Virginia AG Probing Michael Mann For Fraud 617
eldavojohn writes "Republican Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has requested receipts and research documents relating to nearly half a million dollars in state taxpayer money used to conduct climate change research at the University of Virginia while under direction of Michael Mann, originator of the famous 2001 IPCC Hockey Stick graph depicting rapid climate change. Mann appears to be a prime target for Cuccinelli — who has also requested hearings with the EPA to contest the grounds of their carbon dioxide studies. Mann's expenditures of taxpayer money may become problematic if Cuccinelli finds violations of Virginia's Fraud Against Taxpayers Act. Cuccinelli has been active in pushing conservative views in the past, including an effort to remove the titillating mammary from the beloved Great Seal of Virginia. No end in sight for the politicizing of the science and research surrounding climate change."
Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:3, Informative)
He's also the asshole that told all the public universities in Virginia they could no longer have policies of non-discrimination towards gays.
Stay classy.
His Official Policy on Homosexuality Is No Secret (Score:3, Informative)
He's also the asshole that told all the public universities in Virginia they could no longer have policies of non-discrimination towards gays.
Stay classy.
Well, I live in Northern Virginia by DC so I'm painfully aware of his policies. In 2004, as a State Senator in Virginia's Senate, he stated " Homosexuality is wrong [pqarchiver.com]." This was in regards to a bill that would be introduced to add homosexuality under hate crime legislation after a particularly disturbing case. Cuccinelli vowed to fight any extension of gay rights. He would be reelected in 2007 and appointed as Attorney General this year.
Your fancy logic is no use here, this is politics. You have to d
Not Appointed (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Not Appointed (Score:4, Funny)
The pope counts as a liberal by US standards.
Re:His Official Policy on Homosexuality Is No Secr (Score:5, Insightful)
You have to disprove Cuccinelli's belief that "homosexuality is wrong" and his apparent reinforcement that it moves him up the voting chain so the populace agrees.
There are large portions of the population which (for whatever reason) don't want to support "gay rights".
The goal then, should be to re-frame the argument in a way as to remove the government from areas which it doesn't belong (like defining marriage).
Think of it this way, if the government had no concern for marriage and only "cared" about civil unions, what issue would it be what the sexes of the two parties are?
You want to "marry" a man or woman or child or goat or rock (or a mix), that's between you and the church.
Everything else is a contract, let the lawyers fight over it.
Re:His Official Policy on Homosexuality Is No Secr (Score:5, Insightful)
A very large percentage of the population around the world happens to agree with him. (I dont, personally, but they are clearly the majority around the world.)
However you do NOT have to convince them otherwise in order to convince them that gays should not be legally persecuted. You just have to convince them that the entire subject is outside of the proper purvue of the government to begin with, generally a much easier argument.
Of course, if what you want is not to simply put gay people on an even playing field legally, but you really want to give them special privileges instead, no argument is going to work with these people. Or with me either, for that matter. "Hate crime" legislation is dangerous nonsense. If violent crimes are not being dealt with properly, that is an issue to be dealt with across the board, but we should never have a law that imposes a heavier penalty for assaulting a member of a 'protected class' differently than an assault on any other citizen, and we also should insofar as at all possible avoid defining crimes by ultimately unknowable mental states of the aggressors, rather than simply by their actions.
Re:His Official Policy on Homosexuality Is No Secr (Score:5, Insightful)
The arguments for hate crime laws are not hard to understand.
If a white man beats up another white man after he has been to the polling booth, that's bad for a lot of reasons. If a white man beats up a black man after he has been to the polling booth, that's bad for all the aforementioned reasons, but it could also be an attempt to scare other black people from voting. It's not just an attack on that man, it's an attack on his class/category. A person motivated by hate may take the normal punishment for such a crime, and still consider it a success if it worked as intended.
Similar things would be attacks on gays in order to keep them in the closet, and from publicly defending their interests, attacks on muslim women who refuse to wear a veil, etc. Such attacks are already illegal for obvious reasons, but society believes (correctly, in my opinion) that commiting crimes in order to suppress minorities is especially bad, and deserving of extra sanction.
The only issue I have with hate crime laws is if they are directed against particular groups only. It's not what kind of group it is that matters, but the intent of the suppressing act.
Re:His Official Policy on Homosexuality Is No Secr (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course, if what you want is not to simply put gay people on an even playing field legally, but you really want to give them special privileges instead, no argument is going to work with these people.
Here is an example of one of the policies [vt.edu] in question.
Is not being fired simply for being black a "special privilege?"
Is not being denied entrance as a student simply for being black a "special privilege?"
Is not being denied financial aid simply for being black a "special privilege?"
Is not being denied the ability to participate in graduation simply for being black a "special privilege?"
Is not being called a [racial slur of choice] in the workplace or the classroom a "special privilege?"
Now s/black/gay and s/racial/sexual/. Do any of the above statements make _more_ sense after that? People should be hired/accepted/funded/allowed participation from the best possible candidate regardless of race, military background, age, disability, religion, gender, nationality, and so forth. Because there have been problems with issues in the past, they have been enumerated as things you should not discriminate against. It's not providing [positive] special treatment, it's ensuring against [negative] special treatment.
