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I don’t usually like sequels…

…but I am LOVING Climategate 2.0.

Yep, it’s the anniversary of Climategate 2009, and the anonymous benefactor who released the first batch of purloined emails has released another 5,000. Also, he’s put a zip file of 250,000 more into the public domain encrypted with a strong password which he claims he won’t release — an insurance policy, a piñata for hackers and the Sword of Damocles, all in one delightful package. (Note to Julian Assange: anonymous leakers not in jail). Same deal as before: dropped on a Russian server linked to comment threads on well-known skeptical blogs.

Follow along, won’t you? The four blogs who were the recipients of largesse:

Watts Up With That
Tall Bloke
Climate Audit
Air Vent

The BBC is already spinning it like a very spinny thing indeed.

I confess, I have a weakness for Scientists Behaving Badly stories. This one is my favorite.

Comments


Comment from JeffS
Time: November 22, 2011, 10:18 pm

I confess to a weakness for Any Professional Behaving Badly stories. Because, y’know, they’re supposed to be professional.


Comment from Scubafreak
Time: November 22, 2011, 10:19 pm

Oh Dear. The Enviro-trolls on the cornfield are going to be going BERSERK today, trying to simultaniously deny and distract….


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: November 22, 2011, 10:30 pm

Exactly, JeffS. I have a childlike faith in science, so when somebody breaks it, I want to see him HURT.

Oh, balloon dude is Michael Mann of Penn State. I should have said.

Boy, Penn State is having more of its share of ouch lately, huh?


Comment from Alice
Time: November 22, 2011, 10:35 pm

I understand that Penn State is changing its name to “State Pen”. (h/t to some commenter on some blog I read somewhere).


Comment from Nina
Time: November 22, 2011, 10:36 pm

May I chortle?

I read WUWT regularly, and have been enjoying this very much. 🙂


Comment from QuasiModo
Time: November 22, 2011, 11:20 pm

I confess, I have a weakness for Scientists Behaving Badly stories. This one is my favorite.

These days it’s more unusual for public figures to be honest and morally upright.


Comment from BigBluBug
Time: November 22, 2011, 11:37 pm

When I was doing science, I marveled at the petty rivalries and the viscious competition.

Grant proposal reviews were fascinating. Recognizing that the proposal came from a rival (it’s supposed to be a blind review) was a great opportunity to smack them.

A rival publishes an abstract detailing a research path you’ve already been down, and determined it would be fruitless, was an occasion to celebrate.

Getting a chance to point out a mistake, or better yet cause them to make a retraction? Party Time!

I guess the climate change slugs figured out that forming a family was in everybody’s favor. They all get to run their own crews and there’s a whole Climate Expert mafia to watch each others back.

When WUWT publishes one of these stories, it gives me a fine feeling of, as a famous Ewok described, schadenboner.

BBB


Comment from Nina
Time: November 22, 2011, 11:40 pm

Being abed is giving me guilt-free time to explore, as well. Let’s hear it for the mobile and wifi!


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: November 22, 2011, 11:44 pm

I used to do art for scientists (patent applications, data sheets…that sort of thing). They were amazingly consensus creatures.

I’d do a drawing for Scientist 1, who would pass it to Scientist 2, who would pass it to Scientist 3…and on and on, each one making his tweaks and changes. And then Scientist 7 would change everything back the way Scientist 1 had it.

I came to the conclusion that engineers were better scientists than scientists. At least what they did was evidence based (and if the bridge fell down, they’d go to jail).


Comment from JeffS
Time: November 23, 2011, 12:25 am

I have a childlike faith in science, so when somebody breaks it, I want to see him HURT.

I’m an engineer by profession, and I have a childlike faith in professional engineers, a faith that I keep sternly suppressed. As a survival technique, learned by long and sad experience.

So when a professional engineer is nailed for misconduct, or karma bites ’em on the ass, I indulge in a wee bit o’ schadenfreude. Scientists are nearly as satisfying.

Who, me? Bitter? Naw! 🙂

Boy, Penn State is having more of its share of ouch lately, huh?

Yup. And if State Pen (heh!) and its fans fail to cease the denial, they’ll have a whole lot more ouch.


Comment from Pablo
Time: November 23, 2011, 12:39 am

Boy, Penn State is having more of its share of ouch lately, huh?

My thought exactly. What is their threshold for shame these days? Will Mann get a riot in his honor when they fire him? So many questions…


Comment from sakhara
Time: November 23, 2011, 1:35 am

When I discovered that this was done again, I felt like a kid on Christmas morning.


