Mosher and Fuller’s “Climategate: The CRUtape Letters” is now available. We’ve all been tantalized and want to learn what SteveMosher was up to during the days before the big break, and to read any other secrets they may have run down.
To buy your copy, click here!!
“Steven M Mosher, born in Grand Rapids Michigan, graduated Northwestern University and attended UCLA for graduate studies in literature”
This makes sense to me. Mosh does have style. Were you Tristram Shandy over at Open Mind a while back? If it was you, tamino didn’t let my joke about the window get in (don’t think he got it, so it looked kind of sick). I was censored!
Alarmist, much?
well THAT explains some things…
Do you know how electrical wire was invented?
…two Hollanders fighting over a penny!
dah dummm!
Aww, looks like the blurb about the book is buggin bugs. Poor bugs.
Thanks Mosher and Fuller, there are many like me who are agnostic about AGW, who will find this book a great read. We appreciate the fight you, lucia, McIntyre, Watts, McKittrick, the Pielke’s, Jeff “Id” and many others do to help keep the science from being buried in revisionism, obfuscation, value adding, manipulation, data loss, poor programing, collusion and all the other ills which have been hilighted in the luke-warm and sceptical blogs.
Many have grown tired of the censorship shown by the AGW crowd on Tamino, RC etc, and appreciate even more the much more even-handed moderation at the previously fringe blogs which are now becoming more mainstream by the day. The service Lucia and so many others do is invaluable, the public is slowly awakening to the truth that they have been misled and still are being misled by politicians and scientists and others who have been playing all the Hysteric’s cards to keep the opposing viewpoints from being seen and heard.
bugs,
Good try. But you fail.
Question, for you and the other true believers:
When more leaks happen (they always do) do you think you will find a limit of rationalizing you are willing to undertake on behalf of AGW?
Good show, Mosh. 😉
hunter — looks like bugs might get the chance today, see
http://www.judicialwatch.org/news/2010/jan/judicial-watch-uncovers-nasa-documents-related-global-warming-controversy
Basically an FOI request (no hacker strawman here) around the “hottest year on record” controversy
On a related note, this seems rather silly: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/01/14/more-on-john-colemans-special-tonight-kusi-press-release-says-nasa-improperly-manipulated-data/
“The NCDC deleted actual temperatures at thousands of locations throughout the world as it changed to a system of global grid points, each of which is determined by averaging the temperatures of two or more adjacent weather observation stations. So the NCDC grid map contains only averaged, not real temperatures, giving rise to significant doubt that the result is a valid representation of Earth temperatures.”
I mean, seriously? Surely they can come up with a better straw man as their take-away line :-p
Mosher,
I grew up in Rockford. About a half hour north.
Zeke,
Tell us, would you invest money based on market research data treated that way?
Do you think the concept of reproducible, transparent science was improved by the NCDC doing that with the data?
hunter,
Given that all the raw station data is archived (e.g. http://dss.ucar.edu/datasets/ds570.0/), I fail to see the issue here. If not a bald lie, the use of the term “deleted” is certainly purposefully misleading.
And yes, I would be happy to invest in market research data that was as meticulously analyzed and examined as climate data.
Zeke:
Bzzzt on assigning motive.
The issue is unless you know which stations and which versions of the data for those stations they are using, it’s pretty much impossible to replicate these results.
Can someone tell me where the ‘tape’ in CRUtape comes from? I’m sure I’ll be embarrassed that I don’t understand it….but I’ve been wondering for weeks now.
Well, C.S. Lewis wrote a book called The Screwtape Letters that involved a wise demon advising an apprentice demon on how to corrupt a British man… just kind of seemed apropos… but it’s a bit of a stretch, really.
S. Geiger (Comment#30270) January 14th, 2010 at 9:25 pm
They run their IT department on a Turing machine using a paper tape.
S. Geiger
I believe it’s a pun on “The Screwtape Letters” a book by English author C.S. Lewis in which Screwtape, who is a senior demon, writes letters to his junior demon nephew on how to corrupt humans and claim their souls. Lewis is more famous for his Narnia Chronicles and books on Christian apologetics, although this book is fairly well known.
Now that we’ve had our C.S. Lewis introduction, I encourage everyone to read his Space Trilogy , A Grief Observed and Reflections On The Psalms . -For starters. 😉
Andrew
The title is important, climategate would have been fine too.
The book is actually revealing Tom and Steve did a good job going through the emails in detail. It isn’t what a reader like myself would call a light read, but we would be disappointed if it were.
Boris. I have in the past ( 2007) used Tristram as a sock puppet, maybe a dozen posts or so in my whole history. I think I outed myself about this bad practice in 2007. maybe used it a few times since then, probably at Tammys since he blocked a request for data.
Window joke. Mohel’s.
If you search some threads on CA you will find a Dr Slop and a Toby as well. best novel ever. I have a few unpublished academic papers on Sterne, Sterne and Romantic irony. I was preparing them for submission, but that whole game just bored me. I had my understanding of them and had unravelled some things to my satisfaction. Ah, so add Nabokov and Pynchon and you have all the novels you will ever need to read.
David Jay (Comment#30234) January 14th, 2010 at 6:34 pm
Hollander jokes. Well, I attended calvinist schools but was not Dutch much, nor did I subscribe to the canons of Dordt or TULIP.
Suffice it to say when I was instructed in the religion I decided to read Calvin’s institutes and see for myself. I’m agnostic I like pyhhro. ( effin spelling)
Andrew Kennett (Comment#30253) January 14th, 2010 at 7:56 pm
hunter — looks like bugs might get the chance today, see
BUGS.
Dont you find it a bit suspicious that you and I were discussing the Y2K problem the other day, just before this judical watch thing came out? hehe.
S. Geiger (Comment#30270) January 14th, 2010 at 9:25 pm
As Tom explains it is a play on cs lewis’s book the screwtape letters.
Erudite allusions are a fetish of mine. gutter talk as well.
How do I put it. the marginal and the taboo.
so, “mere climatology” is the next book which covers the bare minimum beliefs you need to count as a fiathful memeber of the church of climatology. venerating the relics, like the hockey stick, a shroud of turin, is not required.
Mosher
The Y2K beatup? Is that all you’ve got?
“…when he joined Creative Labs as a director of marketing and product development.”
That’s the CRUx of the matter.
“…two Hollanders fighting over a penny!” Actually that joke was invented by the Belgians.
I’m finding the vendor’s website impossible to deal with. If Steve wants to sell this book, especially outside the US, he should seek a better distributor.
Jeff Id (Comment#30256)
Mosher,
I grew up in Rockford. About a half hour north.
