Friday, April 22, 2005
Considering global climate change on Earth Day
Today is Earth Day. Consider that fact, and then consider the following, concerning the effects of the changing climate on the world’s food supply:
There are ominous signs that the earth’s weather patterns have begun to change dramatically and that these changes may portend a drastic decline in food production – with serious political implications for just about every nation on earth.
***
The evidence in support of these predictions has now begun to accumulate so massively that meteorologists are hard-pressed to keep up with it. In England, farmers have seen their growing season decline by about two weeks since 1950, with a resultant over-all loss in grain production estimated at up to 100,000 tons annually. During the same time, the average temperature around the equator has risen by a fraction of a degree – a fraction that in some areas can mean drought and desolation. Last April, in the most devastating outbreak of tornadoes ever recorded, 148 twisters killed more than 300 people and caused half a billion dollars’ worth of damage in thirteen U.S. states.
To scientists, these seemingly disparate incidents represent the advance signs of fundamental changes in the world’s weather.
I’m no alarmist, no tree-hugging, whale-saving, bike-pedaling, candle-using environmentalist whack job, but those are sobering thoughts.
Those words are from the April 28, 1975 issue of NEWSWEEK magazine. You can view a PDF of the article here, as reproduced at Junk Science.
Incidentally, the next sentence after the spot where I left off the quote above reads as follows:
The central fact is that after three-quarters of a century of extraordinarily mild conditions, the earth’s climate seems to be cooling down.
Yessirree Bob, just thirty years ago it was a scientific “fact” that the earth’s climate was cooling down, and global cooling was going to cause mass famine and storms and floods and tornadoes and maybe another ice age and OH MY GOD THE GOVERNMENTS OF THE WORLD JUST AREN’T DOING ANYTHING ABOUT IT!
Is any of this getting through to you “global warming” advocates out there?
There are ominous signs that the earth’s weather patterns have begun to change dramatically and that these changes may portend a drastic decline in food production – with serious political implications for just about every nation on earth.
***
The evidence in support of these predictions has now begun to accumulate so massively that meteorologists are hard-pressed to keep up with it. In England, farmers have seen their growing season decline by about two weeks since 1950, with a resultant over-all loss in grain production estimated at up to 100,000 tons annually. During the same time, the average temperature around the equator has risen by a fraction of a degree – a fraction that in some areas can mean drought and desolation. Last April, in the most devastating outbreak of tornadoes ever recorded, 148 twisters killed more than 300 people and caused half a billion dollars’ worth of damage in thirteen U.S. states.
To scientists, these seemingly disparate incidents represent the advance signs of fundamental changes in the world’s weather.
I’m no alarmist, no tree-hugging, whale-saving, bike-pedaling, candle-using environmentalist whack job, but those are sobering thoughts.
Those words are from the April 28, 1975 issue of NEWSWEEK magazine. You can view a PDF of the article here, as reproduced at Junk Science.
Incidentally, the next sentence after the spot where I left off the quote above reads as follows:
The central fact is that after three-quarters of a century of extraordinarily mild conditions, the earth’s climate seems to be cooling down.
Yessirree Bob, just thirty years ago it was a scientific “fact” that the earth’s climate was cooling down, and global cooling was going to cause mass famine and storms and floods and tornadoes and maybe another ice age and OH MY GOD THE GOVERNMENTS OF THE WORLD JUST AREN’T DOING ANYTHING ABOUT IT!
Is any of this getting through to you “global warming” advocates out there?
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