Climate Audit

Dave Dardinger

What physical concept allows tree rings from trees that are positively correlated to precipitation to be generally negatively correlated with temperature? It would seem to me that increased global temperatures would increase precipitation due to increased evaporation (what goes up must come down). I realize that there are some exceptions to this from changes in prevailing winds, but if that’s what’s going in here, then why aren’t rules provided in Mann 08 which allow for such exceptions? The team has been doing this long enough that they should have some reviewable set of rules which can pass a smell test. IMO there should be a program or set of rules which is applied to each and every proxy candidate and the result be part of the SI of any paper doing proxy reconstruction.

R DeWitt

I think the argument that “what goes up must come down” is a little too simple to establish that increased temperature must go with increased precipitation. Evaporation puts water into the atmosphere, but other processes take it out. These need not increase with increased atmospheric water content. There needs to be more to the argument than what was stated.

• DeWitt Payne
  Posted Oct 18, 2008 at 12:23 PM | Permalink

  Re: R DeWitt (#5),

  This was discussed extensively on Pielke, Sr.’s blog some time ago. The discussion was not about whether increased temperature leads to increased precipitation, but about how much the precipitation would increase, IIRC. I’d be interested in learning what processes other than condensation remove water from the atmosphere.

• BarryW
  Posted Oct 18, 2008 at 2:40 PM | Permalink

  Re: R DeWitt (#5),

  The other part of the question is where does it come out? Not necessarily where it entered. Also wind patterns would affect where moisture winds up. Consider how Gulf moisture affects the US south.

  • R DeWitt
    Posted Oct 18, 2008 at 2:59 PM | Permalink

    Re: BarryW (#14),
    Yes, that rather nicely completes my thought.

• Dave Dardinger
  Posted Oct 18, 2008 at 4:51 PM | Permalink

  Re: R DeWitt (#5),

  A few points:

  1. Over any reasonable period of there cannot be much difference3 in the amount of evaporation and the amount of precipitation.

  2. We’re talking a relatively small amount of change, so there shouldn’t be much difference in air or sea currents and thus we’d expect a quantitative difference, not a qualitative difference.

  3. Granted there can be regional differences in temperature responses rather as opposed to precipitation responses. But as I said,

  …if that’s what’s going in here, then why aren’t rules provided in Mann 08 which allow for such exceptions?

  So why does Mann make the blanket statement that tree rings are always positive responders to temperature? He’s been at this long enough to be aware of the exceptions. Of course he also should have become aware of the problems with stripbark / bristlecones

Barclay E. MacDonald

I am not the person to answer these questions. Manifestly, I do not understand. Nonetheless, I am certain of my conclusions.

Lars Baath

A paper in Nature this year shows that trees have an optimum temperature for growth. Thus temperatures below the optimum will show positive and above will show negative correlation with tree rings. To select for only positive will then definitely bias towards lower temperature estimatesa dn teh MWP would didsappear from history…

Max

Not being in academic or scientific circles myself, when ones’ data or in this case proxy is used, is there a royalty paid for its usage when used within a published study? Or does it just become public domain once its published?

Steve McIntyre

#16. I’m talking here about the screen on tree rings. They test corals and speleos separately and permit negative correlations on these (which they invert in CPS). There are NO neg corr tree ring series.

HEre are the proxies you mentioned:
id code
330 chuine_2004_burgundyharvest 5000
385 dongge 6001
386 dunbar_1994_o18 7000
389 felis_2000_o18ann 7000
427 haase_2003_srca 7000
428 heiss_1994_o18 7000
466 isdale_2001_havannah 7000
476 kuhnert_1999_d13cann 7000
477 kuhnert_1999_d18oann 7000
481 lee_thorpe_2001_c13 6000
485 linsley_1994_d13c 7000
486 linsley_1994_d18o 7000
487 linsley_2000_srcaann 7000
897 qian_2003_yriver 5000
899 rodrigo_1999_andaluciarainual 5000
1188 wang_1991_chinaannual 5001
1207 zhang_1980_region5 5001
1209 zinke_2004_16o18oann 7000

anonymous

Unless it’s meant as “here (originally here)”

John F. Pittman

The effects of temperature and precipitation is more complicated than the Dendro’s have been willing to talk about. There is the negative evaporation effect once the first few inches of soil has dryed, as indicated in the first quote. There is the presence of tap roots in many of the species that the dendro’s like to use, as indicated in the third quote. There are the mycological constraints that have not even been mentioned, IIRC, as indicated in the second quote. There is the fact that dependent on what is ACTUALLY beneath the tree, one can’t even tell if the tap root is stunted, typical, or somewhere in between.

Wind Run Changes: The Dominant Factor Affecting Pan Evaporation Trends in Australia
Article from: Journal of Climate Article date: July 15, 2007 Author: Rayner, D P More results for: pan evaporation rates indirect to temperature | Copyright information Copyright American Meteorological Society Jul 15, 2007. Provided by ProQuest LLC.

ABSTRACT

The Class A pan evaporation rates at many Australian observing stations have reportedly decreased between 1970 and 2002. That pan evaporation rates have decreased at the same time that temperatures have increased has become known as the “pan evaporation paradox.”

Pan evaporation is primarily dependant on relative humidity, solar radiation, and wind. In this paper, trends in observed pan evaporation in Australia during the period 1975-2004 were attributed to changes in other climate variables using a Penman-style pan evaporation model. Trends in daily average wind speed (termed wind run) were found to be an important cause of trends in pan evaporation.

It is a bit more complicated than increased temperature increases evaporation.

Pseudotsuga menziesii (Mirb.) Franco
Douglas-Fir http://www.na.fs.fed.us/pubs/silvics_manual/volume_1/pseudotsuga/menziesii.htm

Like nearly all perennial woody plants, Douglas-fir is dependent on a mycorrhizal relationship for efficient uptake of mineral nutrients and water. Approximately 2,000 species of fungi have been identified as potential symbionts with Douglas-fir, and both ectomycorrhizal and ectendomycorrhizal structures have been observed on this species (59). Occasionally, nursery practices result in seedlings with few mycorrhizae, but no deficiencies in mycorrhizal infection have been reported for natural seedlings.

and

Although Douglas-fir is potentially a deep-rooting species, its root morphology varies according to the nature of the soil. In the absence of obstructions, Douglas-fir initially forms a tap root that grows rapidly during the first few years. In deep soils (69 to 135 cm, 27 to 53 in), it was found that tap roots grew to about 50 percent of their final depth in 3 to 5 years, and to 90 percent in 6 to 8 years; however, boulders or bedrock close to the soil surface result in quick proliferation of the original tap root.

jae

OOps, I should have looked at the map. It’s not “Great Plains,” like you said, Steve…It looks like most are in Colo.

Fred Colbourne

Reply to Max #13

The text, graphs, photos, and the form of tables in the scientific paper are protected by copyright, but the data is not. You can use the data to make your own graphs and tables. By convention, the data is made available to allow others to replicate the analysis and to comment on the study. When an author refuses to allow others access to the data, the work becomes suspect.

stan

The law of large numbers? So if I flip a coin 10,000 times and delete all tails rsults from my data set, I can use the law of large numbers to establish that my coin always lands on heads?

Cherry picking isn’t cherry picking, if you do it enough?

bender

PIPO = Pinus ponderosae

Peter Brown

Mr McIntyre;

Brought back into your discussion again I see. First, please do not consider me an “anti-CA dendro” at all, I actually quite enjoy reading yours and others’ postings and do so fairly often.

But I am curious, what “steps to correct the mishandling of their data” would you suggest are appropriate? Researchers who collect and develop data sets and then submit those data to archives such as the ITRDB do so typically without any preconditions on what is done with them beyond that point. Some data collected for specific purposes (e.g., Douglas-fir chronologies collected for evidence of spruce budworm outbreaks) often have a warning in the accompanying metadata file but that still would not preclude someone from using the chronology for another purpose. Are you suggesting we do not submit the data at all, and only allow their use when specifically asked by someone that we know and trust will not misapply the data? That would appear to go against your persistent and continuing call for data transparency. Perhaps I should publish a letter to the editor demanding some sort of satisfaction (and what sort of satisfaction should I be demanding), but PNAS does not have such a system, so perhaps an LTE to some other journal, Nature or Science, perhaps my local newspaper? Perhaps a posting here, for all your readers to see? Or, perhaps continued research to develop improved mechanistic and statistical climate/growth models to better reconstruct climate over the past several centuries? Or perhaps should we just give up since that is so difficult (impossible)?

Peter Brown

PS You apparently missed my obviously lame attempt at humor, but that “personal attack” quote you pulled out above was firmly tongue-in-cheek, meant to highlight the often too-typical response that used to prevail on this blog that any hint of a global warming bias in a comment had to be put down immediately (and please note I say “used to”; lately the posts are much more measured).

