An Inconvenient Truth

Al Gore’s film “An Inconvenient Truth” discusses the implications of what would happen if we, globally, do not take a more proactive stance to combat climate change. He makes extremely exaggerated claims, according to Bjørn Lomborg. “While it’s nice to see Gore bucking the trend in a nation where many influential people deny that global warming even exists, many of his apocalyptic claims are highly misleading. But his biggest error lies in suggesting that humanity has a moral imperative to act on climate change because we realize there is a problem. This seems naïve, even disingenuous.” Lomborg claims that morality is not the issue. The movie’s premise, to Lomborg, was to make “three points: global warming is real; it will be catastrophic; and addressing it should be our top priority.” He believes that, “Inconveniently for the film’s producers, however, only the first statement is correct.” Lomborg continues in his article “Inconvenient Truths for Al Gore” to explain where Gore’s data falters, giving concrete evidence from the United Nations Panel concerning global warming.

Lomborg argues that in the film, Gore indeed presents disturbing “consequences of the sea level rising 20 feet (seven meters), flooding large parts of Florida, San Francisco, New York, Holland, Calcutta, Beijing, and Shanghai.” He questions, “Were realistic levels not dramatic enough? The United Nations panel on climate change suggests a rise of only 1-2 feet during this century, compared to almost one foot in the last century”. Additionally, Gore exaggerated other aspects of his argument. He preaches about the horrors Antarctica will face associated with global warming, but in reality, his data is skewed. He fails to mention that only 2% of Antarctica is rapidly warming, whereas the other 98% has actually gotten colder in the last half-century. According to Lomborg, “The UN climate panel estimates that Antarctica’s snow mass will actually increase during this century. And, whereas Gore points to shrinking sea ice in the Northern Hemisphere, he fails to mention that ice in the Southern Hemisphere is increasing.” Gore needs to get his facts together if he wants to accurately persuade the public about the horrors that civilization faces. Lomborg does not argue that there is no such thing as climate change, but he reasonably argues that the picture Gore paints is not entirely factual.

According to Lomborg, the real issue is cost effectiveness and using resources wisely. While global warming is a global problem, there are a dozen other global problems that can be solved much more cheaply.  While global warming is a problem that we will need to tackle in the 21st century, but it is not the end of the world.  We must keep things in perspective: sea levels are rising, but they have been rising for a century already. Lomborg proposes the converse: tackling problems that we can fix cheaply. He argues that combating disease, hunger, and polluted water would bring immediate benefit to millions and allow developing countries to increase productivity and break the cycle of poverty.  In doing so inhabitants of such countries would be less vulnerable to the hazards of climate change. According to Lomborg, "generations will not chatise us for not having committed to Kyoto, but rather wonder why in 'in a world of inconvenient truths' Gore focused on the one where we could achieve the least for the highest cost.".   

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