I am sure that many of us are sick of the weather right now. In the UK we are beset by strong winds and torrential rain, whilst over the pond, our North American cousins are experiencing unprecedented low temperatures as an arctic winter is taking hold and reaching as far as Florida. There seems no doubt that our climate is changing, and we are told that we can expect more of the same and that possibly worse is to come.
One possible cause of climate change is rising levels of what we call greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, and yet I am sure that the quantities of these materials has always been in a state of flux. Our atmosphere is probably cleaner now than it was in the nineteenth century, and every volcanic eruption will produce far more carbon dioxide than human activity tends to. However, human activity does make a significant contribution to the state of the atmosphere, that cannot be denied and yet the numbers of people continue to rise inexorably.
Even in the 1960s there was a great deal of concern about the burgeoning population, and yet since then it has more than doubled. People are living in areas that cannot sustain current numbers and yet aid pours in, feeding those people and encouraging further expansion, leading to greater poverty and more need for aid. In the developed world, technological developments mean that people are living longer, again putting more strain on resources and so it goes on. There is a struggle for survival, but this is no longer a driving force for evolutionary change, it is the species that is in trouble. Environmental change is usually slow, thus giving organisms a fighting chance to evolve, however rapid change as produced by catastrophic events leads to extinction on a vast scale. We are sitting on a time bomb, or even several time bombs if we include the super volcanoes and the possibility of asteroid collisions, and yet the things that we could do something about are largely being ignored in the hope that they will go away. This is not about saving the planet, the planet takes care of itself, it is about saving the human race if indeed there is anything left worth saving.
One possible cause of climate change is rising levels of what we call greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, and yet I am sure that the quantities of these materials has always been in a state of flux. Our atmosphere is probably cleaner now than it was in the nineteenth century, and every volcanic eruption will produce far more carbon dioxide than human activity tends to. However, human activity does make a significant contribution to the state of the atmosphere, that cannot be denied and yet the numbers of people continue to rise inexorably.
Even in the 1960s there was a great deal of concern about the burgeoning population, and yet since then it has more than doubled. People are living in areas that cannot sustain current numbers and yet aid pours in, feeding those people and encouraging further expansion, leading to greater poverty and more need for aid. In the developed world, technological developments mean that people are living longer, again putting more strain on resources and so it goes on. There is a struggle for survival, but this is no longer a driving force for evolutionary change, it is the species that is in trouble. Environmental change is usually slow, thus giving organisms a fighting chance to evolve, however rapid change as produced by catastrophic events leads to extinction on a vast scale. We are sitting on a time bomb, or even several time bombs if we include the super volcanoes and the possibility of asteroid collisions, and yet the things that we could do something about are largely being ignored in the hope that they will go away. This is not about saving the planet, the planet takes care of itself, it is about saving the human race if indeed there is anything left worth saving.
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