Wednesday, February 03, 2010

Michael Mann Exonerated

Penn State has issued a phase one ruling on the inquiry into Michael Mann's conduct. They found there was no substance to the first three allegations, and said that while they could find no evidence to substantiate the fourth, they would convene a phase two inquiry on it, for which a committee of faculty has been appointed.

It is important to get the word on this out before the denialists grab the report and start distorting it.


Allegation 1: Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions with the intent to suppress or falsify data?

Decision: NO. Michael Mann did not
engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions with the intent to suppress or falsify data
------------------------------

Allegation 2: Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions with the intent to delete, conceal or otherwise destroy emails, information and/or data, related to AR4, as suggested by Phil Jones?

Decision: NO. Michael Mann did not engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, with the intent to delete, conceal or otherwise destroy emails, information and/or data, related to AR4, as suggested by Phil Jones
---------------------------

Allegation 3: Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any misuse of privileged or confidential information available to you in your capacity as an academic scholar?

Decision: NO. Michael Mann did not engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any misuse of privileged or confidential information available to you in your capacity as an academic scholar
---------------------------

Eli humbly suggests that the mice list examples of people who accused Mann of these, so we may inquire for an apology. Links will be filled in.

Allegation 4. Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting, or reporting research or other scholarly activities?

The committee of inquiry could, in their words, find no evidence of a violation on the fourth one, they believed that further inquiry was warranted given the public outcry.

Francesca Grifa of the Union of Concerned Scientists points out that

"The remaining question relates to whether Dr. Mann's conduct eroded public trust in the integrity of climate change science and climate scientists. Because different branches of science have different cultures, the committee—comprised solely of administrators—didn't feel it had the standing to pass judgment.

"Unfortunately, climate contrarians are already misrepresenting this finding to foster doubt regarding the strong scientific consensus on climate change. These baseless attacks on the character of scientists and the credibility of their institutions are intended to divert public attention from the challenge of addressing the real-world consequences of climate change.


Eli wants to get this out there because Morano and Co are already in full cry about the phase two inquiry. Remind everyone that on three of the four charges McIntyre, Morano, Myron Ebell and Co were shown to be pond scum.

Mann has issued a response to the report

"I am very pleased that, after a thorough review, the independent Penn State committee found no evidence to support any of the allegations against me.

Three of the four allegations have been dismissed completely. Even though no evidence to substantiate the fourth allegation was found, the University administrators thought it best to convene a separate committee of distinguished scientists to resolve any remaining questions about academic procedures.

This is very much the vindication I expected since I am confident I have done nothing wrong.

I fully support the additional inquiry which may be the best way to remove any lingering doubts. I intend to cooperate fully in this matter – as I have since the beginning of the process."

More details below the fold
Beginning on and about November 22, 2009, The Pennsylvania State University began to receive numerous communications (emails, phone calls and letters) accusing Dr. Michael E. Mann of having engaged in acts that included manipulating data, destroying records and colluding to hamper the progress of scientific discourse around the issue of anthropogenic global warming from approximately 1998. These accusations were based on perceptions of the content of the widely reported theft of emails from a server at the Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia in Great Britain.
Given the sheer volume of the communications to Penn State, the similarity of their content and their sources, which included University alumni, federal and state politicians, and others, many of whom had had no relationship with Penn State, it was concluded that the matter required examination by the cognizant University official
All these communications were, as you might have expected given the source, incoherent. The University attempted a synthesis of the charges flying about
At the time of initiation of the inquiry, and in the ensuing days during the inquiry, no formal allegations accusing Dr. Mann of research misconduct were submitted to any University official. As a result, the emails and other communications were reviewed by Dr. Pell and from these she synthesized the following four formal allegations. To be clear, these were not allegations that Dr. Pell put forth, or leveled against Dr. Mann, but rather were her best effort to reduce to allegation form the many different accusations that were received from parties outside of the University. The four synthesized allegations were as follows together with the phase one ruling:
Allegation 1: Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions with the intent to suppress or falsify data?

Finding 1. After careful consideration of all the evidence and relevant materials, the inquiry committee finding is that there exists no credible evidence that Dr. Mann had or has ever engaged in, or participated in, directly or indirectly, any actions with an intent to suppress or to falsify data. While a perception has been created in the weeks after the CRU emails were made public that Dr. Mann has engaged in the suppression or falsification of data, there is no credible evidence that he ever did so, and certainly not while at Penn State. In fact to the contrary, in instances that have been focused upon by some as indicating falsification of data, for example in the use of a “trick” to manipulate the data, this is explained as a discussion among Dr. Jones and others including Dr. Mann about how best to put together a graph for a World Meteorological Organization (WMO) report. They were not falsifying data; they were trying to construct an understandable graph for those who were not experts in the field. The so-called “trick”1 was nothing more than a statistical method used to bring two or more different kinds of data sets together in a legitimate fashion by a technique that has been reviewed by a broad array of peers in the field.

Footnote: The word trick as used in this email has stirred some suspicion. However, trick is often used in context to describe a mathematical insight that solves the problem. For example, see in a classic text on quantum mechanics by David Parks: "The foregoing explanation of the velocity paradox involves no new assumptions; the basic trick, the representation of a modulated wave as the superposition of two (or more) unmodulated ones, has already been used to explain interference phenomena..." pg. 21, Introduction to Quantum Theory, David Parks, Third Edition, Dover 1992.

