East Anglia Confirmed Emails from the Climate Research Unit - 1241415427.txt

From: Tom Wigley <wigley@xxxxxxxxx.xxx>
To: Phil Jones <p.jones@xxxxxxxxx.xxx>
Subject: [Fwd: CCNet Xtra: Climate Science Fraud at Albany University?]-FROM TOM W
Date: Mon, 04 May 2009 01:37:07 -0600
Cc: Ben Santer <santer1@xxxxxxxxx.xxx>

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Phil,

Do you know where this stands? The key things from the Peiser items are ...

"Wang had been claiming the existence of such exonerating documents for
nearly a year, but he has not been able to produce them. Additionally,
there was a report published in 1991 (with a second version in 1997)
explicitly stating that no such documents exist. Moreover, the report
was published as part of the Department of Energy Carbon Dioxide
Research Program, and Wang was the Chief Scientist of that program."

and

"Wang had a co-worker in Britain. In Britain, the Freedom of Information
Act requires that data from publicly-funded research be made available.
I was able to get the data by requiring Wang’s co-worker to release it,
under British law. It was only then that I was able to confirm that Wang
had committed fraud."

You are the co-worker, so you must have done something like provide
Keenan with the DOE report that shows that there are no station records
for 49 of the 84 stations. I presume Keenan therefore thinks that it was
not possible to select stations on the basis of ...

"... station histories: selected stations have relatively few, if any,
changes in instrumentation, location, or observation times"
[THIS IS ITEM "X"]

Of course, if the only stations used were ones from the 35 stations
that *did* have station histories, then all could be OK. However, if
some of the stations used were from the remaining 49, then the above
selection method could not have been applied (but see below) -- unless
there are other "hard copy" station history data not in the DOE report
(but in China) that were used. From what Wang has said, if what he says
is true, the second possibility appears to be the case.

What is the answer here?

The next puzzle is why Wei-Chyung didn't make the hard copy information
available. Either it does not exist, or he thought it was too much
trouble to access and copy. My guess is that it does not exist -- if it
did then why was it not in the DOE report? In support of this, it seems
that there are other papers from 1991 and 1997 that show that the data
do not exist. What are these papers? Do they really show this?

Now my views. (1) I have always thought W-C W was a rather sloppy
scientist. I therefore would not be surprised if he screwed up here. But
ITEM X is in both the W-C W and Jones et al. papers -- so where does it
come from first? Were you taking W-C W on trust?

(2) It also seems to me that the University at Albany has screwed up. To
accept a complaint from Keenan and not refer directly to the complaint
and the complainant in its report really is asking for trouble.

(3) At the very start it seems this could have been easily dispatched.
ITEM X really should have been ...

"Where possible, stations were chosen on the basis of station histories
and/or local knowledge: selected stations have relatively few, if any,
changes in instrumentation, location, or observation times"

Of course the real get out is the final "or". A station could be
selected if either it had relatively few "changes in instrumentation"
OR "changes in location" OR "changes in observation times". Not all
three, simply any one of the three. One could argue about the science
here -- it would be better to have all three -- but this is not what
the statement says.

Why, why, why did you and W-C W not simply say this right at the start?
Perhaps it's not too late?

-----

I realise that Keenan is just a trouble maker and out to waste time, so
I apologize for continuing to waste your time on this, Phil. However, I
*am* concerned because all this happened under my watch as Director of
CRU and, although this is unlikely, the buck eventually should stop with me.

Best wishes,
Tom

P.S. I am copying this to Ben. Seeing other peoples' troubles might make
him happier about his own parallel experiences.



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Subject: CCNet Xtra: Climate Science Fraud at Albany University?
Date: Sun, 3 May 2009 15:57:08 +0100
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CCNet Xtra - 3 May 2009 -- Audiatur et altera pars

CLIMATE SCIENCE FRAUD AT ALBANY UNIVERSITY?
-------------------------------------------


The University at Albany is in a difficult position. If the University received such records as part of the supposed misconduct investigation, then they could easily resolve the problem by making them available to the scientific community and to readers. If the University does not have such records then they have been complicit in misconduct and in coverup of misconduct. If the University at Albany does have such records, but such records are not in accordance with the stated methodology of the publications, then the University has more serious difficulties.

"Investigations" of scientific misconduct should themselves align with the usual principles of scientific discourse (open discussion, honesty, transparency of method, public disclosure of evidence, open public analysis and public discussion and reasoning underlying any conclusion). This was not the case at the University at Albany. When you see universities reluctant to investigate things properly, it provides reasonable evidence that they really don't want to investigate things properly.
-- Aubrey Blumsohn, Scientific Misconduct Blog, 2 May 2009



(1) ALLEGATIONS OF FRAUD AT ALBANY - THE WANG CASE
Aubrey Blumsohn, Scientific Misconduct Blog, 2 May 2009

(2) THE FRAUD ALLEGATION AGAINST SOME CLIMATIC RESEARCH OF WEI-CHYUNG WANG
Douglas J. Keenan, Informath, April 2009

(3) KAFKA AT ALBANY
Peter Risdon, Freeborn John, 15 March 2009


=====
(1) ALLEGATIONS OF FRAUD AT ALBANY - THE WANG CASE

Scientific Misconduct Blog, 2 May 2009
http://scientific-misconduct.blogspot.com/2009/05/allegations-of-fraud-at-albany-wang.html

Aubrey Blumsohn

Professor Wei-Chyung Wang is a star scientist in the Atmospheric Sciences Research Center at the University at Albany, New York. He is a key player in the climate change debate (see his self-description here). Wang has been accused of scientific fraud.

I have no inclination to "weigh in" on the topic of climate change. However the case involves issues of integrity that are at the very core of proper science. These issues are the same whether they are raised in a pharmaceutical clinical trial, in a basic science laboratory, by a climate change "denialist" or a "warmist". The case involves the hiding of data, access to data, and the proper description of "method" in science.

The case is also of interest because it provides yet another example of how *not* to create trust in a scientific misconduct investigation. It adds to the litany of cases suggesting that Universities cannot be allowed to investigate misconduct of their own star academics. The University response has so far been incoherent on its face.

Doug Keenan, the mathematician who raised the case of Wang is on the "denialist" side of the climate change debate. He maintains that "almost by itself, the withholding of their raw data by [climate] scientists tells us that they are not scientists".

Below is my own summary of the straightforward substance of this case. I wrote to Wei-Chyung Wang, to Lynn Videka (VP at Albany, responsible for the investigation), and to John H. Reilly (a lawyer at Albany) asking for any correction or comments on the details presented below. My request was acknowledged prior to publication, but no factual correction was suggested.

Case Summary

The allegations concern two publications. These are:

Jones P.D., Groisman P.Y., Coughlan M., Plummer N., Wang W.-C., Karl T.R. (1990), “Assessment of urbanization effects in time series of surface air temperature over land”, Nature, 347: 169

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