Talk:Climatic Research Unit email controversy

Name of article

Is the name of the article supported by reliable sources? I did a search in the sources, and find that the neologism 'climategate' is only mentioned in blogs and other non-reliable sources. Is there an alternate name that is reasonable, more neutral in tone, and that is supported by reliable sources? LK (talk) 09:41, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I support the reasoning and the move by ChrisO to the new article name. LK (talk) 09:45, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Please note that Wikipedia:Words to avoid#Controversy and scandal deprecates -gate in article titles ("[It] should not be used in article titles on current affairs"); I've therefore changed the title to follow our usual practice in similar cases, e.g. Rathergate → Killian documents controversy. I've not been able to find any reference to "Climategate" in non-blog sources, though I expect it will probably show up in due course. -- ChrisO (talk) 09:57, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Reliable sources

I'll add some reliable (non-blog) sources below as I find them. These are preformatted so that they can be dropped into the article as needed. -- ChrisO (talk) 10:26, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

• "Hackers target leading climate research unit". BBC News. 20 November 2009.
• Revkin, Andrew C. (20 November 2009). "Hacked E-Mail Is New Fodder for Climate Dispute". The New York Times.
• Hickman, Leo; Randerson, James (20 November 2009). "Climate sceptics claim leaked emails are evidence of collusion among scientists". The Guardian.
• McMillan, Robert (20 November 2009). "Global warming research exposed after hack". Computerworld.
• Staff (21 November 2009). "Climate scientists accused of 'manipulating global warming data'". The Daily Telegraph.
• Stringer, David (21 November 2009). "Hackers leak e-mails, stoke climate debate". The Associated Press.
• Webster, Ben (21 November 2009). "Sceptics publish climate e-mails 'stolen from East Anglia University'". The Times.
• "East Anglia University Statement on Hacking of Climate Research Unit Emails". UEA CRU. 21 November 2009. Retrieved 21 November 2009.
• Eilperin, Juliet (21 November 2009). "Hackers steal electronic data from top climate research center". The Washington Post.
• Macrae, Fiona (21 November 2009). "Hackers 'expose global warming con': Sceptics claim that leaked emails reveal research centre massaged temperature data". Daily Mail.
• Johnson, Keith (21 November 2009). "Hacked Emails Show Climate Science Ridden with Rancor". Wall Street Journal.
• Eilperin, Juliet (22 November 2009). "In the trenches on climate change, hostility among foes". The Washington Post.
• Overington, Caroline (23 November 2009). "Hackers expose climate brawl". The Australian.

Google now has quite a few stories on this now...its gone "mainstream" google.Smallman12q (talk) 01:33, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes, but note that many of the articles listed by Google are from blogs and other non-reliable sources; some care needs to be taken here. -- ChrisO (talk) 01:34, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

• Here's a cite to BBC for the name "Climategate": 'Climategate' - CRU hacked into and its implications, by Paul Hudson. Called a blog, but appears to be one of the exceptions we can use, "blog" by RS. It's an important source, as it confirms the authenticity of many of the "hacked" emails: "The e-mails released on the internet as a result of CRU being hacked into are identical to the ones I was forwarded and read at the time and so, as far as l can see, they are authentic." -- Pete Tillman (talk) 16:50, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Wrong. Personal comments on the blog of a TV weather presenter to not constitute a reliable source.

Politically Incorrect Sources

• Times Online by Nigel Lawson -- I believe this quote from the Times should be added to the page and the article linked to regarded as a reliable source, as this paragraph fully encapsulates what was done by these human caused global warming proponents at the CRU which was controversial; "Atonishingly, what appears, at least at first blush, to have emerged is that (a) the scientists have been manipulating the raw temperature figures to show a relentlessly rising global warming trend; (b) they have consistently refused outsiders access to the raw data; (c) the scientists have been trying to avoid freedom of information requests; and (d) they have been discussing ways to prevent papers by dissenting scientists being published in learned journals." -- Added by Tom Perkins 2009/11/23, 07:12 EST —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.171.69.27 (talk) 12:14, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Nope, guest columns and other opinion based pieces aren't reliable sources.
—Apis (talk) 12:37, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Correct. This is an opinion piece by Nigel Lawson, a UK politician who is a well-known critic of the Stern Review, the Kyoto Protocol etc. This may be a WP:RS as to his own political views, but not with regard to the incident under discussion here. --Nigelj (talk) 12:43, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

So if you are honestly implementing Wikipedia rules then, you'd have no troubles with the inclusion of the citation or the paragraph if emails were quoted which directly backed up the quote? Or are you just trying to prevent the materials which damage the concept and proponents of AGW from the wikipedia record? Tom Perkins 2009/11/23, 12:47 EST —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.27.212.7 (talk) 17:48, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

No, that would violate a whole new level of Wikipedia policies, not to mention be unbelievably biased?
—Apis (talk) 19:24, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Exactly how is quoting an email from a person biased as to what the email says? What was written was written. It appears you think reality violated Wikipedia's "neutrality" and policies. If so, Wikipedia makes itself of less worth than needs be--and to what purpose? So far, in this case, it isn't to be unbiased. The bias is quite evident. Tom Perkins 2009/11/23, 19:02 EST —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.171.69.27 (talk) 00:04, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

tree ring data

From reading round this the key issues all seem to be about tree ring palaeotemperature data. The FOI requests which apparently lead up to the email leak/hack were for tree ring datasets and the most embarassing/ambivalent responses were about tree ring data. If the scandal does have significant potential it is to discredit this method of historical temperature reconstruction. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeremy Young (talk • contribs) 13:24, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

How can FOI requests possibly lead up to the hacking of emails? That doesn't make any sense. --TS 13:53, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

The CRU has repeatedly refused FOI requests. The best source of this is unfortunately both "unreliable" and currently down (http://www.climateaudit.org). However, one such refusal is recorded at http://camirror.wordpress.com/2009/11/21/test/. The reason FOI requests are suspected to be linked is circumstantial. The file is called FOI2009.zip and the leaker used the name FOIA (see http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/11/13/open-letter/#comment-11917) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Slowjoe17 (talk • contribs) 16:33, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

