By First we had the “Climategate” scandal and now we have “Googlegate”:
Among the points of interest in the unfolding climate scandal is the fact that the term “climategate” rapidly eclipsed global warming in the number of links produced by a simple Google search.
As is standard, Google’s auto-suggest function facilitated this, several days into the story’s evolution. Anyone typing in the letters c-l-i would see the suggested time-saving choice of climategate. Within a day or two of the auto-suggest function being added for “climategate” it had become the top item in the list.
Suddenly, though, on Monday December 1, Google stopped offering “climategate” as a choice to those who typed c-l-i and even to those who typed c-l-i-m-a-t-e-g-a-t. Strange.
Intrigued, I sent a few questions to Google’s Global Communications Department and a polite gentleman by the name of Jake Hubert responded right away.
This is what he wrote back in an e-mail: [Talking About the Weather]
Make sure to read the whole posting, but his email dialogue with Google eventually made it all the way to the Google CEO, Eric Schmidt.
I just went over to Google to check and see if it has been fixed yet and the auto-suggest still doesn’t gave “climategate” as a suggestion. On Bing their auto-suggest gives a “climate-gate” suggestion which is how few people spell the scandal. On Yahoo their auto-suggest give “climate gate” with a space. Yahoo’s spelling was giving me more search results compared to Google and Bing and came up with the number one search being the Wikipedia page on the scandal.
If you are wondering why Google may be trying to suppress search engine traffic for “Climategate” remember that Al Gore serves on their board of directors and CEO Eric Schmidt supported Al Gore’s 2000 Presidential campaign.
It is ironic that Google’s motto is “Don’t Be Evil” and they have been busy censoring information in China and now are trying to suppress search engine results here in the US.
It is the sad reality. No mistake...
1:09 pm on December 5th, 2009 1
"Googled" climategate myself, now over 30,000,000 responses. Yet had to type all of the letters. Next to the last letter I typed was "Climate guatemala"
1:57 pm on December 5th, 2009 2
Tried it myself. Looks like Google is doing evil after all.
2:23 pm on December 5th, 2009 3
How is "climategate" getting 30 million responses?
I type in "Watergate" and I get 920K. Something else that's timely, like Obamacare, gets only 846K. "I am extremely terrified of Chinese people," a popular meme for a while, yields only 50K or so, and was only 303K in its media heyday.
While I agree that Google is doing wrong if they are deliberately blocking people from accessing links to "climategate,' the fact that there are thirty million for this almost overnight leads me to think someone is manipulating something on the other end as well.
2:54 pm on December 5th, 2009 4
Just re-entered, results 1-10 of 30,300,000 responses in.09 secs.
3:43 pm on December 5th, 2009 5
While Climategate shows that there was definitely scientific misconduct going on at the University of East Anglia, it seems unreasonable to therefore assume that this represents the whole scientific community. The evidence for climate change comes from a broad array of the sciences, including glaciology, meteorology and atmospheric physics. Climate skeptics also play an important role in balancing the debate and it's likely that many on both sides are partially correct.
However it's difficult to find a more comprehensive investigation that measures up with what the UN's IPCC has done (2500 scientific expert reviewers from 140 countries, more than 800 contributing authors, and more than 450 lead authors). Intelligent people like yourselves can see that there are also a lot of hidden agendas and science is often tainted by political motives. So it's wise to be suspicious of policies that 'coincidentally' are favorable for certain groups or individuals. However, like a grand jury in a courtroom, the IPCC has reached a consensus that is difficult to reject. I am no expert on climate change, but I find it difficult to believe that so many scientists are all the subject of, or are involved in a political conspiracy. Sure, there are scientists who worry about their reputation and have corrupt funding priorities. But I don't believe that this represents the majority of scientists or that it could have significantly swayed the IPCC's final report.
There is some contradictory evidence that goes against parts of the global warming model. But it's important to see these things in terms of a bigger picture. Think of a murder investigation with fingerprints, DNA, CCTV and eyewitness evidence all pointing to one culprit. But then the eyewitness backs out. While this destabilizes the strength of the model, it is not logical to assume that it automatically disproves all of the other evidence on hand.
What I think happened at the University of East Anglia is that you have a few bad eggs who wanted their research to fall in line with everyone elses, but obviously didn't. This doesn't mean that they discovered contrary evidence, it probably means that their methodology or analysis is not up to scratch, judging from their ethical conduct. But like what happens all too often with the Korean press slandering the military here, when a few bad eggs pop up, it's unfair to say that it reflects the integrity of the rest.
