Our policymakers have all been coerced, in one way or another, to ‘accept’ (or, at least, pay lip service to) the assertions that the Earth is getting warmer and warmer, and that we, humans, are the cause of it.
These policies are largely based on the UN’s series of IPCC reports on Global Warming/Climate Change which claim that there is a scientific concensus that the Earth is warming and that the increase of CO2 due to human activity is the cause.
Recently released documents (originally hacked, but since verified as authentic) have demonstrated that many of the scientists who produced the studies which demonstrated this ‘CO2 forced (caused) climate change’ have refused to release their data for scrutiny by other scientists: they have even stated they would rather destroy their original data than permit other scientists to analyze it!
And, they have been caught hiding data which would contradict their official findings….
So, what would Richard Feynman – in my never-humble-opinion, THE most brilliant scientist to have ever walked this Earth – say about this?
Lubo Motl, of The Reference Frame, reminds us of Richard Feynman’s famous commencement speech at CalTech in 1974 , in which Dr. Feynman discusses ‘cargo cult science’ and how it is gaining a hold in our mainstream education and science…. The whole speech is an excellent read! Still, this is perhaps the most salient point he makes:
It’s a kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty–a kind of leaning over backwards.
For example, if you’re doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid–not only what you think is right about it: other causes that could possibly explain your results; and things you thought of that you’ve eliminated by some other experiment, and how they worked–to make sure the other fellow can tell they have been eliminated. Details that could throw doubt on your interpretation must be given, if you know them. You must do the best you can–if you know anything at all wrong, or possibly wrong–to explain it. If you make a theory, for example, and advertise it, or put it out, then you must also put down all the facts that disagree with it, as well as those that agree with it. There is also a more subtle problem. When you have put a lot of ideas together to make an elaborate theory, you want to make sure, when explaining what it fits, that those things it fits are not just the things that gave you the idea for the theory; but that the finished theory makes something else come out right, in addition.
In summary, the idea is to try to give all of the information to help others to judge the value of your contribution; not just the information that leads to judgment in one particular direction or another.
And, Dr. Motl asks:
Do you think the e-mails indicate that the climate scientists have followed the same principles?
CEI is the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a think-tank, which has focused on verifying whether or not ‘the government’ is releasing accurate statements, especially when it comes to issues with impact as pervasive as ‘Global Warming’ or ‘AGW’ or ‘ACC’ (whatever you want to call it).
Dr. Hansen heads up GISS, and is perhaps one of the best known voices on this side of the Atlantic pond (aside from politicians and celebs) calling for drastic action to save us all from the inevitable catastrophe caused by man-made ‘climate change’.
Today, on behalf of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, I filed three Notices of Intent to File Suit against NASA and its Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), for those bodies’ refusal – for nearly three years – to provide documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act.
The information sought is directly relevant to the exploding “ClimateGate” scandal revealing document destruction, coordinated efforts in the U.S. and UK to avoid complying with both countries’ freedom of information laws, and apparent and widespread intent to defraud at the highest levels of international climate science bodies. Numerous informed commenters had alleged such behavior for years, all of which appears to be affirmed by leaked emails, computer codes and other data from the Climatic Research Unit of the UK’s East Anglia University.
So – this is why it matters:
‘Good scientists’ – even the CRU scientists know this, as per the leaked documents – always hand over the ‘raw data’ (that means, exactly as it was collected (along with the methodology used, conditions under which it was collected), before it was processed or ‘normalized’ (scientific meaning of the word) in any way-shape-or-form), what they did with it and why, and their results along with their hypothesis and conclusions when they submit their work for peer-review.
This is really, really important: errors or mistakes (not to mention fraud) can occur at any point of the work. It can occur at the very point of data-collection. For example, if a thermocouple ‘x’ were used to measure temperatures at 5 out of 15 points, and thermocouple ‘y’ was collected for the rest, it will be necessary for any reviewer to read up on both thermocouples to make sure they behave exactly the same way under all conditions.
