2 Miller, G. Tyler Jr. Living In The Environment: Principles, Connections, and Solutions. 12th ed.Brooks/Cole: Belmont, CA, 2002, p. 593, 555.
"... it should depress us to live on a planet that becomes less complex and wild with each passing day, and it should depress us even more that we are the cause for that change," says Bill McKibben in his book Hope, Human and Wild (Little, Brown and Co., 1995) He's right. It should. It has depressed me. But it should also empower us. It should inspire us to strive to understand how our daily decisions affect the world we live in. It should inspire us to start reshaping our relationship with each other and with the living world around us. It should inspire us to reach out to help those who may not understand or who simply don't care.
3 Climate and Climate change on our Earth are dependent on a multitude of variables – carbon cycles, longitude, elevation, cosmic activity, atmospheric concentrations of CO2, ocean currents, ocean salination levels, cloudiness, air pressure, and so on. In fact, Columbia University oceanographer/climatologist Dr. Wallace Broecker believes that more than one million variables influence climate change. Of course, the point of saying all this is to admit two things.
First, climate change and the factors that influence it are ridiculously complicated and very difficult to compile and interpret with accuracy. Second, climate change on Earth has been happening for the entire 4.7 or so billion years the earth has been. These natural cycles of warming and cooling, directly related to atmospheric CO2 levels, have sometimes waltzed and other times violently shoved the Earth from periods of sever cold and wide spread glaciation to interglacial periods of moderate warmth, a condition similar to which the modern human age has so far enjoyed. As Miller notes, and consensus science agrees, the warming we are currently experiencing is most likely a "natural climate change trend enhanced by human activities".
We do know that human activity in the world is a significant contributing factor in the changes we are beginning to feel. Since the onset of the industrial revolution, humans have been releasing unnaturally large quantities of CO2 (amongst other things) into the atmosphere, primarily as a result of our burning of fossil fuels. Miller also reports that "the concentration of CO2 in the troposphere is higher now than it has been in the past 420,000 years and is rising by about 0.5% a year." Knowing this, it is with no big surprise that, according to NASA's website, the 4 warmest years on earth since 1890 have all occurred between 1998 and 2005. Making the connection between human activity and environmental change is a more difficult science to exact. The uncertainty and potential destructiveness of the impact of severe climate change over a relatively short period of time is a frightening concept to talk about, but a reality we are faced with. Of course, it's easier to say 'we're not part of the problem' or that 'there's no conclusive evidence to say we're contributing to this change'. Denial usually is the easy way. But, as the theorist would agree, easy is for people with no imagination and denial is for those who are not willing or not able to face reality.
For more information on human affected climate change visit the United Nations site: http://unfccc.int/2860.php
4 Arthus-Bertrand, Yann. Earth From Above. Editions de La Martiniere: Paris, 2002, p. 451.
5 For really practical information on how to lessen your impact as a consumer check out the book, The Consumer's Guide to Effective Environmental Choices: Practical Advice from the Union of Concerned Scientists. The book was written by Michael Brower and Warren Leon (Three Rivers Press, 1999). Follow this link: http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/
6 Bryson, Bill. A Short History of Nearly Everything, Broadway Books 2003. p. 425.