Climategate and Peer-Review

Wegman (2006) on the social network and its implications for 'peer-review':

One of the interesting questions associated with the ‘hockey stick controversy’ are the relationships among the authors and consequently how confident one can be in the peer review process. In particular, if there is a tight relationship among the authors and there are not a large number of individuals engaged in a particular topic area, then one may suspect that the peer review process does not fully vet papers before they are published.

Phil Jones to Michael Mann, May 6, 1999 (0926026654.txt):

You may think Keith or I have reviewed some of your papers but we haven't. I've reviewed Ray's and Malcolm's - constructively I hope where I thought something could have been done better. I also know you've reviewed my paper with Gabi very constructively.

Phil Jones, March 11, 2003 (1047390562.txt):

I will be emailing the journal to tell them I'm having nothing more to do with it until they rid themselves of this troublesome editor. A CRU person is on the editorial board...

Michael Mann, March 11, 2003 (1047388489.txt):

I think we have to stop considering "Climate Research" as a legitimate peer-reviewed journal. Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal.

Michael Mann, March 12, 2003 (3366.txt):

Either would be good, but Eos is an especially good idea. Both Ellen M-T and Keith Alverson are on the editorial board there, so I think there would be some receptiveness to such a submission.

Tom Wigley, April 24, 2003 (1051190249.txt):

One approach is to go direct to the publishers and point out the fact that their journal is perceived as being a medium for disseminating misinformation under the guise of refereed work. I use the word 'perceived' here, since whether it is true or not is not what the publishers care about -- it is how the journal is seen by the community that counts.

Keith Briffa to Ed Cook, June 4, 2003 (1054748574.txt):

I am really sorry but I have to nag about that review - Confidentially I now need a hard and if required extensive case for rejecting - to support Dave Stahle's and really as soon as you can.

Ed Cook to Keith Briffa, June 4, 2003 (1054756929.txt):

I got a paper to review ... that claims that the method of reconstruction that we use in dendroclimatology ... is wrong, biased, lousy, horrible, etc. ... If published as is, this paper could really do some damage ... It won't be easy to dismiss out of hand as the math appears to be correct theoretically.

Ray Bradley, October 30, 2003 (1067532918.txt):

Tim, Phil, Keef:
I suggest a way out of this mess. Because of the complexity of the arguments involved, to an uniformed observer it all might be viewed as just scientific nit-picking by "for" and "against" global warming proponents. However, if an "independent group" such as you guys at CRU could make a statement as to whether the M&M effort is truly an "audit", and if they did it right, I think that would go a long way to defusing the issue.

Phil Jones to Michael Mann, March 31, 2004 (1080742144.txt):

Recently rejected two papers (one for JGR and for GRL) from people saying CRU has it wrong over Siberia. Went to town in both reviews, hopefully successfully.

Phil Jones to Michael Mann, July 8, 2004 (1089318616.txt):

I can't see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow - even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is !

Tom Wigley, January 20, 2005 (2151.txt):

Proving bad behavior here is very difficult. If you think that Saiers is in the greenhouse skeptics camp, then, if we can find documentary evidence of this, we could go through official AGU channels to get him ousted.

Michael Mann, November 15, 2005 (4121.txt):

The GRL leak may have been plugged up now w/ new editorial leadership there, but these guys always have "Climate Research" and "Energy and Environment", and will go there if necessary.

Phil Jones, March 19, 2009 (1237496573.txt):

I'm having a dispute with the new editor of Weather. I've complained about him to the RMS Chief Exec. If I don't get him to back down, I won't be sending any more papers to any RMS journals and I'll be resigning from the RMS.

1249503274.txt:

Journal of Geophysical Research standard request:

Please list the names of 5 experts who are knowledgeable in your area and could give an unbiased review of your work. Please do not list colleagues who are close associates, collaborators, or family members.

Phil Jones, August 5, 2009:

Agree with Kevin that Tom Karl has too much to do. Tom Wigley is semi retired and like Mike Wallace may not be responsive to requests from JGR.

We have Ben Santer in common ! Dave Thompson is a good suggestion. I'd go for one of Tom Peterson or Dave Easterling.

To get a spread, I'd go with 3 US, One Australian and one in Europe. So Neville Nicholls and David Parker.

All of them know the sorts of things to say - about our comment and the awful original, without any prompting.

Phil Jones' peer-reviews of colleagues work:

Review of Wahl&Amman.doc
review_mannetal.doc
review_schmidt.doc
SanteretalSciencereview.doc