Climategate has been all the rage on the blogosphere of late and judging by the emails we’ve received in the past few days from our international readers, New Zealand’s own climategate has gone global. The fuel providing the heat is a recent criticism of New Zealand’s National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) by the New Zealand Climate Science Coalition (NZCSC).
The coalition released an 8-page report that compares the figures on NIWA’s website with the official graph NIWA has constructed that purports to show that New Zealand’s temperatures have steadily risen since 1909.
The problem is that the two sets of figures do not match. When one graphs NIWA’s own websites figures the graph shows a constant steady rate of temperature.
The climb in temperature in the official graph is due to the fact that NIWA adjusted the raw data, in almost all cases, upwards. It is these adjustments, and not the raw data itself, which leads to the incline on the official graph. NZCSC have cried foul, Ian Wishart, author of best seller Air Con: The Seriously Inconvenient Truth About Global Warming, got hold of it, the blogosphere followed suit.
In response NIWA have argued that they had good reasons for adjusting the raw data in this fashion. They maintain that over a hundred years the sites where measurements have been taken have changed and so they have needed to adjust their figures upwards to correct for the distortions these changes would have made.
I am aware that not being a climatologist or someone that familiar with the relevant data to any great extent makes it difficult to arrive at an informed position in this debate. However, it seems to this lay person that two things are evident.
From what I have seen from NIWA’s response, the raw data does not support their conclusions and the method of collecting the raw data was flawed and inaccurate to begin with.
The issue then is whether one is justified in adjusting the data to fit what one thinks it would have been if these inaccuracies did not exist, and, if we are, how confident we can be of the results based on counter-factual speculations of this sort. I myself have no idea of the answer but certainly I think that it is fair for people to ask questions of this sort. Especially with the backdrop of the international climategate emails and memos and when serious political policies such as the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), which restricts people’s life, liberty and property, are being passed on the basis of the legitimacy of climate change science.
Scientific debates aside, it seems that as a point of justice the burden of proof must fall on those who wish to impose severe restrictions on other people’s lives, liberty and property; those advocating restrictive policies, like the ETS and those under discussion at Copenhagen, must be able to show that their polices are defensible. This is simply an implication of the idea that people have a prima facie right to liberty and property. A prima facie right is one that holds as a default position in the absence of sufficient reason to the contrary. It seems to me fairly self-evident that if one is going to restrict people’s freedom or property one needs good reasons for doing so. A principle that suggests we could enslave, coerce and confiscate people’s property for no reason, trivial reasons or simply when we unsure there were any reasons would clearly be wrong – much more so when the question hangs over the reason as to whether or not the justification has been faked.
One thing that did interest me in this whole debate, however, is how some scientists have defended NIWA against its critics. What I have observed does not inspire confidence. A good example occurs over at MacDoctor. MacDoctor had raised questions about NIWA’s data, the response from Gareth Renowden, author of Hot Topic.
I think you are giving far too much weight to the CRU email hack. Here’s a few reasons why:
1: The emails were stolen. Those released amount to under 2% (pers comm) of the total stolen, and have clearly been selected to support the storylines being run by the “right wing blogs” you mention. The editorial selection has been made by a bunch of crooks.
2: Many of the mails being talked about have perfectly innocent explanations (see RealClimate). They are the private conversations of a bunch of working scientists, not the science itself. We see that they can be rude about each other and their rivals — that only proves that scientists are human. However, the climate sceptic network is making all sorts of outrageous claims about what they say. Sadly you seem to have bought those interpretations, rather than the somewhat more mundane truth.
3: Our body of scientific knowledge is found in the peer-reviewed literature, not in a careful selection of emails. Not one peer-reviewed paper is called into question by these emails.
4: Timing is everything. These emails were “released” a couple of weeks before the Copenhagen conference, and while a major emissions reduction bill is before the US legislature. They were immediately trumpeted from the rooftops by the usual suspects – those campaigning against action on climate change. Coincidence, or part of a campaign?
If I was a climatologist, I would be very angry at this point, not because I have to go back and redo any work, but because those seeking to delay or prevent action on climate change are resorting to vicious personal attacks against my colleagues. After all, if you can only make a case by stealing and lying, what sort of case have you got?
There are some things about this response that deserve comment. Consider the points raised in 1: here Gareth’s response is to attack the character of those who took the emails. He notes that they are crooks, that the data has been used to support a particular line of interpretation put forward by “right wing blogs.” Similarly, in 4: he suggests that the timing of the information was politically motivated.
These arguments commit the ad hominem fallacy; whether or not the material put forward by climate change sceptics is true or false depends on the empirical evidence for it and not on the motives of those who put it forward. One can see the point better by simply reversing it, suppose a body of scientific data is appropriated by left-wing bloggers and is released just before an important political meeting. Does it follow that the studies themselves are worthless? Gareth seems to be suggesting that because the people had particular political leanings or particular political motivations that one should reject their research without actually examining the evidence. Far from showing that the sceptics claims are unfounded, this very line of argument suggests that the scientists are letting political commitments dictate the lines of inquiry they will consider from the outset.
Gareth’s points 2: and 3: have more merit. He suggests correctly that the nasty rude character of individual scientists does not mean their research is flawed. This is correct; it makes the valid point that whether an individual scientist has a good character is in fact a different question as to whether his arguments are sound. Of course this observation actually rebuts most of what he has said in 1: and 4:.
Moreover, Gareth suggests that what matters is what the peer reviewed studies show and these are not called into question by anything in the leaked (stolen) emails and memos at the centre of climategate and goes on to suggest that there are innocent explanations of the conversations in question. These latter claims, if correct, do provide a valid response to the questions people raised.
MacDoctor responds to this as follows:
Those released amount to under 2% (pers comm) of the total stolen
No. You can access all the emails. The ones being discussed in blogs and the media amount to about 2%.
Many of the mails being talked about have perfectly innocent explanations
I’m sure you are right. However, many of the e-mails have meanings that cannot be interpreted in any way except that they reveal severe selection bias. Even Monbiot thinks that they show more politics than science.
Our body of scientific knowledge is found in the peer-reviewed literature
Apparently not, according to the emails. There appears to have been a concerted effort made to keep certain articles out of the peer reviewed literature. The smothering of dissenting views makes for a flawed, truncated science that is all but worthless.
Timing is everything
Indeed. CRU timed plenty of scary statistics to be brought forth just before the Copenhagen conference – now all suspect. The timing works both ways.
Here MacDoctor addresses both the valid and invalid arguments. In response to the issue of peer review, MacDoctor notes that the climategate emails and memos provide evidence that the process of peer review has been corrupted. He also notes that not all of the emails and memos can be plausibly explained away in the fashion Gareth suggests.
At this point I was interested in seeing if Gareth had an adequate response to these points. I was disappointed. Gareth’s response is as follows,
Selection bias! In the cherry-picking of stuff to feed into right wing attack lines, yes.
The “concerted effort” was to deal with crap – papers that should never have got through peer review. Note that the perversion of peer review was actually being conducted by sceptics – notably Chris de Freitas, who as an editor at Climate Research was responsible for passing several papers from his sceptic mates for publication without proper peer review. Six editors resigned in protest. Full story here from one of the editors who resigned.
CRU “timed” no scary statistics for release, and none of their normal products are now suspect.
I must say I’m astonished that someone who (presumably) relies on evidence-based should be so partial when it comes to work in another field. Your choice. Your loss.
What we see here is not a valid response to MacDoctor’s concerns but rather a series of tu quoques. He responds by noting that right wingers have selection bias. That may or may not be true but that was not the question. The question was whether the scientists at the heart of climategate had selection bias. You do not show that one person is not biased by pointing out that someone else is or might be. In the same way, pointing out, as Gareth does, that some sceptics of anthropogenic global warming (AGW) have tried to manipulate peer review does not actually tell us anything about whether defenders of AGW have also manipulated peer review.
If anything, Gareth’s remaining comments tend to suggest that they did try to do this but were justified because the work of sceptics is “crap.” This shows us that, at the crucial point, his defence degenerates to denigration and name-calling. The rest of the response is to insinuate that those who do not disagree with these obviously fallacious arguments do not follow “evidence based research.” Strange, I though evidence based research involves actually providing evidence for your claims, not raising red herrings and making evasions.
After reading the exchange I am left wondering; here scientists are defending their position by using clear-cut obvious examples of fallacious reasoning but surely scientists of all people know not to do this don’t they?
For those like myself who are lay people the questions remain. Governments advocate using the force of law, with policies such as the ETS, to restrict peoples freedom, confiscate their property and raise the price of food, petrol and power. We are told this is because a “consensus” of scientists thinks certain facts about climate change and AGW are the case and that these facts justify certain action. Apart from the obvious is ought fallacy employed in such reasoning (empirical research by itself cannot answer moral questions about what we ought to do) and putting aside the question of whether scientific consensus are always reliable guides to truth, it is disconcerting, in such a politically charged context as we find ourselves in amidst climategate, that when people discover that data has been adjusted on the basis not of what it actually showed but what they think it should have shown under non-existent ideal conditions and they ask questions about this that at least some defenders of science respond with evasions. People who are trained in scientific thinking must know that such responses are fallacious and inadequate. When I witness this, especially when some of it seems premised on the idea that views can be dismissed out of hand if the conclusions are “right wing,” it makes one, at the very least, a bit suspicious that we are dealing with politics and agendas as much as science.
Tags: Climate Change · Climategate · Copenhagen · ETS · Gareth Renowden · Global Warming · Ian Wishart · MacDoctor · NIWA · Public Policy96 Comments
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Did you watch the mention of this climate gate on the news? Pretty much:
– The emails are just normal exchange of scientists (worrying if this is true!)
– Global warming is really happening (skipping the real debate of whether it’s natural or man made)
– The emails will not affect Copenhagen (also worrying but quite expected)
Gareth’s response is very disappointing.
His points have been clearly rebuffed, but instead of continuing the debate he resorts to denigration.
Observing this sort of “I have facts”, “well, you’re a ponker” style of debate really puts people off. I would credit this “I can counter your points with emotion” attitude with driving me towards the right.
.-= My last blog-post ..Innovative Thinking… =-.
These emails just confirm what was largely known already, that politics had infected climate science and skewed the results to the global warming side. And now that politicians have gotten their teeth into it there is no stopping their pitbull like clamping reflex, especially since AGW gives them an excuse to hoard more power and wealth to themselves and their political buddies.
.-= My last blog-post ..Athens and Jerusalem =-.
Scrubone – I thought it was the deniers claims that had been “clearly rebuffed.” That is surely what the evidence shows.
It’s amazing how willing people are prepared to buy into unwarranted attacks on the integrity of our scientists on the basis of a “when are you going to stop beating your wife” allegation.
The deniers trumped up their graphics by combining data from different stations without normalising them for location. Our scientists actually gave a very clear example of how they derived adjustment factors of the Wellington stations. I would have thought this would have been clear to most lay people.
