Global Warming is defined as the increase of the average temperature on Earth. As the Earth is getting hotter, disasters like hurricanes, droughts and floods are getting more frequent.
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Over the last 100 years, the average temperature of the air near the Earth´s surface has risen a little less than 1° Celsius (0.74 ± 0.18°C, or 1.3 ± 0.32° Fahrenheit). Does not seem all that much? It is responsible for the conspicuous increase in storms, floods and raging forest fires we have seen in the last ten years, though, say scientists.
Their data show that an increase of one degree Celsius makes the Earth warmer now than it has been for at least a thousand years. Out of the 20 warmest years on record, 19 have occurred since 1980. The three hottest years ever observed have all occurred in the last eight years, even.
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Earth should be in cool-down-period
But it is not only about how much the Earth is warming, it is also about how fast it is warming. There have always been natural climate changes – Ice Ages and the warm intermediate times between them – but those evolved over periods of 50,000 to 100,000 years.
A temperature rise as fast as the one we have seen over the last 30 years has never happened before, as far as scientists can ascertain. Moreover, normally the Earth should now be in a cool-down-period, according to natural effects like solar cycles and volcano activity, not in a heating-up phase.
All these facts lead scientists to infer that the global warming we now experience is not a natural occurrence and that it is not brought on by natural causes. Man is responsible, they say. What did we do? Read more about the man-made causes of global warming in the following articles.
editor: Karin Lindinger
publishing date: April 30, 2007
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Readers' Comments:
Human race since the beginning of time has been the only living creature that hunts, kills or contaminates just for fun. Global warming is caused by our actions. We as humans are so stupid or insane that we don`t want to realize that only us can stop this situation, caused by ourselves. I think GW should be taken to schools, universities and everywhere were tyoung people are to give them the conscience that the problem is there and only together, it can be solved.
Sandra Pineda, Dominican Republic, Teacher
I agree that human activities accelerated the processess of earth's warming and the effect of this GW can lead to a more serious repercussions and disasters that will not only affect human beings but also the other living and non-living things that co-exist with us.
As co-creators of God, it is our primodial task to ensure safety and security of our planet. We have to refrain from destroying the earth to its very core for a minute and temporary compensation. We need to care and protect our planet for the sake of our coming generation. We must embark immediately our counter-measures to mitigate the problem.
It is true that we are not yet sure if the effect of GW to us is either good or bad, but why wait for the result? Why not prepare, prevent and mitigate now while the problem is still manageable? We should refrain from senseless talking while doing nothing to share our efforts even in our own little contributions. You know what to do. You must do it now. Before it's too late.
Jes Castillo, Philippines, advocate
What did we do?! are you stupid?! we're putting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every day and cutting down our "air refiners" (trees)! we keep on poisoning our air, land and water!!! more like the question is "what didn't we do to cause global warming?"
Anonymous Reader
If the source of the proble is the mankind, I'm completly in agreement that everyone of us have the moral obligation to do something in pro-this cause. The future generations could be the victims of this abuse.
Carlos Diaz, n.a.
Where are the references? There is no such thing as a solid established link between the human contribution to the GW and these events. We know that there is GW but no-one can be sure wahts causing it. Its a hypothesis based mainly on political rhetorics, not science. Furthermore we don´t really know if the GW is catastrophic. It could well be benign or even better for us.
Jan Lindstrom, Sweden, Aerosol scientist
