I’m developing a comprehensive Mongoose Traveller module focused on the “Lobopods of Mars,” featuring detailed lore, gameplay mechanics, and character creation guidelines, enriched with intellectual insights and narrative creativity.
Integrating mysteries
Including enigmatic elements like “the mother demon” into the module, planning a structured format with introduction, background, and scenario hooks, while incorporating fan-based supplements and new content for Mongoose Traveller.
Highlighting Mars’ characteristics
I’m noting Mars’ unique biology, highlighting new species and evolving technologies. This leads to outlining adventure seeds, essential game stats, and key NPCs, setting the stage for varied scenarios.
Below is a fan-created, unofficial Mongoose Traveller (2nd Edition–style) campaign module inspired by Lobopods of Mars, by Henry Edward Hardy. This module adapts Hardy’s retro-futurist alternate history, political drama, and subterranean mysteries into a Traveller framework. It is written for Game Masters (Referees) who want to run a plot-rich science-fiction campaign on a perilous Mars, replete with hidden colonies, fanatic cults, and possible discoveries of alien life.
Statting out Cultists, Environmental Threats, & Potential Martian Organisms
Running the Campaign
Tone & Atmosphere
Politics & Diplomacy
Exploration vs. Confrontation
Appendices
Appendix A: Timeline Highlights
Appendix B: Technology & Gear Quick Tables
Appendix C: Sample Maps & Location Ideas
1. Introduction & Themes
The Story So Far
In Lobopods of Mars, two stranded explorers—Marta and Jim—realize their water supply has been sabotaged, their base possibly infiltrated by a clandestine sect, and that new signs of subterranean life may lurk deep under Pavonis Mons, one of the enormous shield volcanoes on Mars. The entire setting blends mid-20th-century “rocketpunk” with advanced fusion drives, an alternate Cold War timeline, and a strong focus on survival and intrigue.
Themes to Highlight
Isolation & Survival. Mars is dangerous: limited resources, geological instability, dust storms that last for months, and sabotage around every corner.
Conspiracy & Betrayal. Hidden sects or “brothers” roam the lava tubes; clandestine sabotage at bases suggests deep espionage and infiltration.
Discovery & Awe. Hidden life forms that might upend all assumptions about Mars—the Lobopods or other subterranean “demon” biology.
Moral Questions. Do the Travellers try to rescue survivors and preserve fragile life, or exploit the new life forms for profit or glory?
In Mongoose Traveller terms, this module focuses on exploration, investigation, and politics in a mostly low-tech environment compared to the usual interstellar Imperium. You can easily drop this Mars “pocket dimension” into an existing campaign: perhaps it’s a lost colony world stuck at Tech Level 8–10, or a secret experimental settlement established by powerful patrons.
2. Setting Overview
Alternate Timeline & History
In Hardy’s timeline, the space race took a dramatically different turn:
1950s–1970s: Early breakthroughs in fusion propulsion and the first Russian and U.S. landings on Mars, both lost under mysterious circumstances.
1980s–2000s: The International Space Agency (ISA) formed. Massive colonization campaigns eventually led to three major Martian settlements—Bradbury Landing, Schiaparelli, and Mutch City—and scores of scattered corporate outposts.
2020s–2030s: Political realignment leaves Mars semi-autonomous under a Mars Secretariat and Mars Assembly with minimal direct oversight from Earth’s powers. Earth and Mars maintain uneasy ties through the ISA.
In Traveller terms, treat Earth as the “metropole,” with Mars as a newly developing colony. Strangely, nobody returns from Mars: the cost and danger are too high. The entire campaign is set on (or near) Mars: well-suited for an extended planetary campaign or a “weird outlier” in a larger star-spanning setting.
Mars Governance & Law
Mars Secretariat: 9 members with power to protect essential resources.
Mars Assembly: Large talk-shop forum with minimal direct power.
No Single Currency: Water and air are not sold directly but through controlling the hardware or supply. Some usage of Earth credits or corporate scrip.
Crude but Harsh Justice: Outlawry is the worst punishment. Railgun Veto from orbital stations can wipe out suspicious large gatherings.