Matt you obviously have either not read nor understood Gareth’s article or the NIWA posts.
Why the hell do you say “the method of collecting the raw data was flawed and inaccurate to begin with.”? Please explain – in what way was the data collection flawed or inaccurate? As far as I know no-one has raised this as an issue – what do you know that the rest of us don’t?
“From what I have seen from NIWA’s response, the raw data does not support their conclusions” What do you mean? Surely you need to look at the data as well as the explanations of how it was treated to evaluate the conclusions.
It would have been dishonest to combine data from different stations without adjusting for location, elevation, etc. This dishonest trick is what the deniers did and even they now acknowledge that adjustments were necessary. But they avoided adjustments purely because they had a preconceived conclusion and by falsely using the unadjusted data they could produce the graphic they required to support it.
“The issue then is whether one is justified in adjusting the data to fit what one thinks it would have been if these inaccuracies did not exist, and, if we are, how confident we can be of the results based on counter-factual speculations of this sort.” This is silly. There was no adjustment of data “to fit what one thinks it would have been” That would be a dishonest step and we would be be justified in calling fraud if there were any evidence of that.
I am aware that people can behave that subjectively in their day to day life. But no scientist worth her salt knowingly does that and no scientific colleague knowingly allows such subjective treatment of data through the normal review process. It would be in diredct conflict with the scientific ethos.
If you had read NZ sceptics lie about temp records, try to smear top scientist, Climate change deniers live in glass buildings or the NIWA posts linked to therein you would be aware of the nature of the adjustments. And you would also be aware that preparing a graphic without taking the nature of the different locations into account (and purely because you wanted it to fit your own belief) is a dishonest act. It is scientifically unethical. Even fraudulent.
I can appreciate many people are upset because ‘as a point of justice the burden of proof must fall on those who wish to impose severe restrictions on other people’s lives, liberty and property”. And that is a political question. I myself don’t think the ETS we have is any good. Also, I am aware that our response to anthropogenic climate change will, in the end, probably be far more beneficial economically to us than often portrayed. But then again I have the scientist’s optimism about humanity in general.
OK, some people are pessimists, and worry about the way politicians are reacting to this problem.
But take that out with your politicians. Don’t blame the scientists for their discoveries. Don’t shoot the messenger.
And making unwarranted accusations about the integrity of those messengers, while it might divert attention away from real problems, does nothing to solve them.
Deflecting attention from, or denying, a problem doesn’t make it go away.
.-= My last blog-post ..Being good – no gods required =-.
Ken you ask Why the hell do you say”the method of collecting the raw data was flawed and inaccurate to begin with.”? Please explain – in what way was the data collection flawed or inaccurate? As far as I know no-one has raised this as an issue – what do you know that the rest of us don’t?
Simple, the reason I say this is because they adjusted the results. Obviously they did this because they thought that the raw data had been collected in a way that was inaccurate and so needed to be adjusted. If it was accurate, why adjust it?
“From what I have seen from NIWA’s response, the raw data does not support their conclusions” What do you mean?
I mean that the data itself without being adjusted did not support the conclusions they drew. There may or may not have been good reasons for adjusting it, but the fact still remains that without adjusting it in the way they did the data did not support the conclusions they drew.
It would have been dishonest to combine data from different stations without adjusting for location, elevation, etc. This dishonest trick is what the deniers did and even they now acknowledge that adjustments were necessary. But they avoided adjustments purely because they had a preconceived conclusion and by falsely using the unadjusted data they could produce the graphic they required to support it.
This actually proves the points I made above, because different stations were used the method of collecting raw data was flawed an inaccurate. That’s why you say it would be dishonest to rely on it. NIWA had to adjust the material to fit what they believe it should have delivered had a less inaccurate method been used. The point is that the data does not support the conclusions they drew, the method of collection was flawed and skewed the results, what supports their conclusion is their opinion on what the data would have shown had it not been flawed.
This is silly. There was no adjustment of data “to fit what one thinks it would have been” That would be a dishonest step and we would be be justified in calling fraud if there were any evidence of that.
Well clearly there was an adjustment of data, what was this based on, not the data after all. Presumably it was based on what they thought the data should have been had the stations not been moved. Whats the alternative, that they based it on what they think it should not have been. If that’s your position then NIWA clearly are being dishonest.
NZ sceptics lie about temp records, try to smear top scientist, Climate change deniers live in glass buildings or the NIWA posts linked to therein you would be aware of the nature of the adjustments. And you would also be aware that preparing a graphic without taking the nature of the different locations into account (and purely because you wanted it to fit your own belief) is a dishonest act. It is scientifically unethical. Even fraudulent.
More ad hominem evasions, however nothing you say responds to any points I actually made which were that the original method of gathering data was not accurate, because the locations changed. Hence NIWA adjusted the results, this adjustment was not based on the data itself, it was based on beliefs about what the results should have been had an accurate measuring system been put in place. Nothing in this attack on skeptics actually addresses these facts which no one seems to be denying.
.-= My last blog-post ..NIWA, Climategate and Evasive Fallacious Answers =-.
I’m with Ken here. There is no justification provided for this comment:
As NIWA clearly explain on their website the temperature data had to be adjusted due to changes in the position of the readings. There is nothing deceitful here – it’s standard practice to adjust temperature data in this way, and they most likely did it (they don’t mention in their statement) with correlations to other such adjustments in NZ as a means to validate the adjustment factor.
To call this process flawed and inaccurate is disingenuous and adds a lot of value judgement to a relatively innocuous issue. It is a fact of life that the reading stations changed.
Moreover, as Ken notes, use of the raw data is out of the question when it was from multiple sites. One has to combine it and perform adjustments for distance above sea level to even begin to use it. You’re stating that the fact that the raw data doesn’t support their conclusions (which it could never) then their whole conclusion is faulty. This again is disingenuous.
Have you read the NIWA response properly? http://www.niwa.co.nz/news-and-publications/news/all/niwa-confirms-temperature-rise/combining-temperature-data-from-multiple-sites-in-wellington
It seems to argue this properly you would have to come up with a new adjustment figure for moving between reading stations. Was theirs too low? Too high? Why? Comparisons with other sites? What specific problem do you have with NIWA’s method?
Matt – you have clearly not read the NIWA post on this, or either Gareth’s (NZ sceptics lie about temp records, try to smear top scientist) or my (Climate change deniers live in glass buildings) brief description of the adjustments.
I advise you to go away and read these so that you can see why you are completely wrong with your continually repeated claim that the adjustments were “based on what they thought the data should have been.” As I said – that description of the adjustment practically amounts to claims of fraud or doctoring of the data – which is completely unwarranted (and perhaps we can describe as an ad hominem attack if we wanted to appear clever).
Matt, you clearly have no understanding of real world research as you describe the use of different stations as proving the “method of collecting data was flawed an inaccurate.”
1: There is no evidence of inaccuracy anywhere – you have not produced any. The uncertainty in any measurement would have been purely the uncertainty of the thermometers or other instruments used. This would have been well below the variability inherent in measurements of such natural and fluctuating systems. Perfectly normal.
2: This was clearly an historical study. Scientists had to use the data which was recorded many years ago. That is the only way, short of having a time machine, to do such studies. In these sort of studies we use what we have – and it’s not as if their was any decision to investigate global warming 150 years ago, is it?
(Obviously if we want to make continuous measurements of future temperate changes, and had appropriate funding, we would set up and consistently use designated stations and equipment
3: I repeat it would be dishonest to ignore the fact that the different stations would produce different temperature readings. Anyone who produced graphics ignoring this would be either a fool, ignorant of this sort of subject, or motivated to produced skewed results (and I suspect the later was the case for these denier groups, obviously – given their agenda).
Finally, you claim “NIWA adjusted the results, this adjustment was not based on the data itself, it was based on beliefs about what the results should have been”. That is an irresponsible and highly motivated charge. It’s also clearly untrue.
If you had read the posts I referred to you would know that data was used to determine adjustments. Have a look at this figure (you would surely have seen it if you approached this open mindedly): http://openparachute.files.wordpress.com/2009/11/temp-wgtn.jpg
Clearly the researchers had data for the same time times at both the Kelburn and Airport stations. They could work out a reliable adjustment factor form that. Now, one might question how good this would be for adjusting the old Thorndon data (or if a better way could be found) – but it certainly seems reasonable to me. (And if you disagree – what is the reason and where is your evidence? And why question the integrity of the scientists who did this adjustment?).
So you are completely wrong to claim adjustments were not based on data, or that adjustments were made “to support conclusions.”
By the way. Have a look at this figure. Compare the Airport and Kelburn plots. Surely you must conclude that it is wrong to combine raw data from different stations without normalising the data.
Surely!
I think that must be obvious to practically any one. But apparently not the the Climate Conversation Group and the Climate Science Coalition?
Yeah, right.
Learning more about the method used to collect the data just leads to more questions. For instance how was the altitude adjustment differences validated? Did they measure the temperatures in both places for a while back when they changed locations so as to mark the differences? Added to this the differences between Thorndon pre 20s, Kelburn post 20s and Wellington Airport more recently are more than just altitude! There is for instance vast differences between urban warming effects between these locations, especially between the burbs and the airport, burning jet fuel tends to have a big effect. And this effect has increased over time, so how was this adjusted for and importantly how was the adjustment validated?
.-= My last blog-post ..Athens and Jerusalem =-.
nyokodo – welcome to the real world. These are the sorts of questions researchers must deal with every day. If you have the expertise and genuine questions why not communicate with NIWA on specific issues? That would be the honest thing to do before making wild accusations against honest scientists.
However, what we have in this post by Matt is part of Ian Wishart’s Global Government conspiracy theory. The deniers have been prepared to question the integrity of the scientists doing their research – with no justification.
Yet clearly the specific graphic shows fraud – combining data from different stations without any consideration of the fact that they were different. No attempt to work out adjustment factors, No attempt to take in to consideration elevation, etc. etc..
Do you really think they were so naive they were ignorant of the need to make these adjustments?
Of course you don’t
.-= My last blog-post ..Being good – no gods required =-.
Ken: I’m no scientist but I do have a lot of experience dealing with statistics and especially stats produced by Government, and I wouldn’t trust any Government stats as far as I could throw my office building. This isn’t specifically any reason to doubt any particular statistics but it is a reason to NOT assume they’ve followed the obvious!
.-= My last blog-post ..Athens and Jerusalem =-.
So nyokodo – do you trust the deniers in the Climate Science Coalition, Climate Conversation Group and Ian Wishart?
Especially given their record, particular paroina and the obvious skulduggery in their press statement.
.-= My last blog-post ..Being good – no gods required =-.
Ken: I don’t really trust anyone that much, but I especially don’t trust those who have a vested interest in a particular outcome in the shape of funding and/or power. Ian Wishart could just as easily report for global warming as report against it, and as the CRU hacking scandal has proven being a sceptic of AGW tends to put your job in danger.
