LONDON – E-mails stolen from climate scientists show they stonewalled skeptics and discussed hiding data — but the messages don't support claims that the science of global warming was faked, according to an exhaustive review by The Associated Press.

The 1,073 e-mails examined by the AP show that scientists harbored private doubts, however slight and fleeting, even as they told the world they were certain about climate change. However, the exchanges don't undercut the vast body of evidence showing the world is warming because of man-made greenhouse gas emissions.

The scientists were keenly aware of how their work would be viewed and used, and, just like politicians, went to great pains to shape their message. Sometimes, they sounded more like schoolyard taunts than scientific tenets.

The scientists were so convinced by their own science and so driven by a cause "that unless you're with them, you're against them," said Mark Frankel, director of scientific freedom, responsibility and law at the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He also reviewed the communications.

Frankel saw "no evidence of falsification or fabrication of data, although concerns could be raised about some instances of very 'generous interpretations.'"

Some e-mails expressed doubts about the quality of individual temperature records or why models and data didn't quite match. Part of this is the normal give-and-take of research, but skeptics challenged how reliable certain data was.

The e-mails were stolen from the computer network server of the climate research unit at the University of East Anglia in southeast England, an influential source of climate science, and were posted online last month. The university shut down the server and contacted the police.

The AP studied all the e-mails for context, with five reporters reading and rereading them — about 1 million words in total.

One of the most disturbing elements suggests an effort to avoid sharing scientific data with critics skeptical of global warming. It is not clear if any data was destroyed; two U.S. researchers denied it.

The e-mails show that several mainstream scientists repeatedly suggested keeping their research materials away from opponents who sought it under American and British public records law. It raises a science ethics question because free access to data is important so others can repeat experiments as part of the scientific method. The University of East Anglia is investigating the blocking of information requests.

"I believe none of us should submit to these 'requests,'" declared the university's Keith Briffa. The center's chief, Phil Jones, wrote: "Data is covered by all the agreements we sign with people, so I will be hiding behind them."

When one skeptic kept filing FOI requests, Jones, who didn't return AP requests for comment, told another scientist, Michael Mann: "You can delete this attachment if you want. Keep this quiet also, but this is the person who is putting FOI requests for all e-mails Keith (Briffa) and Tim (Osborn) have written."

Mann, a researcher at Penn State University, told The Associated Press: "I didn't delete any e-mails as Phil asked me to. I don't believe anybody else did."

The e-mails also show how professional attacks turned very personal. When former London financial trader Douglas J. Keenan combed through the data used in a 1990 research paper Jones had co-authored, Keenan claimed to have found evidence of fakery by Jones' co-author. Keenan threatened to have the FBI arrest University at Albany scientist Wei-Chyung Wang for fraud. (A university investigation later cleared him of any wrongdoing.)

"I do now wish I'd never sent them the data after their FOIA request!" Jones wrote in June 2007.

In another case after initially balking on releasing data to a skeptic because it was already public, Lawrence Livermore National Lab scientist Ben Santer wrote that he then opted to release everything the skeptic wanted — and more. Santer said in a telephone interview that he and others are inundated by frivolous requests from skeptics that are designed to "tie-up government-funded scientists."

The e-mails also showed a stunning disdain for global warming skeptics.

One scientist practically celebrates the news of the death of one critic, saying, "In an odd way this is cheering news!" Another bemoans that the only way to deal with skeptics is "continuing to publish quality work in quality journals (or calling in a Mafia hit.)" And a third scientist said the next time he sees a certain skeptic at a scientific meeting, "I'll be tempted to beat the crap out of him. Very tempted."

And they compared contrarians to communist-baiting Sen. Joseph McCarthy and Somali pirates. They also called them out-and-out frauds.

Santer, who received death threats after his work on climate change in 1996, said Thursday: "I'm not surprised that things are said in the heat of the moment between professional colleagues. These things are taken out of context."

When the journal, Climate Research, published a skeptical study, Penn State scientist Mann discussed retribution this way: "Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal."

That skeptical study turned out to be partly funded by the American Petroleum Institute.

