Looking at inconvenient truths.

An Inconvenient Truth has been going around for awhile, as a film and as a presentation.

It has been praised by some and denounced by others.

Chris Mooney, at Intersections, has his own thoughts on the documentary and the science behind it.

He looks at the New York Times criticism of the film and numbers.

Let me be clear: I have seen An Inconvenient Truth, and I found it almost entirely accurate. Gore has done a tremendous job of drawing attention to this issue and he gets the science right by and large. But my question as a point of strategy has always been: Why include the 1 to 5 percent of more questionable stuff, and so leave onself open to this kind of attack? Given how incredibly smart and talented Al Gore is, didn't he see this coming?

Alas, I've already shown how Gore overstepped on the relationship between global warming and tornadic activity (something the Times piece curiously omits, as this is a clear cut-case and an obvious opportunity to show the IPCC itself contradicting Gore). The treatment of hurricanes in An Inconvenient Truth is also problematic...

This is something I have heard when other specialist comment on the film. It is mostly right on the nose. But it takes some worse cases when it isn't clear that they are what will happen. Or, like with the image of New York City partly underwater, the fact it will take up to 100 years to happen. A true result, but the omission makes the visuals extra scary.

These bared threads offer people who want to obfuscate the problems a way to do so.