Al Gore GW Flim-Flammery

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It almost caused me personal pain, but I had no choice but to rep this post

 

The 'cute little kid' used spot lights, not IR lights -- which was the correct set up to get the desired results. The set up used by Gore's team could not have obtained the results reported. The issue is not the validity of the test (when properly done) but rather the willingness of Gore and his team to show obviously doctored results -- a serious breach of scientific integrity.

 

It strikes me as bogus to conclude that something is very likely true because it doesn't seem likely that it's not true. I know you didn't say exactly that, but when I try to condense what you did say down, that's pretty much what I get. And I'm not even a scientist or a science-ish guy.

e.g., it's not likley that global warming advocates would successfully conspire to fraudulently convince the world that global warming is real - particularly without the promise of great personal profit, so global warming must be real. ?

 

Glad you liked it, BTA.

 

That is pretty much what I said Gaer. I am no scientist, I can't read the graphs or numbers correctly but there seems to be as much consensus as the scientific world can ever reach. It is really just in the US this debate is even alive. All of this doesn't make it true but you have to admit that if the sceptics finally are proven correct the world has been tricked and fooled like it has never been tricked and fooled before.

 

I wouldn't necessarily say tricked and fooled; moreso possibly led down the garden path by a combination of bad science, intellectual dishonesty, and political agendas.

That said, I think (as others have already said here) that some degree of global warming is pretty obvious, even to someone as uninformed as me. But this thread is about Al Gore and his integrity and/or lack thereof.

 

So. the issue is that Gore didn't give the correct directions for performing an otherwise easily reproduced scientific experiment? We're acknowledging that the science he presented is totally valid and are simply faulting Gore for being too lazy to make sure that the method he laid out for conducting the experiment would work? I'm OK with that.

We haven't caught Gore perpetrating some sort of grand fraud or misrepresenting the science regarding carbon's effect on retaining heat. We've caught Gore being lazy -- and that really shouldn't surprise anyone. Come on, folks, the main gained like 300 pounds after retiring from politics! It's hardly news that he's lazy. Sorry, guys, I'm still yawning...

 

The point of criticizing Gore (who seems to have earned some with what was mentioned) is to pretend the Global Warming issue isn't real.

I think odds are that it is. Humans can and have done massive things so claims that little us with a little more CO2 couldn't make Global Warming happen are laughable to me when I consider all the other massive things we have done-go visit New York (a city I like) if you want to feel what it is like to walk down a man made valley.

Correct me if I'm wrong but we've made paths of concrete, steel, and other stuff that span a continent repeatedly.

If we put enough space junk in orbit that NASA had to have the shuttle dodging it when we were still sending it up then maybe we can do a number within the atmosphere when more organizations, companies, and so on can use that rather than low Earth orbit as a dumping ground.

Of course it doesn't help when some of the skeptics criticizing global warming concerns were also the same people claiming smoking wouldn't harm people a few years back. Now was there a secret conspiracy against tobacco companies then that this was all BS and part of or where their major companies involved in selling a product that it turns out does harm and these companies were not eager to loose their markets? Are the skeptics that defended smoking then the best people around at fighting conspiracies or were they knowledgable people willing to put a price on their integrity?

 

I was criticizing Gore long before he became the face of climate control.

 

Why do I have the feeling that that is true for all the rest of Gore's critics on this thread ?

 

Because he had less personality than the Lincoln robot at Disneyland. At least with climate control he almost shows some emotion and conviction.

 

You don't.

And for that matter you don't have to believe Bill Nye either.

But that doesn't mean you should ignore people who have actually tried to study the matter in a more honest and accurate method than either of them.

Especially if you are willing to extend your trust so far as to take people and organizations who were previously arguing smoking isn't bad for people (before being skeptical of human related Global Warming) with half a grain of credibility.

 

You keep throwing up the smoking strawman pplr -- please stop. Most of the people on these boards are smart enough to see such arguments as ridiculous and irrelevant.

 

Granted some of the people who may be skeptics of Global Warming here may get their info from different sources or people who used different sources themselves, though if so please speak up.

As it is people and organizations who are currently promoting skepticism of Global Warming recently were in fact party to denying harm related to smoking earlier.

Be it organizations like the Heartland Institute....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heartland_Institute

or people who at one point had some stature such as Federick Seitz but seem to have tarnished it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Seitz


Now some of the skeptics here may not be followers of these folks but if not then please state the reasons for why. As it stands I've seen criticism of both Gore and concerns about Global Warming but little in detailed explanation of the criticism of the latter.

I can live with criticism of Gore because it appears he earned it (and people discussed how). But complaints were also made about concerns relating to Global Warming in general and (unlike with Gore) little was given to back those up.

As for my argument being

, hardly. If such people and organizations weren't actively trying to promote GW skepticism even currently then maybe it would be-but as it is that isn't the case.

 

Ha. Could be. But I believe that this is less about climate change and more about Gore himself - you know, the guy with "no personality."

 

BTA, the funny thing is that it is very possible to prove exactly what Gore said the experiment proved -- a cute little kid and Cleveland was able to do it for his science fair, after all, by simply following the proper procedure and using the right items for the experiment. The science to which Gore alluded with the experiment is entirely valid, and really not up for debate. Gore may be guilty of failing to vet the experiment (of course it's also entirely possible that he was simply being too vague), but he is not guilty of misrepresenting or failing to understand the actual science, which you seem to keep insisting. There aren't any respected skeptics with actual training in a relevant scientific field arguing that carbon in the atmosphere doesn't cause warming. In fact, we depend on that very warming to sustain life as we know it. This is undisputed, easily understood, and just as easily proven.

Respected skeptics (the ones who are actually qualified to have a scientific opinion) argue not about whether CO2 leads to global warming, but about the long term severity of maintaining comparably high carbon levels over a long period of time. We have seen high atmospheric carbon levels many times i the past -- but those levels rose due to one-time phenomena and were not maintained for comparably long periods of time. What is different now is that we are putting a steady and predictable amount of carbon into the atmosphere, which is causing the carbon levels in our atmosphere to steadily and predictably rise, and we show no real signs of reversing this trend. Scientists are indeed arguing about the long-term impact of this, but no one is arguing that our rising carbon output has no impact at all -- or that there is not more carbon in our atmosphere as a result of human activity.