If it's Tuesday, it Must be Time to Talk TV
Jesse Ferrell and I had some sort of strange psychic moment yesterday. Seems we both decided at the same time to watch the British TV documentary The Great Global Warming Swindle, which aired in Britain back on March 8. Jesse wrote about it in the AccuWeather.com Community Blog.
Only a trailer for the program is available at the Channel 4 site. The whole thing has popped up here and there - the links appear to be ephemeral, but you can try searching for it on Google Video or YouTube.
So what was my opinion? It was interesting. Some of the information presented was familiar to me, some of it was new. Not surprisingly, it prompted quick and resounding condemnation from the other side - and in one case from one of the scientists who appeared in the program. Carl Wunsch, a professor of physical oceanography at MIT, believes the filmmakers mislead him about their goals and used his words out of context. Dr. Wunsch's response to the film is very thoughtful and worth reading. UK publication The Independent documents some of the questionable evidence used in the film. A couple of the climate modelers who run RealClimate didn't pull any punches with their comments. I'd be interested to know the reactions of any of the other scientists featured in the program to the finished product.
I don't think all the questions regarding climate change have been answered, but I don't think dueling documentaries are going to answer any of those questions and I don't know that they merit much attention. At the end of the day, it comes down to the science, not who makes the most persuasive argument.
Whew....I started my forecasting shift before the sun rose this morning, and it's now mid-afternoon. Y'all have a good day - I'm hitting the highway. I've got some ideas for the blog for tomorrow - hopefully they'll flow more smoothly than this entry.
Comments (5)
Thought perhaps you were about to write, "British comedy."
Seems more appropriate to me. Sort of a tragic comedy, or a comedy of tragedies, depending on ones perspective.
Here's an informative bit of info on Durkin:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Durkin_(television_director)
Posted by ciel | April 4, 2007 2:41 AM
Dear Laura,
I am the author of a recently published book entitled The Second Law of Life. In the book I explain in layman language some of the fundamental physical laws that govern the energy balance of the world. From these fundamental laws you can draw conclusions about the way we humans are exhausting the natural reources. And I can tell you that huge problems are threatening our planet such as global warming!
Now I know that many people think that technology only will solve eventually all the problems we are facing today. Well I can assure you that this will simply NOT happen, we will need to change substantially the way that we consume non-renewable resources. And there are many solutions to the problem, we can all start to contibute to these solutions from today onwards! I have mentioned some of these in a recent radio interview that you can listen to: http://www.xzone-radio.com/March2007.htm (go to March 26, 3rd hour).
Best regards, John
Posted by John Schmitz | April 4, 2007 10:36 AM
I watched the program when it was first broadcast with absolutely no knowledge on the program maker Martin Durkin, from the links on this board all I can say is "Hat's off to the guy!".
He obviously enjoys "stirring" contoversy in the realm of strongly held views( not just on GW)and produces watchable TV.
There was not much in the program that has not been aired before, however the following day I was working on a farmers market and it was very much the hot topic of conversation between growers and customers alike.The reaction to it was wholly favourable, a good antidote to the views of newspapers such as the "Independent" which once portrayed one of the most beautiful of October days I can ever recall as "No reason to be cheerful" duh?(They saw it as an anomaly indicative of disaster to come).It is absolutely clear that on AGW people have very entrenched views and nothing will shift them.
I'm trying to keeping an open mind but I am beginning to move to the view that the debate is becoming a massive distraction from tackling our real problems, war, malnutrition, disease and so on..
Meanwhile the politicians are covering themselves in "greenwash" to get elected, corporations too in order to be seen as ethical and my fellow farmers are enjoying the heady intoxication of bio fuels, a sniff of profits to come.
Wish I had a time machine.
Posted by Stephen Pasek | April 4, 2007 2:17 PM
Hi,
I find it disconcerting how graphs are "corrected." The artical in Independant goes into how The Great Global Warming Swindle used graphs that were old and not "corrected." It always makes me suspitious when things get eraced and rewritten, whether they be numbers in a form for the IRS, or scientific facts.
While I did shake my head at some of the Great Global Warming Swindle's points, and did see it as a sort of propaganda, I also see Gore's work as a sort of propaganda as well. The way statistics are used seems to prove Mark Twain's assertion that there are three types of lies, "Damn Lies; White Lies; and Statistics." People on both sides need to stop this nonsense, and honor the Truth.
Posted by Caleb Shaw | April 4, 2007 3:47 PM
It's interesting that Mr. Gore is praised for bringing his polimical docu-drama to the public and similar efforts on the other side are heavily criticzed.
Dr. Wunsch agrues in circles: he admits that it is extremely difficult to measure ocean levels and then he says it is a scientific fact. He says that emiting co2 in the atmosphere is dangerous and then he says that climate predictions, based on "extremely complicated coupled models" are very uncertain, on and on it goes.
If this whole debate has convinced me of anything it is the fact that scientists are human just like the rest of us, they're not unemotional, disinterested, computers. They have politics, emotions, are heavily invested in their careers, and all of this plays into their "science". The public is fed with "instant science" and so often it turns out to be wrong.
The makers of the great global warming swindle deserve just as much credit as does Mr Gore.
Jim
Posted by Jim Roth | April 5, 2007 11:14 AM