An Inconvenient Truth

There's a movie teaser line that you may have seen recently, that goes like this: "What if you had to tell someone the most important thing in the world, but you knew they'd never believe you?" The answer is "I'd try." The teaser's actually for another movie, but that's the story that's told in the documentary "An Inconvenient Truth": it starts with a man who, after talking with scientists and senators, can't get anyone to listen to what he thinks is the most important thing in the world. It comes out on DVD today.

The scariest horror film of 2006 was a documentary.

The first thing everyone wants to know, or at least to argue about, is whether Al Gore has his facts straight. The short answer is yes, he does. There are minor errors. They don't detract from Gore's main point, on which the scientific debate has ended.

And the main point is scary, and almost too big to think about or talk about. The earth is warming, because of us. Sometime in the next hundred years, our environment is going to change in big ways. We can't predict it with much accuracy yet, but the best estimates we have are that it's going to be -- measured in lives and dollars -- really bad.

In a way this film isn't really about that story. It's about a man telling that story -- someone who, after suffering a bit of a setback, asked himself, well, what can I do now? What's important to me? How do I want to spend my time?

What's important is a question a lot of nerds may be familiar with. We like to talk about important things. But how do you respond when you try to say something serious and the cool kids laugh at you? What do you do, when you put yourself out there, try to engage people's minds, and instead they make fun of your clothes?

The good news for anyone who's had a prom invitation rejected is that people can come back from worse disasters. His presidential bid didn't go so well in 2000. Gore had given talks on global warming before; after he was forcibly retired from public service, he took a Powerbook and Keynote on the road, sharpening and expanding his slideshow talk in airports and hotels.

Half of the film is that talk, and it's an engrossing talk. There are charts and diagrams and footnoted stats (and a Futurama clip) and it's about as fun as numbers and chemicals get. Turns out Al Gore has a sly sense of humor (but not a nasty one -- the film's only two political nudges are pretty gentle). Unless you're a climate scientist you'll probably learn something too.

But the other half, interwoven with the lectures, is a man picking up the pieces and rediscovering something important in his life, a message that he has to tell. That succeeds as a film.

And Gore's lecture succeeded too. Somehow, I'm not sure how, this documentary changed the way Americans look at global warming. In early 2006, global warming was still seen as one of those things that may be true or may not. Pundits were fairly evenly divided and both positions were routinely heard. It's now late 2006 and the debate has moved from "is global warming happening?" to "it's happening, we've caused it, and what if anything should we do about it?"

Most of the warming-deniers left are the real extremists out in Rush Limbaugh territory. We're not yet all the way to a serious, scientifically-informed debate, but somehow, overnight, this film pulled most of the fence-sitters over to where the scientists were years ago.

As for actually fixing global warming, it will take a miracle. Maybe two miracles. I think in the next few decades we're going to need to start an Apollo moonshot-type miracle of technology and engineering to beat back the greenhouse effect. Nanorobots. Reflective dust in the stratosphere. Giant mirrors at the Lagrange point. Bioengineered plankton to sink carbon or change the oceans' albedo. Something. That's just a guess.

But meanwhile, though we hope someone can build us an airbag before we crash the car into the tree, that doesn't absolve us from stepping on the brakes. Right now, we need a change in attitude, in our community and our politics, to start slowing the damage we're doing every day to our grandchildren's Earth -- to buy them time, and give them more options. The only way that happens is when the governments of industrialized and developing nations decide this is a priority.

And the only way that happens is for people everywhere to stop listening to the cool kids and, once again, pay attention to the nerds.

Go buy the nerd's DVD.

Comments

Nothing inconvenient about the results

[Josh Lindenmuth]

I don't think the reason that nobody initially wanted to listen had to do with the story, but rather the storyteller. Gore was about as charming and captivating as an endangered sea turtle. Had some other high profile public figure attacked the problem with the same gusto, there may have been a little more initial acceptance of the core message, which I actually feel would have harmed the result.

Why? Because if anyone else had tried to get congress to act on Global Warming, there would have never been An Inconvenient Truth. Had Gore been more successful in convincing congress to join the Kyoto treaty or strengthen EPA guidelines, I don't believe there never would have been the movie. Which just means that the public would remain uncommitted/unconvinced, and future administrations would have just reversed what the more convincing version of an Al Gore could have achieved in Congress.

What's amazing is that Al Gore's movie really IS engrossing. He comes across as a man with a mission. While he may sensationalize the risk a little at times, he delivers a message that is irrefutable: we must act now. I believe he has helped increase awareness of the problem, and the greater the awareness the greater the chance for long term change. Governments will act on ridiculously expensive endeavours only in the face of overwhelming public support ... An Inconvenient Truth is one big step in the right direction.

