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Global Warming: A Titanic Global Experiment?

-- Katie -- 02/07/2007

Former New York Times environmental reporter William K. Stevens wrote a great opinion piece in yesterday's NY Times. Stevens reflects on the sea change in scientific opinion on global warming since he covered the issue for the Times (he retired in 2000).

Throughout most of Stevens' tenure at the Times, there was still some skepticism about global warming. Although there was compelling research on global warming, many scientists were not sure yet whether it was caused by humans or a natural part of earth's cycle. But each successive report since the 1990's has had stronger evidence that humans are indeed causing global warming, leading to the latest report by the IPCC that humans are all but certainly the cause of global warming. With that knowledge, Mr. Stevens writes:

Some experts believe that no matter what humans do to try to rein in greenhouse gas emissions, a doubling is all but inevitable by 2100. In this view, the urgent task ahead is to keep them from rising even higher.

If the concentrations were to triple, and even if they just double, there is no telling at this point what the world will really be like as a result, except to speculate that on balance, most of its inhabitants probably won't like it much. If James E. Hansen, one of the bolder climate scientists of the last two decades, is right, they will be living on a different planet.

It has been pointed out many times, including by me, that we are engaged in a titanic global experiment. The further it proceeds, the clearer the picture should become.

With every successive year, we are experiencing hotter temperatures, shrinking ice caps and more storms like Katrina. And every year we are learning more about how our actions are affecting our planet. What are we waiting for? There are solutions out there to curb our greenhouse emissions. If we are not willing to take the steps to do this soon, we may not be able to stop what is happening to our planet.