.-= My last blog-post ..Athens and Jerusalem =-.
Why can’t we, ordinary people, without being dragged into the politics, just say:
Hey NIWA, your adjusted data show different graph than your raw data. Something smells in here. How exactly did you adjust your data? And how can we be assured you’re not being dishonest?
Imagine if you are investing money to a company. The company gives you an uptrend graph to show that your investment is doing well. But then you found out that the data for that graph had been adjusted. And doing the graph using unadjusted raw data actually show that your investment isn’t doing well at all. What would you do? Just trust the investment company without asking questions? Would you stop asking question when they say that they had to do adjustment because the way they acquired the raw data is flawed?
If that investor was me. I’d keep asking that company until I’m fully convinced the adjustment is truly fair and truly honest.
nyokodo – Ian Wishart has a Global Government conspiracy theory he attempts to support. That’s why he is unreliable – as this fallacious press release shows.
I think you are now in the old ghetto mentality — avoid facing the facts by surrounding yourself with “explanations” – no matter how unlikely.
Anon – ditto.
The thing about the scientific ethos is that it has ways of encouraging objectivity and detecting subjectivity. That is why governments invest in science.
On this specific question the government is not silly. They will accept the evidence of their experts, unless real evidence were produced to suggest they do otherwise. That hasn’t happened.
However, the government isensible to know that the deniers report is faulty, self-serving, ideologically driven and promoting a specific agenda.
No sensible government would invest in people like that.
.-= My last blog-post ..Richard Dawkins in Auckland – update =-.
nyokodo,
If you don’t want to trust anyone, particularly any respectable scientists, then you better quickly stop what you’re doing and spend the rest of your life carrying out laborious research into everything that crosses your senses.
Thinking of driving later today? Best not to trust those engineers who built that car, or the scientists who developed the principles the engineers used. Probably should start from scratch with figuring out the laws of motion for yourself…
I’m just making a point here: if you have genuine concerns with NIWA’s approach, learn more about climate science from reputable sources and ask them wise questions. I’m sure you’ll find the answers you seek if you following this approach.
This is far better than randomly speculating on potential issues on a field you may know little about. Like any modern scientific pursuit, this is not an easy topic and there are many issues and caveats one must be aware of. It requires dedication and knowledge to properly critique.
Anon,
If you were investing in NIWA, you’d presumably go their offices and they would run you through the details of why adjustments were made – as they have done on their website and we have done in this thread.
If you’re not happy with this explanation, you should learn more background knowledge on the topic and ask more informed questions. (you do essentially say this as well)
Oh and nyodoko,
Ian Wishart, going by his previous journalism/book and his sensationalist approach, could definitely be expected to be a typical AGW ‘denier’. He is hardly a bastion of a considered, rational approach to science. He’s even criticised the teaching of evolution in schools…he’s basically, and sadly, our own little American fundamentalist in NZ.
“SCIENTISTS at the University of East Anglia (UEA) have admitted throwing away much of the raw temperature data on which their predictions of global warming are based.
It means that other academics are not able to check basic calculations said to show a long-term rise in temperature over the past 150 years. ” http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6936328.ece
Australia voted down its global warming bill http://blogs.dailymail.com/donsurber/archives/4938
Simon, in reality, we all have interest in the validity of the data whether we’re direct investor or not, because we’re talking about global taxation system at stake here. I’m just appalled at anyone who attacked people who are questioning the discrepancy and the leaked emails.
Why is it that this is always about GW and deniers? Whether the world is warming or not is easy to measure. As long as you don’t skew the data and provide the data publicly for everyone to check – public review instead of peer review. But thanks to CRU for dumping the raw data, we now have no idea.
But what’s difficult is to measure how much of the climate change is caused by human activity and what to do about it. See http://nzconservative.blogspot.com/2009/11/science-versus-religion.html
Amusing comparisons:
“And making unwarranted accusations about the integrity of those messengers, while it might divert attention away from real problems, does nothing to solve them.”
And:
“Especially given their record, particular paroina and the obvious skulduggery in their press statement.”
And yes, these both came from the same person!
Matt, since writing my initial post on the CRU scandal it has been rather depressing to observe the way that scientists have responded to it – and the allegations about the Climate Science Coalition are more or less libellous.
Perfectly good opportunities to discuss climate science have been wasted, replaced instead by personal attacks and fllacious smears against so called “deniers.” I’ve been snowed under over the last few days getting my next podcast ready, but I’ve been making notes on my observations on how the scientific community has been reacting in a way that is anything but scientific. More to come.
You can see some of the irony here: You’ve cited a NIWA representative engaging in personal attacks, and then someone comes in and starts posting comments claiming that it’s the “deniers” engaging in personal attacks, and then that very person engages in personal attacks, wll the while believing himself to be cool, calm, rational and scientific.
It’s a crazy world out there.
Glenn, I don’t think Matt has quoted any NIWA representative at all. He doesn’t even appear to have checked. out the NIWA web site on this issue. Pity, because if he had perhaps he wouldn’t have made the mistakes he did.
A pity more people didn’t actually check out the facts before buying into this conspiracy theory.
.-= My last blog-post ..Richard Dawkins in Auckland – update =-.
Well said Glenn. I am thankfull we do not live in a technocracy
Anon,
We were discussing the NZ situation specifically…to try and make some progress here….can you address those responses?
But on the recent deletion of data issue, read more in to it. They seemed to have decent reasons for not storing all the raw data in the 1980s (technological limitations and cost etc.) but instead storing the processed data. I don’t know the level of processing stored, so can’t comment further on this. But I do know first hand the ridiculous amounts of data that can be generated for things like this, and how raw data is not necessarily essential to store.
However, given the current political situation around AGW, it’s a shame there is raw data missing for their particular research.
Also though, their research is far from the only research, and their results were confirmed from other sources. It isn’t like everything rests on East Anglia.
If you want raw data, check out some sources below:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/data-sources/
[…] such as The Beretta Blog, with “the Glenn of the Peoples,” MandM, with “Hew” Flanagan, and a number of posts at NZ Conservative, with the “Big […]
Glen,
Where does Matt cite a NIWA representative engaging in personal attacks?
What Matt does do though is continue the sensationalism with disingenuous remarks that don’t reflect the actual state of affairs.
Given the NIWA data is pivotal in important public policy decisions, and that the government has purchased the analysis, I see no reason why the methods used to adjust the data shouldn’t be freely available to the public.
If it is freely available (for all the station data, not just the brief rundown on the Wellington info) please provide a link.
My error, it’s Gareth Renowden that Matt cites who engages in the personal tactics. My point remains the same, obviously.
“Given the NIWA data is pivotal in important public policy decisions, and that the government has purchased the analysis, I see no reason why the methods used to adjust the data shouldn’t be freely available to the public.”
Maybe because they are not allowed? A lot of it is collected by the MetService and they might not like Niwa to just give it away to anybody.
Besides, I am sure that if you are a researcher interested in the data, you would not have much difficulty getting access.
The following page contains an overview over their methods with all the references:
http://www.niwa.co.nz/our-science/climate/information-and-resources/clivar/pastclimate#y140
Frank
If you are after data go to the National Climate Database. Sorry I am not at my PC so can’t pass on the link – but do a search. Perhaps start at the NIWA site.
You could always communicate with the individual scientists doing the work.
One problem though, because of the current extreme attacks being made on NIWA – extreme press headlines around the world ( as a result of Wishart’s clever lies) scientists are probably prevented from communicating with media at the moment. You will be aware that NIWA bureacrats have an extreme policy on this – sacking Dr Salinger because of his communications with media.
Unfortunate – but scientists actually often have very little contol of their anilit to communicate in such matters.
Ken its rather frustrating to see you again misrepresent what I wrote and then attribute some position to me I did not hold.
First, I said the method of collecting the raw data was inaccurate. You and Simon both suggest this claim is false and unjustified. The problem is only a few sentences latter you state that relying the raw data would skew the results and be dishonest. This however only makes sense if the raw data was inaccurate. In fact your continual stressing the need to adjust the data before one can rely on it shows that the raw data itself is inaccurate. Claiming something is accurate and then at the same time claiming it needs to be altered and changed before it gives you a correct picture and that proclaiming its true is dishonest is more contradictory nonsense.
Second, you accuse me of slandering NIWA by saying the adjustments were “based on what they thought the data should have been” But if you actually read my post you will see that what I said was that they had adjusted the data to fit what [they] thinks it would have been if these inaccuracies did not exist, I explained this a few lines earlier where I said NIWA They maintain that over a hundred years the sites where measurements have been taken have changed and so they have needed to adjust their figures upwards to correct for the distortions these changes would have made. interestingly this is precisely what you state in your response to me Simon himself actually says the same thing he writes As NIWA clearly explain on their website the temperature data had to be adjusted due to changes in the position of the readings… Moreover, as Ken notes, use of the raw data is out of the question when it was from multiple sites. One has to combine it and perform adjustments for distance above sea level to even begin to use it.
Third you seem to think that I said NIWA were unjustified in making these adjustments. You claim I maintained that “NIWA adjusted the results, this adjustment was not based on the data itself” but what I said in the blog was that the raw data does not support their conclusions note the use of the word “raw” data. That is the data collected from the stations itself did not support their conclusions. I did not say there was no data at all that supported this what I actually said was
The issue then is whether one is justified in adjusting the data to fit what one thinks it would have been if these inaccuracies did not exist, and, if we are, how confident we can be of the results based on counter-factual speculations of this sort. I myself have no idea of the answer but certainly I think that it is fair for people to ask questions of this sort.
Here I explicitly stated I did not know wether the adjustments were justified or not. I left it an open question.
So all we see here Ken is the fact that you have repeatedly taken my comments out of context distorted them and attributed to me a position I never expounded. Simon apparently does the same thing and then dismisses it as “sensationalism”.
What we don’t see is an actual addressing of the questions raised.
.-= My last blog-post ..Goodbye Anna =-.
Ken, I see you are telling people in here they should not criticise NIWA until they have actually read the arguments NIWA officials give for their position, and familarise themselves with the issues in the debate.
Perhaps you can explain to us all why Climate change skeptics can’t simply dismiss that request by calling it “jelly wrestling” and giving a story about how if the emperor has no clothes.
.-= My last blog-post ..Goodbye Anna =-.
No, Matt. Therevis nothing wrong with the raw data. It,s how irbid used. To produce a graphic combining raw data without taking into account the fact they are fr different stations. Then to use that to claim there has been no warming and that the NIWA presentation is fraudelent is dishonest. It is malicious to then spread that around the world as Wishart has done.
You are either dishonest or ignorant of the science to repeat the graphic here. A lay person could easily undestand the issue if the looked at all the information available.
You didn’t check with the NIWA information, did you?
.-= My last blog-post ..Richard Dawkins in Auckland – update =-.
