Jump to content

Talk:Andrew Montford/Archive 1

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Archive 1

Comments by FellGleaming

Hi Mark, excuse my Wikipedia ignorance, but I'm not only not quite sure what you're referring to, but I am ashamed to say I wasn't previously aware of this WP feature in general. I assume this page is some sort of sandbox for creating a new article on Montford? Or are you referring to another existing WP article? Fell Gleaming(talk) 17:40, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Ya it`s like a sandbox, but instead of username/sandbox you put username/yourarticlewip. My sandbox fills up quickly so i do this for articles i work on slowly. The ref problem is up above, any ideas why different urls are going into one url? mark nutley (talk) 17:42, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
O and this is the talk page for the article wip, the actual article wip is the userpage mark nutley (talk) 17:44, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
Ah, I understand now. I fixed the problem for you. Different urls, but had the same friendly name. Fell Gleaming(talk) 17:53, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks mate, gotta remember that little trick :) I reckon the article is nearly ready to go to mainspace, if you have a minute to spare would you look it over for any obvious errors, thanks mark nutley (talk) 18:31, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

"amateur non-journalist"

WTF is an "amateur non-journalist" and how does it differ from a professional non-journo? Would a professional non-journo be *better* at not being a journalist, and therefore more scrupulously avoid journalism? Tim is a blogger whose blog could often be considered journalism, so I guess I agree that he isn't a professional at not being a journalist William M. Connolley (talk) 20:38, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Despite WMC's unhelpful tone, I do agree the construction is inelegant. Perhaps "writer" is most appropriate. Fell Gleaming(talk) 20:52, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
It`s what it says in the ref, WMC was most insistent on using what is in the ref`s on the The Hockey Stick Illusion article, so that is what i have done here mark nutley (talk) 21:10, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
This source [1] calls him an environmental writer. That seems a fair, well-sourced, and elegant title. Fell Gleaming(talk) 21:18, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
Err well that ought to teach you not to use Ridley as a source William M. Connolley (talk) 22:07, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
I`m good with that mark nutley (talk) 21:20, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

BLP

I've reverted this[2] for BLP reasons. Opinion articles are not reliable sources for factual information, they are only reliable for the opinion of the writer. Personal information about a third party cannot ever be sourced to such. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 10:07, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

More poor refs

Since FG just got reprimanded for misrepresenting sources [3] looks like a bad idea William M. Connolley (talk) 11:59, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Hmmmm - nothing about being an accountant. Nothing about being a scientific publisher ("being in" != "being a"). Nice try - no Cigar. Doh! --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 12:16, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
The ref i used says both those things, whats the problem with it? mark nutley (talk) 12:25, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
I have fixed the accountant ref issue, now working on the science publisher one :-) mark nutley (talk) 18:32, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
Fixed the issue with science publisher mark nutley (talk) 19:20, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
No, you haven't. You may still want to consider the difference between "being in scientific publishing" and "being a scientific publisher" - its a small change in wording - but it makes a world of difference. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:26, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
Ok i`ll change that now, might i ask what the "which" tag is for? Am i meant to put in a list of people who have said his layperson's explanations of the Hockey Stick debate have received favorable comment from readers or just some refs? mark nutley (talk) 19:30, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Occupation Author, Blogger?

I notice the infobox says "Occupation Author, Blogger" but the text says "Montford is a Chartered Accountant who also works in science publishing". If "blogger" really is his occupation the text should say it. OTOH, does he not work in accountancy? I don't know, I'm just asking William M. Connolley (talk) 21:57, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Rv: why

The name was wrong William M. Connolley (talk) 20:13, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

And still is William M. Connolley (talk) 21:05, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
And the reason for your reverting of reliably sourced material would be? mark nutley (talk) 21:09, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

