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BEAR SCIENCE ATTACKED

Have these people no shame?

As the poster child for the climate change generation, polar bears have come to symbolise the need to tackle climate change. But their popularity has attracted the attention of global warming sceptics funded by the oil industry, who have started to attack polar bear science.

Posted by Tim B. on 07/05/2007 at 03:41 AM
  1. polar bear science (sic).  Is that science about polar bears, or science BY
    ~!^%&$@ polar bears?????
    Cheers
    RodC

    Posted by Rod C on 2007 07 05 at 03:56 AM • permalink

  2. Polar bear science says they’re doomed.  We don’t want oil companies paying people to go and count the damn bears!  That’s just meaningless statistics.

    Posted by anthony_r on 2007 07 05 at 03:56 AM • permalink

  3. has attracted the attention of global warming sceptics funded by the oil industry

    It’s an article of faith that scientific inquiry that throws doubt on the validity of Global Warming (or its bastard half-brother Climate Change) is always funded by the oil industry and is therefore suspect.

    What this ignores is that a truth exists independently of its discoverer.

    For example, Nazi-sponsored research was among the first to draw a link between smoking and cancer. The Nazis were and are despicable, but the cancer link still holds.

    Posted by The Mongrel on 2007 07 05 at 04:02 AM • permalink

  4. I have found Mann’s hockey stick very effective for killing polar bears.

    Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 07 05 at 04:03 AM • permalink

  5. I just don’t get it. What’s the problem?
    If the ice does melt, we will no longer need the polar bears to police the ice sheets and keep them free of pesky seals and their dangerous blow holes!

    I mean, sure. The polar bears are on contract but they’re not union and it wont be all that hard to cut them loose once we don’t need them anymore.

    Posted by Grimmy on 2007 07 05 at 04:04 AM • permalink

  6. I don’t understand - I’m a climate change sceptic and I’m NOT oil funded

    Posted by aussiemagpie on 2007 07 05 at 04:07 AM • permalink

  7. It’s the Bipolar Bears you have to worry about. They are so unpredictable!

    Posted by blogstrop on 2007 07 05 at 04:08 AM • permalink

  8. White privilege.
    What about brown bears?

    Posted by chrisgo on 2007 07 05 at 04:10 AM • permalink

  9. A reply to Soon’s paper, under review at the journal, accuses him of ignoring data that does not fit his argument and of misinterpreting the predictions made by climate models.

    Not even the IPCC pretends that climate models predict anything.  The only results derived from these models are interpretations, and Soon is being smacked on the wrist for making his own.

    Posted by cuckoo on 2007 07 05 at 04:16 AM • permalink

  10. Dropbears are also very importantDropbears

    Warning and Information about Drop Bears
    Latin scientific name: throatsremovis:

    And from this site all about Dropbears:

    Tourists wishing to protect themselves are advised to use the only 100% effective deterrent. The dropbear doesn’t like the smell of Vegemite. Therefore, a liberal coating of this product applied to the face and neck regions will afford protection. Due to the numbers of dropbears around these days, Vegemite can be found on sale in every supermarket in Australia.

    Posted by aussiemagpie on 2007 07 05 at 04:24 AM • permalink

  11. Sorry I’m late everyone.  I was just having a “brown bag” lunch with a cigar chompin’, 10 gallon hat wearin’, son’o'bitch from Houston.

    What’s going on?

    Posted by murph on 2007 07 05 at 04:33 AM • permalink

  12. We is probearly dooomed, they may turn into solar bears and reflect the heat back into outer space or melt the glaciers

    Posted by Hillyminx on 2007 07 05 at 04:35 AM • permalink

  13. #11, murph:

    What’s going on?

    Not sure. I think it has something to do with the furry land sharks wanting special access to the labs or something.

    Posted by Grimmy on 2007 07 05 at 04:36 AM • permalink

  14. Three of the six other authors also have links to the oil industry

    Let me guess…. they drive cars?

    Posted by squawkbox on 2007 07 05 at 05:15 AM • permalink

  15. I’m glad I’m on the big oil payroll because all those millions are going to be really useful when the world comes in an end…

    Posted by murph on 2007 07 05 at 05:20 AM • permalink

  16. Three of the six other authors also have links to the oil industry

    And the other three don’t.

