Male Emperor Penguins go for three months without eating – in -70 degree weather with 100 mph winds – while carrying an egg which if they drop will grow up to be socially dysfunctional. If their wife is one day late hauling the groceries back across the ice, the kid dies.

Somehow, I don’t think their tough lifestyle is our fault.

Dr. Walt Meier at NSIDC has told me that the Arctic was ice free several times during the the last 15,000 years. Yet somehow, the bears survived without us coddling them. I’m guessing too that Neanderthals were in no way responsible for the ice-free Arctic, because they didn’t own any Winnebagos.

As far as human survival at the poles goes goes :

Jelly-wrestling leader sacked. A weekend jelly-wrestling bout in the Antarctica has cost the organiser his job. The evening of jelly wrestling at McMurdo Base was uncovered the following day by a high-powered delegation from the United States Office of the Inspector General, which audits the National Science Foundation – funder of the programme. The organiser of last month’s jelly wrestling, which was held in a vehicle maintenance facility and attended by New Zealanders from neighbouring Scott Base, was sacked the following week.