Who’d a thunk it was be a hotbed for heretics!!! 🙂
Zeke,
It is not that AGW promoters have not been meticulous in their analysis that is at question. It is that the AGW promoters have been meticulously misleading people, as Lucia demonstrates here and as climategate etc. demonstrates, that is the issue.
quote of the day: “the context makes it worse”
(oh, gavin, as if context could make it better)
This is very cool Mosher!
(btw… mom was born in Detroit, my sister went to UCLA first and then on Northwestern for her Masters 🙂 )
just a few days ago, on this page, we were discussing sceptics as a
group of intelligent online observers, detached from the outcome, with an extremely solid grasp on the topic at hand.
now we have moved on to promotion of the books of those, who are “detached from the outcome”.
a book, that in its title draws a completely false analogy to watergate. (do you folks remember that incident? this was real stuff!)
and fails to mention the fact that the mail was STOLEN in the advertising text. (not a good first impression for the factual accuracy of the book)
this wont stop the denialists, who are the clear target audience of the book, from buying it though.
and actually untrue or misleading statements that confirm their made up minds (and left out important pieces of informations that contradict them) will increase the sales.
happy cash in!
steven mosher (Comment#30282) January 14th, 2010 at 10:58 pm
No wonder you like Nabokov. “I was the shadow of the waxwing slain by the false azure of the window pane…”
sod,
1) We don’t know whether the emails were hacked or leaked.
2) Even if they were hacked they are public knowledge now and the means of acquisition is irrelevant.
3) The analogy to watergate is more than appropriate.
4) Book are not necessarily big money makers. If it become a best seller Tom and Mosh would do well, however, if sales are modest they may not recover the time they spent writing it.
sod:
That is a sad and silly line of argument. It condemns all parties in the debate who do anything that has the slightest chance of furthering their careers or earning money (regardless of how pitiable the amount might be). Have you seen Gavin Schmidt’s beautifully and expensively produced book? How about our PR and Foundation supported notables Hoggan and Littlemore? How about the saintly James Hansen?
Steve and Tom:
Congratulations!! Good luck in breaking even.
sod (Comment#30308)
OMG are you serious? I really do believe you silly silly people (with your Oscars, Heinz rewards, and a Nobel too!) are wanting to incite a real civil war in this country.
Tom Fuller #30271 confesses that the title The CRUTape Letters was based on The Screwtape Letters by C S Lewis, documenting the advice of senior devil Screwtape to his nephew Wormwood on how to lead humanity astray. But Tom F says this was a stretch. Why? Screwtape and Wormwood would have rapidly found a happy niche in the world of the Climategate email, the hockey stick, peer review Team-style, and promises of ever-increasing heating.
Ah, Pynchon. That explains a few things.
Sod–
When you write and publish your own history of the event, you can write the advertising text for your version.
Boris: “… studies in literatureâ€
This makes sense to me. Mosh does have style.”
Mosquito birthmark?
Re: DeWitt Payne (Jan 15 10:37),
The editor ate my post. I’ll try again.
How the data were obtained is irrelevant. Did it matter that Daniel Ellsberg stole the Pentagon Papers other than to Ellsberg himself? Should the NYT not have published them because they were obtained illegally? We all know the answer to that one. Please explain why this situation is any different other than whose ox is being gored.
SOD
sod (Comment#30308) January 15th, 2010 at 7:24 am
just a few days ago, on this page, we were discussing sceptics as a
group of intelligent online observers, detached from the outcome, with an extremely solid grasp on the topic at hand.”
I am not “detached from “the” outcome whatever that is. I am ATTACHED TO A PROCESS. that process is a rational process where individual interest asymptotically approaches zero as more individuals participate. The pre requisite of this convergence is a positive vector of approval toward other participants in the process. You dont understand that. let me make simple. I’m ATTACHED to an open process where you get to see the data, I get to see it, you get to see the code, I get to. I’m attached to a process where we get to argue openly, without moderation.
It will be clear to people watching, rational people, who is working toward agreement and who is digging their heels in irrationally. I would say you are headed the way of being in denial about the fundamentals of science.
“now we have moved on to promotion of the books of those, who are “detached from the outcomeâ€.
a book, that in its title draws a completely false analogy to watergate. (do you folks remember that incident? this was real stuff!)”
Several points. All analogy’s are false. An Analogy is is used by a writer to illuminate the unknown with the known. All such illumination casts shadows and colors the scene. metaphors and analogies ( like calling people deniers, oil shills, etc etc) “pick out” salient features. Sod sticks his head in the sand. Not literally of course. What is salient in my comparison: People in Power, committing a minor “crime” ( see the Jesus paper in chapter 6 of Ar4 ). they are caught by McIntyre. He tries to FOIA the correspondence to uncover this crime and Jones and Palmer thwart the FOIA, Jones orders mails to be destroyed, because they fear an APPEAL which Palmer says is certain( the order to destroy goes out BEFORE the original FOIA decision ) and Briffa
complies with the order. The crime is the cover up.
Well, I happen to believe that Nixon was right about a lot of issues. I also believe the break in at watergate was small potatoes. Nothing in that Crime made nixon wrong about issues of the day. But he was guilty of a cover up and obstruction os justice. Nothing in THAT made him wrong about domestic or foreign policy. Still, he had to go. And he did. The same goes for Jones. Nothing in the jesus paper escape makes Jones wrong about the science of radiative physics. His cover up doesnt make him wrong about surface temps. How could it? Those actions, do however, make him unsuited for the tasks he performs: advisory to NOAA on data archiving and access. Author on Ar5.
“and fails to mention the fact that the mail was STOLEN in the advertising text. (not a good first impression for the factual accuracy of the book)”
Well, I don’t know if the mail was stolen. As I point out in the book, The story behind the release of the mails is a tail wagging the dog story. A cock and bull story. A mystery that ends in a whimper rather than a bang. It just doesnt matter. the mails showing that jones is unfit for duty were stolen. there. Does that make Jones fit for Duty. Dear, sod, you break into your wife’s email. You find out that she is sleeping with me and enjoying it. Does the fact of your crime make her less the harlot and you less the cuckhold?
“this wont stop the denialists, who are the clear target audience of the book, from buying it though.
and actually untrue or misleading statements that confirm their made up minds (and left out important pieces of informations that contradict them) will increase the sales.”
You are free to contradict any of the criticisms I have of skeptics in the book. And free to provide a larger context than I did.
Look, people complained that the quotes were being taken out of context. We put them into context.
NOW, I could have pulled a jones and suggested to Tom that we “change the dates” on some of the mails to tell a better story.
I could have elided out parts of mails to make them look worse.
Hide the decline. I could have pulled a bunch of team tricks.
stupid pet tricks.
“happy cash in!”
Ya, the pool needs cleaning.
