This fellow, Charles Monnett has been suspended pending an investigation into his polar bear research. You may recall that he single-handedly inspired Al Gore (not that it takes much) into producing this piece of science fiction for his even larger fiction, An Inconvenient Truth. Gore cited Monnett’s research.
Only one problem now, his “research” is collapsing, and as you read the transcript, you’ll see why even the simplest of queries get Monnett flustered. Yet this was peer reviewed published science.
Never Yet Melted writes:
The Inspector General interview transcript (excerpts) had me, for instance, in stitches.
Disclosing as it does the level of rigor of methodology being employed:
ERIC MAY: Well, actually, since you‟re bringing that up, 18 and, and I‟m a little confused of how many dead or drowned polar bears you did observe, because in the manuscript, you indicate three, and in the poster presentation –
CHARLES MONNETT: No.
ERIC MAY: – you mentioned four.
CHARLES MONNETT: No, now you‟re confusing the, um, the estimator with the, uh, the sightings. There were four drowned bears seen.
ERIC MAY: Okay.
CHARLES MONNETT: Three of which were on transects.
ERIC MAY: Okay.
CHARLES MONNETT: And so for the purpose of that little ratio estimator, we only looked at what we were seeing on transects, because that‟s a – you know, we couldn‟t be very rigorous, but the least we could do is look at the random transects. And so we based, uh, our extrapolation to only bears on transects, because we‟re saying that the transects, the, the swaths we flew, represented I think it was 11 percent of the entire habitat that, you know, that could have had dead polar bears in it.
ERIC MAY: Um-hm [yes].
CHARLES MONNETT: And, um, so by limiting it to the transect bears, then, you know, we could do that ratio estimator and say three is to, um, uh, “x” as, uh, 11 is to 100. I mean, it‟s that kind of thing. You, you‟ve, you‟re nodding like you understand.
LYNN GIBSON: Yeah.
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah, that‟s pretty simple, isn‟t confusing. I mean, it‟s –
ERIC MAY: So, so, so you observed four dead polar bears during MMS –
CHARLES MONNETT: One of which was not on transect.
ERIC MAY: Okay, so that‟s what –
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah. …
ERIC MAY: So I highlighted under here, and we‟ve got the four, and that‟s what –
CHARLES MONNETT: Oh, here you go. Yeah. Well, I‟m pretty confident that it was four. I mean, that‟s, um – uh, look, look what is in the paper. I mean, it should have the – probably the same information that, you know –
ERIC MAY: Well, it –
CHARLES MONNETT: There‟s a table in there, but does it – it has the dead ones in it, doesn‟t it?
ERIC MAY: Well, and I think you, you explain, so this is the portion where you‟re talking about the 25 percent survival rate.
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah.
ERIC MAY: And you‟re talking about four swimming bears and three drowned or dead polar bears.
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah. Yeah, but that‟s because those are on transects.
ERIC MAY: On part of this 11 percent?
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah, it says that right in here and, 11 and –
ERIC MAY: Right, right, but that‟s what you‟re talking about. …
How to do things with statistics.
3 CHARLES MONNETT: The paragraph in the left-hand column. Um, God, I‟ve got people here who are second-guessing my calculations. Um, well, um, we flew transects. That was our basic methodology. They were partially randomized. And we, uh, we looked at a, a map. I think we probably used GIS to do it, and we said that our survey area, if you bound it, is so big.
ERIC MAY: Um-hm [yes].
CHARLES MONNETT: And then we made some assumptions about our swath width, and I think we assumed we could see a, a bear out to a kilometer with any reliability, which mean you‟re looking down like that. And, uh, sometimes you might see more; sometimes you wouldn‟t. Sometimes you can‟t see a whale out that far, so it depends on the water conditions. And so we just said that, um, if you add up, we had 34 north/south transects provide 11 percent coverage of the 630 kilometer-wide study area, and that was just to get our ratio of coverage. And then the area we really were concerned about was just the area where the bears were, so we could ignore the area at that point and just go with a ratio, because we assume that‟s the same, because these things are pretty, uh, they‟re pretty standardized. They were designed to be standardized, so in each bloc – have you seen the blocs? Have you seen our design? It‟s in here.
ERIC MAY: I took – yeah, in, in your study.
CHARLES MONNETT: It‟s right at the beginning here. Um, every map in here has got it on it. Um, there, those are our blocs. And so, uh, this one would have four pairs. This one would have probably three pairs. I don‟t know, there will be later maps. Um, and there, you can see the flights. Uh, well, yeah, they‟re in here. Um, so we‟re flying these transects, and we‟re assuming we can see a certain percentage or a certain, certain distance. Therefore, we can total up the length and the width and come up with an area. And so we calculated that
our coverage was 11 percent, plus or minus a little bit.
