[NatureNS] Global Warming (more)

Date: Wed, 11 Jun 2008 16:19:04 -0300
From: Stephen Shaw <srshaw@dal.ca>
To: naturens@chebucto.ns.ca
References: <F4C240B1-803F-4BBF-A00A-CF42F53B54F8@eastlink.ca>
User-Agent: Internet Messaging Program (IMP) H3 (4.0.3)
Precedence: bulk
Return-Path: <naturens-mml-owner@chebucto.ns.ca>
Original-Recipient: rfc822;"| (cd /csuite/info/Environment/FNSN/MList; /csuite/lib/arch2html)"

next message in archive
next message in thread
previous message in archive
previous message in thread
Index of Subjects

&amp;nbsp;I suspect that some people
Hi Paul,
Interesting opinions, but under point (4), apart from the religiously-backed
Armageddon-sayers, I hadn't heard anyone seriously make the extreme claim that
"the planet itself is not sustainable, but will be destroyed in the end, with
all life on it", at least not in the near term which appears to be what you
mean.  In the ultra-long term, the several astronomers on this network will be
able to tell us when the sun is likely to have expanded to red giant 
status and
to have gobbled us up which will surely achieve this end, but I think 
that this
is currently projected to happen several billion years down the road, not in
the near term.

As a result of projected global warming, water shortages, political 
interference
(e.g. Zimbabwe, Burma) but predominantly because of continuing massive human
population expansion, it is likely that many parts of the world will 
experience
increased famine based on unsustainable agricultural food production in the
near future, and that the resulting human deaths will accelerate into numbers
not seen yet even in the earlier Ethiopian crisis.  The extinction of current
animal and plant species that is already evident is bound to accelerate also:
some scientists have suggested that we are now at the start of a global mass
extinction period like those that have happened before several times in 
Earth's
history, but for the first time this one will have been precipitated by human
interference and competition.

Even so, no-one reputable has suggested as far as I know that all life will
disappear as a result -- even after the great Permian extinction in which >90%
of then-current species reputedly disappeared, life bounced back and subgroup
richness eventually increased even more.  The corollary, though, is that this
process of evolutionary replacement took many millions of years, and the new
groups that emerged were not the same as the old.  Once gone, the gorilla,
tiger and the U.K. Large Blue* and their particular genes are not coming back
in the same form.
Cheers,
Steve
*added for entomological colour -- butterfly now reintroduced from mainland
Europe, but is it exactly the same species, same genes?


Quoting "Paul S. Boyer" <psboyer@eastlink.ca>:
> Some points on the global warming issue....
.... 4. There are also bad principles which go largely unquestioned in
> this  discussion, which show the complete lack of economic 
> understanding by  the public, and even by people otherwise well 
> educated.  Two of these  are: the sustainability argument, and the 
> precautionary principle.
>
> There are very few resources in the world which are truly sustainable 
> indefinitely.  In the long run, the planet itself is not sustainable, 
>  but will be destroyed in the end, with all life on it.  It makes no  
> sense to eschew non-sustainable resources: just the opposite.   
> Economic analysis shows that the most rational policy is to use  
> resources, even non-sustainable ones, and the sooner the better.  
> When  considering sustainability, one must always take into 
> consideration  the time frame: products made from plants are classed 
> as sustainable,  but what about the soil from which those plants 
> grow?  How long will  it last?


next message in archive
next message in thread
previous message in archive
previous message in thread
Index of Subjects