Let’s face it. While these emails are highly embarrassing to the scientists who wrote them, this is no smoking gun by any stretch.
AGW scientists want to brush this scandal aside as an anomaly. Fact Check.org concluded that that even if the data from the CRU is tainted, the preponderance of evidence from other sources is so vast that the CRU data can be dismissed and the AGW theory still holds firm.
Not so fast. The Fact Check story is a deplorable example of "objective journalism." At a time when world leaders are meeting at this very moment in Copenhagen in hopes of creating a world governing body, and want to establish a world currency of carbon credits, this issue becomes much more serious that simply arguing over scientific theory. This has the potential to affect every aspect of our daily lives. Certainly this is the end state for many people on the AGW side, as they seek an entirely new paradigm of modern existence.
The ClimateGate scandal does raise some very troubling questions about the claims these scientists have been making for twenty years, and about their peer review process. Further, there is nothing in the emails that exonerate the scientists from the allegation that AGW, at least among the circles of Phil Jones and the CRU, might actually be a conspiracy. Indeed, we cannot rule that out.
First, the CRU has claimed that 95 percent of their data is freely available. That claim is categorically false. The CRU has not been transparent at all, which is proven in their emails in which Phil Jones asks his colleagues to destroy their emails. The CRU has repeatedly and consistently stonewalled the Freedom of Information inquiry, cherry-picking the data they have released thus far. Further, the CRU has failed to disclose its raw data, and refused to release their computer programs used to analyze their data. When the computer coding was discovered by the hacked emails, computer programmers analyzed it, and it was found to be in an atrocious mess.
Second, scores, even hundreds of scientists have dissented on many aspects of AGW theory. Some scientists (even AGW scientists) claim the Earth is now in a cooling phase. While still others believe the Earth is warming, they disagree whether the cause is human-induced.
Third, even if all the claims of AGW were unanimous, the AGW advocates claim that consensus does not change the science. True. So why are they are the first ones to cite consensus on AGW theory? At one time we had widespread consensus on the Ptolemic model of the of the universe, which placed the Earth at the center of the solar system.
Fourth, AGW advocates claim the problems with data are only isolated to the CRU of East Anglia University. This is also categorically false. For example, Chris Horner, a senior fellow at the Competative Enterprise Institute, filed a FOIA request for raw data to NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, of which the director Jim Hansen has stonewalled for two years.
Fifth, you have allegations of unfair peer review process. Just ask Douglas Keenan, a mathematician at SUNY who claims he was blackballed by Phil Jones and the CRU.
Further, there are questionable temperature adjustments made by New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric research. All of these sources contributed to the 2007 IPCC report, which calls to question the validity of the entire IPCC report itself.
It is impossible for us to determine the motives behind these scientists’ actions. Does this scandal reveal a conspiracy of scientists on a global scale? Highly unlikely. More likely the scientists may have been contaminated by collective group think. If any conspiracy existed, it was likely limited to Phil Jones and his circles of the CRU, as evidenced by his desire to delete emails.
There is no question that this global community on Earth must take care of the environment which nourishes us and gives us life. We must drastically curb our emissions and pollution. But no one has explained to me how selling a carbon credit to Ethiopia will save the planet.
In real science, the burden of proof is always on the proposer, not on the skeptics. Considering the doubt cast upon AGW theory by these emails and other troubling evidence in the entire climatology community, the burden of proof now resides upon the global warming scientists.
After all this, is it unreasonable for us to ask for more evidence? Does the information currently available justify relinquishing our nation's sovereignty to a global world government?
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