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Posted in Climate change, Coal, Energy, Environment, Renewable energy, Web 2.0 | Tagged al gore, climate, global warming, talk, TED | 6 Comments

6 Responses to “Al Gore - New thinking on the climate crisis”

1. on April 23, 2008 at 11:37 am1 Kiashu

   I really wish we had a better and more prominent person than Gore. In the first place, his own lifestyle doesn’t exactly make him the poster-boy for low emissions and consumption.

   But more importantly, he has mixed messages. He overstates the dangers and then understates the measures needed. I come away from his presentations with, “The world is going to BURN AND FLOOD TOMORROW! So, um, change the lightbulb.”

   Couldn’t we have someone who is on the one hand moderate and sensible about the dangers, but who also proposes bold measures?

   
   
2. on April 23, 2008 at 2:16 pm2 mcfarm

   Unfortunately Kiashu, it appears that Al Gore is simply a high profile messenger, and we need an entrepreneurial ‘doer’ as a leading public figure. Can’t think of anyone high profile enough on a global stage atm.

   Al Gore was good in that he was VP and presidential candidate of the world’s worst emitter. Now we need someone like Bill Gate’s to have a climate epiphany!

   The current issue of Time magazine has a ‘green’ cover and Al Gore is interviewed. Interesting to read what the US right wing press are making of the global warming issue just the same. At least they appear to be making it an issue - perhaps the first of many (pun intended).

   
   
3. on April 23, 2008 at 6:59 pm3 naught101

   Kiashu: George Monbiot, Daniel Quinn, James Hansen, there’s heaps of them, but the reason they aren’t high-profile is that they DO provide radical suggestions for change.

   If you really think there’s worth in having a grand leader, there’s plenty of ways to force the issue: you have a blog, and a network of other blogs, get writing. If you want Gore out of the picture, ignore him, and blast anyone who says Gore is the epitome of environmentalism, cause he isn’t.

   
   
4. on April 25, 2008 at 9:18 am4 Terry Townsend

   A great conference was held in Sydney April 11-13, in which hundreds of attendees heard international speakers including John Bellamy Foster, Patrick Bond and Roberto Perez discuss solutions to global warming.

   The conference formulated the following statement; audio and video of some of the presentations are available from the links below:

   Climate Crisis — Urgent Action Needed Now!

   Statement initiated by participants in the Climate Change|Social Change conference, Sydney, Australia, April 11-13, 2008.

   The conference was organised by Green Left Weekly.
   The following statement was started by the participants in the Climate Change|Social Change conference. It is being distributed to environmental, trade union, Indigenous, migrant, religious and community organisations to help build the movement against global warming.

   Anyone who agrees with it is welcome to add their signature, and an updated list of signatories will be issued on a regular basis. To add your name, email climatechange.socialchange@gmail.com

   * Read more at http://links.org.au/node/369

   Marxism and the environment — John Bellamy Foster

   Marxism and the environment was a workshop given by John Bellamy Foster to the Climate Change Social Change Conference, in Sydney on April 12, 2008. Foster is editor of Monthly Review (USA) and author of Marx’s Ecology. The conference was organised by Green Left Weekly. For more audio and video of John Bellamy Foster on related topics, go to http://links.org.au/node/343

   Subscribe free to Links - International Journal of Socialist Renewal - at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373

   
   
5. on April 26, 2008 at 3:14 am5 Eliana

   Looks like “Inconvenient 2″ is nowhere as funny as the original: http://www.236.com/news/2008/04/25/an_inconvenient_truth_ii_not_a_6048.php

   
   
6. on April 29, 2008 at 9:01 pm6 BilB

   Further reading here

   http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7363600.stm

   Try paragrph 5 where it is decalared that environmental carbon build up over the last 200 years is 14,000 times greater than that produced by nature.

   
   

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