http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/07/21/ofcom_global_warming_swindle_adjudication/

British regulator Ofcom has rejected complaints that the popular polemical film, The Great Global Warming Swindle, misled viewers. The regulator said it was paramount that the public received alternative points of view - even if these were not endorsed by institutions or the major political parties.

While some aspects of the presentation "caused some concern", the regulator notes, such as failing to give guests time to respond after broadcast, the errors were "of such insignificance" that they could not be judged to mislead the audience....cont'd

http://www.greatglobalwarmingswindle.com/

In other words, while the show may have sought to mislead viewers, shows like this are part of the usual rough and tumble of public debate, so they should be allowed.

Sounds reasonable to me.

More about this here:

A Humiliating Defeat for Bob Ward and the Myles Allen 37 (http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=3328#comments)

A Humiliating Defeat for Bob Ward and the Myles Allen 37 According to that link, the adjudicator selected 4 of the 175 allegedly misleading features and found those four to be not "harmful" in their deceptions, if any.

One interesting point - the omission of certain relevant facts from the film was held to be OK because its audience was presumed to be familiar with them.

All in all, an interesting legal take: the truth or falsity of the assertions in the film are irrelevant to whether it misleads or not.

A bit shocking,
As the documentary contained factual mistakes which clearly did mislead viewers.

"For instance, parts of some of the graphs were actually made up, as the programme makers effectively admitted when they corrected the most blatant errors for later broadcasts."

Read more (http://www.newscientist.com/channel/opinion/dn14379?DCMP=ILC-hmts&nsref=top1_head_Comment:%20Why%20ruling%20on%20%27 climate%20swindle%27%20film%20is%20dangerous)


"Ofcom said that The Great Global Warming Swindle, which challenged the theory that human activity was the major cause of climate change, was "unjust and unfair" in the way it represented individuals, including Sir David King, the Government's former chief scientist."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2008/07/21/eaofcom121.xml

What is shocking to me is the fact that there is even a "debate" about this topic.

..then again there is a "debate" about Evolution.

You can show people the elephant in the room and there will always be some who say "what elephant?"

Andre is wondering when it becomes shocking that nature fails to obey the commands of the alarmists and let the globle cool instead.

As the documentary contained factual mistakes which clearly did mislead viewers. Few if any of those were considered - the adjudicator only bothered to evaluate 4 of the 175 specific complaints.

And the decision was very interesting in its conjoinment with a common pattern of the past generation: the physical reality was not considered relevant. The film is not "harmful" in its presentation of factual error and falsehood, because the film honestly presents the opinions of its makers, and [i[the audience is presumed to be familiar with the omitted facts[/i].

As long as the film presents the honest opinions of some legit political faction, and the physical facts are available elsewhere to its audience, it is "the other side" of a political controversy and not "harmful" in its deceptions - regardless of its own relationship to those physical facts.

The increasing trend of omitting physical reality from evaluations of bias, slander, deception, etc, is quite striking over the past generation of public discourse in the US.

"Ofcom said that The Great Global Warming Swindle, which challenged the theory that human activity was the major cause of climate change, was "unjust and unfair" in the way it represented individuals, including Sir David King, the Government's former chief scientist."
Here's (http://www.lavoisier.com.au/papers/articles/Illarionov2.html) an article exposing how the British Government's former chief scientist was operating...

All in all, an interesting legal take: the truth or falsity of the assertions in the film are irrelevant to whether it misleads or not.Mislead is your conclusion. Ofcom concluded differently (which of course is conveniently overlooked by many):In summary, in relation to the manner in which facts in the programme were presented, Ofcom is of the view that the audience of this programme was not materially misled in a manner that would have led to actual or potential harm. The audience would have been in no doubt that the programme’s focus was on scientific and other arguments which challenged the orthodox theory of man-made global warming. Regardless of whether viewers were in fact persuaded by the arguments contained in the programme, Ofcom does not believe that they could have been materially misled as to the existence and substance of these alternative theories and opinions, or misled as to the weight which is given to these opinions in the scientific
community.

"For instance, parts of some of the graphs were actually made up, as the programme makers effectively admitted when they corrected the most blatant errors for later broadcasts."C4 corrected mistakes. Can't say that from many, many mistakes made by AGW apostles...

