Those Madcap Ice Caps Crack Me Up

The ice caps are melting.

It doesn't take long into a read to see that the person who wrote it really wasn't thinking. Consider this from the BBC website:

"The rate at which some of the world's glaciers are melting has more than doubled, data from the United Nations Environment Programme has shown. Average glacial shrinkage has risen from 30 centimetres per year between 1980 and 1999, to 1.5 metres in 2006."

Pause. Stop. Think.

There are how many centimetres in a metre? I'm guessing 100. Average global shrinkage used to be 30 centimeters per year. That's 30% or .3 of a metre. In 2006 the shrinkage was reportedly 1.5 metres. That's 150 centimetres. If these measurements are accurate, then the difference between the 1980 - 1999 period and 2006 is not just "more than doubled", it's a full 5 times greater.

That's problem number one.

The second problem is that it is comparing a trend 1980 - 1999 with a single point year - 2006. What if 2006 was a spike year? I understand that in the past six months the glaciers have been growing again. Why does the data stop at 2006? Why isn't the fact that the glaciers are growing back included in the article?

The third problem is the weasel word "some", as in "some of the world's ice caps are melting". What does this mean? Are some of ice caps not melting? If so, why don't we hear about them?

The fourth problem is the alarmism. The usual alarmist narrative goes like this, "it's not too late, but we must act immediately". They never say, "it's too late", and they never say, "it's impossible to stop or correct". It's always possible, but it's going to take big bucks and relegation of control of people's lives to Big Environment. And it's gotta happen NOW.

Now, let's check the article:

"Dr Ian Willis, of the Scott Polar Research Institute, said: 'It is not too late to stop the shrinkage of these ice sheets but we need to take action immediately.'".

Immediately. Must - act - immediately.

Oops.

Didn't act immediately. Finished reading the article. Delay of 5 minutes occurred.

Too late.

We're doomed.

And that's the way the Ball bounces.