FOI? That's kooky talk. If there were any FOI requests the scientists would have answered quickly and fully. Science is all about getting the data out there. In fact, they probably took care to make the data easily accessible on line, so everybody could look at it. No scientist would hide behind technicalities, deliberately make data hard to get, or delete material to avoid releasing it. Right? Tom Harrison ^Talk 14:36, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Tony, there's a conspiracy theory doing the rounds that the university was hiding data rather than releasing it under FOI, and that the hacker was attempting to expose all the data that the university was supposedly hiding. The university has denied the claim, stating that the data isn't theirs to release in the first place due to copyright issues. See the Daily Mail story linked above for the details. -- ChrisO (talk) 14:54, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Scientists hiding data? Bah, that's like the ridiculous canard that journals were pressured not to publish critical articles. I can't think where people get these goofy ideas. Tom Harrison ^Talk 18:59, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Tom: How about from the emails themselves(presuming they are legit, and this isn't the only one in the archive that discusses hiding or ignoring FOI requests. Bellis (talk) 22:45, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Well, yeah, there is that, but it doesn't count because it's stolen, and copyrighted, and taken out of context, and probably made up by global warming deniers conspiring with Big Oil to make the scientists look bad. Plus, it's forbidden to link or quote that on Wikipedia, so it doesn't really exist anyway. So there. Tom Harrison ^Talk 22:50, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Forbidden to link why? Is it not relevant to the discussion to see the actual content of the emails? For anyone interested (and without a link) the relevant emails are 1107454306.txt 1228330629.txt (sorry I missed the sarcasm before) How about linking to a news article that contains the content? Is that also illegal? (Oh, nevermind, the Illuminati are also blacklisting those sites, too!) Bellis (talk) 23:10, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

If we find whoever hacked the emails, any chance we could do a swap with the Yanks for that young Scottish chap who faces a possible 70 years in a federal prison for hacking the Pentagon to find out the truth about Roswell? --TS 15:24, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I notice from these edits that, based on WP:ENGVAR, it's already been decided that, for the purposes of this article, East Anglia can be considered to be part of the USA. --Nigelj (talk) 17:56, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Actually I thought it had been determined to be part of Afghanistan... -- ChrisO (talk) 18:18, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Let's not to stop on minor things, folks :) I personally would be interested to insert a more recent opinions of, say McIntyre or Michaels into the article, as soon as they give out one. --J. Sketter (talk) 18:31, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Why? William M. Connolley (talk) 18:58, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

WMC: As a party to this conspiracy against science, I think it's appropriate for you to pipe down. i.e. your name is in the whistle blower files.65.12.145.148 (talk) 02:35, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

If for nothing else, to give some face for these mysterious sceptics who claim this and that :) Altho I understand that whatever is the truth, 4,000 files takes some time to leaf trough. --J. Sketter (talk) 19:18, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

But McI had nothing to do with the hacking? Oh anon, I recommend reading my mails in there, you might learn something William M. Connolley (talk) 08:25, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I've read a lot of those emails, and I have to say I didn't learn a thing, but it confirmed a few things.67.141.235.203 (talk) 15:34, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

A further note regarding to sources

I've taken quite a strict line on using blogs in this article, of any political complexion. McIntyre presumably posted his comments on his blog, but they are sourced to a reliable secondary source which quotes him; likewise for the RealClimate quote, which comes from a secondary source. If prominent bloggers' comments are quoted by mainstream sources then fair enough, but we shouldn't be going to blogs looking for convenient quotes. -- ChrisO (talk) 19:58, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Sounds sensible. Let's be patient. --J. Sketter (talk) 20:41, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

This article is a highly notable event about public institutions -- it is not covered by BLP.

This classification is a blatant attempt at censorship. This is a very notable event about extremely important public institutions. It is clearly not covered by the BLP. Stop the censorship now. EggheadNoir (talk) 19:33, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Nonsense. Read BLP - it applies in all articles, and even outside article space. You cannot use unreliable sources like blogs to make negative statements about living people. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:37, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

EHN is a sock William M. Connolley (talk) 19:37, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Very obviously so. Scibaby again? -- ChrisO (talk) 19:48, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

User:EggheadNoir seems determined to engage in a quick-fire edit war here, without reading, let alone joining in, any discussion on this page. If it is a sock account, how quickly can it be blocked? --Nigelj (talk) 19:59, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Quicker than I thought. Already done, although not for long.... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:02, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I've reported the sockpuppet at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Scibaby. I'm not certain whether it's a Scibaby sock or a tentacle of the Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Tinpac sockfarm. Either way, though, hopefully a checkuser will get to the bottom of it soon. -- ChrisO (talk) 20:05, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

User:Twyla8 appears to be part of the same sockfarm. I've reported it at the link above. Could someone please block it for repeated disruptive editing? -- ChrisO (talk) 20:13, 22 N

Copyright issues - a reminder

I noticed that an anonymous IP editor just added a link to the leaked files in this edit. Could editors please refrain from doing this. Wikipedia:Copyrights#Linking to copyrighted works specifically states: "If you know that an external Web site is carrying a work in violation of the creator's copyright, do not link to that copy of the work. Knowingly and intentionally directing others to a site that violates copyright has been considered a form of contributory infringement in the United States. ... Linking to a page that illegally distributes someone else's work sheds a bad light on Wikipedia and its editors." Since this material is not only copyrighted but stolen, it should not be linked from this article or any other on Wikipedia. -- ChrisO (talk) 20:11, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

The Pentagon Papers were not to be released either, I see Wikipedia quotes them. Will you claim the difference lies in the Pent.Pprs. having been read into the Congressional record? Or simply in years having passed? Whistleblowing is legally protected and socially lauded activity, exposing frauds places Wikipedia in a good light. 16:38, 2009/11/22 EST —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.171.69.27 Tom Perkins(talk) 21:39, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Apart from your nonsensical misinterpretation of the material, the Pentagon Papers were prepared by the US government and hence are in the public domain. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:45, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I suggest specificity, which material, what misinterpretation? The Pentagon Papers were Top Secret, discussing them or being in possession of them without authorization was treason--they were emphatically not public domain--yet their release is held to be the sine qua non of whistleblowing. Whistleblowing is certainly now a legally protected activity. The CRU emails contain what are now involuntary and inadvertent admissions by proponents of human caused global warming of acts on their part which are illegally avoiding Freedom of Information Act requests for documents and suggestions such documents should be destroyed instead their being released. Tom Perkins 17:08 2009/11/22 EST

Apart from your nonsensical misinterpretation of the material, public domain is a legal concept. Things can be both top secret and in the public domain at the same time. Distributing them may be illegal, but it is not copyright infringement. Moreover, the pentagon papers have been irrevocably published, and hence secrecy considerations do not apply. It's well-established that the government cannot use secrecy claims to prosecute people who spread already available material, even if it originally was obtained illegally by a third party. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:47, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

