Recent Comments

Prev  320  321  322  323  324  325  326  327  328  329  330  331  332  333  334  335  Next

Comments 16351 to 16400:

16351. nigelj at 08:39 AM on 29 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       One of the great things about innoculation theory is it's politically neutral. It exposes nonsense regardless of who is speaking or writing and regardless of political parties.

       Innoculation theory helps get us towards the truth, and to identify credibility of websites, and claims they make, and to identify sensible, rational, effective solutions.

       The only people opposed to innoculation theory are people afraid of the truth, and people with hidden agendas they are too embarrassed to openly admit to.

16352. nigelj at 07:45 AM on 29 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       Aaoron Davis @12, 

       "What John Cook is talking about is the Innoculation Theory and how it can be used toprotect us from Fake News. nigelj@10 and Clayeight3@8 seem a bit off topic."

       No we aren't off topic. The article discuses a whole range of issues including the origins of fake news. Innoculation theory is mentioned as part of the picture.

       I do agree with your proposition to teach critical thinking in schools. I have promoted that myself on this and other websites several times, so saw little point in repeating it again. I read your link.

       If anything your comments on liberty are a little off topic! However I responded briefly as one does and because your comment was interesting. But I suggest we should stay with the simple dictionary definitions of liberty, and not your arbitrary re-definition or discussion becomes confused. Your use of the term arbitrary authority is a little vague, and I don't see where you are going with it. Proper authority that is not arbitrary would have to mean democratically elected authority and governed by rule of law. This is uncontraversial anyway.

       I also agree on the problem of the tax cuts and higher government debt and your general commentary on that. It is also going to make dealing with climate change much harder, as it means its even harder for governments to spend money on climate research and renewable energy should they wish. This was probably part of the intention.  

16353. Aaron Davis at 07:24 AM on 29 December 2017
       CO2 limits won't cool the planet
       

       The average monthly values over all latitudes between 60-70oN should smooth out the differences.  Irkutsk at 52.3N and 51.5N is not especially relevant to the question.  When I find the monthly averages without the correction you identified I will try it again.    

       Just to be clear, is your claim that a 3.5% change in CO2 is not perceptable or that it is perceptable but my comparison with Antarctic temperatures will not support that conclusion since "Other Effeect" are not consistent enough within the same year to be cancelled out of the difference equations @16?  It appears that you are arguing the latter, but without sufficient, acceptable and relevant evidence for me to rebut.

       Please be so kind as to accept the burden of proof in this regard.  Or simply wait for me to arrive at this conclusion on my own once more data is identified.  

       Best regards, 

16354. nigelj at 07:16 AM on 29 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       TPohlman @22 and 23, I have not referred to you as a "denier". Just wanted to clarify  this.  To me its just interesting discussion on polar bears, and thank's for the links you posted.

       You say "More ice does not always imply ‘good for bears‘ any more than less ice always implies ‘bad for bears’, no matter how many times the mantra is repeated."

       So are you seriously saying that no sea ice, or very small extent of sea ice, would have no effect on polar bear numbers? Come on it has to have an effect.

       Look at the picture very long term. According to research by Noaa linked below, summer ice will decline drastically and  spring ice during the feeding season you mentioned will also decline. Even winter ice will eventually be down to 10 - 15 %. I simply suggest this has to effect seals and polar bears.

       www.theverge.com/2013/4/12/4217786/arctic-ice-free-summer-2050-noaa-study

       According to NSIDC website:

       "Combined with record low summertime extent, Arctic sea ice exhibited a new pattern of poor winter recovery. In the past, a low-ice year would be followed by a rebound to near-normal conditions, but 2002 was followed by two more low-ice years, both of which almost matched the 2002 record (see Arctic Sea Ice Decline Continues). Although wintertime recovery of Arctic sea ice improved somewhat after 2006, wintertime extents remained below the long-term average. In 2015, the wintertime extent set a new record low: 14.54 million square kilometers (5.612 million square miles). The next year reached a statistical tie: 14.52 million square kilometers (5.607 million square miles)."

       nsidc.org/cryosphere/sotc/sea_ice.html

       Sea ice is all going one way, down, down, down...

16355. Aaron Davis at 06:19 AM on 29 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       What John Cook is talking about is the Innoculation Theory and how it can be used toprotect us from Fake News. nigelj@10 and Clayeight3@8 seem a bit off topic.  If you define liberty as 1) having the means to exercise free will and 2) being free from arbitrary authority, and the roll of government is to secure these characterists for All. Both conservative and liberal approaches have advantages and disadvantages. 

       However, a critical view of the tax bill passed and signed by only conservatives puts all our posterity (both conservative and liberal) at risk of losing liberty as the National Debt exceeds $21T.  Those that support these cuts are clearly not seeking to fulfil the requirements clearly stated in the constitution and should be removed from power, or we should all expect to lose our liberty.  Failure to see this is an example of the crippling power of Fake News, and greed of the few, which the Russians are successfully exploiting to their advantage every day.

16356. nigelj at 06:11 AM on 29 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       Aaron Davis @9,

       You say “Secure the Blessings of Liberty for Ourselves and our Posterity”. This “truth”....

       We can say "its true that liberty is a good thing" and it is, but it depends on what is meant by liberty. The standard dictionary definition is typically "the state of being free within society from oppressive restrictions imposed by authority on one's behaviour or political views."

       This is a good goal to have. Note it doesn't say free from all restrictions. This would be anarchy and the rule of the jungle and unworkable. We need at least some rules and restrictions in order for society to function. Yet at the same time nobody wants excessive restrictions either.

       So our definition of liberty is just a right to do "certain things". It's then purely a case of how do we figure those limits out? Our laws and rules might be based on principles:

       1) Laws are needed if our behaviour effects other people, and causes them physical or psychological harm at significant levels. Laws are also needed if we degrade the "commons" (the environment we all share)

       2) Laws should be based on mainstream scientific evidence, not conspiracy theories and alternative facts.

       Right now some conservatives seem to have lost touch with these principles, and seem to think laws can be based on alternative facts, and rights to pretty much destroy the environment. This has to change.

