Climate Change is Not Caused by Humans

Introduction

There is ongoing contention whether the observed rise in Earth’s average surface temperature has been produced by human activities or is part of the natural variability that the climate has experienced for millions of years. Some would argue the evidence is not conclusive enough to assert that the climate changes observed in recent decades are a product of human activities. Discontinuing natural climate change research under the assumption that any change is the result of human activities is shortsighted and unscientific. To make well-founded environmental policy decisions, it is necessary to understand the mechanisms leading to climate change; to this date, the potential role of solar variability, natural climate oscillations, and terrestrial-astronomical climate forcings has not been fully investigated.

Advocates against anthropogenic global warming argue that the potential impacts of human-induced climate change are overstated and that more complex environmental problems exist. Adopting a policy of mandatory reduction in the consumption of hydrocarbons will almost certainly cause significant economic pain to the general public. It is generally felt that aviation and private automobile use will be threatened with extensive penalties. Losing sight of this basic scientific issue has resulted in grand mishandlings of the global warming matter. At issue, the arguably larger future global warming matters are the reduction of biodiversity, increasing deforestation, desertification, reduced water supply, increased acidity of lakes, and the loss of coral reefs. Furthermore, the spread of domesticated animal-borne diseases and the declining availability of cheap high-density fuel mark the end of the greenhouse era. Understanding the issue of possible natural climate variability is important. There needs to be extensive investigation of potential future impacts because of higher increases in temperature due to the greenhouse effect and increased solar variability, along with any other potentially impacted mechanisms of climate change.

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Natural Factors Influencing Climate Change

It should be firmly established that, regardless of one's stance on anthropogenic climate change, the Earth's climate has always changed. There are a number of natural factors driving these variations, some of which are detailed below. Volcanic eruptions can inject massive amounts of aerosols into the stratosphere. These fine particles reflect sunlight back into space and cause global cooling of typically less than a degree Celsius that can persist for consecutive years. Variations in solar radiation, which may include sunspot cycles, also influence climatic conditions since the sun is the primary heat source for Earth. When solar activity is high, received radiation is also high. This cone of elevated radiation cools the Earth less than usual; thus, the reverse occurs when solar activity is low.

Ocean currents play another significant role in climate behavior. For example, the thermohaline circulation sends warm Gulf Stream water towards the North Atlantic. The warm water heats the overlying air, and the moisture-laden air mass is carried by the prevailing wind patterns eastward toward Western Europe; this is why Western Europe is generally warmer than other parts of the world at the same latitude. However, warm, salty water is not as dense as cold, fresh water, so the warm water circulates back via the North Atlantic Drift to the Gulf of Mexico. Here, it cools and becomes dense enough to descend, forming part of the deep cold water flow. This forms the engine by transporting heat of the thermohaline circulation, which supports the large-scale distribution of climates on Earth. The cessation or slowdown of the thermohaline circulation has been linked to extremely rapid cooling events in the past. Thus, the natural environment is capable of fluctuating the continuous cooling and warming of the Earth. Evidence can clearly be seen in these internal components of the climate system, turning humans into climate variability critics. However, the fact remains that climate does fluctuate.

Human Activities Impacting the Environment

It's no surprise that human beings have a profound effect on the world around us. Quite simply, geographic areas may change drastically and abruptly due to deforestation, pollution, or even urban replenishment to the point that we no longer comprehend specific aspects of a region. Human activities release enough greenhouse gases into the atmosphere to make a statistical claim on worldwide climate change. The combustion of fossil fuels for power, heat, and transportation is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions. It is responsible for approximately 80 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. Industrial processes, deforestation, agriculture, and waste are all significant contributors to the world's principal sources of greenhouse gas emissions. Greenhouse gases trap energy from the sun and heat from the planet's surface. When this system is damaged, it leads to alterations in the climate system.

