I am becoming quite fond of my little corner of Schiphol airport. I have put up my Christmas cards and a few bits of tinsel. I now have a boarding card for the 0800 to Manchester. This is the sixth boarding card I have had. It is very hard to understand why, time after time, they don’t know a flight is cancelled until some time after it was due to leave and all the passengers have queued at the gate for hours.
Of course, Manchester is a lot further from Ramsgate than Schiphol is, so even if the flight atually goes, this represents rather dubious progress.
Happy New Year everybody.
Remarkably, KLM delivered my lost luggage, including my laptop, at 9.30 pm on New Year’s Eve. At that time a pretty lively party was already in full swing,much improved by the presence of a great many beautiful young women, mostly from Latvia. I am not sure why; my life as ever consists of a bewildering succession of chance encounters with really nice people. I am in the fortunate position of being able to say that Nadira was the most lovely of all, without indulging in dutiful hyperbole.
It was an extremely happy Christmas. Having my mum, both my brothers and all my three chidren together was as great as it was rare.
We have been through the laptop in lost luggage discussion before. The problem is that my shoulders dislocate at the drop of a hat, and I travel without hand luggage to avoid an accident.
2011 is going to be a very important year for me. particularly the first quarter. A number of crucial events are going either to set me up financially for the rest of my life, or result in real distress and failure. At present I have reason to be very optimistic. I am also very absorbed in my life of Alexander Burnes, which I hope will help establish a serious academic reputation.
The Portuguese edition of Murder in Samarkand has sold unexpectedly well in Brazil. The translation of the Turkish edition has just been finished.
I hope to do a Wikileaks retrospective in the next couple of days. Just a quick thought on the case of the poor young gardener in Bristol. Of the Jill Dando case, long before Barry Bulsara’s succesful appeal I blogged that this appeared to be a miscarriage of justice in which the police had fitted up the local weirdo.
Despite not being enamoured of landlords in general, I fear the same dynamic is at work in Bristol, albeit Chris Jefferies is much more intellectually capable than Bulsara. My instinct is that the police have picked up on Jefferies for being camper than a boy scout jamboree and archer than Trajan.
Jefferies’ release on bail has me worried that there was nothing against him other than the “He’s a weird one, guv” instinct of some not very bright cop. The case needs to be closely watched as history shows that the powers of the police to make the evidence fit the suspect are considerable.
FYI, I emailed the webmaster a few days ago offering to help install a registration plugin (there are several available for this platform). No response yet. (Well, it is the holidays.)
The quality of discussions here is often superior to other political forums, but it degenerates when people habitually attribute ulterior motives as a shortcut to undermining other people’s credibility. It’s sloppy and rude, and invites retaliation.
By the way, I second Frazer’s observation. Craig spends very little time on the blog even when he’s at home, and rarely says much about it when it’s mentioned to him. Dismiss or deny that as you please, but don’t expect a running commentary from Craig – he hardly ever reads past the first few comments.
AB,
What’s your agenda in smearing Suhayl?
techie my lad, why so keen to protect radical chinless wonder and spoilt scion of the rich anno? He’s not very nice, you know.
AB,
What’s your agenda in smearing Suhayl
Phew tungsten, quite an answer! I’ll try to focus on the relevant bits.
1. Do people believe a parity between the genders, races and sexualities is possible? Sure, yes. And we have to try. Briefly, let’s take each in turn:
(a) Sexuality is the easiest one. A person’s sexuality is an invisible component, and so is the hardest to discriminate against. People are entitled to be privately opposed to homosexuality or lesbianism, but there should be some common agreement that gay men and women are treated just the same as straight couples. We broadly have this protection at the moment, and I am not sure I have heard a good reason against it (except “respecting religious beliefs”, which cannot in themselves be justified by the lawmaker or the court).
(b) Gender. Given the way in which the career market has changed to include women, and the way capitalism has changed to more often require dual incomes per household, men and women now have a more equal share in earning family income (though in terms of treatment and pay equality, there is still some way to go). What would be a reasonable counterargument to this? If the woman’s place is in the home, then the natural order of things perhaps would revert to this stereotype at some point in the future; that said, I think the greater equality afforded to women these days is empowering, and it is reversing a great deal of injustice meted out to the female sex by patriarchal religion and its conservative cultural descendants.
