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Tuesday, June 03, 2014

Scientists : Polar Bear Numbers 'Qualified Guess'

This may come as a shocker to some, but scientists are not always right — especially when under intense public pressure for answers.

Researchers with the IUCN Polar Bear Specialist Group (PBSG) recently admitted to experienced zoologist and polar bear specialist Susan Crockford that the estimate given for the total number of polar bars in the Arctic was “simply a qualified guess given to satisfy public demand.”

Crockford has been critical of official polar bear population estimates because they fail to include five large subpopulations of polar bears. Due to the uncertainty of the populations in these areas, PBSG did not include them in their official estimate — but the polar bear group did include other subpopulation estimates.

PBSG has for years said that global polar bear populations were between 20,000 and 25,000, but these estimates are likely much lower than how many polar bears are actually living in the world.

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5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Guess what the world changes and everything on the planet adapts to that change. You can try and stop climate change but I doubt it will have an impact. Our planet has always gone through heating and cooling cycles. And in the portions that saw increased temperatures civilization flourished. The Dark Ages and the Renaissance period is a perfect example of this. The dark Ages saw temperatures plummet which meant less food, less people, and knowledge being in the hands of the few. In The Renaissance we saw periods of higher temperatures meaning food was easier to get and more plentiful. This fueled the growth of population. These populations congregate in cities and knowledge was more available. We are currently in one of the longest warning periods on record. What we need to worry about is global cooling which no one is really talking.

BTW Polar bears are nothing more than brown bears that broke off into a new sub-species because of natural selection. They can mate with brown bears and produce viable offspring. Same genetics, different active genes.

Anonymous said...

Today's scientists will provide what ever outcome the highest bidder is willing to pay for.

Anonymous said...

Life in a bubble; see 11:38 & 11:58.

Anonymous said...

urgent message to ALL:
The climate is changing and it's been changing since the beginning of time...get it???

Anonymous said...

12:24 PM whats your rationale for polar bears? God ran out of brown paint? I would love to hear what kind of child logic you use to get through life.

Your inability to digest both sides of an argument and come to your own conclusions is a reflection of what is wrong with most people these days.