The most provocative e-mails are usually about one aspect of climate science: research from a decade ago that studied how warm or cold it was centuries ago through analysis of tree rings, ice cores and glacial melt. And most of those e-mails, which stretch from 1996 to last month, are from about a handful of scientists in dozens of e-mails.

Still, such research has been a key element in measuring climate change over long periods.

As part of the AP review, summaries of the e-mails that raised issues from the potential manipulation of data to intensely personal attacks were sent to seven experts in research ethics, climate science and science policy.

"This is normal science politics, but on the extreme end, though still within bounds," said Dan Sarewitz, a science policy professor at Arizona State University. "We talk about science as this pure ideal and the scientific method as if it is something out of a cookbook, but research is a social and human activity full of all the failings of society and humans, and this reality gets totally magnified by the high political stakes here."

In the past three weeks since the e-mails were posted, longtime opponents of mainstream climate science have repeatedly quoted excerpts of about a dozen e-mails. Republican congressmen and former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin have called for either independent investigations, a delay in U.S. Environmental Protection Agency regulation of greenhouse gases or outright boycotts of the Copenhagen international climate talks. They cited a "culture of corruption" that the e-mails appeared to show.

That is not what the AP found. There were signs of trying to present the data as convincingly as possible.

One e-mail that skeptics have been citing often since the messages were posted online is from Jones. He says: "I've just completed Mike's (Mann) trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (from 1981 onward) and from 1961 for Keith's to hide the decline."

Jones was referring to tree ring data that indicated temperatures after the 1950s weren't as warm as scientists had determined.

The "trick" that Jones said he was borrowing from Mann was to add the real temperatures, not what the tree rings showed. And the decline he talked of hiding was not in real temperatures, but in the tree ring data which was misleading, Mann explained.

Sometimes the data didn't line up as perfectly as scientists wanted.

David Rind told colleagues about inconsistent figures in the work for a giant international report: "As this continuing exchange has clarified, what's in Chapter 6 is inconsistent with what is in Chapter 2 (and Chapter 9 is caught in the middle!). Worse yet, we've managed to make global warming go away! (Maybe it really is that easy...:)."

But in the end, global warming didn't go away, according to the vast body of research over the years.

None of the e-mails flagged by the AP and sent to three climate scientists viewed as moderates in the field changed their view that global warming is man-made and a threat. Nor did it alter their support of the conclusions of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which some of the scientists helped write.

"My overall interpretation of the scientific basis for (man-made) global warming is unaltered by the contents of these e-mails," said Gabriel Vecchi, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientist.

Gerald North, a climate scientist at Texas A&M University, headed a National Academy of Sciences study that looked at — and upheld as valid — Mann's earlier studies that found the 1990s were the hottest years in centuries.

"In my opinion the meaning is much more innocent than might be perceived by others taken out of context. Much of this is overblown," North said.

Mann contends he always has been upfront about uncertainties, pointing to the title of his 1999 study: "Northern Hemisphere Temperatures During the Past Millennium: Inferences, Uncertainties and Limitations."

Several scientists found themselves tailoring their figures or retooling their arguments to answer online arguments — even as they claimed not to care what was being posted to the Internet

"I don't read the blogs that regularly," Jonathan Overpeck of the University of Arizona wrote in 2005. "But I guess the skeptics are making hay of their (sic) being a global warm (sic) event around 1450AD."

One person singled out for criticism in the e-mails is Steve McIntyre, who maintains Climate Audit. The blog focuses on statistical issues with scientists' attempts to recreate the climate in ancient times.

"We find that the authors are overreaching in the conclusions that they're trying to draw from the data that they have," McIntyre said in a telephone interview.

McIntyre, 62, of Toronto, was trained in math and economics and says he is "substantially retired" from the mineral exploration industry, which produces greenhouse gases.

Some e-mails said McIntyre's attempts to get original data from scientists are frivolous and meant more for harassment than doing good science. There are allegations that he would distort and misuse data given to him.

McIntyre disagreed with how he is portrayed. "Everything that I've done in this, I've done in good faith," he said.

He also said he has avoided editorializing on the leaked e-mails. "Anything I say," he said, "is liable to be piling on."