Decision 1. As there is no substance to this allegation, there is no basis for further examination of this allegation in the context of an investigation in the second phase of RA-10.
Allegation 2: Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions with the intent to delete, conceal or otherwise destroy emails, information and/or data, related to AR4, as suggested by Phil Jones?

Finding 2. After careful consideration of all the evidence and relevant materials, the inquiry committee finding is that there exists no credible evidence that Dr. Mann had ever engaged in, or participated in, directly or indirectly, any actions with intent to delete, conceal or otherwise destroy emails, information and/or data related to AR4, as suggested by Dr. Phil Jones. Dr. Mann has stated that he did not delete emails in response to Dr. Jones’ request. Further, Dr. Mann produced upon request a full archive of his emails in and around the time of the preparation of AR4. The archive contained e-mails related to AR4.

Decision 2. As there is no substance to this allegation, there is no basis for further examination of this allegation in the context of an investigation in the second phase of RA-10.

Allegation 3: Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any misuse of privileged or confidential information available to you in your capacity as an academic scholar?

Finding 3. After careful consideration of all the evidence and relevant materials, the inquiry committee finding is that there exists no credible evidence that Dr. Mann had ever engaged in, or participated in, directly or indirectly, any misuse of privileged or confidential information available to him in his capacity as an academic scholar. In media reports and blogs about Dr. Mann and other paleoclimatologists, those who are named in the CRU email files are purported to have been engaged in conspiratorial discussions indicative of a misuse of privileged or confidential information. Although it is not clear where the exact accusation lies in this with respect to Dr. Mann, it is inferred that the emails prove the case. Those who have formed this view feel that, in their capacity as reviewers, Dr. Mann and his colleagues had early access to manuscripts from other authors with whom they disagreed, and that they could somehow act on those to reject them for publication. Actually, when one does due diligence on this matter, and asks about what papers were involved, one finds that enormous confusion has been caused by interpretations of the emails and their content. In some cases, the discussion and related debate centered on papers that were about to emerge which members of the purported conspiracy had written, but which were simply under embargo. In other cases, the discussion and related debate centered on papers that have emerged in otherwise notable scientific journals, which they deemed to have been published with a lower standard of scholarly and scientific scrutiny. The committee found no research misconduct in this. Science often involves different groups who have very different points of view, arguing for the intellectual dominance of their viewpoint, so that that viewpoint becomes the canonical one. We point to Kuhn2 as an authority on how science is done, before it is accepted as “settled.”

Decision 3. As there is no substance to this allegation, there is no basis for further examination of this allegation in the context of an investigation in the second phase of RA-10.

Allegation 4. Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting, or reporting research or other scholarly activities?

Finding 4. After careful consideration of all the evidence and relevant materials, the inquiry committee could not make a definitive finding whether there exists any evidence to substantiate that Dr. Mann did engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions that deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting, or reporting research or other scholarly activities. It is the case that there has been a public outcry from some quarters that Dr. Mann and his colleagues did deviate from what some observers claim to be standard academic practice. All disciplines and scientific fields work within broad bounds of “accepted scientific” practice that apply to all researchers. However, within different disciplines of science there are additional elements of accepted practice that may be specific to those disciplines and therefore are different from those of other disciplines and fields. For example, accepted practices in a field of pure mathematics, such as number theory, may differ markedly from those in a field such as socio-biology. This is axiomatic. That said, the committee could not make a definitive finding on this allegation for reasons that follow. . . .
followed by a summary of relevant Penn State research policies
Decision 4. Given that information emerged in the form of the emails purloined from CRU in November 2009, which have raised questions in the public’s mind about Dr. Mann’s conduct of his research activity, given that this may be undermining confidence in his findings as a scientist, and given that it may be undermining public trust in science in general and climate science specifically, the inquiry committee believes an investigatory committee of faculty peers from diverse fields should be constituted under RA-10 to further consider this allegation.

In sum, the overriding sentiment of this committee, which is composed of University administrators, is that allegation #4 revolves around the question of accepted faculty conduct surrounding scientific discourse and thus merits a review by a committee of faculty scientists. Only with such a review will the academic community and other interested parties likely feel that Penn State has discharged it responsibility on this matter.


100 comments:

Angliss said...

There's already so much spin hitting this one that we'll be affecting the the Earth's axial tilt soon. And I've seen many, many comments at other sites that essentially claim that Penn State is in on the conspiracy and/or that PSU can't be objective because it takes money from the feds.

Paranoid and irrational much, people?

Truth about Mann said...

What, no scientific fascism? How disappointing.

http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2009/12/03/climategate-exxon-fascism/

carrot eater said...

They pretty much say that the complaints they received were so incoherent, they had trouble putting together concise allegations.

Angliss: We're dealing with tin-foil hatters here. What do you expect, rational thought?

Phil said...

The Guardian today has a story from Fred Pearce: "Climate scientists have long been targets for sceptics"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/cif-green/2010/feb/03/hacked-climate-emails-sceptics-funding

Angliss said...

carrot eater: Expect rational thought? Not really, but I hope sometimes. It would be nice if, once in a while, a tin-foil hatter woudl come up with something better than "Of course PSU would exonerate Mann - it would hurt their reputation if they didn't!"

