Oceans to Rise One Meter by 2100 says scientists

[DeltaASA16]

I studied this mess in college. The earth goes through these cycles. It's just part of the natural process.

Iceage
Glaciers grow
Glaciers retreat
Global Warming
Icecap melts
Coast disappears
Expensive homes flood
People drown or move inland
Then it starts all over again.

Sure there are patterns like that.. But you can't deny that releasing all these toxins into the atomphere, at rates never seen before in history, aren't destroying our ozone and forming a layer of "smog" around the atmosphere.

Surely burning fossil fuels which release toxins can't be a good thing? Just think about it.. Is it good to litter our atmosphere with dust, smoke, CFC's, etc?

[Katamarino]

Ice cores show that during the past 1000 years until about the year 1800 (industrial revolution, fossil fuels start being burnt in earnest), atmospheric CO2 was fairly stable at levels between 270 and 290 ppmv. The 1994 value of 358 ppmv is higher than any CO2 level observed over the past 220,000 years. In the Vostok and Byrd ice cores, CO2 does not exceed 300 ppmv.

Now, tell me that this is routine?

[v1images]

Looks like we will finally not have to walk miles over sand to get to the sea at skeggy anymore!

[indian airlines]

[conspiracy theorist mode]

Conspiracy Theory #527

Atlantis was a result of one of the cycles of warming and cooling as Paul described above. They had far better technology than we have today, and when the flooding started, they built a great big shield around their city. Then Poseidon went mad and killed everybody bwahahaha.

Sub Parts to #527: Porn should be outlawed because it is a secret weapon of the terrorist b@stardfvckers to distract us from kicking their butts. 9/11 never occured. the 767 is actually a giant nuclear missile being hidden by the US Government.

[/conspiracy theorist mode]

Tanuj, pass some of that over here, will ya?

Hehehe, no it's all mine.

Awesome new avatar, btw.

[assghanistan]

people adapt to the earth changing all the time. people will adapt to this. it's not like 1m of water is all of a sudden going to just rush up and submerge everything. as it gets closer, people will eventually either start moving further inland or do something about it.

[HKG-YUL]

people adapt to the earth changing all the time. people will adapt to this. it's not like 1m of water is all of a sudden going to just rush up and submerge everything. as it gets closer, people will eventually either start moving further inland or do something about it.

This reminds me of the movie:

"The Day After Tomorrow".........where will you be....?

[screaming_emu]

people need to look on the bright side. It will be a bit warmer and you wont have to go far to get to the beach.

[FlyingPhotog]

Surely burning fossil fuels which release toxins can't be a good thing? Just think about it.. Is it good to litter our atmosphere with dust, smoke, CFC's, etc?

Point taken, but - the atmosphere was much more clouded with dust and smoke during the epochs of the dinosaurs and more frequent catastrophic volcano eruptions.

[screaming_emu]

and everybody says "oh, its changing much more rapidly than it did a long time ago....uhh...I dont believe we had the NOAA back then

[FlyCharlestonSC]

uhh...I dont believe we had the NOAA back then

We did--the opperating base was an ark, though.

And they can tell you how fast the water level rose...


jk

[duplix]

It is true the earth goes through cycles. But while there is still a possibility global warming (yes "warming": on a global scale the average temperature goes up, and this is considerd as a fact and generaly NOT disputed) is a natural phenomenon, as climate models become more sophisticated, it is almost certain todays's (and tomorrow's) global warming is caused by human activity, and in large by the burning of fosile fuels.

The consequences of global warming are very real, and will become visible withing our own lifetime. Yes, oceans will rise and typhoons will more likely emerge. But the climate change caused by global warming will also cause shifts in global food production (and consequently starvations). The material and human costs are potientially huge. Nowedays, insurance companies are already trying to calculate the future costs of this self-inflicted damage.

There are two ways to deal with the problem. We could change our behaviour and burn less fosile fuels, or we could solve problems as they arise. It looks like the western world has chosen the second option. Even today, the Netherlands have already started building dams to counter the expected rise of sea levels.

But solving problems as they arise is not an option for most of humanity. While it is the industrialized world which gets the benefits of industrialisation and is responsible for global warming, it are 3th world countries which will pay the biggest price. A country like bangladesh is likely to be submerged withing a century, but unlike the Netherlands, it does not have sufficient resources to do something about it. Big droughts, like those in eastern Afrika or the mid-US(!) during the 80s, will not cause starvation in the west (as we have overproduction), but in developing countries.

And which benefits do we, in the west, have? We use a lot of fosile fuels. And we do that very inefficient. Take transportation as an example (using a large quantity of a finite, precious resource like oil for the purpose of going from point A to B is already in itself very uneconomical and unresponsible, but that is another debate). We use a SUV where a smaller car would do. We take a plane on short haul when a high speed train would be much more environmental (and economicaly) friendly. But we forget that this behaviour has a real cost in terms of human life. And we refuse to change this kind of behaviour (and chose to build dams).