I posted up information on IPCC publication deadlines, which are presumably there to ensure that authors do not play favorites. Here are dates of submission, acceptance and publication of some studies that have been discussed recently on this blog. These should be compared against WG1 deadlines of August 12, 2005 for being supplied to TSU, December 16 for being "published or in press" and end February as a drop dead date for final preprints.
Wahl, Ritson and Ammann was submitted on 3 October 2005, accepted on 27 February 2006 and published April 28, 2006. On its face, it failed to meet both the December and February deadlines – it merely got to December status in February. Purely hypothetically, IPCC reviewers might want to consider whether it met submission deadlines for even being supplied to TSU for inclusion in the First Draft. The possibility of its not being supplied for the First Draft is, of course, entirely hypothetical as this information is confidential. But since IPCC review is supposed to be done with an abundance of caution, I presume that diligent reviewers will check such things.
Hegerl et al [Nature 2006] was submitted on 8 July 2005, accepted on 28 February 2006 and published on April 20, 2006. This article does not describe the HC reconstruction. That is described in another article [Journal of Climate] which had not been accepted as at April 20, 2006, according to the Nature article. IPCC reviewers should ensure that any results attributed to Hegerl et al 2006 are actually supported in the NAture article; if they come from the Journal of Climate submission, then they should not appear. As to the Nature article, as with the Wahl et al 2006 article in Science, it did not meet either the December deadline for being "published or in print" since it was accepted only in February and did not meet the February drop-dead date as it only then arrived at the December milestone.
Wahl and Ammann [Climatic Change], not the rejected GRL article, was submitted on May 10, 2005 and accepted on February 27, 2006. No final preprint exists currently and as of today, it does not appear in the online publication list for Climatic Change. On an earlier occasion, we reported that there were dramatic changes between the version that existed in December and the accepted version, including the inclusion of verification r2 statistics that confirmed our findings in MM05a, MM05b. Again, this failed several milestones – it was not "published or in print" by December 16; no final preprint existed as at February 28 and substantial changes were made post December.
Dare I observe that there seems to have been lots of activity on this front on February 27-28. Of course, this last minute flurry was pointless under IPCC WG1 policies.
Osborn and Briffa [2006] was submitted on 23 September 2005, accepted on 17 January 2006 and published on Feb 10, 2006. So it met the February deadline, but did not meet the December deadline of being "published or in print". It’s too bad since Briffa is a lead author. Diligent reviewers should also review their First Draft records to check whether a draft version of Osborn and Briffa was made available for the First Draft as it was supposed to be. As a lead author, I’m sure that Briffa would be expected to comply with the letter of all policies.
Again all this discussion is entirely hypothetical. No reader should conclude that any of these studies have been mentioned in the Second Draft of IPCC 4AR. That information is confidential. However, there’s no harm in saying that lead authors should not be permitted to circumvent rules in favor of their own publications, just as a general point. I’m sure that such things are unlikely to happen with IPCC, but you never know.
Climate Audit 
86 Comments
Why do I smell a set-up? 🙂
Suppose it turned out, just hypothetically in a parallel universe far, far away, that an eka-IPCC alterno-4AR was published that included material from papers that did not meet their deadline criteria. What recourse would the offended parallelo-humans have?
In this science-fiction world, there is no ombuds-alien to intercede. There is no watch-dogoid, no eka-IPCC police, no Inspector General, no office of pseudo-citizen complaints, no court of legal reckoning. The most
wethey might expect are eka-IPCC internal self-assessments. ‘Protocols are in place to appropriately adjudicate results,’ they might say. ‘We are confident that the final product accurately represents the consensus outlook of the council of consensual authors.’Seriously, now: In a council of cobras, who calls for the mongoose?
But then again, it works both ways. It would have been good as a contrast if Usoskin et al 2006 was considered:
Usoskin, I. G., S. K. Solanki, and M. Korte (2006), Solar activity reconstructed over the last 7000 years: The influence of geomagnetic field changes, Geophys. Res. Lett., 33, L08103, doi:10.1029/2006GL025921.
My emphasis.
