The Inconvenient Truth

[Yezra'el]

This evening I went to see a documentary film that I had been eagerly awaiting – The Inconvenient Truth by the “almost US president” Al Gore. This film not only lived up to the expectations I had, but went a lot further. The film brings the discussion of environmental change to the forefront, particularly global warming, and particularly human civilizations role in effecting this change. The film hits hard at what we all know, but so easily fall far short of making any impact on most of our priority lists. This film highlights the devastating reality of our current situation – the perils that have already occurred and those that seem immanent to occur.

Alas, I can do little justice in attempting to give a synopsis of the film, but a quick visit to www.google.com and do a search, or visit www.climatecrisis.org will give you a fairly good idea of what this is all about. Ultimately, seeing the film would be even better yet, I cant stress the importance of not only seeing the movie, but also learning from it and sharing the movie and what you have learned with people you know. I know Theatre prices are high, but do it if you can – or bootleg it off the internet even: this is a must see.

This movie left me deeply troubled, frightened and shocked at our earth’s current situation – it literally broke my heart to see this, and know that I have done so little. If you choose to not see the movie, at least take the time out of your day to visit a few websites like the one mentioned above or others concerned about global warming and its implications, and even better yet make a small change in your life wherever you can to try and make a difference. I have personally ben trying to post this on any website I can, and email it to anyone I know, in my effort to spread it around. I am aware that moderators might find this inapropriate for this forum, but I beg of you ot let it stay out of principle.

Sincerely,
Yezra'el

[Osaka]

Bartz are carebears.

[Saek]

go back to bartz. maybe they'll care.

[Kilgore]

This evening I went to see a documentary film that I had been eagerly awaiting – The Inconvenient Truth by the “almost US president” Al Gore.
Sincerely,
Yezra'el

Hoho! For once I am proud to be from Teon. My euro-homies just put you in your place. I haven't seen the movie but I am going to find a way to see it without paying for it.

1) Oil is finite in the amount of environmental damage it can do because it is a very limited resource. Less than 94 years of it left. Less than 15 years of it left at current prices (think $450/bbl in 2020). Coal is the real LT threat.

2) The earth's ecosphere 600MM years ago was a gigantic popsicle (Snowball Earth), but it corrected itself via volcanic eruptions. The earth's atmosphere is comprised of mostly nitrogen, with the balance oxygen. All other elements are very miniscule in comparison (including CO2). There is no reason to believe the Earth cannot correct a CO2 imbalance on its own.

3) A type 1a supernova close enough, which is speculated could occur every few thousand years, would alone be enough to fry the entire ozone layer, it would replenish itself within a few hundred years. The ozone damage from CFCs in the 1960s-1980s is almost already gone. The only reason there ever was an ozone "hole" was because in Antarctica during the winter it gets so cold that the wind patterns are isolated from the rest of the world. So cold that you can't fly planes in b/c the hydraulic lines would burst. There was never a risk of an ozone hole in any other area of the world (except S africa which it touched sometimes).

4) The largest near term threat to the end of human civilization is nuclear war. Climate change is also a threat but not nearly as catastophic. Since being in office, the Bush administration has pledged to eliminate more nuclear warheads than the Clinton administration, both in absolute number and percentage terms.

The Earth corrects itself. It is humanity that must learn how to not annihilate one another. There is absolutely nothing we can do to the Earth to really eradicate life or change it drastically, save continuing to pollute for thousands of years. It took bacteria billions of years to make the atmosphere 20% oxygen. Billions...ponder that against your scale of hundreds of years. The end of civilization as we know it will go out with a bang and not a whimper--probably within the next 1,000 years. It will be the next Cuban missile crisis except action instead of a standdown. Hopefully for us it will not be within our lifetimes.

[Helepolis]

This is totally non-L2 related, moving to Offtopic section...

[Magus]

Actually for any of you who have seen "The Day After Tomorrow", the danger of that movie is quite a reality (Minus the giant hurricanes which were presented to thicken the plot). But the possibility of the jet stream being redirected is quite eminent.

If the polar ice caps were to completely melt, sea levels could rise several thousands of feet. Whole continents would be flooded, entire islands would no longer be habitant. Even if the sea level rises another ten feet, islands would already be destroyed due to most of them being right on sea level.

But oh well. Like Kilgore had said, we will most likely destroy ourselves long before that becomes a reality, so don't go joining any environmental groups or tree huggers anytime soon.

[Valador]

Hey...are you sure you weren't watching "The Core" instead of Al Gore

[Magus]

The move was called "The Inconvenient Truth", not "Al Gore".

[mazik]

kilgore metaphor -- what u propose is like "Hey smoking cigarettes is okay, your way more likely to get killed in a car accident" logic... so this Al gore movie really comes down to smokers vs. non-smokers.... Im talking about tobacco smoke ppl

[small]

look a single volcanic erruption pores more Co2 and sulfur into the air then the entire histroy of the industrial revolution.

The whole in the ozone layer of the polar zones is due the fact ozone layer is created when the sun hits oxygen.. well the polar zones dont get sunlight 6 months out of the year and recived very indirect sunlight the rest of the year.
Ozone layer is constately spun out by centrifucal force... if human produced CFCs produced hole in the ozone layer it would have forced over the equator as the rotation of the earth would have forced the majority of free moving gas toward the equater. contray to logic and the laws of pyhsics the equater has the thickest layer of ozone.

In roman days aka prior to 400 AD it was possible to grow graps in scotland... as the vikings set foot in the new world they grow grapes in what is now northern canada. Both of these areas are still far to cold grewo grapes. the world has been hotter in human history. the world will more then likely return to those tempetures. the tempreture changes constatly and will continue to be byond humans abilty to control.

