Posted on 11/29/2006 7:34:31 AM PST by Anti-Bubba182
Billions of people could be wiped out over the next century because of climate change, a leading expert said.
Professor James Lovelock, who pioneered the idea of the Earth as a living organism, said as the planet heats up humans will find it increasingly hard to survive.
He warned that as conditions worsen, the global population which is currently around 6.5 billion, may sink as low as 500 million.
Prof Lovelock also claims that any attempts to tackle climate change will not be able to solve the problem, merely buy us time.
Given the dire situation we face, he urged people to drop the phrase "global warming," which has cosy connotations, and instead start to think of it as "global heating."
Prof Lovelock, is an independent scientist who first proposed the Gaia Theory, which argues that the Earth, like a body, is a complex and intricately balanced system which all works together to allow life to continue as we know it.
However he fears that as carbon dioxide emissions from man and the planet itself soar, the Earth will heat up causing water shortages, destroying life in much of the planet's oceans and making it impossible for plants to grow.
Prof Lovelock, who last night gave the 5th John Collier Lecture to the Institution of Chemical Engineers in London, said: "There is very good evidence of what happened 55 million years ago when as much carbon dioxide was put into the atmosphere by geology as is being done by us now.
"Temperatures zoomed up by 8 degrees and stayed there for 200,000 years then came back to normal."
He fears something similar may happen again, and warned: "if it does it is going to make this an exceedingly difficult century."
However Prof Lovelock said mankind has managed to survive previous climatic disasters of the past.
"There have been at least seven of these major climate changes before and we have to adapt," he said.
"It is going to be tough and there will be some evolution of humans during it.
"The survivors will be those humans that can make their way to refuges or Arctic places and survive there.
"I think an awful lot of people will die but I don't see the human species dying out.
"I would think a hot earth could not support much over 500 million."
He warned there are no simple solutions to global heating and there is nothing we can do now to "save the earth."
"People will try to do things but the way to really look at them is they are a bit like when your kidneys fail you can on dialysis - and who would refuse dialysis if death is the alternative?" he said.
"But we have to remember that all they are doing is buying us time. The problems will go on.
"Trying to take the job on of regulating the earth is about as crazy as you can get.
"It is something quiet beyond humans at this stage in their evolution."
Despite this people should do what they can to reduce their impact on the planet.
"There is no point driving around in a Chelsea tractor when you can drive a small car but it does not escape the fact that changes are underway," he warned.
Prof Lovelock's dire forecast for the future of the human race is far more pessimistic than the Government's own assessment of global warming.
Tony Blair told European leaders at a summit in Finland last month that it was not too late to reverse the effects global warming.
In an open letter to delegates he said there was a window of "10-15 years to take the steps we need to avoid crossing catastrophic tipping points."
This echoes the findings of Sir Nicholas Stern in his influential report on climate change.
In it he says there is still time to avoid the worst impacts of climate change if countries co-operate internationally.
Mankind has a tiny effect on the overall climate. It's pure arrogance on the part of many of these climatologists to believe that the relatively small amounts of greenhouse gases we are releasing into the atmosphere are going to cause a drastic change in climate.
Even more outrageous is the idea that the pitifully small reduction in how much of those gasses under Kyoto will have any noticeable effect.
The climate may change drastically in the future, but it's not going to be caused by man made CO2 emissions, and if it is going to change, our reducing those emissions isn't going to make a difference.
There are things we can effect in this world, and things to which all we can do is react. We can't change the climate. We can't stop hurricanes from occurring. We can't prevent earthquakes. We can't prevent tsunamis.
Mankind needs to learn that we aren't gods. Maybe sometime in the distant future we may be able to have a significant effect on the climate. However, at this point we obviously know so little about how the earth works as a whole that we're more likely to screw things up than fix them even if we had the ability to exert more control.
We need to concentrate on learning more about how the earth works rather than trying to justify predetermined theories about man made global warming when it is obvious that we simply don't know enough for those theories to have any real validity.
Yes, let us now engage in that noble task of having one child or less per woman, so that the muslims can take over the planet even more easily.
Now THIS is the thread where I wanted to ask what you all thought.
Or to put it very succinctly:
"Ain't none of us gettin' outa here alive."
Yes, but money is just a medium of exchange. Power is a similar aphrodisiac. One's desires can be achieved through either but power is the easier. (Like the old college motto - seduction is nice but liquor is quicker.)
Lemme think.. the EU, Middle East, leftists.. we should be able to make the quota. Yeah. Hell, we should be able to convince the liberals that this is true, and we won't even need to lift a finger!
Billions of people are going to be wiped out because of Islamist Jihadists, unless the West wakes up and smells the stench.
Right. Sign Kyoto, and all will be well. Except developing third world countries are immune from its provisions. Like Communist China for example. As Kyoto seeks to handcuff the United States, global commies press for our signature.
Funny how you never hear these guys who "sound the alarm bells" make that argument, though.
Au contraire. That argument is part and parcel of the enviro-wacko agenda.
And their target number would be 90%...
I'll be right back; need to set my alarm clock.
And your dental floss.
Unfortunately this is TRUE.
All hot freeper ladies willing to act out their sexual fantasies before our impending doom can contact me via FReepmail.
I wouldn't do that.
The new catch phrase is "Climate Change"....it could go to either extreme.
The only thing they know for sure is, it won't be nice out.
;-)
And you correctly state the purpose of the whole thing.
Slick Willie, to stay in harmony with his base, the loony left and the outright Communists, here and abroad, signed the treaty but never even submitted it to the Senate for ratification. He knew the Senate would embarrass him with their rejection.
However, expect the left to try again when they are stronger.
Right friend, and when you explain that fact to people, they just look at you mystified.
Yes, let us now engage in that noble task of having one child or less per woman, so that the muslims can take over the planet even more easily.
Who said it would be our 50%?
;-)
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