Here's a disclaimer: I'm as green as they come, and even I was left questionning the the principles of the climate change debate after Channel 4's documentary last Thursday.
Somewhere buried in the corner of my lounge, buried beneath the boxes of organic muesli and the hefty documentation for my new Good Energy account, I found my television and The Global Climate Change Swindle.
After 90+ minutes, I turned the TV off with my green world upside down. Climate change is actually caused by sun spots, and the whole carbon emissions issue was pushed by Thatcher as a way to vindicate her plans for nuclear power? It all seems to make so much sense.
A backlash from environmentalists was inevitable. Unfortunately for Channel 4, one of the people who objected to the programme was Professor Carl Wunsch, a highly respected oceanographer from the Massuchusetts Institute of Technology who says he himself was swindled into taking part in the programme.
His own discussion was taken out of context, he said, and he was misrepresented. He has written to the head of production company Wag TV asking that the film is never shown again publicly without his participation, and says that Channel 4 should apologise to viewers.
The full text of the letter was posted to the RealClimate website.
"I thought I was being asked to appear in a film that would discuss in a balanced way the complicated elements of understanding of climate change - in the best traditions of British television," he wrote.
"When a journalist approaches me suggesting a "critical approach" to a technical subject, as the email states, my inference is that we are to discuss which elements are contentious, why they are contentious, and what the arguments are on all sides. To a scientist, "critical" does not mean a hatchet job - it means a thorough-going examination of the science."
As just one example of his comments being "distorted by context", he said referred to his explanation that a warming ocean expels more Co2 that it absorbs "thus exacerbating the greenhouse gas buildup in the atmosphere and hence worrisome.
"It was used in the film, through its context to imply that Co2 is all natural, coming form the ocean, and that therefore the human element is irrelevant. This use of my remarks... is close to fraud."
A Channel 4 spokesperson was clear that the production company had made it clear that the programme would be a polemic.
"Channel 4 supports Wag TV in its rejection of Professor Wunsch's claim that he was "duped" into taking part in the programme or that he was misrepresented within it," he said.
"Their correspondence with Professor Wunsch clearly indicates the nature of the programme that he would be participating in."
"If Professor Wunsch does make a complaint we will look into that, but we are confident that he wasn't "duped"."
He said that science is furthered by discussion and debate and that it is Channel 4's job to give a voice to alternative views as part of that debate.
The Channel 4 has certainly generated some debate, but it is helpful to emphasise how polarised opinion is? Surely not. I feel more in the dark than ever.