Any group of scientists can start up their own peer-reviewed journal. However, for it to be taken seriously, it needs to have been conducted by people with an educated background in the field and contain good scientific methodology. What the climate skeptics need to do is band together and review each other's data. If there is agreement between different fields by different scientists and an increasing number of papers are published, then they have a strong case on their hands which cannot be ignored by the majority of the scientific community. I would actually be surprised if any important world-changing model had 100% agreement by everyone. Science is what designs our fighter jets, optimizes ballistics and gives us our daily weather report. There are always disagreements, but this is a part of our progress.
To me, global warming seems to make sense. The Earth was warmer during early prehistoric times due to higher concentrations of gas in the atmosphere. And we know that carbon dioxide in particular traps heat more than nothing. Gravity keeps the carbon dioxide from floating into space, and we can measure its increasing concentrations in modern times. Prehistoric plants trapped carbon dioxide and sunlight energy in concentrated deposits, over millions of years. We are now digging that up as petroleum and coal. When we burn these fuels at a rapid rate, we release that same stored energy and gas back into the atmosphere. There are natural cycles of warming and cooling in Earth's history, but the idea here is that us burning petroleum and coal has also influenced an overall temperature trend.
Unfortunately I don't particularly want to be drawn into a debate on this message board, and I like this blog and it is intelligently written. I just wanted to give my two cents.
4:04 pm on December 5th, 2009 6
"To me, global warming seems to make sense". Right, now explain to me why the earth has been COOLING for the last decade…and why these wonderful "scientific models" and the IPCC failed to forecast any of it.
9:45 pm on December 5th, 2009 7
Well, I hope this doesn't get ugly, but are you sure your claim is backed by someone with scientific credibility? If your answer to this is yes, then how can you convince yourself that this scientist is not actually part of a counter-conspiracy? Which scientists we can trust is actually a complex problem.
It's often the opposing voices that seem the loudest, and it's difficult for the public to discern between fact and misinterpretation. Not all scientists have access to comprehensive global meteorological data, and not all scientists have the wisdom or experience to see through complicated data and analyze it accurately.
Here is one possible counter to your claim, from the BBC at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8376286…
Sceptic
Since 1998 – more than a decade – the record, as determined by observations from satellites and balloon radiosondes, shows no discernible warming.
Counter
The year 1998 was exceptionally warm because of a strong El Nino event, while 2008 was unusually cold because of La Nina conditions. Variability from year to year is expected, and picking a specific warm year to start an analysis (or a cold one to end with) is "cherry-picking". If you start in 1997 or 1999 you will see a sharp rise. Furthermore, while the UK Met Office regards 1998 as the hottest year yet, Nasa thinks it was 2005 (they use the same data but interpret it differently). According to the Met Office, the 10 warmest years in the modern record have all occurred since 1997.
12:44 am on December 6th, 2009 8
Michael Mann who is one the biggest names involved with Climategate is the guy that came up with the now debunked hockey stick graph and he is one of the people who co-wrote the IPCC report. That is why the IPCC report is no longer valid. If you read through the emails it just confirms what skeptics have known for years that these guys were manipulating and hiding data to include from freedom of information requests. People had to file these freedom of information acts for this data because they refused to hand it over for replication which is part of the peer review process.
For example the biggest problem for alarmists is the medieval warm period. During that time frame it was warmer than it is right now. They were growing grapes in northern England and the Vikings colonized Greenland because it was green at the time. As far as I know the Vikings had no SUV’s to drive around in to go do their rape and pillaging with.
The emails show these alarmists were colluding to hide the warm period which the result was Mann’s hockey stick. Here is what Mann’s corrected hockey stick graph now is confirmed to look like after Climategate:
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/ind…
The Climategate emails even show how their computer codes were manipulated to ensure warming:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/04/climategate…
The head of the IPCC is now demanding an investigation:
” target=”_blank”>http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8394483.stm
And if you are wondering the IPCC doesn’t carry out any climate research they just look at papers which we now know were only from alarmists with cooked data:
As far as the UK Met Office all those numbers are now no longer usable because of Climategate:
As far as NASA their climate change head Jim Hansen even before Climategate was proven to be hiding and manipulating data:
http://rokdrop.com/2007/08/15/its-official-global…
So much for the science is settled argument.
Remember warming is not the issue, the world is warming, not as much as during prior time periods, but never the less warming. What is causing the warming is the issue and Climategate shows the alarmists data is fraudulent and they have been intentionally been stifling debate on the issue for political reasons.
To me astrophysicist Nir Shaviv makes a strong case for what is causing the warming:
http://www.sciencebits.com/CosmicRaysClimate
However you can’t tax solar rays and clouds and that is why alternate views like from Shaviv are so viciously attacked by the alarmists.
1:15 am on December 6th, 2009 9
Sorry, but no matter how you slice it, the crap we put into the ground and air is damaging to the Earth and humans.
1:52 am on December 6th, 2009 10
Very well written!
I just want to say that, It is my belief "global warming" is a sham. My two cents.
