An Inconvenient Truth

[ecopal]

For a more scientific rebuttal to Al Gore's facts please take a gander at:

www.canadafreepress.com/2006/harris061206.htm

Thanks for sharing that article.

I also don't like to be propagandized by far left liberals or extremist conservatives and welcome a diversity of opinions.

The article below is just the "tip of the iceberg" (please pardon the expression) about the how the Bush administration is censoring scientific reports on global warming.


TOP CLIMATOLOGIST ACCUSES U.S. OF TRYING TO GAG HIM
* 12:57 30 January 2006
* NewScientist.com news service
* NewScientist.com staff and AFP

NASA's top climate scientist has accused the Bush administration of trying to stop him from speaking out after he called for swift cuts in emissions of the greenhouse gases linked to global warming in a recent lecture.

James Hansen, director of the US space agency's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, said that officials at NASA headquarters had ordered the public affairs staff to review his forthcoming lectures, papers, postings on the Goddard website and requests for media interviews, the New York Times reported on Sunday.

"They feel their job is to be this censor of information going out to the public," said Hansen, who told the paper he would ignore the restrictions.

Dean Acosta, deputy assistant administrator for public affairs at NASA, denied that there was any effort to silence Hansen. "That's not the way we operate here at NASA," Acosta said. "We promote openness and we speak with the facts."

Acosta said that government scientists were free to discuss scientific findings but that policy statements should be left to policy makers and appointed spokesmen. "This is not about any individual or any issue like global warming," he said. "It's about coordination."
Different planet

Hansen has been issuing about the long-term threat of greenhouse gas emissions since 1988, and has had run-ins with various US politicians.

He said that "efforts to quiet him" had begun in a series of calls after a lecture he gave on December 6, 2005, at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco. In this talk he said that significant emission cuts could be achieved with existing technologies, but that without leadership by the US, climate change would eventually leave the Earth "a different planet".

US administration policy is to use voluntary measures to slow, but not reverse, the growth of emissions.

"After that speech and the release of data by Dr Hansen on December 15 showing that 2005 was probably the warmest year in at least a century, officials at the headquarters of the space agency repeatedly phoned public affairs officers, who relayed the warning to Dr Hansen that there would be 'dire consequences' if such statements continued, those officers and Dr Hansen said in interviews," the Times reported.

Hansen said "it would be irresponsible not to speak out, particularly because NASA's mission statement includes the phrase 'to understand and protect our home planet'".

Hansen's supervisor, Franco Einaudi, is reported as saying there had been no official "order or pressure to say shut Jim up". However, he added: "That doesn't mean I like this kind of pressure being applied.?

 

[A Zalace]

For a more scientific rebuttal to Al Gore's facts please take a gander at:

www.canadafreepress.com/2006/harris061206.htm

TripleB I am a little disappointed. I figured you would at least check the people that you are basing your arguments on. The link that you posted from canadafreepress was referring to a letter sent to the Canadian Prime Minister by 60 renowned current and retired scientists requesting a rational examination of the science of global warming. These scientists are part of a group called "the Friends of Science". Now if you had done a little more research you would have discovered that the "friends" attempt to persuade the Canadian Prime Minister to question the human role in the global warming debate ended in embarrassment. It was discovered that "the Friends of Science" was receiving its funding from the oil industry. Now we all remember the wonderful science that was funded by the tobacco industry. I have included a link below so you can read for yourself in case you are skeptical. I have to say, I don't think this issue is about arguing or proving each other wrong. It is simply about our children's future. There is no big group promoting the move to "Green" because they will greatly profit from it. No one argues that oil and coal produce the cheapest and most profitable form of energy. The question is at what cost. Going green, at least in the case of oil, will probably be expensive at first, and no one group will be able to monopolize it like oil has. There are many alternatives that will play a role. You can go online right now and find ways to run your vehicle gas free, and you can get this information for free. These people are not trying to corner the market. They just realize change must take place.
Some links:
http://desmogblog.com/oil-companies-funding-friends-of-science
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Friends_of_Science

 

[TripleB]

TripleB I am a little disappointed. I figured you would at least check the people that you are basing your arguments on. The link that you posted from canadafreepress was referring to a letter sent to the Canadian Prime Minister by 60 renowned current and retired scientists requesting a rational examination of the science of global warming. These scientists are part of a group called "the Friends of Science". Now if you had done a little more research you would have discovered that the "friends" attempt to persuade the Canadian Prime Minister to question the human role in the global warming debate ended in embarrassment. It was discovered that "the Friends of Science" was receiving its funding from the oil industry. Now we all remember the wonderful science that was funded by the tobacco industry. I have included a link below so you can read for yourself in case you are skeptical. I have to say, I don't think this issue is about arguing or proving each other wrong. It is simply about our children's future. There is no big group promoting the move to "Green" because they will greatly profit from it. No one argues that oil and coal produce the cheapest and most profitable form of energy. The question is at what cost. Going green, at least in the case of oil, will probably be expensive at first, and no one group will be able to monopolize it like oil has. There are many alternatives that will play a role. You can go online right now and find ways to run your vehicle gas free, and you can get this information for free. These people are not trying to corner the market. They just realize change must take place.
Some links:
http://desmogblog.com/oil-companies-funding-friends-of-science
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Friends_of_Science

