Polar bears refused to die as predicted and this is how the propheseers respond
By Paul Homewood
When they can’t win with facts, they resort to smear tactics, as Susan Crockford has just found out.
The polar bear experts who predicted tens of thousands of polar bears would be dead by now (given the ice conditions since 2007) have found my well-documented criticisms of their failed prophesies have caused them to lose face and credibility with the public.
Predicted sea ice changes (based on 2004 data) at 2020, 2050, and 2080 that were used in 2007 to predict a 67% decline in global polar bear numbers vs. an example of the sea ice extent reality experienced since 2007 (shown is 2012). See Crockford 2017 for details.
Although the gullible media still pretends to believe the doomsday stories offered by these researchers, the polar bear has fallen as a useful icon for those trying to sell a looming global warming catastrophe to the public.
Here’s what happened:
I published my professional criticisms on the failed predictions of the polar bear conservation community in a professional online scientific preprint journal to which any colleague can make a comment, write a review, or ask a question (Crockford 2017). Since its publication in February 2017, not one of the people whose work is referred to in my paper bothered to counter my arguments or write a review.
They ignored me, perhaps hoping the veracity of my arguments would not have to be addressed. But it has not turned out that way. Now, too late, they have chosen a personal attack in the journal BioScience (Harvey et al. 2018 in press).
Harvey et al. (“Internet blogs, polar bears, and climate-change denial by proxy”) pretends to be a scientific analysis on internet blog posts about polar bears, climate change, and Arctic sea ice but single me out for their peculiar brand of “scientific” smearing because most of the polar bear content on the blogs they examined (80%, they estimate) came from me.
You wouldn’t know from the paper, for example, that I am a professional zoologist with a Ph.D. in evolution (with polar bears in my dissertation), only that the GWPF describes me as “an expert on polar bear evolution” (as if this is probably a lie).
The authors state: “Crockford vigorously criticize, without supporting evidence, the findings of several leading researchers who have studied polar bears in the field for decades.”
Anyone who reads my blog or has read my paper knows this is the opposite of what I do.
The fact that I criticize with supporting evidence is precisely why these “leading researchers” feel so threatened and why the paper had to be written.
These misrepresentations alone tell you all you need to know about the motive behind the paper and the accuracy of the rest of their statements about me and others.
The long list of co-authors joining in on this attack includes several psychologists, one of whom has written similar papers before, as well as serial-litagator/climate change champion Michael Mann:
BioScience is an interesting choice for this “Forum” paper: I counted only 4 polar bear research papers in this journal since 2004 but 11 papers on “climate change denial” since 2010 (not including this one). In other words, few polar bear scientists would usually read this journal but many people interested in the “problem” of “climate change denial” would seek it out.
You can read it here (open access).
It is little surprise that we find the clownish Michael Mann on the list of authors, even though he knows nothing about polar bears.
It all goes to show just how desperate the climate mafia are getting that they have to resort to such shoddy tactics.
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
This is a classic case of playing the man (or woman) and not the ball.
And in the world of climate science fiction – avoiding the facts.
Shoddy, Shady, Shameless.
Instead of disappearing the Polar Bear population instead DOUBLED THREE TIMES and these people are defending their position while attacking an eminent source on the subject?
I would quite like a polar bear to ‘know’ Michael Mann, in the biblical sense of course
Highly unlikely unfortunately. Mann doesn’t seem to be much into field work. His realm is distorting data and stats at a computer and making speeches.
Wouldn’t we all?
This shoot-the-messenger tactic is only going to draw attention to the failed predictions of the climate scientists.
Solid evidence Susan’s fact based blog and books have hurt the warmunist meme badly. Derocher and Sterling got the basic polar bear biology wrong. Mann again defending the indefensible, showing himself evermore the fool.
That’s how the devil works. You start with a little harmless white lie to support your cause. Then you are forced to lie more and more. Finally, you believe your own lies.
Ristvan,
You nailed it.
Dr. Crockford asked me why these scientists did not defend their work against her highly specific criticism, instead attacking it indirectly with this paper. I told her “this is how they defend their work.”