RE #2 –
Yes…what is good for the goose…
Except, is there an established relationship betwen dipole moments in trees and sunspot activity? Does the dipole respond to biological/climatalogical (not solar) changes? The attempting to reconstruct temperature from tree rings we run into the confounding factors that many things contribute to the width of a tree ring. Does the 14C in a tree ring suffer from this same issue? Or is it “independent” of the temperature, moisture, etc.? If not, then it’s no better than any of the other reconstructions. However, 14C is an independent measurement of solar activity, then they might have something.
THe Usoskin dates are a few weeks later than the ones above, so IPCC WG1 could use that against its inclusion: Received 1 February 2006; revised 15 March 2006; accepted 22 March 2006; published 25 April 2006.
In an active field, this illustrates why it’s impossible for a formal process supposedly involving two sessions of expert review to keep up without a locked-in-stone cutoff date.
On the other hand, if Usoskin et al suspected that the dates were not locked in stone, then maybe they’d have rushed the article. That’s what’s wrong with favoritism – with some guys knowing that the schedules don’t apply to everyone. Let’s hope that such a thing hasn’t happened here.
BTW which do you think is more likely to be of enduring merit: an article which has been scheduled to attempt to meet IPCC deadlines or an article which has been written with seeming indifference to IPCC deadlines.
Mr ClimateAudit: You really can’t see the wood for the trees can you? Personally I’d be happy for the IPCC AR4 to have references to as many RECENT papers as possible, on the understanding that they are deemed to be relevant by the authors and expert reviewers. Now that the USA had considered it appropriate to effectively release the Second Order Draft of the AR4 to the world, NO ONE can claim that they haven’t had the opportunity to read it, and if they so desire to inform authors of their own pet (possibly “late”) publications. So I fail to see how authors would be able to “play favorites” with “late” entries rather than any other (“earlier”) publications. And I also don’t see how “lead authors” would be any more likely to “circumvent rules in favor of their own publications” now than previously.
What I want is the best AR4 that can be produced, based on knowledge currently available. “Mr ClimateAudit” appears to be much more easily satisfied — to him (or is it her?), things would all be fine and dandy on the simple condition that every bureacratic check and balance has been adhered to.
Re #5,
Thanks for the laughs John. 🙂
John Hunter
re # 5
You just made a rather big blip on my radar – you protest to much, for a start.
I wonder if your comments might evolve into an interesting news item…..
watchfully yours
Just throw in another red herring, (or rollmop, yeah I know misplaced metaphor), but Pat’s initial musings, and the the follow ons all assume that the unit of measurement, time, was constant.
Think on it, because if the time unit was not constant, then……
#4
I would hazard a guess that meeting a deadline, ie publishing deadline, said article might be published.
On the other hand, an article with much merit, post deadline, might be added “post proof” if sufficient persuation were made that it was in the “interest” of readers.
Depends on how objective an editor is, I suppose.
RE: #5
Since when did the elementary rules of fair play become “bureacratic check and balance” ?
The IPCC has said that there is a set of rules it will stick to. I have always thought it to be relatively important that you stick to what you say.
It is under any circumstances kind of poor if someone has to be bending or breaking rules to get a paper in. How many years since the last AR ? How many millions of dollars spent ? If it really requires breaking the rules to get a paper in after the self-imposed deadline to make the case, doesn’t that tell you something about how weak the evidence is ?
The IPCC is meant to be a scientific organisation that is responsible, and accountable. It has yet to own up to its responsibility for using the hockey-stick as a centre-piece of its scientific case. It will be interesting to see how seriously it takes its own procedures.
yours
per
Re: #5 You sound like a damn ultra-liberal Democrat. Rules? We don’t need to obey no stinking rules. Why have a rule, if it is ignored?
#10
The IPCC is a scientific organisation?
Que?
Per said that the IPCC was “meant to be” a scientific organisation.
Mr. AntiAudit: although it may sometimes seem as if Americans are “the world,” we are in fact only 5% or so of the world, so 95% of the world is still “safe” from any evil that might come to plague those with the opportunity to comment upon the 2nd order draft. Have you considered real or virtual “draft-burnings” to try to keep the rest of us “safe”?
Just a note for those participating in the US Government review process of the wg14AR: If you’re unable to submit your comments by COB today (because, e.g., you’re still waiting for username/password access to the “gray” literature database), Dave Dokken says they will still accept comments for the next few days.
On a related note, can anyone provide a link to a free copy of MM03? The right margin link to it is invalid.
Armand: I’ll put it up at http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/MM03.pdf for a while, though it’s no longer open access so I may have to remove it again in a while.