rv why

Yilloslime removed this [4] which i just put back. His edit summary shows he, A did not read my edit summary and B did not look very closely at the source mark nutley (talk) 17:04, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Yiloslime is entirely correct in his removal, and i do think that he read your edit summary, unfortunately you (apparently) don't understand what a scientific journal is, how it is published....
Your insertion is just as non-sensical as saying that "Michael Mann is a co-author of Nature volume 392". Montford (if its him) is a coauthor of a paper that is included in the collection of issues 5-8. More specifically this paper, which appeared in issue 7 (1995) on page 1221, it was 1 out of 28 papers that appeared in that issue[5]. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 17:52, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
So then it should read His paper is included in issues 5-8? He has had a few of his papers published like this mark nutley (talk) 17:56, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
(ec)This is your reference. Montford isn't mentioned. And "Issues 5-8" isn't a proper reference--JSC Dalton Transactions has been published since 1966, so in order to find the issues in question you need to also specify at least a year. And Dalton Transactions is a scientific journal--no one would author or coauthor 4 full issues. Maybe edit, but not author. And is it even possible that Montford an authored article in the journal? Again, unlikely as Dalton is venue for research publications in inorganic chemistry and Montford is an accountant. Is it possible someone named Andrew Montford published something in Dalton, yes, in fact there's this but there's no evidence that this is the same Andrew Montford that's responsible for Bishop Hill.
Mark, as you've been repeated told: You need to get much at sourcing. Somewhere someone proposed that you should be restricted from introducing new sources into an article without first getting them approved by a more experienced editor. This was a wise proposal and should probably be implemented. Yilloslime TC 18:03, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
It is the same montford, he got his PHD in chemistry at St Andrews University The paper i tried to link it was his honours project as an undergraduate and had been cited in two other papers that i know of. I will rewrite the section so it points to the correct reference mark nutley (talk) 18:09, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
OK, yes, I just noticed that he studied chem and is middle initial is W, so it could be the same guy, in fact probably is the same. But that doesn't change the fact that it's ridiculous to assert that he coauthored 4 issues of the journal or excuse the poor sourcing. And how is this even relevant? It certainly doesn't belong in the LEDE, i don't think we need to note it in the article at all---he's not notable as a chemist, this doesn't appear to be a notable paper, etc. Yilloslime TC 18:14, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
If the paper was not notable then it would never have been cited, unless of course you know better that the Royal Society of Chemistry?. This is an article about montford and this is a part of his personal and professional history, so yes it should go in mark nutley (talk) 18:21, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
All science journals (that i know of) are collected this way, so there is nothing special about being included in a collection. The paper should be cited as:
Clarke, Russell; Gahagan, Michael; Mackie, Raymond K.; Foster, Douglas F.; Cole-Hamilton, David J.; Nicol, Mairi; Montford, Andrew W. (1995), "Alkene epoxidation catalysed by camphor-derived -ketophosphonate complexes of molybdenum(VI)", J. Chem. Soc. Dalton Trans. (7): 1220, doi:10.1039/DT9950001221
But as far as i can see, there is nothing specifically noteworthy about it. Its a regular scientific paper, which has 1 citation in another paper [which is a rather low citation count]. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 18:29, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
Two citations that i have found [6] [7] mark nutley (talk) 18:35, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
Still a very low citation count. And rather irrelevant. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:31, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
I disagree, it gives some perspective on his background, and whats wrong with people knowing he has a background in the sciences? This material is well sourced, there is no reason for it not to be included mark nutley (talk) 19:43, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
WP:NOT provides several good reasons for it not to be incuded. Mark, this is barrel scraping. Yilloslime TC 19:50, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

I see nothing in wp:not which says well sourced material which gives background information should not be allowed into an article about said person. I also do not see how giving background information is "Barrel Scraping" It`s factual and well sourced mark nutley (talk) 20:08, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Not all facts--even properly sourced facts--deserve mention. Yilloslime TC 20:21, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
Well that is your opinion. However as part of his background it does deserve mention so i`ll rewrite it and put it back in mark nutley (talk) 20:23, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
I think of particular relevance from WP:NOT is WP:NOTDIRECTORY, especially #7. Yilloslime TC 23:05, 2 May 2010 (UTC)
What this part you mean? Rather, an article is a summary of accepted knowledge regarding its subject are you for some reason unable to accept the knowledge for some reason? mark nutley (talk) 23:09, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Views on climate change / The Hockey Stick Illusion

There is a rather strange bit where we have "views on cl ch" and then a section on THSI, but it doesn't say what his views *are* William M. Connolley (talk) 21:51, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Sources

I've removed some unsourced material per BLP. Please make sure that everything is sourced, preferably to secondary sources. Cheers, SlimVirgin talk contribs 22:15, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Andrew_Montford#Submission_to_parliamentary_inquiry

This section doesn't seem belong, and looks pretty WP:COATRACKy. Unless his submission has received significant independent coverage, we probably shouldn't be mentioning it, and we certainly don't need to be highlighting in its own section as though it's as important as his book or blog. And no, this is not independent coverage, nor does it constitute "publication" in the usual sense of the term, as discussed here. I've removed it. Yilloslime TC 00:41, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

cite issue

This cite was causing issues and I have removed it and brought it here as I dont know where it is requited if at all, it occured during the merger. Off2riorob (talk) 14:20, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

