Talk:Climatic Research Unit email controversy

New Title Suggestion V22.0 Alpha Release - Free discussion for ideas, not positions!

I've been trying to think of ways in which we might be able to break this frustrating deadlock over the article's title. With a piece of paper and a pencil, I did a Venn diagram to look for common elements that we could agree on for a title. Here were my two sets of data:

Set 1	Set 2
Climatic Research Unit	Climatic Research Unit
Data	Data
Documents	Documents
Files	Files
Theft	Leak
Stolen	Scandal
Controversy	Controversy
E-mail	"Climategate"
Release	Release
Hacking
Incident

From these sets, possible titles can be created from common values. I have eliminated obvious problem results like "Climatic Research Unit controversy" because they lack enough specific information, and removed adjusted for singular/plural mismatches:

• Climatic Research Unit documents controversy
• Climatic Research Unit document release controversy
• Climatic Research Unit files controversy
• Climatic Research Unit file release controversy
• Climatic Research Unit data controversy
• Climatic Research Unit data release controversy

All of these would seem to have some merit, and I hope these examples can be used to generate new discussion or promote new thinking. I quite like Climatic Research Unit data release controversy because it encompasses e-mails, code and other data, keeps the manner of release ambiguous (neither "theft" nor "leak"), and acknowledges that a controversy exists; however, I would prefer to see this thread used as a means to promote discussion about common elements instead of using it to advocate a specific position. I hope this proves useful. -- Scjessey (talk) 20:32, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Any of these would be much better than the existing title. Unless anyone has any new points to make, I suggest that we simply declare consensus reached, let you pick one, and ask an admin to unprotect and carry out the move. Itsmejudith (talk) 20:42, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Hear, hear! I as impressed with the ingenuity as I am tired of the topic (which is to say very). I think Scjessey's preferred title is spot-on. I also think consensus has been reached and agree with itsmejudith. jhe_iv (talk) 20:49, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

While I can agree that 'the more accurate the better', and Scjessey's proposed title is far better than the current, I specifically vote for Climategate, this is definitely a scandal and a coverup, even if you're too shy or afraid to read the CRU emails and munge through the data (I'm neither shy nor afraid), you can easily look at what people like IPCC scientist John Christy and people like him say:

No consensus on IPCC's level of ignorance http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7081331.stm

The consensus the aforementioned 'white washers' keep talking about in these talk pages is a complete fabrication on their part, there is evidence of a scandal, a cover-up, there is evidence data was manipulated to reflect fallacies. In short the scientists making the claim (CRU for example) have the burden of proof, and that proof in science comes in the form of peer-reviewed journals and peer-reproducible results.

If the vote is down to the current title or Scjessey's proposal of Climatic Research Unit data release controversy then I definitely vote for the latter, though this is definitely '-gate'-worthy

Adam.T.Historian (talk) 20:56, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

I like either of your last two – the ones using the word "data", as that is less specific than "documents" or "files", since what was leaked was more than just documents. Well, now that I think about it, maybe "files" is the most broad of the three. Whatever. I vote for whichever term of those is the most broad.
-Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 21:10, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Note: I, too, like Climategate, but there are many problems with this (all previously enumerated but I'll rehighlight -gate as I think its instructive and demonstrates the power of the suffix). That being said, I am hereby begging editors who read this section to not oppose the move because you favor "climategate" but rather opine on whether the suggested titles are better than the current one. After the move, you are free to propose climategate again (I don't think climategate will be accepted for at least 6 months but who knows) but please don't derail this discussion as has been involuntarily done to previous move attempts. These titles are much better than the current one and we should take every inch improving this article that we can get. jhe_iv (talk) 21:18, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

(After about 20 billion edit conflicts have triggered a rise in the sea level) ... All of these are improvements, and thanks for the diligent effort! There's a question implicit in the title, about what the focus of the article is. If it's about the "hacking incident", then we are covering the unauthorized access and disclosure of the files - who did it, how, why, etc. If it's about the emailes / files, then it is about the conduct of the climate scientists - what they were talking about, what they were doing, and how that differed from the normal actions of scientists studying a subject. If it's about the climategate controversy, it is about the people and groups who raised the alarm following release of the files and began advocating against AGW (is that the right acronym?), how that issue reached the mainstream, and what resulted. A comprehensive article that is about the entire incident would have to address all three and give due weight to each. So far this article is not comprehensive, and focuses almost entirely on the hacking of the emails, and what the emails contained. The scandal surrounding that is barely addressed at all, but depending on how it plays out is probably the main event here, unless the substance of the allegations against the scientists is born out, in which case the main focus would be on their behavior, or unless the perpetrators get caught and there is a lot of fall-out from that, in which case that would be the main event. It's all a little early. Having said all that, I prefer "Climatic Research Unit documents controversy" if we're going to have one article cover both issues. First, most of what was released were documents, not data. Second, the salient thing is that they were documents, not that they happened to be in files - electronic or otherwise. Third, the word "documents" implicitly includes what happened to those documents, i.e. they were hacked and released. Adding the word "release" narrows the subject, and does not necessarily include the question of what was released. - Wikidemon (talk) 21:26, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Incidentally, I support all of the above proposals as an alternative to the current title, so the exact choice is not all that important. - Wikidemon (talk) 00:06, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

• Support for Climatic Research Unit data release controversy--SPhilbrickT 21:34, 30 December 2009 (UTC)
• Support for Climatic Research Unit data release controversy - it's a good, lucid compromise. »S0CO^{(talk|contribs)} 21:51, 30 December 2009 (UTC)
• Support for Climatic Research Unit data release controversy Troed (talk) 21:53, 30 December 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose (shrug) I respect the "anti-Climategate" position, but we are the only ones calling it something else. Nightmote (talk) 22:06, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Sorry to butt in, but if this article is not named climategate, do you favor any or all of these over the current title, "CRU e-mail hacking incident"? - Wikidemon (talk) 00:06, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Hi, Wikidemon. I believe that we are arguing over what this article is named because we cannot decide on what this article is describing (a data theft versus a question of scientific malfeasance), and until we have reached consensus on the scope of this article, the title will be under constant attack by one group or another. A fork has been proposed, and was attempted. I do not support the fork, but truly understand why it is proposed. Nightmote (talk) 02:50, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Tongue firmly in cheek, I will immediately support "CRUTape Letters" if it is proposed. I read that and thought it was brilliant! Nightmote (talk) 02:50, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

If truly pressed, I might go with "CRU Data Controversy". It avoids theft vs hack altogether and skips the "-gate" thing. Not going to fly, though. But if pressed, that's where I'd go. Nice and short and reasonably open-ended without being too vague. Nightmote (talk) 02:50, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

• I noticed that in the UK (the locus of the incident), "Warmergate" seems to outstrip "Climategate" for popularity. I didn't have that in my Venn diagram, but it wouldn't have changed the list of common elements. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:11, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Support for Climatic Research Unit data release controversy - with the intention of supporting Climategate at the next available opportunity Adam.T.Historian (talk) 22:16, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• It will never be called "Climategate" because Wikipedia does not use POV -gate names to title articles about current affairs. A -gate name is even cited in Wikipedia:Naming conventions as a POV name disallowed by NPOV. -- ChrisO (talk) 22:33, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Never is a long time, ChrisO - I do see a Watergate article in Wikipedia, after all. Adam.T.Historian (talk) 22:42, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Yes, there's a Watergate article, but that's because the scandal was named after a place - the Watergate complex. The term "Watergate" had no inherent implication of scandal. By contrast, every other instance of -gate is derivative and POV, since the term is used to "suggest unethical behaviour and a cover-up", as one source puts it. That's why Wikipedia rejects the use of -gate in article names about current affairs, because it slants an article from the outset. Compare Killian documents controversy ("Rathergate") or Dismissal of US attorneys controversy ("Attorneygate"). -- ChrisO (talk) 22:48, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose Clearly here on these talk pages and to "insiders" it has become a "controversy". However, to the general public, like me, it is an "incident". And, as I stated in the voting section, I strongly oppose "Climategate". Gandydancer (talk) 22:27, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Would you support any of the above titles over the current one? What if they used the word "incident" instead of "controversy"? - Wikidemon (talk) 00:06, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Wrong. This is referred to as a controversy at all possible levels in [WP:RS]. I've linked to CNN and a Nobel Prize winners panel to that effect at this talk page. Troed (talk) 13:32, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose "data release". Far too vague and ambiguous. As others have pointed out, "data" has a specific meaning in this context, since it can refer to scientific data - which is of course not what was stolen from the CRU. "Release" is highly misleading, since it implies that the CRU released the stolen material, which of course it did not. I could live with "Climatic Research Unit documents controversy", however. -- ChrisO (talk) 22:33, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Have you even seen the CRU data released? There is a great deal of 'scientific data' in it, models, custom programs, etc. Also, there was no data of a personal nature, so who was it stolen from, the British people in order that the British people could access the data? It's an ongoing investigation, your strong support of CRU isn't really helping the naming conventions discussion IMHO. Adam.T.Historian (talk) 22:47, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• The stolen material certainly included material of a personal nature, from what I've read about it - i.e. private correspondence - and it belonged to the UEA, not to the "British people". British universities are not run like American ones. Don't make the mistake of thinking that the American model of information ownership exists everywhere. -- ChrisO (talk) 22:55, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Perhaps instead of reading about it, you'll go and get a copy of the CRU data, then you will see that the emails are all related specifically to the work the CRU was doing. I mean the collection is so precise as to imply the possibility that it may've even been compiled by the CRU in anticipation of a UK FOIA request, since it's an ongoing investigation we can only wonder about this point. But regardless it is obvious that there was a great effort to disallow inclusion of all e-mails of a purely personal nature. Adam.T.Historian (talk) 23:03, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Much as it pains me to add to the bike shed: "data": absolutely not, there has been controversy over "CRU not releasing their data" which would cause obvious confusion. "documents": no, neither emails nor code are usually referred to as "documents". Indeed, I keep my documents in a separate folder from both my emails and my code. Simonmar (talk) 22:36, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Simonmar, couldn't both of these things be contained in different sections of an article named Climatic Research Unit data release controversy? I mean they are definitely related are they not? The CRU consistently refused to release their data, then their data is released without apparent authorization, wouldn't these both be fitting topics under an article named 'data release controversy'? Seems like a natural evolution, at least in my mind, one being the result of the other? Adam.T.Historian (talk) 23:00, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

What about "information"? Would that not cover everything we need it to?
-Garrett W. {☎ ✍} 07:22, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

←Reminder: I started this thread in the hope of getting people to come up with ideas for how to find common ground. It was not intended to be yet another place for people to stake their position and vote on stuff. Please try to stick with the original plan if possible. -- Scjessey (talk) 22:38, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Support for Climatic Research Unit data release controversy - I agree with Gandydancer that incident might be better, but I do think the proposed formulation is an improvement. --DGaw (talk) 22:41, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Support. I prefer Climate Research Unit documents controversy but any of those are better than the current title. BTW, as a software developer, I would consider source code to be a type of document. While I don't have any experience with FORTRAN or IDL, I have worked with C, C++, C#, Visual Basic (classic and .NET), COBOL and RPG, and in every single case, the source code files have been plain old text files that can be opened in any text editor, word processor or IDE of choice. So I consider "documents" to be an inclusive term. But like I said, any of the above are better than the current title. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:53, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• oppose wasting more time discussing the article title. But since I'm here, "data release" is obviously wrong - it was email hacking William M. Connolley (talk) 23:04, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Strong oppose Reliable sources focus overwhelmingly on the emails, not on "data." And to call this a "release" is absurd -- there's been no serious proposal by any reliable source that the emails were "released" which implies a voluntary action. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 01:12, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

• Climatic Research Unit data release controversy has a majority consensus so far, and might I add seems to be the best proposed name yet, as the article can cover both the initial refusal of the CRU to follow the valid science rule of peer-reviewed journals and peer-reproducible results, as well as the apparent unauthorized release of the CRU data as a result of their refusal. I don't see a better possible title, unless we're out to sweep under the rug any possible wrongdoing or bad science on the part of the CRU? I mean we are all after the facts here, aren't we? Adam.T.Historian (talk) 23:11, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• That is to say, both the refusal of the CRU to release their data or have peer oversight, as well as the apparent unauthorized release of the aforementioned data, are both controversies and both inseparably linked. I do believe we've struck gold with this title, it's succinct and can accurately cover the controversy from beginning to present day. Adam.T.Historian (talk) 23:18, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• Sigh. You still don't understand. CRU haven't refused to release any of their data. Read up on the facts and come back when you've got a clue. That you find a consensus with yourself is hardly surprising William M. Connolley (talk) 23:24, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

"come back when you've got a clue." Spare us the personal attacks, Bill. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:00, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Really? "...I'm getting hassled by a couple of people to release the CRU station temperature data. Don't any of you three tell anybody that the UK has a Freedom of Information Act !" - Phil Jones Email, 1109021312.txt - Gunnanmon (talk) 23:40, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• The sources showing that the CRU refused to release data are too exhaustive to name here, you can feel free to google "CRU refused to release data" and cherry pick what you consider to be reliable sources, allow me to offer a few here:

Global Warming ate my data - We've lost the numbers: CRU responds to FOIA requests

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/08/13/cru_missing/

Britain's Climate Research Unit to release data in wake of Climategate - Britain’s Climate Research Unit (CRU) announced it would make its data publically available, something which it had refused to do previously. The unit however has admitted that it did not have access to much of the raw data required to reconstruct climate records because it had been deleted.

From the examiner, no idea why it's triggered a spam filter, it's a valid news site.

I must point out this thread was initially opened to cement the naming of the article to Climatic Research Unit data release controversy, for which we still have majority consensus. More sources can definitely follow, just let me know! Adam.T.Historian (talk) 23:53, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

No it wasn't. I opened the thread with a fresh approach to trying to come up with a better title, and I hoped it would lead to a free debate about the words and concepts all sides agreed with. Perhaps I made a mistake in expressing a preference, but I went to great pains to insist I did not wish this thread to become something where people staked a position for advocacy. Everyone else turned it into the usual votefest, for which I am utterly dismayed. I wish I hadn't bothered, quite frankly. -- Scjessey (talk) 00:26, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

FYI, The Examiner is being filtered to discourage editors from linking to it due to its extreme unreliability. Blacklisting is an extreme measure but sometimes it has to be done to keep out the worst of the crap. (If you get your information from The Examiner, I'd suggest you try casting your net a bit more widely.) -- ChrisO (talk) 00:06, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Examiner.com is not a valid news source, it's a blog. Generally speaking, it is not a reliable source. It's already come up on the Reliable Sources Noticeboard several times: Examiner.com = paid blogging no editorial oversight, Request to reopen discussion on Examiner.com and Examiner.com.

In fact, I was one of the editors who led the effort to have it blacklisted, so you have me (in part) to thank/blame. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:31, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

• Strong oppose (to "Climatic Research Unit data release controversy") 'data' would be incorrect, there is rather little data, lots of documents and lots of emails. As others have pointed out, the main issue (so far) have been the emails. Release indicates voluntary/legal which certainly isn't the case. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 01:53, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Since we still have majority consensus for renaming the article Climatic Research Unit data release controversy, and no one is talking about the naming specifically, I will indulge you, however I will have to take your word for it that the examiner is blacklisted for topics unrelated to 'Climategate', as I'm not a news hound and am not familiar with all of the news sites intimately.

While Gunnanmon's comment alone proves my original point, here's one of my favorites, Russians complaining about misuse of their data, cherry picking of data, it also mentions refusal of FOIA requests:

http://english.pravda.ru/science/earth/30-11-2009/110832-climategate-0

Adam.T.Historian (talk) 00:21, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Da. Pravda being reliable organ of right thinking. People's newspaper resist bourgeois concepts of "factual accuracy" or "neutrality." Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 01:22, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

As an aside, I personally find it hilarious that right-wing Americans are suddenly fans of Pravda - possibly the world's most infamous newspaper. What is the world coming to? -- ChrisO (talk) 02:00, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Should I take this to mean that anyone such as myself who takes a strong stand to see Wikipedia NPOV honored are 'right-wing'? I suspect this type of 'false-dichotomy think' is a big reason this article has disgraced WIkipedia NPOV policy for so long. There is more to the controversy of data being released from the Climatic Research Unit than the incredibly biased name Climatic_Research_Unit_e-mail_hacking_incident could ever cover in good faith. This is why a majority consensus rightly voted to change the name to Climatic Research Unit data release controversy. In case you didn't know (which wouldn't surprise me at this point) misuse of Russian climate data is a valid component of this controversy. Adam.T.Historian (talk) 02:24, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

• Weak support- it's better than the one we've got. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:29, 31 December 2009 (UTC)
• Support of Climatic Research Unit documents controversy --BernhardMeyer (talk) 10:21, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose, per Kim. Not data. Oppose "release" - seems like an endorsement of the POV that "we don't know if it was released with permission or not" when no source supports that POV, only some editors here. And less than fond of "controversy". Guettarda (talk) 15:55, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

For the avoidance of doubt I have not suggested the info was released by permission. That would be speculation and almost certainly untrue. I cannot remember seeing anyone else suggest this either. That I oppose the use of the word "hack" when the means whereby the unauthorised publication took place does not mean that I think PJ himself copied it onto a USB stick and posted to Russia and Turkey! But some other dastardly person else might have, without permission, obviously. We don't know. The police do not yet know. The UEA/CRU does not yet know. When they know I bet we hear of it pretty damn quick. I am saying NO speculation should appear in the article. Certainly none of my wild speculations of this para! But "hack" is speculation too and the "theft" is, for the moment, just alleged. BTW "taking without permission" is not "theft". Paul Beardsell (talk) 01:30, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

• Oppose. The only thing wrong with the present title is that it is neutral. Every attempt to change it seems to be an attempt to emphasise POVs. --Nigelj (talk) 16:06, 31 December 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose, in case it wasn't clear. See my earlier comment. Simonmar (talk) 22:06, 31 December 2009 (UTC)
• Support, but I think a better title is "Climate Research Unit email controversy". Cla68 (talk) 00:07, 2 January 2010 (UTC)
• Support for Climatic Research Unit data release controversy. -- Benstrider (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 08:26, 2 January 2010 (UTC).
• Support for Climatic Research Unit data release controversy. The current title is NOT NPOV.Jarhed (talk) 00:23, 3 January 2010 (UTC)
• Support for Climatic Research Unit data release controversy. This is at least not POV like the current title. Nsaa (talk) 22:42, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Suggested Title, Hopefully Neutral Enough

