Oh, good grief.

I heartily welcome LGF’s scathing and deserved attacks on the intelligent design, anti-evolution community.

Lumping climate change skeptics in with anti-evolutionists, however, is just absurd. I fully accept the concept that man-made emissions contribute to the greenhouse effect. However, climate science is very difficult, and we need to essentially understand how big the uncertainties are.

The “ClimateGate” controversy is a good one because it is going to force the underlying data and assumptions out into the public, which is the ONLY way science should be conducted.

Not that it should matter, but I feel the need (due to the condescending tone of the topic) to establish my credentials. I have a PhD in Chemistry from one of the top-5 ranked universities in chemistry (tied for 1st by US News). I, unlike probably 99% of the people on this board, have taken graduate coursework in atmospheric chemistry. I also am a research director for a “green-tech” company (and am fully committed to the idea of cleaner energy sources), so the climate-change fear-mongering is actually very good for me financially.

I’ve also sat in energy+environmental policy seminars at this same university when questions like “is it okay to exaggerate for the public when we know that we’re right” were asked. I also sat in a class by a prominent climate-change scientist, when, days after the 9/11 attacks, he was leading a discussion on how we get the public’s attention back on the real problem, global warming.

There are frauds, zealots, and liars saying whatever they need to say to get money on both sides of this issue. Shining some light on Mann, Jones, and some of the sleaziest of the pro-AGW group will be beneficial overall. They were subverting the peer review process, and that’s a huge problem.

Climate change IS extremely complicated, and it’s inevitable that some of the evidence is going to be contadictory (unlike evolution deniers, who are fraudulently claiming scientific contradictions). That needs to be worked through in the public eye and not be hidden by some influential scoundrels who are willing to break the rules because of their “faith” in their correctness. More debate, not less, is needed here, and the AGW alarmists should not hide from debate with those that disagree with their theories and those that agree but question the severity of the problem.