Sunday 20 February 2011

Beauty Is In The Eye Of The Beholder

In May 25th 2007, there was a comment in a newspaper respect to thedraughts forecast which had been voiced by our environment state minister. Such comments accused the minister because such a draught hadn't been as severe as it had been said.

When we speak about climate we have to face stacks and stacks of opinions and as many things in life "beauty is in the eye of the beholder". I mean, depending on your position respect a man-made climate change or a natural  climate change, your points of view will difer from others. Man-made climate change is the official theory accepted nowadays but to fail some predictions doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Climate change is a reality which was forseen for some people more than 60 years ago, I would dare to say more, but whose effects, without taking into account how fast they develop, they won't be in the twinkling of an eye. We should be more accurate when speak in terms of time. It is not the same to speak in geological terms than in human life length terms. In fact, climate change is developping so fast, as never seen or at least recorded, that we could speak of important changes during a human life. If we compare human life lenght and geological changes lenght we are speaking about an enormous difference. Such faster changes are already having some visible impacts on fauna and Earth ecosystems which are not having enough time to readapt to the new circumtances. For better for worse, we humans have the ability to adapt as faster as the environment changes (and that's bad because people is not enough concerned to begin to make a change). The question is how long we will be able to keep the rate of change (maybe when we realize is too late).

I think our minister was right accepting the predictions from the IPCC so there is only room for three possibilities: she didn't expain accurately or she wasn't properly understood or people didn't want to understand her message. I think she would try to say thay periods of draught will be longer with periods of rain shorter than nowadays and maybe more intense. Now, more than ever, we should take profit of the smallest drop of water. Waste is not synonim of well-being.

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