Nobel Peace Prize with an Agenda

The Norwegians have just awarded the Nobel Peace Prize to a UN panel and Al Gore, for their good work in warning about global warming. Me, I'm not a scientist, and am basically agnostic about the subject. It has been clear to me since I was in 6th grade that pumping millions of tons of gook into the air and water are probably not a good thing in the long run - and I was in 6th grade quite a while before anyone had thought of global warming. When I was in 7th grade I even considered studying the new-fangled subject called Ecology at the university (though by the time I hit campus, some years later, I had changed my focus). So getting mankind to be kinder to the environment is a sentiment I can share.

The Nobel folks, on the other hand, tend to leave me underwhelmed. This time also. Only yesterday I was reading in the Guardian (of all places!) about this British judge who had just revealed how Al Gore cheats in his film "An Inconvenient Truth". The Guardian, perhaps the judge, and even yours truly, were all of the opinion that calling people to better protect the environment, as Gore does, is an admirable vocation. Still, you would expect a wee bit more intellectual rigor to be an automatic requirement of Nobel candidates, wouldn't you?