24 Hours of Climate Reality: Gore-a-thon – Hour 5

A new post containing a cartoon from Josh will appear every hour. At the end of the 24 hours, everything will be collated on a single page. Readers are encouraged to post skeptical arguments below, as well as offer comments on what has been seen from the Climate Reality Project so far.

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Polar bears are being threatened. They need rescue from climate change!

Umm, no.

In fact, there’s so many polar bears in Canada Canada’s growing polar bear population ‘becoming a problem …

And, the government scientist who sounded the alarm that Al Gore picked up on is in trouble for “making up” much of the issue from siting 3 drowned polar bears then extrapolating a population decline from that single observation:

Al Gore’s “drowned polar bear” AIT source under investigation

The polar bear poster that launched a thousand quips

The level of ridiculae surrounding the polar bear “plight” was kicked off by that master of disaster Al Gore, with his swimming, drowning, polar bear animated characterization in “An Inconvenient Truth”. See it below about halfway in.

Gore later added to that distortion by making use of this photo:

Astute readers may recall seeing a photo flashed around the world earlier this year of polar bears “stranded” on an ice cube at sea. Please follow this link to the original photographer. See the bottom right photo.

A Canadian blogger, Carole Williams, tells the story behind this picture, which was taken in 2004 just off Alaska by a marine biologist on a Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute project, Amanda Byrd.  As the marine biologist (Byrd) points out, the bears were in no danger so close to the coast (they can swim 30 miles).

She just wanted a photograph more of the “wind-sculpted ice” than of the bears. Byrd writes:

“[You] have to keep in mind that the bears aren’t in danger at all. It was, if you will, their playground for 15 minutes. You know what I mean? This is a perfect picture for climate change, in a way, because you have the impression they are in the middle of the ocean and they are going to die with a coke in their hands. But they were not that far from the coast, and it was possible for them to swim.”

The image was copied from the ships computer (where Byrd had downloaded the camera flash memory stick to) by another member of the shipboard research crew and passed on to Environment Canada. Then it was eagerly adopted by many as an example of the fate that awaits the polar bears – including Al Gore, who used the picture as huge projected backdrop in one of his highly lucrative lectures.

Gore said:

“Their habitat is melting,”  “beautiful animals, literally being forced off the planet.”

Audience: [gasp!]

Yes, it melts every summer.

Read all the details of the story behind the photo, here and here. It seems that a lawsuit is brewing and Canada has some pretty hefty copyright laws.

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