An Inconvient Truth

A new movie coming out by Al Gore about Global Warming, its like a documentery, all facts...... it looks terrifying. I saw a private teach in by him last spring and he talked about a lot of the same stuff as they did in that movie "The Day After Tomarrow"... its pretty scary.
I think its cool someone big in politics is finally making a stand for the enviroment, I actually like Al Gore even though he is a democrat, our enviroment would be much better if he was presidant......
The movie should be good, it is even ganna have a section about Hurricane Katrina, and how more stuff like that is ganna come.
So the movie comes out May 24... check out the site www.climatecrisis.net
I for one cannot wait to see it.

 

When I first heard about it, I didn't want to see it, because I was afraid of what it might say about our future. But I realize now that is exactly why I have to see it. I think that every person in America should do the same.

 

sounds like something i'd want to see. i hope a lot of people do, and i hope they actually take it in.

p/s i love your signature,Rivalution.

 

Al Gore is obsessed.

 

Al Gore is right on the money! The obsession is on the part of many ordinary Americans who are obsessed with materialism and maintaining their living standards at the expense of the rest of the planet!

 

That is actually the most important reason why things are going in the direction that they are, in my opinion. The very fact that so much time is wasted looking into "alternative energy" and other forms of "environmentally friendly" ways to maintain status quo is what I believe our downfall is going to be. The only effective solution would mandate that people stop living the kinds of lifestyles they are living.

"Oh, I'm concerned a lot about the environment, but I have bills to pay and I need to get my new expensive game console!"

 

There is no way in hell that more than a few people in the entire world will be okay with that. I mean, people in 3rd world countries don't really even have industry, so they won't care, but pretty much everyone in every industrialized country would raise their voices in a resounding "HELL NO" and revolt. That sort of approach is way too far out there. The researching alternative energies is definitely seems to be our best option currently. Your suggestion, while, if it could possibly work, would be highly effective, is totally unrealistic. Please don't take offence to my comments, by the way. They are just my thoughts and nothing more.

Anyhow, new alternative energy sources are a very viable option that, when a good one is discovered, and the project is given proper funding, could bring global warming to a near halt within a relatively short period of time (my estimate: 10-30 years). The first part of this period of time would be mass producing the technology and making it widely availiable, the second part would be making it mainstream and replacing outdated technologies with it as fast as possible, and the third, and longest part, would be waiting for nature's exponentiation of global warming to slow. I am here referring to how the melting icecaps, permafrost, etc. release masses of CO2 into the atmosphere and further accelerate global warming.

 

Hey folks,

check this out:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7243389866689882461

It's a 45 minute BBC interview with Al Gore on his film "An Inconvient Truth". I think everybody should see it, this is a must-see! It's shocking what he tells us, but we have to listen and change our attitudes towards the environment.

Peace.

 

We are all (husband and kids) going to see it so maybe they will get it.

 

*bump* 'cause this is important!

 

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Gore does not know science. Here's the real truth by someone who does.

Inconvenient Truths Indeed
By Dr. Robert C. Balling Jr. : '



Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" opens around the country this week. In the film Gore pulls together evidence from every corner of the globe to convince us that climate change is happening fast, we are to blame, and if we don't act immediately, our Earth will be all but ruined. However, as you sit through the film, consider the following inconvenient truths:

(1) Near the beginning of the film, Gore pays respects to his Harvard mentor and inspiration, Dr. Roger Revelle. Gore praises Revelle for his discovery that atmospheric CO2 levels were rising and could potentially contribute to higher temperatures at a global scale. There is no mention, however, of Revelle's article published in the early 1990s concluding that the science is "too uncertain to justify drastic action." (S.F. Singer, C. Starr, and R. Revelle, "What to do about Greenhouse Warming: Look Before You Leap. Cosmos 1 (1993) 28-33.)

