(Fifteen-minute read)

As warnings of global climate change grow ever direr, no one knows quite what the effect over time will be.

A slowing Gulf stream, or the melting of arctic sea ice.

Climate is already wreaking havoc in some very weird ways.

Just how bad is it really?

We should be terrified.

Yes, we all know that climate change is a concern, but if you are not currently losing sleep over it you are nowhere near having a proper appreciation of what is at stake.

Just how worried should you be that climate change might kill your children?

No one can foretell the future.

Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the climate change story is not that we know exactly what is causing the rise in average global temperature, but that we have known about it for so long.

Fantastic, you declare.

So if we know for sure it is the burning of fossil fuels that is the cause of global warming we can just switch over to renewable sources of energy (like solar and wind turbines) and the crisis will be over. Temperatures will stop rising.  Right?

Unfortunately, no.

The magnitude of the climate change threat is immense.

With our predictions consistently underestimate the severity of the problem.

There’s just no way, it cannot all come to a swift end in less than 30 years from now.

If you wrap my head around some very extreme predictions of climate catastrophe within the decade basically your worse horror story comes true on the human race, culminating in it being wiped from the face of the planet.

Surely nonsense. Except… It is true.

Savage wildfires, 25-mile long icebergs, disappearing lakes, freak allergies, and the threat of long-gone diseases re-emerging should be enough to convince the most unconvinced.

Here are a few other facts unreported.

Speed up the melting of glaciers, and mountains will rebounding faster.

Slows down satellites, requiring engineers to periodically boost them back into their proper orbits.

Speed up the thawing of permanently frozen soil – lakes draining,(125 lakes in the Arctic have disappeared in the past few decades), mudslides. rock falls, sinkholes- long-dormant diseases like smallpox could re-emerge as the ancient dead, their corpses thawing along with the tundra, get discovered by modern man.

Temples, ancient settlements and other artefacts that stand as monuments to civilizations past will disappear.

Because the earth is warming the migration of birds is changing so is the genetic profile of their entire population changing.

Arctic Phytoplankton Blooms Earlier

Your grandchildren will inherit inexorably rising temperatures that render much of the Earth uninhabitable. Their problem? Yes, but yours, too.

Humans are the most common large animal to ever walk the planet, in the not so distant future we are likely to be besieged by climate “refugees” arriving.

A 4C temperature rise will result in a global economic meltdown, disastrous food shortages and conflicts over natural resources and water.

Cars, trains, roads, and buildings, flood barriers, drains, underground systems, reservoirs, power stations, ports and all are designed for existing temperatures, sea levels and rainfall.

Even worse, the warmer, wetter conditions will encourage the fungal, algal, tick-and-mosquito-borne diseases we usually only see in the tropics. with climate change will be a recipe for social disorder, ill–health and mass grumpiness.

If there are water and power cuts, as expected, then get ready for migrations out of urban areas to the cooler countryside.

4% is quite enough to kill off trees, wildlife, garden plants, insects, and river life.

The notion that human activity, or the activity of any organism, can affect Earth on a planetary scale is still a hard one for many people to swallow. And it is this kind of disbelief that fuels much of the public scepticism surrounding global warming.

However, our intelligence, technology and sheer numbers mean our species packs a punch that can shake the world in wild ways.

Climate scientists confidently expect temperatures to rise up to 4C by 2100.

ARE THEY DETACHED FROM REALITY.

I DONT THINK SO.

Economics is a fully owned subsidiary of the biosphere. The sooner we realize it the better.

Rising productivity is damaging us all.

The economy should serve us all rather than dominate us all and it must work within the planetary ecological boundaries.

We most let more of the real word into economical spending decisions.

If nations invested 2.5 per cent of their GDP, or about $2.4 trillion globally each year, in the restructuring OF OUR WORLD MARKETS they may be able to perform the required transition TO A SUSTAINABLE MARKET PLACE in 20 years.

IN THE MEANTIME;

No matter how high humans cause the mercury to rise and how much damage we do to the planet, Earth and life will survive. It just might no longer be in the form we prefer or the form that allows us to thrive.

Earth could care less.

We will be recorded as a minor perturbation in the Earth system. The Earth will go on.

The question is: Will we?”

We can have no climate justice without migrant justice.

(SEE PREVIOUS POST FOR POSITIVE SUGGESTIONS TO SOLVE CLIMATE CHANGE)

All human comments appreciated. All like clicking and abuse chucked in the bin.