Truth brought to bear on Bolt's hypocricy

In another Andrew Bolt signature piece of twisted green-hate tenuously stuck together with gnarled logic, Hypocrisy - Hard to Bear, we get this beauty:

And ssshhh. Don’t mention that the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre says the extent of Arctic ice is in fact “greater than this time last year”.

Tim Lambert picks him up: Andrew Bolt goes quote mining

That quote was brutally ripped from its context on this page, which says:

Arctic sea ice still on track for extreme melt ...

Although ice extent is slightly greater than this time last year, the average decline rate through the month of May was 8,000 square kilometers per day (3,000 square miles per day) faster than last May. Ice extent as the month closed approached last May's value.

And this month it's been running neck and neck with last year's melt.

A hand-full of Bolt's commentators point out the fault in his argument.

Hmmm, is the author’s point that environmentalists and journalists have an environmental impact, and therefore scientists are wrong if they think increased greenhouse gas concentrations won’t enhance the greenhouse effect? Or that polar bears can kill people, so therefore we shouldn’t care if they go extinct? Or that some people writesilly things on the internet, therefore it’s okay to quote the US National Snow and Ice Data Center out of context?

Link to Lambert's piece

Steve L of Canada (Reply)
Fri 20 Jun 08 (09:23am)

Andrew Bolt says: ‘Don’t mention that the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre says the extent of Arctic ice is in fact “greater than this time last year”.’ It does and the same report, published on its website http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/ , also says the ice is thinner and more likely to melt. The NSIDC also states: ‘Although ice extent is slightly greater than this time last year, the average decline rate through the month of May was 8,000 square kilometers per day (3,000 square miles per day) faster than last May.’ The report adds: ‘Average Arctic Ocean surface air temperatures in May were generally higher than normal. While anomalies were modest (+1 to 3 degrees Celsius, +2 to 5 degrees Fahrenheit) over most of the region, temperatures over the Baffin Bay region were as much as 6 degrees C (11 degrees F) above normal.’ Oh such irony, when you point your accusing pen at others for selective reporting. Hypocrisy? Pretentious? Moi?

Stuart Nuttall of Exeter, England (Reply)

And ssshhh. Don’t mention that the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre says the extent of Arctic ice is in fact “greater than this time last year”.

Tim Lambert provides some balance for this cherry picked from context.

strange days indeed (Reply)

Arctic sea ice is on a long-term downward trend. There is a bit more this year because of an exceptionally warm 2007 which caused a decline even greater than the norm. This year the coverage has reverted to the normal downward trend, which means a temporary increase over 2007.

Exactly the same argument applies to 1998, which was abnormally hot because of the El Nino fluctuation. It’s only by picking 1998 that Andrew is able to make this “it hasn’t warmed” claim. It has warmed since 1997 and since 1999.

Polar bear populations are increasing because hunting them has been forbidden. This has nothing to do with the extent of the ice. Just as it is a mistake to focus on one year (2008 ice or 1998 temperature) it is a mistake to focus on one species. Most studies say that large numbers of species are headed for extinction if global warming cannot be mitigated.

James (Reply)

Arctic sea ice melt ‘even faster’

Arctic sea ice is melting even faster than last year, despite a cold winter.

Data from the US National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) shows that the year began with ice covering a larger area than at the beginning of 2007.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7461707.stm

ANDREW of Melbourne (Reply)

The only sign of a possible response from Bolt was this.

Can someone please tell me why my comment from earlier today did not make it onot Andrew’s Blog??? Or was it censored when he was proven to be a liar.

Trebby of Sydney (Reply)

Not bearing up well under your own hypocrisy, AB,?

Also looks like you may have suffered a spate of White Hat Trolling! Good to see your argument being opened like a tin can, calmly, rationally, and indisputably. The only honourable thing left for you to do is retract.

But, I am not bullish about that. In fact, I'm positively...

