So our politicians would have us believe that unless we take action, or action is forced upon us by incentives and stealth taxes; we will hurtle towards catastrophic change where the UK will be under the sea, or a desert, or under a massive ice sheet, depending upon which doomsday model you look at; fact or myth?

 

Can we make the slightest difference without the full co-operation of developing nations such as China and India? Is it fair, or reasonable, to expect these countries to halt their industrial revolutions? When we burnt as much coal etc as we liked during our economic development?

 

Understanding of climate science is arguably not at level whereby policies which affect the general populous can be justified. There is compelling evidence, which suggests that the present warming is just a natural deviation from the long term trends.

 

Are G20 governments really using the 'climate change agenda' as a smoke screen to introduce capital taxes by stealth?

 

Should we all be willing to make sacrifices to our quality of life to protect the environment for future generations no matter how tenuous, or not, the evidence is?

Global warming is a myth, intended to scare the shit out of us.

 

It's pretty much scientifically proven that global warming is a lie, we're just in a natural geological cycle.

 

Anyway, it shouldn't matter, as we are all going to die in 2012 anyway. The Mayans are at least as good a source as people who believe in global warming.

Climate change is generally being used as a reason for taxing people differently rather than more so the idea that it is a scam to allow governments to tax more is a nonsense. And why would governments want to raise taxes just for the sake of it? It's not as if the extra revenue goes straight into politicians' pockets.

 

The overwhelming majority of climate scientists agree that climate change is happening and that human behaviour is largely (if not entirely) to blame. So either they are all wrong or they are somehow all part of the same conspiracy. But for a conspiracy like this to work, the number of people involved needs to be small to avoid someone squealing. Is it really likely that hundreds of scientists have been bought off by governments and that not one of them has gone to the press to say they've been bribed or that an attempt has been made to bribe them?

 

So the alternative is that they are all wrong. Not impossible but not very likely wither. Then there is the question that no climate change denier will answer - what if you are wrong? If we act on the assumption that climate change is a problem only to find that it isn't, many of us will have enjoyed lower fuel bills, oil and gas reserves will last longer and long-term economic growth might have been slightly lower than it could have been. Only one of those consequences is arguably a bad thing but even that is not irrevocable. However, what if we assume that climate change isn't a problem only to find out in a decade a so that it very definitely is? By then, the damage could be irreversible.

 

So, yes, I believe that climate change is happening and that we need to act to prevent it being catastrophic. Even if I end up being proved wrong, I'd rather that happened than finding out that it's too late. I wouldn't get any satisfaction out of saying "told you so".

I don't agree with Global Warming.

 

I think we should reduce the amount of pollutants we are throwing into the atmosphere, but geologically speaking the earth is cold. We're coming out of an Ice Age and the earth will naturally be hotter for a few 1000 years, then we're gonna slip into a new Ice Age. My standard Grade Geography teacher told us why it B/S in 4th year. I can't remember exactly, but it's something to do with the Earth's orbit naturally changing slowly over thousands of years between two points.

 

CO2 levels have been higher in the past, and the earth was quite a bit hotter when the dinosaurs were around.

 

Water levels have been rising for centurys, it's not something new. You used to be able to walk from London to Paris. And Australia never used to be an island. 40,000 years ago you could get to Aus via land from Indonesia. And the Bass Straight [Water between Melbourne and Tasmania] filled in like 25,000years ago.

 

Most of it is scare mongering, but there are things we can be doing to reduce our impact on the Earth. Land fill and the rate we are sucking oil out the ground can't be good for the future.

 

 

It's all a myth. Even if it is true I still couldn't care a jot about it.

Global warming is a myth, intended to scare the shit out of us.

 

It's pretty much scientifically proven that global warming is a lie, we're just in a natural geological cycle.

 

Anyway, it shouldn't matter, as we are all going to die in 2012 anyway. The Mayans are at least as good a source as people who believe in global warming.

 

no it isnt a myth... the earth IS or has been warming up over the last few decades, that is a recorded fact. and its not a geological cycle, geology has nothing to do with climate! :lol:

 

what is in considerable doubt though is MAN MADE global warming.

