User:Jpat34721/My Stuff/Climategate

Arguing in good faith?

This exchange was about my contention that the paragraph framing the controversy lacked balance and in fact only the apologist side was presented. I had inserted this edit, which was rv'd by Scj. Here is an excerpt from our discussion. Note the pattern: Scj never addresses my reasoning but rather simply dismisses it. (bolding is mine)

Scj->These edits by Jpat34721 are very problematic. Terence Corcoran is a known skeptic (see this source where he refers to Kyoto as "mind-blowing madness") writing an opinion piece for a conservative-leaning organ (The National Post) in an editorial section. This is compounded by original research from Jpat34721 like, "who has covered climate change for Financial Post for years". I expect these edits to be self-reverted pending a proper, consensus-building discussion.

JP-->First off, if your view is that only "non-skeptics" (by your definition) are to be allowed here, our result will be by definition not POV neutral. Corcoran is well versed in the subject, is an editor at a major publication, has actually read the e-mails and written a well rounded and well researched article in a reliable source. Secondly, this section, which frames the debate on the e-mails needed balance. Only one side was presented. My "OR" is easily proved and I'll add a cite if you like but it seems pretty silly to me.

Scj-->But that is far removed from the "knowledgeable non-skeptic" for the "Financial Times" you originally portrayed him as. You should self revert your edits immediately. This sort of controversial, agenda-driven addition should be discussed on the talk page first.

JP->Let's take a different tack. [With my addition T]here are now three articles listed in debate framing paragraph, plus the [quote from the] IPCC chairman. Three of the four entries are dismissive of the controversy. Of the journalists mentioned, the writer of the AP article is mentioned in and authored some of the emails we are attempting to frame in this section, one is fresh out school with a BA in history, and one is an editor of a leading publication who has 35 years of journalistic experience. On what reasonable basis can you reject Corcoran and accept the other two?

Second, we're attempting to document a controversy here. Controversies have at least two sides. In this case, there's roughly three.

(1) There's nothing to this.

(2) The emails raise legitimate questions about process.

(3) This proves global warming is a hoax.

Without my insert, only (1) is represented in the paragraph that frames the controversy. How can this be called NPOV? (3) is difficult to include in the framing because that view is mostly (wholly?) relegated to the blogs. Including (3) would (IMHO) also be inflammatory and undue weight. The Corcoran quote is solidly in (2) and without something akin to this, we have not framed the controversy, which by default, implies WP's position is (1) which violates POV.

I got no response to the above so I offered a compromise edit, replacing the Corcoran quote with one from Climatologists Pielke. This too was rejected:

Scj-->I just don't see why we need more opinion in this already opinion-laden bloatfest.

JP-->Because without my edit or one like it, the opinionintroduction would be one-sided, at least in framing the debate. See my reasoning above.

Scj->One-sided in your opinion. I reject your reasoning. Sorry, but you have to discuss these things before adding them if they are going to be so obviously contentious. I've removed the paragraph pending the outcome of this debate, particularly because of the errors in it and the aforementioned original research.

This pattern is played out over and over in trying to bring balance to this article. Any source that is considered in the skeptic camp, regardless of notability, is rejected out of hand, (mis)using WP:Fringe as justification. Pointing out that the standard is "verifiability and not Truth" is rejected out of hand. Arguments about balance are rejected out of hand, (mis)using WP:Undue (the skeptic view of the emails have actually gotten more press than the apologist but you'd never no it from our article). Many editors on the apologists side have decided that this controversy is a conspiracy by skeptics and are determined to ensure the article reflects this view. Further down in the same discussion we have this:

JP->Their were no opposing views presented in the paragraph before my edit. Your stance that that is perfectly acceptable is quite odd since if there was no significant opposing view out there, we wouldn't have a controversy. Clearly we do have a controversy (otherwise we're all wasting our time), clearly it is not just sceptics that are concerned by the contents of these emails, your contentions notwithstanding, and clearly the other side deserves some ink in the paragraph which is attempting to frame the issue. The current scorecard in that section is 3 to 1 in your favor. Doesn't that feel about right to you?

You also misquote WP:NPOV, which says "Neutrality requires that the article should fairly represent all significant viewpoints", bolding mine. Your spin on NPOV above would indicate that you think it is our job to pass judgment on the "reasonableness" of a viewpoint but of course reasonable men will always disagree about that. If we stick to [[WP::NPOV]] emphasis on significance, reaching consensus will be a lot easier.

Scj->No, you have it all wrong. "Clearly we have a controversy" because skeptics have made it so, butby blowing up this molehill into a mountain. It is through the efforts of folks like you that this controversy has reached the significance that it has. I am disinclined to sit still while skeptics attempt to use Wikipedia to pile even more bullshit on top of that mountain. And I didn't "quote" NPOV - I wrote my own words that reflected the spirit of the policy. The key to this is weight, and the pile on your side is too heavy.