(2) Gore discusses glacial and snowpack retreats atop Kenya's Mt. Kilimanjaro, implying that human induced global warming is to blame. But Gore fails to mention that the snows of Kilimanjaro have been retreating for more than 100 years, largely due to declining atmospheric moisture, not global warming. Gore does not acknowledge the two major articles on the subject published in 2004 in the International Journal of Climatology and the Journal of Geophysical Research showing that modern glacier retreat on Kilimanjaro was initiated by a reduction in precipitation at the end of the nineteenth century and not by local or global warming.

(3) Many of Gore's conclusions are based on the "Hockey Stick" that shows near constant global temperatures for 1,000 years with a sharp increase in temperature from 1900 onward. The record Gore chooses in the film completely wipes out the Medieval Warm Period of 1,000 years ago and Little Ice Age that started 500 years ago and ended just over 100 years ago. There is evidence from throughout the world that these climate episodes existed, but on Gore's Hockey Stick, they become nothing more than insignificant fluctuations (Gore even jokes at one point about the Medieval Warm period).

(4) You will certainly not be surprised to see Katrina, other hurricanes, tornadoes, flash floods, and many types of severe weather events linked by Gore to global warming. However, if one took the time to read the downloadable "Summary for Policymakers" in the latest report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), one would learn that "No systematic changes in the frequency of tornadoes, thunder days, or hail events are evident in the limited areas analysed" and that "Changes globally in tropical and extra-tropical storm intensity and frequency are dominated by inter-decadal and multi-decadal variations, with no significant trends evident over the 20th century."

(5) Gore claims that sea-level rise could drown the Pacific islands, Florida, major cities the world over, and the 9/11 Memorial in New York City. No mention is made of the fact that sea level has been rising at a rate of 1.8 mm per year for the past 8,000 years; the IPCC notes that "No significant acceleration in the rate of sea level rise during the 20th century has been detected."

(6) Near the end of the film, we learn of ways the United States could reduce emissions of greenhouse gases back to the levels of 1970. OK. Assume the United States accomplishes this lofty goal, would we see any impact on climate? The well-known answer is NO. China, India and many other countries are significantly increasing their emission levels, and global concentrations of CO2 may double this century no matter what we decide to do in the United States. Even if the Kyoto Protocol could be fully implemented to honor the opening of this movie, the globe would be spared no more than a few hundredths of a degree of warming.

Throughout the film, Gore displays his passion for the global warming issue, and it is obvious that he has dedicated a substantial amount of time to learning about climate change and the greenhouse effect. This leads to an obvious question. The Kyoto Protocol was negotiated in December of 1997 giving the Clinton-Gore administration more than three years to present the Protocol to the United States Senate for ratification. Given Gore's position in the Senate and his knowledge and passion for global warming, one must wonder why then-Vice President Gore did not seize on what appears to have been an opportunity of a lifetime? "An Inconvenient Truth" is billed as the scariest movie you'll ever see. It may well be, but that's in part because it is not the most accurate depiction of the state of global warming science. The enormous uncertainties surrounding the global warming issue are conveniently missing in "An Inconvenient Truth."

Robert C. Balling Jr. is a professor in the climatology program at Arizona State University, specializing in climate change and the greenhouse effect.
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AP INCORRECTLY CLAIMS SCIENTISTS PRAISE GORE’S MOVIE ​

The June 27, 2006 Associated Press (AP) article titled “Scientists OK Gore’s Movie for Accuracy” by Seth Borenstein raises some serious questions about AP’s bias and methodology.

AP chose to ignore the scores of scientists who have harshly criticized the science presented in former Vice President Al Gore’s movie “An Inconvenient Truth.”

http://www.epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=257909

Anyone knowing much science can easily see through the Gore's cherrypicking, misleading, half truths.

 

__________________

If you would take the time to research the points in Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" you find that it's all hokum. Start by reading this:

http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=052406F

written by Dr. Robert C. Balling Jr. professor in the climatology program at Arizona State University, specializing in climate change and the greenhouse effect.

 

Some people won't believe global warming is happening until their hair catches on fire.

