Wednesday, December 09, 2009

Climate-Gate

I challenge the executives of organizations involved in global warming denial to step away from their keyboards and allow a neutral third party to download their emails and post them on the web. I would like to see how well they follow the moral requirements that they insist on imposing on others.

A lot of ink and electrons are currently being wasted on a discussion of the contents of some email files stolen from the East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit (CRU), which is heavily involved in climate change research. Those emails have been quote-mined for a few select quotes that suggest that the authors were trying to "hide the decline" and (GASP!) keep sub-standard scientific research out of professional scientific publications.

Spend some time looking over your own emails and see if there you can't find things in thousands of emails that can't be quite-mined by somebody with an axe to grind against you.

It is interesting to note, however, that in all of these emails they were only able to find a few select quotes and no evidence as far as I have seen of scientists engaged in a conspiracy for the purpose of maintaining funding that would have otherwise been lost.

This causes me to wonder what we would find if we looked at the email of those who vocally deny the existence of global warming.

One thing we would not find on those emails is an intelligent fact-based discussion of the merits of anti-global-warming science. This is because there is no such thing as anti-global-warming science. All of the science favors the conclusion that humans are putting enough greenhouse gas into the atmosphere to significantly warm the planet.

There might be a few emails that honestly assess the climate change data, and they may identify a few real problems, but this is going to be an extremely small portion of the overall email content.

Expecting to find good science among the emails of global-warning deniers is like expecting to find good science among the emails of young-earth creationists or the directors of the Creation Museum. It is absurd to expect such a thing.

Instead, the only thing global warming deniers have to talk about - and what is almost certain to occupy the bulk of their emails, is how they are going to muddy the water and hide the scientific facts from the voting public. The objective here is to manipulate the public into behaving the way that benefits a few industry executives - into protecting what amounts to a multi-trillion dollar subsidy by preventing them from understanding on and acting on the truth of global warming - and of what it will cost those people, their neighbors, and their descendants.

I am not talking about some grand conspiracy theory such as the claims that the moon landings were faked or a secret international organization secretly pulls the strings behind every government on earth for their own benefit. I am talking about an industry trying to protect the economic equivalent of trillions of dollars in government subsidies spending a few hundred million dollars muddying the water and burying the facts that would cause people to take away those subsidies.

We are talking here about a group of people who are substantially indifferent to the destruction of whole cities and even whole nations and the misery of whole populations. We have good evidence of this in the poor quality of the arguments that they put forth in denying global warming. They are good arguments that are effective at convincing people who get their information in two-minute sound bytes from the likes of Fox News and Rush Limbaugh, but they are arguments that any intellectually and morally responsible person would throw in the garbage.

I will be looking at some of those arguments in the posts to come and showing not only that the arguments are flawed, but that a morally responsible person who is not indifferent to the destruction of whole cities and whole nations would never use those arguments and condemn any who did.

Am I wrong about this?

Well, one way that the global-warming deniers can prove their perfect moral virtue is by stepping away from the computers and allowing people unrestricted access to their email files. If they have nothing to hide, then what reason could they possibly give to refuse having others do to them what they are more than happy to do to others.

Of course, since we are dealing with people who are substantially indifferent to the destruction of whole cities and the misery of whole populations and who show absolutely no moral conscience when it comes to manipulating people into doing things that could cost those people their lives, we should not be at all surprised that they have no problem with the moral crime of hypocrisy either.

Am I wrong about this?

Well, they can prove it easily enough. All they need to do is open their email servers up to public viewing. Let them prove their superior moral and intellectual qualities to the world.

36 comments:

  1. What is needed is another "Warren Commission". They really knew how to get at the truth! Yuk Yuk!!!

    Give them hell, Alonzo!

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  2. So...unable to stand behind the perpetrators of the original offense (who happen to share your views on global warming), your answer is to say "Well, the other guys are probably doing it too." Awesome argumentation.

    And your characterization of those who don't agree that global climate changes are man-made as the destroyers of civilization demonstrates a really reasonable and open-minded position. I'm sure anyone who disagrees with your politics probably eats babies as well.

