Just a little bit ago, one of the folks I see on my timeline posted a link, to a Forbes.com article titled “Sorry, Global Warming Alarmists. The Earth Is Cooling” It was posted without comment, so, I am not sure why this fellow put it online. It got me to thinking about the Environment, the Earth, and where we are at today, so I wrote the following reply:
Alas, it is too easy to confuse weather with climate. There are documented changes in the Earth, accelerated by our terrible Stewardship, that are causing huge changes.
Two big ones?
1) The temperature of the ocean has warmed almost 1.5 degrees in the past 100 years. That might not sound like ANYTHING to folks, but, it means there is a HUGE change to the ocean’s ecosystem, and the amount of heat energy stored in the environment.
2) The average temperature of the atmosphere has risen by almost 1 degree in the past 100 years.
Now…for y’all who are saying “but it is a cycle…and happens all the time. The Earth Adapts!” The fallacy there is that this is happening orders of magnitude faster than it has ever happened before. What used to take half a million years is happening in a hundred years. It takes time to adapt to change and the current, rapid change is not allowing that time. It is, essentially, this situation. you are driving down a road at 20 MPH, and come to a sharp, left-hand curve. You make it through the sharp turn with no problems because you have time to adjust your path. Now…you speed up to 100 MPH, as you are on a nice, straight stretch. Suddenly, you are on top of a sharp, right-hand turn. Because you are going so fast, and have so little time before you are in the curve, your tires break loose from the pavement, you flip the car and roll off into the ditch, where the punctured fuel tank dumps gasoline that ignites. I believe we are on that road, driving at at 100 MPH, and are in the last seconds of still having a chance to keep control of the vehicle, slow down enough, and get through the curve successfully.
In any case, even if one is a denier…what about how we are treating the Earth? Are we the good stewards that God calls us to be? We have filled the world with plastic, to the point that each of us eats a fair amount of tiny, plastic, shards, every day in the food and water that keeps us alive. We are seeing massive extinctions of animals that are a direct result of humanity raping the landscape, in search of greater profits. Look at the trend today of sending in heavy equipment to clear-cut the Tropical rain forests, for the wood, and to repurpose the land for agriculture (In spite of the fact that it is not very suitable for this use). Look at the decisions made by the current administration – to open more and more of the public lands in America (wilderness areas, parks, etc) to the mining and oil drilling companies, whose only goal is to suck the profits out of the land, and enrich themselves.
We are seeing an increase in the violence and frequency of storms – Look at the number of “500 year storms” we have seen around the world just over the past few years! the changes have caused the Polar Ice shelves to be undercut and thinned, to the point that we are seeing both a decrease in the amount of ice and snow at the poles, but, we are seeing ice sheets of unprecedented sizes breaking off and floating out to melt away into the ocean. We are seeing massive die-offs of coral, and marine animal populations directly related to the changes in the water column related to its increased temperature.
It may be too late for humanity. We may have contaminated the Earth so much that it is only by the extinction of the human race that it can heal. However, I cling to the hope that we will be wise enough to start taking the steps necessary to move the environment onto a path of cleansing and renewal, instead of death and destruction. How can we, as Christians, do anything less?
Oh yes, that article from Forbes.com? It vanished completely within hours of being posted. I suspect the editors of the site realized it was without merit and removed it.
God Help Us All
Bee Man Dave