 

Climate change is generally being used as a reason for taxing people differently rather than more so the idea that it is a scam to allow governments to tax more is a nonsense. And why would governments want to raise taxes just for the sake of it? It's not as if the extra revenue goes straight into politicians' pockets.

 

The overwhelming majority of climate scientists agree that climate change is happening and that human behaviour is largely (if not entirely) to blame. So either they are all wrong or they are somehow all part of the same conspiracy. But for a conspiracy like this to work, the number of people involved needs to be small to avoid someone squealing. Is it really likely that hundreds of scientists have been bought off by governments and that not one of them has gone to the press to say they've been bribed or that an attempt has been made to bribe them?

 

So the alternative is that they are all wrong. Not impossible but not very likely wither. Then there is the question that no climate change denier will answer - what if you are wrong? If we act on the assumption that climate change is a problem only to find that it isn't, many of us will have enjoyed lower fuel bills, oil and gas reserves will last longer and long-term economic growth might have been slightly lower than it could have been. Only one of those consequences is arguably a bad thing but even that is not irrevocable. However, what if we assume that climate change isn't a problem only to find out in a decade a so that it very definitely is? By then, the damage could be irreversible.

 

So, yes, I believe that climate change is happening and that we need to act to prevent it being catastrophic. Even if I end up being proved wrong, I'd rather that happened than finding out that it's too late. I wouldn't get any satisfaction out of saying "told you so".

 

the fact is that the earth HASNT warmed over the last few years, figures suggest its levelled off or is cooling. the (evil) daily mail has run a seriese of articles revealing how figures have been manipulated to give the results the government wanted. vital statistics were deliberately omitted and theres a seriese of e mails between scientists that prove the 'cover up'.

 

the climate has ALWAYS varied, long before man became industrialised. again i cite the romans who could grow grapes as far north as newcastle, how in edward 1st reign the temperature was 2c warmer then now, the frost fairs on the thames 17th-19th centuaries ....

 

i dont believe for 1 second that WE are causing climate change, dr david belamy, a reknowned environmentalist also points out the statistically co2 rises in the atmosphere follows warming, it doesnt create it. this has been proven with sediment analysis.

 

however.... im not advocating free for all polution of our planet. we should clean up our act out of RESPECT for our planet, not out of selfish fear of armageddon.

 

 

It's all a myth. Even if it is true I still couldn't care a jot about it.

 

oh ffs.... either add something intelligent to the debate or ill warn you... in fact i might just do that anyway, im SICK of your moronic posts, now please FCUK OFF :angry:

Whether it's "Global Warming" or not, the facts are we ARE fukkin' up our planet though over-population almost certainly, which leads to greater levels of pollution, and drastic reductions of Earth's resources through massive rates of consumption, as well as destruction of natural habitats... The earth cannot cope with what we are doing to it, this much should be blindingly obvious.... There are well over 6 billion people in the world now, historically there was nothing like that level of human population, not in Roman times, not during the Industrial Revolution either... Our behaviour IS acting in a detriment to this planet, but it's not in the way that Govts would have us believe, they want to make it about "Global Warming" or "Climate Change" and not deal with the uncomfortable fact that it's the inherent selfishness of the human species to endlessly procreate and prolong its life more and more that's causing all the problems....

 

We are a cancer on this planet, simple as.... Sorry if that offends, the truth sometimes does....

Whether it's "Global Warming" or not, the facts are we ARE fukkin' up our planet though over-population almost certainly, which leads to greater levels of pollution, and drastic reductions of Earth's resources through massive rates of consumption, as well as destruction of natural habitats... The earth cannot cope with what we are doing to it, this much should be blindingly obvious.... There are well over 6 billion people in the world now, historically there was nothing like that level of human population, not in Roman times, not during the Industrial Revolution either... Our behaviour IS acting in a detriment to this planet, but it's not in the way that Govts would have us believe, they want to make it about "Global Warming" or "Climate Change" and not deal with the uncomfortable fact that it's the inherent selfishness of the human species to endlessly procreate and prolong its life more and more that's causing all the problems....