The "hacked" CRU emails are now irrevocably published, so by that criteria of yours they are now in the public domain. BTW, "Top Secret" and "public domain" are both legal concepts, and yes they are mutually exclusive--unless it has changed from the last time I filed, an aspect of filing for copyright in the US is making public copies available to the Library of Congress. Obviously, that excludes "Top Secret" info from being copyrighted, hence it cannot be "public domain" in the sense that formerly copyrighted materials are. I note you have yet to attempt dispose of the "whistleblowing" aspects of this--the release of these emails is clearly such. Tom Perkins 18:06, 2009/11/22 EST —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.171.69.27 (talk) 23:07, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Sigh. I don't know when you last "filed for copyright", but copyright is automatic in the US since 1989, and in most of the world since the 1980s or earlier. It does not require registration or filing of anything, although registration of a work will increase damages in the case of infringement in the US. Works by the US federal government are always automatically in the public domain. Things don't have to be copyrighted to become public domain - where does that misbelief come from? Anyways, existing publication is a defense against claims of secrecy violations (which may or may not have protected the pentagon papers, but does not apply to the CRU emails), but not against copyright infringement (which does not apply to the pentagon papers, but definitely applies to the CRU emails). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:23, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Well the first time was in 1979 when I was 8. The second and so far last time would have been about 1983. The notion of public domain is that it has been copyrighted and the period has lapsed or the privilege abandoned, or the work predates the modern concept of copyright altogether. There would also certainly be "fair use" exceptions to quoting a limited fraction of the "hacked" data as being exemplary of criminal activity--copyright protects no crimes. And you are still ignoring the "whistleblowing" aspects of this. And of course there is the issue that none of these persons owned the copyright to them in the sense you mean anyway--they were government employees doing government work--if the Pentagon Papers were in any sense in the public domain although Top Secret, then these certainly are also in the public domain by virtue of government employees creating them on government time. Tom Perkins 19:08, 2009/11/22 EST

You may be surprised, but not all countries have the same policies about copyrights. CRU is in the UK, not in the US. What's more, even in the US, only works by the federal government automatically fall into the public domain - and not due to a lapsed period, or abandonment, but simply because that is the law of the land. This does not universally apply to US state governments, and certainly not to universities, even if they are public. So far, the only crime in this has been the illegal hacking and the distribution of private data. And no, most of the people in question are not "government employees doing government work" - most are academics from various countries around the world, working for different research institutes and different universities under different legislative systems, different ownership, and different copyright policies. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:54, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I would also note that much of this data was the subject of a FOI UK law request that was subsequently sidestepped by those inside (if you believe the discussions in the emails) and that the University of East Angila is a PUBLIC university. As such, the emails are owned by the public (presuming FOI law in the UK is similar to in the US)Bellis (talk) 23:21, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Big assumption, and certainly mostly wrong. Many of the emails were not written by employees of CRU, anyways, and hence are not CRUs to divulge in the first place. Also, the UK FOI act only came into force in 2005, so a large amount of the email archive is not covered by it. Moreover, as far as I can tell there has been a lot of noise about FOI, but there is no evidence that a valid request has ever been made. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:31, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Not such a big assumption apparently, after reviewing FOI for EA University. I work in a college IT dept and can tell you that if someone walked in requesting archives of all of our emails relating to a specific person or subject (or a date range), I would be REQUIRED by law to remit them. Seems quite similar in the UK: See here: http://www.uea.ac.uk/is/foi Theoretically anyone could request the entire email archive from CRU. Universities are generally required to maintain archives of all communication relevant to all operations related to public funds, and those communications are generally subject to FOI retrieval. To be honest, I'm not certain about email in the UK, but in the US, emails are considered correspondence and as such are required to be archived and open to retrieval request. PS I know for a FACT a FOI request has been made, because I made one, and got subsequently ignored. Note, one can google "CRU FOI requests" and find that there were numerous requests filed (probably into the thousands after the initial requests were shot down) In the AGW community it is common knowledge that there have been requests, and all of them have been subsequently denied or completely ignored. The likelihood that this is a whistle-blower event instead of a hacking event is also a pretty distinct possibility Bellis (talk) 23:35, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I suggest you check [1]. Even data released under a FOI scheme remain under copyright by the university. If you made a FOI request and got ignored, I suggest you follow proper procedure. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:51, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I suggest you understand that, yes the copyright is held by UEA, which is a Public institution, hence the publications are in the end owned by the UK public -- much like in the US.Bellis (talk) 23:58, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

The copyright rules are very different from in the US. The mere fact that it is a public institution does not mean that everything it creates is in the public domain, or indeed that the UK public owns its materials. -- ChrisO (talk) 01:38, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I'm not even convinced this is the case in the US. I suspect people are still confused about copyrights and right to access data, correspondence etc, which are completely different things. For example, what does 'owned by the UK public' even mean? If Bellis means public domain then he/she should say so because 'owned by the UK public' (the same as 'owned by the US public') sounds like something someone who doesn't understand copyright would say (IANAL and don't pretend to have a lawyer's grasp on copyright but I have enough experience to usually tell when a statement is pretty much meaningless or implies a lack of understanding of copyright). Incidentally in case anyone is not aware, most stuff from the UK government is not in the public domain but rather has Crown copyright and indeed anyone who wants to understand how things work in the UK or a number of other Commonwealth realms need to understand the concept of The Crown. In any case, if Bellis' claim that everything by a US public university is in the public domain is correct, that would imply no US public university can expect much benefit from publishing books, journals etc, since anyone and everyone can legally copy whatever they publish as there is no copyright for their work. This seems rather unlikely. Indeed as others have pointed out, state government material in the US is often not in the public domain yet for some odd reason anything from public universities is? Does the federal government in the US even own any university (not counting military ones)? If not, this mean Bellis is claiming that anything from state government owned universities (which is I presume what Bellis is talking about in such a case) is in the public domain despite the fact actual government published stuff is often not, which seems to me to be unlikely to say the leastr. Nil Einne (talk) 07:32, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Huge red herring. There is a large difference between 'everything' a university produces and email communication archives and archived data from a research institution. The later two are almost certainly subject to FOI law requests, and if you read the emails (and believe they are real) the admin were working under the assumption that they were required to submit to the FOI requests until CRU convinced someone to basically ignore the law (the denials seem to be classified under the 'vexatious' category). Colleges are required by law to maintain archives of every email that comes in and out of the institution specifically for FOIA requests. I know this for a fact, as I help maintain the backups at the institution I work for (in U.S., as I've said before, from reading the UK FOI laws -- things appear similar there too).Bellis (talk) 13:40, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Ultimately, we have to go by what reliable secondary sources publish - the Washington Post, CNN, BBC, etc. My own snark aside, there are legitimate questions about context, and maybe authenticity. We may not, and should not, try to analyze a primary source, which this is. We have to wait on the journalists and researchers to do that. As they report, we summarize their reporting, in neutral language -- and to whoever put in "claim" for "say," anyone who has been around here for a while knows better than to play the Smith-claims-but-Jones-notes game, so let's avoid that. Tom Harrison ^Talk 23:54, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Is it 'ok' to link to news media sources that quote the emails, or is that also considered out of bounds? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1230122/How-climate-change-scientists-dodged-sceptics.html Bellis (talk) 00:09, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I see some looming problems with that. But, I wonder how the fact CRU and it's researchers are mostly funded outside the university, by very varied instances, affects to copyrights of documents and emails? —Preceding unsigned comment added by J. Sketter (talk • contribs) 05:18, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Quoting excerpts from the emails, as the Washington Post and many others have done, is quite legal under fair use. Since some of these quotes have become (in)famous, and are central to the event and the ensuing public debate, Wikipedia guidelines will undoubtedly compel us to post some of these excerpts. The hack itself is trivial, there are dozens of hacks every day that don't make it into Wikipedia. This one is not about the leak it's about what the leak revealed to the public. Having a Wikipedia article on this event banned from quoting the emails would be like having an article about Christianity banned from quoting the Bible. It would be oddly circuitous. Flegelpuss (talk) 07:09, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