Gary (Comment#30309) January 15th, 2010 at 7:51 am
No wonder you like Nabokov. “I was the shadow of the waxwing slain by the false azure of the window pane…â€
Pale fire. One of my favorites as I was a Frost expert. Folks who understand Frost’s view on metaphor will see were I get some of my ideas about it. On Nabokov, I took a class from Alfred Appel ( editor of the annotated Lolita) when I was young and fell in love with the Nabolovian tapestry. And the whole puppet show effect ( se Appells essay) reading Nabokov was excellent training for reading the mails.
WRT to money.
I dont expect to come anywhere close to recovering the opportunity cost of writing the book. Dont expect to. didnt plan to. Heck, I dont even know what I am making. Literally. Oh, I know its less than the book costs. Shrugs. How do I say this. Money doesnt matter to me. For christs sakes guys I went to grad school to study frickin poetry. That’s a materialistic path, DOH!
david.
the first time I thought of Crutape I thought it was an apt
analogy. With Mann ( screwtape) telling wormwood ( Jones) how to corrupt a british man, briffa. Actually, the first time I talked about it ( over on Watts) it was Jones corrupting Mann. Mann as wormwood was too funny for somebody with my sense of humor and onomastics. Anyways, close reading makes man the devil, which is why chapter 3 is the “devil and Mr Jones” ahem. A penetrating chapter and definately more than some on the AGW side will be able to swallow.
jeff?
ROCKFORD? are you a farmer or some kinda hick?
Neven (Comment#30318) January 15th, 2010 at 9:30 am
“Ah, Pynchon. That explains a few things.”
It explains many many things. I used to hunt for him down in hermosa beach. there was a bookstore and theater we was reputed to hang out in. I only had a picture of the back of his head. he worked in aerospace, I worked in aerospace. I like Slothrop. maybe it was my calvinist upbringing. I have a map with little stars just like slothrop.
Now I live in San Narcisco.
When you write and publish your own history of the event, you can write the advertising text for your version.
my histotry?
and your history?
that is interesting lucia.
i would expect that a book on this topic sticks to the facts. and this at least includes a discussion on the “leak -theft” issue.
the official information that we have, supports hack and theft.
from the book, i have seen the claim about leak so far, and no one has mentioned theft at all, until now.
these are the facts.
Steven, your claim about analogies is simply false.
analogies can be good or bad. and they can be false.
it is slightly stupid, that i am forced to explain the watergate affair to a largly american audience.
all the crimes in watergate, were commited by Nixon and his supporters. starting with the break into the watergate building.
the crimes (starting with the breakin) were of a completely different quality, than the “leak”. (deep throat confirming informations to journalists)
with “climategate”, the obvious crime was stealing and publishing data and mail. whether a leak was involved, is at best unclear.
the idea that “climategate” is a cover up. every cover up is similar to water gate is weak. at best.
and yes, if we would all check the last 10 years of mail of our partners, we might find some inconvenient stuff.
but the vast majority of it, in contradiction to your fantasies, will be not be worse than the break of trust that we commit ourself by reading the mail of a person dear to us.
this actually is a pretty good analogy to “climategate”.
so steven, a word of advice. when you find the word “trick” in an e-mail of your wife, figure out the meaning of the word, before you confront her with the results of your research in her private mail.
Sod–
There are often multiple accounts of historical events. Each will include facts available to the author. You could write your history based on what you know. You can find others use the construction “X’s history” below
http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G2-3404706442.html
Gargan did not intend to suggest that Toynbee’s history was not based on fact, but rather that a particular set of work was his.
Sod,
You don’t seem to understand. In most cases, at least those cases in which people ask for my advice, the suspicion itself is enough. No confirmation is needed. In Climategate the evidence was all there, before the release of the mails.
McIntyre laid out the evidence that the IPCC process was corrupted, merely by looking at the time lines and BRIFFAS response to his comments. Briffas response showed he was getting information OUTSIDE THE PROCESS. This pathway is something that Overpeck explicitly forbade and which the rules forbade. So, we KNEW before the mails that they were cheating.
And THEY KNEW THAT WE KNEW. In fact, they were reading CA and said, ‘we have to be really careful mcintyre is watching’
But, like many people caught out cheating they denied the obvious. The resisted releasing the comments and resisted releasing the mails. The trust is broken before the investigation. The lack of trust instigates the investigation. In most cases its because the other party will not confess to the obvious. It’s not the word
“trick” that is at issue, it’s “hide the decline.” Now, I suppose one could twist the obvious meaning of that, but I havent seen anyone try. I would actually respect such a stunt of sociopathic proportions.
Sod.
I do discuss the leak/theft Issue. I present both sides of the argument. present my case. Its circumstantial and in conclusive.
And I admonish people about the dangers of inferring motives
motives of a whistle blower and movites of a hacker.
Nothing in the who dunnit matters.
Nothing in the mails changes the SCIENCE
Nothing in hacker/whistleblower debate changes the WORDS IN THE MAILS.
What is clear is this. A process that we believed to be suspect before the mails is now shown to be suspect.
SOD,
sounding a little bitter??
I think you would love the current US judicial system.
If a cop uses an illegal wiretap to conclusively document a murder, the tape is thrown out of court and, if there isn’t enough other evidence, the murderer goes free.
Think about that. A known murderer goes free because the cop infringed on the crooks civil rights. OK, so the cop gets convicted of infringing on the crooks civil rights right?? NO!! Probably doesn’t even get a smack on the wrist back at the office.
Two crimes and the judge says he can’t look at the evidence. Talk about Justice being BLIND!!!!
Nuthin’ like getting moralistic for the good of society isn’t it old SOD!!!
Mosher,
I was going to skip the book because everything is out there and what is now confimed was already suspected or known. But after reading lines like:
“Does the fact of your crime make her less the harlot and you less the cuckhold?”
and
“A penetrating chapter and definately more than some on the AGW side will be able to swallow.”
You just sold a book!
I almost suspect that sod is your shill, maybe you should cut him in on the profits.
sod,
Are you going to fill the internet with demonstrations of your stupidity?
It. Does. Not. Matter. That. They. May. Or. May. Not. Be. Stolen.
People. Are. Justified. And. Ethically. Able. To Discuss. Their. Content.
Watergate, Pentagon Papers, and numerous whistleblower cases against every sort of human enterprise, from banks to universities to religions, to museums, to armies, navies and airforces, have all been impacted by people who may or may not have released papers and information in a strictly lawful manner.
Normal people deal with the content of the papers and information.
You, on the other hand, assert AGW theory promoters are excluded from this consideration.
If you are able to answer, please explain why you think this segment of human endeavor should be immune from this type of scrutiny?
steven mosher (Comment#30354) January 15th, 2010 at 5:20 pm
Ever heard of Heisenberges Uncertaintly Principle? Ok, you have. In the act of measuring something, you change it. Now, in the act of having an persistently abusive attitude to the CRU, have you created the response you were after?
