Another Supplementary Education:
By the early '70s, James Hansen, a talented man immersed in atmospheric physics, had published several papers on the planet Venus. In fact, he had written his doctorate thesis on the planet. The distant world is surrounded by a thick atmosphere- effectively wrapping it in a blanket of smog, ninety-six percent of which is made up of carbon dioxide. The atmospheric pressure nearest to the surface is equivalent to ninety Earth atmospheres. Venus' surface temperature is four hundred degrees over 740 K. Simply stated, the surface is very hot- hot enough to melt lead. Venus is actually hotter than Mercury despite being nearly twice as far from the sun. Why? Hansen theorized that the internal heat Venus produces (such as the volcanoes that spew accumulative warmth and basalt into the sky) was a factor for the intense heat. A larger factor is the atmosphere and the runaway greenhouse effect it produces, holding in lingering heat and radiation transmitted from the thermonuclear engine within our Sun. Ultraviolet light (UV rays) is the visible sunlight that pierces the air, radiating and furnishing planets and potentially causing massive environmental damage if left unchecked. Sherwood Rowland, American Nobel laureate and a renowned professor of chemistry at the University of California, Irvine, discovered that chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) contribute to ozone depletion. (He was a co-recipient along with Paul Crutzen and Mario Molina.) There are many natural contributors, but man-made chemicals like CFCs push the damage a step past the line of natural recovery. That is to say that the give-off of fossil fuels and inert CFCs used within widely used products like refrigerants and propellants cause an observable, measurable wear-and-tear on an ozone layer- a layer of atmosphere that, on Earth, absorbs ninety-seven to ninety-nine percent of the Sun's dangerous ultraviolet radiation. Ozone depletion is directly related to global warming, but it is not the main mechanism. Gases, including those composed of heat-trapping molecules, that are released into the air take time to escape from the atmosphere. The approximate time for methane to leave the atmosphere is one decade. Nitrous oxide takes one century. There are much more potent heat-trapping gases than carbon dioxide (CO2), but it is pouring upwards more than any other. Twenty percent of the heat-absorbing CO2 emissions linger in Earth’s atmosphere for eight hundred years. The current gases that are given off from human industrial efficiency will have an active impact on the climate of the future. The photographs of the Earth from space, instilled with the passion of over a century worth of dreams, show how fragile our planet appears against the black backdrop of space. Not from an emotionally-invested, environmentalist standpoint, but from a realistic one. The ocean of air that was expected to envelop our planet was thinner-appearing than anticipated, and comparative planetology confirms that planets can be, in a sense, delicate- including ours. The detrimental atmospheric effects on Earth cannot be immediately cited (or pointed to, if you want to be archaic about it) by a layman because they occur on a molecular scale and over long periods of time. However, the evidence demands that we acknowledge the effects as genuine. In 1995, two-thousand five hundred scientists released a report called the Second Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The report has verified that global warming is a reality, and that human emissions are a leading cause. The knowledge that has been collected, and theories that have been supported, does not render the whole of the issue as lucid or complete. At the time of writing, there are some areas still to be debated upon and ultimately fleshed out. An area in adolescent development, for example, would be the time since discovery to present that has not been lengthy enough to absorb accurate data on the next few centuries to demonstrate the exact intensity of global warming. If you are interested in learning more or quad-checking the facts presented here (as I have already triple-checked them), the information is widely available (for free) online. It is an interesting and controversial subject and I recommend that you delve deeper if it piques curiosity. To claim that the effects of global warming do not occur on Earth would make one irrational or ignorant if not both. As a conspiracy theory, it is on the same level as believing that President Obama is not a legal citizen of the United States. The 'hoaxes" have no clear purpose. For example, why would a Kenyan or Muslim shadow government breed a man for the sole purpose of becoming a mediocre centrist of a United States President? Why would so many respected and intelligent people connected with the scientific community come to an "incomplete" conclusion and push it into the realm of politics if it is not a real issue that needs to be acknowledged? The rhetorical questions have no clear, rational answers. I do not expect an irrational person to be consistent in their irrationality, but at least a small platform of logical coherency is absolutely required for the opinion to be considered. The world is not black and white, learned scientists and foreign people are not inherently evil, and the blunt facts are unbiased. I suggest that we, both as a species and as individuals, acknowledge those facts. I do not suggest, however, that we slam our hands down on a panic button or feel environmental guilt for the industrial strides of mankind. Our planet is delicate (in a sense), but definitely not sacred. As an optimist, I have hopes that the human species will rationally assess this issue and react accordingly, over the next few centuries if not sooner. Until that leap of time, the perceived shady science will have light cast on it many times. Merry Christmas, happy holiday, and here is hoping for a progressive new year. |
|
|
