any parts of al gores "an inconvenient truth" exaggerated or wrong?

Answer 1

There was one part that stood out in particular for me. In his presentation, Mr. Gore seems to imply that past temperature increases have always come after a rise in CO2, when in actuality the opposite is true.

Bear in mind that this isn't meaningful to the question of whether or not CO2 actually produces a rise in temperature; it certainly does. It's just that this particular rise *has* come after the rise in CO2, which is part of the reason for the rapidity (is that a word?) seen in the current trend.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/12/co2-in-ice-cores/

Other than that I thought the the film did an excellent job of raising public awareness to the issues surrounding climate change.

Answer 2

He's at the high end of the scientific uncertainty. Kind of a "reasonable worst case" analysis. It shows most in his predictions of sea level rise, which are on the high side.

The main uncertainty is that of feedback mechanisms. Will global warming cause ice to melt and reveal dark earth which will make it worse, faster. Positive feedback. Or make clouds and slow it down. Negative feedback.

There's little data on which feedback mechanisms will be the most important. Gore assumes positive feedback. That may be the majority guess right now, but it's a guess.

The IPCC document is more conservative, some say too much so.

http://www.ipcc.ch/SPM2feb07.pdf

My personal opinion is that what will actually happen is somewhere in between these two.

Answer 3

I have found that most of his "facts" are stretched, taken out of context and just plain exaggerated.

Visit the "science" page here: http://www.climatecrisis.net/thescience/

It lists a group of "facts" about Global Warming and at the bottom gives the citations except the citations are misleading, misquoted or just plain missing:

1 According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), this era of global warming "is unlikely to be entirely natural in origin" and "the balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence of the global climate."

Truth: The IPCC is completely devoted to "Special Report on Safeguarding the Ozone Layer and Global Climate System: Issues Related to Hydrofluorocarbons and perfluorocarbons (SROC/SROCF) "The IPCC does not carry out research nor does it monitor climate related data or other relevant parameters." In other words, IPCC is not interested in or paying attention to Global Warming. In fact IPCC is monitoring GLOBAL COOLING due to hydrofluorocarbons.


2 Emanuel, K. 2005. Increasing destructiveness of tropical cyclones over the past 30 years. Nature 436: 686-688.

Truth: Online here: http://www.mindfully.org/Air/2005/Cyclone-Increasing-Destructive4aug05.htm A well written study but I have to point out that the author cites his own works and this is a big no-no in scientific circles. Also the material covered in the paper only goes back 70 years total so there is no way to know if this trend is new or part of a global cycle.

I just blogged on this very topic and you can read the story here:
http://vicinsea.blogspot.com/

Please people, start thinking for yourself rather than waiting to be spoon fed media hype!

Answer 4

Thank you for taking the time to ask and raise awareness, I dont care if its exagerated, the problem lies in how little we are taking notice! Who care if we go a bit overboard, will it hurt us?NO. Will ignoring the problem hurt us? YES......
This is for all the nobs who think that it is exagerated! People who debate this issue give me the shits! They ramble on and on about it before really looking into it!
Mate if you have any doubts about just how real it is come to Australia or look on the net. We are in the worst drought in history.There are 4yr old children here who have never seen rain. Old farmers are saying this is no normal drought, this is entirely different.Here many towns have run dry, the dams and the bores, and water has to be trucked in to the residents. We are in south east Qld not allowed to use any water whatsoever for any purpose outside..ever. Not to wash your car water the gardens or clean the house. Not even with a bucket. We will be drinking recycled sewerage waste next year. Is that real enough for you? And that's just the towns!
Farmers who have been on their properties for generations are just packing up their belongings and walking away, not selling, just leaving. They are past having their crops fail, because they are broke and in debt up to their eye teeth, and cant even afford the seed. Or the banks have already taken their now useless homes from them. Their stock is all dead, most shot, so they would not die from hunger or thirst. Four Aussie farmers are committing suicide every week...is that real enough for you?
You sit there in your houses with your nice green lawns(god id even go for brown lawn!) And you declare that Global warming is not a threat! In some ways you are right ,,...its not a threat mate its real!
I cant speak for your Al Gore as a politician, but you can plainly see the man has put his neck on the chopping block in front of a world full of uninformed idiots, for the good of those same people! The man is a warrior for this planet, and its about time you nobs give him a break, and get on the computer and educate your selves!

Thank you for listening. Not enough is being done here or anywhere else in this place we call home.
Soon i believe we wont have one.

Answer 5

Exaggerated? Doesn't Gore predict a 20 rise in sea level in 100 years? The U.N. IPCC worst case scenario is a couple feet.

Yeah, Al Gore's movie is politically motivated propaganda.

Answer 6

I have not seen his movie, however, I have been hearing abut global warming. I recently heard that scientists in Russia, and I think other parts of our world have discovered that the sun is getting hotter. That would explain the glaciers melting, etc. The sun shines all over our world, and I don't fully believe that pollution is the problem. It would help for us to clean up our air, however, the sun getting hotter makes a lot more sense to me than humans causing global warming. Take care.

Answer 7

I think it's misleading. Research into global warming is not even close to a clear cut as he makes it out to be. I used to participate in paleoclimatology research and not all signs point in the same directions. And saying humans are the cause has almost no empirical basis in fact.

Answer 8

Yes most of it is wrong. Even the BBC points out some of the hypocrisy ( http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6401489.stm ) BUT this doesn't mean that energy efficiency isn't a good thing. small realistic energy projects should be supported. I think this blogger says it best http://mygreenproject.blogspot.com/ .

Answer 9

Yeah!! Almost everything after he says "Hi there. I'm Al Gore, and you're not."

Answer 10

Yes, pretty much all of it. But what do you expect from a politician.