Tuesday, July 25, 2006

An Inconvenient Truth II

Film review
We are all going to die. And we'll be sweating like pigs (and probably underwater) as we do so.

Went and saw a sneak-preview tonight of An Inconvenient Truth (thanks Drew!), a disturbing look at global warming. Despite my earlier comments about Peak Oil potentially being a larger problem, this is certain a movie worth seeing. Al Gore is a great communicator. There are many great visuals to help you 'get it'. Check out the related site, and when it comes out in Oz*, go and see it (if you are in more developed parts of the world, leading the way in causing climate change, please go and see it sooner!).
PS Has anyone else been having trouble with Blogger? I haven't had to access my site for the last twelve hours.
UPDATE: Oz release = 14th Sept 2006 (Thanks again, Drew). Be there.
UPDATE #2: Oh, and here's a nice review.
Ten points for naming the country of the pic above.

17 comments:

Andrew said...

Hi Byron,

I couldn't get to your blog last night, so something went wrong somewhere in the google empire.

An Inconvenient Truth screened in the Sydney film festival didn't it? You said you saw a preview ... are there further public screenings on the way?

Sweating on your reply ...

Andrew said...

I couldn't upload images last night either.

Drew said...

Glad to hear you liked it Byron. Bummer we didn't get a chance to chat about it afterwards.

Yes, it had screened at the Sydney Film Festival. The Greater Union site has it's release date as September 14.

The website is worth checking out too - it even has blogging widget thingies.

Neil Cameron (One Salient Oversight) said...

I did the research about 12 months ago (ie trawling the internet, not crunching numbers). If all the ice caps and ice sheets and glaciers around the world melt, the sea level will rise by around 70 metres.

If you live 70+ metres above sea level, you'll be fine.

Christopher said...

But surely if all the ice is melting there will be a few others problems to worry about even if you are living 80m above sea level.

byron smith said...

But surely if all the ice is melting there will be a few others problems to worry about even if you are living 80m above sea level.

Yeah, one or two...

Hey, did you know that 40% of the world's population gets its drinking water from (melting) Himalayan glaciers?

Anonymous said...

What's the pic of?

byron smith said...

Marty: can't you guess? ... I guess not. It's a little island in the Venetian lagoon with a cool little ruin on it. Seemed to combine destruction with rising sea levels.

byron smith said...

Speaking of Peak Oil, Rev Sam has an interesting post.

Anonymous said...

With all this talk of impending doom don't forget the very real possibility of a global (?influenza) pandemic. Potentially much sooner than peak oil or inconvenient truths. Could of course be a Y2K-type fizzer, but then again maybe not...

byron smith said...

Adrian: I see your even-more-pressing global catastrophe and I raise you, um, an alien invasion? (Don't you hate it when brothers have to outdo each other?).

Bird-flu was so 2005...

Though having said that, the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918-19 killed between 50 and 100 million people - more than WWI and WWII combined. Today, in a far more globalised world, a similar outbreak could spread faster and further. By the same token, perhaps reaction times within the international community could also be faster. Maybe.

...Oh, oh, oh - I see your alien invasion and I raise you a major meteorite strike.

byron smith said...

After reading Miranda Devine's review, I seriously question whether she saw the same movie. For discussion, see Christopher.

Anthony Douglas said...

So, are the ten points still lying around, even though you've pretty much tipped us off that it's Italy?

(Yes, I should be working on my sermon instead...)

byron smith said...

Bingo - that was quick! Ten points You must have an RSS feed on the comments of the pics and points post. I thought that it could be ages before someone came across that tip-off, which I only added this afternoon. How long did it take you to scan back through all the outstanding points?

byron smith said...

PS I should be working on my sermon too... What's yours on? Mine's on Luke 21 - the mini-apocalypse and the destruction of Jerusalem.

Anthony Douglas said...

Yes, I have an RSS feed, but as far as I can see, the tipoff has been there for months. I just happened on it while waiting on hold on the phone. Though I found something else which I'll keep up my sleeve...

My sermon - well, it's baptism-fest in the morning, so I picked a suitably evangelistic passage for all services: Isaiah 34 (oh, OK, and 35 too, and you can guess which we're actually reading).

Anthony Douglas said...

Oh, I get it. You tipped us off to the tip off. I didn't notice!