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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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 Posted: Mon Jun 26, 2006 10:59 pm Post subject: |
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It is a movie about Global Climate Change that could have been much better.
The moral flaws of An Inconvenient Truth
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| [T]he film flirts with double standards. Laurie David, doyenne of Rodeo Drive environs, is one of the producers. As Eric Alterman noted in the Atlantic, David "reviles owners of SUVs as terrorist enablers, yet gives herself a pass when it comes to chartering one of the most wasteful uses of fossil-based fuels imaginable, a private jet." For David to fly in a private jet from Los Angeles to Washington would burn about as much petroleum as driving a Hummer for a year; if she flew back in the private jet, that's two Hummer-years. Gore's movie takes shots at Republicans and the oil industry, but by the most amazing coincidence says nothing about the poor example set by conspicuous consumers among the Hollywood elite. Broadly, An Inconvenient Truth denounces consumerism, yet asks of its audience no specific sacrifice. "What I look for is signs we are really changing our way of life, and I don't see it," Gore intones with his signature sigh. As he says this, we see him at an airport checking in to board a jet, where he whips out his laptop. If "really changing our way of life" is imperative, what's Gore doing getting on a jetliner? Jets number among the most resource-intensive objects in the world. |
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Octavius Hite
Joined: 28 Jan 2004
Location: Househunting, looking for a new bunker from which to convert the world to homosexuality.
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| Posted: Tue Jun 27, 2006 5:03 pm Post subject: |
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Climate experts: Gore's movie gets the science right
http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/06/27/gore.science.ap/index.html
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WASHINGTON (AP) -- The nation's top climate scientists are giving "An Inconvenient Truth," Al Gore's documentary on global warming, five stars for accuracy.
The former vice president's movie -- replete with the prospect of a flooded New York City, an inundated Florida, more and nastier hurricanes, worsening droughts, retreating glaciers and disappearing ice sheets -- mostly got the science right, said all 19 climate scientists who had seen the movie or read the book and answered questions from The Associated Press.
The AP contacted more than 100 top climate researchers by e-mail and phone for their opinion. Among those contacted were vocal skeptics of climate change theory. Most scientists had not seen the movie, which is in limited release, or read the book.
But those who have seen it had the same general impression: Gore conveyed the science correctly; the world is getting hotter and it is a manmade catastrophe-in-the-making caused by the burning of fossil fuels.
"Excellent," said William Schlesinger, dean of the Nicholas School of Environment and Earth Sciences at Duke University. "He got all the important material and got it right."
Robert Corell, chairman of the worldwide Arctic Climate Impact Assessment group of scientists, read the book and saw Gore give the slideshow presentation that is woven throughout the documentary.
"I sat there and I'm amazed at how thorough and accurate," Corell said. "After the presentation I said, 'Al, I'm absolutely blown away. There's a lot of details you could get wrong.' ... I could find no error."
Gore, in an interview with the AP, said he wasn't surprised "because I took a lot of care to try to make sure the science was right."
The tiny errors scientists found weren't a big deal, "far, far fewer and less significant than the shortcoming in speeches by the typical politician explaining an issue," said Michael MacCracken, who used to be in charge of the nation's global warming effects program and is now chief scientist at the Climate Institute in Washington.
One concern was about the connection between hurricanes and global warming. That is a subject of a heated debate in the science community. Gore cited five recent scientific studies to support his view.
"I thought the use of imagery from Hurricane Katrina was inappropriate and unnecessary in this regard, as there are plenty of disturbing impacts associated with global warming for which there is much greater scientific consensus," said Brian Soden, a University of Miami professor of meteorology and oceanography.
Some scientists said Gore confused his ice sheets when he said the effect of the Clean Air Act is noticeable in the Antarctic ice core; it is the Greenland ice core. Others thought Gore oversimplified the causal-link between the key greenhouse gas carbon dioxide and rising temperatures.
While some nonscientists could be depressed by the dire disaster-laden warmer world scenario that Gore laid out, one top researcher thought it was too optimistic. Tom Wigley, senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, thought the former vice president sugarcoated the problem by saying that with already-available technologies and changes in habit -- such as changing light bulbs -- the world could help slow or stop global warming.
While more than 1 million people have seen the movie since it opened in May, that does not include Washington's top science decision makers. President Bush said he won't see it. The heads of the Environmental Protection Agency and NASA haven't seen it, and the president's science adviser said the movie is on his to-see list.
"They are quite literally afraid to know the truth," Gore said. "Because if you accept the truth of what the scientific community is saying, it gives you a moral imperative to start to rein in the 70 million tons of global warming pollution that human civilization is putting into the atmosphere every day."
As far as the movie's entertainment value, Scripps Institution geosciences professor Jeff Severinghaus summed it up: "My wife fell asleep. Of course, I was on the edge of my chair." |
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sundubuman
Joined: 04 Feb 2003
Location: seoul
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| Posted: Tue Jun 27, 2006 6:20 pm Post subject: |
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About the Nicholas Institute
In short, the Nicholas Institute�s mission is to become the nation�s leading source of effective solutions to critical environmental problems�by providing decision makers in the public and private sectors with unbiased evaluations of policy risks and rewards, and innovative, practical ideas for meeting complex challenges.
- Tim Profeta, Director, Nicholas Institute
The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University is a nonpartisan institute founded in 2005 to engage with decision makers in government, the private sector, and the nonprofit community to develop innovative proposals that address critical environmental challenges. The Institute will address the demand for high-quality and timely data relevant to these pressing environmental problems. It seeks to act as an �honest broker� in policy debates by fostering open, ongoing dialogue between stakeholders on all sides of the issues and policy-relevant analysis based on academic research. The Institute�s staff leverages the broad expertise of Duke University as well as public and private partners nationwide.
The Institute is in the process of hiring its core staff, consisting of experienced professionals that will bring years of experience and context to the Institute�s work. The staff will work in conjunction with Duke faculty and students, as well as partners outside Duke�s walls, to produce the research and policy design that best informs decisions by the government, private sector, and nonprofit community on environmental matters.
The Institute will be housed within the Nicholas School in the Levine Science Research Center on the Duke campus, and later will move with the school into its new facility Nicholas Hall, which is still in the planning stages. The state-of-the art facility will be designed to meet the highest standards for "green" buildings. The Institute will soon open an office in Washington, D.C.
Wow.......the head of an "institute" that is not even 2 years-old, which will focus on "pressing" environmental challenges, that is just now in the process of hiring its staff (non-global warming accolytes need not apply), and opening an office in Washington DC, of all places.
I've said it before and I'll say it again, there are an ever-increasing number of people whose jobs are tied directly to crises, without which they are useless and redundant.
Is it any wonder that the man in charge of this institute would wholeheartedly lend his name to Gore's fear-mongering propaganda? |
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