From the National Academy of Sciences executive summary of their report, Surface Temperature Reconstructions for the Last 2000 Years:

“The existence and extent of a Little Ice Age from roughly 1500 to 1850 is supported by a wide variety of evidence including ice cores, borehole temperatures, glacier length records, and historical documents. Evidence for regional warmth during medieval times can be found in a diverse but more limited set of records including ice cores, tree rings, marine sediments, and historical sources from Europe and Asia, but the exact timing and duration of warm periods may have varied from region to region, and the magnitude and geographic extent of the warmth are uncertain.”

The executive report is good information. It is a good update of all the science about global warming. You can find it at:

http://newton.nap.edu/execsumm_pdf/11676

If you want, I can also point you to other articles which demonstrate that scientists are studying things like the effects of solar variation on climate. These things are being researched, but the conclusions remain the same - the vast majority of warming seems to be man made.

Climate scientists take all of these things into account when they make their predictions - solar energy, natural cycles, etc. The models are getting more and more accurate, and almost all the science says that greenhouse gases are a significant cause, even if there are other factors acting on the climate.

As for the movie, I went in already convinced about global warming, and so I concentrated on the information about global warming, not Al. Consciously, anyway. I did come out liking him a lot more… It’s interesting to me that our views colored the movie - I never thought once that he was using the movie as a political vehicle.

Your views on the movie are especially interesting to me. In my experience, most conservative bloggers who attacked the movie did so on the basis of a few bits of misinformation, without having seen the movie. Another conservative blogger who saw it came out with lots of new questions about global warming, a good thing. You are the only conservative blogger I’ve seen who actually went to see the movie, tried to keep an open mind, and has maintained the same basic position about global warming.

Anyway, global warming is happening, and there is very little real debate about what is causing it. As Gore pointed out, if you look deep enough, you’ll find that most of the (very few) scientists who cast doubt on anthropogenic global warming are indeed funded by ExxonMobil in one way or another. There is some research going into solar causes, but it is inconclusive, whereas there is a strong correlation btw CO2 and GW. Also there are some paleoclimatologists who point out that the earth has gone through these cycles before - but the temperature 65 million years ago is really not relevant to our ecosystem today. Indeed, most of the serious climate scientists work hard to add all these variables into their models of climate change - that’s why we have a range of predictions instead of a definite number.

Personally, as an amateur ecologist and semiprofessional environmental activist, I think global warming is only one problem of many that threaten the world’s ecosystem (and thus humans).
If it’s not caused by humans, there is plenty more to worry about.

Sorry to ramble on and on, but I am fascinated by your openminded approach… a rarity in the blogosphere. If you think I could point you to some useful information, please don’t hesitate to ask.

I’m interested in how you saw the film. Did it change your opinion any on global warming?

Thanks for the pointer on wedges. I’ll be sure to check it out.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=stabilization+wedges&btnG=Google+Search

Anyway, about the solutions, he talked about stabilization wedges, which is a plan to reduce emissions using technology we already have.

Is global warming falsifiable? Yes it is, but we are observing unprecedented climate change, as predicted 20 years ago. I’m not sure what you mean by falsifiable other than that - if we didn’t observe temperature increases, then we would have to abandon the theory.

And it’s funny how two people can see two different films. You saw something very different from what I saw.