‘The file entitled lies_damned_lies_README.txt contains information that clearly contradicts paragraph 3, page 17 in XYZ et al., 2004, which negates that article’s entire conclusions. Paragraph 3 states that abc = abc. X himself, in the aforementioned file, proves that abc =/= abc, but rather that abc = 123.’

I, too, want to know if sceptics can do this. If it can be done, it should be done, as RobinL points out above. Then if anyone demands sneeringly, ‘Oh yeah? Show me how this disproves the science,’ such a demand can easily be met.

On the other hand, I get what you’re saying entirely. The climate change issue seems to read more like a religious debate than a scientific one!

Fanatic: God exists. My literature says so. Many millions of people accept its truth. There is a consensus; the science is settled. Why do you think there are no Godless holy books? Sure, there is no ‘proof’ that God exists, but models of human belief show quite clearly that the probability is high. You cannot disprove my claim, or provide data that contradict its truth. Therefore my literature is authoritative.

Atheist: God doesn’t exist. Your literature is a tissue of lies written by gullible and selfish men.

Fanatic: Not so. My literature was written by God.

Atheist: How do you know?

Fanatic: It says so.

That is asking us to prove a negative. The biggest issue with Climategate is that we now know that there was a systematic attempt to close scientific journals to sceptic papers. How many papers, how good they were, or what effect they would have had on our understanding of the climate we will never know.

In terms of citations in scientific papers dealing with climate change, Hadley (Met Office) and CRU (UEA), known as HadCRU when conjoined, between them far outnumber any other source in the world for the last ten years (18,000 approx). They have been instrumental in setting up the parameters for the IPCC, etc., etc.

http://sciencewatch.com/ana/fea/09novdecFea/
(Scroll down for table).

Until it’s all collated and cross-referenced, and an easily understood short version is produced, we are wasting time discussing: too easy to dismiss, a la Monblot.

Fun, though.

The emails don’t show a conspiracy and there may well be innocent answers to all the questions that skeptics raise, but they cast enough doubt on the scientific method as to need that clarification.

Because unlike EVERY OTHER SCIENTIFIC DISCIPLINE, climatologists don’t publish their methods or source data. God forbid a denialist attempt to replicate their results.