Unable to form supermajority. Proposal fails. My deepest thanks to those who somehow managed to avoid commenting. My deepest scorn for those who lacked restraint.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Following the discussion initiated above by SCJessey, and keeping in mind the criticisms leveled against the word "release", I would like to propose "Climatic Research Unit Documents Controversy". *I* like it because I proposed it and I'm enormously self-centered. Others may like it because it avoids any reference to "hack/theft/release". I am proposing this in no small part because Wikidemon asked whether there would be *any* title I would support over "Climategate", and I began to feel some small hint of shame that I may have been an impediment to progress. So. If a supermajority (>66%) of editors agree to this title, it is my intention to request that an admin make the change. I would like to close this section on Tuesday the 5th of January. Nightmote (talk) 22:53, 31 December 2009 (UTC) That would be a very bad idea. A move discussion that lacks discussion is pretty much worthless. Guettarda (talk) 06:05, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Without comment, "Climatic Research Unit Documents Controversy", yea or nay, and my sincere apologies if I have seemed an ass as opposed to an honorable foe. yea Nightmote (talk) 14:44, 31 December 2009 (UTC) nay - to begin with, abbreviations in articles titles are a bad idea. Guettarda (talk) 16:08, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Big yea for Climatic Research Unit documents controversy. Itsmejudith (talk) 16:14, 31 December 2009 (UTC) I was being lazy and have changed CRU to Climatic Research Unit. I removed the 2009, as well. Nightmote (talk) 16:45, 31 December 2009 (UTC) yea for Climatic Research Unit documents controversy (comment moved) Troed (talk) 16:39, 31 December 2009 (UTC)   Cs32en  15:56, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Cs32en please revert that silly attempt, false as it is, at discrediting me. Troed (talk) 16:46, 1 January 2010 (UTC) You may want to have a look at your contributions before making such claims.  Cs32en  20:03, 1 January 2010 (UTC) It seems you're purposely trying to create a revert war due to your obviously (for anyone clicking that link and bothering to go back to 2007) false accusation and from the discussion at your talk page. I have no intention in going down that path. Troed (talk) 20:21, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Please no comments. Just an up or down (though I appreciate your thoughtfulness) Nightmote (talk) 16:33, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Full support. In fact, I proposed this very same title 11 days ago. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:51, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Nyet. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:00, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Please no comments. Just an up or down.Nightmote (talk) 17:09, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Non --Nigelj (talk) 17:13, 31 December 2009 (UTC) aye 98.220.51.203 (talk) 17:20, 31 December 2009 (UTC) whoops, Textmatters (talk) 17:23, 31 December 2009 (UTC) yea --BernhardMeyer (talk) 17:24, 31 December 2009 (UTC) nein. Let's stop wasting time talking about the article name William M. Connolley (talk) 17:46, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Yea. --DGaw (talk) 17:50, 31 December 2009 (UTC) 無. In fact, double-plus 無. - Wikidemon (talk) 17:54, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Plus Good Arzel (talk) 17:56, 31 December 2009 (UTC) No Cannot agree to any change without discussion. The Four Deuces (talk) 18:00, 31 December 2009 (UTC) No A furore by some bloggers does not a controversy make. Lumos3 (talk) 18:01, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Please no comments. Just an up or down. Nightmote (talk) 18:34, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Yes The current name is incredibly stupid, plus it was not an e-mail hack :) mark nutley (talk) 18:12, 31 December 2009 (UTC)   Cs32en  16:03, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Please no comments. Just an up or down. Nightmote (talk) 18:34, 31 December 2009 (UTC) How is that at all in keeping with "voting is evil" principle? Guettarda (talk) 18:35, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Yes A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:38, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Why is this being discussed yet again when an earlier proposal to do exactly the same thing has just been closed for lack of consensus? (#Requested move, above.) This is a waste of everyone's time. -- ChrisO (talk) 22:09, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Please no comments. Just an up or down.Nightmote (talk) 22:40, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Yea Adam.T.Historian (talk) 22:53, 31 December 2009 (UTC) New account with advanced editing skills.  Cs32en  12:27, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Oppose It's an "e-mail incident", not a "documents controversy".  Cs32en  23:13, 31 December 2009 (UTC) Neigh. New accounts used for voting, noted. Viriditas (talk) 00:43, 1 January 2010 (UTC) No Gandydancer (talk) 02:10, 1 January 2010 (UTC) No Even if the contents of the documents may be controvertial, the focus of this article should be something that has been called an incident. Masudako (talk) 03:31, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Full Support: Lets get this over with.jheiv (talk) 04:21, 1 January 2010 (UTC) NO Data is the CORRECT description - Gunnanmon (talk) 05:17, 1 January 2010 (UTC) NO Bertport (talk) 05:33, 1 January 2010 (UTC) YES That title makes much more sense due to the fact that most of the files released were actually documents unrelated to emails. Of course, Climategate makes more sense, but I guess that's already been shot down for some silly reason.TheGoodLocust (talk) 06:21, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Most of the information released where emails, the rest were miscellaneous files; data is appropriate. - Gunnanmon (talk) 07:16, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Dude, I actually downloaded the files, I know what I'm talking about - there are far more documents (nearly 4 times) than email text files.TheGoodLocust (talk) 07:58, 1 January 2010 (UTC) WP:OR? Nil Einne (talk) 10:25, 1 January 2010 (UTC) You do use google right? The # has been mentioned in many sources - also, WP:OR is specifically stated not to apply to simple things like "counting." TheGoodLocust (talk) 07:27, 2 January 2010 (UTC) Yes pretty pointless though since this obviously isn't going to achieve consensus or a super majority or whatever (which in itself is a recipe for disaster). I'm also not sure why we don't follow the WP:RM process even if it isn't required since this even if did achieve anything is a recipe for disaster. Nil Einne (talk) 10:25, 1 January 2010 (UTC) No Opposing on principle. I see a similar proposal following WP:RM just closed which I would have supported had I noticed but would have still failed I'm sure. I don't see why we're having this. Nil Einne (talk) 10:30, 1 January 2010 (UTC) No . . dave souza, talk 16:11, 1 January 2010 (UTC) No Time to stop the naming nonsense and move on. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 16:24, 1 January 2010 (UTC) I think it is fair to say that the overwhelmingly vast majority of contributors to this topic think the existing title is bad. This large group has, thus far, been unable to come up with an alternative that wins a majority of support. If a !vote were to be taken on the existing title, it would receive far less support than many of the other alternatives that have been put forward. It is for this reason that the discussion on the title must continue. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:29, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Answer (1): Yes! This article is not about just another "hacking incident", it is be about the ensuing controversy over the revealed material. We are going to fully document the Climatgate controversy here and the controversy is not the release of the material but what is revealed in the material. OR, if you don't like that, like this: Answer (2): No! There is a separate Climategate controversy under prep in user space. This article is only about the incident. This leak is but a little footnote in history. Climategate will be discussed fully elsewhere. You can't have it both ways. Paul Beardsell (talk) 01:01, 2 January 2010 (UTC) Support, unless Climategate controversy is split out, in which case the current title is probably fine. Oren0 (talk) 02:36, 2 January 2010 (UTC) Support -- Jarhed (talk) 00:33, 3 January 2010 (UTC) Support--Heyitspeter (talk) 01:19, 4 January 2010 (UTC) Straw poll: How much support does the existing title have? Oppose -- Scjessey (talk) 16:29, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Oppose - actually, the current title goes squarely against WP:NPOV and should thus be edited for neutrality without the need for votes/consensus, although it would be preferred if there could be consensus on the new neutral version. Troed (talk) 16:34, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Is this in an absolute sense, or a relative sense? If we want a straw poll, my suggestion would be to use one to find out which alternative wording has the most support, and then use that as the basis of a move request. That would allow us to investigate and a variety of possible wordings. Guettarda (talk) 16:38, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Perhaps we can create a table of all possible (reasonable) title examples and then have vote. How about something like that? -- Scjessey (talk) 17:05, 1 January 2010 (UTC) I applaud your continued effort to improve the title! I think this attempt to demonstrate there is consensus for some change is valuable. Paul Beardsell (talk) 00:49, 2 January 2010 (UTC) Prefer Climatic Research Unit Documents Controversy. As someone completely uninvolved coming here to look into this I find this to be the most neutral title proposed so far. I also want to say that the whole "Please no comments. Just an up or down" attitude is not going to make the discussion any more productive. We should not me just giving a thumbs up or down, but should be making cogent and convincing arguments. We don't vote on things here, we do poll to check the status of consensus, but those polls should include reasoning that attempts to convince others of your point of view. We are run by consensus, not majority. A "vote" that has no reason or justification behind it means pretty much nothing. Chillum (Need help? Ask me) 17:11, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Faulty question - even if no support is shown, all you will have demonstrated is that there is no general support for any title (which i suspect is true), it is time to leave this question, since continuing is futile. Once there is more development about this case (which there will be in February/beginning of this year), there will be plenty of opportunity to take this up again.. Imho most people are trying to "jump the gun" in this case. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 18:07, 1 January 2010 (UTC) It does not follow that because there is no consensus that the current title is the best. Another will find more consensus, I am sure. In particular losing the word "hack" when even the victim's own spokespeople are unsure as to whether a hack is concerned, to the extent that they have set up their own enquiry to determine how the leak occurred. Paul Beardsell (talk) 00:49, 2 January 2010 (UTC) Support in preference to the alternatives that have been offered.  Cs32en  18:34, 1 January 2010 (UTC) Oppose: Title reflects the view that the controversy is the unauthorised release of the material. No, this type of leak happens every week: A bank's database is released, etc etc, and we rarely document that type of hack/leak here at WP. What is noteworthy is what is revealed in the material. That is the controversy. Paul Beardsell (talk) 00:49, 2 January 2010 (UTC) Comment - Be careful when going down the road of "let's dogpile on the current title", as when so much opposition piles up, it can lead to a change just for the sake of changing, because people get it in their heads that something simply must be done. This is exactly how Israeli apartheid got watered down to Allegations of Israeli apartheid which was further neutered into the current Israel and the apartheid analogy. If a change is to be made, then make it solely for the sake of the new term being acceptable, and not for any shortcomings of this one. Tarc (talk) 01:14, 2 January 2010 (UTC) You wouldn't be saying that if the title of this article was Anthropogenic Climate Change is bullshit, would you? To some, the current title as almost that bad. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:34, 2 January 2010 (UTC) Oppose current title as watered down and missing the point. Oren0 (talk) 02:36, 2 January 2010 (UTC) awful, a bunny died in heaven for that title - Wikidemon (talk) 02:43, 2 January 2010 (UTC) Support per Tarc and everything I have said on the matter during these almost daily polls for weeks now: Let's wait until we have some information upon which to base a meaningful (not simply POV) change in the title. --Nigelj (talk) 15:13, 2 January 2010 (UTC) Oppose -- current title is POV, misses the point, and is just awful. -- Pete Tillman (talk) 18:57, 2 January 2010 (UTC) Oppose -- Jarhed (talk) 00:32, 3 January 2010 (UTC) Oppose -- If the article were about the hacking alone, as the title currently suggests, it would have been deleted or merged into another article long ago. The notability of the event rests, instead, in the controversy surrounding the contents of the emails.--Heyitspeter (talk) 01:18, 4 January 2010 (UTC) Oppose, current title is an embarrassment to anyone who cares more about WP than they care about the CRU. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:41, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Pressmulti - removal of a piece with millions of readers? - Climategate: the corruption of Wikipedia

Damian Thompson, Blogs Editor of the Telegraph Media Group, states the following in Happy New Year from Telegraph Blogs… "James Delingpole (whose Climategate posts attracted millions of page views in one week alone)". One of James Delingpole's pieces has been about this article Climategate: the corruption of Wikipedia. According to some of our editors this article should not be mentioned at the top of our discussion page

• Tony Sidaway (talk · contribs) removes it by stating 1. "Like Solomon's piece on which it is based, this Delingpole opinion column presents severe BLP problems." (Revision as of 2009-12-23T21:35:25)
• Tony Sidaway (talk · contribs) 2. "Inappropriate press link (BLP issues" (Revision as of 2009-12-24T17:20:52)
• Scjessey (talk · contribs) removes it by stating "… rm iffy source per previous discussion" (Revision as of 2009-12-24T23:48:21)
• Stephan Schulz (talk · contribs) removes it by stating "Taking out the thrash. We don't spread lies per WP:BLP." (Revision as of 2009-12-26T09:20:07)
• ChrisO (talk · contribs) removes it by stating "trash removal again" (Revision as of 2009-12-26T11:39:36)
• ChrisO (talk · contribs) removes it by stating "rv per WP:BLP" (Revision as of 2009-12-28T08:46:21)
• Guettarda (talk · contribs) removes it by stating "there was no consensus to add this" (Revision as of 2009-12-29T18:31:14)
• Scjessey (talk · contribs) removes it by stating "Undid revision 334813567 by Nsaa (talk) - under opinion hit piece by climate skeptic - not legitimate press coverage in any possible way" (Revision as of 2009-12-29T23:59:51)
• Guettarda (talk · contribs) removes it by stating "Nsaa, please don't re-add contentious material without consensus. As you have shown yourself, there's no consensus for your addition" (Revision as of 2010-01-03T23:06:24)

It has been discussed here Archive_14#James_Delingpole:_Climategate:_the_corruption_of_Wikipedia and Archive_13#"Climategate: the corruption of Wikipedia" and even an WP:BLPN has been raised by me at Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard#Talk:Climatic_Research_Unit_e-mail_hacking_incident. Still this piece is not mentioned by us. Last the claim was that under opinion hit piece by climate skeptic - not legitimate press coverage in any possible way. For how long shall this piece go unmentioned at this page under extremely dubious claims? Nsaa (talk) 14:20, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

It's an opinion piece and should therefore go unmentioned unless multiple reliable sources report on it, as this would indicate sufficient notability of Delingpole's opinion. Such reports reliable sources, if they would occur, would very likely also be a basis for describing the various inaccuracies in Delingpole's text. Note that the Telegraph is an involved party here, and the complete quote is "our bloggers, who range from the mischievous and bloody-minded James Delingpole [...]".  Cs32en  14:45, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Correct. As you have shown his has been discussed. Arguments have been made for excluding it. And it isn't like this is article space - that template is a bit less important than WikiProject tagging - it's basically a tool for boasting that we're significant, a pat on the back for editors. So why keep bringing it up? It's a smear piece. It's full of errors. And it's trivia. Guettarda (talk) 15:07, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Recognising and acknowledging criticism is a just a Good Idea. That WP is held in regrettably popular disrepute over this issue is something that we need to deal with in one way or another. I'm not sure what the best way is, but I do know that ignoring it will not serve the encyclopedia well in the end. My preference would be that we link to it, acknowledge it. Perhaps in the new suggested FAQ question which actually deals with the issue as to why we think the wordlwide, headline grabbing, TV documentary making, Nobel discussion provoking controversy is about the leak/hack, when we all know different. To the shame of WP. Paul Beardsell (talk) 23:49, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

"Recognising and acknowledging criticism is a just a Good Idea". Perhaps. But that's not the purpose of article talk pages, and it's not the purpose of this template. Guettarda (talk) 04:07, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

That Delingpole says things which are maybe/possibly/probably/definitely not true is not the point. Delingpole is a very widely read columnist at one of the UK most established and respectable newspapers. It is not for us to say whether what he says is untrue, but to report what is being said. Paul Beardsell (talk) 23:54, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

If that newspaper is going to continue to publish trash like the Delingpole piece, it isn't going to be respectable for much longer. The fact remains that there is a consensus that this opinion piece does not deserve a place at the head of this talk page because it isn't real journalism and it disparages Wikipedia and Wikipedians with error-laden speculation and smears. We are under no obligation to include it, and so we won't. -- Scjessey (talk) 02:02, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

"It is not for us to say whether what he says is untrue" - On the contrary, it is. That's specifically our role. "Don't repeat gossip" is one of the principles of BLP. It's also our job to assess sources - pick the reliable ones. An article that gets its facts wrong isn't a reliable source. Regardless of who publishes it. Guettarda (talk) 04:07, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

On the one hand I am told we must ignore the fact that a newspaper cannot know that the hack/theft/leak was hack and disregarding the fact we know they speak through their **** we must say there was a hack, on their authority. On the other hand we cannot repeat what is said elesewhere by the same newspaper, as per your argument, above. What is it? My solution is not to repeat what Delingpole says as fact, and not to report the hack as fact. Goose and gander. Paul Beardsell (talk) 04:47, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Guettarda, please refrain from going the WP:BLP way again. That's handled here WP:BLPN for this case. 1. there's not established anything that says that {{pressmulti}} should be handled otherwise than other content on talk pages. Some of the latest arguments say that we should handle it like it was in the Article mainspace ("not legitimate press coverage in any possible way" and "An article that gets its facts wrong isn't a reliable source." etc.). 2. It's claimed that James Delingpole's pieces Climategate: the corruption of Wikipedia is not a WP:RS. This is not relevant for the talk page discussion, but I can answer it altogether since these outrageous claims are made. Lest's read together then "Note that otherwise reliable news sources--for example, the website of a major news organization--that happens to publish in a "blog" style format for some or all of its content may be considered to be equally reliable as if it were published in a more "traditional" 20th-century format of a classic news story. However, the distinction between "opinion pieces" and news should be considered carefully. […]" and WP:V (which superseeds WP:RS) ""Blogs" in this context refers to personal and group blogs. Some newspapers host interactive columns that they call blogs, and these may be acceptable as sources so long as the writers are professionals and the blog is subject to the newspaper's full editorial control. Where a news organization publishes the opinions of a professional but claims no responsibility for the opinions, the writer of the cited piece should be attributed (e.g. "Jane Smith has suggested...")." Wikipedia:Verifiability#cite_ref-3. I.e. Mr. Delingpole can be used as a Reliable source as long as he is attributed as the writer. So please don't remove this piece again. It's even ok to add it in the main space ... Nsaa (talk) 12:27, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

You asked a question. I answered it. You have already established that there is no consensus for inclusion. So please don't add material for which there is no consensus, especially when it is nothing more than trivia about the article. Thanks. Guettarda (talk) 14:38, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Indeed. Re-adding it will be viewed as disruptive. We are under no obligation to embrace opinion pieces that denigrate our project. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:40, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

"We are under no obligation to embrace opinion pieces that denigrate our project." Yeah, lets control the world of WP even more so that no criticism of WP is allowed under any circumstances. Seriously, the levels being taken to keep information out of WP is simply amazing. This material should be included, if WP is to ever be taken seriously in the future then honest inclusion of notable material should be included. Arzel (talk) 15:11, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Acknowledging that disparagement exists is not the same as embracing it. This being the talk page, not the article page, you ought to show consensus for disallowing stuff in routine informational templates. There may be such a consensus, there are certainly multiple editors objecting to this mention, something I think is misguided and only serves to further encourage the perception mentioned by Arzel above that this article has spun out of control and over the top in its defense of accepted science on climate change. I think we do look foolish here, even if we are doing so by advocating the right side of a ridiculous scandal. I wouldn't re add it myself, though, because edit warring is always bad. But as far as edit warring one side of an issue constitutes disruption, it takes two to tango. - Wikidemon (talk) 15:17, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Isn't the purpose of the talk page to discuss things to improve the article? The criticisms made by the article is about user conduct, which I don't think should be discussed here, but on other places. Like the accusations about Connolley has been on COI board. The Delingpole article talks briefly in general about the page and than goes on to accuse Connolley. We know these accusations are wrong as he didn't remove 500 articles because he didn't like it, he removed them because of Wikipedia guidelines and most of them had nothing to do with CC. I don't see what this article adds to the discussion to improve the article. It is just the opinion of one person, a person specifically hired to write in a controversial manner so to get a lot of attention. Constructive criticism about this specific article could be used here on this talk page. I don't see the op ed by Delingpole as constructive nor as specific about this article, it is about the state of CC articles in WP and the criticisms about user conduct.83.86.0.82 (talk) 18:05, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

It's part of the history of the article. When historians read texts it's not always because they agree with what the text says. The text itself is historical. Here we have, as part of the history of the article, a broadside attack on the article, Wikipedia, and its administrative corps, printed in one of the highest profile English language publications in the world and presumably read by tens or even hundreds of thousands of people. Likely, more people have read about this article than have read the article itself. On a prosaic level that helps explain some of the complaints and vandalism around here. At a deeper level it lets us know that calling this article "x x mucky x" instead of "climategate" sets a lot of people off and gives them cause to accuse Wikipedia of distorting things. - Wikidemon (talk) 23:25, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I've just reread the article Climategate: the corruption of Wikipedia and is stunned by all the claims about how wrong this is. Can someone please give me some insight into what's wrong in this article? (Even if it's wrong it's not justifiable to remove it from the pressmulti-template - we do not do WP:OR, but it could be very interesting to note what's wrong whit the article - this start look like the unjustifiable attacks on Bjørn Lomborg and his book The Skeptical Environmentalist.).

As I see the Telegraph entry points to unjustified removal like this on [6] and a lot more very disturbing actions from some of our contributors. As for the last removal of this entry {{pressmulti}} it's tragic, but I understand why. At least two of the editors removing this link has attracted attention from James Delingpole ("one of his Wikipedia chums – name of Stephan Schulz"[7]) and Lawrence Solomon ("fair-minded Wikipedians tried to remove the graph from the page, as can be seen here. Exactly two minutes later, one of Connelley's associates [Tony Sidaway] replaced the graph, restoring the page to Connelley's original version, as seen here." Lawrence Solomon: Wikipedia's hockey stick wars). This article has been removed under varios reasons, mainly by the WP:BLP argument. Since this is handled at WP:BLPN and no what so ever arguments for keeping it out on this ground has been given this is not a valid argument, the next argument surfacing for keeping this out is that a lot of editors thinks it's trash (oh what a argument!). The latest one is that it's no consensus for adding it. For the last comment we can see that the prior arguments for removing it is not justifiable, claiming consensus for adding a standard template used on this kind of press coverage is ridiculous and as Wikidemon point out above, it's the removal of a standard talk page template that should have consensus, or it should be handled by the wider community to add such a claim (do we need consensus for adding critic of our editors, such articles will never be mentioned at Wikipedia ... because people under scrutinization will never allow this in. But please try to let the wider community go for such a policy in the appropriate policy pages). It's even more ridiculus claiming that my actions here is disruptive as done by Scjessey. I will ask him to re-read that policy. I've argued for all my actions here and given very firm grounds for keeping it as for Wikipedia's policy. Either you give a good reason for why it should go out and reach consensus for it here at the talk page or you will stop removing this from the talk page in the pressmulti template. Adding it again. Nsaa (talk) 22:23, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

As you yourself demonstrated, there's no consensus for adding this template. And since it's merely trivia, please build consensus first, before re-adding it. Thanks. Guettarda (talk) 23:08, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Your actions are disruptive. You insist on adding controversial material to the talk page without consensus. And your actions are not justifiable by policy. It's merely a trivia template. One that happens to link to an article that's basically an attack on editors here and based on an article with serious factual errors. It doesn't contribute to building an encyclopaedia - which is, of course, the only purpose of this project. Guettarda (talk) 23:13, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Consensus is not required before adding routine information to a talk page. If two sides are edit warring over this they are both being disruptive. If you believe that a template is merely trivia you are free to nominate it for deletion, or advocate for changes in the template. In the meanwhile the template is the way we note media mentions of Wikipedia articles. I regularly refer to this template when I see it on articles for insight into how the world outside of Wikipedia is perceiving Wikipedia articles, something that is relevant to improving the article. If it doesn't do anything for you, you're free not to follow those links. Advocating for removing information from a talk page that others find useful because the contents of the link offend you isn't really a helpful way of building the encyclopedia. - Wikidemon (talk) 23:19, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

The template is trivia. It's trivia about articles. That doesn't mean it's useless. So please don't put words in my mouth. That specific bit of error-filled gossip isn't an appropriate link to add to this article. Guettarda (talk) 23:34, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Stop making these accusations about this piece like "error-filled gossip". Where's the Gossip? Where's the Errors? The article doesn't get more erroneous if you just repeat it enough times. (I've asked for what's wrong with it, but a answer is not possible to get …)? Nsaa (talk) 00:07, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

You also miss the point when you say that "[c]onsensus is not required before adding routine information to a talk page". It's not routine, it's controversial. It's not routine to add links to gossipy trash. And, quite frankly, Delingpole isn't even writing about this article - he's attacking editors. Guettarda (talk) 23:41, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

You don't get it? If you don't like this WP:RS article so please say so, but that is your (and some of the other editor here's opinion and is really irrelevant for this case). Where's the Gossip? Where's the Trash? Don't writing about the article... hmmm... let's read together again (you seems not to read the articles and policies ... ) "If you want to know the truth about Climategate, definitely don’t use Wikipedia. “Climatic Research Unit e-mail controversy”, is its preferred, mealy-mouthed euphemism to describe the greatest scientific scandal of the modern age. Not that you’d ever guess it was a scandal from the accompanying article. It reads more like a damage-limitation press release put out by concerned friends and sympathisers of the lying, cheating, data-rigging scientists […] that the entry has been hijacked, as this commentary by an “uninvolved editor” makes clear."[8](my bolding) (You stated "Delingpole isn't even writing about this article" ... hmmm ... ) Nsaa (talk) 00:18, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Just to make it clear

• Almost half of Delingpole's piece is a direct quote from Solomon's error-filled column. It's includes Solomon's clearly erroneous claims. Delingpole takes Solomon at face value. Nuff said.
• Then there's a quote from another blog about WMC's de-adminning. Mind you, not a link to the Arbcomm case, but to another blog.
• Then there's a bit about Delingpole's article being removed as a source in a BLP. So we don't repeat inaccurate gossip in our articles
• Then he calls William ugly.