May I suggest that you actually read the discussion? Nobody claims we cannot quote from the emails under fair use. What is under discussion is an external link to the complete archive, which is forbidden via WP:EL. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:23, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Well, Bellis asked above "Is it 'ok' to link to news media sources that quote the emails, or is that also considered out of bounds?". The above is just a response. I think that such links are OK, as long as it results in a quality article. Short quotes are fair use, and if a respectable third party does the quoting, then I think we should trust that decision. Similarly, if some part becomes widely quoted, it may make sense for us to quote it too, if it is a good way to describe the debate. As I see it, the question about quotations is more about being encyclopedic and tasteful than a legal question (which is good, since about those it is not for us to wonder why). -- Coffee2theorems (talk) 11:36, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Is Scibaby involved in the hacking?

Should Wikipedia notify the police about Scibaby's activities here, the IP addresses he uses etc., so that they can investigate his possible involvement in the hacking? Count Iblis (talk) 20:34, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I very much doubt that Scibaby is involved in any capacity, other than the usual one of making a nuisance here. -- ChrisO (talk) 20:36, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

The headline says it all about the paranoia revolving around "scibaby" in these parts. No matter how awful scibaby may have been, please don't project it onto the billions of other climate skeptics on the planet, or onto the small fraction of those who are now coming to these articles to see how fairly Wikipedia is documenting the CRU leak and, on occasion, engaging in edits to restore what they see as NPOV, due weight, and coverage of all the important aspects of the event. And please don't use scibaby fears to try to ban editors whose edits you do not like. Thank you.Flegelpuss (talk) 07:24, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Does your checkuser-confirmed sockpuppet agree with you? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 16:42, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

F has been blocked for socking, astonishingly William M. Connolley (talk) 18:08, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Washington Post

Hackers steal electronic data from top climate research center. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:51, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, it's already in the list above at #Reliable sources. Please add any further articles you come across to that section, to keep them all in one place. -- ChrisO (talk) 21:07, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

fyi

Bah, CA has a mirror now. Only now noted --J. Sketter (talk) 21:26, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Not News

I know this policy is never followed, but this minor news event is not material for an encyclopedia. Bleh. -Atmoz (talk) 03:23, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

At first glance, it is extremely far from being "minor". However, time will tell. Meanwhile, this article will exist, and will reflect the state of the facts as they are discovered. Ling.Nut (talk) 04:28, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Malicious redirects

There are some malicious redirects popping up - Mike's nature trick. Can someone delete them please? William M. Connolley (talk) 08:35, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

OI, that isn't malicious! It's legitimate. Several articles use that as their title. People will be entering those words in the search box. Ling.Nut (talk) 08:52, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

People have written all kinds of things we don't put in wiki. We have BLP after all. The redir is not legit and should die William M. Connolley (talk) 09:29, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Please respect Wikipedia more than you respect your own views.

Recent edits to this article are partisan. Editors rmv as "No source, and wrong" something that is easily sourced, and correct. Please respect the facts that exist, not the ones you wish to exist... If the whole thing is revealed as a fraud later, then you can say the facts are wrong. meanwhile, the emails do suggest that data was fudged. Please respect Wikipedia more than you respect your own views. I do it all the time. Ling.Nut (talk) 08:53, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

WP:BLP strictly requires that unsourced negative information about living people (and an accusation of fraud is such) is deleted immediately. If you can find reliable sources for deleted statements, feel free to re-add them with proper sourcing. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:25, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Of course, it would be nice if Wikipedia had some respect for the posters to the site. I am a climate skeptic with a scientific background and I have found that Wikipedia has some kind of surveillance system which is used to delete any remarks which are not following the popular view that man is causing global warming be burning fossil fuels. Now if those supporting this view had any evidence, never mind proof, that this is true it would give me comfort. But, as it is, Wikipedia is just another propaganda source. So, why am I censored, while climate crazies are not? Arthur (talk) 09:53, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Aha! We are more cunning than ever you thought. You see, I've *not* deleted your useless post above, just to demonstrate that it is self-contradictory. Mwahahaha William M. Connolley (talk) 10:05, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Actually both climate crazies and people like you are routinely 'censored'. This isn't a site which welcomes 'posts'. We are an encyclopaedia and you should only discuss ways to improve the article or the encylopaedia in general, not your personal views in support or against global warming or anything else. The removal of such discussions is completely legitimate regardless if they support the 'popular view' nor does it matter what 'evidence' or 'proof' is provided nor what your background is. Policy encourages WP:Civility and WP:AGF and WP:Don't bite the newbies however all contributors do have to respect wikipedia rules and guidelines and several of them make discussions on wikipedia concerning editors personal opinions or other subjects unrelated to ways to improve the encyclopaedia largely taboo (except in a small number of circumstances). While we usually allow some leeway, this is limited in hot button topics because otherwise it is likely to get out of hand. Nil Einne (talk) 10:25, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

One finnish news article, please edit and add if you feel so

"In Finland, MEP Eija-Riitta Korhola is going to present a written query to European Commission about the credibility of IPCC climate reports. Her husband, climatologist and Helsinki University professor Atte Korhola says that published e-mails show some concerning signs, and expresses the view that the current political weight of climatic research has led the climatology to lose it's rules." (not a quate, but my summary, sorry)

From a finnish online newspaper Uusi Suomi

• Ovaskainen, Teppo (21 November 2009). "Korholas went on to a climate war". Uusi Suomi.
• Google translate of the finnish page: [2]

