date: Wed, 7 Sep 2005 13:56:57 +0100
from: "Jonathan Renouf" <jonathan.renouf@bbc.co.uk>
subject: Final thoughts
to: "Keith Briffa" <k.briffa@uea.ac.uk>

   Hi Keith,
   Good to talk to you this morning. Just a few thoughts to reiterate what we're hoping to get
   out of filming tomorrow.
   1) Your interview appears at a crucial point in the film. Up until now our presenter (Paul
   Rose, he'll be there tomorrow) has followed two conflicting thoughts. On the one hand he's
   understood that the world is currently getting warmer. But on the other he's discovered
   lots of historical stories (the Bronze Age, the MWP, the LIA) which tell him that climate
   changes naturally all the time. In trying to resolve this paradox he's come across this
   thing called the hockey stick curve, and he's come to you to explain it to him.

   2) Your essential job is to "prove" to Paul that what we're experiencing now is NOT just
   another of those natural fluctuations we've seen in the past. The hockey stick curve is a
   crucial piece of evidence because it shows how abnormal the present period is - the present
   warming is unprecedented in speed and amplitude, something like that. This is a very big
   moment in the film when Paul is finally convinced of the reality of man made global
   warming.

   3) The hockey stick curve shows that what Paul thought were big climate events (the Bronze
   Age maximum, the MWP, the LIA) actually when looked at in a global context weren't quite as
   dramatic as he thought. They're there, but they are nothing like as sudden or big.

   4) Paul can question you on things like: How reliable is the hockey stick curve? How do you
   work out past climate (cue for you to talk about proxies)? What drives all the "natural"
   fluctations in climate (this can be answered in very broad terms eg it's down to changes in
   the sun's output, volcanoes etc)

   5) In terms of filming my first choice is to do it as a projection in Zicer, where you show
   the Mann curve, then flick up as many other ones as you think are important (within
   reason!) and elaborate the point that what's happening now is unprecedented compared to
   these historic records. In my ideal world, you walk right up to the projector image and
   point things out on the screen, with parts of the projected image falling on your heads and
   shoulders. Stills of tree rings or anything else climate related eg ice cores, corals,
   would also work as powerpoints, because you could talk about them as egs of proxies.

   Hopefully this makes it clear what I'm trying to achieve.
   Look forward to tomorrow.
   All best
   Jonathan

   Jonathan Renouf
   Series Producer
   Science Department
   201 Wood Lane
   London W12 7TS
   Tel: 44-20-8752-5695
   Fax: 44-20-8752-7534
   Mob: 07739-920-490
   Email: jonathan.renouf@bbc.co.uk
   http://www.bbc.co.uk/
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