Hard News: The Daily Embarrassment
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There's a distinct undertone of contrition in the Herald's editorial on Owen Glenn this morning ...
And yet they're saying explicitly "people should get gongs for giving scads of cash to political parties".
If our honours system is going to be a rich boy's club for political cronies, then I vote for its abolition.
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And yet they're saying explicitly "people should get gongs for giving scads of cash to political parties".
I'd wager that's John Roughan, trying to stay the right side of his "the more money in politics the better" argument.
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Or trying to extract themselves from having to criticise National in future if they award honours to their donors?
The aristocratic tone of that editorial is also pretty horrifying. We need a group of public-spirited wealthy men to guide the state and political parties, lest they be forced to seek the support of ordinary voters. Quelle horreur!
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his knighthood was not greeted with mean-spirited and defamatory accusations like this
Well, blogs weren't all that big at the time :-) And anyway, is what DPF said in his "cash for honours" post all that far from what I/S said in his:
Bluntly, this smells. It reeks. It stinks of payback, of rewarding your donors, of Blairite corruption and the UK's "cash for honours" scandal.
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Would it be unkind to note here that Sir Tony O'Reilly was knighted by Tony Blair (sorry, Her Majesty), and that O'Reilly owned various media which might have influenced public opinion about Blair's government?
Perhaps the NZ Herald would like to launch one of its famous campaigns, on how the honours system rewards the rich and influential? (Just run it by the proprietor first ...)
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Graeme: not that different, no. Plenty of people on both sides of the fence seem to regard it as unseemly to reward your donors (though it will be interesting to see how many of them are consistent about it in future - and how many oppose the transparency regime of the EFA which makes such scrutiny possible).
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Cushing was actually a National Party fundraiser for a while. Curiously, though, his knighthood was not greeted with mean-spirited and defamatory accusations like this.
No, Russell, I guess the mean-spirited and defamatory shit had well and truly been heaped on Cushing's head long before. And I don't recall The Herald (or anyone else) being particularly coy about broadcasting those.
And while we're on the subject, haven't allegations of certain individuals and organisations "buying" elections, votes, policies and everything but the kitchen sink been flowing thick and fast a lot closer to home? Ay, Idiot/Savant?
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Continental drift evolved into the more accurate term plate tectonics
Wegener was kicked around because he wasn’t a trained geologistThat is at best a gross oversimplification and it certainly wasn't a neat, smooth evolution. Indeed, Wegener met a lot of purely prejudicial opposition, but he proposed a mechanism that was utterly impossible: continents ploughed through solid seabed rock like ships.
It was the discovery of the Mid-Oceanic Ridge and direct observation of spreading and subduction by real oceanographers and geologists that led to the emergence of the theory of plate tectonics.
If that work hadn't been done, Wegener's work would have - deservedly - been forgotten. That has nothing to do with his credentials and has everything to do with detailled data and a plausible mechanism, none of which Wegener had. His role is important, but overrated and detracts from the real work done in the late 60s.
Romantic stories about outsiders showing the entrenched fuddy-duddies how it's really done are just that - romantic stories. To make a leap of induction and claim that this somehow confers legitimacy on the denialists is foolish.
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I find all this credential bashing pointless.
I have the highest respect for accountants. In fact I even had one as a girlfriend. Looks like Lucy Lawless, lots of fun to be with, we're still good friends.
OK, now hand a Black and Decker to your accountant and tell him/her to do your dentistry for you. Next, get your bank manager to give you a medical check-up and prescribe for you. After that, you can hand your financial portfolio to your doctor and ask them for investment advice.
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As for Complaining to the Press Council about a misleading article well the infamous Professor Michael Mann, of the discredited hockey stick fame did so back in 2004
.. Dr de Freitas’s change of viewpoint from being a scientist warning about global warming in Listener articles published in the 1980s to his present stance where he describes himself as “a global warming agnostic, not a sceptic.” This feature canvassed his views as he gave comparative examples of temperature studies which supported his conclusion that “global temperature has not risen appreciably in the last 20 years.”. The feature also quoted graphs produced by Professor Mann in the IPCC’s latest report in 2001 which showed by contrast a “sharp kick-up [in Northern Hemisphere temperatures] in the 20th century.” ..