ERIC MAY: Okay. And I believe you rounded up, too. It was 10.8 and you rounded up to 11?
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah. Well, that‟s a nothing. Um, yeah, 10.8. And then we said, um, four dead – four swimming polar bears were encountered on these transects, in addition to three.
ERIC MAY: Three dead polar bears?
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah, three dead.
ERIC MAY: Right.
CHARLES MONNETT: But the four swimming were a week earlier.
ERIC MAY: Okay.
CHARLES MONNETT: And, um, then we said if they accurately reflect 11 percent of the bears present so, in other words, they‟re just distributed randomly, so we looked at 11 percent of the area.
ERIC MAY: In that transect?
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah.
ERIC MAY: Right.
CHARLES MONNETT: In, in our, in our area there, um –
ERIC MAY: Right.
CHARLES MONNETT: – and, therefore, we should have seen 11 percent of the bears. Then you just invert that, and you come up with, um, nine times as many. So that‟s where you get the 27, nine times three.
ERIC MAY: Where does the nine come from?
CHARLES MONNETT: Uh, well 11 percent is one-ninth of 100 percent. Nine times 11 is 99 percent. Is that, is that clear? …
LYNN GIBSON: I think what he‟s saying is since there‟s four swimming and three dead, that makes –
ERIC MAY: And three dead.
CHARLES MONNETT: Well, you don‟t count them all together. That doesn‟t have anything to do. You can‟t – that doesn‟t even –
LYNN GIBSON: So you‟re not saying that the seven represent 16 11 percent of the population.
CHARLES MONNETT: They‟re different events.
ERIC MAY: Well, that‟s what you try – we‟re trying to –
LYNN GIBSON: You‟re talking about they‟re separate?
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah, they‟re different events.
ERIC MAY: Right, so explain to us how –
CHARLES MONNETT: On one day – well, let me draw. I, I, I don‟t have confidence that you‟re understanding me here, so let me (inaudible/mixed voices). …
CHARLES MONNETT: It makes me feel more professorial if I write it on the blackboard.
LYNN GIBSON: Okay, go ahead.
CHARLES MONNETT: No, that‟s okay.
ERIC MAY: (Inaudible/mixed voices)
CHARLES MONNETT: If you could see it, I wanted you to see it was why I was going to do it there.
ERIC MAY: (Inaudible/mixed voices)
LYNN GIBSON: We‟re your students today.
CHARLES MONNETT: Uh, well, this has transects on it, doesn‟t it, guys?
LYNN GIBSON: Yes, it does.
CHARLES MONNETT: I mean, look right here. So here‟s our coastline right here, this red thing.
ERIC MAY: Okay, yep.
CHARLES MONNETT: And here‟s our, um, our study area. We go out to whatever it was. I don‟t remember, 70, 71 degrees or something like that. And, um, around each of these things, we survey a tenth of the distance between, basically.
ERIC MAY: Okay.
CHARLES MONNETT: And so if you draw these lines here, and this is – you‟re just going to have to pretend like I did this for all of them. And you calculate the area in here.
LYNN GIBSON: Um-hm [yes].
CHARLES MONNETT: And you total them all, and then you calculate the whole area. This – the area inside here was 11 percent.
LYNN GIBSON: Okay.
CHARLES MONNETT: Okay? Now what we said is that we saw three, three bears in 11 percent.
ERIC MAY: Three dead bears?
CHARLES MONNETT: Three dead, yeah, dead –
ERIC MAY: Right.
CHARLES MONNETT: – in the 11 percent of the habitat. And so you could set up a, um, a ratio here, three is to “x” 25 equals 11 over 100, right? And so you end up with – you can cross-multiply. You know algebra?
ERIC MAY: Um-hm [yes], yeah.
CHARLES MONNETT: You can cross-multiply. Okay, so you end up with 300 equals 11x, and I am sure that that‟s – equals 27, okay?
ERIC MAY: Right, right, got that.
CHARLES MONNETT: And if you stick four in here instead, you end up with –
ERIC MAY: Thirty-six.
CHARLES MONNETT: – whatever that number was, yeah, 36. Now, um, those numbers aren‟t related, except we made the further
assumption, which is implicit to the analysis. Seems obvious to me. We went out there one week, and we saw four swimming on the transect, which we estimated could have been as many as 36.
LYNN GIBSON: Correct.