As for the Y2K molehill.
http://rabett.blogspot.com/2010/01/giss-email-dump.html
The Rabett is on the job. Usual beat up and snide insinuations, allegations, abuse, calls for legal action in the denialosphere.
The Heisenberges Uncertaintly Principle? LOL.
First your explanation of “history” and now this.
You’re a hoot, bugs.
Rabett doesn’t even know what “random” means. That’s pretty basic. I wouldn’t trust him to explain how to prevent ingrown toenails, let alone anything more important.
As to “snide insinuations, allegations, and abuse… ” , lay off Grant for a while, ok?
You want a hoot, carrick?
http://climateaudit.org/2010/01/14/giss-on-hansen-y2k/
I’m trying to work with ya. Where’s the hoot in that post? I don’t see an owl, nor even a teapot.
My big problem with Rabett beyond his occasional ignorance and continuous snark, is he is like Grant. They both hide behind a moderation wall that protects them from having to defend their own BS against all comers.
Carrick (Comment#30391) January 15th, 2010 at 11:59 pm
They have a long history of helping out people with data. They don’t have a long history of dealing with public abuse and denigration from people, who then abuse the FOI process to demand information. Why did their attitude suddenly change? Was it them, or those demanding the information?
I don’t really follow your argument, bugs. I don’t see much material difference in GISS’s behavior, other than the commendable release of the code and data in 2007.
Other than expressions of annoyance, what are you seeing that I’m missing? I think you’re reading too much into this.
Carrick (Comment#30402) January 16th, 2010 at 1:01 am
I’m saying that after you abuse someone, then ask them for a favour, you might not get the someresponse as if you treat someone with respect, then ask them for a favour. Maybe GISS is more used to the political manners of North Americans.
“Ever heard of Heisenberges Uncertaintly Principle? Ok, you have. In the act of measuring something, you change it. ”
Why yes I have Bugs. Unfornuately it doesnt operate at macroscopic scales. Bugs, you cannot seem to argue effectively logically or analogically. Long ago, I formulated a similar theory with regard to reading texts, it had to do with the principles of romantic irony and derrida, with some quine thrown in, see his theory on the indeterminacy of translation. The key is this.
You must demonstrate a viable coherent meaning for jones words that contradicts its surface meaning. He told people to delete mails. I can quote this and assert a literal meaning for these words. You are welcome to try to spin them into some other translation. However, merely asserting that there is another meaning is the weakest form of textual skepticism.
“Now, in the act of having an persistently abusive attitude to the CRU, have you created the response you were after?”
Ah I see. If you think that people calling them names causes and excuses their behavior. Nice principled fellows. Here is a clue Sod. You can call me any names you like. You can do whatever you like to me. My principles dont change.
“As for the Y2K molehill.”
Bugs you missed the joke.
“h I see. If you think that people calling them names causes and excuses their behavior. Nice principled fellows. Here is a clue Sod. You can call me any names you like. You can do whatever you like to me. My principles dont change. ”
It was more than just that, it was an attack on science, their principles didn’t change, either. The scientists worked out long ago, personal abuse was out, and debased science. They weren’t dealing with honest people out after information, they were dealing with frauds.
hunter (Comment#30376) January 15th, 2010 at 8:48 pm
Bugs is merely engaging in a tactical diversion. It’s also funny because on one hand he defends the scientific method and on the other hand he refuses to employ it WRT his claim that they are stolen. he can’t even see that I’ve said that one cant tell whether the mails are from a whistle blower or hacker. To be sure, if one were to apply the law of averages it is 4 times more likely that the mails were released by a whistleblower than stolen by a hacker.
To be sure, an external hack would be even less likely than this knowling what we know about the IT infrastructure at CRU.
steven mosher (Comment#30408) January 16th, 2010 at 1:18 am
I have never said anything about them being stolen. Most of the claims made about them are BS. The only issue is the FOI compliance, and the letters clearly shows they talked to the FOI people, displayed that the claims are not in good faith, the FOI people agreed with their reluctance to release the data requested. The recent Y2K FOI ‘scandal’ on CA reveals what this is all about. Once again, there is nothing, but the inane bable and denigration due to the topic is all McIntyre is after.
Bugs:
It is not only about “the FOI compliance.” You are guilty of the act of trying to change history to suit you as you claim Mosher is. The emails alos have to do with the science. And as Mosher said ” like many people caught out cheating they denied the obvious. The resisted releasing the comments and resisted releasing the mails. The trust is broken before the investigation.””
Persons such as myself have had questions concerning the stationary assumptions and claims about tree ring proxies. We have had these becuase in my case I am an engineer and a biologists who has had to deal with such problems in the design of waste systems and pollution detection systems. The answers (hand waving) that you, youself have quoted, by the authors do not cause persons like myself to think that the issue has been explained or settled. But rather as MOsher stated, I feel that the trust has been broken by reading their papers. As others say, I read their reasoning and assumptions, and my BS meter starts pegging out.
By the way, you also show a tendency to selectively remember when discussing analogies. the real issue that brought the Presidency down was Nixon was guity, according to the prosecutors, of coercion. Leon Jaworski decided that if NIxon gave up the presidency, justice would be served, especially if Ford was going to pardon him, anyway. One of the special prosecuters quit, because he wanted Nixon tagged fot the crime he committed. In cae your memory is as bad as it appears, in this case, Nixon was not covering up for others, he was covering up his involvement of knowledge prior to the crime.
But then sod seems to think a poor argument by the climate science people make it a good argument. I daressy, scientific methodology discussions appear lost to sod. He really needs to explain how Briffa’s last public staement about known problems realte to past publications. HInt: look at the tense in the current quote and do a timeline wrt scientific method. Where does that thing called vaildate come in the scientific method? After you publish many articles and 2 large books destined to change man’s response to the environment, obviuosly.
Now the leaks of e-mails, data and code is an ‘attack on science’?
Thanks for the laugh, maroon.
Bugs:
“Once again, there is nothing, but the inane bable and denigration due to the topic is all McIntyre is after.”
Speaking of babble, could you expand a little on that sentence?
With respect to the GISS emails, it would seem who looks bad depends on what the reader thought about the parties in the first place.
I don’t see how SteveM comes of looking bad. The GISS guys are all sending each other messages rebutting things SteveM doesn’t say, and suggesting him of being dim for believing things he has never claimed to believe and does not say anywhere. (Not in the emails, not in the letters to GISS.) Maybe if he had said or thought any of those things the GISS guys seemed to assume he said or thought he would look bad. But how does their collectively creating that strawman, feeding it to each other, winging about it and rebutting it internally at GISS make SteveM look bad?
