On Sep 24, 4:20 am, "Laxman Belbase" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Most people think of climate change as something that occurs only gradually,
> however, with average temperature changing two or three degrees Celsius over
> a century or more; this is the rate at which 'forcing' mechanisms operate,
> such as the accumulation of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere due to the
> burning of fossil fuels or widespread changes in land use.
>
> But climate change has occurred with frightening rapidity in the past and
> will almost certainly do so again. Perhaps the most famous example is the
> reverse hiccup in a warming trend that began 15,000 years ago and eventually
> ended the last ice age.
Hands up all of you who "think of climate change as something that
occurs only gradually."
None? Well then hands up all of you who think that the economic system
is controlled by an "invisible hand" that will keep it stable. And
keep your hands up if you think that climate is the same. That at the
top of the atmosphere the incoming and outgoing radiation are kept in
balance by an invisible mechanism.
Well you are wrong. There is no automatic climate governor. It it
gets out of balance it jumps about until it reaches a new stable
point. That is abrupt climate change in action.
But just as the US congress will not act to prevent an abrupt economic
crash, neither will they act to prevent an abrupt climate change.
Waur a' doomed :-(
Cheers, Alastair.
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