If violent crimes are not being dealt with properly, that is an issue to be dealt with across the board, but we should never have a law that imposes a heavier penalty for assaulting a member of a 'protected class' differently than an assault on any other citizen
If basic laws provide sufficient deterrence to common crime but a specific class of people are still being targeted, then some kind of additional measure is needed. Let's say that there's an acceptable level of muggings - there's a few, but in general, the threat of imprisonment is enough to deter most would-be muggers, and the punishment/rehabilitation level is maximizes deterrence, minimizes state costs, and minimizes repeat offenders by effectively rehabilitating them. At the same time, anti-Catholic sentiment has caused a rampant level of muggings of nuns that is not deterred by the basic statues.
To alter the already correct formula that deters casual muggings to attempt to protect the nuns would be a societal harm.
Further, hate crime prosecutions are often done to change the venue when local forces are sympathetic to the cause and chose not to use the existing laws. For example, U.S. v. Cecil Price et al.
we also should insofar as at all possible avoid defining crimes by ultimately unknowable mental states of the aggressors, rather than simply by their actions.
By that logic there should be no distinction between involuntary manslaughter and first degree murder.
Re:His Official Policy on Homosexuality Is No Secr (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:His Official Policy on Homosexuality Is No Secr (Score:5, Informative)
Well, yes, that is flamebait. Global warming was politicized long before Al Gore came along - however his success pushed it into the area of public conversation, and then it because more recognizable to a lot of people.
While I don't claim this piece is unbiased, it is _very_ informative on the politics behind global warming campaigning. It's also quite a few years old and possibly out of date, but certainly enlightening nonetheless. I recommend you have a look.
http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/denialmachine/index.html [www.cbc.ca]
Now back to our regular topic, which has nothing at all to do with any of this post...
Re:His Official Policy on Homosexuality Is No Secr (Score:4, Informative)
It's been interesting to hear the narrative pushed at you from the wingnuts, you mean? Because the first notable paper on global warming, by Plass in 1956, was called “The Carbon Dioxide Theory of Climate Change”.
But apropos spin...
Who wrote that? Republican strategist for the Bush administration, Frank Luntz [wikipedia.org], in 2002.
Re:His Official Policy on Homosexuality Is No Secr (Score:5, Informative)
"It's been interesting to hear the narrative pushed at you from the wingnuts, you mean? Because the first notable paper on global warming, by Plass in 1956, was called “The Carbon Dioxide Theory of Climate Change”."
Personally, in these cases I refer them to Svante Arrhenius, who had calculated that doubling CO2 level raises temperature by 4-5C. In 1908.
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/co2.htm [aip.org]
Re:His Official Policy on Homosexuality Is No Secr (Score:4, Informative)
it has been interesting to watch the spin doctors morph AGW into what I think is a more likely and accurate way to put it - "climate change". Something Earth has experienced for its entire existence.
"Global warming" is an accurate term - it was meant to refer to the global mean temperature increasing. The problem was that many non-scientists don't understand how mean values are calculated, and hence didn't understand that the mean could increase even though some regions might cool. The myth that Any Cooling Disproves Global Warming [newscientist.com] became widespread, and so scientists began to talk about "climate change" instead.
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't let facts get in the way of your partisan hatred. All he did was point out that only the state legislature has the authority to mandate such policies.
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:4, Insightful)
Bullshit. That's the same tired tripe they've been pushing since well before the civil rights movement. You can't discriminate against blacks and you can't discriminate against gays. Get used to it.
Actually, in a democracy you can discriminate against whoever the hell you want as long as the majority agrees with you. Get used to it.
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe you need to retake civics class. The majority can sit on it if the courts deem their laws unconstitutional. It's time you got used to the 14th amendment, advice Kenny could use too. We've had it what, like 150 years now?
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:5, Informative)
Have you actually read the opinion? http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/metro/Cuccinelli.pdf
He's telling the public universities that, in his opinion, they don't have the authority to have those sorts of policies unless specifically authorized by the General Assembly. Previous AGs have said the same thing. Part of his job is to provide legal advice, which is exactly what he did.
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:5, Informative)
The opinion is remarkably poor legal advice, as it fails to account for the relevant differences between local governments and universities and does not speak to the general grants of authority given to Virginia universities to craft their own rules.
I was going to mod you down, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd rather correct you:
The AG's job regarding legal advice is to provide it in response to requests from state institutions. In this case, I believe, nobody asked him - he just decided that it was in his political interest to create the opinion from his reading of the laws.
He's - if I can borrow the term - legislating from the AG's office. I'd rather he go back to prosecuting people who harm society by breaking the law. (We'll, I'd rather he leave office. Steve Shannon is no great shakes, but I voted for him as a way to vote against this kind of activism).
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
"U.S. Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) said in a statement that Cuccinelli's advice would "damage the Commonwealth's reputation for academic excellence and diversity."
""What he's saying is reprehensible," said Vincent F. Callahan Jr., a former Republican member of the House of Delegates who serves on George Mason's board of visitors. "I don't know what he's doing, opening up this can of worms."
Total prick. He might as well of put out a press release that simply said "I hate
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You know, the only place where the kind of thinking - open hatred towards a class of society, is considered normal and encouraged by society is - the sorts of views expressed by you and parrotted endlessly here :-) It's quite ironic, when one thinks about it....