--J. Sketter (talk) 10:42, 23 November 2009 (UTC) (sig. added)

I am going to revert this addition on two grounds:

1. The English of the contribution is not clear in some important areas: I'm not sure what "and express the view that the current political weight of climatic research has led the climatology to lose it's rules" actually means, for example.
2. What I can make out from the contribution does not seem directly derived from what I can make out from the Google translation: I can see nothing in the translation about a "written query to European Commission about the credibility of IPCC climate reports", rather it says, "MEP Eija-Riitta Korhola (cons), [of] the European Commission intends to make a written question to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change IPCC reports are reliable", which is very different - she intends to write to the IPCC, not the EC. It also says that "Korhola and her husband, University of Helsinki, environmental change, Professor Atte Korhola, [have been] shot down by the government's climate policy expert, MP Oras Tynkkysen". None the less, "Professor Atte Korhola, European academies of science of environmental panel member, as interpreted by the alleged manipulation of the messages is 'normal scientific debate,'", so it seems that her husband, the Professor, actually said that the the emails show 'normal scientific debate'.

In the light of our strict responsibilities regarding living persons and their views, I think there is enough doubt to us English speakers as to what has been reported and what has been added to this article that it should go, at least until we have more reliable translations and summaries to base our reporting on. --Nigelj (talk) 11:37, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I'd also note that such items only would be of interest when it transcends from the "i want to" level, into "has done so" with an additional "has been accepted by". My initial reactions here was that this was a politician wanting to ride a news-burst to some self-promotion. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 11:56, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Uhhuh! I accept your decision. Absolutely. I have to admit only now I read the translation more closely. Every single argument in Nigeljs #2 is based on wrong translation (except for the assumption that Mrs. Korhola would be a member of both parliament and commission). GT still is worse than nothing when dealing with these two languages. Also Kim D. Petersens point is fair. If Korhola really acts, maybe we can return to subject... at least then I may have a source in official EU English :) But as I said, I should have paid attention to the machine-translation before deciding to offer the thing here. Very stupid by me. I think I better restrict myself to minor edits in this article, just like before... Thanks for your politness. (after google: restrict minor by myself, article think hemmaglutinin she this, just like before the edits...) --J. Sketter (talk) 17:07, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

another reference that should be added

another reference: <http://www.theaustralian.com.au/story/0,1,26386720-2702,00.html>

Page name

We seem to be in danger of random POV moves. I think it would be a good idea if page-move was locked William M. Connolley (talk) 12:58, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

as opposed to intentional POV 'moves'??lol?? (Keep up the good work! pj)67.141.235.203 (talk) 20:26, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Page move and other edits by User:Tjic

Please do not try to change the slant of this articled by quick-fire dramatic edits: rather, please engage with the discussions on this talk page. Considerable effort has been put into keeping this page neutral and based on published facts, secondary reliable sources etc. Please engage with the consensus philosophy that makes WP work so well. --Nigelj (talk) 13:00, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Date error on release and link to release notification?

Slowjoe17 (talk) 14:12, 23 November 2009 (UTC) This is my first time writing for Wikipedia, so I may be asking dumb questions.

The article says the release at the Air Vent was on the 19th, but the actual link is dated the 17th.

Should the actual release comment be linked? It is http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/11/13/open-letter/#comment-11917

Well you could start by reading this page. #Copyright issues - a reminder will answer your question and give you links to various WP policies that you should also look at. The issue's getting an airing below too. --Nigelj (talk) 16:28, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Content of Emails

I am surprised (well not really) to see that the actual content of the emails is not discussed. Certainly many reliable sources have gone into some detail about the contents and which ones are significant and why. Is there any objection to creating a section detailing the notable contents of the emails? WVBluefield (talk) 15:12, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I would appreciate that. 84.72.61.221 (talk) 15:31, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Well, it's going to be a lot of work, as, for balance, for every point you want to quote from an email, we're going to have to go right back into the science and the papers, diagrams, datasets etc under discussion, find the context, understand the theory, the statistics and the data and explain not only what the conspiracy theorists have made of it, but also what the original author actually was talking about and what s/he meant by it at the time. All this with reliable sources. And just trying to put one side of the argument in, will just lead to it getting removed on the basis of WP:WEIGHT and balance, unfortunately. --Nigelj (talk) 15:53, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Between copyright problems and the fact that both blogs and op-eds in recognised newspapers (see Lawson article in Unreliable Sources above) are apparently disallowed here, it seems to be unrealistic to get the content of the emails onto the page ATM. It seems clear to me that the copyright issue can't really be worked around.

Since http://www.climateaudit.org (currently at http://camirror.wordpress.com) and http://www.realclimate.org are primary discussion actors in this controversy, is there any mechanism to provide an exception for them for this page? Slowjoe17 (talk) 16:18, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Nigelj: what concerns quotes about climate science i agree with you, but please realize that a big portion of the email has actually nothing to do with diagrams and datasets. there are other important issues raised by those emails that could (and in my opinion should) be adressed: the attempt to hijack/abuse the peer-review-system, lack of confirmation-bias-awareness, the priority of political issues over scientific ones, insults, etc. To elaborate these points is of course not the job of wikipedia, but if reliable sources point at these issues, wer have to include it. 84.72.61.221 (talk) 16:53, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

SlowJoe, are you saying that realclimate isnt am RS for BLP's? On the other matter, several non blog sources go into detail about the specific contents of the emails. I see no reason to excluded these. WVBluefield (talk) 16:52, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Is ClimateAudit an RS? It wasn't listed in the section above. IMO, either both CA and RC are reliable sources, they both are not, or someone needs to explain the difference. Slowjoe17 (talk) 17:04, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

The difference is that RC has been positively reviewed in a number of scientific publications, and is written by acknowledged experts. CA has not been treated similarly, and McI's qualification is a 30+ year old B.Sc. and 30 years experience in mineral exploration. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:07, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

"The difference is that RC has been positively reviewed in a number of scientific publications ..." - No doubt by the very people that run the site. "30 years experience in mineral exploration" - as a statistician for the same ... and of course the material he is commenting on is inherently statistically based ... a little something you left out. --GoRight (talk) 22:35, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

leading climate change scientist

Why not adressing him by his name - Kevin Trenberth? And as this seem rather an obvious attempt to discredit those who leaked the files, we should perhaps also mention, that trenberth is appearing in the leaked emails more than a 100 times. 84.72.61.221 (talk) 15:30, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Oh, you're fast, thank you. about the phrase 'allegedly named in the emails': 1. it would be nice to have a source for that, but as I understand, the emails itself can't act as a source, right? 2. i would more much more prefer the term 'appears' or 'whose name appears', as 'named' could be misleading as he is also the author/recipient of several emails. 84.72.61.221 (talk) 15:41, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