The skeptics started the name-calling said Mann, who called McIntyre a "bozo," a "fraud" and a "moron" in various e-mails.

"We're human," Mann said. "We've been under attack unfairly by these people who have been attempting to dismiss us as frauds as liars.

The AP is mentioned several times in the e-mails, usually in reference to a published story. One scientist says his remarks were reported with "a bit of journalistic license" and "I would have rephrased or re-expressed some of what was written if I had seen it before it was released." The archive also includes a request from an AP reporter, one of the writers of this story, for reaction to a study, a standard step for journalists seeking quotes for their stories.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091212/ap_on_sc/climate_e_mails;_ylt=
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The science was faked. Your topic headline is a complete lie.

Just look in to Professor Lindzen, of MIT , foremost expert on climate to give you the truth on AGW.

Might I start you off on your investigation with this 30 min presentation by him?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmGiiNQ0yHQ

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/08/the-smoking-gun-at-darwin-zero/

the article has many pictures so i wont copy and paste here as they are of charts.... but to get you started.....

The Smoking Gun At Darwin Zero
12 December, 2009

by Willis Eschenbach

People keep saying “Yes, the Climategate scientists behaved badly. But that doesn’t mean the data is bad. That doesn’t mean the earth is not warming.”

.....

Is it any wonder many climate scientist say things like this?


One scientist practically celebrates the news of the death of one critic, saying, "In an odd way this is cheering news!" Another bemoans that the only way to deal with skeptics is "continuing to publish quality work in quality journals (or calling in a Mafia hit.)" And a third scientist said the next time he sees a certain skeptic at a scientific meeting, "I'll be tempted to beat the crap out of him. Very tempted."


LMAO

..maybe they should start equipping every aircraft with some sort of hepa filter chit sucking device and help clean up the air a little..while they fly around..just like the giant windmills ..they could build giant hepa filter chit suckin' devices and help purify the air a little..of course these are just a couple of ways..sure beats bitchin' about it...

..they could even attach the giant hepa suckers to the top of skyscrapers ..every little bit helps..maybe crazy,silly..or maybe genius..i'm leaning towards the latter..but i could be bias,after all these are my ideas..pat pending..lol

Science is not religion. The TRUTH HAS nothing to do with science.

Lindzen as a scientist, and avowed denier of global warming, which is his science given right, has no business peddling his 'work' as THE THRUTH, and people aware of and/or endorsing his work have no business miss-packaging it as THE TRUTH.

Science questions, validates, and PROPOSES what it can demonstrate as MOST PROBABLE!!! Truth has nothing to do with MOST PROBABLE. Science keeps questioning, through a healthy spirit of applied skepticism, any statistically accepted 'MOST PROBABLE'.

The scientific means of establishing that which is 'most probable' at any given moment, is the volume of 'scientific consensus' vs 'counter scientific consensus' on any issue.

Personal opinions, public surveys and individual biases, subjective convictions and dogmatic beliefs are of absolutely no relevance in the scientific discourse.

As for the global warming question, there is no more debate within the scientific community.

There is an overwhelming number of 'eligible' scientific candidates whom have presented and defended their findings amongst peers, pointing to global warming as 'MOST PROBALBE', measuring up against an insignificant proportion of equally eligible scientists, presenting and defending their opposition or downright denial.

That simple! Overwhelming eligible members of the scientific community presenting and defending successfully a converging number of varied SCIENTIFIC perspectives, ELECTS THAT WHICH IS PROBABLE.

Given the permanent probing, questioning and skeptical nature of science, it always welcomes and encourages 'expert dissension'. Unlike religion that would excommunicate any questioning and dissension against dogma.

Like it or not, agree with it or not, believe it or not, does not enter into this equation.
Statistical 'scientific support' establishes that which is 'MOST PROBABLE', in spite of the 'welcomed' and on-going small proportion of dissenting positions, or downright 'dirty tricks' from questionable foes (e-mail fabricated scandal)!

it doesnt really matter now

the public now has the perception that data was manipulated and faked. rightly or wrongly they believe that now

and its gonna be tough to overcome that now

Most of the public are more intelligent than to believe a few emails about a few sets of data represent the 10's of thousands data sets collected by thousands of different Universities and Scientists world wide.

