Theos-Talk Archives (March 2006 Message tt01526)

The mediums are asleep, so we have news weather experts to predict 
things like that.

Vince

--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, Cass Silva <silva_cass@...> wrote:
>
> Where are the mediums when you need them?  Can't get a forewarning 
on the land downunder.
> 
> Cass
> 
> Vincent <vblaz2004@...> wrote: Perhaps we are due for another 
planetary cataclysm.  We haven't had 
> one of those for quite a while.
> 
> Vince
> 
> --- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, "TimeStar"  wrote:
> >
> > The planet may be sitting pretty in 25,000 years, as Carlos 
says, 
> but the
> > next 100 years will be a hell of a ride.   Best regards, Krsanna
> >  
> > http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/03/26/coverstory/index.html
> >  
> > 
> > Be worried, be very worried
> > The climate is crashing, and global warming is to blame
> >  (Time.com  ) -- No one can say 
> exactly
> > what it looks like when a planet takes ill, but it probably 
looks 
> a lot like
> > Earth.
> > Never mind what you've heard about global warming as a slow-
motion 
> emergency
> > that would take decades to play out. Suddenly and unexpectedly, 
> the crisis
> > is upon us. 
> > From heat waves to storms to floods to fires to massive glacial 
> melts, the
> > global climate seems to be crashing around us.
> > The problem -- as scientists suspected but few others 
appreciated -
> - is that
> > global climate systems are booby-trapped with tipping points and 
> feedback
> > loops, thresholds past which the slow creep of environmental 
decay 
> gives way
> > to sudden and self-perpetuating collapse. That's just what's 
> happening now.
> > It's at the north and south poles -- where ice cover is 
crumbling 
> to slush
> > -- that the crisis is being felt the most acutely. 
> > Late last year, for example, researchers analyzed data from 
> Canadian and
> > European satellites and found that the Greenland ice sheet is 
not 
> only
> > melting, but doing so faster and faster, with 53 cubic miles 
> draining away
> > into the sea last year alone, compared to 23 cubic miles in 1996.
> > One of the reasons the loss of the planet's ice cover is 
> accelerating is
> > that as the poles' bright white surface disappears it changes the
> > relationship of the Earth and the sun. Polar ice is so 
reflective 
> that 90
> > percent of the sunlight that strikes it simply bounces back into 
> space,
> > taking its energy with it. Ocean water does just the opposite, 
> absorbing 90
> > percent of the light and heat it receives, meaning that each 
mile 
> of ice
> > that melts vanishes faster than the mile that preceded it.
> > This is what scientists call a feedback loop, and a similar one 
is 
> also
> > melting the frozen land called permafrost, much of which has 
been 
> frozen --
> > since the end of last ice age in fact, or at least 8,000 years 
ago.
> > Sealed inside that cryonic time capsule are layers of decaying 
> organic
> > matter, thick with carbon, which itself can transform into CO2. 
In 
> places
> > like the southern boundary of Alaska the soil is now melting and 
> softening.
> > As fast as global warming is changing the oceans and ice caps, 
> it's having
> > an even more immediate effect on land. Droughts are increasingly 
> common as
> > higher temperatures also bake moisture out of soil faster, 
causing 
> dry
> > regions that live at the margins to tip into full-blown crisis. 
> > Wildfires in such sensitive regions as Indonesia, the western 
U.S. 
> and even
> > inland Alaska have been occurring with increased frequency as 
> timberlands
> > grow more parched. Those forests that don't succumb to fire can 
> simply die
> > from thirst.
> > With habitats crashing, the animals that call them home are 
> succumbing too.
> > In Alaska, salmon populations are faltering as melting 
permafrost 
> pours mud
> > into rivers, burying the gravel the fish need for spawning. 
Small 
> animals
> > such as bushy tailed rats, chipmunks and pinion mice are being 
> chased
> > upslope by rising temperatures, until they at last have no place 
> to run. 
> > And with sea ice vanishing, polar bears are starting to turn up 
> drowned.
> > "There will be no polar ice by 2060," says Larry Schweiger, 
> president of the
> > National Wildlife Federation. "Somewhere along that path, the 
> polar bear
> > drops out."
> > So much environmental collapse has at last awakened much of the 
> world,
> > particularly the 141 nations that have ratified the Kyoto treaty 
> to reduce
> > emissions. The Bush administration, however, has shown no 
> willingness to
> > address the warming crisis in a serious way and Congress has not 
> been much
> > more encouraging.
> > Sens. John McCain and Joe Lieberman have twice been unable to 
get 
> even mild
> > measures to limit carbon emissions through a recalcitrant 
Senate. 
> > A 10-member House delegation did recently travel to Antarctica, 
> Australia
> > and New Zealand to meet with scientists studying climate 
> change. "Of the 10
> > of us, only three were believers to begin with," says Rep. 
Sherman 
> Boehlert
> > of New York. "Every one of the others said this opened their 
eyes."
> > But lawmakers who still applaud themselves for recognizing 
global 
> warming
> > are hardly the same as lawmakers with the courage to reverse it, 
> and
> > increasingly, state and local governments are stepping forward. 
> > The mayors of more than 200 cities have signed the U.S. Mayors 
> Climate
> > Protection Agreement, pledging, among other things, that they 
will 
> meet the
> > Kyoto goal of reducing greenhouse emissions in their own cities 
to 
> 1990
> > levels by 2012. Nine northeastern states have established the 
> Regional
> > Greenhouse Gas Initiative for the purpose of developing a 
program 
> to cap
> > greenhouse gasses.
> > Click here
> > 
> cnn=yes>
> > for the entire cover story on Time.
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
> >
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  
> Yahoo! Groups Links
> 
> 
> 
>  
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 		
> ---------------------------------
> New Yahoo! Messenger with Voice. Call regular phones from your PC 
for low, low rates.
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>