Here’s a great RealClimate.org post on the hateful hockey stick. On one hand, I hesitate even to raise the subject because deniers have used the famous Mann hockey stick graph so effectively to distract attention from the scientific consensus on climate change. On the other hand, it now seems that one of the most recent and most-quoted hockey stick critics. Dr. Edward J. Wegman, is dodging his responsibility to back up his numbers.
Also, if you read down on the RealClimate post to comment #6, you’ll find an interesting bit of criticism of the graphs that Wegman uses to make his critical argument. And if you click through to Wegman’s voluminous report, and go to figure 4.1 on page 30, you’ll find the graphs in question originated not from Wegman, but from McIntyre and McKitrick, the economist and the statistician who first criticized Mann’s original work.
Which leads back to the good question: if they were truly interested in launching a fair critique of the Mann graph, why wouldn’t they keep the y-axis the same in comparing Mann’s work with theirs?
It summons to mind the old aphorism about lies, damn lies and statisticians.