Your Travellers might already be on Mars or arrive unexpectedly (if you incorporate jump drives). A “lost colony” angle works equally well: the party is stuck unless they unravel local mysteries.
Factions & Power Blocs
Three Settlements (Bradbury, Schiaparelli, Mutch): Each with a distinct political style and local militia.
Corporate Outposts: Tech-mining or life-support manufacturing, each with its own security or mercenaries.
Religious/Ideological Groups: Sects like the Adamantovy Brothers or various schismatic enclaves.
ISA: Officially neutral, controlling the sky and orbital platforms with advanced gear.
3. Life on Mars
Environment & Survival Mechanics
Use Mongoose Traveller’s existing rules for Low/Trace Atmosphere, Extreme Cold, and Vacuum Survival, with these special modifications:
Atmosphere: Pressure is so low that characters need vacc suits almost everywhere outside. Even “terraform bubble” domes only slightly raise ambient pressure.
Dust Storms: A planet-wide storm might reduce visibility to zero and hamper electronics. Treat as Poor Visibility or Total Darkness for Recon, heavy penalties on Sensors and communications. Extended storms hamper overland travel for weeks or months.
Water Rationing: Water is lifeblood. PCs should track daily water usage with added tension if rationed or sabotaged.
Gravity: Mars has about 1/3 Earth normal. Characters effectively have +1 DM on Athletics (Endurance or Strength) checks for short bursts of lifting or jumping. Long exposure leads to bone density issues if not carefully managed.
Technology & Equipment
Mars is roughly Tech Level 8–10, with a few cutting-edge pockets at TL 11 or 12 in ISA bases. There is advanced knowledge of:
Fusion Reactors (small scale, continuous power)
Hall-Effect Thrusters (for spacecraft and some heavy ground vehicles)
3D Printing / Micro-Assembler Tech (common but limited by material feedstock)
Travel & Communication
Surface Crawlers: Widespread, come in everything from personal ATVs to big rigs for cargo pods.
Zeppelins / Solar Montgolfières: Helium-filled craft, possible but rare. Storms are disastrous.
Radio & Laser Comms: Often short-range; relays exist but can be jammed or dust-blocked.
Economics & Barter
Currency is Ad Hoc: Barter for oxygen tanks, suit parts, specialized gear.
ISA Credits: The nominal official currency, but not always accepted outside major bases.
Sponsorship: Large Earth corporations or states sponsor certain groups or individuals for off-world missions, but friction arises with local powers over “ownership.”
4. Character Creation
Recommended Careers & Backgrounds
Scouts (Mars Division): Skilled in reconnaissance, survival, and can navigate dusty, bleak terrain.
Drifters (Outbackers): Desert survival, sand-prospecting, knowledge of local gangs or hidden caves.
Marines (ISA Security or Corporate Mercenaries): Possibly brought in to guard crucial resources or to quell local cult uprisings.
Scientists & Scholars: Volcanologists, geologists, or xenobiologists lured by rumors of Lobopods.
Rogues (Smugglers/Salvagers): Recycled equipment, black-market water deals, or infiltration into cults.
Skills in the Lobopods Setting
Survival: Vital. The difference between living or suffocating in a dust-filled ravine.
Vacc Suit: Everyone must have at least a level-0 in Vacc Suit (or equivalent skill representing Mars suits).
Recon: Dust storms plus sabotage calls for heavy usage.
Gun Combat / Melee: Firearms are prone to dust clogs; carbon-lattice sabers are popular in close quarters.
Engineer (Power, Life Support): Essential for base maintenance and crawler repairs.
Diplomat / Persuade: Dealing with the Secretariat, local militias, and “heretic” cults.
New or Variant Equipment
Equipment
Tech
Cost
Notes
Carbon-Fiber Staff
10
Cr. 150
Light, extremely durable. +1 DM to Athletics (Pole Vault) checks in low-G; does 2D damage (Melee-Blunt).
Plasma Cutlass
11
Cr. 5,000
Counts as an advanced “Energy Blade.” Does 3D+3 damage, ignores up to 4 points of armor. Limited battery.
Self-Heated Meal
–
Cr. 5–10
Vital for daily survival. Water needed to rehydrate if not pre-filled.