• Raven
  Posted Oct 19, 2008 at 9:22 PM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#36)

  But I am curious, what “steps to correct the mishandling of their data” would you suggest are appropriate?

  How a blog post that identifies the issue? If you don’t have your own blog there are a number of climate related blogs that probably would allow you to guest post.

• chopbox
  Posted Oct 19, 2008 at 10:47 PM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#36),
  I was surprised to hear Steve characterize you as an anti-CA dendro, and I am glad to hear you say you are not anti-CA. By so doing you have at least put it out there that you feel that you have been mis-characterized.

  I am always glad to have people come on this blog to talk of their work, ESPECIALLY those whose work has been criticized. For me, it’s simply a question of realizing there are usually two sides to issues, and too often I am left wondering about “the other side”. So, I thank you for coming back to talk to us about your work.

  I intend to take your question seriously, instead of rhetorically, as I believe that is how it has been asked. To do so, I need to know first, do YOU agree with Steve’s assessment that

  “these chronologies … do not meet any of [Rob Wilson’s] ex ante criteria for selecting a temperature proxy”,
  … “[i]n Brown’s terms, the sites would ex ante be expected to have have a dominant precipitation response, with a lesser negative temperature response”,
  and therefore, that Mann et al’s treatment of the data as a temperature proxy amounts to a mishandling of the data?

  Your question leads me to believe you probably do have reservations with the way your data has been used by Mann et al. (If on the other hand, your question really was rhetorical, I have misunderstood you, and I apologize.) If this were a conversation we were having, I would now wait to hear what you had to say, and only if you said that you felt that yes, you did have some qualms about the way the data were handled, would I go on to make the following suggestion. One limitation of the blog format is that it is inconvenient for me to wait, so please allow me to jump ahead a little.

  If I am right, and you do have qualms, and really were asking a serious question, then may I suggest the following? Pick a blog (this one would do nicely, but of course there are others) and make a quiet but firm statement that you had never intended your data to be used as a temperature proxy. That’s it. That’s all.

  I don’t think it is as important to submit a Comment to PNAS as I do that you do something. I realize that Steve suggested the Comment to PNAS (and my response to that is that I sincerely wish he would take his own advice and submit more of his own work to peer-reviewed journals!!) but he of all people knows that there are other ways to disseminate one’s point of view – and a simple statement on a blog at least has the benefit of being easy and immediate. You felt it sufficed to state on this blog that you had been mis-characterized as being anti-CA; perhaps for similar reasons it suffices to use the same medium to simply “put out there” your objections to what amounts to a mis-characterization of your data.

  Again, thanks for coming on here.

Willis Eschenbach

Peter, first, thank you for posting, and for clearing the record. If you wished to take the time to expand on your responses to my previous questions, that would be marvelous.

Second, I agree with chopbox that IF you feel that Mann is mis-using your datasets, you have a scientific obligation to make that fact known. The old quote that “For evil to prevail it is only necessary for good men to do nothing” is nowhere as true as in science. This is because unlike say politics, science is not built upon agreement. It is built upon falsification, and for science to work, somebody has to be the bearer of the bad news. Somebody has to speak up, to post notice each and every time the Emperor is more than threadbare, to point out when in fact he’s buck naked.

This, to me, is the most discouraging part of climate science in general, and dendroclimatology in particular. You guys rarely seem to find a single fault in even the most egregious examples of your compatriots’ work. Observing the silence of all of you lambs, I’m left with two choices for an explanation of the pervading stillness:

1) Climate science is in such an advanced state that nobody is making any mistakes, or

2) Climate science is in such a pathetic state because nobody is making any waves.

Don’t you guys care that your chosen scientific field is becoming the butt of jokes? Don’t you care when someone makes unsustainable claims based on the data you worked so hard to acquire and analyze? Don’t any of you folks care that Michael Mann is dragging the good name of paleoclimatology through the mud?

I keep waiting for someone in the field, anyone, to have the balls stand up and publicly say something like “Linah Abaneh’s thesis reveals a deep problem with the Graybill proxies, and possibly with proxy data collection in general,” or “Mann is using the Brown proxies upside down”, or anything but the deafening silence … but no, you can’t figure out which steps might be appropriate, you fret over whether to send it to Nature or Science or your newspaper, you dither over whether to post here on this blog or elsewhere … and at the end of the day, you and the overwhelming majority of your “scientific” compatriots opt once again for the silence of the lambs.

Color me unimpressed. You seem like a nice guy, in fact most of the dendros I’ve had any real contact with have been nice guys … but science is a blood sport, it is built on proving that the other guy is wrong. If you don’t have the stomach to stand up for your principles, if you don’t have the balls to name names and dissect fraudulent claims, then go be an auto mechanic or something.

Because a man who won’t speak out to keep his own scientific backyard clean, a man who is unwilling to point out both scientific mistakes and scientific malfeasance in a clear loud voice, is only pretending to be a scientist. Y’all seem not to have notice a sea-change that has occurred in the last decade — people are watching you and checking your work. In the past, none of this made much difference. But now, your claims are being scrutinized like never before.

The response of the climate scientists and the dendro community to date has been “Yikes, we’re under attack, circle the wagons, and for god’s sake, don’t criticize anyone’s work.“ And in the past, that worked quite well … but as my daughter would say, “Dad, that’s so last century”.

The trouble with the response is that we’re in the 21st century, when it’s all out in the open, when the internet lets anyone verify the math and investigate the proxies. The proper response in 2008 is to say “Yikes, we’re under attack, circle the wagons, and for god’s sake, everyone check each others work.“

You do not gain points by silence in the position that you are in. You do not gain points by ignoring the errors of your fellow scientists. You do not gain points by having outsiders like Steve and myself and many others pointing out obvious flaws in your work. I should not have to spend ten seconds finding out that Mann is a charlatan, you guys should have found that out long ago and pulled his credibility ticket, that would have gained you points … but noooo, you’d rather stand by and watch the train wreck.

You gain points by being as open as possible about your work. You gain points by being clear about the limitations of your data and methods. You gain points by encouraging dissention and disagreement, not by adherence to false claims of consensus. You gain points by actively falsifying the claims in your field of science that are not supportable. You gain points by being certain about uncertainty and error and what they truly mean to your claims and considerations.

And although silence is indeed golden … none of that can be done in silence.

Peter, I implore you both not to take this personally, and to take it very personally. I am able to say these things to you because you are more adventurous, more outspoken than the majority of your colleagues, as evidence by your willingness to engage in the rough-and-tumble of the discussion here. I appreciate that, and I acknowledge and applaud you for it. So in that sense I am talking to your colleagues through you, and not to you personally.

But a bit of time spent here is far, far from what needed. Climate science is sick, and dendroclimatology is moribund. That’s the problem, and no amount of golden silence will be enough to cover that up. It’s time for you guys, including you personally, to take on the task of cleaning out the Augean Stables that have sprung up in your very own backyard.

• John A
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 2:51 AM | Permalink

  Re: Willis Eschenbach (#41),

  Don’t hold back, Willis. Tell us how you really feel.

  • kim
    Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 5:48 AM | Permalink

    Re: John A (#44),

    Gramsci meets Old Sol.
    ==============

Peter Brown

“Yikes,… everyone check each others work.”

That, to me, is obviously one way science proceeds, and is doing so at this very moment. However, personally I do not see how science proceeds from any sort of “he said/she said” exchanges on a blog, where discussion is not only highly transient but, in case everyone hasn’t realized this yet, anyone can say anything they want, whatever it’s truthfulness or lack thereof. It is interesting to read what others think of tree-ring research – why I stick with reading this – but why should I try to engage in any scientific discussion when, for example, previously I tried to make a good-faith effort to answer several questions posed by Mr. Eschenbach, Mr McIntyre now denigrates those answers as “unresponsive”? What is in it for me? Why should I – and I imagine I speak for many researchers who may come here for entertainment – spend my valuable research time answering your questions here when I could be spending that time doing science and trying to publish my results in peer-reviewed journals where the process of science takes place?

• kim
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 7:59 AM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#46),

  Because there is a search for truth here that it might behoove you to join.
  =============================================

• Nylo
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 8:10 AM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#46),

  Instead of asking yourself why you should engage in a scientific discussion with McIntyre and others, the real question that you should be asking yourself is this: “According to the findings here shown by McIntyre about the obvious misuse of my own scientific research, what is really stopping me from engaging in a discussion with Dr. Mann?”

  Best regards.

• PhilH
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 9:27 AM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#46), Having read this blog for several years, I find it far from being “transient,” but, rather, highly focussed. Focussed on the fact that the Team has, now, for over ten years, been abusing yours and others data without a peep from you folks. As for wasting your time, it would take you less than a minute to type: “The Team should stop using inappropiate dendro data for temperature reconstuctions.” Try it. You will sleep better tonight.

