The Times has an article about this documentary. Apparently the producer of The Great Global Warming Swindle, Martin Durkin, was supposed to have done a documentary on race, collaborating with a geneticist named Armand Leroi. Leroi was alarmed by bogus claims made in The Great Global Warming Swindle, and when he made his concerns clear to Durkin, the later replied by telling Leroi to go fuck himself. Leroi, concerned about Durkin's commitment to honest debate, has pulled out of the race documentary.

The Times also details some other things the documentary got wrong.

Claim: Ice core d[b]...

The Times has an article about this documentary. Apparently the producer of The Great Global Warming Swindle, Martin Durkin, was supposed to have done a documentary on race, collaborating with a geneticist named Armand Leroi. Leroi was alarmed by bogus claims made in The Great Global Warming Swindle, and when he made his concerns clear to Durkin, the later replied by telling Leroi to go fuck himself. Leroi, concerned about Durkin's commitment to honest debate, has pulled out of the race documentary.

The Times also details some other things the documentary got wrong.

Claim: Ice core data shows that carbon dioxide levels rise after
temperatures go up, not before
Fact: This is correct, but climate scientists have a good explanation.
There is a substantial feedback effect – initial small rises in temperature
lead to substantial release of carbon dioxide from natural reservoirs in the
oceans, which then produce much steeper warming later on.

Claim: Temperatures in the troposphere, the lower part of the atmosphere,
have not risen as predicted by the models
Fact: This was once the case, but it has been resolved now that
initial measurement errors have been corrected

Claim: Temperatures rose for the first part of the century, then cooled
for three decades before warming again. There is no link to carbon dioxide
Fact: Temperatures did follow this pattern, but again there is a good
explanation. The mid-century effect fall came about chiefly because of
sulphate aerosols – particles that have a cooling effect on the atmosphere.
These are no longer produced so heavily by industry because of environmental
regulations to combat other problems, such as acid rain

The issue isn't that Leroi is an expert on global warming and is debunking the documentary. The issue is that the film's producer has such a disregard for honest debate that it cost him a collaborator on a future documentary.

Facts 1 & 3 may be "theories" but if the film did not inform its viewers of these theories (that many scientists find convincing, probably because these are theories that compatible with empirical evidence) then that too suggests that the film was doing some swindling of its own. I have not seen the film, so maybe it did let viewers know about these arguments.

"This was once the case, but it has been resolved now that initial measurement errors have been ...

The issue isn't that Leroi is an expert on global warming and is debunking the documentary. The issue is that the film's producer has such a disregard for honest debate that it cost him a collaborator on a future documentary.

Facts 1 & 3 may be "theories" but if the film did not inform its viewers of these theories (that many scientists find convincing, probably because these are theories that compatible with empirical evidence) then that too suggests that the film was doing some swindling of its own. I have not seen the film, so maybe it did let viewers know about these arguments.

"This was once the case, but it has been resolved now that initial measurement errors have been corrected." --sounds like jiggling the numbers to fit my view.

Do you know of anybody with credible authority who makes this argument, that the troposphere measurements are just "jiggling the numbers"? If so I would like to know about them. But because they come to a conclusion you don't like is not good evidence that their methods are wrong.

Well now, were you there for the conversation? Who had disregard for whom? Leroi could have had the disregard for the honest debate. I do not trust the Times to be unbiased in its reporting of the story.

It was an e-mail exchange, and it looks like Leroi and/or Singh (another scientist involved in the dispute) gave the full exchange to the paper. If you read the article you would know that Durkin apologized for what he wrote in the exchange. Given that Durkin sent out TWO e-mails blowing off Leroi and Singh using obscene language. Durkin claims he was going through a stressful time, but based on reports on the documentary and this e-mail exchange, I have to say it does not...

Well now, were you there for the conversation? Who had disregard for whom? Leroi could have had the disregard for the honest debate. I do not trust the Times to be unbiased in its reporting of the story.

It was an e-mail exchange, and it looks like Leroi and/or Singh (another scientist involved in the dispute) gave the full exchange to the paper. If you read the article you would know that Durkin apologized for what he wrote in the exchange. Given that Durkin sent out TWO e-mails blowing off Leroi and Singh using obscene language. Durkin claims he was going through a stressful time, but based on reports on the documentary and this e-mail exchange, I have to say it does not look good for Durkin's integrity.

So you agree that the documentary did not "get the facts wrong" but you do disagree with their conclusions. I can live with that.

If the documentary pretended that scientists had no response to "facts" 1, 2, and 3 then I believe it was NOT giving an honest portrayal of the global warming debate and could be accused of pulling its own swindle.

come on, tell me the global warming community isn't trying to swindle people.

If you can explain the idea of carbon offsets, china's exemption from Kyoto, and how a $1 tax on a gallon of gas would fix anything..... all for starters, I'll buy your idea that its not a swindle.

By the way, the carbon offsets thing is what I want explained more than any other... and I know what it is... I want you to tell me why it does any good.

The film is titled "The Great Global Warming Swindle". If, as its title indicates, it is accusing those concerned about global warming of being "swindlers"

Yeah, and people on your side like to say "we have a concensus of scientists", as if there's a s...

come on, tell me the global warming community isn't trying to swindle people.

If you can explain the idea of carbon offsets, china's exemption from Kyoto, and how a $1 tax on a gallon of gas would fix anything..... all for starters, I'll buy your idea that its not a swindle.

By the way, the carbon offsets thing is what I want explained more than any other... and I know what it is... I want you to tell me why it does any good.

The film is titled "The Great Global Warming Swindle". If, as its title indicates, it is accusing those concerned about global warming of being "swindlers"

Yeah, and people on your side like to say "we have a concensus of scientists", as if there's a such thing as concensus science. I guess both sides are guilty of misstating huh?

Steve27Smith, the policy issues you bring up are not really relevant to what I'm talking about--did this documentary misrepresent the science behind global warming. I will say this: Just because you don't like those policy stands doesn't mean that their proponents are "swindlers". I will also repeat what I said before: the use of such a loaded term like "swindlers" does not indicate a willingness to honest and open debate.

Yeah, and people on your side like to say "we have a concensus of scientists", as if there's a such thing as concensus science. I guess both sides are guilty of misstating huh?

My reading is that global warming denial is becoming more and more of a mar...

Steve27Smith, the policy issues you bring up are not really relevant to what I'm talking about--did this documentary misrepresent the science behind global warming. I will say this: Just because you don't like those policy stands doesn't mean that their proponents are "swindlers". I will also repeat what I said before: the use of such a loaded term like "swindlers" does not indicate a willingness to honest and open debate.

Yeah, and people on your side like to say "we have a concensus of scientists", as if there's a such thing as concensus science. I guess both sides are guilty of misstating huh?

My reading is that global warming denial is becoming more and more of a marginal position both among scientists and among political elites. The debate is no longer whether or not human-made global warming is occurring, but what to do about it. The few reputable scientists (like Richard Lindzen) who deny global warming are probably analogous to Harold Jeffries, the famous geologist who denied plate tectonics. From what I've read about it, this documentary The Great Global Warming Swindle will not convince me otherwise...if anything, it probably confirms what I've said, if it engaged in the shenanigans described in the Times of London article.