Two points:
a.) Gore isn't the only one warning us about global warning. Just about every scientist on the planet not in the employ of an oil corporation agress on this.
b.) Consider the source. This is Drudge, after all.
Are you sure this wasn't the Onion?
But in the 70's there was much ink spilled warning everyone about the coming ice age!
I'm concerned about global warming. It looks like I should also be concerned about Al Gore's health.
By forcing land to be cleared for agriculture, overeating is also a "significant contributor to global warming!"
Gabriel,
LOL! Thanks for that!
"But in the 70's there was much ink spilled warning everyone about the coming ice age!"
Gene, that was journalists, so I've read, not scientists. But even if it had been scientists, so what?
Some scientists were wrong about the human race being destroyed by Halley's Comet in 1910, but the fact that they were wrong about Halley's Comet doesn't mean we're impervious to comets and asteroids.
But in the 70's there was much ink spilled warning everyone about the coming ice age!
If global warming melts enough of the ice caps to stop the Gulf Stream, there will be another Ice Age. The only thing that keeps the British Isles from looking like Labrador is the Gulf Stream. Turn that off, and we'll be able to build igloos in England.
Gabriel raises a point...what happened to Al Gore? Geez, I've been without a TV for over a year, so I haven't seen any recent photos.
Do some good for the environment and drive a hybrid car!
(You can ignore the fact that hybrid cars are made out of metal and other materials extracted out of the ground, i.e. Mother Earth, fabricated using a complex industrial process, fueled by electricity produced by not so friendly environmental coal, oil, hydro sources...no worry though... it is good for the environment and, more importantly, you can feel good about yourself for do some good that may not be all that good...)
Gore looks like Francis from Pee Wee's Big Adventure.
Just about every scientist on the planet not in the employ of an oil corporation agress on this.
How *handy* not to ever have to listen to what geologists say!
What if it turns out that farting may be the worst contributor to Global Warming?
Crikey!
Oh come on Mark!
We are supposed to consult the "experts" when it comes to torture!
You are linking to the "experts" of global warming, yet you don't seem to be impressed...
Maybe you should check the dictionary...
Al Gore is not a scientist, although he likes to play one on television sometimes. Skepticism of Al Gore is justifiable.
Skepticism of global warming is justifiable if it is based on empirical evidence, and here the case is decidedly not running on the side of the skeptics at this point.
Of course, "is it happening" is a purely scientific question, separate from "what, if anything, should or can be done about it", which is a political , economic, and social question, in addition to scientific.
"But in the 70's there was much ink spilled warning everyone about the coming ice age!"
Atmospheric physics has advanced considerably since the 1970s. Science is all about adjusting and correcting itself to account for additional data as it becomes available. This is what makes it work.
Can experts be wrong ? Sure. But they are usually proven wrong by other experts.
If a cardiologist says you need bypass surgery, are you going to seek a second opinion from another cardiologist, or the bag boy at your local supermarket?
Louise.
Not a silly as it sounds.
2 years ago, our Labour(Left wing) govt. tried to impose a Fart tax on farmers, because of all the methane gas that was created by cows, sheep, deer and pigs( actually the gas from animals belching is about the same volume as animals farting), all in the name of reducing global warming.
Of couse, the bill never got passed - farmers were coming in and dumping truck loads of cow shit on parliament steps, and opposition MP drove a tractor up the steps of Parliament, and it was a national joke. You can imagine all the witty stories that abounded. (and you know, completely out of character for me, I can't recall one right now- Bugger!!!)
But I'll keep my thinking cap on. 
Well, they keep telling us "Just about every scientist on the planet not in the employ of an oil corporation agrees" that the average temperature has risen a degree in the last century or whatever.
To me, "just about every scientist" includes the bag boy and only leaves out the server at your local rib joint, who wants you to keep getting the half rack and side of unjin rings. Your geneticists and metallurgists and astronomers aren't going to be any better qualified to make a judgment just because it's all Science. They might have a better eye than average for good methodology, but I've worked with too many yahoos with letters after their names who forgot that studying one subject doesn't decrease their ignorance in others to put any more stock by default in their opinions than I do in, oh, Wikipedia.
What gets me isn't the preponderance or dearth of evidence about global warming. It's the fact that there are--seems like there have always been--more people telling me "we now know it's real," using other people who just say "we now know" for evidence, than there are people actually reporting on original climatological research.
I see good and bad arguments on both sides, although bad it's-real arguments seem to get a lot more bandwidth than good it's-not ones. What I don't see is much deconstruction of good it's-not-real arguments; they're usually ignored or dismissed without even a cursory fisking.
