David Rose is a writer for the UK tabloid Mail on Sunday, and is known for his inaccurate and misleading climate change coverage. Rose is particularly fond of cherry picking data to hide the rapid decline in Arctic sea ice. In August 2014, he published a piece focusing on the fact that at the time, there was more sea ice in the Arctic than during the record-breaking summer of 2012. Rose’s misguided focus on noisy short-term data is underscored by the new record low winter Arctic sea ice extent we experienced this year, less than seven months after his piece was published.
the independent regulator of the newspaper and magazine industry. We exist to promote and uphold the highest professional standards of journalism in the UK, and to support members of the public in seeking redress where they believe that the Editors’ Code of Practice has been breached … IPSO is here to serve the public by holding publications to account for their actions.
The first clause in the Editors’ Code of Practice deals with accuracy of the Press and includes the following provision.
i) The Press must take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading or distorted information, including pictures.
Bob Ward’s complaint alleged that Rose and the Mail had violated this section of the Code on several points, for example by giving the impression that the long-term decline in Arctic sea ice had reversed and by claiming that polar bear populations aren’t declining. On each point, Ward was correct that Rose’s piece is at best misleading, and often factually incorrect. Nevertheless, yesterday Ipso ruled in favor of Rose and the Mail.
On the Arctic sea ice decline, Rose covered himself by quoting contrarian climate scientist Judith Curry, who allegedly told him,
The Arctic sea ice spiral of death seems to have reversed.
This claim is entirely false, as the data in the following video illustrates.
Arctic sea ice annual minimum volume data, created by Andy Lee Robinson.
Rose also quoted climate scientist Ed Hawkins saying, in understated fashion,
I’m uncomfortable with the idea of people saying the ice has bounced back
So Ipso ruled that by including these comments from two climate scientists, Rose “had made clear that scientific opinions regarding the significance of the most recent data varied.” In this specific case, most of the fault lies with Judith Curry for providing Rose with a misleading and scientifically indefensible quote.
However, on several other points, Rose’s piece was simply factually wrong. For example, it claimed,
Yet even when the ice reached a low point in 2012, there was no scientific evidence that bear numbers were declining
As Ward pointed out in his complaint, the Polar Bear Specialist Group has reported that several polar bear sub-populations are declining. Specifically, in the group’s latest report, they found that three sub-populations are declining, six are stable, one is increasing, and nine lack sufficient data. For example, one recent study found that the number of polar bears in the southern Beaufort Sea has declined by approximately 40% over the past decade.
Polar bear survival is strongly tied to the abundance of sea ice, which they rely upon to hunt seals. While Arctic sea ice as a whole is declining rapidly, in some areas it has remained stable, depending upon local geographic conditions. In areas with stable sea ice, polar bear sub-populations have also generally remained stable.
However, sea ice in other regions has declined, and the local polar bear sub-populations along with them. The long-term outlook is bleak for both Arctic sea ice and polar bears, including in most regions where the ice has so far remained stable. Uncurbed global warming will eventually melt the ice, even in currently stable regions.
In any case, there was scientific evidence in 2012 that several polar bear sub-populations had declined. Ipso ruled in Rose’s favour because he wrote,
the main international bear science body, the Polar Bear Specialist Group, admits it has no reliable data from almost half of the Arctic, so cannot say whether numbers are falling or rising.
However, this is different from claiming that there is no scientific evidence that polar bear numbers are declining. The data show that three sub-populations are declining, and some very rapidly. In short, Rose has confused a lack of data from some sub-populations with “no evidence” of population decline. The latter is simply untrue. The available data are very concerning, which is why polar bears are listed as a threatened species.
Posted by dana1981 on Friday, 27 March, 2015
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