Wegman Report

[[File:1000 Year Temperature Comparison.png|thumb|right|The hockey stick graph. We hates it, we hates it, we hates it forever!]]{{globalwarmingnav}}
The '''Wegman Report''' (14 July, 2006) (officially the '''Committee on Energy and Commerce Report''') was a report on the "hockey stick" graph produced by a commission headed by [[statistic]]ian Edward Wegman. It is now remembered as the epitome of [[global warming denier]] stupidity, in terms of both its factual errors and its college freshman-level [[plagiarism]] from textbooks and [[Wikipedia]].

==Keep going!==
After notorious deniers [[Steve McIntyre]] and [[Ross McKitrick]] published a paper in ''Geophysical Research Letters'' criticizing [[Michael Mann]] et al.'s reconstruction of global temperatures that led to the hockey stick graph, the [[scientific]] community reconfirmed Mann's analysis with [[Reproducibility|similar data from independent studies]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.skepticalscience.com/broken-hockey-stick.htm|title=Is the Hockey Stick Broken?|work=Skeptical Science}}</ref> The denier community would not stand for this absurd ''science'' stuff, so they decided to launch a second attack on the hockey stick.

In 2006, [[Republican]] US Representatives [[Joe Barton]] and [[Ed Whitfield]] commissioned Wegman to produce a study discrediting the hockey stick. Totally ignoring any of the independent lines of research backing up Mann, Wegman went back and used McIntyre and McKitrick's shoddy models (colloquially referred to as "M&M," candies included) to [[PIDOOMA|claim]] that Mann had just made up the hockey stick. By [[willful ignorance|ignoring]] the other lines of research and using algorithms that were intended to [[cherry-picking|cherry-pick]] data to spit out a non-hockey stick shaped graph, Wegman produced a "refutation" of Mann's work. Of course, Wegman never submitted his "research" for [[peer review]]. The report went straight to the desks of Barton and Whitfield without any vetting besides some "review" by Wegman's colleagues. The Wegman Report was then used as "[[Dunning-Kruger effect|definitive evidence]]" by Republicans in [[Climategate]] hearings that Mann and his colleagues were guilty of scientific fraud. Never mind that Wegman's work had already been debunked by this point.

In November of 2010, the story broke that a good deal of the report had been copy-pasted from [[Wikipedia]] and some old textbooks, one of which was authored by Mann's colleague Raymond Bradley.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://archive.ph/20101122064816/http://www.usatoday.com/weather/climate/globalwarming/2010-11-21-climate-report-questioned_N.htm|title=Experts Claim 2006 Climate Report Plagiarized|work=USA Today}}</ref> [[George Mason University]] dragged its feet in investigating charges of [[plagiarism]] and misconduct. The delay led to a scathing editorial in ''[[Nature (journal)|Nature]]'' stating that "long misconduct investigations do not serve anyone, except perhaps university [[public relations]] departments that might hope everyone will have forgotten about a case by the time it wraps up."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v473/n7348/full/473419b.html|title=Copy and paste|work=Nature}}</ref>

==No more gas==
In 2008, Wegman submitted a modified version of the report to the journal ''Computational Statistics and Data Analysis''. In an egregious case of "pal review," the journal's editor accepted the paper ''six days'' after submission, apparently on his own say-so without sending it out for standard peer review. The modified version dropped the climate-related material, leaving only a "social network analysis." The goal of this "analysis" seemed to be to reveal the [[Global warming conspiracy theory|secret warmist cabal controlling climate science]]. In [[reality]], all it revealed was that Mann had written other papers with his co-authors.

Wegman apparently forgot that there are things you can get away with in [[politics]] that will get you in very hot water in the scientific world, one of those being to copy-and-paste without attribution. In 2011, the journal retracted the paper and apologized for not having detected the plagiarism earlier.<ref>[http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167947307002861 RETRACTED: Social networks of author–coauthor relationships], ''Computational Statistics & Data Analysis''</ref><ref>[http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/2011/05/17/controversial-paper-critiquing-climate-change-science-set-to-be-retracted-because-of-plagiarism/ Controversial paper critiquing climate change science set to be retracted because of plagiarism], Retraction Watch</ref><ref>[http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2011/06/journal-retracts-disputed-network.html Journal Retracts Disputed Network Analysis Paper on Climate], ''Science''</ref> Keeping it classy, Wegman blamed this cock-up on one of his grad students.<ref>[http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2011/05/24/wegmans-defence-makes-him-look/ Wegman's Defence Makes Him Look Worse], Deltoid</ref>

==External links==
*[http://rabett.blogspot.com/2010/10/dummies-guide-to-strange-scholarship-in.html A Dummies Guide to Strange Scholarship in the Wegman Report], Eli Rabett
*Deltoid's [http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/global_warming/wegman/ Wegman category]
*[http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/11/plagiarized_gop-commissioned_climate_change_report.php Plagiarized Report Laid Groundwork for Climategate], TPM
*[http://deepclimate.org/2010/11/16/replication-and-due-diligence-wegman-style/ Replication and Due Diligence, Wegman Style], Deep Climate
*[http://climateprogress.org/2010/11/21/wegman-exposed-experts-find-shocking-plagiarism-in-2006-climate-report-requested-by-joe-barton-r-tx/ Wegman Exposed] and [http://climateprogress.org/2011/05/16/wegman-scandal-rocks-cornerstone-of-climate-denial/#more-49190 Wegman Scandal Rocks Cornerstone of Climate Denial], Climate Progress
*[http://www.stat.columbia.edu/~cook/movabletype/archives/2011/06/further_wegman.html Further Wegman Plagiarism], Andrew Gelman
*[http://crookedtimber.org/2011/10/07/wegman-plagiarism-case-gmu-jury-out-to-permanent-lunch/ Wegman Plagiarism Case: GMU Jury Out to Permanent Lunch], Crooked Timber (more plagiarism by Wegman revealed, surprise surprise)

==References==
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[[Category:Denialism]]
[[Category:Pseudoscience]]
[[Category:Government incompetence]]
[[Category:Plagiarists]]
[[Category:Conservative deceit]]

Categories: Denialism, Pseudoscience, Government incompetence, Plagiarists, Conservative deceit