CHARLES MONNETT: If we correct for the area. And we went out there later, a week to two weeks later, and then we saw the dead ones, the three dead ones in the same area, which could have been 27. And then we said let‟s make the further assumption that – and this, this isn‟t in the paper, but it‟s implicit to this aument –
ERIC MAY: Um-hm [yes].
CHARLES MONNETT: – that right after we saw these bears swimming, this storm came in and caught them offshore, all right? And so if, um, if you assume that the, the, the 36 all were exposed to the storm, and then we went back and we saw tentially 27 of them, that gives you your 25 percent survival rate. Now that‟s, um, statistically, um, irrelevant. I mean, it, it‟s not statistical. It‟s just an argument. It‟s for, it‟s for the sake of discussion. See, right here, “Discussion.”
ERIC MAY: Um-hm [yes].
CHARLES MONNETT: That‟s what you do in discussions is you throw things out, um, for people to think about. And so what we said is, look, uh, we saw four. We saw a whole bunch swimming, but if you want to compare them, then let‟s do this little ratio estimator and correct for the percentage of the area surveyed. And just doing that, then there might have been as many as 27 bears out there that were dead. There might have been as many as 36, plus or minus. There could have been 50. I don‟t know. But the way we were posing it was that it‟s serious, because it‟s not just four. It‟s probably a lot more. And then we said that with the further assumption, you know, that the bears were exposed or, you know, the ones we‟re measuring later that are carcasses out there, it looks like a lot of them, you know, didn‟t survive, so – but it‟s, it‟s discussion, guys. I mean, it‟s not in the results. …
The reliability of the calculations used and the scrupulous oversight of the peer-review process.
ERIC MAY: So combining the three dead polar bears and the four alive bears is a mistake?
CHARLES MONNETT: No, it‟s not a mistake. It‟s just not a, a, a real, uh, rigorous analysis. And a whole bunch of peer reviewers and a journal, you know –
ERIC MAY: Did they go through – I mean, did they do the calculations as you just did with us?
CHARLES MONNETT: Well, I assume they did. That‟s their purpose.
ERIC MAY: Okay. Right, and that‟s – again, that‟s why I was asking peer review.
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah.
ERIC MAY: Did they do that with that particular section of your manuscript?
CHARLES MONNETT: Well, I don‟t, I don‟t remember anybody doing the calculations but, um, uh, there weren‟t any huge objections. There weren‟t a – let‟s put it this way, there weren‟t sufficient objections for the journal editor to ask us to take it out.
ERIC MAY: Right. Well, let me, let me read you what – the four bears – and representing what we were just talking about, this section.
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah.
ERIC MAY: So just let me, let me read what I have here, okay?
CHARLES MONNETT: Okay.
ERIC MAY: “If four swimming bears, if four bears represent 11 percent of the population of bears swimming before the storm,” –
CHARLES MONNETT: Um-hm [yes].
ERIC MAY: – okay? “Then 36 bears were likely swimming.”
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah, maybe, I mean –
ERIC MAY: Okay, but I mean –
CHARLES MONNETT: No, we didn‟t say “likely.” I think we said “possibly,” or did you say “likely” or –?
ERIC MAY: Well, or this – again, as you just stated earlier, this is Discussion, so –
CHARLES MONNETT: I‟d be surprised if we said “likely,” but mostly we were saying “possibly.”
ERIC MAY: Okay, so let me – let, let me continue, so –
CHARLES MONNETT: Okay.
ERIC MAY: – so you have that. “If three bears represent 11 percent of the population of bears that may have died” –
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah.
ERIC MAY: – right?
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah.
ERIC MAY: I think those are your words in your manu- – “may have died.”
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah.
ERIC MAY: “ – as a result of this storm, then 27 bears were likely drowned.” Okay, so far, so good?
CHARLES MONNETT: Well, if I used “likely.” I don‟t know if I did. …
And, then, the interview really gets humorous. “I mean, the storm had nothing to do with it!”
ERIC MAY: Isn‟t that stretching it a bit, though, saying – making that conclusion that no dead polar bears were observed during these years, and then, all of a sudden, 2003, you guys are – you observe dead polar bears?
CHARLES MONNETT: I don‟t think so.
ERIC MAY: Why?
CHARLES MONNETT: Well, if you ask me, I would know, I mean, what I saw, I mean, if I saw something weird like that.
ERIC MAY: So as a scientist, if another scientist made these conclusions based on the information, you would be okay with that as a peer reviewer?
CHARLES MONNETT: Well, yeah, I would, I mean, if, you know, if they told me that. They keep notes. I mean, they did this – every, everything like we do, so –.
ERIC MAY: And that‟s a, that‟s a – and it‟s a stretch, isn‟t it, though, to make that statement?