I see Ken, after I have clarified to you publically what I did said you distort again you assert
To produce a graphic combining raw data without taking into account the fact they are fr different stations. Then to use that to claim there has been no warming and that the NIWA presentation is fraudelent is dishonest. It is malicious to then spread that around the world as Wishart has done.
You are either dishonest or ignorant of the science to repeat the graphic here.
If you see the above post nowhere did I say there was no warming, nor did I say that NIWA presentation is dishonest. Nor did I represent the graph as accurate. What I actually said was that the way the raw data was collected was inaccurate.
So again we see you (a) dishonestly attributing to me things I did not say (b) condemning dishonesty.
Like I said when scientists have to resort to dishonest character attacks and out right contradictions it makes people suspicious.
You ignored my question, Matt. So I must conclude that you didn’t check the NIWA information.
Pity. Have a look at Gareth’s latest post for a link to some more specific information about the denier deception.
Matt, you are sliding around now – but face the fact. You reproduced that fraudelent graphic claiming no warming. And you actually suugest NIWA was not up front. When the facts show all along that the deniers have been dishonest – and you are a camp follower.
The factviscthat there is nothing wrong with the raw data – just the way it is used by the denier groups in the graphic you reproduce here.
Just go and have a look at the NIWA information.
.-= My last blog-post ..Richard Dawkins in Auckland – update =-.
How about an explanation as to why 3 separate countries all mysteriously managed to turn essentially flat temperature graphs into graphs showing temperatures steadily rising?
Are we supposed to just swallow, amidst the pejorative labelling, ad hominems, red herrings, tu quoques and the-trust-us-we’re-scientists mantras that all three countries just happened to independently move the sites they took temperatures in to ever increasing hotter spots over roughly the same time period?
And whilst swallowing this, are we supposed to ignore the massive amount of emails and memos that are climategate which seem to not only say that said upwardly adjusted figures were not adjusted for these reasons (putting it mildly) but that anyone who suggests otherwise should be professionally ostracised and poo poohed i.e. subjected to ad hominem attack (coincidence of course)?
.-= My last blog-post ..Goodbye Anna =-.
Madeleine, you are just thrashing about trying to divert discussion away from the issues here.
Matt, I detect that you are now not so confident of the claims made in your post.
Will you then acknowledge that the graph you have above taken from the denial report is actually unwarranted? That it is an unjustified use of the data? That it was incorrect to combine site data without adjusting for diffrent stations?
.-= My last blog-post ..Richard Dawkins in Auckland – update =-.
“Madeleine, you are just thrashing about trying to divert discussion away from the issues here.”
I’m the one doing that am I?
I raised an issue, you responded with a red herring which if it was true would also be a tu quoque.
“Matt, I detect that you are now not so confident of the claims made in your post.”
Psychoanalysis or ESP?
Matt, I detect that you are now not so confident of the claims made in your post.
You detect wrong, I did not make the claims you said I made in that post.
Will you then acknowledge that the graph you have above taken from the denial report is actually unwarranted?
Please show me where I said the graph was warranted. I actually said the data collection it was based on was inaccurate. You just spent the last two comments claiming I should not have said it was inaccurate.
Again we see you (a) falsely attributing something to me and (b) contradicting yourself.When called on it you (c) simply assert and repeat the claims suggesting others deep down really agree with you.
That it is an unjustified use of the data? That it was incorrect to combine site data without adjusting for diffrent stations?
Well perhaps you could show me where I said it was a justified use of the data. What I said was the method of collecting the raw data was flawed and inaccurate to begin with.
Again you simply attribute to me the opposite of what I said.
Its also interesting that you spent the last few comments criticising me for saying this was inaccurate, now your suggesting I always said it was. Its hard to take this contradictory nonsense seriously Ken.
To repeat I said that collecting the data in this way was inaccurate. I said in a previous comment that this inaccuracy was why NIWA adjusted them.
SO all we see here Ken you repeating thinks that are false and have been pointed out to you are false several times, one can simply read the above comment to think they are false.
Of course in nearly every post you also condemn “skeptics” for distorting others data.
.-= My last blog-post ..Goodbye Anna =-.
Ken a few weeks ago when criticising the James Hannam you wrote:
Hannan excuses the church as “siding with the scientific consensus of the time.” What a desperate excuse! That is the way you kill science….Scientists work hard to demolish the “scientific consensus of the time.” (They are an ambitious lot, aren’t they?) … [Albert Einstein, Charles Darwin, Isaac Newton, Richard Dawkins, Fr Georges Lemaître, etc.] were doing the normal scientific thing of challenging current “scientific consensus?”
In this quote you state, quite clearly that scientists work to demolish the current consensus, that normal scientists work hard to demolish this consensus, and that failure to do so “kills science”.
Anthrogenic global warming is the current scientific consensus, so by the logic your own logic, insisting people agree with this theory is anti science, in fact if a person is truly doing science they should be focusing on demolishing this theory.
I am not saying necessarily disagree with AGW, what I do disagree with is scientists who continually re-write the rules so that their own philosophical is uncritically accepted.
.-= My last blog-post ..Goodbye Anna =-.
“Matt, I detect that you are now not so confident of the claims made in your post.”
Hi Ken, I’m really impressed with your psychic ability to detect things like that. Would you mind showing some quotes to back it up? E.g.: which claims and which parts that show Matt’s lack of confidence.
You ignored my question, Matt. So I must conclude that you didn’t check the NIWA information.
Actually i you look at what I wrote in the above post
you’ll see I noted NIWA’s position.
In response NIWA have argued that they had good reasons for adjusting the raw data in this fashion. They maintain that over a hundred years the sites where measurements have been taken have changed and so they have needed to adjust their figures upwards to correct for the distortions these changes would have made.
But I note again you (a) ignore what I actually wrote and (b) choose to attribute something to me on the basis of no evidence.
I note also that you are demanding people read a persons position before they comment on it. In complete contradiction to the position you have repeatedly defended when we discussed Dawkins etc in an earlier post.
“Madeleine, you are just thrashing about trying to divert discussion away from the issues here.”
On the contrary, she raised an important question regarding the actual issue here, which is why “scientists” are always “adjusting” data that originally does NOT show global warming so that it, after these very convenient “adjustments” it does?
You failed to address that issue, as well as the actual issue that Matt raised.
Let me put it another way. Why are so many scientists lying?
On the issue of Ken’s attack on Ian Wishart:
Former Vice President Al Gore declared that the Congressional climate bill will help bring about “global governance.”
“But it is the awareness itself that will drive the change and one of the ways it will drive the change is through global governance”
On November 20, 2000, then French President Chirac said during a speech at The Hague that the UN’s Kyoto Protocol represented “the first component of an authentic global governance.”
“For the first time, humanity is instituting a genuine instrument of global governance”
In December 2007, the UN climate conference in Bali, urged the adoption of a global carbon tax.
U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon: “A climate deal must include an equitable global governance structure’ – Oct. 25, 2009, New York Times
Nope, no global government to be concerned about, right Ken?
Well, I signed up for the access to the National Climate Centre data base but can’t find anything about how they adjust the raw data from station records.
I sent an email to NIWA asking them for details on the adjustments on Sunday and haven’t had a reply.
Any other suggestions Ken?
I haven’t seen NIWA use the IP defence as a reason for not releasing the methodology used in making the adjustments, and given the amount of other commercially useful information that is available at no charge, I don’t think IP is the reason I haven’t found the relevant information.
I’m not buying the “ohh it’s just tooo hard!” defence either.
Andrew, I think the answer us here is the data- you work out for youself what you think the best ways are of combinig the data from different stations.
There us a recent posting by NIWA referred to in Gareth’s last post providing answers to questions like this. It does give specific references to publications reporting findings and procedures.
Follow those up and wait for a reply to your email )you certainly aren’t going to suggest they are hiding something because they didn’t reply overnight are you?)
They are the experts. They haven’t been caught lying like the deniers. Really it’s matter if doing your own work – I can’t do it for you.
.-= My last blog-post ..Richard Dawkins in Auckland – update =-.
Matt, could you provide with the titles or links to the specific NIWA documents you consulted before writing this post?
Thanks Ken, I hadn’t visited Gareth’s site since he put that up.
Matt,
You and Ken seem to be on slightly different pages – maybe even of a different book. So let’s just try and sort one issue, that is representative of all the issues.
The issue that the raw data is inaccurate. You think it should be termed inaccurate. Ken and I think this is a wrong and misleading use of the term inaccurate.
When I think of the accuracy of the raw data I think to how it was measured – i.e. the mechanics and reliability of the device used for measurement. It doesn’t seem this point is in question here, therefore for each site, the raw data is accurate. Surely you can agree there?
Now of course we have multiple sites across time. Hence when viewed as a collection of multiple raw data sets, each set of raw data is still accurate. It would also be fine IMHO to say that all the raw data is still accurate.
However, due to the different sites having different properties, combining the raw data together would be invalid. Adjustments are required to handle the different nature of each site. Adjustments that are standard practice in climate research.
So I’m drawing a distinction between the accuracy of the data and whether or not the use of this data is valid. These are different concepts. Using the raw data without adjustment for site properties would be invalid and possibly intentionally misleading.
Matt…any part of this you don’t agree with specifically?
So now you might have more insight into why Ken and I were so opposed to you calling the raw data inaccurate, and how this is actually misleading and essentially making an evil mountain out of a molehill.
I don’t think IP is the reason I haven’t found the relevant information.
No, the reason you haven’t found it Andrew is that you haven’t looked. The data has been freely available on the NIWA website and the information about the corrections has been published and is available for anyone to read. Get real man.
“The data has been freely available on the NIWA website and the information about the corrections has been published and is available for anyone to read. Get real man.”
So where’s the link/URL then?
OK, back at my PC and can pass on slome links:
Gareth’s latest post: NZ temps: warming real, record robust, sceptics wrong
NIWA’s recent release dealing with the lies from the denier organisations: NZ temperature rise clear.
Some extracts from this:
“(b) Methodology for adjusting data publicly available
The methodology for adjusting for site changes in the NZ temperature record was published in the peer-reviewed International Journal of Climatology in 1993. NIWA referred Dr Vincent Gray of the NZ Climate Science Coalition to this paper on 19 July 2006.
Reference:
Rhoades, D.A. and Salinger, M.J., 1993: Adjustment of temperature and rainfall measurements for site changes. International Journal of Climatology 13, 899 – 913.
(c) Unadjusted (raw) data publicly available
NIWA’s unadjusted climate data is available to anyone at no charge, through web access to the NIWA climate database. This has been the case since 1 July 2007. “
“(b) measurements from climate stations which have never been shifted
“Dr Jim Salinger has identified from the NIWA climate archive a set of 11 stations with long records where there have been no significant site changes. When the annual temperatures from all of these sites are averaged to form a temperature series for New Zealand, the best-fit linear trend is a warming of 1°C from 1931 to 2008. We will be placing more information about this on the web later this week.”
