Skip to content
Do you have adblock enabled?
 
If you can read this, either the style sheet didn't load or you have an older browser that doesn't support style sheets. Try clearing your browser cache and refreshing the page.

(Breitbart.com)   Judge says "An Inconvenient Truth" should actually be titled "Convenient Political Indoctrination" and rules that it can't be shown in schools without guidance notes   (breitbart.com) divider line
    More: Obvious  
•       •       •

681 clicks; posted to Politics » on 10 Oct 2007 at 6:47 PM (15 years ago)   |   Favorite    |   share:  Share on Twitter share via Email Share on Facebook



73 Comments     (+0 »)


Oldest | « | 1 | 2 | » | Newest | Show all

 
2007-10-10 3:30:08 PM  
Eh. The science in AIT was pretty reasonable on the whole, though it left out some important caveats and complexities. But it isn't really an science documentary; it's got a definite political message. I'd have some qualms showing it in a science class, but not in all classes (e.g., a current events class).
 
2007-10-10 3:32:14 PM  
Ambitwistor: I'd have some qualms showing it in a science class, but not in all classes (e.g., a current events class).

I'd show it in social studies as an example of modern-day propaganda.
 
2007-10-10 3:35:47 PM  
I'm against showing it to kids at all. Better they not know what we're doing to their future so that they won't try to get even.
 
2007-10-10 3:40:27 PM  
Where did this happen? We don't have "lorry drivers" around these parts.
 
2007-10-10 3:41:39 PM  
Show Bill Nye. I like him
 
2007-10-10 3:43:29 PM  
Terrorizing the public with tales of their future death is a big multi-billion dollar business! We can not impede its progress!
 
2007-10-10 3:44:43 PM  
Ambitwistor: The science in AIT was pretty reasonable on the whole

farm1.static.flickr.comView Full Size


What bothered me was that it wasn't scientific on the whole. Almost every graph lacked a y-axis.

Most of the graphs don't mention the intervals between data collection (or what season they were collected). If you're measuring static, if you take more frequent measurements it will looks like the static is becoming stronger.

I still believe global warming is happening, but that movie was largely disingenuous.
 
2007-10-10 3:49:20 PM  
bradkanus: Terrorizing the public with tales of their future death is a big multi-billion dollar business! We can not impede its progress!

Which is totally different than saying "Vote Republican or the terrorists are gonna git ya!"
 
2007-10-10 3:52:24 PM  
What ever happened to Red Asphalt?
 
2007-10-10 3:52:52 PM  
Show it in auto shop while building a muscle car.

/or not
 
2007-10-10 3:54:57 PM  
Indoctrination? In our schools?

Stand still willya? How can you have any meat if you don't eat your pudding?!
 
2007-10-10 3:55:01 PM  
absoluteparanoia:

What bothered me was that it wasn't scientific on the whole. Almost every graph lacked a y-axis.

Sometimes that's a problem and sometimes it's not. For example, in the graph you show, the lack of a y axis doesn't let you tell how much the CO2 change is in absolute units - which is what you'd need to know to calculate the additional forcing - but it does show you that the change is way outside recorded natural variation.

Most of the graphs don't mention the intervals between data collection (or what season they were collected). If you're measuring static, if you take more frequent measurements it will looks like the static is becoming stronger.

That changes your estimate of the autocorrelation, but not so much the trend.

I still believe global warming is happening, but that movie was largely disingenuous.

I don't have any problems with the graphs on that basis. My main problems with the science in AIT are:

1. He talks about the potential for multi-meter sea level rise, but it doesn't give a time frame. People disagree about the time frame so there's no particular number he could have given, but that really needs to be said.

2. There's the implication that global warming caused Katrina, although he's careful not to say that outright. Well, you can't attribute any one hurricane to climate change. You can only talk about an increased statistical propensity for powerful hurricanes - and the jury is still out on that too. Yeah, he hedged a bit, but this is one of the more controversial issues within the climate science community.

3. The paleoclimate relationship between CO2 and temperature is more complicated than just correlations from ice core proxies. His point is valid, but you need more than that graph to really demonstrate it.
 
2007-10-10 3:57:18 PM  
Inconvenient Truth was made for the average American, not scientists. Of COURSE they dumbed down the material.
 