In summary, in relation to the manner in which facts in the programme were presented, Ofcom is of the view that the audience of this programme was not materially misled in a manner that would have led to actual or potential harm. - -
- -
Ofcom does not believe that they could have been materially misled as to the existence and substance of these alternative theories and opinions, or misled as to the weight which is given to these opinions in the scientific
community. And so you see that, as I pointed out, the factual errors and deceptions in the film are not evaluated, but simply accepted,

along with those more than 170 of the 175 specific objectionable features which were never even considered,

and the whole thing treated as if it were a purely political issue, with two sides and opinions on both sides, and the physical facts granted on both sides as well as being known to the intended audience (that latter is an explicit assumption of the adjudicator). and the manner of presentation held to be not misleading so as to lead to "harm", while the content of the presentation is simply ignored.

Which is a fascinating trend, in especially recent political discourse dominated by the rightist authoritarians. Everything is a matter of opinion. Factual reality does not matter.

And so you see that, as I pointed out, the factual errors and deceptions in the film are not evaluated, but simply accepted,
You still don't seem to grasp the situation. Ofcom did the job assigned to their legislation - to determine whether there had been a violation of Rule 2.2, a possibility that none of the complainants seemed to have considered and for which their preparations were abysmal. They neither accepted or vindicated the program.Which is a fascinating trend, in especially recent political discourse dominated by the rightist authoritarians. Everything is a matter of opinion. Factual reality does not matter.With factual reality you mean flawed climate models? Or "An Incovenient Truth"?

The climate model of ozone dynamics is definitely flawed.
They didn't account for the large store of now illegal CFCs out there, and the inevitable black market, or the "need" for developing countries to find economic "solutions".

Ozone is the last thing we need to worry about, obviously.

You still don't seem to grasp the situation. The situation is as follows: a bunch of politically blinkered and scientifically immature people think this judge's ruling has something to do with the basis of the recent warnings about CO2 accumulation and its likely effects.

And they feel justified in namecalling and slandering those who don't.

That's easy to understand, it's just hard to respect.

The situation is as follows: a bunch of politically blinkered and scientifically immature people think this judge's ruling has something to do with the basis of the recent warnings about CO2 accumulation and its likely effects.
Ofcom is not a court. At the other hand, a real High Court ruled (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2007/10/11/scigore111.xml) that "An Inconvenient Truth" contained nine key scientific errors. Being concerned about misleading, did you ever adressed that here?

At the other hand, a real High Court ruled that "An Inconvenient Truth" contained nine key scientific errors. Being concerned about misleading, did you ever adressed that here? Back when that bullshit was the subject of something like half a dozen threads in this forum

and the usual claim was that there were 34 "scientific errors" found by that judge, and that Gore's film had been banned from British schools in consequence, and so forth,


and you were here, IIRC, and probably remember, which would make your innuendo about "did you ever address that here" a deliberate lie,

a few posters - including me - actually went through the dozens of items at issue in detail, the argument(s) Gore was making throughout his film, the overall situation of the British court, the various lies of the people misrepresenting the thing, and so forth.

Much as I recognize the value of repetition in propaganda, and your role on this forum of repeating BS until it takes on a life of its own,

I really don't see the need to go through all that again. I'm glad you've cut it from 34 to 9, and if you will cut it from 9 to 3, of your choice, maybe someone with a high boredom threshold (if necessary maybe even me) will repeat one more time on this forum exactly why those features of Gore's film aren't scientific errors, how it was that the judge did not say they were scientific errors, how scientific error is not involved in the judge's findings, the difference between Gore's argument and a scientific establishment of fact, the relevance of those features to Gore's argument, the relevance of Gore's argument to the issue at had (the scientific basis of the recent warnings by dozens of scientist about the recent CO2 accumulation and its various likely effects,if you've forgotten) and so forth.

Meanwhile: Ofcom is not a court. At the other hand, a real High Court ruled In the matter of the physical realities behind global warming and related possibilities of our CO2 accumulation, the rulings of "real courts", like those of adjudicators, sports referees, and the consensus at Joe's Bar and Grill, are interesting and worth taking into honest consideration if informed and reasoned.

Whispers: Swindle of the masses.