Mitchell Taylor

Mitchell Taylor, PhD, is a Canadian biologist specializing in polar bears. Canada has the world's largest polar bear population.^[1]

Taylor was involved in research and management of polar bears for the Northwest Territories and Nunavut Territory since 1987. Dr. Taylor was a member of the Canada’s Federal Provincial Polar Bear Technical Committee until 2008. Dr. Taylor has published over 50 scientific papers on polar bear related topics, has worked in the field on most of the world's polar bear populations. Most recently he and colleagues completed the Davis Strait population inventory (one of the most southern of all polar bear populations) and is a co-author on Canada’s Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) polar bear draft status report. From 2004 to 2008, he was also manager of the decentralized and relocated Wildlife Research Section.^[2]

Controversy about polar bears and climate change

One of the most publicized negative effects of climate change is the decline of polar bear population. Taylor believes that "Polar bears, as a species, do not appear to be threatened or in decline based on the data that I’ve seen at the present time, although some populations do seem to be experiencing deleterious effects from climate change."^[2] Taylor was not invited to an international meeting of polar biologists held 29 Jun–3 Jul 2009 in Copenhagen. The chairman of the Polar Bear Specialist Group (PBSG), Dr Andy Derocher explained that his rejection had nothing to do with his undoubted expertise on polar bears: "it was the position you've taken on global warming that brought opposition". Dr Taylor was told that his views running "counter to human-induced climate change are extremely unhelpful". His signing of the Manhattan Declaration was "inconsistent with the position taken by the PBSG".^[3]

Taylor was a participants in all the previous PBSG meetings between 1981 and 2005.^[4]

In their press release after the meeting, "The PBSG renewed the conclusion from previous meetings that the greatest challenge to conservation of polar bears is ecological change in the Arctic resulting from climatic warming."^[5]

See also

• Global warming

References

1. ^ Haggett, Scott (Oct 30, 2009). "Canada, Greenland to jointly manage polar bears". Reuters. http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE59T4ME20091030. Retrieved 2010-08-24. 
2. ^ ^{a b} lexi.net (2009-01-25). "Dr. Mitchell Taylor, Polar Bear Biologist: FCPP - Frontier Centre for Public Policy". FCPP. http://www.fcpp.org/publication.php/2571. Retrieved 2010-08-24. 
3. ^ Booker, Christopher (2009-06-27). "Polar bear expert barred by global warmists". Telegraph. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/5664069/Polar-bear-expert-barred-by-global-warmists.html. Retrieved 2010-08-24. 
4. ^ "Meeting participants overview". pbsg.npolar.no. http://pbsg.npolar.no/en/meetings/participants.html. Retrieved 24 August 2010. 
5. ^ This page was published July 04 2009 (2009-07-04). "15th meeting of PBSG in Copenhagen, Denmark 2009" (Press release). Pbsg.npolar.no. http://pbsg.npolar.no/en/meetings/press-releases/15-Copenhagen.html. Retrieved 2010-08-24. 

Persondata
Name	Taylor, Mitchell
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth
Place of birth
Date of death
Place of death