New Global Warming Talk by Al Gore.

Al Gore spoke again at the TED conference and presented some new information.
Video presented here.

I find his points often well made, even outright compelling. The evidence that he generally presents is certainly easy to understand and permit me to repeat, compelling. However, occasionally he makes a statement that sets of my skeptic alarms as a scientist. The one in this video being his example of the temperature of venus versus earth (and mercury). It bugged me because he said "It's not because Venus is closer to the Sun". I immediately thought "Whoa! Say what?!" and did some research. This article is what I found.

To give Mr. Gore much deserved credit, his overall point that carbon dioxide plays a huge part in Venus extreme temperatures is certainly accurate. But to quote from the article I just cited: "Interestingly, we can't simply blame a higher amount of carbon dioxide for Venus's fate" (emphasis mine). Venus history is complex and is almost certainly impacted by it's closer proximity to the sun, it's geology, etc., etc.

Now maybe I am being a bit of a pedant, but when it comes to presentations such as Mr. Gores, I am really sensitive to technical issues, particularly because he is using technical issues that I am often familiar with to explain the problem. I am afraid that the global warming naysayers/skpetics will find the technical weaknesses, and dismiss his entire point. Throwing babies out with the bathwater as it were.

Mr. Gores strength, in my opinion, is that he doesn't tend to fall victim to the hyperbole that other environmentalist groups might resort to. He doesn't really need to use hyperbole, his excellent points are out there in nature for everyone to see.