Dear Editor:
RE: Climate doomsday, Feb. 28.
Although looking well researched and thought out, Jane Vandervliet’s main argument basing dire climate predictions on the past 200 years, when the Earth is over 4.5 billion year old, give or take, is exactly the reason mankind should be paying attention.
In my opinion, just looking at the simple yearly temperatures of our atmosphere and oceans, taken over the past 200 years, suggest climate change is indeed rapidly changing, during a period that coincides with the beginning of the industrial revolution (ie, man-made emissions of greenhouse gases).
Have a look at our disappearing glaciers and Arctic and Antarctic ice masses. And if you compare these rates of changes with those periods of change throughout the geological timescale, one will quickly see that this “blip,” as Vandervliet refers to it, is actually the canary in the coal mine singing her heart out.
Mother Earth is our biggest polluter, but she does her best to maintain a balance that keeps her healthy. Along comes man and that balance is beginning to tip. And when it does it’ll be catastrophic. But she’ll heal herself over time, a commodity she has an abundance of. And us earthlings could very well be eradicated.
But Vandervliet is correct in stating who can we believe, especially in this world of mass media, greed, and corporate governance influencing our current governments – and of course “fake news.”
One does not need a PhD in Earth sciences to see our world is being irreparably damaged.
I must agree with Vandervliet regarding plastics in our food chain, but consider this: just because we can’t see the emissions of “man-made greenhouse gases” doesn’t mean they’re benign and that climate change is a normal course of events.
Despite the scientific pundits, corporate and governments, being at odds over this topic, I look at man-made greenhouse emissions in the same way as discarded plastics; it’s all pollution and everyone should stop arguing whether “climate doomsday” is happening or not, and just clean up their backyard.
Remember folks, we’re living on the only “live boat” man has ever known. Let’s stop drilling it’s hull.
Brett Davis,
Orton