Last week the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), released
"The Science of Climate Change 1995", it's first report in five years.
 
This IPCC report, like all others, his held in such high regard largely
because it has been peer-reviewed.  That is, it has been read,
discussed, modified and approved by an international body of experts.
 
But this report is not what it appears to be.  It is not the version
that was approved by the contributing scientists listed on the title
page.
 
A comparison between the report approved by the contributing scientists
and the published version reveals that key changes were made after the
scientists had met and accepted what they thought was the final
peer-review version.  The scientists were assuming that the IPCC
would obey the IPCC rules.  (A body of regulations that is supposed
to govern the panel's actions.)  Nothing in the IPCC Rules permits
anyone to change a scientific report after it has been accepted
by the panel of scientific contributors and the full IPCC.
 
The following passages are examples of those included in the approved
report but deleted from the supposedly peer-reviewed published version.
 
 
*  "None of the studies cited above has shown clear evidence that we
    can attribute the observed [climate] changes to the specific cause
    of increases in greenhouse gases."
 
*  "No study to date has positively attributed all or part [of the
    climate change to date]  to anthropogenic [manmade] causes."
 
*  "Any claims of positive detection of significant climate change
    are likely to remain controversial until uncertainties in the
    total natural variability of the climate  system are reduced."
 
 
Whatever the intent was of those who made these significant changes,
their effect is to deceive policy makers and the public into believing
that the scientific evidence shows human activities are causing global
warming.
 
If the IPCC is incapable of following its most basic procedures, it
would be best to abandon the entire IPCC process, or at least that part
that is concerned with the scientific evidence on climate change, and
look for more reliable sources of advice to governments on this
important question.
 
Warren Tatter
--- GEcho 1.10+
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