Though I couldn't find the movie playing anywhere near my home, I was delighted to spot a companion book that I wasn't aware of during a recent trip to the bookstore.  It was nice to finally get an up to date and unbiased read on the scientific findings regarding global warming.  Yes I said unbiased.  It's high time people stopped trying to politicize this issue and started trying to do something about it...

One of the remarkable things about this book is just how accessible it is.  I was able to read the bulk of it in under two hours.  Most of it is large print and presented in plain language.  As it is adapted from former Vice President Gore's slideshow and lecture, it reads very much like a presentation rather than a typical book organized into chapters.

Interspersed throughout Gore includes stories from his own life that shaped his attitude toward environmental issues, and while an interesting look into him as a person, you can pretty much skip them if all you are interested in is understanding climate change.

The book will not make a scientist out of you, indeed it exists principally to make you aware that there really is a climate crisis, and that the scientists of the world are largely in agreement that it (a) exists, (b) is going to wreak havoc on our environment and economy, and (c) is a direct result of human emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases.

It covers the major, measurable, (and verified) signs of global warming including:

  • the increase in average global temperature
    ...if you look at the 21 hottest years measured [in the last 250 years,] 20 of the 21 have occurred within the last 25 years...
     
  • worldwide reduction in the mass of glaciers through melting
    ...globally, more than 85% of glaciers are shrinking...
     
  • change in weather patterns including more frequent and more powerful storms
    Major storms spinning in both the Atlantic and the Pacific since the 1970s have increased in duration and intensity by about 50 percent.
     
  • and an increase in global precipitation levels
    ...overall, the amount of precipitation has increased globally in the last century by almost 20 percent.
     
  • rising temperatures more rapidly dry soil, leading to increases in desertification
    Global Yearly Desertification in square miles per year: 1970's -- 624, 1980s -- 840, 1990s -- 1374
     
  • areas of permafrost will thaw due to rising temperature
    Trucks that must travel on frozen highways in Alaska for most of the year now sometimes get stuck in the mud as the permafrost thaws... the number of days each year that the tundra in Alaska is frozen solidly enough to drive on ... has fallen to fewer than 80 days a year [down from around 200 days a year in the 1970s]...

And then goes on to indicate what other effects we are likely to see in the future, such as a change in the nature of the "Global Ocean Conveyor Belt" the convection current which carries hotter water from the equator to the extreme northern and southern latitudes and then carries cold water back.  Ever wondered why Madrid is so much hotter than New York, even though it is on the same latitude?  It's largely because there is an enourmous current of tropical water that surges northward past the coast of Spain.  Imagine what would happen if this conveyor belt were to change shape dramatically, or reverse direction.  What would be the impact on locally grown crops and produce? What else might happen?

...Around 10,000 years ago ... when the last glacial ice sheet in North America melted, it formed a giant pool of fresh water.  The Great Lakes are a remnant of that huge freshwater lake, which was held in place by an enourmous ice dam.

Then one day the ice dam broke and the fresh water rushed out into the North Atlantic ... the Gulf Stream virtually stopped.  So Western Europe no longer received all of that heat ...

Consequently, Europe went back into an ice age for another 900 to 1000 years.  And the transition happened fairly quickly.

Some scientists are now seriously worried about the possibility of this phenomenon recurring ... [given the] rapid melting of ice in Greenland, which is adjacent to the area in which the [Gulf Stream] operates...

Perhaps the most distressing section of the book demonstrates the most immediate effect of global warming: the persistent efforts of certain industries based in fossil fuels to spread disinformation and doubt about the phenomenon.  The most telling piece of information was a pair of studies examining printed articles on global warming.

One study was based on a random sampling of scientific articles published in peer-reviewed science journals.  The sample amounted to about 10% of the total number of articles printed on the subject in the last 10 years. Of these articles (over 900 of them) the percentage that disagreed with the consensus view that the actions of human beings is contributing to global climate change was 0.  Random sample, 0% disagreement.  Much like the supposed "controversy" of evolutionary theory, the belief that there is a major debate among the scientific community about whether humans are contributing to global climate change is patently false.

A second study was based on a random sampling of articles on climate change from four major American newspapers.  The sample amounted to about 18% of all articles printed on the subject in the last 14 years at these papers.  Of these articles (over 600 of them) the percentage that gave equal weight to the scientifically discredited view that human beings play no role in global warming was 53%.  As the book notes, no wonder people are confused.

The book concludes with a helpful section explaining changes which we can make in the way we live our lives to start cutting back on carbon emissions, intermingled with sidebars debunking many of the myths about global climate change which are often believed by people who aren't in possession of all of the information, or who have been misled by propaganda bought and paid for by the oil and gas industries.  (Thank you Exxon Mobil.)

I strongly suggest you read this book.  It is not a gloom and doom horror story, but rather a message of hope.  Yes global warming is real, yes it's caused by human beings, but we can do something about it, with the technology and scientific knowhow that we have today, not years and years from now.

Thanks, Al.  I've been so confused by much of the disinformation about global warming, it was a relief to finally read something that made sense and didn't try to paint the issue one way or another. You had my vote buddy, sorry it didn't work out.

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