Government suspends biologist over 2006 report on dead polar bears

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/29/science/earth/29polar.html?_r=1

by brazzy • 15 years ago

65 21 15 years ago

nytimes.com

brazzy4• 15 years ago

And this is the industry lobby's take on that article: http://www.climatedepot.com/a/12115/Paging-Warmist-Polar-Bea...

How very eloquent and fact-oriented...

_delirium• 15 years ago

Hmm, climatedepot.com looks pretty a bit... unhinged. Do the various professors on its parent organization's Board of Advisors (http://www.cfact.org/about/1551/CFACT-Board-of-Advisors) realize they're running essentially a tabloid? I would think that even if you had skeptical views on the climate-change debate, you would want your name associated with publications that take a more serious tone...

brazzy4• 15 years ago

I'm sure they have less "unhinged" publications as well. But this site echoes how a lot of people think, and how those who fund CFACT want them to think. I doubt anyone works for them without realizing this. Ultimately, their job is to sway the opinion of the general public into this direction, and I suppose they see this as covering all their bases.

bfe8• 15 years ago

The best way to read this article is to start at the end and read backwards. I didn't at first recognize the recently and Orwellianly rebranded name (in the wake of disastrous publicity) of the federal government's agency that's supposed to be in charge of regulating companies involved in offshore drilling, but this is the same agency whose personnel has recently been implicated in not just being figuratively in bed with, but literally having sex with, people from the offshore drilling companies they're supposed to be regulating (and snorting cocaine with them too). You just can't make this stuff up.

And so extreme is the apparent regulatory capture that a scientist who works for the agency and reports seeing dead polar bears gets interrogated and then suspended by his employer.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2008/09/10/52243/oil-companies-ga...

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/11/washington/11royalty.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09...

bfe8• 15 years ago

OK sorry to comment on my own comment but I've been reading up on this the past couple hours and I once again call total bullshit on the Obama administration.

I made several donations to the Obama campaign but like so many others I have been terribly disappointed at what a flimsy useless ballsack he has been at actually walking the walk and even ensuring a halfway decently basic level of adult functionality in the federal government.

How hard is it after two and a half years in office to have an agency that isn't still figuratively if not still literally spreading its legs wide open for the industry it's supposed to be regulating.

brazzy4• 15 years ago

The US Federal government employs 2.5 million people. Promising significant changes in such a gigantic organization is one thing, actually achieving them quite another, no matter how well-meaning or competent one is...

iwwr• 15 years ago

Not considering this case in particular, but it is rather shameful how every single unusual weather event (and now 4 polar bears) is being exploited to promote the global warming political agenda. Not saying that the science is bad or that the policy objectives are wrong, but there should be more willingness for objectivity and reasoning.

Extreme events in isolation are saying nothing, the same as the isolated death of a few bears.

bfe8• 15 years ago

OK but why does a scientist suddenly get interrogated by agents from his employer's Inspector General's office and then put on administrative leave for happening to mention in a report that he noticed dead polar bears. How do you even expect "science" to be done under those kinds of conditions. And the "global warming political agenda" is the thing you're worried about here? Seriously?

brazzy4• 15 years ago

Objectivity and reasoning need on be founded on data, and data is a collection of single events, unusual or not. All this guy said was "we surveyed A1 square miles of arctic ocean and found N1 live polar bears and after a storm we surveyed A2 square miles and found N2 drifting dead bears, so basic arithmetic gives an estimate of X% of bears getting killed by such a storm in such an environment." And yeah, the small sample size results in a huge margin of error, but it's one perfectly legitimate datapoint. What connects it to global warming is that the environment in question has lately become increasingly ice-deficient, forcing the bears to swim long distances which is apparently very dangerous for them.

Global warming skeptics are free to provide their own data, but they seem to be more intent on personally attacking those who disagree.

Frankly, at this point anyone who claims that global warming isn't happening is either a paid industry shill or has allowed themselves to be brainwashed by such because he doesn't want to believe in something that implies his lifestyle is not sustainable. You can have legitimate arguments about the extent, speed, and cause of global warming, but claiming that it is not happening is neither objective nor reasonable given the undisputable evidence of shrinking glaciers and arctic ice covers.

farmerbrown• 15 years ago

Sure, some degree of global warming is probably happening. The bigger point here is that the "end-of-the-world" global warming is never going to happen. That is, the effect size of anthropogenic global warming is apparently small and does not match the original predictions put forth in the late 1980s. You can see the data (and complete lack of a rebuttal) here:

http://www.skepticalscience.com/Hansen-1988-prediction-basic...

Note that the observed global temperature anomaly, in black, tracks Scenario C, a scenario that "assumed a rapid decline in greenhouse gas emissions around the year 2000." However, during the same period, atmospheric carbon dioxide increased by approximately 40 parts per million. [1]

So, where does that leave us? It leaves us with a climate sensitivity of 3°C for a DOUBLING of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Of course, this assumes the existence of positive feedbacks in the climate system. One such positive feedback might be a decrease in snowfall, something talked about in the early 2000s:

"According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, within a few years winter snowfall will become 'a very rare and exciting event'." [2]

Recently, though, the claims are now that "snow outside is what global warming looks like." [3]

Without positive feedbacks, the climate sensitivity is more like 1.2°C for a DOUBLING of atmospheric carbon dioxide.

[1] http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/#mlo_full [2] http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/snowfalls-are-now-j... [3] http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/dec/20/uk-snow-...

Government suspends biologist over 2006 report on dead polar bears

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