Project 4 part 1

An Inconvenient Truth was Al Gore’s documentary on global warming. The documentary was a mixture of footage taken during Gore’s presentations on global warming, and footage of Al Gore’s personal life. Gore’s documentary begins with footage from his presentation on climate change. He addresses the audience by joking about almost becoming president, and then begins his claim on global warming. Throughout his presentation, he flips through a slide show with pictures, graphs, and digital animations showing what global warming is and some of the affects it has in the world. Many of Gore’s personal anecdotes are incorporated throughout the movie. Some anecdotes he focuses on are his presidential campaign in 2000, and his childhood. Gore ends his presentation with a call to action; this is where he states his main thesis.

Al Gore’s whole presentation is about how humans have caused global warming and how as a race, we are not doing anything to fix the problem we are responsible for. In his call to action, Gore states his thesis: every single human being is, in some way, responsible for global warming and that each and every person needs to address this problem and then act to fix it. Gore’s slide show provides all the evidence that supports his thesis. Some subjects he uses as evidence are rising carbon dioxide emissions on the planet, melting glaciers and ice caps, and green house gasses blocking heat in the Earth’s atmosphere. Because Gore ended with a call to action and incorporated his thesis within that plea, it only makes sense that he would build all of his evidence before stating his thesis. With a thesis that asks for something to be done, it is more effective when viewers and listeners know why they should take action before they are asked to do so and that is why Gore’s thesis and call to action are efficient.

Gore’s presentation was also efficient because of all the graphs and animations he used. One graph that really stuck out to me was the graph Robert Revell created to show the rise of CO2 emissions in the atmosphere. Not only did this graph shock me, but Gore did a really good job of explaining why the CO2 emissions consistently went up and down each year. One of the most effective animations, in my opinion, was the animation that predicted what would happen to the world if Greenland or a piece of Antarctica were to melt. In this animation, Gore showed that the ocean level would raise 20 feet, causing many costal landmasses all over the world to be overtaken by water. This stuck out to me because the world is already over populated and I cannot imagine what would happen if humans had less land to live on than we already do.

Another aspect of An Inconvenient Truth is how Gore appealed to his audiences’ emotions. One way Gore did this was by making viewers take pity on him. Throughout his presentation, many anecdotes featuring his personal life were played. A good amount of these anecdotes featured Gore’s upsetting loss of Florida votes in the 2000 election. He also began his documentary by saying, “I used to be the next president of the United States.” The election of 2000 is now an historical event because of the recount in Florida and Gore used his misfortune in the election to appeal to his viewers’ sympathy. While this is a way to establish pathos, I personally think it was a cheap shot on Al Gore’s part. If he so strongly believes in global warming and making a change, his message will get through to readers. Instead of being confident that his viewers would listen to what he had to say about global warming, Gore felt the need to create a fallacy to attract his audience’s emotions. And he didn’t attract emotions to the subject; he attracted emotions to himself, showing a sign of weakness. While this was a very bad attempt at establishing pathos, Gore did appeal to his viewers’ emotions in some effective ways as well.

Gore established pathos in an effective way by using inspirational, heart-warming music. Subtle music played in the background of many scenes when showing how global warming has effected the planet. The music was effective because it was played during emotional footage, causing a more emotional reaction from the audience. This appeal to emotion worked better than Gore’s attempt to gain pity from his personal life because the music is less intense, more hidden, and a smaller aspect of the film. Viewers are less likely to address that Gore was trying to persuade them when listening to the music than watching anecdotes on his personal life.

Gore established ethos by using his personal character to prove he was a credible source. Some ways Gore established a name for himself were by using his political credibility, educational credibility, and personal interest of the subject. Gore showed a lot of footage about his political life and just like a campaign, he can gain a lot of support because people like him as a politician. He also created credibility by referring to his education throughout his presentation. He often mentions his college education and even refers to one of his former professors when speaking of carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere. I think another characteristic that helps establish Gore’s credibility is his concern for global warming. It is very evident throughout his presentation, just how much Gore cares about our planet and awareness about global warming. I think Gore established his credibility very well; his best way of doing so was by showing how much he has personally dedicated to awareness and the prevention of global warming,

I personally gained a lot while watching An Inconvenient Truth. Al Gore attempted to use ethos, logos and pathos throughout his presentation to persuade his audience to take action and be more aware of global warming. I think I can more easily recognize causes of global warming and avoid contributing to them now. A lot of the footage was shocking to me and has given me a new perspective on the planet Earth and how I will treat it from now on.