If the last few weeks have were all about Brownmania, then this week is all about continued scandals relating to global warming "research". This time, I have to put research in quote because it isn't a case of scientists fudging or faking results. It is a case of opinion and propaganda being treated as scientific research.

The previous (and Nobel prize wining) IPCC report stated that as much as 40% of the Amazonian rain forest could react drastically to reduce precipitation resulting from global warming. (Er, maybe from climate change--I forget whether cooling or warming causes reduced precipitation at the moment.) As it turns out, this finding was not the result of any scientific research or modeling at all. The basis for the claim comes from activists that are part of the World Wildlife Foundation and other such groups. James Delingpole at the Telegraph reports:

It gets even better. The two expert authors of the WWF report so casually cited by the IPCC as part of its, ahem, "robust" "peer-reviewed" process weren't even Amazon specialists. One, Dr PF Moore, is a policy analyst:

[snip]

And the lead author Andy Rowell is a freelance journalist (for the Guardian, natch) and green activist:

[snip]

But the IPCC's shamelessness did not end there. Dr North has searched the WWF's reports high and low but can find no evidence of a statement to support the IPCC's claim that "40 per cent" of the Amazon is threatened by climate change. (Logging and farm expansion are a much more plausible threat).

The evidence of tampering within the environmental science community continues to mount.

• We have learned that the data behind the famous hockey stick graph was altered to hide the decline.
• The researchers at the CRU used their influence to hijack the peer review process and keep scientists who's research opposed the view of AGW from publishing in established journals.
• The Russians have accused climate researchers of cherry-picking Siberian station data which if considered in its entirety does not substantiate the AGW theory.
• The former Green Peace leader admitted to exaggerating the claims of polar ice cap melt in order to sway public opinion.
• A Nobel-prize-winning IPCC report has been found to include bogus claims about Himalayan glacier melt and, now, about dire threats to the Amazonian rain forest.
• IPCC chair Pachauri used this report to secure funding for his institute of research and could now be facing criminal charges.

People keep claiming each of these incidents is isolated and that the scientific proof for global warming is still rock solid. If it wasn't obvious to you before that the process has been anything but scientific it should be glaringly obvious to you now. The tide is indeed turning. Christopher Field, the new co-chairman of the IPCC working group responsible for climate impact reports, had the following to say:

The 2007 study should be seen as "a snapshot of what was known then. Science is progressive. If something turns out to be wrong we can fix it next time around.