I am really pleased that Phil Jones is talking to the press. Jones is the director of the Climate Research Unit, the part of East Anglia University involved in the Climategate scandal. I am distressed that he entertained thoughts of suicide and very happy that he decided not to find the long term solution to a short term problem. I find the very idea that he is receiving threats due to this scandal disgusting. This is climate science, not a war. His decision to stick around and watch his granddaughter grow up is the right one. This too shall pass, Dr. Jones.
His comparison of himself to David Kelly, the researcher who killed himself apparently due to misuse of his research in the run-up to the war in Iraq, is curious to say the least. I have seen no indication that Jones believes his work has been misused by governments. I think it has, but I don't think Jones does.
Jones is in the public light because he is accused of wrongdoing. This must be distressing, even more so if you don't think you have done anything wrong. But he needs to answer those who have criticised him (I am one--Steve Mosher and I have written a book that is largely about what we see as Jones doing things wrong), not just announce that he is distressed. He may be very distressed, and still have done wrong things.
There is one area where we think Phil Jones acted improperly and two further areas where we feel he was extremely mistaken. The one that is rightly the focus of the current investigation is violation of the UK's Freedom of Information Act. This is what Jones wrote:
Phil Jones: When the FOI requests began here, the FOI person said we had to abide by the requests. It took a couple of half-hour sessions—one at a computer screen, to convince them otherwise, showing them what Climate Audit was all about.
Phil Jones: If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the United Kingdom, I think I’ll delete the file rather than send it to anyone.
Phil Jones: You can delete this attachment if you want. Keep this quiet also, but this is the person who is putting in Freedom Of Information requests for all the emails that Keith and Tim have written and received regarding Chapter 6 of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Report. We think we’ve found a way around this.
Phil Jones: Can you delete any emails you may have had with Keith regarding the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report? Keith will do likewise.
This is plausible, if not overwhelming, evidence that Phil Jones broke the law. There is no question that he was trying to evade the requirements to make public data available to any who legitimately requested it. Indeed, he did make the data available to other colleagues who requested it but not to those he considered skeptical. Jones is the one, after all, who wrote "We have 25 years invested in this – why should we let you see the data when your only objective is to find something wrong with it”?
The second area of wrongdoing involves his primary responsibility as curator of the record of historical temperatures. He does not seem to have done a very good job of it. As that is a professional matter and I am not qualified to pronounce on it, I will just say that the results of his tenure at CRU have not yielded a better and more accurate record.
The third area of contention is his 1990 paper that declared the urban heat island effect a negligible factor in determining average temperatures. It does seem that his co-author did not perform due diligence in selecting the sites to be used, that Jones knew about this for years without correcting it, and that science has not been well-served as a result. Again, a professional matter for professionals to correct.
Did Jones mess up? Probably. Are there legal ramifications? That's what they are investigating right now. Does it have an impact on our beliefs regarding global warming? Maybe, but I have yet to see anyone change their opinions based on what happened. Skeptics are more triumphant, warmists more defensive, politicians more inclined to make speeches.
But Phil Jones, you're blessed with a common name. You have done creditable work in the past, and this will be remembered long after this scandal fades from public view. Keep a sense of perspective. We in the media will find a shiny new toy very quickly and we'll leave you alone thereafter. Indeed, to a large extent that's already happened. Other climate news has eclipsed Climategate very quickly. So enjoy your leave of absence and pay special attention to your granddaughter. First things first.
Steve Mosher and I have written a book about the leaked emails mentioned above. The title is Climategate: The CRUtape Letters. It is available on Create Space here, Amazon here, Kindle here and Lulu here. One Amazon reviewer wrote, "Mosher and Fuller do a good job putting the ClimateGate documents in context, and the book is a riveting read. I received my copy yesterday, and find the book to be faithful to the climate war events that I have followed over a period of years. It reports actual email communications of a small group of paleoclimatologists and their roles in perhaps the biggest scientific hoax since Piltdown Man."
Comments
sorry Tom, but i found this article disgusting.
you are part of the witch hunt on Phil Jones.
those death threats are not independent from the stuff that you are doing.
it would have been a good idea to remain silent a little longer on this topic.
Give me a break. They all say that they have received death threats, once they've been found out. And, how, pray tell, if he had stepped down and was not working, could anyone email him? I guess Jones was working after all.
Doubt about the death threats aside, thoughts of suicide are generally not the thoughts of a righteous man. No, innocent men don't commit suicide, especially those still living at home, and collecting a salary (which Jones is).
Jones, Mann and the rest have presumed upon our willingness to trust them as scientists. In fact, they insist on it. They have as yet failed to release the original data, which they say they 'lost'. They have not released their computer code, yet Jones now requests our sympathy.
Their tune is now changing from 'trust us' to 'pity us'. None of them should be believed if they don't produce every single scrap of data and computer code. Just. That. Simple. No pity.
even more disgusting comments. that was exactly what i expected.
Jones did NOT stop to work. he stood back from being the head of the CRU.
this is getting even more ugly fast.
Jones is not the victim here. He has had a good career. He had good options.
