Many are drinking the “Heartland kool-aid” thinking there is nothing to worry about. There may be far greater dangers
and concerns that we need to face in our individual lives that we are still unaware of so please keep in mind that we must be
vigilant and skeptical and leave no stone un-turned as our story continues to be revealed to us.
Yes, the arctic ice has diminished almost 50% in the last 38 years (the time that extremely accurate records were kept, see below),
but they point out the arctic ice also curiously diminished around the same amount in the period of 1940-1950 (this appears to
maybe be true from Russian historical data). Don't try to look this up on Google Earth because they just show the arctic as a
blue circle which is wildly inaccurate. But you can look it up on the National Snow and Ice Data Center (which I show below).
In the back of their minds they are also thinking that the antarctic ice loss is not that great too which seems to blow a hole in
the theory.
But I don't think they are realizing that the rate of loss is starting to become exponential dovetailing with the exponential
industrialization, fossil fuel use, and extraction.
I really like this Skeptical Science piece where they patiently go through all the climate
science skeptic arguments and refute each one. For example, saying the arctic ice melted one time before does not take into
account what is going on today with the massive extraction and industrialization of our planet like no time before in history.
The rich seem to be disconnected from what is going on in the planet personally and disconnected from their brothers and
sisters that they share this planet with so they don't seem to feel a strong need to use their money to help much, yet.
But we hope that this will start to change as the truth becomes revealed.
Forget about global warming; the mass extinction of key animals in our ecosystem such as bees, birds, coral reefs, and so on is
something that we need to be absolutely seriously concerned about. I am glad that many are waking up to the idea
that it might hit their pocketbooks in a big way and so that they may begin to actually take some real corrective action.
The IPCC report in 2018 said that we need have a global net reduction in CO2 emissions by 45% by 2030
(the 12 years that everyone was talking about in 2018) to avoid the type of devastation that could take place.
Here is the Skeptical Science report (#1 hit if you google “
climate change is not real”).
If you look at the trend of Arctic ice in the last 40 years you can see
a pronounced decline in surface area of roughly 40 percent.
You can see this on the
National Snow and Ice Data Center website.
The Antartic ice decline is not nearly as bad, probably
because it is over a landmass, whereas the Arctic is
basically over water.
But it will decline too if Global Warming continues as it has.
Extinction Rebellion has a picture
at about 4:25 through its
intro video that shows that the Arctic ice is melting
faster and faster (note that the end of the graph is around
4.7 million square kilometers which matches the data from the data above)
and indicates the Northern polar ice cap may be gone sooner than we think,
with unknown catastrophic consequences when we lose this “air conditioner
for the planet”.
Wikipedia says “The Arctic ocean will likely be
free of summer sea ice before the year 2100, but many different dates have been projected. One study suggests 2060-2080[50] and
another suggests 2030.[51][52]”
Maybe we need to get off the argument about the melting ice caps (for persuasiveness sake) and focus instead on the extinction of
species such as bees, birds, insects, and coral reefs which are key components of the entire ecosystem of the Earth.
People can always make graphs and graphics tell any story they want so the bottom line is that people have to really think about
these things and understand what is going on in today's day and age. It is completely unsustainable and that in itself is enough
reason to stop it immediately.
Antarctica melts a lot slower than the Arctic I think because it is mostly land whereas the Arctic is mostly water. However some
sources say it is beginning to melt slowly too. Wikipedia says parts of Antarctica might start to resemble Alaska by the 22nd
century due to global warming, but of course we will have problems long before then if global warming continues.
Ocean acidification is a process where the warming up of the ocean by CO2 creates bicarbonate ions (acidic) which makes the ocean,
which has pH > 7 (a base) more like pH=7 (neutral) which has the effect of being inhospitable to marine life.
Coral reefs, which are the home of much marine life, suffer a double whammy from warming of the oceans and acidification which
"bleaches" them. There is restorative work that can be done but the scientists say we also need to reduce the amount of CO2 in
the atmosphere to preserve life that depends on food from the sea, which is most life. Plankton, at the core of the food chain,
is also affected by acidification.
