From: Thomas C Peterson <Thomas.C.Peterson@noaa.gov>
To: Phil Jones <p.jones@uea.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: Fwd: Jones et al 1990
Date: Wed, 20 Jun 2007 08:27:50 -0400

   Fascinating.  Thanks for keeping me in the loop, Phil.  I won't pass it on but I will keep
   it in the back of my mind when/if Russ asks about appropriate responses to CA requests.
   Russ' view is that you can never satisfy them so why bother to try?
   It seems to me that what they are saying is the equivalent of accusing a doctor of
   malpractice for not seeing a broken bone in a Chinese x-ray taken in 1985 when the break is
   clearly visible in a state of the art 2005 Canadian MRI scan examined while wearing their
   special problem finding glasses.
   They also don't seem to understand the collaborative nature of the work, equivalent to
   accusing you of faulty reading of metadata at the USHCN station in Reno because you quoted
   a general USHCN statement that wasn't fully applicable to Reno.
   Good luck.
            Tom
   Phil Jones said the following on 6/20/2007 3:59 AM:

       Tom P.
         Just for interest. Don't pass on.
      Might be a precedent for your paper to J. Climate when
      it comes out.
         There are a few interesting comments on the CA web site.
      One says it is up to me to prove the paper from 1990 was correct,
      not for Keenan to prove we're wrong. Interesting logic.
      Cheers
      Phil
      Wei-Chyung, Tom,
        I won't be replying to either of the emails below, nor to any
       of the accusations on the Climate Audit website.
         I've sent them on to someone here at UEA to see if we
      should be discussing anything with our legal staff.
         The second letter seems an attempt to be nice to me,
      and somehow split up the original author team.
        I do now wish I'd never sent them the data after their FOIA
      request!
      Cheers
      Phil

     X-YMail-OSG: wrT8WAEVM1myBGklj9hAiLvnYW9GqqFcbArMYvXDn17EHo1e0Vf5eSQ4WIGJljnsEw--
     From: "Steve McIntyre" [1]<stephen.mcintyre@utoronto.ca>
     To: "Phil Jones" [2]<p.jones@uea.ac.uk>
     Subject: Jones et al 1990
     Date: Tue, 19 Jun 2007 13:44:58 -0400
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     Dear Phil,

     Jones et al 1990 cited a 260-station temperature set jointly collected by the US
     Deparment of Energy and the PRC Academy of Sciences, stating in respect to the Chinese
     stations:

     The stations were selected on the basis of station history: we chose those with few, if
     any, changes in instrumentation, location or observation times.

     This data set was later published as NDP-039
     [3]http://cdiac.ornl.gov/epubs/ndp/ndp039/ndp039.html , coauthored by Zeng Zhaomei,
     providing station histories only for their 65-station network, stating that station
     histories for their 205-station network (which includes many of the sites in Jones et al
     1990) were not available:

     (s. 5) Unfortunately, station histories are not currently available for any of the
     stations in the 205-station network; therefore, details regarding instrumentation,
     collection methods, changes in station location or observing times, and official data
     sources are not known.

     (s. 7) Few station records included in the PRC data sets can be considered truly
     homogeneous. Even the best stations were subject to minor relocations or changes in
     observing times, and many have undoubtedly experienced large increases in urbanization.
     Fortunately, for 59 of the stations in the 65-station network, station histories (see
     Table 1) are available to assist in proper interpretation of trends or jumps in the
     data; however, station histories for the 205-station network are not available. In
     addition, examination of the data from the 65-station data set has uncovered evidence of
     several undocumented station moves (Sects. 6 and 10). Users should therefore exercise
     caution when using the data.

     Accordingly, it appears that the quality control claim made in Jones et al 1990 was
     incorrect. I presume that you did not verify whether this claim was correct at the time
     and have been unaware of the incorrectness of this representation. Since the study
     continues to be relied on, most recently in AR4, I would encourage you to promptly issue
     an appropriate correction.