 

_________________
Here is what some respected climate scientists have to say about Gore's film:

Appearing before the Commons Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development last year, Carleton University paleoclimatologist Professor Tim Patterson testified, "There is no meaningful correlation between CO2 levels and Earth's temperature over this [geologic] time frame. In fact, when CO2 levels were over ten times higher than they are now, about 450 million years ago, the planet was in the depths of the absolute coldest period in the last half billion years"; Patterson asked the committee, "On the basis of this evidence, how could anyone still believe that the recent relatively small increase in CO2 levels would be the major cause of the past century's modest warming?"

Patterson concluded his testimony by explaining what his research and "hundreds of other studies" reveal: on all time scales, there is very good correlation between Earth's temperature and natural celestial phenomena such changes in the brightness of the Sun.

Dr. Boris Winterhalter, former marine researcher at the Geological Survey of Finland and professor in marine geology, University of Helsinki, takes apart Gore's dramatic display of Antarctic glaciers collapsing into the sea. "The breaking glacier wall is a normally occurring phenomenon which is due to the normal advance of a glacier" says Winterhalter. "In Antarctica the temperature is low enough to prohibit melting of the ice front, so if the ice is grounded, it has to break off in beautiful ice cascades. If the water is deep enough icebergs will form."

Dr. Wibjörn Karlén, emeritus professor, Dept. of Physical Geography and Quaternary Geology, Stockholm University, Sweden, admits, "Some small areas in the Antarctic Peninsula have broken up recently, just like it has done back in time. The temperature in this part of Antarctica has increased recently, probably because of a small change in the position of the low pressure systems."

But Karlén clarifies that the 'mass balance' of Antarctica is positive - more snow is accumulating than melting off. As a result, Ball explains, there is an increase in the 'calving' of icebergs as the ice dome of Antarctica is growing and flowing to the oceans. When Greenland and Antarctica are assessed together, "their mass balance is considered to possibly increase the sea level by 0.03 mm/year - not much of an effect" Karlén concludes.

The Antarctica has survived warm and cold events over millions of years. A meltdown is simply not a realistic scenario in the foreseeable future.

Gore tells us in the film, "Starting in 1970, there was a precipitous drop-off in the amount and extent and thickness of the Arctic ice cap." This is misleading, according to Ball: "The survey that Gore cites was a single transect across one part of the Arctic basin in the month of October during the 1960s when we were in the middle of the cooling period. The 1990 runs were done in the warmer month of September, using a wholly different technology."

Karlén explains that a paper published in 2003 by University of Alaska professor Igor Polyakov shows that, the region of the Arctic where rising temperature is supposedly endangering polar bears showed fluctuations since 1940 but no overall temperature rise. "For several published records it is a decrease for the last 50 years," says Karlén

Dr. Dick Morgan, former advisor to the World Meteorological Organization and climatology researcher at University of Exeter, U.K. gives the details, "There has been some decrease in ice thickness in the Canadian Arctic over the past 30 years but no melt down. The Canadian Ice Service records show that from 1971-1981 there was average, to above average, ice thickness. From 1981-1982 there was a sharp decrease of 15% but there was a quick recovery to average, to slightly above average, values from 1983-1995. A sharp drop of 30% occurred again 1996-1998 and since then there has been a steady increase to reach near normal conditions since 2001."

Concerning Gore's beliefs about worldwide warming, Morgan points out that, in addition to the cooling in the NW Atlantic, massive areas of cooling are found in the North and South Pacific Ocean; the whole of the Amazon Valley; the north coast of South America and the Caribbean; the eastern Mediterranean, Black Sea, Caucasus and Red Sea; New Zealand and even the Ganges Valley in India. Morgan explains, "Had the IPCC used the standard parameter for climate change (the 30 year average) and used an equal area projection, instead of the Mercator (which doubled the area of warming in Alaska, Siberia and the Antarctic Ocean) warming and cooling would have been almost in balance."

