Here is an article that covers some of the same aspects of the Hadley CRU email story that I covered in a post yesterday, but with more detail in some areas. Here is some more about 'cherry picking' data. I like calling the AGW hypothesis the 'greenhouse gas hypothesis' because the catastrophic global warming supporters only consider greenhouse gases, and ignore other possible anthropogenic causes of warming. The reason for this, I think, is that they want to reduce energy consumption that is primarily provided by fossil fuel combustion. Reducing energy is the key part of the socialists agenda for the destruction of capitalism. The scientists invoved in the global warming cabal may be apolitical, but the politicians that provided the money and drove the policy debate are purely political with no real interest in science.

I have noticed that the believers in the catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) hypothesis fail to mention water vapor when they describe the basis of global warming. Water vapor is, of course, the primary "greenhouse gas" with CO2 and methane as minor contributors. Carbon dioxide does absorb infrared radiation at 2.7, 4.3 and 14.77 microns, and in the absence of other factors would cause atmospheric temperatures to increase slightly. The AGW hypothesis is that, according to the Clausis-Clapyron equation as verified by experiment, an increase in temperature exponentially increases the amount of water vapor the air can hold, so if relative humidity remains the same there will be more water vapor. This additional water vapor will cause the air temperature to increase more, and this will further increase water vapor in the air thus temperature will ratchet upward. The people who support the hypothesis appear, based on the Hadley CRU emails recently released, to have deliberately made the past appear cooler, and the present warmer. People had suspected that for some time since there was indication of it, but the AGW proponents would not release their raw data and their data massaging scheme. I had always had doubts about the past temperature record based on my own experience. The data had been collected from all around the world by many different people with no set procedure or standards, using equipment with uncertain accuracy and variation in local surroundings over time; thus it was highly likely that the error in the data was much larger than the temperature changes being monitored. I also had some philosophical concerns about the concept of a single average temperature. They compute a monthly average temperature for a worldwide grid of blocks about 450 miles on a side. In many of these grid squares there are many measurements of maximum and minimum temperatures that are somehow mashed into a monthly average temperature for the entire grid square. In some of the grid squares there are no measurements, so they use some sort of procedure to generate the average temperature for that grid. Then they average all of the temperatures from the grids to get the monthly average for the world. It appears that there was no configuration management on modifications to the computer routines that made these computations. It also appears that the raw temperature data were not retained, so no one can verify the work. There are many other issues with this procedure that I won't go into now. The emails reveal that they have pushed down the past temperature and jacked up recent temperatures. McIntyre revealed many errors and flaws in this work and some, but not all, were subsequently corrected. Starting in 1979 there were satellite measurements of worldwide temperature. At first there were errors in that system, but the University of Alabama-Huntsville team had an open record, and accepted criticism and corrected errors. This reliable satellite measurement record put a limit on what the researchers at Hadley CRU and NASA/GISS/NCDC could do in messaging their data. This may explain why temperature has not gone up recently, as was predicted by the 'Mann Hockeystick' curve. The AGW proponents use some 21 Global Circulation Models (GCMs) to project future temperature. In developing these models, they were 'calibrated' by forcing the models to produce the temperatures of the past. There were two problems with this. First, they assumed that the natural temperature increase that started in the early 1800's suddenly stopped about 1950, and, next, that all temperature increases after that were due entirely to atmospheric CO2 increases. Thus natural increases were ignored, as were increases that might be due to things such as land use changes. This made it certain that the GCMs would project temperature increases if CO2 level increased. The problem with the GCMs is that they appear to have been calibrated to something that is not true. There is also a potential problem with error build-up in numerical solutions of non-linear equations as they are projected far into the future. At any rate, the GCMs have proven to have no predictive competence, and results from the various GCMs do not match, even on a local level (some predict flooding in California while others predict drought; there is no consistency in results). I think the proponents of catastrophic AGW have fallen into some common fallacies that I read about somewhere, but I've forgotten where:

Confirmation Bias - the researchers unconsciously manipulate data to confirm what they believe. (I have seen this a lot in my career.)