SteveM was asking for specific information, which the GISS guys were reluctant to provide. Their “reasons” appear to be mostly based on a) jumping to a conclusion about the argument SteveM was going to make with it (which argument SteveM never made), b) the mistaken notion that they had, in fact, never had 1934 rather than 1998 as the hottest year (so, the didn’t explain why that happened until later, c) Hansen’s apparent notion that the only thing that “counts” is whether or not a mistaken number appeared in a journal article rather than a NASA publically accessible, cleared by NASA web page d) what appears to be a belief that the explaining that the method is described in a journal article is the same as “the code is publically available) and e) jumping to the conclusion that if Model GISSE code is available, no one could possible want or be asking for the code that creates GISSTemp.
Various responses seem to justify waving away actual requests based on these ideas.
Mind you, I can understand how the NASA guys might not read SteveM’s actual requests carefully. Having confused each other during discussions over lunch, they might have come to believe SteveM was making arguments he did not make. They might think that he isn’t permitted to discuss the US temperature rankings simply because they don’t think it’s important, so he is required to only discuss global temperatures (and so must be.)
But the fact is, my impression is the NASA guys got themselves rather confused, and present lots of “rebuttals” that might seem reasonable to each other– but which have nearly nothing to do with SteveM’s requests and which ultimately had nothing to do with what SteveM was saying at his blog.
I’d say the NASA guys look human– SteveM doesn’t look bad. Not as big a deal as climategate letters. But, it does show how difficult it is to get code and information out of people who are somewhat tribal and not inclined to share code and data with people they consider outsiders.
Someday, some sociologist may go through those and use it as an example of tribalism at work.
Let us cut down the thicket. Eli does not moderate. There is a magic word, but sans that and advertising for Viagra, have at it.
Second, “Judicial Watch” had nothing to do with the FOIA, they grabbed the response to CEI’s FOIA, and issued a press release. . . . .The long and short of it is that if you read the 215 pages, there is nothing wrong, so CEI has not publicized the result. McIntyre comes across as “difficult” and whiny, but we knew that. Judicial Watch got it hilariously wrong. OTOH, compiling the information was not without cost. Eli things they get one more bite at the apple before costs are imposed.
Third, Ellsberg had legitimate possession of the Pentagon Papers, and in fact contributed to writing them. What he did not have was permission to make them public. Whoever hacked the CRU server STOLE the Emails.
Pure speculation, but based on observing human nature. There is no way that the GISS team, with their anti-science stance, is treating their underlings very well or fairly.
We now see that GISS is populated with the same sort of people who led CRU into a non-scientific, unethical dead end. It will be just a matter of time before someone, who is as disheartened by their behavior as the climategate leaker, releases an American version of the crugate.
Eli:
I stand humbly corrected, but there goes my advertising revenues.
I didn’t see any problems with it either…
Other than the person who should have known better than to put their name and password in an emai.
How do you know they were “hacked”? It seems far more likely to me it was a whistleblower (somebody involved in the FOIA request).
Lucia:
The one legitimate issue raised by James Hansen was ranking numbers whose uncertainties are as large as they are.
On the other hand, this seems a bit odd to me. I don’t claim deliberate manipulation, but confirmation bias could explain it.
If you experience cooling lasting longer than 10 years call Dr. Rabbet immeadiately.
“If you experience cooling lasting longer than 10 years call Dr. Rabbet immeadiately”
Rack ‘im. 😉
Andrew
bugs:
McIntyre go the data he got without an FOI request, and in any case, the abuse ran both directions. I guess you’re forgetting Gavin, who runs RC, and regularly verbally attacks other people, who are then not allowed an opportunity to respond.
The “abuse of the FOAI act” is a red herring. There have been no abuses of the FOIA act, except by people who tried to prevent data that should legitimately be publicly domain from being released.
Ah. climate scientists have a tendency to be tribal now? (And they cry how important AGW is to ALL humanity? That is just nutty, and verrrry telling!)
Every other kind of Environmental Scientist in America (who works in the private sector or for the government) must share their data with anyone who asks for it-especially if the work is on public land.
So many exceptions made for the tiny humanly flawed climate tribe! Why is that? LMAO
1. Since it takes about five minutes to generate an FOIA request, since they don’t have to be limited, and every one of them has to be dealt, why yes, Virginia, there is FOIA bombing. Wanna take a guess at how much time and energy this one cost, then multiply by a low hourly rate of let us say $50. If you are in the US, you paid it.
2. Wanna place a little bet on whether the CRU hack was internal?
3. OTOH, Dr. Rabett recommends waiting a while. He doesn’t understand what you found wrong with the last decade that had, what, eight of the ten warmest years on record, the other two being 1998 and 1997, but there is no accounting for taste. Should be hot enough for you this year tho. Take two reality pills and have a nice rest.
The last decade that had, what, eight of the ten warmest years on record, the other two being 1998 and 1997!
LMAO! The horror!
Eli:
Of course you have statistics to back you up on this? How many FOIA requests has Gavin had to deal with in eight years?
I’ll bet that the FOIA.zip file was generated internally. How it became public…a bit tougher to track down. Anyway, whether you’re willing to bet doesn’t change the objective probability of which is more likely.
I’m not sure what this is in regards to. I have a headache now, thanks.
“He doesn’t understand what you found wrong with the last decade that had, what, eight of the ten warmest years on record, the other two being 1998 and 1997, but there is no accounting for taste.”
Carrick,
I think this poster descended into rant because they read an opposing view. I’ve found that Hardcore Warmers are perpetually taken aback by thoughts that don’t conform to the party line, and they inevitably are at a loss when thrown off script. 😉
Andrew
Carrick–
It’s a perfectly legitimate issue to point out and discuss
However, it’s not really an answer to Steve’s question, is it? There’s no reason to not provide code, or suggest that 1934 was never ranked higher by NASA etc. One can answer a question and then provide clarifying information. I don’t think the fact that uncertainty in the computation is a legitimate issues makes bad for Steve to notice the changes in published numbers along with the switch in position, try to track down why the numbers flipped, want to look at the code and ask. So, someone (Sod? Bugs?) suggests SteveM looks back, I think they are wrong. SteveM looks just fine.
Eli
Imagine how much money could have been saved if Santer had just handed over the piddling little time series for tropical tropospheric temperatures or advised people they were supposedly going to post publicaly soon rather than acting like a baby and refusing, thereby forcing those who wished to have the information file an FOI.
Oh. I forgot. Climategate shows wy he didn’t advise people they were going to post it publicly without the FOI. Because that was a lie.