So, if you wan’t to pursue this issue look at the data yourself in the climate database and have a play. (Go to the National Climate Database)
and:
“3. NZ Climate Science Coalition disingenuous
For more than two years, New Zealand Climate Science Coalition members have known of the need to adjust the “seven station” data. They have had access to:
* the raw data
* the adjusted data (anomalies)
* information needed to identify the adjustments made by Dr Salinger
* information needed to develop their own adjustments.
However the NZ Climate Science Coalition paper collated by Richard Treadgold (25 November 2009), and the media release issued by the Coalition on 26 November, were based on analysing the “seven station” data without any adjustments at all for site changes. This is why NIWA Chief Climate Scientist Dr David Wratt expressed his disappointment with the coalition statements, in NIWA’s media release of 26 November.
(a) Coalition told in 2006 of need to take account of site changes
NIWA advised NZ Climate Science Coalition member Dr Vincent Gray of the need to calculate appropriate adjustments to account for significant site changes in an email to him dated 19 July 2006, pointing out problems with graphs he had produced without any such adjustments. We advised him that over the period covered by his analysis the Hokitika site moved from the town centre, to the edge of town, then the airport. We also advised him there had been several site changes in Auckland and Dunedin, and told him about the 120 metre change in the height of the Wellington measurements.
(b) Methodology for adjusting data publicly available
The methodology for adjusting for site changes in the NZ temperature record was published in the peer-reviewed International Journal of Climatology in 1993. NIWA referred Dr Vincent Gray of the NZ Climate Science Coalition to this paper on 19 July 2006.
Reference:
Rhoades, D.A. and Salinger, M.J., 1993: Adjustment of temperature and rainfall measurements for site changes. International Journal of Climatology 13, 899 – 913.
(c) Unadjusted (raw) data publicly available
NIWA’s unadjusted climate data is available to anyone at no charge, through web access to the NIWA climate database. This has been the case since 1 July 2007.
(d) Adjusted series provided in 2006
NIWA provided Dr Salinger’s adjusted temperature series (anomalies compared with 1961–1990 averages) for each of the seven stations, to NZ Climate Science Coalition member Warwick Hughes on 19 July 2006. Information about changes to the seven station sites is documented in a publicly-available report published by the NZ Meteorological Service in 1992, and much of this information is also available from the metadata in the climate database.
Reference:
Fouhy, E., Coutts, L., McGann, R., Collen, B., Salinger, M.J., 1992: South Pacific Historical Climate Network Climate Station Histories. Part 2, New Zealand and Offshore Islands. NZ Meteorological Service, Wellington. ISBN 0-477-01583-2.”
Sorry for quoting extensively – but people have obviously being doing a lot of prejudging and haven’t bothered to check out the facts for themselves (preferring to believe the deniers who have been caught out lying on this matter).
Matt – again, which NIWA information did you consult before writing this post?
Andrew: I sent an email to NIWA asking them for details on the adjustments on Sunday and haven’t had a reply.
Be ready for a wait. The NZSCS were waiting months on end and simpky never got a response. However, in light of that now being widely known, NIWA may be a bit more vigilant in getting back to people. Let us know.
“preferring to believe the deniers who have been caught out lying on this matter”
No, this is false. Is this just the recycled complaint that the NZCSC did not admit the reasons for the adjustments? This was not a lie. How many times does this need to be pointed out?
Claiming that they admitting glossing over it? Now that was a lie (one guess who told it).
Glenn – our comments obviously crossed. However, mine contains links you really should consult instead if taking the denier’s report and press releases as gospel.
A general comment on the response of CRIs in situation like this – from someone who has experienced the problem on the “inside.”
Most scientists will admit they aren’t media savvy, and honestly try to handle things as best they can. But in a situation like this they have no control. Contact with the media is controlled by company bureaucrats. We know NIWA has an unfortunate history of interfering with scientists’ access to media (after all they sacked Dr Salinger for this very thing).
I myself experienced a similar situation (on a much smaller scale) when our research group came under slanderous attack from a commercial firm. Our bureaucrats’ attitude was to ignore it. They banned us from making any response, communicating with the media, publishing our data in the area, etc., etc. The penalty for violating the prohibition was sacking.
We felt we were being kicked in the face by an unprincipled mob of thugs while our employer held us down.
So, I have no sympathy for people who behave like thugs, assaulting the integrity of scientists – without reason – repeating lies from a known denial groups with a history of lying – all the while knowing the victim cannot respond.
And then inventing a conspiracy based on the non-response or slow response of the victim.
For this reason I see the current attack on the integrity of our scientists as cowardly. Even worse, because these thugish bloggers don’t bother consulting the information that is available.
.-= My last blog-post ..Richard Dawkins in Auckland – update =-.
“The methodology for adjusting for site changes in the NZ temperature record was published in the peer-reviewed International Journal of Climatology in 1993.”
As far as I can see at the moment, this paper, or a summary of the information in it, is not available on the NIWA site, or on the The National Climate Database site.
Billy T can prove me wrong by providing a link, or go….
Simon
You and Ken seem to be on slightly different pages – maybe even of a different book. So let’s just try and sort one issue, that is representative of all the issues.
The issue that the raw data is inaccurate. You think it should be termed inaccurate. Ken and I think this is a wrong and misleading use of the term inaccurate.
I agree that Ken and I are not on the same page and there seems to be a communication problem.
But for the record I did not say the raw data itself was inaccurate in the post above I said the method of collecting the raw data was flawed and inaccurate to begin with. I think that’s a fair comment, one cannot reliably determine the rate of temperature increase over a period of 100+ years from raw data gathered from stations that frequently change locations.
From what you say in your post it seems you and I agree on this.
So now you might have more insight into why Ken and I were so opposed to you calling the raw data inaccurate, and how this is actually misleading and essentially making an evil mountain out of a molehill.
Sure, except when Ken asked me what I mean’t I explained it, your comment came in after this. Ken then accused me of attacking NIWA in a way I did not after this, I explained by self again and he continued to. He is still doing so, posting information from NIWA to rebut the attacks I allegedly made, despite the fact I did not make them and have pointed it out several times. I think in that context to suggest it’s the result of my use of terms is inaccurate ( I actually was quite careful to say “the method of collecting the raw data” precisely to avoid the confusion you refer to. I explained what I meant repeatedly, you seem to have got it so its not like I wasn’t clear.
Ken also keeps reference Gareths website, yet anyone who looks at it can see its full of sarcastic, vitrololic attacks on people who disagree with him, usually overtly motivated by the idea that anyone with “right wing” views are stupid. Apparently the scientific community were so emanored by this type of writing the gave it an award. If that’s what is considered good scholarly defenses of AGW then I have real questions about the integrity of the scientific community on this issue. After seeing this and also seeing the way prominent members of the scientific community published on religion and philosophy ( something I do know about) and how well fellow scientists have received what is clearly ignorant and substandard scholarship on these issues. I have to confess that my confidence in this community is some what less than it has been in the past. It seems clear to me that if a person has conservative political or religious views a good number of scientists will accept any argument no matter how bad that contradicts it.
Andrew: “As far as I can see at the moment, this paper, or a summary of the information in it, is not available on the NIWA site, or on the The National Climate Database site.”
For Christ’s sake, Andrew – that’s not where you find scientific journals.. Don’t expect to be spoonfed. Go to a research library. If you have subscription status consult the appropriate journals on-line.
The bottom line here is, unless someone is prepared to research the issue, collect the evidence, then they should really not think they can reliably comment on the integrity of the scientists doing the work.
Research takes time and effort.
By the way, Matt – what NIWA information did you consult before writing this post?
.-= My last blog-post ..Richard Dawkins in Auckland – update =-.
Ken, Billy T claimed the info was on the site, you did also, so you were lying, no big deal.
“unless someone is prepared to research the issue, collect the evidence, then they should really not think they can reliably comment on the integrity of the scientists doing the work.”
So shut-up then Ken.
Matt,
Right, closer to the same page now.
Still, I think your comment that the method of collecting the raw data was flawed and inaccurate is a bit problematic…
1. it’s not strictly the method that’s the problem – it’s the situation of sites changing. I’m sure this happened for many reasons outside of climate science. The way you put it, using ‘method’, gives it too much agency – like their actual processes for collecting the measurements were faulty, and not just the situation of having multiple sites. That’s how I read it anyway…
2. I still think the terms flawed and inaccurate are wrong in this context. Like I said above, it’s to do with the reality of the situation. Rarely is data collected in a pure sense, there are always caveats to take into account. While “flawed and inaccurate” might be correct in some abstract strict sense, using them for this scenario is far too strong, and makes me think you’re trying to create a negative view.
Simon
Reliability of a method is partially linked to the environment and goals. But I suspect there is an interdisciplinary issue here. AS someone with a Philosophy background I probably do use the word in a more abstract sense. Certainly nothing malicious was intended.
I think the same thing occurs with my use of the term “belief” when I talk of NIWA’s beliefs. In popular discourse belief is often contrasted with knowledge, to believe something is to have a kind of groundless opinion. In philosophy to believe X is simply to think X is the case. Understood this way belief is an important component of knowledge, knowledge is a belief which is both true and supported or grounded in the right way.
Hence saying something is based on NIWA’s beliefs is not to necessarily say its unfounded.
I have however explained this to Ken before as has Glenn.
In my admittedly lay opinion It actually seems to me that the issue of AGW actually depends more on what the temperatures have been for the last two or three thousand years ( suppose for example it was hotter a thousand years ago and then cooled a rise in the last 100 would not necessarily be significant). We certainly have no testing stations in NZ to determine this data. But like I said its not my field.
.-= My last blog-post ..Philosophers’ Carnival – Call for Submissions =-.
Matt, it is pointless to go on about the “method” being flawed. Given the data that existed, and if you have been tasked with deriving an over-all country change incorporating as much data as possible, one has to be intelligent about how the data is combined. Can you suggest a method you consider not flawed, or even better than NIWA used?
The method used by the denier groups is definitely flawed and inaccurate.
Do you admit that. Matt?
And if you do, are you still standing by your decision to produce their deceptive graph at the top of your post?
Now, if you are unhappy about the methodology used to combine all the data then why not stick with conclusions drawn for the individual stations, where the site has not been moved. Generally they show an increase with temperature over time.
The problem you have is that you cannot use this to provide a sensible figure for the whole country. Nor does it have the statistical advantage of using more data points. But that should not be an issue for any of the commenters here. Surely they are not interested in that detail, they just want data showing how temperature has or hasn’t changed (which is not given by the deniers graph – don’t you agree?)
Anyone can do this for the individual stations using the available climate data. If you just want to get an eyeball impression have a look at the data for Wellington (http://openparachute.files.wordpress.com/2009/11/temp-wgtn.jpg).
I think there is a clear upward trend with time for the Kelburn station data. The rate of increase will be large than when all the data is combined. So, combination of the data has, in a sense, weakened the case for climate change (by lowering the figure for the rate). However, it will have also reduced the standard error meaning it provides a more precise indication of the warming rate.
