BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: pdq
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 06:54 PM

Don Firth,

The following link gives you a pdf file of 111 KB. I'm sure you will read it as you have such an open mind:

             ponder this

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Ebbie
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 04:29 PM

Wolfgang, have you seen the documentary, 'An Inconvenient Truth'? Its analysis and conclusions are as valid for you as they are to the USA. This is not an isolated phenomenon.

Gore talks about the pre-historical fluctuations and concludes that this is something different or at least something very much more immediate and impactful to the human race. If we- as the human race - are major contributors to the event, it should behoove us to reduce our impact as much as possible as soon as possible.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Wolfgang
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 03:14 PM

Climate-related sea-level changes of the last century are very minor compared with the large changes in sea level that occur as climate oscillates between the cold and warm intervals that are part of the Earth's natural cycle.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 03:13 PM

Your biased opinion, pdq. The U. S. Geological Survey is an unbiased, multi-disciplinary science organization. Just because their findings are not to your liking does not make them biased.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: GUEST,Frank Hamilton
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 03:04 PM

Truther, you are wrong. Bush was never duly elected but ramrodded through an illegal election based on crooked electronic voting machines and a corrupted US Supreme Court decision.


"Al Gore's a pro rassler who took a dive in the 2000 election and now shills for the big-money "fix-it" corporations that are going to tax you til you bleed to fix a non-existent problem. What a whore. His movie is bad science, he's a bad actor, he's a GOOD whore though, and he's not worth any more effort from these digits."

As for his movie being bad science, let's see you prove it. Today's atmosphere being dictated by religious wing-nuts have denegrated science to such a degree that it's impossible to give scientists their just due. "Creationism" and the vapidity of "Intelligent Design" have polluted the discussion to such a degree that there is an attempt to smash Galilleo's telescope once again. The majority of credible scientists in the US support Gore's conclusion and recommend his film for its authority and common scientific sense.

As to the implication of "corporatism" to Al Gore, that's not his fault. The whole electoral system has been contaminated by lobbyists and those who hold the purse-strings are unfortunately from K-Street. But the point is being missed. Gore has gone against the corporate interests in this film and the most static that you here are from those who have a vested interest in keeping the oil, coal and nuke industry alive and eschewing alternative energy sources.

Frank Hamilton

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: annamill
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 02:54 PM

Hi. Wonderful thread. Best in a while. I was thinking...;-)

Maybe if we all turned our refrigs and freezers up real high...

Love, Annamill

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: pdq
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 02:41 PM

At the bottom of the site Don Firth links to you will see:

------------------------------------------------------------------------
U.S. Department of the Interior
U.S. Geological Survey                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   USGS Fact Sheet 002-00
January 2000
------------------------------------------------------------------------
This page is http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs2-00/
Maintained by Eastern Publications Group Web Team
Last revised 01-31-00


That page was set-up for the 2000 presidential campaign and has not been changed. I know people in the USGS and federal EPA and they say both agencies were so politicized during the Clinton years that many people who would not parrot-back the party line were forced to quit. Can we say Nazi tactics.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 02:00 PM

I don't recall that. Where on the National Geographic site, John?

United States Coast and Geodetic Survey is not exactly a collection of liberal hippy freaks and they say THIS. In case you're not up on your metric system, 80 meters is about 262 feet (262.47 to be precise).

Very interesting graphic representations HERE.

