Re: An Inconvenient Truth

On 20 Jun 2006 05:57:01 -0700, "rick++" <rick303@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I finally saw it. I recommend drinking a gallon of coffee before hand
to survive the double whammy of Al speaking and power point slides.

Somehow, I saw the movie when I often take a nap so had a difficult
time sitting through the first portion also. A few times, I rested my
eyes and listened, but later was able to be awake for the 2nd half.

I've often been accused of dozing off in some business meetings. But I
do know what's going on. And I sometimes use the description of an
oriental associate in one of instances when he seemed to doze off. He
said he was "in deep concentration". :)

I rhink his facts are essentially accurate, but the visual graphics are
exagerated to emphasize his concerns. His graphs dont label the axes,
smears out lines unnecessarily, dont show where zero is, to make them
appear more dramatic. Also he does clearly distnguish whcih of his
cute animations are depictionsof past data (e.g. healing ozone hole)
or possible future extrapolation (e.g. shrinking arctic ice). People
can
mistake extrapolation for fact.

To capture the wide range of CO2 concentration, his graphs may be
logarithmic so there isn't necessarily a "zero point" (the graph
passes through zero and goes negative when the concentration passes
below unity). The concentration may possibly increase much faster than
you think.

The documentary intrersperses Al presenting powerpoint slides in
various cities with flashbacks in Al's life and Al sahking hands with
this and that VIP. It reminded me of Sagan's Cosmos series,
which was as much about the author as the subject.

I recommend seeing it because it is about an important topic and
person. Its also an interesting exercise in media propaganda.

Much of the video footage is public domain. He probably got it from
the press. But I would hardly call it media propaganda. However, the
footage seems to have been edited to bring home his main points. So it
seems to be integrated with the movie. But that is more an artistic
license.
.

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