The Antarctic Ice Sheet Has Started to Collapse and Nothing Can Stop It

[Han Cholo]

The Arctic is in much worse shape and will likely colapse first.

Especially considering there's no background landmass to sustain it.

[Äijä]

The problem here arises from thinking from a short-term human viewpoint. Geological, glaciological, and climatological phenomena operate on a long time scale. Centuries are insignificant as indicators of long-term trends in which major changes take place in tens to hundreds of thousands of years. In these changes events taking a few centuries are mere glitches in the overall pattern.

Glacial retreat started around 13,000 years ago. Like past episodes of glacial retreat, this one has been interrupted by reversals and accelerations. That is the way it works. What happens over ten years or over a century is irrelevant. If this deglaciation is the beginning of an Interglacial Age, we can expect the whole Age to last at least 100,000 years, if it is like those of the past. with occasional halts, reversal, and lurches forward, global temperatures , averaged over tens of thousands of years will unsteadily increase for at least another 40,000 years, even though, for a few centuries, the temperature may DEcrease, from time to time.

If this warming trend is only a pause in the Wisconsinan or Wuerm Ice age, it could end at any time with a return to glacial conditions, possibly with a return of the 3-km. thick Laurentide continental ice sheet in eastern Canada, and extensive glaciation in eastern and northern Europe. WE DO NOT KNOW the significance of the average warming over the past 13,000 years.

If we are entering an Interglacial Age, we must be prepared for rising sea levels, shift of climatic belts, desertification of some agricultural areas and, inevitably, major demographic shifts. If this is but an Interstadial glitch, God help us ! We are not capable of coping with a return to Ice Age conditions. We must expect major geographical changes and HUGE population shifts, which will not be peaceful or orderly !

We cannot control these processes. We did not start them and we can't stop them. If we never burn another atom of carbon,if we are
heading into an Interglacial Age, temperatures, on the long-term average WILL rise, no matter WHAT we do. If we are facing a return of the Ice Age, all of the global warming we are capable of producing won't keep us from freezing.

+1

[Smaug]

Global Warming is a myth. We are just going through a natural heating, which has already happened during the Roman Empire and the Middle Ages, and is very well documented. Some Roman sources talk about olive trees being planted in Britannia.

[Styrian Mujo]

But your descendants will.

Climate changes all the time with or without humans.

[Styrian Mujo]

I think climate changes are essential to human evolution. Human populations from colder climates seem to have evolved traits like high intellignce and creativity and if we enter a new ice age than this modern society/system will collapse and most won't be able to cope with the new conditions therefore only the best,the healthiest most intelligent will survive and reproduce and so the cycle continues...

[LightHouse89]

I think global warming will mean......long summers....lots of hot babes all year round dressing half naked.....so what is to not like about it? LOL

[Melina]

For somebody who find race mixing disgusting, this seems remarkably contradictory.

Racemixing can be controlled. In this day and age there are many ways to not get pregnant and have a mongrel child. Everyone knows children are a product of sex these days. On the other hand if there is a tsunami or if the water levels go up there is little we could do.

[Svipdag]

Global Warming is a myth. We are just going through a natural heating, which has already happened during the Roman Empire and the Middle Ages, and is very well documented. Some Roman sources talk about olive trees being planted in Britannia.

That is exactly what global warming is: natural heating. Global warming induced by human activity is a myth. But, there certainly is and has been global warming. Between 13,000 BP and 8,500 BP some 20,000,000 CUBIC KILOMETERS (approximately 20 trillion metric tons) of ice in the Laurentide Ice Sheet melted in 4500 years. THAT required global warming which boggles the imagination. Definitely no myth.

[Smaug]

That is exactly what global warming is. Global warming induced by human activity is a myth. But, there certainly is and has been global warming. Between 13,000 BP and 8,500 BP some 20,000,000 CUBIC KILOMETERS (approximately 20 trillion metric tons) of ice in the Laurentide Ice Sheet melted in 4500 years. THAT required global warming which boggles the imagination. Definitely no myth.

True, I chose the wrong words to express myself. What I meant is that global warning as it is spread in media today, as a consequence of Human activities, is a myth.

[Svipdag]

True, I chose the wrong words to express myself. What I meant is that global warning as it is spread in media today, as a consequence of Human activities, is a myth.

Right. You'll get no argument from me on that. Every major volcanic eruption releases more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than has all of the combustion of fossil fuels in human history.