In the 70's it was global cooling.
Whatever happened to the Ozone problem? It just dropped off and is no longer spoken of. Guess there was no money in it.
In any case, the world will end in 2012, so who cares.
1:56 am on December 6th, 2009 11
Pollution is a whole separate issue from global warming.
I have said this before but this is why I am so against the global warming eco-faith because it obscures real environmental issues. Take for example the Yellow Dust issue in China.
http://rokdrop.com/2007/05/17/yellow-dust-linked/
There are few environmental problems that rank up there with Yellow Dust and it continues to get worse and worse every year and this is something that has actually be proven to change the weather and have negative health effects.
Yet how many people even know of this issue and how much money and effort is being allocated to deal with it compared to global warming? The global warming eco-faith and their missionaries have totally obscured and even stigmatized legitimate environmental issues.
I am a member of the Sierra Club because I believe in conservation efforts that the group promotes, but I am seriously considering canceling my membership because more and more of the organization’s efforts is going towards the global warming eco-faith instead of conservation. I get my bi-monthly newsletter and more and more of its causes are to get people to attend global warming protests instead of conservation efforts. It’s sad.
This is the true harm the eco-faith and their false prophets like Al Gore have caused.
2:10 am on December 6th, 2009 12
No need to be sorry.
I feel fine. A bit cold this morning.
We could transfer our factories to Mars!
Or stop having babies and die out.
Bottom line is that GW is a transfer of wealth issue.
2:13 am on December 6th, 2009 13
I'm not surprised. Google gives me different search results when using Explorer and Mozilla. Try it.
3:09 am on December 6th, 2009 14
LOL "well, I hope this doesn't get 'ugly'". We are an ugly bunch on ROK drop, of that you can be sure.
Feel free to be as ugly as you want. Our peer review is outstanding.
2:22 am on December 7th, 2009 15
GI Korea: Unfortunately I don't have the time to pay you the courtesy of an extended discussion, so I'll have to make this the last post on this thread. But I'll come back to read your response nonetheless. Often times, these kinds of debates lead to nowhere but a firming up of harder opinions on both sides. It's a curious an unfortunate aspect of the human condition…
But anyway, you actually know more than me about the counter arguments, which I've not read in depth. I respect your opinions and the reasons that you have for them. The hockey stick controversy seems pretty well summed up on Wikipedia, but in the end it boils down to one group's word against another's. A couple of observations that I want to point out though:
Getting a lot of scientific information online often leads to an inaccurate portrayal of the overall consensus of the scientific community. I think we need to separate conspiracy ideas from the scientific basis for climate change, because that will take a good deal of time to discuss also. While conspiracies provide a reasonable motive for deceiving the public, they are not in themselves solid evidence until proven comprehensively. Even with the hysteria of mad cow mostly over, I can remember that there were ridiculous (and widely accepted) conspiracy arguments that were floating around at the time. These in themselves lent no weight to the argument that American beef shouldn't be imported. There are also strong motives for the petroleum industry in particular to discredit climate change action, so I would recommend keeping the two issues (conspiracies and climate change) as separate entities.
The internet skews the perception of scientific data, because anyone can write something and rise to the top of search engine results. Some of these authors are real scientists, and some claim that they are. Not all scientists are reputable. Dissenting voices against a popular idea are often attractive, and a common thing is to select one or more prominent scientists to discredit in particular. The general public however, are not familiar with the complexities of the debate. Who among us can accurately analyse ice core data? Not me, for one. One expert's opinion is as good as another's. So the only choice I have is to go along with what the majority of peer reviewed publications are saying. The IPCC report was not in itself an investigation, it was an analysis and summary of an enormous amount of scientific data across multiple fields and was commissioned to help governments form policy from accurate facts. Peer reviewed scientific data is as good as we can get, when it comes to getting the straight facts. And the more of it that we have, the better.
If we choose not to believe peer review data, then the dilemma is: what can make you so certain that the scientific sources you get your information from are more trustworthy? The answer to this, is that we have no reason to believe anyone, but peer review is at least subject to analysis and criticism by those who are familiar with the methodology involved. How can we trust these people though? Well maybe we can't. But then again why should we trust anyone who builds a website and publishes something?
The science community is not set up to discredit and counter-argue with climate change skeptics. No one is paid to do that. For that reason, it often looks as if the skeptics remain unchallenged.
Researchers are also not encouraged to publish their opinions on government policy in their papers, or to discredit popular claims. What they are paid to do is to run experiments and present the data as best as they can. How people then interpret this data is up to them. The IPCC's task was to try and make sense of an overwhelming amount of research, and their conclusion was unequivocal. We need to remember that the research in question was performed by government agencies and public universities. To get hundreds of university professors 'in' on a conspiracy or to trick them into being unknowingly involved is a pretty big task.