<ref name="Ridley_2010-02-03_Spectator">[[Matt Ridley|Ridley]], Matt. "[http://www.spectator.co.uk/print/politics/all/5749853/the-global-warming-guerrillas.thtml The global warming guerrillas]", ''The Spectator'', 3 February 2010.</ref> Off2riorob (talk) 14:21, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure what happened here. Some material was removed and the ref disappeared with it, but I've fixed it I think. SlimVirgin talk contribs 01:57, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Request for comment

Should section titles be allowed to use the term Climategate? 20:41, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Discussion

This article previously had a section header with the term Climategate in it, both versions are below.

The section title was called Involvement in " Climategate Controversy"

It has been renamed to Involvement in Climatic Research Unit email controversy

I seek community input on weather or not the use of the term "Climategate" is acceptable for use in a section title. mark nutley (talk) 20:41, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Involved editors

Within the climate change related articles there has been constant bickering over the use of the term "Climategate" However it is how the controversy is known, and there is no reason for us not to use it in section titles. mark nutley (talk) 21:31, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

  • Further to this, WP:AT clearly says "Using names and terms commonly used in reliable sources, and so likely to be recognized, for the topic of the article". Now i know this is for Article names but if articles themselves are meant to be called whatever the sources call them then it follows that section titles and section text should also use the same. mark nutley (talk) 06:47, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

We have an article called Climatic Research Unit email controversy. It is called that for a good reason. But the skeptics have never liked that, and constantly make redirects and renames to the article we don't have, viz Climategate, for their own POV ends. This is Bad William M. Connolley (talk) 21:38, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

  • Comment I am under the impression that WP Policy says the use of the -gate suffix is not allowed for article names. There is no policy however against the use of a commonly used name for a controversy is there? mark nutley (talk) 21:50, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
  • I have an "Ilk"? The reason this conversation is happening here is because some editors insist on removing the term Climategate from article sections and article text. I think it is time the question of having it used in section titles, and in section text was answered mark nutley (talk) 22:05, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
  • The controversy is called Climategate even in sympathetic media outlets such as The Guardian. Thus, that name does appear to be the common name for the incident in the media. So, calling it that in section headings in other articles is ok, IMO. That being said, however, if you don't want to have to be reverting it back all the time, I would suggest using the same title as the Wikipedia article. Perhaps that isn't fair, but that's the way it is in the Wiki. Cla68 (talk) 23:38, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Yes. The incident is now commonly known as climategate. It's referred to as climategate by pretty much anyone writing about it. I don't even think you could say that it's a pejorative term any longer. Having said that, you need to be a bit pragmatic about such matters. Avoiding the word will save you a lot of grief. Thepm (talk) 02:19, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Look at this from the readers' perspective. The diehard blogoholics are going to know what we mean even if we say "that hacking kerfluffle right before Copenhagen" or whatevs. Casual readers, though, will get no more out of "climategate" than "someone thinks there is some scandal around global warming - shocker". With the descriptive title, we might actually convey some information and encourage readers to keep coming back to Wikipedia; prejudicial terminology like "climategate" drives away even the people who think the hack exposed a scientific scandal, though - when was the last time anyone checked Conservapedia for anything? Thepisky (talk) 03:27, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

  • Yes, of course, because none of out casual readers will have ever picked up a newspaper, nor watched the news. No doubt they have all been living on the moon, in a cave, with a box over their heads. Yes the term climategate was only ever used on a few blogs, never mentioned in the MSM, mark nutley (talk) 14:38, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Wow, sarcasm! That's original! Seriously, though, I think you are vastly overestimating the amount of context people bring to these pages. Or you might be vastly overestimating the real-world impact of that hack - "Don't say stupid things in email" will almost certainly go in the information packet for new hires/grad students, but it is not like this is animal testing. Given the discussion below I would like to see if any prominent commentators have mentioned that he submitted that letter. We can trust that he did it, sure, but I am not clear on why it is important enough to have a whole section in his encyclopedia article. Thepisky (talk) 01:35, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Uninvolved editors