The real reason this was not there was included in my edit summary last time I re-simplified this sentence: "The lede summarises the article's main points. Specific details and links are contained in the main body, no need to repeat here."--Nigelj (talk) 15:54, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I can not see how the name of a person is a specific detail. 84.72.61.221 (talk) 16:20, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

climate-sceptic blogger Stephen McIntyre

In the Stephen McIntyre Wikipedia-article he is not adressed as climate-sceptic and as far as I know, rightly so. To critisize works of climate scientists doesn't actually make you automatically a climate sceptic. I'd like to see that removed (or at least sourced). 84.72.61.221 (talk) 15:57, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

This cited source says that he "has for years been challenging data used to chart climate patterns". What other kind of climate sceptic is there? --Nigelj (talk) 16:03, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I disagree: 'challenging data used to chart climate patterns' does not imply someone is sceptic. Actually, finding errors and faults is propably the most important scientific task. A climate sceptic, in my understanding, is someone who is hesitant in accepting the theory in its whole, not someone who critisizes particular data. if we would take your interpretation of the word, we would have to label every single person who corrected/critisized any data used to chart climate patterns. this would obviously include the majority of climate researcher. 84.72.61.221 (talk) 16:17, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Well, if you can find one source that says he spent his time looking for examples of where the warming was faster than the professional scientists were claiming, then I'll believe you. --Nigelj (talk) 16:21, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Well, actually it is the other way round: it is you who has to provide a source for calling him a climate sceptic. So, it's not about you believing me, it's only about you sourcing your claims. please respect the rules. 84.72.61.221 (talk) 16:36, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Wrong. The statement in the article is already adequately sourced, he has spent years challenging the data in use by professional climate scientists, I've patiently explained that. The only possible exception would be if his scepticism was the other way round, which is so unlikely, I don't know why I bothered to mention it to you. Maybe because I hoped you'd go away for a week or two trying to find that source? --Nigelj (talk) 16:49, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

That's blatantly ignorant. 'if his scepticism was the other way round' -> so if he would be SCEPTIC, but the other way round, you wouldn't call him a SCEPTIC? I don't see how that makes any sense. Further, it is clearly not adequately sourced, as the source doesn't call him a climate sceptic. I think you're being too one-sided on this subject and unavailable to sound arguments. I therefore would very much like to hear the opinions of others. If there is consensus with your position, then that's fine and we should change the article about McIntyre in that regard. Being a 'leading climate sceptic' is surely something noteworthy, don't you think? 84.72.61.221 (talk) 17:04, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Calm down both, please. 84.72.61.221 is right, of course, but I wouldn't be surprised if there's another RS, really labeling McIntyre a "sceptic"; and finding a RS explicitely stating the opposite may be hard, indeed. :) --J. Sketter (talk) 17:50, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I wonder if the sock-detection experts would like to look into this trolling? --Nigelj (talk) 18:48, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I removed your WP:OR name calling and added a reference to McIntyre's blog for context. --GoRight (talk) 19:37, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Will you please avoid personalisation and personal attacks?! I did not add this stuff to this article, it is not 'mine'. I am simply defending the material on the basis that it was properly sourced (until you removed it). I am not prepared to put up with fellow editors who get personal or who can't behave like adults. Understand? --Nigelj (talk) 21:30, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

"I did not add this stuff to this article" - I stand corrected and apologize on that count. As for personal attacks, where exactly have I attacked you personally? I merely used a factual description of what the offending text was, WP:OR and name calling. --GoRight (talk) 22:22, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Haven't tried to attack you personally. As this is not the place to talk about McIntyres possible motives for critisising the data and methods used, we have to stick to the sources. It's pedantic to make the difference, but it still exists. Could he be called "a statistician"? (math)--J. Sketter (talk) 20:29, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

IMHO we should simply stay with what the source actually used, i.e. blogger. If you want to call him something else then simply provide a source to back it up. That's all the IP was asking for above and I agree, and apparently you do as well. --GoRight (talk) 22:22, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Reactions

This seems to be a reaction that should be added to the article as it is a claim that has been made often, denied often and now proved true. --

Mojib Latif, a climate researcher at Germany's Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences, said he found it hard to believe that climate scientists were trying to squelch dissent. Mr. Latif, who believes in man-made global warming but who has co-authored a paper ascribing current cooling to temporary natural trends, said, "I simply can't believe that there is a kind of mafia that is trying to inhibit critical papers from being published."[3]67.141.235.203 (talk) 19:25, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

That's an interesting point, but not really a reaction, is it? 84.72.61.221 (talk) 19:57, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Article Title

The Climate Research Unit does not officially label this action as a “hack”, only that data was illegally taken from the servers[4]. There has even been some speculation that this was an internal leak from some whistleblower inside the CRU or the university[5]. This being the case, I propose we rename the article to Climatic Research data theft, or something along those lines. WVBluefield (talk) 19:32, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I think we should stick to whatever the WP:RS are calling it. Are they calling it a data theft or a hack? --GoRight (talk) 19:39, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Some call it a hack and others call it data theft, but the CRU is only calling it theft. WVBluefield (talk) 20:45, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Wall Street Journal 23 nov

Settled Science? Computer hackers reveal corruption behind the global-warming "consensus" (quotes the Washington Post). Gwen Gale (talk) 19:34, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Clearly this WSJ article is not notable, not an RS, violates CW laws, and fill in another reason here. WVBluefield (talk) 19:37, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

It is an 'opinion piece': far from being a reliable secondary source re this incident, it is a primary source as the personal opinions of one Mr James Taranto, who wrote it. --Nigelj (talk) 19:41, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

It can be cited as reaction to the topic. Gwen Gale (talk) 19:46, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

• Inhofe to call for hearing into CRU, U.N. climate change research (from The Hill) Gwen Gale (talk) 19:39, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Are you just going to keep posting links here, so that we have to read each one and tell you over and over that opinion pieces and blogs are not reliable sources? --Nigelj (talk) 19:45, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

This is reliably published news and commentary on the topic. Editors are welcome to look for more sources. Gwen Gale (talk) 19:47, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Opinion pieces are perfectly acceptable as long as they are attributed as such and as long as they are from otherwise reputable sources, of which these all are. --GoRight (talk) 19:55, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I didn't know CRU fell under the remit of the United States Congress... -Atmoz (talk) 19:47, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

The US Congress funds stuff worldwide, they likely give them money (or give money to orgs which cite CRU publications). Gwen Gale (talk) 19:51, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