A false exoneration would be far, far, FAR more damaging to PSU's rep when it was discovered. PSU has nothing to gain by exonerating Mann falsely and everything to lose, especially given the excellent reputation of PSU's atmospheric sciences department. When I was getting my BSEE at Penn State in the 1990s, it was considered to be in the top 5 or so best schools in the country for meteorology and climatology.

dhogaza said...

"Eli humbly suggests that the mice list examples of people who accused Mann of these, so we may inquire for an apology. Links will be filled in."

Well, someone with too much time on their hands *could* FOIA the Uni.

Anonymous said...

It has been announced today by the Nazi High Committee; after careful review of his public statements had concluded that Adolph Hilter, did not lie about his behavior. He was after all, just following his scientists study and observations dealing with the state of approved occult practises as understood by the masses in those days. He cannot be blamed for things he did not fully understand at that time. Now is the time for the world; to move past the past and allow the State to move us all into the next new reality! Swift as a Starling, tough as a Bunny... Have A Nice Day:)

Anonymous said...

Here's the straight scoop from Faux News. "Spin", indeed!

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/02/03/penn-st-investigating-scientist-research-misconduct/?test=latestnews

dhogaza said...

Someone from the university should demand a retraction from Fox. Mann has been explicitly cleared of research misconduct, as the full report from the University makes clear.

CapitalClimate said...

But, but, when did he stop beating his wife?

Anonymous said...

Must have caused a pretty serious disruption to his work.

Don't you just know that it will be the very same people asking why they were not told that climate change was comming.

Little Mouse

Angliss said...

Fox's spin is NOTHING like what I'm reading out of some of the wackier sources. Dellingpole at the Telegraph, wmar's comments at Dot Earth, Pajamasmedia, Michelle Malkin and all the commenters there, American Spectator, and many more.

Anonymous said...

This is good and cheering news,

The Lorax

bigcitylib said...

Interesting that they should even go ahead with the further investigation on the 4th point. Seems almost a sop to the "public interest". Of course Mann will be exonerated and or it will end in confusion. What are accepted scientific practices in the first place? The committee has already trotted out Kuhn; once Popper makes the scene they will achieve 100% philosophical vacuuity.

PS. Wanna read about "mean girl" behavior among scientists, try Hull's "Science as Process" about the "clade wars", or maybe dig through the old archives at the dinosaur list. There were coups, countercoups, boycotts, journals started up to publish stuff that couldn't get published in the extant journals. In comparison, climate scientists are sissys.

dhogaza said...

Interesting that they should even go ahead with the further investigation on the 4th point. Seems almost a sop to the "public interest".

They're trying to forestall as many claims of "whitewashing" as they possibly can.

It's hopeless, but understandable.

Robert P. said...

In its attempt to exonerate Mann for his "trick", the report cites a purportedly innocuous use of the word in "Introduction to Quantum Theory, David Parks, Third Edition, Dover 1992." However, a search for "David Parks" on the Dover Website,
http://store.doverpublications.com/, yields

"Sorry, no matches were found."

Try it yourself - see if you can find any evidence of the existence of such a textbook on the Dover website. Can we conclude that the investigating committee is fabricating citations to nonexistent quantum theory textbooks in order to cover for Dr. Mann ?

Is it irresponsible to speculate? Surely, it would be irresponsible not to.

bigcitylib said...

Rp_sq:

OH MY! The jig is up! And I never realized before: Al Gore is FAT!!!

Anonymous said...

Well, RP-sqrd,

I didn't realize that the UCLA engineering school was such a nefarious place.

I remember learning a number of cool "tricks" (as the profs put it) when I was a student there.

One such devious "trick" was to use Fourier transforms to simplify the computation of convolutions and correlations. Vewwy sneaky!

David B. Benson said...

RP_sqrd --- Learn to spell the name of famous physicists.
David Park's book

Jeez...

[word verification is "skinsin". I agree.]

Jim Eager said...

David Benson, oh no, don't tell them our most secret tricks!

David B. Benson said...

Jim Eager --- Every trick in the book and a few more. :-)

Steve Bloom said...

Coherence and proper spelling, David? Please, you'll give them an inferiority complex. :)

Anonymous said...

This was posted at CA @ 12:29 am 4 Feb 2009:

"Mr. McIntyre,

Were you one of the complainants against Mann? If so, could we please see the correspondence that you sent to Penn State? Thanks.

So one can conclude that you would have no reservations with someone using FIPPA to see all your UofT emails (sent and received and cc’d and deleted) that may make reference to CA, Mann, CRU, CanWest, David Rose, Friends of Science, Tom Harris, IPCC etc.? Just to make sure that you are on the up and up; of course you are probably clean, just as Mann is, but people are asking questions. Same goes for your colleague McKitrick. The results of all such investigations should be made publically available, including transcripts of all interviews with you and Ross, should it come to that.

Given the important nature of your work here at CA, people have the right to see unequivocal proof that you were telling the truth when you stated that “Everyhting that I’ve [SteveM] done in this, I’ve done in good faith”.

With those important details out of the way, you and Mann could then return to advancing the science."

RockyMtn

Anonymous said...

Correction the post was made at 12:29 am on 4 Feb 2010

Tired cousin Pika...

No One said...

Awesome !!!

That means he can continue to stick his nose in the air and smile that smug smile of his !

Eat THAT, denialists !

Best,

N

Roger Jones said...

