UNESP 2007

Global Warming: Get used to it

By Fareed Zakaria

The most inconvenient truth about global warming is that we cannot stop it. Please don’t mistake me a skeptic. I’m fully persuaded by the evidence that climate change is real and serious. Of the 12 hottest years on record, 11 occurred since 1995. Temperatures have risen by 0.74 degrees Celsius over the past century. (If that seems small, keep in mind that the difference in temperature between the ice age and now is about 5 degrees C.) And human activity appears to be one important cause. The concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has risen dramatically since the industrial revolution. Methane has doubled and carbon dioxide levels are up 30 percent since 1750. The projections going forward are highly plausible scientific estimations. The recent report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts that by 2100, temperatures will have risen by somewhere between 1.1 and 6.4 degrees, and as a result, sea levels will rise by 18 to 59 centimeters. The trouble is, if you accept all these facts and theories about global warming, it is difficult to see how any human response launched today can avert it. (…)

(Newsweek, Feb 17, 2007.)

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