SCI 207
February 25, 2013
Global Warming: Is it the Unwitting Demise of the Human Race
Since the inception of planet earth, the sun has heated the planet. As earth cooled and an atmosphere developed, it provided a protective shell that allowed microscopic creatures and plant life to grow. As the species on earth diversified, plants began to absorb carbon dioxide and provided oxygen that was needed for animal life. In turn animals exhaled carbon dioxide for plant life. Over time, a complex symbiotic relationship developed between the earth’s weather, chemical elements, and living organisms. This balance has, for the most part, helped keep the global temperatures relatively constant. However, there are at least five times that global temperatures drastically changed resulting in the mass extinction of a good portion of the species living at that time. These were caused by natural occurring events such as extreme volcanic activity or an impact of a large asteroid on the earth. Now however, some scientist are questioning where or not human activities that produce large amounts of carbon dioxide will lead to extreme changes in climate and another mass extinction event. While the debate rages on, the earth continues to warm. Furthermore, very little has been done to address the issue as inaction continues to be the norm. And even though global warming is a natural phenomenon, there is evidence that human actions are exacerbating the problem to a point that it could ultimately lead to a collapse of the environment and the biodiversity of the planet, to include the possible elimination of the human race. Therefore, if there is even a possibility that human actions are contributing to global warming, the world should do everything it can to mitigate our carbon footprint. For more than a century, mankind has known that the burning of fossil fuel creates carbon dioxide but its affect on the atmosphere were initially unknown. Therefore, in order to blame global warming on human production of carbon dioxide via the burning of fossil fuels, scientific evidence must show a direct correlation between the two. One of the first to prove carbon dioxide was a greenhouse gas was Gilbert Plass. In 1955, his in-depth research and analysis proved that higher levels of carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels could indeed raise average global temperature (Graham, 2010). But just because fossil fuel could be a cause, it did not mean it was the cause.
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