Re:Nothing inconvenient about the results

[Josh Lindenmuth]

In many respects I agree, Kyoto is NOT the answer. However, the answer will almost certainly cause a major change in our economy and definition of prosperity. The world cannot sustain 3 ton SUVs, Airbus jumbo jets, and lavish cruise ship vacations forever. We all want our children to live a better life than we do today, but in order for this to happen we need to redefine what 'better' means. If we continue to equate 'a better life' with 'having more stuff', then frankly the environment is doomed.

Until we find far greater stores of cheap clean energy and raw materials, consumption will always yield pollution and environmental damage. We must reduce consumption to reduce global warming. This is the expensive and unfortunate consequence of tackling global warming ... the lifestyle that we covet must change. Once/if we move down that path, it will be economically painful in the short-term, but at some point we just won't have any other choices and we'll end up with a radically different society/world (which I am optimistic will be for the better).

Re:Nothing inconvenient about the results

[Sqwubbsy]

it was the Bush administration which refused to ratify it that's all.

And the Clinton administration. Kyoto protocol was passed on December 12, 1997. Clinton never submitted it to the Senate for ratification.

Bush has problems with China and India (two of the top polluters) being exempt. This is not a Republican issue, although I encourage you to yell at Reid and Pelosi to pass it.

Relavant wikipedia section:

On July 25, 1997, before the Kyoto Protocol was finalized (although it had been fully negotiated, and a penultimate draft was finished), the U.S. Senate unanimously passed by a 95-0 vote the Byrd-Hagel Resolution (S. Res. 98)[37], which stated the sense of the Senate was that the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol that did not include binding targets and timetables for developing as well as industrialized nations or "would result in serious harm to the economy of the United States". On November 12, 1998, Vice President Al Gore symbolically signed the protocol. Both Gore and Senator Joseph Lieberman indicated that the protocol would not be acted upon in the Senate until there was participation by the developing nations.[38] The Clinton Administration never submitted the protocol to the Senate for ratification.

The Clinton Administration released an economic analysis in July 1998, prepared by the Council of Economic Advisors, which concluded that with emissions trading among the Annex B/Annex I countries, and participation of key developing countries in the "Clean Development Mechanism" -- which grants the latter business-as-usual emissions rates through 2012 -- the costs of implementing the Kyoto Protocol could be reduced as much as 60% from many estimates. Other economic analyses, however, prepared by the Congressional Budget Office and the Department of Energy Energy Information Administration (EIA), and others, demonstrated a potentially large decline in GDP from implementing the Protocol.

The current President, George W. Bush, has indicated that he does not intend to submit the treaty for ratification, not because he does not support the Kyoto principles, but because of the exemption granted to China (the world's second largest emitter of carbon dioxide [39]). Bush also opposes the treaty because of the strain he believes the treaty would put on the economy; he emphasizes the uncertainties which he asserts are present in the climate change issue.[40] Furthermore, the U.S. is concerned with broader exemptions of the treaty. For example, the U.S. does not support the split between Annex I countries and others.

Re:Nothing inconvenient about the results

[gcranston]

It's not really a bandwagon jump if he's BEEN AT IT SINCE HE WAS IN UNIVERSITY!

And where are these arguments against Global Warming being our fault? Seriously, where? And nothing from a newspaper, industry report, or Congressional committee counts on this issue. I'm asking where are the bona fide scientific papers in refereed journals? There aren't any. Saying there is evidence either way on this is like saying cigarettes might not kill you because I have this report from Imperial Tobabcco, and another from the Senate Committee on "Taxes on Tobacco make us piles of money" that say they're healthy.

Please, for our sakes, pull your ignorant head out of your ass and read something.

Re:Nothing inconvenient about the results

[Mister Whirly]

"It's not like global warming was unheard of - it just has a credibility problem."

That's because people like to get political instead of scientific when addressing the issue. In the film, it is stated that out of 928 scientific studies on global warming, zero had any doubt that A) it exists and B) we are causing it. So it depends on if you want to listen to science, or politics. Usually the people with the loudest mouths on both sides of the issue have the least to say. Whether or not you believe that it is even happening, it may be prudent to at the very least look into it a little.

Jon Stewart said it best...

[wanerious]

I'll have to paraphrase, but it is kind of remarkable that the film was made. Jon Stewart tried to imagine pitching a movie with the gripping charisma of Al Gore combined with the drama and excitement of a scientific powerpoint presentation. It's hard to imagine many execs falling over themselves to write that check.

Of course, I'll probably rent it (along with "Who Killed the Electric Car") tonight for a uber-geek double feature.

Re:Jon Stewart said it best...

[jandrese]

Only on Slashdot can we get a slideshow about how we're all going to die and someone asks "I wonder what resolution he was using for the presentation?"

Pretty much always the case...