Micro-Hall Thruster
10
Cr. 12,000
For small vehicles or used as a jump pack in low gravity (requires Pilot (Thruster) skill checks).
“Hillbilly Armor”
8
Varies
Improvised plating for vehicles, provides +2 Hull/Structure. Bulky and prone to breakdown.
5. Dangers & Mysteries
The Brothers Cult (Adamantovy)
The Adamant (Old Believers) are a secretive extremist group descended from the earliest Russian colonists. They believe they dwell in a literal Hell (Mars) and must “purify” or “conquer demons.” They are well-organized and cunning, far from mindless zealots.
Motives: Destroy or control any evidence of new life that contradicts their dogma, sabotage rival bases, and forcibly convert outsiders.
Assets: Hidden tunnels, improvised but lethal weaponry, possible infiltration of official outposts, blackmail of local administrators.
Weaknesses: They’re short on advanced supplies. Their dogma can create internal schisms.
Underground Hazards & Encounters
Lava Tubes of Pavonis Mons: Labyrinthine passages, occasional pockets of near-breathable air (algae or unknown flora?).
Subterranean Geysers & Cracks: Sudden scalding steam or collapses.
Feral Machine “Scrapfields”: Old mining robots or half-sentient drone clusters left behind.
Possible Martian Life: The “Lobopods”
While Lobopods are only hinted at in Hardy’s text, we can treat them as a thrownback to the bizarre creatures of the Burgess Shale Pre-Cambrian environment on Earth, only 2 billion years more evolved.
Biology: Like the centipede-like Earth creatures from the Burgess Shale, only much more advanced. Some are Human-Lobopod chimerae, with human torsos and Lobopod abdomens.
Distress Call: The PCs receive a cryptic message from Base Zebra, indicating sabotage and infiltration.
ISA Mission: The party is officially deployed to investigate water theft in Pavonis Mons, rumored cult involvement.
Rescue & Recovery: A wealthy sponsor hires the group to confirm rumors of newly discovered Martian life, and quietly bring samples back.
Corporate Rivalry: Rival outposts suspect the Brothers are capturing or “weaponizing” an unknown organism. The PCs must intervene.
Adventure Seeds
Sabotage at Camp Zebra
The PCs arrive to find the base nearly deserted. Evidence points to infiltration of the water recycling system.
Various logs have been tampered with, the base’s auto-sentries are turned off.
Clues lead underground, where the “Brothers” have stashed stolen water.
Into the Lava Tubes
Long subterranean treks through phosphorescent crystals, pockets of active algae, rotted-out hush zones.
Occasional ambushes from cult scouts or weird life forms.
Danger of partial flooding (super-saline or acidic water) from below.
The Hidden Colony
The PCs discover a centuries-old settlement of “Old Believers.”
Commander Tuolong might be imprisoned or forced to sabotage the group.
Strange alignments with other cults (the “Peacock Angel” Yazidi group?), culminating in a doomsday confrontation.
Encounter with Lobopods
The PCs witness a colony of caterpillar-like creatures, some with humanoid torsos with the remains of several dead Adamantovsky monks.
Potential moral conflict: preserve them or destroy them?
Clash of Sects
Rival cults or religious enclaves might also vie for the “sacred secrets” under Pavonis Mons.
The PCs can mediate, exploit, or try to route them away from Mutch City’s water supply.
Suggested Scenes & Encounters
Base Ruins: The PCs pick through damaged water-tanks, battered labs, footprints leading below.
Showdown in the Junkyard: Confront rogue mechanical drones or auto-rifles in a cavern of rusted hulls.
Cult Ritual Chamber: Fire-lit ceremony using rocket fuel as “incense,” a chance to see the cult’s fanaticism up close.
Final Conflict by the Geyser: With both cultists and possible alien organisms swirling around, the PCs must decide how to handle the overshadowing threat.
8. Bestiary & Encounters
Below are approximate “creature” or “NPC” stats for Mongoose Traveller 2e. Adjust for your table’s style.
Attacks (Close Combat only): 2D+2 as “acidic bite” or “claw.” On a successful hit, it deals 1D damage ignoring normal armor (vac suits degrade by 1 point each round of contact).