Got it — thanks, Ross!
#17. I’ve fixed the link. BTW If you go to Category – multiproxy pdf,s, I’ve started indexing some of the papers discused here with links.
Armand MacMurray (#14): Oh naive one, read:
http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2006/05/us_govt_leaks_ipcc_report.php#more
— given an internet connection, it would appear that everyone in the world now has access to the Second-order AR4 draft.
And I’m sure we both agree with William Connolley’s comment that:
“It doesn’t matter much who you allow to read it, as long as you don’t have to bother reading comments from all the wackos.”
Re:#20
Now John, unlike William, I’d be interested in reading your comments…
John Hunter
It must be a fetish amongst alarmists that the most recent papers must necessarily be better, or supercede older papers. I fail to see how. Surely the process should be that very recent papers have not had any time for comments or rebuttals, nor any opportunity for replication of part or all of the work presented.
If the IPCC were to prevent all articles published three years before the publication date of the review and then to
cherrypickselect the most robust and widely tested ones for inclusion, I would conjecture that the quality of the resultant science would be improved.After all, can the IPCC really afford another Hockey Stick fiasco?
John
They want that “smoking gun” so much it hurts. That’s why when there is a 1% modification in sattelite data they get all giddy. Nevermind that even if they had the the 30% they need, it still wouldn’t be a smoking gun.
So they keep hoping for that new paper so they can go “SEE! SEE !”
In addition since every new paper is a re-hash, they can talk about the larg amount of papers that prove it. NEvermind that it’s all the same paper with the same authors.
Same Spaghetti different sauce.
In this case, sticking to the rules would arguably protect IPCC. I’ve been on the record for quite a while as saying that, if I were John Houghton or someone of that ilk, I’d be mad at Mann and the Hockey Team. I would be extremely cautious about relying on papers by mini-Mann and other Hockey Teamers which are hot off the press or not even off the press. I would definitely not allow another guy from the Hockey Team, acting as a lead author, to promote his own work.
John H, if you want WG1 to make a good case for what you regard as a serious problem, don’t think that WG1 is doing you any favors by promoting Hockey Team studies. You should be the one asking WG1 to disentangle themselves from the Hockey Team. It should be you that’s insisting that they enforce deadlines if it reduces the profile of the Hockey Team in IPCC 4AR.
Steve McIntyre (#24): You really don’t understand, do you? You think this is all a big competition between the “warmers” and the contrarians — in which case you have to run it like a game of squash, the only important criterion being that the “rules” are strictly observed so that one side doesn’t get an unfair advantage.
You say “if you want WG1 to make a good case for what you regard as a serious problem ….” — as if I have already made up my mind about what the AR4 should say (have you, and/or your cheerleaders already made up your minds? — yes, you probably have!).This indicates just how warped are your perceptions of this whole business. I don’t want a “good case” at all (as well as not being a squash game, this also isn’t a court of law) – I want a good REVIEW of the science.
Re:#25
How would you suggest dealing with authors who ignore the IPCC rules and don’t provide the final versions of their “accepted” papers for the IPCC review process?
HUNTER: you are one of the true believers, and you just can’t face reality, can you? At the present time, there is NO real good support for AGW. The Hockey Stick is broken, forever, and the models are laughable. LOL.
jae (#27):
“At the present time, there is NO real good support for AGW. The Hockey Stick is broken, forever, and the models are laughable.”
This is the kind of rubbish which, if you say it often enough and loudly enough (with no justification), you actually get to believe it youself. I guess you are well past that point.
Re #23
ETSV, the modification was from a S&C version 5.1 trend of .086C/decade to a version 5.2 of .12C/decade. Is that closer to 30 or 1 percent?
Re #27 JAE: you are one of the true believers, and you just can’t face reality, can you? At the present time, there is NO real good evidence against AGW. The surface trend is clear, and the atmospheric physics sound.
Thanks, Steve M., for Category – multiproxy pdf,s !
Given a substantive question (#26) and a troll (#27), it’s interesting to note which one John H and Peter chose to ignore, and which one they both pounced on.
Re #31, Steve said the following “Again all this discussion is entirely hypothetical. No reader should conclude that any of these studies have been mentioned in the Second Draft of IPCC 4AR.”.