These silly knee jerk decisions to refuse to hand over data that back up claims in peer reviewed articles is costing the tax payers money. It’s idiotic. And, the excuses for not giving the information out is often nothing more than malarkey (which anyone who has ever worked at a national lab would know.)
lucia (Comment#30457) January 16th, 2010 at 3:13 pm
Interestingly, Santer was one of the first scientists to be subject to public attack and scorn, for publishing a paper that demonstrated there was an AGW signature. Once again, the deniers complain that their tactics of harassing scientists produce resentment and shunning.
hunter (Comment#30420) January 16th, 2010 at 8:35 am
They weren’t leaked. That so many people say they are shows their prejudices. This book shows what the denier attitude is, misrepresent as much as possible, abuse as much as possible, personalise AGW and ignore the science.
Roy Spencer hides the increase.
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2010/01/roy_spencer_hides_the_increase.php
This time it’s a real case of fiddling with the trend of actual temperature data.
bugs:
Don’t lie.
You have no idea whether they were leaked or not.
bugs:
That Tim Lambert post was complete dreck in my opinion. 90% insults, 0% substance.
Right up bugs alley.
That deltoid post should have been put in the “Other Side is The Devil” blog post.
This is typical: “pough: Anyways, I like the cheeky title, but (unlike denialists) I’m not going to simply assume this was done for nefarious purposes.”
I applaud him for not impugning motives, but I’ll point out that the Devil Incarnate, Steve McIntyre, blocks comments that impugn motive from his blog.
Hiding the increase would involve deleting 2008 and 2009. So Lambert’s post is brain dead from the start.
Santer’s refusal was especially lame.
He was resistent because the data people asked for was intermediate calculations ( vital for quality checking)
His argument: they could use the paper to write the code for
themselves and that coding effort would take 2 hours.
IF TRUE, this is a reason FOR releasing the code, not a reason
AGAINST releasing the code.
But santer is an angry man. According to his own words he was chastised by his superiors.
Now, WHAT did jones suggest that Santer do?
Did jones suggest that santer pick his fights and not fight stupid fights? No
Did jones suggest that Santer comply with his governments laws about data and code availability? No.
Did jones suggest that Santer turn data and code over so that skeptics would take him out of the crosshairs? No.\
What did Jones suggest?
Corrupt your FOIA officer like I did!
Bugs-
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/01/is-spencer-hiding-the-increase-we-report-you-decide/
Andrew_FL, you should really follow bugs’ link to Tim Lambert’s website and read some of the comments.
This is my favorite part:
When you’re an AGW idiot, the only thing you need to know for a fit to be “ridiculous’ apparently is whether it makes gives a burning sensation in your little tummy.
Seriously, neither Gavin nor Tim have the slightest clue how one would go about determining the correct dimension of a polynomial, or how to test for over-fitting.
One such criterion is the Akaike information criterion, and ironically a degree 4 polynomial optimizes that criterion.
I’m sure what Lambert doesn’t like about Spencer’s fit is that it turns down at the end:
figure
NEWSFLASH TO GLOBALWARMINGOLOGISTS! Not liking it IS NOT a sufficiency test for whether a particular statistical method has properly captured the statistical trend of a data set!
In the end Tim, Gavin and I guess bugs are upset because Spencer didn’t hide the decline in the secular temperature trend.
Carrick-The Polynomial fit debacle was rather amusing considering Rhamsmoothing….
Carrick (Comment#30513) January 16th, 2010 at 10:14 pm
The quadratic seems to be a poor choice, since it’s going in one direction and temperature is going in another.
bugs–
Yes. Quadratics fits are generally a poor choice; Spencer stopped doing it.
Climate science seems rife with poor smoothing choices. Remember Rahmstorf’s end smoothing? That crummy method made it into a formal peer reviewed publication. Remember Hadley’s previous end point smoothing which they changed when temperatures dropped and it no longer showed the answer they considered right? So, yes. There are lots of bad smoothing methods. In fact, there are probably more bad smoothing methods than good smoothing methods.
Spencer picked a bad smoothing method and has now stopped using it. Evidently, he must have learned it was bad.
bugs:
It’s quartic (quadratic is 2nd order). And while I agree with Lucia that polynomials aren’t ideal for smoothing, but your explanation makes no sense.
If you have a trend, and the trend changes over time (by e.g. decreasing), mathematically you will need to include even order terms to capture that. It turns out in the AIC sense quartic is optimal for doing that.
If the even order terms weren’t needed, they would get suppressed by the fitting algorithm (as long as you weren’t over-fitting). I can fit that same curve for a 4th order polynomial up to a 10th order polynomial, and I get very little difference in the shape…the higher order terms simply don’t add any information and are suppressed.
Lucia:
I think he stopped using it because he got harassed by the peanut gallery, though I agree it wasn’t a great method.
But again to say that something is a “bad smoothing method” that needs to be quantified. It is a weaker choice than other methods, but for it to be “bad”, you’d have to show what it did wrong in this case. As I pointed out, Spencer didn’t over fit, in fact in the AIC sense his choice of polynomial order was optimal.
As far as the issues with polynomial fits, the simplest way I can put it would be as follows: You can get really steep slopes at discrete points along the smoothed region, and especially near the end points.
Whether that matters or is suboptimal in a particular application is a separate issue, and I would say the only way we will know is by waiting e.g. 10-years and seeing what happens. In this case, given what is known, the quartic function does a decent job of capturing the long-term trend in the data, and I suspect if it had not dipped down at the end, the peanut gallery would never have let out any hoots. Spencer’s problem wasn’t that he used a sub-optimal polynomial, but that he was off message.
The issues with what happens as you approach the end-pionts when smoothing data isn’t of course unique to polynomial fits of course. Any approach you select is going to have issues with respect to stability as you add more data points.
My own choice for smoothing is a low-pass acausal Butterworth filter, and the “best” way of handling the end points, is just to drop the points near the end points. With recursive filters, this requires few points, so the “loss” of information is less than with e.g., a running average.
If the good Dr. Rabett is desirous of a little bet as to “whether the CRU hack was internal?” then I, for one, would be more than happy to take him up on the offer. In the interest of fairness I feel I should disclose that I work in IT and not in Climatology and have had a bit to do with Unix system security for European banks. If he is interested, then please make a specific wager amount with some details concerning how the winner will be determined, what time frame (if any) as well as any other restrictions. I’ll be more than happy to provide contact details either here or at his hutch.
bob
After Climategate there is Glaciergate
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/united-nations-blunder-on-glaciers-exposed/story-e6frg6n6-1225820614171
schnoerkelman:
I doubt Rabbet was interested in actually betting, but let me know if he takes you up.
Just make sure he defines what he means by a hack. To a lay person, hack could be logging in to an anonymous file server and downloading a zip file.
Maybe the openness message is getting thru:
NASA Administrator Charles F. Bolden, Jr. – January 14, 2010 Transparency,
Communication and Cooperation
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=33246
“President Obama has made it clear that he is committed to a more transparent and responsive Federal Government. I believe that NASA should be a leader in implementing that goal.
