The Warm Blue Dot: Evidence for Anthropological Global Warming
Introduction
Throughout the long history of the Earth, the global climate has fluctuated drastically, ranging from tropical to glacial. In the mid-18th century, the Industrial Revolution began, and humanity began a bilateral campaign: one waged with the goal of achieving a prosperous, industrialized future, and another, inadvertently waged against the environment. The purpose of this literature review is to examine the influence of anthropological global warming on the overall climate and to investigate the impact of humanity compared to natural circumstances. Although there is a small, but vocal dissenting minority, an overwhelming majority of researchers agree that human-induced …show more content…
In the examples to follow, Melany Banks and Avram Hiller offer compelling evidence and discussion that contributes to the idea that humans contribute in the smallest of ways, and therefore we must be mindful of that. Focusing heavily on the automobile industry, Banks suggests that responsibility be administered to a collective made up of “Order Givers, Order Followers, [and] Supporters (Banks 57). By way of this practice, we may place the president of an automobile company in the ‘order giver’ category, as his/her orders to produce more and more vehicles will add more and more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere (Banks 58). Likewise, Hiller pleads that each individual action, such as driving a gasoline-powered car to the grocery store, plays an important contributing role in adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Despite the analogous argument that pouring a “quart of water into a flooding river” will make no noticeable difference in harming the community downstream, Hiller argues that one would not be able to drive a car anywhere without certain harmful preceding actions: producing roads (emissions) and oil drilling (emissions) (Hiller 351). Humans have a tendency to shy away from responsibility, especially for grave transgressions, but to make meaningful, healing ground, we must accept our individual responsibility for the damage we have all …show more content…
Carbon dioxide is becoming an increasingly prevalent component within the atmosphere, and we can see the effects everywhere: when we look south toward the melting ice sheets of Antarctica—when we look to our rising oceans, becoming warmer and more acidic by the day—when we realize the temperatures rising wildly around us. Anthropologically-driven climate change, although not necessarily irreversible or incurable, will continue for some time regardless of what is done in hopes of remediation. The current state of climatology research is underlined by a wary tone; it is almost fair to say that one may feel reprimanded as they read articles on this subject. It seems as though climatology research will be focused primarily on identifying effects of specific human activities (how harmful to the environment are the emissions from each cigarette?) and remediation of the climate as it appears in the future. As research moves in those directions, we will gain a more meaningful understanding the consequences of our actions and have the wherewithal to introduce legislation that can serve the purpose of our Earth; our
Introduction
Throughout the long history of the Earth, the global climate has fluctuated drastically, ranging from tropical to glacial. In the mid-18th century, the Industrial Revolution began, and humanity began a bilateral campaign: one waged with the goal of achieving a prosperous, industrialized future, and another, inadvertently waged against the environment. The purpose of this literature review is to examine the influence of anthropological global warming on the overall climate and to investigate the impact of humanity compared to natural circumstances. Although there is a small, but vocal dissenting minority, an overwhelming majority of researchers agree that human-induced …show more content…
In the examples to follow, Melany Banks and Avram Hiller offer compelling evidence and discussion that contributes to the idea that humans contribute in the smallest of ways, and therefore we must be mindful of that. Focusing heavily on the automobile industry, Banks suggests that responsibility be administered to a collective made up of “Order Givers, Order Followers, [and] Supporters (Banks 57). By way of this practice, we may place the president of an automobile company in the ‘order giver’ category, as his/her orders to produce more and more vehicles will add more and more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere (Banks 58). Likewise, Hiller pleads that each individual action, such as driving a gasoline-powered car to the grocery store, plays an important contributing role in adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Despite the analogous argument that pouring a “quart of water into a flooding river” will make no noticeable difference in harming the community downstream, Hiller argues that one would not be able to drive a car anywhere without certain harmful preceding actions: producing roads (emissions) and oil drilling (emissions) (Hiller 351). Humans have a tendency to shy away from responsibility, especially for grave transgressions, but to make meaningful, healing ground, we must accept our individual responsibility for the damage we have all …show more content…
Carbon dioxide is becoming an increasingly prevalent component within the atmosphere, and we can see the effects everywhere: when we look south toward the melting ice sheets of Antarctica—when we look to our rising oceans, becoming warmer and more acidic by the day—when we realize the temperatures rising wildly around us. Anthropologically-driven climate change, although not necessarily irreversible or incurable, will continue for some time regardless of what is done in hopes of remediation. The current state of climatology research is underlined by a wary tone; it is almost fair to say that one may feel reprimanded as they read articles on this subject. It seems as though climatology research will be focused primarily on identifying effects of specific human activities (how harmful to the environment are the emissions from each cigarette?) and remediation of the climate as it appears in the future. As research moves in those directions, we will gain a more meaningful understanding the consequences of our actions and have the wherewithal to introduce legislation that can serve the purpose of our Earth; our