We’re talking hypotheticals here, I wouldn’t draw conclusions from them. Lets see what studies the final version reviews eh?
re # 13
Yes 🙂 Understood 🙂
re # 26
Well John Hunter, a reply?
re#28
Such a wonderful all-purpose putdown, John! Do you have it set up as a macro on your keyboard, or perhaps a set of such insults prepared with a randomizing function?
Maybe we could save some time for mr Hunter, and create a bot. So whenever certain people say something, certain replies are posted in return.
Then Mr Hunter can get on with his research.
Re #36, surely there is one allready? it’s the one that generates anonymous replies to people like me with the following words (randomly mixed) ‘comprehension’, ‘lacks’, ‘warmer’, ‘troll’, ‘[posters name]’, ‘is’, ‘ignore’, ‘fallacy’, ‘ad hom’, ‘back to the stone age’, etc etc etc?
Actually I thought you were one peter.
It seems that Peter Hearnden is going for the “woe is me” act of trying to provoke another flamewar. If he doesn’t stop, I will reach for the delete button to prevent thread derailment.
#26: “How would you suggest dealing with authors who ignore the IPCC rules and don’t provide the final versions of their “accepted” papers for the IPCC review process?”
I guess I didn’t understand the question, in the sense that I wasn’t aware it had happened. I have reviewed parts of both the First-order and Second order drafts and have come up against no such problem. Until I do, it’s hypothetical.
#27, #28 and #35: Can anyone tell me why:
“At the present time, there is NO real good support for AGW. The Hockey Stick is broken, forever, and the models are laughable.
is NOT a “a wonderful all-purpose putdown”
while:
“This is the kind of rubbish which, if you say it often enough and loudly enough (with no justification), you actually get to believe it yourself.”
is?
If the “Hockey Stick is broken” can anyone point to a recently published millennial temperature reconstruction that should not be cause for concern?
Do any of Mr ClimateAudit’s cheerleaders have any track record in climate modelling?
Just a few questions to ponder …..
#41, I woud ask in turn whether anyone in climate modeling understands that in science data take no rigorous physical meaning without the context of a falsifiable theory?
What falsifiable theory of tree growth gives temperature-proxy meaning to ring widths or densities? John H?
Even without the statistical problems, I can find no reason to believe that it is possible to reconstruct temperature using tree rings. See the post I put up yesterday or the day before.
Re:#40
The question seems quite clear to me, but if you feel you need a concrete example in order to answer it, I’d be happy to provide one. Since we’ve been asked not to quote, cite, etc from the drafts in public, send me a private email and I’ll reply privately with the example. You can email me by adding an ‘s’ to my first name (at) mindspring.com.
Forgot to give comment number–see #63
re: #41
Because the first is limited to AGW and your statment could be used about one’s political, religious or sexual views with equal effect.
Also the former statement, while somewhat vague does mention a lack of evidence for AGW, claims the Hockey Stick has been debunked and proclaims the Climate models are risible (presumably because of their inability to predict either the past or future accurately.
All of these claims can at least in theory be attacked as being incorrect. How could your putdown be attacked?
Stuff like this really makes me wonder.
If the hockey stick is broken, it is broken. The hockey stick was about using proxies as a thermometer. If your “thermometer” doesn’t tell you about temperature, it is broken. If you know your “thermometer” is broken, you don’t use the data it gives you because you know it is wrong. Using data from a broken “thermometer”, because you like the data it gives you, or because you need that data, is an elementary error.
I hear the abuse about “cheer-leaders”. I hear the innuendo that this is just statistics, and doesn’t really matter. The trouble is, when it comes to the substantive issues that determine the integrity of the MBH’98 and other millenial reconstructions, I don’t hear much from John H.
yours
per
#40. John Hunter said:
John, I suspect that you “came up against it”; it’s just that you didn’t notice. It shouldn’t be too hard for you to figure out. But without trying to do so, concede for the sake of argument that the unsavory situation has come about, what would you do?
#44: This is a reall classic. This thread is devoted to an anal-retentive commentary about whether the IPCC “rules” are being followed, and yet here we have a ClimateAudit cheerleader (Armand MacMurray) offering to divulge information from an AR4 draft to someone who he only knows from this blog. If you want to be pedantic (and I don’t know anyone who would claim that Mr ClimateAudit isn’t) you would say that NO ONE knows who I really am — I say am “John Hunter”, and I may sound like a certain John Hunter who lives and works in Australia, but all I provide as identification is a Yahoo email address. And good old Armand is quite happy to pass on confidential AR4 information to “me”. Oh dear, oh dear.
