Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Why the Climategate controversy matters…

The leaked emails suggest that Projection and Anecdote are the key planks of the science of global warming.
Turn on the radio or TV at any point in the past two weeks, or eavesdrop on our professional commentariat, and you’ll certainly have heard the mantra that despite Climategate, the ‘science behind global warming’ remains as strong as ever, and unquestionable.

For Guardian columnist George Monbiot, the behaviour of the Climate Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia, revealed in the files, was disgraceful, yet as he called for director Phil Jones to resign he also assured us that the scientific basis was ‘unimpeachable’ (1). Even Benny Peiser, director of the new Global Warming Policy Foundation, hastened to tell BBC’s Newsnight that ‘we are not questioning the basic science of global warning’, instead preferring that the Foundation express concern about ‘transparency and openness’ (2).

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