     Regards, Steve McIntyre



     From: "D.J. Keenan" [4]<doug.keenan@informath.org>
     To: "Steve McIntyre" [5]<stephen.mcintyre@utoronto.ca>
     Cc: "Phil Jones" [6]<p.jones@uea.ac.uk>
     Subject: Wang fabrications
     Date: Tue, 19 Jun 2007 20:45:15 +0100
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     Steve,
     I thought that I should summarize what has happened with the Wang case.
     First, I concluded that the claims made about Chinese stations by Jones et al. [Nature,
     1990] and Wang et al. [GRL, 1990] were very probably fabricated.  (You very likely came
     to the same conclusion.)
     Second, some investigation showed that Phil Jones was wholly blameless and that
     responsibility almost certainly lay with Wang.
     Third, I contacted Wang, told him that I had caught him, and asked him to retract his
     fabricated claims.  My e-mails were addressed to him only, and I told no one about
     them.  In Wang's reply, though, Jones, Karl, Zeng, etc. were Cc'd.
     Fourth, I explained to Wang that I would publicly accuse him of fraud if he did not
     retract.  Wang seemed to not take me seriously.  So I drafted what would be the text of
     a formal accusation and sent it to him.  Wang replied that if I wanted to make the
     accusation, that was up to me.
     Fifth, I put a draft on my web site--
      [7] http://www.informath.org/apprise/a5620.htm
     --and e-mailed a few people, asking if they had any recommendations for improvement.
     I intend to send the final version to Wang's university, and to demand a formal
     investigation into fraud.  I will also notify the media.  Separately, I have had a
     preliminary discussion with the FBI--because Wang likely used government funds to commit
     his fraud; it seems that it might be possible to prosecute Wang under the same statute
     as was used in the Eric Poehlman case.  The simplicity of the case makes this easier--no
     scientific knowledge is required to understand things.
     I saw that you have now e-mailed Phil (Cc'd above), asking Phil to publish a retraction
     of Wang's claims:  [8]http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=1741#comment-115879
     There could be a couple problems with that.  One problem is that it would be difficult
     for Phil to publish anything without the agreement of Wang and the other co-authors
     (Nature would simply say "no").
     Another problem is that your e-mail says that you presume Phil was "unaware of the
     incorrectness" of Wang's work.  I do not see how that could be true.  Although the
     evidence that Phil was innocent in 1990 seems entirely conclusive, there is also the
     paper of Yan et al. [Advances in Atmospheric Sciences, 18: 309 (2001)], which is cited
     on my web page.  Phil is a co-author of that paper.
     Phil, this proves that you knew there were serious problems with Wang's claims back in
     2001; yet some of your work since then has continued to rely on those claims, most
     notably in the latest report from the IPCC.  It would be nice to hear the explanation
     for this.  Phil?
     Kind wishes, Doug
     *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *
     Douglas J. Keenan
     [9]http://www.informath.org
     phone + 44 20 7537 4122
     The Limehouse Cut, London E14 6N, UK

     Prof. Phil Jones
     Climatic Research Unit        Telephone +44 (0) 1603 592090
     School of Environmental Sciences    Fax +44 (0) 1603 507784
     University of East Anglia
     Norwich                          Email    [10]p.jones@uea.ac.uk
     NR4 7TJ
     UK
     ----------------------------------------------------------------------------

--
Thomas C. Peterson, Ph.D.
NOAA's National Climatic Data Center
151 Patton Avenue
Asheville, NC 28801
Voice: +1-828-271-4287
Fax: +1-828-271-4328

References

   1. mailto:stephen.mcintyre@utoronto.ca
   2. mailto:p.jones@uea.ac.uk
   3. http://cdiac.ornl.gov/epubs/ndp/ndp039/ndp039.html
   4. mailto:doug.keenan@informath.org
   5. mailto:stephen.mcintyre@utoronto.ca
   6. mailto:p.jones@uea.ac.uk
   7. http://www.informath.org/apprise/a5620.htm
   8. http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=1741#comment-115879
   9. http://www.informath.org/
  10. mailto:p.jones@uea.ac.uk