You're what you hate :-)
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:5, Insightful)
Being gay is a behavior,
No it's not. One could "be gay" buy never have sex with another person of the same sex. Just as slashdotters can "be straight" and remain virgins.
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:4, Informative)
Being gay is probably genetic.There's physical differences in the brains of gays. There are gay animals. You can't choose to be gay or not, same as you can choose who you fall in love with. What gays can do is not act on their desires, sames as religious heterosexuals can choose not to have sex outside of marriage OR not for procreation AND not divorce when they change their minds.. and they do that sooo well !
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Being gay is probably genetic.There's physical differences in the brains of gays.
I've pointed this out before but was moderated into oblivion. What you're saying is true. These differences clearly show up in MRIs. They have different brain chemistry - just as normal males and females also differ; whereby gays match neither.
What's not commonly known and likely the reason I've always been moderated negatively is that many "gays" do not have different brain chemistry from other males which likely means for many "gays" it absolutely is a choice.
What I have done a poor job of explaining is,
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:5, Insightful)
Another tidbit is also likely explains why I get moderated to hell is that many mental illnesses also show up on MRIs. Which suggests diseases such as sociopaths and psychopaths, among many others, are not actually diseases. You can't have it both ways. If you follow the logical conclusion, either these are not diseases or they are
How do you figure that? The root cause of something does not determine whether it is or is not a disease. For example, a bacterial infection and gut flora both have the same root cause, but one is a disease and the other is normal, as the former is harmful and the latter is typically beneficial or at least neutral.
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:4, Insightful)
What's not commonly known and likely the reason I've always been moderated negatively is that many "gays" do not have different brain chemistry from other males which likely means for many "gays" it absolutely is a choice.
Or it means that MRIs aren't the be-all and end-all of measuring a person's biochemical make-up.
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:5, Informative)
This means that things in people's lives - choices they made or things that happened to them and how they reacted to those things - are mainly responsible for homosexuality. Biology plays a role, just as it does in just about everything, but it is not the main "cause" (if we want to use that word) of homosexuality.
If anyone wants citations, I can look them up. Just respond to this post and I'll get back to you.
In fact, 50% suggests a strong genetic link.. (Score:4, Interesting)
There is a good summary of separated homosexual twin studies here [tim-taylor.com]. The conclusion is that, if one twin is gay, then the probability of the other being gay is around 55%. Many people misunderstand genetics and statistics, and think that this implies being gay is not genetic, since they expect there to be a 100% probability "because it's genetic and twins have the same genes". This is a incorrect view. Quote from a more detailed explanation of why [religioustolerance.org]:
"Assume that 5% of males have a homosexual orientation as adults. Consider two identical newborn twin boys who were separated at birth and raised in different homes without any contact with each other. If homosexuality were caused by something in the environment, then, if twin #1 turned out to be gay, the chances of the other twin becoming a gay adults would only be about 5%. That is because the second twin would have been exposed to a totally different environment during his upbringing. So his chances of being gay would be the same as for any other male -- about 5%. But, studies have reliably shown that if one twin is gay, there is about a 55% chance that the other twin will be gay."
and about 50% of studies find that genetics is a significant factor in homosexuality and 50% do not
If one identical twin develops schizophrenia, the other twin has "only" a 48% chance of also developing the disorder. This does not mean that genetics is not a significant factor.
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:4, Insightful)
You know, just because different brain structures show up in an MRI doesn't mean that they're genetic; for instance, if you're a taxi driver, your brain has probably changed [bbc.co.uk] in order to better store a map of your area. It's difficult to tell, post hoc, whether or not consistent differences in gross brain structures* cause or are caused by different behaviors. However, by your "logical conclusion", being a taxi cab driver is a disease.
Furthermore, it doesn't matter how much being gay is due to nature or due to nurture. We don't discriminate against people because they choose to ferry passengers in a car all day long; we don't discriminate against people because they're immoral dickwads; we don't discriminate against people because they're completely asocial and spend all their free time trolling Slashdot; we shouldn't discriminate against people because they choose to have hot hot gay sex all night long. As long as it doesn't impair your ability to be happy and function in society, there's no need to classify it as a disease.
*Yes I know they're all gross
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:5, Insightful)
Another tidbit is also likely explains why I get moderated to hell is that many mental illnesses also show up on MRIs. Which suggests diseases such as sociopaths and psychopaths, among many others, are not actually diseases. You can't have it both ways.
Hmmm...no. IANANS but I would say that sociopathy and psycopathy are referred to as "illnesses" or "diseases" because there are direct links between these conditions and extremely negative behaviour, i.e. violence. Homosexuality, on the other hand, results in a sexual attraction to someone of the same sex, with extremely few, if any negative effects to society. You cannot compare them. I don't think you get modded down because your views are morally objectionable, or because of a politically correct under-current. I think you are modded down because you don't make sense.
