Jeff Master’s Review on Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth About Global Warming

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I haven't seen it, but Jeff Master's review of "An Inconvenient Truth", the Al Gore movie, seems a good and fair review of not just the movie, but the environmental impact and sciences behind the truth about global warming.

The science presented is mostly good, and at times compelling, but there are a few errors and one major distortion of the truth. Gore does an excellent job focusing on the most important issues, and usually presents them with a minimum of hype and distortion. The only exception to this comes in his treatment of global warming and extreme weather events such as hurricanes.

The points Masters makes on the complex issues of global warming and human impact on the planet are very compelling and honest. Definitely worth a read.

As a side note, doesn't anyone use the word "pollution" any more? It appears to be a lost word. Pollution is what is killing our planet. Not global warming. If global warming has a direct cause and effect related to humans, it's from pollution. Pollution and abuse of the land causes more deaths, more illness, and more disease than global warming today. By reducing pollution levels globally, everyone benefits, including the planet. Let's stop polluting. Bring back micro-awareness of what we all can do to stop polluting and it doesn't stop with just picking up a piece of paper.

2 comments from people who had something to say

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  1. Derek said:
    June 30, 2006

    Lorelle, I strongly encourage you (and anyone, for that matter) to see An Inconvenient Truth and judge for yourself. I don’t think you can authoritatively say that Jeff Masters’ review is a “good and fair review” of the movie if you haven’t seen the movie yourself. Good and fair regarding the attendant environmental issues, yes.

    His criticism that Gore paints with too broad a brush in the section about hurricanes and weather events is a valid one, and one that I’ve heard raised elsewhere as well. I do disagree with some of his other points of contention: Master’s statement that the movie plays like a campaign ad was a clinker (would that all campaign ads were so free of ad-hominem vitriol), and his objection to Gore’s description of the effect that CO2 emissions have on the atmosphere is hair-splitting at its pettiest. But anyhoo, I agree with the majority of his review and found it interesting to read the thoughts of someone who is (apparently) a meteorologist or geologist of some kind.

    I agree that the term “pollution” has fallen into under-use. The thing is (as you say) that pollution is and climate change are directly related as cause and effect. I share your giving a hoot about not polluting… if you’ll pardon the expression. :P

  2. spun out said:
    July 16, 2006

    From the moment the film began to percolate, the corporate greenhouse gas machine had all sorts of blogs, fox news stories, and other “spin control” venom ready to roll. Doesn’t it sound funny when most people who haven’t seen the film have the very same criticism? Perhaps they have all seen the same spin doctors disparaging the film with the same arguments! Just like all the people who said that “Fahrenheit 911″ was a “movie driven by and about hate” when most of it WAS TRUE. It was too risky to fathom that people might actually see it. Just like Fahrenheit, eventually “An Inconvenient Truth” will be proven true by HISTORY and future events. But this time, instead of a nightmare war on the other side of the globe, we might just have bet the ranch!

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