Most idiotic climate claim ever?
I’m pretty sure some people lay awake at night trying to come up with new ways to demonstrate that planet is going to hell in a handbasket. As I pointed out in Why climate change communications is like ‘Shaka, when the walls fell’, it’s all about imagery, not facts.
What better imagery then than turning lobsters into B-movie crustacean cannibals by making a lame-assed “experiment” that you put up on YouTube, complete with movie titles. Of course the non-thinkers are eating this right up, and they don’t even need drawn butter. Watch:
From Climate Desk:
Noah Oppenheim’s plan was simple: Rig a young lobster underneath a waterproof, infrared camera; drop the contraption overboard off the coast of Maine; and see who comes along for a bite to eat. The takers, he expected, would be fish: Cod, herring, and other “groundfish” found in these waters that are known to love a good lobster dinner. Similar experiments conducted in the 1990s showed that apart from being snatched up in one of the thousands of traps that sprinkle the sea floor here—tools of this region’s signature trade—fish predation was the principle cause of lobster death. Instead, Oppenheim, a marine biology graduate student at the University of Maine, captured footage that looks like it comes straight from the reel of a 1950s B-grade horror movie: Rampant lobster cannibalism.
First, lobsters are scavengers, so they’ll take advantage of anything that is stressed, dying, or dead. No surprises there.
Second , the fossil record of clawed lobsters extends back at least to the Valanginian Age of the Cretaceous. So of course, they’ve survived some of the warmest periods of Earth’s history.
Third, it seems there’s a hockey stick in lobsters, all while that warmth induced cannibalism is going on:
![lobstergraph[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/lobstergraph1.jpg?quality=83)
Source of data: Maine Dept. of Marine Resources.
The cannibal lobster story is making me downright crabby.
Oh, bad pun. Bad Larry! *slaps self on wrist*
Hi Noah
Despite my attempts at puerile humour earlier I would like to say that your standing and others’ general estimation of your character would soar if you chose to please continue to contribute as you commendably did with your comment above. None are criticising you for your defence of the questionable.In fact, I personally saw saw it as worthy. To quote Wellington on the eve of the battle of Waterloo “I always have use for a man who continues to defend a defenceless position”.
I am not in any way qualified in a climate related field but can decide for myself the merits of an argument and so far have read every comment here and even looked at some of the links provided.
It does seem to me that you have a case to answer.
You are kindly invited to address some of the points raised in this thread.
Please.
Andy
What’s this?
Global warming insanity.
What’s this?
It must have been boiling back then.
What’s this?
It seems as if lobsters chow each other whether in tanks or in the wild. This claim by Oppenheim about global warming induce lobster cannibalism is utter garbage. Anthony, see my previous 2 comments showing lobster cannibalism during cooler climate times.
In 1910 even crabs liked cannibalism. Wake me up when something is actually being caused by global yawning.
[paywalled]
Noah Oppenheim @ur momisugly March 11, 2014 at 11:01 am
And yet Jimbo (the Citation that Never Sleeps) says
@ur momisuglyMarch 12, 2014 at 3:30 am,
@ur momisuglyMarch 12, 2014 at 4:05 am,
@ur momisuglyMarch 12, 2014 at 4:29 am
Noah: where’s the reference to that earlier tethering study? It appears your assumption that lobster cannibalism behavior changed between the two studies was unwarranted.
Reuters report on Noah Oppenheim’s study under the guidance of Professor Richard Wahle is at http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/12/03/us-usa-lobster-idUSBRE8B21CH20121203
Well this whole thing makes me feel better about eating lobsters. I am actually following the Golden Rule: doing unto them as they would do unto each other.
I’m surprised that this is over a year old. I would have thought that Noah would have been prepared for the type of questions that we had for him, but I guess it’s possible that his study didn’t get much scrutiny since it advanced a CAGW meme.
That being said, I’m still hoping Noah returns to this thread.
I checked the YouTube site to see what sort of comments people leave on this “research”
Quite a lot of people pointed out that cannibalism is normal state in lobsters and known for very long time.
Noah had been aware of this argument for at least 7 months, yet he said nothing. Wobble, don’t hold your breath.
Jimbo!!!! Funniest stuff I have read on WUWT!!! EVA!!!!!!!
Of course it could be the hot toddy talkin and the fact I have a roaring sinus infection.
Now if we can just get climate scientists to eat each other…
You know, it seems that maybe Noah is a scientist after all- a modern climate concerned scientist, The kind that does not bother to research history. That dodges criticism of his paper. That uses hyped up cheesy videos about his work to mislead people. The kind that claims to be a scientist when he does not even have a grad degree. Who ignores evidence that disproves his thesis in favor of linking the results to ‘climate’.
This lad may have a real future yet!
First it was the Holocaust denial, now it is the Lobsters! What is next? Puppies? You Climate Denialists are pure evil. [/sarc]
Rather disappointed. I was hoping that after getting some responses, Noah would have chosen to engage. Sad that he didn’t. Not surprising, just sad.
TonyG,
For the sake of his conscience, I hope he is diong some real introspection. Sadly from what he wrote, he may have had that surgically removed some time ago.
I’ve never seen it but I knew there had to be one out there somewhere…..
http://nortonsafe.search.ask.com/videos?geo=US&prt=360&locale=en_US&o=APN10505&ver=20&chn=retail&q=scfi+giant+lobster&tpr=10
OOPS!
Try this.