Introduction
Climate has been and continues to be an important aspect of the human survival, and therefore, the condition of the atmosphere and the status of the sea are major concerns for every human (Weissbecker 9). The status of climate has always been a global focus of almost every nation that understands the need to protect nature and the environment. Even though the global climate continues to be a concern of the contemporary world, many people are still unaware of whether the global climate change is a manmade disaster or a natural occurrence (Robinson 13).
Even as the climate continues to prove uneasy to predict, recent geological and scientific studies have revealed that to some extent, there is exists a situation of human-induced climate change. Environmental scientists believe that the atmosphere was better during the agrarian era that the contemporary industrial period (Weissbecker 31). However, for many theologians and the archaists, geological science is just a mere fiction, and that the ongoing global climate changes are natural and only explainable through the spiritual ways (Robinson 10). Based on the prevailing confusion, this essay seeks to support the fact that the ongoing global climate change is a manmade disaster rather than a natural occurrence.
The status of the global climate is a concern for every human being bearing in mind that climate controls a large number of important, human economic and social activities such as agriculture, tourism, and fishing among others (Schlesinger, Kheshgi, and Smith 20). Even as the climatic conditions continue to set a global fear to the scientists and the ordinary people alike, the knowledge of what is causing climate changes remains convoluted, as the issues of climate change and global warming seem to be controversial for every human being. A large number of people across the world are either uninformed, misinformed or with very little idea about the changes in the atmospheric temperatures, rainfall patterns, wind velocity, and humidity.
Even though the changes in the climate are vividly clear among many people, knowledge on whether these changes are natural occurrences or human-induced is still lacking in both the learned population and in the illiterate population (Schlesinger et al. 11). For the scientists who deal with the meteorological departments, the geological departments, the geophysical departments, among other environmental sectors, the issues of climate change and global warming have received varied opinions, thus, subsequently spilling over the confusion to the global human population.
Global Climate Change is Human-induced
The question as to whether people and their activities are affecting the status of the global climate remains a dilemma for many ordinary people, as whether to believe or not to believe in the modern science remains a personal choice (Robinson 27). Nonetheless, there is a considerable literature on environmental science that seems to reveal truth about the global climate change as a human-induced situation and there is need to believe that human activities are contributing to global climate changes (Robinson 23). Evidence from the global revolutionary science is one of the main substantive facts pointing out towards the contribution of the human beings and their modern activities in the global climatic changes.
During the agrarian revolution when the humans could only use environmentally friendly organic materials to dig the land and produce food, the ozone layer, and the sea were fresh with their natural components (Inhofe 13). The latest scientific evidence points out that the depletion of ozone layer and the contamination of the seawater are recent problems that have emerged due to the intensified industrialization. A lot of evidentiary literature has emerged to substantiate the alleged contribution of industrialization and human activities on the global climatic change.
Human beings have been altering the global climate through a gradual that only scientists that provide proof of their involvement (Robinson 22). If people need to understand the manner in which industrialization, a human instigated business, has contributed to the changes in the global climate, they first need to understand what climate really means (Schlesinger et al. 5). According to most scientists, climate describes the long-term weather conditions of certain places or the geographical areas. However, some scientists define climate as the average weather conditions of a certain geographical area.
Therefore, climate change is an ecological word that describes the gradual or continued shift of the climatic conditions or the weather patterns of a certain region (Schlesinger et al. 8). Climate situations such as high temperatures, changes in the rainfall patterns, changes in the global weather seasons, the rising of the sea levels and the retreating glaciers, define climate changes. Environmental scientists have associated the above climatic conditions with a growing climatic problem known as the global warming. According to Schlesinger et al. (13), global warming refers to a steady rise in the overall temperature of the earth within its atmosphere due to the greenhouse effects that occur due to increased levels of carbon dioxide gas and other pollutants.
