There was no scandal. What happened is that the University of East Anglia was hacked, and the emails of the Climate Research Unit were stolen. Climate skeptics then trolled through the archives and selected short quotes out of context, completely distorting the meaning behind the emails, which were perfectly fine and entirely unobjectionable.
How can a pseduoscandal invented by climate skeptics possibly be a reason for why climate skeptics exist?
Maybe the distortions and fake outrage did convince some people, but it still seems wrong to point to this as a valid cause.
search for "FOIA2011.zip" to read them yourself
For those interested in the actual email zip, here's one working link I found.
http://assassinationscience.com/climategate/2/FOIA2011.zip
The top level README.md contains what the compilers thought were some of the most damning texts, and give reference so you can see the context for yourself.
Here are some from the README.md:
<1939> Thorne/MetO:
Observations do not show rising temperatures throughout the tropical troposphere unless you accept one single study and approach and discount a wealth of others. This is just downright dangerous. We need to communicate the uncertainty and be honest. Phil, hopefully we can find time to discuss these further if necessary [...]
<3066> Thorne:
I also think the science is being manipulated to put a political spin on it which for all our sakes might not be too clever in the long run.
<1611> Carter:
It seems that a few people have a very strong say, and no matter how much talking goes on beforehand, the big decisions are made at the eleventh hour by a select core group.
<2884> Wigley:
Mike, The Figure you sent is very deceptive [...] there have been a number of dishonest presentations of model results by individual authors and by IPCC [...]
<4755> Overpeck:
The trick may be to decide on the main message and use that to guid[e] what's included and what is left out.
i read them many years ago on one of my previoys computers
what i remember:
- exchanges about how to quiet skeptics
- the engineer's negative opinion of the codebase he was hired to clean up
maybe sometime this week i can dredge up the files to take another look, if there is interest
the zip archive may still be floating around on the web somewhere
UPDATE: found it
For those interested in the actual email zip, here's one working link I found.
http://assassinationscience.com/climategate/2/FOIA2011.zip
The top level README.md contains what the compilers thought were some of the most damning texts, and give reference so you can see the context for yourself.
Here are some from the README.md:
<1939> Thorne/MetO:
Observations do not show rising temperatures throughout the tropical troposphere unless you accept one single study and approach and discount a wealth of others. This is just downright dangerous. We need to communicate the uncertainty and be honest. Phil, hopefully we can find time to discuss these further if necessary [...]
<3066> Thorne:
I also think the science is being manipulated to put a political spin on it which for all our sakes might not be too clever in the long run.
<1611> Carter:
It seems that a few people have a very strong say, and no matter how much talking goes on beforehand, the big decisions are made at the eleventh hour by a select core group.
<2884> Wigley:
Mike, The Figure you sent is very deceptive [...] there have been a number of dishonest presentations of model results by individual authors and by IPCC [...]
<4755> Overpeck:
The trick may be to decide on the main message and use that to guid[e] what's included and what is left out.
The internet works even though its built on a horrifyingly rickety series of dependencies. People complain about other people's code. The only code that doesn't have someone complaining about it is signed Knuth, and Djikstra would probably complain about something if you asked him.
At no point did I say the science was wrong. It isn't. If anything, the projections are too rosy.
There are types of speech that are legitimately harmful, and discussing how to protect people from its harms is part of being in a functioning society. Programmers complain about code, but that doesn't make the results wrong. I guess I could explain why the models aren't can't be exactly predictive, but nobody wants a deep dive on epistemology. But the deeper problem is this isn't a great use of anyone's time: "You cannot reason someone out of something he or she was not reasoned into."
Your not understanding something doesn't make it wrong. Your skepticism is based on some combination of fear and pride, not reason, but it's ok. I'm not mad at you. I'm sure you're doing your best.
Of course this will be downvoted to oblivion, to punish me for pointing it out. Because it's now an ideological debate.
What was this scandal?
he also left personal messages expressing his dislike of the codebase :D
search for "FOIA2011.zip" to read them yourself
scandal was contents of the email, which demonstrated attempts to shut down critics