And once again I find myself wondering if this argument that is taking up so much cumulative human time and emotion even matters.
First, let me say I don't think "belief" comes into play here. Either the science will prove that human-generated industrial emissions affect the climate.. or it will prove that they don't, or it will remain so mired in political claptrap and emotion that we will never come up with a definitive, unbiased scientific answer.
So I don't pretend to have any idea whether human emissions are actually accelerating climate change. But I am beginning to suspect that, while it's an interesting academic question, THE ANSWER DOESN'T REALLY MATTER THAT MUCH. Certainly not enough to divide friendships and ruin family gatherings.
Before you start throwing sharpened icicles in my general direction, please hear me out:
By saying it doesn't matter, I mean that it shouldn't significantly affect our private and public choices about dealing with emissions, energy sources, and preparations for living with the effects of a changing climate. Here are some of my reasonings:
1) Whether human emissions contribute or not, we know the climate is changing. Always has, always will. Science has found plenty of proof that there were planet-wide cooling and warming trends on scales of both centuries and millennia before the industrial age, and even before humans walked the Earth. There is no reason to expect natural climate fluctuations will ever stop. Even if we stopped all emissions cold-turkey, today, the climate will still change. That means still need to expect and adapt to changing water tables and weather patterns, melting ice caps, etc...
2) Whether or not human actions (emissions among them) affect climate change, they certainly will have some kind of cumulative effect on the earth. Science has proven time and again that even the smallest changes in an ecology's chemistry eventually affects the ecological and biological balance. This is part of the natural order of things-also known as evolution. As long as changes occur slowly, the world has adapted to them. Some species go extinct, others evolve to fill the gaps... But we've also seen that if ecology changes occur too quickly, (sometimes caused by short-sighted human intervention) nature (and humans) can't always adapt fast enough. So it makes sense that we should probably practice caution, and minimize creating potential drastic ecological changes as much as we can, especially till we really know without doubt what the full impacts are.
3) There is a finite supply of fossil fuels. The earth doesn't make gas and oil as fast as we use it. This is clearly known. So regardless of ecological impacts of burning fossil fuels, we're eventually going to run out and need alternatives.... And it's probably better to have those in place and economically viable before we run out of the old stuff.
Just some random thoughts on a slow Saturday morning.... If you think the answer to the climate change question really does matter, Why?