Going back to the idea of the internet skewing scientific consensus though, Wikipedia has compiled a list of prominent scientist who oppose climate change in some form at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_scientists_o…
I don't believe these people to be counter conspirators, and I also think they are reputable scientists. If you know of any other scientists, who are at least professors, that are missing from this list, anyone is free to add them.
But have a look at another group of reputable scientists standing on the other side of the debate: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_authors_from…
While not being a very good argument in itself (that more is better), it helps to illustrate my point that the dissenting voices are much more conspicuous online than the quieter majority. It's also difficult to believe that so many publicly funded researchers are motivated for self interest to misrepresent the data on climate change.
To get a more accurate portrayal of the bigger picture, we need to use Google Scholar for searches, instead of the regular search engine. This is the direct way to proper data. I also recommend following Nature's continuous publications on climate change. If you only use peer review channels to learn about the science of climate change, it becomes incredibly one-sided. And it's very hard to find papers published in good journals that provide a convincing argument discrediting the climate change model as a whole. We could argue that it's because the conspirators band together to keep these people out. But that may also be because the data that these people are presenting is simply not scientifically sound. They can make claims of conspirators working against them, but in reality nothing stops them from publishing their own journal and distributing it to like-minded individuals. Journals grow in reputation because people come to know that they have been historically accurate.
Anyway, I'll cut it here because it's time for bed. I'll come back to read your response, but I think for the time being we'll just have to agree to disagree. Like the gentlemen that we are
Keep up the good work on the website.
5:38 am on December 7th, 2009 16
Lee, I appreciate the thoughtful and polite comment because often times this issue turns into emotional arguments instead of logical ones.
I am all for peer reviewed research and that is what Climategate has disclosed was not happening with global warming. The emails showed the conclusion by top alarmist scientists to stop skeptics from being published in the large journals of record and the media has demonized skeptics over the years as deniers. That is why the skeptics had to turn to the Internet to get there ideas out there. The emails also showed the alarmists were colluding to discredit skeptics in anyway possible and were even cheering the deaths of skeptics. How often have you heard that skeptics were oil company shills? Well Climategate has now shown the alarmists were taking millions of dollars from the oil companies themselves!
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/04/climategate…
With such vicious attacks against skeptical scientists is it any wonder why so few scientists were willing to put their name and reputation out there to be attacked by not only the alarmist scientists but the mass media and politicians as well? Incredibly not one of the major networks in the US (ABC, CBS, or NBC) have covered Climategate. The liberal print media has been busy doing everything they can to play damage control. Is it any wonder why as bad as Fox can be it gets so much viewership when important stories like this can only be seen on it? In your home country of Australia the ABC has been busy playing damage control and ignoring the story as well:
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/ind…
Times are changing and more and more scientists are coming out against the global warming faith.
If the science of global warming is so settled these alarmists should readily provide all their data for replication so skeptics wouldn't have to file freedom of information acts to get the data, which Climategate has shown these scientists were concluding to destroy the records. Decades of climate data has now gone missing. As I pointed out with NASA's Hansen this problem has been going on for years well before Climategate even happened. I can't think of any other time when a huge scientific issues such as this was not following the scientific process of providing data for replication?
Then you read stuff like this and if the alarmists aren't willing to make sacrifices themselves then why should everyone else?:
Glenn Reynolds said it best when he siad "I’ll believe it’s a crisis when the people who tell me it’s a crisis start acting like it’s a crisis."
7:16 am on December 7th, 2009 17
http://www.forbs.com/2009/12/03/climate-science-gore-int...
10:29 am on December 7th, 2009 18
You've made some good points GI, and it's true that some on the climate change side have been unfairly stifling skeptical voices.
The Climategate emails are almost certainly authentic, however, for these and other scandals we may interpret them as a window into a larger conspiracy that stretches the globe, or statistically isolated incidents that inevitably arise whenever a large amount of people work on the same topic.
As time goes by and more evidence on both sides emerges, I encourage everyone to open their minds to both sides of the debate. Don't become married to your ideas. I promise to do the same. And if my position on the issue changes, I'll be sure to come back here and post.
10:48 am on December 7th, 2009 19
I would only disagree as to the internet being a culprit. Yes there is a vast amount of garbage on the internet that can more than satisfy any conspirocy theory or wacky idea.
On the other hand for one interested in finding good resources that are reliable, credible, and informative, that data is out there as well.
It comes down to wether one is searching to confirm a preconcied idea, or one is looking for the truth of the matter.
3:25 am on December 19th, 2009 20
What I want to know is how a search engine drops the most searched for term from 30 million to 13 million in less than 3 weeks when it's on everyones' minds? Bing shows 50+ million for climategate with no signs of slowing down. How else can you explain it except blatant manipulation. Anyone an adwords advertiser?