So Matt, if your only worry is the method, how to combine data from the separate stations – don’t do that. Consider the stations separately.
But to be consistent you have surely got to criticise the “method” used by the deniers (just lumping all the data and stations together). Not only is that method “flawed” – it’s downright dishonest. Especially as they had been made aware of the problems several years ago when they made a similar attempt.
Re Gareth’s website. Where and when did he get an award for this from the scientific community? I hadn’t been aware that our community was really into websites. The Sciblogs portal is a very recent development.
As for your comments on his writing style – don’t be such a pussy. I get far worse comments directed at me every day. It doesn’t stop me participating in discussion. I think you are suffering from an extreme case of confirmation bias. You don’t read Gareth’s site (and he is an acknowledge authority on this) and you don’t read NIWA’s information (I have to conclude that because you refuse my repeated requests for information on NIWA material consulted before you wrote this post).
Yet you are prepared to criticise them both.
Where is you integrity, Matt.
.-= My last blog-post ..Richard Dawkins in Auckland – update =-.
Matt – re your last comment on AGW and preferring a 1000 year time scale.
1: Temperature have been investigated over a much longer time scale than that using proxy measurement.
2: There is some interesting work suggestion that humanity has had an influence form quite early times – probably since the development of agriculture.
3: The current concern is with the temperature increases that have occurred over the last 150 years, since the industrial revolution.
4: I think there is no doubt now that a component of that increase results from anthropogenic effects, particularly emissions of CO2, CH4, etc.
5: This is, I think irrefutable now, caused by the release of fossil carbon. (Actually in the long term warming is not a problem, more cooling, because of subduction of surface C due to tectonic plate convection effects.
6: Of course this occurs against a large background of temperature changes due to non-anthropogenic effects. We are well aware of this.
7: In my experience arguments used by deniers (Glenn’s most recent post is an example) actually have been well dealt with by climate scientists in the past. Yet they still keep cropping upo and they can fool some of the people for some of the time.
8: The lesson is – learn what the scientists say. Just don’t listen to one side. particularly an ideologically driven side.
.-= My last blog-post ..Richard Dawkins in Auckland – update =-.
“So, I have no sympathy for people who behave like thugs, assaulting the integrity of scientists –”
This is called debate. It’s what we do in a free society. If “scientists” do not like free speech and open debate they should explain why they think they should be treated as high priests who are above scrutiny by the general public.
Here some examples from the emails that have exposed the truth that Ken’s friends are guilty of lying and fraud.
One email says “[W]e can have a proper result, but only by including a load of garbage!”
Another says that a “trick” must be used to “hide the decline”.
If there is a decline, and it has to be hidden from the final results, that is lying and fraud.
Other emails testified to deliberate destruction of contrary evidence.
The claim of course is that the final results are “peer reviewed”. But it is now clear that “peer review” means that only the final carefully massaged and manipulated “evidence” is reviewed, and only by the members of the same global warming cult.
So far not one of the false prophet’s of global warming apocalypse, otherwise known as “scientists”, has been able to give a satisfactory response to the clear proof of fraud that Climategate has exposed. Not one.
They have instead engaged in deceit, in attempts to claim that the words above really mean something else (as though “hide the decline” means “I am having steak for dinner tonight”), and the tactics we see Ken and others engaging in. A mixture of “how dare you question us!” and “your right wing/Christian/creationists so your opinion does not count”.
None of this is new. It was some of the “scientists” who claimed that the earth was on the imminent verge of a new ice age in the late seventies. When that failed to take hold they invented global warming. When the actual temp decline became common knowledge they started using the term climate change instead.
Of course, saying the climate is changing is like saying humans breath air.
One fraud after another. And Ken is outraged they his ilk might be held to account for this crime.
“one has to be intelligent about how the data is combined.”
Bit like “hide the decline” eh? I suspect that “intelligent” means forcing the evidence to fit the desired outcome.
I love it. Ken says “The lesson is – learn what the scientists say. Just don’t listen to one side. particularly an ideologically driven side.” and immediately below that is his promotion of Richard Dawkins! 🙂
Nope, no ideologically driven agenda there, right Ken 🙂
Thanks for the reply Matt…clearer now – def. seems some terminology issues. I still think you’ve presented a clearly biased article by ignoring the cogent explanations from NIWA. But hey, that’s the whole point of blogs isn’t it.
——————–
I find the issue of AGW, and especially the recent developments, very interesting from a science in the public sphere point of view.
Never before, I don’t think, has the public had such an interest in a scientific topic from a critical perspective. (Well, maybe evolution fits in here too – but that’s a bit different). And never before have scientists had to defend themselves against such dedicated opposition. Or perhaps I’m just fallaciously highlighting the current times over history which had incidents that were just as dramatic in terms of public impact.
Scientists are not typically used to justifying every step of their methodology to lay people, and the effects of this are interesting. The balance between how much people need to really know/experience themselves and how much they trust others’ knowledge is intriguing. Also interesting is how this changes with the topic – how much the topic impacts on the person’s belief systems etc.
“Another says that a “trick” must be used to “hide the decline”.”
I guess you never took high school science and had to make a graph. The “trick” is not malicious, and “the decline” mentioned is not being hidden as part of some conspiracy. As I understand it, there is a problem with some post 1960 tree ring data, because it conflicts with the vast amount of other data that confirms warming. The scientists who collected the tree ring data, IIRC, believe it is anomalous, but I don’t think anyone is sure why. It is certainly not the case that the anomalous tree ring data “disproves” global warming, since there is a mountain of other evidence that confirms it, and again the scientist responsible believe the data is anomalous.
The graph smoothing and compensating for the different locations of measurements is perfectly normal. It certainly is not, as Ken has said, a case of them fudging the data to fit some preconceived conclusion, but rather altering the raw data on the basis of known facts about the relation between things like altitude and temperature readings.
If you right wing folks want to hand over science to the left, then continue as you have been doing.
You’d be a lot smarter if you simply accepted AGW and argued for your preferred carbon reduction solutions.
“Never before, I don’t think, has the public had such an interest in a scientific topic from a critical perspective. ”
I disagree with ‘Never before’ but not so important in this discussion.
If you’re going to tax everyone (or change a law) based on science, then of course the public is going to (or at least so I hope) scrutinize that part of science.
That’s why it has been disappointing (and disheartening) to see how the scientific community handled crugate.
Lay people are not stupid. True we don’t have specialised knowledge/skills of those scientists, but we can smell a rotten fish. And the crugate emails smell really stink. For one I accepted AGW right before reading those emails. I think I’m not alone.
I don’t know what standard scientific community hold, but those emails are far from innocent.
“Scientists are not typically used to justifying every step of their methodology to lay people, and the effects of this are interesting.”
If scientists want public funding, they need to get used to it!
No more fishy emails, no dirty trick, no deleting data, no skewing graph, no data massaging, no more trying to using dirty tactic to eliminate alternative theories (sacking people, excluding papers from peer-review, etc).
Anon,
Yes lay people are not stupid. But those emails, as unprofessional and nasty as the few cherry picked examples are, have no impact on the mass of data that exists from a wide variety of sources.
Baby, bathwater. Use your reason.
Also, of course methodology needs to be justified and explained as best as possible. And it is for funding – if you’ve ever been involved in a grant application process.
And please, do some more research and thinking about the use of phrases such as “the trick”…it’s explained just above here. I’m sure you can think of some times in the past 10 years you’ve used casual language that could be easily misconstrued.
And even in the worst case scenario – that all the scientists involved in the scandal are lying in a mass, organised conspiracy…this still has no impact on all the other lines of evidence by other scientists the world over. But this isn’t plausible enough to be taken seriously…unless you’re one for crazy conspiracy theories, then you’re likely to believe anything…
Thanks for the reply Matt…clearer now – def. seems some terminology issues. I still think you’ve presented a clearly biased article by ignoring the cogent explanations from NIWA. But hey, that’s the whole point of blogs isn’t it.
Simon, if you read the post you’ll see I did mention NIWA’s explanations I said In response NIWA have argued that they had good reasons for adjusting the raw data in this fashion. They maintain that over a hundred years the sites where measurements have been taken have changed and so they have needed to adjust their figures upwards to correct for the distortions these changes would have made.
Then I went on to state
the issue then is whether one is justified in adjusting the data to fit what one thinks it would have been if these inaccuracies did not exist, and, if we are, how confident we can be of the results based on counter-factual speculations of this sort. I myself have no idea of the answer but certainly I think that it is fair for people to ask questions of this sort.
So I did not ignore NIWA’s explanation I explicitly summarized it and then stated that t I myself “don’t know” wether its cogent or not. To come to an informed opinion on this I would have to read all NIWA’s stuff read the counter arguments from the other side, familiarize myself with the relevant factual issues and also analysis the arguments. I have not done so, as such I remain agnostic.
Whats interesting is how you ignore what I did so, insinuate I said something else and then cast subtle insinuations against my honesty. That tends to corroborate some of what I did say in my post.
Matt,
Apologies, I should have re-read the article to make sure. You certainly didn’t ignore NIWA’s response.
The intent of my last post though was criticising how you dealt with NIWA’s response. You didn’t give much weight to it in comparison to the relatively ignorant claims against NIWA. You positioned it like an actual scientific debate, when in reality it seems very likely that the Climate Coalition guys are being intentionally misleading as they knew full well about the adjustments and the obvious reasons for them. It’s very unlikely there is any controversy here.
But like I said earlier, you have your views and background and you were making a particular point. You’re not supposed to be fully impartial.
Matt – as you have not indicated which NIWA information you read in preparation for this post I have to conclude that your evaluation, or reference to, NIWA’s situation relies only what you read in the Wishart press releases (basically the denier organisation’s report and follow up response to NIWA’s comments).
Your did pass on judgment of this issue in your title (“evasive and fallacious answers”) so you hardly have made an objective assessment.
I think that demonstrates sloppy scholarship on your part and consequently I think you have taken a partisan position and now try to wriggle out of it when the information presented shows you were wrong.
The fact remains that your posted this article, with the partisan heading, and prominently displayed the graphics taken from the Wishart’s release. This has been used around the world to accuse our scientists of fraud. And I think that is the implication you intended (but now haven’t the courage to stand by).
Similarly your continual reference to data and methods as being inaccurate and that the adjustments were aimed at producing the values that the scientists “believed” they should be.
And finally, clearly you have reacted negatively to those of us who have been explaining the science to you. But have ignored those extremely partisan commenter who have been attacking the integrity of our scientists and/or advocating extreme views on the climate change issue.
So, I must conclude you are partisan, that this has lead you to sloppy scholarship, and that you haven’t the courage to actually clearly stand by your real beliefs.
I agree with Simon that blogs are not about scholarship – they are very much about expressing views. They are usually partisan about the issues the blogger feels strongly on. But you must be a disappointment to your fellow partisans because you can’t clearly express a genuine position on this issue.
