Climate Change: The Next Generation: Richard Muller is a well bad tosser (and a disingenuous wanker)

Richard Muller is a well bad tosser

by Mike Kaulbars, greenfyre, April 26, 2011

BPSDB

Knowledge is a deadly friend
When no one sets the rules.
The fate of all mankind I see
Is in the hands of fools.

Let me begin by saying I have enormous respect for William M. Connolley (aka Stoat) and generally do not significantly disagree with him.

However, in his April 5th piece “Muller is rubbish” Stoat said, “But he [Muller] isn’t a tosser. I’m sure he’ll be glad to know that.”

Stoat, you’re just plain wrong, Muller most definitely is a well bad tosser, a “denialist chumming complete bollocks.”

Short Prologue

(more documentation at bottom)

Richard Muller is a Berkley physicist of some minor notoriety in climate change circles for being critical of “the Hockey Stick” (i.e., historical temperature reconstructions). By “critical” I mean calling it “phoney.”

Earlier this year the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature group began a project to re-examine the existing temperature data. The project drew criticism for, among other things:

consisting exclusively of people with a poor track record for:

discussing the science honestly.

actually understanding the science.

being funded in part by Koch Industries.

On March 31, 2011, Muller testified before Congress and affirmed the high quality of the existing climate science which sent the climate change Deniers into a frenzy.

The Muller sideshow has been one I have been largely ignoring, but then a repeat commenter brought this video clip to my attention:

The full talk may be found here.

MULLER: “What they did was, and there is a quote. A quote came out on the emails, these leaked emails that said, let’s use Mike’s trick “Hide The Decline.” That is the word. Let us use Mike’s trick “Hide The Decline.”

Except of course that is not the quote. The actual quote is:

“I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (i.e., from 1981 onwards) amd [Sic]from 1961 for Keith’s to hide the decline.”

Of course Muller never clearly states “This is the exact quote,” so strictly speaking he is

not actually lying. What we are dealing with here is the tactic typical of more than a few Deniers of presenting information in a way that pretty much guarantees that the audience will be completely misled and draw all of the wrong conclusions, but if challenged the presenter plays coy and disingenuously asks, “Who? Me?”

It’s just more of the “I did not have sex with that Red Herring” plausible deniability defence of what can only be described as lies. Indeed the whole presentation is in this form.

Watch the clip as though you were a naive viewer and see if these are not the interpretations that a reasonable person would draw from how Muller presents it, even though all of them are false:

the data in question is the basis for the “hockey stick,” i.e., both documented recent temperature rise and the pre-instrumental record;
the tree ring proxy data undermines climate change science and/or “the hockey stick”;
the “Nature” trick is what was used on Brifa’s tree ring proxy data;
the adjusted data/graphic was published in a peer reviewed journal;
as a consequence of #4, the scientific community was fooled about climate change, particularly the faculty at Berkley;
the “decline” was a secret until exposed by the Deniers;
CRU was not hacked, but rather it was a leak by an insider;
That the tree ring data came out through the CRU hack

(1) It’s not of course. For the past 130 years the record is based largely on direct measurement, or is Muller unaware of that amazing new scientific instrument known as “the thermometer”? It’s only been around for about four centuries.

The historical record is based on a wide range of proxies using many different data sets from many different studies.

(2) The tree ring proxy data can be dropped entirely and it makes no difference worth mentioning, a fact published in 2007.

(3) As the full, accurate quote clearly shows, the “trick” is in reference to a different data set from Brifa’s tree ring proxies. Further, as I noted at the time, if you don’t immediately spot that “Mike’s Nature trick” is a reference to a technique published in the Journal Nature, then you probably don’t do science (but note how Muller never mentions “Nature,” he just says “Mike’s trick”).

(4) The graphic in question was for the cover illustration of a report, not as the presentation of scientific data. When presenting the actual science the decline is clearly shown in the graphs and discussed in the text (e.g., 1995 here, 2000 here and 2007 here).

(5) I don’t know how things are done at Berkley, but most scientists read the scientific literature for information rather than basing their knowledge on a cover illustration.

Insomuch as Berkley has an excellent reputation I am going to assume that the faculty there routinely follow this standard practice and it is only Muller’s misrepresentation of their competence that is the problem.

(6) as noted in #4, the decline was known and freely discussed in the literature for a decade and a half before the CRU hack. Muller even says “in their paper” (suggesting he is referring to the 2007 Mann et al. paper, published years before the CRU hack) “if you dig into it” (Muller means ‘if you just read it’ since they explicitly discuss the issue), etc.

(7) The investigation into the incident is ongoing and there is no definitive answer as yet, but all of the actual evidence points to a hack, not a leak. Note that is evidence, something scientists rely on rather than just breezily claiming that some unidentified group “most people who know this business believe…”

(8) The data was available on the CRU web site and had been for years.

And so on. Completely exposing every misleading statement of Muller’s in just that five minute clip is far from done, but I think I have made my point; he is a disingenuous wanker. The references below document at much greater length the degree and extent to which Muller is misleading the public and anyone who mistakenly takes him at face value.

Notwithstanding the predictable defences of Muller (rebutted here), I find his presentation to be

disingenuous to the point of being outright dishonest.

Make no mistake here, this is a formal presentation that we are watching, not idle faculty lounge banter.

Even if it were a casual discussion I think most scientists would agree that it is still inexcusably sloppy and misleading.

Just another example where the informal nature of a Denier presentation led to some unintended mischaracterizations and poor phrasing that just happened to leave the audience completely misinformed. No lies were told, and it’s just unfortunate that the result bears absolutely no resemblance whatsoever to reality. Yeah, right.

What makes the whole thing particularly nauseating is his feigned indignation at any scientist who would ever dare to misrepresent fact and mislead people, and his supposed outrage at such deception.

Naturally, if the climate scientists were actually guilty of the acts that Muller implies then his indignation would be understandable. However, those supposed acts are actually the creation of Muller misrepresenting the facts and misleading people. As I keep noting, the Denialosphere is never low on irony.

So Dr Muller, if a scientist who glosses up a cover graphic deserves such vehement condemnation and opprobrium as you have been dishing out, what would you say is appropriate for someone giving outrageously dishonest, misleading presentations as you have been doing? Surely watching your own performances you must be in fits of apoplexy at the inexcusable charlatanry, never mind the flaming hypocrisy, no?

Given his track record Muller was invited to testify to Congress by the House Republicans in the full expectation that he would affirm their idiotic delusion that climate change is a hoax. “In the hands of fools” indeed.

Muller Redeemed?

There has been much sturm und drang about Muller’s Congressional testimony on the preliminary analysis of the data and how his affirmation of the validity and quality of the science somehow shows him to be, at the end of the day, a real scientist of integrity and substance.

Here is my question, given how BEST has painted themselves into a corner, what the hell else was he going to do?

The whole premise of BEST is that they are doing a completely transparent, totally accountable review of the data. Everything would be available, everything would be public. The data, the code, the methodology, all of it laid out for everyone to see.

So BEST is absolutely committed to revealing everything when they release their conclusions. That is the only justification for the very existence of BEST, and they knew that whatever they release will come under intense scrutiny by the entire scientific community.

They have put themselves in a position where any withholding or fudging will be immediately exposed and the entire project and staff utterly discredited.

Since the existing science is of high quality and valid, and the data do clearly show the reality of climate change, Muller was stuck. What were his options? Lie to Congress and have that exposed shortly thereafter? thereby finishing off whatever academic credibility he has left? Refuse to testify even though it would later be revealed that preliminary results were available?

So I repeat, what the hell else was he going to do?

I am glad that he did what he did, but insomuch as he really had no other option I find I cannot interpret it as evidence of his essential good character and scientific integrity. For that I am going to need him to stop giving misleading presentations and interviews and start presenting the facts honestly, accurately, in context and in good faith.

Even better would be if he made some effort to correct his earlier misrepresentations and admit to the disingenuous and dishonest nature of them. Until then, as far as I am concerned, he is nothing more than a well bad tosser.

When every man is torn apart
With nightmares and with dreams,
Will no one lay the laurel wreath
When silence drowns the screams.
Confusion will be my epitaph.
As I crawl a cracked and broken path
If we make it we can all sit back
and laugh.
But I fear tomorrow I’ll be crying,
Yes I fear tomorrow I’ll be crying

Denouement: This post was originally (and more correctly) titled “Confusion will be my epitaph,” but I thought that might be too opaque. Listening to this King Crimson classic the other day I was struck by how well it describes this historical moment. I trust the last couplet requires no explication.