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#17226 12/07/06 03:09 AM
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One of the drawbacks of living "In Paradise" is that we miss a lot of worthy films on the Big Screen. We get EVERYTHING involving "The Rock", he's Samoan, but "An Inconvenient Truth"? Not a chance. I'm awaiting the DVD release from amazon.com, and it occurred to me that most of you might have already seen it. How was it? It's a shame they had to use someone with so little credibilty as Al Gore for the figurehead of such an important topic. What, was Keanu Reeves all booked?

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#17227 12/07/06 07:14 PM
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I agree. Al Gore, to some extent, is the worst aspect of "An Inconvenient Truth." And in the film he at times comes off a little to impressed with himself. Still he does an excellent job of narrating what is an excellent film.

It seems that everybody wants some "credible" spokesperson to save the whales, land a man on the moon, or whatever. Rarely do partisan politicians rise to the level of credibility.

But we don't have any Isaac Asimovs or Carl Sagans looking for a job as figurehead for global warming. Sure could use a couple of volunteers though.

BTW Wolfman ... you might want to find the place there in Paradise where the beach WILL BE in 50 years and buy it now. <g>


DA Morgan
#17228 12/12/06 04:29 AM
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I've finally seen the DVD! I even took notes and watched the extra features (directors comments, etc.). BTW, the extras make the point that it is the film & film makers that have Al coming off a little too impressed with himself. Al, on his own, sounds pretty selfless. I was amazed that he'd been studying this stuff (CO2) since the 60's (much like the internet, I suppose smile )!

I've got some questions about the figures he uses near the end of the flick (but later).

For now, at the end of the DVD, he shows a picture of earth from billions of miles away. It looks like a speck of light on a dark background. There is a band of light that arcs across the speck (much as a superimposed orbit might look) from top to bottom in the photo.
Does anyone know if that band of light is an artifact? As I recall there was a second band to the left that paralleled the "Earth" band. They must be artifacts; but it makes the picture much more dramatic.

So, I think Al looks like a great "spokesman." He's looks much more relaxed and confident; not trying too hard. Does he look younger? Ahh, the magic of film-making.
This DVD could be considered to be carefully crafted just to minimize his status of politician. Wisely he's wiping the slate clean, and not trying to be an Obama now. If this thing keeps gaining momentum, he could be a populist shoe-in. How does Gore-Clinton sound in '08?

It was funny to hear Al talk about how Hansen had been censored/altered, after hearing on SAGG about how anti-GWA's are censored these days.
Guess the tide has turned???

smile
~samwik


Pyrolysis creates reduced carbon! ...Time for the next step in our evolutionary symbiosis with fire.
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The DVD advocates planting trees to help become carbon neutral. But now it looks like we need to find out where those trees are planted (high latitudes vs. equatorial latitudes).

From Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

Planting trees across the United States and Europe to absorb some of the carbon dioxide emitted by the burning of fossil fuels may just outweigh the positive effects of sequestering that CO?.
In theory, growing a forest may sound like a good idea to fight global warming, but in temperate regions, such as the United States, those trees also would soak up sunlight, causing the earth?s surface to warm regionally by up to 8 degrees Fahrenheit.
Forests affect climate in three different ways: they absorb the greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide, and help to keep the planet cool; they evaporate water to the atmosphere, which also helps keep the planet cool; and they are dark and absorb a lot of sunlight, warming the Earth.
Using climate models, researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the Carnegie Institution Department of Global Ecology have found that forests in the mid-latitude regions of the Earth present a more complicated picture. Trees in these areas tend to warm the Earth in the long run.
The darkness of these forests absorbs abundant sunlight, warming the land. While the darkness of the forest lasts forever, the effect of the forest sequestering carbon dioxide slows down over time as the atmosphere exchanges CO? with the ocean.
The conclusion: Planting a forest in the United States could cool the Earth for a few decades, but would lead to planetary warming in the long term. These are the results of a study that will be presented at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, Dec. 7, at the American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting in San Francisco.
?On time scales longer than a few centuries, the net effect will actually be warming in these regions,? said Govindasamy Bala of the Livermore team. ?We thought planting trees across the northern hemisphere would help curb global warming by the CO? absorption but what we found was a different story.?
The authors discovered that a global replacement of current vegetation by trees would lead to a global warming of 2.4 degrees Fahrenheit. Global replacement with grassland led to cooling of about 0.7?F.
The researchers also found that planting trees between 30 and 50 degrees latitude worldwide saw the global mean surface air temperature increase by 0.7?F. Regional warming in North America and Eurasia was as high as 8?F. In earlier studies, planting trees in the boreal forest regions (found mostly in the upper half of the Northern Hemisphere) caused a warming of surface temperatures.
?Although it was previously known that trees could have an overall warming effect in the boreal forests (north of 50 degrees), this is the first study to show that temperate forests could lead to net global warming,? said Livermore?s Seran Gibbard, lead author of the study.
The story is different for the tropical forests. In tropical regions, forests help keep the Earth cool by not only absorbing carbon dioxide, but by evaporating plenty of water as well.
?Should we give carbon credit to the planting of forests? Probably not for countries in mid and high latitudes,? Bala said. ?But the tropical forests present a win-win because they cool the planet by evaporative cooling and the uptake of carbon.?
Co-author Ken Caldeira of the Carnegie Institution warned that proposals to grow more forests to cool the planet should be greeted with caution.
?I like forests. They provide good habitats for plants and animals, and tropical forest are good for climate, so we should be particularly careful to preserve them,? he said. ?But in terms of climate change, we should focus our efforts on things that can really make a difference, like energy efficiency and developing new sources of clean energy.?
The research, also authored by Thomas Phillips and Michael Wickett of Lawrence Livermore, will appear online in the Dec. 8 issue of the journal Geophysical Research Letters.
Founded in 1952, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has a mission to ensure national security and apply science and technology to the important issues of our time. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is managed by the University of California for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.

~samwik


Pyrolysis creates reduced carbon! ...Time for the next step in our evolutionary symbiosis with fire.
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The movie is really good. I'm pretty sure it will quiet down some sceptics ! Film is supported with good scientific facts and nice quotes. I think the responce is good.
Anyway I made a a little pool about the movie here:
http://www.gwboard.com/al-gore-an-inconvenient-truth-vt13.html
To see what people think about it ... And the result shows that people do believe that movie will help us to save the earth !

I just wish americans had voted for Al Gore on elections ... :S

#17727 01/18/07 07:35 PM
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I wish I could agree with you Luka but I can't.

The film is solid but the opposition, fueled by cash from Exxon-Mobil, is trying to do with Global Warming what tobacco did with Cancer.

Don't forget most people still think that what Paris Hilton does is news.


DA Morgan
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Yes an AlGores power bill reflects his personal dedication to reducing co2 emissions...


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