2007-10-10 4:05:29 PM  
No YOU'RE a Towel

Maybe that's indicative the problem, though...IMO, the single most important thing that needs more attention in secondary schooling is what I like to call "how to see through people's crap." Not specific to this, but everyone needs to be able to look at presentations like these and be able to at least say "wait just a damned minute..."

This could be like a combination of a debate class and a statistics refresher.
 
2007-10-10 4:06:32 PM  
CruiserTwelve: Where did this happen? We don't have "lorry drivers" around these parts.

This article says London. I don't know anything about the British legal system, so I don't know if it can be appealed or not.
Link (new window)
 
2007-10-10 4:06:49 PM  
submitter: ules that it can't be shown in schools without guidance notes

as long as he says the same thing about Fox News, I don't see a problem.
 
2007-10-10 4:08:47 PM  
Ambitwistor: Sometimes that's a problem and sometimes it's not. For example, in the graph you show, the lack of a y axis doesn't let you tell how much the CO2 change is in absolute units - which is what you'd need to know to calculate the additional forcing - but it does show you that the change is way outside recorded natural variation.

the lack of a y axis doesn't let you tell how much the CO2 change is in absolute units


Or (as is more likely) relative units. Without a y-axis it's worthless.
 
2007-10-10 4:10:54 PM  
Ambitwistor: That changes your estimate of the autocorrelation, but not so much the trend.

True, but I can take a graph of random numbers/per second and show you a "trend" at the end of the graph.

1. He talks about the potential for multi-meter sea level rise, but it doesn't give a time frame. People disagree about the time frame so there's no particular number he could have given, but that really needs to be said.

2. There's the implication that global warming caused Katrina, although he's careful not to say that outright. Well, you can't attribute any one hurricane to climate change. You can only talk about an increased statistical propensity for powerful hurricanes - and the jury is still out on that too. Yeah, he hedged a bit, but this is one of the more controversial issues within the climate science community.

3. The paleoclimate relationship between CO2 and temperature is more complicated than just correlations from ice core proxies. His point is valid, but you need more than that graph to really demonstrate it.


I have no problem with these objections. Well thought out. +1
 
2007-10-10 4:11:52 PM  
Does no one remember the subtle political cues in Schoolhouse Rock?! Teaching kids about "bills" and "conjunctions" and other such communist drivel; using the Devil's music, no less.
 
2007-10-10 4:25:19 PM  
SilentStrider: submitter: ules that it can't be shown in schools without guidance notes

as long as he says the same thing about Fox News, I don't see a problem.


Do you think this guy gets FOXNews in England?
 
2007-10-10 4:27:14 PM  
Nabb1: Do you think this guy gets FOXNews in England?

Ok, Al-Jazeera International then.
 
2007-10-10 4:29:08 PM  
absoluteparanoia: What bothered me was that it wasn't scientific on the whole. Almost every graph lacked a y-axis.

For some reason, that made me laugh quite hard. I don't know why, but it's funny to me.
 
2007-10-10 4:31:21 PM  
Gore basically pulled a Michal Moore with AIT. He used the data that was most in his favor and didn't show anything that might have been critical.

Just Google "Problems with an inconvenient truth" and many sites have made raised very good questions for Mr. Gore. Some questions are junk, but others are very well thought out.

Here is a good one. A Skeptical Layman's Guide to Anthropogenic Global Warming (PDF) (new window)
 
2007-10-10 4:33:40 PM  
Great now judges are deciding curriculum.
 
2007-10-10 4:34:39 PM  
absoluteparanoia:

Or (as is more likely) relative units. Without a y-axis it's worthless.

It's not worthless. Even if you strip all the units off and change the zero point of the graph, you can still correctly conclude that the average rate of change over the last few hundred years is drastically different in magnitude from the earlier variation over a similar period of time.
 
2007-10-10 4:51:32 PM  
Crosshair:

I've been spot checking some of that document, and he's got some facile but ultimately misleading or even self-contradictory arguments.

He claims that "by theory" the temperature response to CO2 forcing should be immediate, and then concedes that ocean heat uptake is a big thermal sink which causes a time lag. He tries to wave this away by not being "fully understood", when in fact it is well accepted that ocean heat uptake gives decadal or multidecadal lag times.

He claims that climatologists can't account for the pre-1950 warming, all the while showing a figure of climate models which predict pre-1950 warming! If they can't explain the warming, why do their models predict it??