CHARLES MONNETT: Well, no, I didn‟t think so. I thought that was perfectly reasonable to ask them, since it isn‟t something – remember, the reason it‟s not in the database is because it, it doesn‟t happen. You know, you don‟t see it, so – and there‟s a reason, uh, why it‟s changed, which is in, in, in a lot of the early years, there was a lot of ice out there, and there just weren‟t opportunities for there to be dead bears. You know, bears don‟t drown when there‟s ice all over the place.
ERIC MAY: Well, so let me elaborate what I just asked you. Wouldn‟t you, wouldn‟t you notate that as a – like maybe a – you know, your statement kind of is stretching it, and you would say, “Well, based on my conversations with individuals during these surveys, although they weren‟t supposed to look for dead polar bears, they did not” – I mean, because you‟re making a very broad statement by, by that, saying that no dead polar bears were observed during those years. …
ERIC MAY: Well, and based on, based on what I just said, in terms of the, you know, your statement, would it not make more sense, too, because there was a major windstorm during this period of time, which you do mention, but you didn‟t talk too much about that as in 2004 regarding these dead polar bears.
CHARLES MONNETT: What do you mean (inaudible/mixed voices)?
ERIC MAY: Well, you‟re saying that from 1987 to 2003, there was no dead polar bears.
CHARLES MONNETT: Yeah.
ERIC MAY: Did you discuss the storm conditions during those period, period of years as well? I mean, you‟re extrapolating a lot to make such, you know, scientific findings.
CHARLES MONNETT: You mean, the storms are increasing up there?
ERIC MAY: No, you‟re saying that there was no dead polar bears during those years.
CHARLES MONNETT: Certainly.
ERIC MAY: Yet in 2004, you, you observed four dead polar bears.
CHARLES MONNETT: Right.
ERIC MAY: Yet you didn‟t really elaborate on why you believe those dead polar bears died or drowned.
CHARLES MONNETT: Well, yeah, we did actually. I don‟t know why you‟re saying that. We‟ve got an extensive section in the paper talking about the, uh, you know, the wind speeds and out there, and we looked into that very hard. And, and we, um, we‟re very, very careful in this manuscript to, um, write it so that it, uh, reflects uncertainty, uncertainty about the extent of what happened, the uncertainty of why it happened, the uncertainty of what it meant in a, in a broader context.
We knew three things: That we had seen a bunch of swimming bears and that that was unusual in the context of the whole data stream. We knew we saw some dead bears, which had not been reported before and that we had been assured, you know, was new to the study. And we saw, uh – we experienced, we were there, a, a, uh, high wind event, which was actually not a, a very severe high – and it wasn‟t, you know, one of the really severe high wind events, but it was enough to shut us down, which meant that there were some pretty good waves breaking, you know, out at sea, which, um, is pretty easy to imagine would be, uh, challenging, you know, for a bear swimming. And a good bit of that, there‟s a whole section in the paper that talks about the windstorm.
ERIC MAY: Okay.
CHARLES MONNETT: Um, right here, there‟s a map, you know, of the wind speeds and all that and, uh, you know, it shows that it just fits right in there. Um –
ERIC MAY: When I was relating to th
CHARLES MONNETT: Well, I don‟t know, we, we had complete confidence in it. Um, people worked extensively with, with the database and, and, uh, so we were totally comfortable with the swimming ones, um, which, you know, were rarely seen. And it‟s a small thing I think to assume that a, um – you know, the person managing the survey would know and – ….
And here comes Jeff Ruch of PEER to the rescue.
1 JEFF RUCH: This is Jeff Ruch. We‟ve been at this for an hour and 45 minutes, and I‟m curious, are we going to get to the allegations of scientific misconduct or, uh, have – is that what we‟ve been doing?
LYNN GIBSON: Actually, a lot of the questions that we‟ve been discussing relate to the allegations.
ERIC MAY: Right.
JEFF RUCH: Um, but, uh, Agent May indicated to, um, Paul that he was going to lay out what the allegations are, and we haven‟t heard them yet, or perhaps we don‟t understand them from this line of questioning.
ERIC MAY: Well, the scientif- – well, scientific misconduct, basically, uh, wrong numbers, uh, miscalculations, uh –
JEFF RUCH: Wrong numbers and calculations?
ERIC MAY: Well, what we‟ve been discussing for the last hour.
JEFF RUCH: So this is it?
CHARLES MONNETT: Well, that‟s not scientific misconduct anyway. If anything, it‟s sloppy. I mean, that‟s not – I mean, I mean, the level of criticism that they seem to have leveled here, scientific misconduct, uh, suggests that we did something deliberately to deceive or to, to change it. Um, I sure don‟t see any indication of that in what you‟re asking me about.