And this is more than taking a stance on a controversial subject. It actually involves questions about the integrity of NZ scientists.
.-= My last blog-post ..Deniers in denial over climate information =-.
[…] Conversation Group, who collated the paper Are we Feeling Warmer Yet? that Matt drew from in NIWA, Climategate and Evasive Fallacious Answers. This data originated from a combined research project undertaken by members of the Climate […]
Ken,
Once again all your comments reflect a failure to read critically what I actually said.
1. You write “Your did pass on judgment of this issue in your title (“evasive and fallacious answers”) so you hardly have made an objective assessment.” if you read the whole blog you’ll see I was referring to the answers Gareth made to Macdoctor. You’ll see I also gave reasons why these answers are fallacious, none of these reasons are based on NIWA data or any scientific issues. I note no one has contested my analysis of Gareth’s arguments in this comm. Thread.
2. You suggest I have misrepresent NIWA’s position. As I pointed out to Simon I summarized what I take to be NIWA’s response in my post what I actually said was
In response NIWA have argued that they had good reasons for adjusting the raw data in this fashion. They maintain that over a hundred years the sites where measurements have been taken have changed and so they have needed to adjust their figures upwards to correct for the distortions these changes would have made.
This is almost exactly how you yourself describe there position, in comments below. In fact it summarizes what Gareth says, (that is when you ignore all the name calling insults and other fallacious rhetoric that Gareth uses) . It also is the same as what Simon says when he says “As NIWA clearly explain on their website the temperature data had to be adjusted due to changes in the position of the readings.” It also reflects what. So , unless you want to suggest you are misrepresenting their position yourself, and so is Gareth and Simon, I suggest you drop this. Clearly my description of there position is as accurate as yours because it’s the same as yours.
3. The fact remains that your posted this article, with the partisan heading, and prominently displayed the graphics taken from the Wishart’s release. This has been used around the world to accuse our scientists of fraud.
I note that Gareth also displays graphics from Wisharts release on his website as well, I take it then you think he is attacking NIWA dishonestly? Obviously not, because merely displaying a graph does not entail endorsement (or for that matter a critique) of it. What matters what one goes on to say about the graphs. If you read what I actually wrote you’ll see nothing I wrote asserts or entails that NIWA were dishonest. Again this is you taking a comment I made in isolation from the context and distorting what I said.
4. your continual reference to data and methods as being inaccurate As I already have pointed out now multiple times I said the method of collecting the raw data was inaccurate. You yourself have actually agreed with me on this you write in a previous comment that “it would have been dishonest to combine data from different stations without adjusting for location, elevation, etc. Exactly, the method of collecting raw data from these different stations is inaccurate. You seem to think I am saying NIWA’s adjusting the raw data is inaccurate. The problem is I did not say this, and moreover I have repeatedly pointed out to you that this was not what I said.
5. clearly you have reacted negatively to those of us who have been explaining the science to you. But have ignored those extremely partisan commenter who have been attacking the integrity of our scientists and/or advocating extreme views on the climate change issue. Actually I merely responded to those who criticized me, as to people “explaining the science to me” that is another misreading. If I had taken a stance on the science and myself attempted to engage in science, then that might have been necessary but I didn’t. Most of my responses have been simply pointing out the failure of some scientists to read what I actually wrote.
5.You write that I said “ the adjustments were aimed at producing the values that the scientists “believed” they should be.” Again you are misquoting me out of context, as I have already pointed out to (and a simple reading of my post shows) what I said was the data was adjusted “to fit what [NIWA] thinks it would have been if these inaccuracies did not exist” the inaccuracies in question being those brought about by changes in location. I have already told you this, moreover I have also already told you, and both Glenn and I have both explained to you, that the phrase “believes” when used by people with Philosophy backgrounds simply means to think is the case, it can refer to a warrant belief or an unwarranted belief and by itself implies no judgement on the warrant for the belief. Given this has been explained to you repeatedly its hard to believe your distortion of what I said is not deliberate. A misunderstanding in terminology is one thing repeating it after it has been explained to you is another.
6. You write: I think that demonstrates sloppy scholarship on your part. I agree that if I had criticized NIWA’s analysis without actually reading it or being familiar with the ins and outs of the debate and instead relied on the partisan comments of skeptics that would be sloppy, this is why I did not do this, But this does raise the question why do you continually criticize Theologians and philosophers without actually reading the ins and outs of the philosophical debates and rely on partisan comments of unqualified skeptics like Dawkins. In fact not only have you done this you have repeatedly said this kind of scholarship is OK. Once again we are seeing you (a) distort others writings (b) keep asserting points based on these distortions after they have been pointed out to you and (c) contradicted yourself insisting on everyone treating scientists according to scholarly protocols which you ignore and disdain in every context where a scientist criticizes someone else. I put to you that this is sloppy and partisan scholarship.
.-= My last blog-post ..Anna’s Last Post =-.
Simon you wroteThe intent of my last post though was criticising how you dealt with NIWA’s response. You didn’t give much weight to it in comparison to the relatively ignorant claims against NIWA. You positioned it like an actual scientific debate, when in reality it seems very likely that the Climate Coalition guys are being intentionally misleading as they knew full well about the adjustments and the obvious reasons for them. It’s very unlikely there is any controversy here.
Ok so I am partisan because ,in a particular debate, I don’t dismiss one side as dishonest and ignorant and assert the others sides case more weight and value. I suggest that’s a fairly novel interpretation of what it means to be non-partisian.
I find the issue of AGW, and especially the recent developments, very interesting from a science in the public sphere point of view.
Never before, I don’t think, has the public had such an interest in a scientific topic from a critical perspective. (Well, maybe evolution fits in here too – but that’s a bit different). And never before have scientists had to defend themselves against such dedicated opposition. Or perhaps I’m just fallaciously highlighting the current times over history which had incidents that were just as dramatic in terms of public impact.
Scientists are not typically used to justifying every step of their methodology to lay people, and the effects of this are interesting. The balance between how much people need to really know/experience themselves and how much they trust others’ knowledge is intriguing. Also interesting is how this changes with the topic – how much the topic impacts on the person’s belief systems etc.
Yeah these deeper philosophical/epistemological issues interest me to. I think the evolution issue is an interesting example. I think the issues in both these debates are similar; it comes down to the difference between thinking that science is a reliable method of gaining truth ( or empirically adequate theories) and thinking science is the onlyreliable method for gaining truth.
If one holds to the latter view then the scientific consensus should always be followed. If one takes the former then while one will in general respect the scientific consensus, there might be times when current science says one thing and but information we gain from some other method or discipline tells us another. This clash will force people to decide which method they think trumps the other and there will be a kind of turf war for dominance.
In evolution what happens is that the scientific consensus comes into conflict with what some people believe is a correct theological position. In AGW the scientific consensus is used to infer certain moral or political conclusions. People who consider there to be sources of theological knowledge or knowledge about morality and politics independent of science then can suddenly be in a position where they have what they think are reliably formed beliefs about something which is contradicted by the scientific consensus, they will need to choose therefore which source to believe. Then their comes a kind of conflict or fight for which source has dominance.
This I expect explains the vitrol of scientists I mention above, powerful instiutions behave that way when their monopoly is challenged
I think this is the real interesting question, suppose something I think I know from a reliable source P conflicts with what is the current scientific consensus, am I rationally required to always follow the scientific consensus. I myself think that sometimes you are and sometimes you are not.
Take evolution, it might be that the evidence for evolutionary theory is much stronger than the evidence for the contention that Genesis should be read literally. But it also might not be, one would need to look at both the empirical science and the theological exegetical questions to answer it. Similarly with AGW if there are certain restrictions on human freedom which appear unjust and tyrannical and which appear to be plausibly implied by AGW, then one might ask whether the empirical evidence in favour of AGM is as certain as the conclusion that such policies are unjustified.
You might think that moral and political conclusions can never trump scientific ones, I am not so sure. My response to some socio-biological accounts of ethics are like this, I am quite certain that raping little children really is morally wrong. Far more certain of this than any socio-biological theory which entails that morality is really an illusion which we mistakenly believe for survival purposes, the evidence for such theories does not struck me as any where as compelling as my belief that raping children is really wrong. In fact there are few things I am as certain of as this claim.
I also think its fair that if science is going to speak in certain contexts such as morality and theology then those who have moral and theological positions have a right to question the methodologies of science and examine its contributions to their field, just as a scientist would demand do so of a theologian or ethicist that presumed to write on science.
Ken unfortunately only wants it one way, he wants us to always listen to the scientific consensus, to not criticise it unless we have studied the science ourselves. Yet thinks supports scientists making comments about religion and ethics with little or no knowledge or training in these issues, often ignoring the feild all together. That is what separates me from him
Matt,
Just picking out one point, as we seem to have reached the limit of usefulness of internet/text discussions 🙂
I’m interested to know something from you, given your philosophy & theology background. Do you personally draw a distinction between theological/philosophical knowledge and scientific/evidence-based knowledge?
I.e. would you say, that for living life here on earth, one is more valuable than the other? That for explaining the natural world as we can sense it, one is more valuable than the other?
If you could answer relatively concisely without getting too philosophical that would be great 🙂 But maybe that’s impossible with this topic…
Matt wrote: “it comes down to the difference between thinking that science is a reliable method of gaining truth ( or empirically adequate theories) and thinking science is the only reliable method for gaining truth.”
A bit off topic now, but on that note of the word ’empirically’, here’s an interesting article from a former atheist. The article: http://atheism-analyzed.net/First%20Principles.htm
“In other words, Naturalism and Materialism declare that intuition and other transcendences cannot exist, yet the basis for Naturalism and Materialism is itself necessarily intuitive and transcendent.
So Naturalism and Materialism deny their own foundational validity, and thus are paradoxical (violate the Principle of Non-Contradiction), and so are neither coherent nor valid.
This paradox is fatal, rationally speaking, for Naturalism and Materialism, but not for Empiricism, because Empiricism has voluntarily chosen to limit its range of investigation, and, in theory any way, does not say anything at all about transcendences or about value systems, except that they are out of the range of the testability and verification constraints placed upon Empirical processes. (Empiricism is a process, not a worldview or value system).
In this manner Empiricism retains its validity as a process for obtaining information about physical reality. Naturalism and Materialism are seen to be invalid, non-coherent worldviews, spun off from Empiricism, but no longer identical to it.”
I repeat, Matt, that your treatment of this issue does show poor scholarship. Actually partisan scholarship. This assessment of mine is supported by your current promotion of the political campaign by ACT and the denier groups to attack the integrity of our scientists (Auckland Public Meeting: Climategate, NIWA and the ETS).
It is also supported by Madeleine’s admission that you drew on the deniers’ report “Are we Feeling Warmer Yet?” for this post. I have repeatedly asked you which NIWA sources you consulted and your refusal to answer surely confirms that your presentation of the NIWA position relied only on that report.
