

UK Government: Climate change scientists broke the law hiding data - miked
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7004936.ece

======
yannis
I am glad this is breaking out slowly but surely and the C02 saga will
probably be the greatest scientific scandal of our time. I have been following
the story for as far as I remember as I had an interest in Ice Ages. This
article <http://www.warwickhughes.com/icecore/zjmar07.pdf> is very good at
debunking some of the myths. You can play with a model online with this
<http://cs.clark.edu/~mac/physlets/GEBM/ebm.htm#tiptop> and you can download a
more sophisticated program <http://www.giss.nasa.gov/tools/modelE/> from
Goddard, or you can write your own Clojure one, like the one we had yesterday
here at HN.

There is no doubt that an increase in CO2 will increase temperatures. However,
this is only part of a model. C02 can get absorbed by the Oceans and other
earth mechanisms and balance out. If you follow the Palaeoclimate literature
(ice cores in Antartica) the rise in temperature gave a rise to C02 and not
the other way round.

You can look how the famous hockey stick curve looks if plotted against
historical times (it looks more like a series of hills).

Serious variations in temperature (on a global level) are caused mostly by
sunspot activity. I am sure other HN posters can add 100's more argument to
these.

However, as humans there is no doubt that we are destroying our environment.
As such I am very much for better policies in this respect but certainly NOT
for trading carbon credits and fattening fat cats further.

~~~
gjm11
> or you can write your own Clojure one, like the one we had yesterday here at
> HN.

The Clojure one we had yesterday that

1\. looked only at data during the "hockey-stick handle" period;

2\. found, in his very first graph, a steady increase in temperatures over
that period whose magnitude (>2 degrees C) was greater than that in the usual
"hockey-stick" graph (~ 0.7 degrees C);

3\. plotted a bunch more graphs in ways that would inevitably make changes of
~0.7 degrees invisible (look at the last one -- range from -20 to 80 degrees
on the y-axis);

3\. claimed to have shown by all this that the hockey-stick is not real?

That one?

> CO2 can get absorbed by the Oceans and other earth mechanisms and balance
> out.

Perhaps it can, but since it's possible to measure CO2 levels and they are in
fact increasing that's not actually happening.

~~~
yannis
Just have a look at fig 4 at the paper I quoted above
<http://www.warwickhughes.com/icecore/zjmar07.pdf> You will see the 'hills' I
mentioned above.

I am not actually suggesting inaction I support any measures that will lower
human impact on the planet, however, I am supporting _good_ science and
policies that do not have the word _TAX_ in them.

~~~
gjm11
How do you know that the best policies do not involve taxation? (If it's
because you take it as an axiom that _no_ good policy involves taxation, then
the fact that you don't want taxation in this particular case is perfectly
uninformative.)

~~~
yannis
It's because in general I believe tax money is not utilized effectively and
their impact on demand is minimal. Non-tax policies could have similar
effects. For example the government could impose a ban on _manufacturing_ SUV
vehicles or improve the public transport system. Increasing the age at which
one could get a driver's license in the USA would probably reduce petrol
consumption by a few percent (as more families have more than one car).

What evidence do you have that the money received in tax would not purchase
goods and services that would increase emissions?

I never made an axiom that _no_ good policy involves taxation. It was your
assumption. The least you could have done was to ask me to clarify my
position.

~~~
gjm11
> What evidence do you have that the money received in tax would not purchase
> goods and services that would increase emissions?

Eh? Where did I say or imply that it wouldn't? I asked why you're so sure that
taxation couldn't be part of the best policy. I didn't say I'm sure that it
should be. I don't know what the best policy is.

(In any case, surely what's relevant is not whether any tax revenue would go
to purchasing things that increase emissions, but whether the _net_ effect
would be an increase in emissions.)

> I never made an axiom. [...] It was your assumption.

You might want to remind yourself of the meaning of the word "if".

> The least you could have done was to ask me to clarify my position.

Curiously, that _is_ exactly what I did.

------
ErrantX
The only conclusion that I 've been able to draw from this mess is: climate
science has been seriously compromised :(

I just cant decide who can be trusted as a source for accurate and unbiased
information/opinion.

~~~
vannevar
"The only conclusion that I 've been able to draw from this mess is: climate
science has been seriously compromised"

Really? I'll give you a more plausible conclusion: that the scientists in
question got tired of responding to repeated Freedom of Information requests
from people whose only interest was to disseminate distortions of their
findings.

~~~
CWuestefeld
_requests from people whose only interest was to disseminate distortions_

How do you know the intent of those asking for information? It seems to me
that there are plenty of people here on HN that would just like to try their
own hand at models. Who gets to decided when a request merits a response?

 _the scientists in question got tired of responding to repeated Freedom of
Information requests_

The one who pays the piper calls the tunes. If you're going to build your
business (yes, research and universities are businesses) on public funding,
then you've got to be prepared to have your customers -- the public -- ask
about what you're doing. It seems to me that they ought to have at least an
intern dedicated to maintaining a public web site where everything is made
available. Then no annoyance to the researchers would occur.

~~~
gjm11
My understanding is that they _couldn't_ make everything available, because
some of their data came from sources with confidentiality conditions attached.
See, e.g., [http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427393.600-battle-
fo...](http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427393.600-battle-for-climate-
data-approaches-tipping-point.html) (note: "New Scientist" is less than
perfectly reliable, but I have no reason to think they're wrong on this
particular point).

------
kunley
Global warming is the new swine flu.

~~~
TheBranca18
The article talks about climate change. You might want to learn the difference
between climate change and global warming before you dismiss it with a one-
liner.

~~~
kunley
Regardless of the verbal purity and political correctness the point from the
OP is: someone was trying to force the conclusion than the climate is warming
more than it is.

Isn't that clear?

~~~
TheBranca18
Verbal purity? They are two totally different concepts. This isn't about
making sure you use the right term, it's making sure you understand the
difference between the two.

And yes it was clear. I think anyone reading the article should come to that
conclusion. Your comparison was shallow and silly and I called you on it.

~~~
TheBranca18
I always thought that global warming was a subset of climate change. The fact
that the title of the article included climate change made me puzzled as to
why global warming was used.

~~~
kunley
Because I'm commenting article content, not the title. Of course the global
warming is the subset of a climate change -- the subset most relevant in the
article.

~~~
TheBranca18
And like I said before, your comment was poor. You said it was the new swine
flu when it's been around far longer. It was disingenuous and apparently
calling you on it is a no no; so be it.

~~~
kunley
Yeah I bet you would say it's poor also if I said it differently, "global
warming is overhyped" or whatever, probably because you just don't agree with
it.

Speaking of poorness of comments, I guess in this matter you can rely on how
they are upvoted. No offense, just see for yourself..

~~~
TheBranca18
I don't agree with it, but that's not the issue. Your comment wasn't
worthwhile. You're arguing ad hominem and haven't even backed up your silly
point still and it's four or five comments later.

Flipping it over on me doesn't change the fact that your comment was poor.
There are also obvious counterarguments to your point that popularity means
you're right but I don't need to go into them.

~~~
kunley
No. I didn't do any ad hominem until now:

Dear Mr Brain Police, I did back up my point in another subthread. You were
busy here with proving how silly I am so you haven't noticed.

Again, please digest a feedback you're receiving (votes!) and rethink.

------
xenonite
Global warming != Climate change

1.) Global warming increases average temperatures.

2.) Climate change might turn the weather to extremes, which implies greater
temperature _variance_ locally.

Now the pattern I see is: people are trying to focus on 1.), disprove it, then
(falsly) claim that 2.) would also be wrong!

This is not the case. 1.) does NOT relate to 2.) in any way!

The climate change IS happening, this does not change by disproving 1.)