He claims that aerosols can't account for the 1950-1970 cooling because they have continued to go up even during the warming period: if sulfates caused cooling, and sulfates go up, he seems to claim that temperatures should keep going down. But he neglects the concomitant accelerating levels of CO2, which are the whole point!

He misses the point of the GISS urban-rural calibration. It's not that the GISTEMP record doesn't depend on urban stations: it does. It's just that the urban stations are calibrated against the rural stations during periods of overlap to correct for the urban heat island effect.

He incorrectly claims that GCMs are tuned to the observed climate record. There is parameter tuning, but it's at a much more fundamental level: e.g., tune the cloud seeding parameter to match cloud observations. The model is not tweaked so that it fits, say, the temperature record.

... and so on.
 
2007-10-10 5:01:51 PM  
absoluteparanoia:

True, but I can take a graph of random numbers/per second and show you a "trend" at the end of the graph.

Given the variability visible in the graph, that kind of trend is extremely unlikely to happen by random (i.e., from random noise superimposed on zero real trend), even with high autocorrelation.
 
2007-10-10 5:05:32 PM  
Kome: absoluteparanoia: What bothered me was that it wasn't scientific on the whole. Almost every graph lacked a y-axis.

For some reason, that made me laugh quite hard. I don't know why, but it's funny to me.


I'm glad you enjoyed it. I should have mentioned that Preparation H is scientific on the whole.
 
2007-10-10 5:08:35 PM  
Actually the court case had a lot more tidbits of information that the media hasn't reported on:


In order for the film to be shown, the Government must first amend their Guidance Notes to Teachers to make clear that 1.) The Film is a political work and promotes only one side of the argument. 2.) If teachers present the Film without making this plain they may be in breach of section 406 of the Education Act 1996 and guilty of political indoctrination. 3.) Eleven inaccuracies have to be specifically drawn to the attention of school children.

How marvelous. And what are those inaccuracies?

* The film claims that melting snows on Mount Kilimanjaro evidence global warming. The Government's expert was forced to concede that this is not correct.
* The film suggests that evidence from ice cores proves that rising CO2 causes temperature increases over 650,000 years. The Court found that the film was misleading: over that period the rises in CO2 lagged behind the temperature rises by 800-2000 years.
* The film uses emotive images of Hurricane Katrina and suggests that this has been caused by global warming. The Government's expert had to accept that it was "not possible" to attribute one-off events to global warming.
* The film shows the drying up of Lake Chad and claims that this was caused by global warming. The Government's expert had to accept that this was not the case.
* The film claims that a study showed that polar bears had drowned due to disappearing arctic ice. It turned out that Mr Gore had misread the study: in fact four polar bears drowned and this was because of a particularly violent storm.
* The film threatens that global warming could stop the Gulf Stream throwing Europe into an ice age: the Claimant's evidence was that this was a scientific impossibility.
* The film blames global warming for species losses including coral reef bleaching. The Government could not find any evidence to support this claim.
* The film suggests that the Greenland ice covering could melt causing sea levels to rise dangerously. The evidence is that Greenland will not melt for millennia.
* The film suggests that the Antarctic ice covering is melting, the evidence was that it is in fact increasing.
* The film suggests that sea levels could rise by 7m causing the displacement of millions of people. In fact the evidence is that sea levels are expected to rise by about 40cm over the next hundred years and that there is no such threat of massive migration.
* The film claims that rising sea levels has caused the evacuation of certain Pacific islands to New Zealand. The Government are unable to substantiate this and the Court observed that this appears to be a false claim.
 
2007-10-10 5:24:38 PM  
...and the pussification of Britain continues.
 
2007-10-10 5:39:26 PM  
absoluteparanoia
Ambitwistor
netizencain


While I agree with your points, you have to remember that Al Gore is a politician, not a scientist. It's fairly obvious that he doesn't understand the scientific complexities of climate change as well as a climatologist would, and the extend of the various ambiguities and vagaries that are involved.

Still, he's a familiar face and he has managed to give the movement some real star power and credibility, as well as plenty of fodder for the freepers and neocons to yammer about.

The film was more or less meant to be digested by your average moran, and if Gore (or Moore in his documtainments) introduced too many of the ambiguities and uncertainties revolving around current theory and facts, the social impacts of these films would not have been realized.

