Why Are We Still Debating Climate Change? Research Paper Example

Climate change is possibly one of the most-discussed but least-understood issues in the public forum today.  News segments, magazine articles, even movies like “An Inconvenient Truth” have made climate change a part of mainstream American life, but for all that, many misconceptions and outright lies abound about this subject and public policy makers, both here and abroad, have been slow to act.  This paper explores climate change from a past, present and future perspective, then goes on to talk about public perception and the politics around this very important issue.

Climate change discovered

Climate change has happened before throughout Earth’s geological history.  About 650 million years ago, the Earth’s surface was largely glaciated, but by the onset of the Pleistocene Era, some 500 million years later, most of the Earth’s surface was covered in swamp areas and shallow seas; since then, Earth has been going back and forth between glacial and interglacial periods (Climate Council 13).  Even in recent times, there has been a fluctuation: for instance, in the last millennium alone saw two distinct climatological periods, namely the Medieval Warming Period, which, as its name suggests, was a relatively warm period which occurred in the 10^th to 14^th centuries and the Little Ice Age, a period of much cooler temperatures which lasted from the 15^th to 19^th centuries (DiMeto and Doughman 32).  However, as the Climate Council points out, “The fact that the climate has changed naturally doesn’t mean it can’t change as a result of human activity” (Climate Council 14).

The Link between Greenhouse Gasses and Climate Change. The relationship between climate change and human activity has long been studied.  As far back as the early nineteenth century, the French scientist Joseph Fourier did experiments to try and understand what factors would influence the overall temperature of the Earth; one of the most important discoveries to come out of this was that the Earth’s atmosphere was responsible for keeping in heat from the sun (Weart 2); drawing on Fourier’s work, the scientist John Tyndall in 1859 concluded that, while the atmosphere was responsible for heat retention, certain gases, like carbon dioxide, could increase the capacity for heat retention (Weart 3). The Swedish physicist Svante Arrhensus predicted back in 1896 that a doubling of the current carbon dioxide levels of his day would result in a 4.9 to 6.1 degrees Celsius increase in the overall global temperature (Otto 187).

People Take Notice of Rising Temperatures. It was in the 1930’s that many people started noticing the change in the climate, and meteorologists confirmed anecdotal evidence of decreased blizzards and lake freezes compared to the past; Time Magazine ran an article in 1939 that said “gaffers who claim that winters were harder when they were young were quite right….weathermen have no doubt that the world for the time being at least is getting warmer” (Weart 1). Weart notes, however, that at first this seemed to be no cause for concern, and that as late as the 1950’s, an article in magazine reported that “Meteorologists do not know whether the present warm trend is going to last for 20 years or 200,000 years” (Weart 2). It was not until the 1970’s that climate change really began to be perceived as problem. James Hansen, a climatologist, predicted that continued fossil fuel burning would continue to heat the planet – with potentially disastrous consequences. It was not until 1979 that first World Conference on Climate Change convened in Geneva, and issued in the modern era of heightened climate change awareness (DiMeto and Doughman 45).

Climate change: what is happening now

So what has been the status of global warming since that first meeting in Geneva in 1979? Unfortunately, all evidence that the problems is, in fact, getting worse.  While much is still not known about the complexities of climate change, scientists are in a consensus that increased fossil fuel burning has led to a corresponding increase in carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere and that, in turn, has led to an increase in temperature (Climate Council 4). The ten warmest years on record have all been since 1990, with most of them occurring between 1998 and 2005 (DiMeto and Doughman 46), and the researchers point out that this has led to an increase in ocean levels by some 8 inches since 1900 (DiMeto and Doughman 5).

Facing the Truth about Climate Change. Even the politically conservative National Academies, in their climate change report in 2001, found, among other things, that 1) climate change is real; 2) that warming cannot be contributed to an increase in solar temperature or other natural cause; 3) that carbon dioxide from fossil fuels is chemically different from carbon dioxide that is in the atmosphere naturally and that globally, carbon dioxide levels are rising both in the atmosphere and the oceans (Otto 63). Their report is backed up by hard science. North America is indeed experiencing an increased number of hot day and nights and fewer cold ones than it ever has before (Cullen 54). To give a very recent instance of this, the summer of 2012 was so hot that it was difficult to grown corn even in the fertile heartland of American, generally considered to be some of the best agricultural land on Earth; 2012 also saw the disaster of Hurricane Sandy and wildfires of unprecedented size in places like Colorado, California, and New Mexico (McKibben 1).

Climate change and its impact on the future

Dr. Heidi Cullen, climatologist and author of “The Weather of the Future”, notes somewhat wryly that, in spite of the possibility of extreme weather change, “Earth is going to be fine….Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of the species that occupy the earth – including us” (Cullen 20).  Predictions of the effect that climate change will have in the future can be difficult, since the processes happening are complex and have many variables that cannot be readily foreseen.

Impact of Climate Change on the Oceans. However, most scientists do believe that ocean levels will continue to rise, not only because of the water from melting polar ice caps, but because of thermal expansion – the property of water which allows it to expand as it warms up (Climate Council 57).  This will lead to displacement of a number of coastal populations, particularly in more vulnerable coastal areas in Africa and Asia, which lack the resources needed to cope with such an extreme event (DiMeto and Doughman 52).  Apart from rising levels, the Earth’s oceans are experiencing an unprecedented process of acidification due to the rising levels of carbon dioxide, and this can have effects on marine animals of all kinds, particularly organisms like corals that will dissolve in highly acidic water (Climate Council 57).