    I’m curious that the rebuttal is in the form of an unpublished paper. Is that bear science or barely science?

    Posted by SteveGW on 2007 07 05 at 05:54 AM • permalink

  17. Let us not forget the Black Bear. Wouldn’t want to be racist or anything.

    One such as this beauty roams through this part of the mountain I live on. In fact one such as was ogling my wife as she walked the dogs.

    Then she asked what that substance on her robe was….said it looked like honey. I said nahhhhh, must be tree sap.

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 06:05 AM • permalink

  18. The NewScientist (is it something new not to need a space between two words, or is it just stupid?) has also solved the mystery of the missing Andean lake:

    On Monday, a team of scientists flew out to the National Park and returned with the verdict: melting glaciers dunnit.

    Please, no attacks on this disappearing-lake science.

    Posted by surly on 2007 07 05 at 06:06 AM • permalink

  19. Hold it a minute.  I’m a global warming skeptic and I haven’t seen one dime from oil companies.  Whose holding on to our payola?

    paco!  Where are your lobbyists and the money bags?

    Posted by wronwright on 2007 07 05 at 06:10 AM • permalink

  20. Polar bears - thick coats, thin skins.

    Critics of polar bear science do have some valid points. Not one polar bear has won a Nobel Prize for Science. Not one polar bear holds a qualification in climatology, although this has not stopped most of the world’s leading human climate change “scientists”. Polar bear science smells strongly of fur seal blood.

    Posted by Contrail on 2007 07 05 at 06:26 AM • permalink

  21. #17 That’s a mighty fine bear El Cid.

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 06:33 AM • permalink

  22. Would anybody critical of Exxon-Mobil funding actually argue the world’s second-largest company (and allegedly at the core of AGW) not conduct research on AGW?

    And besides, with earnings for 2006 in the vicinity of USD 40 billion, it’s hard to imagine any academic in the US who isn’t receiving money (directly or indirectly) from Exxon-Mobil.

    Posted by Hanyu on 2007 07 05 at 06:35 AM • permalink

  23. The Great Global Warming Swindle will be shown on ABC at 8.30 next Thursday.

    Followed by a discussion…

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 06:40 AM • permalink

  24. 21 Ash_

    Yes, yes it is. Although I thought the honey ummmm, tree sap was mighty fine too…:).

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 06:41 AM • permalink

  25. #24, I’m sure the tree sap was spectacular.

    Would you like some Cheezels?

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 06:51 AM • permalink

  26. The religion of Gaia now acquires a Holy animal!

    Posted by Rob Read on 2007 07 05 at 06:54 AM • permalink

  27. #23, yes.  It is a bit hard to get the list of the ‘discussion’ panel from the website: http://www.abc.net.au/swindle (haha).  They flash the names of the expert panel up on the ad (you know, the things the ABC doesn’t have), but it wouldn’t pay to blink.
    I hae only seen the ad once, and recognised Michael Duffy as one of the names.  Now Mr Duffy might be a reasonable chap, but an expert? puleese.  If you must have a journo, why not Bolt?

    Posted by entropy on 2007 07 05 at 06:56 AM • permalink

  28. Would you like some Cheezels?

    Why yes, thank you. Will they have to be glued on?

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 06:58 AM • permalink

  29. #27 Entropy, I saw Michael Duffy and Robyn Williams, but the names disappeared too fast to see others.

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 07:03 AM • permalink

  30. #28 No, they won’t need to be glued on, but they’ll be tasty El Cid.

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 07:04 AM • permalink

  31. #19 Umm, Wron? I’ve been flogging the enslaved accountants who are going over the books. Funny how cheap we got ‘em off ENRON.  Andrea is getting that income stream. Apparently she has a special research and surveillance project. It is absorbing those funds. Andrea is also practising her skinning techniques on polar bears. While they are still alive.