Prepare to tread water.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 10:54 AM

Good information, Guest. Thanks. What I had came directly from the National Geographic site.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: GUEST,282RA
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 10:32 AM

That last post was mine, sorry.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 10:32 AM

>>I still don't see how the "Greenland Icesheet" numbers add up. The numbers are all available. I don't see how you can take the mass of ice covering 1/129th of the area of the oceans, and even if I granted you that the whole thing was 328 feet thick (instead of 328 feet thick at its thickest point)<<

Because that's wrong. You need to quote your sources. Here's mine:

also called Inland Ice , Danish Indlandsis single ice cap or glacier covering about 80 percent of the island of Greenland and the largest ice mass in the Northern Hemisphere, second only in size to the Antarctic ice mass. It extends 1,570 miles (2,530 km) north-south, has a maximum width of 680 miles (1,094 km) near its northern margin, and has an average thickness of about 5,000 feet (1,500 m).

http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9037979/Greenland-Ice-Sheet

>>the most one could hope for in raising sea level would be 2.54 feet. (And before someone says "but 2.54 feet would be catastrophic in and of itself!" -- remember that the ice ISN'T 328 feet thick).<<

Right, it's 5000 ft thick. And that's AVERAGE thickness.

The Greenland ice sheet occupies about 82% of the surface of Greenland, and if melted would cause sea levels to rise by 7.2 metres[3]. Estimated changes in the mass of Greenland's ice sheet suggest it is melting at a rate of about 239 cubic kilometres (57.3 cubic miles) per year [1]. These measurements came from NASA's Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellite, launched in 2002, as reported by BBC News, 11 August 2006.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_sheet

I called it an ice cap but apparently an ice cap is under 20,000 sq. miles while an ice sheet is over 20,000. However, the Britannica link above does call it an ice cap so take your pick.

But, regardless, the danger is not the flooding--at least not yet--the more immediate danger is the Oceanic Conveyor Belt, which regulates earth's temperatures, is being disrupted and that can cause the planet to overheat and we know this is already happening. Quite frankly, I don't think anything can be done about it and that's pretty sad and scary.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 28 Jan 07 - 06:48 AM

I still don't see how the "Greenland Icesheet" numbers add up. The numbers are all available. I don't see how you can take the mass of ice covering 1/129th of the area of the oceans, and even if I granted you that the whole thing was 328 feet thick (instead of 328 feet thick at its thickest point) -- the most one could hope for in raising sea level would be 2.54 feet. (And before someone says "but 2.54 feet would be catastrophic in and of itself!" -- remember that the ice ISN'T 328 feet thick).

Greenland boasts the Northern Hemisphere's largest ice sheet—694, 981 square miles (1.8 million square kilometers)—which covers 85 percent of its total area • Humboldt, its largest glacier, is 62 miles (100 kilometers) wide and 164 to 328 feet (50 to 100 meters) thick.

The Atlantic covers an area of 82 million square kilometers (32 million square miles).
Arctic Ocean, the earth's northernmost cap. With an area of 12 million square kilometers (5 million square miles),
Indian Ocean covers an area of about 73 million square kilometers (about 28 million square miles)
the Pacific Ocean covers more than 166 million square kilometers (more than 64 million square miles)—about one-third of the earth's surface.

So the Greenland icesheet is 694, 981 square miles (.69 million sq mi)

The oceans that it is going to completely melt into are collectively approximately 129 million square miles.

That's approximately 129 times bigger than the Greenland icesheet.

And yet, somehow that 1/129 surface area is going to raise sea level 22 feet?

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: GUEST,282RA
Date: 27 Jan 07 - 11:34 PM

The danger of global warming is not rising sea levels. I mean, that's not good but it's not going to just flood overnight. We're not in any immediate danger of that. The more immediate danger is that with the poles melting and the freshwater ice runoff flowing into the oceans, the salinity content of the ocean will become more diluted. Even a 1% change in salinity content could be pretty catastrophic.

The salinity content has a direct bearing on earth's ability to regulate its temperatures. Normally, the winds sweeping over the icecap on Greenland chills the waters off Norway--a place called Lofoten. That causes the seawater to want to freeze but it can't because it's holding so much salt. So the salt begins to leech out of the freezing seawater and falls to the bottom of the ocean in what are called "chimneys" taking a great deal of chilly water down with it.

