On the otherhand, I recall reading an older outdoor life or field and stream about handgun hunting for black bears and it basically recommended nothing smaller than a .41 mag...I'll see if I can find that article again.
Yes, I've read that, too, and the CW about handgun hunting for bears is a .44mag, with a .41 mag acceptable if you must. This was the "wisdom" I listened for selecting a .44mag as my baseline gun. But, this is HUNTING, not a SD scenario - and one shot kills and ethics apply. The idea is to take the bruin down at a distance, with one shot, and that is where they draw the .4x magnum baseline. I took advice from hunters and guides - one Maine, one Montana, one Alaska, and then one local (Washington). All were uniform about .44 magnum being the minimum they carried or in the case of guides, allowed clients to carry. There was some wriggle room about using a .41, and of course the Alaska guys preferred even more (.454, .460, .500) given their larger sized population. Even in WA, we have a large variation in bear size based on the different climates east/west - with the coastal ones getting much larger because of a richer, more varied diet.
I think that for SD, in an up-close situation, a 4" .357 with "bear" loads like from Double Tap is going to work as Chili's photos showed. Mainly, it would give me enough peace of mind that I could feel I wasn't undergunned (like with a .40, 9, or .45acp) and actually make me worry. Just having the peace of mind you stand a chance to protect yourself, your livestock, and party members is enough to let you let the worry go and then enjoy the trip.
It's not like these bears are hard to find - the park in Redmond, WA (home of microsoft and a 100,000 people or so) where we ride horses weekly has a population of three bears. This is a few miles from downtown Seattle, not the wilderness. I go there weekly and have for the last two years, but never seen them. But I have come across others on weekend rides - but never a confrontation.