Special: Drones will defend the Queen to the death.
Traits: Basic Laser turret (2D damage), or tools that can crush (1D) with a successful Melee attack.
Armor: 4 (heavy plating). If it loses half health, it malfunctions.
9. Running the Campaign
Tone & Atmosphere
Play Up the Isolation: Emphasize darkness, muffled sounds in thin air, the scrape of dust-laden suits.
Gradual Unfolding of Conspiracy: Drip-feed cryptic logs and half-mad survivors’ stories.
Hard Choices: Rare water, uncertain alliances, tension over whether any new life must be reported or suppressed.
Politics & Diplomacy
Mars is governed by a bureaucratic tangle. Characters who know how to bribe, cajole, or blackmail local officials stand a better chance of moving “off-limits” cargo or obtaining hush-hush gear.
Exploration vs. Confrontation
Referees can balance underground “dungeon crawling” with infiltration or negotiation:
Stealth Missions: Sneak into cult enclaves.
Diplomacy Missions: Rally corporate or city-based security to help.
Survival Missions: Sustain and re-engineer a failing outpost.
10. Appendices
Appendix A: Timeline Highlights (Condensed)
1970s: Russian & US Mars colonies vanish in storms.
1980s–2000s: Intensive colonization under the ISA.
2020s: Three big city-settlements, plus smaller outposts. Political crises lead to semi-independence.
2030s: Current day. Dust storms, sabotage, hidden life forms.
Appendix B: Technology & Gear Quick Tables
Gear Category
Example
Typical TL
Notes
Light Weapons
Underwater Pistol (Vac)
8–9
Self-contained ammo, short range.
Melee Weapons
Plasma Cutlass
11
High damage, limited battery.
Environment
Mars Suit (Standard)
8–10
Hard shell or tough fabric.
Vehicles (Surface)
6-Wheeled Crawler
9
Extended range, partial AI or remote control.
Surveillance
HUD with IR/UV Modules
9–10
Great in dust or darkness if not jammed.
Appendix C: Sample Maps & Location Ideas
Base Zebra Layout: Multi-dome arrangement, central airlock, labs, comm center.
Subterranean Maze: Long tubes with occasional branching corridors.
Hidden Cult Enclave: Reinforced meeting hall, living quarters, improvised chapel.
Geyser Cavern: A wide natural chamber with a scalding-water vent, possible secret entrance to deeper levels.
Closing Notes
Lobopods of Mars offers a grittier, near-future flavor than the typical far-flung interstellar scope of Traveller, but it retains that essential spirit of survival, exploration, and big moral decisions. Referees can drop Easter eggs about Earth’s alternate history—nuclear crises, “lost expeditions,” etc.—or keep it purely as a “lost world” scenario that your PCs stumble onto via a jump misjump.
If you want to lean into the cosmic-horror element: amplify the strangeness of the subterranean organisms. Are they part of an ancient ecosystem with a psychic link? Or simply hungry, spongy “extremophiles” waiting for new protein?
Above all, use the bleak red deserts, swirling storms, and claustrophobic tunnels to create an atmosphere both wonderous and terrifying. Welcome to Mars. Your every breath is precious. Good luck—and watch your water supply… and your back.
OMG! Here’s some really important news on CNN. Even the household sponge could be a threat. Amazing. Forget Iraq, I think I’ll go buy some home improvement, household security and entertainment items!
• Some who tried to sanitize germy sponges in microwave got unpleasant results
• News outlets got complaints of odors, ruined appliances
• Researchers advise that the sponges must be WET before going in microwave
Do several convenient half-truths make “An Inconvenient Truth”?
by Henry Edward Hardy
v. 1.06
It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.
–Al Gore, purportedly quoting Mark Twain
I really thought I would like, even love the new Davis Guggenheim film about global warming, “An Inconvenient Truth”. Not only was the film “scientifically accurate”, I read, Gore was relaxed and likable! I wanted to see this new, Gumby-like, personable and flexible Gore.
