Oh, Lordy, no replies to this so I'll be the one to go through it. I did, as it happens, read through the file in question. It shows that merging data from different academic projects with different source data and different analysis software, written by scientists, can be a real headache. Quite enlightening if you want to know how messy real science can get but nothing to do with a conspiracy to falsify global warming data.
What we're talking about is "data tampering". Remember that, children.
- "But what are all those monthly files?
I don't know. What are they?
DON'T KNOW, UNDOCUMENTED. Wherever I look, there are data files, no info about what they are other than their names. And that's useless " (Page 17)
So he has output files, and doesn't know where they came from. Somebody didn't document their code properly. Hold the front page!
- "It's botch after botch after botch." (18)
What is?
- "The biggest immediate problem was the loss of an hour's edits to the program, when the network died no explanation from anyone, I hope it's not a return to last year's troubles This surely is the worst project I've ever attempted. Eeeek." (31)
Maybe the network's shit. Irrelevant.
- "Oh, GOD, if I could start this project again and actually argue the case for junking the inherited program suite." (37)
- " this should all have been rewritten from scratch a year ago!" (45)
Maybe the code's shit. Irrelevant.
- "Am I the first person to attempt to get the CRU databases in working order?!!" (47)
The database is a mess. Irrelevant.
- "As far as I can see, this renders the (weather) station counts totally meaningless." (57)
Right, the count of weather stations is meaningless. So we don't know how many individual
weather stations are contributing to the data. That doesn't mean there's anything wrong with the data,
let alone that it's been tampered with.
- "COBAR AIRPORT AWS (data from an Australian weather station) cannot start in 1962, it didn't open until 1993!" (71)
There you go, there's an error in the database. Do you think it was deliberately added by somebody not smart enough to check when the station opened? And this one mis-labeled data point from a weather station in Australia is responsible for the apparent trend of global warming? Really?
- "What the hell is supposed to happen here? Oh yeah -- there is no 'supposed,' I can make it up. So I have : - )" (98)
What's he making up? Temperature readings? The name of a weather station? Whether two different names refer to the same weather station or not? It's surely not as sensational as you imply.
- "You can't imagine what this has cost me -- to actually allow the operator to assign false WMO (World Meteorological Organization) codes!! But what else is there in such situations? Especially when dealing with a 'Master' database of dubious provenance " (98)
Yes, some stations are listed in the database without a code. The software uses the code as a unique ID.
So each station needs to have one. If you don't know the right one, you add a false one. These are labels.
We have falsification of labels, not data.
- "So with a somewhat cynical shrug, I added the nuclear option -- to match every WMO possible, and turn the rest into new stations In other words what CRU usually do. It will allow bad databases to pass unnoticed, and good databases to become bad " (98-9)
Yes, the database seems to be in a mess. Some weather stations are not labeled properly, and there may be duplicates. But the data are not falsified.