16357. nigelj at 05:18 AM on 29 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       Clayeight @3, I agree all news organisations get things wrong sometimes, or spin the truth. However right now according to this survey Fox have the worst record, and CNN best as below:

       www.politifact.com/punditfact/article/2014/sep/16/fact-checking-fox-msnbc-and-cnn-punditfacts-networ/

        

       However this  truth / fake news / alternative facts issue is clearly not all about news organisations. It's about the absolute nonsense that comes from politicians themselves, particularly the current White House and Trump himself. In all fairness its hard to categorise Trump as genuinely conservative,  he is hard to categorise, but his white house is mostly conservative. Then you have the nonsense claims coming from people like The Heartland Institute on matters of science, which is a conservative institute.

       There's a proliferation of websites peddling alternative facts and conspiracy theories, and in my experience most of these leans quite strongly conservative and to the right. Then there are social media where the whole truth issue really explodes into many alternative facts and complete fantasy land.

       Do liberal / left leaning sources have their own alternative facts? Maybe sometimes, but right now conservatives seem to be in the middle of the alternative facts phenomenon, while liberals are taking the side of mainstream science, traditional sources,  and evidence based decision making and so on. They do this imperfectly but this is their general philosophy. Its an observable socio-political phenomena. Polls have even been done showing conservatives dismissive of climate science for example.

       For myself its sad seeing such partisan divisions and conservatives embracing nonsense, as I have conservative and liberal friends and family, and all are good people. My instinct is to seek common ground and togetherness, and acceptance of differences and using different perspectives whether liberal or conservative as tools to solve problems and achieve solutions and a common good, as was common in the past. But America is going the opposite way, into strong partisan divisions and these sorts of strong divisions  whether political, tribal, religious or otherwise can ultimately lead to civil war or abrupt restructurings of societies systems. 

       Maybe CBD is right, let the states decide their own economic and social policies. It's interesting to look globally, and in most democracies around the world, especially wealthy successful ones embrace  "middle way" economic systems  with welfare systems of some sort, maybe categorised as "medium size government" in the main,  because clearly the majority want this. You also get a few large government models like France.The small government model promoted by current American conservatives is largely not wanted, and this may give an indication of what America would look like if policy was decided at state level.

16358. michael sweet at 04:33 AM on 29 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       Tpohlman @ 22,

       From your reference

       

       I see no evidence of increased sea ice around 1970 or before. This paper does not metion polar bears or the effect of sea ice on bear polulations.

       From your quote "Each was followed by a decline in polar bear reproduction and condition,"  This is consistant with my claim "Adult polar bears have high survival even in bad conditions. Current sea ice conditions threaten cub survival. It will take years for the effects of sea ice decrease to be measured in polar bear counts."  Bad conditions cause failure of reproduction but the adult bears survive in poor condition.  Your quote does not say that polar bear numers decreased, only that reproduction failed.  Because polar bears live so long it takes a long time for bad conditions to be reflected in polar bear numbers.

       These yearly fluctuations have nothing to do with my claim that polar bear numers increased after the control of overhunting.  The control of overhunting would result in long term (decadal) increase in the population while yearly variation in sea ice would only afffect yearly variation.  

       I do not think your data supports your claim that sea ice fluctuations affected long term increases in polar bear populations.  The data do not address the claim that control of overhunting resulted in increase in polar bear populations.

       From Wikipedia

       "Due to warming air temperatures, ice-floe breakup in western Hudson Bay is currently occurring three weeks earlier than it did 30 years ago, reducing the duration of the polar bear feeding season.[163] The body condition of polar bears has declined during this period; the average weight of lone (and likely pregnant) female polar bears was approximately 290 kg (640 lb) in 1980 and 230 kg (510 lb) in 2004.[163] Between 1987 and 2004, the Western Hudson Bay population declined by 22%,[185] although the population is currently listed as "stable".[8]" (my emphasis)

       A decline of 22% of one of the best studied populations of polar bears is considered "stable".  The decrease in female weight portends a failure of reproduction.  This is caused by a decadal decrease in sea ice, not a single bad year.

       From Dr. Derocher, a polar bear researcher in Canada:

       "After the signing of the International Agreement on Polar Bears in the 1970s, harvests were controlled and the numbers increased. There is no argument from anyone on this point. Some populations recovered very slowly (e.g., Barents Sea took almost 30 years) but some recovered faster. Some likely never were depressed by hunting that much, but the harvest levels remained too high and the populations subsequently declined. M'Clintock Channel is a good example. The population is currently down by over 60% of historic levels due only to overharvesting. Some populations recovered as harvests were controlled, but have since declined due to climate-related effects (e.g., Western Hudson Bay). In Western Hudson Bay, previously sustainable harvests cannot be maintained as the reproductive and survival rates have declined due to changes in the sea ice."

       He states that all numbers from the 50's and 60's are guesses and cannot be trusted.

       I withdraw my suggestion that you would not produce data.  In the past those who challenge the scientific consensus have not replied to me with data.

16359. Aaron Davis at 04:01 AM on 29 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       Clayeight3@8 I try to respect the terms of participation here about political posts, although I am frequently reprimanded for being off topic [irrelevant, require more charity and lack clarity] so let me take your comments in a more topical, less political direction. What I see a lack of in the media, leading to False News accusations is the requirement that we seek the truth, not try to appear infallible. With regard to government the truth we seek is the best way to “Secure the Blessings of Liberty for Ourselves and our Posterity”. This “truth” is by no way universally accepted. If we lived in Iran the truth might be “Inshallah”, but because we all repeated the pledge to “Liberty and Justice for All” let’s just go with that.

       Moderator Response:

       [DB] Moderation complaints snipped.

16360. Clayeight3 at 03:31 AM on 29 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       As a conservative I resent the impression that it is only conservatives that have an issue with the truth. I believe those in power will distort the truth to maintain that power, regardless of party affiliation. Many have brought up concerns with news organizations other than Fox News. It’s easy to point to Fox News for spinning the truth for conservatives since they are the only name in the game as far as broadcast news goes. Yet it’s harder to point to spin perpetrated by other news agencies since they all tilt left more than they tilt right. Which in my estimation creates its own risk of "corrosive effects of the partisan media bubble".