Mr ClimateAudit: how are you going to deal with this clear infringement of the rules of confidentiality concerning IPCC AR4 drafts?
#47: I guess our mutual problem is that YOU seem to understand the meaning of the term “broken thermometer” when applied to tree-ring proxies and I don’t. The way I look at proxies (indeed any observations) is to look at their values and their estimated uncertainties. If by “broken” you mean that an uncertainty may have been originally estimated rather low and now turns out to be a bit higher, then I think I understand what you mean, but I would not use the term “broken”. I would simply apply a bit more caution in using that particular thermometer ….. which is what, I think, most thinking climate scientists do.
#48: Steve: you ask: “But without trying to do so, concede for the sake of argument that the unsavory situation has come about, what would you do?”
Steve: it hasn’t happened to me, I don’t know what I’d do, I don’t want to even waste my time thinking about it, and (most of all) I don’t want to turn into a bar-room lawyer like you.
RE: #50
this is amusing. You used the quote, “If the “Hockey Stick is broken”” in post 41, and in post 50, you don’t even know what the word “broken” means.
For the record, in respect of MBH98, there is an unknown uncertainty in the reconstruction; the contribution of bristlecone pines to the reconstruction has been shown to be extreme, and it is known that the BCPs are not a temperature proxy. The methods used to calibrate the proxies lack resolution and do not appear robust, and MBH have withheld adverse statistics when it suited them.
I would have said that the thermometer is broken. If you feel like engaging on any of the issues of substance, please feel free 🙂
yours
per
Re:#49
John, John, John. For someone who claims not to consider hypothetical situations, you’ve created a doozy. Next time, before constructing such a fantasy, you might want to consider that others may harbor more self-restraint than yourself.
You claim:
False. I offered to identify an example of a “gray” paper not properly deposited in the TSU database. It’s very easy to provide an example, without breaking any rules, that would only make sense to someone who also had access to the database (see quote of actual restrictions below). Just so you can’t claim that it hasn’t happened to you (while you continue to claim you are *the* John Hunter), here it is: compare the copy of the next-to-last reference in the TSU “gray” database chapter dealing with tree-rings with the publicly available copy at the 2nd author’s website.
I’d hope you would have the maturity to admit that your statement
was in error.
I’m sure you would also agree that your question “how are you going to deal with this clear infringement of the rules of confidentiality concerning IPCC AR4 drafts?” is moot by your own “hypothetical question” policy, the premise not having happened and thus being clearly hypothetical.
Restriction on access to TSU “gray” document database for 4AR:
“Copies of as yet unpublished manuscripts are provided SOLELY for the purposes of the IPCC WG1 Second Order Draft Review process.
These manuscripts are subject to copyright restrictions and are not subject to the IPCC review process. They may not be quoted nor cited nor distributed to others without prior permission from their original authors in each instance. Failure to comply with these conditions may lead to a reviewer’s comments being removed from the IPCC review process.”
#52: I assume, per, that your grasp of the English language is insufficient for you to understand subtle signals like putting something in quotes — in the present case, it meant that I didn’t say it but someone else did. It has nothing to do with understanding or agreeing with what that somebody meant.
per (#52 second part): if by:
“if you feel like engaging on any of the issues of substance, please feel free”
you mean:
“would you like to discuss with me my views which are simply a regurgitation of those of Mr ClimateAudit”
then the answer is “no”.
If you have something original to say, then I might reconsider.
#53: Armand: In #44 you said:
“Since we’ve been asked not to quote, cite, etc from the drafts in public, send me a private email and I’ll reply privately with the example.”
which to most English-speaking people would infer that you were about to quote or cite something from the drafts in private.
However, in #53, you seem to have decided that my statement:
“and good old Armand is quite happy to pass on confidential AR4 information to me”.
was in error.
Well, O.K., let’s all just accept that you changed your mind and leave it at that.
John Hunter’s email is no secret. It’s at utas.edu.au. It can be found on his home page.
Re:#56
John, for someone who claims to be a scientist and to abhor the hypothetical, you are awfully eager to rely on inference over real facts. In #53, I actually *gave you the example*; since I didn’t “…pass on confidential AR4 information…” in doing so, the facts show your statement is in error.