You seriously see value in that? Maybe as an example of the poor quality of Delingpole's work. But this isn't the place for press criticism. Guettarda (talk) 23:25, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I've asked for substantial evidence of why this article is riddled with errors. So far I've seen none. Please be specific. Either way this has nothing to do with removing the template, but can give your removal point sympathy (the last mark you did, didn't either I like, but I'm not a native English speaker so I'm not aware if this has other (deeper) meanings. As far as I see Ugly goes on the things he wrote, not the looks …). Above you also states that I'm disruptive. Please you should also re-read that policy and give me exact quotes on what ground you do this accusations. Your claim that there's a policy requiring consensus for adding the template is ridiculous. The template is added to talk pages with links to external news coverage, see and read Template:Pressmulti (and Template:Press) and make the very useful categorization Category:Wikipedia as a media topic. So it's ok to remove others contributions by calling it thrash? It's a very interesting piece connecting many of our editors directly to this scandal as far as I see. I now understand why so many are so eager to get it out even if it's a Reliable source that could go into the main article. Nsaa (talk) 23:58, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

You seem to have failed to read to read A 10 in the FAQs above, or to show any appreciation of the requirements of WP:BLP policy. Please do so. . . dave souza, talk 00:09, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

We're not discussing using it as a source for article content, so reliability is not at issue. I haven't seen any principled argument that BLP applies, just an assertion that it does. That discussion is better had at BLP/N because the proposition that poor quality or inaccurate articles should not be noted in the template due to BLP concerns has an applicability well beyond this particular encyclopedia entry. I get use out of it, for the very reason the template exists, and I have explained that in some detail. The accuracy or inaccuracy of the piece does not affect this at all. The function of the template is not to find reliable news sources on Wikiedia - you can go to the Wikipedia family of article for that. The function is to note what other people are saying about Wikipedia, and to have any integrity about it you need to acknowledge the good and the bad. If you don't get use out of it, you don't have to read it. There are obviously other editors who do. Anyway, I don't think discussing it in this manner is going to bring any resolution - there are multiple editors on each side and they aren't showing much sign of understanding each other's positions. I think we should organize this into an RfC and see just where consensus lies. - Wikidemon (talk) 00:19, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Agree on a WP:RFC on this. Can you make one (never done it before)? Nsaa (talk) 00:30, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

(e.c.) Ehhh... please make you aware of the WP:BLPN case at Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard#Talk:Climatic_Research_Unit_e-mail_hacking_incident (raised by me). What about the FAQ A10 (written by Tony S) that's relevant for this discussion? Please? Nsaa (talk) 00:24, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

"I've asked for substantial evidence of why this article is riddled with errors. So far I've seen none." This has been discussed, several times. I don't remember where specifically. But if you haven't been keeping up with things and don't want to believe me, use the search function.

"Above you also states that I'm disruptive. Please you should also re-read that policy and give me exact quotes on what ground you do this accusations." If, as you claim on your user page, you're a bureaucrat, you know well that demanding exact quotes from policy is classic wikilawyering. Written policy follows the way we do things, not the other way round. But if you really insist on going that route, I would point you towards the first point under Signs of disruptive editing: "Is tendentious: continues editing an article or group of articles in pursuit of a certain point for an extended time despite opposition from one or more other editors." As you yourself have shown, there's wide opposition to your additions.

"Your claim that there's a policy requiring consensus for adding the template is ridiculous." Again, I hate to go the route of quoting policy, but in this case you've really strayed into the absurd. Please see Wikipedia:Consensus. The "page in a nutshell" says all you need to read: Consensus is Wikipedia's fundamental model for editorial decision-making. This is policy.

"So it's ok to remove others contributions by calling it thrash?" (I take it you mean "trash"). My comments were not directed to your additions, but rather to the quality of the article to which you were linking.

"It's a very interesting piece connecting many of our editors directly to this scandal as far as I see." Well, since almost half of it is a verbatim quote of Solomon's error-filled piece, it's really only interesting from the point of view of how bad journalism can be.

"I now understand why so many are so eager to get it out even if it's a Reliable source that could go into the main article." Nope, you're mistaken. It's not a reliable source. It's already failed that assessment. Guettarda (talk) 05:51, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Proposal for FAQ entry

A recurring theme at this talk page is the question of whether this is a controversy outside of "a few bloggers" or not. In several places people who seldom participate actively at this talk page vote "no" to title change suggestions with this as their seemingly sole motivation. I recently took the time to clarify this using WP:RS and came up with two that I think we can rely on enough for talk page purposes. One is to CNN coverage of "climategate", where they describe this as a controversy, and the other one is to a BBC World Nobel Prize winner panel where they spend a large amount of their total time with the subject of how this controversy affects the scientific community. When the fallout from the incident this article is about is brought up with the top scientists of the world I think we can safely say that this is beyond "a few bloggers". We should thus clarify this in the FAQ in the hope of making it easier to achieve consensus onwards. My suggested FAQ text below (adding the two sources I think are appropriate, I know other editors have more):

• Q11: Why the repeated calls for describing this incident and its subsequent fallout as a "controversy"?

• A11: While the leak of Climatic Research Unit e-mails and other documents can be described as an incident, the issue of what they mean for the scientific community is referred to as a controversy by reliable sources such as the CNN in a panel on the subject as well as the BBC World in a panel together with the Nobel Prize winners of 2009.

Comments welcome. Troed (talk) 15:05, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm probably one of these uninvolved editors, as I have never edited the artice's page itself. I therefore don't have any particular stake in one version or the other, and I am expressing my assessment of the proposal, based on my reading of existing Wikipedia policies and guidelines.  Cs32en  15:52, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

I note that one of the sources is a YouTube ref. Some editors have a kneejerk reaction to YouTube, because many of the entries run afoul of copyright. I don't know whether that is an issue with this one, and it probably should be settled before including it. Other than that, sounds fine.--SPhilbrickT 16:38, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes I'm aware of that, however, since it's for talk page use and not the actual article, and we're only looking for clarification as to the importance of the controversy, I'd hope for it being enough. Troed (talk) 16:42, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

The programme ("Nobel Minds") is available from the Swedish state television as well (audio in English, subtitled in Swedish) until 21st of January. It also seems as if the Nobel Prize website itself will host the video later, since they've done so all the previous years. When that happens, it can likely be used as in the actual article as well. Troed (talk) 17:23, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Honestly, the "question" isn't really phrased as a question, and the answer is not clear. Guettarda (talk) 16:45, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

As I read it, the question appears to be Why have there been so many calls to describe [this incident and the subsequent fallout] as a "controversy"? If I've read it correctly, that's not a FAQ question at all. Guettarda (talk) 16:48, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

It is a frequently asked question. It is central to the scope of the article, and underlies almost all discussion here. Paul Beardsell (talk) 23:58, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Suggestion for re-phrasing? That the problem exists is visible by just reading through the Oppose-votes at the various sections about renaming, this there seems to be a need for this in the FAQ. Troed (talk) 16:55, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Honestly, I'm not sure what FAQ-worthy question you're trying to get at here. "Why have there been so many calls to describe this as a 'controversy'?" isn't a valid question. That's a question about the motivation of people wanting to use that word. It's not for us to speculate. The alternative question - "Why don't we call this a controversy" isn't a FAQ-worthy question either. It's an ongoing discussion. It's possible that you mean something else all together. But if that's the case, you'll need to explain what you mean. Guettarda (talk) 04:20, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

To be frank. Either this should go into the FAQ, since it's there to help editors quickly grasp something that is important but takes a long time to get into, or the FAQ should just go away completely. We have editors voting on the name of the article who seem to believe that there's no well known controversy - that does not help us in any way trying to get this article into better shape. There are good WP:RS clearly describing this as a controversy and thus it's not about speculation on people's motivation, as you described it. I will however have a go at re-phrasing it. Troed (talk) 11:27, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Again - what is "this"? What question are you proposing we answer here? It's not clear what the question is, let alone what the answer is. Guettarda (talk) 02:44, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

One of the first questions a new editor on this article will have is why it is not titled Climategate? That title is controversial and the FAQ should attempt to answer the question. There should not be a controversy about explaining the controversy.Jarhed (talk) 10:20, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, and that is dealt with in Q.1 of the FAQ. We're talking about a proposed Q.11. And I'm trying to figure out what question Troed is trying to answer here. Guettarda (talk) 16:58, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Please adjust for grammar/clarity and go ahead. Paul Beardsell (talk) 23:56, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree.Jarhed (talk) 10:20, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I assume you both understand Troed's question. Since s/he hasn't answered my question as to what the question is, would one of you be willing to explain what you understand the question to be? Thanks. Guettarda (talk) 16:58, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I read through the discussion and it seemed reasonable to me, and I want this editor to make the change he suggests so we can all read and comment on it. I do not need to know the specifics of it because I assume good faith.Jarhed (talk) 23:19, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

<ri> This seems to be a push for a change rather than a FAQ about how things are. A more appropriate Q and A would be:

• Q11: Why does the title refer to an incident and not as a "controversy"?
• A11: The leak of Climatic Research Unit e-mails and other documents was the incident which led to the controversy over the content of the leaked documents: this article covers both aspects, including the continuing investigations into the leak and the implications of the documents.

My tuppenceworth, dave souza, talk 23:37, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Thank you - I fully agree that your suggestion is much more clear and yet conveys exactly what I was after (English is not my first language, after all). I fully support your version, with the links I found added somewhere around "controversy" for those wishing to verify why we put it into the FAQ. Troed (talk) 10:52, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Change to FAQ Q5

I intend to replace the answer to Q5 with this

Despite widespread reporting of a "hack" and a "theft" neither has yet been established by the police. A Norfolk police spokesman said: "This matter is being investigated as a potential criminal offence. An inquiry team has been established under the leadership of Det Supt Julian Gregory and the investigation is being supported by relevant experts from other organisations. We are currently investigating the exact nature of the alleged breach and the content of the data that may have been accessed. It would be inappropriate at this early stage to comment on the exact nature of the investigation or speculate publicly on the person or persons involved."

Paul Beardsell (talk) 01:55, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The first sentence is your own personal commentary. Please get rid of it. The FAQ is not the place for individual Wikipedians' commentaries. Also, deleting any reference to the statements by the parties reporting the hack and theft is unacceptable. -- ChrisO (talk) 02:02, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, I will do as I previously suggested and add the above to the existing answer. My first sentence was written by me, but it does not follow that everything written by me is "personal commentary". You cannot just assert such a thing, you have to say why you so think. Much of the rest of the current FAQ is written in a style which suits answers to a FAQ, is all that personal commentary too? I'll hold off a few minutes for your reply, you're obviously lurking. Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:12, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The "despite" bit is the personal commentary - you're casting doubt on the multiple reliable reports. That simply isn't neutral and therefore isn't appropriate for the FAQ. It's also an unsourced assumption on your part that the police have not yet established the facts. After six weeks of investigation I bloody well hope they have, otherwise they're wasting a lot of taxpayers' money! You have to state the basic facts without passing opinion on them or introducing your own personal assumptions. I would be happier if you changed that first sentence to: "Many reliable sources have reported a "hack" and a "theft" in relation to the incident." -- ChrisO (talk) 02:17, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I couldn't do that as they only know what you and I know, and you don't know there was a hack because the spendthrift police have not yet got around to confirming your prejudice. A secondary source which incorrectly reports the primary source is not a WP:RS. The UEA/CRU is a primary source, not a secondary, so not the best (as per policy), and even they do not yet claim to know - there are conflicting statements by them, yet the current Q5 answer seems to ignore that. I'll have another go. Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:23, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I just cannot see it! Why is "despite" wrong? I cannot replace it with "also". Maybe I'll try "But" - the police do contradict the ansder to Q5. How about something like: "But a Norfolk police spokeman did not confirm this: ..." ? Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:27, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

No, I've re-read the other FAQs again. If you criticise me on style then the rest are wrong too. So I think by Occam's razor, it's you who's wrong. Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:29, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Give me an example, please, and don't forget WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. -- ChrisO (talk) 02:31, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Catch 22! I am asked for an example which, if it is persuasive, you will disregard as per WP:ABC. Am I wasting my time, Chris? Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:45, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

No, I'm simply asking you for an example and to bear in mind that just because one FAQ is done one way that does not automatically mean that this FAQ has to be done exactly the same way. Not every article or FAQ is of equivalent quality, as I'm sure you've noticed. -- ChrisO (talk) 02:48, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Chris, it's just a FAQ! It's meant to explain to editors why it is that something is so here at the article with the strange and factually questionable name. It is *not* article space. The same criteria do not apply. However, that doesn't mean it is a free for all, either, so don't think I am saying that. The answer to Q5 is not satisfactory. Are you suggesting that the FAQ hide the mini-controversy over whether we should be saying there was a theft or an alleged theft? That there was a hack when the police have not yet said? No and no, I believe you have conceded that already, thank you. Q5 could be better answered. Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:59, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I've not conceded anything. Where are the reliable sources about the "mini-controversy" of which you speak? Bloggers are stirring controversy, as they usually do, but we don't take their views into account because they are not reliable sources. -- ChrisO (talk) 03:05, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I refer to the on-going discussion here! And to the facts! That a blog agrees with you or with me does not destroy our argument! And if you did not concede improvement to Q5 was possible then you were not being quite straight with me when you said that two POVs could be reflected in the answer to Q5. An (a) and a (b), one written by you and the other by me. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:17, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Where are the reliable sources? No evading the question, please. -- ChrisO (talk) 03:20, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The reliable sources for what!?!? You want to say there was a theft. And a hack. It is for you to find your sources. You say you have found them. No, I say that those you quote either (1) are not reliable as per WP:RS or (2) do not say what you say they say. Paul Beardsell (talk) 04:54, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Also, why are you quoting the police statement of 1st December and not the more recent statement of 6th December? -- ChrisO (talk) 02:32, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Help me out. The best I can find from the 6 Dec statement is three words in quotes. Is there a link? Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:45, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, see the current Q5. -- ChrisO (talk) 02:48, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

You agree, just a few words in quotes? Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:59, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I meant yes, there is a link. Here it is: [9] The relevant paragraph states: "A Norfolk Police spokeswoman said last night: ‘Norfolk Constabulary can confirm that it is investigating criminal offences in relation to a data breach at the University of East Anglia (UEA)."

"It is investigating criminal offences" does not mean a crime occurred. And, while we're here, "data breach" does not mean "hack" and nor does it mean "theft", necessarily. So, the answer to Q5 has a POV, and not a neutral one. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:12, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

No, it states that the UEA and RealClimate have both "reported server hacking incidents directly associated with this affair." The FAQ does not endorse or reject those reports. It describes what the parties have said. Do you dispute the factual accuracy of that description? -- ChrisO (talk) 03:16, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I have no problem with the article saying that "X said A". But the article must not say "A" when "A" is not established. We report that the ruskies and the turks say they were hacked. Fine. We report the one UEA spokesman says "hack", anther says "stolen" and another says "appears there was a theft". Fine. We do not say so "A" until a WP:RS says so. A victim is not a RS. The police have not said there was a hack or a theft. They are investigating. Yet the title of this doc says hack. You know damned well that if you concede here, on the FAQ, you'll have to give ground on the title, and before long you'll have an article at WP which deals with the allegations being investigated by the Universities concerned that certain behaviour revealed in the docs was, err, unscientific! In the interim you (plural) make WP a laughing stock by pretending there is "nothing to see", while holding up the gatekeeping screen thus continuing WP being held in disrepute. I just want what we say to be the undisputed truth. I want the valid criticisms (there are a few) being levelled at us to no longer be true. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:30, 2 January 2010 (UTC) (Last sentence amended Paul Beardsell (talk) 04:08, 2 January 2010 (UTC))

"A victim is not a RS" is not a statement that you will find anywhere in Wikipedia's policies. If you think it does, please show me where that's stated. The title of the article says "hack" because reliable sources say "hack". We follow reliable sources. That's all there is to it. -- ChrisO (talk) 03:33, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

<outdent>WP:101 a victim is a primary source of its own allegation. A RS is not a reliable source always or never: When the Torygraph or the Grauniad say "hack" we know that is speculation. Both newspapers say lots of things which we do not report becuase they are crap. The police have not said it was a hack. The UEA is investigating the means by which the info was leaked, they don't know it was a hack. But we can say hack because others say so. No we cannot. We do not report speculation as fact. If you want to say "widely reported to have been a hack" then you have my support. If you want to say "it was a hack" then not. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:57, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

If the UEA doesn't know it was a hack, why has it referred to "the hacking and publication of emails from the [CRU]"? [10] I note that on his own web page one of the CRU's three academic staff refers to "illegal hacking of our webserver".[11] One would think they would be competent to know what happened to their own server, no? -- ChrisO (talk) 04:06, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

When an academic speaks (s)he is not held to be speaking for the University unless (s)he makes it clear they are doing so. It is plain that no statements on the web page you ref refer to "hack" confirming one occurred, the closest you get is speculation they may have been hacked like other bodies have been. AFAIK no official communication from the University (someone authorised to be speaking on its behalf and who is plainly doing so) says "hack". If you want to say "several staff members refer to leak of the info as a hack" that is fine by me. The term hack is poorly defined and variously used and ought to be on some list like ~gate IMO(!). What happened is subject to an ongoing investiagtion. When that says hack we say hack. Until then we, they and you have no idea worth putting into article space. Paul Beardsell (talk) 04:21, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The statement I quoted that refers to "the hacking and publication of emails from the [CRU]" is from a UEA press release, therefore an official statement. Are we reading the same sources here? -- ChrisO (talk) 05:29, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Chris, you make a good point and I can see why you are frustrated. But, the entire quote you refer to is a summary of a section of news and even with that, it's vague "[u]ntil the completion of an independent Review resulting from allegations following the hacking and publication of emails..." and on top of it, notice that the word "allegations" is there. My one suggestion was to say "possible" and others suggested "reported". I think "reported hacking" makes good sense. It was reported, but has yet to be proved. It's not as objectionable as "alleged" might be, but also makes clear that as of now, it's not confirmed. What do you think? 7390r0g (talk) 09:13, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Proposed change to Q5

Current FAQ 5

Why does the article refer to a hacking and to stolen documents? Couldn't this be an accidental release of information or released by a whistleblowing insider ?

Current answer

Wikipedia reports the facts from reliable sources. In their most recent statement on the issue, Norfolk Constabulary say that they, alongside a specialist team from the Metropolitan Police, are "investigating criminal offences in relation to a data breach at the University of East Anglia" [12]. Both the University [13] and a science blog, RealClimate [14] [15], have reported server hacking incidents directly associated with this affair. The University has stated that the documents were "stolen" and "illegally obtained".[16]

Proposal for new answer

The article has taken the point of view you describe. Possibly the material was released accidentally or possibly the material could have been deliberately leaked rather than hacked. This has been discussed at length here at this Talk page. Whether you believe WP should say "alleged theft" or "theft" before theft has been established, and whether the word "hack" should be used in the title of the article itself when the means by which the documents were taken is not yet known, is controversial here at WP. Whether the most recent statement by the Norfolk Constabulary that they are "investigating criminal offences in relation to a data breach at the University of East Anglia" [17] should be taken as confirmation that a crime has taken place seems to be a matter for debate. The University and some of its staff members have variously said the documents "appear to have been illegally taken" or that they were "stolen" [18].

Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:14, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Mmmm...no. That's not an answer to a "why" question. We should aspire to write professionally, at least for the FAQ. Guettarda (talk) 03:57, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I do so aspire. Any copyedit you would care to suggest? The proposed new answer does answer the questioners question. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:59, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

"Because the article has been taken over by raving communists like this Boris fellow who has a picture of Lenin on his user page" would also answer the questioner's question, but it wouldn't be a very useful answer. I suspect that Guettarda's concern is that the response is wordy and rather pointed. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 04:20, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Boris, that's an accurate description of me. Please say how I can improve it but still answer the questioners' FAQ. Paul Beardsell (talk) 04:23, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Copyedits can't solve muddled logic. If you're answering a "why" question with a non-why answer, it suggests that you haven't thought it out clearly. If you focus your answer, then I can figure out what I think of it. As it stands, I don't quite know what you're getting at. Guettarda (talk) 04:28, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Feel free to do more than a copyedit. I just dispute what you say. The questioner asks why do we behave in a certain way. I say we have chosen a particular line but it remains controversial. I could say "because users X, Y & Z are crowding out other opinion". Indeed, that is what I am saying. You don't like my answer. Fair enough. It's not article space. I'll add it to the current answer. Paul Beardsell (talk) 04:34, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I've improved it, I think. Paul Beardsell (talk) 04:36, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Guettarda. The question says "why." The answer should either say or make sense with the word "because" in front of the key sentence. In the current answer, "Wikipedia reports the facts from reliable sources," can be fronted with "Because," and it's true. What sentence in your proposed answer can be fronted with "because?" Hipocrite (talk) 05:15, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Help me out, then. "Why is the moon made of cheese?" How do I answer that starting with "Because"? My answer to the FAQ could start, "Because it has been held by some that in so doing we are following WP policy, others disagree." And then I could continue from there? Or how about: "Because Wikipedia policy is to say things that are not known to be facts as if they were facts." Except I don't think that is WP policy. Another: "Because WP policy is being interpreted incorrectly at this article. The truth is that the suggestions you make in your question could well be true, the information could have been released accidentally, initially. The information could have been deliberately leaked by an insider. But we present as fact, here at WP, that the information was hacked and stolen. The justification given for this is is that we must uncritically accept the victim's own word, and that an investigation of a crime means that a crime must have occurred." There you go, that starts with "Because". Paul Beardsell (talk) 05:47, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Trying to edit the FAQ to win the "war" over the content is backwards. First convince the editors, of which I don't intend to be one, that reliable sources say whatever you claim is true. You do that by finding a reliable source that says what you think is true, and pointing that out here. Then, having convinced the editors that a reliable source says whatever you think is true is true, you edit the article to reflect that. Having done those two, the FAQ would no longer be asked, and I suspect it would be easy to change. Hipocrite (talk) 06:24, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I wonder that the onus is not the other way around. A number of things are possible. Prematurely we have excluded those possibilities taking as authority what some newspapers have said. BUT WE KNOW THAT THE INVESTIGATION HAS NOT CONCLUDED. In the interim we should say "the Telegraph reports X", we shouldn't say "X" when we really do know that X is not yet established. The point being WP should be cautious about saying things which might be false. Say them! Just don't state them as unadorned fact. Say who said them. Paul Beardsell (talk) 06:46, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The article should present the story as represented in mainstream media (MSM). It may be that MSM has incorrectly reported the case, but it is not the role of WP to correct this. The same arguments have come up at articles about 911 truthers, birthers and other similar theories. The Four Deuces (talk) 05:34, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Well those are not good examples. Here I am not suggesting some crank idea be presented as if true without substantiation. The MSM refers to "hack" discursively only. The MSM does not say it has been concluded that a hack occurred. Nobody says that yet *except* WP. We cannot allow ourselves to be ahead of the game. Similarly we could say the sun comes up rather than the earth rotates because, discursively, that's how the MSM handles the issue. NO SOURCE CONCLUDES THE HACK OCCURRED EXCEPT WIKIPEDIA. Paul Beardsell (talk) 05:47, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure that's true. Why don't you open up a new section to discuss your concerns with the article text. Hipocrite (talk) 06:24, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Possibly I overstepped the mark a touch in tone, and I should have empasised only the word CONCLUDES. The investigation has not concluded. Therefore all reports as to how the information left the UEA is speculation. We should treat reports of the hack as speculation, for the time being. We do not have to parrot the newspapers uncritically. I am simply saying at WP we should reserve our position thus avoiding being wrong and not yet say the hack is a fact. Paul Beardsell (talk) 06:51, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Also my suggested edit is not to Article space but to a FAQ on a Talk page. I am not trying to settle the dispute, but to describe it so that it may be understood. The FAQs are meant as shortcut entry into how the article has become what it is. Q5 currently ignores an unresolved debate here as to the supposed hack and alleged theft and how we should report it. This change to the fAQ is meant to frame that debate. It is not a proposal to change the article, although it may contribute towards that indirectly. This is a FAQ on a Talk page. Not all WP policies apply, so please stop trying to apply them like you would to Article space. I am of course intent on being fair minded and accurate, and that's why we're all here? Paul Beardsell (talk) 06:02, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Could you point out where you see the debate ongoing? I'm specifically looking for more than just editors asking the FAQ and getting responded to with the FAA. Hipocrite (talk) 06:24, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

It underpins the article renaming question and thereby the content dispute which is this: Should the article focus on the "hacking incudent" (two words in the title) or on what is popularly known as the Climategate controversy. Some here say the controversy is the hacking incident, making WP look ridiculous! A content fork was prevented by those who said it was a POV fork ("our" POV being that that the controversy is not just about the hacking, "theirs" being that there is no other controversy) but now we are here, at the only place allowed us, trying to document Climategate. The article needs renaming. "They" say the name is accurate. "We" say that no, what we are documenting here is not the hacking incident but the controversy over what the leaked material, going back for years, contained. First step is to change the name. The name is wrong - no one yet knows how the material left the CRU. That's still being investigated. "Hack" is not known! How can it be in the article's name? Paul Beardsell (talk) 07:01, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The material released was not classified, but all stuff that should have been released under Freedom of Information Act requests. Nor was there any personal e-mail. So it was probably released by an insider who understood FOIA, aka whistleblower, not by a hacker. Surely it is the content of the e-mail that makes this incident notable. To put the word "hacking" in the title makes it seem like CRU is the victim and misleads the reader as to what the issue is actually about. Kauffner (talk) 14:01, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Another go

Proposed answer to this page's FAQ Q5 i.e.

Why does the article refer to a hacking and to stolen documents? Couldn't this be an accidental release of information or released by a whistleblowing insider?

The article says "hack" and "theft" because at WP we must follow WP:POLICY. It is true that the initial release of information could have been accidental. Possibly the information could have been leaked by an insider. But here at WP we are not interested in truth but in verifiability. Policy tells us that the repeated use of the words "theft" and "hack" by the victim of the alleged crime means that the information was hacked, stolen. Policy tells us that, despite the fact that police have not concluded their investigation, the main stream media's use of the term "hack" and "theft" require us to parrot this uncritically at WP. It would be wrong to use the phrase "alleged theft" instead of "theft" and "reported hack" instead of "hack" because of WP policy. (Note that not all think that policy is being correctly interpreted in this instance, but that's where we are on the issue at the moment.)

Paul Beardsell (talk) 06:17, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Since this is all a huge waste of time, I removed FAQ #5. Please, lets talk about the actual article. Thanks. Prodego ^talk 06:22, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Hang on a moment. We have only one person complaining about this question. Are we to remove questions every time someone objects to the answer? -- ChrisO (talk) 06:26, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I have voiced my discontent with Q5 to ChrisO on several occasions.--Heyitspeter (talk) 01:10, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Not acceptable. Remain civil. Chris, please remove this comment and yours. Hipocrite (talk) 06:28, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Refactored. It's an important point. -- ChrisO (talk) 06:35, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

"One"? That's a huge misrepresentation of the current state of discussion at this talk page. Troed (talk) 10:18, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I have my own reservations about this item, I just haven't said much about them. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 12:24, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I suggest that that's fine, but having now been through this a few times, the suggestion to add all this stuff to the FAQ is a frequent drumbeat. I am concerned that by removing FAA to FAQ's because some editors are looking at the process backwards (first convince people to change the article, then change the FAQ), or because some editors are looking at the FAQ as a "settle items" section, it's going to harm editors ability to get out of the circle of the same thing over and over. Hipocrite (talk) 06:28, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

If you really want to argue this point, go ahead and put it back - I have no objection if someone actually wants to argue over it. Removing it is just symbolic of how little it matters. It being there or not has absolutely no impact on the article. So why argue? Prodego ^talk 06:31, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't. I want others to top arguing about it, and instead focus on the article. I've tried to incorporate Paul's concerns into A5 (which someone re-added - I had no intention to). Hipocrite (talk) 06:33, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually it's more to do with the fact that the same questions keep being asked over and over and over again. The purpose of adding the statements of the various parties to the FAQ was to say "this is what the parties have said, see #5". The FAQ is there to serve a purpose, not just to look pretty (or be fought over). Psb evidently disagrees with what the sources say. That's his business, but surely we can't let that stop us from reporting neutrally what they say in the first place. -- ChrisO (talk) 06:35, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Again, I do not dispute what sources say. I dispute that some of them can be considered WP:RS for some of the things they say, things which are not known yet to be true. There may have been a leak, not a hack. An insider's leak is not theft necessarily. We cannot yet parrot some peoples "theft" and "hack". Paul Beardsell (talk) 07:11, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

So lets stop beating the dead horse here. If its been discussed before (and I'm sure the use of 'theft' has), then what would be nice is to add links to these prior discussions in the FAQ. Then people can be directed to that, and we can stop beating the dead horse. What I'd really like to do is get this article unprotected so it can be improved. Prodego ^talk 06:38, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The discussions are extremely long and rambling. Anyone trying to get anything useful from them is going to end up very frustrated. Tony Sidaway wrote the Q5 reply to distil megabytes of discussions (I'm not exaggerating) into four sentences. -- ChrisO (talk) 06:41, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Honestly I find it a bit unusual - typically we always use alleged unless there is confirmation that something actually took place. However, it is vastly unlikely to be anything but a hacking + theft. Prodego ^talk 06:48, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Well now we are in the realms of speculation. That doesn't allow us to make things up. There is no conclusion yet of the investigation. Theft is alleged. Hacking is suspected. But FWIW I will give you good odds on real money it was an inside job, the server is reported to have been difficult to access from outside. Paul Beardsell (talk) 07:14, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm curious. What confirmation would you look for? Bear in mind that the institution which owns the server in question has said explicitly that it was hacked. If a bank said that it had been robbed, would you not take it at its word? -- ChrisO (talk) 06:52, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I am starting to get upset at this repeated assertion of yours. The institution has not said it was hacked. Some people who work for it who were not speaking on behalf of the institution have used the word hack, but it is plain from context they have no idea how the info was released, the term is very loosely used by them. Chris says that again and again as though repetition will make it true. Paul Beardsell (talk) 07:22, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

What do you call this then? That's an official statement by the university on its official website. Are you suggesting that someone hacked the UEA's website too and posted that there? -- ChrisO (talk) 11:22, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

It's just an intro to Phil Jones' stepping-aside statement, not an official statement of the University's position. Paul Beardsell (talk) 09:19, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

And that argument is a pretty good answer to FAQ 5 isn't it :). Prodego ^talk 07:03, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

If a bank is robbed it is robbed. If information is made available without permission is it is not necessarily theft. The police are investigating. If one of the insider scientists/programmers posted the info on a USB stick to Russia and to Turkey then that may not have been criminal and it certainly was not a hack. Paul Beardsell (talk) 07:06, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I can't see how it wouldn't be criminal - even in your example it would be stealing data. But I think ChrisO's answer has pretty much summed this up. They say that they were hacked, there is no reason to doubt them. We won't say 'alleged bank robbery' until the thieves are caught just in case it is actually insurance fraud. Prodego ^talk 07:18, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

But not all crimes are theft! Unauthorised access, copyright violation etc. Theft is a particular crime. But it may not be criminal as a public interest defence could be successful. Let's just be safe, and say "alleged theft". Paul Beardsell (talk) 07:22, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The issue is with a misrepresentation of the available sources. The correct representation of this incident both from the police, the involved parties and the MSM reporting involve "alleged", "possibly stolen", "leaked" as well as "stolen" and "hacked". There's absolutely no reasion for us to only report half of everything because someone wants to go WP:OR and say that it's "obviously a hack". See this discussion (amongst others). Troed (talk) 10:18, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Why would we say "alleged" when the university in question says definitively, on its official website, in an official statement, that the material was hacked and stolen? Why would we want to cast doubt on that? Why would we not take their word for it? -- ChrisO (talk) 11:22, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Because we are to report what WP:RS are saying about the incident. Not just some of it. We are not casting doubt, we are reporting. If we do NOT report what WP:RS are saying we are however in effect making an unsupported conclusion. Troed (talk) 11:51, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm afraid that's not really responsive to my question. Why do we want to cast doubt on what the university has said? Which reliable sources are doubting or disputing the university's account? -- ChrisO (talk) 12:12, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

We don't know if the hacker is an insider or an outsider. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 12:25, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Doesn't change things. It is still hacking, and material was still stolen. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 14:02, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Only if words mean what you want them to mean. Paul Beardsell (talk) 09:16, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

We're not casting doubt on what the university has said. We should absolutely mention their claim, the claims in MSM as well as quotes from the police. There's no reason why we would want to select, ourselves, only a few of the available reliable sources. 12:40, 2 January 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Troed (talk • contribs)

If we're not casting doubt, then don't use "alleged". If we are casting doubt, then find a reliable source that casts doubt, and explicitly say that x says so. Guettarda (talk) 15:46, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

That's what I've been saying the whole time, and such WP:RS have been linked to numerous times. All I've ever proposed is that we should quote all parties of interest (CRU/Univ, police, media) and qualify who says what. If the sources say "alleged" then it must be included, due to WP:NPOV and WP:OR. Troed (talk)

(ec and unindent) I find FAQ #5 unconvincing in substance, tone, and as a process matter per its editing history. Just reading it without the background of edit warring, it is an argumentative claim about a speculative subject and it looks rather defensive. Asking for neutrality in the description of the data disclosure is not a matter of casting doubt on the university's veracity. Questioning the reliability of the university as a source does not require producing a reliable source in opposition to prove in the negative that the university is wrong. A press release by a party to an incident is simply not a reliable source as to the truth behind the incident. Here we have an institution embroiled in international controversy over an embarrassing disclosure, issuing statements without citing its basis that the disclosure in question was illegal. No doubt some press releases in defense of organizations accused of impropriety are in fact true, neutral presentations of the facts. But there are also plenty of cases where the target of a leak, whistleblowing incident, expose, investigation, what have you, makes allegations of illegality as a smokescreen to divert attention away from its own misdeeds, or to intimidate those who would come forward. It makes a big difference whether the accusations are true or not - is this an honest beleaguered institution dealing with a smear campaign, or is this an academic bully engaging in further bullying? An FAQ is a good way to deal with perennial proposals when there is firm, lasting consensus on an issue. It's not a proper way to stifle debate on a fresh issue where consensus is far from clear. A number of serious editors have questioned whether juxtaposing the presumptive and claimed, but unproven, illegality of the disclosure with the fact that secret files were disclosed without permission, is an appropriate thing to do in the lede and article title, or even in the body of the article. On the other side one editor in particular who has reverted changes to the FAQ perhaps 10 times in 3 days is pointing to the FAQ as a demonstration of consensus. The article is barely a month old. It would be good to have a resolution to this, sure, but we're not there yet. The simplest approach would be to keep things neutral for now, neither asserting nor denying the illegality of the data disclosure. Wikipedia has no deadline. As events unfold it should become clear who did it, and the legality issue will be decided. Or it will never be decided, in which case the long-term version of the article will simply state that. Meanwhile, no need to write the article from the side of one of the parties. - Wikidemon (talk) 13:11, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

It is completely inappropriate to discuss the legality of the data reveal except as reported in RS. Among authorities on the law, there is not even agreement about which country the incident occurred in and whether or not it was illegal where it was done. All such speculation is completely immaterial and not helpful to resolving the disputes in this article.Jarhed (talk) 10:11, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

(I apologize, I confused two different blogs.Jarhed (talk) 10:00, 3 January 2010 (UTC))

Deletion of Q5

Given the very apparent controversy over the answer to Q5, can we please delete the question entirely until we reach consensus on its answer? Its current form has been broadly rejected.--Heyitspeter (talk) 02:00, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Tabula rasa on the "theft" issue

Could someone concisely lay out exactly what change they would like made to the article, and what sources support that change with respect to the "theft" vs "alleged theft" vs "leaked" vs "insider," or whatever? I'm having a hard time following. I would really appreciate it if the format of the change include the current text and the prospective text, along with the sources that are used, and the sources that will be used, along with the specific part of the to-be-used sources that justify the changes. Thanks! Hipocrite (talk) 10:34, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

My suggested change is that WP does not conclude a "theft" has occurred until a reliable source preferably the police confirms this as a result of investigation. Until then WP should call it an "alleged theft" or the article should say "X says there was a theft". And the same for "hack". There are no WP:RS sources which confirm theft or hack. There are no sources saying there was no theft or no hack - nobody has come forward to own up to releasing it deliberately or by mistake. But I am not saying we should say there no theft and no hack, so I need not provide a source and I cannot: At the moment no WP:RS definitively says anything conclusive about the manner of the unauthorised publication or that this would amount to theft. Readers of WP must not be led by WP to think things which are not established facts. Paul Beardsell (talk) 08:44, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

The NPOV reasons that "theft" is an issue is because editors on one side of the issue see it as unfair that the emails were likely obtained or revealed illegally, and thus focus more on the possible crime involved in that. Editors on the other side of the issue see possible or likely illegal behavior in the emails themselves and are not concerned about whether their revelation was a crime. I think it is obvious that both sides have important points to raise and I wish everyone would just raise them and stop it with the POV pushing. As far as authoritative facts on the theft itself, there is no single person on the planet that can ascertain that, and the facts might not be known for years if ever. Of course we can stick to published facts that are known and move forward.Jarhed (talk) 09:46, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Let me try this again. "I would really appreciate it if the format of the change include the current text and the prospective text, along with the sources that are used, and the sources that will be used, along with the specific part of the to-be-used sources that justify the changes. Thanks!" Hipocrite (talk) 09:51, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Jones email 19th take two

editing for clarity: apparently my sentence could be misread. this proposal is about REMOVING the current link to a blog, REPLACING it with a link to CNN. A slight rephrasing is also necessary due to the new source, but the meaning is the same as the one currently in the article and thus this should be a trivial change to enact in the spirit of making the current article better —Preceding unsigned comment added by Troed (talk • contribs) 11:32, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

In the archives it was brought up that the current source for a statement in the article could be seen as unreliable. I believe sources have been found that we can agree on are more neutral and reliable. I'm thus proposing making a change to that effect.

The last paragraph here should be changed from it's current wording and link to McIntyre's own blog to the following:

• Stephen McIntyre claimed that the "trick to hide the decline" consisted of not showing that the tree ring records went down in the late part of the 20th century, and that since it's unknown whether this unreliability of the proxy compared to the temperature record also exists in earlier periods the most reasonable interpretation is that these particular records can't be used to estimate temperatures in the past. [19]

There was a discussion as well in the archive on how to reference McIntyre here. If we feel we need to, I'd suggest using the same source and simply adding that he appeared in a panel on the subject at CNN since he's named in the emails in question. Troed (talk) 11:10, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Lots of people say lots of things. Why is this notable? Hipocrite (talk) 11:35, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

It's notable because this is the Climategate controversy which some here prevent being documented at WP. McIntyre has been questioning the research of the CRU and some of his criticisms are seemingly acknowledged by Phil Jones in the e-mails revealed by the "hacking incident" (unauthorised publication of the CRU e-mails). Phil Jones admits in e-mail to the "trick" of "hiding the decline". The trick is this: The tree ring data is used as a key plank in the argument supporting conclusions re ancient temperatures, yet when recent tree ring data is shown to be a most unreliable proxy of recent known temperatures that part of the tree ring data is ignored, instead of questioning whether tree ring data can be used as reliable proxy for ancient temperatures. More honest, says McIntyre (and so says the scientific method) would be to discard the tree ring data completely. But that would remove a pillar of the climate change argument. Phil Jones elected not to do that. Why? asks McIntyre. That is why this is notable. McIntyre essentially says Jones is not acting scientifically. The best response Jones has is that McIntyre is an idiot. Paul Beardsell (talk) 09:09, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Your definition of the trick is noted, but conflicts with reliable sources. In one figure for a report, a graph showed the climate changes found by three different studies: one, which relied only on tree rings and temperature readings unlike the other two which also used other proxies, was according to its authors to be disregarded post 1960, and the post 1960 part of it was not shown in the graph. The scientists concerned were already openly questioning the cause and implications of the divergence problem causing the problem, and had published on the unreliability of the tree ring proxy [as shown by post 1960 decline in tree ring density correspondence with temperature, as I understand]. That's a paraphrase of Phil Jones's response, which includes the statement that "As for the tree-ring decline, various manifestations of this phenomenon have been discussed by numerous authors, and its implications are clearly signposted in Chapter 6 of the IPCC AR4 report." As for discarding the tree ring data completely, that is indeed shown in this study published at the start of 2008. Whether that makes McIntyre look an idiot is a matter of opinion, but it does clearly suggest that gullible people have been misled by McIntyre disregarding other proxies and published scientfic studies. Maybe that's an aspect of the "controversy" that we should make explicit. . . dave souza, talk 10:38, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I am in favour of that aspect and all aspects of the controversy being made explicit. Paul Beardsell (talk) 06:38, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. However, McIntyre is being asked to reflect upon this by the media in relation to this event, and is an involved party since he's named in the emails. Looking at the article, McIntyre is thus more notable than the Real Climate blog entry we're currently reporting from. Troed (talk) 11:55, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

WP:OTHERCRAP. What are we using the blog to say? Hipocrite (talk) 12:22, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I suggest another section if you want to go into notability of Real Climate, which was not my intention. I answered your question about McIntyre's notability above. I'd also like to clarify that I'm simply trying to correct a source that was contested by someone else, in the spirit of making the article better. Troed (talk) 12:37, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

<ri> There's the question of the self published source of McIntyre's blog being used without any other source that his minority, and in scientific terms fringe view, is notable as an opinion on this specific issue. That he's notable in other areas of this controversy doesn't mean that we should cite his blog opinion on every email. There's also the question of giving undue weight to his minority view by presenting it as the last word on the topic: McIntyre should know that the unreliability of that specific proxy was already known at the time of the email, which was discussing how to avoid presentations being skewed by that unreliability, and that there has been subsequent research comparing its outcome with alternative proxies. However, as a published expert on fringe science notes, a common theme is the "zombie argument" which ignores further research. The research in question is referred to in the Real Climate quotation in the article on the "divergence problem" — "see e.g. the recent discussion in this paper" which refers to this 1997 paper on Proxy-based reconstructions of hemispheric and global surface temperature variations over the past two millennia which concludes that "Recent warmth appears anomalous for at least the past 1,300 years whether or not tree-ring data are used. If tree-ring data are used, the conclusion can be extended to at least the past 1,700 years, but with additional strong caveats." Regardless of whether or not we quote McIntyre's opinion, we should either quote or summarise that 1997 research. Must pause now, will aim to produce suggestion for a suitable summary. . . dave souza, talk 13:40, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Do you agree that my suggestion above solves the problem that we're currently linking to McIntyre's blog without creating other changes to the article as it stands? You were the one to originally bring it up after all, I just went looking for WP:RS to that effect. Troed (talk) 14:10, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

