiments”.

Of principles, presidents and pretense … the descent of the Royal Society

Nullius in verba is the motto of the London (U.K.) Royal Society which as the history page of their website notes in a sidebar:

“roughly translates as ‘take nobody’s word for it’. It is an expression of the determination of Fellows to withstand the domination of authority and to verify all statements by an appeal to facts determined by experiment.”

On this same history page, one learns that the full-name of The Royal Society (RS), which celebrated its 350th anniversary last year, is ‘The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge’. It says nothing about advocacy; and strangely enough, nullius in verba is nowhere to be found anywhere else on the RS website – except a lonely fragment thereof:

‘In Verba’ – the Science Policy Centre’s blog – provides updates about our work on providing scientific advice to policymakers.

The RS “Science Policy Centre” claims to provide:

independent, timely and authoritative scientific advice to UK, European and international decision makers.

We champion the contribution that science and innovation can make to economic prosperity, quality of life and environmental sustainability and we are a hub for debate about science, society and public policy [emphasis added -hro]

That’s certainly a tall order isn’t it?! One might ask: how did this noble organization venture so far from its chartered roots of ‘withstanding the domination of authority‘ to one with an acquired mandate of providing ‘authoritative scientific advice’?

The answer to this question lies in a very timely and well-written report, from the U.K.’s Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), entitled Nullius in Verba – On the Word of No One: The Royal Society and Climate Change (or Nullius in Verba, for short).

This report was written by Andrew Montford, author of the increasingly influential The Hockey Stick Illusion, as well as the GWPF’s 2010 critique of The Climategate Inquiries – and the more recent self-published Conspiracy in Green, an exposé of the collusion by “environmentalists and BBC journalists [in the subversion of] the corporation’s output, [and the exclusion of] global warming sceptics from the airwaves”.

As Dr. Richard Lindzen notes in his Foreword to Nullius in Verba:

Andrew Montford provides a straightforward and unembellished chronology of the perversion not only of The Royal Society but of science itself, wherein the legitimate role of science as a powerful mode of inquiry is replaced by the pretence of science to a position of political authority.

[...]

[T]here are certain peculiarities of The Royal Society’s behavior that are perhaps worth noting. The presidents involved with this issue ([Robert] May, [Martin] Rees and [current President, Paul] Nurse) are all profoundly ignorant of climate science. Their alleged authority stems from their positions in the RS rather than from scientific expertise. [emphasis added -hro]

And as Montford notes in his introductory summary:

For 300 years after its foundation, the Royal Society adopted a position of aloofness from political debates, refusing to become embroiled in the controversies of the day. This position was encapsulated in the Society’s journal, The Philosophical Transactions, which carried a notice that ‘It is neither necessary nor desirable for the Society to give an official ruling on scientific issues, for these are settled far more conclusively in the laboratory than in the committee room’. In the 1960s, the society began to become increasingly involved at the interface of science and political policymaking.
[...]
Immense damage has been done to the reputation of the Society by its last three presidents. While the fellows’ rebellion has improved matters considerably, the continuing desire of the Society’s leadership to engage in political controversies represents a serious ongoing risk to the Society’s reputation and an abandonment of its principles. [emphasis added -hro]

If you are new to the “climate wars” (as I still consider myself to be, even after more than two years on the battlefield), Montford’s chronology provides considerable context and background which, although specific to the RS, is echoed in the pre- (and post-) Climategate activities of other high profile and supposedly “independent” organizations.

As one who has spent many years in the non-profit (and primarily) government-funded sector, I know from experience that change does not often happen unless driven from the top (and is frequently suggested by senior staff, rather than by the membership or even the senior voluntary leadership). Government funding provides an additional wrinkle: he who pays the lion’s share to the piper usually calls the tune. Here’s how the RS describes its funding sources:

The Royal Society has a variety of funding sources in order to ensure its independence.

• 68.2% from Parliamentary Grant for specific projects and programmes.
• 13.1% from companies and trusts.
• 9.5% from trading (e.g. journal sales, venue hire).
• 8.1% from investments and endowments.
• 0.8% from other public bodies.
• 0.3% from membership contributions from Fellows.

Seems to me that the only “independence” that is being ensured is that of the President and upper echelons from the Fellows, as Montford confirms (p. 37):

In the 50 years since Lord Adrian warned of the dangers that a flood of government money represented to the Royal Society, all of his worst fears have come true. Despite repeated claims that the Society is independent of government, the reality is rather different. Although the fellows still have to pay subscriptions to the Society, the total raised in this way is dwarfed by sums routed through the Society by government [...] [emphasis added -hro]

But … nullius in verba (least of all mine!)… read the whole report. At 40 pages, it is not a long read, but it is a very enlightening – and alarming – read.

