This past Wednesday I had the pleasure of talking with a number of distinguished guests that attended PRI’s Annual Gala. One comment really stuck with me – that the research done by our scholars is of great value, but their denial of global warming is not sensible. Since the Pacific Research Institute doesn’t really deny global warming, such observations were great conversation starters and allowed me to engage in meaningful debates.

Anyone who has the time to read what PRI publishes on climate change and the environment knows that our organization questions some of the mainstream science behind global warming, not the phenomenon itself. And we are not alone in this. As an article that appeared earlier this year in The New York Times reveals (From a Rapt Audience, a Call to Cool the Hype, March 13, 2007), there are quite a few respected and independently minded scientists, who reject environmental alarmism. Even though individuals such as e.g. Al Gore have contributed to spreading climate change awareness, a British High Court judge ruled that “An Inconvenient Truth” contains nine, in my opinion, significant factual errors.

For example:

• The assertion that sea levels will rise up to 20 feet in the near future is highly alarmist and unlikely.

• The melting of the snow cap on Mt. Kilimanjaro in East Africa cannot be expressly attributed to global warming.
• The polar bears mentioned in Mr. Gore’s movie have died because of a storm, not because they were unable to reach ice (allegedly melting and disappearing from where it could once be found).

Rather than being minor inaccuracies, those are vivid images that effectively impact people's imagination.

It is very important to engage in a careful debate about climate change and the dangers that it poses to our livelihood on Earth. It is irresponsible, however, for anyone to misrepresent facts in an effort to inspire rash policy-making. Through movies such as “An Inconvenient Truth… or Convenient Fiction?”, The Pacific Research Institute argues that the science behind global warming is uncertain, but the negative impacts of alarmist policies on individuals are all too real.