(c) Race and culture: much has been written on this blog about the incompatibility of different cultures, or that “forced” immigration is intended to keep a host nation frustrated and divided. Personally, I think cultures do have the capacity to get along fine, which I tend to think of as obvious: I suspect here that you’re rejecting multiculturalism when the real object of your frustration ought to be globalisation. The mechanisms of international capitalism pits one worker (white) against another (black, Jewish, Latino, etc) and people see the differences of colour and custom, rather than the economic system that took their job, or downsized their role to India, or replaced their work with a Chinese computer.
I sense there is much more about race that is cause for debate here, but nevertheless it would be helpful if on each of these characteristics you could show why you think equality is not possible (leaving aside economic effects of migration and international competition).
My point on teaching ‘thinking’ in schools was intended to aid your argument. My thesis is: let’s teach about sexual, racial and gender equality (or fairness, if you like) in schools, and then give children the tools to critically examine everything they are taught. That’s not to say they should get a Nick Griffin video for every Human Rights class – just that I am confident the ideas of human equality stand up strongly to ongoing critical analysis.
In fact, if you were to accept the need for anti-discrimination legislation (say, to reduce hate crime or job discrimination) then you could call for protectionist import taxes and a tougher immigration policy for the UK – to achieve a national state rather than a world one – whilst at the same time avoiding calling for racially divisive policy.
(2) I agree that the NC can be too prescriptive, and I’d add that the syllabus is too crowded. It changes too often (though what are we doing if not proposing new changes?!).
You find my suggestions for sanctions Orwellian, but don’t forget that it is you (and AB) who are proposing that teachers’ authority is on the wane. The question remains, what would you do about it?
I find it hard to believe that the traditional authority role of parents and teachers has been deliberately socially engineered to undermine society (to keep capitalism running? to keep an underclass in penury? to keep non-elites busy fighting each other rather than rioting against the political class?). I say it is the decline of the age of deference, and a decline in the traditional political power of the church, which in turn produced an individualist rights-based outlook. It is easy to romanticise the old order of things, but with the greater emphasis on human rights now, and a justified shame upon false imprisonment, unfair trials, punishment beatings and torture, I think this is generally a good thing.
5. Lots of heat here, but not much light. I agree that minority ethnic consciousness produces an upsurge in traditionalism, especially in Muslim communities here in Birmingham (UK), who sometimes overcompensate for Western values despite emerging liberal attitudes at home (in the cities, at least). Insofar as Western ideology is odious to immigrant groups, I contend that it is neo-capitalism and blood-soaked US-UK resource wars that causes resentment, and that again should make the Washington Consensus, not multiculturalism, your real target.
That said, I am in favour of the generation of new ideas to facilitate better integration of certain ethnic groups in British society. The Citizenship Test was a patronising device that slapped Islamic communities in the face, just at the same time as our militaries were looting their countries and killing their brethren; I’d warrant you found it Orwellian too, and that might be fair comment! But forced deportation of non-indigenous British citizens harks back to pre-civil-rights era United States, as well as exhibiting a great deal of defeatism. With the UK as it is now, what would you suggest with existing Indian, Pakistani, African, Jamaican, Eastern European and Far Eastern communities?
Personally, I think some modifications to the international financial system would work wonders. Firstly, a Tobin tax on international financial transactions. Secondly, a wholesale closing down of tax havens, most of which are in British jurisdiction. Thirdly, to buffer ordinary people from the ravages of international capital: split all retail banking from their speculative banking arms, and refuse all state bail-outs to the latter. Oh yes, and forth: ensure the taxation systems properly collect the corporation tax they are due (see: Vodafone et al). You refer to “economic hardship ahead” – well, sure. But if we implement even some of these suggestions, we’ll have a budget surplus and no public spending cuts will be necessary. Hence my proposition that your complaint should be primarily economic, not racial.
*
I’d like to understand more about your political direction, and whilst you might find the left-right paradigm tired, I think it is useful. Hence, if you would answer my previous counter-questions, I think we might learn something:
(i) Are you arguing that a person should be proud of his nation regardless of what it does on the international stage?
(ii) Are you proud of your country? (If you can say what country you’re from, that would add some interesting detail also).
(iii) Why are you in favour of religious teaching? Are you in favour of teaching just the ‘state religion’, or all religions?
(iv) You disagree with my approach to reduce welfare dependency, but you’ve not suggested how you would do it. What would you do? Are you in favour of welfare mechanisms at all?