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Never Yet Melted continues:
What is downright scary is the way these bozos think that dressing up wildly extravagant theories resting on baseless extrapolations of insignificant anecdotal-level observations with jargon and a few formulae in order to reach preconceived and intensely desired conclusions is perfectly legitimate scientific activity.
If anybody wonders how junk science can become established science and the accepted basis for fabulously costly governmental programs and polices, just look at the work of Dr. Charles Monnett and at PEER.
For those of you criticizing the technique Dr. Monnett used, I strongly suggest going to Amazon and doing a quick search on “transect sampling”. This is a very well established technique for estimating biological populations. Or for estimating vegetation amounts, or the number of unexploded ordinances in a region, or…
Paddy, above, was pointing out that Monnett is incharge of Government money. He is a Contracting Officer – note capital letters, this is a formal title – with the authority to bind the US Government in contractual agreements. There is a WHOLE raft of ways to get in trouble that way. As bad as his science is, I suspect that his problems are coming from the contractual side of the house – he’s his own CO, he’s also his own Project Manager and – apparently – his own Quality Control Officer. Lots and lots of room for incompetence to play.
Ray says:
July 29, 2011 at 1:59 pm
Where do polar bears go to die? Or do their only mean of death is by drowning (due to AGW, of course)?
No valid conclusion without a proper autopsy.
I was about to ask the same question, Ray.
“Four dead Polar bears” floating in the water does not mean “Four Polar bears that drowned” especially in the weather/wind conditions described. “Assuming” they drowned and “knowing” that they drowned is not the same thing. Did one or more of those bears die from choking or injesting something poisonous and then fall or be blown into the water? If so, this would not be a death related to weather/climate.
Wow, the interview was something else. lol, Even Monnett states that his math was of 5th grade level and there is a lot of damning information about the current scientific process, but, most of it only confirms what we already know. Peer- review doesn’t mean squat and for the most part, this guy didn’t do anything that any other alarmist doesn’t do…… over reach with his assumptions.
However, from reading the manuscript, here’s the part that has smoke and fire.
Start at line 14 pg 40…….
———————————————————————————————————————-
ERIC MAY: Do you recall seeing this? And it‟s a, it‟s a – where the (inaudible) – for you guys, it‟s a – from ESS, a manuscript review approval, like a signature. Do you recall reading those? And I believe it‟s from man- – like Cleve Cowles and –
CHARLES MONNETT: Hold on, February 10th. Ah, no, I don‟t recall seeing this. This must be what Cleve gave to Paul when he asked him to review the, the document.
ERIC MAY: Well, this was in, uh, Mr. Gleason‟s possession and –
—————————————————————————————————————————
The exchange continues after that…… apparently, this Cleve Cowles also had problems with their numbers and maths….. And, if this goes anywhere…. Here’s the funny part Monnett let loose a tell. I’ll bold the part that any investigator would perk up on…..
CHARLES MONNETT: Hold on, February 10th. Ah, no, I don‟t recall seeing this.
That’s classic. I’m betting he has seen it.
To those whining that we didn’t see any malfeasance and therefore should leave him alone, sorry, we’re paying this guy. He has a doctorate for heaven’s sake!! If this passes as the type of science he does, then he needs to move on and get off of our payroll.
Incompetence is just as dangerous as malfeasance.
Sorry, but having read the PDF, and it might seem to be all fun and games to the kangaroo court here, but if I had been Monnett, I’d have bowed out at line page 4/ line25. No scientific training? Criminal investigation of a scientist, about that scientist’s work, with no science training? Really?
An inconvenient truth about what happened to polar bears
To those insisting on defending this…… paper.
Yes, transect sampling is a very valid method for population estimates. But one of the things expected from the scientists we employ is a modicum of proper judgment.
This transecting of the area had apparently been occurring since the 80s. One day, in a spot they apparently covered weekly, they found floating dead polar bears. This had never been encountered before, nor since, apparently. Tell me, in this instance, would it be proper to apply this method?
Were there any reported in any other sector? Did we see any the next day? No? What of the day prior? No? The storm, while grounding the flights wasn’t particularly harsh either. Had we seen polar bear carcasses floating around after other storms? No? Then it is likely what was witnessed was not representative of the bear population! In other words, it wasn’t a sampling of anything.
Use your heads.
KR – It seems you are not understanding that alhtough the original whale study did appear to use a well designed transect study to gather data, the polar bear die off claims did not. the polar bear claims were arrived at by looking at two individual data points, cherry picked to produce spectacular results, from among all the data collected during the transects.