A hearing can be regarding anything at all. They could talk about handballs during Irish soccer games if they wanted. Ignignot (talk) 20:25, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

• Lord Lawson calls for public inquiry into UEA global warming data 'manipulation' (Telegraph.co.uk) Gwen Gale (talk) 19:43, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

• Hacked e-mails fuel climate change debate (Wired article published by CNN) Gwen Gale (talk) 20:02, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

• E-mail leak turns up heat on global warming advocates (Bostonherald.com, quotes NYT) Gwen Gale (talk) 20:07, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for posting these links. I'll repost this one, which may have gotten lost upthread:

• BBC: 'Climategate' - CRU hacked into and its implications, by Paul Hudson. Called a blog, but appears to be one of the exceptions we can use, "blog" by RS (ie, BBC). It's an important source, as it confirms the authenticity of many of the "hacked" emails: "The e-mails released on the internet as a result of CRU being hacked into are identical to the ones I was forwarded and read at the time and so, as far as l can see, they are authentic." This is also the first RS I've seen to use "Climategate",--Pete Tillman (talk) 20:30, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

It didn't get 'lost' up there - it got 'criticised'. We already did this under #Reliable sources. These unreliable sources (blogs, opinion pieces etc) will not be useful in the article, unless it's going to get very much longer. They can be used in the sense, "X has claimed A", but for each of these we will need "Y has counter-claimed B" or "Z has denied A" etc. for balance. Please see WP:WEIGHT, of course some of these 'theorists' that you want to quote, like Nigel Lawson, and TV weather presenters, are so close to being Flat Earth proponents that there will have to a lot of balancing, truly scientific, material. --Nigelj (talk) 20:41, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

The topic is notable, these sources, some of which are articles from reliable publishers, others which are blogs under the editorial control of a reliable publisher, deal straightforwardly with the topic. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:47, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I didn't think that a one-line, unsigned post constituted much criticism. Was that you?

And you seem to be attempting to tar the BBC's Paul Hudson and others as "Flat Earth proponents" -- watch that POV, please. Thanks, Pete Tillman (talk) 20:49, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

It's true, I didn't see anything about flat earth in any of those sources. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:52, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

As for "there will have to a lot of balancing, truly scientific, material," the pith of this notable topic are emails which (according to the sources) show much of that scientific material has been manipulated and is hence unreliable. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:55, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Only according to the climate change sceptics, who are (predictably enough) spinning a handful of the 1,000-odd leaked e-mails as somehow discrediting an entire field of science. It's an illogical and frankly dishonest argument. -- ChrisO (talk) 21:05, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

(e/c)That may be your opinion, but that seems to be the problem here, as demonstrated by your disruptive editing in this section. We try to proceed by discussion and consensus, not by flooding talk pages with our personal opinions and with lists of unreliable blog and opinion pieces as potential sources, generally, here on Wikipedia. I would have thought that a sysop would know that. --Nigelj (talk) 21:08, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

In my mind this article is about a political issue that relates to science, so the standard of RS is different. Obviously there will be very few (if any) scientific journal articles about the incident. Instead I think we should be on the lookout for some kind of investigative journalism. Ignignot (talk) 21:37, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

A personal blog by Paul Hudson is not a RS, not even in the darkest pits of wikipedia.
—Apis (talk) 21:56, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Odd that this "personal blog" is available at www.bbc.co.uk/. Try again? Pete Tillman (talk) 22:58, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that is odd. However, I meant personal as in expressing his personal opinion.
—Apis (talk) 23:05, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

(ec) I hate to burst your bubble, but according to Wikipedia:Reliable sources, opinion pieces can only be considered reliable sources for statements about the authors opinion.
—Apis (talk) 21:13, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Which of these are opinions? I dont think any of them are. WVBluefield (talk) 21:21, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

It's little things like "top stories in Opinion" (as in the very first source posted) that gives it away.
—Apis (talk) 21:25, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Talk pages are meant for discussing sources and improving articles. I'm citing sources from reliable publishers which support the topic's notability, which is about reliably published assertions that the scientific sources themselves have been manipulated. You're welcome to say you disagree with any reliable source, but otherwise your assertions are supported neither by the cited sources nor the policies of this website. Please also try not to stray into personal attacks. Meanwhile, Apis O-tang is mistaken, WP:RS notes that as to opinion, "it is important to directly attribute the material to its author, and to do so in the main text of the Wikipedia article so readers know that we are discussing someone's opinion." Gwen Gale (talk) 21:19, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

There are just as many hundreds of reliable blogs and opinion pieces on the web at the moment saying that the stolen material proves absolutely nothing about the science or the existence of man-made global warming. A "reliably published assertion" that a weatherman or a conservative politician is excited by the theft supports only the fact that that person got excited. It means nothing about the science or the facts, and that will have to be shown for each climate-denier or climate-sceptic blog or posting you want to highlight. Which will take time and effort, and make the article very long and rather dull to read. There is no way that you will get away with reporting some bloke's personal take without the rest of us getting enough air-space right next to it to provide balance and WP:WEIGHT. --Nigelj (talk) 21:46, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

All true, but of course that means we need to be selective ... which in turn means we should examine the available options in some detail ... etc, etc. --GoRight (talk) 22:29, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

• Climate Emails Stoke Debate: Scientists' Leaked Correspondence Illustrates Bitter Feud over Global Warming, news story from WSJ, 11-23-09. Includes a link for those wishing to download the hacked archive. Pete Tillman (talk) 22:36, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Hans von Storch on Climategate

• Personal site of Prof. Dr. Hans von Storch, an established expert in climatology, re Climategate: "...scientists like Mike Mann, Phil Jones and others should no longer participate in the peer-review process or in assessment activities like IPCC." Nov.21, 2009, under "News"

You have to take it with a grain of salt because he has a history with those involved at the CRU. Ignignot (talk) 21:50, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, note he repeatedly refers to them and himself as 'adversaries'. He would be more credible if he thought of his peers as 'colleagues', I think. --Nigelj (talk) 21:59, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Talk about selective quoting. "Another conclusion could be that scientists like Mike Mann, Phil Jones and others should no longer participate in the peer-review process or in assessment activities like IPCC." (emphasis mine). And while you are at von-Storch's site, check out his account of the Climate Research controversy and his opinion on the contentiouscrappy Soon & Baliunas article that exemplified CR's problem. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:12, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

You may want to have a look at this email, which van Storch has confirmed as legitimate: "Hans von Storch is partly to blame -- he encourages the publication of crap science 'in order to stimulate debate'." ... "... -- must get rid of von Storch too ..." -- Tom Wigley, copied to Phil Jones