       I think it’s disingenuous to imply that it’s only Fox News or conservatives that have issues with the truth. Understandably this blog points to them for their reluctance to believe Climate Change, but that does not change the fact that liberals and progressives have issues with the truth as well. To that end, I have a friend with a PHD in Poli Sci and is a far left socialist who is critical of the medias madness on “Russiagate”. By making this post “Very refreshing: Aaron Mate brutally destroys Guardian journalist Luke Harding, author of a new book which makes the case for Trump-Russia "collusion.” Harding's efforts to defend his book are utterly laughable. If you're wondering why the corporate press never brings on skeptics of the "Russiagate" hysteria despite near-constant coverage, this should make it fairly clear.” https://medium.com/@caityjohnstone/what-happens-when-a-russiagate-skeptic-debates-a-professional-russiagater-1e796f620a4a
       
       Point being is political ideology has no bearing on issues of truth.

       Moderator Response:

       [DB] Off-topic snipped.

16361. TPohlman at 02:43 AM on 29 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       Michael,

       just to make this easier, here’s the “money quote” from Stirling, et al 2008:

       “The 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s each experienced a two- to three-year decline in seal productivity in the eastern Beaufort Sea and Amundsen Gulf, associated with heavy ice conditions, around mid-decade. Each was followed by a decline in polar bear reproduction and condition, after which both seal and bear populations recovered (Smith, 1987; Harwood et al., 2000; Stirling, 2002). The beginning of each of those three periods was associated with heavy ice conditions through the winter before the reproductive decline of the seals, followed by a late spring breakup.”

       In summary, first seals, then bears, recovered from a decline caused by excessive sea ice and late spring breakup. More ice does not always imply ‘good for bears‘ any more than less ice always implies ‘bad for bears’, no matter how many times the mantra is repeated.

16362. Aaron Davis at 01:45 AM on 29 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       CBDunkerson@6 The idea that we should let states do what they want is not new. We kept Slave/State Free States for far to long. It was the call for States Rights that the Southern States fought the Civil War About. The fear is that States with high tax and regulations would lose their wealthiest citizens while bringing jobs to low tax low regulation States.

       I am particularly interested in the topic of inoculation and vitamins. In both the Engineering and Geology Classes teach as an Adjunct at the Community College I ask the students to write 10-15 true/false and multiple choice questions on the reading before class. I then use the questions in the lectures and the quizzes. My thinking is that this will help them formulate challenges in their minds to get them to think critically about the claim. I also impress on them the 12 tests they can apply from Attacking Faulty Reasoning to help them with the exercise. These 12 tests fall into 3 categories: Table manners, fallacies, and resolution.

       A) Table manners

       1. Fallibility - no one is always right.
       2. Truth Seeking – we must agree to seek the truth
       3. Burden of proof – the guy with the claim has the burden
       4. Charity – put the other guys argument in the best possible light
       5. Clarity – be as clear with your position as possible.

       2) Fallacies

       1. Acceptable – another researcher must have an opportunity to reproduce to replicate the results
       2. Relevant – the premises must be appropriate to the argument
       3. Sufficient – there must be sufficient evidence on one side or the other
       4. Rebut all challenges – explain contradictory evidence

       3) Resolution

       1. Resolve without full agreement - When all the above are satisfied but time is of the essence it’s okay to resolve without full agreement.
       2. Suspend judgement– While there is time, and not all agree, it’s okay to wait for new information.
       3. Re-evaluate – When new acceptable, relevant and sufficient, fully vetted evidence comes in it’s okay to proceed in a different direction.

       Best regards

16363. Michael Schroeder at 01:37 AM on 29 December 2017
       Ocean acidification isn't serious
       

       A question on ocean acidification from a non-scientist historian who's abidingly concerned about anthropogenic global climate disruption (and teaches freshman college students about this stuff in a first-year seminar on "People & the Planet" at a small liberal arts school in Central PA): 

       I'm reviewing climate change denialist Gregory Wrightstone's book, "Inconvenient Facts" (2017), and I'm a bit puzzled by one of his assertions.  On p. 110 he writes: 

       "During the Cambrian, Ordovician and Silurian periods of the early Paleozoic era (543-416 million years ago), CO2 usually exceeded 4,000 ppm, reaching a maximum of nearly 8,000 ppm in the Cambrian period.  The later was ~20 times today's concentration.  When we compare CO2 levels to the rock record from the author's home turf in the Appalachian Basin of the eastern United States, we find that most of these CO2-enriched periods were dominated by limestone deposition.  Limestone deposition could not have occurred had the oceans been 'acidified'.  Most of the limestone was deposited during the periods of highest CO2 concentrations." 

       Thanks to this website and the references in this comments section, I've been able to find ample evidence discounting most all of Wrightstone's other assertions on ocean acidification, but this one has me puzzled.  How were marine organisms able to make hard shells, and deposit massive amounts of limestone, when atmospheric CO2 (and oceanic carbonic acid levels) were so high?  It's my understanding that when atmospheric CO2 reaches ~550 ppm, CO2 absorption by the oceans & the spike in oceanic carbonic acid levels renders marine animals incapable of forming hard shells.  So how were these huge limestone deposits created when atmospheric CO2 levels (and oceanic carbonic acid levels) were so high?

       Thanks in advance for helping me (and my students) understand the science involved here.

16364. TPohlman at 01:21 AM on 29 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       Michael Sweet,

       For a look at sea ice conditions (actual vs. modeled) in the late 20th century that clearly shows high conditions in the 70s and then the decline, I think you will find this paper useful, particularly see figures 2 and 7 in the PDF version.

       http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-11-00201.1

       It‘s more difficult to find references to the low points during the first half of that century, due to lack of data,  but I will look for you.

       As for the conjecture that recovery from excessive sea ice could have helped polar bear recovery along with the hunting ban, I will see what I can find. As I was clear, I “don’t know how valid that is”,  but reasonable conjecture sometimes leads to fruitful lines of research, as I’m sure you know.

       in that regard, I’m somewhat surprised at your in referenced assertion that ‘adult polar bears have high survival in bad conditions“. I suggest you look at what happened in periods of high Spring ice in 2004-2006, as well as in previous episodes in the 20th century and well documented in the literature. For more on that try these (Amstrup et al. 2006; Cherry et al. 2009; Pilfold et al. 2012; Stirling 2002; Stirling and Lunn 1997; Stirling et al. 1980; Stirling et al. 1993; Stirling et al. 2008).

