IOP Sees Errors Of Its Ways

If you remember, one of the sub-stories to come out the frenzy around the CRU email hack was a controversy over the Institute Of Physics' statement to the U.K. Science and Technology Committee in which they, among other things, suggested that the non-U.K. scientists who had been drawn into the CRU Hack controversy should be investigated by the Committee--that the committee should start an international witch hunt.

In other words, the IOP statement came across as a typical piece of denialist crap.

After the statement was issued, push-back ensued from enraged IOP members and the media, and the institute began to "clarify" its way out of the pickle it found itself in. What eventually became clear was that the Institute's statement had been hi-jacked by members of its energy sub-committee, who managed to steer their document through the IOP's larger administrative structure and land it (the statement) on the desk of U.K. Science and Technology. Now Peter Gill, one of the the members of the energy sub-committee, and a known denialist, has spoken out, and while I don't take his account at face-value, this part--a letter from the IOP to members of the Energy sub-committee--seems straight-forward enough:

Following the meeting of the Science Board on 17 June 2010, it is with regret that I announce that the Energy Sub-group is to be disbanded, immediately. This, as you can imagine, is a direct consequence of the Climategate affair.

So, some retroactive justice, at least.

For another account of an organization (the American Physical Society) infiltrated and made to look silly by deniers, try this.

More On the Adventures Of The IOP

Ever since the once respected Institute of Physics issued its wild-eyed statement on the CRU Hack, its been trying to "clarify" its way out of the consequences (ie. shock and revulsion among its membership). What has become increasingly clear is that Denialists were able to hijack its Energy Group, and then its Energy sub-Group, and slip their statement out the door without proper oversight from the governing body. Some general background on that here and here. And it looks like Terri Jackson, one of the folks in question, is using her IOP connections to stake a place on the global warming denial rubber chicken circuit.


DC's piece is most interesting, as it presents strong evidence that knowledge of the IOP's statement was conveyed in advance (almost a month in advance, in fact) to climate change denier and swivel-eyed lunatic Christopher Monckton:

Monckton was touring Australia – perhaps still is – and during that tour he made some allusions to Climate Scientists being about to face criminal charges, and also to peak academic bodies having some very interesting submissions to make to the UK inquiry.
[...]

From what I’ve seen, Monckton, Plimer, Carter, etc are in frequent enough contact with each other and the organisations that circulate fud as their strategy, that I’m fairly confident Monckton knew ahead of time and was basically boasting

As DC notes:

Monckton’s tour began in early February, well before the parliamentary submission deadline of February 12. And the IOP submission wasn’t released to the general public until the end of that month, along with the other received submissions.

So, a thoroughly planned out and well-executed exercise in fud creation. Very much like the infiltration of the APS, which Monckton also had a hand in.

Latest IOP Retreat

It all began with a stem-winder of a statement from the U.K. Institute of Physics to the U.K. Science and Technology Committee in which they, among other things, suggested that the non-U.K. scientists who had been drawn into the CRUC Hack controversy should also be investigated by the Committee--in other words, that the committee should start an international witch hunt rather than just a national one. Well, this got the IOP into no end of trouble, especially after the role of climate changer denier Peter Gill in crafting the original statement came to light. On their main web-Page, the IOP issued not one but two "clarifications" of their first statement, in which they jettison some of the wilder charges in that statement while claiming to stand behind the basic principles contained within it. Until yesterday. Yesterday, moving the issue to the IOP blog, a third clarification was issued. This one doesn't add much to the other two, but does touch on process issues. In other words, how did the original piece of crap manage to sale through the process to see the light of day in the first place. Best bits:

In its statement, the Institute says that the evidence submitted to parliament followed “the process we always use for agreeing documents of this kind", noting that it submits 40 to 50 evidence statements to parliamentary inquiries per year. "We asked the energy sub-group of our Science Board to prepare the evidence, based on its analysis of material that is in the public domain following the hacking of the CRU e-mails last year," says the IOP. "The draft was circulated to the Science Board, which is a formal committee of the Institute with delegated authority from its trustees to oversee its policy work, and approved. However, we are already reviewing our consultation process for preparing policy submissions, and the comments we have received on this submission reinforce the need to make sure our procedures are as robust as possible."

The Institute also says it "strongly rebuts" accusations of “being overly influenced by one ‘climate-change sceptic’ on the energy sub-group, and then of a lack of openness about the authorship of our evidence". It adds that "The individual in question had no significant influence on the preparation of the evidence. Responsibility for the evidence rests with our Science Board, whose members’ names are openly available on our website."

Now the weird thing is: I can't find the new "statement" quoted here on the main website, although its early and I may just be missing something. But it seems as though the IOP is trying to shuffle the whole controversy off the main-stage.

The Institute Of Physics Regrets...

The IOP wriggles a bit more, clarifying their original clarification. I've juxtaposed some of the March 2 vs. March 5 passages:

March 2:

The Institute’s statement, which has been published both on the Institute’s website and the Committee’s, has been interpreted by some individuals to imply that it does not support the scientific evidence that the rising concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is contributing to global warming.

March 5:

We regret that our submission has been seized upon by some individuals to imply that IOP does not support the scientific evidence that the rising concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is contributing to global warming.

March 2:

That is not the case. The Institute’s position on climate change is clear: the basic science is well enough understood to be sure that our climate is changing – and that we need to take action now to mitigate that change. More information about IOP’s views can be found on its website here.

