[Zipperfish]

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

So, what does that have to do with this study? You keep changing the subject, like somehow that will keep everyone distracted from the fact that yet another denier myth has been busted.

WUWT hasn't got their offical denial up yet, so you'lll have to excuse Fiddle if he seems like he's grasping at straws.

I will say one thing though--those researchers piss of the locals. According to one native I talked to, they've tranqed every bear in the area like ten times.

[Zipperfish]

N_Fiddledog N_Fiddledog:

Oh, I see we're back to that then, are we?

You have no argument for what I did say, so you'll just make something up and say I said that.

You were talking about ice decrease in reference to the bears.

I asked "Decrease from when?" The bears have been around for 130 thousand years. They've seen worse and survived.

But yes we have a satellite record of an Arctic ice decrease of about 15 or 20 years. So what? There's no surveyed evidence of effect on bear populations. There have been decreases in a couple of areas but hunting regs explain those. There have been increases in others.

yes I said the ice was decreasing and the first reply you had was "Is it?"

Like most deniers you deny, then deny having denied.

[N_Fiddledog]

Let's look at the whole quote Zip.

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

N_Fiddledog N_Fiddledog:

One suspects the bear population will continue to grow as it has over the last 50 years.

Why would you suspect that if the average amount of sea ice is declining over time?

I then respond:

$1:

Is it?

Declining from what? From 15 years ago? From 20? We don't have reliable records before 36.

So...so what?

The polar bear goes back at least 130 thousand years. There have been a number of warm periods during that time including the relatively recent Medieval, Roman and Holocene optimum.

It's pretty clear I'm saying decline from when over the 130 thousand years the bear has been around.

So again...is it? From when? From 30 years ago, sure. From the height of the Holocene optimum when the glaciers melted from Kansas to the Arctic? Not likely? That was what? 10 to 7 thousand years ago? The bear has been around for at least 130 thousand years.

[N_Fiddledog]

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

So, what does that have to do with this study? You keep changing the subject, like somehow that will keep everyone distracted from the fact that yet another denier myth has been busted.

You mean what does Polar Bear expert Mitchell Taylor being ostracized from the global warming cabal have to do with this one?

But I explained that earlier. I contend that every time you see one of these half baked bear scare hypotheses studies you'll find Derocher or Stirling's name floating around them. I then explained why I don't find those two credible.

But, you know what? You're a little bit right here. I made a mistake. Not a big one, but a bit of an oops.

I'd seen Derocher's name connected to this story. I thought I'd seen his name as being behind the study. I went back and looked. Mostly it's just Derocher giving Whiteman a reach around in congratulations. But where I made my mistake was here:

http://www.polarbearsinternational.org/ ... ol-studies

I saw the word "studies" and didn't connect to the fact of it being plural. They're two separate studies on cortisol. You're Whiteman study concerns zoo bears. There's a different study that I was thinking was the same one from Derocher on bears in the wild.

Nevertheless my contention remains true. You always see the names of Derocher or Stirling floating around somewhere in bear scare stories.

Hey, this is interesting though.

$1:

Scientists hypothesize that summer stress will be largely influenced by the a) body condition of the bears at the time of ice breakup, b) the duration of seasonal ice coverage and c) the sex, reproductive status and age of the individual.

The connection to ice breakup is just a "hypothesis", as in a guess. You were talking as if it was an established fact.

[Zipperfish]

N_Fiddledog N_Fiddledog:

It's pretty clear I'm saying decline from when over the 130 thousand years the bear has been around.

So again...is it? From when? From 30 years ago, sure. From the height of the Holocene optimum when the glaciers melted from Kansas to the Arctic? Not likely? That was what? 10 to 7 thousand years ago? The bear has been around for at least 130 thousand years.

It's declining very quickly right now. It's quite well known that polar bears rely on sea ice in their life cycle. It's not a huge leap to say that further declining arctic sea ice is going to impact the bears negatively. And this latest study seems to bear that out. No pun intended.

[N_Fiddledog]

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

N_Fiddledog N_Fiddledog:

It's pretty clear I'm saying decline from when over the 130 thousand years the bear has been around.

So again...is it? From when? From 30 years ago, sure. From the height of the Holocene optimum when the glaciers melted from Kansas to the Arctic? Not likely? That was what? 10 to 7 thousand years ago? The bear has been around for at least 130 thousand years.

It's declining very quickly right now. It's quite well known that polar bear rely on sea ice in their life cycle. It's not a huge leap to say that further declining arctic sea ice is going to impact the bears negatively. And this latest study seems to bear that out. No pun intended.

This study presents a hypothesis of what may affect bears in a possible future. Nothing more.

And speaking of hypotheses I contend that as bad as you may see this current little 20 year decline, the bears have seen worse over the last 130 thousand years.

[Zipperfish]

N_Fiddledog N_Fiddledog:

This study presents a hypothesis of what may affect bears in a possible future. Nothing more.

And speaking of hypotheses I contend that as bad as you may see this current little 20 year decline, the bears have seen worse over the last 130 thousand years.

I didn't say it was bad, I said it was happening. That's the part you seem to have trouble coming to grips with. As Caleb said, it's another denier myth being busted.

The paper is not just a hypothesis, it's a complete scientific study where they went out an measured bear activity based on the hypotehsis that "lowered activity of shore and ice bears is a response to decreased food availability." What they measured was consistent with "fasting non-hibernating animals"--e.g. hungry and maybe starving.

[N_Fiddledog]

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

N_Fiddledog N_Fiddledog:

This study presents a hypothesis of what may affect bears in a possible future. Nothing more.

And speaking of hypotheses I contend that as bad as you may see this current little 20 year decline, the bears have seen worse over the last 130 thousand years.