[kan0r]

..with inconvenient truth: People will laugh, people will ignore, people will not like you for telling them about it.
They laughed at Galileo Galilei, they laughed at Gandhi and they now laugh at everything inconvenient.

Since when does public opinion influence truth?

the final conclusion is essentially...

[xlurker]

I have seen the movie; it is well done.

There are some conclusions that I think are inevitable... The final ultimate conclusions is essentially:

• Wind or solar energy-farms should be build in gargantuan scales. If one is dubious about such large scaling, just think of Google, they use tens of thousands of computers to power the search machine, all are centrally controlled and maintained.

Nothing, absolutely nothing, says it can't be done with energy-farms on colossal areas. These farms are used for sequesteration and also as an energy source. This does not depend on changing human nature, it will work and it will pay itself of. All it needs is for someone to propagate the idea.

Runup to that conclusion:

Sadly recent news and statistics can let one only draw the following conclusions:

1. it is not possible to change human habits even if the first world nations reduce CO2 emmisions, the second and third world nations will compensate by buying oil and coal no longer being bought by first world nations [1]
2. for us as a developed and civilized world to (really don't want to sound melodramatic) survive this, we will need to reduce CO2 levels in the atmosphere. As much as I would like humanity to finally change its habits and maybe become a bit more conscious of itself as a whole: what I would like has little influence on what "is" ; in particular little influence on 6 billion+ people ... (e.g. China will likely overtake the US concerning CO2 emmisions in 10 years...)
3. Since (1) will happen no matter what, reduction of CO2 in the atmosphere by reducing emmisions will not be enough
4. the conclusion from (3): sequesteration of CO2 requirement: large amounts of energy
5. the amount of energy needed for (4) will be large, it cannot come from other limited sources such as gas or atomic thus it must come from renewable sources: wind, solar, tidal/water (I exclude fusion since this is still too uncertain for the next 30 years)
6. no matter what the source of energy, the industry needed to provide the amounts of energy will be huge, it cannot only be used for sequesteration but also (obviously as an energy source)
7. a second conclusion of (1) is that humanity cannot change one of it's habits: consumption of resources / pruduction of goods, both need energy; if we cannot solve the problem by reducing consumption of energy, then we solve the problem by producing more means of producing energy
8. based on (7) look for systems that have a positive energy return on energy investment scale the good candidates to very large levels basically I think (8) is the only way to go for humanity, (8) is then applied to (4) examples of (8) can be found : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_energy_develop ment
9. first example: a wind turbine produces enough energy for a bit more then 300 homes, the US has approx. 300 million citizens, and maybe 80 million homes, thus 1000*1000 wind-turbines would supply enough energy for all households and sequesteration of CO2 just lining them up next to each would not work since there is only so much wind availible, spacing them at a distance of 1km to each other might work, thus one would need 1 million square kilometers, the US itself occupies 10 million square kilometers. wind turbines could be setup on the same areas used for agriculture the energy return on energy investment is more than twenty-fold, amortization after approx. 3 years. Amount of time to build: decades
10. a further maybe quicker to implement example for (8) would be to create large industries that create huge amounts of solar panels, not based on silicon but instead on the energy/resources-cheaper version: copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS) solar panels [2] [3] claims th

Proof is for mathematicians

[PIPBoy3000]

In science, the best you can do are experiments whose results seem to support or not support a theory. Even when the results seem to point one way or another, you can pick apart the methodology, the bias of the experimenters, and more. That's the best you can do with science. It's a human endevor, and has the same human flaws.

That's why we have peer reviewed journals, public debate, and more. No, consensus is not proof. Look at the long standing belief that ulcers were caused by "stress". It turns out it's a bacterial infection and it took a crazy guy drinking a batch of the bacteria to prove his point. But in so many other cases, the evidence changes the consensus. It takes awhile and can be hotly debated, but the process generally works.

Global climate change is in that category. Smaller experiments support it. The historical record supports it. Various measurements support it. Sure, it's not proof, but that's as good as it gets with science.

Re:Proof is for mathematicians

[Abcd1234]

If you want to prove a hypothesis - you need evidence.

Nice, you just illustrated the GPs point.

You *can't* prove a scientific hypothesis! All you can do is provide more and more evidence to back it up. Even General Relativity isn't "proven" in the scientific sense, and as far as theories goes, it's as rigorously tested as they get.

So, the question is, at what point will there be enough evidence to convince you? Personally, I think the answer is "never", because you have your beliefs and you're unwilling to deviate from them.

Re:I'm so tired of this!

[xtracto]

scientists or the media have a bias at all on this issue

Scientists can have whatever bias they want, but science will be the same.

We are in danger of becoming a society where science is the new priesthood, universities are the new temples, and PhDs are the new bishops of a timid and trusting flock.