This very salty water at the bottom moves southward hugging the Eastern Americas due to the earth's rotation. When it gets to Antarctica, it joins more heavy, cold, salty water there and it all flows into a huge faultline in the ocean floor. The earth's rotation propels this water through this seam or trough that takes the water to the Pacific and Indian Oceans where it surfaces. This cools the waters of the tropical regions and prevents the tropics from overheating. It flows around Africa and works its way North until it hits the Arctic waters near Lofoten. Now the water is warm because it came from the balmier southern climes. Because it's warmer, it retains its salinity quite well until the winds sweeping over the Greenland icecap chill it and cause its salt to leech out and the whole cycle starts again.

Lowered salinity levels in the seawater due to polar melting causes smaller, weaker chimneys to sink and not nearly as much cold, heavy, salty water is moving south and hence the tropics won't be cooled sufficiently causing the waters to heat up which will kill a great deal of ocean life.

Couple this with the fact that Greenland's icecap is melting, the waters off Lofoten are not being sufficiently chilled to form chimneys anyway. So the Arctic waters heat up but don't get chilled anymore and that overheats the Arctic. That also destroys a great deal of marine life.

Ultimately, the earth will survive this change but life will be dramatically altered and there is no guarantee that humans will survive...or want to.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Ebbie
Date: 27 Jan 07 - 09:52 PM

Juneau's Mendenhall Glacier is making a remarkable retreat. When I first saw it just under 19 years ago it was still far enough forward that the little waterfall still fell into it. Now, not only is the ice wall close to a half mile away but even the wall has thinned and collapsed and become just a wedge curving around the landpoint. A few more years and it will have disappeared entirely from view, it will have slunk behind the point.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 27 Jan 07 - 05:31 PM

Good article HERE, and some good links as well. I think one would be a bit over the top to try to claim that this magazine has a political bias.

More HERE. And still MORE. Keep on TRUCKIN'. Need any more? If so, according to the google heading, I can supply over 10,117 more links to similar articles.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Bill D
Date: 27 Jan 07 - 04:33 PM

Since floating ice displaces water, they don't need to melt for their effects to be felt. Maybe some of the signs Naemanson mentions IS from these first big chunks. Lots more to come.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 27 Jan 07 - 03:17 PM

And the Antarctic ice shelf? Or the Greenland ice sheet? Baffin Island, Ellesmere Island, and other such places, with huge ice shelves breaking off ("An ancient ice shelf the size of 11,000 football fields that broke off Ellesmere Island could be dangerous when it starts to drift in the spring, a scientist says."--CNC News, Dec. 2006)? Alaskan glaciers such as the Mendenhall?

When these bodies of ice melt, the water goes directly into the oceans.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 27 Jan 07 - 05:41 AM

"I don't get exactly how the melt water is going to stay on land?????? "

Seriously? That's exactly how Lake Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario were formed, not to mention the thousands of lakes in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan, Indiana and throughout Canada.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: dianavan
Date: 27 Jan 07 - 02:30 AM

...it makes you wonder why anybody would want to be a teacher.

Whats wrong with controversy?

I bet that Federal Way doesn't allow teachers to discuss Iraq, either.

Must be a very boring school if the principal has to approve any and all 'controversial' materials.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 27 Jan 07 - 12:22 AM

"But the day responsibly presented science gets the attention of the general public for a long enough for them to learn something, I shall eat this keyboard."

Would you like some ketchup?

This isn't a question of politics. The information is available and not from any political party.

Watch the film, read a book, and then decide. The signs are already there and no amount of spin doctoring can change it.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: katlaughing
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 11:59 PM

Using high tech monitoring devices, including satellite images, scientists have reconstructed a major climate event that occurred on August 13, 2005. That afternoon the forty-one square mile Ayles Ice Shelf broke free of Canada's Ellesmere Island. It now floats free, an ice island off northeastern Canada.