Environmental scientists point out that the greenhouse gasses are the major causes of global warming. According to Inhofe (25), a greenhouse gas is any kind of a gaseous compound that can attract and absorb an infrared radiation and consequently entrap, hold, and radiate heat within the atmosphere. The absorbed infrared radiation subsequently leads to global warning, which is the ultimate cause of the altered global climate and atmospheric changes.
The major components of greenhouse gasses are the carbon oxide gas, the methane gas, and the ozone gas (Inhofe 18). The gas compound that scientists have found to affiliate with the increased depletion of the ozone layer that control the radiated heat from the sun to the earth is the carbon dioxide gas. Carbon dioxide increases the atmospheric temperatures and subsequently makes the atmosphere hotter by altering the stability and composition of the ozone layer that is responsible for balancing the amount of sun radiation and the ultraviolet rays that hit the earth (Inhofe 30). It is through the depletion of the ozone layer that the global climate changes in terms of increased temperatures, changes in rainfall patterns, changes in the atmospheric air, and changes in the melting and movement of the glaciers.
The greatest ozone depletion agent, carbon dioxide is purportedly a greenhouse compound that most modern industries are releasing due to their daily industrial activities. According to Kininmonth (13), manufacturing industries designed by human beings, use coal energy as a component of production in their machinery systems for combustion, which in turn produces a large amount of toxic carbon dioxide that scatters across the atmosphere. In the United States, a country renowned as the global economic powerhouse, among the nations worst hit by the effects of the global warming, the use of coal is a necessity, and about 91 percent of the coal consumed goes for electric power generation (Kininmonth 9). In a 2012 geological report, the emissions from carbon dioxide gas released from the coal combustion process meant for electricity generation contributed to 24.5 percent of the greenhouse gas emissions assessed in 2012.
Methane is another gas component that scientists have associated with the increased impact on the climate through exuberating global warming. According to Schlesinger et al. (26), the human activities of mining and mineral engineering are also increasing the likelihood of global warming because the processes result in the emission of methane that is capable of increasing the global warming by 23 times higher than the carbon dioxide gas.
The meteorological and geological scientists have largely attributed the gradual increase of carbon dioxide pollutants to most of the human activities that are constantly proving harmful to the atmosphere and the stability of the climate across the world. Coupled with poor environmental policies that control the industrial activities and the ordinary human activities such as deforestation, scientists believe that the world is facing and may continue facing the impact of global warming (Robinson 31). Deforestation is a human –induced practice where people cut down trees in the forests to reclaim the land for constructional purposes, farming purposes, and other human needs for the land.
As the human population increases and the demand for modern housing and shelter increases, forestland becomes the target for the expansion of cities. As a harmful practice, deforestation results in huge losses of the tropical and temperate trees that form protective canopies against the harmful ultraviolet rays, and the loss of important tree vegetation that naturally controls the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. According to Robinson (29), in areas dominated by bare land due to the deforestation process, people have reported high temperatures that fluctuate during the seasons, reduced amount and occurrence of rainfall, and excess wind that is mostly unpredictable in direction and impact.
The Two Evidentiary Paragraphs
Recent research concerning the amount of carbon dioxide as an industrial greenhouse gas in the atmosphere shows that the amount of industrial carbon dioxide has increased by an average of 50% since the beginning of industrialization. Schlesinger et al. (23) discovered that about 97% of the scientists who deal with analyzing changes in climate and weather patterns have agreed to the fact that the contemporary changes in the climate situation are human-induced, through the industrial processes. The twenty-first century has witnessed a sharp increase in the globalization and industrialization processes, with every nation struggling to empower its industrial capacity to meet the millennium targets (Kininmonth 43).
Heavy industrial gas pollutants such as the greenhouse carbon dioxide, chlorofluorocarbons, nitrous oxide, and methane have increased in the atmosphere due to the human-induced industrial activities, which have nowadays taken a global political twist rather than existing for economic wellbeing. According to Kininmonth (37), the top scientists in the world, especially those serving in the American Meteorological Society, the American Geophysical Union, the American Physical Society, and the Geological Society of America have hinted out the excess industrial carbon emissions are causing the depletion of the ozone layer, which regulates the atmospheric temperatures and the atmospheric air.