I don't like it either because I prefer to see all sides of the equation, but these are still positive things he has contributed and they will likely be regarded as such by history.
 
2007-10-10 5:43:07 PM  
netizencain: In order for the film to be shown, the Government must first amend their Guidance Notes to Teachers to make clear that 1.) The Film is a political work and promotes only one side of the argument. 2.) If teachers present the Film without making this plain they may be in breach of section 406 of the Education Act 1996 and guilty of political indoctrination. 3.) Eleven inaccuracies have to be specifically drawn to the attention of school children.

And I do believe that that is exactly what the judge ordered to happen: provide guidance notes explaining that what they're watching is not a balanced documentary. It's not about a judge dictating curriculum... it's about giving the kids the opportunity to decide for themselves. Providing the film as something to think about? OK. Providing the film as truth? Bad.

I haven't seen An Inconvenient Truth mostly because I don't want to "encourage" Al Gore by donating one single dime to him and his "film career." I'm sort of interested to read John Kerry's book on environmentalism^, though. That looks good. I'm sure someone will come along and correct me if I'm wrong.
 
2007-10-10 5:44:52 PM  
Di Atribe: Providing Presenting the film as truth? Bad.

Durrrr... mid-afternoon sleepies be damned...

It's good to get in on a flamewar early, eh?
 
2007-10-10 5:47:22 PM  
netizencain:

Actually the court case had a lot more tidbits of information that the media hasn't reported on:

My comments (leaving out the ones I don't know anything about):

* The film suggests that evidence from ice cores proves that rising CO2 causes temperature increases over 650,000 years. The Court found that the film was misleading: over that period the rises in CO2 lagged behind the temperature rises by 800-2000 years.

Yes, but that in turn is misleading: you expect CO2 to increase in response to warming, due to ocean degassing, but the additional CO2 in turn amplifies and prolongs the warming. (This is what I mentioned earlier: Gore's point is valid, but the graph alone doesn't make the point.)

* The film uses emotive images of Hurricane Katrina and suggests that this has been caused by global warming. The Government's expert had to accept that it was "not possible" to attribute one-off events to global warming.

True.

* The film threatens that global warming could stop the Gulf Stream throwing Europe into an ice age: the Claimant's evidence was that this was a scientific impossibility.

Gore didn't say that the Gulf Stream could shut down, he said that part of the ocean conveyor could shut down. (He just said the Gulf Stream was an example of part of the conveyor.) He also didn't say that this would cause an ice age in Europe, just that it has done so in the past. If it happened now it would cause cooling in Europe relative to the rest of the world, but not an ice age.

* The film blames global warming for species losses including coral reef bleaching. The Government could not find any evidence to support this claim.

I don't know too much about this, but I do know that there are definite causal links between coral bleaching and temperature increases. Whether this has been linked to global warming specifically, I don't know.

* The film suggests that the Greenland ice covering could melt causing sea levels to rise dangerously. The evidence is that Greenland will not melt for millennia.

It could happen in centuries, and some think even less than that, although I'm personally doubtful of the latter. In any case, even if it takes a long time, do we really want to commit future civilizations to that?

* The film suggests that the Antarctic ice covering is melting, the evidence was that it is in fact increasing.

IIRC, Gore didn't talk about Antarctic ice melting, he talked about Antarctic ice sheets breaking up and contributing to sea level rise. Whether ice accumulates in the interior of the continent is not relevant to that issue.

* The film suggests that sea levels could rise by 7m causing the displacement of millions of people. In fact the evidence is that sea levels are expected to rise by about 40cm over the next hundred years and that there is no such threat of massive migration.

The potential 7 meter rise is, again, for a longer time scale and would undoubtedly cause massive migration spread out over centuries. The 40 cm figure is a central estimate, not an upper bound, and even the IPCC upper bound of ~90 cm ignores known ice dynamics which have been worrying scientists.
 
2007-10-10 5:49:47 PM  
Di Atribe:

I haven't seen An Inconvenient Truth mostly because I don't want to "encourage" Al Gore by donating one single dime to him and his "film career."

FWIW, he doesn't keep the profits.

I'm not a big Gore fan but I think it's worth seeing, if only to understand how the public debate is being framed.
 
