In 2006, a documentary with the title “An Inconvenient Truth” was released to the cinemas which featured the former US Vice President Al Gore as its narrator.
According to Boxofficemojo website, the documentary was an instant hit making it the fifth most successful documentary to date, behind titles such as Fahrenheit 9/11, March of the Penguins, Earth and Sicko.
The documentary however garnered much appraisal as it received criticism. The reason is because the global warming phenomenon is a much controversial topic. In the science world, there are two opposing forces on the issue of global warming.
To understand why there are opposing opinions one must first understand what is interpreted as “global warming”.
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the scientific consensus on global warming is that the average temperature on earth has risen since 19th century and more specifically in the last 30 years, and that the warming is caused by humans due to carbon dioxide emissions and if the trend continues the temperature will continue to rise causing severe climate change and the rise of the sea level.
The opposing scientists however, question whether the warming of the temperature is really caused by humans or simply a cyclical phenomenon that occurs every 30 to 40 years.
Timothy Ball & Robert Carter, both geologists, believe that the global warming phenomenon is not related to carbon dioxide emissions. Ball, states that from 1900s to 1940s there was a warming effect. From 1940s to around 1980s there was a significant cooling effect, but from then on it was once again warming up until 1998.
Carter points that according to IPCC own satellite data statistics, from 1998 onwards there is little indication that earth is warming, in fact, the average temperature in the last decade shows signs of cooling.
These scientists don’t dispute that Earth has indeed suffered a certain warming effect, nor do they dispute that humans do need to lower carbon dioxide emissions because pollution causes health problems. What they dispute is the fact that carbon dioxide emissions cause warming. It is a notion which they deny to be correlated.
The study conducted by UK Climate Impact Programme (UKCIP), to which reports that 800,000 homes in Britain will be in danger of flooding in the next 25 years are projections or predictions of the future climate according to the current data.
UKCIP work very closely with IPCC and they use similar models to project future climate change. However, certain scientist have in the past pointed out that the models used by IPCC to project future climate are incoherent and invalid from a scientific point of view.
Hendrick Tennekes, a retired Director of Research for the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute, wrote a piece where he states that he is sceptical of climate models simply because he does not believe that, currently, there are any models used anywhere in the world, including the IPCC models, which can generate “realistic” simulations of future climate.
Truth be told, is that we all have had experiences where we organized outdoor BBQs for the weekend because the meteorological services have said that it will be a sunny day, only to come weekend and it is raining. If meteorological services don’t have the required technology to predict weather in a space of 1 week, how can we possibly believe that the models used by UKCIP can predict weather changes in the next 25 years?
The million dollar question is, do we label these scientists nothing but a group of scaremongers, or can we really afford to ignore the warning signs and do nothing?
24/06/09
Marcelo Alves
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3 comments:
The day has arrived...
francesca? AHHAHHAHAHHAHHAH
Good article, well said. And to answer the question you posed at the end of your blog - it has been rumored that some scientists did at some point exaggerate the impact of climate change (and perhaps you put it quite well in your last paragraph), but if we were to dig deeper beyond the exaggerations and the scare tactics employed, we find that some scientists do care about how we treat the earth as if resources will not be depleted. Hence, the exaggeration...that caught the world's attention. We stopped, we stared at each other and we pondered.
If we look solely at the objective of this exercise, I would argue that we human beings as a species who co-habit this earth with others should treat it with dignity and respect. At this point it's not so much whether we believe that climate change is a fact but more so about whether or not we are living sustainbly and responsibly within an understanding that other lifeforms also inhabit this planet that we call home.
And to end this comment with another question - when our generation eventually pass away, do we leave behind a planet that future generations can build upon sustainably, or do we leave behind a planet that is so torn apart and irreparable that lifeforms could not continue to co-habit this space?
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