I didn't say it was bad, I said it was happening. That's the part you seem to have trouble coming to grips with. As Caleb said, it's another denier myth being busted.

The paper is not just a hypothesis, it's a complete scientific study where they went out an measured bear activity based on the hypotehsis that "lowered activity of shore and ice bears is a response to decreased food availability." What they measured was consistent with "fasting non-hibernating animals"--e.g. hungry and maybe starving.

But seriously, how many times do I have to say I know about the recent 20 year melt in the arctic before you stop rewriting the fact to say I believe something else.

Not only do I know it, you know I know it. You've seen me watch the yearly melt. We've discussed it. There have been threads.

Let me say again what I've been saying over and over again on recent threads.

There was a record low summer minimum for the 30 or so year satellite record in 2012.

After that, the ice has been bouncing back from the increase melting trend of - I think it's about - 18 years.

2013 was also a record for bounce-back from the melt. We're currently a little above that this year.

Now as to whether or not the idea "that summer stress will be largely influenced by the a) body condition of the bears at the time of ice breakup, b) the duration of seasonal ice coverage and c) the sex, reproductive status and age of the individual." it wasn't me that came up with the idea that is "a hypothesis".

It was the guys who I believe have been financing the studies on the subject - Polar Bear International.

And seeing as you like to get technical, Whiteman's study did not as you say, go "out and measure bear activity based on the [sic] hypotehsis that "lowered activity of shore and ice bears is a response to decreased food availability."

That implies Whiteman was out on the ice.

Whiteman measured the cortisol levels of Zoo bears. At least that's what the San Diego zoo tells me.

http://www.sandiegozooglobal.org/what_w ... lar_bears/

[Zipperfish]

N_Fiddledog N_Fiddledog:

But seriously, how many times do I have to say I know about the recent 20 year melt in the arctic before you stop rewriting the fact to say I believe something else.

Not only do I know it, you know I know it. You've seen me watch the yearly melt. We've discussed it. There have been threads.

Let me say again what I've been saying over and over again on recent threads.

There was a record low summer minimum for the 30 or so year satellite record in 2012.

After that, the ice has been bouncing back from the increase melting trend of - I think it's about - 18 years.

2013 was also a record for bounce-back from the melt. We're currently a little above that this year.

Now as to whether or not the idea "that summer stress will be largely influenced by the a) body condition of the bears at the time of ice breakup, b) the duration of seasonal ice coverage and c) the sex, reproductive status and age of the individual." it wasn't me that came up with the idea that is "a hypothesis".

It was the guys who I believe have been financing the studies on the subject - Polar Bear International.

And seeing as you like to get technical, Whiteman's study did not as you say, go "out and measure bear activity based on the [sic] hypotehsis that "lowered activity of shore and ice bears is a response to decreased food availability."

That implies Whiteman was out on the ice.

Whiteman measured the cortisol levels of Zoo bears. At least that's what the San Diego zoo tells me.

http://www.sandiegozooglobal.org/what_w ... lar_bears/

Different study.

This is the one I'm talking about:

Summer declines in activity and body temperature offer polar bears limited energy savings

So:

(a) polar bears use arctic ice as part of their life cycle
(b) arctic ice decreasing
(c) evidence that polar bears responding negatively

[N_Fiddledog]

Oh I see...thanks.

So with this one, there was a previous hypothesis bears might go into a kind of "walking hibernation" to conserve energy during a time of low food. Whiteman gathered evidence that seems to indicate this is not the case.

So therefore the suggestion that if the bear is stressed by hypothetical food loss which might occur as a result of future hypothetical crisis level ice loss he won't have this hypothetical "walking hibernation" super power to make things easier on him.

Big deal. If a hypothetical maunder minimum occurs and there's a hypothetical increase in ice creating hypothetically thickened sea ice seals hypothetically can't break through, it will be the same diff.

[N_Fiddledog]

This is relevant.

$1:

My work and that of others with DNA and fossils have also shown that polar bears likely have been a species for at least several hundred thousand years and thus survived previous interglacial periods in which there likely was little or no Arctic summer sea ice.

I pointed out that if the bears survived one such period perhaps they could survive another, with the logic that if we can predict the polar bear’s future we can also infer its past. This has been ignored (and denigrated) by the polar bear research community although it is a legitimate finding. This is presumably because it does not support predictions (i.e. hypotheses) of polar bears’ extinction.

Crockford’s work is similar in presenting data that do not support declines of polar bear numbers caused exclusively by loss of summer sea ice. She uses her broad background in several scientific fields to question the basic assumption that sea ice is a stable environment in all seasons, even over short time periods.

The loss of stable sea ice is a basic assumption of the models used to predict declines in polar bear numbers to the point of being threatened with extinction (being threatened or endangered with extinction is the criterion for ESA listing).

Scientists know that the assumptions used in a model are critical to its validity. For example, assumptions in genetic models that I use (e.g. mutation rates or species divergence times) are estimates, not known quantities, making model results uncertain. It is legitimate to use models with uncertain assumptions, but the uncertainty of the model results must be openly acknowledged and alternatives considered.

Crockford demonstrates that this has not been done for polar bears and that the basic assumption of stable sea ice is not valid. She strengthens her argument with revelations that there is a consensus that winter sea ice is expected to persist despite global warming, and that heavy spring ice, not absence of summer ice, has a negative impact on seals and thus polar bears. These points could change the entire argument about the future survival of polar bears.

One-sided science ignores the fact that ‘Sea ice is not a stable habitat for polar bears’

[DrCaleb]

N_Fiddledog N_Fiddledog:

Big deal. If a hypothetical maunder minimum occurs. . .