    I was supervising the cleaning of Andrea’s newly extended trophy wall recently and made the completely innocent and totally unrelated comment that:

    Oh, and leave Pedro the Llama alone. That’s one of Andrea’s spies in a Llama suit, he keeps an eye on Wronwright’s activities at home.
    <Looks worriedly at Andrea’s ‘Disgusting perversions committed by Wronwright’ file, which is so large things are starting to orbit it. Wonders why some of the visible file markers include ‘chickens’, ‘mead-fuelled carnage - asstd’ and ‘interspecies relationships of a perverted kind with silicon-based dimorphic hexapodal ungulates’. Remembers he is not really supposed to use Andrea’s computer terminal while in her office supervising the cleaning of Andrea’s trophy wall, so recently extended by 100 metres… upwards. For the mounted heads. Which are mostly human. Oh, look, there’s Huckabee>

    So do the sums about one-plus-one (and remember the last time you did that, the answer is NOT ‘a grapefruit??’, mmmkay?)

    I hear that summer 450BC in Tiryns was nice, BTW. Very nice.

    MarkL
    Minionmeister to the VRWC

    Posted by MarkL on 2007 07 05 at 07:08 AM • permalink

  32. Polar bear scientists would have more credibility if they spent at least some time away from the study of seals.

    Posted by Margos Maid on 2007 07 05 at 07:14 AM • permalink

  33. What a load of bollocks that article was.  The basic thought is that no study which will not confirm a predetermined politico-religious outcome can be permitted.

    So no actual… y’know. science should be done!

    Sheesh!

    MarkL
    canberra

    Posted by MarkL on 2007 07 05 at 07:19 AM • permalink

  34. *Checks mail box*

    Where’s my damn check from Mobilshellhalliburton?

    Posted by ErnieG on 2007 07 05 at 07:22 AM • permalink

  35. 30 Ash_

    #28 No, they won’t need to be glued on, but they’ll be tasty

    Wonderful! Three pallet loads please. I wouldn’t like to run out, you know. The Black’s (bear) are so damn picky at times.

    Pass a human up and eat a fish, then vice versa.

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 07:27 AM • permalink

  36. When polar bear science is done by man, the result is frequently snow-blindness to the freakin’ obvious.

    Posted by PW on 2007 07 05 at 07:32 AM • permalink

  37. El Cid, Cheezels are damn fine eating. I’ll have them delivered immediately.

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 07:33 AM • permalink

  38. As this And this show, without honey or cheezels

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 07:39 AM • permalink

  39. It’s because New Scientist was heading the direction of tosh such as this that I didn’t renew my subscription—20 years ago. Obviously it hasn’t improved.  It was a good read for the layman up to the late 80s when it took a turn to the left.

    Posted by walterplinge on 2007 07 05 at 07:39 AM • permalink

  40. Ash_ (excuse the intermittent typing, clearing a place for the pallets)

    Thanks…will look forward to the feast..:).

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 07:42 AM • permalink

  41. El Cid, just make sure you pay your bear patrol tax. Otherwise the bears get nasty…

    The feasts will be a true delight.

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 07:53 AM • permalink

  42. just make sure you pay your bear patrol tax. Otherwise the bears get nasty…

    Check is in the mail, as we type.

    The feasts will be a true delight.

    Yes, yes they will.

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 07:57 AM • permalink

  43. Ok El Cid, I have the M&Ms;, popcorn, jellybeans, chips, gummi bears, licorice alsorts, chocolate cake, Guinness and other booze.

    Let’s feast!

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 08:32 AM • permalink

  44. I thought it was ManBearPig science…

    Posted by murph on 2007 07 05 at 08:56 AM • permalink

  45. That article was embarrassing, even for NewScientist.

    Posted by moptop on 2007 07 05 at 09:21 AM • permalink

  46. walterplinge—It’s Gramscian scoailism at work.  I pretty much stopped reading Skeptical Inquirer when it became all Bad Baptists! all the time under the new editor.  Needless to say, they embrace AGW, too.

    Posted by richard mcenroe on 2007 07 05 at 09:48 AM • permalink

  47. Bearsciencedammit! This is bearsciencedamn serious, people!

    Posted by Dave S. on 2007 07 05 at 09:51 AM • permalink

  48. #19 paco!  Where are your lobbyists and the money bags?

