Two major hurricanes in a month? Less?
Sep. 21st, 2005 05:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
conuly
I know it's hurricane season, but damn.
In the wake of Katrina, several people chalked up the severity of the storm to global warming, and blamed it on Bush.
While I'm willing to go along with "we're getting bad storms because of global temperature changes", I don't think it's fair to blame Bush for this. That's like blaming him for a lack of gays in the military. Sure, he's not helping the problem, but the problem started long before he came around.
Additionally, here's the sad (or not so sad, depending on your view) reality of the situation: We don't know for sure what's causing global warming. We know that pollution is a problem, we know that it *can* change the average temperature of the world - but we also know that, historically and earlier, the earth has gone through numerous warm and cold periods. Some of them were fairly short, while others were decently long. And within cold or warm cycles, there have been miniature cycles that were colder and warmer than the prevailing temperatures of the period - anybody remember the Little Ice Age?
I don't know what causes these changes. I don't know if the current temperature changes are natural or not. I *do* know that, whatever the cause, the planet can survive a warm period. It can even survive a mass extinction - this is the sixth one, meaning we've gone through five before. Indeed, I wouldn't be too surprised if humans can survive, unless the future is far more apocalyptic than I'd previously imagined.
Kinda sucks for the individuals in the way of the storms, though.
In the wake of Katrina, several people chalked up the severity of the storm to global warming, and blamed it on Bush.
While I'm willing to go along with "we're getting bad storms because of global temperature changes", I don't think it's fair to blame Bush for this. That's like blaming him for a lack of gays in the military. Sure, he's not helping the problem, but the problem started long before he came around.
Additionally, here's the sad (or not so sad, depending on your view) reality of the situation: We don't know for sure what's causing global warming. We know that pollution is a problem, we know that it *can* change the average temperature of the world - but we also know that, historically and earlier, the earth has gone through numerous warm and cold periods. Some of them were fairly short, while others were decently long. And within cold or warm cycles, there have been miniature cycles that were colder and warmer than the prevailing temperatures of the period - anybody remember the Little Ice Age?
I don't know what causes these changes. I don't know if the current temperature changes are natural or not. I *do* know that, whatever the cause, the planet can survive a warm period. It can even survive a mass extinction - this is the sixth one, meaning we've gone through five before. Indeed, I wouldn't be too surprised if humans can survive, unless the future is far more apocalyptic than I'd previously imagined.
Kinda sucks for the individuals in the way of the storms, though.
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Date: 2005-09-21 10:08 pm (UTC)I use e-mail comments, so I see both the reply and what the person replied to.
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Date: 2005-09-21 10:10 pm (UTC)It's all right, it just looks kinda silly now, because I deleted my comment right as you posted yours.
I hate checking my email, but love refreshing my comments page - I can see my comments, and those I've posted elsewhere.