The Human Impact: Severe Weather Events, Food Shortages, and Disease. An increase in the Earth’s temperature means that more moisture will be held in the atmosphere, which can lead to problems like heavy rain (Cullen 55) which in turn can lead to more incidents of flooding and the result of less water being in the soil due to the fact that heavy rains run off and do not soak in where they are needed (DiMeto and Doughman 48). Flooding and droughts could have a severe impact on agricultural practices and lead to major food shortages (DiMeto and Doughman 52). Many scientists are also worried that increasing temperature and moisture in the atmosphere will increase the mosquito population: this, in turn, could well lead to an increase in mosquito-transmitted disease like malaria and dengue fever (Cullen 64).

Climate change: public perception and politics

Carol Costello, in her excellent CNN Online article, notes that, “There is a 97% consensus among scientific experts that humans are causing global warming…Yet some very vocal Americans continue to debate what simply is a fact.  Why is that?” (Costello 1).  There are, in fact, a number of reasons that is so, and they will be explored in this section of the paper.

Misinformation and Money. The frustration is palpable as DiMeto and Doughman note that “Global climate change is a major social issue which many citizens do not understand, do not take seriously, and do not consider to be a major public policy concern” (DiMeto and Doughman 3). One possible reason for this attitude is that people tend to be able to understand immediate threats rather than long-term ones, and the science behind this issue is complicated and not always easily understood (Cullen 29). People assume that because climate change has happened before (and this is backed up by hard scientific evidence) that it is not something that they need to worry about and that scientists themselves do not agree that there will even be any negative consequences to increasing global temperatures (Climate Council 4).  Also, people have been misled by talk in the media that is quite patently false (Otto 63).  In recent years, the fossil fuel industry has funded a variety of conservative organizations and think-tanks  — to the tune of $558 million dollars between 2003 and 2010 (Costello 1) to help spread the message of climate change denial: “they say it’s a hoax, it’s a UN conspiracy, or Al Gore and his friends trying to get rich” (Costello 1).  It is important to note that there exists a definite financial motive behind this apparently very effective campaign of misinformation: by the time Obama leaves the White House, “the United States will pass Saudi Arabia as the planet’s biggest oil producer and Russian as the world’s biggest producer of oil and gas combined” (McKibben 1). In other words, fossil fuels are an enormous part of our economy and there are many who are heavily invested in this and do not want to see any major changes in regards to fossil fuel consumption.

Problems across the Political Spectrum. The state of denial is partly due to the fact that scientific evidence about the reality of climate change have been “suppressed or altered by ideologically motivated appointees” across several administrations (Otto, 194).  Scientists were hopeful that, since George H.W. Bush had admitted, back in 1990, that climate change was a concern, that his son, George W. Bush would take steps to protecting the environment. However, even after the aforementioned report from the National Academies, he refused to sign the Kyoto Protocol to reduce greenhouse emissions, citing the fact that he would not sign since China and India had refused as well (Otto 195).  To be fair, though, the problems have not just been coming from conservative administrations: the Copenhagen Climate Conference, which took place in 2009 during the Obama administration, was a dismal failure, resulting in “no targets or timetables or deals” (McKibben 1).  So clearly, the politics and public perception of the climate change issue is a complicated one, and there are problems in regards to the will to action across the political spectrum in this country.

What can be done in Regards to Politics and Public Perception.  There have been some positive changes in towards working for a healthier environment in recent times. Although Obama has disappointed many of his supporters with inaction on certain issues, it is true that he has invested in green technology, fought for increased mileage on new vehicles for conservation of fossil fuel, and is currently fighting for stricter EPA regulations on coal-fired power plants (Costello 1). Cullen notes too, that there is a deeper problem here, one of public mistrust and misunderstanding, and that, “If people are going to understand what is really at stake, scientists have to find new ways to communicate the science….[to] convey more completely what climate change is really going to look like” (Cullen 20).

Conclusion

Climate change is one of the great social issues facing the United States and the world today and it is one of the most misunderstood and sometimes misrepresented issues as well. The science cannot be denied: the global temperature is rising and there are a whole range of issues that are going to result from that. They include geological issues like rising sea levels and rising ocean acidity, as well as an increase in severe events like hurricanes, flooding, and droughts. The direct human impact also has the potential to be extreme; probably effects include coast displacement, food shortages and an increase in incidents of some diseases like malaria.

However, even as the issue becomes more urgent, policy makers in the United States and around the world appear to be more reluctant to act.  Many people do not understand that this issue is important, and so there is a lack of political impetus for real change to take place.  Also, people have been misled by misconceptions and by misrepresentations in the media.  Much of this has been ideologically motivated and has received heavy funding from the fossil fuel industry and others not willing to cut into their own profits.

There may be a strong controversy about this issue, but the science behind this problem is real and solid and the problem is not going to disappear anytime soon. As a matter of fact, the problem appears to be getting worse rather than better.  Therefore, a good knowledge of the science behind climate change and a more pro-active stance towards influencing those who are in the position to implement public policies, are both important to the future health of our planet.

Works Cited

Costello, C. “Why are We Still Debating Climate Change?”  CNN News Online.  2014. Web. 24 April 2014.

Cullen, H.  The Weather of the Future.  New York: Harper Collins Books.  2010. Print.

DiMento, J. and Doughman, P.  Climate Change: What it Means for Us, Our Children, and Our Grandchildren. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 2007. Print.

Global Weirdness: Severe Storms, Deadly Heat Waves, Relentless Drought, Rising Seas and the Weather of the Future.  Climate Council. New York: Pantheon Books. 2012. Print.

McKibben, B. “Obama and Climate Change: the Real Story”.  Rolling Stone Online Magazine.

Web. 24 April 2014.

Otto, S.  Fool Me Twice: Fighting the Assault on Science.  New York: Rodale Books. 2011. Print

Weart, S.  The Discovery of Global Warming.  Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. 2003. Print.