  • It seems that the article could easily be rearranged to avoid having the refer to Climategate/Climatic Research Unit email controversy in a section title, thereby sidestepping this whole issue. That would be my suggestion for dealing with this. Yilloslime TC 21:54, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Yilloslime is wise to suggest this. It is a good idea. MiRroar (talk) 21:06, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
  • I agree, best to avoid a word in a section title that is controversial for some of the editors. If it is well sourced it can be included in the text of the section. Many readers may not know the term Climategate. Why not introduce it with an explanation in the text rather than the section title? The fact the someone feels strongly that it needs to be in the title suggests their may be some POV pushing. So for all of these reasons I say avoid it in the section title. OK, that's my two cents. :-)-- — Kbob • Talk • 16:44, 5 May 2010 (UTC)
Kbob one of the problems is that some editors will not allow the use of climategate in any form at all, not even in article content mark nutley (talk) 17:37, 25 May 2010 (UTC)
  • Yes, section titles and articles generally should be allowed to use the term "climategate". It was reasonable when the situation first arose not to want to use the neologism, but it has now entered into the language, with over a million Google hits, and newspapers on all sides of the debate using it. I find myself having to write "Climatic Research Unit email controversy ("Climategate")" so that the general reader is given a clue what we're talking about. SlimVirgin talk contribs 01:40, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

General discussion

Why do we even have that section? There's no secondary source to establish the notability of these comments. What's the difference between this and a comment he wrote on his blog? Oh, yeah - the blog posts that are discussed ("Jesus" and "Yamal") are supported by secondary sources. Guettarda (talk) 14:59, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Redirect

I fixed up the redirect William M. Connolley (talk) 11:48, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Sort of, but in doing so, you altered the article's text. May I assume there's nothing contentious about restoring the article's text, per what the source says? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 12:21, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
Of coure not, so i did some small changes as well mark nutley (talk) 12:24, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
Mark, we have to assume good faith that WMC wants to follow our verification policy. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 12:36, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
I do of course AGF, i`m sure he would not deliberately use what is not in a source, nor remove content deliberately with a misleading edit summary. He is after all a highly experienced editor and would never do such a thing mark nutley (talk) 12:57, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
No baiting, please, Mark. Cla68 (talk) 22:57, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Copy Edits Needed

If anyone has any time to do some copy editing that would be great. At present many sentences are not written in appropriate encyclopedic style and contain many editorial comments such as you might find in a magazine article. Thanks for your help!-- — Keithbob • Talk • 01:29, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

The Lead

Is poorly worded and poorly sourced. Can we improve it? What does "maintains" mean? Is he the web site technician or webmaster? Writer? Founder? Please specify and provide a citation to back it up. The current reference below links to a page with no mention of Montford or Bishop Hill and needs to be deleted.

The Hockey Stick Illusion

Montford examines the history of the "hockey stick graph" of global temperatures for the last 1000 years, and what he argues is the unraveling of the graph.

Oh Yeah ??? This is neither NPOV nor informative. What does he argue ? The article implies that Montford's argument is supreme but doesnt tell us what that argument is. If he has unravelled the graph what has he exposed ?

This section is more an ad for a politically inspired book written by a layman rather than a sensible advancement of a biography. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.134.189.108 (talk) 11:44, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

MiszaBot

MiszaBot just archived most of this page to /dev/null, which I suspect was not intentional. I have undone the change, but could somebody more familiar with the syntax check how this is set up? Thanks, Jonathan A Jones (talk) 09:14, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

 Done --Kslotte (talk) 15:50, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 16:41, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

English or British?

I'm not hugely fussed on this point, but I was a bit surprised by this edit [9]. Is there policy on this sort of thing? And do we have RS info on this anyway? We know he lives and works in Scotland and was educated at the University of St Andrews, but beyond that do we know anything? True, his accent on Newsnight sounded pretty English! Jonathan A Jones (talk) 19:07, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

He is english, moved to scotland to study and stayed there. Maybe he likes the whiskey some of the scot`s stuff is ok :) mark nutley (talk) 19:15, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Copy edit tag

This article currently has a {{Copyedit}} tag on it. I have gone ahead and made a series of fixes to the article.[10][11][12][13][14][15] Can anyone spot any other issues regarding grammar, style, spelling, etc. that need to be addressed? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:03, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Iwas working on that a week or so ago and got sidetracked, i can`t see any other issues within the article, i think the tag can be removed mark nutley (talk) 23:14, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
OK, I read through the article again and made another series of small changes.[16][17][18][19][20] Can anyone spot any other issues regarding grammar, style, spelling, etc. that need to be addressed? Please let me know and I'll fix them. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:14, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Review confusion