Simplification: consider 2 thermometers commonly used to measure fever. One is an old fashioned mercury one, the other is the modern, stick-in-the-ear one. If one takes a child’s temperature using the ear thermometer, they may get a different temperature than if they use the old-fashioned mercury one under the child’s arm. Therefore, one would have to document taking the child’s temperature simultaneously with both temperatures and record the readings. Then, one would ‘analyze the difference’ between the readings to see what the difference in readings is. Then, if one recorded 5 temperatures with the ear thermometer, and 15 with the mercury one, then one would have to ‘normalize’ one set of the readings (by adding or subtracting the ‘normal difference’ between their readings) before one could lump all 20 together as one dataset.
When doing peer-review of another scientist’s work, making sure there were no errors or mistakes in how the data was collected (like lumping together readings from the two thermometers in the example above), that there were no mistakes in making any ‘normalization’, and so on. And, since errors or mistakes can occur at any point from here on, all the ‘work’ has to be subjected to scrutiny by one’s peers.
‘Good scientists’ consider this to be a necessary part of any peer-review process.
Yet, the ‘leaked documents’ demonstrate that many of their studies, on which so much policy is being based, have been submitted for ‘peer-review’ without supplying any of their actual data to the peer doing the reviewing!
Which brings us to the point of the Notice of Intent to File Suit:
CEI, using ‘Freedom of Information Act’ FoIA, requested GISS to release much of the data it used to make its predictions of doom and cataclysms. It appears that, for years, GISS has not released it.
In addition, CEI appears to have requested access to the records of ‘discussions’ between various GISS employees about how the data was collected, processed and analyzed. It would seem that they requested sort of similar-type material like was leaked, except from GISS instead of CRU. And, it appears that GISS has not released it, either.
And, though I am no lawyer and people ought to draw their own conclusions, but it does seem to me that CEI is citing the information from the ‘leaked files’ that this ‘cabal of scientists’ was willing to deleted information requested under FoIA (which might constitute a pattern of behaviour among this group of scientists) to put NASA’s GISS on notice that if they do not release the requested information (as the law demands they do), they will indeed face a lawsuit.
By now, most people are aware that the University East Anglia’s (UEA) Climatic Research Unit (CRU) has had their database hacked and tons of documents – including emails between scientists (if one can use that term, in light of the ‘now confirmed’ information revealed therein) which contain some extremely incriminating evidence of scientific fraud, collusion to defraud the public and systematic efforts to subvert the scientific ‘peer review’ process and turn it from an objective assessment into partisan shill.
To me, the last one is the most serious. But, first I have to ask: how come this has not been the leading story in every newspaper and newsprogram everywhere?
Most people have only had a chance to come across a few apologetic articles, like this one in the New York Times, which present tiny snippets of the information unearthed (I condemn the means – let’s get that straight from the beginning – but now that the info is out there, we must assess it), without reasonable context, in order to explain it away as ‘harmless’ and thus diffuse any resulting criticism. SHAME, SHAME, SHAME!
I first came across this at The Reference Frame, and I recommend it for the following reasons: Mr. ReferenceFrame himself taught Physics at MIT. Dr. Lubos Motl is a respected Physicist in his own right, with ties and connections with scientists all over the globe. These, he put to good use himself, verifying whether or not the data the hackers leaked is genuine or not and whether what it reveals can be trusted. As a Physicist, he is much more thorough in this than I would trust most journalists to be, he has the knowledge to evaluate ‘things’, and, let’s face it, as ‘one of them’, most scientists will be more comfortable and open discussing things with him. (The corollary, of course, is that many ‘bad’ scientists will feel more threatened by him because he’s trained to detect any scientific BS!)
Plus, he is updating his post to include the latest bits…
AND, he has posted a comprehensive list of sites which are analyzing/discussing this. Again, I much recommend it… overall, I find his post to be a most useful frame of reference!