If they do believe it then I feel sorry for them.

I seriously question the methods, or 'convenient' polls that would support YOUR PERSONAL PERCEPTION of the public perception you propose above.

What is founded however about public perception, is that it is filtered through high cynicism and skepticism about anything communities of 'experts', 'businessmen' or 'politicians' present it with.

But let's take YOUR PERSONAL PERCEPTION of public opinion for argument sake's.
If the public perception were to fall for the 'convenient' and unfounded dogma of denialists, and go against scientific 'most probable' proposition, then the public perception is not only irresponsibly 'unfounded', but it is accelerating humanity's walk towards self-destruction.

This is no longer about global warming. This about humanity as whole being responsible for distinguishing 'most probable' and acting on it collectively, as opposed to defending individual 'delusional obsessions', and doing nothing.

people who do anything for "arguments sake" annoy the crap out of me

every little thing is not subject for argument for arguments sake

if you don't agree just say so

I don't play debater games

'... I don't play debater games...'

Well then, share your wonderful opinions with yourself and stay out of discussion forums.

This is not a polling station, it's a DISCUSSION - ARGUMENT - DEBATING FORUM !!! It is intended for those whom wish to discuss, exchange, argue and debate opposing views and ideas.

And no offense intended, but get real about your tantrums:
'... annoy the crap out of me...'.
I have no personal interest in 'your crap', nor do I have any personal interest in you. We don't know each other. I responded to a comment you posted, with an OPPOSING view. It would appear you missed that too.

The Left Fell into the Climate Morass
http://mises.org/daily/3927
It might take a while to sink in, but the global-warming cause is on the skids. Two issues are taking the whole project down: it is getting cooler not warmer (and hence the change of the rhetoric to a vague concern over "climate change"); the email scandal of a few weeks back proved that this really is an opinion cartel with preset views not driven by science.
Oh sure, people are saying that climategate is not really very serious and is only being exploited by Fox News and the like. And it's true that not all measures of global temperature show cooling and that the science can be complex.
On that basis, the New York Times urges us to ignore the outpouring:
It is also important not to let one set of purloined e-mail messages undermine the science and the clear case for action, in Washington and in Copenhagen.
Yes, a clear case. Come on. The whole political agenda of these people is now being seriously questioned. It is no longer a slam-dunk case that we are going to have world central planning in order to control the climate and protect the holy earth from the effects of industrialization. Oh, and tax us good and hard in the process.
But you know what is most tragic to me about this? This whole hysteria led to a fantastic diversion of energy on the left side of the political spectrum. Instead of working against war and the police state, issues on which the Left tends to be pretty good, instincts were diverted to the preposterous cause of creating a statist system for global thermometer management.
The effort to whip everyone up into a frenzy over this began more than ten years ago. Every lefty fundraising letter harped on the issue, and demanded people commit their lives to it, explaining that if mother earth dies then all is lost. It is a more important issue than all the rest, the litmus test to determine whether you are a friend or an enemy.
This made it very difficult for libertarians to cooperate with the Left over the last years. Sure, there are some libertarian ideas for dealing with pollution, but none as compelling as central planning, and there was never any way that we would go along with that idea. The costs associated with dismantling industrial civilization outweigh even the worst-case global-warming scenario.
And methodologically, the whole thing was always nuts. If we can't determine cause and effect now with certainty, how in the heck will we be able to determine it after the world state controls our carbon emissions and impoverishes us in the process? No one will ever be in a position to say whether the policy worked or failed. That is not a good basis for enacting legislation.
Meanwhile, the Left threw everything it had into this hysteria. Protests, letters, billions in spending, frenzy, moral passion, mania, witch hunts – you name it. You would swear that climate change was the issue of the millennium for these people.
Meanwhile, the police state has made unbelievable advances in the last ten years. We all live today in fear of the state's "security" apparatus. Airports have become living chapters in a dystopian novel. The local police treat us like potential terrorists. Crossing the US border is becoming reminiscent of East Germany. You can't go anywhere without your papers.
And where has the Left been while the whole world was being Nazified? Worrying about my barbecue grill out back.
Then there is the war issue. The scary George Bush started war after war and kept them going to bolster his own power and prestige, creating as many enemies as possible through provocations and making up enemies if he had to. He funded a bubble that wrecked the economy and destroyed country after country in the name of justice and peace.
And what followed Bush? A president who repudiated this ghastly legacy? No, Obama is a supporter of the same wars and continues them — even ramps them up. Does the Left consider him a bad guy? Not really. With a handful of exceptions, his critics on the Left are friendly critics. They are glad to put up with this because he is willing to do their bidding on the climate-change front.
You think Democrat politicians don't exploit this? They surely do. In this sense, the climate issue is much like the pro-life cause on the Right. If a politician pushes the correct buttons, it doesn't matter what else they say or do. They are no longer looked at with a critical eye.
The American Left has long forgotten its roots. As Arthur Ekirch has explained, the Left sold its soul to the state with the New Deal. Whereas it once opposed regimentation and industrial management of society, it turned around to support exactly that. War was the next issue to go. The New Left in the 1960s held out the hope of capturing some of that early love of liberty on the Left, even the anarchist impulse, but the New Left didn't last long. It was eventually swallowed up by machine politics.
The Left today that supports world government to stop climate change bears little resemblance to the Left of 100 years ago, which favored civil liberties and social liberality and was willing to do anything to end war. Now it has diverted its energies to a preposterously unworkable scheme based on pseudoscience. This is a terrible tragedy.
The Left still has much to contribute to American public life. It can oppose the police state and the militarization of society. It can favor human liberty in most every area of life, even if it hasn't made its peace with the free market. Most of all, it can oppose American imperialism. But before it recaptures the spirit of its youth, it has to get rid of the preposterous idea that it should support the total state to manage what every generation has always known is unmanageable.

