I'm surprised this hasn't already made more of a splash in the blogosphere, as it's been floating around in the press for a day or two already. Anyway, the gist of it is that An Inconvenient Truth can only be shown in British (English?) schools if accompanied by some guidance notes pointing out 9 significant flaws in the coverage of the science.
I saw AIT recently, and while it does not make up lies out of whole cloth in the way that Durkin's Swindle did, I was certainly uncomfortable with parts of the story Gore presented. There was a clear intent to persuade as well as inform, and he stretched reality to fit his agenda in a few places. So I think on balance the judge's decision is pretty fair.
Sorry to be boring and uncontroversial - but maybe agreeing with the judge will turn out to be controversial among climate scientists, so I await the views of others with interest. It's worth noting that most/all intelligent reviews have noted some problems with the original film (eg Eric Steig on RC: "There are a few scientific errors that are important in the film", and Stoat sez: "Its more or less OK, um, except the bits that aren't, and except its completely without qualifications, and consistently on the high side") so I don't expect too much harrumphing about senile judges. OTOH, bloggers have to harrumph about something, or they might as well not blog at all.
I saw AIT recently, and while it does not make up lies out of whole cloth in the way that Durkin's Swindle did, I was certainly uncomfortable with parts of the story Gore presented. There was a clear intent to persuade as well as inform, and he stretched reality to fit his agenda in a few places. So I think on balance the judge's decision is pretty fair.
Sorry to be boring and uncontroversial - but maybe agreeing with the judge will turn out to be controversial among climate scientists, so I await the views of others with interest. It's worth noting that most/all intelligent reviews have noted some problems with the original film (eg Eric Steig on RC: "There are a few scientific errors that are important in the film", and Stoat sez: "Its more or less OK, um, except the bits that aren't, and except its completely without qualifications, and consistently on the high side") so I don't expect too much harrumphing about senile judges. OTOH, bloggers have to harrumph about something, or they might as well not blog at all.
3 comments:
I agree this needs discussion.
Since there are no less than nine distinct points to be discussed at the least, I have slapped together a wiki for the purpose. Please stop by.
The problem is that myself and some other hardy souls will now spend several days in the online trenches pointing out that no, despite Al Gore being a 9 foot tall baby eating lizard who lies like a politician, AGW is still happening. Believe me, there are millions of people out there who will see this and assume that AGW is contested and mostly false theory. They will be urged on by all the anti-environmentalists, anti-communists (They think greens are commies or nazis or both) and ordinary people who think its all a scam to get more tax money out of them.
To sum it up- there are far too many people too bigoted or stupid to actually read the judges decision and other evidence and treat Gore and his film and his exaggerations with the gallic shrug that they deserve.
Guthrie,
I think it's a shame there isn't (to my knowledge) a solid factual responsible film I can point people to and say "this is the real deal, go and watch it". Probably, had such a film been made, it would not have been as big a hit as AIT was. But I cannot recommend AIT without serious reservations.
Michael, I've glanced at the wiki and may comment later. In fact I have the UK DVD so should be able to look up specific passages (especially if people can tell me approximately when they come up).
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