Gore's point that 200 cities and towns in the American West set all time high temperature records is also misleading according to Dr. Roy Spencer, Principal Research Scientist at The University of Alabama in Huntsville. "It is not unusual for some locations, out of the thousands of cities and towns in the U.S., to set all-time records," he says. "The actual data shows that overall, recent temperatures in the U.S. were not unusual."

Carter does not pull his punches about Gore's activism, "The man is an embarrassment to US science and its many fine practitioners, a lot of whom know (but feel unable to state publicly) that his propaganda crusade is mostly based on junkscience."

In April, sixty of the world's leading experts in the field asked Prime Minister Harper to order a thorough public review of the science of climate change, something that has never happened in Canada. Considering what's at stake - either the end of civilization, if you believe Gore, or a waste of billions of dollars, if you believe his opponents - it seems like a reasonable request.

 

Aye.
Apparently he hasn't seen the movie.
Gore points out that none of the scientists that discussed global warming in scientific journals didn't believe there was something happening.


I just saw it today, and I highly recommend those who haven't seen it - go. Go now.

 

hmmmm.....

"Balling has acknowledged that he had received $408,000 in research funding from the fossil fuel industry over the last decade (of which his University takes 50% for overhead). Contributors include ExxonMobil, the British Coal Corporation, Cyprus Minerals and OPEC."

According to Harper's, Balling has recieved more than $200,000 from coal and oil interests over the past six years. Specific incidences include significant levels of funding since 1989 from the Kuwaiti government, foreign coal and mining corporations and Cyprus Minerals Company (totalling $72,554). (Kuwait has opposed the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change). The Kuwaiti government paid for a release of Balling's "A Heated Debate" in the Middle East, a project originally funded by the Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy. The Kuwait Foundation for the Advancement of Science granted Balling $48,993 and the Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research granted him an undisclosed amount. British Coal Corporation gave him a total of $103,544 and the German Coal Mining Association gave him $81,780 in two separate grants. (Ozone Action, NCPPR directory)



After studying all available scientific data on the earth's climate, scientists with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded: "The balance of evidence suggests that there is a discernible human influence on global climate." This panel consists of 2500 climate experts. One writer suggests that these studies are “perhaps the most intensive, peer-reviewed scientific process ever undertaken in human history.” The Intergovernmental Panel also concluded that the 20th century is at least as warm as any period since 1400, while a recent study found the mean temperature of 1901-1990 is higher than any 90-year interval since AD 914.

 

There is a very small group of climate scientists that disagree (most of these are financed by the fossil fuel industry). However their numbers are quickly shrinking. Recently Roy W. Spencer, one of the more prominent skeptics stated: "We're now more willing to admit that global warming is occurring. The debate now is how much warming is going to be in the future."

 

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and Jim Hanson (so-called father of "global warming" has received $250,000 from the Theresa Heinz (Kerry's wife) foundation. If we decide the scientific climate truth based on who gets what money, then it should be known that the government has been spending $2 billion a year (increased recently to almost $4 billion per year) over the past decade - almost all of it going to those who keep up the illusion that there is a big problem. The most esteemed climatologist, Richard Lindzen at MIT, has complained that unless you go along with the alarmists you don't get research funds. And Lindzen proudly boasts that he has not received a penny from outside groups. But anyway, the issue should be decided on the basis of whose science is correct not on anything else.

As far as the IPCC declaring that there is a "discernible human influence", yes that's true. But it is a barely discernable signal within the "noise" of natural variations. That doesn't mean much. Every time a road or parking lot is built we are changing the climate slightly by reducing the albedo, (increasing the amount or solar radiation absorbed). Incidently, climatologist Prof. Richard Lindzen, mentioned above, was a lead author of the IPCC report and has complained that the politico types who wrote the "executive summary" left out all the uncetainties and the caveats of his original report. The problem is that most people only read the "executive summary" and not the scientific report itself.

 

A follow up on Climatologist Richard Lindzen. Here is a Wall Street Journal article he wrote a few days ago.

http://meteo.lcd.lu/globalwarming/Lindzen/no_consensus.html

which is defitely worth reading.