Oh, I found some comedy gold posted on the NASA website What on Earth is That?
It features a talk by NASA GISS warmist Gavin Schmidt, who apparently took a trip to understand that all important metric of the Arctic climate; polar bears. A video of his talk follows. Apparently, Martha Stewart came along for the ride and made a festive thermometer cozy for Gavin.
Gosh, how did he tear himself away from his taxpayer funded blogging duties at Real Climate while he’s still got hundreds of climate reporting stations in Australia that haven’t been updated since 1992 in the GISTEMP database? Good thing he has his priorities straight.
Somebody at NASA writes on that blog:
You just can’t go wrong with a title to a talk like that. The clip below is from an hour-long talk that Gavin Schmidt gave to colleagues at GISS about his visit to Churchill, a tiny town in Canada that’s known as the polar bear capitol of the world. Yes, Martha Stewart came along as well. The talk doesn’t start until about 1:48, and Schmidt’s interview with Stewart starts at 48:18
And here’s the video:
This note is on the video, presumably from Gavin. This video says it has had 35 views so far, so I expect WUWT readers will make up the bulk of the viewership.
Title: Polar bears, Martha Stewart and me
Abstract:
Polar bears are frequently poster children for climate change issues, but until recently I had very little idea of the details of threat posed by continuing Arctic change on their life-cycle. In this presentation I’ll share what I learned on a recent trip along with some other, perhaps more recognisable, New Yorkers, to Churchill, Manitoba
“Polar Bear Capital of the World”!
And, here’s Gavin’s slide show in PDF form:
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/meetings/lunch/2011a/20110209-Gavin_Schmidt.pdf
UPDATE: For those of you that would like some peer reviewed science to help de-gavinify your friends that fear “global warming” will bring on the demise of the polar bear, here’s this from commenter “Jimbo” who writes:
It seems to me that Polar Bears are more robust than previously thought.
and…
This is the perfect thread to show how vulnerable Polar Bears are.
Estimating the Energetic Contribution of Polar Bear (Ursus maritimus) Summer Diets to the Total Energy Budget
The analysis indicated that it is possible for polar bears to maintain their body mass while on shore by feeding on arctic charr and seal blubber. Polar bears of body masses up to 280 kg could gain sufficient energy from blueberries to match the daily energy loss.
http://www.asmjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1644/08-MAMM-A-103R2.1
We describe an observation of a polar bear cub on its mother’s back while the mother was swimming among ice floes in Svalbard, Norwegian Arctic.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/8051204vu73l320w/
Also:
and…
Polar Bears Thrive While Arctic Warms Up!
A survey of the animals’ numbers in Canada’s eastern Arctic has revealed that they are thriving, not declining, because of mankind’s interference in the environment.
In the Davis Strait area, a 140,000-square kilometre region, the polar bear population has grown from 850 in the mid-1980s to 2,100 today.
Polar bears are distributed throughout the Arctic in 19 populations, comprising an estimated total of 20 000–25 000 bears (Marine Mammal Commission, 2006).
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
So, all the fuss is because polar bears have a period of time when they eat, and a period of time when they live off their fat reserves. Last time I checked, other bears do that too, just with the seasons reversed. They’ve adapted to their environment. Jeez
Scroll to 19:50 and watch, hilarious!
Doug Proctor says
Gosh Doug- us rednecks here in Alabama drive around with our rifles in our trucks all the time. I would think it would be spooky not seeing one in someones truck.
If polar bears have such a difficult time surviving in warmer climates, then why do all the zoos in temperate places have happy healthy polar bears?
Keep that guy out of Canada.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz….
Perhaps Martha was there to coach Gavin on what life is like in slam – a word to the wise visit. She at least knows first hand what they do to liars – oops, I mean mendacious people, after all.
Funny, what does Martha do after she serves her prison sentence? Does crooked stuff like manipulation of MSO (Martha Stewart Omni-media) stock so she could pump the price up and unload a plonkerload of what she owned. She hired Blackstone Group to make it look like there might be a buyer for her worthless company and would pay $10/share. Good for a $4 stock! So when it pumped up as far as it would go she dumped her stock.
Crooks always hang out together. Birds of a feather…
Hey cool, that’s one of those experimental CAGW survival vehicles! High enough to cross areas flooded due to anthropogenic carbon emissions, can easily traverse perpetually drought-stricken regions undergoing desertification due to anthropogenic carbon emissions, as well as plowing through those 15-foot snow drifts from the anthropogenic carbon emissions-caused blizzards. Also has the retractable ladders and locking doors and windows to fend off the food- and fuel-starved peasants who’ve come to think Mad Max was way too optimistic.
Note this is an extra-Green version. The roof is extra large for lots of solar PV panels, useful as of course the vehicle is a hybrid. See the stubby smokestack sticking up? It also has “recycling” toilets, dung and other organic wastes are burned for heat, but that’s done in conjunction with syngas production as the engine runs on either syngas, ethanol or biodiesel, or carbon-offsetted liquid fossil fuels (emergency-use only, verified offsets must be logged with the vehicle’s computer before engaging).