In case the absence of the mass media coverage on this topic has left you wondering what it is I am jabbering on about, here is the tip of the proverbial (and growing, not melting) iceberg:
If you would like to check through all the ‘leaked documents’, you can download them from Junk Science, or Friends of Science. Or, look through the database Lubo Motl provides on The Reference Frame: it is excellent. There are many well written blogs (as opposed to news stories(!)) that give the ‘scoop’ on this!
What the emails appear to have revealed:
data had been altered to ‘hide cooling’
data had been forged to demonstrate a ‘warming trend’
Scientists lamented that their data did not demonstrate the conclusions they wanted: this is nothing new. What is new is that they sought advice from each other how to fiddle the data in order to hide what it shows and instead conform to their desired conclusion
Scientists threatened to destroy data rather than permit other scientists examine the un-altered dataset on which their study is based (this is an essential part of the peer review process – without examining the raw data, another scientist cannot possibly assess if it had been processed ‘correctly’: it is unthinkable that a proper peer review could possibly be done without examining the raw data
Scientists knowingly passed only the data that supported ‘Global Warming’ on to the IPCC panel for evaluation, suppressing existing data that opposed it.
Scientists intentionally manipulated ‘impartial’ scientists performing peer review on studies which had findings which did not support AGW/ACC point of view, tricking them into rejecting non-AGW/ACC supporting studies…
All this is bad. Very bad. BUT – and this is, in my never-humble-opinion, is something so vile and unforgivable, I am having trouble wrapping my brain around it: THEY COLLUDED TO SUBVERT THE SCIENTIFIC PEER REVIEW PROCESS!!!
Why is subverting the peer review process the thing that upsets me so much?
Because if people do ‘bad science’ – the peers reviewing it will, eventually, catch it and expose it.
Because if people are committing scientific fraud – the peers reviewing it will, eventually, catch it and expose it, and ruin the reputation of the scientist committing it.
Because if there is a group of scientists conspiring to defraud everyone – the peers reviewing it may take a while to catch on, but, eventually, they will catch it, expose it and make sure these conspirators never get near any science again!
The scientific peer review process relies on the honesty and integrity of scientists. It is nothing more – and nothing less – than, when one writes up one’s experiment/scientific study, one submits BOTH the write-up AND all the supporting data and materials to other scientists who have expertise in this field. These other scientists read the experiment’s/study’s hypothesis, then they examine the methodology used, data (the actual, physical data that was collected, the method/means it was collected by, the ‘controls’ that were placed to limit other possible factors that might affect the data and so on, the methodologies and techniques used to analyze the data, and so on) and then they analyze whether or not the data, collected in the way it was, analyzed as it was, supports the hypothesis as proposed.
It is not an easy process – and it relies heavily on the integrity of the ‘peers’ doing the ‘review’!
That is why it is so highly valued!
There is no fame or fortune in it, yet it is hard (and necessary) work! That is why most scientists take ‘peer review’ at face value!
By showing that this very process which is supposed to test (and thus assure) the integrity of scientific findings can be subverted, and subverted so easily, these people have ended the ‘age of innocence’ among the scientific community!
To sum it up – they have falsified science (and manipulated policymakers) in order to increase their own funding, they have subverted (and thus for ever destroyed the credibility of) the scientific peer review process and utterly destroyed the credibility of science and scientists!
I wish I could think of names vile enough to call them – but, there are none! Their names will go down in history and become the worst possible insults a person can be called!
It seems that, once again, trouble is brewing in this quaint little town.
This time, it is not the Devil who is afflicting young people, but none other than the lovable-appearing Muppet, Beaker!
The affliction of the town’s young people – which causes them to exclaim ‘Meep!’ without provocation – has become so severe that the administrators of the Danvers High School have been forced to resort to banning the word, both written and spoken!