Moreover, human activities are considered the result of social choices over time. Societal choices made are presented in institutions and constraints as behavior. Earth system processes act over minutes to millennia, making it difficult to link changes in climate and other Earth system variables to specific human operations. Human activity interacts with social, economic, and physical systems at various dimensions and scales, producing social and economic trends—or modes of social organization. It could follow that, because more energy is released or taken up by a system, it is also a driver of positive changes in global climate and other Earth systems. However, the fact that it is present in all recent emissions scenarios shows that it is closely related to society. Since the Paris Agreement on climate change in 2015, tipping points have already been discussed. It is increasingly influential in the design of international climate policy. This is why it is difficult to attribute the phenomena linking human system activities, physical systems, actual effects on human society, and environmental conditions.

Scientific Evidence of Human-Induced Climate Change

This scientific analysis is exactly what climate scientists have been doing for nearly 50 years. Scientists have used a number of different methods for measuring changes in the atmosphere. For example, they can measure levels of carbon dioxide in samples of air that have been trapped in air bubbles or tree rings for thousands of years. They can also measure the rate of temperature changes in the atmosphere using meteorological instruments like thermometers, satellites, and weather balloons. These measurements have shown both a rapidly warming climate and rapidly increasing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere since 1880. This increasing carbon dioxide has been driven by human activities like burning fossil fuels, deforestation, and wetland rice cultivation.

Today, nearly all climate scientists believe that most of the warming over the last years has been due to our activities. Even though the last decade's climate is due to an increasing percentage of warming, some of our near-surface thermometers, one being experimented with since 1980, still reveal an acceleration in temperature increase—some temperatures are still in record increase during 1980-2000. One scientific examination of nearly 200 abstracts revealed that not a single one disagreed with the consensus position agreed upon. Scientists construct sophisticated models of the Earth's climate system from nearly 50 years of measurements using such thermometers, satellites, and balloons throughout the Earth’s atmosphere and incorporate other information about the Earth’s surface, oceans, clouds, ice, and sun—have demonstrated that human use of fossil fuels is warming the Earth. This finding, combined with evidence of a rapidly changing Earth system, has central importance for policy. Models that include human activities picture mid-high-risk climate and extreme conditions across the globe in the 21st century.

Conclusion

Numerous debates have been conducted over the causes of reported climate change, with some concern that data analysis and results from those who support the human contribution to global warming may be rejected in favor of more freedom. According to them, the camera is very warm at this time, and only a video or a time span that causes turmoil. On the other hand, an increasingly vivid picture of the likely consequences of climate change paints aggressive public policy efforts across a range of global warming narratives. Researchers, using the models around them, disagree on a much earlier outcome in structures that may predict further warming sooner rather than later because a lack of comprehensive understanding of the complex climate systems makes definitive statements unsatisfactory up to now.

With such competing worldviews at stake, the question "Are humans responsible?" has implications for policy at all levels. The issue is thus the responsibility of governments, companies, and individuals to take appropriate action to address and alleviate observed climatic changes, or whether the increased operation of environmental laws and regulations is unnecessary or counterproductive activity. It is unrealistic to search for more concrete evidence and observations of human-related climate-causing agents. And while the climate engine will surely gradually pick up its intensity, we do not yet know when we will experience a syncopation with regard to record levels of global average temperatures. Ultimately, policymakers need to ask: what kind of consequences will result from inactivity, based on uncertainties in the potential cut-off points that have increased the average global temperature? It is recommended that this decision be enforced by the overwhelming evidence that global climate change is being perpetrated by human activity, or by the physical truths of natural balances and normative societal goals because of the safety and sustainability associated with secular human activities. Policymakers also have a duty to pursue further research to help study such subjective policy decisions, to determine scientifically based official party calls. Mass public perception of global warming also implies that we must all begin to take personal actions, such as regulations, to ensure that we can mitigate the negative impacts of global warming, including lifestyle changes. Policy and personal changes will require continued public education, including questions about the legitimacy of natural and social scientists' claims about climate warming.