I'm reading Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge Lakatos I and Musgrave L, Cambridge University Press 1970, with essays be Popper, Kuhn, Lakatos, Feyeraband et al. In an essay entitled The Nature of a Paradigm Margaret Masterman from Cambridge U uses the trick word many times.

There is a very old etymology of the word trick being used in this sense. Language was not invented yesterday.

carrot eater said...

Books about the philosophy or general practice of science sound like the most boring things possible to me.

Anonymous said...

Angliss, you wrote: "A false exoneration would be far, far, FAR more damaging to PSU's rep when it was discovered. PSU has nothing to gain by exonerating Mann falsely and everything to lose, especially given the excellent reputation of PSU's atmospheric sciences department."

Exactly. Those who are claiming whitewash clearly have no idea how universities work, and how universities maintain their standings. I also notice that many who are crying foul haven't bothered to notice what the parameters of the investigation have been. Sheesh.

Lars Karlsson said...

If you wish to avoid brain damage, then don't read what Delingpole and his admirers write about the issue. It suffices to say that Delingpole compares Mann to OJ in the headline...

And now off to rehabilitation.

amoeba said...

RP_sqrd said...
'In its attempt to exonerate Mann for his "trick", the report cites a purportedly innocuous use of the word in "Introduction to Quantum Theory, David Parks, Third Edition, Dover 1992." However, a search for "David Parks" on the Dover Website,
http://store.doverpublications.com/, yields

"Sorry, no matches were found."'

Strangely, Amazon.com are selling this exact book!

http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Quantum-Theory-David-Park/dp/0486441377

Methinks someone has been drinking the kool-aide!

turboblocke said...

http://store.doverpublications.com/0486441377.html

It's "An Introduction to the Quantum Theory"

Boris said...

"Is it irresponsible to speculate? Surely, it would be irresponsible not to."

At least we don't have to speculate about you being an absolute idiot. You have kindly confirmed our hypothesis. Thanks.

skanky said...

RP_sqrd *is* Delingpole and I claim my five pounds.

carrot eater said...

Is it possible the RP^2 post was parody? I haven't made note of this commenter before, so I don't know what this person is like.

Steve Bloom said...

carrot eater, to borrow a famous construction:

"The contributions of any sufficently ignorant commenter will become indistinguishable from parody."

Anonymous said...

A warning to everyone. This is what happens when one asks blunt and awkward questions as CA (this is the blog moderator's response to my challenges, yes I was pushing their buttons, but this?):

"Jean S: I've checked your math skills, and they don't impress me much. After checking your IP, I think you have no business of being rude and hostile on this site. Your comments are OT, and from now on I will simply delete all of your comments unless they are strictly on the topic. You've been warned."


That sounds like a threat to me.

Marco said...

"after checking your IP" ???
Boohoo, we don't want to get difficult questions! Bow to the McIntyre! Now go back to Realclimate where they censor, whereas we do not!

Robert P. said...

Carrot Eater: yes, it was a parody. I thought that the Peggy Noonan quote ("Is it irresponsible to speculate? It would be irresponsible not to.") would make that obvious; maybe it's not that well known in these quarters. I was trying to ridicule the act of rejecting an entire document on the basis of an isolated typo (the report cites the author as "David Parks", and entering that name into Dover's search engine gives exactly the result described. Sorry.

Anonymous said...

Skeptics knew this inquiry would be a whitewash before it even started. Given your obsession with our blogs, I'm sure you already knew that.

The IP comment means "we know who you are, and you're well-known for being a jerk. Stop it."

Anonymous said...

MarkeyMouse quotes:
"February 03, 2010
Allison C. LernerInspector General
National Science Foundation
Office of Inspector General
4201 Wilson Boulevard
Arlington, VA 22230

Dear Ms. Lerner:

This is a follow-up to my letter of December 2, 2009 and concerns today’s announcement by Penn State University that it has concluded its initial inquiry into possible research misconduct by one of the University’s researchers, Dr. Michael Mann. Penn State’s internal inquiry found further investigation is warranted to determine if Dr. Mann "engaged in, directly or indirectly, any actions that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting or reporting research or other scholarly activities."

While I firmly agree that Penn State’s investigation is warranted and must commence without delay, there are federal laws and policies implicated in this matter, including your “Research Misconduct” regulations, Title 45 CFR Part 689, that go beyond the scope of Penn State’s inquiry. Therefore, in order to have a full and complete accounting of this matter, I request that you now begin a formal investigation of the allegations against Dr. Mann.

Among other laws and regulations, I ask that you investigate compliance with, or violations of, OMB administrative procedures, 2 CFR Part 215 (OMB Circular A-110), in particular 2 CFR §215.36; Freedom of Information Act 5 U.S.C. §552 (NSF Regulation, 45 CFR Part 612); NSF guidelines implementing OMB information quality guidelines (515 Guidelines); Federal False Claims Act, 18 U.S.C. §287, and 31 U.S.C. §§3729-33; and Federal False Statements Act, 18 U.S.C §1001. Finally, given that Dr. Mann was at the University of Virginia from 1999 until 2005, I also request that you inquire whether his activities at the University of Virginia are implicated in this matter and within your jurisdiction.

Sincerely,

James M. Inhofe

Ranking Member

Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works" http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=95a85493-802a-23ad-4090-ba6c1b31b031&Region_id=&Issue_id=

When the Repubs have a majority on the Committees (soon) Mann will be toasted. Not so fast with your pathetic "exoneration" The naughty Mann studies were done before he was at Penn State.