Satellite images and earthquake monitoring devices recorded the event. Nobody lives in the area so it was only digital evidence that existed. Now scientists have visited the newly formed ice island. Its position will be closely watched.

Only five Canadian ice shelves remain connected to land. And measurements show they are 90% smaller than they were a century ago.

At the recent Geophysical Union conference, one report said most Arctic ice will be gone by 2040. Don't buy any real estate near sea level.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 11:40 PM

I don't get exactly how the melt water is going to stay on land??????

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 10:57 PM

47% said they didn't think it was possible, but apparently they weren't willing to go on record as making that a firm "impossible," otherwise I'm quite sure the writer on that particular web site would have really made hay out of it.

Of the other 53%, you don't know what they said and are going strictly on your own pie-in-the-sky, everything-is-just-peachy imagination.

The rest of your post is way off base and getting a bit snotty, so I'll simply ignore it and leave it for others to judge.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Ebbie
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 09:36 PM

Damn. I hate to think it but I strongly suspect that neither John Hardly nor Bunnahabhain has seen the documentary.

I'm disappointed in the both ofcha.

Incidentally, here in southeast Alaska they project that rather than our waters rising we will experience the opposite, that our land will be 17 to 43 inches higher than it is today.

This is because of our glaciers. We are already logging the changes as the glaciers melt. The 'uplift' is already measureable.

They also project that as the land rises we in southeast will note more frequent and stronger earthquakes.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 08:03 PM

(was your posting of the dictionary definition of "patronize" some sort of further claim to ownership? I mean, I already allowed as how you own it. Maybe you could tag one of those "TM" thingies to your posts though, in case anyone else doesn't know.)

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 08:01 PM

47% agreed that it isn't possible. Of the other 53%, 50% were laughing too hard to answer. The other three percent took off their tin foil helmets, removed the gravity-proof ball point astronaut pens they got with two box-tops off of specially marked boxes of Captain Crunch cereal, and wrote the following proclamation:

"Let any and all who read this know that Don Firth understands the way things are and we appreciate his help in our War of the Worlds"

Signed,

The Venutians"

They HATE it when people call them "Venetians". But they do have a terrific comeback line for it. They always say, "Venetian? ....What are you, blind?!"

God, how those Venutians crack me up

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 07:33 PM

Merriam-Webster online dictionary
patronize
def 2 : to adopt an air of condescension

I don't think I'd be laughed off any genuinely scientifically oriented web site for making a statement like that. In fact, a fairly brief google search turned up quite a number of scientific web sites that discussed the matter of global warming and runaway greenhouse effects in some pretty ominous terms. You might try putting "global warming" and "runaway greenhouse effect" into the google "Advanced Search" boxes and see what you come up with.

One site that poo-pooed the idea of global warming being at all detrimental or dangerous to human life mentioned the possibility of a runaway greenhouse effect turning the earth into a second Venus. It said that 47% of the scientists interviewed said that they didn't think it was possible.

Very interesting.

What about the other 53%, John? They didn't talk about them.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Naemanson
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 07:29 PM

You know, the majority of scientists now agree that global warming is occurring and a sizable proportion of them are coming to agree that humans are in large part to blame. (Source: I read this somewhere. *grin*)

The thing to take from this is that they MIGHT be right. IF they are and we do nothing we are being criminal in our treatment of future generations. If they are NOT right and we act then we are taking sensible precautions and leaving the world cleaner for those future generations. So it's a win-win, right?

Well, yes, but only if you can think beyond next year's profits. As I understand it the people who fight hardest against the idea of global warming are the companies who would have to change their ways. It is possible to make cars that burn cheaper, cleaner fuel but that would require change and change is scary. It is possible to make power using cleaner technology but that would again require change. Plus all this change would require money and the proper use of money is to take it as profit.