And I do like the new, new Al Gore. He is charming and very believable. Unfortunately the redacted version of his family and political history omits several “inconvenient truths”. And the scientific arguments he presents are at best anecdotal and oversimplified, and at worst, either speculative and unsupported by clear evidence, or are just plain wrong.
There are basically two components of this film. One is Gore’s slickly produced multimedia show on global warming and climate change. Intercut with this are a series of soft-focus, personal vignettes of the sort usually seen in half-hour paid political advertisements during presidential campaigns.
Who was Al Gore, Sr.?
We learn that Gore’s father was a tobacco farmer. And we learn that Gore’s sister, a lifelong smoker, died of lung cancer. And Dad and son were so remorseful they never grew tobacco again. This is very touching and well-produced, certain to give the sense that Gore has acknowledged, grown and learned from his mistakes and life experience. But has he?
There’s a few inconvenient facts about Gore’s family which go unmentioned. Far from being only a small to middling southern tobacco farmer, what we don’t learn is that Al Gore Sr. was one of the wealthiest, and longest serving members of Congress in his time, serving 7 terms in the US House and three terms in the US Senate. We don’t learn of Gore Sr. and Jr.’s relationship with their political and financial mentor, Dr. Armand Hammer, Chairman of Occidental Petroleum and arguably one of the wealthiest and most influential men of his time. Hammer was a fascinating character. One the one hand, his father, Julius Hammer, was one of the founding members of the Communist Party USA and Hammer himself was perhaps the only American capitalist to receive the Order of Lenin, the highest national Order of the old Soviet Union. According to The New York Times, Dr. Hammer’s first name was derived both from the name of the Dumas character, Armand Duval, in “La Dame aux Camelias” and from the arm-and-hammer symbol of socialist labor. (Not after the baking soda brand, though Hammer did later in life buy a minority stake in the company). On the other hand, Hammer was a confidant of and major supporter of President Richard Nixon. Hammer was convicted of making illegal contributions to Nixon and sentenced to a year in prison. However, he never served any time as he was pardoned by George Bush the First.
We don’t hear anything about how Gore Sr. became Vice President of Hammer’s Occidental Petroleum after leaving the Senate, nor do we learn of how the elder Gore went on the be chairman of the Island Creek Coal Company in Lexington, Kentucky. Nor do we hear anything about Gore Sr.’s most famous triumph, the passage of the Interstate Highway Act. This Act transferred millions of defense dollars into building the familiar system of interstate roads. This represented a huge transfer of wealth from the public to the private sector and a vast and lasting gift to the automobile, petroleum, and manufacturing mega-corporations. The car went from being a luxury to being a necessity. The commuter culture and suburbia were born. Vast tracts of undeveloped or agricultural land were paved over. Vast amounts of asphalt were produced, liberating vast quantities of carbon into the atmosphere and vast amounts of pollutants into groundwater and streams. Oh but we are oh so sorry about the tobacco. But no mention of these other things. Hmmm.
Who is Al Gore, Jr.?
So much for the sins of the father. But how about Gore Jr? Apparently he’s always been a liberal. At least one could easily form that impression from the movie. No mention of Gore’s support for the Hyde Amendment or his pattern of anti-abortion voting up to 1988. No mention of his enthusiastic support as one of eleven Democrats to cross party lines in the Senate to vote for Gulf War I. No mention of his support for the bombing of Yugoslavia, the US “humanitarian” invasion and occupation of Somalia, or other imperial misadventures of the Clinton administration. So much for Gore’s platitudinous mea culpas. They ring pretty hollow compared with the record of his very real mistakes. So much easier not to talk about these “inconvenient truths”.
What really causes the earth to be warm?
Gore attributes much of global warming to “the greenhouse effect”. One gets the strong impression based on gigantic charts Gore projects that rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are primarily responsible for the observed warming. These charts are misleading for several reasons. The charts are not to scale and do not have their origin at 0,0, thus making them very deceptive. They don’t clearly display the units of measurement. The data isn’t properly sourced. Finally, coincidence does not in itself imply or prove causation.
Ok now for the real science which Gore omits. This is really pretty simple, its all basic algebra and geometry with a very little bit of optional trig. Imagine we have a black ball sitting in cold, empty space. Now we shine a light on it. The ball will heat up until the energy it emits is equal to the energy it receives. This is called “thermal equilibrium”.
