Homely Scientist

Okay, this bugs me.  Like, as I learned in the South, it really chaps my butt. Tom Evslin is on the "global warming doesn’t exist because the earth has been warming up for the last 12,000 years" (AlwaysOn, Fractals of Change)—actually it’s more like 10, but hey.  Umm, Tom, it’s been warming up because at the last glacial maximum the Northern Hemisphere was covered with freakin’ ice!

This where a little information is a bad thing.  Okay, one more time.  The earth does go through cycles of ice ages (glacials) and warmth (interglacials).  It gets colder and warmer on a semi-regular cycle.  But here’s the thing about what’s going on, we’re supposed to be cooling down now.  Also the rate of warming is unprecedented.  So it’s not that the Earth is getting warmer it’s how much and how fast.  It’s not that it’s a natural process, the greenhouse effect, it’s our contribution to it.  It’s not that we’re not certain, scientifically, of all the factors, it’s that we are certain about the effects.  The arctic ice sheets are melting extremely quickly, sea level is rising.

Science is a tough thing.  We like to be sure.  We don’t like guessing, but the rest of the world does.  I think regardless of what you actually think, we need to conserve and try to change things.  Or, frankly, we’re all going to be sorry.

Tags: global warming

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