    But the real winner is the way you use "deniers" (drawing a nice cozy relationship between reviled revisionists and what has become a mainstream scientific opinion in the world today) to describe those who don't interpret the scientific data the way you do. Very classy.

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  3. What original Offence? Thus far I haven't even seen any evidence that they fudged any numbers or engaged in any fraudulent activities. A few lines taken out of context and paraded about to mean something entirely different than what they meant in context does not a conspiracy make.

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  4. Well, I would see the original "offense" as scientists acting out of dogma and belief rather than acting scientifically.

    I would think atheists would be even more aware and reticent of scientific dogma (as opposed to actual science) which is little more than a religion of consensus used to bully less mainstream opinions.

    Whether or not climategate emails are overblown (I would agree with you that they probably are) it fills me with dismay to see argumentation ad hominem rather than an actual discussion of its merits or lack thereof.

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  5. You've seen this, right?
    http://www.youtube.com/user/potholer54#p/a/u/0/7nnVQ2fROOg

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  6. rather than an actual discussion of its merits or lack thereof.

    That is not the fault of scientists. Deniers are the ones who avoid all meaningful discussion about the merits (or lack thereof) of the actual science, because whenever they do so they are soundly trounced. They discovered this over a decade ago.

    Instead they must - and do - resort to lies, distortion, manufacturing false controversy/doubt, and character attacks. And when the air is filled with this garbage they cry out "Why can't we just look at the merits, or lack thereof, of the actual science?!". They are the ones who obscured it in the first place.

    And as the cherry on top, when people point out the reprehensible tactics that are used, and the potential consequences of ignoring the problem, the deniers are outraged that anyone would stoop so low as to call them liars who are indifferent to the devastation of populations. "Ad hominem!" they shout, as if this would in any way change the fact that they are indeed lying and indifferent to human suffering.

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  7. Captain Spalding

    So...unable to stand behind the perpetrators of the original offense (who happen to share your views on global warming), your answer is to say "Well, the other guys are probably doing it too." Awesome argumentation.

    This is not even close to a fair representation of my argument. Your interpretation would have me claiming that what the global-warming deniers would do is permissible, which is the opposite of what I am claiming in fact.

    I do not need to claim, nor would I even try to claim, that every person working on climate change must have perfect moral virtue in order for the science to be accurate. Indeed, the argument that, "We have found a few examples of less than perfect moral virtue among climate researchers, so none of the evidence can be trusted" is a wholly invalid inference.

    And your characterization of those who don't agree that global climate changes are man-made as the destroyers of civilization demonstrates a really reasonable and open-minded position. I'm sure anyone who disagrees with your politics probably eats babies as well.

    Whether my view of the deniers of climate change represents a "reasonable and open-minded position" depends on whether the statement is true or not. In fact, it is your insistance that I must necessarily reject such a conclusion without any evidence - simply because of the nature of the conclusion itself - is the very essence of closed-mindedness. I will go where the evidence takes me - even if it takes me to the conclusion that certain people are show callous disregard for the well-being of others. You want to insist on ruling out certain conclusions before evidence is even considered. Which option best exemplifies closed-mindedness?

    But the real winner is the way you use "deniers" (drawing a nice cozy relationship between reviled revisionists and what has become a mainstream scientific opinion in the world today) to describe those who don't interpret the scientific data the way you do. Very classy.

    Saying that global warming deniers "don't interpet the scientific data teh way I do" is like saying that flat earthers or young-earth creationists "don't interpret the scientific data the way I do" - or that holocaust deniers "don't interpet the historic data the way I do." These people are not only wrong, they are culpably wrong - making mistakes that a morally and intellectually responsbile person would not make.

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  8. Indeed, the argument that, "We have found a few examples of less than perfect moral virtue among climate researchers, so none of the evidence can be trusted" is a wholly invalid inference.

    Except that the examples deal directly with how they handle climate research, not whether or not they are "moral" people. If the way they deal with climate data is not trustworthy, then it does indeed cast doubt on their assertions. This isn't about climate scientists who might cheat on their wives.

    Whether my view of the deniers of climate change represents a "reasonable and open-minded position" depends on whether the statement is true or not. In fact, it is your insistance that I must necessarily reject such a conclusion without any evidence - simply because of the nature of the conclusion itself - is the very essence of closed-mindedness. I will go where the evidence takes me - even if it takes me to the conclusion that certain people are show callous disregard for the well-being of others. You want to insist on ruling out certain conclusions before evidence is even considered.

    Except that, as a single person, your "evidence" is nothing more than an appraisal of what you've been exposed to. Surely you aren't so arrogant as to assume that your examination of "evidence" is total or all encompassing. Thus, there may indeed be positions, whether you be unwilling to accept them or just unaware of them altogether, which don't match up with your "evidence". It's a funny thing about how data and evidence works: your application of data is not in and of itself factual, despite it being based upon facts.

    Just be honest: your are throwing around those pejoratives to disparage others based on an argument you don't even present or defend here. That's fine and well (and certainly normal in writing, non-fiction included) but it represents a dogmatic position which is not only rejecting the opinion of its detractors but, rather than responding to why those opinions don't suffice, characterizes them negatively in the most general possible way so as to avoid actual clash with their arguments. You should be well familiar with this tactic as someone who has debated the fervently religious.

    Saying that global warming deniers "don't interpet the scientific data teh way I do" is like saying that flat earthers or young-earth creationists "don't interpret the scientific data the way I do" - or that holocaust deniers "don't interpet the historic data the way I do." These people are not only wrong, they are culpably wrong - making mistakes that a morally and intellectually responsbile person would not make.

    So you're saying that you're so firm in your beliefs that you KNOW you're right and they're wrong. That sounds distinctly like...wait for it...dogma. That's certainly not how good science works.

    Sad, really. The old "atheists are just a religion unto themselves" chestnut becomes more and more true as dogmatists like yourself increasingly soil the pool. Until we can dismantle dogma and dogmatic belief we can never really dismantle religions and religious beliefs.

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  9. So you're saying that you're so firm in your beliefs that you KNOW you're right and they're wrong. That sounds distinctly like...wait for it...dogma. That's certainly not how good science works.

    I'm curious as to your criteria for when one can claim to know something. Specifically in regard to the examples Alonzo gave and you skipped over. Of the three following statements:
    1. The Earth is roughly spherical (as opposed to flat).
    2. The Earth was not created ex nihilo aprox 6000 years ago.
    3. The Nazi Holocaust did occur.

    Are they all dogma, or can you claim to know any of them? Actually know to the point that you will assert that you are right and someone taking the contrary position is wrong.

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  10. Captain Spalding

    Except that the examples deal directly with how they handle climate research, not whether or not they are "moral" people.... This isn't about climate scientists who might cheat on their wives.

    There is a lot more to morality than whether or not people cheat on their wives. Morality also concerns such things as honesty - with recklessly or knowingly attempting to persuade people to take actions that are not necessarily in their interest by misrepresenting the facts.

    If the way they deal with climate data is not trustworthy, then it does indeed cast doubt on their assertions.

    And the best way to deal with this issue is to look at the facts themselves and verify what they say.

    Except that, as a single person, your "evidence" is nothing more than an appraisal of what you've been exposed to. Surely you aren't so arrogant as to assume that your examination of "evidence" is total or all encompassing.

    You draw a false dichotomy between perfect knowledge and perfect ignorance. I know the science of global warming. I know the arguments of the global warming deniers. I know logic. I know that the arguments of the deniers significantly misrepresent the science of global warming and can demonstrate it.

    Just be honest: your are throwing around those pejoratives to disparage others based on an argument you don't even present or defend here.

    Yes. That is exactly what I said in this post.

    But, there are more posts to come in which I will present those arguments. They will aim to demonstrate how the arguments of deniers are not only flawed, but that they contain flaws that no morally responsible person would make. They are the types of flaws that strongly suggest that the person making them are callously indifferent to the destruction of whole cities and the suffering of whole populations. Because a morally responsible person would not be so reckless (in the same way a morally responsible person does not drive after drinking).

    So you're saying that you're so firm in your beliefs that you KNOW you're right and they're wrong. That sounds distinctly like...wait for it...dogma. That's certainly not how good science works.

    By your standards, it would also be an example of dogma for me to say that the Holocaust certainly happened and that those who deny its existence are mistaken.

    My standards of proof are, not coincidentally, the same standards that of proof used in a court of law. It is, "Do I have enough evidence to declare whether the accused is guilty of the charges leveled against them." If I adopt your standard, nobody would ever be accused of any crimes - moral or otherwise - because nobody ever has enough evidence for a conviction. The mere possibility of error would require acquittal in all instances.

    It is an absurd standard, though it is not at all difficult to understand why those who may be convicted of wrongdoing might actually advance such a standard.

    I have made my opening statement in this trial. In my next post, I will start to present evidence sufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused are guilty of the charges.

    As I said above, stay tuned.

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  11. I will definitely continue to follow this series to see the arguments all fleshed out.

    Out of curiosity, you say that you "know the science of global warming." What are your credentials in that field? I'm not trying to "out" you or prove any point, I'm legitimately curious (although I can understand why one would be skeptical of my question, hence the disclaimer).

    For the sake of full disclosure, I have no credentials or experience in that field and am left to simply interpret the opinions and findings of others.

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  12. If we want to help the planet then we need to stop having so many babies. Simple. If we dont mother nature will do it for us through pain and suffering. Preventing deforestation wouldnt do any harm either. They should stop blinding people with statistics as it makes them skeptical. Issue practical measures which are easy to understand and have a significant outcome in the future.

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  13. Please GOD [or nature or whatever for you atheists], let Alphonzo know that he is getting utterly crushed y Captain Spalding, and let him. Just. Stop.

    It's the intellectual equivalent to a fight between Mike Tyson in his prime versus Liberace.

    I'm staying out of the discussion, and just trying to do Al a favor. When you are hopelessly outmatched, call the other guy a racist or something and stop trying to debate him. It's the liberal thing to do!

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  14. John Doe

    An impressive tactic.

    Without addressing any of the reasons for concern, declare victory and continue to do harm.

    It definitely shows your moral character.

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  15. Captain Spaulding:

    For all the crap I have heard over the past few years I will attest that in a post several months ago, Alonzo provided the best explanation for global warming I have heard in the public arena . . . one that even a Grade One student was able to comprehend.

    The problem, as I see it, is that all the debaters are so busy getting all their "ducks in a row" that they don't know it will soon be hunting season when all of the wrong "experts" will be swimming for higher ground which will be defended by us "other guys" who will just let you drown.

    The question your descendants will ask, if you have any, is "Why didn't you do the right thing in the war on global warming? Why did you spend all of your effort in stupid intellectual arguments?"

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  16. "I know that the arguments of the deniers significantly misrepresent the science of global warming and can demonstrate it."

    Case in point: the "decline" that they were seeking to "hide" was a period of proxy tree ring data which is known to be unreliable. In other words, the "trike" was a method to prevent bad data from corrupting the rest.

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  17. This is about al gore and ban-ki-moon stating openly that this is about one world governance. This is about having a global non elected coorperate conglomerate tax you on anything and everything you do, your travel, the food you eat (cows fart methane, they'll tax the farmers for that too) every mammal on the planet expells carbon dioxide, every green thing consumes it. It's plant food. Three words. READ THE TREATY!! Stop being socially driven bleeding heart idiots and WAKE UP! The treaty clearly states there will be taxes imposed on travel, gas, flying, money transfers, and a new system of carbon credit derivitives that you will be forced to buy to offset your carbon footprint will be forced on you! Copenhagen will solve nothing, you can keep polluting all you want as long as you buy market driven carbon derivitives to "offset" your breathing. But what if your local power plant can't afford the extra credits? What if you can't? Well the treaty also calls for an "administrative body to ensure complyance" as stated under their structure for this new world government. So you will be without power and transportation because of it. This has nothing to do with the earth! They are openly trying to rob you blind and controll every aspect of your life and you think it's about co2.

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  18. Ok Zo, I'll bite. Yes, please do check my e-mails. I'm a lawyer. There is nothing there were I have tried to lie and hide the truth and prevent those with opposing views from having their views published. And never have I destroyed evidence.

    If you are correct on this issue or any other, by all means, I want to be pursuaded. If you are correct, why not be above-board and let the whole world see how you arrived at your conclusions?

    The "scientists" of climate gate acted neither scientifically, nor as though they believed that they had truth on their side. Americans are not stupid. They can tell true arguments from false, if both are allowed to co-exist. It's the covering up, and acting as though they had something to hide, that has done so much damage to the global warming argument.

    I see that the revelation of what they have done has upset you, but the reason you are upset is because you believe those "scientists" are on the correct side, but that their emails have done a great disservice to the side of the argument that you believe is true. Rather than trying to pooh pooh the great harm that they have done, you ought to just man up and admit that they dealt a major blow to your sides' case, and move on to some other topic. You would have more credibility by just admitting that you can't win the argument trying to justify what they have done. Stick to arguing strong areas; fighting on that battlefield is a losing proposition.

    p.s. you know nothing of my "moral character." I just thought it was humorous you trying to win a none-winnable debate, and getting deeper and deeper into a hole. I still do. Come to think of it, if you believe that reflects somehow on my moral character, knock yourself out. Make judgments about me.

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  19. Those emails aren't private emails. They are CRU/UEA emails. Staffs had been warned that the emails would be released to the public on FOI so they must be take this into consideration.

    Secondly, the emails are in the context of research funded by the government. So the context is different than let's say your Gmail account.

    The person who leaked/hacked the emails will no doubt be taken to court if/when caught.

    Seems like those scientists did not understand, that when you delete emails, they could still exist in the email server.

    And even if they could access the email server to delete the emails, there would still be lots of backup tapes somewhere safe.

    Big organizations don't lose staffs emails ... simple as that.

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  20. This is really concerning

    "I do not need to claim, nor would I even try to claim, that every person working on climate change must have perfect moral virtue in order for the science to be accurate."

    Sure, the scientists do not need to have *perfect* moral virtue (whatever the criteria is to be considered perfect), but does that mean we should accept any scientist with no moral/ethic/standard what so ever?

    At least the scientists that receive public funding must be trusted, right?

    These emails really damage that trust in those scientists.

    This is not about the science behind AGW, although there may be implications. This is about how the scientific community handle such scandal.

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  21. XXX

    If these things are concerning to you, then what you are virtually guaranteed to find in the emails of the global warming deniers should absolutely floor you.

    They have nothing to back up their claims. Their campaign is NOTHING BUT a continuous attempt to distort and misrepresent the facts. My posts to come will take a huge set of the most common denialist claims and show the manipulations and distortions behind them.

    Yet, this, and the fact that these distortions are being used to convince people to take actions that risk the destruction of whole cities and countries and the suffering of whole populations, does not seem to concern you.

    This tells me what type of person you are.

    Even these emails are turning out to be yet another campaign of distortions.

    The term 'trick', for example, has a clear meaning even in common language as a clever way of accomplishing something. You might hear a person say, "There's a trick to getting that door open," or "Let me show you a trick for keeping the pie crust from tearing as you put it in the pan."

    This does not imply fraud.

    In fact, if you were to look at professional peer-reviewed scientific papers, you will see the term "trick" all over the place, having this meaning.

    However, global-warming deniers, eager to practice their art of deception people to do things that risk the destruction of whole cities are more than eager to present the term 'trick' to mean 'an act of fraud or deception.'

    And this comment about 'hide the decline'?

    The decline they are talking about is the decline in the tree-ring proxy for global temperatures. And if they are trying to hide this, they are doing a very poor job. The fact that the tree-ring proxy shows a decline in global temperatures has been widely reported in the scientific literature. But it is an anomaly, that is at odds with every other form of temperature measurement, including satellite and direct temperature measurements.

    Here, too, the anti-global-warming deceivers, unconcerned about the fact that they are manipulating people into actions that risk the destruction of whole cities, misrepresent this as 'hiding the decline in the global temperatures'.

    There might actually be signs of wrong-doing in those emails. Yet, nothing at this point can hide the fact that in reporting that has been done to date, the anti-global-warming deceivers have once again put their art of deception and manipulation to work, at the potential cost of whole cities.

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  22. "Worst people in the world."

    "This tells me what type of person you are."

    Anybody else think Alonzo might be on the verge of a nervous breakdown?

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  23. Calvin:

    Maybe Alonzo is . . . he may be having the nervous breakdown so he can visit you in the nut house!

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  24. Calvin

    This is an ethics blog and, as such, virtually every post I write has to do with the making and defending of moral judgments.

    There is nothing new in what I am doing, or my form of argument.

    I notice that you have not addressed any of my evidence. You have only attacked the conclusions without regard to the reasoning behind them.

    If the conclusions are flawed, then perhaps you can show where the arguments leading up to them went astray.

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  25. Alonzo, you remind me of Bagdad Joe. They weren't really trying to hide the truth about the tree rings, but if they were, it was ok, since the tree rings were wrong anyway. And they weren't really trying to keep skeptics from publishing their work, but if they were, it's all right, because the skeptics are bad people any way. Yeah, right.

    Your excuse about hiding the tree ring proxy data is lame. I get it that the tree ring data does not jive with the measured temperatures.

    But the scientifically sound approach, once it was discovered that the tree rings did not jive with the observed actual temperatures, would be to reevaluate then how accurate tree rings are in judging past temperatures, back when there was no human recording the actual temperatures. However, the "scientists" instead tried to hide what the tree ring data indicated. Real "scientists" don't run from the facts, they find a way to explain them, or they adjust their original premise (in this case, that one can tell past unrecorded temperatures from tree rings). And it isn't a valid defense to argue that the information got out any way, so their attempts to hide the info was unsuccessful. Do you really want scientists who even consider attempting to hide facts? Wouldn't that just encourage more skeptics?

    People will begin to say: "We can't trust them because they hide facts from us." You WANT people to trust your scientists, don't you? Seems to me the prudent thing to do would be to show great outrage and demand that these bad apples be fired immediately. They've harmed your cause. And you are harming your cause by these lame attempts to defend the inexcusable.

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  26. It would appear that there is an appeal to make all scientific activities purer than one could ever find in a church. Maybe those who have "hidden the truth" learned how to do it from the Catholic Church or the ass-hats at Fox News. Could it be that the same critics oppose vaccinations, birth control and gay marriage?

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  27. John Doe

    In this blog I am about to present case after case of poor arguments that are repeatedly used in the global-warming-deceivers' literature. And, yet, you will continue to ignore them in preference to discussing manipulative distortions of a few emails.

    The point is that it is absurd to claim that they were trying to "hide" things in the sense that you are interpreting the word - as in "trying to conceal from the public the fact that the tree-ring data presented an anomaly that indicated a decline in temperature."

    That interpretation is absurd because this fact was already widely known and discussed in the professional scientific literature.

    If you want to accuse them of this dishonest form of hiding you must at least accuse them also of believing that what they were trying to hide was not already widely known. That, itself, is an absurdity that forces rejection of the original premise.

    An Excel program contains a feature for hiding and unhiding columns. I have a lot of emails where I talk about hiding and unhiding columns in order to bet a cleaner page when printed. I "hide" and "unhide" columns daily as a part of my job. Emails to that effect does not prove that I am engaged in a great conspiracy to cover up any facts.

    In order to prove that they were using the term "hide" in a malicious sense you need to explain what secret they were trying to keep. The tree-ring data was known and discussed in the scientific literature so maliciously "hiding" that would have been stupid and pointless.

    There was nothing in these emails that was not also in the peer-reviewed literature.

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  28. Oh, it appears to me that the good Captain & Mr. Doe will be taking a hard look at the scientific claims you're going to be making in the weeks and months to come, and I look forward to it. I'm also going to be researching some of the specifics I've as soon as time allows, but I don't need to be a climatologist to recognize underhanded conduct when I see it, explained in this roundup of links:

    http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/12/025088.php

    Nor is a PhD required to understand the fundamental immorality and illogic of the way you argue.

    Bottom line: It doesn't matter what the issue is; I know you well enough to know you'll lie about it to advance your personal beliefs.

    You make ignorant, slanderous claims about Scripture while admitting - even bragging! - that you don't bother to educate yourself about its context or actual meaning.

    You twist innocent statements in favor of religious freedom into manifestos for religious tyranny, fantasizing a would-be Inquisitionist under every bed.

    You have callously lied about the words of Melanie Phillips, Sarah Palin, Rep. Monique Davis, and God knows how many other people over the course of your long, pompous career.

    These, simply put, are things someone with good desires would do, so I have no reason to believe your Chicken-Little claims over global warming -- and many reasons not to.

    PS: I'm sure one of you rocket scientists will explain why this isn't as it seems either, but I kinda have a hard time freaking out over man's impact when the global warming alarmists pull crap like this:

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/copenhagen-climate-change-confe/6736517/Copenhagen-climate-summit-1200-limos-140-private-planes-and-caviar-wedges.html

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  29. Calvin

    I hold that a legitimate accusation requires evidence to back it up. I have placed that evidence in each blog in which I make an accusation.

    You, on the other hand, seem to be content with simple assertions.

    Anybody who disputes my conclusions is free to examine the evidence and to challenge it.

    You wish to dispute the conclusions while totally ignoring the evidence that I have given.

    Anybody who wishes to is free to come to any blog posting and explain where I have gotten a fact wrong or drawn a wrong inference. Of course, it's not possible to do that when a person simply makes an assertion. They offer no facts or reasoning to look at.

    Yours is much like the behavior of a defense attorney who, after the prosecutor has presented his case, can find nothing better to do than to call the prosecuting attorney names while asserting the innocence of your client.

    You should try to address the evidence.

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  30. I merely assert now because I already have offered my evidence as to your lies when you originally told them, both on my blog and in your comment threads.

    Taken individually, your conduct regarding the American Spectator's Melanie Phillips, Rep. Monique Davis, and Biblical passages on shellfish each demonstrate that you are not to be trusted. Taken together, they show a stunning pattern of dishonesty.

    You and your sycophantic regulars have defended your dishonesty in these cases, each time unconvincingly. We know this. Perhaps new readers don't, but I'm under no moral obligation to rehash territory you're already familiar with (anybody who's curious is free to search for the applicable names & terms at our blogs).

    You can say whatever you like about my comments here; I really don't care. I just want you to know why I don't believe you - because you have proven to me, beyond any reasonable doubt, that you are not trustworthy.

    Make of it what you will. God bless.

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  31. Calvin

    Your disbelief is noted.

    Of course, as you can probably derive, I do not have much respect for your standards of evidence or with what has and has not been proved to you.

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  32. Mutual, Al. I look forward to many years of demonstrating your utter lack of integrity.

    I only hope that, if you really believe that your message is one of such importance, you come to realize how heavily you have damaged yourself as its messenger with your repeated smear campaigns against decent people.

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  33. "They have nothing to back up their claims. Their campaign is NOTHING BUT a continuous attempt to distort and misrepresent the facts."

    What do you mean nothing? There are thousands of files available for the public to read.

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  34. I look forward to many years of demonstrating your utter lack of integrity.

    I'd almost say this is a case of the pot calling the kettle black, but that implies that the pot and kettle are on equal footing. It's more apt to call this a case of the swine calling the swam filthy.

    Hopefully your future attempts at demonstrating something will rely more on facts and less on fantasy.

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  35. Oh, Eneasz, acting as if you have any standing on which to judge the ethics of another...it's almost cute. Almost.

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