What about the scientists whose careers were stymied by his actions? What about the scientists who wanted to do good work but couldn't because the money was going to those who catered to those with money?
I know someone who taught applied physics to technology majors at an affiliate of Penn State. He was not rehired because someone at the main campus did not like one of his publications even though it had nothing to do with the subject he was teaching. A year later he was offered a job at a branch campus at PSU, but his hiring was vetoed. The salary was 1/4 of what Michael Mann gets.
Jones has the gall to discuss committing suicide because he's been criticised and had to step down from his leadership position. Him and Mann are still collecting very good salaries.
I'm sorry, but they should spend the rest of their careers living on temporary and adjunct salaries at community colleges.
I do not feel sorry for Phil Jones. He knew what he was doing was wrong but did it anyway. To get his death threats he must be accessing his work email.
I don't imagine he feels badly about the 80,000 people who have died in the UK of cold since 2006. These people were living on pensions and could not afford the fuel price increases with the carbon tax. It is called "fuel poverty". So they could not afford heat and died of cold. Phil Jones is still collecting a salary and I am sure can afford heat.
Before anyone accuses me of making up numbers, I used 20,000 a winter for 06, 07, 08 and 09. The number of excess cold related deaths has been increasing each winter so I am sure my 80,000 is low. Then we call add the rest of the planet's excess cold related deaths.
Well, Sod, sorry it disgusted you. I do feel compassion for Jones. It cannot have been pleasant. But I feel much more strongly about the people marty describes here. And Jones is wrong on the substance. He does not and should not have the right to say skeptics cannot look at data generated with public funding just because he doesn't like them or doesn't want them to pick away at it. I don't think that constitutes a witch hunt. And I would not change anything I've written about Jones.
Too right, Mr Fuller. Jones is a typical, snivelling cry-baby who, having been caught with his fingers in the till (metaphorically speaking), is now doing the usual rounds in search of sympathy and a book deal. No doubt, very soon, we'll be getting a statement from his agent.
Jones should be hounded mercilessly until he quits (without compensation or pension) and thereafter hounded mercilessly whenever he raises his head above the parapet.
Jones would take a large step in the direction of finding cheer for himself if he wrote a sincere letter of apology to the family of John L. Daly.
Death threats are pretty much the norm for public figures that find themselves in a middle of a controversy. A person in that situation claiming that he received death threats is as interesting as saying he got an offer from a nigerian businessman.
The real question is if if he got death threats that appeared to more than some anonymous person letting off steam
look Tom, this is what is happening.
Raven is inventing excuses for the deaththreats.
while Pops is rising the ugliness of this topic to a new level.
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you have a responsibility. even for actions taken by prrety insane people, after they read your blog or book.
just don t forget it, when you are taking more liberties with truth and reality.
I find the urban heat island e-mails revealing. Michael Mann was big about filing slander and libel lawsuits, shutting up Steve McIntyre once and for all. Phil Jones was somewhat quiet about that part, so maybe he knew. The final word in the ClimateGate mails is from Phil's former boss asking if he just took Wang on trust.
Sod,
You really are a piece of work, aren't you. "Never take responsibility because we are ALWAYS right", that's the motto of folks like you.
So, when Jones made fun of the death of Dr. Daly...that's not disgusting?
When Jones deliberately evades FOIA requests in an effort to hide his data... that's not disgusting?
When Jones abused the public trust in his position as a head of a learning and research institution that advises Governments and the IPCC... that's not disgusting?
The general lack of professionalism, and infantile backbiting exhibited by Jones (and the rest of the "Team")... That's not disgusting?
Talking about how he's such a victim, and mentioning suicide after having been caught out... that's not disgusting?
You know, I don't think you actually understand what the word "Disgusting" actually means.
Doc
"In an odd way this is cheering news !"
is the kind of harmless bad joke we all have written in a private mail or spoken in private conversation. it is very different from sending death threats.
he who is without sin cast the first stone.
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even completely illegaly blocking FOI request would NOT be the same as writing death threats either.
you folks have a moral compass, that is way off...
Ok sod, let's try this out. Sen Murtha died and I feel happy because disagreed with him about something. ha ha ha.
.....Funny or juvenile?
I'm not sure why Jones needs to further publicize his already compromised role in this whole sorry saga. While anonymous death threats are never fun, they are hardly credible. Give me a peer-reviewed death threat any day. In my experience threats of any kind are hardly a cause for depression and self harm, unless the threats have been credible and unremitting over a significant time period.
I suspect rather that Jones is sad about getting caught, and this is a typical reaction of most people in similar circumstances. This is a bid for sympathy aided by a doctor with a facile prescription pad. I wonder how many scripts doctors have written for people suffering feelings of impending doom due to climate fear mongering. I guess Jones would see his victims as deficient because they "have no training in PR or dealing with crises". This man needs to be brought to book, and tried. If this egregious example of scientific fraud is not prosecuted, then the UK has far deeper problems.
Death threats?
Where is the evidence?
I have said I hope this mess ends in ridicule and not in anger, but in my last conversation with the dear departed Peter Bocking, he noted that ridicule will not suffice; that too many have died already.
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