We can calculate the temperature of the ball and the frequency of the energy it radiates via a lovely and elegant equation called the “Stephan-Boltzmann Law”. This emitted energy is sometimes referred to as “black-body radiation” as it is the ideal thermodynamic description of a “perfect” radiator. The energy given in terms of watts per square meter per unit time is equal to the absolute temperature in Kelvin raised to the 4rth power times a constant, called the Boltzmann constant (= about 1.3807 x 10 ^ -23 J K ^ -1).
Well suffice it to say the most important input into the earth as a thermodynamic system is the sun’s energy striking the earth, measured as “incident solar radiation”.
However, the earth is actually a good deal cooler than we would predict if it were a classical black body. Whats up with that?
Well, the earth isn’t really black. It reflects back some of the light without absorbing and re-emitting it. The percentage of light which is reflected from an object rather than being absorbed is called the “albedo”. The higher the albedo, the “whiter” the object, and the more light it reflects, the less it absorbs, and the cooler it will be.
There are a couple of problems with the “greenhouse effect” analogy. First off, that isn’t how real greenhouses work. Glass doesn’t “reflect” radiation, it absorbs it, thus lowering the albedo, and increasing the temperature derived from the Stefan-Boltzmann law. Gore shows a chart showing light coming in, bouncing off the earth’s surface, then being trapped in the atmosphere and bouncing up and down. (The whole graphical presentation reminded me strongly of the 1955 Disney film, “Conquest of Space” based in part on the book by German-American rocket scientist Willy Ley). Gore quickly glosses over this part by saying “you all already know this”. However, it is completely wrong.
Carbon dioxide (and other, more powerful “greenhouse” gasses such as methane, which Gore omits to discuss in the film) don’t “reflect” infrared radiation. If they did, they would *cool* the earth rather than warming it by reflecting away more of the incident solar radiation, thus raising the albedo. In fact, the correct explanation is that they *absorb* more radiation, thus lowering the albedo and consequently raising the temperature of the earth a little bit. Most of the albedo however is derived from the albedo of the surface particularly where ice is present (as Gore correctly, but self-inconsistently points out). Another factor is that the incoming radiation may be in one frequency range, and the “black body” radiation at another frequency range, and the constituents of the earth and its atmosphere may reflect or absorb these wavelengths to different degrees. This effect is called “radiative forcing”. But Gore’s picture of the atmosphere capturing and reflecting light back to the earth like a one-way mirror — nope that’s just flat wrong. Everyone may “know it” but it is not factually correct (cf Gore’s “Mark Twain” quote above).
What factors contribute to keeping the earth warm? There are a number. There is residual heat left over from the formation of the solar system. (The earth is big and will take a long time to cool). As the earth cools it shrinks, and as it shrinks, it falls in on itself, converting some of the potential energy to heat energy, establishing a new equilibrium. There is thermonuclear heat from deposits of radioactive minerals. There is stored chemical energy which is converted through anaerobic metabolism by archaea and extemophile bacteria such as iron-oxidizing and sulphate-reducing organisms. There is photosynthesis, by which energy from photons is trapped and used to produce sugars and ultimately, ATP. A significant amount of energy is sequestered in the earth’s biosphere, and in subterranean carbohydrates such as oil, coal, coal tar, oil shale, and gas. There is energy stored in the form of angular momentum as the earth spins like a top, and as it orbits the sun. There is energy “produced” by the gravitational interaction of the earth and moon. The tides being one obvious example. There is electromagnetic energy produced by the interaction of the earths magnetic field (which we don’t well understand or have a good predictive model for incidentally), and the charged particles in the solar wind, an example being the aurora, or “northern lights”. There are underwater and possibly subterranean deposits of methane hydrate which may be significant in the thermodynamic and carbon cycles of the earth.
