Rate of change can be lethal

Fact One: All science investigations indicate the earth has never increased its concentration of carbon dioxide and methane as fast as now. As a result, the earth is rapidly warming.

Myth One: There is no need to act, the earth has been colder, and it has been hotter before.

This is an example of the half-lie. Yes, the earth has been hotter and colder, but this is not the issue. The issue is the RATE of temperature change.

The temperature always tracks hotter with rises in carbon dioxide and methane. The earth’s transitions from ice age to warm and back takes approximately 100,000 years of slowly increasing or decreasing temperature in lockstep with the slowly increasing or decreasing greenhouse gasses. Even these slow changes meant some plants and animals were scheduled for extinction. What took tens of thousands of years to warm in our not so distant past is now happening in decades.

Here is a personal analogy using a rate of change, i.e. speed deceleration.  When driving, I like to decelerate slowly. It is easier on the vehicle, passengers, and pets. But I have decelerated quickly. In one of a couple accidents, I mashed into another car at about 45 mph slowing to zero in a few feet. Using my head to full advantage, I decelerated by snapping off the steering wheel with my cranial ram.

By the grace of God and seat belts I walked away from two massive rate decelerations. Prior to the impacts I yelled out, “You bought the farm this time Morrow!” and “You cannot survive this one!”. Lucky for me, my anticipated extinction was not in the cards.

When the earth warms slowly creatures can fly, walk, and slither to new cooler homes. Even plants can move by seed dispersal. Animals and plants can evolve and adapt given enough time.

But, if earth warms too fast, the chances of successful migration and successful re-establishment quickly drop.

Why have we been duped by the myth a warmer earth is OK? It is a human trait. We naturally simplify everything we can. This is good to a certain extent. We cannot spend the whole day figuring out every little detail of every event around us. I simplify as much as possible to move the day along.

But oversimplification takes simplification to the irrational. Logic goes overboard if we oversimplify. People who want to deceive us plant oversimplified answers in our brains when it serves their purposes. This, the most successful myth, is easy to use on us because only biologists know, very well, rapid temperature change of our world is lethal to its critters and eventually to us.

We, including me, fell for the oversimplification and jumped to the conclusion a warmer or colder earth might be OK. Since most of us are not in biology 101 or in basic earth science classes we are almost defenseless to well-crafted science myths. Unless we subscribe to a science magazine or have a friend or kid who happens to know the truth or we our neighbor is a science teacher it is not easy to come to the right conclusions.

The 70-year-old American Institute of Biological Science publishes the journal “BioScience”. It includes a current state of the earth report signed by 11,000 scientists, where they repeat the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 2018 assessment, “An immense increase of scale in endeavors to conserve our biosphere is needed to avoid untold suffering due to the climate crisis.” 

The report goes on to tell us the details of our potential demise but also, they stress hope. “We are encouraged by a recent surge of concern.”

That is us! Let’s stay concerned and, if we elect science wise politicians, we will work our way out of this. Make sure your politician is courageous about his or her commitment to, “An immense increase of scale in endeavors…”

Climate Team America

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