    Not to worry, Wronwright. Petroleum Allies for Combating the Ozone are wining and dining around the clock to insure that climate change skeptics get their share. Paco’s Petroleers have got the gravy train underway, and your anti-global warming comments have not gone unnoticed! A cut of the propaganda profits will be coming your way - er, as soon as we have any profits. The whole thing is being run by the Philanthropic Association of Charitable Organizations - whoever they are - and their expenses have, thus far, exceeded revenues. But we hope to make it up on volume.

    Posted by paco on 2007 07 05 at 10:16 AM • permalink

  49. and their expenses have, thus far, exceeded revenues. But we hope to make it up on volume

    .

    I snorted the breakfast of champions also rans, Diet Coke, up my nose at that one because I actually worked at a company that told me the same thing “yes, yes, we understand that we are selling below cost, but we will make it up in volume”. I’m sure that whole concept would have played out well except for the going bankrupt and being liquidated part.

    Posted by SwampWoman on 2007 07 05 at 11:05 AM • permalink

  50. 43 Ash_

    Why yes you do have some real goodies, as well as other stuff. All, just happen to be favorites of mine, too.

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 11:11 AM • permalink

  51. 49 Swampy

    As you can see, Paco runs a damn tight ship.

    Hope your Diet Coke thingy is all cleared up.

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 11:14 AM • permalink

  52. #50 Well, dig in El Cid.

    They’re all tasty.

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 11:18 AM • permalink

  53. Ash_

    They’re all tasty.

    I’m sure they are Lady Ash_. In fact, damn sure.

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 11:38 AM • permalink

  54. #53 My Lord, you’re more than welcome to sample my wares. Or enjoy them to excess. Whatever you like.

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 11:45 AM • permalink

  55. Cheezles.  I’ve a mate who’s a Mexican carpenter.  He wouldn’t be without ‘em.

    And for all the whiney blowback I’ve been getting for my AGW skepticism, not a single petro-dollar to show for it.  I’m all for cheezeling a bit of research funding from
    BIG Oil.  T’would pour oil on troubled waters.

    Jus’ sayin’.

    Posted by Olrence on 2007 07 05 at 11:46 AM • permalink

  56. So all this oil money gets poured into scepticism and denial, and what are the polar bear scientists supposed to do?  Operated on a fish and chips budget?  Will no one think of the polar bear scientists?

    Posted by RebeccaH on 2007 07 05 at 11:51 AM • permalink

  57. #49.  Well there’s two theories to the ‘below cost’ thing, y’know.  The admin departments beloved ‘full absorbtion costing ‘model, and the common practice of ‘marginal costing’.

    Many’s the time I went eyeball to eyeball with admin over their insistence that every transaction had to contribute to every aspect of a total costing template, when in the real world a certain percentage of transactions could be done on marginal costing, that is, covering the actual wholesale costs of the
    deal, with an undefined margin on top, thus boosting volume, achieving notional economies of scale thus enhancing margins across the board and, and…..

    And they looked at me just the same way you’re looking at me now…..

    Posted by Olrence on 2007 07 05 at 11:56 AM • permalink

  58. #57 Olrence: Paco Enterprises could use a CFO like you. Interested?

    Posted by paco on 2007 07 05 at 12:01 PM • permalink

  59. 54

    Well, i am a bit of a…hmmmm, what’

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 12:04 PM • permalink

  60. Well Sir, that would have to hinge on one crucial consideration.  Would I get to wear one of those dinky green visors?  And could I wear the petty cash tim key on a silver cord ‘round mah scrawny neck?

    Posted by Olrence on 2007 07 05 at 12:06 PM • permalink

  61. wha happen to the res of me post, eh?

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 12:09 PM • permalink

  62. I have no idea El Cid. I didn’t steal it to eat later, I know that.

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 12:10 PM • permalink

  63. #60: You got it! You sound like a big improvement over our last guy; he ran off to Argentina with our acounts payable.

    Posted by paco on 2007 07 05 at 12:12 PM • permalink

  64. Hmmm, suitcase stuffed with purloined unpaid invoices.  Off to corner the Argentine woodworking tool market before Kraft does.

    I know the type.  Sounds like a ‘full absorbtion model’ kinda guy.

    Posted by Olrence on 2007 07 05 at 12:16 PM • permalink

  65. Olrence

    You can be assured of one thing under the Paco branding name…..