You seem to be saying that the only two possible conclusions are that either everything that is detectable by MRI is a disease or that nothing detectable by MRI is a disease. This. Makes. No. Sense. You say "If you follow the logical conclusion..." and then abandon logic. The preference for banana milkshake over chocolate milkshake will likely one day be discernible on an MRI scan, if not already. Should we then say that because expression of a preference for a kind of milkshake over another is detectable by MRI and is clearly not a disease, that sociopathy is also not a disease?
tl;dr My point of view: Without too deep an inquiry into the definition of "disease", a variation in "brain chemistry" is not necessarily a "disease" however the effects of brain chemistry *may* be called a disease.
No matter, by framing your arguments as science, criticising sociopathic CEOs and alluding to down-moderation in the past, you've stolen some "Insightful" mod-points. Well played.
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:4, Interesting)
Another tidbit is also likely explains why I get moderated to hell is that many mental illnesses also show up on MRIs. Which suggests diseases such as sociopaths and psychopaths, among many others, are not actually diseases.
Yes, that *is* probably why you get moderated to hell, because you're *plainly wrong*. Sorry, but the idea of mind-body separation [wikipedia.org], originally championed by René Descartes [wikipedia.org] in the first half of the *17th century*, was proven to be bullshit, along with most of Freudian psychoanalysis, a long time ago. And good riddance since these bodies of ideas have plagued the understanding and treatment of mental illness ever since.
Your *brain is an organ* and as such is subject to affliction by many and various disorders and *diseases* that interfere with its normal functioning.
And if you're wondering, yes I have a mental illness ( OCD [wikipedia.org] ) and I know many others that do as well ( and have known, as some have taken their own lives ) as my family is heavily involved in NAMI [nami.org]. You're comment, which comes only a day after the Nami Metropolitan Houston [namimetrohouston.org] Walk [nami.org], is a testament to how far we still have to go as a society in ridding ourselves of destructive ignorance such as you possess. Welcome to the 21st century.
jdb2
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:5, Insightful)
Survival of the fittest family or tribe. It can be beneficial to have some members of the group who do not have children but instead help raise others children.
Re:Not the only conservative views he's pushed (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I guess science is a lie, and they all chose to be schizophrenic.
Or, you could have no idea what regressive traits are, and are pulling this is out your ass.
Being gay is no more a choice than being schizophrenic or even being straight. Gay people are attracted to the pheromon
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Do pheromones travel in JPEG files?
Woo, witchhunts! (Score:5, Insightful)
After the whole Climategate thing fizzled, I was wondering when some enterprising Republican in the US would take it upon himself to try to drum up some more bullshit. I guess after the guy was done making sure you can discriminate against the gays the way the good lord intended, Cuccinelli thought he'd move on to something that's a better use of the taxpayer's dollars.
Yay Virginia!
It is very serious (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:It is very serious (Score:4, Insightful)
No more messy European style reports about cadmium, lead, beryllium, dioxin, strontium, the water table, air quality ect. by 'experts' in US courts.
Re:It is very serious (Score:5, Insightful)
It also could have a chilling effect not only on other climate scientists, but even discouraging science students in even choosing a career in climate science.
I suspect that's the plan, according to the article he's wanting documents from the period of 1999 - 2005, and it goes on to describe what's he's demanded be produced as:
Among the documents Cuccinelli demands are any and all emailed or written correspondence between or relating to Mann and more than 40 climate scientists, documents supporting any of five applications for the $484,875 in grants, and evidence of any documents that no longer exist along with proof of why, when, and how they were destroyed or disappeared.
I seriously, seriously doubt all the E-mail correspondence will still exist, we're talking about stuff that goes back 11 years. And when it does, and they can't prove "why, when and how" those E-mails were lost exactly, this asshole will claim it's all some giant cover-up. No matter what Mann and the UVA does they're going to lose here, because this isn't a legit investigation, it's a political witch-hunt pure and simple. McCarthy would be proud.
This disgusts me greatly, I'm torn between being glad I'm not living in Virginia and wishing I was so I could raise holy hell at the waste of my tax dollars on political witch-hunts by this jerk. Maybe Virginia voters will wake up and demand an investigation into Cuccinelli's waste of their tax dollars under the same law he's abusing here.
With any luck U VA will resist the subpoena (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:With any luck U VA will resist the subpoena (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm sure UVA will resist the subpoena, but as a UVA grad, shit like this is going to KILL the university. Please tell me what self-respecting scientist would want to work there now?
Politics in Virginia is always a battle between liberal northern VA, which has had huge growth in recent years and is very socially tolerant due to large numbers of highly educated immigrants, and the more rural rest of the state. The one thing I'm hopeful about is that this will royally piss off tons of northern VA voters because they will see it as lowering the quality of UVA, which is seen as a great value as one of the best public universities in the US.
Cuccinelli came out of "liberal" Fairfax County (Score:4, Insightful)
The state has many regions, Southwest is different from Central Virginia, which is different from Hampton Roads and so forth.
It is not as simple as NoVA versus the rest of the state.
Re:It is very serious (Score:5, Insightful)
The White House couldn't even answer demands about emails from more recent time. And for retro-justifying $500,000 in grants (it's not that much, under $100k per year for 6 years), it'll take about that much more to account for it. Produce every document suspected to exist, or justify its non existence is the order. And he doesn't care if that's impractical. In fact he wants it to be. I'm sure he thinks that they'll not provide anything incriminating, but that they'll be unable to provide everything, and what isn't provided won't have accurate destruction history (I know I don't record emails as I destroy them). And so, any single missing document of the thousands or tens of thousands he's expecting and he'll have his "proof" that they must have done something because they couldn't comply with his simple request.