Accordingly, whether we are referring to the Agency’s treatment of requests under the Freedom of Information Act, answering questions from Congress or cooperating with our Inspector
General in Agency audits or investigations, I expect that we will respond both promptly and thoroughly.”
Lets hope this means The Team at GISS as well as the rest of NASA
FYI: Don’t be fooled. Science is always politicized
Posted: January 14, 2010, 7:30 PM by NP Editor
Food, climate or toys: Policy implications enter into every stage of risk assessment
By Ronald L. Doering
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fpcomment/archive/2010/01/14/don-t-be-fooled-science-is-always-politicized-160.aspx
In spite of the media treatment of them, there is nothing that is surprising about the now famous Climategate emails. Surprise could only come from a misunderstanding of the relationship between science, policy and politics. Of course the emails reveal that the climate scientists were affected by policy and political considerations. They had to be. Science, policy and politics are inextricably intertwined. What is surprising is how much our public discourse is still dominated by the quaint utopian view that science and policy can be strictly separated.
Mosh and Jeff Id –
My son is a Junior at Rockford High. My mailing address is Belmont.
I am not of Dutch descent, although 35 years in West Michigan is rubbing off on me. I have come to believe that paying retail for ANYTHING is a sign of great moral failure.
Great work Mosh!
David,
I had the great pleasure of returning to western michigan after 14 years or so of absence. I’m not dutch either but buying retail sucks even if you dont have blue eyes and blond hair
schnoerkelman (Comment#30561) January 17th, 2010 at 12:10 pm
the opposition “hacker/whistleblower” is not hard to figure out.
If a Computer science student at UEA ( not a member of CRU) released the data is that a hacker or whistleblower? They are a student of the university, but not specifically a part of CRU
Let me give you a scenario that is VERY HARD to determine causality in.
Suppose I am a member of CRU and I want to collect the files
and get them out. How do I do this? I simply go out and
purchase some simple tools for exploiting the system. I then
go to an external computer or employ a cutout or take a trip
to another country where I then send a mail to myself and others inside CRU. That mail has an attachment which contains the malware. As a CRU employee I then open the mail click on the attachment and the system is infected. I look like a victim. It looks like somebody mailed me malware and I stupidly opened it.
The foresenic investigation will uncover that I ( and hopefully others) were the people who were stupid and allowed the malware in. Once that exploit is in place a bunch of stuff can happen. Forensically this looks like a hack. somebody outside the system mailed malware and stupid people on the inside let it in.
But its not a hack. Its a whistleblowing.
And I can also make a hack look like a whistleblower, forensically.
back in July of 2008 CRU employees left a bunch of stuff on open FTP. Some people have a habit of making text files of all of their passwords. Dont ask me why, they just do it. When files like this
are left on an open FTP, then an outsider can look like an insider.
Final question: if a former employee of CRU used social engineering to figure out Jones’ password and accessed the
from a distance is that a hack or whistleblowing? what’s it look like foresenicly?
really final question: if briffa released the data, not because he was fed up with the FOIA denials, but because he lost a girl friend to david palmer does that make it a whistleblowing?
What about an IT guy who was fired?
What if it was Mann? The twana brawley of climate science?
Bottomline. who and why doesnt change a word of the mails or their meaning.
steven mosher wrote: > add Nabokov and Pynchon and you have all the novels you will ever need to read.
Not hardly. Especially in light of the fact that the best novel of the 20th Century is neither Pale Fire nor Gravity’s Rainbow (not even close, that one) but Blood Meridian Or the evening redness in the west
steven mosher (Comment#30598)
On your last point, who and why changes nothing: I fully agree.
To accept a bet I’m not obliged to disprove that there was a break-in nor to prove that a whistle blower was at work. The official investigation will present a finding at its conclusion which I must be willing to accept. Given the intensely political nature of this matter I don’t necessarily believe that the official finding will be correct, especially if there is no prosecution, but I will have no other alternative unless the person or persons responsible come forward and provide one. I do not have, nor am I likely to be granted sufficient knowledge of the UEA systems environment and the details surrounding the event to undertake an independent investigation.
Having said all of that, I do believe that we have sufficient information to speculate about what is likely to have occurred and thus to accept the Bunny’s wager.
As to the crack vs. whistle blower (cracking is the proper term here see: http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1392) issue, I have implicitly simplified to insider vs. outsider. While this is not strictly valid I think that it is generally correct. If the person in question had either physical or login access from within UEA for any legitimate reason then I would, at least initially, classify that person a whistle blower. Anyone without legitimate access is then a cracker.
I think this is a case for Occam’s razor: which version explains what we know as simply as possible. If we posit a break-in then we need a fairly elaborate story to get the archive contents first into the hands of the cracker and then out onto the Internet.
First the Cracker needs to find the files or archive. It seems unlikely to me that this kind of data would be sitting on an Internet facing machine given the type of material and sensitivity — there is no need for the data to be there, Dr. J isn’t sending it to his friends for comment. If the cracked machine is on the Internet and is in a DMZ (likely, but not certain) then another hop will be required to get to the data. The need to cross a DMZ is usually non-trivial since the firewalls are usually setup to make this difficult, that is no inbound connectivity is allowed.
Assuming the Cracker does get through the DMZ then the information must be gathered, noting that this seems to very specific to Dr. J and not a simple collection of all email traffic. Given the size of the archive (60MB) the filtering would need to be done inside CRU since moving ALL of the email offsite and then filtering doesn’t seem plausible. Further, we are making our Cracker very decent type, carefully removing all the personal information that is contained in a random collection of email for any user, not to mention the volume of “noise” from simple day to day business.
OK, once the data has been located and filtered moving back off is pretty simple, then cleaning up the logs and covering tracks. If this scenario is correct then I would expect, at a minimum, that the DMZ firewall(s) would have logging showing exactly when it happened. Since those are out of band to the attacker they would not be compromised.
Now consider the case for an insider. We assume that the user has system access and thus has somehow found the data of interest. There are two cases here, either the data is all neatly organized as it was presented — the result of preparing for a FOI response perhaps, or a large disorganized archive containing all email. The second case will require filtering the same as in the Cracker case but seems more plausible to me, there is no need to embarrass all those co-workers by making their (truly) private email public. There is also ample time to perform filtering since this is a legitimate user, no need to hurry or move the data somewhere else.
Given an archive we simply require a way to get the data off of the machine and out onto the Internet. Two obvious possibilities would seem to be a USB stick or a simple FTP transfer to an off-site (non-EAU) system. Since I have no idea what the physical security is like at EAU I can’t say if it would be possible to use a USB stick or not.