So, when such a posession by evil (?) Muppet begun to sweep through the youth population (some students even said ‘Meep’ AT a teacher!), how was the school to protect the students not yet infected into channeling this spirit? Obviously, the school had to take the strongest possible steps! According to news reports, the school instituted a rule (clearly communicated to all parents) that any student who utters this sound ‘Meep!’, or even wears an article of clothing with the word ‘Meep!’ on it, will face expulsion from school! Oh, and the police will be notified, too…
After all, what else could they do? Now, even MORE young people were affected than the LAST time – and they had to resort to ‘witch trial’ and executions then!!!
Could they learn a lesson from history?
Or, perhaps, educational professionals might have some of them ‘professional educational tools’ they could employ?
…don’t be ridiculous – that would mean actually doing their job!
They did what any authority in power these days seems to think is the ‘best’ way to deal with something they don’t like: BAN IT!!!
Of course, this hit the blogosphere pretty fast: I read about it on Dvorak Uncensored. They carry a quote from a lawyer who says she sent an email stating ‘Meep!’ (the address is publicly available on the school’s website, right margin) to the principal, vice principal and administrator, only to get a reply from the VP that her email has, indeed, been forwarded to the local police department….
This is serious matter: curbing the freedom of speech of students is nothing to Tinker with! The only circumstances – according to the US Supreme Court – that a student’s right to free speech may be abridged on public school grounds is if the ‘speech’ is ‘sexually explicit’ or if it ‘promotes the use of illegal substances’…. Of course, I am no lawyer, but, in my never-humble-opinion, the word ‘Meep!’ does not do either!
Despite the clear rules of law, the school leadership has deemed this offensive word, ‘Meep!’, to be such a danger and such a disruption, no amount of force is unjustified in getting rid of it!
When I told my own kids about this situation, both my sons shouted out (simultaneously) “Reason!” and “Common Sense!” The point being, if the teens in Danvers High switched to saying ‘Reason!’ or ‘Common Sense’ in the same manner they are now using the term ‘Meep!’, would the school ban ‘Reason!’ and ‘Common Sense!’ ?
Some clever people (sorry, I lost the link) have suggested that, perhaps, the students might stop saying ‘Meep!’, but each and every one of them could, say, accidentally drop a textbook at 10:45 each and every day…. accidents DO happen….
Personally, I think they ought to continue the behaviour, but change ‘Meep!’ sound to ‘Baaaaaaaaah!’ After all, if the school WANTS them to behave like sheep, they might as well SOUND like sheep!
Now, I did not grow up with the Muppets: right generation, wrong continent. But, my husband did. And, he likes Beaker! He has the audacity to think that Beaker, contrary to the Danvers High administrators, is not actually evil! He asked me to send them this message (I recommend you turn the volume down – the music is seriously ‘wussy’, to the point of ‘ear-bleed-causing’, but the video does make the point): DON’T FEAR THE BEAKER!!!
Of course, there are those conspiracy-minded folk who think that the reason that the school had banned ‘Meep!’ is because during the 2008 US Presidential election, the Muppet Show endorsed Beaker for President – against Obama-Kermit! And that this is just political payback by Obama-Kermit cronies… Personally, I don’t believe a word of that! Though, if you would like adirect confirmation that this ‘conspiracy theory’ is ludicrous, perhaps you could ask the Danvers High School principal, Thomas Murray, directly. His email is murray@danvers.org )
All I have to say to the pedagogues of Danvers High:
Stand up proud, all you thought criminals and free minds everywhere!
And, nominate your most (and least) favourite bloggers and pundits, independent thinkers enemies of censorship and oppression for recognition of their contributions!
This year, the categories are both domestic and international, so there is fun for everyone:
A while ago, I wrote a post opposing sexual apartheid as the solution proposed to ‘fix’ our educational system.
To recap: the ‘problem’ – as it is presented to us: there are too many female teachers, so the classrooms are geared towards ‘girl learning’ and the boys are falling by the wayside….and the proposed fix is to establish boy-only classrooms or schools, staffed preferably by male teachers, so ‘boy learning’ can take place.
On the surface of it, this sounds like a relatively reasonable solution. One of my wisest readers/commenters, CodeSlinger, thought it might be and said so in the comments. And, we also exchanged a few lively emails on the topic, too… because, frankly, I think segregating boys in schools will do more harm than good.