It's not a witch hunt. He has the witch he wants. This is the burning. Investigations as a punishment is nothing new. Even if exonerated, it will be a blow against the reputation of Michael Mann and the treasury of Virgina.
Re:It is very serious (Score:5, Informative)
Just one quick point: you made up most of that yourself. The others, like the myth of "scientists 30 years ago" predicting another ice age, is pretty heavily debunked, and if you were interested in the truth at all, you'd know it.
Re:It is very serious (Score:5, Insightful)
That's pretty much my point. There was one article in Time Magazine 40 years ago. And one in Newsweek. And then you have this [ametsoc.org]:
An enduring popular myth suggests that in the 1970s the climate science community was predicting “global cooling” and an “imminent” ice age, an observation frequently used by those who would undermine what climate scientists say today about the prospect of global warming. A review of the literature suggests that, on the contrary, greenhouse warming even then dominated scientists' thinking as being one of the most important forces shaping Earth's climate on human time scales.
(Wikipedia's summary: "A survey of the scientific literature from 1965 to 1979 found 7 articles predicting cooling and 44 predicting warming, with the warming articles also being cited much more often in subsequent scientific literature.")
Re:It is very serious (Score:5, Informative)
Of course the earth eventually will have another ice age. Those tend to come up now and then. Anthropogenic global cooling due to aerosols is something entirely different, and that's the subject here.
Re:It is very serious (Score:5, Informative)
The thing is, it was settled science by the 70s, so it's not surprising that you wouldn't find many articles about the topic.
In that case why does the disinformation machine sprout the line about scientists arguing for an imminent ice age in the 70s, rather than say the 40s? If they were then surely there should be some literature. The clear implication being made is that a majority of experts in the 70s believed an ice age was approaching (quickly). The facts, as you cited them 7 papers predicting cooling, 44 warming give the lie to that.
Secondly, while Milankovitch obviously did his work earlier (he died in 1958), it is far from true that even the periodic nature of glacials, and how those periods are determined, was "settled science" by the 70s. The work on ice ages was very alive in the 70s (you'll find more than 7 papers which don't predict an "immient" ice age) and certainly not settled until after the publication of this paper [sciencemag.org] in 1976.
Re:It is very serious (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:It is very serious (Score:5, Informative)
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/2008BAMS2370.1 [ametsoc.org]
News = entertainment (Score:4, Interesting)
> The point is, I would highly doubt that a news periodical like Time would
> just pull a story out of their arses without any actual basis to them.
You do understand that even in their greatest era of actual news reporting, all news-providing entities are in the fundamental business of providing entertainment for their customers? And that newness, controversy, and oh-my-gawd-doom stories have been entertaining to the masses since, oh 30,000 BC? The idea that anything that appears in Time Magazine has a factual basis, or even a strong factual basis, can be easily refuted by scanning through a few issues from the 1930s.
sPh
Re:Woo, witchhunts! (Score:5, Insightful)
I know I shouldn't feed the trolls, but I'll play your game.
Let's set aside all rational thought for a moment and accept, just for the sake of argument, your ridiculous premise that homosexuality is a "behavioral decision".
Now, explain to me why a person should be fired from their job at a university for something they may (or may not) do in the privacy of their own home, with a consensual partner. Explain the rational basis for firing someone for something that is completely unrelated to their job performance in any way, shape, or form.
Let's put it in terms of other "behavioral decisions. Explain to me why it's okay to fire someone for being a smoker. Let's say that the person in question never smokes during work hours, or anywhere near the place of work. Let's say no one has ever smelled smoke on the person's breath or clothing. Basically, there is no way for anyone to know that this person is a smoker, except that one day you happen to stumble upon this fact. Maybe you saw him smoking outside of the workplace on the weekend. Maybe he just mentioned it to you in passing one day. Explain to me how it's okay to fire the person for that reason, and that reason alone.
I eagerly anticipate your response.
Re:Woo, witchhunts! (Score:4, Insightful)
Okay, here's a novel thought:
I agree with you (mostly).
Gays shouldn't be fired because they're gay. Men shouldn't be fired because they have sex with strippers. Women shouldn't be fired because go to fetish bars on the weekend. People shouldn't be fired for getting speeding tickets. I shouldn't be fired for going to a Colbert Report taping and you shouldn't be fired for going to a Glenn Beck taping.
None of that has any impact on your work. In fact, many states already have protections on many of those things.
Giving gays that same protection isn't a "special privilege" it's "equality" and "providing basic human rights".
The only reason why giving homosexual couples the right to visit each other in hospitals where unmarried heterosexual couples cannot is due entirely to the fact that in most states it's illegal for homosexuals to marry.. Homophobic legislatures (such as my wonderful home state of Virginia) passed laws explicitly prohibiting it. This was, in many cases, expressly done to prohibit homosexual couples from enjoying the rights and protections offered to married heterosexuals.
So, much like my solution to your previous argument, the answer seems clear to me: Let homosexuals marry. Then all you have to do is say: married couples have hospital visitation rights. Voila! Everyone is equal again!