Anonymous said...

Anyone who looks at Mann and cannot easily determine he is an egotistical, arrogant jerk is an idiot. Further, anyone honestly reading his emails and the tone of his nature is readily apparent, defensive, always right (legend in his own mind"), vindictive whiner. PSU clearing him is like a Democratic Congressional Committee "clearing" a fellow member. Its a joke.

EliRabett said...

As far as commenting in places where you are not welcome, there is always TOR

http://www.torproject.org/

Anonymous said...

Random anonymous

FWIW James M. Inhofe [AFAIK] is a young earth creationist. So paleoclimate, especially ice-cores or anything that goes back >6,000 years is a distinct no-no.

In the case of Prof. Mann, it must be the fact as I understand it that Inhofe is in the pockets of the FF industry.

Religion may not be incompatible with science, but religious fundamentalism combined with wingnutism and corruption certainly is.
--
Verification 'wisele' sounds-like weasely [stoat?]. Mustelids and Rabbets don't mix. Or rather, they mix in the wrong way.

EliRabett said...

Gentlebunnies, we have been POED

carrot eater said...

Dear Anonymous: Perhaps you'd like to send a letter to Penn State, informing them that being arrogant is a breach of their policies.

Dear RP^2: Good parody. As you saw, I thought as much.

Dear Markey: Took a glance, and I see that Mann's affiliation for MBH98/99 was UMass. What more you could possibly hope to find out about those papers, I can't imagine. They've been dissected every which way.

Anonymous said...

Carrot Eator said, "Perhaps you'd like to send a letter to Penn State, informing them that being arrogant is a breach of their policies."

Funny I do not remember making such a claim.

Neven said...

"When the Repubs have a majority on the Committees (soon) Mann will be toasted."

Why don't you organise a military junta just to be sure? BURN THE WITCH!

carrot eater said...

Yeah, Inhofe has been explicit about his creationism. Apparently we can't change our environment, only God can.

I don't think it's even possible for any scientists in the field to be young earth creationists (their heads would explode from the contradictions), but one does suspect that the tendencies of some are informed in some way by their religion. After all, an Earth created by God with the express purpose of being habitable should have negative feedbacks designed into it, shouldn't it? It only makes sense, doesn't it? Huh, what's that about ice ages you say? Er, um, yes, the ice ages. It was probably warmer in the last interglacial? The PETM? Er, well, yes, see, climate always changes, this today is nothing new, but it only changes when God wants it to.


Not something you would talk about in polite company. But some people might think these things sometimes. Not carrot eater, though, I might hasten to add. Other people. And quietly. They don't say it out loud.

carrot eater said...

Anonymous: Well, that was the extent of the substance in your rant about Mann - that he is an arrogant jerk. If that's the only relevant thing you had to say, then that's what we're left with, isn't it?

Anonymous said...

Carrot Eater said, "Angliss: We're dealing with tin-foil hatters here. What do you expect, rational thought?"

and, "Well, that was the extent of the substance in your rant about Mann..."


So I was just responding to the level you set at the top of the comments.

My point is, Mann's personality fits in perfect with the allegations of misconduct. And no I do not believe the emails prove anything one way or another. My opinion of him is valid based upon his interviews I have seen, his emails, comments, and just the general nature of the way he looks (and yes you can sometimes judge a book by its cover). PSU did not perform a serious investigation, please be serious. If they did, the results may have been the same, but with some weight and merit.

dhogaza said...

"and just the general nature of the way he looks"

Anthony Watts's next project:

The Climate Scientist Photo Project.

Not only does photography make physical analysis obsolete, as the surface stations project has shown, it makes psychoanalysis obsolete, as well!

Anonymous said...

Here's hoping that Michael Mann ends up teaching mandatory "general-ed" science courses for non-science majors. He'll most likely have plenty of Young Republicans as students.

And here's hoping that he'll have the opportunity to flunk the whole lot of them.

Anonymous said...

dhogaza lol That was funny.

OTOH I have witnessed your very intuitive judgement of people's character/personality straight from text on a blog (of course I really do not know if you were accurate in your judgements), yet you make light of someone making judgements of character from observing video, pictures, and text.

Anonymous said...

dhogaza is never funny, but he is very often stupid.

guthrie said...

Time to start deleting anonymouses who ignore the request to take a name.

It's their own fault for not playing by the blog owners rules.

Anonymous said...

MarkeyMouse says: Love the photos of Mann with his uber accurate treemometers that can tell the temperature 1000 years ago +/- 0.1 Deg F.

Trouble is, as some periods of his reconstructions only used one tree, I'm wondering if the cut logs are all that remain.

All together now, worship the tree,..Om,,,Omm,,,,,

Anonymous said...

Anonymous I disagree, dhogaza is funny (at times). There is not enough information to make a judgement on his intelligence, but I would find it highly unlikely that he is stupid. Abrasive, confrontational, dismissive, rude, and so on, without question.

doskonaleszare said...

...and the winning number is...

2010 01 +0.724

http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/02/january-2010-uah-global-temperature-update-0-72-deg-c/

Oh boy this is gonna be fun.

carrot eater said...