Comment from f3ba
Time: November 23, 2011, 7:36 am

‘Schadenboner’ simply must be one of the most descriptive words ever to grace the English language.

I get excited just thinking that one day I may be in a situation where I get to say it.

Oh, and the Climate 2.0 thingy…yeah, ah. Well. Tenured lobbyists with science degrees that work in climate science need Porsches too.


Comment from Oceania
Time: November 23, 2011, 8:40 am

These people who do ‘climate studies’ are usually failed scientists … or at best philosophers …

There is no such thing as global warming, and anyone who says that there is, should be referred for a psych assessment asap.


Comment from Oceania
Time: November 23, 2011, 8:52 am

Actually, this is the best bit of entertainment I have had in a long time.

🙂


Comment from MIke C.
Time: November 23, 2011, 10:19 am

Oh, pish-tosh – of course there’s such a thing as global warming. Global cooling, too (look up “Snowball Earth”.) Talk to your local geologist. It’s the “anthropogenic” bit that’s in dispute.


Comment from Ric Locke
Time: November 23, 2011, 12:31 pm

Gonna defend Oceania on this one, Mike.

To a very close first approximation, there is no such thing as Global [$ISSUE]. The “globe” is just too damned big. What there is, is a bunch of local systems that are loosely coupled via some extremely erratic phenomena. Yeah, you can do things like figuring a “global average” — add up the numbers and divide by another one — but it’s about as relevant as polling Ulan Bator, New Zealand, and Mozambique to discover French political preferences.

What’s most amusing to me is the use of five degree grid cells in “climate models”. 360/5 = 72; 72 x 72 = 5,184. A Chinese engineering graduate who used ONLY 5,000 CELLS in a Finite Element Analysis of the return spring on a water pistol would be back to pig-management before sundown.

Regards,
Ric


Comment from Joan of Argghh!
Time: November 23, 2011, 12:52 pm

Just in time for a long, lazy weekend, too. Lots of time to think of search terms to use for perusing the database of emails.

Just type in practically any word and the rabbit trails run deep and twisty! Whee!


Comment from The Sun
Time: November 23, 2011, 1:24 pm

All your climate belong to me!

Think of it as a golden shower of photons.

Bitches.


Comment from BigBluBug
Time: November 23, 2011, 1:32 pm

Scene: A park bench at MIT. A buxom brunette sits on a bench next to a scientist.

Buxomette: So, what’s that you’re working on?
Scientist: I’m using a Monte Carlo model to predict the size of argon clusters.
Buxomette: I only sat down because I was tired. Seeya.

Vs

Buxomette: So, what’s that you’re working on.
Scientist: I’m using a Monte Carlo model to predict the size of Argon clusters. To save the planet from global warming. I just got 1M dollar grant from the UN.
Buxomette: Perhaps your pipette and my Erlenmeyer flask could get together sometime.

Babes and Benjamins, climate science is where it’s at.


Comment from Redd
Time: November 23, 2011, 2:29 pm

Hasn’t science always been political? Oppenheimer, et al, tried to quash the development of the Hydrogen bomb, falsely claiming it was not feasible. It chaffs my butt when a small group of people (scientists) try to preempt the democratic process.


Comment from Some Vegetable
Time: November 23, 2011, 4:08 pm

Uh, Global Warming?

I didn’t do it! Nobody saw me do it! You can’t prove anything!

The Sun


Comment from Formerly known as Skeptic
Time: November 23, 2011, 4:08 pm

Ric 12:31 pm: It’s worse than that, a sphere is 360 degrees by 180 degrees, so it’s 72 x 36 = 2592 cells! Cells near the equator are ~350 miles square! Clearly atmospheric conditions can be treated as homogeneous at those scales, NOT!


Comment from Formerly known as Skeptic
Time: November 23, 2011, 4:17 pm

First, I must admit I don’t follow climate science closely. But, I’m an engineer, and I’ll start to be impressed by these global simulations when one of these guys can input historical data through say, 1990, and predict accurately the climate changes from 1990 through 2010. (Or, if the claim is that the timescale is too short due to random variation, try 1950-2010). Then and only then will I even look at their methodology for anything other than the entertainment value in pointing and laughing. I have yet to hear of one simulation which has been validated in this way.


Comment from nothing tosee here
Time: November 23, 2011, 6:31 pm

8o


Comment from Ric Locke
Time: November 23, 2011, 6:53 pm

FKAS: Yes. ::sigh:: I realized that just about the time the edit availability ran out.

Finite Element Analysis, as practiced today, is absolutely full of techniques for using non-uniform cells. So far as I can see, none of those techniques are used in climate “models”, so ~350-mile-square cells near the equator are all same same as slivers ~350 miles long and ~10 miles wide near the poles.