So, now that you’re aware it has happened, what’s your answer to the original question way back in #26:
I’m sure that most English-speaking people would infer from your dancing around the question that you won’t actually answer it; I try to deal with facts, so I’ll just wait and see.
Hunter: I say again that the “Hockey Stick” is broken. Not only are the statistics bogus as hell, but it is theoretically impossible to measure a temperature signal from tree rings. The change in ring width is too small to separate from noise. See my earlier post.
Armand (#58): (a) Yes, you changed your mind, and (b) re. your question, I have already provided an answer to Mr ClimateAudit – see #51
Doug L (#57): you really have got left behind haven’t you? How does the fact that the “John Hunter” who really lives and works in Tasmania has an email address at utas.edu.au prove that the “John Hunter” who is writing this to you at the moment is the same one? Perhaps you got confused: the email address I give to Mr ClimateAudit is johnroberthunter@yahoo.com – but again which is that “John Hunter”? The truth is, not only is “John A” anonymous on blogs such as this, but so is virtually everybody else, unless you apply a bit of trust.
Like anyone is going to pretend to be THAT John Hunter!
Do you know what the word “metaphor” means?
#65. John A, please don’t hijack this thread to deal with Hunter’s sea level stuff.
John H, I’ve asked TCO not to be juvenile with people’s names. It easily becomes a form of petty ad hominem. I realize that it’s tempting. I like calling Ammann “mini-Mann” which is at least a little bit clever and called Esper “Esper the Magnificent” just because the name sounded like a magician at a circus to me. However, people have twitted me for being juvenile and I pretty much cut it out, although it’s awfully hard not to lapse into using mini-Mann from time to time. You seem prone to bouts of such juvenile behavior from time to time and I would appreciate that you avoid such juvenile behavior.
Re #62 by John Hunter
Through here
http://people.aapt.net.au/~johunter/greenhou/home.html
is a link to both johnroberthunter@yahoo.com and John Hunter’s home page which links back to it through a redirect page.
I suppose it doesn’t really prove anything, I have no idea how much proof is required.
Re: #66
Yes, but at least I only regard Jan Esper as being “difficult”.
Re:#60
John, you claim “re. your question, I have already provided an answer to Mr ClimateAudit – see #51”. In #51, you say “Steve: it hasn’t happened to me, I don’t know what I’d do…”
Have you considered taking a test for ADHD? (I realize that it’s most likely not a “real” disease and just an excuse for many to use Ritalin instead of dealing with more complex problems.) The reason I ask is that one moment you seem to have read post 53 and the next you seem to have completely forgotten it. To refresh your memory, here’s the key part:
So now that it’s happened to you, I’ll repeat the question yet again:
You are contorting yourself quite strongly in order to keep dancing around this question without answering it — are you by any chance a lambada man?
Steve (#66): Sorry, you’ve lost me. I wasn’t aware I had been “juvenile with people’s names”. Whoever signs his/her name as “ClimatAudit” (presumably you) I’ve called “Mr ClimateAudit” — is that what you mean?
WOW, what an ugly general ad-hom! You need to get back on your meds, man.
John H, if you have taken on responsibility for being an IPCC reviewer, then I presume that you would have familiarized yourself with IPCC policies and deadlines in order to carry out your review. The question raised by Armand is not "outside the field" of a competent IPCC reviewer. What’s your answer?
Armand posted the following as the confidentilaity rule for AR4:
“
Let’s say that Armand and John Hunter corresponded about the article in question, where the authors have tabled a substantially different version with TSU than the version that was actually accepted. In this case, their correspondence is entirely for the purpose of carrying out the IPCC review process. So how would such an exchange constitute a breach of IPCC confidentiality?
For that matter, I’m not certain that this IPCC language would prevent a more pointed discussion on this site in which we named the article in question in order that people could provide their advice on how I and other reviewers should deal with this situation as long as we don’t "quote", "cite" or "distribute the article to others".