My understanding is that the polar bear population has been increasing since they imposed stricter hunting regulations in the 1970s (or perhaps 1960s). They suffered more from the impacts of lead than from CO2. Indeed, using the same selective correlation-is-causation argument employed by the Blob, looks like increasing CO2 causes the polar bear population to increase.
Definitely a bad pick for the AGW poster child but the Green Blob likes to use bears in general because of their ‘charismatic’ value. They used and still very dishonestly use grizzly bears in the same way for ‘wilderness’ protection and other similar campaigns. This marketing reached a peak in British Columbia’s so called Great Bear Rain Forest, which offers the added bonus of the so called ‘Spirit (Black) Bears.’
In both cases they present growing populations as shrinking or doomed ones. Since the actual numbers don’t work I suppose they’ll have to find something else. Does The Warming make polar bears more bipolar or ‘stressed’ or perhaps more bigoted?
Don’t be deterred and keep up the good work Susan. You know you’re directly over the target when you start to get flak!
I can’t wait for this to be covered in the BBC’s “Saving Species” or “Costing the Earth”. Well, I guess I’ll just have to wait a long long time.
Bravo Susan Crockford and long may you continue to speak the truth against the corrupt alarmists.
You will have to wait until Hell freezes over, Mr Bratby, let alone the Arctic.
I see that Professional liar Lewandowsky has put his name to this rubbish.
Anything with his name on is automatically a load of cr@p.
When genuine scientists read the attack, on either side of the debate, they will be appalled. It probably does Susan no harm whatsoever as the nasty alarmists will believe anything catastrophic rather than optimistic, but the professionals will see it for what it is, a failing cult lashing out.
Perhaps, but I fear many will see it as a warning to avoid contradicting orthodoxy.
These sorts of obviously nonsensical attacks happened/happen in the USSR and China, not as serious science but as clear warnings about what happens if you “deviate”.
I suspect the authors here have the same intent.
All the more reason not to let them continue to get away with it.
A current example is the Republicans finding their spines. Although they were the majority in both houses, they would wimp out every time Democrats threatened a government shutdown over the budget and promised to blame the Republicans–they couldn’t curl up in fetal position fast enough. In the last couple of days, the House and Senate leaders are saying “bring it on” as the Democrats want to hold up the budget over DACA (illegals being granted amnesty) and not fund the military. Donald Trump got out ahead of them by saying the Democrats wanted to shut down the government over this, thus harming the military, and if they did it was solely their property. YAAAAA!!! And suddenly the Republicans are finding their backbones. Recently when the majority and minority leaders of both houses were invited to the White House to discuss the tax reform bill, Chuck and Nancy got a case of the vapors when Trump referred to Sen. Elizabeth Warren as Pocahontas. The day of, they refused to come in a fit of pique. Pictures in the conference room outside the Oval Office prominently show a vacant chair on either side of President Trump with their name plates on the table in front of each. Good visual, Donald. The media takes this as a sign of his mental instability–we who voted for him take it as a sign he is not putting up with their crap.
When you don’t stand up to bullies, they bully even more.
It’s an irony that such a survival expert and white ursine nomad is held up by the green fluffies to be such a sad case…..becoming extinct – my ar*e, when it, is in fact a top predator and regarded by the ‘locals’ as a carnivorous rival and even a man eating threat – which it is.
Polar bears are a natural phenomenon and humans are in their way, my advice would be to keep out of their way, let nature do its thing.
There is a forensic deconstruction,of this shoddy and dishonest paper, linked to by Susan Crockford, on the Fabius Maximus site:
It is all the more telling, I suggest, because the author who writes on climate matters on the site, who appears to be Larry Kummer the editor, is an AGW believer. Would that more people on that side of the debate had the courage to call out shoddy work and exaggerations by those they agree with on the science.
Kestrel27,
Nicely said. I am a firm supporter of the IPCC and major climate agencies (that’s not to confuse them with angels and oracles — they are institutions, fallible and political like all such).