If an anonymouse doesn't use a name, I assume it's Markey.

doskonaleszare: I knew it'd be a high number, El Nino and all, but holy ****.

That said, I think some of the denier crowd saw it coming; Watts slowed down his reporting of the impending ice age when this came along:

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/01/15/uah-satellite-data-has-record-warmest-day-for-january/

I love how Spencer put a pre-emptive note there about how the measurement is not done. Friendly fire from Monckton there.

Anonymous said...

A bit off-topic, but certainly on-theme:

Ben Santer unloads with both barrels: http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/SanterOpenLetter3_v5.pdf

carrot eater said...

Does anybody have a good handle on just why the 98 El Nino (and possibly this one) is so exaggerated in the satellite data, compared to the surface?

Anonymous said...

Ok so anonymouse is basically a fascist as is Inhofe. A deadly embrace of industry and a central, authoritarian government. In case anyone has forgotten how bad it was under G.W.....
Concerned Mouse

Jim Bouldin said...

My point is, Mann's personality fits in perfect with the allegations of misconduct...My opinion of him is valid based upon his interviews I have seen, his emails, comments, and just the general nature of the way he looks (and yes you can sometimes judge a book by its cover).

Good job 'anonymous', you win the award for contributing the largest bunch of HORESESHIT I've read in a while.

Sure is comforting to know people like you probably sit on jury trials.

EliRabett said...

Santer should demand that D&C release the referee's reviews of their paper.

EliRabett said...

the problem is that the calibration on the ground of the PRTs is only a small part of problems. You have aging, you have the aging of the reference black bodies and a whole other load of issues related to the actual temperatures measured

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2004/2004JD005079.shtml

In other words his pre-emption is basically twaddle.

Marco said...

@Eli:
Santer should not, he should just release *his* review comments to the original GRL06 paper. If I understand Santer correct, he already warned of the incorrect statistical method in that review. After all the Mann attacks on using bad statistical methods, how about using bad statisticial methods *after* you've been made aware of that fact...
One would almost send a complaint to the University of Rochester about professional misconduct.

skanky said...

RP_sqrd: good parody :) You hit the denier's stupidity level perfectly.

carrot eater: creationist climate researchers reminds me of John Ruskin's quote of the "clink of the geologist's hammer".

Boris said...

RP_sqrd:
Well played, sir. Well played.

Anonymous said...

There is actually an important lesson in the RP_sqrd comment - use Google for your searches instead of the search engine on a particular web site. For instance, if you Google "Dover publications David Parks" you will easily find the Dover Publications page for the David Park quantum book.

PS

Anonymous said...

Jim Bouldin said, "Sure is comforting to know people like you probably sit on jury trials."


I see you have made a value judgement of me. Only based upon what I said, while at the same time criticizing me for doing the same.

Well, that makes sense.

btw, I said the emails are not enough to prove one thing or another. Perhaps you should extend your arms over your head to catch points people are making.

Arthur said...

carrot eater - *all* the satellite measures have an exaggerated variation with respect to ground temperature readings, except the long-term trends. This is especially true when you put on a tropical mask (the "tropical troposphere hot spot" effect) but even on a global scale there is some amplification.

Some incomplete analysis from me on this here:

http://arthur.shumwaysmith.com/life/content/hot_spot_redux_analysis_of_tropical_tropospheric_amplification

and in particular this graph:

http://arthur.shumwaysmith.com/life/sites/default/files/apsmith/trop_amp/sat_surf_comp3.jpg

(but it's known from plenty of other analyses as well, of course...)

carrot eater said...

Anonymouse: Well then, write to PSU and let them know your well-made point that they should investigate Mann a bit harder because you think he looks like a creep. I'm sure they'll find your input useful.

Arthur: Thanks, I'll have a look.

Anonymous said...

carrot-eater still not getting the point. If PSU did not take the first round seriously why would they take a 2nd round seriously?

People with Mann's personality invite more attention then people without. Is that very hard to understand? And yes, I went beyond that and said, based upon my personal observations combined with my experience in evaluating people (part of my profession), that his "traits" are more prone to the behavior described in the allegations.

Anonymous said...

It just keeps getting worse....

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/02/05/penn-state-probe-michael-mann-total-whitewash/

Note how Faux News prefaces its slurs with "critics charged..." and "some say...", as in "critics charged that he used "tricks" to make his data match studies that confirmed warming trends."

Also note the transformation of a 541K stimulus grant to the NSF to "541K grant to Professor Mann".

Back in the days of the Fairness Doctrine, Prof. Mann would have been able to demand time on Faux to respond to those slurs.

Angliss said...

Wow, so many mice not getting what it means to be a top-of-the-line university when your rep's been threatened, so little time to address the unsupported claims.

Again, mice, Penn State softballing Mann would be like MIT softballing a professor who stole a patent idea, or like Johns Hopkins softballing a doctor who kills his patients. They wouldn't do it, not for all the money in the world.

Get real.

carrot eater said...

Angliss:

but..but..but...look at his picture! And his mannerisms! I'm not sure what he's accused of, but I'm sure he did it, whatever it was. Just look at him!


Looking at that Fox news quote: On the divergence issue, you can tell the sceptics with half a brain, from the sceptics with zero brain. The latter think the temperatures have actually been dropping since 1960, and it's been hidden. The former know it hasn't, but wonder how you can tell whether or not tree rings are primarily sensitive to temperature at any given point in time. Which is a perfectly legitimate question.

dhogaza said...