       Finally, you and another responder have referred to me as a ‘denier’, a perjorative that is apparently within the Code on this site. I’d be curious as to what you think I’m denying. Or is it that you just assume that any deviation from orthodoxy must imply a uniform ‘denialist‘ worldview? You have no idea what my views are on AGW, sea ice trends, greenhouse gasses, etc. because I haven’t expressed any. Therefore, be more cautious with such a powerful term: spread thinly like peanut butter over everything, it is meaningless, and frankly, somewhat tasteless.

16365. CBDunkerson at 23:48 PM on 28 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       I first began noticing the growth of an 'alternate conservative reality' nearly 20 years ago, so it is gratifying that this is now (finally) a widely recognized problem that people are researching possible solutions to.

       That said, I've developed my own theory on the best response... give them what they want. That is, the next time the US government falls under mostly reality based control they should put forward legislation that allows each state to choose one of two economic paths. This would be similar to the Medicaid expansion under Obamacare... each state can choose to opt in or not. Either they get huge tax cuts for the rich, elimination of welfare and other benefits, and the rest of the conservative wish list... OR they can raise the minimum wage, rebuild infrastructure, shift the tax burden back to the wealthy, strengthen the social safety net, and so forth as progressives want.

       Everybody gets what they say is the best course of action, so it should be wildly popular and pass easily... at which point those living under conservative 'trickle down' economic fairy tales would sink ever further into collapse while the states governed by reality based politicians would finally be able to make sustained economic progress.

       It becomes a lot more difficult for people to deny reality when it is impacting their ability to survive... and they can no longer blame 'the other side' because they got exactly what they asked for. Still, if they somehow perservere in believing nonsense... that means economic and social collapse, effectively limiting the power of those states and still allowing the rest of the country (and world) to move forward as they retreat back to the dark ages.

16366. michael sweet at 22:05 PM on 28 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       Tpohlman,

       The Wikipedia article I linked upthread contains many peer reviewed citations that cover your questions.  In any case, it is common knowledge that hunting reduced polar bear numbers.

       Adult polar bears have high survival even in bad conditions.  Current sea ice conditions threaten cub survival.  It will take years for the effects of sea ice decrease to be measured in polar bear counts.

       I noticed that you do not provide any references for your wild claim that the 1970's had high sea ice amounts.  Unfortunately, Cryosphere Today is not online, but this page has several ice graphs that do not show any increase in sea ice that could have had the result you claim. Satalite data show little decrease in sea ice beore 1996.

       It is typical for deniers to insist that scientists produce peer reviewed references while they spew false, unsupported claims without a shred of evidence.  My claims are those supported by experts.  Your claims are unsupported.  Please provide citations to support your wild claim that sea ice conditions affected polar bears in the 70's.  

16367. Arctic Haze at 19:42 PM on 28 December 2017
       Some curious things about Svensmark et al. reference list
       

       The reviewers made a very poor  job. The fact that they never noticed that Svensmark et al. avoid mentioning recent studies with result conflicting with their own shows they were not experts on aerosols. By the way, at minimum Svensmark and colleagues should address the negative result of the CERN CLOUD project. Pretending that contradictory results never happened is not the way one is supposed to write scientific papers.

16368. MA Rodger at 19:25 PM on 28 December 2017
       CO2 limits won't cool the planet
       

       Aaron Davis @21,

       And you may need to reconsider your opinion that latitude (north or south) provides an "excellent comparison since the slant path sun angle, which are predominant effects are normalized."

       The arctic is ocean surrounded by land. The antarctic is land surrounded by ocean. Does that make a difference?

       Here are two locations with identical "slant path sun angles" for your consideration. The FM and AS averages are marked.

       

       Ooops!! There appears to be a "predomenant effect" or two that are not in any way "normalised."

16369. Eclectic at 19:04 PM on 28 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       Thank you Dr Tol @19.  Yes I have read your own site's 20th December post (including the note on redundancy, and the brutal simplicity of basic positions taken by blogs — rather than the six variables mentioned).

       A more detailed examination of the denier blogs might well discover nuanced positions — but mundane experience of climate science denialism indicates that [their] nuanced positions, when they exist, are mutually contradictory and generally lacking in scientific worth.  The arctic-ice/polar-bear nexus seems to fit the pattern.  And Dr Verheggen's depictions are prima facie "binary", very much so (though probably not more than would be expected, given the mindset of the average denialist).

       You are a busy man, and I do not wish to importune you to provide close analysis of the blog contents themselves.   I agree with you that the positions expressed (by the anti-science bloggers) are likely to be quite predictable and "anything but AGW".

16370. Ari Jokimäki at 17:18 PM on 28 December 2017
       Some curious things about Svensmark et al. reference list
       

       Note that in my article above the paragraph about S17 citation of Laakso et al. was incorrect. I have added a note about this and marked the paragraph for deletion.

16371. richardtol at 17:06 PM on 28 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       @eclectic

       Details are in the link provided by Bart. Just click on my name.

       To summarize, it appears that a single coder was used; 4/182 data entries are nonsense. Dimensionality was artificially inflated before being reduced by PCA. The second PC is dominated by imputed data. The PCA reveals that sources split in one dimension, not two. Nuanced positions were forced into binary codes. The jitter applied hides the previous two points from the casual reader. As the data release is incomplete, we cannot know whether the observed separation is real or an artefact of the database construction.

16372. Aaron Davis at 16:57 PM on 28 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       Deleted

       Moderator Response:

       [TD] You are on the verge of having your commenting privilege revoked.

16373. Aaron Davis at 16:43 PM on 28 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       Snipped

       Moderator Response:

       [TD] Snipped for being on an inappropriate thread. I'm fed up with you ignoring my advice and then warnings.

16374. nigelj at 15:42 PM on 28 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       TPohlman @16 and 17.

       No it was not my count. It was information stated on the website I linked to.

       The table of data  also didn't say "7 populations were stable or increasing" it said 6 are stable and 1 is increasing.

       "Dr. Crockford has disputed this theory,"

       To repeat yet again, the data is too pooor to draw much conclusion either way.