Narrative Fallacy - the tendency to accept a compelling story. Journalists are particularly prone to this. They ignore that which doesn't support the narrative.

Silent Evidence - failure to account for important parameters that are not observed. (Like effect of cosmic rays on cloud formation.)

Ludic Fallacy - willingness to over-simplify and to take models too seriously.

Epistemic Arrogance - over-estimating knowledge and underestimating ignorance of the climate system.

The proponents of the catastrophic AGW hypothesis suggest that the 'precautionary principle' should be followed, otherwise we are playing 'Russian Roulette' with the future. I would rather take that remote small risk than the certain suicide path that the politicians involved in the issue support. The socialists who initiated the UN IPCC stand on the verge of achieving their goal, which Maurice Strong said 20 years ago was to destroy Western Civilization. All of the third world counties in the UN applauded that goal; it is hard to understand why Europe and the liberals in America supported it.

The usually confused and incoherent Chris Mathews has once again revealed the true belief of liberals as he discusses Obama's Afghanistan speech: West Point is the heart of the enemy.

I have long been concerned about the increase of police discretionary power, and the militarization of police departments. Here is a discussion of this from the magazine The Economist. It has gotten to the point that the average person unknowingly violates some law every day. A book has been written describing how the Federal Government has criminalized most everything.

The Hadley CRU email release is going to have a lot of impact on scientists working in the field of climatology. There are calls for the primary players in the emials to be banned from the IPCC in the future, as well as calls for te IPCC to be disbanded. The impact on scientists will be great, but the MSM and the politicians will attempt to ignore it. The politicians will attempt to act as if nothing has happened at the upcoming Copenhagen conference. Carol Browner, as expected, announced that the controvery over the emails is much ado about nothing, and changes nothing.

Here is more about the climate change scandal. I like the comment that if the East Anglia University guys couldn't get the data to fit the global warming hypothesis, it is a good bet that no one can.

There is a global warming debate going on in New Zealand. As usual there is a lot of acrimony over "adjustment " of the raw data. Here is a discussion of this from Flopping Aces. Take a good look at the discussion of large variances in temperature over relatively small distances in similar terrain.

Here are comments about the Hadley Climate Research Unit (CRU) emails by Ian Pilmer. He is one the the critics of the anthropogenic AGW hypothesis that supporters said should be put on trial for "crimes against humanity." Pilmer had warned us that there were serious problems with the work done by the advocates of Anthropogenic AGW hypothesis. These people fudged data to show that previous warm periods inferred by agricultural records and tree line in the arctic when man had no impact did not occur. Not mentioned by Pilmer, the significant revelation that the computer models are "spaghetti" code, with apparently no configuration control, and a lot of arbitrary fudge factors to make results match historical records. In fact, there is no way the researchers can even reproduce their own past projections.

The AGW supporters fall back on polar ice melting and sea level rise since temperature is not cooperating. Here are some comments on this line of reasoning. I like the comment by Dr. Nils-Axel Morner of Stockholm University, the world's leading scientist on sea level who says the rising sea level claims are "the greatest lie ever told." Maybe Obama knew that when he said he would stop the rise in sea level.

George Soros is a nasty man and unscrupulous speculator who early in his life helped Nazi's steal property from his fellow Jews. He rationalizes that if he hadn't done it someone else would have. He became an American citizen, but doesn't like America. He wants to establish a socialist world government. To that end he actively supports the Democrats, and he also supports the green movement. Here is a discussion of his support of James Hansen, a prominent advocate of the apocalyptic anthropogenic global warming (AGW) hypothesis. Mrs. John Kerry's Tides Foundation has also contributed significant funds to Hansen. Hansen is a hypocrite because he castigates any of his opponents who have ever received any funding from an oil company, and claims their future research is irreparably tainted, yet he personally accepts money from advocates of his position.