• craig loehle
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 10:07 AM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#46), As a suggestion, how about starting a debate within your field? In ecology, my field, there are vigorous arguments about allometric scaling, neutral models for community organization, metapopulation models, landscape ecology theory, etc etc. Dendro work seems much too polite, circle the wagons stuff. How come no one writes an objection to a Mann paper from within the field? I did:
  A mathematical analysis of the divergence problem in dendroclimatology
  Journal Climatic Change
  Publisher Springer Netherlands
  ISSN 0165-0009 (Print) 1573-1480 (Online)
  DOI 10.1007/s10584-008-9488-8

• Patrick M.
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 11:28 AM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#46),

  What is in it for me? Why should I – and I imagine I speak for many researchers who may come here for entertainment – spend my valuable research time answering your questions here when I could be spending that time doing science and trying to publish my results in peer-reviewed journals where the process of science takes place?

  Here’s a simple idea: ask one of your trusted friends who is an expert in statistics to read CA, audit it for you and report back to you how credible Steve’s arguments are.

• Just Tex
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 12:35 PM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#46),

  What is in it for me? Why should I – and I imagine I speak for many researchers who may come here for entertainment – spend my valuable research time answering your questions here when I could be spending that time doing science and trying to publish my results in peer-reviewed journals where the process of science takes place?

  What’s very likely “in it for” you is what you and so many of your pusillanimous brethren undoubtedly lack, and currently desperately have need of. That being, authenticity as a scientist. Rather than another advocate of several likely politically motivated and controversial hypothesis, all not yet sustained by valid science.

  As an aside. Steve, although generally I have preferred to be among the many quiet readers, I must inject a giant thank you for your abilities, tenacity, humility and ever present thoughtfulness. Your steady minded leadership sets a commendable standard, that is esteemed much more than you may often recognize.

Mark T.

I should say, probably not everyone, but there is a bit of an egg-shell attitude in play.

Mark

Andy

Could it be that your answers are “unresponsive” and you need to engage and show why they are appropriate?

Jim Clarke

Mr. Brown,

You seem to take offense that Mr. McIntyre characterized your responses as ‘unresponsive’, meaning that you did not really answer the questions. You admit as much when you claim that you can not answer a question because you are not a statistician. Fine, but don’t get upset when someone calls your lack of an answer ‘unresponsive’. But I was most struck by your ‘answer’ to this question:

“…what protection is there against “data snooping” and “cherry picking”?”

You responded:

“…there is no need for “protection” since those terms are irrelevant to the process of development of explicit site selection criteria.”

The terms ‘data snooping’ and ‘cherry picking’ have very specific meanings that have nothing to do with being selective to insure data quality. I believe the ‘protection’ against such a misuse of data, no matter what the science, is supposed to be in the peer-review process and in the scientific community at large. If someone misuses data to get a predetermined result, they should be vetted by their peers in that community. The fact that you will not even acknowledge that the misuse of data is a possibility, indicates that the community is failing to police its own, which is why this blog exists in the first place.

Why should you be here and taking part in this discussion? Because this blog is fulfilling a role that has been abdicated by the scientists in your community. It may not be as neat and tidy as ‘established procedures’, but the ‘established procedures’ have now been twisted to do the exact opposite of their original intent. Peer review is becoming synonymous with peer protectionism… to the detriment of science.

Mann may have done more for the advancement of an agenda, but McIntyre has done more for the advancement of science, by insisting that the science is legitimate. He should not be so alone in this.

Mark T.

Thus confirming the “silence of the lambs” hypothesis.

Mark

Steve McIntyre

why don’t you do your own temperature reconstruction, or basic research into the issues such as the divergence problem?

In the stock market, there are people who work as “analysts”. To some extent, that’s the sort of thing that I do. If an analyst wrote a damning report on Lehmann Bros last year, you wouldn’t say – well, if you’re so smart, why don’t you try running your own investment bank. That’s not the job of an analyst. And if he told you to get out of Lehmann Bros, you wouldn’t jibe at him for not making an alternate recommendation.

Another point is that nothing that I say is so difficult that it’s beyond the ken of paleoclimatologists. If the points are valid, then they should be known to practitioners in the trade. They should be known to practitioners whether or not I choose to publish in academic journals. And they should be known to practitioners not because they have are under any obligation to read Climate Audit – they aren’t, tho more people seem to than admit it – but because they points were valid in an objective way and, if someone wants to be considered a “professional”, they should know as much as “amateurs”.

• Dave Dardinger
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 12:05 PM | Permalink

  Re: Steve McIntyre (#62),

  And to make explicit the implicit point you’re making, those who publish after you’ve made an analysis, and still use faulty methods or lack of due diligence (e.g. Dr. Mann et. al.), should be taken to task by those in a position to do so. And this would presumably include Dr. Brown.

Kenneth Fritsch

I think that while the visits that Rob Wilson and Peter Brown make to this blog reveal, at least, something about their attitudes, I find it frustrating that we receive little in their replies that contain details and specifics of the issues at hand and particularly with regard to the subject of the threads wherein they reply.

Are those lack of specifics and directness related to the attitudes (like, for example, Peter Brown’s: why should I do science on a blog without the comforts and securities of peer review or Rob Wilson’s: life is short and I have better things to do) or to a lack of direct and specific answers on their parts.

Rusty Scott

With all due respect to the regulars here who are trying to understand and analyze so much of the work that has been done to date, but the comment section on a blog is not a useful place for meaningful debate. Sure, some clarification can be made on some points, but for truly opposing viewpoints it just doesn’t work. For every statement Mr. Brown has made, there have been at least three requests for him to address diverging questions and concerns. Only a fool tries to argue with more than one person at a time. I’m sure he has chosen his words carefully in his responses to specifically avoid being drawn into the discussions everyone wants to have with him. It would be more productive, perhaps, if Mr. Brown could have an e-mail exchange with Steve McI to formulate a blog post here that helps inform us of Mr. Brown’s opinions on Mann’s work.

• Mark T.
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 12:33 PM | Permalink

  Re: Rusty Scott (#68),

  With all due respect to the regulars here who are trying to understand and analyze so much of the work that has been done to date, but the comment section on a blog is not a useful place for meaningful debate.

  I think you misunderstand the purpose of threads such as these (as does Peter Brown). It is not to elicit meaningful debate, at least, not anything designed to replace peer review. It is, more importantly, to push for consistency. Steve makes an off-the-cuff remark in a blog posting and it’s all hell in the dendro field, yet Mann publishes an even more egregious use of similar data without a whimper from the same crew.

  These people have all the time in the world to point out Steve’s apparent errors, made in a blog posting, yet can never bring themselves to do the same when it’s published in some otherwise respected journal article (where “serious science” is being done). Then they come in here and blather on about not doing serious work on a blog.

  It is astounding, truly.

  Mark

Peter Brown

A quick response to Kenneth Fritsch’s comment,

why should I do science on a blog without the comforts and securities of peer review

that is possibly one of the most inane statements I’ve read here. Given that it has its faults, peer-review and publication is the currency of science, as one of my old professors once said. There is often nothing “comforting” and certainly not “secure” about peer review. Sure scientists may read this blog and be entertained or even find some things to agree with (or strongly take exception to), but you won’t find anyone publishing original research here. Mr McIntyre, I appreciate your self-appointed role as an auditor, and perhaps it has its place, but stock market analysts do not publish to anyone more than self-interested parties; that is not the way science works.

• PhilH
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 1:50 PM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#68), On the contrary, what Steve is doing is “original research.” Original if in no other sense than he is doing what no one else has the knowledge or independence to do. And he is doing it entirely openly. He is publishing it to thousands, many of whom are highly qualified scientists in their own fields. You seem to be under the impression that climate scientists are the only ones who understand how science works. You say that this is not the “way science works.” It has been shown repeatedly, and reasonably, on this blog that this particular branch of climate science ain’t working. The kind of peer review your old professor was talking about doesn’t exist for the Team and the IPCC. People here have literally been begging you to help fix the problem and you keep responding like some high-society snob.

• Kenneth Fritsch
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 8:11 PM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#68),

  A quick response to Kenneth Fritsch’s comment,
  “why should I do science on a blog without the comforts and securities of peer review”
  that is possibly one of the most inane statements I’ve read here. Given that it has its faults, peer-review and publication is the currency of science, as one of my old professors once said. There is often nothing “comforting” and certainly not “secure” about peer review.

  Peter Brown, I am sorry I missed your comment as I thought you had left to do peer- reviewed work. My comment was from my judgment of your seeming discomfort and hesitancy to discuss science issues (at least in any meaningful detail) at this blog. Now you tell me peer review is neither comforting (most of the time)nor secure. Would that mean that peer review and blog posting are not enjoyable? If so you may be in the wrong field of endeavor.

  It has always been my experience that scientists who thoroughly enjoyed their work would discuss it anywhere and any time.