       "Her thesis (shared by some others) is that excessive sea ice in the spring feeding window is far more dangerous to polar bear survival than reduced ice in the summer fasting period, as evidenced by 2007.

       What others apart from armchair bloggers? What recognised polar bear experts agree with it?

       To me all this is somewhat beside the point. Arctic ice is projected to decline further. At some point this will include all ice spring and summer posing a challenge for the bears. 

       You go on to say "I note with some interest the comments by nigelj and Michael Sweet about the growth of the polar bear population since the 70’s (in the face of declining sea ice) being due to the cessation of hunting. While that is entirely reasonable in concept, it would be good to see some papers on the topic cited, since it seems to an underpinning of the argument."

       Well I suggest you do a google search, if thats not too much trouble. To me its obvious less hunting would be a factor in increase in polar bear numbers. Some things are just obvious.

       "i mention this because of an alternative (more likely joint) hypothesis. That theory was that polar bear recovery was due in part to the fact that the 70s were a period of extremely high sea ice and cold conditions which made for poor seal harvesting conditions in winter and spring. Warming and the retreat of sea ice in the 80s and 90s would have removed those constraints. I don’t know how valid that is, but it is certainly consistent with sea ice trends since satellite records were kept."

       It's possible the cold period followed by warmer conditions caused a temporary bounce back in numbers, but this is a short term thing that could explain the pattern over a decade. You cannot conclude this process would continue for decades, and also forever unabated. There is going to be a point where warming and lack of sea ice starts to cause problems. Warming reduces areas of sea ice and this can affect breeding of seals. I posted some research above relating to this problem in more recent decades.

16375. TPohlman at 14:55 PM on 28 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       I note with some interest the comments by nigelj and Michael Sweet about the growth of the polar bear population since the 70’s (in the face of declining sea ice) being due to the cessation of hunting. While that is entirely reasonable in concept, it would be good to see some papers on the topic cited, since it seems to an underpinning of the argument.

       i mention this because of an alternative (more likely joint) hypothesis. That theory was that polar bear recovery was due in part to the fact that the 70s were a period of extremely high sea ice and cold conditions which made for poor seal harvesting conditions in winter and spring. Warming and the retreat of sea ice in the 80s and 90s would have removed those constraints. I don’t know how valid that is, but it is certainly consistent with sea ice trends since satellite records were kept.

16376. Aaron Davis at 14:36 PM on 28 December 2017
       CO2 limits won't cool the planet
       

       MA Rodger - Yes, I see that I missed the definition of the anomoly.  I was incorrect in assuming the anomoly was the annual rather than monthly.  Thank you for pointing that out.

       Moderator Response:

       [TD] You really need to take that as a lesson that you really, really need to read and deeply consider the replies to you, and the material that you are being pointed to, instead of ignoring it all and merrily continuing to post your self-generated notions that violate fundamental physics, mathematics, and even logic.

16377. TPohlman at 14:36 PM on 28 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       NigelI,

       thanks for responding to my post, which apparently has been moved back to moderation for some reason. Note that per your count, 7 populations are stable or increasing, and 3 are declining. several of the 9 listed as ‘data deficient’ (mostly on the Russian side of the Arctic) have never been accurately measured, due to well-known issues, and aren’t typically considered in Red List assessments. Given the existing measured relatively stable population, the primary rationale for Polar Bear listing status as ‘Vulnerable’ is modeled projections of impact of sea ice loss, based on IPCC models.

       Given the data on actual sea ice loss vs. actual polar bear population trends, Dr. Crockford has disputed this theory, and as far as I can tell, has not had any serious challenge to her paper. Her thesis (shared by some others) is that excessive sea ice in the spring feeding window is far more dangerous to polar bear survival than reduced ice in the summer fasting period, as evidenced by 2007. If there is science to reject that theory, it would be good to see a discussion of that as well.

       Moderator Response:

       [JH] While deleting a series of spam posts, I inadvertently deleted your post. I apologize for doing so. Here is the text of your deleted post:

       TPohlman at 12:44 PM on 28 December 2017 

       i would have been a bit more sympathetic to your point of view if you or any of your 13 coauthors had taken the time to refute Dr. Crockford’s recent paper that uses published, peer-reviewed papers on the projected relationship between sea ice decline and polar bear populations to show that the theory advanced in those papers appears to be disproven. Her thesis is that sea ice conditions expected in those papers by 2050 has already occurred, but expected population declines have not. If you wanted to refute that, you should do so. Admittedly, a number of the coauthors don’t have the expertise that Dr. Crockford has in Arctic biology,  but several of you do. You could have spent the time wasted on this paper challenging her published science, if you wanted to build credibility in what you call the denial blogosphere. Instead, you have played into their hands with this hastily constructed hit piece.

16378. Aaron Davis at 14:32 PM on 28 December 2017
       CO2 limits won't cool the planet
       

       https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgiBcycZ1Ek&t=9s

       Work by Khilyuk has shown that only 11% of heat transfers in the troposphere is carried by radiation;
       Khilyuk, L. (2003). Global warming: are we confusing cause and effect? Energy Sources, 25(4), 357-370.

       Expect to see a complete re-write of the theory of global warming. With this new model I hope to see the development of an Active Thermal Control System for the Earth providing a stable climate for our posterity, Good job Ned!

       Moderator Response:

       [TD] If you really want to push such nonsense despite its violation of all empirical evidence and centuries of physics, at least do it on a more appropriate thread.

16379. nigelj at 13:23 PM on 28 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       TPohlman

       "Her (Susan Crockfords) thesis is that sea ice conditions expected in those papers by 2050 has already occurred, but expected population declines have not."

       She doesn't have enough information to reach that conclusion. The following are the estimates of population trends in the sub populations according to the polar bear experts here: 

       3 Are Declining
       6 Are Stable
       1is Increasing
       9 Are Data Deficient

       So overall numbers do appear to actually be declining slightly, but despite this with so many data deficient areas, I don't think we can be sure of overall trends in numbers with any degree of real certainty, so its not possible right now to draw conclusions, or say any predictions have been proven wrong.

       You also need to understand there has been a reduction in hunting polar bears due to changes in the law, and this could have had more effect than realised on numbers further confusing the picture. 