So you didn't catch McIntyre lying in the Fox News piece, dudes?

Steve McIntyre of the Web site Climate Audit also charged that the panel looked at papers that were already publicly available. "They did not examine any of Mann's correspondence that was not already in the public record," he said. In effect, he argued, the panel didn't use any of its investigatory powers to plumb deeper.

Well, no, the looked over all of Mann's e-mails including those that weren't in the public record (interesting way to say "stolen"), which among other things is how they know he didn't delete e-mails in response to Jones's e-mail requesting he do so.

McI caught in an out-and-out lie, how unsurprising is that?

Anonymous said...

btw carrot eater does the following define you?

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=carrot%20eater

Just curios as I have not seen your picture or any video of you its hard to tell, but probably pretty close.

Jim Bouldin said...

Anonymous said...

I see you have made a value judgement of me. Only based upon what I said, while at the same time criticizing me for doing the same.

You're very observant.

For a jackass.

Anonymous said...

You will have to do much better than that Jim, try harder.

Mark said...

I just figured it out. Anonymous is doing a parody of the concern troll. It all fits: Eli's recent thread on concern trolls, taken with RP_sqrd's parody earlier in this thread, inspired anonymous to parody a concern troll. Anonymous is playing it very well. First, trying to seem reasonable ("And no I do not believe the emails prove anything one way or another") but slowly revealing skepticism based on flimsy reasoning ("and just the general nature of the way he looks"). Well done, Anonymous, great parody! Bravo!

Anonymous said...

Mark not a bad conclusion, but not correct. I am not performing a parody on anything. Just voicing my opinion based upon my years of experience in dealing with, managing, and leading people. My original assessment of Prof Mann was based not just on his picture, not just on his recent comments, not just on his video interviews, but on all of it together. His personality (as I describe it) often leads to misconduct and certainly leads to a higher level of scrutiny than those that are less abrasive, smug, and defensive.

Leave Prof Mann out of it for a moment. Do you know anyone like I described above and do they usually garner more attention than others and often take shortcuts, are extremely biased (in their own favor), and are just more prone to misbehave?

Mal Adapted said...

For the mice who think it isn't science if the scientist isn't nice:

"Science doesn’t work despite scientists being asses. Science works, to at least some extent, because scientists are asses."

Credit: Peter Watts, via Hank Roberts

David B. Benson said...

Eli --- I opine you should not allow anonymous postings. Too many Nonny Mice who don't sign their post or leave an IP address even.

EliRabett said...

It usually becomes clear after a couple of rants which anon are which. We can live with it at least for now.

Freedom of speech
Freedom of religion
Freedom from want
Freedom from fear
Freedom to rant

The American Way

carrot eater said...

Perhaps we should play the game that was suggested above. Somebody can make up some random and incoherent allegations about me, then I'll put up my picture and maybe a video of me talking about something or other.

Then we can all decide if I have the personality-type that is consistent with the alleged misdeeds. If so, I must be guilty. What a great process.

Anonymous said...

Carrot eater I was with you until the last part of your post. I never assigned guilt to Prof Mann. I just would not be surprised if he has done something. Although if you knew ahead of time that video, pictures, and comments were to be used to assess your personality, that may skew the results. Why are you working so hard at twisting my point into something you can argue against? Are you that uncomforatble?


Shall I use a name less anonymous like "radish-eater" or "kahtza"?

jackgym said...

The junk science is crumbling around your ears. The truth is coming to get you!

Anonymous said...

Relevant article: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7017905.ece

Material in the article strongly suggests a coordinated campaign of harassment against Phil Jones and the CRU.

Excerpts:

The leak was bad. Then came the death threats.

“He now accepts that he did not treat the FoI requests as seriously as he should have done. “I regret that I did not deal with them in the right way,” he told The Sunday Times.”

“But he pleads provocation. Last year in July alone the unit received 60 FoI requests from across the world. With a staff of only 13 to cope with them, the demands were accumulating faster than they could be dealt with. “According to the rules,” says Jones, “you have to do 18 hours’ work on each one before you’re allowed to turn it down.””

“A further irritation was that most of the data was available online, making the FoI requests, in Jones’s view, needless and a vexatious waste of his time. In the circumstances, he says, he thought it reasonable to refer the applicants to the website of the Historical Climatology Network in the US.”

“He also suspected that the CRU was the target of a co-ordinated attempt to interfere with its work — a suspicion that hardened into certainty when, over a matter of days, it received 40 similar FoI requests. Each applicant asked for data from five different countries, 200 in all, which would have been a daunting task even for someone with nothing else to do. It was clear to Jones that the attack originated from an old adversary, the sceptical website Climate Audit, run by Steve McIntyre, a former minerals prospector and arch climate sceptic.”

“If the leak itself was bad, the aftermath was the stuff of nightmares. Even now, weeks later, Jones seems rigid with shock. “There were death threats,” he says. “People said I should go and kill myself. They said they knew where I lived.” Two more death threats came last week after the deputy information commissioner delivered his verdict, making more work for Norfolk police, who are already investigating the theft of the emails.”

amoeba said...

Re: Anonymous said and the TimesOnline article about coordinated campaign of harassment against Phil Jones and the CRU.
One only has to look at the comments.