Technorati Tags: global warming, climate change, denialists, skeptics

First to go: Iconic Polar Bear or Fabled Narwal?

Andrew Bolt repeats he doesn't want us to use polar bears as a symbol of global warming in our media any more:

Bear With Us: More Hype Deflated

The eco-hype is cooled, along with the weather:

The polar bear is in trouble in Canada because of overhunting and global warming, but it is not endangered or threatened with extinction, an independent committee advising the Canadian government said Friday.

The obligatory genuflection to global warming is there, of course, but perhaps we can now drop the absurd use of the polar bear as the emblem of global warming doom.

Andrew Bolt – Sunday, April 27, 08 (09:31 am)

He'll be pissed-off to read in Wired's story that, should his long-running persecution of the poor polar bear succeed, the narwhal is ready to drop in on its wave:

The polar bear has become an icon of global warming vulnerability, but a new study found an Arctic mammal that may be even more at risk to climate change: the narwhal.

It seems the 80,000 strong narwhal is highly specialised, reducing it's chances of adapting to a melting environment.

The narwhal, which dives about 6,000 feet to feed on Greenland halibut, is the ultimate specialist, evolved specifically to live in small cracks in parts of the Arctic where it's 99 percent heavy ice, Laidre said. As the ice melts, not only is the narwhal habitat changed, predators such as killer whales will likely intrude more often.

"Since it's so restricted to the migration routes it takes, it's restricted to what it eats, it makes it more vulnerable to the loss of those things," Laidre said in a telephone interview from Greenland, where she is studying narwhals by airplane.

Imagine the mileage that environment groups could make by elevating the fabled Narwhal 'as the emblem of global warming doom.'?

The narwhal, a whale with a long spiral tusk that inspired the myth of the unicorn, edged out the polar bear for the ranking of most potentially vulnerable in a climate change risk analysis of Arctic marine mammals.

Unravell the unicorn myth, that takes in Noah Ark and the Great Flood, a story embedded in our Abrahamic DNA, and you will have the genesis of the great green religion that Andrew so fears. He's much better off hoping the polar bears will pull through; and that's the Knuts and Bolts of it:

The Unicorn Song

A long time ago, when the Earth was green
There was more kinds of animals than you've ever seen
They'd run around free while the Earth was being born
And the loveliest of all was the unicorn

There was green alligators and long-necked geese
Some humpty backed camels and some chimpanzees
Some cats and rats and elephants, but sure as you're born
The loveliest of all was the unicorn

The Lord seen some sinning and it gave Him pain
And He says, "Stand back, I'm going to make it rain"
He says, "Hey Noah, I'll tell you what to do
Build me a floating zoo, and take some of those

Green alligators and long-necked geese
Some humpty backed camels and some chimpanzees
Some cats and rats and elephants, but sure as you're born
Don't you forget My unicorns

Don't forget the narwhal. The research study Wired's article cites was published this week in the peer-reviewed journal Ecological Applications.

Global Warning Climate Change Energy

How much scientific abuse can a polar bear?

A favourite deceit of AGW sceptics is to present Bjorn Lomberg as a "scientist." He isn't. His PhD is in Political Science — a humanity.

There are different methodologies between those used in "hard" and social sciences. Social sciences don't really use the scientific method. This is clearly demonstrated through out a recent Salon.com interview with Bjorn, and was especially telling in the discussion of Bjorn's use of polar bears.

Here is a response to the writer quoting one expert's opinion (a front-line researcher in polar bears).

"OK. But I've talked to a different expert that's up in Greenland, who works for the Danish government, and he has looked over my chapter, and said that it's OK."

If only all experts were equal.