       I'm no expert in polar bears or biology, but it only takes a minute to find the critical information underpinning this issue. You should be able to do this yourself, and apply some healthy scepticism to Crockfords views.

       It should literally be  self evident a decline in ice affects their basic habitat, so at some stage will pose problems. Habitat loss has been a prime factor in the decline of many species. Polar bears are not as resourceful and adaptable as humans, and the trouble is we tend to see things through our own eyes.

       I'm always open to alternative opinions, but Crockford is unconvincing.

16380. johnthepainter at 11:24 AM on 28 December 2017
       Some curious things about Svensmark et al. reference list
       

       #6. Haze, A research paper that fails to recognize recent research related its subject of investigation, rather than challenging it, building on it, or at least indicating that it raises no difficulty with the paper's conclusions, strongly suggests that it should not be published in a reputable, peer-reviewed journal. That it also includes a sentence inaccurately referenced only increases the belief that, at the minimum, it should have been returned to correct these shortcomings.

16381. MA Rodger at 10:30 AM on 28 December 2017
       CO2 limits won't cool the planet
       

       Aaron Davis @18,

       Not only are you seriously in error throughout you grand analysis, you are too stupid to understand when these errors are pointed out to you.

       Perhaps we should consider the most egregious error you make. This is the inability to understand that an anomaly will take away any sign of temperature variation if such a variation resulted from an annual dip in CO2 over tha arctic. Consider this. The graph below is the RSS TLT data for arctic & antarctic, the graph you cite up-thread. It plots anomalies. Note the maximum variation is just +/-a handful of degrees centigrade from zero.

       

       So what happened to the annual variation in polar temperature? This would give an annual cycle of 30ºC peak-to-peak but it has been disappeared. This disappearance is achieved "...by subtracting the a mean monthly value determined by averaging 1979 through 1998 data ... for each month." So the stonking big annual 30ºC cycle is entirely disappeared and any other annual cycle (like for instance a possible teeny weeny drop in temperature due to CO2 levels dropping by a few ppm every year for a handful of months) will also be disappeared with it. Was this teeny weeny cycle there during the period 1979-98 which provided the data for the anomaly base?

       

       It appears it was! So it too would be disappeared from the anomaly.

       Arron Davis, if you cannot comprehend this basic property of anomalies, you don't really have a place comment about anomalies on this thread.

       Moderator Response:

       [TD] Snipped insult.

16382. Eclectic at 10:30 AM on 28 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       Richardtol @13 , would you (without going to extremes of effort) please give some detail of your objection.

       Do you feel that the Verheggen basic data are worse (the selection of the 45 + 45 blogs; or perhaps the selection of the blog contents/articles)?

       Or do you object to the content analysis in terms of the six categories of the sea-ice/polar-bear nexus?  Or some more general aspects of analysis?

       Presumably you do not object to the qualitative or statistical division of the 90 blogs, with respect to their being science-based or "science-denier".   Here seems to be one of those fortunate situations where the division is so black-or-white, as to need no actual mathematical analysis.

16383. villabolo at 07:11 AM on 28 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       The authors propose a number of ideas to help bring an end the post-truth era. One key idea involves the establishment of an international non-governmental organization that would create a rating system for disinformation.

       Unfortunately this won't make an impact on the confirmatory bias that grips most Conservative's minds.

       Also, what happens when the objective non-governmental agency gets replaced by someone who's not objective?

16384. Ciência e Clima at 07:05 AM on 28 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       cienciaeclima.com.br - social science still has much to contribute with climate science (and with science in general). But not in the way portraited in the article - as a technique to separate the truth from the lie. That is naive.

16385. Haze at 06:51 AM on 28 December 2017
       Some curious things about Svensmark et al. reference list
       

       My apologies "This puts in the top 1.7%"  should read "This puts it in the top 1.7%"

16386. Haze at 06:47 AM on 28 December 2017
       Some curious things about Svensmark et al. reference list
       

       I guess it doesn't really matter what you do or don't think as Nature Communications, first published in 2010, is a peer-reviewed open access journal with an impact factor of 12.2 .  This puts in the top 1.7%  of the 12,016 journals tracked by Journal Citaton Reports.  In view of its pedigree it is a reasonable assumption that Nature Communications publishes only those papers that meet fairly stringent criteria.  That this paper by Hensmark has been published in a high quality journal indicates the reviewers had a different opinion from you regarding  the validity of the findings and conclusions drawn and  the relevance of the papers cited.  

       Moderator Response:

       [JH] "Hensmark"?

16387. HK at 06:46 AM on 28 December 2017
       Some curious things about Svensmark et al. reference list
       

       #3 Funkypants:
       You are not the first to notice that!
       This is a citation from this article by George Monbiot (second § from bottom):

       "Newsrooms tend to be largely peopled by humanities graduates. Over the years, I have found myself explaining to other journalists how to calculate percentages, that two orders of magnitude greater does not mean double, that animals and mammals are not synonyms, and that CO₂ stands for carbon dioxide. There is a lack of contact not only with most of the population, but also with the material world and its physical parameters."

16388. HK at 06:32 AM on 28 December 2017
       Some curious things about Svensmark et al. reference list
       

       Richard Alley pretty much killed the cosmic rays hypothesis here.
       At 42:00 he mentioned the Laschamp event about 40,000 years ago, when the Earth's magnetic field was weakened by 75-95% and the flux of cosmic rays into the atmosphere greatly increased. According to Svensmarks idea this should have had a huge impact on the global climate, but it didn't.

       In Alley's own words:
       "We had a big cosmic ray signal, and the climate ignores it. And it is just about that simple! These cosmic rays didn’t do enough that you can see it, so it’s a fine-tuning knob at best."

16389. nigelj at 05:53 AM on 28 December 2017
       Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
       

       Excellent article, with constructive suggestions.

       Alternative facts are a most unfortunate modern phenomenon. One can only despair at this unusual and corrosive development, coming mostly from The White House in a continuous affront to our sanity.

       The Age of Enlightemment in the 17th century was based on society sharing objective facts and especially scientific facts, and has led to huge scientific and economic progress. We are in real danger of reversing all this progress.

