April 10, 2006
The Heat Is On
As if on cue, another cold front blows in on Global Warming...
A sudden outbreak of common sense finds another article on the web about global cooling, warming, changing - let's cut to the quick:
The essence of the issue is this. Climate changes naturally all the time, partly in predictable cycles, and partly in unpredictable shorter rhythms and rapid episodic shifts, some of the causes of which remain unknown. We are fortunate that our modern societies have developed during the last 10,000 years of benignly warm, interglacial climate. But for more than 90 per cent of the last two million years, the climate has been colder, and generally much colder, than today. The reality of the climate record is that a sudden natural cooling is far more to be feared, and will do infinitely more social and economic damage, than the late 20th century phase of gentle warming.
Ahem. Global warming certainly creates problems, but it also comes with unusual benefits - extended growing seasons, increasing the amount of arable land, the amount of liquid water available as rainfall and usable runoff. But global cooling does not. Global cooling shortens the growing season, reduces the amount of arable land, affects the kinds of crops that can be grown due to intolerance of frost and temperature dips, and locks fresh water out of the ecosystem as ice. Indeed, global cooling will have a far greater negative impact on humanity that global warming.
Enjoy the beach now...
Posted by MEC2 at April 10, 2006 04:16 PM