UPDATE: 02/10/2012 01:36 PM PST Post has been amended to reflect new link to Nullius in verba report (http://www.thegwpf.org/images/stories/gwpf-reports/montford-royal_society.pdf)

Desperately seeking humility and nuance in climate science

In October 2011, Dr. Judith Curry had a lengthy and interesting post regarding the Draft Strategic Plan (2012 -2021) of the U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP). In her commentary, Dr. Curry shared with her readers some conclusions that she had conveyed during the course of a related panel discussion:

If we as scientists are not humble about the uncertainties and areas of ignorance, we have an enormous capacity to mislead decision makers and point them in the direction of poor policies. Uncertainty is essential information for decision makers.

Climate scientists have this very naive understanding of the policy process, which is aptly described by the A+B=C model in the context of the precautionary principle. This naive understanding is reflected in the palpable frustration of many climate scientists at the failure of the “truth” as they “know” it to influence global and national energy and climate policy. This frustration has degenerated into using to word “denier” to refer to anyone who disagrees with them on either the science or the policy solution.

Today’s issue of Nature includes a “World View” column authored by Ryan Meyer, science integration fellow at the California Ocean Science Trust in Oakland, on this very same plan:

Finding the true value of US climate science

A new strategy for addressing climate change takes a realistic approach to the challenge of making science useful, says Ryan Meyer

08 February 2012

[...]

Is it possible to be realistic and nuanced about the limited role that science often has, but still to offer a compelling case for public support? The US Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) will shortly release a strategic plan that does just that.

Over the past two decades, the USGCRP, which coordinates 13 federal agencies and departments, has spent more than $30 billion on climate-change research. In doing so, it has improved our understanding of climate systems. But, as the National Research Council pointed out in 2009, when it comes to fulfilling its legal mandate of supporting decision makers with useful information, the USGCRP has been a disappointment.

[...]

There was no coherent plan (let alone resources) to implement the concepts, and the central goals of the programme remained entirely focused on advancing knowledge. The USGCRP did not provide any coherent account of how doing science in this way would be different from what had gone before, or how science institutions would need to change in order to deliver better value to society.

What, then, is different this time? In its 2012 report, the USGCRP has expressed a more nuanced and humble account of the role of science in society’s responses to climate change.

[...]

The latest plan also acknowledges difficult but crucial science-policy trade-offs. For example, it discusses the “dynamic tension” between increasing model complexity and policy-makers’ needs for simplicity and tractability. For a government science programme to explicitly recognize these choices as a proper concern of science management is a new and welcome step.

Will this bold vision be realized? The USGCRP does not yet have a strong mechanism for allocating funds among its new priorities. Some in the research community will surely lobby against trade-offs that seem to threaten the status quo. And, as it has in the past, the National Research Council reviewed this plan with a critical eye, pointing out that the USGCRP will need more resources and greater leverage over agency budgets and priorities to make it happen. Without these ingredients, the idea will probably run into the sand. [emphasis added -hro]

Speaking of those who perceive threats to the status quo … I wonder what Trenberth and his gang of 37 (who seem to think that “panic” is the preferred option) might have to say about all this?!

As someone once said, we live in interesting times!

Of consensus and the weakness of plastic pillars

There’s been an interesting confluence (but I’m sure it must be coincidental) of blogposts in the last twenty-four hours or so. Much of the “consensus” alarmism to which we’ve been subjected by the mainstream media (MSM) for so many years can be traced back to the European Union’s (and in particular Germany’s) deep-green-tinted “science”. But as Pierre Gosselin noted in a post today:

“THE CO2 LIES … pure fear-mongering … should we blindly trust the experts?”

That’s what Germany’s leading daily Bild (see photo) wrote in its print and online editions today, on the very day that renowned publisher Hoffmann & Campe officially released a skeptic book – one written by a prominent socialist and environmental figure.

This is huge. More than I ever could have possibly imagined. And more is coming in the days ahead! The Bild piece was just the first of a series.

Mark this as the date that Germany’s global warming movement took a massive body blow.

Today, not one, but two of Germany’s most widely read news media published comprehensive skeptical climate science articles in their print and online editions, coinciding with the release of a major climate skeptical book, Die kalte Sonne (The Cold Sun).