The Muir Russell review was initiated and funded by the UAE. Parliament or the select committee were not involved. Please don't insist on easily refutable wrong positions - if in doubt, read the sources provided. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:25, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

GWPF report now out

The GWPF report is now available [21]. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 09:53, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Interesting, thanks. Doesn't take very long for it to degenerate into twaddle though: Many media outlets appeared to be extremely reluctant to mention the Climategate affair - ho ho William M. Connolley (talk) 10:30, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

It's a bit variable, but do keep reading. Anyway I have added a sentence and a link. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 11:41, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

I got to p 15 without finding anything of value, and some stuff of clearly negative value: ie, disinformation. What of value do you find in it? William M. Connolley (talk) 13:29, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't think my opinion of the contents of the report is terribly relevant. FWIW I wouldn't greatly disagree with Fred Pearce in the Guardian [22], but further discussion would really be off-topic for this talk page. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 16:25, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

I took but do keep reading to be an opinion on your part of some virtue, which I failed to find. Never mind. FP's latest which you refer to seems to be the same errors yet again William M. Connolley (talk) 17:41, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
Your comments here is just bad and personal meaning. Why don't you just blog about it? You know here we use WP:RS sources. You even tries to [23][24]kick out The Guardian. Nsaa (talk) 22:07, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
I might blog it, but at the moment it doesn't appear to be of any interest. As to the Grauniad: it is very nice, but it is just a newspaper, and makes mistakes like any other paper. Your argument, if I understand it, is something along the lines of "X is anti-environmental but nonetheless X appears in the Grauniad; therefore X *must* be true". This is obviously falacious (you might perhaps be arguing that "X appears in the Grauniad, therefore X must be true" but that seems unlikey) William M. Connolley (talk) 22:30, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
We do not discuss the truth. We discuss what reliable sources are saying. Probably your truth lies far from my and others truth ... Nsaa (talk) 22:42, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Fred Pearce in The Guardian 14 September 2010

I removed Nsaa's recent addition [25] because it isn't even close to balanced; it is shamelessly one-sided (and thats ignoring my dislike of the Pearce article). Anything NPOV would have to include some stuff like But detractors of the GWPF said the same criticism of bias applied to Montford's report. The study, for which Montford was paid £3,000, did not involve interviews with any of the scientists or anyone involved in the inquiries. Montford said it was reviewed by "five or six people", including the sceptical blogger Steven McIntyre and members of GWPF's advisory panel. According to Montford, none was sympathetic to the scientific case for human-induced climate change. "I'm partisan in this argument. There's no denying that," he admitted. William M. Connolley (talk) 21:55, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

What has this to do with the blog and what I added ("Fred Pearce in The Guardian describe the revelations the blog has done as "landed some good blows" talking about "CRU scientists did back-door deals to include unpublished research in the last IPCC report" among others.")? Nsaa (talk) 22:03, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
You haven't read what Pearce wrote properly. "Good blows" is Pearce's (inaccurate) description of the report that the GWPF bought off Montford. It isn't about his blog (but the text I was quoting is from [26]; never mind,it is all much of a muchness) William M. Connolley (talk) 22:26, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
(edit conflict)Agree with you on this one. You're correct here that the sentence points to the report not the blog. But that you claim that the article is inaccurate doesn't merit. Why can't you rephrase it so it get's more balanced then? Nsaa (talk) 22:58, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Hopelessly inaccurate. Fred Pearce writes, "One of the most serious charges to emerge from 'climategate' was that CRU scientists did back-door deals to include unpublished research in the last IPCC report, published in 2007 [...] And, when someone asked for the emails that would have exposed it, they hastily deleted them". This is not the same as saying "CRU scientists did back-door deals", as Nsaa's edit implies, because the charge remains unproven, and Pearce is careful not to endorse this view (only to say Muir did not pursue this line of enquiry all the way, leading to mistrust). Of course 'skeptics' can now level any charge they wish, ex post facto, and claim deleted e-mails would have proven their case, at the same time ignoring the response of the University which insists its e-mail archive remains in tact. Wikispan (talk) 22:37, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Wikispan and WMC, instead of simply reverting the text, why don't you make an alternative suggestion on how it should be worded? Don't you think that would be more helpful? If you don't, I don't see why NSAA's text can't be added back in there. Cla68 (talk) 22:49, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
"If you don't [make an alternative suggestion] I don't see why NSAA's text can't be added back in there." I prefer to talk about it first. Please take the necessary time to read and understand both objections. Wikispan (talk) 23:12, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
Actually, WMC did propose alternate wording in his comment. Cla68 (talk) 00:44, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
(edit conflict)This is documented as far as I see even in this article [27] "British sceptic David Holland submitted an FoI request to the university asking for emails in which CRU scientists discussed their work for the IPCC. Two days later, Jones sent an email to colleagues asking them to delete emails relating to the behind-the-scenes work for IPCC. That email, as Montford points out, carried Holland's FoI number as its subject line.". I rest my case. Nsaa (talk) 22:58, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
That only establishes a point already conceded by Phil Jones, who did not want to share data and correspondence with people who he felt had ulterior motives, seeking only to affirm their preconceived conclusions (i.e. AGW doesn't exist). It does not show, as your version suggested, that "CRU scientists did back-door deals". Wikispan (talk) 23:12, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