       'Alternative facts' and fake news are a response to a changing world seen as a threat, and IMO are also driven by putting beliefs and instincts above hard objective evidence. It all leads to yet more partisan divisions.

       Notice how despite Donald Trumps many hopeless policies and and his poor standard of personal conduct, how he still has a solid loyal base of supporters. An article I read in the NZ Herald (can't find the thing now) observed he maintains some level of support by falsely blaming 'scapegoats' for all the problems in society, including blaming the media, immigrants, or liberal elites. This inflames the public and their prejudices, and distracts attention from what Trump is actually doing so he gets away with it.

       All Trump's failings are labeled 'fake news' and blamed on the scapegoats. The Republican Party as a whole does much the same thing at times especially their media supporters like Fox. However more and more people are seeing that "the emperor has no clothes".

       The parisian divide in America is driven by complex social and political forces. One thing needs resolution fast: The debate on free trade versus protectionism. Better public understanding of this issue would go a long way to diffuse tension, and partisan divisions. Economic evidence favours free trade, and this needs to be highlighted. Of course it has to have rules, and countries have to abide by those rules. But my point is get the public agreed on a few simple economic basics and this will help unite people.

16390. nigelj at 05:05 AM on 28 December 2017
       US government climate report looks at how the oceans are buffering climate change
       

       Just amplifying my comment. Swayseeker's ideas are interesting and feasible in theory, but look incredibly expensive for what would be achieved. It would cost huge sums obviously just to extract even 1% of ocean heat content given the volumes of heat involved. I would need to see some calculations to be convinced it made sense.

       Of course, if some private sector company wants to try such things and sees benefits related to growing crops, then that is their business I suppose.

       However it would not be appropriate for governments to spend public money on such schemes. We have three basic options for use of tax payers money1) spend money to reduce emissions and 2) spend money to suck heat out of the system 3) a combination of both

       IMO we have to spend all public money  money right now on limiting emissions. This is the priority given dangerous climate change scenario. This is economics 101 the best use of scarce resources. I'm talking here particularly about public money and government schemes etc.

       If we are successful with limiting dangerous climate change, we can then worry about sucking heat out of the system, if such things are practically plausible.

16391. nigelj at 04:44 AM on 28 December 2017
       US government climate report looks at how the oceans are buffering climate change
       

       Swayseeker wants to spend billions of dollars to extract maybe 1% of ocean heat content.

       Just cut fossil fuel emissions. It's too late to do much about heat already in the system.

16392. richardtol at 04:14 AM on 28 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       I most certaintly did not "underscor[e] the validity of [y]our conclusion." Quite the opposite, in fact. I argue that your analysis is poor and your data is worse. Your conclusion is therefore invalid.

16393. Aaron Davis at 04:10 AM on 28 December 2017
       CO2 limits won't cool the planet
       

       The serious errors in your grand analysis are::- MAYBE NOT SO SERIOUS but thanks anyway.

       (1) You fail to consider the potential magnitude of such a CO2 effect. Are you asking the impossible of your method - trying to use a microscope to measure the distance to the moon or a twelve inch ruler to measure the width of a human hair? If there were a signal to detect, it would perhaps be a fraction of the global response to a 15ppm decrease in CO2 over the preceeding three month period, something less than 0.001ºC perhaps?

       a. The potential magnitude of such a CO2 effect can be discerned from the Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity. Here a 100% increase in CO2 concentrations should result in a mean change in temperature between 2oC and 7oC. A decline of 3.5% (-14/400 ppm) should be between -0.07 and -0.245oC. While the 39 year slope is -0.1oC per cycle, the initial 10 year average of 0.24oC is way out of bounds. The standard deviation is 0.79oC, rather than 0.175oC - or 4.5x the expected range. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_sensitivity

       (2) The climate of the arctic & Antarctic are greatly different so their annual temperature ranges are going to be vastly dissimilar.

       a. I feel this is an excellent comparison since the slant path sun angle, which are predominant effects are normalized. Proximity in time (6 months) removes the year to year variation. Geophysics is a science of removing confounding effects. While the test fails at 15 ppm, I’m careful not to conclude CO2 significance fails at longer time frames of centuries, but at these longer timeframes any hope of affecting an effective Active Thermal Control by moderating CO2 is not feasible.

       (3) You appear to be using not temperatures by temperature anomalies over a period in which the 15ppm cycle has operated throughout and thus the effect will be entirely absent within any anomaly.

       a. The term anomaly refers to removing a reference temperature to both sequences and has no effect on the results.

       (4) You fail to mention the 1ppm sinusoidal Antarctic CO2 cycle which would reduce your raw 15ppm by 1ppm.

       a. I agree, for calculations I will refer to a 14 ppm variation in baseline CO2 concentrations (see response 1a).

       (5) The results are expressed incoherently. As described the result I obtain does show a non-statistically-significant downward trend but beyond that nothing that could be interpreted as "an average decrease of temperature (negative 0.10oC)" or "the Standard Deviation of the 39 year series is 0.79oC".

       a. Yes, I agree the conclusion could be expressed better, but I think you have the main points okay. The negative slope may be in response to an increase in seasonal CO2 variations in later years beyond the 14 ppm swing.

       b. I would appreciate it if someone could give me instructions on posting an image. I believe that if Ptolemy had seen what Galileo saw he would have come to the same conclusions.

       (6) The "raw dataset" referred to is not the data used in analysis but a broader dataset for the full year. The "clear jump" etc are not evident within the data analysed.

       a. The chart I refer to appears ¼ of the way down on the website http://www.climate4you.com/Polar%20temperatures.htm#Recent . Temperature changes in the two Polar Regions shows the jump in Arctic Temperature relative to Antarctic Temperature starting around year 1994. The caption on the figure starts with “Global monthly average lower troposphere temperature since 1979 for the northern (60-82.5N) and southern (60-70S) polar regions, according to Remote Sensing Systems (RSS).”

       b. A serious engineer would place more emphasis on the 1.25oC rise in Arctic temperatures from 1994-2017 over what appears to be a modest effect of CO2 over this 23 year time frame.

       Best regards.