2007-10-10 6:14:59 PM  
Ambitwistor: FWIW, he doesn't keep the profits.

O RLY? I did not know that. Where do they go?
 
2007-10-10 6:16:04 PM  
helchose:
absoluteparanoia
Ambitwistor
netizencain


...and obviously my spelling and grammar is beyond reproach in that last post. So much for being in a hurry...
 
2007-10-10 6:18:28 PM  
To me, this seems very dangerous.

Sure, the film contains some inaccuracies, it is a bit sensationalist, and it it a bit dumbed down - but the point of the film is just to convince your average Joe that global warming is real (which it is) and that we should try to do something about it (which we should).

I'm certainly not in favor of hiding evidence which doesn't support the cause and I'm not in favor of silencing detractors - but these things need to be done in the proper scale. If you give "equal time" to the problems with his arguments, then poor Joe will leave the film unsure about whether global warming is real or not.

It's the same kind of argument you get in teaching evolution VS teaching intelligent design - it doesn't make sense to spend half of the time teaching real science and half of it teaching made-up crap.

If there's a 95% chance that anthropogenic global warming is real, then IMO, about 95% of a presentation about it should be pushing the pro-warming stance, with a 5% nod to some of the problems and counter-arguments.
 
2007-10-10 6:24:40 PM  
I wonder what would happen if every educational film that was shown in schools had the same level of scrutiny as An Inconvenient Truth has had. Would every educational film need a warning label?
 
2007-10-10 6:34:38 PM  
Chuck Wagon

I wonder what would happen if every educational film that was shown in schools had the same level of scrutiny as An Inconvenient Truth has had. Would every educational film need a warning label?

Sally is abstinent so she doesn't have to deal with all the troubles Mary is having. "Using a condom is wrong," says Jim, so he's abstinent too. They are going to wait for the big day when they are married. But Mary, oh poor Mary. She smartly wraps up her countless boyfriends, but this time the condom broke, and now she has AIDS and is going to die before seeing her 21st birthday. But not before seeing her newborn child die of AIDS first.
 
2007-10-10 6:40:40 PM  
But anyway, you know what's a much MUCH bigger deal than falling for Al Gore's propaganda and reducing pollution or whatever?

INVADING AND CONQUERING A COUNTRY AND KILLING THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE IN YOUR NAME BECAUSE YOU FELL FOR PRESIDENT'S BUSH'S PROPAGANDA.
 
2007-10-10 6:43:23 PM  
rush22

Subtle.
 
2007-10-10 6:50:09 PM  
Di Atribe:

The profits go to Alliance for Climate Protection, a non-profit who says that "Our mission is to persuade the American people - and people elsewhere in the world - of the importance and urgency of adopting and implementing effective and comprehensive solutions for the climate crisis." Don't know whether you find that more or less palatable than giving money to Gore.
 
2007-10-10 6:50:50 PM  
ACP also says they're bi-partisan, FWIW.
 
2007-10-10 6:52:37 PM  
Can we also apply this requirement to history textbooks?
 
2007-10-10 6:53:41 PM  
i don't think there's nearly enough research being done on solar warming. fluctuations in the total solar radiance could be a significant contributing factor to global warming. we should be spending more time trying to figure out how to cool down the sun than worrying about how to get better gas mileage. priorities, people, priorities

/i have no idea
 
2007-10-10 6:55:21 PM  
Ckevinatilusa: Can we also apply this requirement to history textbooks?

How about science textbooks that teach creationism...er, intelligent design.?
 
2007-10-10 6:58:24 PM  
No wonder kids are so stupid. They're showing this crap in school.
 
2007-10-10 7:28:38 PM  
Yet another "activist judge".

Oh, I forget, that's only when they side with something dittoheads DON'T like, otherwise it's "sound adjudication".
 
2007-10-10 7:34:29 PM  
Lesson is, when making a documentary, be more like him

img171.imageshack.usView Full Size


and less like her

img222.imageshack.usView Full Size
 
Displayed 50 of 73 comments


Oldest | « | 1 | 2 | » | Newest | Show all



This thread is archived, and closed to new comments.

Continue Farking




On Twitter


  1. Links are submitted by members of the Fark community.

  2. When community members submit a link, they also write a custom headline for the story.

  3. Other Farkers comment on the links. This is the number of comments. Click here to read them.

  4. Click here to submit a link.