Don’t misunderstand me, please. I agree that our education system is broken and the way it is failing is more quickly and easily visible when one looks at the ‘statistics’ of our ‘boys’…. but I think these stats are just the tip of the proverbial ice-berg. I propose that ‘our boys’ are the ‘canaries in the mine‘ and that moving them into a ‘canary-only tunnel’ will not help things.
Where to begin….there are so many reasons!
For the sake of the discussion (and to keep this post at least somewhat focused), let’s put aside the facts that:
Segregation of a specific segment of our population has never, ever, in human history, resulted in ‘a good thing’ (for the segregated segment, that is).
Some ‘girls’ have more ‘male’ brains and way of thinking/learning than many ‘boys’, and vice versa – and these kids would really become victims in a segregated educational system: not just of not being able to learn in the manner presented, but also through social ostracism of ‘being like the other’ which is so different, it must be segregated. Again, boys would suffer greater damage from being considered ‘effeminate’ or ‘girlie-boys’ than girls would for being considered ‘tom-boys’.
A segregated system focuses on ‘gender-specific’ subjects (the expert-designed plans even boast of it),necessarily leaving out others, which denies students opportunities bef0re they are even discovered…
It hides the problem, instead of fixing it.
It is unconstitutional! And just plain wrong, immoral and ( insert a strong derogatory word of your choice here)!
Instead of re-stating my position, I’d like to quote from an email I sent to ‘CodeSlinger’ when he – quite rightly – pointed out we must do SOMETHING to help ‘our boys’! I wrote:
The only thing that strikes me about this is that it makes you appear a little idealistic: do you think that the very same people who have so successfully and, I think, quite intentionally marginalized boys in the integrated classrooms – and it WILL be the SAME people who will be in charge of the segregated system – do you think they will not use the opportunity the segregated system will provide them to even further damage our sons?The goal is to marginalize anyone who would have the backbone to stand up against ‘the system’. If the boys are segregated, in the name of ‘helping them’, they will be given ‘physical activity’ to help them ‘burn off their energy’, but not the skills to become educated enough to be listened to if they speak out. It will be the beginning of creating an underclass of men: either too whipped to dare stand-up, or effectively indoctrinated to think they are not competent to pay attention to anything beyond sports. It’s their nature, you see….
Can you see what I mean?
Do you not see how ‘segregating’ boys would be an incredibly useful way to ‘weed out’ any who have the backbone to ‘stand up’ for ‘themselves’ or for what they think is ‘right’ – to more effectively marginalize the very people most likely to stand up to an oppressive authority? In a society which is completely reliant on listening to ‘experts’ and pays little heed to self-taught or self-educated individuals, or people who are not academics, this would prevent any such ‘independent voices’ from being given any credence.
There has already been talk that ‘boys’ would likely ‘benefit’ if, from early on, their education were geared towards ‘trades’, because ‘boys’ are ‘better’ with ‘hands-on’ learning than ‘book learning’…
Can you not see how this would be the first step to creating an underclass? As if my point needed further proof, one of CodeSlinger’s own links (in the comments) is to an article which sums up a Dr. Spence’s document, which he prepared for the Toronto school board to engineer these ‘all-boy-learning-environments’:
How much more proof do we need that this is – whether by design or error – going to result in raising a generation of boys to be our society’s underclass?
Of course, there will be a group of boys who will be ‘protected’ from this psychological destruction: Muslim boys. They will be the only males in our society who will be insulated from this psychological destruction from kindergarten on – and they will be the only males who will dare to speak up and affect the evolution of our society. But, that is a different story…
Yes, our educational system is broken.
Yes, it is failing boys more than girls.
But we ought not presume that co-incidence implies causality – or, that change for the sake of change will be a good thing! We could make things much, much worse…. and that is a gamble we cannot afford to take. Not with our sons….
