An Inconvenient Truth is an American documentary released in 2006 centered around the climate change campaign that was created and presented by American politician and environmental advocate Al Gore. The film is a recording of a presentation that Gore has done “almost a thousand times” as he stated, in which he shares personal anecdotes and opinions which led him on his journey to make people aware of climate change, paired with a slide show with graphs, charts, and imagery to support his points. Gore identifies climate change as a moral issue over a political one, and stresses the consequences of climate change if there are no mitigating factors put into place.
The topic of climate change itself is an umbrella, underneath which comes not only the effects on human life, but the effects on an array of species, which includes plant life forms. Deforestation due to human activity leads to the loss of natural carbon sinks in the environment, which in turn leads to more carbon released into the atmosphere, which negatively impacts the global environment. These negative impacts in terms of plant life include loss of plant species due to inhabitable conditions, which effects many animal species, and in turn effects humans.
The film was a success, and became well known for its campaign against climate change and for describing to viewers what a world would look like in the near future if our carbon footprint remained the same.
Applied Plant Ecology Winter 2020 