       Moderator Response:

       [TD] Your use of equilibrium climate sensitivity is completely inappropriate. ECS is estimated only for the entire planet, and is defined to be after equilibration of the entire planetary climate system with the new, now stable, level of CO2. Equilibration takes hundreds to thousands of years. For just some background, see GFDL's post on equilibrium and transient climate sensitivity.

16394. PluviAL at 02:13 AM on 28 December 2017
       US government climate report looks at how the oceans are buffering climate change
       

       Swayseeker: Sorry your comment was axed. No, the scale of civilization, except for CO2 and other carbon related pollution, is relatively small. To act on the scale of the problem requires world wide cooperation at the root of the problem, CO2 emissions.

       It is possible to act at the planetary scale, but that requires use of planetary scale tools, such as building tools using the atmosphere itself, which is possible, although we have yet to develop such tools. Solar updraft tower technology begins to work at such a scale, but it is still too small to address the huge scale of ocean heat storage.

       However, the atmosphere can engage the oceans' heat as your comment suggests.  I like to think in terms of solutions, because if you think only in terms of the problem, as this article shows, is truly awesome, and thus emotionally disabling.  

16395. Swayseeker at 23:50 PM on 27 December 2017
       US government climate report looks at how the oceans are buffering climate change
       

       If every city on the coast used heat pumps to extract heat from the ocean and pump it into greenhouses to grow food in (in the deserts and in Arctic regions and so on) it could help a little. Typically one might use 1 unit of energy to move 4 units of heat. Water could be evaporated in greenhouses to humidify air to enhance rainfall. Water could be evaporated in greenhouses to desaleanate it and so on. All this could help move the heat out to space or to grow plants and take carbon dioxide out of the air. Rain moves heat upwards (evaporation at the low side and condensation at the cloud side).

       Moderator Response:

       [JH] Sloganeering snipped. Upon further review, initial decision reversed.

16396. Michael Schroeder at 23:34 PM on 27 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       Michael Sweet, thank you for your concise, clear & understated response, which confirms my own evaluation of these sources.

16397. MA Rodger at 21:52 PM on 27 December 2017
       CO2 limits won't cool the planet
       

       Aaron Davis @16,

       Always happy to bring delight.

       You attempt to calculate the effect of a polar GHG effect resulting from a seasonal 15ppm decrease in atmospheric CO2 concentrations over the arctic in summer. You attempt this by comparing the variation of arctic temperature summer and winter with the same variation in antarctic temperatures. The serious errors in your grand analysis are::-

       (1) You fail to consider the potential magnitude of such a CO2 effect. Are you asking the impossible of your method - trying to use a microscope to measure the distance to the moon or a twelve inch ruler to measure the width of a human hair? If there were a signal to detect, it would perhaps be a fraction of the global response to a 15ppm decrease in CO2 over the preceeding three month period, something less than 0.001ºC perhaps?

       (2) The climate of the arctic & antarctic are greatly different so their annual temperature ranges are going to be vastly dissimilar.

       (3) You appear to be using not temperatures by temperature anomalies over a period in which the 15ppm cycle has operated throughout and thus the effect will be entirely absent within any anomaly.

       (4) You fail to mention the 1ppm sinusoidal antarctic CO2 cycle which would reduce your raw 15ppm by 1ppm.

       (5) The results are expressed incoherently. As described the result I obtain does show a non-statistically-significant downward trend but beyond that nothing that could be interpreted as "an average decrease of temperature (negative 0.10oC)"  or "the Standard Deviation of the 39 year series is 0.79oC".

       (6 The "raw dataset" referred to is not the data used in analysis but a broader dataset for the full year. The "clear jump" etc are not evident within the data analysed.

16398. Funkypants at 16:45 PM on 27 December 2017
       Some curious things about Svensmark et al. reference list
       

       Nigelj - I have worked on radio as a news writter & news reader.  I have found that most journalist have a profound lack of knowledge of even the basics of science.  I got accused of being sexist when I mentioned that only female mosquitoes bite.

16399. nigelj at 15:19 PM on 27 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       Alchemyst @9, you ask for "arguments" about why Susan Crockford is wrong. Ok, one of the main things she claims is polar bears will simply adapt to less sea ice. The following two articles explain why this is unlikely, with reference to comments and research by polar bear experts.

       www.desmog.ca/2017/11/30/polar-bears-chosen-bizarre-symbol-deny-climate-change-scientists-say 

       motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/aepnpz/climate-change-deniers-think-polar-bears-are-thriving-in-a-melting-arctic

       They cover only the main points, but straight away it's possible to see how weak Susan Crockfords views are. If you want the detail use google to find relevant research papers.

       As stated by MS above, numbers have increased due to hunting, not climate issues. If Crockford was open and transparent she would have acknowledged this.

       However according to the experts, numbers are only increasing in some places, and where they have decreased it appears to be lack of seals due to lack of sea ice as discussed below:

       www.worldwildlife.org/stories/polar-bear-population-decline-a-wake-up-call-for-climate-change-action#

       To me this is a good indication of what is most probable long term as sea ice declines.

       Clearly the increase in numbers in some sub populations from some moratorium on hunting is essentially a "one off" event that has hidden the effects of climate change, so far.

       This polar bear issue is difficult currently in terms of exact numbers, because of measuring difficulties, and many factors influencing their populations, and I think its of more use to ask what is most probable looking ahead. On this issue Susan Crockfords conclusions are implausible.

16400. michael sweet at 13:14 PM on 27 December 2017
       How blogs convey and distort scientific information about polar bears and Arctic sea ice
       

       Michael Schroeder,

       The IUCN/SCC Polar Bear Specialist Group is a group of polar bear experts.

       Susan Crockford has never studied polar bears in the wild.  She has published on dog genetics and some polar archaeology.

       Regarding polar bears over the last 50 years, around 1970 the USA, Canada and several European countries passed laws restricting the hunting of polar bears.  Before that they were overhunted and the numbers were low.  Unsurprisingly, when overhunting stopped the population of polar bears increased.  This is urelated to global warming.  Not everything is related to AGW.

       Crockford and Wrightstone pick 50 years to get the full increase in population from the stoppage of hunting.  Somehow they have left off the eplaination of the increase.

       Experts are concerned about the future of polar bears.

Prev  320  321  322  323  324  325  326  327  328  329  330  331  332  333  334  335  Next