In a proper transect study, as your earlier posts describe; you sample a representative portion of the total, analyze the changes over time, and then extrapolate those results to the total area. The whole idea is that a large number of data points over a large area will “average out” all the differences due to isolated causes associated with time and location and that what changes remain to be discovered are more universal in nature. That’s not what the dead polar bear conclusion did. It took one “4 live bear sighting” from all the myriad transect data, then compared it to a “3 dead bear sighting” at different place, time, and set of conditions. They used these numbers and their own preconceptions to come up with the final conclusion of only a 25% survival rate due to AGW.
A proper transect study would have recorded the live bear vs. dead bear numbers over the total area covered by the transects and then extrapolated to get larger numbers for the total area covered. And the analysis would have looked at how these numbers changed over time as AGW worsened if that’s what they suspected to be the cause. Instead they took a single dead bear data point and expanded it to represent the total area. Next they took a seperate single live bear data point and expanded it to represent the total area. And they just assumed that each individual data point was representative of the whole. That’s how a grab sample works, not how a transect study works. A grab sample study only works when the parameter being studied is homogenous, which bear deaths are not. They just assumed that the differences in their grab samples were caused by AGW. That’s called anecdotal evidence, not science.
KR:
Many thanks for your informative post at July 29, 2011 at 2:32 pm which says:
“For those of you criticizing the technique Dr. Monnett used, I strongly suggest going to Amazon and doing a quick search on “transect sampling”. This is a very well established technique for estimating biological populations. Or for estimating vegetation amounts, or the number of unexploded ordinances in a region, or…”
I always wondered why estimates of biological populations, extinctions, etc. are bollocks.
I now know because you have explained it. Thankyou.
Richard
How is this any worse than estimating global temperature from one tree?
He says 4 dead….then 3 dead……then 4 swimming……
I’d just like to know how far apart they really were…chances are this was just a local event, something to do with the storm
KR says:
July 29, 2011 at 2:32 pm
For those of you criticizing the technique Dr. Monnett used, I strongly suggest going to Amazon and doing a quick search on “transect sampling”. This is a very well established technique for estimating biological populations. Or for estimating vegetation amounts, or the number of unexploded ordinances in a region, or…
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Get used to it, the scientists will be “thrown under the bus” by the bureaucrats.
gpp says:
July 29, 2011 at 9:20 am
“there is word the polar bears seen floating dead in the water were actually shot with a tranquilizer, they ran to the water where they drowned.”
__________________________________________________________
Well? We’re waiting…
You aren’t just going to toss that grenade and run off, are you?
Richard S Courtney
An interesting comment, Richard. It is ever more clear to me that you do not work in a scientific field. Or, for that matter, with statistics. And that your statements regarding scientific techniques should be weighted accordingly.
Donald Shockley
This study properly used transect sampling to determine the statistics at that time point, but did not represent a temporal evolution except for the fact that no drowned bears had been sighted prior to that point.. The temporal evolution was that drowned bears were completely new!
Keep in mind that the surveys did see swimming bears from time to time (standard record point), and also analyzed sea ice levels (I noted in the transcript that they tallied 20 different kinds of ice, a real challenge). The 4 swimming bears represented a large count according to their sampling, and the 3 drowned bears a complete anomaly. NOTE: I don’t think those bears would have drowned without the Beaufort 6-7 storm (land levels, ocean levels likely higher), and the lack of sea ice that made wave conditions that much worse. But given that no drowned bears had been seen before in these surveys, reporting it is actually an interesting bit of science. Which Monnett qualified quite properly in his paper/posters.
I’m waiting for the IG to actually announce charges (if they decide to do so) – this really seems like a researcher being punished for stating scientific results that don’t agree with agency aims. Keep in mind that the MMS was noted for receiving, how do I put this, hookers and blow, from the energy companies. And that Monnett received a ton of agency pressure over this…
If they flew over an area and saw 4 bears swimming and then after a storm they fly over the same area and find 3 bears floating dead in the water should they not report that?
Furthermore are they not allowed to raise the obvious point that they only flew over 11% of the area and therefore the total number of bears dead is likely much more than just 3 (It’s severely unlikely they flew over the only 11% area with dead polar bears isn’t it?)?
The working and reasoning is stated clearly in paper with all the conditions and caveats. This kind of stuff has to be reported. You can’t just sweep this stuff under the rug and pretend polar bears are immune to storms based on faith.
Anthony – “You may recall that he single-handedly inspired Al Gore (not that it takes much) into producing this piece of science fiction for his even larger fiction, An Inconvenient Truth. Gore cited Monnett’s research.”