Bjorn's referencing of another expert is supposed to counter the point, but he never makes a commitment on which has the better data and the better hypothesis — a fundamental step in hard science.

clipped from www.desmogblog.com Bjorn Lomborg's new book attacked by a polar bear 31 Aug 07 It seems there may be a bit of last minute damage control over at the Bjorn Lomborg camp. A heavy piece of the marketing campaign for Lomborg's new book Cool It was the author's claim that polar bear populations are increasing. Lomborg uses this as evidence of his argument the consequences of global warming are more hype than reality. And the marketing of Lomborg's contentious claim seemed to be working. That is until Salon.com's Kevin Beger took Lomborg to task over the claim. Beger levels the polar bear claim leaving Lomborg's only defense to say: "OK. But I've talked to a different expert that's up in Greenland, who works for the Danish government, and he has looked over my chapter, and said that it's OK." Now, Lomborg's book review on Amazon no longer carries any mention of polar bears, but the google entry for Amazon still has the original polar bear claim here for all of us to see. It is too late for a correction.

Polar bears on the way out

U.S. Ge­o­log­i­cal Sur­vey sci­en­tists do not hold out much hope that car­bon di­ox­ide can be turned around in time to help the po­lar bears...

clipped from www.world-science.net Report: Most polar bears to die out by 2050 Two-thirds of the world’s po­lar bears will be killed off by 2050 — and the en­tire popula­t­ion gone from Alas­ka — be­cause of thin­ning sea ice from glob­al warm­ing in the Arc­tic, U.S. gov­ern­ment sci­en­tists fore­cast Fri­day. Only in the north­ern Ca­na­di­an Arc­tic is­lands and the west coast of Green­land are any of the world’s 16,000 po­lar bears ex­pected to sur­vive through the end of the cen­tu­ry, said the U.S. Ge­o­log­i­cal Sur­vey, which is the sci­en­tif­ic arm of the In­te­ri­or De­part­ment. USGS pro­jects that po­lar bears dur­ing the next half-cen­tu­ry will dis­ap­pear along the north coasts of Alas­ka and Rus­sia and lose 42 per­cent of the Arc­tic range they need to live in dur­ing sum­mer in the Po­lar Ba­sin when they hunt and breed. A po­lar bear’s life usu­ally lasts about 30 years. Sci­en­tists do not hold out much hope that car­bon di­ox­ide can be turned around in time to help the po­lar bears.

Just how much can a polar bear?

Translation anyone?

Global Warning Climate Change Energy

Arctic hippopotamus to survive the polar bear

We only have one hundred years till mankind can start experiencing life in our own Jurassic Park according to Appy Sluijs, an expert in ancient ecology at Utrecht University in the Netherlands and fossil footprints of a pantodont found on an Arctic island.
:::[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantodont]

Most adult polar bear males weigh 300-600 kg (660-1320 lbs) and measure 2.4-3.0 m (7.9-10.0 ft) in length, about the size of a pantadont. That both animals have made Svalbard archipelago their home over time is a stunning demonstration of how ecology adapts to climate change over 55 million years.

The questions each one of us has to answer is - do our descendents start having to adapt in 2107, within 100 short years? Or are you the type that intuitively believes that mankind should live out our benign interglacial bonus in accordance with natures prescription?
:::[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polar_bear#Natural_range]

clipped from www.reuters.com COAL MINE SEVEN, Svalbard, Norway (Reuters) - Fossils of a hippopotamus-like creature on an Arctic island show the climate was once like that of Florida Fossil footprints of a pantodont, a plant-eating creature weighing about 400 kg (880 lb), add to evidence of sequoia-type trees and crocodile-like beasts in the Arctic millions of years ago when greenhouse gas concentrations in the air were high. about 55 million years ago "Where we are now was once a temperate rainforest," orests grew in the Arctic when carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, was at about 1,000 parts per million in the atmosphere because of natural swings in the climate. clipped from www.reuters.com Sea levels 55 million years ago were about 100 meters higher than now -- Antarctica was free of ice. Carbon dioxide levels are now at almost 390 per million in the atmosphere, up from 270 before the Industrial Revolution and rising fast. Sluijs said they could reach 1,000 parts per million by 2100 if not held in check.

Global Warning Climate Change