All Posts Tagged With: "climate"
Scientist at centre of email scandal steps down
Director of Climatic Research Unit accused of manipulating data to silence critics
The chief of a prestigious British research centre caught in a storm of controversy over claims that he and others suppressed data about climate change has stepped down pending an investigation, the University of East Anglia has announced.
The university said in a statement Tuesday that Phil Jones, whose emails were among the thousands of pieces of correspondence leaked to the Internet late last month, would relinquish his position as director of the Climatic Research Unit until the completion of an independent review.
The university’s Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research Trevor Davies said the investigation would cover data security, whether the university responded properly to Freedom of Information requests, “and any other relevant issues.” The statement said the specific terms of the review will be announced later in the week.
Jones has been accused by skeptics of man-made climate change of manipulating data to support his research. In particular, many have pointed to a leaked email in which Jones writes that he had used a “trick” to “hide the decline” in a chart detailing recent global temperatures. Jones has denied manipulating evidence and insisted his comment had been misunderstood, explaining that he’d used the word trick “as in a clever thing to do.”
Davies said there was nothing in the stolen material to suggest the peer-reviewed publications by the unit “are not of the highest-quality of scientific investigation and interpretation.”
But the correspondence from Jones and others—which appears to include discussions of how to keep critical work out of peer-reviewed journals and efforts to shield scientists’ data and methodology from outside scrutiny—have been seized upon by those who are fighting efforts to impose caps on emissions of carbon dioxide as evidence of a scientific conspiracy.
Sen. James Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican and a vocal skeptic of global warming, called Tuesday for Senate hearings on the emails. In a letter to Sen. Barbara Boxer, a California Democrat who chairs the environment committee, Inhofe said the emails could have far-reaching policy implications for the United States. Both Congress and the Environmental Protection Agency are taking action to curb global warming based on a report that uses data produced by the Climatic Research Unit.
What Shakespeare taught me about climate change
“Let not men say / ‘These are their reasons; they are natural;’ / For, I believe, they are portentous things / Unto the climate that they point upon.”
Sometimes I think it doesn’t matter what you study, as long as you study something, for I have often noticed that many brilliant people have arrived at the same habits of thought through the studies of entirely different disciplines. This is why I rely on my knowledge of Shakespeare to understand climate change.
Now, before you scoff too loudly, understand that I am not about to suggest that Shakespeare knew very much about global climate (when he uses the word “climate,” it is in a more limited sense) or that he was prescient enough to predict our current situation. In fact, the part of Shakespeare studies that I’m thinking of here is the so-called authorship debate. You know, where a small number of observers keep making the case that William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon could not have been the author of the plays attributed to him.
Those wishing to make the case for someone other than Shakespeare being Shakespeare can trot out a number of seemingly convincing points, all of which are true, as far as they go:
1. Though Shakespeare is supposed to have gone to the Stratford grammar school, there is no record of his actually having attended there.
2. There are no surviving letters mentioning Shakespeare as a dramatist.
3. Shakespeare’s will does not make mention of any books.
From these facts, the anti-Stratfordians (whoever their preferred Shakespeare may be) go on to draw all sorts of conclusions. If Shakespeare didn’t attend school he couldn’t possibly have been able to write the plays people say he did. If Shakespeare was so famous, why doesn’t anyone mention ever having met him? How could a literary genius not have owned any books? It doesn’t add up!
At least it doesn’t add up unless you know the full slate of facts. To wit:
1. There are no records of Shakespeare attending the King’s New School in Stratford because the records from the period were lost in a fire. Shakespeare’s father was the Bailiff of the town, a position roughly equivalent to a mayor. On this evidence, it is nearly certain that Shakespeare would have attended the local grammar school.