This seems like an overstatement to me. Gore talked about a lot of data in his movie; this was a fairly minor note about visible threats to a specific species. “Single-handedly” seems to be quite an exaggeration…
[Snip. Personal ad hominem attack. ~dbs, mod.]
Luther Wu says:
July 29, 2011 at 4:31 pm
gpp says:
July 29, 2011 at 9:20 am
“there is word the polar bears seen floating dead in the water were actually shot with a tranquilizer, they ran to the water where they drowned.”
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Well? We’re waiting…
You aren’t just going to toss that grenade and run off, are you?
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I think he’s conflating two separate events. But, yes, actual drowning of polar bears are caused by man…….. once again we see the researchers causing harm to the study objects. They killed off their share of penguins down south, too, by banding their wings. They are really a very stupid lot.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/story/2007/09/24/bear-deaths.html
What’s scary to me is how unclear and subject to misinterpretation the whole interview is. I get the sense that the investigators are completely ignorant of what a transect is or how biological population surveys are done.
One investigator is so dense it has to be explained to him that the reciprocal of 11% is 9.
There is nothing wrong with speculating in a scientific article as long as you are clear that that is what you are doing. They saw three dead bears in surveying roughly 11% of the range and estimated that about 27 bears may have died over the whole range. Anyone reading the article would realize this is a very rough estimate.
Newer work seems to be confirming Monnett’s concerns.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jul/19/polar-bear-cubs-drowning-ice
Not that the science matters when ideology is at stake.
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This demonstrates the huge problem of misdirection that lies in “science” nowadays that some commenters here have touched upon already.
For arguments sake, let’s say this study is an accurate representation of polar bear deaths. The problem is that it doesn’t matter because the premise that it is a new trend cannot be supported because there is no long term study on polar bear drownings. Arguing over how many bears drown is irrelevant especially when framed in the context of alarmism.
This is the same argument that is at the crux of the AGW scare in which it is assumed the earth is heating at an unprecedented rate on a geological timescale which there is no real way to know.
You can’t make a blanket statement like “Polar bears are dying because of global warming” and then go around counting bear carcasses with the assumption that the more you find the more right you are.
This is the oldest trick in the book. Make a huge claim, provide some numbers, then argue about how bad the problem really is plus or minus some figures. Everyone starts arguing about a decimal point in the extrapolation and the original claim becomes valid, just in need of “better proof”.
“He’s not wrong because someone else found dead polar bears!”
Ridiculous!
Another question I forgot to ask about the post headline…
Were they grilling the drowned polar bear researcher over charcoal, hickory or some other scented wood?
And are they members of the Happy Cannibal’s Society? “For people of good taste”
Warm and cozy in the wildlife cabin, Charles Monnett is surveying the bay through his binoculors.
Charles Monnett: Quick Mr Gleeson, grab your binoculors come have a look at this.
JS Gleeson: What is it Mr Monnett?
CM: Is that a polar bear out on the bay?
JSM: Why yes Mr Monnett, it is a polar bear. But it seems to be floating face down.
CM: I think it has drowned Mr Gleeson
JSM: Poor unfortunate bear
CM: Unfortunate for the bear, but fortunate for us Mr Gleeson
JSM: Good thinking Mr Monnett
CM: How many bears did we see this excursion Mr Gleeson?
JSM: Errrr ummm none Mr Monnett
CM: Yes yes I know but how many did the locals say they saw?
JSM: 25 locals said they saw a bear, that could just be one bear
Monnett gives Gleeson a death stare
JSM: Or it could be 25 bears Mr Monnett
CM: Exactly Mr Gleeson
JSM: So 4% of the bears have drowned?
CM: Possibly Mr Gleeson, but take a closer look, is that a female bear?
JSM: Hard to say Mr Monnett
CM: Yes but statistically there is a 50% chance that that is a female bear Mr Gleeson
JSM: Yes that’s true
CM: And almost all mature female bears have cubs this time of year
JSM: Yeeesss?
CM: So this momma bear has lost her 2 cubs as well Mr Gleeson
JSM: Darn you’re good Mr Monnett
CM: That would make it 11.11% of polar bears drowned due to Global Warming Mr Gleeson
JSM: Not just good, you’re amazing Mr Monnett
Meanwhile, on a party charter boat 95 miles away…
Party Goer 1: Hey it’s time, where is the stripper with the polar bear suit?
Party goer 2: last I saw he was leaning over the rail throwing up.