I find it interesting and quite telling that you concentrate on WHO is saying what instead of WHAT they are saying. Is the information they have wrong? Are they giving false resources? They did not say that that Dr. Al Gore's (he is a PHD right? He's the expert.) data was wrong. They said it wasn't complete and it was misleading. I believe a better name for Dr. Gore's Movie would have been "Inconvenient Half-Truths". As far as "funding" goes..the bread is buttered on both sides. The "Oh my God we are all gonna die!" crowd has plenty of "research" grant money riding on the global warming coat tails.

 

[A Zalace]

I find it interesting and quite telling that you concentrate on WHO is saying what instead of WHAT they are saying. Is the information they have wrong? Are they giving false resources? They did not say that that Dr. Al Gore's (he is a PHD right? He's the expert.) data was wrong. They said it wasn't complete and it was misleading. I believe a better name for Dr. Gore's Movie would have been "Inconvenient Half-Truths". As far as "funding" goes..the bread is buttered on both sides. The "Oh my God we are all gonna die!" crowd has plenty of "research" grant money riding on the global warming coat tails.

Don't blow a fuse. I hope you took your meds today. You obviously did not investigate any further, but I honestly didn't expect that you would. If you did Triple, you would have seen the countless publications addressing why WHAT they were saying was incorrect, backed by hard data I might add. I just figured you would actually go back and do some research before you exploded back onto the scene, but I guess I was wrong. Just a bit of advise Triple, when you go on line and google a topic you shouldn't sell the farm on the first article you read. Your 60 scientist letter does not hold credibility next to the many studies done by 1000s of world renowned scientists. I have not been able to find one study published by a scientist refuting humans affects on global warming that wasn't traced back to the oil industry. I have on the other hand found hundreds of studies published by scientists whose backers cover the spectrum of our society and the world. Once again I will bring up Wal Mart. You should read the article in Outside magazine about Wal Mart that was just published. We all know that Wal Mart doesn't really care about the community. They shut down small businesses and then they don't even take care of their own. They've capped salaries, reduced full time employment, and all but eliminated benefits. The owners each make $19 billion a year, and yet they do everything they can to prevent giving back to the employee. I find it interesting that a company that obviously cares nothing about the community has made it their goal to become almost completely Green by 2012. They already built the first Wal Mart free from the grid in Colorado. They are also pushing their vendors to move their companies towards green production and sustainability. Wal Mart spent a great deal of money researching the human caused global warming issue, and what they discovered scared them. I wouldn't consider Wal Mart's research to be "green" funded.
I do consider what is being said not just who is saying it, but even more importantly I consider the credibility of who is saying it. You accuse Mr. Gore of claiming to be "the expert" on the topic, which just shows me that you have not seen the movie yet. If you had seen the movie you would realize that Gore gives all the credit for the science he uses to the scientists who produced it. Where is your credibility? You are fighting so hard to disprove something that you have never even seen. It is just plain silly and so is this discussion.
I appreciate your right to your own opinion, but I also find hope in the fact that your opinion has become the minority in the world. I have to leave our discussion at that because it simply isn't going anywhere. I wish you the best.

 

[TripleB]

Don't blow a fuse. I hope you took your meds today. You obviously did not investigate any further, but I honestly didn't expect that you would. If you did Triple, you would have seen the countless publications addressing why WHAT they were saying was incorrect, backed by hard data I might add. I just figured you would actually go back and do some research before you exploded back onto the scene, but I guess I was wrong. Just a bit of advise Triple, when you go on line and google a topic you shouldn't sell the farm on the first article you read. Your 60 scientist letter does not hold credibility next to the many studies done by 1000s of world renowned scientists. I have not been able to find one study published by a scientist refuting humans affects on global warming that wasn't traced back to the oil industry. I have on the other hand found hundreds of studies published by scientists whose backers cover the spectrum of our society and the world. Once again I will bring up Wal Mart. You should read the article in Outside magazine about Wal Mart that was just published. We all know that Wal Mart doesn't really care about the community. They shut down small businesses and then they don't even take care of their own. They've capped salaries, reduced full time employment, and all but eliminated benefits. The owners each make $19 billion a year, and yet they do everything they can to prevent giving back to the employee. I find it interesting that a company that obviously cares nothing about the community has made it their goal to become almost completely Green by 2012. They already built the first Wal Mart free from the grid in Colorado. They are also pushing their vendors to move their companies towards green production and sustainability. Wal Mart spent a great deal of money researching the human caused global warming issue, and what they discovered scared them. I wouldn't consider Wal Mart's research to be "green" funded.
I do consider what is being said not just who is saying it, but even more importantly I consider the credibility of who is saying it. You accuse Mr. Gore of claiming to be "the expert" on the topic, which just shows me that you have not seen the movie yet. If you had seen the movie you would realize that Gore gives all the credit for the science he uses to the scientists who produced it. Where is your credibility? You are fighting so hard to disprove something that you have never even seen. It is just plain silly and so is this discussion.
I appreciate your right to your own opinion, but I also find hope in the fact that your opinion has become the minority in the world. I have to leave our discussion at that because it simply isn't going anywhere. I wish you the best.

