article: Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth: unscientific?
Okay, first of all, I think thats it ridiculous that parents brought a case to court in an attempt to make distribution of an Inconvenient Truth illegal in the classroom. Even if the film lacked the presentation of a multitude of perspectives, I still think it serves its educational purpose by introducing students to at least some aspects of the argument. But anyway, let us examine the nine counts of scientific inaccuracy that the judge would Gore guilty of...
1. "A 7 meter rise in sea level will be caused by the melting of either west Antarctica or Greenland in the near future". Burton (the judge) seems to think that this scenario would only happen after mellennia, not in a matter of a few years. Gore only really says that Greenland's coasts will be dramatically flooded, he doesn't necessarily suggest that the country will be underwater in a few years. This flooding, however, supposedly has the potential to destroy life on the coast, which nonetheless is the habitat of humanity/animals, etc. Exerts seem to have several different opinions on this matter. The intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2007 predicts a rise in sea level by 59 cm by 2100 excluding the possible melting in Greenland and Antartica because of the extreme uncertainty, while James Hansen of NASA believes that it will rise several meters by 2100. So many varying reports hinders me form making my own decision about the matter because I'm not a sceintist, nor have I personally observed this data, etc. I'm not willing to make a strong claim on a topic that is so disputed when I myself have no concrete evidence. Nonetheless, I still think we should be safe an take steps to help the environment or prevent the further melting of the ice caps. I think we should take these steps just for the sake of our planets well being. I think there needs to be a point in time where we look beyond who is right and who is wrong, because there are always going to be dissenting opinions. Regardless, we need to unite together to make our planet a cleaner place.
The second claim Burton holds Gore responsible for is that low-lying inhabited Pacific atolls are being inundated because of global warming. Burton claimed that no evacuations to nations such as New Zealand had occurred, yet in 2005, the people of the Carteret atoll in Papua New Guinea announced their imminent evacuation. This evacuation is scheduled to begin in 2008, supposedly. This article : http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2005/nov/25/science.climatechange
talks about the evacuation. For more than 30 years, 980 people have been living on the atolls. The evacuation will begin as soon as money is made available to the Papuan New Guinean regional government. The article states that by 2015 the islands are likely to be completely submerged. This has apparently been inevitable for 20 years, as storm surges and erosion have worsened so much that bits of the atolls have been breaking off from time to time. In 1995, Han island was completely inundated and another cut in half by the sea. The people there have nearly starved because salt water destroyed many of their sources of food. For many years they have depended on emergency aid because the islanders barely have any money. Little source of transportation is provided in or out of the island. According to the Red Cross, the number of people in the Oceania region affected by weather-related disasters has soared by 65 times during the past 30 years because increased numbers of cyclones, droughts and floods.
Although, these islands are totally different than the continents that Gore observes, they still serve as a model of what is to come in the future. Incidents of such severe island flood us prove that coasts of continents could be submerged and possibly change the entire map eventually. I think this is really scary thought and serves as a terrific point to support Gore. If anything at all, it sends us a warning that we need to do something about how we treat this planet, just in case these findings are true. I really don't want myself or my children or my grandchildren, or even my great great grandchildren to end up under water. People seem to be so selfish when it comes to the future. Because it doesn't affect them, they make no effort to plan for those in the future. I don't understand how people can be so thoughtless.
The third point he mentions is the "ocean conveyor" in the North Atlantic will shut down. Burton claims that according to information provided by the IPC, it is very unlikely that the ocean conveyor (known technically as the meridonal overturning circulation or themohaline circulation) will shut down in the future. The IPC states that while it is unlikely to shut down completely, it is likely to slow down by 2100. Gore argues that it is indeed possible to cease functioning if it were to receive a large influx of cold water, which he points to the possibility of Greenland ice sheet melting. In 2006, a team of researchers led by Kirsten Zickfeld of the University of Victoria, 8 people from the team believed that there was a 40 percent chance that the conveyor belt would collapse if the global average temperature rose by 4 degrees celsius above pre-industrial levels.
Gore claims that there is a direct relationship between the historic rise in CO2 in the atmosphere and temperature. Burton claims that the graphs that Gore uses does not show a perfect fit. Some sources state that CO2 increases lag behind temperature rises, yet this does not necessarily disprove that CO2 warms the atmosphere and that rising CO2 emission have caused warming since the 20th century.
Gore asserts that the receding snows of Kilimanjaro are due to global warming, since 21 percent of the 1912 ice covering the mountain was still around in 2003. Using high resolution satelite images, a 2006 study led by Nicolas Cullen of the Tropical Glaciology Group, it was concluded that the glaciers appear to be remnants of a past climate that was once able to sustain them. However, there is uncontested evidence that the world's mountain glaciers are melting fast.
Gore asserts that Lake Chad's disappearance is due to global warming, but Burton credits this to factors such as population increase, overgrazing, and regional climate variability. But according to NASA, a 30 percent decrease took place in the lake between 1966 and 1975. irrigation counted for only 5 percent and drier conditions resulted for the rest of the decrease. Irrigation demands increased four fold between 1983 and 1994, accounting for 50 percent of the additional decrease in the size of the lake. This is really alarming that such changes would occur in such a short period of time.
Gore claims that the impact of Hurricane Katrina was due to global warming. The debate continues, yet as hurricanes collect their power from the temp of the surface water, this gives a significant boost to the argument. Still heavily contested. It seems hard to pick a side and really feel confident when there are so many varying opinions.
Gore asserts that polar bears are drowning because of disappearing ice, but Burton stated that only four polar bears were found dead because of a storm. However, other scientists have suggested that weather conditions are becoming more severe in growing expanses of open water and making swimming more difficult. To me this seems like a reasonable claim. There is no doubt that ice is melting throughout the world, although the cause is contested. The lack of ice would cause polar bears to swim longer distances in comparison to before. Because the ice has melted so quickly, the polar bears have not had enough time to evolve to the changing conditions.
Lastly, Gore claims that the coral reef bleaching events are due to global warming. Burton states that according to the IPCC report, if the temperature were to rise by 1-3 degrees celsius, there would be increased bleaching and widespread coral mortality. But he claims that the impacts of climate chance related stresses from other stresses such as over-fishing and polluting are difficult to discern. Unless drastic measures are taken, its likely that bleaching will occur.
Overall, I agree with the reporter of this article, who says that Gore oversimplified particular topics and presented things in, well, not the best fashion. Despite this, I believe it was the best documentary on global warming that has been produced thus far in major circulation because it talks about all of the main issues in a comprehensive fashion. I think that the documentary itself is extremely important because it sparked debate and discussion about this entire issue.