JP->Mountain or molehill frames the controversy we are trying to chronicle perfectly. It is not for us to decide the issue, it is our job to inform the reader about the significant arguments on all sides. You comments re NPOV show that you have a fundamental misunderstanding "of "the spirit of the policy".

Scj->Actually, it is our job to inform the reader about the significant arguments of all sides in the proper proportion, which is the qualifier you seem to be having issues with. If you spent any significant time editing elsewhere on Wikipedia, you would have a better grasp of these policies. Limiting yourself to one article makes it much harder.

Article ban/Block Synopsis

For those who are interested, here is brief synopsis of this whole affair

1) User:Hipocrit warned me on my TP that an edit I made in an effort to find a compromise between he and another editor was an rv and since I had made a change to another section earlier, I was in violation of 1RR

2) Due to a misunderstanding on my part about what constituted a revert, I didn't think he was right on either case but to be safe, I self-reverted the change.

3) Because another editor (or perhaps Hipocrit, I don't remember), had already reverted my edit, my self-revert didn't show up in the history.

4) Hipocrit did not believe that I had self-reverted and so filled an request for sanction.

5) In the comment process, William M. Connolley (WMC), said not only had I violated 1RR I may have violated 3RR and was guilty of other unspecified "bad behavior"

6) The sanction request remained open for a while, meanwhile Hipocrit filed similar sanction requests against 3 other editors.

7) WMC enlisted the help of two admins to clear out the backlog of sanction requests.

8) The admins sanctioned me with a 30 day article/talk page ban. (Not a topic ban). In other cases, one editor was given a 24 hour ban, the other two were closed without action.

9) Feeling that there had been a rush to judgment and I was not given a fair hearing, I filed an appeal at WP:AN and later filed a COI incident report against WMC.

10) About half way through the appeal process, I realize that the definition of revert that I was working under (from [WP:Revert] was different than what the admins and WMC were working under which I came to find out later, came from 3RR. Please see here.

11) I then dropped my appeal (see my "ignorance is no excuse remarks" at WP:AN) and began working constructively with the admin who banned me to fix the problems with the various definitions of revert scattered across wikipedia and some shortcomings of the article probation warning process. Again see the link in 10)

At this point I would like to apologize to the admins BizMo and 2over0 for my accusations of bad faith. With my confusion regarding reverts, it seemed at the time that I was in a kangaroo court. I understand now that I had in fact violated 3RR (or come close) given the 3RR definition of revert (which at the time was different than both [help:revert] and [WP:revert], where I had gotten my info. They were unaware of my confusion and just doing their job.

12) During the COI process, my claim that WMC had a COI was discounted by Hipocrit.

13) I explained that [WP:RS] press reports had implicated WMC in the scandal and therefore he should recuse himself.

14) Admin Ioeth threathened me with blockage if I did not immediately provide references to back up the claim in 13 (see Last Chance above)

15) I posted two sources

16) I tried to get the discussion back on track by posting a summary of my view.

17) Admin Atama asked for diffs to back up my contention that WMC was editing the article in question with a POV.

18) I posted the diffs

19) I was immediately and indefinitely blocked by Jehochman

Mainstream sources using "climategate"

• Cambridege Scientific Alliance: 'Climategate' – the furore over the implications of the leaked emails from the Norwich-based Climate Research Unit
• New Zealand Herald: First came Climategate, the row over leaked emails that raised doubts about data used to confirm global warming by the influential United Nations panel on climate change.
• NYT: The question of whether the planet is heating and how quickly was at the heart of the so-called “climategate” controversy that arose last fall when hundreds of e-mail messages from the climate study unit at the University of East Anglia in England were released without authorization.
• AFP: The so-called "climategate" controversy that exploded last fall on the eve of UN-sponsored climate talks unleashed a furor over whether the planet was heating and, if so, at what pace.
• Time: Has 'Climategate' Been Overblown?
• Discover: Just when the whole “ClimateGate” affair had retreated from the headlines, other climate scientists have stepped in to shoot themselves in the foot in the public spotlight.
• WSJ: ClimateGate's Michael Mann Received Stimulus Funds
• NPR: The have a topic portal entitled ClimateGate
• Economic Times: NEW DELHI: Barely recovering from Climategate, IPCC’s credibility has come under a cloud yet again in the wake of Glaciergate.
• NYT: Mr. Blankenship invoked the recent “Climategate” e-mail scandal, in which messages purloined from a server at a British climate research center suggested that some prominent scientists may have fudged some data to support evidence of human-driven global warming.
• Washington Post: In the ensuing "Climategate" scandal, scientists were accused of withholding information, suppressing dissent, manipulating data and more.
• Revkin (NYT DotEarth): I've asked him if he can parse out how much was "Climategate" compared to the climate talks. I'll post an update if I hear more.
• Times Online:Steve Dorling, of the University of East Anglia’s school of environmental sciences — yes, the UEA of “climategate” email fame — warns that it is “wrong to focus on single events, which are the product of natural variability”.