I see the arrogance is not limited to man-made global warming. I am not a scientist. I am not saying you should believe or disbelieve the artical I referenced. It is just 1 of many that seem to poke holes into some of the theories presented by the alarmist. I do think global warming MAY be taking place. We are talking about a celestial body that is over 3.5 billion years old!!! You are using data collected over 15-20 years or so (data that whether you like it or not is debatable) to come to a conclusion that human consumerism (a phrase I borrow from another poster) is the catalyst for the global warming. Is it 10 years, 15 years or maybe 30 years we are using for analysis? We are comparing this to what? The last 50 years? 100 years? 100 years is a long time to us humans but it is a blink of the eye to a planet that has been around over 3.5 billion years.

I'm sorry I have disappointed you in that my research isn't up to the high standards you have obviously set for yourself and others. I am not out to "disprove" anything. The onus is on the "man-made global warming " crowd to come up with the proof. Proof that has yet to be conclusive and inclusive as to the data that seems to be conveniently over looked or omitted.

My research methods may be lacking mainly because: 1. I'm not an alarmist,
2. Common sense tells me 10-20 years of data out of sample size of about 75-125 years from a variable that has over 3,500,000,000 years is about as worthless as a George Bush fundraiser at Barbara Streisands house and 3. I have a life. Why do I have this strange feeling that if there is a Democrat in the White House the global warming debate will gradually fade away (remember the homeless during the Reagan & Bush I years).

 

[Revelnit]

I find it interesting and quite telling that you concentrate on WHO is saying what instead of WHAT they are saying. Is the information they have wrong? Are they giving false resources?

So TripleBS let me ask you a question. First I have to say that your response seems to be anger based with all the bold print and misspellings. I find this interesting and telling about you. Anger is often the result of embarrassment, and I would have to say that you embarrassed yourself pretty well when you started supporting your argument with biased research. Actually I have two questions now that I think about it. The first one deals with the tobacco industry. So from what you are telling everyone are we supposed to also believe the highly qualified scientists that were supported by the tobacco industry? These guys presented scientific research and data that said tobacco does not cause cancer. They were experts in their fields. Are you really that naive TripleBS? If a person's pay is based on them not understanding something, why would anyone expect them to understand it? So I realize I have asked more than two questions, but that is okay I am sure you understand. Why would the oil industry fund research into global warming? It would be counter productive to them. If they discovered it was caused by carbon emissions what would they benefit? They would have just spent a bunch of money discovering the one thing that will put them out of business. :funn: :nono1: Ahh but wait. What if they spent a bunch of money trying to convince ignorant people that humans have no part in causing global warming. Now that is worth spending money on. That's right, keep them driving their hummers because as we all know they make you look big and tough and important. Oh shoot I didn't use any bold type. Lets see how about ignorant, ignorant, ignorant. But hey what should we expect from someone who has a liquor bottle next to their handle?

 

[Revelnit]

2. Common sense tells me 10-20 years of data out of sample size of about 75-125 years from a variable that has over 3,500,000,000 years is about as worthless as a George Bush fundraiser at Barbara Streisands house and

Dude you are just striking out left and right here. I have actually seen the film the Inconvenient Truth, and the data used on the film is from 3,500,000,000 years ago. They got the data from ice cores taken at both poles. These core samples reveal data as far back as the first ice age because there has always been some ice at the poles. If you don't believe that, then you probably don't believe in carbon dating either, or better yet gravity or relativity. Which means that you obviously can't believe that scientists put rovers on Mars, or that dinosaurs existed. As for saying you have a life, I have to question that. Look at how many posts you have on this message board.

 

[Indigo Jill]

Interesting discourse but ... I am beating Kurt to the punch :roll: ...aren't we all supposed to attack the "issue" and not the "poster"?? Name calling gets no where and tells those of us that lurk in a discussion more about the poster than anything else.

Just my .02 cents.

 

[Revelnit]

Interesting discourse but ... I am beating Kurt to the punch :roll: ...aren't we all supposed to attack the "issue" and not the "poster"?? Name calling gets no where and tells those of us that lurk in a discussion more about the poster than anything else.

Just my .02 cents.

You are absolutely right. I get a little worked up when people argue a topic that they really know nothing about, specially when it is something that will affect all of us. TripleB I apologize.

 

[Miss Kitty]

You are absolutely right. I get a little worked up when people argue a topic that they really know nothing about, specially when it is something that will affect all of us. TripleB I apologize.

Thank you. And now might I add... .