KR, Did you read the transcript? He admitted that there wasn’t even a spot in the database for polar bear observations until the last few years when he decided to add it because he already thought AGW was having an effect. The long term study was about whales, not polar bears. The interview itself showed how little was behind the “no drowned polar bears before” claim. If it’s not in the data, you can’t substatiate the claim. That’s the difference between anectdotal evidence and actual scientific data. And did you notice when pressed about who he actually talked to about the prior recollections before adding the polar bear entry in the data collection, he doesn’t name multiple earlier observers. Instead, he just says one prior manager. And the manager is only seeing the old data reports that don’t include any listings for polar bears since the study was about whales.
It’s apparent that the polar bear drowning sensationalism was simple anectdotal “evidence” and not factual scientific data. The reason such anectdotes can’t be relied on for scientific conclusions is observational bias. Something could exist for years before you happen to notice it. Just because you finally took notice doesn’t mean it’s abnormal. But that’s what all anectdotal evidence assumes. And once you have noticed something, and drawn conclusions about why it’s happening, it’s natural to tend to remember those instances that reinforce your conclusions and forget those that don’t support your ideas. That’s why it’s so important to use recorded data and not memory. And the interview bears this out. Polar bears had been sighted throughout the course of the study. But nobody had any interest in recording data until they saw something they thought could be tied to AGW. That’s fine and dandy as a reason to add more data collection for future studies, but you can’t rewrite history and assume “no data = never happened” for past data and draw any reasonable conclusion from that. And that’s exactly what Monnett’s interview shows he has done. Anectdotal evidence from a scientist is still anectdotal. The science comes from rigourous data collection, analysis, and reproducability of results. The polar bear drowning story has none of these.
Also notice at the very end when he is discussing the results of the original whale study. He again shows the typical AGW bias. Even though the study shows no change in whale migrations as a result of increased human activity associated with oil exploration and development, he still thinks it’s happening. But it’s just that the effects of AGW are distorting the whale behavior so he wanted to change the data, throwing out the non-migration data until he gets the results he thinks should be happening. He seems rather upset that he was being forced to stick to the original study parameters instead of being able to tweak them to produce the results he wants.
KR says:
July 29, 2011 at 1:09 pm
Having read the transcript, Dr. Monnett was doing basic transect sampling (which I do as well), and his math holds up.
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With all due respect KR, I know a little (not a lot) about statistical process control and I think you have this wrong. With such small samples, you would need to be very careful because your ‘bears per whatever’ numbers have huge uncertainties.
At the very least, shouldn’t one adjust for residence time? How long does the average swimming polar bear stay in the water? And how long does a dead polar bear’s corpse remain on the surface and recognizable? I’d guess that dead bears have a much longer residence time in the survey area than do swimming bears and thus a much higher probability of being counted (maybe multiple times depending on exactly how the survey is done).
It might also be a good idea to verify that swimming polar bears don’t occasionally nap and that if they do, an observer in an aircraft can distinguish between a sleeping bear and a dead bear.
Donald Shockley – “Did you read the transcript?”
Yes, I did. Monnett saw something he had not seen in the years he had been flying the studies, asked previous team leaders about, and found that they had not seen drowned bears (or at least, bear corpses floating in the water) in their time running the teams. That’s a fair bit beyond “anecdotal” evidence. Dead bears in the water was exceptional, which can be noted from the fact that although they had record items for bears, swimming bears (rare by their statistics), various seals, walruses, different whale species, and 20 different kinds of ice, they had no entries for dead bears in the water up to that point.
I would have preferred that he went through the notes from the observers for previous years, but without an event index that would be difficult (check every polar bear sighting?). But given that a dead bear in the water was so unusual, I think his checks with previous team leaders back 16 years to 1987 was sufficient.
“Even though the study shows no change in whale migrations …
Did you read all of the transcript? When discussing other MMS work, work he removed his name from due to study shortcomings, he noted that there were distinct changes in whale patterns that the MMS studies distinctly did not record, and did not want to. And that the detailed whale migration pattern studies got pushed out to another group actually willing to tabulate those possibly climate related changes. See the transcript pages 89-92 for a discussion of this.
Don K
Monnett did include his uncertainties, and anyone in the field (including the three anonymous reviewers of the paper) familiar with statistical sampling could check them. That’s why works like “likely” are key in these articles.
Sleeping bears? You should look at the bottom of transcript page 28 and the top of 29 – rotting corpses with stuff floating off of them, and a corpse bloated to the shape of a beach ball, are apparently pretty easy to distinguish from “sleeping” bears. You might also look at http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20091112192208AACh5nC, where this question is discussed – apparently polar bears have no reflex to keep their head above water if they fall asleep.
Residence time is really immaterial. If the bear is moving or stationary, the statistical sampling chance of overflying one in your search pattern (and ‘marking’ it as within your transect swath when over it) does not change.