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 12:27 PM • permalink

  66. My GOD!

    It ate me up again…just like Ash_s, Olrence.

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 12:29 PM • permalink

  67. I think it’s part of the Great Microsoft conspiracy El Cid.

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 05 at 12:33 PM • permalink

  68. Paradoxical Abreviation Confabulator Operations working for you too?

    Posted by Olrence on 2007 07 05 at 12:33 PM • permalink

  69. Or is that the Prolixity Avoiding Context Omitter?

    Posted by Olrence on 2007 07 05 at 12:36 PM • permalink

  70. Or maybe the Perplexing Attenuation Conundrum Ordnance?

    Posted by Olrence on 2007 07 05 at 12:42 PM • permalink

  71. New Scientist descends to a new low in attacking scientists with ad hominen slurs. Another reason I don’t buy that rag anymore.

    Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 07 05 at 12:44 PM • permalink

  72. Think I’m OK now. Paco, cleaned out my cash cache.

    Posted by El Cid on 2007 07 05 at 01:15 PM • permalink

  73. Could somebody tell me what the great advantage is to keeping a giant, bad-tempered predator around that would at best consider me a tasty between-meal snack?  I say their highest and best use is as a bear-skin rug in front of a crackling fire.

    /Not that I’ve seen many polar bears or enjoyed many crackling fires in Florida, but I can dream.

    Posted by SwampWoman on 2007 07 05 at 03:57 PM • permalink

  74. “But their popularity has attracted the attention of global warming sceptics funded by the oil industry, who have started to attack polar bear science.”

    Polarbearologists need to rise up and put a stop to that nonsense.

    Posted by Dave Surls on 2007 07 05 at 04:32 PM • permalink

  75. #48 paco -

    A cut of the propaganda profits will be coming your way - er, as soon as we have any profits. The whole thing is being run by the Philanthropic Association of Charitable Organizations - whoever they are - and their expenses have, thus far, exceeded revenues. But we hope to make it up on volume.

    paco, you told me the same exact thing when I asked you where my 90% share of the profits (albeit with a 10% share of voting rights) were for Wronco, my small but growing Mighty Mo of a company you “acquired” in a hostile takeover *. 

    “We’re losing money”, you said.  “We’re not making any profits”.  “We have a slight cash flow problem”.  That’s all I heard but every time I travel to the corporate offices (by a Greyhound third class bus ticket to save money), I see nothing but luxury.  Polar bear rugs.  Teak wood furniture.  Van Gogh and Renoir reproductions on the walls.  And teams of scantily clad female assistants waiting on the new Wronco “management” team.

    Cut those expenses paco!  I want my profits!

    * hostile takeover, paco style = Apaches helicopters, tanks, and a crack team of commandoes

    Posted by wronwright on 2007 07 05 at 05:36 PM • permalink

  76. #23 Ash_’s post on the Great Global Warming Swindle being shown.  If you follow the limk to the ABC blurb about their evenhandedness, they have one of those e-polls.

    Vote early and often!!

    Cheers
    RodC

    Posted by Rod C on 2007 07 05 at 06:19 PM • permalink

  77. #75: Just a cunningly-designed front, Wronwright. Those female assistants are unpaid interns from the local community college, and the “polar bear” rugs are made out of hair collected from the barber shop across the street from the Golden Age Retirement Home.

    Posted by paco on 2007 07 05 at 07:16 PM • permalink

  78. Right, holiday time.

    I’m off on minion sabbatical for a few days to Remulak’s mucus mines down Melbourne way to study the slave-flogging technology of these alien allies of the VRWC.

    Be nasty while I’m away.

    MarkL
    Minionmeister to the VRWC

    (With apologies to the Moxargon Group)

    Posted by MarkL on 2007 07 05 at 07:38 PM • permalink

  79. Can one be snow blinded by polar bear science?

    Posted by andycanuck on 2007 07 05 at 10:57 PM • permalink

  80. #78: I’m off on minion sabbatical for a few days to Remulak’s mucus mines . . .

    Say, Mark, while you’re down there, check on the viscosity of the output at shaft #8. Not altogether satisfactory.

    Posted by paco on 2007 07 05 at 11:08 PM • permalink

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