Human industrial activities have contributed to an imbalance in the manner at which the natural atmosphere operates and especially when viewed from the perspective of the natural cycle of the greenhouse gas and processes (Schlesinger et al. 54). Evidence from the heavily industrialized nations such as China, America, Germany, and Japan have shown considerable alterations in the state of climate, starting from the shifting in the temperature levels, changing of the rainfall patterns, the and the changing of the levels of humidity.
In a survey of these industrialized nations by the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), politically neutral scientists have discovered that the movement of glaciers and the melting of ice and snow have become more rapid in the recent days than in the past (Yu 3). Such occurrences associate with the increased levels of surface temperature, both on the sea and on the land, with an estimated increased temperature of 0.41 Degrees Fahrenheit in a period between 1880 to 2012. According to Yu (33), from a cultural perspective and a scientific approach where the ecosystem show an independent interaction between the ecosystem elements, scientists have observed that the natural occurrences that were initially important in depicting and timing the spring and winter seasons have changed and some are extinct.
A Counterargument Against the human-induced Climatic Changes
An overriding aspect that brings a controversial debate as to whether the greenhouse gasses, which come from the human industrial activities, have altered with the natural cycle of the atmospheric gasses and processes is whether carbon dioxide is such a harmful gas as alleged by the several scientists (Yu 18). A counterargument report released by the scientists of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) reveals that global warming is a natural atmospheric process and that the environmental scientists should not blame industrialization for the continued changes in the global climate.
According to Inhofe (22), while reviewing the historical happenings on the global climate, the NASA scientists discovered that the process of global warming is a natural occurrence because back in 1000 A.D and towards the era of 1950 A.D, there were records of similar trends in the climatic changes (Inhofe 14). According to the NASA scientists, this period recorded very large temperature deviations and the changes in the atmospheric pressure, rainfall patterns, temperature and humidity, partly associated with the volcanic eruptions and the changes that existed in the direction of the sun (Inhofe 19). This era is a crucial example of how warming periods have existed even without the human influence.
Conclusion
Whether the issue of the contribution of the carbon emission on the global warming is a scientifically verifiable fact or it is just an existing theory trying to delude people not to venture into the coal and gasoline-powered industry is a question that very few people can understand or answer. It is virtually true that the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased tremendously over the past years especially when considered the increasing levels of the uncontrolled carbon emissions that go directly to the atmosphere and increase the carbon dioxide content in the air. When empirically verified by the scientists, it is discovered that global warming tends to increase with the relative increase in the amount of carbon dioxide that is alleged to be coming from the coal and gasoline powered industries, factories, cars, and other industrial products and processes.
Nonetheless, some controversial scientists have come up with credible evidence pointing out that the process of global warming is a natural occurrence and should not remain blamed on the human activities such as industrialization, deforestation, and other human activities that harm the environment. These scientists believe that the process of global warming has been historical and that no scientists have performed experiments in the earth’s atmosphere.
Works Cited
Inhofe, James. The Greatest Hoax: How the Global Warming Conspiracy Threatens Your Future, New Delhi, India: WND Books, 2012, Print.
Kininmonth, William. Climate Change: A Natural Hazard, London, United Kingdom: Multi-science Publishing, 2004. Print.
Robinson, Matthew. America Debates Global Warming: Crisis Or Myth?, New York, United States: The Rosen Publishing Group, 2007, Print.
Schlesinger, Michael, Haroon Kheshgi, and Joel Smith. Human-induced Climate Change: An Interdisciplinary Assessment, London, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Print.
Weissbecker, Inka. Climate Change and Human Well-Being: Global Challenges and Opportunities, London, United Kingdom: Springer Science & Business Media, 2011. Print.
Yu, Hongyuan. Global Warming and China’s Environmental Diplomacy, New York, United States, Nova Publishers, 2008. Print.