cc: Timo Hämeranta , "Ross McKitrick" date: Thu Jul 22 09:51:30 2004 from: Phil Jones subject: Re: ROG Data to: "Steve McIntyre" Steve, The two files show the cross-dating of the polar urals cores (ring width and density). Should be relatively self-explanatory. Output comes from a program developed here, that is loosely based on cofecha. Program takes the set of cores, averages them (with various options on the smoothing to get residuals and also periods, this one using 50-year segments), then correlates each with the average. It also does some averaging across the rows and columns. Finally it has the option of using another chronology, so here we've used the density one for ring width and vice versa. We use the program to check dating and help with dating when starting with a new set of trees. There are loads of plot options as well, as although the numbers help plots are necessary as well. Correlations are lower in the early years, but the plots confirm the dating is correct. Take it from me these are good. We are using the program on much of the material we have from northern Eurasia and also from the world data bank. We are finding some simple mistakes. What I mean here is that the chronology produced from the cores in WDCP don't give the chronology also given there. If you alter a few cores - give them the dates they should have - then they do. So, it seems that archive problems like the one you've seen with these polar ural series have occurred. WDCP is not that well resourced - the last I heard was that NOAA may cut much of its paleo funding, so I'm not surprised. On a different matter, I can understand why people like Tom Crowley don't respond to you and others in the skeptic camp (can't think of a better simple term at the moment). We are all busy people and we've also spent a lot of time (years) making contacts to get a lot of the paleo data we use. The same applies to instrumental data also. Also constraints are put on us by a lot of the groups/individuals who send data not to pass it on. I'm going to try and put more data onto our web site, but this is not high on my agenda. I would like it to be higher, but there are other things I have to do (some of which I'm much less keen on) that take precedent. Your aim is to check the work we do, with the explicit intention of trying to find mistakes or conclusions that aren't valid. If you found we were right would you still write a paper? I will commend you for writing a paper first and then putting something on your web site, rather than doing it the other way round like David Legates. I've always dealt with the scientific literature and believe this is the best way. I would recommend that you publish your results in journals that climatologists read. Web sites are just places for more details - not substitutes for formal publications. I think I've done and said enough over the past week or two, so can we have a break for a while. Cheers Phil At 09:14 21/07/2004 -0400, Steve McIntyre wrote: Dear Phil, Thank you once again for your continual courtesy and energy. I had surmised that the 400 year gaps in russ021w and russ021x were probably due to identification number duplication. However, in the files as archived with WDCP, these have been actively filled with 0 values and are not merely latent curiosities of identification number duplication. Any mechanized handling of the data under present circumstances will lead to incorrect results and accordingly the archived datasets should be promptly amended. I would appreciate a copy of the cross-dating statistics report and the rwl version that you actually used, since it differs from the version archived at WDCP. As a matter of interest, I am still puzzled by your criteria for "too few trees". I would like to test the 10th and 11th century portions of the Polar Urals chronology against explicit CRU policy. I am not presently suggesting that these portions do not meet such criteria, but they are obviously in a danger zone and, given the wide use of this indicator, it seems worthwhile checking. I think that, for millennial dating, one might reasonably wish for a site with more than 3 trees in the late 10th and early 11th century (of which 2 are short-lived with low crossdating values). Hence my interest in a check against explicit criteria. I am also interested in the crossdating checks for these early trees. A couple of the early 11th centuries are very short. My initial crossdating calculations for these few trees show values significantly lower than later values, which would seem to make this period a little precarious. BTW Jacoby has recently archived the Sol Dav data (but not before AD900) and states that the early portion of the published series does not meet replication standards. Again, thanks for your continuing courtesy in this. Replication and checking are fact of life in business (where most of my experience lies), especially when you are communicating with the public. There are very formal processes for this; auditors and securities lawyers, who are among the most highly paid professionals in our society, do little more than replicate and check. If you wish to offer securities to the public, you get used to dealing with questions from them. The corresponding processes in paleoclimate studies (and probably most academic pursuits) seem very casual to me. When studies get used for policy purposes, it seems to me that there is a material change in the level of due diligence is required. This leads to a conundrum: many scholars seem quite happy to have their studies quoted in big reports (like IPCC), but then fail to make arrangements for public archiving of their results and methods and become defensive if they are asked for their data. In the offering of securities, there is an interesting stage that deals with this - if a report by an indepenedent professional (e.g. a geologist) is used in a prospectus, the independent professional has to provide a consent letter authorizing the promoters of the prospectus to refer to his report and to supply the consent letter to the securities commission. The terms of the consent letter impose disclosure requriements on him. This would deal with the situation of someone like Crowley, whose study is quoted by IPCC, but who repeatedly and persistently refuses to disclose his proxy data versions. In a prospectus situation, if the IPCC wished to use Crowley's report, Crowley would have to agree to make his data pulic if asked (which he should probably do on alternative grounds). There are some interesting articles about replication studies in economics and political science by Dewald, Gary King and McCullough/Vinod, which might interest you. Some journals have now adopted policies requiring the archiving of data and source code as a condition of publication. I would encourage you to contribute the source code for Jones and Mann (2004) and Mann and Jones (2003) to your planned data contribution. Procedures like this with avoid frustrating efforts after the fact to obtain data and methods. Regards, Steve McIntyre Prof. Phil Jones Climatic Research Unit Telephone +44 (0) 1603 592090 School of Environmental Sciences Fax +44 (0) 1603 507784 University of East Anglia Norwich Email p.jones@uea.ac.uk NR4 7TJ UK ----------------------------------------------------------------------------