I’m also noticing the “ledge” at the back. This may be an Inconvenient variant, that’s actually the wall around the hot tub, comfortably sized and capable of holding Al Gore and a chakra-releasing massage therapist. Sadly, what’s “inconvenient” is the hot tub uses solar heating, there’s only so much solar energy to go around and the vehicle also uses a solar-powered water purifier… And the tub doubles as the on-vehicle water supply tank. But still, it’s fun to laugh at hungry polar bears and peons while lounging in a soothing pool of warm bubbling water while sipping a fine organic wine, which Al knows is certainly the Truth.
He passed on one of the world’s great traditions: kiss the Blarney stone, hoist a pint at Oktoberfest, hand-feed Churchill polar bears.
sandw15: Yeah it matters. If he paid for it, in reality we only paid once, for his salary. If we paid for it, then we paid twice, for his salary and for the trip.
There are a number of people who lost a lot of cabbage on the Martha Stewart Omni pump & dump that [snip]
I admit I made/lost nothing on it myself, luckily I caught her interview on MSNBC & figured out what she was up to in time.
But she got me a 90 day restriction for using funds from a sale that hadn’t cleared and sold after 1 day.
Is he going to release a picher book on this, too. No science, just pichers, ………… 8^D.
Jeff,
There are a couple of issues with your statements.
First Ursus Maritumus (Polar bears) are experiencing a decrease in the time they have to feed. This is not the case for most other species on North American bears (although there are population dependent differences). In this case body weight seems to be decreasing and fecundity seems to be suffering.
Most populations of Ursus Arctos (Grizzly bears) should be able to do better, but some populations, such as those at the southern edge of their range are beginning to have troubles. Specifically, in the Yellowstone area the Whitebark pine is experiencing declines due to Mountain Pine Beetle (the first species in Gavin’s PDF). This is causing a decline in one of, if not the, most important food sources for grizzlies in this area. It has not affected populations in this region yet, but is expected to.
Of course Ursus Americanus (Black bears) are a weedy species and quite adaptable. They are not in any danger.
Personally I would vote for the Mountain Pine Beetle as the poster child. Around here they have resulted in a new species of pine, the “Red Pine” with vast stretches of forest killed in the recent outbreak. Of course Spruce Budworm is right in there too…
Finally I would note that this is part of a program at GISS of lunchtime seminars. When I worked at SGI I had to give a couple of these It was expected if you were doing interesting work that others might benefit from.
Gosh, how did he tear himself away from his taxpayer funded blogging duties at Real Climate while he’s still got hundreds of climate reporting stations in Australia that haven’t been updated since 1992 in the GISTEMP database? Good thing he has his priorities straight.
i always wonder how many gov’t “workers” spend all day in their cubicles just surfing the internet all day and generally wasting time on the taxpayer’s dime…someone called in to a talk radio show a few days ago and said they were hired about a year ago by the State of CA(under stimulus $$$ iirc) and the department was so disorganized that they really couldn’t find any work for him to do yet…i think the department was planning to move their office location or they were planning expansion in the future(something like that) but the guy just had no work to do..just show up every day, twiddle thumbs and collect paycheck, pension, and healthcare…
Oh, I got snipped again… I want you to know that I harbor no disrespect for women.
A gentle woman has stolen my heart away. She is gorgeous, inside, outside and from every angle she is stunning. She loves me, she really REALLY loves me. NEVER have I been so smitten!!! She said I had it coming!
But Marthy is a bit differences from that.
old44 says: “This man could bore the legs off a billiard table. Nothing you couldn’t learn flicking through a 20 yo copy of NatGeo at a dentists office.”
That’s one of my hobbies. No, not lowering billiard tables; leaving old National Geographics in dentist’s offices.
I’m glad he was able to get out and take this trip, even if it was on “our” dime. Maybe this will jar him from his Matrix of models and he can discover what the rest of us are experiencing: reality.
I love that Martha flew up on her own private jet and Gavin thought that was cool… posers.
kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
July 8, 2011 at 7:19 pm
They’ve been using them for years to drive tourons up onto the disappearing glaciers along the Icefields Parkway in BC. I was lucky enough to snap this picture of a receding glacier and my Harley before the entire icefield disappeared:
http://thevirtualbarandgrill.com/albums/rtts2000/aav.jpg
zoom in here to see them at work on yet another fast fading relic of the LIA.
http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=52.212551,-117.232876&spn=0.065003,0.184879&t=h&z=13
/sarc
@Doug Proctor
Fascinating post, thanks.
Jason Joice,
I would note that he was invited by Polar Bears International (and probably Martha Stewart, it is in the video) and so would assume that this is the entity (or entities) which paid for his trip. Not the taxpayer.
Also, the talk itself was quite good, well worth a look. I watched the whole thing and noted that the Q/A was quite good.
Now that the Space Shuttle has reached its end, 3000 +/- NASA employees in Florida will join the unemployment roles in 10 days. Why can’t Hansen and Gavin join them too?
Polar bears are among the safest of all the big carnivores. Tigers now, they’re in trouble.
Bob Johnston,
He thought the jet was cool, compared to the puddle jumper he flew in on. You should also note that he was rather dismissive of dear old Martha, didn’t seem to like her too much.