1. Climate Change1
Jim Stevens
NSCI 170 Section 6380
Professor Berman
March 3, 2015
Climate Change
The Truth is Out There

2. Climate Change 2
How is it that humans can be so arrogant as to claim responsibility for changing the
climate of the entire earth? After all, Earth is believed to be over four and a half billion years old
and the human race has only been around a measly 2.8 million years (Ghosh, 2015). Moreover,
we have only been pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere for a paltry two and a half
centuries, since the dawn of the industrial revolution. We know from scientific evidence that the
earth has undergone drastic changes in climate numerous times throughout its history. It follows
that climate change will continue to occur indefinitely whether or not an industrialized society
exists on the planet. These are some of the beliefs held by those who do not subscribe to the
theory of anthropogenic caused climate change. However, these arguments have a fatal flaw;
they simply ignore the evidence that scientists are literally unearthing every day from deep below
the frozen glaciers of Antarctica and Greenland. Scientific analysis of ice cores taken from these
two regions reveal that we are on a collision course with dramatic changes to our climate, some
say irreversibly. While I am skeptical of the latter half of that statement, there is definitive proof
that climate change is real. Now all that remains is to get everyone to listen.
The idea of climate change is not a new concept. In fact, we know that humans and their
ancestors actually lived through several ice ages. Moreover, Ghosh states that climate change
was the likely catalyst in our evolution from human-like tree dwelling primates to Homo erectus
(2015). However, the thought that humans were contributing to global warming and enhancing
climate change by burning fossil fuels did not come about until Swedish scientist Svante
Arrhenius first proposed it in 1896 (Weart, 2008, p. 1). His theories were largely ignored by the
scientific community until the mid-twentieth century as new theories and technologies began to
emerge.
One such theory, published by Edward Lorenz in 1963, would ultimately revolutionize
way scientists think about the atmosphere, weather forecasting and climate change. The Lorenz
Attractor is a simplified representation of a chaotic system. It demonstrates a the concept of the
"Butterfly Effect" which states that small changes in a system will eventually produce large
variances in the way that system behaves (Lorenz, 1963, pp. 130, 142). However, it also
demonstrates that over time, chaotic systems have a predictable behavior. What this means with
regard to weather and climate is that it is impossible to accurately forecast more than a week or
two in advance because tiny variances in the initial state of our atmosphere and oceans lead to
huge variances in the behavior of weather patterns over a relatively short period. However, we
can predict the long term future state of climates because over a long period the latter variances
tend to follow a predictable pattern. Figure 1 illustrates a computer model of the Lorenz
Attractor.
Figure 1: Lorenz Attractor
http://favbulous.com/post/993/9-impressive-webgl-javascript-effect-showcase

3. Climate Change 3
Of course, theories are useless without evidence to support them and one of the most
abundant resources of climate change evidence lies deep beneath the frozen landscapes of
Greenland and Antarctica. Here scientists are able to learn much about past climate and thus
predict future climate change by analyzing ocean floor sediment and from ice cores samples
from these regions as well as others. In fact, according to Ahrens (2015), "A multiuniversity re-
search project known as CLIMAP (Climate: long-range investigation mapping and prediction)
studied the past million years of global climate" (p. 398). By careful analysis of the chemicals
and substances contained in these samples, scientist have been able to both reconstruct climate
conditions from the past as well as to study multiple feedback mechanisms that affect long-term
climate effects. Their results clearly demonstrate that small changes to one feedback mechanism
greatly influences all other feedback mechanisms and ultimately our climate, just as Lorenz
theorized mathematically. A positive feedback system tends to enhance or accelerate effects on
the climate, while negative feedback systems tend to mitigate or slow the effects, reducing the
chances of "runaway" climate change.
One such feedback mechanism studied by CLIMAP is the chemical weathering–CO2
negative feedback mechanism. According to Ahrens (2015), "Chemical weathering is a process
by which carbon dioxide is removed from the atmosphere as silicate minerals in rocks
decompose in the presence of moisture" (p. 406). As the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere
decrease due to chemical weathering, the climate becomes cooler. Periods of high chemical
weathering are indicated as peaks on Figure 2 below and troughs indicate the opposite.
Consequently, as the atmosphere cools, less water vapor evaporates from the oceans and
restricting the moisture available that is needed for the chemical weathering process, thus
reducing the amount of CO2 that is removed from the atmosphere. The pendulum then begins to
swing in the opposite direction which tends to lead to a warming of the atmosphere. Because
this mechanism tends to keep climate change in check, it is a negative feedback mechanism.
It is important to note that while we could assume, just by looking at the data from Figure
2, that an increase in CO2 levels begets an increase in atmospheric temperature. However,
scientists believe that temperature is the dominant factor in this relationship and that CO2 levels
merely regulate temperature extremes. Despite this fact, scientists are extremely concerned with
the direction of our climate over the past 250 years. As the world became industrialized and we
are pumping unprecedented levels of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, the level of CO2 is
rising, unchecked despite the current temperature levels. In other words, these seemingly minute
quantities of CO2 in our atmosphere, compared to nitrogen and oxygen which constitute the vast
majority of our atmosphere, are expected to have an enormous effect on global temperatures over
the next century. Moreover, by altering this important feedback mechanism, we are greatly
impacting our future climate. Glaciers will continue to melt, raising sea levels and threaten to
food the coastlines of the United States and around the globe; reduced snow-cover in our polar
regions mean that more solar radiation will be absorbed by the earth's surface, further increasing
global temperatures; the increase in greenhouse gases will trap more of this radiation in our
atmosphere and continue to warm the earth; and finally, with this increase in heat energy in our
atmosphere, we can expect an increase in violent, severe weather events.

4. Climate Change 4
Figure 2: Antarctic Ice Core Data Past 400,000 Years
http://www.researchgate.net/publication/224962710_Climate_and_atmospheric_history_of_the_
past_420000_years_from_the_Vostok_ice_core_Antarctica/links/0046351d295fdb0670000000/i
mages/2.png (Petit, et al., 1999, p. 431)
Despite the scientific evidence from just one aspect of our delicate climate system, there
are many who still reject or outright ignore these warning signs. Politicians and business leaders
choose to lobby against environmental programs aimed to mitigate or reverse climate change
claiming that it simply does not exist. They argue that the economic costs to implement such
programs outweigh any potential "real" threat to our climate. While I personally believe that
nature and the earth always seems to find a way to balance itself out, I also believe that we may
not like the results. As I stated before, now all we need to do is to get everyone to listen.
Works Cited
Ahrens, C. D. (2015). Essentials of Meteorology: An Invitation to the Atmosphere (Seventh ed.).
(S. Kenter, Ed.) Stamford, CT, United States of America: Cengage Learning. Retrieved
March 4, 2015
Ghosh, P. (2015, March 4). First human' discovered in Ethiopia. Retrieved March 6, 2015, from
BBC News Web site: http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-31718336
Lorenz, E. N. (1963, March). Deterministic Nonperiodic Flow. Journal Of The Atmosphere
Sciences, 20(2), 130-141. doi:10.1175/1520-0469
Petit, J. R., Jouzel, J., Raynaud, D., Barkov, N., Barnola, J., Basile, I., . . . Stievenard, M. (1999,
June). Climate and atmospheric history of the past 420,000 years from the Vostock ice
core, Antarctica. Nature, 399, 429-436. doi:10.1038/20859

5. Climate Change 5
Weart, S. R. (2008, August). The Discovery of Global Warming (2nd ed.). Boston, MA, United
States of America: Harvard University Press. Retrieved March 6, 2015, from
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/summary.htm