My posts describe one of the central aspects of the climate policy debate — the center did not hold, and now both Left and Right have to a large degree abandoned the core or consensus of climate scientists.
Whatever your beliefs about climate change, this should be regarded as an odd — even ominous — development. The result is policy gridlock. As Steven Mosher aptly said, we no longer prepare even for the inevitable repeat of past extreme weather.
The other results is that much of the debate becomes propaganda, much of which is gibberish. The “white knight is talking backwards, and the red queen’s off with her head.”
This is the subject of my hundreds of posts — documenting this sad state of affairs and how it came to be (e.g., how the AR5’s worst case scenario became the “business as usual” scenario), — and suggesting ways to resolve it. Before we pay a large price for our folly.
Why not arrange a meeting where Lewnadowsky and the rest can experience polar bears at first hand, up front and personal?
Good idea. Let’s send them to one of those places where the ‘experts’ (those poor sniveling snowflakes unable to take criticism) say that polar bears have left due to global warming.
14 authors on such a “science” paper 🙂
To paraphrase Einstein: if Susan was wrong, only one Mann would have been enough.
Amongst the ‘scientific community’ alas, absolutely nothing out of the ordinary about any of this. Increasingly plainly the driving motivation is money. All ethical considerations, not to mention respect for intellectual rigour, are trumped by this insatiable lust. In this, they are joined by the mainstream media, with the BBC leading the pack. All evidence, let alone logic
and intuition, which runs counter to the orthodoxy is simply ignored and/or scrupulous proponents thereof are, as far as possible, tyrannised.
Climate change is not a problem. The corruption of science and intellectual integrity most surely is.
“Climate change is not a problem. The corruption of science and intellectual integrity most surely is.”
Well put. As a scientist, I could not be hired by my undergraduate institution in a position for which I was highly qualified and for which I had been invited to apply because: “You are the wrong politics and we have to have someone who will do and say whatever the environmentalists want.” However, the dept. chairman (from Wales no less) did say to me: “If this doesn’t work out, I could use a secretary.”
In the United States, it is almost impossible for non-left wingers to be hired in colleges and universities. This is especially true of their colleges of Arts & Sciences which are the umbrella for language, political science, sciences, history, etc.
There is absolutely NO diversity of thought allowed in our institutions with rare exceptions.
“NO diversity of thought” … that is a great riposte when various groups start banging on about lack of diversity.
One is reminded of the contempt of Francis Bacon for academia:
“…the din and pomp of professors.”
The WWF needs to be reported to the Advertising Commission as they are advertising for donations because of the polar bear decline. Their advert is obviously a total lie.
yes keith I was thinking the same…
Attack the Messenger!
That is what they do. I am sure they would attack the polar bears if they could in order to keep the man-made climate change scam going.
I love this exhange in Crichton’s ‘State of Fear’: Evans & Jennifer are in the big climate conference centre.
‘The delegates were clearly academic types, many dressed casually in a manner to suggest an outdoorsy lifestyle – khakis and L.L.Dean shirts, hiking boots, Patagonian vests. “It looks like a lumberjack convention, doesn’t it?” Jennifer said… “You’d never know that these guys spend most of their time in front of computer monitors.” “Is that true?” Evans said. “A lot of them, yes.” “And the hiking shoes?” She shrugged. “The rugged look is in, at the moment.”‘
PS If you haven’t read Susan Crockford’s novel “Eaten” get it for Christmas.
As well as smearing Dr Crockford, there are other aspects of the paper that are of note. Take this claim.
Doran and Zimmerman 2009 asked two questions
“Significant” is not synonymous with “most“.
Cook et. al 2013 looked at the endorsement of AGW theory, not the estimates of how much warming was due to AGW.
Any proper peer reviewer (someone with knowledge of the literature) should have picked up on this.
Proper scientists should have referred to the estimates from the data. This from AR5 WG1 Ch10 Page 869
If there was empirical evidence to support the belief that most of the warming since the Industrial Revolution is from human activities, the IPCC would have presented it. So the authors misrepresented nonsense opinion surveys instead.
For further details, and for links to check for yourselves, see my post here.