Mark Hodgson

Can you submit documentary evidence without provenance in the UK?

Jan 10, 2017 at 8:59 PM | Entropic man

EM, your question is to Mark Hodgson, however ........

Mann submitted the Hockey Stick without documented evidence to world wide applause, IPCC recognition, fame and fortune. When he was asked for evidence to back up his claims, by Steve McIntyre and others, he did not agree. Steve McIntyre and others, have tended to be quite careful about their choice of words. Why hasn't Mann sued McIntyre?

You have neatly summed up Climate Science's major problem with all the claims ever made - NO EVIDENCE, or tampered evidence, or "evidence that would not stand up in Court to informed cross examination". That is why Mann does not want to end up in Court.

The difference (?) between UK and US Law on this point, is (probably) not significant.

Perhaps I have misinterpreted your use of the word "provenance"?

Why don't you concentrate on saving the good bits of Climate Science?

"Can you submit documentary evidence without provenance in the UK?"

No. You always have to point to the origins of documentary evidence. Hence you would produce an email and say that it was from the "UEA leaked emails".

I think you're trying to make a different, and I would add, bizarre, point, and that is that Mann could make the eccentric challenge that 1000s of emails had been written by someone else and presented as the UEA emails. The court would then require proof that they were real, ignoring the the fact that no one had hitherto challenged the authenticity of the emails, and there had been three investigations into them in the UK where no doubts were cast on their provenance. I don't think that's likely, but you can never tell with the DC court.

Either way their authenticity and provenance is easily proved, and I don't believe even Mann would cast doubts on them. I think he's in trouble if it gets to court, but what do I know?

EM asks: "Can you submit documentary evidence without provenance in the UK?"

I have regularly submitted evidence in Courts and tribunals without being asked to demonstrate its provenance (because my opponent new it was what it claimed to be and didn't challenge it). The issue only really arises if ones opponent doesn't accept the evidence and challenges its provenance (or correctness) - then you would have to demonstrate that it really is what you claim it is.

In the UK we also have a doctrine of judicial notice. I'm being lazy and just looking for a reference online. The one I found is American and gives the following definition (which sounds close to our version) and confirms that US Courts have the same (or a similar) doctrine:

http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Judicial+Notice

"A doctrine of evidence applied by a court that allows the court to recognize and accept the existence of a particular fact commonly known by persons of average intelligence without establishing its existence by admitting evidence in a civil or criminal action.

When a court takes judicial notice of a certain fact, it obviates the need for parties to prove the fact in court. Ordinarily, facts that relate to a case must be presented to the judge or jury through testimony or tangible evidence. However, if each fact in a case had to be proved through such presentation, the simplest case would take weeks to complete. To avoid burdening the judicial system, all legislatures have approved court rules that allow a court to recognize facts that constitute common knowledge without requiring proof from the parties.

On the federal trial court level, judicial notice is recognized in rule 201 of the Federal Rules of Evidence for U.S. District Courts and Magistrates. Rule 201 provides, in part, that "[a] judicially noticed fact must be one not subject to reasonable dispute in that it is either (1) generally known within the territorial jurisdiction of the trial court or (2) capable of accurate and ready determination by resort to sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned."

Under rule 201 a trial court must take judicial notice of a well-known fact at the request of one of the parties, if the court is provided with information supporting the fact. A court also has the option to take judicial notice at its discretion, without a request from a party.

Rule 201 further provides that a court may take judicial notice at any time during a proceeding. If a party objects to the taking of judicial notice, the court must give that party an opportunity to be heard on the issue. In a civil jury trial, the court must inform the jury that it must accept the judicially noticed facts in the case as conclusively proved. In a criminal trial by jury, the court must instruct the jury "that it may, but is not required to, accept as conclusive any fact judicially noticed." All states have statutes that are virtually identical to rule 201.

The most common judicially noticed facts include the location of streets, buildings, and geographic areas; periods of time; business customs; historical events; and federal, state, and International Law. Legislatures also maintain statutes that give courts the power to recognize certain facts in specific situations. For example, in Idaho any document affixed with the official seal of the state Public Utilities commission must be judicially noticed by all courts (Idaho Code § 61-209 [1996]). In Hawaii, when a commercial vehicle is cited for violating vehicle equipment regulations, a trial court must take judicial notice of the driver's subordinate position if the driver works for a company that owns the vehicle (Haw. Rev. Stat. § 291-37 [1995]).

The danger of judicial notice is that, if abused, it can deprive the fact finder of the opportunity to decide a contestable fact in a case. In Walker v. Halliburton Services, 654 So. 2d 365 (La. App. 1995), Johnny Walker fell from a tank truck approximately ten feet to a concrete floor. Walker sought Workers' Compensation benefits for his injuries, and his claim was denied by the Office of Workers' Compensation.