Steve McIntyre

#68. Peter, you state “you won’t find anyone publishing original research here”. Well, for what it’s worth, I think that I do “original” work and that it’s “research”. I don’t advocate blogs as an alternative to academic journals tho some readers are more enthusiastic about this than I am. I think that academic journals are important.

In my case, I started the blog because our peer reviewed work was being attacked on another blog. In that case, climate scientists seemed quite content to take their opinions from non-peer reviewed blog postings by Mann and his associates.

I view this blog as more like a boisterous ongoing seminar, rather than a “journal”.

Willis Eschenbach

Peter, you misunderstand me greatly (which is not unheard of, as my writing is not always the clearest) when you say:

What is in it for me? Why should I – and I imagine I speak for many researchers who may come here for entertainment – spend my valuable research time answering your questions here when I could be spending that time doing science and trying to publish my results in peer-reviewed journals where the process of science takes place?

I don’t care where you stand up and make your position known. The issue is not where you do it, it is that it is not getting done.

Steve M. and I and most of the folks who post here are not climate scientists. Despite that, time after time it has been the folks on this blog that have pointed out the egregious errors in you climate scientists’ vaunted, much-worshiped “peer-reviewed” ideas. WE SHOULD NOT HAVE TO DO THAT!

This blog exists for one reason only — because too many climate “scientists” have not been doing their job. When Steve M. and I and others were writing to Donald Kennedy at Science Magazine to try (unsuccessfully) to get them to enforce their own policies regarding the Hockeystick, where were the climate scientists?

Oh, I remember now, they had more important stuff to do than actually keep their own backyard free of mistakes and malfeasance, they were “doing science and trying to publish [their] results in peer reviewed journals” as you note above, checking their compatriots’ work is beneath them, they couldn’t be arsed to do something as basic as upholding scientific principles like archiving and replicability …

As I said before, neither Steve nor I nor anyone who is not a climate scientist should have had to spend one minute on Michael Mann’s garbage. Y’all should have nailed the bogus “Hockeystick” to the wall before it ever got through peer review. And if it wasn’t shredded then, it should have been demolished before it ever got to the IPCC.

But NOBODY BUT US SPOKE UP! You were all sitting around telling each other how solid the consensus is, and how robust the results of your novel statistical methods are, and none of you said one damned word. None of you did the shovel work to find out what was underneath the glossy, glittery golden surface of the “Hockeystick”. And now, because of y’all’s unwillingness to take a stand and police your own compound, we are having to do the same thing on the New! Improved! Mannomatic 2008!, featuring the latest innovation, upside down Brown and Woodhouse proxies! …

Dude, you are getting outclassed, outdone, and outshone by a bunch of outsiders on a daily basis, amateur scientists are grinding your faces into the dirt … do you truly think the issue is whether you discuss your obvious failures on a blog or in the journals? That’s re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. The issue is that you climate scientists are mostly standing around telling each other how insightful you are, and how your papers and ideas have no problems, instead of making sure that your studies are not full of statistical lacunae, un-archived proxies, scientific check-kiting, cherry-picked data, “CENSORED” files, and unreported procedures. That’s your job, and you are failing at it miserably.

w.

PS – These days, the process of science does not just take place in the journals. That’s another outmoded 20th century idea. It takes place wherever scientific ideas are examined and falsified. That process is increasing on the internet. Heck, you probably even believe that the current level of peer review of climate science studies actually means something … and that is a terribly and dangerously last century idea.

Near as I can tell, the main function of peer review in climate science these days is to screen out anything that challenges the consensus view of the establishment. It certainly does not fulfill its true function, it has not slowed the flow of garbage like the Hockeystick and Mann 2008 and far too many other obviously pseudo-scientific studies from making it into the journals.

But there’s obviously a scarcity of climate “scientists” out there who think that something more than peer review is needed, otherwise this blog would be out of a job.

Peter, you seem to think that I am asking you, and other climate scientists, to post here. I am not. I am simply asking you to DO YOUR JOB. It is helpful to us when climate scientists engage here, it is always useful for us when climate scientists come here to clean up mysteries and to answer questions, I’m always glad when you or Rob Wilson or Roger Pielke or John Christy or the other climate scientists post here.

But if no climate scientists ever show up here, if none ever post here again, that’s OK too. We will continue to do your job for you until you start doing it yourselves. We don’t mind … it’s not that hard …

PPS – What’s in it for you?

Well, when your kids ask “Daddy, what did you do in the climate wars”, you’ll be able to say “I didn’t duck and run, I didn’t pretend not to see the problems, I didn’t just stay silent, I didn’t say that … smelled like roses. I stood up and spoke out for what is right and I fought the good fight for truth, justice, and the Scientific Way” …

• kim
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 6:00 PM | Permalink

  Re: Willis Eschenbach (#80),

  Woof, hear, hear, and word, willis. It’s a war with a foregone conclusion, too.
  =================================================

• davidc
  Posted Oct 20, 2008 at 6:57 PM | Permalink

  Re: Willis Eschenbach (#80),

  Willis,\\Well said.

pete m

And, for the record, I do not feel that Dr. Mann misappropriated our data; I think that was one of many possibly legitimate means of developing temperature signals at a global perspective.

So it was legitimate to take the largest positive (of TWO), ignore 15 negative, to calculate global temperature anomalies. I’d love to know the basis for this legitimacy. Mann … et al … Brown …

crickets …

jae

Well, just in case numbers count, I am also a scientist (chemist), and I support everything Willis Eisenbach has said. It’s high time for more integrity in climate science.

jeez

I was thinking we should substitute hearty for robust in the future, but after looking it up, I kinda like definition 2 for climate science.

Main Entry:
ro·bust Listen to the pronunciation of robust
Pronunciation:
\rō-ˈbəst, ˈrō-(ˌ)bəst\
Function:
adjective
Etymology:
Latin robustus oaken, strong, from robor-, robur oak, strength
Date:
1533

1a: having or exhibiting strength or vigorous health
b: having or showing vigor, strength, or firmness
c: strongly formed or constructed : sturdy d: capable of performing without failure under a wide range of conditions

4: full-bodied ; also : hearty

5: of, relating to, resembling, or being a relatively large, heavyset australopithecine (especially Australopithecus robustus and A. boisei) characterized especially by heavy molars and small incisors adapted to a vegetarian diet — compare gracile 3
synonyms see healthy
— ro·bust·ly adverb

Bill Drissel

Re: #87

“It has always been my experience that scientists who thoroughly enjoyed their work would discuss it anywhere and any time.”

Dr Linah Ababneh (U of Arizona) has reportedly received legal caution not to discuss her PhD thesis in tree ring research. Does anyone know of another field in which a university lawyer would caution a freshly-minted PhD NOT to discuss his/her thesis? I find they don’t want to talk about anything else 🙂

Regards,
Engineer Bill

Steve McIntyre

Comments like Peter Brown’s are really quite astonishing. My post was made a technical point about how Mannian “procedures” acts as a form of data mining, either intentionally or unintentionally, using Brown’s proxies as an example so that even a non-statistical dendro like Brown could be informed of the impact of the procedure. This observation had nothing to do with large policy decisions. Indeed, I’ve said on many occasions that, if I were a senior government minister, I would make decisions based on advice from formal institutions such as the IPCC, even if I, in an individual capacity, had reservations about their processes of due diligence. I would do what I could to improve the processes of due diligence, but would consider myself bound by their opinions.

If IPCC wants to take the position that paleo arguments are irrelevant to their report, that would be fine with me. As an IPCC AR4 reviewer, I suggested that the entire paleo chapter be deleted to save space if this was the “consensus”. But having decided to continue with the paleo arguments, I’m entitled to discuss them.

I also happen to think that some of the questions are interesting statistically. I’m entitled to do so.

This blog is a sort of diary. Yeah, it jumps around, but the themes are pretty consistent and IMO some of the work that I’ve done on one topic illuminates other topics. For example, I’m going to do a pretty good new post today on the Santer dispute, which draws on methods worked up in our discussions of proxy calibration.

Nothing in Brown’s outburst has any bearing on any technical issue and it is profoundly disappointing to see this sort of conduct.

Mark T.

Though hardly surprising in this field of research.

Mark

Peter Brown

Mr McIntyre;

Hey, I’m only responding (and having some fun, apparently in poor taste) to both the posts on your blog and the implication in your original post that accused me of being in on some sort of conspiracy of silence about issues of interest to you and the others that post here. Why don’t other working scientists come here and answer every question you and others have? Beats me. It is such an engaging and welcoming atmosphere.