Alan Wilkinson wrote:

This was the exact text:
I hereby make a EIR/FOI request in respect to any confidentiality agreements restricting transmission of CRUTEM data to non-academics involving the following countries:
CAROLINE ISLANDS
SOLOMON ISLANDS
WALLIS ISLANDS
COOK ISLANDS
NIUE ISLAND
1. the date of any applicable confidentiality agreements;
2. the parties to such confidentiality agreement, including the full name of any organization;
3. a copy of the section of the confidentiality agreement that "prevents further transmission to non-academics".
4. a copy of the entire confidentiality agreement,
I am requesting this information for the purposes of academic research.

The point of his argument seems somewhat blunted by three observations:

An apparently identical template was posted on ClimateFraudit.
http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=6623

The fact that this FOI was submitted at the same time with the ClimateFraudit initiated FOI storm. What a coincidence?

If he were genuinely an academic, why would he issue the CRU with an FOI request about confidentiality agreements restricting transmission of CRUTEM data to non-academics involving the listed countries?

I'm sure there are other things that do not add-up about Alan Wilkinson's claim.

amoeba said...

It is most revealing to google

'Alan Wilkinson' site:climateaudit.org

It reveals that Alan Wilkinson was not an honest broker, but a porolific poster at ClimateFraudit and part of the FOI campaign.

Read this:
'Steve McIntyre
Posted Jul 24, 2009 at 10:59 AM | Permalink | Reply
I suggest that interested readers can participate by choosing 5 countries and sending the following FOI request to david.palmer at uea.ac.uk:

Dear Mr Palmer,

I hereby make a EIR/FOI request in respect to any confidentiality agreements)restricting transmission of CRUTEM data to non-academics involing the following countries: [insert 5 or so countries that are different from ones already requested]

1. the date of any applicable confidentiality agreements;
2. the parties to such confidentiality agreement, including the full name of any organization;
3. a copy of the section of the confidentiality agreement that “prevents further transmission to non-academics”.
4. a copy of the entire confidentiality agreement,

I am requesting this information for the purposes of academic research.

Thank you for your attention.

Yours truly,

yourname


If you do so, please post up a copy of your letter so that we can keep track of requested countries.'

From:
http://climateaudit.org/2009/07/24/cru-refuses-data-once-again/

A coordinated campaign, unintentionally revealed by one of the dishonest participants.

Anonymous said...

What's the significance of the small New Zealand-administered territories?

Whoops, shoulda read further. I see, he wanted to issue separate FOIARs for as many territories as possible. Bit of a pattern of behaviour from McIntyre, wouldn't you say?

guthrie said...

Yup.
Thats why nobody has any time for Macintyre, which enables him to play the poor underdog.

Thats a pretty shady way of approaching things as well - bombard CRU with FOI requests when they can get most of the data from GISS, and anyway a lot of it will be embargoed for confidentiality.

Thats nice work Amoeba, is there any way it can be put to the relevant authorities/ people who need to know what sort of people are atatcking the scientists?

Anonymous said...

(Adjusting my tinfoil hat here...)

I can't help but wonder if this whole "climategate" thing was a setup along these lines....

The climateaudit folks bombard the CRU with FOI requests, hoping that someone important there "flies off the handle" in writing.

When said important person gets fed up enough and does "fly off the handle", a climateaudit mole is there ready to snarf up the radioactive email messages and splatter them all over the Internet.

Like I said, this is sort of getting into "tinfoil-hat" territory... but I just can't help but wonder about it all....

John Mashey said...

http://it-networks.org/?p=222
is interesting.

amoeba said...

Re: John Mashey said...

http://it-networks.org/?p=222
is interesting.
2:26 PM

Thanks John, I noticed that a little while after I'd got stuck-in!

Seems there are some good journalists around!

Anonymous said...

Eli humbly suggests that the mice list examples of people who accused Mann of these, so we may inquire for an apology.

Really? Why? Because the board of regents are a bunch of soft cocks?

Everyone knows two things about Mann.

1. He's a dishonest sack of shit

2. He'll be gone inside of a year.

EliRabett said...

Anon, you appear to be confusing Marc Morano with Michael Mann. No harm, they share the same initials, but Eli understands that Morano is a litigious soul so be careful

Anonymous said...

Eli:

I've always thought very highly of you if not for your science knowledge but your humor.

Didn't your mom ever tell you to stop hanging around with the wrong boys at school?

You're still not listening to her.

Anyways you will always get a pass from me being from Crooklyn. I forgive your peculiar transgression my son.

Anonymous said...

With reference to the FOI requests, the claim that data is requested for 200 countries is misleading. The requests were for copies of the agreements concerning restrictions on sharing data. Dr. Jones implies that all these requests were for detailed climate data. Most of these countries could have been handled by a simple statement: "No agreement." Those who had agreements would easily be satisfied by issuing a copy of said document. Unfortunately, we are told, many of the documents are lost. I think the only response possible for these would be, "Unable to produce document." I don't see 18 hours of staff work to accomplish this.

My second comment is in reference to Senator Inhofe's letter. I see responses to his religious beliefs but no responses to the very real issues he outlined. NSF will surely do an investigation. I know this because I work for a company almost entirely funded by NSF grants. The Senator's citations are correct. It will take time (probably years) but it will happen.

I realize Penn State is engaged in questions related to academic fraud. They don't and shouldn't address OMB and other regulations.

Laurie