Non-peer Review (Score:4, Insightful)
Great...
Definitely the beginning of the end when science is evaluated by non-scientists (or bought/paid for court "expert witnesses").
Re:Non-peer Review (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Non-peer Review (Score:4, Insightful)
Climategate is no longer about whether climate change or global warming is or isn't happening. It is about the egregious abuse of the scientific method and peer review.
Re:Non-peer Review (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand (Score:5, Insightful)
Pure trolling (Score:5, Insightful)
That's pure trolling from Cuccinelli, he has not asked for the data (which is open) related to the papers in question, but ALL of Mann's e-mail with about 20 people.
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/05/cuccinelli_is_using_the_law_to.php [scienceblogs.com]
Re:You mean you *HOPE* it's trolling (Score:4, Insightful)
"Because if he's not, and Mann DID commit some sort of fraud, any and all AGW claims will be blown to smithereens."
Even if we assume that Mann bribed all scientists reviewing his work, killed Kennedy and in fact is a reincarnation of Hitler (pre-emptive Godwining) - it won't change ANYTHING.
Mann's papers are just several of many thousands, written by different teams from various parts of the world with different methodologies and data sources used.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:You mean you *HOPE* it's trolling (Score:5, Insightful)
I thought it failed because the poorest third were angry that they weren't going to be guilt-tripping the developed third into propping them up through international welfare.
Actually, I'm pretty sure that's what actually happened.
Not a matter of "YOU BROWN FOLK STAY POOR". We drove our car through standing water and it flooded, killed our car, we've got a mess on our hands. We're waving our arms shouting "Look if you go this way, global warming. Bad shit. Go around the long way. It's harder, but if we had known about this shit we'd be going that way too".. meanwhile the third world refuses to understand what we're saying, and instead are just preoccupied with the fact that we went right through the high water and now they have to go around. ... but more than that, what they REALLY want is just reparations from the industrialized world. Nothing like a big fat annual check for never managing to get a working competitive economy in order.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually it's more of... well I can't think of a good metaphor.
But to say "Go around the long way. It's harder, but if we had known about this shit we'd be going that way too" is pretty disingenuous since we got rich going the easy way and still don't show any signs of being serious about going the hard way.
It's hypocritical of the developed nations who got rich filling the atmosphere with carbon to tell the developing nations they can't do the same while we're still filling the atmosphere with carbon.
Re:You mean you *HOPE* it's trolling (Score:4, Insightful)
Considering that much of AGW research was done long before Mann's papers - it's still won't change anything.
Fraud? It's looking him in the mirror (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe someone should sue Cuccinelli for fraud. After all, this sounds like a waste of taxpayer money if I've ever heard of one.
Re:Fraud? It's looking him in the mirror (Score:5, Interesting)
Mann did invite a lot of criticism by not opening his data when people asked him for it. I'm referring of course to the issues with the bristlecone pine and his convolution of several sets of temperature proxies. I haven't heard of any evidence that Mann is involved in any fraud though, but witch hunts by their very nature never come up empty-handed. This one won't either.
Re:Fraud? It's looking him in the mirror (Score:5, Informative)
Mann did invite a lot of criticism by not opening his data when people asked him for it. I'm referring of course to the issues with the bristlecone pine and his convolution of several sets of temperature proxies. I haven't heard of any evidence that Mann is involved in any fraud though, but witch hunts by their very nature never come up empty-handed. This one won't either.
I think you're confusing Michael E. Mann [wikipedia.org], who conducted some research based on climate data with the CRU [wikipedia.org] which actually publishes some of the data.
The controversy in that case was just this: CRU publishes a compilation of recent near-surface temperature, in association with the Hadley Centre. This is made up of data from various national meteorological agencies, which is processed to remove local noise and variations (urban heat island effect, moving of weather stations, etc), gridded and used to produce global surface temperature records.
The end-product of CRU's record was always available in public. What was controversial was that some of the national weather agencies' records couldn't be released because those agencies had copyright over the data, and were selling it commercially. There's also a possibility that the CRU scientists used copyright as an excuse to spite those who were using FOIA requests to harass them (as they saw it, and I for one don't blame them - requesting data you have no intention of using, for the sole purpose of making a noise about it, whether it's released or not is disingenuous at best).
In any case, pretty much all of the actual data, barring a few stations, was in the public domain long before the FOIA requests - those making the requests just couldn't get as much political mileage out of public domain data. You can still find all that data by going to RealClimate [realclimate.org]
Michael Mann, on the other hand, is a researcher who worked on the "hockey stick" graph - a consolidation of various paleoclimate data, collected from proxies like tree rings and ice cores. He and his co-authors overlaid several paleoclimate reconstructions over each other, to show how well they correlated, and found that they all correlated pretty well, and showed a marked rise in temperature during the industrial era. One controversy with this data is that they added instrument records (that is, the CRU temperature series) to the end of the chart [wikipedia.org] (which you can see as the black line in the image), which shows more warming in recent times. Another is that one proxy (tree ring data) shows a decline in the proxy measurement (tree ring width) from the 1960s onwards, which on the face of it, should imply that temperatures are declining, but which no other data, including all the various instrument data show. Mann used a statistical trick of stopping the tree ring data with the 60s and tacking on the instrument data, a technique some people disagree with.
