Michigander, I respect your opinion on this matter, but I have to respectfully disagree with your ammunition choice. I carry a GLOCK 20 in the woods of Alaska and do so regularly, and would never load my magazines with any type of hollowpoint ammunition due to the penetration defficiencies as compared to the FMJ and hard cast rounds provided by Double Tap, Buffalo Bore, etc.. Do you carry Hornady XTP or something else?
My personal carry gun is a .45 with hand loaded XTP's. Since I don't currently truly need a 10mm for any wildlife, and because of the fact that my extra money needs to go towards tools, I still haven't bought a 10mm, but I do have access to a couple of them when I want to borrow them.
I actually have a lot more respect for your opinions on the matter than I do my own, because you have a more sincere need for that level of power, and I would thus presume have spent a lot more time thinking about it than I have.
My wet phone book tests were geared less towards grizzly attacks, and more towards smaller issues that are common to the abnormally safe wilderness we have around here. At least I consider it abnormally safe relative to some more deadly environments.
What I did was use an old coat, a wood block, and the wet phone book to test the 10mm round I was discussing, which was a fringe of how hot it can be aggressive bonded JHP, I don't know the bullet manufacturer. It blew the living **** out of the test target. I would predict no problems whatsoever killing a charging black bear with that ammo.
In order to test more sizeable bear potency, I'd probably use a piece of hardwood to simulate a skull, then a gallon jug of water or two, and finally a wet phone book, then I'd do the same with a similarly hot FMJ.
My problem with FMJ's is that I was shot by one, specifically a x25 round when my CZ52 fell on the ground and shot me. It was going a little bit faster than a 10mm load would probably go, and made a nice and neat 3/10 of an inch hole through my leg, and I didn't at first even know I'd been shot. A 10mm HP round would have probably blown my leg almost off. It is a story that proves the validity of both shot placement and stopping power. (Not to mention the stupidity of commies and the importance of the 4 rules being followed religiously). My thought is that a nice and neat .40" hole is a lot less useful than a gaping baseball size hole, but penetration is certainly the key issue here, because it's all about getting to the central nervous system to disrupt it.
If you have done any ammo tests with extra hot bonded JHP 10mm that suggests it to be insufficient for Alaskan deadly big animals, or have any other well rounded reasoning, I'd love to hear about it. Otherwise, I will probably end up doing my own sometime soon, if for no other reason than personal knowledge.