March 5:

IOP’s position on global warming is clear: the basic science is well established and there is no doubt that climate change is happening and that we should be taking action to address it now.

This passage from March 2:

It reflected our belief that the open exchange of data, procedures and materials is fundamental to the scientific process. From the information already in the public domain it appears that these principles have been put at risk in the present case, and that this has undermined the trust that is placed in the scientific process.

...is replaced by something milder on March 5th:

The evidence to the Committee was focused however on the need to maintain the integrity, openness and unbiased nature of the scientific process. The key points it makes are ones to which we are deeply committed – ie that science should be communicated openly and reviewed in an unbiased way. However much we sympathise with the way in which CRU researchers have been confronted with hostile requests for information, we believe the case for openness remains just as strong.

And a bit on procedures missing from the March 2 edition:

The preparation of the evidence followed the process we always use for agreeing documents of this kind. We asked the Energy Sub-Group of our Science Board to prepare the evidence, based on their analysis of the material which is already in the public domain. The evidence was then circulated around Science Board, which is a formal committee of the Institute with delegated authority from its trustees to oversee its policy work, and approved.

The actual submission, mind you (and I haven't gone through it thoroughly), does NOT seem to have changed. They are still calling for a broader inquiry to cover those researchers not associated with CRU but who might have conspired with them.

IOP Statement Authors Still Anonymous

So where we left this story was: the U.K.'s Institute of Physics wrote an extremely critical statement in regards to the University of East Anglia's handling of FOI requests from climate change sceptics, and submitted it to the U.K. Science and Technology Committee, who have been investigating various issues behind the CRU hack. Later they issued a "clarification" of the statement designed to make it sound a little less nutty. But when asked who the actual authors of the original piece were, the IOP clammed up, other than to say they were part of the IOP's energy sub-group...whose members they refused to identify!

As W. Connolley wrote, what had mostly likely happened was that the energy sub-group was "hijacked" by deniers, who then composed their statement and managed to steer it through the larger administrative structure of the IOP and land it on the desk of the committee.

And then it was was discovered by me (I think), here on this blog, that the identity of one of the sub-group's members was one Peter Gill, who had more than a sniff of denialism about him.

Cue the U.K. Gaurdian's David Adam: yeah, it turns out Peter Gill is a Warmocaust Collusionist and, yeah, he was "involved" in the preparation of the IOP document, but the IOP won't get more specific, and still won't say who the other sub-group members are. Their reasoning is, to put it mildly, bizarre:

The institute supplied a statement from an anonymous member of its science board, which said: "The institute should feel relaxed about the process by which it generated what is, anyway, a statement of the obvious." It added: "The points [the submission] makes are ones which we continue to support, that science should be practised openly and in an unbiased way. However much we sympathise with the way in which CRU researchers have been confronted with hostile requests for information, we believe the case for openness remains just as strong."

...which is to say that the the IOP feels comfortable issuing anonymous demands for scientific openness.

More coverage here.

U.K. Institute Of Physics Sort Of Retracts

Of all the nutty submissions placed before the U.K. Science and Technology Committee, this stem-winder from the U.K. Institute of Physics--which seemed to suggest, among other things, that there had been wrong-doing not only among the UEA's Climate Research Unit (CRU, headed by Phil Jones), but among the international scientists that swapped emails with the CRU team--was the most disturbing. It sounded like a prank, or perhaps the work of a small group within the IoP that had hijacked the organization to send out denialist literature under its name (remember the infiltration of the APS?).

At the moment, option number two looks most likely, for yesterday the IoP felt the need to issue a reinterpretation of their original statement:

The Institute's statement, which has been published both on the Institute's website and the Committee's, has been interpreted by some individuals to imply that it does not support the scientific evidence that the rising concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is contributing to global warming.

That is not the case. The Institute's position on climate change is clear: the basic science is well enough understood to be sure that our climate is changing – and that we need to take action now to mitigate that change.

The U.K. Gaurdian has written about this sudden turnabout; the best bit from their story:

The institute statement says its submission was approved by its science board, a formal committee of experts that oversees its policy work.

The Guardian has been unable to find a member of the board that supports the submission. Two of the scientists listed as members said they had declined to comment on a draft submission prepared by the institute, because they were not climate experts and had not read the UEA emails. Others would not comment or did not respond to enquiries.

An institute spokesperson said the submission was "strongly supported" by three members of the board. "All members were invited to comment. Only a few did, all concerned approved [the submission] unanimously."

So, nobody can find the people that wrote the submission??? The bottom line--as reported by Stoat (that's Connelley)--seems to be that a small "Energy sub-group" within the IoP science group managed to slip this stuff passed the larger IoP leadership. You can read about their "sceptical" credentials at Stoat's place.

And it seems the reinterpretation has been inspired by a backlash from within the IoP membership that is, even now, being conveyed to IoP poobahs behind the scenes. But I would agree that it isn't really enough. The story of the IoP condemnation of CRU has gone international; the organization has been made fools of, and their new statement amounts to a bit of "we didn't really mean what we clearly said" arse covering. They should issue a complete and thorough retraction of their first statement, and an apology to everyone involved.

PS. One of the IOP's mysterious Energy sub-group members appears to be Peter Gill. His sceptics creds include supporting Nigel Lawson's efforts to address the IOP. Also, Feroze Duggan appears to have been a member of the group until at least 2008. Also, Dr John Roberts of University of Sheffield was recently a part of the sub-group, though perhaps not currently.