Patrick Jeff Condon
Credentials
Jeff Condon is an Aeronautical Engineer.1Jeff Condon. “Where’s the Media?”, the Air Vent, July 19, 2009.
Background
Patrick (Jeff) Condon, who previously went by the Pseudonym “Jeff Id,” is a climate change skeptic who runs the contrarian blog the Air Vent.2Jeff Condon. “Id’s Out,” the Air Vent, February 4, 2010.
The Air Vent hosts pages that supposedly debunk Michael Mann’s “Hockey Stick” graph and cover the event known as “Climategate.” The blog also regularly posts articles and comments favouring a view skeptical of climate change, including a number of posts suggesting that arctic sea ice is not retreating.
Stance on Climate Change
“Right now, nothing, and I mean really NOTHING, indicates that AGW is anything but moderate or even beneficial.”3Jeff Condon. “Dogs, Puppies and True Skepticism,” the Air Vent, April 10, 2012.
Key Quotes
“The media and propaganda blogs like DeSmog should be proud to have the [CRU] dataset on line and pleased that Heartland would invest that money for the common good.”4Jeff Condon. “Hey Media – Skeptics are Scientists Too,” the Air Vent, February 16, 2012.
Key Deeds
2011
The Air Vent was one of three blogs to receive information released in a criminal hacking of climate scientists’ emails in 2011. Roger Tattersall, the operator of a skeptical blog titled Tallbloke’s Talkshop and Condon had both received messages from a hacker who identified himself as “FOIA.”
Condon later received a “formal request” by the US Department of Justice’s criminal division on December 9 to preserve “all stored communications, records, and other evidence in your possession” related to their own blogs as well as to Climate Audit, a climate skeptic blog run by Steve McIntyre.
December 2010
Published a “rebuttal” of a paper by Steig et al which had concluded that Antarctic warming was not localized to the Antarctic Peninsula, but also strongly affected the West Antarctic. Steig’s paper had been published in Nature.
The rebuttal paper, titled “Improved Methods for PCA-Based Reconstructions: Case Study Using the Steig et al. (2009) Antarctic Temperature Reconstruction” was sent to the Journal of Climate on February 3, 2010 and accepted November 25, 2010. The authors were Ryan O’Donnell, Nicholas Lewis, Steve McIntyre, and Jeff Condon.
Many climate skeptic blogs, including Steven McIntyre’s own Climate Audit present the study as a refutation of the Steig study. McIntyre also suggests that their difficulty in having the study published in the Journal of Climate was due to a “abusive peer review process” in which one of the reviewers supposedly made attempts to “suppress the article” that “went far beyond an unconflicted reviewer.”5Steve McIntyre. “O’Donnell et al 2010 Refutes Steig et al 2009,” Climate Audit, December 2, 2010.
Condon himself said that he was “quite satisfied that the review process was fair and equitable,” although he too claimed that “excessive deference was paid to this one particular reviewer at the beginning of the process.”6Jeff Condon. “Doing it Ourselves,” The Air Vent, December 1, 2010.
Affiliations
- The Air Vent — Owner/blogger.
- Steve McIntyre — Study co-author.
Publications
- O’Donnell, Ryan, Nicholas Lewis, Steve McIntyre, Jeff Condon, 2011: Improved Methods for PCA-Based Reconstructions: Case Study Using the Steig et al. (2009) Antarctic Temperature Reconstruction. J. Climate, 24, 2099–2115. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/2010JCLI3656.1
Other Resources
Resources
- 1Jeff Condon. “Where’s the Media?”, the Air Vent, July 19, 2009.
- 2Jeff Condon. “Id’s Out,” the Air Vent, February 4, 2010.
- 3Jeff Condon. “Dogs, Puppies and True Skepticism,” the Air Vent, April 10, 2012.
- 4Jeff Condon. “Hey Media – Skeptics are Scientists Too,” the Air Vent, February 16, 2012.
- 5Steve McIntyre. “O’Donnell et al 2010 Refutes Steig et al 2009,” Climate Audit, December 2, 2010.
- 6Jeff Condon. “Doing it Ourselves,” The Air Vent, December 1, 2010.