Interesting reading, especially for those who feel this will blow over. Many more topics indexed here. Pete Tillman (talk) 22:18, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Is there something strange to call your opponent in a scientific debate an adversary? von Storch speaks about ethics, what imho is the main thing in this whole incidence. --J. Sketter (talk) 22:33, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Sadly also this was already 3 days old (quite soon after the incident). As a side note: any idea dividing the "reactions" -section to first reactions and later ones? --J. Sketter (talk) 22:51, 23 November 2009 (UTC)J. Sketter (talk) 00:36, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

It looks to me like the consensus here is clearly that this is not very important or relevant ('grain of salt', 'would be more credible if', 'selective quoting', 'already 3 days old' etc) Yet a para has appeared on it in some detail, with its own heading! Worse than that, it is only sourced from von Storch himself - primary source: von Storch on von Storch. And he is only 'mentioned' in the stolen documents. So I removed it, but it ia back again with 'please discuss on talk'. So here I am. How can you possibly justify a whole section on this one man: sourced to himself; undue weight? --Nigelj (talk) 23:15, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I see the section is continuing to get elaborated, but those who say, "pls use talk" are making no attempt to do so, just continuing to edit contrary to consensus here. --Nigelj (talk) 23:33, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes that is disappointing, why this unwillingness to participate in discussion?
—Apis (talk) 00:08, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

(ec)Not to mention that the reactions section is getting out of proportion, we can't quote every kooky person who has an opinion or the hundreds of people that happens to be mentioned in the stolen correspondence. This also raises wp:blp issues, storch is accusing the others of trying to destroy "Climate Research". How about we add that von Storch "encourages the publication of crap science 'in order to stimulate debate'." Should we quote people slandering away at each other? that would quickly get ridiculous.
—Apis (talk)

Apis: By calling Storch a kooky person, you have discredited yourself. please restrain from insults. 84.72.61.221 (talk) 00:36, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

00:04, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

• Van Storch is a central figure in current climate science; his opinion carries real weight. And it does appear that the "Hockey Team" targeted him: "must get rid of von Storch". I think that VS's opinion belongs in the article. Pete Tillman (talk) 00:30, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Fox News and CNN are not RS's?

Its like some editors aren’t even trying to hide their POV pushing anymore [6]. WVBluefield (talk) 22:42, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

That is certainly true, but probably not in the way you think William M. Connolley (talk) 23:09, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Edits related to research ... spelling, missing edit explanation, and sourcing

I accidentally hit "enter" while trying to restore the phrase "and keeping skeptics' research out of peer-review literature.". My intention was to add the phrase, and a citation. As I typed it in, I realized I was using the spelling"Skeptic", rather than "sceptic". (Is this an English issue?) While deciding how to handle the spelling, I accidentally hit enter, and added the phrase without an edit summary, thereby breaking my 100% edit summary streak. My next edit was to correct the spelling (except in links - I think I did it correctly, but if it is an UK spelling, feel free to revert.) I then added a WSJ source to back up the phrase. I gather that the phrase was removed because it was supported by Fox News. As per my read of this discussion Fox is acceptable.

I see Connolly has reverted the spelling. Sorry about that, I thought sceptic was simply an error, but apparently not.--SPhilbrickT 23:06, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

It is what we call "English", Brck William M. Connolley (talk) 23:10, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

As I said, sorry. My spell-checker agreed with my practice to use skeptic. Which doesn't make me right. However, while reverting the spelling change, you also removed a phrase supported by the citation I added. You questioned whether three are need? I haven't read the other two, but the statement about keeping stuff out of the literature was removed by you when you removed the Fox cite. So I found an alternative cite. I haven't checked to see if my cite covers the rest of the sentence, or if the other cites cover all points.--SPhilbrickT 23:19, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, that was an accident. Though as it happens I don't think it should be included, as unjustified William M. Connolley (talk) 23:35, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Removal of citation in response to Connolley edit summary query

WMC wondered whether three citations were needed for a single sentence. That sentence asserts six points. I've confirmed that the first five are covered by the Revkin article, and the sixth point is covered by the WSJ article. Accordingly, I removed what was footnote nine, also a WSJ article, as redundant.--SPhilbrickT 23:45, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Balance? or not?

I hastily added a sentence "Storch has been critical of Mann in the past." in an attempt to provide balance to the prior sentence in which Storch called for the recusal of Mann and Jones. My intention was to make it clear this was not someone making an unbiased call, but someone with a history of conflict with Mann. However, I'm not sure whether it is proving the balance I want. If anyone has any suggestions, please feel free to improve.--SPhilbrickT 23:51, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I think that the problem lies not in balance but in your notion that being critical about someone is equal to have a conflict with that person. second, your source, at least as I understand it, is more about scientific stuff and storch's critic of mann's work, not about the person himself (or did I overlook something?). to me that doesn't justify judging it an unbiased call. sources that go into the personal relationship between the two would be more appropriate. 84.72.61.221 (talk) 00:15, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Why is there little-to-no coverage of the actual contents of the e-mails?

Is there any particular reason why there's little-to-no coverage of what the e-mails actually said? By that, I mean actual quotes from the e-mails? Without that, it's difficult for the reader to understand what exactly all the fuss is about. If it's a question of sourcing, there are plenty: [7], [8], [9], [10], [11].

In particular, I suggest that we work the following into the article. (Note that I'm copying and pasting directly from news articles.)

In one e-mail, the center's director, Phil Jones, writes Pennsylvania State University's Michael E. Mann and questions whether the work of academics that question the link between human activities and global warming deserve to make it into the prestigious IPCC report, which represents the global consensus view on climate science.

"I can't see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report," Jones writes. "Kevin and I will keep them out somehow -- even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!"

In another, Jones and Mann discuss how they can pressure an academic journal not to accept the work of climate skeptics with whom they disagree. "Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal," Mann writes.

"I will be emailing the journal to tell them I'm having nothing more to do with it until they rid themselves of this troublesome editor," Jones replies.

In another e-mail posted online, and unrelated to Trenberth, the British research center's director, Phil Jones, wrote that he had used a "trick" to "hide the decline" in a chart detailing recent global temperatures. Jones has denied manipulating evidence and insisted his comment had been misunderstood. He said in a statement Saturday that he'd used the word trick "as in a clever thing to do."

In one of the stolen e-mails, Trenberth is quoted as saying "we can't account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can't."

He said the comment is presented by skeptics as evidence scientists can't explain some trends that appear to contradict their stance on climate change. Trenberth explained his phrase was actually contained in a paper he wrote about the need for better monitoring of global warming to explain the anomalies -- in particular improved recording of rising sea surface temperatures.

A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:42, 24 November 2009 (UTC)