But let’s talk science for a minute. I am very curious as to your comment on AR4 Chap 6. It appears to me as a dabbling climate scientist (as most here apparently are) the way to approach the question of AGW is certainly from first principles (the physics of the earth system as it presently stands) but also its history, focused on the question is recent warming an unprecedented feature in the system attributable to novel forcing provided by humans. Instrumental data are too short, thus paleo. Now all are proxies of varying fidelity and resolution, all suffer from a fading record issue (goes for instrumental too, which really is just another proxy record after all), all need many more records from many more places (and updated!), all need much more detailed mechanistic models of formation. This is all going to take new science built upon the old. Of course, all of this I’m sure is incredibly obvious to you, and as you’ve stated several times in the thread your interest here is in much more simple tasks of “auditing” existing studies to make sure they are doing what they say they’re doing, or, taking it a step further, what you suggest they should be doing. And please don’t get me wrong, fine work, keep it up, do what you feel you must. But did I read this right that if you are that government official who is relying on the IPCC AR5 to set policy, you really would prefer to not have some clue – albeit however imperfect – that what the first-principles bunch says is the way the system works has not (or has) happened in the past, that Chapter 6 (or whatever number it is in AR5) is truly unnecessary?

But focused even on more closely on the work you are doing here, do you really think the IPCC AR5 will cite blog posts? Assuming that a version of Chap 6 will be in AR5, don’t you think that to contribute to the new science that will be critical for better understanding of the precendented/unprecedented question you should be publishing your work here?

• kim
  Posted Oct 21, 2008 at 9:26 AM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#103),

  I can only speak for myself, but I’d like the policymakers to have information upon which they can rely, which is not happening at present, and I expect the IPCC to cite the truth, from wherever it comes.
  ===================================================

• PhilH
  Posted Oct 21, 2008 at 9:30 AM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#103), Re: your mea culpa; herewith mine; sorry.

• Dave Dardinger
  Posted Oct 21, 2008 at 10:41 AM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#103),

  Dr. Brown,

  But let’s talk science for a minute.

  I think you meant “talk about science” as there’s not a whit of science in your post.

  Re: Peter Brown (#96),

  Mr. McIntyre now has a new post up, off on a new subject, this thread will be soon dropped like a hot potato

  Uh, isn’t that how it works in the peer reviewed literature? [MBH98 meet Mann et. al. 2008] Note that many of the posts here, both the head articles and the substantive responses, carry references to old posts and threads. Sure things are quicker on a blog, but that doesn’t mean they drop the past. It would certainly be better if new readers could read all the old posts but with the comment numbers now over 300,000 (though only part of the numbers correspond to displayed posts) this just isn’t possible any more than it is for a grad student to read all the old literature in her field of interest. Hence the need for review articles and books with titles like “Advances in X 2007”.

• Patrick M.
  Posted Oct 21, 2008 at 11:13 AM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#103),

  I think the key to getting useful responses is to only present substance. If you stick to the science/math, that’s what will be fired back at you. If you respond to the most annoying posts then you will reap what you sow.

  Steve has been quite fair in the past when “evil” 😉 climate scientists show up, (even to the point of reprimanding people making stupid comments or trying to hijack the thread). You won’t find that on RC.

• Steve McIntyre
  Posted Oct 21, 2008 at 9:28 PM | Permalink

  Re: Peter Brown (#103), Brown made the allegation that I had”

  accused [him] of being in on some sort of conspiracy of silence about issues of interest to you and the others that post here.

  I “criticized dendros for feeling that it was important to speak out about an incidental post at CA, while remaining silent on MBH98-99 and similar studies”. I did not accuse them of conspiring to do so. I made a statement of fact about their silence “on MBH98-99 and similar studies”. I presume that the silence of each dendro is an independent personal decision.

  Peter, please stop making these stories up.

PhilH

(although my flame may start it baking again, who cares?) Apparently you do. On the other hand you probably would be a lot more comfortable at Real Climate, where you don’t have to insult the participants and the proprietors are really thin-skinned and everyone is snotty.

Jeff Alberts

I mean honestly, does everyone really believe that all climate scientists (and by the way I do not consider myself a “climate scientist” much, I only dabble occasionally) are in on some vast dark conspiracy (oh, wait a sec…IPCC, of course!) to alter the course of human civilization by forcing us to give up our cars and coal-fired power plants?

I don’t. There are a great many who don’t toe the consensus line, and are denigrated as “deniers” for their trouble.

I did notice that you completely refuse to stick to any scientific discussion, and would rather make it about blogs and “navel-gazers”.

Peter Brown

Mr. McIntyre;

What in the world made you think that I would hold such an opinion?

My question was rhetorical; I never for a moment thought you do. I’m sure you see my point, however, that to truly have an impact on the science – given the cumbersome manner in which it labors – one has to go through the proper motions. As Chip Knappenberger points out, a blog discussion could have some useful outcome, provided it is carried through to a proper endpoint that makes it available to the broader scientific community. Personally, I’m not the one to do that with you here either by dint of expertise or temperament (I prefer high school-level blog discussions), I was only brought into this one because you asked me a (albeit indirect) question about my thoughts on Mann et al. 2008. I answered that, and I see now you’re two more threads ahead of this one so perhaps time to let it die…

(BTW, I very much appreciate your interest in history; it is exactly why I am a dendrochronologist.)

Chip Knappenberger

You all don’t need to remind me of how things transpire over at Real Climate. But, things aren’t that different over here.

Here is an example: at RC the other day, Gavin asked (a bit rhetorically) Roger Pielke Jr. what he thought the reason was for a particular RC post. And Gavin reacted with horror when Roger told him his opinion—that RC had launched a preemptive attempt to discredit the results of a climate change survey—as opposed to Gavin’s notion that they were trying to engage the authors and help improve things. If Gavin had really wanted to help out, he would have contacted the survey’s authors directly and invited them in for a discussion of the issue. He didn’t. The survey authors got defensive and nothing really good came out for the exchange. To me, Roger’s opinion as to the post’s purpose was the correct one.

This has parallels in this thread. Had Steve McIntyre really wished to seek instructive comments or opinions from Dr. Brown, he should probably gone to him directly, or at least informed him about his blog posting. AND, more importantly, he would not have started off the posting by drawing attention to Dr. Brown previous dealings with Climate Audit and how Steve thought they were less than useful. Now, maybe you all get a kick out of this type of thing, but it is hardly setting forth an environment for friendly back-and-forth discourse. I for one, when I am trying to get something I want from my girlfriend,let’s say, don’t start out by reminding her how ornery and uncooperative she has been in the past, but instead start out by saying nice things about her and how I am sure she’d love to help out on this occasion. But this is not how Mr. McIntyre started out, and so, in this case (as in many others) I have the same opinion as Roger’s as to the purpose of this post. It was not to draw out an opinion from Dr. Brown about the proper handling of his data, but, conversely, was to unilaterally condemn Dr. Brown by linking him (implicitly or complicitly) with the evil Dr. Mann (in addition to providing a report on some interesting results from some great sleuthing by Mr. McIntyre).

I read this blog to keep up with all the interesting findings that you all put forth (that I haven’t the time or energy to do myself) and I find that the best discussions are the ones where a scientist from the “other side” takes part in the discussion. I was very interested in Mr. McIntyre’s findings at the heart of this article and would have loved to have Dr. Brown’s thought out opinions about whether or not Dr. Mann’s treatment of his tree rings was a good idea or not in light of Mr. McIntyre’s observations. But, as a result of the constant barrage of petty comments, questions, directives, and accusations, Dr. Brown was never apparently in the mood to thoroughly share his opinions on the matter. I can’t say I blame him.

Clearly, I realize, as I have told the folks over at Real Climate on occasion, that this (or that) is not my blog, and so the moderators can do whatever they want to. Over at World Climate Report, for instance, we don’t open anything up for general discussion, but, instead, deal one on one with people who has expressed an interest or an opinion. But that is our choice–like it or not. But, as Roger Jr. is fond of pointing out, it is the failure to acknowledge a blog’s real purpose that is the hypocrisy. If you want give and take, things need to be structured differently.

-Chip

• Willis Eschenbach
  Posted Oct 21, 2008 at 5:09 PM | Permalink

  Re: Chip Knappenberger (#124), thank you for your thoughtful post. In some ways, I agree with you when you say:

  Now, maybe you all get a kick out of this type of thing, but it is hardly setting forth an environment for friendly back-and-forth discourse. I for one, when I am trying to get something I want from my girlfriend,let’s say, don’t start out by reminding her how ornery and uncooperative she has been in the past, but instead start out by saying nice things about her and how I am sure she’d love to help out on this occasion. But this is not how Mr. McIntyre started out, and so, in this case (as in many others) I have the same opinion as Roger’s as to the purpose of this post. It was not to draw out an opinion from Dr. Brown about the proper handling of his data, but, conversely, was to unilaterally condemn Dr. Brown by linking him (implicitly or complicitly) with the evil Dr. Mann (in addition to providing a report on some interesting results from some great sleuthing by Mr. McIntyre).