I live in the western Pacific Ocean. I have friends who are from some of the smaller islands in Micronesia. They remember their islands being larger. There is evidence all around us of the rise and fall of oceans. I live on the side of a mountain. I think I am safe from all but the highest, roughest ocean hijinks. But my friend Manny comes from Polowat. They are not much higher than sea level there. The people of Yap, Satawal, Palau, Pagan, and all the other little islands have every right to keep their homes but the say the islands keep getting smaller.

Humans MIGHT be to blame this time. They certainly were not in the past. But we MIGHT be this time. Do we really want to take that chance?

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 06:59 PM

Don, you could not be patronized by another. Not legally anyway. You have the proprietary rights to the verb, and all usage thereof.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 06:52 PM

". . . not being laughed off the site?"

Really, John?

What I said there is the opinion of a substantial number of scientists, particularly planetologists and meteorologists. It took me a while to be convinced of the possibility, but then I saw the data. I'm not making this up, as you seem to (would like to) think! So stop patronizing me. You might try reading a little scientific rather than political information on the subject for a change.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 06:39 PM

Oh, yeah, things will get pretty nasty before the earth turns into another Venus. But it's pretty hard to predict just how far it can be pushed before that tipping-point is reached. And there is considerably more than one chance in a billion of it happening, and assuming that it's hardly worth worrying about is a kind of dangerous way of looking at it. That's sort of like figuring that because the number of people who get run over by cars is relatively small, it's statistically perfectly safe to play in the traffic. We do know that it is possible. But we don't know exactly where that point is. If we did, we could deal with it better.

I've talked to planetologists and meteorologists who maintain that even if we stopped pouring greenhouse gases into the atmosphere today, it may already be too late.

Don Firth

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.
                           —T. S. Eliot

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 06:36 PM

yup, Bunnahabhain, that's what I'm saying. And you're betting that the dramtics, dubious specific claims, and exaggerated magnitude estimates are to sex it up to gain the attention of the general public...

...and I'm agreeing, but saying that doesn't change the fact that they are dramtics, dubious specific claims, and exaggerated magnitude estimates -- not science.

And yet they are swallowed whole here by the same crowd that would laugh the same kind of dubious science -- offered from an opposing political pov -- right off the mudcat. And has done so often and arrogantly.

I mean, really, if you were discussing the topic on a more scientifically oriented website (not a folk music site) caould you really imagine...

"Planetologists believe that it started out to be much like earth, but the same volcanic activity that happened on earth in its early stages, combined with its proximity to the sun, precipitated Venus's current state, uninhabitable by any life-form anywhere near similar to life as we understand it.

That could be us sometime in the not too far distant future."

...not being laughed off the site? Really?

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Bill D
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 06:31 PM

*sigh*...no, giant waves will be intermittant when LARGE chunks of ice break off near population centers. This already happens at times. Most of the sea level rise WOULD be gradual....and there will likely still be polar ice....unless the runaway scenario gets ahold. But *IF the most conservative estimates are correct, Florida and New Orleans will be real problems. Offshore islands in Virginia and N. Carolina already see erosion...and rising waters are only part of the picture. Temperature changes affect vegetation, land use, farming, fishing (already an issue in Alaska and New England), recreation, cities...(you think Phoenix is hot now...), tourism, .......how long a list do you want?

It's hard to win though...if we DO become conservative and beat the worst of it, people like you will say in 30-50-80 years, "see...it wasn't really a problem after all! Let's go back to how we WERE doing it!"

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 06:09 PM

The trouble with it isn't the basic science. It's the way it's presented, and some of the specific claims it makes.

The simple truth is scary enough without sexing it up, or heading towards a Hollywood disaster movie. Sea levels will rise an amount, an amount of time. We've only got order of magnitude estimates for height and time.

A 50/50 chance of changes in rainfall and temperature greatly reducing our viable crop-lands is far more dangerous than a one in a billion chance of a runaway greenhouse creating another Venus.

