Just what was NASA Administrator Michael Griffin trying to tell us in the National Public Radio interview, today, on Morning Edition?
"I'm aware that global warming exists," he flatly admits to NPR's Steve Inskeep. "I understand that the bulk of scientific evidence accumulated supports the claim that we've had about a 1-degree centigrade rise in temperature over the last century . . . I'm also aware of recent findings that appear to have . . . pretty well nailed down the conclusion that much of that is manmade."
Sounds like he's a believer in the message Al Gore has stumped for over the past 2 years (and eloquently articulated in what became the Academy Award winning film, An Inconvenient Truth).
However, where Gore and the science community have largely concluded global warming is bad for the planet, Griffin waffled on his assessment this morning, saying that "Whether [the current global warming trend] is a long-term concern or not, I can't say."
In fact, Griffin took a fairly strange tack in explaining his position to Inskeep, arguing that "To assume that it [global warming] is a problem is to assume that the state of Earth's climate today is the optimal climate, the best climate that we could have or ever have had . . . "
Interestingly, that's not the assumption I've made--nor have heard anyone else make.
Griffin goes on to charge that it's "a rather arrogant position" for people to accord themselves the right "of deciding that this particular climate that we have right here, today, right now, is the best climate for all other human beings."
The problems I find with that line of reasoning is that
1) no one has said today's climate is the best. Indeed, it probably should be a bit cooler than it is today if human habitability is going to be our yardstick. After all, sea-level rise, due to the current global warming, has already begun encroaching on human settlements, especially on island nations, reducing their terrestrial real estate. Moreover, current average-global-temperature increases are undoubtedly contributing to droughts that are making farming more costly in large parts of the globe, including much of Florida, Arizona, the Plains states, and California. Climate change is also fostering more erratic weather, in many regions changing the onsets of monsoons and their intensities, both of which can also negatively affect farm cycles.
2) humans aren't the only animals of value. People share the globe with zillions of other species--from mighty oaks and algae to such charismatic megafauna as polar bears in the Arctic and penguins in the Antarctic. The latter are already losing their habitat as glaciers and polar ice sheets have begun melting at rates unheard of in recorded history. The greenhouse gases that human activities spew are certainly contributing to the warming cycle that threatens these polar zones with precipitous change, even as our own regions are slowly altering. And
3) recent warming trends have spurred the spread of disease-causing mosquitoes and other pests. No one would argue that fostering the spread of tropical and other diseases would be a global good.
Over the past few years--and especially the past few months--the august Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has issued reports representing the concensus of more than 1,000 of the world's best informed scientists on climate and its impacts. They conclude that human activities are driving up average global temperatures.
Indeed, just last month, IPCC issued a report to policymakers on the likely impacts of current climate trends. It concluded, contrary to many conservative pundits, that a synthesis of the accumulating data show dire impacts are likely to begin soon. Not only will corals, which play an integral role in ocean health, bleaching--a sign of stress and vulnerability to sickness, but wildfire risks are going to skyrocket. Sickness and death rates in human populations are predicted to soon rise due to those emerging diseases, inability to deal with heat waves or unusual flooding and droughts. Grain yields will suffer will fall at low latitudes but climb a bit at higher ones. Unfortunately, the soils at higher latitudes are often not suitable for grains.
Overall, it says to expect major disruptions to agriculture, falling freshwater supplies, and increased risk of sickness and death from communicable diseases.
Why is Griffin waffling on whether this is a long-term concern? Because some of the prediction may not happen?
I'm betting Griffin buys life, fire, and homeowner's insurance. Why isn't he willing to acknowledge that the planet may need some insurance policies too?
Could it be politics? Can the fate of the globe afford to rest on politics instead of science?
This is truly food for thought...
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