(v) You believe the media is controlled, whilst I think the state of the media occurs as a result of complex interplays between different components of global capitalism. But we’re agreed that the effect is propagandist in Western societies, so: what would you do about it?
Thanks.
@AB – which part of my text was a load of bollocks? See, I want to understand where you’re coming from, but you alternate rapidly between polite and descriptive, to evasive and abusive, and back again. This doesn’t much help if you want your political position to be understood (you’re here, and your posting, so it would seem reasonable to make that assumption).
So, I warmly invite you to respond to my remarks at [December 31, 2010 7:53 PM], which in themselves were honest and civil answers to your questions. You do have answers to the questions you posed yourself, surely?
your => you’re
Oops! 😉
Ruth asked”
“AB,
What’s your agenda in smearing Suhayl?”
Payback, Ruthie, payback. Except I’m smearing no one. I am repudiating Dr. Saadi’s multiple smears against me. Smears fully endorsed by Techie, Jon and Clark.
Look at the previous thread. Look at his vicious insinuation about me and his attempt to intimidate me by posting as much personal information about me as he had at his disposal.
Or to put it simply: to maintain the truth in the face of a barrage of lies.
And he still won’t answer my questions though they require only the slightest effort. Here they are again, just in case he forgot.
(1) “If Al Qaeda was responsible for 9/11, and if on 9/11 Al Qaeda was run by Osama bin Laden, and if Osama bin Laden was then a guest of the Afghanistan Government, and if as was the case, the Afghanistan Government refused to hand Osama bin Laden over to American justice, on what possible grounds can the US and its allies, including Britain, be condemned for their war against the Afghanistan Taliban?”
NOTE: Posturing about what you’d do in Afghanistan if you were God is irrelevant. Just state, briefly, what grounds, if any?
(2) “According to Wikileaks, Osama bin Laden’s is alive and well and and living in Pakistan from where he is directing military operations against the US in Afghanistan. So are not US military operations in Pakistan, however tragic the consequences, (a) entirely justifiable, or are we to conclude that (b) Julian Assange is an unwitting dupe or (c) conscious agent of US disinformation?”
Answer (a), (b) or (c), or state briefly any other inference that is logically consistent with the conclusions.
(3) “You don’t support them, and latterly – perhaps always – have maintained the BNP is a security services operation. But you speak positively of a number of their policies.”
Of BNP policies of which I have spoken positively, to which he Dr. Saadi opposed?
(a) immediate withdrawal from the war in Afghanistan
(b) withdrawal from the EU
(c)devolution of power to the lowest practical level of government
(d) protection of British industry from competition from Asian sweat shops.
But let me reiterate what I said above about Dr. Saadi’s tediously repetitious smear:
Dr. Suhayl Saadi said:
“I ask Alfred one simple question which he is well able to answer and he tries to avoid answering it by firing three or four questions at me, all of which I answer.”
The question implies a lie: the lie that my position concerning the BNP is ambiguous and that there are reasonable grounds to suppose that I am a crypto-nazi and a racist. But I have already stated my position on the BNP multiple times and unequivocally, as confirmed by Jon, who states:
“You don’t support them, and latterly – perhaps always – have maintained the BNP is a security services operation. But you speak positively of a number of their policies.”
Selective quotation, AB? My full paragraph was:
“Hmm, AB, I don’t understand why you won’t answer Suhayl’s question. You don’t support them, and latterly – perhaps always – have maintained the BNP is a security services operation. But you speak positively of a number of their policies. I’d imagine a simple ‘no’ from you would suffice, and it might put to bed the bad feeling between you?”
Err… I haven’t endorsed the smearing of anyone, as far as I am aware. Honest, guv!
Right, I am off to eat ice cream and watch some movies. Night all!
AB,
Are you a government hack?
AB,
Are you a government hack?
King Of Welsh Noir (liked your book btw) thanks for your timely, if somewhat poignant, on-topic comments.
And although my multiple and dishonest detractors here are prepared to acknowledge that I have said the BNP is likely a security services operation, none have had the integrity to mention the evidence I have presented indicating the BNPs possible connection with NATO’s train-station-bombing Gladio project, or to acknowledge my believe that purpose of the operation is to negate support for populist policies.
So what I have proposed is that the the BNP’s Nick Griffin is not a tin-pot neo Nazi, but the head of an operation sponsored by the existing fascist power structure, for which Craig Murray wants your vote, and which has as its aim to discredit populist policies and thereby undermine the democratic rights of every citizen.