It wasn't very clear from the above, but now looking at the link I see you're citing the CNN transcript of a broadcast from December 7, 2009, to cite McIntyre as one of those selected for the program. If we accept that appearance on a CNN "special investigation" as the story was developing has sufficient significance to appear in the brief summary in the article, then the timing and content of McIntyre's views would fit best as an expansion of the sentence that "Some critics cite this sentence as evidence that temperature statistics are being manipulated." The program also includes releveant points from Mann, the "fact that these data shouldn't be used after 1960 because of this divergence", and from Michael Oppenheimer that other research data and analyses showed the same conclusion. That's a fairer representation of that particular source, but it's not an ideal source for a scientific issue. So, simply changing the paragraph to your draft doesn't solve the problems. . . dave souza, talk 15:55, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I somewhat agree with your points, but I must stress that I'm only trying to fix the sourcing issue here - not to make any larger changes to the article as it stands. Reading the archived discussion, and the fact that no other replies were made, had me believe there was indeed consensus as to both notability and the quality of the CNN panel source. When the article is un-protected I suggest we bring the section up for discussion again, with your points above in mind. Troed (talk) 16:33, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

<ri>The problem wasn't with the source, but rather that we can't use a blogger to analyse science. We use scientists to analyse science. We use climate scientists to analyse climate science. Guettarda (talk) 17:13, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

That's not how I read the archive. McIntyre is a published scientist in the area, is being asked for his opinion by reliable media and is also a named party in the emails in question. The paragraph thus has three valid reasons for being included, and all three of them together is a very strong argument. It would not be prudent of us to start validating scientists, it would border on being WP:OR when we have WP:RS arguments for inclusion. Troed (talk) 17:21, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

McIntyre is a very respected scientist, guettarda. RealClimate, on the other hand, has showed to be a tool to push the AGW through. The emails show time after time the involved scientists always offering to use the realclimate to attack the skeptics. Either way, realclimate is referred on this article, and been McIntyre involved, I think we should point to his explanation on this issueEchofloripa (talk) 17:29, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Your skepticism is showing, but respect in science relates to published work in the field. . . dave souza, talk 17:45, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

McIntrye has been published in the field. He is a reliable source, and he has been contacted multiple times for his perspective. CNN and FNC have both talked about this. Just last night FNC ran a report on Climategate and had McIntrye on. Mann would not respond to calls to appear. Arzel (talk) 18:10, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Peer-reviewed scientific papers, not TV appearances. --Nigelj (talk) 18:22, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

<ec> From what I've seen, he's published on statistical analysis and his expertise relates to that specific aspect of the studies rather than the field as a whole. His remarks in the CNN source fail to acknowledge that the 2001 study was based on more proxies than the tree rings, and his views seem very much to be a minority view among experts in the field. While we can describe such opinions as minority views, we must also show the context of majority scientific views and show them as such. . . dave souza, talk 18:25, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

There's nothing to stop us discussing proposals and hopefully reaching agreement as to what's to be implemented. The sourcing does show how the controversy was presented in the news as it developed, and as such may be useful for describing the controversy rather than the science. Note that McIntyre is introduced as "one of the skeptics who was named in one of those e-mails" and, after the break, as "slammed in a number of those e-mails for questioning global warming". The discrepancy is prsumably due to the first intro using the singular by mistake, but the point that he's a skeptic questioning global warming is essential context for his remarks. The paraphrase of his claims looks a bit incorrect to me, will think more about that. . . dave souza, talk 17:45, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The paraphrase comes from two quotes, and I feel I'm accurately representing them: "The tree ring records went down in the late part of the 20th century. [...] they didn't show the decline." and "No one knows why it became unreliable or whether the unreliability existed in earlier periods. The most reasonable interpretation of it is that you can't use these particular records to estimate temperatures in the past." Troed (talk) 19:34, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Why do we need to use McI? The meaning of the phrase is clear - the person who used it has explained it. Second-hand commentary from McI adds nothing useful. Moreover, the second sentence (No one knows why...) is straying off into another issue, which is the divergence problem, which we already mention. The existing text from McI is also irrelevant, and straying off - McI's opinion that all the tree-rings are useless doesn't have a place in this article William M. Connolley (talk) 20:24, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

If the tree rings aren't reliable since 1960 why should they be reliable for any period? The CRU is using the proxy when it suits them and not when it's not. That seems unscientific to me, and you don't have to be an expert in climate to know so, that's just basic scientific method. The unreliability of the tree ring data makes relying on it non-sensical, it's circular, fallacious. McI points this out: "Hiding the decline" (a phrase from Jones' e-mail released in the docs) is dishonest, and would remain dishonest no matter what language Jones used. It, and McI's opinion about it, deserves a place in the article. Paul Beardsell (talk) 06:38, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps I should clarify that I remain unconvinced that that appearance on a CNN "special investigation" as the story was developing has sufficient significance to appear in the brief summary in the article, McIntyre does seems to be a published critic but that doesn't mean we have to give his views a prominent place on every issue. If we do find that his views on an issue have been published in suitable reliable sources to the extent that they're notable as an aspect of the "controversy" rather than the science, they remain minority scientific views and have to be described as such, as my comments below. . . dave souza, talk 22:46, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The article is about the leak of emails from CRU. Mainstream media is reporting on the controversy, and when doing so they consider the views of McIntyre to be important to report due to his status as a published scientist who's involved in the controversy. It's not up to us to judge whether they are correct or not in doing so. WP:NPOV. Your comment would be more correct if this article was about the divergence problem. Troed (talk) 20:49, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Ah, that's a point that's coming up in my examining the proposal. Per WP:WEIGHT, it should always be clear which parts of the text describe the minority view, and that it is in fact a minority view. The majority view should be explained in sufficient detail that the reader may understand how the minority view differs from it, and controversies regarding parts of the minority view should be clearly identified and explained. . . dave souza, talk 22:34, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

<ri> Troed, comments on your proposal. As you say, you've sourced it from two well separated statements. The first, in the context of being asked if he thinks it's an attempt to shut down criticism, is to agree, and state that the trick was not disclosing in 2001 IPCC report that the "tree ring records" went down then immediately somewhat contradicting that by stating that the email was about the 1999 World Meteorological Report and that "they simply substituted temperature information for the tree ring information to show the record going up when it went down." While the above proposal is undoubtedly a good faith paraphrase of these points, I think it misses the important context that it's about two specific reports. The second part responds to a question as to whether he agrees with Mann's reported statement that the data became unreliable in the 1960s for reasons other than that a temperature decline, and I think your summary there is reasonable but it's a separate issue and should not run on from the previous question. So, accepting that a modified version can accurately reflect McIntyre's claims, that minority view has to be shown in the context of the mainstream view and must not obscure the mainstream view. The logical way to do that is to show the "trick" aspect in the context of the mainstream statement about it, with clarification of what is meant by "decline" as that's a bit unclear. Contrary to the impression he gives that the "divergence" was not disclosed, the issue was discussed in a previously published papers cited on the 1991 diagram. As to his latter statement, the mainstream view is that the divergence should be investigated, the tree ring record compared with other proxies, and evaluation done with the tree ring record omitted. See the paper I've referenced above. Given that McIntyre seems to still be producing information in more reliable sources than a few words on a TV show it would be helpful to find a better source of his views to avoid any misinterpretation. . dave souza, talk 22:34, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

"The article is about the leak of emails from CRU" - we aren't using McIntyre as a source on the theft, we're using his opinion on the science. We're using a blog post of his as a source on the science. A blog post. He's not enough of an expert on the science that a blog post of his counts as a reliable source. Ask yourself this - would you use a blog post from Stoat as a reliable source for this article? After all, William has a PhD in the field, and he has several papers in the peer-reviewed literature. Stoat is a far better source on the science than is Climate Audit, per our policy on self-published sources. If you aren't comfortable with using Stoat, you can't seriously be suggesting that Climate Audit is a reliable source. Guettarda (talk) 02:32, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

This story is controversial enough without arguing over sources. Let's stick to reliable ones--no blogs.Jarhed (talk) 09:40, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm confused. This whole section, my proposal, is about CHANGING the current sourcing in the article from a blog, ClimateAudit, to a reference on CNN instead. In my mind it's a trivial and obvious correction to make that only makes the article better without any other changes and I don't really understand why it got to be such a huge discussion. Troed (talk) 11:22, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

The rewrite so far is an improvement on the current situation, but continues to give undue weight to the fringe view of one of those interviewed in the TV program, and should it also show the mainstream response. . . dave souza, talk 15:51, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, but that doesn't change my main point. McIntyre is not an expert on the science, so regardless of who a CNN producer decided to interview for that segment, we aren't interested in his analysis of the science any more than we're interested in any other well-known non-scientist. Guettarda (talk) 15:49, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

McIntyre is a published scientist. He has a maths degree, and has been a postgraduate student. He has caused/forced the global warming stats for N.America to be revised downwards significantly. This work here is universally accepted, not disputed: He was instrumental in causing a highly respected climate research body to revise its model, and he was thanked for it. If you do not know this, fair enough. But it is very widely known. McIntyre is an expert in the statistics and modelling of climate science. Several mainstream climate scientists have said that McIntyre has interesting things to say, that his criticisms deserve to be addressed. To say otherwise simply betrays your POV. Paul Beardsell (talk)

Who can speak for who?

1. The CRU can speak for itself.
2. Imagine if the CRU were a person and shouted on the sidewalk "Help! I've been robbed!". That makes it a report of robbery, right?
3. The CRU is free to say "hack" or "theft" if they so choose - but if we quote them, we need to source them to news pieces which actually quote them.
4. If we source any quotes to the CRU press-releases hosted on their website, are those valid sources? Are they primary sources or secondary?
5. Those associated with or work for the CRU, can offer personal opinions, but unless those statements are definitely being made on behalf of the CRU in a spokesperson role, then they do not speak for the CRU and are therefore not an authoritative source for the CRU's positions.
6. The police can speak for themselves
7. The police can assert they are investigating.
8. Direct quotes from the police, reported via valid news sources, are the best source for what the police are actually saying and have said.
9. The police can say if they feel/suspect/think a crime may have been committed.
10. In absence of a criminal conviction, only a reasonably comprehensive post-investigation report is a valid source for the conclusion that a crime has been committed.
11. Until such time that authoritative formal conclusions that crime has occurred are released, an unqualified use of "theft" and "stolen" - from an official standpoint, would be presumptive.

It's not for us to say it's "true" that a crime has been committed. Rather, it's up to us to report what those in authority say about this - and the authorities have not released any conclusions yet. This means that until then, any source which makes a conclusion by using an unqualified "theft" or "stolen" is definitely a POV source and makes the article POV. We can avoid this by saying what I suggested - that this episode has variously been reported as a "leak" and a "theft". By this means we acknowledge both sides, without taking sides.

When you add all these up, I think this issue is best resolved by the suggested edit I offered here Talk:Climatic_Research_Unit_e-mail_hacking_incident#Fully_sourced_suggested_change_to_article_introduction, with the exception that "reportedly" be used instead of my suggested "possibly". 7390r0g (talk) 19:50, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Usually a determination that a crime has been committed is made before the investigation, but individuals are presumed innocent until proved guilty. If someone breaks into your house, your local newspaper does not call it an "alleged burglary" and opine that you may not be telling the truth. The Four Deuces (talk) 22:34, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Not a "determination" (ref dictionary), you mean "assumption". Yes, maybe, but: (1) WP does not make these assumptions or report them as if they were fact. (2) In this case this was not a "burglary" (ref dictionary) but the unauthorised publication of information, and that may or may not be theft. It could have been released by mistake. If released deliberately this could be a breach of the civil law, not the criminal law (and theft is a criminal offence, not a civil one). Taking without permission is not necessarily theft, neither is old fashioned copyright violation. Unauthorised release of info has a public interest defence, potentially. There are many reasons not yet to conclude theft. Paul Beardsell (talk) 09:33, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Shouldn't that be "for whom"? Guettarda (talk) 22:53, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I've said this before and I'll say it again - the press releases are issued by the University of East Anglia, not the CRU; they are posted in the Marketing and Communications section of the UEA's official website at http://www.uea.ac.uk/mac/comm/media/press/CRUstatements . They are corporate press releases of the university, listed on its press releases page at http://www.uea.ac.uk/mac/comm/media/press . The branch of the UEA issuing them is the Marketing and Communications division of the UEA, not the CRU. The CRU has a separate website at http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/ . Let's please try to get this right. -- ChrisO (talk) 23:06, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

A careful newspaper would use a qualifier like "reported", "alleged", or the like, to cover most any police investigation or crime report. Quite a few of them turn out to be mistaken, false, or even fraudulent. We aren't the police so we're the last people who should be deciding on the accuracy of an apparent victim's account of a purported crime. If the weight of the high quality third party neutral sources are reporting the incident as a crime, hack, or the like, then I think it's fair that we should drop the qualifiers and attributions and simply report what they say. Without that certainty we should qualify it in a neutral way, respecting WP:WTA, with an attribution like "X said that Y". We shouldn't base that distinction solely on a logical analysis made here among Wikipedia editors. We can look to the sources for guidance here. - Wikidemon (talk) 23:09, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

That's not quite accurate. Turning to my copy of the Associated Press Stylebook, it says: "The word [allege] must be used with great care ... Do not use alleged to describe an event that is known to have occurred, when the dispute is over who participated in it. Do not say: He attended the alleged meeting when what you mean is: He allegedly attended the meeting." In this case, there is no dispute among reliable sources that the reported event occurred. The unknown factor is who did it, not whether it happened. -- ChrisO (talk) 23:18, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

@ChrisO. Your line of thinking is sound, but I am unsure if I agree with your point. It's undisputed that the email/documents have been disseminated. It's undisputed that the CRU, as the keeper of the records, is in a position to say that they were released on an unauthorized basis. But it's not unanimous in the media that this is a "theft". There are a number of reliable sources using the word "leak". What's in contention is not that something happened. Rather, what's in contention is how to most neutrally refer to what happened. If some reliable sources say "leak" and there's no conclusion from the authorities that it was "theft", then as per my suggestion, we should say This episode has variously been described in the media as a "leak" and as a "theft". This is the most neutral way to describe it. As I see it, for us to say "theft" is like Morty Seinfeld saying "My wallet's gone! My wallet's gone!", when he's missing his wallet at the doctor's office. Later, the facts come out - he had actually misplaced it. Similarly, it may very well be that legal officials will eventually determine that this was a "theft", but they haven't done so yet and until then, current sources support both "leak" and "theft". And please take note that my suggestion completely avoids using the problem word "alleged".7390r0g (talk) 02:20, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Huh? "Do not use alleged to describe an event that is known to have occurred, when the dispute is over who participated in it." So who was the hacker? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 23:49, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

We don't know, obviously. But the fact of the hack is not in dispute in the overwhelming majority of reliable sources. -- ChrisO (talk) 00:02, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Then what was the point of citing the Associated Press Stylebook? This particular argument seems invalid given the fact that the dispute over who participated in it is not over. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:10, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Our guidelines take a similar approach. It also says: "Alleged (along with allegedly) can also be misused to cast doubt on a statement, and should not be used as a routine qualifier". If we have reliable sources that question the "fact" of the hack, the way to deal with it is to say "but xx questions whether it was a hack". Simple enough. But make sure that the dissenting view is notable enough that we aren't creating problems by putting undue weight on minority opinions. Guettarda (talk) 02:23, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

@Guettarda. The WP page you point has notation on it as an example of "Acceptable use" of the word "alleged": O.J. Simpson was charged with murder by the State of California after he was alleged to have murdered his ex-wife and a friend of hers in 1994." [In the context of a legal action, alleged is understood to mean "alleged by a privileged source such as a prosecutor". Note how the sentence attributes the allegations.] This clearly supports the use of the word "allege" but I recommend against it - we can edit around that word by using my suggestion (see above). In that manner, we remove an impediment to consensus. 7390r0g (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 02:33, 3 January 2010 (UTC).

Yes, it says that the state alleged that he committed murder. It does not say that the state charged him with an alleged murder. Despite the fact that Simpson was acquitted of the crime, it's still correct to speak of the murder (not "alleged murder"). Guettarda (talk) 02:38, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

@Guettarda. Bearing in mind that I feel we can still be effectively NPOV even without the word "alleged", I think you are misunderstanding the word usage. However, since I am not a linquist, I have not much to offer other than a few examples. If this helps, good. If not, please feel free to offer other examples. Any of thse would be fine examples of criminal allegation related edits:

1 Joe Blow has been charged with murder. It is alleged that he shot Tommy Tudly."

2 Police are investigating an alleged robbery of Al's pawn shop. Al called the police last week and reported he was robbed.

3 This controversy arose in Nov, 2009, after reports that the CRU email system was "hacked" [direct quote source]. According to [source], information was "taken without authority" [direct source quote] and released on the Internet. According to the CRU, the electronic records in question "appear[s] to have been illegally taken" [direct quote source]. One source close the the CRU, Professor Trevor Davies, characterizes the materials as having been "stolen", though some sources in the media report that the emails and documents were "leaked" [sources]. Police are investigating this as a possible crime [source].

My point is, instead of fistfighting over one or two words, let's see if we can craft sentences that helps get both supported views into things. Of my three examples, #1 and #2 both show correct usage of "alleged". But #3 is better because both views of "leaked" and "hacked/stolen" are represented and the bugbear word of "alleged" is avoided. I hopt this helps. 7390r0g (talk) 06:58, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

For clarity: 73's example (3) above would satisfy me completely. Paul Beardsell (talk) 09:41, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

ChrisO and Guettarda, I think there's a misunderstanding here. You're correct in that Wikipedia should not add qualifiers as "alleged" since that would correctly be weasel wording, possibly changing the effect of statements etc. However, this does obviously not apply when quoting them from reliable sources. Then they're there for a reason, and us dropping the qualifiers would - just as if we added them - change the contents of the statements. That we must never do. Troed (talk) 11:17, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

OK. So which sources use "alleged" to imply that there is doubt? After all, we don't copy formatting for formatting's sake. Guettarda (talk) 16:52, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

And if some sources are using "alleged" to imply doubt, then we document the differences of opinion. Guettarda (talk) 16:53, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

@Guettarda. We've moved past the problems with the word "alleged". The best solution seems to be to craft the words in such a way as to make both views clear and not side with either view, while at the same time citing everything back as close to it's original source as possible. This avoids trouble and yields a good result. What do you think about my #3 in this section? Would you support that? 7390r0g (talk) 17:36, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

We don't need the verbal gymnastics in 3, because 2 is already wrong by the WP:WEIGHT of WP:RS. Where are the main sources saying 'alleged theft'? Where are the sources actually saying that the owners of these emails and docs (i.e. the management of UEA or of the CRU) knowingly and intentionally published these emails onto the internet, and that only roguish sources within the UEA are pretending this was a theft? I have not come across such a theory in print yet. The fact of the theft is in no doubt. Even if some politically motivated member of UEA staff copied the data onto an internet server and told his Russian friends the URL, that was still a theft unless he was instructed to do so by his employers, the rightful owners of the files. --Nigelj (talk) 20:46, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

see this and this for such examples of "alleged" from WP:RS Troed (talk) 10:46, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

To begin with, you need to correct CRU to UEA in #s 1-5. Guettarda (talk) 20:48, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

BLP banner on this talk page

Editors here are concerned that no slanderous or libelous information should be introduced into this article. I think we can all agree that this should be the case. That said, I want the BLP banner taken off of this article. This is not a bio and should not be treated as one (except for no slanderous or libelous information, of course). This article is about an ongoing controversy, and it is impossible and idiotic to write intelligibly on this subject without referring to aspects of the controversy that have been reported in reliable secondary sources. I say for the third time, no slanderous or libelous information of course, so please do not use that as an excuse for keeping the banner on this page.