Obviously we could discuss the article without “quoting” it or “distributing” it to others. Cite is defined (OCD) as “quote (a book or author) as evidence for an argument”. In this case, we would not be “citing” the article in question in the sense that we were using it as evidence for an argument in an academic sense. We would be discussing what to do in the context of duties as IPCC reviewer? Maybe John Hunter can explain why this would be a breach of IPCC confidentiality. I’m just thinking out loud, but, in this particular case, I think that we would be entitiled to take a strict (rather than wide) interpretation of the language, since the authors themselves seem to have substantially breached IPCC policies.
Steve (#77): Don’t bully me — I get enough bullying from your cheerleaders. I don’t set IPCC policy and so do not have to answer the question “How would you suggest dealing with authors who ignore the IPCC rules and don’t provide the final versions of their “accepted” papers for the IPCC review process?”. I repeat:
“It hasn’t happened to me, I don’t know what I’d do, I don’t want to even waste my time thinking about it, and (most of all) I don’t want to turn into a bar-room lawyer like you.”
However, I’ll give you one clue, although I’m sure my answer will be quite outside your field of comprehension. If I read a reference to a paper in the AR4 draft and I did not have access to it, then I’d email the authors and ask them nicely for a copy. Is that too radical?
#79. John H, you’re answering a different question.
But as to writing politely, that’s what I’ve done. I write very polite inquiries to people. I would say that I’m a lot more polite than most people who criticize me. If you look at (say) my correspondence with Crowley, I was unfailingly polite despite considerable foolishness on his part. He published a scurrilous article about me in EOS and I posted up the correspondence to refute it. But it shows a pattern of polite inquiry – but persistent.
Previously if people were unresponsive to polite inquiries, there wasn’t much I could do about it. Now I have a bit of an audience and, if I get blown off, I write about it. Unfortunately that seems to be the only way to get any action. It’s certainly helped with Science, who disliked being criticized and are now a bit responsive
But I still write politely before I take anything public.
The question at stake does not involve getting a copy of the article. The article is on the internet and available to all. The issue is that a radically different version was filed with IPCC. This affects what the lead authors wrote and what reviewers have access to. It’s a legitimate question and deserves an answer.
To coin a phrase, 🙂 let’s face it folks. Anyone who regards comment 77 as bullying is seriously delusional. Attempts at rational communication with such a person may be expected to be a waste of keystrokes, and bandwidth.
To summarize, don’t feed the trolls.
“Anyone who regards comment 77 as bullying is seriously delusional.”
Particuarly when one says “Don’t bully me” to the owner of the Blog.
Don’t like it, go away.
Armand (#83): Spare me the tips about how to “be taken more seriously in scientific circles” – I read the first line and then found better things to do. However, I did follow your instructions:
“compare the copy of the next-to-last reference in the TSU ‘gray’ database chapter dealing with tree-rings with the publicly available copy at the 2nd author’s website”
Yes, they are different. Presumably the one in the TSU database is an earlier version – the TSU database is indeed headed “Unpublished Literature Section”, so I would have thought that might lead one to a modicum of caution. I also presume that the version that is publicly available on the web is the version as finally accepted.
So, according to you, this shows “an example of a “gray” paper not properly deposited in the TSU database” — I don’t think so. I assume that, when it was deposited, it was indeed a gray paper, and the “gray” version is the one “properly” deposited. The only (relatively minor) problem seems to be that the database was not updated when the paper was finally accepted.
I presume you got this information from Steve (I haven’t the time to read through his interminable verbiage to check). So I wonder how long you and Steve have known about this problem and have failed to get it fixed. The TSU database page does include a button entitled “Contact WG1 TSU” so it is extremely easy to get them to fix inconsistencies. But I guess it is better for Steve and his cheerleaders if this problem doesn’t get fixed and it continues to serve as an example to support the party line.
The quality of the AR4 is not helped if people see problems which are easily fixed, but for purely partisan reason do not fix them.
To all who are interested in having yet more evidence of the idiots who inhabit this site, here is a personal email I received from Doug L today:
———————————————————
Dear Dr. Hunter,
As entertaining as your style on the ClimateAudit
board is, I feel compelled to tell you it seems that
you’re past your prime and need a new challenge.
Perhaps you should take up cribbage or something.
I wish you well
Doug L.
———————————————————
Ageism as well as intellectual bankruptcy!
Pretty amazing eh, Steve?
I totally disagree with Doug L. [SM- flame snip]
John A (#86): Oh dear – the best you can do after #65 and #73? Isn’t there something about “sticks and stones …..”? Feel well enough to discuss some hard science?