I just added what I think is a fair summary of Montford's report. You guys can add more detail if you like, but stop reverting each other and start cooperating and compromising. Cla68 (talk) 23:08, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Cla, while I think you did a reasonable job, Pearce doesn't actually say that Montford makes a compelling case, rather he made "sharp – and in many cases justified – rejoinders to the official inquiries", but was likely to be ignored for its hypocricy in being as one-sided on the sceptic side as the inquiries that Lawson et al. had attacked for lacking a "sceptic" voice. Pearce himaelf criticises the inquiries for not having "directly addressed the scientific judgment of the emailing climate scientists under scrutiny", and says that "Montford dissects this systemic failure well." I've modified the wording a bit to reflect Pearce's article more closely, as ever improvements will be welcome. . dave souza, talk 16:50, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
A couple of quick comments:
  • I tagged the statement "a British think tank that rejects the scientific consensus on climate change" for a cite. The Global Warming Policy Foundation article doesn't say this (but does note the GWPF's apparent skeptic sympathies), and the GWPF describes itself as a policy-advocacy group,
...to challenge "extremely damaging and harmful policies" envisaged by governments to mitigate AGW. [28]
I subbed in a cited bit as a trial, see article. --Pete Tillman (talk) 23:15, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
With regard to the pay, one could pull out the oft-seen arguement "We're just reporting what's in the source"... And having said that, the amount paid does not in any way seen notable or relevant and doesn't need to be here. I would say he was paid by the group to run the inquiry, vs appointed, as that more clear about the relationship. Ravensfire (talk) 22:37, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
I think the section can be changed to add the other sources Pete found for the paragraph over at the Climategate article. Cla68 (talk) 23:25, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

Bishop Hill

I am the Tim Osborn who is from the Climatic Research Unit. Hence please bear in mind possible conflicts of interest that I may have with respect to this article (e.g. that Montford has previously criticised CRU). Anyway, my comment is about the 2nd para of the Bishop Hill section, which notes that "the Daily Mail reported that Paul Dennis, a British climate scientist, had posted an account on Bishop Hill of Dennis's interview with police..." It's hardly notable that Paul Dennis was interviewed by the police, given the large number of people interviewed, but my point here is that it is even less notable that he posted an account of it on Bishop Hill. I don't think that particular item on Bishop Hill is very high in the public attention! Given it's lack of notability, that sentence should go. TimOsborn (talk) 23:34, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

I think the purpose of this sentence is to help establish the notability of Montford's blog, in that it is a reference to his blog in a reliable source. Is it your argument that the Guardian and Channel 4 references are sufficient to establish notability, and are superior to this one, so that if we were to reduce the three references to two then we would cut out this one? Jonathan A Jones (talk) 14:26, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
JAJ, yes that is what I was arguing. The other two seemed sufficient and superior to that one. Perhaps things have changed a little since I made the above suggestion, due to some more attention being paid to articles about this issue (police interview of Paul Dennis), but not by much. TimOsborn (talk) 23:35, 26 August 2011 (UTC)
The problem is that the Daily Mail is notoriously unreliable as a source, particularly on science, and this section seemed to be giving undue weight to its assertions about Dennis, raising BLP concerns. I've removed it accordingly, and have clarified that Delingpole was commenting as a newsblogger. The other sources do cover the notability aspect quite adequately. . dave souza, talk 12:03, 28 October 2012 (UTC)


BLP noticeboard

Section = 109 BLP articles labelled "Climate Change Deniers" all at once. This article was placed in a "climate change deniers" category. After discussion on WP:BLPN and WP:CFD the category was deleted. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 17:07, 20 December 2015 (UTC)

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Andrew_Montford/Archive_1&oldid=1136519113"