Has anyone watched "An Inconvenient Truth"?

[SC David]

isnt there a super volcano under yosemity?

Yellowstone. When that goes off in however long, much of North America is done with.

The way I see it, Earth has its own natural energy balance that is being partially disrupted by the "progress" of humankind, and the lifestyles of those with influence. If everyone on earth lived like the average American, we would need more than 3 earths to support ourselves. The main contributing factors being our diets and the amount of land it takes to raise the cattle for our carnivorous, and our energy consumption. The energy consumption of America is high because of our land use patterns, with our sprawling landscape being the reason we are so reliant on fossil fuels. We NEED cars and trucks to be a successful nation since our infrastructure depends on it.

Good point Paul, but an even better point would be each of us trying to tell that to a couple of hundred thousand Chinese or Indians who want their turn at becominmg a developed nation and want the same environmental restictions (ie none) that the developed world had when they were at that stage of development.

Whatever we do is miniscule compared to these future superpowers.

You don't think that the problem might be that there are too many people on this planet do you ? (And no I'm not a fascist, left wing or otherwise, advocating death squads.)

Countries like China and India which are quickly industrializing and catching up to modern nations may try to model some parts of their lifestyle off of the US, Europe, and elsewhere, but will not be successful in replicating our societies since there are simply too many people in too small of space in their compacted cities to handle the amount of space that cars require. Roads, houses, everything would have to change. It's impossible to tell what is to come of these countries, but they do not have many environmental standards at this point and many big cities have been polluting like for many years. Busy Indian cities are already at a point of capacity as far as automobiles are concerned. There are already too many of them on the road and the up and coming middle class would be foolish to think they could have 5+ cars per household, as we are allowed in rural America. As far as polluting and such goes, these future superpowers won't get much worse, since the cars roaming the streets are all dinosaurs and the new ones they will be able to buy will be much cleaner. Same thing goes with all other industrial technology that is being outsourced. Newer = cleaner, and newer is what they will soon be getting.

The population problem will likely sort itself out. Your Neo-Malthusian view about population control implies that there are already too many people on the planet, and that it is a problem that will only get worse. I think that as innovation in overpopulated areas of India and China continues, solutions will arise. The carrying capacity will be sorted out and poverty rates will, hopefully, decline.


As for humankind making matters worse, I believe that we are playing a minor role in offsetting the natural balance of the earth and making global warming come upon us a little sooner than would happen without us here. The earth has its cycles, and we will have to adapt to the climate changes that are naturally occurring, and it should be in our best interest to slow these changes to the best of our abilities. Hope I made sense

[CharlesAFerg]

I'll be in the world I was meant to be born into when we're colonizing other planets like in 'Aliens', or even 'Starship Troopers'.

I'd fit right in.

[Zeuk in Oz]

The population problem will likely sort itself out. Your Neo-Malthusian view about population control implies that there are already too many people on the planet, and that it is a problem that will only get worse. I think that as innovation in overpopulated areas of India and China continues, solutions will arise. The carrying capacity will be sorted out and poverty rates will, hopefully, decline.

I certainly hope you are right, but how do you see this being achieved ?
Surely the emerging, educated, middle classes in these countries will continue to aspire.
Who is going to stand in their way or at least argue against their growing affluence ?

[Fetch]

Indeed... "Where I come from we don't need roads..."



organic nonetheless.

lololol Isn't it 'Where we're going we don't need roads' ?
Whatever, hilarious reference!!!!

[danielhstout]

Indeed... "Where I come from we don't need roads..."



organic nonetheless.

Who said anything about getting rid of our roads... We just need to use our resources more wisely and strive to achieve something better than the status-quo.

[Dash01]

Al Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" movie is certainly worth seeing on DVD, as Michael Crichton's "State of Fear" novel is worth reading. These two productions are useful as sort of intellectual bookends in the environmental debate.

Keep in mind, however, that each has an ax to grind. Al Gore wants to be president, and this movie is part of the groundwork for his campaign. His references to his injured son and dead sister or maudlin attempts to garner the sympathy vote. His father, Sen. Albert Gore mineral-leased the family farm to Armand Hammer, an unsavory oil baron and Kremlin sympathizer who headed Occidental Petroleum. Both the Gores and Hammer knew there were no minerals in that farm, but rather used it as a conduit for money laundering and influence peddling. So, along with the Kennedy and Bush clans, the Gores have a checkered past that should be viewed with skepticism and circumspection.

