Wednesday, July 28, 2004
Glaciers in Peru:
The Peruvian glaciers above 18,000 feet are expected to melt completely whithin ten years. This must be the most dramatic evidence of global warming yet. Their current size is 25% less than a century ago. If the environment is changing this rapidly, it becomes very hard to imagine anything surviving. The eco-system generally takes much longer than the available time period to evolve to new conditions. Meanwhile, with China developing at a rate never seen before, they are estimated to have an affect which will cause fuel shortages within five years. These shortages are expected to be permanent. One thing is for certain, the world twenty or thirty years from now promises to be significantly different than the one we know now. The signs that the planet is in distress are growing exponentially. I find it very difficult to believe that there are still people who state that the current changes are not caused by humans. If they are not, then nature has decided that there are far too many of us on this planet so it is going to make it much more difficult to survive. We as a species have failed for some time to live in harmony with the environment. In the next few decades we are either going to change this dramatically, find another planet to destroy, or fundamentally cease to exist as a developed species. Yes, that's right, we are the virus which is the scourge of the rest of the planet. The rest of the planet needs an inoculation against us.
The Peruvian glaciers above 18,000 feet are expected to melt completely whithin ten years. This must be the most dramatic evidence of global warming yet. Their current size is 25% less than a century ago. If the environment is changing this rapidly, it becomes very hard to imagine anything surviving. The eco-system generally takes much longer than the available time period to evolve to new conditions. Meanwhile, with China developing at a rate never seen before, they are estimated to have an affect which will cause fuel shortages within five years. These shortages are expected to be permanent. One thing is for certain, the world twenty or thirty years from now promises to be significantly different than the one we know now. The signs that the planet is in distress are growing exponentially. I find it very difficult to believe that there are still people who state that the current changes are not caused by humans. If they are not, then nature has decided that there are far too many of us on this planet so it is going to make it much more difficult to survive. We as a species have failed for some time to live in harmony with the environment. In the next few decades we are either going to change this dramatically, find another planet to destroy, or fundamentally cease to exist as a developed species. Yes, that's right, we are the virus which is the scourge of the rest of the planet. The rest of the planet needs an inoculation against us.
# posted by Wil Smith : 7:02 a.m.
