The Dog Ate my Data

Oh no, here we go yet again. A panel has been set up by the University of East Anglia (UEA), called the Independent Climate Change Review, to investigate certain matters arising as a result of the leaked climategate emails involving Professor Phil Jones of the UEA. Already one of the panel, Dr Phillip Campbell has resigned due to allegations bringing into question his impartiality. Now the impartiality of another panel member, Professor Geoffrey Boulton has been called into question. Professor Boulton refutes the allegations and has refused to resign. For a synopsis of what’s going on over pop on over to Climate Audit.

The Review’s web site states:

The Review team


The Independent Climate Change Email Review is being conducted by an expert team, led by Sir Muir Russell KCB DL FRSE. The Review team has more than 100 years’ collective expertise of scientific research methodology and a wide range of scientific backgrounds.


None have any links to the Climatic Research Unit, or the United Nations’ Independent Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). More information about each of the review team members can be found in the Biographies section.

But look at Boulton’s CV available here. He worked for UEA where the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) is located for 18 years.

In addition, in direct violation of the Review’s own independence statement that none of the reviewers have any links to the IPCC, Boulton’s CV states that he was a contributor to G8 Preparatory Groups and Intergovernmental Panels on climate change. This alone warrants his resignation from the Review panel. Perhaps Boulton has just "padded" his CV or perhaps his CV refers to some other intergovernmental panels - either way it does not look good for Boulton or the "independent" review.

Why does this theme of trickery, underhandedness, ethical shortcomings and outright untruthfulness seem to follow AGW peddlers like a bad smell. This Review panel so far gives me that bad feeling you get when you have just stepped in something nasty on the pavement. Is there nothing about AGW that is open, verifiable, testable, ethical and honest. I am getting totally fed up with the underhanded methods employed, the failure to fully and openly declare associations and funding, the breach of ethics and the breach of common decency that seems to pervade these people. They disgust me.

Surely it cannot be that hard to organise a review panel that is beyond repute, that is unless of course the outcome has already been decided. With one member already forced to resign and a second under a cloud perhaps the best course of action is to scrap this panel, replace Sir John Muir who does not seem to have much luck at organising impartial panels, and set up a new panel that will hold an open enquiry. That is the only way this investigation is going to have any credibility. A closed investigation stacked with AGW proponents into something as important as this is not just a total waste of time, it is a joke. I would like to see a panel with a range of skills including a reputable legal professional with a proven record of impartial moderation, an ethicist, a science historian as well as a couple of hard core scientists. I won’t hold my breath on that one.

If the science community keep this up they only way they are going to get public funding soon will be to run lemonade stands in their spare time.