Defending Good Science

May, 2005

Beating Science with a Stick

There are very few "junk science" issues debated as emotionally and strongly as climate change.  We've heard the hysterical claims for years now - the earth is getting warmer.  Heck - Greenpeace tried to claim Manhattan would be underwater within 100 years unless we acted immediately.

Call me a skeptic, but I believe that the "global warming" debacle may be one of the largest frauds in recent memory. The more entertaining reference to this is with the "hockey stick" graph.  Michael Taube cites the case brilliantly in a recent Toronto Sun article, and has allowed me to share parts of his article:

Previously, scientists and environmental groups touted one scientific theory to justify their claim of global warming – the so-called “hockey stick” theory developed in 1998 by Prof. Michael Mann of the University of Virginia.

Mann, an environmental scientist, plotted temperature change in the northern hemisphere for the last 1,000 years.

He claimed that weather conditions remained fairly stable until the 20th century, when the temperature began to shoot up.  This curvature, which visibly created the effect of a hockey stick, showed that we were living in a period of warmer weather. The hockey stick theory initially received huge support within the scientific community, and Mann’s findings were published in scientific journals.

It successfully passed two peer reviews at the United Nations’ International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), making global warming the new international cause celebre. Mann’s theory also led to the birth and approval of the Kyoto protocol, an attempt to combat global warming by reducing man made  “greenhouse gas” emissions like carbon dioxide, thought to the be the major cause of the global warming phenomenon.

To be sure, the “hockey stick” theory had its skeptics. But, at first, the IPCC wouldn’t pay any attention to them and scientific journals wouldn’t publish their research.

Now, thanks largely to two Canadian researchers, that’s all changed.  Due to their efforts, the hockey stick theory is now being widely challenged in the scientific community as an incomplete, flawed and ultimately invalid piece of research.

In January, University of Guelph economics professor Ross McKitrick and Toronto-based mineral exploration consultant Stephen McIntyre had their own article accepted in the important scientific journal, Geophysical Research Letters (the journal that published one of Mann’s earliest hockey stick papers).  What they discovered helped snap Mann’s hockey stick into pieces. Here are just a few of their findings.

• No academic or institution attempted to independently replicate the hockey stick theory before coming out in support of it.  For all the billions of dollars spent on climate research, the theory was, incredibly, simply accepted as fact.

• When McIntyre tried to get the data from Mann in 2003, he was told by the lead author that he had “forgotten” the exact location.  One of Mann’s colleagues said it would have to be compiled since it didn’t exist in one spot.  McIntyre thought this “bizarre,” since he assumed “they would have some type of due-diligence package for the IPCC on hand.”   They didn’t, because the IPCC hadn’t actually verified it.

• Finally, key statistics in the hockey stick study were called into question. Since reliable temperature measurements have only been available since 1850, today’s researchers use “proxies” such as tree rings to help determine global warming.  Mann said he had used 112 proxies, but McIntyre countered that 35 were never used.  Then, in 2003, five years after his initial study, Mann said he had used 159 proxies, a number never before disclosed.

Here’s the kicker.  McIntyre and McKitrick also discovered that the weather in the 15th century was actually warmer than in the 20th century. They found that out by replicating Mann’s temperature calculations on their own.

So now, the environmental science community is up in arms.

Mann’s theory still has supporters, but a growing number of climate experts are questioning it.

Unfortunately, the costly and ineffective by-product of this apparently flawed theory, Kyoto, came into effect in February.

Link of the Month

The Friends of Science

'Friends of Science' is an organization of "active and retired geologists, engineers, earth scientists and other professionals, not to mention concerned Canadians, who believe the science behind the Kyoto Protocol is questionable."

It's an interesting resource with many references to technical papers, online publications and scientific journals.

It would be nice to see more of an international flavour regarding membership, but given that the USA isn't going to be ratifying Kyoto anytime soon, one would assume there isn't a need.

http://www.friendsofscience.org

Talk To Us!

Bad things can happen to good companies.
When it happens, the smart companies call Checkmate Public Affairs.

Checkmate Public Affairs specializes in ‘Defending Good Science.’  We manage issues.  And we deliver results, because we love what we do, and are fanatic believers in mind-blowing customer service.   

Checkmate is dedicated to assisting corporations with science-based risk & crisis communications and issues management.   We are a small firm with a niche practice – which means we aren’t loaded with the overhead and complicated structures of many big agencies.

Visit the "Defending Good Science" blog, for a light-hearted look at junk science issues throughout the month...

Jeff Chatterton, President
Checkmate Public Affairs

Phone (519) 342-0025
Tollfree (877) 284-7952
Fax (519) 342-1221

Sign up for the "Defending Good Science" newsletter by clicking here.