Most of the heat stored in the earth is, well stored *in* the earth. We basically have very little direct evidence of what is in the earth’s mantle, and no clear idea at all what is in the core. It is on average 3,950.5 miles to the center of the earth from the surface. We have actual data of what is in the first 5 miles or so (12,262m being the deepest documented “hole” (Elert, 2003)), or about the first 1/10 of 1% of the surface. Below that, its all pretty speculative. And yet almost all of the earths stored heat is stored in the terrestrial rock and underlying structures whatever they may be. Shouldn’t we get a better understanding of how heat and carbon are sequestrated and released in the earth itself, before we say as Gore suggests that the science of the issue is settled, we know exactly what to do to fix the problems, and we lack only the political will to carry through?
Next in importance to the lithosphere in terms of the earth’s heat transport system, is the hydrosphere, the oceans, lakes, and rivers. We are just beginning to understand how ocean currents transport heat and chemicals, and we have no strong predictive model relating the transport of heat within the hydrosphere to heat transport in the lithosphere. Should we not also study the oceans more thoroughly before we declare that we know enough to solve the issues?
And the atmosphere. How well do we really understand it? Not well. Can we with certainty predict what the mean surface temperature on the earth will be in 2010? Or 2100? We don’t have a strong predictive model which doesn’t break down fairly fast compared to real data. Gore points out that the ten warmest years on record occurred during the past 14 years. But what about those other four years? If there was a constant heating going on, the increase, one might reason, should be constant. Clearly there are some hidden variables, the huge one being… we don’t have a good objective measure of the energy output of the sun. And we don’t really have more than a clue about how the sun works. We have the general idea that it works by hydrogen fusion, but there is the nagging problem of the “missing neutrinos”. A big huge problem for studying the thermodynamics of the earth since the major input into the system is incident solar radiation. [However, see Solving the Mystery of the Missing Neutrinos, http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/articles/bahcall/]
We don’t understand why the Sun’s corona is is 2 million degrees hotter than the surface. We don’t well understand or have a good predictive model of sunspots or solar flares. We understand little about the sun with certainty. Do we really know enough about stars like our Sun to be able to predict, and if necessary, modify its behavior? Is all the science settled and we just need political will?
Finally, Gore uses words and pictures to strongly imply (although he is careful not to state it categorically) that Hurricane Katrina was caused by global warming. That’s a big assumption and really not supportable based on the evidence.
The Gore Sound-and-Light Show
In September of 2005, Al Gore spoke to the Sierra Club and said, “We must disenthrall ourselves with the sound-and-light show that has diverted the attentions of our great democracy from the important issues and challenges of our day.” Indeed we must.
We really don’t understand what the consequences of the massive deforestation, species die-offs, and fossil fuel orgy of the last century will be. It could have little long-term effect as the earth and biosphere’s homeostatic mechanisms are probably (hopefully!) orders of magnitude stronger than whatever good or harm man can yet produce. The earth may reach a new, quasi-stable equilibrium at a higher temperature, as in the Carboniferous Period when the earth is believed to have had no permanent icecaps. It may result in runaway heating of the earth which boils the oceans and turns the Earth into another Venus. Human activity may even trigger the collapse of the biosphere and a catastrophic deep-freeze as in the “snowball earth” hypothesis of Harvard scientist Paul Hoffman (Hoffman and Schrag, 1999). The fact is we don’t know what effect our human depredations on the environment will bring. And thus in our ignorance we should try to follow the first principle of “do no harm”. And second, we should really try to figure out how our terrestrial and solar systems work. We should not offer false certainty or false hope however. Whatever is going on with the climate and the biosphere whether it is of human origin or causation or not is already too big an effect for our primitive society at our low technological level to remediate or “fix”. So let us walk softly on the earth, all learn to do the math and science, and let us all hope for the best and prepare for the worst.
“An Inconvenient Truth” is a beautifully produced and presented, but misleading and self-serving compilation of half-truths, omissions, oversimplifications, and misrepresentations. Not recommended.
Scanlyze is an online magazine of essays, commentary, satire, and analysis. Were we half as clever, for inspiration we would take Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, Swift, Montaigne, or Seneca.
“The men who create power make an indispensable contribution to the Nation’s greatness, but the men who question power make a contribution just as indispensable, especially when that questioning is disinterested, for they determine whether we use power or power uses us.”
John F. Kennedy, October 26, 1963
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