Is the global warming that we are seeing signs of simply a cycle? Like sunspots or a wobble in the earth's axis?
First off, what if it is? It is still a cycle that has the power to drastically change the world and human life on it. Only about one-fourth of the earth's surface is land. A lot of that land is near sea level. Most of the world's population lives near sea level. So forget about storms; for the ice caps and glaciers to melt -- which does appear to be happening -- will drasticaly resculpt human existence on earth.
Here in the USA we are better able to cope with rising oceans, but if sea level changes enough it is good-bye Florida and a chunk of the Gulf Coast including Mobile, New Orleans, Houston, Corpus, and on the east coast New York City, Washington, D.C., and on all coasts the homes of a hunded million Americans. Perhaps in the case of D.C. and NYC levees and coffer dams can be built, but with a sea level rise of just three feet a big part of our country disappears, the most populous and industrialized parts, along with some of the most productive farmland.
Sea level rise can precipitate a war between Pakistan and India, between China and Russia, between Mexico and Central American countries.
My point is that even if this is a natural cycle, it can do a number on us and we need to do what we can to reduce harm.
But it's not a natural cycle. It is wholly or partly man-made.
The greenhouse effect was discovered and studied about 180 years ago. It has to do with the way that earth's atmosphere gathers and traps solar heat. The greenhouse effect exists and has been proved. Carbon dioxide is not the only gas that creates the greenhouse effect, but it is a major one.
Atmospheric carbon dioxide has been increasing. It's impossible that it wouldn't be, considering the volume of CO2 that human activity has put into the atmosphere since 1850.
You don't need a T-Rex in a Humvee. We're doing just fine all by ourselves.
One time I calculated that in Lubbock County, population 250,000+, we are throwing billions of pounds of CO2 into the air each year just by burning gasoline, diesel, and natural gas. Work it out for yourself: One gallon of gasoline produces about 22 pounds of CO2 out the tailpipe. How many gallons of gasoline do YOU burn every year? Multiply that by 22. Say you drive 15,000 miles a year; say your vehicle gets 15 miles per gallon; then YOU produce 22,000 pounds of CO2 per year all by yourself, NOT counting the natural gas and electricity used by your home!
Say Lubbock County has a hundred thousand drivers, all doing the same; that's 2.2 billion pounds of CO2 per year from Lubbock drivers!! NOT counting commercial trucks! All told, we in Lubbock county probably put something like ten billion pounds of CO2 into the air each year by burning fossil fuels for energy. All by our little insignificant selves in little old Lubbock.
Really, the effect is two fold. No. 1, you burn fuel that was stored underground for millions and millions of years and you are releasing the heat energy that was stored up in that fuel. No. 2, you produce carbon dioxide, and carbon dioxide when it is in the atmosphere traps more solar heat. So there are two ways the earth gets hotter.
Here's another way to look at it. Throw a log onto the fire in your fireplace. The log burns, right? The heat that comes from burning that log was the energy of sunlight collected and stored up by that tree over decades if not centuries. And in only a few minutes, you are releasing all that energy! Along with the CO2 that the tree took from the air over many years.
Same with gasoline, diesel and natural gas. In only 150 years, we humans have burned up and liberated much of the energy that was collected and stored by trillions of organisms over a span of 300,000,000 years. How can anyone think that such a radical and sudden change has no significant consequences?
