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An Inconvenient Truth: The Scientific Argument John W. Nielsen-Gammon Texas State Climatologist Dept. of Atmospheric Sciences, Texas AM University Submitted to GeoJournal, November 28, 2007 In Final Form February 7, 2008 doi:10.1007/s10708-008-9126-z (c) 2008 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. The original publication is/will be available at . Contact information: John W. Nielsen-Gammon, Dept. of Atmospheric Sciences, Texas AM University, 3150 TAMUS, College Station, TX 77843-3150, n-g@ Abstract The movie An Inconvenient Truth is a powerful portrayal of global warming and its impacts. The main scientific argument presented in the movie is for the most part consistent with the weight of scientific evidence, but with some of the main points needing updating, correction, or qualification. The detailed argument relies almost entirely on past and current evidence and neglects almost all information that can be gained from computer models, perhaps because such information would be difficult for a lay audience to grasp, believe, or connect with emotionally. This places an undue weight on current events as signs of ongoing climate change: some such events are apparently not related at all to climate change, while for other specific events the role of global warming is difficult or impossible to establish. 1. Introduction An Inconvenient Truth (David et al. 2006) (henceforth AIT) is a documentary that features major portions of a “slideshow” by Al Gore interspersed with interviews and other vignettes. My discussion of the content of the movie is based upon repeated viewings and my own transcription of the movie. The slide