Environmentalists confound again [Symbolism, not science, behind 'threatened' status]

National Post ^ | 2008-05-16 | Don Martin

[Clive]

OTTAWA -When environmental activists want cuddly creatures for poster purposes, nothing beats Canadian.

Forget our most endangered species, like the black-footed ferret, northern swift fox and Vancouver Island marmot. They don't stand a chance of becoming fundraiser-worthy victims when there are fuzzy seals and majestic polar bears to protect through international publicity.

The baby seal was the star last month when the Farley Mowat protest ship was seized by Canadian authorities for illegally interrupting the annual hunt. Partly due to that publicity, the European Commission is threatening to ban all Canadian seal product imports for no apparent reason other than the wide-eyed seal pups are so dang cute and graphically gush blood all over ice floes during a slaughter captured annually on television.

Now it's the polar bear, granted mostly symbolic protection by the United States this week as the highest-profile potential casualty of global warming as its mostly Canadian domain disappears with the Arctic Ocean ice melt.

Ironically, the polar bear's primary diet is the seal, and it has a particular affinity for the young pups it grabs by the head and chews, a death surely more prolonged than the fatal whack of a sealers' hakapik.

The "threatened" status afforded the Canadian great white is intriguing. One might not associate that alarmist term with an animal whose Arctic population has doubled to 25,000 bears in the last 40 years, with only two of the 13 pockets of population experiencing any decline and the rest enjoying a boom.

Yet somehow, despite that population surge, its long history of surviving even warmer climates and having lived off much reduced sea ice, the polar bear is now the world's photogenic canary in the global-warming coal mine.

When the U.S. Fish and Wild-life Service put up its suggestion for a "threatened" designation for the species, the service was swamped with a record-shattering 670,000 responses, or more than 25 for every polar bear on the planet.

"The polar bear cannot wait much longer," insisted a top official with the Centre of Biological Diversity in Washington. "The window of opportunity to save the polar bear is closing rapidly."

This frenzy of concern forced a reluctant U. S. Secretary of the Interior, Dirk Kempthorne, to almost visibly hold his nose while announcing that he was "compelled" to bestow the beast with "threatened" status, while taking pains to stress "this listing will not stop global climate change or prevent any sea ice from melting."

In other words, anything done to protect the species won't do any good unless climate change is halted and reversed-- a daunting challenge that may be beyond human manipulation.

Of course, nothing is more confounding and contradictory than the global warming question, because the so-called "junk science" practised by the alleged "climate change deniers" is backed by evidence to suggest this is merely the latest incarnation of regular planetary warming periods. They add that arbitrarily extrapolating a short-term meteorological trend can paint the inaccurate picture of an oncoming apocalypse.

Yet even on the smaller question of the polar bear's status, a divisive debate rages. An arm's-length analysis last month from the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife concluded the polar bear's future merely rated a passive "concern" which, in the dialect of these scientists, means wait and see.

While Environment Minister John Baird made plenty of politically correct bear noise on Wednesday -- "it's a great iconic Canadian beast whose survival, its ability to thrive is something that's tremendously important to us"-- his government has made the right call in waiting for fresh scientific data later this summer before announcing further polar bear protection plans.

Perhaps the correct picture of the polar bear's plight is, ironically, the notorious shot of a four-bear family apparently stranded and doomed to drown as an iceberg fragment melts beneath their paws.

Unfortunately for those who have used it as the basis for campaigns to save the species from climate change, the interpretation was entirely bogus. "They were healthy, fat and seemed comfortable on their iceberg," according to its photographer.

In the global-warming coal mine, perhaps the canaries are fat, healthy and increasingly numerous.

[Clive]

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[The Great RJ]

Government policy swayed by an animated image of drowning polar bears. If cartoons now are now the prime influencer's of government policy, I'm waiting for a bill in Congress to bail out Acme because global warming must be causing declining numbers of roadrunners and thus coyotes.

[fanfan]

[GourmetDan]

"The polar bear cannot wait much longer," insisted a top official with the Centre of Biological Diversity in Washington. "The window of opportunity to save the polar bear is closing rapidly."

The whole approach to 'endangered' and 'threatened' species is backwards because of evolutionary teaching. This is one of the biggest costs imposed on economies in the name of evolution and it is a complete error.

While trying to preserve genetic diversity has value, trying to control environments to save species is exactly backwards. Were scientists able to think outside the 'evolution box', they would realize that hybridizing 'threatened' species is the answer; not trying to control environments (which is impossible).

Hybridizing species ensures that the genetic diversity of the 'threatened' species is preserved inside the population of the more generalist species. Just because the diversity is not expressed as that particular morphological-type does not mean that it isn't there. It is, it's just hidden from outward view.

When environmental conditions again favor the 'threatened' species particular sub-set of genetic diversity, it will re-appear from the parent population because the environment will filter it out once again. That's how it appeared in the first place and will happen again.

Unfortunately, 'science' tries to preserve the environment rather than the genetic diversity itself because it doesn't understand the biological-systems it is studying. The understanding is backwards and is an extremely costly step in exactly the wrong direction. Brought to you courtesy of evolutionary-thinking.

[Don Corleone]

Real Estate tip: If you see a nice Cave, buy it as the environuts will have us all living in them soon. (As they live in mansions paid for by our taxes)

[thackney]

I blame Coca-Cola.

Can we go after them for windfall profits?

Coca-cola 2007
Revenue $28.9 Billion
Profit $6.0 Billion (20.7%)
Taxes $1.9 Billion (6.6%)
http://ir.thecoca-colacompany.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=94566&p=irol-SECText&TEXT=aHR0cDovL2NjYm4uMTBrd2l6YXJkLmNvbS94bWwvZmlsaW5nLnhtbD9yZXBvPXRlbmsmaXBhZ2U9NTQ5OTI1NiZkb2M9MSZudW09NDg%3d

[Red6]

They make far too much!

That's not reasonable according to me. Tax them and redistribute the money./sarc

—

On topic though. The author is spot on. It's always a “spotted owl” or a cute “baby seal” that needs rescued. The animal needing to be saved has to somehow strike an emotional cord in the target audience, since environmentalism is after all nothing but a business and clever marketing ploy.

[zip]

ping