 

We are a cancer on this planet, simple as.... Sorry if that offends, the truth sometimes does....

 

spot on scott

 

and thats a good point you make about historic populations, clearly fewer man made no impact on the climate in the past yet it was much warmer....then colder...

interesting

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12...-told-quit.html

 

and further interesting reading

 

http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/

I don't see any point in worrying about it at the moment, it's not as if there will be a catastrophe within our lifespans, and even if there is, big deal, we'll all die and then nobody will care any more because nobody will be alive. I'm not saying we should stop trying to improve the situation, because we obviously do to keep our species alive and junk, but I don't think regular people should bother themselves buying into the scare story at least until we have a bit more concrete evidence to support the fact that we're all going to die (which, again, is a NATURAL CYCLE) within x years.

 

But yeah, I'm not too good at this whole debate thing, so I'll just sit back and watch you guys battle this one out ;o

I don't see any point in worrying about it at the moment, it's not as if there will be a catastrophe within our lifespans, and even if there is, big deal, we'll all die and then nobody will care any more because nobody will be alive. I'm not saying we should stop trying to improve the situation, because we obviously do to keep our species alive and junk, but I don't think regular people should bother themselves buying into the scare story at least until we have a bit more concrete evidence to support the fact that we're all going to die (which, again, is a NATURAL CYCLE) within x years.

 

But yeah, I'm not too good at this whole debate thing, so I'll just sit back and watch you guys battle this one out ;o

 

the point is that IF we ARE causing global warming we HAVE to act now to prevent it because theres a time drag between what we do now and when it actually impacts. ie if we stopped all emmissions today it would still take 20 odd years for the effects to stop. we are (in theory) living on borrowed time, live today, pay tomorrow.

 

it doesnt matter if you consider yourself 'good' at debate or not, if your intention is based on an honest reasoned opinion thats what matters most.

I don't see any point in worrying about it at the moment, it's not as if there will be a catastrophe within our lifespans, and even if there is, big deal, we'll all die and then nobody will care any more because nobody will be alive. I'm not saying we should stop trying to improve the situation, because we obviously do to keep our species alive and junk, but I don't think regular people should bother themselves buying into the scare story at least until we have a bit more concrete evidence to support the fact that we're all going to die (which, again, is a NATURAL CYCLE) within x years.

 

Well, this is really part of the problem BrayFish... We are disrupting that natural cycle by elongating our lives.... It's fast becoming a lot more than "three score and ten" these days.... In fact if one were to look to history again, one would see that the average life expectancies were shorter a few hundred years ago.... Heck, even in Victorian times.... The problem of overpopulation and overconsumption is not a "scare tactic", it's very, very real, oil and gas supplies are NOT infinite mate.... I'd also say that when you have women in their 50s going off for IVF treatment, this is also an ethical issue, because it also disrupts the natural order... Should this be allowed...? Personally, I really, really dont know.....

 

If we dont "worry about it at the moment", when exactly do you suggest we DO worry about it....?

I don't see any point in worrying about it at the moment, it's not as if there will be a catastrophe within our lifespans, and even if there is, big deal, we'll all die and then nobody will care any more because nobody will be alive. I'm not saying we should stop trying to improve the situation, because we obviously do to keep our species alive and junk, but I don't think regular people should bother themselves buying into the scare story at least until we have a bit more concrete evidence to support the fact that we're all going to die (which, again, is a NATURAL CYCLE) within x years.

 

But yeah, I'm not too good at this whole debate thing, so I'll just sit back and watch you guys battle this one out ;o

As others have said, if we carry on as we are the damage could be irreparable by the time we get round to doing something about it. That's why I'm hoping a climate change sceptic will answer my question - what if you are wrong?

 

Don't worry about whether you think you are any good at "this whole debate thing". As with anything, you can only improve by practising. As long as your comments are backed up with some reasoning, they will be welcome. Just don't take any criticism of your comments personally.