Anyway, the point is, none of Michael Mann's data was ever hidden away
One of many shenanigans (Score:5, Informative)
This is but one of many shenanigans [washingtonmonthly.com] the new Virginia AG is involved in.
sPh
consider this... (Score:4, Interesting)
Can you envision any scenario where a republican calling for a fraud investigation related to climate research would not be criticized as "politicizing science"? I agree that's probably what's happening in this particular case, but it seems that any call for an investigation would end up being impugned as "politicizing science" regardless of the investigation's merits.
Re:consider this... (Score:5, Insightful)
Probably because it is politicizing science regardless of the merits. The way science operates is not generally by having attorneys general investigating the merits of scientific papers. If something was wrong or fraudulent, that's a job for journal editorial staff and university misconduct boards to sort out.
Similarly, it'd be correctly considered "politicizing science" if democrats launched a fraud investigation of a libertarian economist, regardless of whether that economist did or didn't fabricate evidence. The attorney general is just not the right person to do it.
Re:consider this... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'll be the first to recognize that Mann's hockey stick has some issues [wikipedia.org] with the older data. Unfortunately, there is a difference between manipulation of data for a political reason and just being wrong. Most science, when first published, is wrong and scientists try to be clear that the data they present has significant uncertainty attached to it (this is often forgotten by the media looking for a sensational story).
Given that, let me turn your question around: given that as a political entity, Republicans generally have disavowed that any climate change is possible how could anyone as a member of that political entity actually evaluate the difference between Mann being wrong and Mann committing fraud in an unbiased way? I don't think they can, they don't have any credibility on this topic.
Re:consider this... (Score:4, Insightful)
If the investigation had any "merits", could he please find a few decent scientists who know about this stuff (either worked in the field or in allied fields) who might conduct it, instead of doing it as a political witch-hunt?
If not, the criticism is entirely valid.
Re:consider this... (Score:5, Insightful)
No. If it is scientific fraud, then normaly the colleagues would complain (as it happened with those high profile frauds like Jan Hendrik Schön [wikipedia.org] or Hwang Woo-Suk [wikipedia.org]). If it is financial fraud, normally the finance departement of the university would complain. If someone from outside calls it fraud and starts an investigation, it always sounds like politics.
Another Carpetbagger (Score:4, Funny)
He is just another Republican carpetbagger (from New Jersey). These grifters evidently think that everyone in the South is an easy mark.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Oh, and he apparently doesn't like our state seal [washingtonmonthly.com], either.
You Commit Three Felonies a Day (Score:5, Interesting)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704471504574438900830760842.html [wsj.com]
Re:You Commit Three Felonies a Day (Score:5, Interesting)
Unless Mann is a saint, even if he is not truly fraudulent with his funds, he will be hard pressed to defend every last research dollar spent under his program. He could be found guilty for nothing more than what is an accepted practice among researchers because the alternative is a non-workable research program.
Great Seal of Virginia (Score:3, Informative)
The motto on the Great Seal of Virginia is "Sic Semper Tyrannis". It means "thus always to yyrants" and was attributed to Brutus after stabbing Caesar and was also what John Wilkes Booth said after murdering Lincoln. Timothy McVeigh was wearing the motto (with a picture of Lincoln, not the VA seal) when we was arrested.
That (now) hateful phrase remains on the seal, but at least the cartoon titty is gone.
Mann Should Have Stayed In Florida (Score:3, Funny)
He didn't have all these problems when he was doing Miami Vice.
Good. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Good. (Score:4, Interesting)
Science should be defended by peer review and by thesis defence, not by challenging it in a court of law, with the possibility of a legal punishment for being wrong, or for producing a politically inconvenient result.
Though this is becoming a bit of a Godwin by itself, I'll mention Galileo here...
Re:Good. (Score:5, Interesting)
Science should be defended by peer review and by thesis defence, not by challenging it in a court of law, with the possibility of a legal punishment for being wrong, or for producing a politically inconvenient result.
I agree. I am a scientist myself. However, i am also an employee. Instead of letting idiotic morons who believe the earth is 6000years old and relativity is bullshit because its to complicated for them (see Andrew Schlafly) throw mud on me in public, i would rather prefer that they go to court. Because then there is a good chances it hurts them.
It's 2010! (Score:4, Insightful)
You would think that by this time, the discussion would have moved from "is global warming real?" to "what do we do about it?" No such luck.
This is not about "punishing" science (Score:4, Interesting)
My guess is this has little to do with Michael Mann or the University of Virginia. This has everything to do with the AG's petition to put the EPA's threatened regulation of carbon dioxide under review [vaag.com]. The AG is seeking to undermine the EPA's grounds for action by showing that it is based on weak, missing, or faulty scientific evidence.
The law the AG is using is the Virginia Fraud Against Taxpayers Act [taf.org], a relatively new "whistleblower" law. The kinds of fraud this law attempts to cover are:
* Submitting false service records or samples in order to show better-than-actual performance.
* Falsifying natural resource production records -- Pumping, mining or harvesting more natural resources from public lands that is actually reported to the government.
