Instapundit has a roundup this morning, including this — the fix is in:

The picture that emerges is simple. In any discussion of global warming, either in the scientific literature or in the mainstream media, the outcome is always predetermined. Just as the temperature graphs produced by the CRU are always tricked out to show an upward-sloping “hockey stick,” every discussion of global warming has to show that it is occurring and that humans are responsible. And any data or any scientific paper that tends to disprove that conclusion is smeared as “unscientific” precisely because it threatens the established dogma.

For more than a decade, we’ve been told that there is a scientific “consensus” that humans are causing global warming, that “the debate is over” and all “legitimate” scientists acknowledge the truth of global warming. Now we know what this “consensus” really means. What it means is: the fix is in.

It also makes one wonder — what else have these people and their enablers in the media been lying to us about?

[Update a few minutes later]

Three things you absolutely must know about the scandal.

[Update a few minutes later]

For those who want to get their geek on, here’s a preliminary code review:

I’ve examined two files in some depth and found (OK so Harry found some of this)

* Inappropriate programming language usage
* Totally nuts shell tricks
* Hard coded constant files
* Incoherent file naming conventions
* Use of program library subroutines that appear to be

o far from ideal in how they do things when they work
o do not produce an answer consistent with other way to calculate the same thing
o but which fail at undefined times
o and where when the function fails the the program silently continues without reporting the error

Yes, let’s completely upend the world’s economy over results like this.

[Update a few minutes later]

Here’s more:

We have here a stellar example of it in real life in the above example where a “squared” value (that theoretically can never become negative) goes negative due to poor programming practice.

There are ways around this. If a simple “REAL” (often called a FLOAT) variable is too small, you can make it a “DOUBLE” and some compilers support a “DOUBLE DOUBLE” to get lots more bits. But even they can have overflow (or underflow the other way!) if the “normal” value can be very very large. So ideally, you ought to ‘instrument’ the code with “bounds checks” that catch this sort of thing and holler if you have that problem. There are sometimes compiler flags you can set to have “run time” checking for overflow and abort if it happens (there are also times that overflow is used as a ‘feature’ so you can’t just turn it off all the time. It is often used to get “random” numbers, for example.)

But yes, from a programmers point of view, to watch someone frantic over this “newbie” issue is quite a “howler”…

And this:

So we have a tacit confirmation that they start with GHCN data. That means that ALL the issues with the GHCN data (migration to the equator, migration from the mountains to the beaches…) apply to Hadley / CRU just as they do to GIStemp.

Both are broken in the same way, so that is why they agree. They use biased input data and see the same result.

And this:

BTW, IMHO it would be easy to make an alternative Global Temperature Series. “Mc” is quite right that it is easy. I could have one in about a day (less if I didn’t want to think about the details too much) and it would be more accurate than GIStemp. How? Simply by “un-cherry picking” some of the GIStemp parameters then running the code.

I finds the dig at “real science” vs “procedures” interesting. How can you have reliable science if your procedures are broken? I learned about “lab procedures” and the importance of them very early in chem lab. Anyone who disses the merit of sound procedures is an accident waiting to happen… IMHO. And will produce errors from unsound procedures.

But the overall thing that I pick up from this is just the tone of True Believers. These folks really do think they have it all worked out. And that is a very dangerous thing. It leads to very closed minds and it leads to very strong “selection bias”. Often with no ability to self detect that broken behaviour.

You know, I think there will be a great deal of insight come from this “leak”…

The climate gods have feet of clay. What’s sad is that people like commenter and defender Chris Gerrib (who had never even heard of induction until this discussion) and many politicians (e.g., Al Gore) are incapable of understanding the degree to which this invalidates the entire enterprise, because of their ignorance of epistemology.

And the warm-mongers aren’t happy about it.

[Update a few minutes later]

Environmentalists exposed as liars. I’m shocked, shocked I say.

[Update a few minutes later]

Here’s more on the apparent fraud at the Climate Research Unit.

The problem is that the files and emails seem just too good to be true. A number of files seem to be smoking guns — revealing how to resist Freedom of Information Act requests for their data (which would both be scientific misconduct and actually illegal); long-term marketing plans on how to push the climate-change agenda; and discussions of how to pressure peer-reviewed journals to stop accepting papers that disagree with the “accepted” view of global warming.

In other words, just what the skeptics have been suggesting for years. It seems just too neat, and we don’t have independent verification of where the files came from. Someone who is willing to hack might also be willing to create fakes.

But then, the whole package is very large — 63 megabytes — and seems to be very internally consistent. Several people have already corroborated a number of the emails as being ones they wrote or received. The package also includes substantial data and computer programs, which are being explored as this is being written.

The best we can say right now is that we should keep our eyes on this. If these files are eventually corroborated and verified, it is a bombshell indeed — evidence that there has been a literal conspiracy to push the anthropogenic climate change agenda far beyond the science.

I wish I could say that I was surprised. Actually, I am, a little. I wouldn’t have thought they’d be this blatant about it, but it’s been clear for years that this was being driven by a non-science agenda.

As noted in comments, Jerry Pournelle has some thoughts today:

sounds to me as if climatologists are now admitting they have not the faintest idea of what is going on. I have a remedy for them. Study the data and refine the models. Stop assuming you already know the answers and start looking for better models….

But that’s no fun. It doesn’t give them an excuse to implement socialism via the green door.

[Afternoon update]

Here is more from James Delingpole:

The world is currently cooling; electorates are increasingly reluctant to support eco-policies leading to more oppressive regulation, higher taxes and higher utility bills; the tide is turning against Al Gore’s Anthropogenic Global Warming theory. The so-called “sceptical” view is now also the majority view.

Unfortunately, we’ve a long, long way to go before the public mood (and scientific truth) is reflected by our policy makers. There are too many vested interests in AGW, with far too much to lose either in terms of reputation or money, for this to end without a bitter fight.

But if the Hadley CRU scandal is true, it’s a blow to the AGW lobby’s credibility which is never likely to recover.

What I find delicious about this is (as always) the toxic brew of self-righteousness and hypocrisy. I don’t want to hear anyone, ever again, tell me that it’s “just about the science.”

[Mid-afternoon update]

A lot of discussion over at Slashdot.