Climate Change and the Future

¶ … reporting on the climate change phenomenon has become increasingly alarming. It was not too long ago that much of the rhetoric associated with the future of the Artic portrayed the loss of cute polar bear habitats. While no one really wanted the cute creator's habitat to melt away, it is reasonable to assume that this image did not invoked a sense of urgency among many people that would be inspiring on a level in which they would take action.

However, as the science has narrowed in on the consequences of anthropogenic warming, a much bleaker picture emerges that goes far beyond polar habit destruction and places the eminent crisis much closer to home -- in the backyards of coast urban dwellers in some of the greatest cities on the planet. " ..

glaciers in the western Antarctic, undermined by the warmer seas of a hotter world, were collapsing, and their disappearance "now appears to be unstoppable." The melting of these great ice sheets would make seas rise by at least four feet -- ultimately, possibly 12 -- more than enough to flood cities from New York to Tokyo to Mumbai (Mann, 2014)." Despite the unimaginable consequences and the effects to human life that the rising sea levels are predicted to take, there is still a reaction of indifference from many individuals; including the story's author.

One of the primary reasons for that even concerned individuals can still have a sense of indifference that allows them to defer action is that the consequences of climate change will mostly occur in the distant future and the worst effects will not actually affect people living today or their children. It's been a problem that has been a source of delay about acting on environmental issues for decades.

Some of immediate concerns seem much more pressing (to most) than some abstract concept of how bad the planet will be in some untold number of years into the future. However, throughout the development of the climate science there were also a number of missteps by scientist that worked to discredit their understanding of the planet's natural system.

Some of these errors that were made about the efficacy of science to tackle these issues in the early days gave many average citizens the needed doubt to justify dismissing the scientific claims as unreliable at best. Another issue is that since the natural systems on the planet are so complex, they are alien to nearly all laypeople and even other scientist with different specializations would undoubtedly have trouble understanding some of the finer points relative to the theory.

This leads to a situation that acts to dilute the moral responsibility that many may feel to act to help preserve a habit planet for other species as well as future generations of our own. The different political efforts that have been made by concerned individuals have all been undermined at some point through massive.