  The issue that you are not dealing with here is that we have tried being nice. We have tried being sweet. We have tried being professional. None of that has worked. Do you think I filed a Freedom of Information Act on Phil Jones without trying all other avenues first? Please, give us some credit here.
  .
  The last time Peter Brown came here he blew me off, and blew Steve off, and we were cordial and polite. I liked the interchange, he seemed friendly … but he blew us off. We got nothing.
  .
  Now you’re right, when you are trying to get something from your girlfriend, then opening by recounting past history is likely a mistake.
  .
  But that’s far from the situation here. This situation here is like after your girlfriend has repeatedly refused to give you back something that you own. She won’t do the right thing. Sweet’s not working, what’s next? So you try to shame her into giving it to you by pointing out publicly, when her friends are around, that giving you back your property is the correct thing to do.
  .
  Even that’s not a good analogy. This thread is more like issuing a public challenge for your girlfriend to live up to societal standards and do the right thing. Steve said:

  Will Brown and/or Woodhouse take any steps to correct the mishandling of their data? Let’s hope so, but I’d be astonished if they do.

  You seem to think that is a bad tactic, that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. And in general, you are right.
  .
  However, look at the results in this case. Peter came here and confirmed that no, he wasn’t going to say that Mann’s handling of the Brown/Woodhouse proxies was wrong in any way, that what Mann does is his business. Peter washed his hands of the whole matter. In fact, he wasn’t going to say a word about it, and if he did say a word, it might be on a blog or not. And I commend him for coming and making his views clear, viz:

  But I am curious, what “steps to correct the mishandling of their data” would you suggest are appropriate? Researchers who collect and develop data sets and then submit those data to archives such as the ITRDB do so typically without any preconditions on what is done with them beyond that point. Some data collected for specific purposes (e.g., Douglas-fir chronologies collected for evidence of spruce budworm outbreaks) often have a warning in the accompanying metadata file but that still would not preclude someone from using the chronology for another purpose. Are you suggesting we do not submit the data at all, and only allow their use when specifically asked by someone that we know and trust will not misapply the data? That would appear to go against your persistent and continuing call for data transparency. Perhaps I should publish a letter to the editor demanding some sort of satisfaction (and what sort of satisfaction should I be demanding), but PNAS does not have such a system, so perhaps an LTE to some other journal, Nature or Science, perhaps my local newspaper? Perhaps a posting here, for all your readers to see? Or, perhaps continued research to develop improved mechanistic and statistical climate/growth models to better reconstruct climate over the past several centuries? Or perhaps should we just give up since that is so difficult (impossible)?

  In other words, Steve was right, Peter Brown won’t speak out.
  .
  I used the occasion of his washing his hands of the matter to chide him for the fact that amateur scientists and scientists from other disciplines are doing the work that the climate scientists should be doing, that of picking up the scientific trash in their own backyard. And I probably got out of line in the way I said it. I am an amateur scientist and a reformed cowboy. I grew up on an isolated cattle ranch surrounded by kids and animals and horses and guns and vegetables and cowboys, and I tend towards direct speaking. Too damn direct, my wife sometimes tells me, and I suspect she is right …
  .
  The problem I face is that there’s no indirect way to tell someone that they are getting their asses kicked by a pickup sandlot team and they better do something about it. There’s no polite way to tell people they’re not doing their job of finding the faults in each others’ ideas. Brown or Woodhouse should have been the first to notice the mishandling of their data, not Steve. You can pour all the honey on it you want, but the ugly fact underneath the honey is that climate scientists are not looking critically at their own field, including watching what others do with their own work. They are not finding each other’s errors. They are not checking each others’ work. They are not reviewing when asked to review. They are not pointing out when their data is used in an improper manner.
  .
  Instead, they pour honey on everything, there’s no problems, we’re just good old boys doing science. So what if Maine rain falls in the Seine for eight years, it makes no difference to the result, and there’s no need to mention when Bob or Billy does something stupid with my hard-earned proxies, pointing out Mikey’s mistakes just gives ammunition to our enemies, don’t say anything about the gaping holes in someone’s ideas, we’ve moved on from those gaping holes to new gaping holes so the old holes don’t matter, besides, I wouldn’t know whether to write to Nature or my local newspaper, and I wouldn’t dream of insulting a professional colleague by questioning their work, it’s just not done …
  .
  I see no way to fight this apathy, this terrible malaise that afflicts climate science other than to put it out into the bright glare of daylight.
  .
  Or, to channel my inner cowboy, let me ask the assembled masses. How do you make a whole field of science grow a pair of balls, and start looking for errors in their own work?
  .
  I don’t know the answer to that, Chip. Your solution, of making nice and pouring honey on it, has not worked all that well. Steve is trying another tactic, a call to arms. Me, I try to do it in my own ways. You do it by way of your excellent website.
  .
  We’re trying all the tactics we have at hand. You don’t like our tactics, fine … we’re just encouraging people to raise their voices. But to fault Steve’s attempt to urge some action because it doesn’t encourage “friendly back-and-forth discourse” is to miss the point. He is issuing a challenge, not a request for a faculty tea party, and in the event, it was successful down to and including our discussion here.

  .

  Finally, you say:

  I was very interested in Mr. McIntyre’s findings at the heart of this article and would have loved to have Dr. Brown’s thought out opinions about whether or not Dr. Mann’s treatment of his tree rings was a good idea or not in light of Mr. McIntyre’s observations. But, as a result of the constant barrage of petty comments, questions, directives, and accusations, Dr. Brown was never apparently in the mood to thoroughly share his opinions on the matter. I can’t say I blame him.

  I could not disagree more. I thought it was shameful of him not to stand up and speak his piece. Blaming it on “But mommy, they were mean to me, they asked me questions in writing, they wrote things I didn’t like” as you are doing doesn’t cut it, you should be embarrassed to excuse him on that basis. He had a chance to take a principled stand, and he waffled, wandered, and left. He had (as everyone does here) a choice of who to respond to and what to say. He was free to ignore petty comments and irrelevancies. We were not encouraging him to attack Mann. We were encouraging him to stand up for himself and the proper use of his proxies. I was sad that he did not take advantage of the opportunity.
  .
  I will say it again. Science is a blood sport. It progresses, not by proving things are right, but by proving they are wrong. Falsification is the heart and core of science. So if you can’t stand to have your precious little snowflake ideas attacked in the marketplace lest they melt, then go be an auto mechanic. Seriously. Science can only move forwards when someone’s pet idea is shown to be wrong, wrong, wrong, when someone’s cherished theory is shot full of holes, when someone’s vaunted and iconic Hockeystick has the broken shaft stuffed way up its … blade … and that’s not a pretty process, no amount of honey can make that sweet.
  .
  My very best to you, people should check out your World Climate Report website.

  w.

  • Chip Knappenberger
    Posted Oct 22, 2008 at 12:35 PM | Permalink

    Re: Willis Eschenbach (#135),

    Mr. Eschenbach,

    Thanks for the direct and impassioned response. I understand your level of frustration, but I believe that you’ve come to reach such levels by having unrealistic expectations in the first place.

    For example: If, in the course of his tireless investigations, Mr. McIntyre uncovered that someone was using some results of mine in an unusual way (and in fact informed me about them), I would give him a cordial “thanks for letting me know” and “maybe I’ll look into it further if and when I have the time or inclination.” And perhaps I would actually do so if I felt the application was particularly inappropriate and depending on the nature of the issue, may or may not directly contact the person who was using my data and try to open a discussion with them. The only way I would ever send a note into a journal about it was if, in my opinion (not yours), it was material to the conclusions of the study. If I felt that Mr. McIntyre’s interpretation of his analysis results was different than mine, then I perhaps would engage him about it on his blog. But for certain, one thing I would not do, would be to openly and publicly denounce the use of my data in such a way on the blog, unless I thought that it was nefarious, and then, probably not without contacting the nefarious user directly and trying to work things out.

    It seems as if you are hoping for, or seemingly demanding, a different outcome. I think you should set your sights on pointing out potential issues and then letting the chips fall as they may. Telling other people what they should or should not be doing doesn’t really go over so well, and in fact is not really even appropriate unless you are the boss (and even then people don’t like it).

    If you all feel that there is a scientific issue that needs to be resolved that impacts the general scientific knowledge base, then it needs to appear in the peer-reviewed scientific literature. Airing out dirty laundry on a blog may feel good, but, in general, is serves very little greater good. I know this from experience. We can talk ‘til we’re blue in the face about stuff at World Climate Report, but if we want to have any ground to stand on at all, we need to put something into the literature, or at least point to something in the literature. Therefore, despite the extra effort (and added frustration) that it takes to publish in the literature, we do try to do so from time to time.

    But, I don’t mean to come into your sandbox and start throwing sand.

    You gave me a direct response (born out of frustration) and I’ll reply with an equally direct response (also born out of frustration)… You all would be much more effective if you published your results in the peer-reviewed scientific literature. You may think you are a bunch of outsiders rubbing their faces in the dirt, and I guess that gives you some measure of satisfaction. To me, until you put some stuff in the literature that shows what you all have found materially impacts the general conclusions, then you have achieved little that I can use.