Our environment fluctuates naturally according to various influences including (but not limited to) sunspots, solar flares, meteor showers, volcanoes, tectonic movement, space dust and gases, etc., that are completely beyond our control. Our own behavior in the form of smokestacks, cowflop, tailpipe emissions, desert and farm irrigation, overpopulation, clear cutting, etc. also has significant influence. So, we can and should be better stewards of our planet, even while recognizing that the natural environment does what it does according to its whims.

In additions to seeing Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" movie with open-minded circumspection, one should also read Michael Crichton's "State of Fear" novel, if only for its footnotes and cites. In particular, Crichton's cites of historical temperature readings taken over the past ~150 years are interesting: So-called "heat islands" such as New York City have been quite stable in temperature or actually declined over that period. How could this be, if there is in fact global warming? On the other hand, we have clear photographic and other evidence of receding glaciers and breakup of Greenland icecaps, which I have personally witnessed.

[attack eagle]

I hate to be rude on the internet... but your an idiot. Get informed before you broadcast your ignorant filth all over the web.

And what is your education in this matter? If you are going to bash someone for being uneducated in this matter, I'd like to know which section of NASA you are working in that makes you an expert.

I could say to you get educated before you spread your pavlovistic propaganda filth all over the infoweb as well.
But that wouldn't be very polite, respectful or even good form would it?
No offense Daniel, but it's a propagandistic film... not an educational one. If you want TV education watch TLC or Discovery.

I beleive in global warming too... It's been going on since the middle of the ice age...and after it is over, there will be ANOTHER ice age, and so on and so forth.
*I say we blame the dinosaurs... there was twice as much oxygen in the atmosphere before them... and now burning them give off too much co2... and there is more land, swamps are desrts, forests are ice... bad dino, bad.* -the preceding is a comedic reponse that shows simply how different earth is today without industrial intervention. I know it is plants we burn.


I will say this, Remember the Hubbub about the hole in the ozone layer? I lived under that for many years, and i never wore sunscreen. never did me any harm, nor anyone that I know either.

People who think the Earth will remain static with no major climatological changes have forgotten to read their history recently, or are delusional.
Thanks Al gore for inventing the internet so we could discuss this here, I know you are a reliable source of completely unpolitically motivated factual information.
That's my .2

[danielhstout]

And what is your education in this matter? If you are going to bash someone for being uneducated in this matter, I'd like to know which section of NASA you are working in that makes you an expert.

I could say to you get educated before you spread your pavlovistic propaganda filth all over the infoweb as well.
But that wouldn't be very polite, respectful or even good form would it?
No offense Daniel, but it's a propagandistic film... not an educational one. If you want TV education watch TLC or Discovery.

I beleive in global warming too... It's been going on since the middle of the ice age...and after it is over, there will be ANOTHER ice age, and so on and so forth.
*I say we blame the dinosaurs... there was twice as much oxygen in the atmosphere before them... and now burning them give off too much co2... and there is more land, swamps are desrts, forests are ice... bad dino, bad.* -the preceding is a comedic reponse that shows simply how different earth is today without industrial intervention. I know it is plants we burn.


I will say this, Remember the Hubbub about the hole in the ozone layer? I lived under that for many years, and i never wore sunscreen. never did me any harm, nor anyone that I know either.

People who think the Earth will remain static with no major climatological changes have forgotten to read their history recently, or are delusional.
Thanks Al gore for inventing the internet so we could discuss this here, I know you are a reliable source of completely unpolitically motivated factual information.
That's my .2

I think you should have paid more attention to my later posts before you attempted to discount what I am trying to say.

Well I would have to say that Discovery is about the only channel I watch but I don't believe that the information is unbiased; most everything is biased in some way. What did you think about Ted Koppel's special on the global warming "crisis"? Total propaganda too I assume.

Obviously Gore has political motivations... but that doesn't discount the fact that he is raising awareness to a serious issue.

As far as my education goes... I am still a college student (or a young dumb kid who thinks he knows it all of course). I have written three research papers on the subject for different classes. I have seen the facts and witnessed both sides of the argument. I care about this issue enough to not let other politcal figures guide me. All I am trying to get through to people is to get educated. Do the research yourself and look at both sides of the issue. After you do that you can really draw your own mature conclusions.

I apologize for my initial post... it was just an emotional reaction to what I perceived as a worthless unprecedented statement.

[CharlesAFerg]

SEXYTAYME EXPLOZION!

[Robin-535im]

Could it be Csaba Csere?

Maybe Rollo Tomasi?