At the application hearing, the hearing officer stated that it was her experience that a soft-tissue injury heals in six weeks. She then took judicial notice of the fact that a soft-tissue injury heals in six weeks—preventing Walker from contesting that proposition—and disallowed Walker's claim. On appeal the Louisiana Court of Appeal, Third Circuit, reversed the decision and ordered the payment of workers' compensation benefits. According to the court, it was a clear error of law for the hearing officer to take judicial notice of such intricate medical knowledge."

Oops - typo on the 3rd line. "new" should of course read "knew".

EM, don't you think it was "unfortunate", that no one actually checked Mann's supporting evidence for the Hockey Stick, despite the Peer Review process and the IPCC?

It also makes a bit of a mockery of all the academic and professional bodies that accepted the Hockey Stick, because they thought it had been subjected to a credible Peer Review process.

According to Phil Clarke, Gergis "proved" the Hockey Stick. Proved what?

According to Skeptical Skience 97% of scientists agree with Mann

Mark Hodgson

Thank you. Judicial notice sounds a sensible compromise between being too lax and too pedantic.

I've also seen cases where a judge has requested clarification of slang terms for the record. Remember the Sun ridiculing a judge for asking a barrister to define "Linford's lunch box"?

Golf Charlie

EM, don't you think it was "unfortunate", that no one actually checked Mann's supporting evidence for the Hockey Stick...?

You will be be pleased to know that a further 18 years of research using a variety of proxies has confirmed the Hockey Stick.

You will be be pleased to know that a further 18 years of research using a variety of proxies has confirmed the Hockey Stick.

Jan 11, 2017 at 5:43 PM | Entropic man

Yes, they have confirmed that the Hockey Stick should never have passed Peer Review, and that those Climate Scientists that continue to endorse the Hockey Stick, are not worthy of the term Scientist.

Have you given up on studying Law? You said you were quite enjoying it, but perhaps it isn't quite as simple as just accepting whatever Mann says is right.

"You will be be pleased to know that a further 18 years of research using a variety of proxies has confirmed the Hockey Stick."

Delighted can you provide the papers you believe has confirmed the hockeystick? The IPCC doesn't appear to have used any of them in AR4 and AR5 so it's not obvious that the scientific community sees it as you do.

EM, are you starting to understand why Climate Science wants to move on from the Hockey Stick? If they try to stand on it, it offers no support.

Golf Charlie

The IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (AR5 WG1) of 2013 cited the following reconstructions in support of its conclusion that for average annual Northern Hemisphere temperatures, "the period 1983–2012 was very likely the warmest 30-year period of the last 800 years (high confidence) and likely the warmest 30-year period of the last 1400 years (medium confidence)":[5]

Pollack and Smerdon (2004) [also in AR4]
Moberg et al. (2005) [also in AR4]
D'Arrigo, Wilson & Jacoby (2006) [also in AR4]
Frank, Esper & Cook (2007) "Adjustment for proxy number and coherence in a large-scale temperature reconstruction".
Hegerl et al. (2007) "Detection of human influence on a new, validated 1500–year temperature reconstruction".
Juckes et al. 2007 "Millennial temperature reconstruction intercomparison and evaluation".
Loehle & McCulloch (2008) "Correction to: A 2000-year global temperature reconstruction based on non-tree ring proxies".
Mann et al. 2008 "Proxy-based reconstructions of hemispheric and global surface temperature variations over the past two millennia".
Mann et al. 2009 "Global Signatures and Dynamical Origins of the Little Ice Age and Medieval Climate Anomaly".
Ljungqvist 2010 "A New Reconstruction of Temperature Variability in the Extra-Tropical Northern Hemisphere During the Last Two Millennia".
Christiansen & Ljungqvist 2012 "The extra-tropical Northern Hemisphere temperature in the last two millennia: Reconstructions of low-frequency variability".
Leclercq & Oerlemans (2012) "Global and Hemispheric temperature reconstruction from glacier length fluctuations".
Shi et al. 2013 "Northern Hemisphere temperature reconstruction during the last millennium using multiple annual proxies".

Note the presence of two papers from Mann et al, dated 2008 and 2009, updating MBH98.

Entropic Man, yesterday you were wondering if it had ever been proved that the ClimateGate E-Mails were genuine.

Now following geronimo's point about the Hockey Stick being dropped by the IPCC, you point to a load of other IPCC approved reports, including some with Mann's name on them.

How can anyone prove that they went through a better Peer Review process for acceptance by Climate Science and the IPCC, than Mann's original Hockey Stick?

I think Trump has already decided that Climate Science can not prove it's honesty, in much the same way Climate Science decided on the guilt of anthropogenic CO2.