    I spend most of my time these days writing reports for various clients who want a review of the state of various aspects of climate change science. In doing so, I highlight the findings that stand against alarmist claims. But, I’ve got very little to work with concerning the paleotemperature reconstructions. So, typically, I pass over that issue. I can’t very well say “the hockeystick is broken because the face-grinding cowboys over at a blog I frequent say so.”

    Take your game out of the “sand lots” and into the big leagues.

    You all have expended a monumental amount of energy in your research and in your blogging, and I have the utmost respect for your efforts. Please do everyone a favor by organizing them and writing them up for publication.

    Oops. There I go doing what I suggested you don’t do…telling other people what they should do. So, never mind, carry on doing whatever it is that you like to do. But, if you toned down your expectations as to what impact you may think your efforts as they are currently structured will have, you’d be less frustrated by the attendant inaction.

    -Chip Knappenberger

    • Craig Loehle
      Posted Oct 22, 2008 at 1:34 PM | Permalink

      Re: Chip Knappenberger (#158), Chip: there is no contact email address I can find at WCR.

    • Kenneth Fritsch
      Posted Oct 22, 2008 at 2:20 PM | Permalink

      Re: Chip Knappenberger (#158),

      Chip, I know who you are in the climate science world, but I am not aware of how familiar you are with some of the discussions of published papers that are introduced by Steve M and analyzed by him and others here at CA. My enlightment from those analyses has far outweighed that obtained from most climate scientists who come here and pop out after a quick visit.

      I realize that you were addressing your post to Steve M, but I wanted to be sure you knew how valuable and enlightening (and fun) that those paper analyses can be for the laypersons here. I feel fortunate that Steve M provides a blog and atmosphere that is conducive to that activity. As far as Steve M’s future publications of peer reveiwed papers are concerned that is up to him. I am older than you and Steve M (and probably almost everyone posting here) but I am also hestitasnt to give advice.

      Perhaps some academicians are unaware of the appeal of their papers to laypersons and the potential value they have to laypersons. Heck, some of them even provide a chuckle or two.

Bob North

I think Chip Knappenberger last post (#124) says things very well and I urge those that post here regularly (including Mr. McIntyre) to attempt to refrain from snide, petty comments or snippy responses to those such as Dr. Brown who may be able to help us at least better understand the Dendroclimatologist position. (Even though other bloggers such as Gavin Schmidt and others at Real Climate and Tamino at Open Mind are much worse about initiating or allowing such non-productive comments, I would even urge that we refrain from such comments with respect to them as well even though it is very hard to restrain oneself at times). Remain above the fray.

jmt,
Bob

• Kenneth Fritsch
  Posted Oct 21, 2008 at 4:36 PM | Permalink

  Re: Bob North (#126),

  I think Chip Knappenberger last post (#124) says things very well and I urge those that post here regularly (including Mr. McIntyre) to attempt to refrain from snide, petty comments or snippy responses to those such as Dr. Brown who may be able to help us at least better understand the Dendroclimatologist position.

  Bob North, thanks for your inputs on keeping the conversation temperate as that is always good advice, but I think blogs serve to reveal insights beyond what one might obtain from polite academic talk and peer review formalism.

  The frustration of visiting scientists and the blog regulars works both ways. I can see, perhaps, the visiting scientist being distracted and agitated by remarks that are not on topic and could be construed as a personal attack, but I have experienced blog exchanges where the visiting expert was truly interested in debating the issues and imparting knowledge and was rather easily able to rise above the fray. On the other hand, when an expert appears at a blog and departs from the subject at hand to deliver his/her opinion of the posters or the atmosphere they might generate, I have to wonder whether they seriously appeared to discuss the science or to merely provide an opinion the posters and their ilk.

  Regular posters, on the other hand, I think have too high of expectations of what the visiting expert can deliver in way of answers to pressing questions. They also become frustrated with indirect and conjectured replies from the experts. While this all may seem chaotic and without a directed purpose, believe me when I say that much can be learned from these exchanges by the sensitive and tuned-in observer.

  As an example would you want the RC blog feigning a disinterested view of climate science divorced from policy advocacy while at the same time promoting one? I like knowing what a blog or a newspaper, for that matter, is promoting/advocating and have a major dislike for those that attempt to enhance the value of their world view by claiming neutrality.

Mark T.

Good point, kim.

Mark

jae

I support the direct cowboy approach, instead of the PC approach. Only the insecure thin-skinned folks stay out of arguments. My father always told me not to talk about politics or religion (he should have added science, I guess), because it starts arguments. But what else can you talk about that’s meaningful? Sports?

jae

Let’s recall what Craig Loehle did when the mobs attacked his paper. He stuck around, listened to the comments, commented, and finally agreed with some criticisms. So he FIXED the problems, and has a much better paper now. The dendros can learn a lot from that experience, IF they really care.

jae

CORRECTION: Sorry Steve, I know, I meant CERTAIN climate scientists, not all. I don’t mean to detract from the many great ones, such as Craig Loehle (if he’s a climate scientist?).

Steve McIntyre

Enough editorializing on this.

Peter D. Tillman

Steve, thanks again for the good work, and good entertainment,

Willis, thanks for the Cowboy poetry, and kicking butts that need kicking.

Peter Brown…. Huh. Grow up, man, and grow balls.

Best regards, Pete Tillman, returning to lurking
—
“It’s a sin to waste the reader’s time” — Larry Niven

Steve McIntyre

Folks, Peter Brown’s words speak for themselves. No need to editorialize.

Dr Brown, both the previous two commenters are not “amateurs” in the way that some people demonize readers here. They are both “Drs” with degrees as meritorious as yours (as are many of the commenters on this thread.)

However, I would like to respond to another one of Peter Brown’s accusations against me. In Peter Brown (#146), he says:

You are constantly admonishing others not to attribute motive but do it yourself constantly.

In my head post, I did not speculate on motives that Brown and/or Woodhouse would have for not commenting on the mishandling of their proxies in Mann et al; I merely speculated that they would not do so. Nothing about motives. Later Peter Brown accused me of imagining a “conspiracy” of dendros. I said that this accusation was made up, that I had never made any statement that asserted (or , for that matter, implied) such a conspiracy. In that context, I observed that my presumption was that individual dendros were making personal decisions – but once again, did not make any assertions or speculations on what those motives were.

I really think that Dr Brown’s accusation is unfair both in general and in the context of this thread. I would appreciate being directed to instances where I have departed from this policy so that I can examine the incident and implement my stated policy.

M. Jeff

My impression, developed over many months, is that comments by the AGW mainstream are typically given more leeway in venting than are the comments by skeptics. Peter Brown is certainly not being snipped as would skeptics who might write in such an abusive manner.

Steve: I expect regular readers to abide by the rules of the blog. I give Peter Brown more leeway because I’m not prepared to have go over to the listserv and complain that I was censoring his comments. Plus he’s supposed to be “professional”.

Nylo

I did learn something valuable about Peter Brown’s point of view, and I believe it to be a scientific comment, or at least I think it pretended to be so. He wrote:

I do not feel that Dr. Mann misappropriated our data; I think that was one of many possibly legitimate means of developing temperature signals at a global perspective

There it is. Peter Brown defended here that it is legitimate to use dendro proxies which were qualified by himself as precipitation proxies in order to look for a temperature signal, and in fact it is legitimate to cherry-pick the specific proxy which, far from being representative of the collection, just happens to show the desired result, without any analisis of why that proxy should be chosen among the others to be a better temperature proxy.

So, I can only conclude that virtually anything is legitimate in the dendro world, except for critizising another dendro’s work.

CU.

• jae
  Posted Oct 22, 2008 at 11:56 AM | Permalink

  Re: Nylo (#154),

  There it is. Peter Brown defended here that it is legitimate to use dendro proxies which were qualified by himself as precipitation proxies in order to look for a temperature signal, and in fact it is legitimate to cherry-pick the specific proxy which, far from being representative of the collection, just happens to show the desired result, without any analisis of why that proxy should be chosen among the others to be a better temperature proxy.

  In defense of Dr. Brown, one could make a case that the proxies are temperature proxies, due to more heat causing more moisture stress. But that’s one big problem with dendroclimatology: there’s all sorts of ways to “excuse” data snooping.

Craig Loehle

People sometimes act like outside reviews (audits) are novel, and not standard. I have personally been on review teams of the following: 1) a site visit to a Long Term Ecological Research site (NSF site visit/review by a team). Comments we gave were taken seriously. 2) a site review of a DOE field experiment on CO2 enrichment of tree growth 3) a review of plans for a large DOE mesocosm experiment. In addition, our department at Argonne Lab was reviewed by 3 outside big cheeses (and they really were) to overview quality and make suggestions. None of this was a statistical audit, but all quite serious stuff.

Tenured Prof

If I can speak a bit directly here with the benefit of anonymity. I am an academic in the environmental sciences and I follow this blog at times. I know many of the academics whose work Steve critiques and who have occasionally appeared in the comments.