A little while ago, I wrote to my MP (Member of Parliament) with some questions and concerns regarding the CHRC (Canadian Human Rights Commission).
This afternoon, I received this reply from my MP:
Thank you for taking the time to write to me with your question. I looked into it for you, and have this information from the Ministry of Justice:
· The Canadian Human Rights Commission and Tribunal are independent agencies that administer the Canadian Human Rights Act without interference from the Government.
· The Member of Parliament from Westlock-St. Paul (Brian Storseth) brought forth a motion this Parliament asking the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights to study the Commission’s mandate, operations, and its application and interpretation of section 13.
· The Committee adopted this motion. I look forward to the committee’s study of these issues, as well as the study of Professor Moon’s report.
With respect to the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal decision, Warman v. Lemire, we cannot comment as the matter is before the court.
Warman v. Lemire:
At issue is whether the hate messages prohibition in s.13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act is inconsistent with freedom of expression and other Charter rights, and whether the 1990 judgment of the Supreme Court of Canada in Taylor , which held that s.13 is constitutionally valid, should
be reconsidered as a result of the evolution of the Internet and legislative amendments.
On September 2, 2009 the Human Rights Tribunal ruled s. 13 unjustifiably infringed on the Charter, which guarantees the freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression.
Yesterday, Ms. Lynch (Chief Commissioner of our Canadian – federal – Human Rights Commission) had testified in front of Parliamentary Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights (or something like that – I confuse easily…). Our valiant defender of the right to not be annoyed – at the expense of the freedom of expression – was at her most patronizing!
Actually, Ezra Levant has a whole set of posts, as he was blogging it live! (As were many other fine people – thanks to all of them!) And, of course, I could not help myself: while commenting at Mr. Levant’s site, I made a comment that can hardly be understood unless one knows some of my views on ‘things’….
Here is my comment:
OK – one more tiny little question…
If there were a job opening coming up for the head of the CHRC (as I suspect after today’s testimony, there just might be): how would one go about applying for the job?
My husband says I’d be good at it! (‘Change’ is still the ‘good’ mantra, right?)
The key here being ‘change’…. because, I do have a ‘slightly’ different idea of where the ‘balance of rights’ lies….
I do not have a passport, because as much as I am a Canadian patriot, I do not recognize the government’s jurisdiction over me on this issue. I am not the slave (chattal) of my government, for them to issue me some ‘papers’ which permit or deny me the right to travel, inside or outside of my country!
Sorry, that is just too much of a government encroachment upon me and my person!
Nor do I believe that a government has the jurisdiction to tax people against their will. A government only exists at the sufferance of the populace: its role is to provide external defense and to uphold internal laws. Citizens ought to be free to contribute to the upkeep of the government at their will – the government does not have the moral (and ought not have the legal) right to extort taxes from its citizens by coercion or force.
Do you think people would then not pay their taxes? I think we would. When is the last time you received an awesome service in a restaurant, and did not leave a tip? I have certainly never skimped….provided the service was acceptable and I am known to ‘overtip’ if the service is excellent! The same should go for taxes.
Because, if a government has the power to set the tax rate AND to FORCE the citizens to pay the taxes it sets, regardless of democracy or anything else, we will see irresponsible government spending, waste in the civil service, corruption… We all know the story!
Thus – in my never-humble-opinion – it is a gross violation of human rights and freedoms for a government to exact taxes by force of law, to collect personal information about its citizens, to issue ‘travel permits’, and so on. And, if I were the Chief Commissar of the Canadian Human Rights Commission, my first target would be the overbloated, over-reaching, oppressive government which is smothering us, our rights, denying us our freedoms!
THAT is the ‘change’ I was referring to in my comment….
Though, my husband thinks I’d be very effective at it!
Today, Jennifer Lynch – the head of Canadian Human Rights Commission – is testifying in front of the same Parliamentary Committee that Ezra Levant and Mark Steyn did. And, her testimony will be carried live at 3 pm EST on CPAC.
Xanthippa's Chamberpot 