Lets Get Down to Business to Defeat Climate Change

The heart of the matter discussed is that limiting the rise of global warming to an overall 1.5 degrees C would be infinitely better for the Earth, climates and all living animals than letting it get to the 2-degree C range. One technological fix that could address this problem of riding temperatures is the “greater reliance on techniques that remove CO2 from the air to return global temperature to below 1.5 C by 2100” (IPCC Press Release pg. 2). A socio-economic fix that could potentially be employed in this time frame could be “CO2 emissions decline by about 45% from 2010 levels by 2030…reaching new zero around 2050” (IPCC Headlines Statements pg. 2). This could be achieved through acts of governments and agreements like the Paris Agreement where the world over can agree that there is a problem and we need to fix it before it’s too late.

This argument, that climate change science is still in its infancy and thus unreliable, is one of my least favorite arguments from people against climate change because it’s simply not true. As told in Reidy’s article, Tyndall, in 1861, said “that any changed to the constitution of the atmosphere ‘would produce great effects on the terrestrial rays and produce corresponding changes of climate’” (Reidy pg. 2).  This means that, over 150 years ago, someone came up with the idea that climate change is real. People who believe it’s in its infancy, are just straight up crazy. It’s actually the sameish age as psychology and people don’t call that a new science. So no, this statement that climate science is too young to be reliable is not true.