The online PC decision , which didnt uphold the complaint, is here
http://www.presscouncil.org.nz/display_ruling.asp?casenumber=962The original herald articles are here
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=3516830
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=3516831The passage of time has shown Mann to have published rubbish, I think the statistics he used was assesed by experts as being "graduate student level" and Mann used his influential position on the IPCC at the time to get his hockey stick into prominence .
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As Jule Fairey said, it was the Labour Party's lack of nous in giving this award that was most disturbing for me. However deserving he may or may not have been of the order, it was certainly an uncalculated move. They're going to need to work hard to regain enough momentum, and mistakes like this don't help.
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Governments should hand out gongs to their political donors (just ignore what we said yesterday). We need a group of public spirited wealthy men to support political parties, to ensure they pursue sound, sensible and responsible policies, and so they don't have to seek the support of ordinary voters instead.
Uh, guys, are you quite sure this isn't intended as sarcasm? Given the miniscule likelihood of the Herald actually retracting their opinion, that would seem to be the most likely interpretation.
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Not a good sign for the "Global warming, we are all going to die!!" crowd when the NYT, of all publications, starts publishing articles skeptical of it.
I also see a "on one hand, and then on the other' rather balanced article on GW on Stuff.co.nz this morning.
Rather tends to support O'Sullivan's thesis on GW.
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From Stuff:
Kiwi electricity consultant Bryan Leyland recently led a team of international sceptics to a climate conference in Bali.
I don't know Mr Leyland from swiss cheese,but "electricity consultant" doesn't exactly inspire confidence that he's an expert in the science of global warming and melting ice sheets.
Or that he's unbiased.
Not a good sign for the "Global warming, we are all going to die!!" crowd when the NYT, of all publications, starts publishing articles skeptical of it.
I think you need to re-read the article James. It's about the way that the media covers events and ascribes them to global warming when they supposedly support the thesis. Indeed, the only opinion offered in the piece about whether global warming exists, of Dr Sunstein is:
I don’t doubt that climate change is real and that it presents a serious threat, but there’s a danger that any ‘consensus’ on particular events or specific findings is, in part, a cascade.
It's not exactly skepticism.
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Not a good sign for the "Global warming, we are all going to die!!" crowd when the NYT, of all publications, starts publishing articles skeptical of it.
Oh right. It's so sceptical that the guy it quotes says " I don’t doubt that climate change is real and that it presents a serious threat".
The story certainly has some merit, but it's essentially about the perils of associating short-term events with long-term predictions for media impact. Both sides of the climate change argument do this.
But the story is also disingenuous and selective. Implying that the striking shrinkage of the Arctic ice cap doesn't matter because part of the Antarctic ice cap has thickened (in line with projections from climate models, btw) is just silly.
Here's a new summary of research about the Arctic ice thinning -- which is happening much faster than any of the models have predicted. In terms of the science, it's a bloody big story.
I also see a "on one hand, and then on the other' rather balanced article on GW on Stuff.co.nz this morning.
This one. Right. On one hand, it quotes a Victoria University geologist who has been leading drilling research in Antarctica, and on the other, Bryan Leyland, an energy consultant and spokesman for the Climate Science Coalition, who is not a scientist, and is funded by Exxon.
Rather tends to support O'Sullivan's thesis on GW.
Er, how exactly?
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The passage of time has shown Mann to have published rubbish, I think the statistics he used was assesed by experts as being "graduate student level"
Likely Steve Curtis doesn't know the difference between an eigenvector and a steinlager, but he seems happy to uncritically regurgitate this nonsense he's picked up from somewhere without quoting his source.