But the day responsibly presented science gets the attention of the general public for a long enough for them to learn something, I shall eat this keyboard.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Greg F.
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 06:09 PM

Another ostrich for junk science.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 05:51 PM

What? They think that all ice on the planet will melt?

Wow. New Orleans. What a brave prediction. Wasn't it global-warmed-below-sea-level some time around 1850? Kinda like predicting that it will be darker at night than during the day. I gotta go with you to Vegas some day. I bet you're just a terror at roulette.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Cluin
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 05:49 PM

Then it can join the ranks of Atlantis, Ys and Lyonesse.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 05:47 PM

I have a couple of oceanographer friends who would disagree with you on every point, John.

Even now, at the present rate of melt, most of Florida will be under water within a couple of decades. And New Orleans? Don't buy real estate there if you're smart.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 05:39 PM

Bill,

I'm sure you'll tell me if I'm wrong, but the "Inconvenient Truth" speculation about rising sea levels goes something simply like this:

If all ice on the globe was melted, the seas would rise by X.

But then, nobody is calling for all the ice on the globe to melt.

The movie also implies through its video editing that the rise would be tsunami-like. It does this by showing video of huge breaking waves crashing in on an unprepared land-mass.

But even if I allowed that all the melt would occur and cause the predicted rise -- it would not happen in tsunami-like manner, rushing down and up from the poles instantaneously. The melt would occur (as what has happened so far) over such a period of years that rise would be gradual.

A gradual rise wouldn't have made good, dramatic film footage, nor good propaganda.

Furthermore, the notion that all the ice would melt is not what science is predicting anyway. I don't know any science that has concluded that the warming that is occurring is going to result in ALL the ice to melt -- no cold poles -- summer vactions at the Antarctic beach house.

But even if it did, again, not all of it would rush to the sea -- not even on the Antarctic. Much of the water would still likely remain land-locked much as our glacier-made lakes in N. America.

And you can't have it both ways. If we are the principle cause of global warming, then our contribution will not remain a constant. Our use of hydrocarbon fuels would necessarily decrease with a warming.

But, again, pointing out that probablilty didn't fit the political agenda of the movie.

Bill, which of the scientists is predicting that we will become another Venus as Don suggests? Because unless you agree with Don, I'd like to see some of your outrage directed his way in your demand for "science".

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Cluin
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 05:22 PM

"...But eco-systems are far more delicately balanced than most people believe.."

Amen. Read Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything for a quick lesson on how extremely unlikely our even being here is and how thin the thread that holds our continued existence is. Paranoia is too tame a word for the feeling you'll be left with.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Bill D
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 05:15 PM

"It confirms what you already believe to such an extent that you don't question it."

good grief, John! I hope you don't really mean that! That borders on an insult to my/our fairness & even intelligence. I have prided myself on NOT just buying into dire predictions at first glance. As Don Firth says, this has been studied for years in detail by many people who have no hint of bias.

YOU offer no refutation beyond "I question..." Measuring sea-level rise in relation to X amount of melting is just math! We are now SEEING some serious melting...ask the Inuit what THEY think about the changing climate...and ask the polar bears what has happened to the ice where the seals live. Weather bureau statistics SAY something is happening, and the computer modeling says the trend is scary....I hope you aren't accusing the programming of being political!

It's pretty simple...YOU cannot afford to be wrong. If we refuse to accept these studies until the water is up to out knees, it's a bit late to buy hip boots.

Still, if you must continue to be adamant, please confine it to data and real arguments, hmmm? Don't accuse honest people of political bias about such important issues.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 04:45 PM

And when I say "uninhabitable," I mean take a look at Venus, our nearest neighbor. Its current state (much hotter than a pizza oven) is the result of a naturally occurring runaway greenhouse effect (we assume that it was natural) that took place millions or billions of years ago. Planetologists believe that it started out to be much like earth, but the same volcanic activity that happened on earth in its early stages, combined with its proximity to the sun, precipitated Venus's current state, uninhabitable by any life-form anywhere near similar to life as we understand it.