With the propaganda starting out so far ahead of the science, I was always skeptical, but as more questions got answered, I found one I didn't think they'd ever get to: why were they so afraid to objectively report the controversy while it was more controversial?
Maybe the media are as dumb in science as they are in religion.
Ed,
You might want to check out realclimate.org for regular fiskings by scientists of anti-global warming arguments.
I think the problem is that so many everyday liberals take global warming as a matter of faith without ever looking into it. Then they argue the position by calling skeptics stupid, right-wing (is that an insult?), fundamentalists, etc... I've looked into it, and while I'm not scientist and there may well be people on this very combox who know more than I, I feel satisfied that it is real, that it is a threat and that it is caused by humans.
Anyway it's unfortunate that the issue has been so politicized. There really is no reason why people on the right shouldn't care as much as people on the left about the environment.
"Gene, that was journalists, so I've read, not scientists. But even if it had been scientists, so what?"
Good point, Pavel. I don't dispute that something's happening. But I've read so much contradicting information, it's frustrating.
Don's point about methane is very apt here. Gore says cigarette smokers contribute to global warming. Seems silly to this scientific lay person. Here in Reno, NV, they've banned fireplaces in all new homes for over 15 years now due to the inversion layer that occurs in the basin the city sits in (a small part of the Great Basin). Now that folks can't make fires to heat their new 3000sq/ft homes, they use more electricity, natural gas, etc to keep warm in snowy winters - all things that lead, per Gore & others, to global warming. But what about the excess of that 3000 sq/ft domicile that houses 2.5 people? I'll bet the former VP's house is bigger than that & his girls don't live at home anymore, either. And I'll bet he didn't fly coach to Cannes, either. If he'd really wanted to spread the word about this issue, why didn't he give his book away on the internet rather than allow it to go into print, killing who knows how many trees?
It's not just about cigarette smokers. (Would that everyone would quit for health reasons, anyway!) And it's not just about the cars, either, is it? Seems to me, it's a whole package deal. Carping on cigarette smokers sure doesn't seem to help Gore's cause, IMO. I'm so frustrated by this issue - it's hard to discern what's true out there. Gore? Michael Crichton? Meteorologists?
It's just so frustrating. I think for a lot of folks, including me, Gore is contributing to a very real phenomenon of *global warming information fatigue*.
Thanks, for the URL, Marc. One of my pet peeves has always been people who are (or seem to be right) for all the wrong reasons, which may have fueled my skepticism as much as the lopsided reporting itself.
Also, I forgot last time:
Don.(Kiwi) and Louise, Dave Barry has been covering bovine methane emissions for years. It might be worth looking into some of his work before getting on...uh, isn't there a fancy Greek term for human-generated I can use when discussing our own farting? All I can think of is homogenic, but that would be more like the marital act, wouldn't it?
"But what about the excess of that 3000 sq/ft domicile that houses 2.5 people? "
I recall catching one of those celebrity shows once where the story was about a Hollywood actor and his "environmentally sound" house in Colorado. To note, it was his second home and was some 4000+ square feet in size.
If one is concerned about the environment, does having two (or more homes) and one so large make environmental sense?
It does if one is only concerned about feeling good.
In fairness to Mr. Gore (and I'm no fan of him or his party) there's more to this. I read fairly recently about it and it isn't the combustion of a tablespoon worth of tobacco that's causing problems. It's how much wood is burned in a Third World country to dry it. The number of tons of wood burned to tons of tobacco produced is daunting.
So. I'm NOT convined that humanity is causing global warming. But being a right-wing sorta Catholic I might take issue with that sort of environmental hooliganism. You know, burning a tree so someone else can get lung cancer. Not very "steward-of-the-vineyard" kind of behaviour.
Still don't like Gore. But the Drudge report might be quite fair and forthcoming here.
"Maybe the media are as dumb in science as they are in religion."
Oh, absolutely. As our host would put it, with few exceptions deduct 50 IQ points from any media story about a scientific topic.
But that's no excuse for not doing your own homework.
Shoulda said the Drudge Report WASN'T all that honest. My mistake. But here's another question: Is it Christian to grow tobacco crops in a world that experiences hunger? I know there's enough food to go around (we and the Fast Food Generation are just eating it all). But is it Godly to grow so much of the stuff on good land? I can't think so )thuogh I may have a weakness for pipe tobacco, so I'm not looking for bans or anything crazy.)
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