Wednesday, March 9, 2016

Stop saying humans aren't causing climate change


While I feel the quality of writing at Wired has really spiraled downwards, I was enthusiastic about this article on climate change: http://www.wired.com/2016/01/please-stop-saying-humans-arent-causing-climate-change/

Then I saw it was a reprint from the Guardian and that made more sense. Wherever it's from, the information is sobering. For instance:

-Of the 15 hottest years on record, 13 of them happened between 2000 and 2014.

-Last year smashed all earlier temperature records. Droughts and wildfires have been a consequence.

-The UN World Meteorological Organization announced that global climate is now one degree Celsius above pre-industrial temperatures. That's huge.

-There is only a 0.01% chance that this is due to natural variations.

Also from the article:

 “While considerably greater than cited in some media reports, the odds are low enough to suggest that recent observed runs of record temperatures are extremely unlikely to have occurred in the absence of human-caused global warming.”

In layman terms, the climate has gone catawampus and we're the ones who caused it. For sure.

Not that I imagine this will make any kind of difference. Many have known about this for a long time now and basically shouted at deaf ears. Others with true isonomy have known and been unable to do much as those who hold the strings see change as "costing too much." I don't deny progress has been made and that there are people who have changed their practices and behaviors to do something about this as well as steps being taken worldwide to at least prevent things from getting worse than they are.

In light of the data, though, the question becomes "will it be enough?"




No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.