Saturday, February 17, 2007

Global Warming is true but no need for panic as earth has been warmer before

Global warming is true. It is now proved nearly beyond doubt that the planet is warming up. But there is no place for panic. Earth has gone through a thousand cycles of warming and cooling through its long history and sure this time also the living matter on this planet will adjust as it has done for the past 3 billion years. We should not let media turn a scientific discussion into a panic circus as they did with something like Y2K.

For example what they don't say and we should know is that the earth's climate was very warm during the Miocene (about 17 million years ago) and when forests extended up to the Arctic about 2 million years ago. On the other hand there has been 33 glacial advances (ice ages) from 1.5 million years ago to the present. The last ice age ended about 12,000 years ago. In between we have had very warm periods like the cycle we are going through now. But if the cycles are any clue, we are heading for another ice age sooner or later and will wish we would have enjoyed the warmer climes of today.

We should also know that the Arctic was warmer during the Holocene (about 5,000 years ago) by up to 5C than present. Also the Arctic was as warm during the 1920s (up until 1940) as it is today. According to the available climatic information, from 1940 through 1975 the earth's mean temperature declined by about .25C before starting to climb by approximately 0.35C from 1977 to the present.

So despite that we are in a warming up cycle now, we can adjust and there is no reason to panic like it is the end of the world.

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