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posted by cmn32480 on Monday February 06 2017, @05:58PM   Printer-friendly
from the we-need-a-full-copy-of-production-for-testing dept.

A high-level whistleblower has told this newspaper that America's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) breached its own rules on scientific integrity when it published the sensational but flawed report, aimed at making the maximum possible impact on world leaders including Barack Obama and David Cameron at the UN climate conference in Paris in 2015.

The report claimed that the 'pause' or 'slowdown' in global warming in the period since 1998 – revealed by UN scientists in 2013 – never existed, and that world temperatures had been rising faster than scientists expected. Launched by NOAA with a public relations fanfare, it was splashed across the world's media, and cited repeatedly by politicians and policy makers.

But the whistleblower, Dr John Bates, a top NOAA scientist with an impeccable reputation, has shown The Mail on Sunday irrefutable evidence that the paper was based on misleading, 'unverified' data.

It was never subjected to NOAA's rigorous internal evaluation process – which Dr Bates devised.

His vehement objections to the publication of the faulty data were overridden by his NOAA superiors in what he describes as a 'blatant attempt to intensify the impact' of what became known as the Pausebuster paper.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-4192182/World-leaders-duped-manipulated-global-warming-data.html

More details can be found in his own words here:

They promised to begin an archive request for the K15 datasets that were not archived; however I have not been able to confirm they have been archived. I later learned that the computer used to process the software had suffered a complete failure, leading to a tongue-in-cheek joke by some who had worked on it that the failure was deliberate to ensure the result could never be replicated.

https://judithcurry.com/2017/02/04/climate-scientists-versus-climate-data/


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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by jmorris on Monday February 06 2017, @07:48PM

    by jmorris (4844) on Monday February 06 2017, @07:48PM (#463593)

    Bates is not a NOAA scientist

    And yet again you prove SJWs Always Lie , in this case your handle. From the end of the second link:

    John Bates received his Ph.D. in Meteorology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1986. Post Ph.D., he spent his entire career at NOAA, until his retirement in 2016. He spent the last 14 years of his career at NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center (now NCEI) as a Principal Scientist, where he served as a Supervisory Meteorologist until 2012.

    Now you will scream and deflect. Please prove me wrong... but you won't.

    The most disturbing line for me was this one:

    Some on the Science Council, particularly the younger scientists, indicated they had not known of the Science requirement to archive data and were not aware of the open data movement.

    These people are in positions of responsibility in Science and apparently don't even know how Science works. Kinda confirms everything I have been saying about the state of Science today. So instead of a detailed post I'm just going to drop the mic.

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  • (Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Monday February 06 2017, @09:11PM

    by Zz9zZ (1348) on Monday February 06 2017, @09:11PM (#463660)

    Meh

    The article is riddled with "quoted phrases" and emotional language more fitting to rehtoric. It lacks detail, has no sources, and even the conclusions they draw themselves are nowhere near the emotional reaction they are trying to get:

    For the period 2000 to 2014, the paper increased the rate of warming on land from 0.15C to 0.164C per decade.
    ....
    Now, some of those same authors have produced the pending, revised new version of the sea dataset – ERSSTv5. A draft of a document that explains the methods used to generate version 5, and which has been seen by this newspaper, indicates the new version will reverse the flaws in version 4, changing the buoy adjustments and including some satellite data and measurements from a special high-tech floating buoy network known as Argo. As a result, it is certain to show reductions in both absolute temperatures and recent global warming.
    ....
    Like Climategate, this scandal is likely to reverberate around the world, and reignite some of science’s most hotly contested debates.

    The difference in the temperatures after being adjusted back down are not that great, the global average is still increasing by a wide margin. They admit that scientists are revising their models, as scientists do every year, and try and make it seem like a reaction to Mr. Bates "SHOCKING" claims. "It is certain to show.." so they are scientists now? They know the future? Uh huh... more like pandering to their target audience.

    This scandal will reverberate only with ignorant people who think this confirms the university based illuminati trying to undermine oil and coal for... reasons...? The scientifically literate will say "Hmm, things are still warming quite a bit and we still need to get a handle on pollution and greenhouse gases." Worst case for NOAA, some inquiries into their process. If someone intentionally bumped the numbers up (I don't see why they should bother but ok) then I do hope it is addressed and NOAA is more careful in the future.

    Overall result for deniers: crazies think their crazy is confirmed. Instead of seeing the small correction to the warming trend that this is, deniers will assume this somehow means all warming trends are false. The big bad government is doing stuff to harm energy companies because they are secretly in bed with China trying to help their solar market... for "reasons", and so Trump should join together with Russia and start WWIII with China.

    Overall result for normal people: Global warming is still real, NOAA not immune to "possibly" (facts and sources please) manipulating data to promote a political position. I won't villify them though, as long as they aren't actually making the trend say the temperature is dropping when it isn't. I see this as trying to shock people into waking up and taking action on climate change. I don't like the idea that they would intentionally change data and relevant parties should be suspended or let go if that did happen.

    More likely, Bates is politically fishing and we are only hearing the most outlandish version of this story. Were there valid reasons for adjusting buoy data with shipboard measurements? The air at sea level could have a warmer layer whereas the ships are much higher off the water and might have a more accurate reading for the local temperature. Intentional malfeasance, or simply data processing that requires some critical thinking to understand?

    It is safe to ignore this report, the corrected data still upholds the warming trend so nothing has changed, just more click bait to outrage conservatives so they'll follow Trump even more blindly. Go ahead Jmorris, drop that mic and never pick it back up!

    --
    ~Tilting at windmills~
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 11 2017, @05:38PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 11 2017, @05:38PM (#465830)

    Hey, you're full of shit as usual. Bates himself confirmed this story is a giant steaming pile of lies / propaganda / fake news. Care to take back your I'll conceived notions?