Magazine Editor and Former Global Warming Alarmist: "I Feel Like I've Been Had"

Tipster ArthurK. says to expect more of these mea culpas.

Because of manmade global warming, I warned in 1996, that “sea levels could rise as much as three feet by the year 2100 … warming can lead to hotter and more frequent heat waves … stronger and more frequent hurricanes to Hawai‘i … endanger native plants species [and] coral reefs.” These dire predictions came from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Researchers at the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia provide much of the IPCC’s analysis and predictions. In November 2009, hackers released thousands of e-mails from the CRU, going back years, and it is these e-mails that reveal the very unscientific, unethical activities I described above.

I feel I’ve been had.

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This doesn’t necessarily mean manmade global warming is disproven. But it does deflate the certainty and moral righteousness of the Al Gores and the IPCCs of the world. At Copenhagen and in Congress, politicians have proposed massive disruptions to our economies and lifestyles in the name of halting global warming. It turns out they’ve been doing so, at least partly, with books that have been cooked more than the planet.

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People make these kinds of mistakes all the time, and the motives are no mystery. For the researchers, grant dollars and reputations are on the line. For reporters, global warming offers the thrill of covering The Biggest Story Ever Told, an appeal I could not resist. For politicians, it has offered an endless opportunity for grandstanding and power grabs. Convinced they are saving the earth—what could be more rewarding or important?—all three groups helped each other lose their minds.

It’s time for scientists to do what science is all about: check their work to see if the results can be reproduced. Fresh eyes need to look at the original data the CRU used, to see if they can independently find the same evidence for warming. But wait—that can’t be done. Somehow, the CRU managed to “lose” all its original data.

How’s that for an inconvenient truth?

Meanwhile, Chris Horner finally got his longstanding FOIA request for NASA's GISS data answered. He hints NASA's just another motley CRU:

Andrew Revkin has an item up today at the New York Times's Dot Earth blog on our expanded inquiry into NASA's problems with temperature-data management and manipulation. He addresses a FOIA request of mine first sent to NASA late in the afternoon of January 26. Remember that timing for a moment.

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In response to Andy's piece this morning, someone commented to me how fascinating it was for NASA to run to the New York Times over the weekend, after waiting two years to respond to my opening request for documents that, as I will soon detail, are disturbing and in a few cases even damning in their content (incidentally, on Friday I filed our appeal of NASA's substantial refusals to provide other documents responsive to the initial August 2007 and January 2008 requests, and expect to litigate later this month immediately upon their affirmation of the refusal, if that is indeed the route they choose).

Yes, that was prompt for an agency that couldn't quite seem to find time to attend to my earlier requests. The thing about that is, Andy contacted me the morning of the next day after I sent the FOIA, in the later afternoon. Which means NASA actually contacted him about it, oh, immediately.

Panic.

Thanks to EdwardR. for that.

posted by Ace at 02:30 PM

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