The Internet upload case would require a bit of care to avoid detection via logging and potentially blocking software. It might not be possible, for example, to connect to an anonymous proxy from inside and even if it was that would likely by found in the logs. A better way would be to use someone else’s user account to actually send the package off-site and even better to do that by moving the data to a neutral site. Using another user’s account can be as simple as waiting until the target person leaves the room for a short period without locking the screen. This tactic is frequently used by some that I know to send email inviting all staff to have a beer or the like. It usually makes the point very quickly.
Given the two scenarios above I find the internal/whistle blower case to be the clear winner but of course YMMV.
Ray (Comment#30608) January 18th, 2010 at 1:15 am
Read what I said more carefully.
schnoerkelman (Comment#30642) January 18th, 2010 at 11:16 am
If they find out its a whistleblower, the AGWers will NOT change their mind about the mails. If it turns out to be a hacker I won’t change my mind. It’s a difference that makes no difference.
A wheel that doesnt turn, or turns without consequence. A hamster wheel for a rabbett
steve mosher–
Excellent point. When we learn whether the emails were hacked or leaked by a whistle blower, that information will not change anyone’s interpretation of the contents.
That said, if they discover it’s a hack and that the hackers are some funded partisans, that information will be interesting in and of itself. It won’t change ‘the science’ one bit — but it will be interesting.
So, we’ll see.
I still tend to lean toward “disgruntled graduate student or former post doc”. But that’s not based on any evidence.
schnoerkelman, we use cracker a bit differently down here in the SouthEast United States.
On another note, I find the coincidence of the release of the archive and the archive’s name with the FOIA decision of the internal UEA to be too great to ignore.
Also, don’t rule out the anonymous FTP server hypothesis, since this wouldn’t have been the first time that somebody at UEA placed a sensitive file in a publicly accessible location. Mann made a similar mistake when he mistakenly allowed his directories to be publicly searchable.
Then there are the climate insiders who keep emailing their passwords and user names. You think they’d figure out someday this is a bad idea.
Steve,
Boris informs us you graduated with a degree in literature. I recall a few years ago at CA, Bender or someone challenged a reader to verify some topic with the R statistics program. They said something along the lines of, “Even Mosher uses R”. So do you also have a mathematics and statistics background?
Eli Rabett (Comment#30434)
January 16th, 2010 at 11:48 am
“1. Since it takes about five minutes to generate an FOIA request, since they don’t have to be limited, and every one of them has to be dealt, why yes, Virginia, there is FOIA bombing. Wanna take a guess at how much time and energy this one cost, then multiply by a low hourly rate of let us say $50. If you are in the US, you paid it.”
Actually this is wrong. The FOIA requests are part of the job; a job requirement. It is built into their salary.You don’t get more money for simply doing your job.
I got it the first time, friend: Laurence Sterne and Tristram Shandy, Thomas Pynchon, Vivian Darkbloom. It doesn’t change my comment. Not that it matters.
steven,
Now I see why you don’t call Watts out for his moronic stuff: he’s plugging your book. You just had to say it was a business decision and I’d understand. 🙂
“Especially in light of the fact that the best novel of the 20th Century is neither Pale Fire nor Gravity’s Rainbow…”
Blood Meridian, Ray? Not even in my top fifty, though I like McCarthy. I’ll take Absalom, Absalom, Lolita and Ulysses. But then, I’m more a short fiction guy, so just give me Flannery and Barthleme and I’m happy.
“I still tend to lean toward “disgruntled graduate student or former post docâ€. But that’s not based on any evidence.”
But didn’t the “hacker” attempt to lockout RC and post an article there? That behavior is not exactly in line with some truth seeking grad student who’s not buying into the scam.
Boris:
I know of a former researcher who shoot his professor over claims of plagiarism. People can do some pretty extreme things sometimes. And even if Gavin’s characterization is accurate (no reason to doubt it, but he’s human), this isn’t that far “out there”.
Boris–
“Disgruntled” is not a synonym for “truthseeking”.
Boris:
“Now I see why you don’t call Watts out for his moronic stuff: he’s plugging your book. You just had to say it was a business decision and I’d understand. ”
1. You obviously don’t read everything I say in the comments over at Watts.
2. I’ve made my standard appeal for data and code transparency on his site as well as here on Lucia’s
3. If Anthony says anything about the one area where I have some measure of competence ( UHI and the land record.. not the sea record) you can be sure I will chime in.
4. I think the reporting on cold events is a funny counter point.
5. Like my recent postings on RC, I’ve tried to first look for a common ground where there are things we can agree on ( like scarfetta posting code) and leave the criticism up to others.
6. Anthony did the post on the amazon thing on his own accord. It came as a surprise to me and Tom. I found out about it @ 3:18PM PST, when somebody told me.
7. My goal would be to earn anthony more money not the other way around. You forget, bender is my pool boy.
Next!
“Especially in light of the fact that the best novel of the 20th Century is neither Pale Fire nor Gravity’s Rainbow…â€
Blood Meridian, Ray? Not even in my top fifty, though I like McCarthy. I’ll take Absalom, Absalom, Lolita and Ulysses. But then, I’m more a short fiction guy, so just give me Flannery and Barthleme and I’m happy.
Absalom Absalom: The only faulkner worth reading.
Lolita: I’d second that.
Ulysses. Over rated, but necessary.
Flannery. Was always recommended by the weak minded. Perhaps I shall change my mind upon your advice and give it a read.
Barthleme: I’d choose barth, or Borges
Boris,
You seriously dont get the joke of posting the file on RC and then linking to it in a hidden way on CA?
You really dont get the psychology of these kind of people do you. have you never put a bag of burning poop on somebodies doorstep and rang the bell?
personally, I think it was probably somebody’s mistress. This would change the meaning of all the mails.
Wikipedia:
A lengthy shaggy dog story derives its humor from the fact that the joke-teller held the attention of the listeners for a long time (such jokes can take five minutes or more to tell) for no reason at all, as the story ends with a meaningless anticlimax.
Carrick (Comment#30653)
It might come as a surprise with a tag like schnoerkelman, but I was born in Georgia and know what a cracker is. One might say “I resemble that remark” :@)
steven mosher (Comment#30650)
Hear! Hear!
I’m just doing this for fun and because “others” have been going on about “Hackers”. I may well be wrong. As I said I have no information beyond what’s well known, but I find the hacker version simply too complicated given the alternative. If we assume a hacked-off postgrad/postdoc/colleague/… and using Dr. J’s account it becomes simply too delicious 🙂
I doubt we will ever really know the answer since I don’t expect the investigation to get very far.
“Flannery. Was always recommended by the weak minded.”
Flannery gets a bad rep because some think she’s a Christian writer–she isn’t: she’s a writer who happens to be Christian. But if people are hung up or anti-Catholic/Christian, they tend to reject her out of hand.