That could be us sometime in the not too far distant future.

Don't think it could happen here? That's a comforting self-deception. But eco-systems are far more delicately balanced than most people believe. We've been pretty lucky so far. But we could very easily screw up big time!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 04:31 PM

It cherry-picks empirical data and specultes very non-empirical conclusions.

I question the specifics about rises in sea level.

I question the amount of human contribution.

And I question that it is "science" to even draw conclusions about drastic consequences. We don't even know on balance whether warming would be a good or bad thing.

You guys accept it because, for you it is a "Convenient" film. It confirms what you already believe to such an extent that you don't question it.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Don Firth
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 04:25 PM

I have not yet seen "An Inconvenient Truth," but I've just put it at the top of my NetFlix list and it should be here in a few days. But I have been following this matter for decades.

The vast majority of scientists say—and have been saying for some time now—that the evidence for global warming and climate change is verifiable and incontrovertible.

Although there may be other factors involved (periodic natural variations in climate and minute fluctuations in the sun's radiation), the major contributor to the current increase in the earth's mean temperature is man-cause atmospheric pollution. Those with a vested interest in maintaining the status quo ("Screw the future—all that matters is the Quarterly Financial Report!") point to these natural fluctuations and try to claim that that's all there is to it and there is no cause for concern. But that is not a knowledgeable scientifically based opinion, nor, for that matter is it even a defendable political opinion. It's pure self-induced blindness.

It is the intellectual—and moral—equivalent of refusal to acknowledge that they are enjoying their picnic between the railroad tracks while the train is rushing toward them.

Those who try to debunk the idea of global warming, or claim that it is a political issue, not a scientific issue, simple do not understand—do not want to understand—what they are really dealing with.

It is possible, and the way we're going, it is very likely, that in a much shorter time that anybody (except scientists, particularly meteorologists and planetologists) think possible, we could reach a tipping-point, and set off an irreversible runaway green-house effect, and within a frighteningly short period of time—a few very short and agonizing years, not a few centuries, or even a few decades—this planet will be rendered uninhabitable. Once we hit that tipping-point, there is absolutely nothing that can be done to stop it.

Those who claim that this is a political issue, not a scientific issue simply have no concept of the enormity of what they are playing at.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Ebbie
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 02:27 PM

John Hardly, I would be interested in hearing you explicate on the film. What part(s) do you find objectioanble or questionable or on shaky scientific ground?

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Bill D
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 02:25 PM

"It shouldn't be shown in a science class." ????

John...it is ABOUT science! It is a scientific theory. It is not about Al Gore's politics. Scientific theories are meant to be tested and examined...and this one has been for years now. More & more data and computer models are saying that it IS an accurate prediction and that we should pay attention. Does that make it 100%? Of course not....they 'predict' that the Sun will burn out in 12-15 billion years, we can't be sure.. but that is not a current concern.

The point is, anyone who does NOT agree with the prediction can do MORE tests, analysis and 'choose' to put their head in the sand and ignore what a majority of respected scientists tell us...but if the prediction is "danger" by most experts, it makes sense to bahave as if they are correct and change our habits!

Those to whom this evidence is "Inconvenient" had better get used to it.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 02:18 PM

I think Berle has a trademark thing on "Uncle Melty".

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 02:18 PM

"Melty"?

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: Kim C
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 02:10 PM

With all this global warming going on, seems like Frosty ought to change his name.

Subject: RE: BS: 'An Inconvenient Truth'-banned
From: John Hardly
Date: 26 Jan 07 - 02:07 PM

It shouldn't be shown in a science class. Political science, maybe (I guess that would be "Social Studies" at the junior high level).

Same arguement that has been thrown about here as regards teaching "creation" of any kind in public schools. Science classes should be that -- the study of science. "An Inconvenient Truth" contains way more than science.