I would like for us to discuss this and if no adequate justification can be given in the next 24 hours (except for no slanderous or libelous information), then I intend to take the banner off. Its presence on this article is absurd and it can be perceived as POV pushing, not (4th mention) protecting the article from slanderous or libelous information.Jarhed (talk) 00:13, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I think the BLP tag relates to the fact that stating there was a theft is making accusations against persons unknown who are presumably living persons. That does not really make sense to me. The Four Deuces (talk) 00:20, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

BLP applies to all pages, so the banner doesn't matter. Prodego ^talk 00:39, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree that it does not matter and should come off.Jarhed (talk) 00:47, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

No, the emails suggest criminal behavior on the part of the individuals named in the emails. The point of the banner is that the people in the emails are innocent until proven guilty, and acusations can harm them.Jarhed (talk) 00:50, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

The BLP banner is there supposedly to stop us documenting the conduct revealed in the content of the unauthorised publication. I.e. to prevent WP documenting Climategate. Paul Beardsell (talk) 09:44, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I get the same feeling and I would like for it to stop. I am not yet convinced that it is impossible for us to come to agreements on this article.Jarhed (talk) 11:10, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

WP:BLP applies to all biographical information regardless of the topic. In this particular case, we have 3 or 4 scientists who might have broken the law or engaged in unethical behavior. The WP:BLP need to be there as a reminder that we have to follow this policy. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 01:03, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I do not agree that the banner is there to remind people of WP guidelines. Instead, BLP policy is being used to prevent the inclusion in this article of data about the controversy that is being reported by reliable sources. I note that virtually every controversial article in the article space has this banner on it. In other words, it is used by some editors to push POV. I think it should come off.Jarhed (talk) 01:22, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, yes, the banner could be perceived as some kind of threat, kind of like posting the city noise regulations outside a nightclub. But I think there are worse things to worry about around here than a proliferation of talk page header banners. We may disagree on specific applications of BLP but for the most part we all believe in the policy and want to follow it, right? I think it cuts both ways - there are lots of people of different political stripes mentioned and they all need to be treated with the respect accorded them by BLP. In fact, I think it is the researchers themselves who we need to be the most careful about because their reputations and life work are under assault. Unnamed lawbreakers really don't have BLP protections, not if their identities are unstated. The banner itself is neutral, so any implication that the banner itself is being used abusively is a bit of speculative reasoning and perhaps an expectation of bad faith. - Wikidemon (talk) 01:31, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Ok then why is the banner there if everyone is supposed to be assuming good faith?Jarhed (talk) 04:55, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)The banner isn't the problem. It's the invalid use of WP:BLP that's the problem. In most situations, as long as we follow WP:RS, it's not a WP:BLP violation. The few exceptions that WP:BLP adds (such as sexual orientation) currently don't apply to this article. This is the only article that I edit in this topic space, so I can't speak definitively about the others, but if WP:BLP is being misapplied, I suggest that you point this out. We also have a WP:BLPN where (hopefully) uninvolved editors can offer their opinions. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 01:32, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree that the invalid use of BLP is the problem. I have been involved in disputes on BLPs over this very issue. It can be argued that unproven allegations should not be put in a BLP, even if properly documented. However, I will say this for about the 18th time, this article is not a BLP, and there is no justification for trying to keep out reliably sourced investigations and allegations using BLP policy.Jarhed (talk) 06:04, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

"In most situations, as long as we follow WP:RS, it's not a WP:BLP violation" - if that were the case, then we wouldn't need a separate BLP policy, we wouldn't have a Foundation declaration on the topic. Our policy on biographies of living people holds us to a far higher standard than our guideline on reliable sources. (Please note that WP:BLP is policy, while WP:RS is only a guideline.) Guettarda (talk) 02:36, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

That is precisely what I was trying to say. I agree that we should not put libelous information in this article. However, if an investigation or allegation has been reported in a reliable source, it can be used for this article, even if such inclusion is not necessarily appropriate for a BLP. I would like to know if anyone disagrees with this, because it seems as if I am merely restating WP policy.Jarhed (talk) 04:55, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

BLP is about much more than just reliable sourcing. An article may be completely compliant with WP:RS but still be unacceptable from a BLP perspective. Please see WP:BLP#Criticism and praise for a key set of criteria that apply to this article in particular. WP:BLP#Presumption in favor of privacy is another important criterion, especially: "Wikipedia editors must not act, intentionally or otherwise, in a way that amounts to participating in or prolonging the victimization [of someone who is the victim of another's actions]". -- ChrisO (talk) 10:11, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I appreciate what you are saying and I agree with it in principle. However, I know from experience that what you are saying is in no way some settled fact that everybody agrees with. I have had the exact opposite argument with people on other BLPs and they are just as adamant as you are about putting in reliably sourced data. As long as you understand that what you are saying is your opinion only and is open to interpretation, then we agree. If we must go for arbitration to get a source in, we must. However, generally speaking, editors should be able to include data in this article from any reliable source. The repeated notion that BLP somehow applies to this article is flat wrong, except (for the 20th time) no slander. Finally, I feel that your lecturing tone is condescending to me, and I will thank you in advance for civility toward me going forward.Jarhed (talk) 10:54, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

No condescension was intended and I apologise if my comments came over that way. The scope of BLP is defined by the very first sentence of WP:BLP, which defines it as "information about living persons [on] any Wikipedia page." In other words, not just biographies. Material that violates the BLP policy does not somehow become excluded from BLP by virtue of being posted on a non-biographical article. Please note also that the presence of the template has nothing to do with whether BLP applies. The policy automatically applies to any Wikipedia page that contains information about living persons, whether or not it has been templated. The template is just a courtesy to editors to make them aware that they need to follow BLP in editing that article. This expectation exists by default; the template is merely a reminder. -- ChrisO (talk) 11:07, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Thank you very much for that clarification, that certainly explains some things for me. However, you should know that some editors on this article, including myself, feel as if other editors are attempting to misapply BLP to this article in an attempt to push POV. I agree with you that the presence of the template has nothing to do with whether BLP applies. So do you agree with me then that the banner should come off?Jarhed (talk) 11:15, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

It serves a useful purpose by informing editors who are not aware of BLP of the requirements. What purpose would be served by removing it? Surely more guidance is better than less? If you feel that editors are "attempting to misapply BLP to this article", how would removing the template help, considering that BLP is applicable by default whether or not the template is present? -- ChrisO (talk) 11:24, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

If an editor is so ignorant that he thinks he can put slander in a WP article, I doubt such an editor would be bothered to read the banners at the top of the talk pages. On the other hand, over the last few days I have been told repeatedly that properly sourced mentions of the investigations and allegations surrounding climategate are prohibited in this article by BLP, which is false and nothing but POV. Removing the template would be a good start in ensuring that everyone understands that its presence on this article is controversial, because it is being used by some editors to push POV. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jarhed (talk • contribs)

The problem you allege is not with the template; if BLP is cited to reject a particular piece of content, it can be cited whether or not the template is present, as BLP applies to every article whether or not it's been templated. It seems to me that there are two issues here. First, you appear to believe that BLP shouldn't apply to this article. You are welcome to query this at the BLP noticeboard, although I should add that the editors there will tell you what I've said here - that BLP applies to any article where information about living persons is included. Second, you object to BLP being used to exclude particular items of content. Again, I suggest you should seek advice from uninvolved editors at the BLP noticeboard, where they will be able to advise on whether a particular item of content meets the requirements of BLP. Don't forget that the onus is on you to prove that it meets BLP requirements, not on others to prove that it does not. -- ChrisO (talk) 17:27, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

The problem I allege is with certain editors who want to exclude properly sourced negative information about individuals, despite the fact that such rejection is against BLP policy. The only interpretation I can find of your statement is that you refuse to discuss any compromise position, and if I don't like it I can seek arbitration with a bunch of other editors just like us. If that is what you mean to convey then that is how it will have to be. I just expect a little bit more cooperation among good faith editors.Jarhed (talk) 23:05, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I haven't read the whole discussion but as the editor who originally (I think) put the BLP template wanted to say a few things. The template should definitely not come off. BLP issues have to be considered in all articles. However it's of particular relevance here since there are several controversial claims about the people involved, particularly the reseachers so it serves as an important reminder. The fact so many people seem to think BLP doesn't matter here further proves the point. (It also categorises this page so it can be more easily monitored.) Yes the BLP template when appearing in non biographies likely shows up most commonly in controversial articles (or articles concerning controversial subjects). This isn't surprising or indicate of nefarious purposes. It happens because controversial articles are those where there's most likely to be contentious details of living people added. There's not that likely to be contentious details of living people added to Devil facial tumour disease but 2009 Richmond High School gang rape is quite a different matter. This isn't to say it's going to happen in all such articles. For example Global warming obviously a controversial article but doesn't have a BLP tag and is unlikely to need one since mentioning individuals should be rare and hopefully always in a clearly non controversial fashion (and if it is controversial it's probably more likely to be about whether they should be mentioned at all because it gives undue weight to their views which may raise some BLP issues in the talk pages but not much in the article). P.S. I should add that IMHO this discussion is a pointless waste of time. The BLP template is not going to be coming off so don't spend your time arguing over it coming off. If you believe that BLP is being misapplied then you should discuss that. Trying to remove the BLP template is just going to make people ignore you because they think you either don't understand BLP or don't care about it or perhaps even questions your motives. I should also add that I'm a fairly regular at WP:BLP/N so IMHO the inclusion of the template is completely uncontroversial (in fact, it rarely is, the issue that does arise is whether BLP applies to a certain case). Nil Einne (talk) 23:35, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Who said that BLP doesn't matter here?Jarhed (talk) 09:54, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

There are many, but e.g. "The repeated notion that BLP somehow applies to this article is flat wrong, except (for the 20th time) no slander." (from this very discussion) & However, (please forgive me if I don't say this right) BLP stands for **BIOGRAPHY** of a living person. Inclusion of the BLP warning on this article seems absurd to me, it not being a BIOGRAPHY. (from Talk:Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident/Archive 15#Biography of a living person) et al. I would note that recently you've been primarily the one who's been arguing that BLP doesn't matter here or only matters for slander or some odd notion like that but I WP:AGF you've realised you were wrong and have simply forgotten that you were doing that a couple or more days ago. I appreciate that the notion BLP only applies to slander or biographies is unfortunately a fairly common one so I'm not blaming you for being under that impression for a time, but I do think it is unfortunate it took you so long to realise these notions weren't correct despite repeatedly being informed by other editors and think your example amply demonstrates why the BLP tag is quite important here. Nil Einne (talk) 12:21, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Freedom of Information Section: Reboot - Part 2

Reboot: I want to make three points.

• It is NOT not a WP:BLP violation if we cite reliable sources. Yes, there are some exceptions (such as outing someone's sexual orientation) but they currently don't apply to this topic.
• No one is saying (at least I hope not) that the FOI allegations are true, and nor should our article say such a thing. We can, however, cover the allegations.
• There are plenty of reliable sources we can cite. Unfortunately, I do not have enough free time to do much research right now, but the New Zealand Herald and The Telegraph articles spring to mind. I'm pretty sure that the Associated Press and FactCheck.org articles cover this as well. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:34, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

BLP is about far more than just citing reliable sources. Otherwise WP:BLP could have been as simple as "use reliable sources", rather than the 40K of text that's there now. I direct your attention in particular to WP:BLP#Writing and editing, especially the "Criticism and praise" subsection. -- ChrisO (talk) 23:05, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Sorry for the alphabet soup, but if you're strictly following WP:V, WP:OR and WP:NPOV (which I always try to do anyway), WP:BLP is largely redundant. Sure, it adds a few extra conditions such as not outing someone's sexual orientation, but they don't apply to this situation. WP:BLP specifically says:

If an allegation or incident is notable, relevant, and well-documented by reliable published sources, it belongs in the article—even if it's negative and the subject dislikes all mention of it. If it is not documented by reliable third-party sources, leave it out.

Example

"John Doe had a messy divorce from Jane Doe." Is this important to the article, and was it published by third-party reliable sources? If not, leave it out, or stick to the facts: "John Doe divorced Jane Doe."

Example

A politician is alleged to have had an affair. He denies it, but the New York Times publishes the allegations, and there is :a public scandal. The allegation may belong in the biography, citing the New York Times as the source. [emphasis mine]

The Criticism and praise section says:

Criticism and praise of the subject should be represented if it is relevant to the subject's notability and can be sourced to reliable secondary sources, and so long as the material is written in a manner that does not overwhelm the article or appear to take sides; it needs to be presented responsibly, conservatively, and in a neutral, encyclopedic tone.

I propose we do exactly that. Now that we are on the same page, and we have the attention of ArbCom and the Admin noticeboard, will you be willing to work with me and our fellow editors in adding this section to the article? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 23:56, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

ChrisO: I await your response to why we shouldn't add this content if we strictly follow WP:V, WP:OR and WP:NPOV. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 03:37, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

This issue was archived without a resolution so I am reposting it. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 01:42, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I certainly support re-creating this section, and have previously posted a start towards it, with RS's. So, should we put up a draft here? (or, better, on a separate subpage, since the 1.5 day archive is a nuisance). -- Pete Tillman (talk) 01:57, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Sounds like a plan. I would like to get this resolved as well.Jarhed (talk) 05:57, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

We should be mindful in mentioning the scientists that facts should be obtained from news stories, not editorials, and that opinions should be attributed to the persons who made them and not be presented as fact. (I note the NZ Herald item is an editorial while the Telegraph item is a news story.) We should rely on major mainstream newspapers close to the story, i.e., the London broadsheets. Also weasel words should be avoided. The Four Deuces (talk) 07:33, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree with these caveats, provided the facts reported by the reliable sources get into the article, and provided reliable sources are used in all cases (*edited to remove blog names*). Let's strive for NPOV and let the reader make up his or her own mind.Jarhed (talk) 09:32, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Could someone describe the the current text and the prospective text, along with the sources that are used, and the sources that will be used, along with the specific part of the to-be-used sources that justify the changes. Thanks! Hipocrite (talk) 09:52, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Sure, I'd love to. We can use the following two articles from FactCheck.org[20] and the Associated Press[21]. The follow are excerpts from both sources which justify the change:

Source: FactCheck.org

Ben Santer e-mail, Nov. 12, 2009: My personal opinion is that both FOI requests [for data related to a 2008 paper and for correspondence dating back to 2006] are intrusive and unreasonable. Steven McIntyre provides absolutely no scientific justification or explanation for such requests. … McIntyre has no interest in improving our scientific understanding of the nature and causes of climate change. He has no interest in rational scientific discourse. He deals in the currency of threats and intimidation. We should be able to conduct our scientific research without constant fear of an "audit" by Steven McIntyre; without having to weigh every word we write in every email we send to our scientific colleagues.

Source: FactCheck.org

It’s clear from the e-mails that there are people with whom the scientists would rather not share. What’s less clear is whether any deliberate obstruction actually occurred — that’s one of the subjects of the East Anglia investigation.

Source: FactCheck.org

One of the most disturbing elements suggests an effort to avoid sharing scientific data with critics skeptical of global warming. It is not clear if any data was destroyed; two U.S. researchers denied it.

The e-mails show that several mainstream scientists repeatedly suggested keeping their research materials away from opponents who sought it under American and British public records law. It raises a science ethics question because free access to data is important so others can repeat experiments as part of the scientific method. The University of East Anglia is investigating the blocking of information requests.

Source: Associated Press

One of the most disturbing elements suggests an effort to avoid sharing scientific data with critics skeptical of global warming. It is not clear if any data was destroyed; two U.S. researchers denied it. The e-mails show that several mainstream scientists repeatedly suggested keeping their research materials away from opponents who sought it under American and British public records law. It raises a science ethics question because free access to data is important so others can repeat experiments as part of the scientific method.

Source: Associated Press

Santer said in a telephone interview that he and others are inundated by frivolous requests from skeptics that are designed to "tie-up government-funded scientists."

Source: Associated Press

There are allegations that he would distort and misuse data given to him.

Source: Associated Press

"We find that the authors are overreaching in the conclusions that they're trying to draw from the data that they have," McIntyre

Based on the above, I suggest we add the following subsection to the Content of the documents | E-mails subsection:

==== Santer e-mail of 12, Nov 2009 ====

In one e-mail, climate scientist Benjamin Santer of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory writes about a request for data and correspondence from Steven McIntyre under the British Freedom of Information Act (FOI):

My personal opinion is that both FOI requests [for data related to a 2008 paper and for correspondence dating back to 2006] are intrusive and unreasonable. ...We should be able to conduct our scientific research without constant fear of an "audit" by Steven McIntyre; without having to weigh every word we write in every email we send to our scientific colleagues.

According to FactCheck.org, it's clear from the e-mails that there are people with whom the scientists would rather not share. Whether any actual obstruction happened is one of the subjects of the East Anglia investigation.

Santer told the Associated Press that he and other scientists are flooded by frivolous requests that are designed to "tie-up government-funded scientists." McIntyre disagrees with allegations that he would distort and misuse data given to him. McIntyre believes that climatologists are "overreaching" in their conclusions given the data available. "Everything that I've done in this, I've done in good faith," he told the Associated Press.

A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 14:02, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I've not been following this aspect of the incident, so I am not aware of how significant it is and cannot speak to WP:WEIGHT concerns. With that said, it seems that what A Quest For Knowledge has written is presented in a manner that puts Stephen McIntyre (and his FOIA requests) in a positive light. This is not necessarily wrong, but if it is indeed true that McIntyre's requests have negatively-impacted the work of the researchers it would seem that there is a wee bit of an NPOV problem with this proposed text. -- Scjessey (talk) 15:46, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Yet again, the layout of the info gives the last word to McIntyre, and gives undue weight to his minority views. Better balance needed. . dave souza, talk 15:54, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Who isn't an expert on the science, and should not be quoted as a source as to the appropriateness of the inferences made. Guettarda (talk) 16:00, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Scjessey: It's a first draft. Feel free to tweak it.

Dave souza: I'm confused by your "yet again" comment. This is the first time I've made this proposal. As for his "minority views", this is not an article about global warming. Whether Santer violated FOI requests or not, is neither a majority view point nor a minority viewpoint as we simply don't know. The matter is being investigated. All we can do is report what reliable sources say about the matter.

Guettarda: Again, this is not an article about science so much as it's about a political controversy. McIntyre is an involved member in this controversy whose specifically named in Santer's e-mail. His qualifications as a scientist might matter in an article about global warming, but not here. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 16:29, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

No, you're mistaken. When we're discussing the quality of the science, we use expert sources. Otherwise we might as well use Rush Limbaugh, since he's far more notable than McIntyre. Guettarda (talk) 16:45, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

No, we're not discussing the quality of the science. That's where you're mistaken. We're discussing whether McIntyre was making frivolous FOI requests and whether Santer violated those requests. McIntyre is an involved member in this controversy whose name is specifically mentioned by these scientists. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 16:55, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, then what is this about?

McIntyre believes that climatologists are "overreaching" in their conclusions given the data available.

This is a comment about the nature of the inference. Which is, of course, a comment on the science. Guettarda (talk) 17:03, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

It's a statement about what McIntyre believes, not whether his belief is right or wrong. In an article about the controversy, we have to explain what the controversy is. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:18, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

But this is not an article about the controversy. The controversy is only part of what this article is about. -- Scjessey (talk) 17:32, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Maybe, but it's certainly one of the biggest parts of it. Yes, the article currently downplays the controversy, but that's one of the WP:NPOV issues that I would like to see addressed. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:38, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

We don't know what 'the controversy' is. All we have are the editorial opinions of various media outlets and those of the people they have chosen to interview. When the UEA enquiry returns some actual further information, then we will have something else to report. That's why, at the moment, this is an article about an 'incident' and reactions to that incident. Because that's all that's happened. If anyone is sacked or arrested or something else, then there will be more facts to report. Until then, all the rest is speculation. --Nigelj (talk) 17:43, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

FactCheck.org[22] and the Associated Press[23] are reliable sources. Would you care to be bring this up at the reliable source noticeboard and allow uninvolved editors determine whether FactCheck.org and the Associated Press are reliable sources? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:50, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, UEA have decided to hold a formal investigation, and the police have decided to open criminal investigations. According to you, they both needn't bother - they could just go to these two US websites and find out the full truth from there? --Nigelj (talk) 18:16, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Please address what I am saying, not some Straw man. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:18, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I am, like everyone else here, addressing precisely what you are saying: Your proposed text is unacceptable for this article because it is based solely on uninformed media speculation. Please learn to debate with more civility and to assume more good faith and intelligence in those who disagree with you. And while you're at it, please don't keep 're-booting' the same old arguments over and over again on this page, based on such speculation. --Nigelj (talk) 18:28, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

When did I say that the UAE and police shouldn't bother holding investigations and should just get the truth from the mainstream media? Please cite the diff. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:34, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Looking over the sources, they appear to give a more balanced overview than the proposed summary. Will try to revise the proposal, and as usual more sources giving expert opinion would be welcome as a way of improving this section. . . dave souza, talk 18:37, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

"It's a statement about what McIntyre believes, not whether his belief is right or wrong". It's not an explicit reply by McIntyre to Santer. The comments are juxtaposed in the US News & World Report article, but there's no explicit connection. It's a general comment by McI on the science. Which he may be proposing as justification for his actions, but there's no specific reason to consider it a comment on Santer's response, rather than anyone else's. This isn't a section about McI, it's a section about Santer. Guettarda (talk) 19:18, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

FOI requests (deleted 26 November 2009

Here's the original start, from here. A bit out of date, but Regalado's reports are good-quality, definitely a RS.

Antonio Regalado, a journalist at Science Magazine, wrote in Science Insider: "[U]niversity researchers may [...] find themselves in legal jeopardy if they deleted emails requested under the U.K.'s Freedom of Information (FOIA) legislation, a crime under U.K. law." The hacker who released the documents used the name "FOIA", Regalado pointed out, adding, "the emails, which appear to be genuine, though their authenticity could not be confirmed, indicate a concerted effort to fight the FOI requests that may itself have slipped into questionable territory." Regalado quoted one purported email said to be sent by Phil Jones, Director of the Climatic Research Unit, to Michael Mann. Jones declined to comment about it, but Mann responded to Regalado, "I did not delete any emails at all in response to Phil Jone's [sic] request, nor did I indicate to him that I would." Regalado wrote that the e-mails showed some scientists were concerned about wasting their time by being drawn into controversies if some of the documents were released in response to FOI requests.

The UK Information Commissioners Office (ICO) oversees the FOI process there, and issued the following statement:

"Destroying requested information outside of an organisation’s normal policies is unlawful and may be a criminal offence if done to prevent disclosure.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Tillman (talk • contribs)

Public or private

I haven't actually be able to find a source to verify that the UEA is a public university. It is entirely conceivable that despite the comment from the ICO quoted above, the CRU may not be required to submit to FOIA requests, at least in part, because it appears much of their funding is from private investment. Does anyone know any better? -- Scjessey (talk) 19:39, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

A point of context that needs to be shown: the first FOI request to CRU was in 2007, according to this page. Our article shows the Freedom of Information Act 2000 as coming into force in phases, with the first "general right of access" on 1 January 2005, it appears that Jones e-mail of 2 Feb 2005 was at that time when it was being first phased in. There are various exemptions, and Jones was right to point to exemption of personal data protected by the Data Protection Act,[24] though his informal wording doesn't look great in the light of publicity. . . dave souza, talk 20:05, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Dave, it was just my first attempt at writing the section. How about we drop one of the last two sentences about McIntyre? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 20:43, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't have a source readily to hand, but I do know that the FOIA issue is substantially complicated by the fact that CRU received considerable project funding from the DOE which is supremely subject to FOIA. I would be suprised to find out that CRU isn't subject at least partially to FOIA due to funding agreements.Jarhed (talk) 22:57, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Draft tweaked, with comment

The following aims to present the information related to this specific email in context as shown in the sources:

==== Santer e-mail of 12 Nov 2009 ====

In one e-mail, climate scientist Benjamin Santer of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory commented on a request for data and correspondence from science blogger Steven McIntyre under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOI):

My personal opinion is that both FOI requests [for data related to a 2008 paper and for correspondence dating back to 2006] are intrusive and unreasonable. Steven McIntyre provides absolutely no scientific justification or explanation for such requests. ... McIntyre has no interest in improving our scientific understanding of the nature and causes of climate change. He has no interest in rational scientific discourse....We should be able to conduct our scientific research without constant fear of an "audit" by Steven McIntyre; without having to weigh every word we write in every email we send to our scientific colleagues.