pffft

bite me

I post what I want, when I want, where I want, and if you don't like that it's a YP not a MP

we already have enough people who just want to argue to hear the sound of their own voice

Thank you Llewellyn H. Rockwell Jr., chairman of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, promoting 'Classical Liberalism' in America.

And this is just one more personal opinion, attempting to 'SPIN' the topic and shape it to its perspective of things.

Confusion galore!!! Climate from the scientific perspective is no longer the heart of the matter here.

Instead we are presented with yet another sort of conspiracy ploy, with all the gusto of loss of freedom, police state, American Imperialism.

'... THE CORRUPTED POLITICIANS, THROUGH ITS POLICE STATE ARMADA, WILL IMPOSE ABSOLUTE CONTROL OF THE AVERAGE FREEDOM FIGHTING AMERICAN PATRIOT, WITH THE CLIMATE SCARE PLOY!!!...'

How much kool-aid is there out there, and how many are drinking it???

Paranoiac behavior, is not an dimension that science was ever designed to deal with. Neither was politics, nor 'Classical Liberalism'. Let's kill mental states of confusion and delusion. Let's stop mixing and confusing everything just to serve our unfounded obsessive individual compulsions.

Bull's eye!!! Nothing to add your honour!

heavenlyboy34

Llewellyn H. Rockwell Jr.. the Author of that opinion is a known anti-environmentalist.
He has called environmentalism "an ideology as pitiless and Messianic as Marxism."
As an aide to Ron Paul he has developed a philosophy whereby he advocates federalist concepts as a means of promoting freedom from central government.
He also advocates secession for the same political decentralist reasons.

The sentence, "Two issues are taking the whole project down: it is getting cooler not warmer (and hence the change of the rhetoric to a vague concern over "climate change")
Proves he has no idea what Global warming is about. Anyone who makes this statement is uninformed.

Then he says it, the jest of his ignorance and motivations,
"the email scandal of a few weeks back proved that this really is an opinion cartel with preset views not driven by science."

LOL
The emails have been proven to prove nothing to change the facts.
Even if the claim were true in the emails, it would only represent a few sets of data of the more than 28,000 sets of data collected.

"an ideology as pitiless and Messianic as Marxism."

Yep.... that about sums it up..

A smoking pile of fraudulent nonsense..

it sounds to me as though it's YOU who is having the tantrum.

i've nothing to add but that; wanna tell me to FO too?