You might have missed the hoards of media pundits falling over themselves in indecent haste to correct the appalling hackfest unleashed on the climate scientists earlier this year. Phil Jones, the climatologist in East Anglia, was accused of impropriety and dishonesty in his handling of climate data and the Penn State climate scientist Michael Mann was accused of falsifying and suppressing data.
But the whole business was investigated and they were cleared, completely and unconditionally cleared. There was no conspiracy, no fiddling the data, no suppression of the facts, and the statements made by the scientists were supported by peer-reviewed research.
Recently the Times retracted its version of events but did you hear the media celebration that the UK climate scientists were completely exonerated? Of course not. The problem with such apologies after the fact is of course that the damage is already done. The volume of the accusations far exceeds the whisper of apology and by the time it is made, everyone has got used to the idea that climate data was fixed.
The sad fact is that once people have been told something, especially by someone trusted, then regardless of how much later contrary evidence is produced including retractions, a substantial number of people will continue to believe what they have been told. Propagandists have long known this and exploit it regularly. In this case climate science has been the victim.
You can read the Times statement here.