Meanwhile, back to the subject of last minute papers, and IPCC shuffles, some visitors may not be aware of a stunt performed for the IPCC SAR (second assessment report).
A very brief review of “climate change science” in action may be found at http://www.john-daly.com/sonde.htm
Re # 87
John, are you not over-reacting a little? You seem to come across as a mullah who has his cherished beliefs profaned by the unclean.
Obviously in your area of science you have not experienced the hard knocks we in mineral exploration experience from having our pet theories falsified by drilled facts.
I have always wondered why climate theories are advertised as such, since they seem somewhat difficult to disprove empirically, especially in terms of the time frames involved.
Since climate is sensu-strictu weather over a 30 year period, then climate predictions could only be tested to be valid or false after a period of “climate length”.
So global warming (AKA climate change) isn’t a real scientific theorey in these terms.
Your intemperate reactions to comments here seem to somewhat support that idea.
Re # 93
John,
JohnA has previously corrected me over the issue of black holes – which I erroneously described as points in 3D space with infinite mass. Wrong. Infinite density, which error I freely admitted to on my personal blog.
But that does not imply, mullah-like, that he proscribed my error.
But in your case we need to make an exception, unfortunate as that is.
However this thread is fast disappearing into another horizon, rather than the one SMcI intended, so I stop here.
And as mining types do, we tend to think on a different plane – Steve posted his comment as I was writing mine.
Seems like most of the posting you do here – which I assume is done under your own free will and not under pressure from the intellectually bankrupt folks of the board – is outside your field. That is, aside from some sea level skirmishes which pop-up here-and-there. But since the sea level discussion now has its own place here, I assume that you will reside there and refrain from “commenting on matter outside my field” on other threads?
Christmas in May!
Dear John H, I think it is quite clear that my grasp of the English language is not adequate to keep up with what you write ! Apparently, you use quotes and ask questions when you don’t even understand the words you are using.
I did offer you the chance to engage in discussion of issues with substantive merit. I notice that you declined the offer, and took the opportunity to indulge in a little bit of name-calling.
Isn’t it funny how actions speak louder than words ?
yours
per
Re:#75
Thanks for finally taking the time to check out my example! You comment that “The only (relatively minor) problem seems to be that the database was not updated when the paper was finally accepted.” Had the other IPCC rules (e.g. “will not be subsequently modified (except perhaps for copy editing)”) been followed, I would agree.
However, given that the (seemingly final) preprint copy of this paper is approximately 50% longer than the copy held by the TSU, includes roughly 30% more citations, 40% more main tables/figures, and so forth, it seems to me that the scientific content has been changed substantially. Given such substantial content changes, I consider it a major problem that the authors did not provide a post-change copy to the IPCC.
Although the first part of your post was a credit to this board, in the last two paragraphs you, sadly, reverted to unwarranted assumptions and baseless accusations:
You say “I presume you got this information from Steve …”
Wrong.
You say “So I wonder how long you and Steve have known about this problem…”
I can’t speak for Steve, since I have not corresponded with him on this subject other than my public posts on this board. I have known about this problem for about 2.5 days.
You say “… and have failed to get it fixed. The TSU database page does include a button entitled “Contact WG1 TSU” so it is extremely easy to get them to fix inconsistencies. ”
(sigh) [apologies to Gavin!] John, you should realize by now that it’s your unwarranted presumptions and assumptions about others’ actions that get you into trouble. You should consider that not everyone will act just as you would in a situation.
I have corresponded with the TSU regarding this matter, but consider it unlikely that they will be able to turn back time and provide the changed article in time for the start of government review in early April (as it would have been, had the authors acted properly).
Finally, you say “The quality of the AR4 is not helped if people see problems which are easily fixed, but for purely partisan reason do not fix them.” I wholeheartedly agree, and suggest that you pass on this comment to the proper recipients — the authors of the article in question.
It’s not just a matter of turning back time to early April for government review. It’s a matter of turning back time to December for the writing of the Second Draft. IPCC rules required that articles be published or in print in December precisely so that this sort of shenanigans would not occur.
IPCC rules required TSU to remove references to any articles where they did not have at least a final preprint in hand. Again, had TSU done that, the problem wouldn’t arise. It’s too late to cooper up the situation regardless (nd BTW nothing has been done so far despite Armand’s notice.