In an Associated Press interview, McIntyre disagreed with his portrayal in emails, and said "Everything that I've done in this, I've done in good faith," he told the Associated Press.

FactCheck.org noted that the great majority of CRU's data is already freely available, and the scientists were reluctant to supply their own correspondence, code and data to people whose motives seemed questionable to them. It is not clear that any actual obstruction happened, and emails show the scientists discussing with university officials and lawyers their obligations under the new legislation, informing critics that data is already freely available, or that the information has been sent to them. This question is to form part of the East Anglia investigation.

The Jones e-mail of 2 Feb 2005 subsection covers the same issue, and it could work better to have a FOI section describing the phasing in of the FOIA from 2005, then showing both emails in context. . . dave souza, talk 20:47, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I would support the addition of something like this ot the article Nil Einne (talk) 12:20, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Climategate

1 The misnomer given to an incident where one or more thiefs hacked into servers at CRU and stole data.

2 A term coined by some media sources to describe the controversy surounding an alleged theft of data and emails from CRU that led to considerable world-wide commentary on the issue of AGW and that may have affected the outcome of the COP15 United Nations Climate Change Confrence.

3 An incident where email correspondence between leading climate researchers at CRU revealed that they may have conspired to present scientific findings falsely, and that they may have broken federal laws in the destruction of data that was requested in accordance with FOIA laws.

I understand that this is a controversial topic and that there are lots of editors with some strong emotions about this issue. Still, it makes no sense to me that we can't just start with something like #2 above and produce a halfway decent article that is reasonably NPOV. Thanks for letting me share.Jarhed (talk) 10:41, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

2 is much better than 1 and I would rather go to 2 than stay with 1. However, 2 is problematic in that perhaps what the controversy is about would not be stated. I think that 2 is not stable, and would inevitably become 3. I think that is why some here fight so hard to keep the article at 1. [As an aside maybe some US scientists broke Federal law, I'm unsure, but more to the point is that CRU scientists may have broken UK law. [Nested aside: Of course if the feds produce a warrant, the UK authorities are now obliged by treaty to surrender their citizens. Perhaps that's what you think the CRU scientists should be worried about?  :-) ]] Paul Beardsell (talk) 11:17, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Frankly Mr. Beardsell, I consider #2 to be the unarguable NPOV truth and I do not understand why any reasonable person could not agree with it as a starting point. Nor do I see it devolving. Only further facts could change it, and I doubt that any more facts will be forthcomming. Ever.Jarhed (talk) 12:42, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Whereas, Sir Jarhed, I consider #2 the NPOV truth, it is not the whole truth. What is popularly known as Climategate is not what is documented here or would be documented at #2. The scandal is the behaviour seemingly revealed in the documents hacked/leaked. For the moment Climategate, Climategate scandal and Climategate controversy all link here. While that remains the case the pressure will remain for this article to actually be that described as #3, above. Further facts that be forthcoming, you are wrong IMO. There will be the findings by the police into allegations of the theft of the info, findings by the police into allegations of the breach of the FOI. Findings by the University into both the same but also into the conduct of scientists at the CRU. Speculatively, the insider who so carefully compiled and leaked the info will come forward or be discovered. These new facts will all become part of the story to be reflected at this article, or some fork thereof. But my support for #2 as a step on the way remains unabashedly enthusiastic. Paul Beardsell (talk) 22:13, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments and I agree with your point that this article needs to address the behavior seemingly revealed by the stolen emails. Trying to get some consensus on a plan to move forward seems like a reasonable thing to try.Jarhed (talk) 22:48, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

<edit conflict> I'd hope that something along the lines of 2 is the target here, but that "incident" is inherently an outcome of the unauthorised distribution of data reported as stolen from CRU servers, and to understand the media controversy the science has to be clearly shown, in accordance with reliable scientific sources rather than mainstream media. As for 3, how could they have broken federal laws? CRU isn't in a federation. Still, to fully describe the controversy it would be good to find third party sources on such conspiracy theories, and show them as such. . . dave souza, talk 11:21, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Mr. Souza, don't you think that what you just said belongs in a properly written NPOV article? I do.Jarhed (talk) 11:41, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I said it because I think that a properly written NPOV article describes the theft or leak, describes the science involved and also describes the media controversy, taking care to avoid undue weight to minority views in terms of science. . . dave souza, talk 11:56, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree with that as well.Jarhed (talk) 12:36, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Regarding 3, the UK isn't (yet) the 51st state of the USA. -- ChrisO (talk) 11:22, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I know I know, I just don't know the FOIA lingo in the UK.Jarhed (talk) 11:41, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

That's a very good point: we should have a link to Freedom of information in the United Kingdom and, given the date and phrasing of the email, possibly to Environmental Information Regulations 2004 as it's quite possible that the FOIA of 2000 (2002 in Scotland) didn't apply to the data or to universities which are, I think, private rather than public bodies. People in the US understandably find it hard to appreciate that at that time the full disclosure of what had previously been private discussions was a considerable culture shift, with many voicing concern that it would prevent frank private exchange of views. There should be sources that have dealt with this misunderstanding. . dave souza, talk 11:56, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

My desire is to try to get some consensus among us editors on how to proceed on this article, not to work on details.Jarhed (talk) 12:36, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I support the effort in trying to clarify the "controversy" part of the incident (#2, in my mind), currently it's barely showing at all even though that's where the media coverage is. I'm fine with having a part of this article deal with the science as long as another part (or if it should be split into two articles) deals with the controversy and media coverage. It's not up to us to say that the media coverage is of no importance and to delve into scientific details - there are better articles for that which we could link to. Troed (talk) 13:00, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

That makes sense to me. The climategate controversy is interesting to anyone who follows the news. I think that we could move forward on the various aspects of the controversy at least.Jarhed (talk) 13:06, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

The point is that Wikipedia is not news, and dealing with the news media controversy in isolation without a third party source analysing that controversy would tend to replicate the news without explaining the issues. At present the various points of "controversy" are described and explained very briefly under the Content of the documents main heading: it might make sense to change the E-mails heading of Controversial points in emails. In a more organised way than at present, each email would be described together with the basic interpretation of that email, the claims of controversy and the scientific majority view response to these claims. That would satisfy NPOV requirements, including WP:LAYOUT. . dave souza, talk 15:05, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Please forgive me, but I am having problems discerning the point of your comment, other than to lecture me about what WP is and is not.Jarhed (talk) 22:32, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

The discussion seemed excessively focussed on the controversy in the news, which has tended to be superficial and seems to have largely faded away for now as the news moves on in the normal way. Any article has to describe the leak or theft, and the items singled out as being controversial. We do that at present, the debates are mentioned in a rather unorganised way. My suggestion above was a possible way of making it clearer that these are the areas of controversy. In each case we would show the basic interpretation of the document or email, the claims of controversy and the scientific majority view response to these claims. That's not well covered at present. In looking at the Santer e-mail of 12 Nov 2009 proposal, it strikes me that it might work better to have headings relating to subjects: FOIA issues would cover that email and the Jones e-mail of 2 Feb 2005. . . . dave souza, talk 23:24, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

that led to considerable world-wide commentary on the issue of AGW and that may have affected the outcome of the COP15 United Nations Climate Change Confrence. are both wrong. There was precious little discussion of [commentary on] actual climate issues; and the effect on COP15 was negligible / invisible William M. Connolley (talk) 18:18, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I ask you to please take care not to put words in my mouth. I did not say "discussion" I said commentary, which has been considerable, world-wide, and notable. I said "may" have affected because the issue is debatable and explainable, and moreover is one of the things that a reader is likely to want to know. I assure you that I am just as adamant for this article to be decently written and NPOV as you are. I think that editors who share that goal can cooperate toward it.Jarhed (talk) 22:24, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Commentary / discussion makes no difference. Please don't waste time on trivia. I've edited my reply above to use "commentary" - see, nothing changes. The *commentary* has been widespread, on the hacking itself, yes. But on actual climate issues? No William M. Connolley (talk) 23:28, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I do not consider it trivial that you misquoted what I said and called it "wrong". Call me wrong all you wish, just when you do, I will thank you to keep your comments accurate. As for the rest of your comment, it is pure POV and unbelievable.Jarhed (talk) 07:04, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for that clarification. It ties in with the conclusion of the two sources being discussed above, that the incident and subsequent claims failed to undercut the scientific consensus.[25][26] It does seem that the brief storm of media controversy was more to do with the reputations of individuals than with the broader issues, and from what I've been reading there's been a focus on trying to explain the scientific context of a decade ago rather than current science. We'd need a good source to show any effect on COP15, and I make no claim to understand its outcome. . . dave souza, talk 18:59, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Some sources claim that the scientific consensus has been undercut. I think that an exploration of this claim would be useful in this article, balanced as you said earlier by scientific "weight", and assuming that reliable sources are used. Our main limitation is what the reliable sources report, but from what I have seen I think we can cobble a solution together.Jarhed (talk) 22:30, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I think we already do?

and related climate change are not of the highest quality of scientific investigation and interpretation. CRU’s peer-reviewed publications are consistent with, and have contributed to, the overwhelming scientific consensus that the climate is being strongly influenced by human activity

but did not support claims that global warming science had been faked...The AP sent the emails to three climate scientists they selected as moderates, who did not change their view that man-made global warming as a real threat.

IPCC has "a very transparent, a very comprehensive process which ensures that even if someone wants to leave out a piece of peer reviewed literature there is virtually no possibility of that happening.

The word travesty refers to what Trenberth sees as an inadequate observing system that, were it more adequate, would be able to track the warming he believes is there

The integrity of the scientific evidence... has been called into question. And the reputation of British science has been seriously tarnished

We have every confidence in the science and the various datasets we use. The peer-review process is as robust as it could possibly be."

On December 5, however, concerned that public confidence in the science had been damaged by leaked e-mails, the Met Office indicated their intention ..... The Met Office remained confident that its analysis will be shown to be correct[58] and that the data would show a temperature rise over the past 150 years.

In response to the incident, 1,700 British scientists signed a joint statement circulated by the UK Met Office declaring their "utmost confidence in the observational evidence for global warming and the scientific basis for concluding that it is due primarily to human activities."[67] Met Office chief executive John Hirst and its chief scientist Julia Slingo asked their colleagues to sign the statement "to defend our profession against this unprecedented attack to discredit us and the science of climate change."

Climatologist James Hansen said that the controversy has "no effect on the science" and that while some of the e-mails reflect poor judgment, the evidence for human-made climate change is overwhelming

The conspiracy theorists may be having a field day, but if they really knew academia they would also know that every published paper and data set is continually put through the wringer by other independent research groups. The information that makes it into the IPCC reports is some of the most rigorously tested and debated in any area of science.

documents and e-mails had been selected deliberately to undermine the strong consensus that human activity is affecting the world's climate in ways that are potentially dangerous

None of it affects the science one iota. Accusations of data distortion or faking are baseless. I can rebut and explain all of the apparently incriminating e-mails that I have looked at, but it is going to be very time consuming to do so

The American Meteorological Society stated that the incident did not affect the society's position on climate change. They pointed to the breadth of evidence for human influence on climate, stating "For climate change research, the body of research in the literature is very large and the dependence on any one set of research results to the comprehensive understanding of the climate system is very, very small. Even if some of the charges of improper behavior in this particular case turn out to be true — which is not yet clearly the case — the impact on the science of climate change would be very limited."

The American Geophysical Union issued a statement expressing concern that the emails were "being exploited to distort the scientific debate about the urgent issue of climate change" and reaffirming their 2007 position statement[78] with regard to human influences on climate. They stated that "Science and the scientific method is seldom a linear march to the 'correct' and indisputable answer. Disagreement among scientists is part of the energy that moves inquiry forward."

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has "expressed concern that the hacked emails would weaken global resolve to curb greenhouse-gas emissions". Alan I. Leshner, CEO of the AAAS and executive publisher of the journal Science, ..... It’s important to remember, though, that the reality of climate change is based on a century of robust and well-validated science."

The statement noted that the "internal consistency from multiple lines of evidence strongly supports the work of the scientific community, including those individuals singled out in these email exchanges".

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon rejected the view that the leaked e-mails had damaged the credibility of climate science.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said that there is no doubt about the scientific evidence that underpins the Copenhagen conference

During a press briefing on December 7, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said, "I think scientists are clear on the science. I think many on Capitol Hill are clear on the science. I think that this notion that there is some debate ... on the science is kind of silly."

We should be cautious about using partial emails that have been leaked to somehow cast doubt on the scientific consensus that there is. That is very dangerous and irresponsible because the scientific consensus is clear

Ninety-five percent of the nails were in the coffin prior to this week. Now they are all in.

Obviously the article needs work and I'm sure we could work more on the notion that this release undercuts the science but we clearly already address that notion and with numerous explainations from people of why they don't think it does. In fact the size of what I quoted above should give you a hint that it's one of the major things we are addressing. Note I cut some of the explainations for brevity. Nil Einne (talk) 13:04, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

2 questions

Several of the editors here horrify me, and I am deeply disappointed. I believe it should be clear that there are two questions which Wikipedia is obligated to address:

1. the release (passive) or obtaining (active) of the packet of documents, which could be illegal, or just immoral, or a laudable "liberation" (possibly illegal) of unethically concealed information, cf. the Pentagon Papers, and

2. The conduct and attitudes revealed by the documents which have been obtained.

Treatment number one I suggest be called "Climategate", because of the common usage, and the second "Climate Science Scandal", since it satisfies every definition of that word. This is most likely, I think, one of those instances when (Emerson's foolish) consistency needs to be reconsidered. I think it is confusing (but hopefully not deliberately so) to conflate the two questions.Oiler99 (talk) 19:56, 3 January 2010 (UTC)oiler99

Your belief and horror is noted, your grasp of Wikipedia's policies seems rather shaky. Firstly, no personal attacks. As for what appears in articles, see WP:V, WP:NPOV and WP:NOR for the basics. Thanks, dave souza, talk 20:09, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Dave, I cannot see Oiler99's violation of WP:NPA and I think your grasp of that policy may be shaky. The wikilawyering brandishing of inappropriate policy is why several of the editors here horrify me too. I do not think the WP:ABC weapons you wield support your POV. Oiler99 is far from alone in thinking that WP should be dealing with the issues he describes, in much the way he describes them. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:53, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

All editors must assume good faith of other editors, and these are not "WP:ABC weapons", they are essentials of the five pillars which are the basics of what we do here. My statement was rather rushed, it is also appropriate to mention the talk page guideline which requires us to focus on improvements to the article, making specific proposals backed by sources, and not on commenting on other editors. Oiler99 is of course welcome to contribute, and will profit by following that guidance. . . dave souza, talk 11:12, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I share your disappointment and I understand your emotional reaction to some of the things that have been said on this article. I think that some editors here are hyper-agressive, for example, accusing people of violating WP policies in many instances when they have not. It might be good to consider that the agressiveness seems to have come from both sides, and to try to be patient.Jarhed (talk) 22:39, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Documentation of e-mails

The American meteorologist dr. Neil Frank has stated the following in a article in Houston Chronicle (largest daily newspaper in Texas, USA):

"Particularly disturbing was the way the core IPCC scientists (the believers) marginalized the skeptics of the theory that man-made global warming is large and potentially catastrophic. The e-mails document that the attack on the skeptics was twofold. First, the believers gained control of the main climate-profession journals. This allowed them to block publication of papers written by the skeptics and prohibit unfriendly peer review of their own papers. Second, the skeptics were demonized through false labeling and false accusations.

Climate alarmists would like you to believe the science has been settled and all respectable atmospheric scientists support their position. The believers also would like you to believe the skeptics are involved only because of the support of Big Oil and that they are few in number with minimal qualifications.

[…]

Climategate reveals how predetermined political agendas shaped science rather than the other way around. It is high time to question the true agenda of the scientists now on the hot seat and to bring skeptics back into the public debate.

— Neil Frank, Houston Chronicle, Climategate: You should be steamed (Archived at 2010-01-04)

This quotation can be used to write more into the E-mails section like "The e-mails document that the attack on the skeptical scientist was twofold. The AGW supporting scientist gained control of the main climate-profession journals, and make them block papers and prohibit unfriendly peer review of their own papers and the skeptics were demonized through false labeling and false accusations." (it could probably be written better, but what's important here is to get out some information about what the emails indicates). Nsaa (talk) 23:26, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

It's in the opinion section of the newspaper so it'd have to be filed under "reactions" or something similar. Still, feel free to throw down another proposal for including it in the email section while indicating its editorial roots.--Heyitspeter (talk) 00:56, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Please be careful to distinguish opinion pieces from straight reporting. In my view the article already has too much of the former and too little of the latter. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 23:29, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Also, it appears to be rather ill informed. What papers were blocked? From what I've seen, an email gossiped about wanting to prevent publication of an incompetent paper, it was published anyway and subsequently shown to be incompetent. Peer review should mean that unsuitably low quality work isn't published, but it doesn't always succeed. . . dave souza, talk 23:45, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps you should read more about the emails before you comment on them. Here's one example: http://climateaudit.org/2009/12/22/climategatekeeping-schmidt-2009/.Jarhed (talk) 09:31, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

About "trick to hide the decline" – removing well sourced comments?

Why is a well sourced paragraph like this

Stephen McIntyre states in this paper that the "trick to hide the decline" consisted in discarding the tree ring data starting from 1961, because the proxy data for this years demonstrated a sharp decrease of temperatures, contrary to the real data - casting therefore doubt on reliability of all the tree ring data reconstruction.

removed? It's an area expert ("climate statistician"), and it's not only quoted from him but from a WP:RS source. Nsaa (talk) 02:14, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Per #Jones email 19th take two above, there a number of issue with this, and it's not a reliable source for science. . . dave souza, talk 02:21, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I do not see a consensus in that section to remove it. Prodego ^talk 02:24, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

@dave souza: Why isn't it a reliable source? It's used in our FAQ A5 and in the article several times (See [27] [28] [29]). What's called? Cherry picking? Nsaa (talk) 02:34, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

See my comment at #Blog-sourced material removed below. . . dave souza, talk 11:17, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

McIntyre's not an expert. McIntyre's "paper" is a blog post. A blog post by a non-expert is not a reliable source. And there's no such thing as a "climate statistician"; even if there was, McIntyre has no advanced degree in that field. He has just the one co-authored publication in the peer-reviewed literature, and that pub has few if any positive citations. He's not a reliable source for the science. Guettarda (talk) 05:35, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Saying that McIntyre is not an expert in this area is clearly incorrect. McIntyre has at least 3 peer-reviewed publications on this specific topic, and you wouldn't expect many positive citations of articles that criticize the quality of the research of some of the biggest names in the field. His research has had a notable impact on climate science, and he has engaged in debates in the peer-reviewed literature with the biggest names in the field. I think your obvious dislike of McIntyre is beginning to bias your view of his notability. His views belong in this article. SkipSmith (talk) 08:20, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Three? I'm only aware of one. What are the other two? As for "obvious dislike" - I honestly have no opinion about the man, one way or the other. Guettarda (talk) 13:48, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

RealClimate is a blog as well, but there appears to be no issue with using them as a reliable source to explain the "hide the decline" comment. TruthOutThere (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 09:03, 4 January 2010 (UTC).

I would appreciate it if someone would explain this disagreement to me, because I am having problems understanding it. RealClimate and ClimateAudit appear to me to have similiar reliability: they are both blogs and can be credibly accused of pushing an agenda. Therefore, in an effort to reach NPOV, we should agree to either include or exclude them both as credible sources.