* Billing for research that was never conducted; falsifying research data that was paid for by the U.S. government.
Arguably, if the AG can show that the climate science was cooked, he could have a case. If he wins it, he may have established a legal precedent for throwing out the climate data in the EPA case.
This sounds like a pretty smart legal move, if you are a Republican and you control the governorship of Virginia.
Not surpising given this (Score:5, Interesting)
Government funded science is always politicized (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
To me, allocation and use of public funds - taxes - is by definition political, and I'm happy someone is checking they are wisely spent.
But, I'm not sure there enough suspicion to specifically investigate that guy, nor that other investigation may prove more wirth it, if less politically rewarding.
Re:Ken Cuccinelli (Score:5, Insightful)
The scientists and academics allowed themselves to become political;
What does that even mean? All science has political implications. That doesn't mean the researchers are doing it for politics, and it certainly doesn't warrant government harassment of scientists. There had better be a damn good reason and some solid evidence of malfeasance before such "probing" is initiated.
Re:Ken Cuccinelli (Score:5, Informative)
Well, for what it's worth, Michael Mann and a few others contribute regularly to the arguably political website known as Real Climate [realclimate.org], a website which isn't exactly known to allow dissenting views.
By their own words, the site was organized to provide immediate spin/response (you pick) to media stories on the subject of AGW... much like any other environmental organization does for topics that relate to their own specific causes... organizations that most folks do not hesitate to label as political in nature.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Ken Cuccinelli (Score:5, Insightful)
Accused and exonerated. Don't forget that little bit.
IF the NSF review (it was their money) had shown that he had even simply violated ethical principles, then I could see a justification for a criminal investigation. This research has been through several reviews (and the reviews are now under review), and he's not been found guilty of anything.
If AGs are out there bringing charges against scientists when scientific review boards claim nothing has been done wrong, then the system is broken. There's no purpose to having scientific review boards if politicians bring criminal charges against scientists doing research they don't like. In retrospect, it was nice that Bush just forbid funding for stem cell research. That was the correct way to use political tools to prevent research the politicians didn't want done. This current action is setting a precedent which is absolutely terrifying for a scientist. How do we know whether the research the government is paying us to do will piss someone off, or make the wrong person look bad and get us in court?
Oh, and if you want a specific political reason for why he's doing this:
He wants press.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I wasn't aware that Penn State's board had exonerated Mann (this was recent - as earlier this month). Looking further into it, the NSF Office of the Inspector General is doing (not 'has done', is doing) a meta-investigation of this (which is in and of itself unusual. Before you say it - mind you that the NSF currently doesn't answer to an administration which could be accused of being pre-disposed against Mann).
This means overall, I doubt that he's free and clear just yet. Until that point, my assertion sta
Re:Ken Cuccinelli (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Ken Cuccinelli (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is the politicization of science.
Consulting the electorate can be an effective way of arriving at some consensus on issues that cannot be easily answered scientifically. For example, should we spend more money on roads and infrastructure, or defense, or health care, or something else? Should we allow abortions, or file sharing? Analyses based on good information can provide some insight into how effective a particular idea might be, what problems are most urgent. Scientific studies are not perfect (what is?), but much better to base decisions on that than blind guessing or gut instinct. Technological advances provide more options. But none of this can make our decisions for us. We have to do that. And we should decide such matters ourselves, not demand that science provide all the answers.
Some politicians just don't understand that. These dim witted ones are wont to treat scientific studies as if they are political opponents or allies. When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. They cast aspersions on the data, which is so pointless. Check the data, don't try to beat it up with innuendo! That's like doubting that there were ever baseball players with .400 batting averages, just because. Compare to other data, don't just indulge in baseless speculation. If necessary, have new data collected. That's all that need be done. Such a waste of time and effort and money to invoke politics on issues that can be settled with information. Politics should be reserved for larger issues, for the hard questions.
But instead, they run away from facts. They persist in thinking we don't really know much. when we actually do know a great deal more than they imagine. They indulge in the sin of denial. They want things that are demonstrably not true to be true, act as if they are true, and act as if everyone, including good scientists, does the same thing. Even as they use the fruits of scientific and technological advancements that are all around us, things such as cars, planes, plastics, medicines, phones, computers, TVs, and much, much more, they manage, incredibly, to convince themselves science is just bull. And that scientists are nothing more than high grade fakers. These idiot politicians turned armchair scientists are worse, much worse, than the people second guessing the decisions of coaches of professional sport teams.
Re: Politicizing science? (Score:5, Funny)
'Global warming' -- sorry, I forgot, it became 'climate change' when the planet stopped warming
I guess the glaciers in Glacier National Park are disappearing because we don't allow enough logging to keep the trees in check, and a northwest passage is opening up because we tolerate too many whales.
Re: Politicizing science? (Score:4, Insightful)
"I guess the glaciers in Glacier National Park are disappearing because we don't allow enough logging to keep the trees in check,"
Or a multi year drought reduces snow fall, so that glaciers recede even at constant temperature. Warming isn't the only thing that makes glaciers shrink, or that changes the width of tree rings.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Except that his "lie" has been independently reproduced and been confirmed. Let me cite guardian.co.uk [guardian.co.uk]: