Confidence in Scientists Dropping as Result of "Climategate"
Fallout from a loss of public confidence in climate science is
affecting other fields of research, a top US academic claimed.
American opinion polls point to a general deterioration in people's
faith in science, according to Dr Ralph Cicerone, president of the
National Academy of Sciences.
It came after two major public relations setbacks for the global
warming gurus.
One was the "climategate" scandal involving leaked emails from the
Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, which led to
accusations that scientists manipulated and suppressed data.
The other was an admission by the United Nations' influential climate
change body that it issued flawed data about the rate at which Himalayan
glaciers were melting.
Two years ago the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
reported that the mountain range could lose all its glaciers by 2035. In
fact the claim had no valid scientific backing.
Speaking about "transparency and integrity in science" today at the
world's biggest science conference in San Diego, California, Dr Cicerone
said there had been a loss of public trust in climatology that appeared
to be spreading.
Polls conducted in the US had shown that people now had a worse opinion
of scientists than before.
Addressing the annual meeting of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science (AAAS), he said: "I think the damage has spilled
over to other kinds of science. I don't think it's fair, but we have to
address our fundamentals in any case as we improve science. Let's do it,
and I hope we can set a new level of transparency and trust."
Dr Cicerone is himself a distinguished climate scientist. In 2001, he
led a National Academy of Sciences study on the current state of climate
change and its impact on the environment and human health.
He was highly critical of the IPCC's handling of its mistake, which
resulted in an embarrassing retraction after being brought to light by
New Scientist magazine.
The body admitted that "clear and well-established standards of
evidence" had not been properly applied. However, it insisted the glitch
did not undermine the large body of evidence showing that human activity
was causing climate change.
A number of senior experts have since said it is unrealistic to suppose
that the mighty Himalayan glaciers could vanish within a few decades.
Dr Cicerone pointed out that the IPCC was widely viewed as the foremost
authority on climate change, adding: "the greater the stature of the
institution, the harder the fall".
He said: "The IPCC could have gone public with all the information and
said, 'Here's what happened and we screwed up'.
"It didn't and I think that hurts the reputation of the institution."
Lord Rees, Astronomer Royal and president of the Royal Society, said two
particular aspects of climate science made it difficult to communicate
to members of the public. First, it was "diffuse and international", and
secondly it was "remote in time".
"The consequences will only affect the next generation and not us," he
told the meeting. "These are the two features that make it hard to get
the public exercised about the need to do something about climate
change."
COMMENTS:
"TRANSPARENCY AND INTEGRITY IN SCIENCE"
"transparency and integrity in science" No such thing these days. Scientists have to follow the money. Grants for research are only dolled-out to the scientists who go along with the vested interests of multinational companies including chemical, oil, and the pharmaceutical industry. If any scientist comes up with an idea that might affect the profits of these industries his career will disappear faster than an ice cube in the Sahara. The same disappearing act would happen to any scientist's career that dared to prove that the "established" theories of the scientific "elite" were completely wrong.
It's all very well to talk about openness and honesty in science,
particularly climate science, but nothing has changed. Both the UEA CRU
and the IPCC are preently engaged in damage limitation, not coming
clean. Even as Dr. Cicerone speaks, at least one climate scientist is
still being refused publication in science journals, and refused peer
review because his research results do not accord with the AGW agenda.
He is Dr. Ferenc Miskolczi, and his story can be read here:-
http://www.examiner.com/x-32936-Seminol
Now it may well be that Dr. Miskolski is wrong, but that is the purpose
of peer review. It is up to other climate scientists to examine his work
and prove his theory wrong if it is. But the response of the global
warming fraternity is to willfully ignore him and hope he goes away.
The trust of the public in climate science will never be restored while
the same old behaviour goes on. The Royal Society are not facing up to
the fact they are totally discredited, and need to take drastic action
to restore confidence, not issue platitudes.
Climatology: The spice for data:
Note: Released by NASA under FOI.
-
Subject: Re: Your Reply to: GISS Temperature Correction Problem?
From: Gavin Schmidt gschmidt@giss.nasa.gov
Date: 19 Feb 2008 14:38:47 -0500
To: rruedy@giss.nasa.gov
I had a look at the data, and this whole business seems to be related to
the infilling of seasonal and annual means. There is no evidence for any
step change in any of the individual months.
The only anomalous point (which matches nearby deltas) is for Set 2005.
Given the large amount of missing data in lampasas this gets propagated
to the annual (D-N) mean – I think – with a little more weight then in
the nearby stations. The other factor might be that lampasas is overall
cooling, if we use climatology to infill in recent years, that might
give a warm bias. But I’m not sure on how the filling-in happens.
Gavin
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So remember if you find the temperature data is cooling off, just add a
little “climatology” it will warm things up nicely.
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