BTW, you don't have to spend much time reading McIntyre's blog to admire him for being a class act: he works hard to present his findings, data, and opinions reasonably and verifiably. He even polices his commenters, something that RealClimate most assuredly does not do. In any case, personal attacks on McIntyre are not helpful in the context of this article.Jarhed (talk) 09:39, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

This seems to be wrong

The article says: "Selected information from these documents has been distributed by opponents of the case for anthropogenic global warming in a controversy dubbed Climategate.[3]"

All sorts of outlets have distributed "selected information", like newspapers and the BBC and ABC, or the Reuters article that is referenced here. So, it's not just "opponents of the case for anthropogenic global warming", which is a rather clumsy description in and of itself. Alice Lyddel (talk) 03:42, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. What if we delete that sentence, and then change the first sentence of the next paragraph from this:

"The controversy arose after various allegations were made including that climate scientists colluded[6] to withhold scientific information,[7] interfered with the peer-review process to prevent dissenting scientific papers from being published,[8] deleted e-mails and raw data to prevent data being revealed under the Freedom of Information Act,[9] and manipulated data to make the case for global warming appear stronger than it is.[9]"

To this?:

"The controversy, dubbed Climategate,[include here the source from the sentence in question] arose after various allegations were made including that climate scientists colluded[6] to withhold scientific information,[7] interfered with the peer-review process to prevent dissenting scientific papers from being published,[8] deleted e-mails and raw data to prevent data being revealed under the Freedom of Information Act,[9] and manipulated data to make the case for global warming appear stronger than it is.[9]"

This seems to me to include the meat of the sentence while cutting out the disputed content. Thoughts?--Heyitspeter (talk) 05:18, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Time magazine of 7 Dec 2009 addressed the issue of who calls it what here. I've taken out the disputed line and added another line at the place you suggest that describes the alternative names for the controversy and the inferred meanings behind them. I think it's important to note that "Climategate" is meant to convey a specific POV. -- ChrisO (talk) 08:49, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Oh? What POV is that, because I have no idea.Jarhed (talk) 09:48, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Time states "Skeptics of global warming, who have long considered climate change a fraud, refer to the incident as "Climategate," with obvious intimations of scandal and cover-up." Hipocrite (talk) 10:47, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Blog-sourced material removed

I have removed this material added by User:Psb777, which was sourced to a blog. Please note that per WP:SELFPUB, self-published sources must not be used to source "claims about third parties" and they "should never be used as third-party sources about living persons, even if the author is a well-known professional researcher or writer". Restoring this material will constitute a violation of WP:V and WP:BLP. I would like to remind people that "citing unencyclopedic sources" is a form of disruptive editing, which the current article probation forbids. -- ChrisO (talk) 09:09, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I did not add the material originally. We have been through this again and again. There is no SELFPUB here. Undeniably the Daily Mail is a reliable source, whether you like the newspaper or not. If a newspaper reports the statement of someone we can report it. And it matters not whether that statement is spoken or in a blog. So says WP:RS and countless resolutions at WP:RSN. I note the allegation of WP:V and WP:BLP violation and deny there is either. Having been thru this again and again I cannot believe you do not know it. Therefore I hold your reversion to be disruptive and your reasoning specious, and remind you of the article probation in turn. Paul Beardsell (talk) 09:40, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I have noticed as well that some editors keep getting reverted on unfounded claims of policy violation. Clearly such deletions are disruptive in violation of "article probation" and just plain common courtesy.Jarhed (talk) 09:46, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

ChrisO, can you explain why you did that instead of agreeing to my proposal to change the source of that paragraph to an undisputed WP:RS instead? Troed (talk) 10:37, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

What now? As the article is under probation can I just sit back and wait for intervention/arbitration or must I specifically ask for that? Paul Beardsell (talk) 09:40, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Unless it specifically meets the exemptions in WP:RS, blogs should not be used as sources for anything. If an otherwise reliable source says something and cites it to a blog, we should evaluate if the reliable source is putting it's reliability on the statement, or if it's just repeating blogging. If the later, I would seriously question if it's worth including. Hipocrite (talk) 10:28, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I note that ChrisO has no objection to the other pro-CRU blog being cited. Here the McIntyre blog is not used as the source, the Daily Mail is. If the DM says McIntyre said something to their reporter on the phone we would accept that as WP:RS. When the DM reports what McI says in his blog we would not? C'mon! You're making policy on the hoof. Paul Beardsell (talk) 10:49, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

There appears to be a fullsome discussion about your proposal above at the "Jones email 19th take two" section that resulted in what appeared to be agreement that, at the very least, the appropriate source was the CNN panel, and that a 1997 paper should be included in the mix. I wonder why you didn't take any of that thread, which you participated in, on board when you made your edit. Hipocrite (talk) 10:53, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

As I have now explained twice on your Talk page, I did not introduce either version to the page. Someone else did. I agree they could have introduced the better version. I agree that I could have re-introduced the better version rather than revert the deletion. You do not criticise the deleter for not improving instead of deleting. But I accept your criticism and I move now to include the better version, with your implicit approval. Paul Beardsell (talk) 11:23, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Please don't put words in my mouth. Hipocrite (talk) 12:15, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Please note what Hipocrite says - a blog should not be used "unless it specifically meets the exemptions in WP:RS". I presume your objection refers to the use of RealClimate as a source on the hacking of its own server. It is quoted under the exemptions in question, just as Climate Audit is quoted as a source on the hacker's use of that website in a failed attempt to disseminate the files that had been uploaded to RealClimate. I wonder why you are objecting to RealClimate as a source on that issue but not to the use of Climate Audit? There is no exemption for the use of a blog as a source on a third party, especially not a living person ("never" means "never"). -- ChrisO (talk) 12:52, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

<ri> The paragraph concerned included a link, supposedly to "a paper", but actually to McIntyre's blog: confusingly, the blog page concerned only gives two diagrams and a link to the Daily Mail article which is cited inline at the end of the paragraph. The Daily Mail is a tabloid with a particularly poor reputation for science reporting, and as such is unsuitable for a statement on science, particularly one with the WP:BLP issue of accusations that a living scientist committed fraud. Per WP:RS, "Reliable non-academic sources may also be used in articles about scholarly issues, particularly material from high-quality mainstream publications. Deciding which sources are appropriate depends on context. Material should be attributed in-text where sources disagree." Note also that "Questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for checking the facts" and WP:SELFPUB applies. The first link implies McIntyre's endorsement of the article, but the article contains blatant errors as well as the misleading slant which is shown in the summary. So, we can use this material with care to explicity state McIntyre's views as published in the tabloid, but must not give the impression that it's a scientific paper or that it's anything other than a minority view, and must show the majority view of the questions it raises. In accordance with the layout provision of NPOV it would be better placed with the other "criticisms" of the email, and followed by an explanation. . . dave souza, talk 10:58, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Controversial editors on this article

It's not appropriate to insinuate other editors are acting in bad faith. Either post proof or don't comment.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Perhaps I am slow, but I just noticed that there is at least one editor on this article who is himself a part of the controversy. Has this issue already been discussed and is everyone ok with that? I would think that, considering how scrupulous everyone apparently is about BLP, that such would be a BIG violation thereof.Jarhed (talk) 09:58, 4 January 2010 (UTC) No editors here appear to be parties to the controversy. Please be mindful of WP:BLP. Hipocrite (talk) 09:59, 4 January 2010 (UTC) It depends upon on what you mean by "the controversy". I had thought that two editors here are mentioned in the hacked/leaked material. Am I wrong? Certainly two have very close connections with the CRU. Paul Beardsell (talk) 10:41, 4 January 2010 (UTC) I suggest that you are treading on, if not over, the line. If you have evidence that editors here have a COI, present it, don't pussyfoot around it. Hipocrite (talk) 10:46, 4 January 2010 (UTC) Anyways, there has been this COI case that found no COI. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 10:52, 4 January 2010 (UTC) I didn't say there was a COI. But William is mentioned in the e-mails hacked/leaked e-mails. That is all I said. That they are a party to the controversy. No allegation. But it does depend what you think the controversy is. Paul Beardsell (talk) 11:51, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Swifthack?

I see that this term has been added to the lead. Is this really appropriate? Obviously WP:GOOGLE applies, but I don't see a single reliable source using this term on Google News. Does a single reference in one article justify double the lead coverage of the term "Climategate", which is used in hundreds of sources? Oren0 (talk) 10:14, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

"Swifthack" seems sourced to Time Magazine. Time Magazine is unquestionably reliable. Hipocrite (talk) 10:17, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

What about WP:UNDUE ? Swifthack seems to exist in one WP:RS only (and we include the citation of the term at length) while Climategate is to be found in numerous other WP:RS. My google-skills might've failed me though, but I searched over several pages of results. Troed (talk) 12:08, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

WP is not in the business of promoting neologisms but reflecting terms in use. When a number of significant sources start using this new term, when people aware of the Climategate controversy don't say "huh? what?" to this neologism, then we'll reflect its usage here. Not before. I suggest. Paul Beardsell (talk) 12:18, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

We are supposed to represent both sides of a dispute. Since "Climategate" was coined to convey a specific meaning (-gate#Etymology, usage and history of -gate gives useful background info on the general subject of -gate names), we should note what that meaning is, and we should note that other parties disagree with that view of the issue and have presented an opposing perspective (i.e. that it is an artificial "scandal"). This sort of balancing of perspectives is simply what NPOV requires. -- ChrisO (talk) 12:43, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, but we're not currently following WP:UNDUE, as we should. Swifthack, from what I can see in WP:RS is a minority phrase which we do not reflect at all. Troed (talk) 13:03, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

"Swifthack" is reliably-sourced (Google News), although less popular. In this instance it would not be unreasonable to say that we should either have both neologisms or neither. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:12, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I could only find blogs and opinion pieces when going through the results from your link though? I still believe, after having gone through WP:RS, that it's a minority term compared to Climategate which is on the contrary well sourced and in active use. While I cannot ask Google Trends to only use what we would consider reliable media, this comparison pretty much says everything. "Swifthack" is used by a small small minority, not even registering on the map. WP:UNDUE clearly applies. Troed (talk) 14:28, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, it would be unreasonable to argue that we should include both or neither. That argument implies they are of roughly equal footing. The neologism Climatequiddick is probably more accurate than either ClimateGate or SwiftHack, but it didn’t catch on, so it isn’t included. We don’t include terms because they accurately capture the event, we don’t include a rare term for political balance, we include terms that have wide acceptance in RS.SPhilbrickT 15:21, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Recent changes not discussed here

A few recent changes to the article have been made without discussion here on the Talk page despite the article's probation status. I intend to revert them, creating a sub-section for their discussion here, where a consensus as to their inclusion can be found, one way or the other. Paul Beardsell (talk) 12:18, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Probation does not mean that every edit has to be vetted through talk. I would suggest you discuss first and revert later, unless there are edits that you strongly feel are unacceptable in itself. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:21, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, thanks for that. Indeed, those edits which I genuinely feel are uncontroversial and that no one will complain about I intend to leave alone. I will try very hard to maintain every appearance of neutrality, and I ask you correct me should I fail to do so. Paul Beardsell (talk) 12:31, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Stephan. I strongly advise against engaging in disruptive editing, as it is likely to lead to an enforcement request. You have already been formally notified of the article probation, and you have indicated on my talk page that you are aware of the requirements. Please do as Stephan suggests and discuss your issues with the changes first. -- ChrisO (talk) 12:36, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Stephan too. As he suggests, except where edits are controversial plainly, I will first discuss. Paul Beardsell (talk) 12:49, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

ChrisO, I have formally notified you of the article probation and it is your edits I am finding problematic. My edits of the article are good faith attempts to reflect the consensus here. Yours, I suggest, are not. Your repeeated assertions of my poor behaviour are unsubstantiated by particulars. Now, please leave me alone, there is no need to warn me, I know what I am doing and I take full responsibility for my actions - I will not claim ignorance as an excuse. Paul Beardsell (talk) 12:46, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm happy to discuss any problems you have with any changes that I have made. What are the issues you have with them? -- ChrisO (talk) 12:49, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I am about to. Paul Beardsell (talk) 12:53, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll await your comments and will do my best to respond to them. -- ChrisO (talk) 13:16, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I haven't forgotten you, but I'm going to get some sleep. Paul Beardsell (talk) 14:03, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Tree ring data is rubbish but so what?

This edit is problematic. The point does need to be made that the lack of the tree ring data does not destroy the climate warming argument. But the way we do this, here, makes it seem we are editorialising, embarking on some type of WP:SYN synthesis. It isn't for us to quote a WP:RS saying A=>B and another WP:RS saying B=>C and then to say haha A=>C. But let's be clear here, in the section where this edit I don't like appears, the section is about the e-mail, and why it is controversial. The issue here is not whether AGW is occurring, but about the e-mail which *some* say shows cheating by *some* scientists. We aren't saying the e-mail admitting the "trick" doesn't matter because even if the tree ring data is rubbish AGW is occurring anyway. No, the e-mail still matters and requires explanation/excuse/uderstanding. So this edit is improperly juxtaposed here. Paul Beardsell (talk) 12:43, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

McIntyre's promotors, if not his own writings, spread the idea that the tree ring data is the only proxy, and that the changes made to a graph on the cover of a report show all the continuing research and updating of ideas to be cheating. Science doesn't mean that if one part of a data set shows problems you discard all the data, it means investigating the problems and that's been a continuing process. We have to give due weight to the majority view, and not obscure it when describing minority views. . . dave souza, talk 13:23, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, once again, I agree, or not, so what? That does nothing to minimise the controversy over *this* e-mail. That controversy is not fairly dealt with by showing AGW is occurring. Or not. The controversy over the e-mail remains even if Greenland melts tomorrow. (although we would have other things to worry about) Paul Beardsell (talk) 13:56, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Agree. I think Hipocrite should discuss the phrasing here at the talk page. While I believe the edit to be in good faith and an attempt at conveying the consensus from earlier it's out of place to start discussing a paper on the divergence problem as if it was part of McIntyre's quote. The actual new phrasing of the quote also reads a bit funny since it starts of with tree records and immideately goes into the "divergence problem". That should at least just be a proper link, maybe to another article where the 2008 paper is discussed in detail? This is after all an article on the email incident/controversy and not yet another article on the science of climate change. There are better articles for that. Troed (talk) 13:00, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

You both raise a good point. I'll clarify. Hipocrite (talk) 13:01, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I've taken another stab at it. Hipocrite (talk) 13:07, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

The introduction to the section was unclear, I've modified it to reflect more fully the cited sources, and added a 1997 source discussing the divergence problem and recommending that tree ring proxies post 1960 should be discarded. The positioning of the McIntyre para remains problematic, as it should be made clear that his is a "skeptic" minority view and the points he makes should be shown in the context of the majority view, which the 2008 paper shows. If we want a reference relating it to the article, RealClimate: The CRU hack links to its article on that paper as "the recent discussion in this paper", shown in the RealClimate statement in the article. . dave souza, talk 13:18, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I hardly think that disregarding the data when it fails to support your hypothesis is accepted practise by the scientific majority! Therefore, that McIntyre is a member of the skeptical minority seems hardly relevant. We use McI here because he is the one who has been most clearly raising the flag on this issue. The argument which Jones, Mann et al have to address is whether or not the parts of the tree ring data are being rightfully ignored in their post hoc justification. Now, they seemed to be doing a good job of that until Jones unfortunate e-mail language (i.e. the controversy of this section) which so many scientists are charitable enough to assume is playfully sarcastic! But I digress! Who cares if McI is a member of the skeptical minority? He's the guy to quote here. We are not in the business of constructing Jones' defence here. Paul Beardsell (talk) 14:23, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Your description of "disregarding the data when it fails to support your hypothesis" is blatantly inaccurate, either you've been misled or you've not examined the sources which show that they published the data, published the problems and proposed ways of investigating the divergence problem, and continued that investigation. While it was in progress, the defective part of the reconstruction (not data) was omitted from a figure showing a graph of three reconstructions. The only one ignoring the work on the divergence problem seems to have been McIntyre. . . dave souza, talk 14:41, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

My argument was made slightly tongue in cheek. Continuing in the same vein: they were doing so well with their "divergence problem" until the language of Jones' e-mail which now demands sympathetic explanation for your POV to hold sway. And it is that e-mail which is the subject of the section the editing of which we are discussing. That is what we are discussing. Paul Beardsell (talk) 15:02, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I also had a go. I think the problem is that we're including too much; the second half (McIntyre also says that since the cause of the divergence problem is unknown, and may have existed in earlier periods, tree ring records can't be used to estimate temperatures in the past.) just isn't relevant here. It belongs over at divergence problem (the issue does; that McI quote probably doesn't). This isn't the page to debate climate science. All that is necessary is to explain what the phrase means, and what it consists of William M. Connolley (talk) 13:37, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

While you are correct that we shouldn't repeat reports of climate science here duplicating efforts in other articles, this article is about the incident/controversy and McIntyre is used by WP:RS to explain "the trick" amongst others. Dave souza is on the right track in how to report a minority view, but your edit made a mockery out of all the attempts here at the talk page in how to phrase this paragraph. We should discuss it further. Troed (talk) 13:41, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

We have two options: we can confine the article to explaining the documents and noting the "controversy", as is done in the remainder of the section, or we can go into more detail on specific skeptic claims, presenting them properly as minority scientific views and showing clearly the majority view of these claims. In this instance McIntyre deceives by omission, something apparent both in the CNN program and in the tabloid article. Whether his cryptic comments are a notable part of the "controversy" is questionable. . . dave souza, talk 13:47, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Echoing I think what others are saying: The controversy over the e-mail remains whatever the underlying science. I suggest that it is not for us to explain away the controversy over Jones' e-mail by synthesising an argument calling McI into disrepute. The point is plain, surely: The language of "trick" and "hide the decline" remains problematic. It's not for us to make excuses for Jones, here. We seem to be constructing the defence he will be using at the UEA enquiry, m'lud, (that's how it reads!) not just dispassionately saying why there is a controversy. Paul Beardsell (talk) 13:56, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I think the correct solution is to explain why we're mentioning McIntyre here. "Stephen McIntyre, a scientist often mentioned in the leaked emails, give the following opinion on "the trick" when asked by MSM" or something to that effect. (Note - I do not suggest my specific wording above, but you get the idea). That satisfies why, who's opinion it is etc. Troed (talk) 14:01, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

The whole section needs to be redrafted entirely because it is too long and too quote-farmy. I will try and do that but it will be bold and I expect no-one will like it. I don't support long descriptions of people who are already linked, as it can lead to well-poisoning, and don't think either that it's necessary to describe McIntyre as a scientist. Itsmejudith (talk) 14:26, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. In fact, describing McIntyre as a "scientist" might even be somewhat misleading, because the assumption of the reader will be that he is a scientist in this specific field (which is disputed). -- Scjessey (talk) 14:29, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Where is that disputed? He's factually a published scientist in exactly this field - the whole "remove the decline" issue is over presenting a better looking hockey stick - the same stick McIntyre originally found statistical flaws with. Again, it's not up to us to assert WP:TRUTH here, we go by WP:RS and they clearly thinks McIntyre's comments on this controversy are worth something. Thus, we should report that. Troed (talk) 14:38, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

He's a bloody clever statistician to have gotten them to re-assess the N.American temperatures downwards by 0.7 deg without having access to their models. For which he was thanked. Precious few tenured PhD climate scientists in ivory towers have single handedly made such a significantly contribution. He is a published scientist with a good quality maths degree and some postgrad experience to add to decades of real world experience, who is now a scientist in the way they were 100 years ago. Paul Beardsell (talk) 14:47, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

But he's not a climate scientist. He's a mathematician who worked in the minerals business, and then began applying his knowledge of statistics to support his skeptical stance towards anthropogenic climate change. He's very good at crunching numbers and mining data, but his scientific background with respect to climate change itself is essentially nonexistent. His own bio corroborates this. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:58, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

This is a common response, but it's not correct. Most scientists with good input into climate science are not "climate scientists" - but paleogeologists, atmospheric physicists, sea level specialist etc etc. Since there's provably statistical problems in some papers about climate the proper scientists to point that out would be those with expertise in statistics. It's of no actual importance whether data comes from "climate proxies" or not when falsifying the use of improper statistical methods etc. Troed (talk) 15:04, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Troed's quicker than me. (ec) What is a climate scientist? As I understand it you do one of chemistry, physics, maths, biology together with geography and then you're a meteorologist, maybe. There is no one route to becoming a climate scientist. You'll find a very mixed bag of backgrounds amongst those describing themselves as climatologists. With everything so firmly based on models being an applied mathematician might be the very best qualification, if you were to try and break into the field. That's McIntyre. And precious few of them have single handedly managed to make a contribution like that of McIntyre's which I described. Paul Beardsell (talk) 15:13, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm looking forward to your suggested changes. Troed (talk) 14:38, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

(unindent) I shortened the section so see what you all think. Let's please keep some issues separate a) whether we think McIntyre has done good work, b) whether we personally think he meets the criterion for "a scientist", and c) whether we think he should be described as "a scientist" in this article. C) is the only one that ought to be discussed on this talk page. I already said what I think. Itsmejudith (talk) 14:53, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I like it! (Some markup to fix, and it's somewhat "he said", "they said" repeating - but a lot better). My main objection to the resent change was to present other research as part of McIntyre's quote. You splitting that up makes the section much more readable. Good job. Troed (talk) 14:58, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Me too, thank you! Paul Beardsell (talk) 15:34, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, it streamlined the issues and I've made some further clarifications. . dave souza, talk 15:43, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

But I have a niggle with the subsequently added "The other two reconstructions also used other proxy data, including corals, ice cores and lake sediments." which destroys the connection between the two paragraphs it now separates. Jones was not talking about ice cores or corals or lake sediments in his e-mail, he was talking about tree rings. We continue to rehearse the climate chnage argument, but this is a section on *that* e-mail. Paul Beardsell (talk) 15:34, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

It's a clarification direct from the source, to avoid the misperception that all the reconstructions were based on the tree rings. Jones states that one reconstruction used only tree rings, leaving it unclear what the other reconstructions used. . . dave souza, talk 15:43, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I summarised just from the quotes that were already in the article and didn't go back to the sources. Ideally people will now go to the sources to check that there has been no inadvertent cherry picking. And I know the style is now very boring but perhaps it is still better than having a quotefarm. When we're ready to go for GA then we can get the article properly copyedited. Itsmejudith (talk) 15:54, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Agree, with thanks. That's what I've been doing. I've now moved the clarification on proxies to the start of the paragraph, to meet Paul Beardsell's concern about it interrupting the connection to the following paragraph. The graph concerned is what *that* e-mail was discussing, and we need to be clear about it. . . dave souza, talk 16:02, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Realclimate as a RS

On this section: "Before the incident, continuing research had already presented reconstructions based on more proxies, and found similar results with or without the tree ring records."

Realclimate is been used as a reliable source. Being it a blog and now knowing that realclimate has been used as a tool to push the AGW, how can we still have it been used as a RS, especially to try to prove that other reconstructions based of proxies found similar results?Echofloripa (talk) 17:10, 4 January 2010 (UTC)