Academia is like a country club. Only a select few are admitted. Sorry, but that is the way that it is. Now Steve is not in that club. He probably could be if he published, but he has chosen not to, and given those choices he never will be. Sorry. The guys in the club have tenure, research grants, access to the media, and an ear with politicians. Some of them even have blogs. Steve has a blog and that is it. When he gets attention from the media, politicians, or even some academics, the guys in the club go ape sh*t.

So there is going to be no playing nice here, so don’t expect it. Steve is like the guy who wears jeans and a tank top on the golf course. Persona non grata. But if Steve shoots scores in the 60s the club guys are going to have to take some notice.

So my advice is to forget aspirations of convincing the guys in the club of anything. They ignore what goes on here at their peril (thus, many pay attention but pretend not to). I have no doubt that much of Steve’s work will one day appear in the peer reviewed journals, only Steve may not be a co-author on the paper, if you get my drift. He((, this has already occurred.

Steve has decided to be a pain in the a$$, good for him. But don’t expect the guys in the club to like it. They won’t. Ever.

• Alan Wilkinson
  Posted Oct 22, 2008 at 1:57 PM | Permalink

  Re: Tenured Prof (#161),

  You are right, this isn’t about science it is about politics. Brown’s input and reactions made that crystal clear.

  If you make a bunch of assertions without providing evidence then you will only convince your audience if they have their own evidence to support those assertions. If on the other hand you supply evidence without drawing any extravagant conclusions then you are doing science. Brown was not doing science here and, as Tenured Prof says, is not interested in doing science here for very good reasons to do with career and power which blogs seriously threaten if you are the least bit insecure.

  Only very strong and exceptional people have the ability to buck the professional herd, especially when it is feeling threatened.

• David Smith
  Posted Oct 22, 2008 at 2:26 PM | Permalink

  Re: Tenured Prof (#161), Tenured Prof, I think you’ve described the situation well.

• stan
  Posted Oct 23, 2008 at 10:27 AM | Permalink

  Re: Tenured Prof (#161),

  Prof,

  The country club of climate scientists would not bother anyone, if they didn’t use their club to influence govt policy. But they use their little club to try to impose enormous costs on everyone else in the world. Some in the club are even demanding that anyone who disagrees with the club be thrown in jail.

  This may not be a focus of Steve’s, but it is a really big deal to a lot of his readers.

  Bottom line — when the country club members use the club’s activities to demand significant sacrifices be imposed on the rest of the world, the rest of the world should have the right to demand that the club be competent, open, transparent, and honest in its dealings. And that right is not dependent on whether they like McIntyre or want to blackball him.

  When the club started pushing the world around, the world got the right to push back. And looking under the rock is the first step.

Mark T.

There aren’t many reasonable people in here that don’t agree with your comments, Tenured Prof. Personally, I don’t think the guys in the club will ever be convinced of anything that originates from here, not publicly at least; they will just drift into obscurity if time proves Steve, and the methods he advocates, correct.

Mark

jae

Steve Mc’s fantastic work here has been cited by hundreds, if not thousands, of influential people all over the world, including many climate scientists. So, even if he never publishes another paper in a “respectible” journal, I am certain that his efforts have had a great effect on science and policy. We haven’t seen the tip of the iceberg, yet. You don’t have to be a member of any country club to make a difference. Let the snobs in the ivory towers keep ignoring reality, as they are wont to do. The towers have fallen down over and over in history.

Chip Knappenberger

All,

Well, perhaps I messed something up, but I tried to use the “reply and paste” feature as well as my salutation (“Mr. Eschenbach”), to indicate that my comments were primarily in response to his reply (#135) to me. It was hmy sense of his frustration that I was trying to address not Mr. McIntrye’s.

As far as all Mr. McIntyre’s work, I am very aware that it does and will continue to have “trickle down” impacts other than those which may derive directly from a peer-reviewed publication. His struggles (documented wonderfully by Dr. McKitrick in “Scattered Consensus”) have opened my eyes to the realities of the peer-review process and the reproducibility (and willing co-operation of the participants) of the results. Since that lesson, I, myself have tried to pay better attention to reproducibility issues in the papers for which I serve as a reviewer, and am surprised at the response I get when I ask the editor if I could get a copy of the raw data such that I could try to see if I get the same answers as the authors. Usually, the response is along the lines of “well, no one has every asked me that before, so let me think about it…” Unbelievable!

Further, I have tried to be more aware of proper statistical procedures and confidence intervals when working with my own research projects as a result of the conversations that have taken place on the Climate Audit blog.

And, I imagine, other researchers learn form the discussions here and make appropriate changes in their way of doing things. I almost asked Mr. McIntyre whether he thought that he saw any improvements in the latest Mann et al. paper compared with the initial ones. I am glad to see that he believes that there are some—which I find a testament to his efforts. Hopefully, he can spot them in other papers as well. For me, that would be a great sense of self-satisfaction and contribution to science.

So I am well aware that the impacts and effectiveness can be found in places other than the peer-reviewed literature. But, from my angle, I largely rely on the literature to base my writings and as such would love to be able to directly include the diligent and seemingly tireless efforts of Mr. McIntyre and crew in my reviews. And so that is where I am coming form on this particular issue.

-Chip Knappenberger

PS. Dr. Loehle, my email address is chip@nhes.com

• Gerald Machnee
  Posted Oct 23, 2008 at 9:09 AM | Permalink

  Re: Chip Knappenberger (#171),
  So we are getting a “trickle down” and a “trickle up” effect. Keep it up!

Jeff Alberts

They are both “Drs” with degrees as meritorious as yours (as are many of the commenters on this thread.)

I’m not 🙂

Steve McIntyre

Yes, of course, I recognize that there is a need to collect things together and if I were a young academic building a CV, I’d play the game that way.

I’ve always agreed that it would make sense to pull some articles together. As I said above, Ross has been after me for ages to pull some articles together and I agree.

My excuses and they are only excuses:
– I like looking at new things and figuring out how they work. Since I’m doing this out of interest, I think that I’m entitled to do what interests me.
– it’s not like the climate science community has understood the articles that we’ve already written;
– Lots of the things that I do aren’t “original” as journals understand the term. They are comments on papers. In lots of cases, the ability to do such comments has been stonewalled and it’s taken a long time to get relevant data which, in some cases, is still not available.
– I did submit an article last year (with Roger Pielke) which received the most vicious imaginable reviews. One of the reviewers accused us of “fraud”. WE also sent it to Kerry Emanuel who thought it was interesting and another prominent author in the field was going to quote it. But by the time that we got it back, I was working on other things unfortunately.
– on some of the statistical issues, I’m still learning things as I go.

I have no excuse for not finishing up something on Almagre.

The main problem is time and energy. Obviously if I could clone myself, I’d get twice as much done.

Also CA has a very large audience – the Google searches are always off the charts, indicating a lot of lurkers. So I’ve gotten into the habit of doing CA first. By the time that I finish that, I’m tired.

I do not agree that academic journals provide particularly searching peer review. In my own experience, both positive and negative, the review process is pretty cursory. So it’s not “big league” in that sense.

But don’t get me wrong – I do not share the opinions of many readers on the merits of blogs vs journals. I’m pretty conventional in my attitudes; I appreciate academic journals and do not view blogs as substituting in any way. But I like experimenting and seeing where things go and that’s what I’ve been doing. I agree on the need to publish things in academic journals. I have topics that are in a position to be formalized. So I need to get back to looking at Mann et al 2008, since as Hu observe, the clock is running on the comment period and we still haven’t opened up the EIV method.

• Jeff Alberts
  Posted Oct 22, 2008 at 9:11 PM | Permalink

  Re: Steve McIntyre (#174),

  – it’s not like the climate science community has understood the articles that we’ve already written;

  I think it’s more like they choose to ignore them. I hope that something good might come of your work, but it will probably be in the form of people of Mann’s ilk trying to correct things behind the curtain without acknowledging that he screwed up, and that you helped ferret out major problems. It really amazes me how childish they seem to be.

jae

If nothing else, this expose’ will make the “peer-reviewed” journals enforce their policies. Some of these journals have become nothing more than Hollywood tabloids.

Phil Johnson

In my department there were fields where creativity and ideas were a necessity. However, I think new ideas might have been a liability, or at least unnecessary, in some fields.

Craig Loehle

What’s the difference between CA and RC? At CA, Steve does an analysis, people discuss it, errors are found and corrected, some very interesting alternate ways of looking at stats are put forward in head-spinning detail, scripts are posted so you can try it yourself, and Steve corrects his mistakes. At RC, the “expert” tells you what is correct.

BarryW

Is there a journal of applied statistics somewhere that might be appropriate? I would think that might be a receptive venue for the sorts of analyses that you do while avoiding the hostility you’ve been getting in the climate fraternity.