 at the libertarian Cato Institute. Another joked that the way to deal with skeptics was “continuing to publish quality work in quality journals (or calling in a Mafia hit).” Scientists suggested that they would rather destroy data than provide them to their critics. They also discussed using “tricks” in their research, debated how to frame uncertainties in some of their data, and attempted to control access to peer-reviewed journals.
Within days, the heist—soon dubbed “Climategate“—was all over the news. Glenn Beck called it a “potentially major scandal”; Fox News crowed that the emails “undercut the whole scientific claim for man’s impact on global warming.” Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) decried (PDF) them as evidence of “scientific fascism.”
The immediate impact on public opinion was dramatic. A poll by Yale and George Mason University (GMU) found that in November 2008, 71 percent of respondents agreed that the planet is warming (PDF). Five weeks after Climategate, only 57 percent believed it. The emails, said a Yale report (PDF), had “a significant effect on public beliefs in global warming and trust in scientists.”
IF A SINGLE PERSON CAN BE credited with setting the stage for Climategate, it’s Stephen McIntyre, the retired mining consultant behind the popular skeptic blog Climate Audit. Over the past decade, McIntyre has built a reputation for finding methodological errors—some real, some perceived—in climate studies. The Wall Street Journal heralded McIntyre as “global warming’s most dangerous apostate.”
Indeed, McIntyre has made goading scientists—particularly Mann—close to a full-time job. Like Mann, McIntyre is genial in interviews, but on his blog, his tone toward the scientists targeted by his audits ranges from inquisitive to openly hostile.
The 63-year-old squash enthusiast from Toronto made his money in mining. He has also consulted for the Canadian oil and gas exploration company CGX Energy. He says his mining ties don’t affect his views on climate change and insists that his prolific blogging on the topic has not benefited him financially—rather, it’s taken time away from more profitable business.
* Correction: An earlier version of this piece stated that the graph featured in the film showed temperature rise. It actually shows rise in CO2 levels. We regret the error.
McIntyre belongs to the school of skeptics known as “lukewarmers”—those who believe the planet is warming and humans are playing a role (see our Field Guide to Climate Change Skeptics), but don’t think this is as much of a problem as it has been made out to be.
“I’m not particularly comfortable with either side of the US debate,” McIntyre told me. “There are obviously competent and intelligent people that view it as a serious problem. That doesn’t mean that they’re right, but it’s not a hoax.” Nor does he oppose government regulations on principle, as do some of the free-market think tanks that regularly invite him to DC for speaking engagements. “I’m a Canadian,” says McIntyre. “I think governments can do things.”
McIntyre’s entrée into the climate debate came with a paper he coauthored with economist Ross McKitrick that critiqued an earlier version of Mann’s (PDF) hockey-stick graph. The paper was published in the November 2003 issue of Energy and Environment. It’s a publication known for providing a platform to skeptics—which is why, among the trove of hacked emails, there’s one from Mann urging colleagues to “dismiss this as [a] stunt, appearing in a so-called ‘journal’ which is already known to have defied standard practices of peer-review.” Mann predicted that “the usual suspects are going to try to peddle this crap.”
Sure enough, McIntyre and McKitrick were soon invited to Washington for a briefing (PDF) arranged by the George C. Marshall Institute and the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), both free-market think tanks that have been heavily funded by ExxonMobil and other oil interests. They were also asked to meet with Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), who has called climate change “the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the Ameri