And on the U.K. alarmist front, Andrew Montford, author of The Hockey Stick Illusion [which Gosselin had indicated was quite influential in the formulation of views of the authors of Die kalte Sonne], at Bishop Hill notes that the BBC’s Richard Black has declared that, in effect, “consensus doesn’t matter“. Montford quotes Black:

But if the presence of a consensus is irrelevant, so, logically, is its absence; which makes the continued use by sceptics’ groups of the “consensus is cracking” meme a bit mystifying.

After all, how many times can you say it’s cracking before people start asking “so why hasn’t it cracked, then?”

In both cases – consensus and breaking consensus – it’s surely the evidence that should count, not the number of people you can get to sign your letter.

The United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP)’s Joseph Alcamo would probably differ from Black; or at least he would have circa October 1997, when his recipe contribution to the climate consensus co-ordinators’ cookbook, included:

Distribution for Endorsements –

I am very strongly in favor of as wide and rapid a distribution as possible for endorsements. I think the only thing that counts is numbers. The media is going to say “1000 scientists signed” or “1500 signed”. No one is going to check if it is 600 with PhDs versus 2000 without. They will mention the prominent ones, but that is a different story.

Conclusion — Forget the screening, forget asking them about their last publication (most will ignore you.) Get those names! [emphasis added -hro]

Seems to me that perhaps, in the intervening years, “consensus” has morphed into one of those “ideas” that – not unlike “climate change” – according to Mike Hulme, is “so plastic“.

Hulme:

“Claims such as ’2,500 of the world’s leading scientists have reached a consensus that human activities are having a significant influence on the climate’ are disingenuous.

“That particular consensus judgement, as are many others in the IPCC reports, is reached by only a few dozen experts in the specific field of detection and attribution studies; other IPCC authors are experts in other fields.”

Richard Klein:

[I]t is this line-by-line approval process that results in the actual consensus that the IPCC is famous for, and which is sometimes misunderstood. The consensus is not a consensus among all authors about every issue assessed in the report; it is a consensus among governments about the summary for policymakers.

The above page also contains (along with source links):

Greenpeace:

Scientific consensus

There is, in fact, a broad and overwhelming scientific consensus that climate change is occurring, is caused in large part by human activities (such as burning fossil fuels), and if left unchecked will likely have disastrous consequences. Furthermore, there is solid scientific evidence that we should act now on climate change, and this is reflected in the statements by these definitive scientific authorities.

Union of Concerned Scientists:

Scientific Consensus on Global Warming

Scientific societies and scientists have released statements and studies showing the growing consensus on climate change science. A common objection to taking action to reduce our heat-trapping emissions has been uncertainty within the scientific community on whether or not global warming is happening and if it is caused by humans. However, there is now an overwhelming scientific consensus that global warming is indeed happening and humans are contributing to it. [emphasis added -hro]

Oreskes:

The scientific consensus is clearly expressed in the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Created in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environmental Programme, IPCC’s purpose is to evaluate the state of climate science as a basis for informed policy action, primarily on the basis of peer-reviewed and published scientific literature (3). In its most recent assessment, IPCC states unequivocally that the consensus of scientific opinion is that Earth’s climate is being affected by human activities. [...]

IPCC is not alone in its conclusions. In recent years, all major scientific bodies in the United States whose members’ expertise bears directly on the matter have issued similar statements.[emphasis added -hro]

As Steve McIntyre noted, he has never made the claim that “the consensus is cracking”. Nor am I aware of any skeptic who has actually made such a claim. So Black’s “consensus is cracking meme” is either a strawman or a figment of his imagination. Although, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that Black – not unlike James Painter, whose 2011 Poles Apart “study” of MSM presentations of skeptic views has been elegantly deconstructed by Maurizio Morabito – has chosen to blinker himself (and/or his readers).

OTOH, there is the recent (Jan. 30/2012) report from the “UN Secretary General’s High-Level Panel on Global Sustainability”.

Some might interpret their “diplomatic”:

As international sustainable development policy is fragmented and, in particular, the environmental pillar is weak, [the United Nations Environmental Program, parent of the IPCC, IPBES, and a host of other acronymic offspring and purveyor of increasingly scary stories since 1972 -hro] UNEP should be strengthened.

as implying that the “consensus is cracking”. But I couldn’t possibly comment!

Mind you, come to think of it … “plastic pillars” certainly do have some inherent weaknesses, don’t they?