• Irish Times, Damaged credibility doesn't alter climate facts: It Has been a bad winter for the environmental movement. It started with climategate.
• The Metropolitan: The level of confusion and misinformation surrounding the real and perceived issues of “climate change” related to CoP 15 in Copenhagen is enormous
• The AlterNet, "Climate-Gate" Pseudo-Scandal Just Slanderous Nonsense:
• Rachael Maddow (MSNBC): MADDOW: Yes. And on climate change. There are a lot of interesting ways to talk about the right way to respond to that, but instead, it‘s Climate-gate, it‘s all made up.
• LA Times: Meanwhile, the December climate change summit in Copenhagen was done few favors by the Climategate scandal -- the incident in which a number of e-mails were made public that suggested climate scientists were cherry-picking data and tampering with peer review procedures in an effort to downplay anything that might serve as ammunition for global warming skeptics.
• LA Times: Also absent from the discussion in Copenhagen is the Climategate scandal. Recently leaked e-mails reveal climate scientists have a long track record of manipulating data to hide scientific evidence that contradicts the global warming establishment.
• Yale University: Climategate: Anatomy of a Public Relations Disaster

Lead

The Climatic Research Unit hacking incident came to light in November 2009 with the unauthorised release of thousands of e-mails and other documents obtained through the hacking of a server used by the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia (UEA) in Norwich, England. The University of East Anglia described the incident as an illegal taking of data. The police are conducting a criminal investigation of the server breach and subsequent personal threats made against some of the scientists mentioned in the e-mails.

Extracts from the e-mails have been publicised and allegations have been made that they indicate misconduct by leading climate scientists such as withholding scientific information, interfering with the peer-review process of scientific papers, deleting information to prevent disclosure under the United Kingdom's Freedom of Information Act, and selecting data to support the case for global warming. Individuals who oppose action on global warming called the incident "Climategate", which became a commonly used term for the incident. The University of East Anglia and climate scientists have described these interpretations as incorrect and misleading, with the extracts being taken out of context in what has been described as a smear campaign. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change head Rajendra Pachauri are among those who have suggested that the incident was intended to undermine the then imminent December 2009 Copenhagen global climate summit. Though the vast majority of climate data have always been freely available, the incident has prompted general discussion about increasing the openness of scientific data. Scientists, scientific organisations, and government officials have stated that the incident does not affect the overall scientific case for climate change.

Climategate is the name commonly used to describe the furor that erupted with the unauthorized release of e-mails and other documents stolen from a computer used by the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia (UEA) in Norwich, England. Published extracts from the e-mails gave rise to allegations of misconduct by leading climate scientists including charges that they withheld scientific information, impeded the publication of opposition papers in the scientific journals, deleted information to prevent disclosure under the United Kingdom's Freedom of Information Act, and selected data to bolster their theories. The University of East Anglia and many climate scientists described these interpretations as misleading and incorrect, and said that the e-mails in their proper context show nothing untoward. The timing of the incident raised concerns their publication was a smear campaign designed to derail consensus at the December 2009 Copenhagen global climate summit, then just weeks away.

The University of East Anglia said the data was taken illegally and the police conducted a criminal investigation of the server breach as well as subsequent personal threats made against some of the scientists mentioned in the e-mails. While many climatologists expressed the view that nothing in the released documents undermined the science behind the prevailing theory of global warming, the incident caused many scientist to raise concerns about the implications for the scientific process and for the openness and transparency of the CRU.

Move this to reactions

The University of East Anglia has announced that an independent review of the allegations will be carried out by Sir Muir Russell and that the CRU's director, Professor Phil Jones, would stand aside from his post during the review.

Move this to a section on Copenhagen

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change head Rajendra Pachauri are among those who have suggested that the incident was intended to undermine the then imminent December 2009 Copenhagen global climate summit.

Ideas for a new title

• Climatic Research Center Stolen Email Controversy
• Climatic Research Center Stolen Data Controversy
• Climatic Research Center Purloined Data Controversy

How about: "climategate"? which is the version now being used in the Norwegian, Swedish, Danish and Dutch versions! But to be more serious, if you want to achieve a neutral position on Wikipedia articles you really are banging your head against a wall. Moreover, by editing these articles you are giving the appearance of different views being able to be expressed without (as you point out) any substantial part of the alternative viewpoint ever getting into the articles. This is far more deceitful than a straight forward opinion piece by one side! So, in my view, given the failure of Wikipedia to do anything about these full-time paid lobbyists who edit the articles, it is much better not to edit the article at all rather than give the illusion of impartiality.85.211.166.99 (talk) 11:02, 14 July 2010 (UTC)