Yeah, the danger has always been there. Normal people see scientists almost as priests who have "The Truth". The reality is that we do not have "The Truth", we *try* to look for the truth, science is about *understanding* the phenomena of the universe. In fact, there is no truth after all, there are only *accepted models* (theory).

The issue here is that, scientists have discovered information that shows the impact that humans are making to the environment, the problem is that normal people (non scientists) always look for a black and white "simple" answer (thats why "God" was invented).

It is, fundamentally, the same monstrosity that corrupted organized religion 1,000s of years ago. It must be rejected if science is to escape the fate of those organized religions.

Oh no it is not, the difference is that for any scientist to get reputation, it must have published some work which is *peer reviewed* by other scientists. And, as we saw with the chinesse scientist, it is very easy to lose the reputation if they make fraud.

And ultimately, no mattering the reputation of the scientists, science will continue to grow and our understanding will continue to grow.

The real problem is in pollitics, the governments do not care about global warming, as they do not care about lots of other things just because they do not understand it. To understand it, the problem must be stated in terms of profit or loss (of wealth or mind-share).

I watched this movie and I think it was great. I would really invite other people to watch it. But the sad thing is that, anyone who refuses to accept the issues of global warming will just waste 2 hours and then after watching the movie will just try to make excuses.

Re:I'm so tired of this!

[jamie]

We are in danger of becoming a society where science is the new priesthood, universities are the new temples, and PhDs are the new bishops of a timid and trusting flock. I'd say this corruption of science is almost as alarming as global warming, and far easier to demonstrate. Any true follower of science must reject "consensus" for what it is: argument by authority.

Incorrect. Argument by authority "is fallacious only when the person [cited] is not a legitimate authority in a particular context." Climate scientists are, of course, exactly the authority one should cite about matters of climate science.

Comparing science to religion is very much the rage but the simple fact is that science produces testable theories which seek to correctly describe the world around us, while religion does not. Anyone with education and intelligence who studies scientific research or does their own scientific experiments can correct scientific errors, and this is not true for religion.

I'm not sure why you went off and attacked the concept of consensus because I wrote (correctly) that the scientific debate on this matter had ended. The vast majority of climate scientists acknowledge that the Earth is getting warmer and that one of the causes is human production of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide. It is virtually impossible to find any respectable scientist who will disagree, anymore.

What this means is that we -- lay readers like you and I, and scientists alike -- can move on to other questions. Maverick scientists are of course welcome to try to disprove the existing consensus belief, and the wonderful thing about science is that they are always welcome to do so (and will receive great acclaim if they are right and everyone else is wrong). But it is correct, and significant, and important to say that there is consensus and the scientific debate on this particular question is over.

Re:I'm REALLY Serial!

[TerranFury]

I was really pretty pissed off by that episode, actually. It's obviously satire mocking global warming -- but it's just crude name-calling. I know that's what South Park is supposed to be, but I have a problem when it starts distributing the mental tools for people to stick their fingers in their ears and say "na na na!" about something that matters.

Re:I'm REALLY Serial!

[Workaphobia]

I see it from another perspective. South Park's commentary introduces me to biases that I have never even considered before, biases that allow me to put my own in perspective. For example, they taught me that it's *okay* to hate the anti-drug people - that it's not hypocritical to be anti-tobacco yet still hate that jackass in the "zephyr" awareness commercials. Likewise, I never had any strong opinions about illegal immigration (and still don't), but all the same I did not identify at all with Americans who have lost their jobs until I saw the SP episode satirizing that issue.

If you disagree with the messages conveyed by South Park, fine. It's not like I choose to believe everything they say either. But how about instead of making a fuss because they happen to promote a view you don't like, you just accept South Park as a welcome source of underrepresented criticisms, and make up your mind for yourself.

Re:747 "efficient?" Ha!

[Com2Kid]

howstuffworks.com link

Basically, 747 gets between 69.8 to 100mpg passenger miles per gallon.

Comparing both vehicles as being "full" is a faulty assumption. Airlines work their arses off to ensure that their airplanes take off as close to capacity as possible. Lots of people drive their SUVs to work alone.

(And the 747 is not exactly Boeings most fuel efficient airplane, the 787 is going to kick its arse! Not a huge jumbo jet, but amazingly cool. :) )

Re:I'm REALLY Serial!

[operagost]

but it's just crude name-calling.

Be sure to post that every time someone calls the President an idiot on Slashdot.

SP doesn't believe in anything

[irritating environme]

After a while, the fallacy of South Park becomes apparent: they make fun of anyone that believes in anything or takes a stand for anything

So eventually, you have to conclude that the political tenor or the show is to believe in nothing. Except watching TV. And doing nothing.

In an ideal world sarcasm is humor to paint ones path through the world. In high school mentality, it is an illusion of airs of superiority maintained by denigrating everything that is not you.