The real reason for the ignorant lies being spread on Mann's paper has nothing to do with the obscure technicalities of the PCA statisictical methods he used, but that this now almost 10 year old paper was very much an iconic, high profile study. The sceptics logic behind smearing it is that if they can discredit this "AGW icon" in the court of non-scientific public opionion, then by association they hope to discredit the whole of AGW science. Which is of course a desperate dishonesty.
In fact whether Mann's PCA analysis was right or wrong is almost entirely irrelevant, the underlying data and the obvious conclusions drawn from it, not only stand unchallenged, but have been confirmed by numerous independent studies in the decade since.
And if Steve Curtis had bothered to read the NZ Press Council link he gave, he would read that their judgement was based entirely on journalistic considerations. The science did not enter into it.
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Rather tends to support O'Sullivan's thesis on GW.
Er, how exactly?
The fact that there have recently been more articles in various newspapers that deal with some aspect(s) of GW hype shows some movement on the subject.
There isn't any doubt that the NYT leans liberal, and when they run an article that doesn't slavishly tow the liberal line on a given subject, that is something to note.
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The fact that there have recently been more articles in various newspapers that deal with some aspect(s) of GW hype shows some movement on the subject.
Showing up ignorant journalism as hype, discredits the journalist....not the scientist. On the other hand "smear by association" is always a handy dodge.
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Re the Mann graph, a quick look at __New Scientist's__ Guide for the Perplexed leads to this, which has a link to a 2006 report of the US National Academy of Science (pdf)
The basic conclusion of Mann et al. (1998, 1999) was that the late 20th century warmth in the Northern Hemisphere was unprecedented during at least the last 1000 years. This conclusion has subsequently been supported by an array of evidence that includes both additional large-scale surface temperature reconstructions and pronounced changes in a variety of local proxy indicators, such as melting on ice caps and the retreat of glaciers around the world.
And New Scientist wraps up with:
Most researchers would agree that while the original hockey stick can – and has – been improved in a number of ways, it was not far off the mark. Most later temperature reconstructions fall within the error bars of the original hockey stick. Some show far more variability leading up to the 20th century than the hockey stick, but none suggest that it has been warmer at any time in the past 1000 years than in the last part of the 20th century.
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but none suggest that it has been warmer at any time in the past 1000 years than in the last part of the 20th century.
The "it was hotter in the Medieval Warm Period" (MWP) meme is another dishonesty doing the rounds. Between about 1000 - 1500 AD temperatures in Europe where higher than the long-term norm, while modern era temperatures are not a lot higher... so who cares?
The dishonesty is this. The MWP arose naturally over many centuries. The rate of it's rise and decline was quite gradual. By contrast the rate of modern warming is dramatically faster.... worse still whatever we do now, even if we didn't burn another drop of oil or coal from today onwards....we are committed to at least another 30 years of temperature increases at the current rate of rise.
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Philip wants it spelt out bell, book and candle.
so lets go to the testimony of professor Wegman and his commmittee of the National Academy of Sciences(NAS)http://energycommerce.house.gov/reparchives/108/Hearings/07192006hearing1987/Wegman.pdf
Most of the proxy series show little structure, but the last two show the characteristic ‘hockey stick’ shape. The principal component-likemethodology in MBH 98/99 preferentially emphasizes these shapes
as we shall see.... page 3
...It is not clear that Mann and associates realized the error in their
methodology at the time of publication. Our re-creation supports the
critique of the MBH98 methods.
In general, we found the writing in MBH98 and MBH99 to be
somewhat obscure and incomplete and the criticisms by
MM03/05a/05b to be valid. The reasons for setting 1902-1995 as the
calibration period presented in the narrative of MBH98 sounds
plausible, and the error may be easily overlooked by someone not trained in statistical methodology. We note that there is no evidence
that Dr. Mann or any of the other authors in paleoclimate studies
have had significant interactions with mainstream statisticians....__page 6 & 7..The MBH98/99 work has been sufficiently politicized that this
community can hardly reassess their public positions without losing
credibility. Overall, our committee believes that the MBH99
assessment that the decade of the 1990s was the likely the hottestdecade of the millennium and that 1998 was likely the hottest year of the millennium cannot be supported by their analysis....__page 8
This refutes the conclusions of his paper
And the first of the NAS panel recommendations..