No confidence a priori — I don’t have to see it fail if I know going in that it won’t (because can’t) work.

Oh, and it’s worse than that. If you put in data from 1900 to 1990, none of the models can manage 1940-1950. They can’t simulate their own input, in other words.

Regards,
Ric


Comment from Scubafreak
Time: November 23, 2011, 10:54 pm

On a sadder note:

Fantasy author Anne McCaffrey passed away today at the age of 85. Best known for her “Dragonriders of Pern” series, McCaffrey began her writing career in 1967 with the publication of “Restoree,” her first novel. She was rumored to be working on a new installment of the “Pern” series.

Thanks for creating such amazing worlds for us to inhabit every once in a while, Mrs. McCaffrey. You will be missed.

http://scifi.icanhascheezburger.com/2011/11/22/sci-fi-fantasy-anne-mccaffrey-passes-away-at/


Comment from Christopher Taylor
Time: November 24, 2011, 2:25 am

Yeah Michael “Piltdown” Mann. Every story about Climaquiddick II I’ve seen in any legacy news (not many) has made sure to dedicate at least one paragraph to how the previous emails were so carefully scrutinized by various politicians and deemed Not A Problem©


Comment from Oceania
Time: November 24, 2011, 5:34 am

*Cough*!

Right,
1) CO2 is not – repeat – not – a Greenhouse gas. Never was, never can be.
2) Thermal capacities and infrared-emission/absorption lines of CO2 do not correspond with those of WATER VAPOUR – the Prime Greenhouse gas in our atmosphere.
3) Most of the ‘atmosphere’ is within 8 miles or so of the surface. Rock on up to 45,000 feet and take off your O2 mask. See? Hypoxic yet? Can’t breath?
4) There are no correlations with CO2 concentrations and anything that is much of a muchness historically. Period.
5) Global Warmists aka – delusional fuck-tards have no ability to model anything, nor any real science background.
6) Hockey stick graphs, faked data, and bullshit. Remember the most faked data came from NEW ZEALAND!!!!!!!!!!
They knew it was faked- yet pushed it out there to be ‘absorbed’. Their emails reveal this.

I reckon that heading down to East Anglia with a 300 cal belt-fed and going on a drive by house to house at 1 AM is the way to go.
Lets start wasting these pricks ‘en mass’. Ethnic Cleansing, Killing 101. Time for some Eugenics.

Maybe – just Maybe Sweasels Satanists might turn up for a head collection. I wonder how many nvCJD prions are in the brains of these morons?

Remember – your government tried to ‘fuck the world’ on this one. I think it is time for the World to really fuck these guys up badly.


Pingback from Correlation Not Causation | Daily Pundit
Time: November 24, 2011, 7:31 am

[…] Not Causation Posted on November 23, 2011 11:30 pm by Bill Quick S. Weasel Yep, it’s the anniversary of Climategate 2009, and the anonymous benefactor who released the […]


Comment from Oceania
Time: November 24, 2011, 7:41 am

All we need now is Oliver Cromwell … I’ll take on the job of Lord and Flash Protector!


Comment from mojo
Time: November 25, 2011, 6:03 am

Boy howdy. You can almost hear the sphincters tightening around the globe.


Comment from Some Vegetable
Time: November 25, 2011, 3:10 pm

Oceania has more scientific knowledge than I ever will but we agree on the willfully fradulent nature of the published arguments regarding man-related global warming and especially on CO2.

My first clue was that CO2 is only the 17th most common element in the atmosphere. It’s an incredibly low percentage. The man-made portion of that is very small. I don’t think most poison gases would be dangerous in that kind of ppm concentrations.

My next hint was the use of “treemometers” – reading the rings of old trees and extrapolating the ancient climate of an entire planet from a very limited number of samples.

I hate the unfettered extrapolation of data. My favorite example of the danger is: ” I gained five pounds over Thanksgiving weekend. If this keeps up, I’ll weigh 800 pounds when I sit down to the Thanksgiving table next yeaar!”


Comment from Oceania
Time: November 26, 2011, 1:46 am

Me? Shit no!

I’m writing up my second PhD at the moment – And I’m feeling really pooped! It is easy to do the work, but writing and publishing is just getting to be a drag … especially since needing to work a second job to pay for the research.

As for these climate ‘rapists’ getting fat cheques and all the nice new buildings … I think that they need to be forcibly exterminated. Seriously.

I might start my 3rd PhD next year … I will be the most over-qualified sheep shagger on the planet.

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