History will show there was a Medieval Warm Period, and that Climate Science went out of political fashion in 2016.

The IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (AR5 WG1) of 2013 cited the following reconstructions in support of its conclusion that for average annual Northern Hemisphere temperatures, "the period 1983–2012 was very likely the warmest 30-year period of the last 800 years (high confidence) and likely the warmest 30-year period of the last 1400 years (medium confidence)"

lol. So, even if it were true, they are confident that the Northern Hemisphere was warmer when (per wiki) the Vandals started their westward trek from Dacia and Hungary.

Well, woopity doo. This is why climate science was an academic backwater before they started forecasting the end of the world, and why its future is an academic oxbow lake.

It now actually seems a little bit sad when I re-read my last comment.

Then I think of the lost human lives and lost time that the global-warmers have inflicted on the human race, and I start feeling less well-disposed towards them.

Well, mh, the yoke will be on 'em, the team, that is.
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michael hart, I have low confidence in the credibility of any statement from the IPCC, that claims to have been made with anything more than a 50:50 level of confidence.

Perhaps their confidence is based on confidence in Mann and his Hockey Stick. If so, I have no confidence at all.

Exxon discovery

EM, I'm sure you'll be happy for the same to apply to Mann's discovery in his ongoing litigation? ;-)

Mark Hodgson

Yes. There is no longer any reason to delay.

Mark Hodgson

Yes. There is no longer any reason to delay.

Jan 12, 2017 at 11:00 PM | Entropic man

Entropic Man, What was Mann's reason for the delay, that has now changed? Or what has changed your mind about Mann's reasons for delaying?

Surely Mann was advised of the likely consequences of suing Steyn?

Jan 11, 2017 at 7:32 PM | Entropic man

Dendrochronology was one of the reasons why I originally DID believe in Mann's Hockey Stick. D'Arrigo was the one who famously admitted having to pick cherries to make cherry pie. Her pioneering methodology was closely tied to that of Jacoby.

https://climateaudit.org/2016/01/29/cherry-picking-by-darrigo/

All the other papers you list, are Jacoby dependent, and it is logical to assume that Mann only used Hockey Stick Data to make his Hockey Stick.

When Climate Science comes crashing down, the first branch to crash will be dendrochronology. This is a bit unfair on all diligent dendrochronologists, as the Science of dating timber by tree rings, remains sound. It is those who prefer warm Cherry Pie that have overcooked things.

Meanwhile, a year ago, this:

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/01/27/briffa-embraces-tree-ring-uncertainty-in-new-study-gives-message-to-the-paleoclimate-community/

Briffa's name heads the teamsheet, and ClimateGate revealed his doubts about Mann's scientific motives.

Do you really believe that Mann's salvation exists in even more cherry picking?

Golf charlie

Discovery could not begin until the anti-SLAPP appeal was decided. This was brought by Steyn's co-defendants and was therefore their responsibility. Please explain how this delay was Dr. Mann's fault.

You refer to WUWT and Climate Audit. Do you have nothing more credible than climate denier websites? I have very low confidence in such propoganda.

 I have very low confidence in such propoganda.

Jan 13, 2017 at 5:13 PM | Entropic man

Well that explains why you believe all the tripe produced by Mann and his Hockey Teamsters. I believed in it once.

But your beliefs are not going to save Climate Science, and you have no intention of trying to save the good bits.

A nit to pick. Dendrochronology is solid and in no danger. It is dendroclimatology, the making(faking) of temperature series from tree rings that is fragile, has had far too much reliability ascribed to it for policy purposes, and has been deliberately perverted to serve a political purpose, the Piltdown Mann's famous 'cause'.
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kim, you are quite correct. Dendrochronology is an established and proven method of dating timber, and has been used in archaeology etc without adverse criticism. In some work on historic ships, it has helped to establish where a ship was built, on the assumption it was made using locally sourced timber.

Many houses were built with "old ship's timbers", though I have a personal view that some of these timbers were ones that were cut, carved, shaped etc for a ship, but then warped/cracked/split so were rejected by the shipwrights. The basic design of a Cruck Frame House is similar to an upside down ship, and the skills in joinery and craftmanship would have allowed some interchangeability, possibly by the same workforce.

Meanwhile, Entropic Man insists we should all listen to the same bunch of failures, proving, once again, that Climate Science is incapable of correcting it's own mistakes, because it can't acknowledge ever having made a mistake. and just keeps repeating them.

Hopefully, the forthcoming drought in funding for Climate Science will allow the honest ones to get published.

We'll eventually feel sorry for the majority of them, trapped quite pusillanimously in their labor of love. We should be able to forgive the weakness.
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