[astinus]

SMALL YOU LIE!!!

I WILL CONTROL THE WEATHER!!!1

[mazik]

one inconvienent small thing... Al Gore = Not Human

[TyphonSet]

Al listens to Tipper and I hate Tipper....

[megalomaniac]

look a single volcanic erruption pores more Co2 and sulfur into the air then the entire histroy of the industrial revolution.

The whole in the ozone layer of the polar zones is due the fact ozone layer is created when the sun hits oxygen.. well the polar zones dont get sunlight 6 months out of the year and recived very indirect sunlight the rest of the year.
Ozone layer is constately spun out by centrifucal force... if human produced CFCs produced hole in the ozone layer it would have forced over the equator as the rotation of the earth would have forced the majority of free moving gas toward the equater. contray to logic and the laws of pyhsics the equater has the thickest layer of ozone.

In roman days aka prior to 400 AD it was possible to grow graps in scotland... as the vikings set foot in the new world they grow grapes in what is now northern canada. Both of these areas are still far to cold grewo grapes. the world has been hotter in human history. the world will more then likely return to those tempetures. the tempreture changes constatly and will continue to be byond humans abilty to control.I'm glad you do not have any political power nor anything to say in scientific circles...

[small]

I'm glad you do not have any political power nor anything to say in scientific circles...
sceintific circles constatly sqaubble over this...

the media general gives air time to the doom sayers because that gets higher rateing...
Scientsit who should no better often mis represent fact...
for instance they like to point to this chart http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png

however they leave out that year 1850 is what is called a minma and is one of the coldest grouping of years in human hisotry... so by looking at a small scale of years it is easy to scare poeple....
why scare poeple because sacring poeple gets grant money...

another example Jiangxi Province used to grow things like oranges and grapfruits prior to the year 1300(got to love chinnese record keeping)
However to this day those subtropical fruits are unable to grow.

A global warming is part of a natural cycle humans have little if any influence over...
B Al gore DID NOT INVENT THE INTERNET... SO WHY TRUST ANYTHING ELSE HE WOULD SAY.

[astinus]

YES HE DID!

[small]

YES HE DID!
I suppose he also wrote love story and discovered love canal...
the problem is poeple like gore think they are the center of the universe.
gore is like hey my room mate knew the wirter for that movie therefore the movie is obviously based off me.... yeah...
he is whining on about the end of the world and enviroment this and that because HE is not in office... because if we didnt elect center of the world gore then world must end....
As for the person saying he is glad i have no say in the matter think again i vote... and guess what at current people like me who think a more localy focused enviromental(and federal deregulation) controls AKA the republicans hold the majority..

[astinus]

and guess what at current people like me who think a more localy focused enviromental(and federal deregulation) controls AKA the republicans hold the majority..

I don't understand what you mean there, care to rephrase?

[small]

I don't understand what you mean there, care to rephrase?
poeple like me who think
more then base level enviromental regualations at the federal level are silly and get in the way of progress.. namely you take things like air pollution... cities vary mosty due to wind... "the valley" of socal... very little weather gets in so there is very little movement in that region you can fart and come back to the same spot a year later and still smell it. It would there for make sense for Southern califorina to have more strict guidlines on air pollution...
however go up to seatle where strong winds and proxmity to the ocean clears up most pollutants quickly...
with federal regualtions the people in southern califorina do not receive the enviromental protection they need, but poeple in seattle receive unessacry rules which hamper job growth.
Republicans arent agaist enviromental laws they are simply for each county,state ETC makeing thier own enviromental laws.

[megalomaniac]

the sad thing is, people like you actually believe what they say...

[astinus]

so what you're saying small, is that you should be able to produce more pollution simply becase it goes somewhere else than the area it's produced?

hate to sound like someone from Kain but, lawl

[collin]

http://youtube.com/watch?v=lf_OdZwwNT0&search=al%20gore%20southpark

al gore and global warming (im sure u can make the connection urself).

[collin]

im being super serial

[collin]

thank you al gore your super awesome.

[C0NAN]

The Earth corrects itself. It is humanity that must learn how to not annihilate one another. There is absolutely nothing we can do to the Earth to really eradicate life or change it drastically, save continuing to pollute for thousands of years. It took bacteria billions of years to make the atmosphere 20% oxygen. Billions...ponder that against your scale of hundreds of years. The end of civilization as we know it will go out with a bang and not a whimper--probably within the next 1,000 years. It will be the next Cuban missile crisis except action instead of a standdown. Hopefully for us it will not be within our lifetimes.

Kilgore got his shit together, Al gore is an idiot.
Remember he said he created the internet too.
What humans have done in the ~70+ years of major car polutants, to the earth, is compaired with about 2 volcanoes going off.

The earth runs in cycles, we are mearly on the last end of a cycle of global cooling, hence the earth rewarming up. If we dont nuke each other first then we will see a global freeze again.

Oil? Pshshh, oil compaines want you to think we are running out. This beautiful scare tactic has everyone screaming the sky is falling.
If we were running out of oil, like they say we are, think about this.
1-why are we still driving around massive SUVs?
2-why isnt alternative fuel being pushed?
3-why arent the car companies coming out with cars that will hit 200+MPG, it is very possible?
4-why is it that every small company or private inventor has their products bought up and locked away by the oil compainies?

The oil isnt running out anytime soon, if anything that comes out of our actions, its that we will lose the battle trying to harm the earth. The earth heals and changes itself, we are here just for the ride.