Friday, February 17, 2006
Mother Nature 1, Michael Crichton 0
On the one hand, we have evidence of the melting of glacial ice and rising of sea levels - a process that is progressing at rates faster than predicted by scientists who were labeled scaremongers, hoaxes and conspiracy nuts by Republicans and other right wing aficionados.
How do you think Mikey's book is going to be treated in, say, I don't know, 20 years from now? 10? 5? As I've said before, this is really happening folks. The time to take serious measures was the day before yesterday. And my sense of urgency is not just fueled by the fact that I live on a low lying island (Manhattan). Aside from the personal (I could always move I suppose), how would you calculate the financial impact if we lost parts of Manhattan, or they became periodically flooded or otherwise rendered inoperative. What if, instead of our over-reliance on fossil fuels, this prospect was the result of an al-Qaeda plot? Would we treat it seriously then? Just asking.
Greenland's glaciers are melting into the sea twice as fast as previously believed, the result of a warming trend that renders obsolete predictions of how quickly Earth's oceans will rise over the next century, scientists said yesterday.On the other hand, fiction writer Michael Crichton wrote a loosely sourced and thinly evidenced book that sneered at environmentalists and others in the "global warming industry."
The new data come from satellite imagery and give fresh urgency to worries about the role of human activity in global warming. The Greenland data are mirrored by findings from Bolivia to the Himalayas, scientists said, noting that rising sea levels threaten widespread flooding and severe storm damage in low-lying areas worldwide.
How do you think Mikey's book is going to be treated in, say, I don't know, 20 years from now? 10? 5? As I've said before, this is really happening folks. The time to take serious measures was the day before yesterday. And my sense of urgency is not just fueled by the fact that I live on a low lying island (Manhattan). Aside from the personal (I could always move I suppose), how would you calculate the financial impact if we lost parts of Manhattan, or they became periodically flooded or otherwise rendered inoperative. What if, instead of our over-reliance on fossil fuels, this prospect was the result of an al-Qaeda plot? Would we treat it seriously then? Just asking.