It is especially the case that authors of policy-related documents like the IPCC report, Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis, should not be the same people as those that constructed the academic papers.This was the written testimoney of Wegman to the Committee, his oral answers to questions from the chairman are here
http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/StupakResponse.pdf -
The interesting bit from the NY Times is ..
Today’s interpreters of the weather are what social scientists call availability entrepreneurs: the activists, journalists and publicity-savvy scientists who selectively monitor the globe looking for newsworthy evidence of a new form of sinfulness, burning fossil fuels.as for the MWP
In 1995 David Deming, a geoscientist at the University of Oklahoma, published a study in Science that demonstrated the technique by generating a 150-year climate history for North America. Here, in his own words, is what happened next...
With the publication of the article in Science, I gained significant credibility in the community of scientists working on climate change. They thought I was one of them, someone who would pervert science in the service of social and political causes. So one of them let his guard down. A major person working in the area of climate change and global warming sent me an astonishing email that said “We have to get rid of the Medieval Warm Period.Journal of Scientific Exploration 2005
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The "it was hotter in the Medieval Warm Period" (MWP) meme is another dishonesty doing the rounds.
Global evidence using tree rings etc rather than local historical records supports the conclusion that on average, temperatures did not drop.
New Scientist's guide has a mention of that too.
Another one of the deniers' favourite lies, which Steve Curtis trotted out a while back was that somehow regional drops in temperature and even the short-term effects of El Ninos refuted the conclusion of an overall climb.
The MWP may have been caused by a fluctuation in the Gulf Stream, indeed it's been argued that if the Arctic cap melts, the influx of cold water will seriously alter the flow of the Gulf Stream, cooling Western Europe. Europe 'should' be much cooler than it is in fact, and it's the Gulf Stream that keeps it warm. This particular outcome though has - I think - been lately considered more unlikely.
In any case, regional climate is extremely variable and we might well get the odd glacier advancing here and there while worldwide averages climb.
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The interesting bit from the NY Times is ..
100% fact-free and pure rhetoric.
A major person working in the area of climate change and global warming sent me an astonishing email that said “We have to get rid of the Medieval Warm Period.
Let's see, where to begin? Unattributed, anonymous, and the writer has already declared his antipathy ('pervert', 'let guard down' 'one of them' - is this guy paranoid or what?). Where's the context for the quote? Was the emailler talking about covering up the Mediaeval Warm Period? Sending it down a memory hole? Accounting for its anomalies in a model? A lot of scientists I know talk aggressively about 'getting rid' of problems by finding out what causes them so that those causes can be incorporated into the revised model. That's how science works. To use a casual remark like this, well...
Thanks for highlighting Deminmg's prejudice!
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Philip wants it spelt out bell, book and candle.
Musical comedy indeed.... how appropriate. Wegman's testimony has been repeatedly misappropriated for this silly purpose. All Wegman was doing was commenting on the statistics... not the data.
Wegman had been tasked solely to evaluate whether the McIntyre and McKitrick (2005) (MM05) criticism of Mann, Bradley and Hughes (1998) (MBH) had statistical merit. That is, was their narrow point on the impacts of centering on the first principal component (PC) correct? He was pointedly not asked whether it made any difference to the final MBH reconstruction and so he did not attempt to evaluate that. Since no one has ever disputed MM05's arithmetic (only their inferences), he along with the everyone else found that, yes, centering conventions make a difference to the first PC.
So what happens when the "correct PC centering conventions" are applied to the data? It made almost no difference. Nor has it made any difference to the dozens of OTHER studies that have repeatedly arrived that the same result in the same decade since.
The US National Academy report linked to by Kracklite spells this out... err.. with bells on.
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