By any academic assessment that is indeed poor scholarship. (Actually also poor judgment and questionable ethics) .And your evasive response to my requests is also poor. It seems that in these situations your theological training encourages a jelly wresting response of self justification.
However, in the hope that there may still be readers here who feel they deserve a less partisan analysis and information. Have a look at the most recent NIWA release NIWA – Temperature trends from raw data.
This takes the publicly available data from the climate data base for 11 met stations over the period since 1930. Because no significant station shifts were made in this period the raw data can be considered without adjustments (Note it was the deniers dishonest combination of data from different stations without adjustment which led to the original denier report.).
The data shows a temperature increase over the 78 year period of about a degree. For a graphic summary look at this figure:
http://www.niwa.co.nz/__data/assets/image/0009/99837/varieties/flash.jpg
I won’t comment here on your more recent comments – although I think they are getting to the heart of the matter. Your anti-NIWA position is not based on evidence, rather on an anti-science position inherent in your theology/philosophy. This is a continuing discussion (consider Galielo, etc.) which I will be commenting on more on my own blog. Similarly you lecturing comments on “belief” and “knowledge” are a diversion, but do illustrate that you have a basic misunderstanding of scientific epistemology (probably inevitable with your theology/philosophy) and maybe that is why you have misrepresented the NIWA position. But of course this is also an ongoing discussion.
.-= My last blog-post ..Remove support for child abuse =-.
So basically, Ken knows you have poor scholarship and a partisan attitude, Matt, because you agree with people in ACT who are also sceptics, and as everyone (obviously) knows, if you agree with other sceptics, you’re partisan.
The only way not to lose a debate is not debating at all … or quit when your arguments are getting weaker and weaker as you get closer to the bottom of the issue 😉
Basically you have it right Glenn – except you missed the bit about Matt’s confirmation bias. Relying on his ACT and denier mates and refusing to access the reliable information from the horse’s mouth -NIWA.
But then again he had his own anti-science agenda, as do you.
.-= My last blog-post ..New Zealand’s climate change deniers’ distortions exposed. =-.
Oh, so now you’re saying that Matt relies on ACT?
Ken, I suppose this means (since you’re clearly a fair minded person) that anyone believing in man made global warming who agrees with others whi share the same view must thereby be seen as partisan?
I mean, it’s not like you would employ a double standard or anything.
What exactly are the characteristics of someone who is anti-science (has anti-science agenda)?
Australia Rejects Cap and Trade Tax, New Zealand Caught Hiding the Decline…
New Zealand may be hiding the decline, too
And finally, Watts Up With That is reporting about a conflict between New Zealand’s official climate data and the raw climate data. (H/T MandM, Evolution News)…
I would also be interested in seeing NIWA code as well as them exactly explaining mathematically how they arrived at the ‘corrections’. It is interesting to see how the East Anglia University did it (http://winteryknight.wordpress.com/)!
Stephen – go to New Zealand’s climate change deniers’ distortions exposed or Temperature trends from raw data to see the graphic presentation of raw data – no corrections applied. In this case there is no attempt to combine data from separate stations (as was done dishonestly by the Climate Conversation Group, etc.
No need for codes or mathematical explanations – although you can certainly find that if you look.
.-= My last blog-post ..New Zealand’s climate change deniers’ distortions exposed. =-.
Anon, I have seen Ken use the term “anti-science” so often that I am able to comment on the pattern that shows what the term means to him: It means that a person doesn’t share Ken’s views on what is true and what is not, whether it be epistemology, global warming or the history of science. It is certaionly not a descriptor that indicates that a person is uninformed in the subject being discussed. It is only ever applied to people who don’t agree with what Ken wants everyone to say and think.
That’s what is revealed by the way he uses the term. It’ll be interesting to see what he thinks he’s saying when he applies that label.
I repeat, Matt, that your treatment of this issue does show poor scholarship I am not surprised that you “repeat” yourself. it appears a tactic of yours, make a false claim based on a misreading of someone else’s work, and then after its pointed out, repeat the claim and then repeat it again.
But seeing I need to say it again, I did not say NIWA was wrong, nor did I claim ACT is correct, nor did I claim the “denier” was right. I said I did not know, period, got it yet.
I won’t comment here on your more recent comments – although I think they are getting to the heart of the matter. Your anti-NIWA position is not based on evidence, rather on an anti-science position inherent in your theology/philosophy.
I see, because I said science is one way of gaining reliable information about reality but not the only way. I am anti science. I also think that mathematics is one way of gaining information about reality, but no the only way, ( it can’t tell me wifes name for example) so presumably by parity I must be anti math. I also must be anti theology as well because I don’t think theological reflection is the only way to know things either.
All this response on your part show is that you conflate science, with scientism. They are not the same thing.
This is a continuing discussion (consider Galielo, etc.)
No that had nothing to do with science, it’s a question of history.
Similarly you lecturing comments on “belief” and “knowledge” are a diversion, but do illustrate that you have a basic misunderstanding of scientific epistemology (probably inevitable with your theology/philosophy) and maybe that is why you have misrepresented the NIWA position.
I see, saying that knowledge involves in part a belief means that I don’t understand scientific epistemology. ‘
Ken this is an incredibly ignorant statement. As I have pointed out to you, almost every epistemologist in the world accepts that knowledge at least belief, that is to know p one has to think p, if one things p is false, or one does not have an opinion one way or the other they don’t know it is true. If what you said was true then apparently every epistemologist in the world, including almost all the worlds leading philosophers of science, don’t understand the epistemology of science. Apparently some soil scientist in NZ with no training in epistemology is the only one who does.
Perhaps I should refer you to Iapetus comments on your own blog. Iapetus wrote
“ This is indeed the definition that was used by philosophers from Plato and Aristotle onwards. Incidentally, “Belief” in this case is not limited to a religious, faith-based belief, but refers to any proposition that one is prepared to affirm as true. As a matter of fact, the condition that “knowledge” must be a true belief is pretty self-evident and not in serious dispute.”
He went on to state
“Although I am not Ken’s and Heraclides’ spokesperson, I would very much doubt that either of them would deny that a “true belief” constitutes “knowledge”. ..
Ken explicitly stated that he would not consider a false scientific theory to be “knowledge”. As I understood him, he merely pointed out that all scientific theories are provisional and may be improved or discarded if new data comes in.”
So by your definition Iapetus does not understand scientific epistemology either and neither apparently according to Iapetus do you.
There is of course the usual contradiction here, you have repeatedly come in here and demanded that we not question the scientific consensus unless we carefully read peer reviewed articles put out by scientists first. As soon however as it comes to an Philosophical position that is not in serious dispute and around which these is a consensus disagree with it can be dismissed as “jelly wresting” or “lecturing” without examination.
.-= My last blog-post ..Christmas Gifts for Bloggers =-.
Do you personally draw a distinction between theological/philosophical knowledge and scientific/evidence-based knowledge?
As you have drawn the distinction is suggests that science is “evidence based” whereas theology and philosophy are not. I would not grant that point at all.
But, putting that aside, I do grant a distinction between philosophical knowledge and scientific knowledge.
The problem is that sometimes there is overall in what different disciplines address. In the situation its possible to have scientific reasons for thinking X and philosophical reasons for thinking not X. For example there are some philosophical arguments which purport to show the universe had a beginning, these contend certain metaphysical impossibilities ensue if you deny this. A scientific theory like the steady state theory would contradict this. I don’t think one can say aprori that in cases like this the scientific argument is the correct one. Nor can we say the philosophical one is, we would have to examine both and come to a conclusion based on that.
I.e. would you say, that for living life here on earth, one is more valuable than the other? That for explaining the natural world as we can sense it, one is more valuable than the other?
To some extent it depends, some philosophical questions such as what constitutes a proper name are probably fairly trivial next to studies on how to cure various diseases.
But I think in general religion and philosophy address some of the big existential questions such as who am I what purpose do I have, They also answer the moral questions such as how should I live. And I think in general its more important to answer these questions than many scientific ones. In fact the reason we want to know how to cure diseases etc is often due to the fact that we think other people who are sick have significance value etc and we “should” help them, in which was the scientific endeavor finds its value and significance within a broader philosophical/theological framework.
Part of the problem with the global warming issue is that it’s used to justify certain moral positions and also frequently as part of a broader philosophical/theological view of the universe environment, mans place in it etc., it functions as a kind of eschatology. If one thinks that this broader perspective is flawed, then one needs to ask how much of the science is sound independently of these issues and how much depends upon them. These are the same issues that arise in the evolution debate, when scientists use evolution to justify atheism or naturalism one needs to ask whether evolution is defensible independently of a naturalistic perspective or whether its acceptability ultimately depends on this perspective in some way. It may well be that some form of theistic evolution is viable and so evolution can be detached from naturalism. But that does not mean that people should not ask the question in the first place? What bothers me is the way people are ridiculed and castigated as ignorant fundamentalists (which they often aren’t) for raising the question.
Seems like I just found another “anti-science” group for Ken to add to his hitlist.
http://www.rainbowwellington.org.nz/BloodDonationSep2009.asp
“In modern Western societies a problem with science is it can come to see the body of knowledge it creates as the only knowledge that is real. This is a dangerous illusion”
“Science offers us a discourse and we use it in combination with other discourses to make ourselves and to form a basis for what we do.”
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This is an amazing snippet from Costella on Climategate.
July 3, 2002: email 1057941657
The Director of Climate Research, Otto Kinne, investigated the complaints about the editorial and refereeing process, and wrote:
Dear colleagues, In my [20 June 2003] email to you I stated, among other things, that I would ask C[limate] R[esearch] editor Chris de Freitas to present to me copies of the reviewers’ evaluations for the [two] Soon et al. papers. I have received and studied the material requested. Conclusions: 1) The reviewers consulted (4 for each m[anu]s[cript]) by the editor presented detailed, critical and helpful evaluations. 2) The editor properly analyzed the evaluations and requested appropriate revisions. 3) The authors revised their manuscripts accordingly. Summary: Chris de Freitas has done a good and correct job as editor.
Mike Mann:
It seems to me that this ‘Kinne’ character’s words are disingenuous, and probably supports what De Freitas is trying to do. It seems clear we have to go above him. I think that the community should, as Mike H has previously suggested in this eventuality, terminate its involvement with this journal at all levels—reviewing, editing, and submitting, and leave it to wither way into oblivion and disrepute.
Tom Wigley writes:
I agree that Kinne seems like he could be a deFreitas clone. However, what would be our legal position if we were to openly and extensively tell people to avoid the journal?
Ben Santer writes:
Based on Kinne’s editorial, I see little hope for more enlightened editorial decision making at Climate Research. Tom, Richard Smith and I will eventually publish a rebuttal to the Douglass et al. paper. We’ll publish this rebuttal in [the Journal of Geophysical Research]—not in Climate Research.
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