In a message dated 4/6/01 12:12:47 AM, paul@adventures.co.za writes:
<< Global warming is not a proven fact but it is an undisputable fact that
> the percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere has dramaticly risen since the start
> of the industrial revolution and the trend is accelerating.
Um, fair point, however it doesn't mean or prove anything. Your sample
is tiny (given the history of the Earth), and only spans the era when
testing has been possible, so we have no way of knowing whether ozone
depletion and warming isn't cyclical, or whether it isn't perhaps
declining in the long term (one or two millennia).
> The problem with waiting to see what the net result is going to be is
> that by the time we know for sure, it may be too late to do much.
Environmental eschatology is a growth industry. Since the dawn of human
habitation on this planet it's been popular to postulate that we have
reached an apocalyptic 'end time', we create myths and fables about our
own demise. We even have Chicken Little coining the phrase "The sky's
falling!" to fret over our fear of a fiery and sticky comeuppance.
Thirty years ago it was nuclear holocaust, today it's CO2 and global
warming, what next?
Regards
Paul Oxley
AfricanAdrenalin.com
>>
Paul
I realize that this thread is probably long since dead but I have been
out of town for the last couple of weeks at the the T/O and the EJS and
wanted to comment on your response. I realize that the composition of the
earths atmosphere has changed over time and dramaticly at that. Lets face it,
the earth was formed from a batch of intergalactic dust and the atmosphere
has gone thru some pretty dramatic changes along with it but these changes
have occured in what is frequently referred to as geologic time i.e. tens of
thousands of years up to hundreds of millions of years at a time. The
difference that is happening now is we are talking about a couple of hundred
years. I just think pretending that this isn't going to effect anything is
shortsighted at best.
I realize that the "Chicken Little" thinking runs rampant but it is
usually associated with religious nut cases but also extends into other areas
such as conservation issues. I don't personally subscribe to it, I actually
believe as a species we will somehow muddle thru but I am pretty sure that in
100 years from now we will look back at this time in history and consider it
the dark ages for environmental issues - we know what we are doing to our
environment but didn't have the will to change our behavior.
On a completely different note, do you have the contact info for the
Safari Centre in South Africa?
Nice web site BTW.
Bill
Great Basin Rovers
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