But its all a bit to complicated for some of the brains here. And complicated enough to be twisted entirely out of shape by the sharper wordsmiths.
But for anyone interested in reality, the important question is this: who are the real fascists here? Perhaps that explains the brutality and dishonesty of the arguments thrown at me by Jon, Dr. Saadi, and Techie.
Assange’s anti-Semitic friend.
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com/2010/12/assange-shamir-disinformation-agents.html
The sun’s still shining here so I’m off.
So smear away folks.
btw if anyone should need or have to contact me (unpaid debts? litigation?) have new email: technicolour6000 at hotmail.co.uk. Would close it down, or filter, if it got this level of spam, though.
Jon, well done – great posts!!
Alfred, I did answer all of your questions, in detail. You may think the answers unworthy, but I tried to give the best answers I could in this format.
Now to my question.
You’re in the ballot-box, Alfred. It’s raining outside, because you never left Devon. There is a ballot paper in front of you. One of the choices has the name of the candidate and the words, ‘British National Party’ with the party logo and a little, blank box opposite.
The polling station is closing in one minute.
Would you, or would you not, put a little cross in the little box?
If you are not sure, then please just say so.
‘Yes’, ‘no’ and ‘don’t know’ all would be perfectly valid responses.
Yet still, you render no response. Why is that, Alfred?
Thank you for your attentiveness. I appreciate it. Have a good day. And think about my question.
I do understand everything you’re saying about the BNP and Nick Griffin, Alfred. But my question is do with action, not words. In spite of all you know or think about them or their leader, would you categorically not vote for them if you still lived in the UK? That is my question. I think it’s an important one.
SamB, Frazer: Patronising or insulting me is fair enough, but please don’t tarnish the rest of the board by association. If you think the whole comments section free for all is ruining Craig’s reputation or something, I suppose you would feel defensive of him, most people here have felt defensive for him, I think. If you can’t see that, you haven’t been following the threads.
I have learnt rather a lot from people here: history, politics, economics, culture, art, music, literature, perspectives. Cheers, people.
Dr. Saadi said:
“I do understand everything you’re saying about the BNP and Nick Griffin”
I don’t think so. Certainly you have not acknowledged the argument I have made that the BNP looks like an offshoot of NATO’s train-station-bombing Gladio Project, aimed at discrediting opposition to NATO membership and other unpopular policies.
So the interesting question is this:
Is Nick Griffin a wannabe tin-pot fascist dictator, or is he an agent of the existing fascist power structure intent on discrediting the anti-war, anti-NWO, anti-mass immigration views of the majority of the British population.
As I have repeatedly stated, I believe the latter. So where does that leave Craig Murray and his acolytes who want everyone to vote for the existing fascist power structure?
LOL
And about those questions Dr. Saadi,
since your first attempt was a fail, why not try them again. But keep your answers short. One word in each case could probably do it:
(1) “If Al Qaeda was responsible for 9/11, and if on 9/11 Al Qaeda was run by Osama bin Laden, and if Osama bin Laden was then a guest of the Afghanistan Government, and if as was the case, the Afghanistan Government refused to hand Osama bin Laden over to American justice, on what possible grounds can the US and its allies, including Britain, be condemned for their war against the Afghanistan Taliban?”
NOTE: Posturing about what you’d do in Afghanistan if you were God is irrelevant. Just state, briefly, what grounds, if any?
(2) “According to Wikileaks, Osama bin Laden’s is alive and well and and living in Pakistan from where he is directing military operations against the US in Afghanistan. So are not US military operations in Pakistan, however tragic the consequences, (a) entirely justifiable, or are we to conclude that (b) Julian Assange is an unwitting dupe or (c) conscious agent of US disinformation?”
Answer (a), (b) or (c), or state briefly any other inference that is logically consistent with the conclusions.
(3) Of the following BNP policies, to which are you opposed?
(a) immediate withdrawal from the war in Afghanistan
(b) withdrawal from the EU
(c) devolution of power to the lowest practical level of government
(d) protection of British industry from competition from Asian sweat shops.
Technicolour : I echo your sentiments, there is much to be gained here. For some self-appointed arbitrator to take a quick look at the work of the trolls, nazis, teabaggers and spambots that infest this blog, and declare we’re all guilty is a bit strong. Indeed, “collective punishment” is prohibited under the Geneva Conventions. Maybe Frazer is a teacher? They’re fond of lazy generalisation too.
alan campbell: It’s a bit much slurring Anno and technicolour on the strength that you assume they are wusses, because you assume they are public schoolboys. This former comprehensive pupil, from particularly rough catchment areas, will give you a run for your money, if you fancy mixing it up sometime 😉
Clark says one of my themes is that:
“Global warming is a conspiracy, and would also a good thing anyway.”
This is a silly statement.
First, because the climate is either warming or it is not, but as a physical process it cannot be a conspiracy.
Second, because if Clark means that I believe claims that the climate is warming are the result of some kind of conspiracy of lies, then he should point to some evidence, of which however, he would find there is none.
And quite contrary to Clark’s assertion, I have, for many years, followed closely the mainstream scientific evidence bearing on the question of anthropogenic climate change, have generally accepted it as valid science and have even published some of it. For example, the article:
“Global warming: It’s happening” by Kevin Trenberth, Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand and head of Climate Modeling for the US National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration.
http://naturalscience.com/ns/articles/01-09/ns_ket.html
As a note at the head of the article states, the article was written at my request as a response to a feature article in Canada’s “national newspaper,” the (Toronto) Globe and Mail, which asserted that reports of global warming are “science fiction” invented by self-serving scientists, and that, since 1980, the Earth has cooled, not warmed.
I have also published the following articles by Jim Hansen, Director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Science, and one of the best known advocates of the view that anthropogenic climate change represent a dire threat to humanity.
“Can we defuse The Global Warming Time Bomb?”
naturalscience.com/ns/articles/01-16/ns_jeh.html
and
“An Open Letter on Global Warming”
naturalscience.com/ns/letters/ns_let25.html.
I also published this letter by Nobel Laureate Sherwood Roland, solicited on my behalf by Carl Alberts, then President of the US National Academy of Sciences, and later Editor in Chief of Science Magazine.
naturalscience.com/ns/forum/forum01c.html
Other authors of that letter were President Obama’s Science Advisor, JOHN P. HOLDEN, Founder of the Woods Hole Research Center, GEORGE M. WOODWELL, Member of the US and Russian Academies of Science and former Head of the US National Research Council, HAROLD A. MOONEY, and Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere and NOAA Administrator, JANE LUBCHENCO.
Hardly crackpots and conspiracy theorists, surely. Oh and did I mention that Jane Lubchenco’s research interests include biodiversity, climate change, sustainability science, and the state of the oceans. She has received eight honorary degrees, the 8th Annual Heinz Award in the Environment (2002), and the Nierenberg Prize for Science in the Public Interest from the Scripps Institute of Oceanography (2003). And between 1997 and 1998, she served as president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
My own modest views about anthropenic climate change are suggested by the following piece relating to the Climategate emails, which I wrote just over a year ago.
December 1, 2009
Delusional George: Monbiot proclaims his responsibility to uphold the highest standards of science — the scientists having failed to do so
At first I thought it
now I know it
George Monbiot
is an idiot.
In all the talk about the stolen emails, I have yet to see evidence that any of the journal publications of Phil Jones and colleagues are technically fraudulent.
Sure, data were massaged. Sure, questionable judgements were made. But as far as the integrity of the publications is concerned, the only issue for the scientific community is whether the handling of data was consistent with the published description of methods, theory, etc., and there appears to be absolutely no evidence that it was not.
As to whether the data handling was appropriate, that is another matter. But it is not something to be resolved by Internet chitchat or by the reviled Pat Michaels or other talking heads on CNN of Fox News. It is a question that the scientific community must decide on the basis of evidence and discussion presented in the peer-reviewed literature.
The emails show that Prof. Jones and associates were partisan in reviewing the work of peers whose ideas differed from their own. But no one who participates in process of reviewing and editing journal articles is without bias: for which reason the scientific literature is highly flawed. Nevertheless, the process of peer review is generally believed to be the best method of vetting the literature that the scientific community has yet come up with.
Monbiot’s repeated calls for Prof. Jones’ resignation despite feeling “desperately sorry for him” are, therefore, ridiculous and contemptible.
None of which alters my suspicion that some of the methods and models used to measure and predict climate change are highly questionable. With luck, therefore, the current debate will encourage a new look at the analysis of global temperature trends over the last hundred years or so, with particular attention to the urban heat island effect and other potential artifacts that I discussed with Prof. Jones in an email correspondence many years ago, and which Kevin Trenberth raised in one of the most recent of the stolen emails.
Much more important, though, is the analysis of possible long-term, climatic consequences of human influences on the composition of the atmosphere (not just carbon dioxide but water vapor, black carbon or soot, sulfate particles, and other aerosols, methane, fluorocarbons, etc.), and the surface properties (albedo) of the earth. This is the field of climate modeling, and the stolen emails tell little if anything about this.
Monbiot claim that as a leader among “climate rationalists” he will “uphold the highest standards of science” is simply delusional. George Monbiot was evidently until now totally unaware of the kind of intellectual world in which Prof. Jones operated. How, then, can he presume to uphold standards of any kind within that world?
George simply doesn’t know what is going on and should stop pontificating about and publishing alarmist books on climate change research, a subject about which he is obviously largely ignorant.
canadianspectator.ca/zarchive.050.html
Clark says one of my themes is that:
“Global warming is a conspiracy, and would also a good thing anyway.”
This is a silly statement.
First, because the climate is either warming or it is not, but as a physical process it cannot be a conspiracy.
Second, because if Clark means that I believe claims that the climate is warming are the result of some kind of conspiracy of lies, then he should point to some evidence, of which however, he would find there is none.
And quite contrary to Clark’s assertion, I have, for many years, followed closely the mainstream scientific evidence bearing on the question of anthropogenic climate change, have generally accepted it as valid science and have even published some of it. For example, the article:
“Global warming: It’s happening” by Kevin Trenberth, Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand and head of Climate Modeling for the US National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration.
http://naturalscience.com/ns/articles/01-09/ns_ket.html
As a note at the head of the article states, the article was written at my request as a response to a feature article in Canada’s “national newspaper,” the (Toronto) Globe and Mail, which asserted that reports of global warming are “science fiction” invented by self-serving scientists, and that, since 1980, the Earth has cooled, not warmed.
I have also published the following articles by Jim Hansen, Director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Science, and one of the best known advocates of the view that anthropogenic climate change represent a dire threat to humanity.
“Can we defuse The Global Warming Time Bomb?”
naturalscience.com/ns/articles/01-16/ns_jeh.html
and
“An Open Letter on Global Warming”
naturalscience.com/ns/letters/ns_let25.html.
I also published this letter by Nobel Laureate Sherwood Roland, solicited on my behalf by Carl Alberts, then President of the US National Academy of Sciences, and later Editor in Chief of Science Magazine.
naturalscience.com/ns/forum/forum01c.html
Other authors of that letter were President Obama’s Science Advisor, JOHN P. HOLDEN, Founder of the Woods Hole Research Center, GEORGE M. WOODWELL, Member of the US and Russian Academies of Science and former Head of the US National Research Council, HAROLD A. MOONEY, and Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere and NOAA Administrator, JANE LUBCHENCO.
Hardly crackpots and conspiracy theorists, surely. Oh and did I mention that Jane Lubchenco’s research interests include biodiversity, climate change, sustainability science, and the state of the oceans. She has received eight honorary degrees, the 8th Annual Heinz Award in the Environment (2002), and the Nierenberg Prize for Science in the Public Interest from the Scripps Institute of Oceanography (2003). And between 1997 and 1998, she served as president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
My own modest views about anthropenic climate change are suggested by the following piece relating to the Climategate emails, which I wrote just over a year ago.
December 1, 2009
Delusional George: Monbiot proclaims his responsibility to uphold the highest standards of science — the scientists having failed to do so
At first I thought it
now I know it
George Monbiot
is an idiot.
In all the talk about the stolen emails, I have yet to see evidence that any of the journal publications of Phil Jones and colleagues are technically fraudulent.
Sure, data were massaged. Sure, questionable judgements were made. But as far as the integrity of the publications is concerned, the only issue for the scientific community is whether the handling of data was consistent with the published description of methods, theory, etc., and there appears to be absolutely no evidence that it was not.
As to whether the data handling was appropriate, that is another matter. But it is not something to be resolved by Internet chitchat or by the reviled Pat Michaels or other talking heads on CNN of Fox News. It is a question that the scientific community must decide on the basis of evidence and discussion presented in the peer-reviewed literature.
The emails show that Prof. Jones and associates were partisan in reviewing the work of peers whose ideas differed from their own. But no one who participates in process of reviewing and editing journal articles is without bias: for which reason the scientific literature is highly flawed. Nevertheless, the process of peer review is generally believed to be the best method of vetting the literature that the scientific community has yet come up with.
Monbiot’s repeated calls for Prof. Jones’ resignation despite feeling “desperately sorry for him” are, therefore, ridiculous and contemptible.
None of which alters my suspicion that some of the methods and models used to measure and predict climate change are highly questionable. With luck, therefore, the current debate will encourage a new look at the analysis of global temperature trends over the last hundred years or so, with particular attention to the urban heat island effect and other potential artifacts that I discussed with Prof. Jones in an email correspondence many years ago, and which Kevin Trenberth raised in one of the most recent of the stolen emails.
Much more important, though, is the analysis of possible long-term, climatic consequences of human influences on the composition of the atmosphere (not just carbon dioxide but water vapor, black carbon or soot, sulfate particles, and other aerosols, methane, fluorocarbons, etc.), and the surface properties (albedo) of the earth. This is the field of climate modeling, and the stolen emails tell little if anything about this.
Monbiot claim that as a leader among “climate rationalists” he will “uphold the highest standards of science” is simply delusional. George Monbiot was evidently until now totally unaware of the kind of intellectual world in which Prof. Jones operated. How, then, can he presume to uphold standards of any kind within that world?
George simply doesn’t know what is going on and should stop pontificating about and publishing alarmist books on climate change research, a subject about which he is obviously largely ignorant.
canadianspectator.ca/zarchive.050.html
Jon
Appreciate the intellectual energy you’re bringing to the discussion.
You are forcing me to crystallize and focus my thoughts in a way that can only be benficial.
(1)I think we British totally overestimate our abilities. We may have been movers and shakers on the world stage in the past but this is no longer the case today.
Our perception of ourselves is false because it is based on falsified official history. The reality is quite different.
Once we disown once and for all the Anglo-Dutch monetarist synarchy that has used the control of the money supply to oppress us at home and inflict wars of conquest on other weaker states abroad we may well begin to build a country of which all of us can feel proud.
That said I remain convinced that there is absolutely no point in anyone carrying a burden of permanent shame and guilt re-sins committed in the past.
(2)I have no strong views on religious teaching but believe that children need to know that there is good and bad in all religions. I also have sympathy for those who feel that their majority faith: Christianity is not sufficiently prioritized over others.
(3)I believe in the welfare state and the NHS but detest politicians who pretend they’re ready to finance them when they’re actually cutting them (NICE) in order to finance expensive wars abroad.
Dependency is inevitable where wage levels are so low and so few creative and rewarding forms of employment are now being created.
(4)Along with control of the money supply control of the media including book publishing lies in the hands of the aforementioned synarchy. We need take back control of both.
The internet as it now exists is the most exciting and rewarding means of staying truly informed. As increasing numbers of people become aware of this the corporate/gatekeeper media will implode under the weight of its own disinformation.
In 2011 let’s dump the Frankfurt School agenda and start RE-BUILDING rather than succumbing to the forms of “creative destruction” on which such an agenda relies for its fulfillment.
Suhayl, I wonder whether it might be time to call time on your question to Alfred, valid as it was. He’s not going to give a direct answer, from what I can tell. I was rather hoping he would respond to my answers to his questions too, given I spent a fair bit of time on them.
But referring to us as fascists, Alfred? Not fair at all. I’ve not smeared your reputation at all, though you’re bloody hard work to pin down, politically speaking! I should have been interested to know why teaching children that, say, homophobia is wrong is “indoctrination”, or how you would deal with welfare dependency. The old Alfred would have been happy to offer some views.
Tech, glenn – agreed, even with spammers and troublemakers, I have long enjoyed the exchange of views here. Keeps the grey matter ticking over.
Anyhoo, bed!
you and whose army!
AB
I really hate seeing factually incorrect statements continually repeated, particularly when previous attempts to correct them (not by me in this case) have been ignored.
The Taliban did NOT refuse to hand over Bin Laden. In fact they offered to hand him over as soon as the US supplied them with some evidence of his guilt. They were doing no more than insisting on due process.
I sincerely hope that you can refrain from repeating that particular lie yet again.
While on the subject it is also worth noting that Wikileaks themselves are NOT claiming that Bin Laden is alive and living in Pakistan, the claim was made in one of the released cables, not the same thing at all.
Piss off tony_opmoc, you drunk fuck