The film 'An Inconvenient Truth' to be sent to all secondary schools.

[worldgonewild]

Announced here on David Miliband's blog . Good idea or not, you can let him know direct!

It really is cheaper to drive, pretty, I agree.

Especially with more than one of you.

Even with road tax, MOT, insurance and petrol.

Not to mention, I find the train a REAL nuisance with one SN child and one toddler.

There are never enough carriages on between Edinburgh and Glasgow, never on time, you have to pay to take your kids to use the toilet at the station, it's usually not working in the train, etc. etc.

Of course, I'm spoilt, because my first experiences of really relying on a train as transport was in Europe, where the train a) ran reasonably on time b) had enough carriages for riders c) didn't cost an arm and a leg.

I agree Expat - train travel on the continent really does spoil you.

And the thing aobut the car - the raod tax, inurance and MOT are all "fixed" costs - once you have a car, yuo can't opt in and out of them: so the only things that are variable, which you would factor in when copmaring the cost of train v car are the cost of petrol, the cost of servicing and the slightly increased depreciation that a higher mileage car would have.

When DH and I just had DD1, we went to Balloch for the day. On a Sunday, god forbid!

It wound up costing us over £30 and took absolute ages.

That was the last time he ever used a train.

I've used it for short jaunts alone if I'm going some place where I know I won't be able to get parked.

'Alone' being the catch phrase.

Otherwise, forget it. It's too big a hassle, completely unreliable and way, way too expensive.

"people will have stopped listening when it gets reall yimportant."

I thought it had got really important. Lovelock was going on about GW years and years ago. He was just a weird crank on the fringe of respectable science. Now his views are seen as mainstream, but it's taken 30-40 years for that to happen. There isn't much more time for it to get really important.

As for it being one-sided, well that's OK too because if you sit in a class-room full of 15yr olds and tell them they can't change their mobile phone every year because discarded phones are a major source of pollution, you tell them that they shouldn't expect to have their clothes washed every day because the extra energy and clean water it uses, they can't be driven everywhere and it's unreasonable of them to expect their own car in a few years time, they shouldn't want a foreign holiday every year, they should stop eating fast foods and buying throw-away fashion....in other words telling them they can't expect to join in with the world that the average teen sees as the norm....you don't in all honesty need an opposing view to Al Gore's.

For most people, and this is human nature, it doesn't start getting really important until it's too late.

Al Gore never claimed to have invented the internet! He was involved in draughting a bill that helped with some of it, or something. And he said as much.

I'd love not to believe in Global Warming. But I base a lot of my information on New Scientist, hardly 'Lentil Weavers Monthly' ... it really does seem to be happening. Certainly the climate shifts we're experiencing are unprecedented.

True enough expat, which is why people rely on being led in the right direction, supposedly.

oh but didn't you know that the New Scientist has a political agenda NQC.

Al Gore did claim he invented the internet. Of course he'd prefer to tell a different story since he became a laughing stock for making that comment.

I just think there are better sources like the New Scientist and I'm sure many others.

Um, no , he didn't. He said that while in congress, he took the initiative in creating the internet - as in, helped pass a bill. Lots of important net folks say Gore did a lot for the net, as a legislator.

Oh, that's not a biased link.

Like I said, he doesn't like to admit it now.

Ok, how about snopes ?

Or wikipedia?

Two lovely quotes:

"During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet." - Al Gore

"Yeah, and I invented the spellchecker" - fellow inventor Dan Quayle on hearing that Al Gore invented the Internet.

FFS our children are going to look back and feel so much anger at us for still having our petty little squabbles about whether it is actually happening or not or whether Al Gore said he created the internet or not and therefore his documentary is totally worthless. so let's just say, maybe, just maybe, all the scientists on the IPCC are wrong [or have a political agenda - what could that be - to take over the world using windpower and lentils?] and that very few scientists, employed by oil companies [no agenda there] are right. global warming might be a natural phenomena. So it might be. So it is best to lie back and let it all happen and not to do anything about it at all? It would seem in everyone's best interests if we did all we could about it, even if there is the slightest possibility of it being man made. because the consequences are too fucking disastrous to not act. For fuck's sake.

I think it's too late.

I really do.

There's no way you're going to get whole nations with billions of people to stop using coal, etc.

For aught we know, it'll all go apoplectic, bird flu will dessimate the human population and sort things out, wars will happen over resources and further decimate the population, etc., etc.

Where did this all start? With the Industrial Age?

Shall I go back and be angry with my great-great-great grandparents for kickign it all off?

I do what I can - recyle, walk to work, don't buy stuff with lots of packaging, etc.

It's going to make FA difference because 90% of the other 6b on the planet - and let's be honest here, folks, the chief cause of all this is human over population, so if you really want to do something for the planet, stop having more children - are going to carry on doing exactly what they are doing.

Many don't have any choice to 'go green', they already have to do what they can to survive.

And business. Yeah, Brazil's really going to start chopping down the rainforest.

Those floods in Jakarta right now? Lot of that is from human deforesting the area.

They'll keep going till it's not there anymore.

that was 'stop' chopping down the rainforest.

Sorry, my bad.

I think it is right that this is screened in secondary schools

Even if the predictions are OTT, surely it is still a good thing to teach our children (and some adults, namely most of the USA) that rampant consumerism and planet raping are bad things and should be avoided.

Who gives a shit if Gore tells lies, all politicians lie. This transcends politics. If everyone started doing something about it and shopping about for cleaner energy etc it would be better for all of us in the long run regardless.

Why are you getting so excitied. No one is disagreeing with that. I just don't like Al Gore as the spokesman. There are plenty of credible scientists to carry the message. And plenty of scientists to disagree.

Actually, I think the oil issue is still an issue if if you don't believe in global warming. The population is growing and the supplies are limited. So, absolutely we should learn to live on less foccil fuel consumption.

We should invest in nuclear for starters.

And we should invest in an affordable public trasport infrastructure. We need incentives to get on the trains and off of planes and out of cars. I'm all for these things.

Oh CD, you swore again. When is this going end?

By the way, my post that begins with "Why are you getting so excited..." was a response to Ruty. APpears I'm a bit slow on this thread. Perhaps I should go back to work...

I told you I swear ALL the time
Dh calls me potty mouth

did you get my email?

Yep,got it, I'll reply this afternoon.

Why am I getting excited? Er, cant think why, maybe because my children and grandchildren are going to have us to thank for messing up their planet. sorry about the swearing I just can't believe what some people are saying on this thread. And expat, the reason i am angry now is that it is still possible to do something, and now we have many alternatives and science has progressed far beyond the Industrial Revolution to enable us to choose many cleaner options. It is just govts and consumers don't want to do it. And I' m talking about rich Western consumers. China and india's industries may be causing a lot of problems, but the people themselves aren't because they don't consume termite fashion in the way we do. Just because yes, it is a bit late doesn't mean we shouldn't do anything. Two wrongs don't make a right.

Oh, so just let them all keep cutting down the rainforest and running plants off coal-fired power, but all you 'rich' Western consumers must be stopped!