WUWT readers may remember when Ursus Bogus made an appearance in Science magazine, and the hilarity that ensued from it.
The embarrassment for Science was that it was a Photoshop job. There’s also the penguin version of the stock art. Science subsequently admitted:
The image associated with this article was selected by the editors. We did not realize that it was not an original photograph but a collage, and it was a mistake to have used it.
Well, some enterprising company has taken that hilarity, and turned it into something you can annoy/entertain your warmist friends with at your next party….
From the blog entry at WellDoneStuff:
Chill your drink while also reminding yourself that global warming is killing off polar bears as these arctic ice cube molds melts away. The molds are easy to make, just add water, freeze them, then watch them melt to nothing – just like their real life counter parts!
Available at Amazon.com here
Which reminds me of research published in 2012, using satellites, found their population to be double than what was previously thought.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0033751
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/04/120413145303.htm
(Let’s not forget polar numbers which have also recently gone up according to figures released in 2013).
Now why didn’t I think of that.]:{\…
Alfred
With books, there are some advantages in separating fact from fiction, even stating so on the book cover.
With photography, there are similar advantages. The problem is that cheating is so much easier with altered digital photography.
It’s disgusting to see major publishers too lazy to create and enforce simple rules that require altered imagery to be labelled as such. It would seldom need more than a little symbol like the copyright symbol and an affirmation signature by the photographer on a simple form. National Geographic is one of the few magazines that has adequate published guidelines, for which they are to be commended.
As a former President of the Plagiarism and Ethics sub-committee of the Australian Photographic Society, I’ve had to do deeper research than most. It is very clear that failure to separate photographic fact from fiction is equivalent to telling lies deliberately. It has no benefit to honest society, but potential for much harm to all society.
I kinda like that polar bear shot … er … reshot (and the ice cubes). If they’d redo both and throw in The Titanic they’d be perfect!
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We used to say “A picture is worth a thousand words.” Unfortunately, we can now also say “A picture can confirm a thousand lies.”
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/environment/experts-warn-that-winter-could-last-until-spring-2013021159228
T Shirts
ridicule will be more effective with the academic eletes than scientific rigor.
Re Geoff Sherrington…I am dismayed by and will in future be citing those words as an indication of how even people “in the business” dont get it.
It is in most situations impossible to photograph something, anything, any way, without making jusgements as to how to do that which introduce an element of creativity or interpretation. Even a robot on Mars delivers images that are an interpretation based on the requirements designed into it for the purpose of the project. There is never any such thing as a non-interpretive or “objective” image. The mere fact of choosing what to include and exclude from the image frame is a bias in representation. Your prepostrous warning label would have to be applied to every photo ever made.
When it comes to photo-shop like this, anyone with any visual sensibilities and an awareness of the use of photography from the simple familiarity with it on the web should be able to see its a visual conceit at a glance. Its no use blaming the photographer for the ineptitude of the viewer.
I am reminded of the case of Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle and the fairies. An intelligent man, inventor of Sherlock Holmes, Conan-Doyle was totally, publicly and stridently convinced that images knocked together by two young girls in their back garden were proof of the existence of fairies. Anyone today looking at those pictures can see at a glance that the fairies are crude, flat paper cut-outs. We have acquired that much visual awareness of photography. But people like the guy who thought the polar bear image was real exhibit a visual illiteracy comparable in contemporary terms to that of the famous fairy loving author.
Its not photography that is at fault but the crude perceptual facilities of those who take it literally.
The ice cubes are a fun idea.
This is my favorite polar bear graphic: http://i34.tinypic.com/2qk8e38.jpg
Special Earth Day soup edition: http://i39.tinypic.com/wklr28.jpg
I wonder why the ‘alarmists’ are also very quiet on the subject of the ‘melting Arctic sea ice..’..?
Probably because it has refrozen to a COMPLETELY average figure – unless of course the satellite-based graphs LIE on that section of the curve…
Facts are such a nuisance when trying to tell a good story, aren’t they..?
Jim south London says:
February 11, 2013 at 12:21 pm
Pass the sick bag.Anyone else cant stand those Coca Cola save a Polar Bear adverts everywhere
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Yeah, same here. Have they stopped putting CO2 in Coke now? If not, they must be one of the biggest contributor producers/users of CO2
They also have a set of alphabet ice cubes.
Now you can make a movie showing the ARCTIC ice as it melts away…