Late Night Fiction A blog of much perspicaciousness

Global Warming and the Human Factor

I wrote this little piece for my latest English paper, an argumentative piece. I've removed the citations but left the links of sites I referred to.

Global warming has been a highly controversial matter in recent times because of the number of claims by the government and other “officials” that humans are causing it, and the contradicting scientific evidence that says there isn’t enough evidence to prove it. I believe global warming is not solely caused by humans due to the fact that there are so many different factors that affect climate, and any changes to it, on planet earth.

Since the future needs to be predicted to see where this “warming” trend is going, we look to the past. Records on temperature from around the world provide as good of a model for change in climate as do current data being collected. However, most data has only been collected by humans for a few centuries. This is an extremely small amount of time compared to the many billion years that the earth has existed. For temperatures concerning years before humans were around or before we recorded temperature we have to look at ice core samples and translate them into what they mean in terms of climate at the time. This may seem a little unnecessary for the impact humans have on global climate, but it provides more valuable information than the past 100 years of data and industrialization does. Basically there hasn’t been enough time to see if this “global warming” is because of human activity or any other factor. Scientists simply haven’t had enough time to determine what the true cause of this warming trend is.

Many proponents of global warming state the increase of CO₂ in the atmosphere as another—if not the primary—reason that global warming is, in fact, occurring now. However, the data used to reach this conclusion is gathered by comparing the recent jump in average temperature worldwide with the jump in CO₂ levels. If these two datum were put together in a correlation, it would blatantly show a positive trend towards some kind of “global warming” and the possible “cause” behind it. But, as with everything in science, correlation does not necessarily mean causation. There have many times that the temperature on earth has warmed without such a large amount of CO₂ in the atmosphere as there is now. So saying that increasing CO₂ levels is a direct cause of global warming is like saying since ice cream sales go up at the same time the number of people drowning does, ice cream causes people to drown. There are simply too many other factors to consider when comparing these two trends, such as the season and how many people might be visiting—therefore increasing the likelihood for them to buy ice cream and/or drown. Likewise, when concerning global warming, there are many other factors to consider and one of these is the sun.

The Sun plays an important role in warming the Earth on a normal day; it provides plants with energy needed to carry out photosynthesis, and makes the Earth a habitable planet. On an average day the earth’s surface receives plenty of energy from the sun; in fact, it receives around 1,000 watts of energy per square meter, varying based on location and cloud cover (Johnson). However, there are other factors that play a role in energy we receive from the sun, and they involve what the Sun is doing, not the Earth. Sunspots are one such factor. They were discovered almost 400 years ago by Galileo as distinct, dark spots on the sun. Since then we have figured out the 11 year cycle that spots on the sun go through, increasing or decreasing during this time; however even this cycle can vary. In the late 17^th century, very few sunspots were observed. This was later known as the Maunder Minimum and lasted from 1645 to 1715. It also signaled the beginning of the Little Ice Age, which was one of the coldest periods on record in Europe.

The consequences of global warming, if severe enough, are known. By the planet’s surface heating and therefore the atmosphere, gases gain energy and form more severe storms. The effect that such drastic weather events could have on humanity would be catastrophic and could cause an enormous amount of problems from that point on. Sea levels would rise from ice on earth melting and major cities would be under water, causing the displacement of millions of people. Civilizations would be transformed for generations to come. However, it might not be entirely detrimental for this to happen. In the past, warming periods helped humans settle and develop new areas; Vikings settled in Greenland and named it that for a good reason—one that isn’t still evidenced today. In fact, as opposed to global cooling, warming would be much more beneficial. During the 17^th century, farms and villages in Norway were destroyed by glaciers that grew at a rate of up to 100 meters per year because of the Little Ice Age that was occurring at the time.

While there is a lot of observable evidence that the earth is warming and has been over the past few decades, there are simply too many factors that affect the climate of our planet. These factors, coupled with the relatively short amount of time that humans have measured climate on earth (geologically-speaking), is enough evidence to support the fact that global warming isn’t as big of a problem as it has made out to be in the last few years. We as a society and culture seem to have let a band-wagoning effect and the threat of potential apocalyptic catastrophe overpower our usual calm-minded hunt for reason and logic. If humans were the cause of global warming, it would be because of the CO₂ emitted from their lie-spouting mouths; not their SUVs. Despite the evidence, this doesn’t mean a consciousness of our effect on the environment isn’t important. But most of all, while the industrialization of our world over the past century has not been enough to cause dramatic change now, we will have to see what the future hold for us in terms of our planet’s climate.

Works Cited

http://www.climatescienceinternational.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=31:vanishing-sunspots-prelude-to-global-cooling&catid=1:latest

http://climate-change.suite101.com/article.cfm/global_warming_venus_and_sunspots

http://mb-soft.com/public2/energyso.html

http://www.botany.hawaii.edu/botany/news/warm_arg.htm