~~~
jerf
The problem is that nobody care whether the "climate is changing". Change is
the only constant. The question is whether it is bad and whether we can do
something about it. Neither has been very well established in my mind. If in
fact our CO2 contribution's effect is far smaller than the IPCC and
environmentalists claim, then natural variation is the dominant factor and
even completely giving up industrialization entirely next year may not have a
very large effect. This means that it is a lot harder to affect the climate
than we have been telling ourselves. And climate changes have been happening
continuously for billions of years, so it's not at all obvious that they are
_a priori_ bad for anything other than human agriculture. (Which is itself
bad, but something we can deal with, and broadly speaking is our problem
rather than the ecosystem's problem.)

If environmentalists think they can turn on a dime after _thirty years_ of
"anthropogenic global warming -> disaster", they are in for a well-deserved
beating in the court of general opinion. Falling back to "The climate is
changing" is basically an admission that we have no clue, and more than that,
where we thought human effects dominated it, it doesn't seem to. You can't
just turn around and apply panic over AGW to panic over "climate change"; it
is neither rational nor human-irrational.

If you want to panic over something environmental, how about overfishing,
plastic pollution in the pacific, fertilizer runoff, or something else that
isn't "debatable" but actually, factually exists? In addition to the fact that
it's a bad idea to try to "salvage" climate change as an issue, _it isn't even
necessary_. There are _real_ problems. Unless you personally are driven by
using environmentalism as an excuse to destroy democracy and transfer wealth
to the poor, if you are really driven by concern for the environment, _you
don't need to "win" this issue_. Trying to build your political case on a lie
can only be actively harmful in the long run.

------
ubulgaria
At this point we don't need climate science -- we just need to observe the ice
at poles and the dead coral reefs.

~~~
anamax
> we just need to observe the ice at poles

It's currently increasing at both.... The polar bear populations are
increasing too.

> the dead coral reefs

Runoff from deforestation is killing most of them.

There's some effect from increased disolved CO2, but it goes both ways. (Some
creatures/plants benefit, others have problems, and still others don't seem to
care.)

~~~
bballant
Ice is and polar bear populations are increasing? I have only read evidence to
the contrary. Please provide a citation so I don't think you just made this
up.

~~~
anamax
<http://www.intellicast.com/Community/Content.aspx?a=153>

You can look up the polar bears yourself. You'll find that the population now
is about 4-5x the population in the 60s. It may be decreasing slightly in the
past few years, but that's in the noise compared to the recent increases.
There's no reason to suspect temp change has had an effect comparable to
direct intervention by humans.

~~~
bballant
Thanks for sharing the article. In looking at the data, one notices a clear
cyclic pattern but also a subtle general upward trend in temperature and
downward trend in ice cover (i.e. the temperature lows are higher and the
highs are higher) over time. But I'm no climate scientist.

With respect to the polar bears, I searched around and found many articles
which state that the population in the 60's had been diminished because of
hunting and that, currently, the plurality of polar bear populations are in
decline because of climate change. The one article I found that supports your
argument was from Fox News (no bias there ;-)).

~~~
anamax
> With respect to the polar bears, I searched around and found many articles
> which state that the population in the 60's had been diminished because of
> hunting and that, currently, the plurality of polar bear populations are in
> decline because of climate change.

I note that you didn't mention the relative sizes of these changes, the former
being >4x while the latter is close to the margin of error.

Then again, doing so doesn't fit your beliefs.

~~~
bballant
First of all, the "margin of error" theory comes from you and not the articles
you told me to search out myself. And the hunting definitely adds some
perspective to the ">4x increase" so it's worth mentioning. I'm surprised you
didn't mention it to begin with.

I'm not looking to do battle here. In fact, I thought I was being humorous and
polite. Moreover, I'm happy to see that the polar bear situation is not as
dire as I thought. I've adjusted the thermostat in my apartment accordingly.

~~~
anamax
> And the hunting definitely adds some perspective to the ">4x increase" so
> it's worth mentioning. I'm surprised you didn't mention it to begin with.

I did. Hunting is part of "direct intervention by humans". Habitat is another.

------
lacrossegm
Every victory for AGW denial is a long term loss for all mankind.

~~~
mseebach
Yeah, screw the science, I _know_ I'm right.

~~~
lacrossegm
Yeah, screw down-votes, I know right from wrong.