The world has been warming since the 1970s, with 1998 the warmest year globally - 2006 the warmest year in the UK. That warming has slowed in the 2000s, particularly in the latter part of the decade and that is quite interesting. Will it continue, or is it merely a blip and will warming reconvene with a vengeance in the 2010s (as the Met Office predict: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/...y/slowdown.html and http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/c...ys-1826916.html )

 

The 2000s have actually been warmer than the 1990s, but remember 1991-1993 was unusually cold because of Mt. Pinatubo eruption, with that taken out it actually appears that global temperatures have leveled off.

 

(UK temperatures since 1772-)

http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcet/graphs/HadCET_graph_ylybars_uptodate.gif

 

Personally I do see that there is some correlation between our greenhouse gas emissions and global temperatures suggesting a possible link between the two, but remain unconvinced that it is the sole cause of the warming, and that natural factors need to be understood more fully before these 'doom and gloom' predictions are taken as fact and not - as they are - a scientific prediction based on a number of estimated variables that are not fully understood yet (one example being cloud radiative feed-back which has an error bar big enough to cancel out entirely the radiative forcing of greenhouse gases). I hate the way that some scientists (on both sides of the debate) seem to think they've got it all completely sussed and ignore or dismiss any reliable new data that conflicts with their views.

Edited December 4, 200915 yr by Doctor Blind

The world has been warming since the 1970s, with 1998 the warmest year globally - 2006 the warmest year in the UK. That warming has slowed in the 2000s, particularly in the latter part of the decade and that is quite interesting. Will it continue, or is it merely a blip and will warming reconvene with a vengeance in the 2010s (as the Met Office predict: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/...y/slowdown.html and http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/c...ys-1826916.html )

 

The 2000s have actually been warmer than the 1990s, but remember 1991-1993 was unusually cold because of Mt. Pinatubo eruption, with that taken out it actually appears that global temperatures have leveled off.

 

(UK temperatures since 1772-)

http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcet/graphs/HadCET_graph_ylybars_uptodate.gif

 

Personally I do see that there is some correlation between our greenhouse gas emissions and global temperatures suggesting a possible link between the two, but remain unconvinced that it is the sole cause of the warming, and that natural factors need to be understood more fully before these 'doom and gloom' predictions are taken as fact and not - as they are - a scientific prediction based on a number of estimated variables that are not fully understood yet (one example being cloud radiative feed-back which has an error bar big enough to cancel out entirely the radiative forcing of greenhouse gases). I hate the way that some scientists (on both sides of the debate) seem to think they've got it all completely sussed and ignore or dismiss any reliable new data that conflicts with their views.

 

Put the over-population and over-consumption which leads to greater pollution in as variables though mate.... Look at India for example - before the end of WW2, population was little over 500 million, now it's over a BILLION.... And this is just one example.... I just do not believe for a minute that the rise in global population is not a factor in the growing problems we now face.... More people = more consumption of the Earth's resources=more pollution, it's a very simple equation....

Denialists f*** me off so much. Go to places like Bangladesh and the Maldives where livelihoods are being disrupted by the massive rise in sea levels and then tell me that global warming isn't happening and if it is we ought not to care about it. Millions, possibly billions of lives are at risk.

 

And there IS a firm scientific fact we can use to back this up Brayden. It isn't just a cyclical heating/cooling thing:

 

Every day, I pine for the global warming deniers to be proved right. I loved the old world – of flying to beaches wherever we want, growing to the skies, and burning whatever source of energy came our way. I hate the world to come that I've seen in my reporting from continent after continent - of falling Arctic ice shelves, of countries being swallowed by the sea, of vicious wars for the water and land that remains. When I read the works of global warming deniers like Nigel Lawson or Ian Plimer, I feel a sense of calm washing over me. The nightmare is gone; nothing has to change; the world can stay as it was.

 

But then I go back to the facts. However much I want them to be different, they sit there, hard and immovable. Nobody disputes that greenhouse gases trap heat in the atmosphere, like a blanket holding in the Sun's rays. Nobody disputes that we are increasing the amount of those greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. And nobody disputes that the world has become considerably hotter over the past century. (If you disagree with any of these statements, you'd fail a geography GCSE).

 

Yet half our fellow citizens are choosing to believe the deniers who say there must be gaps between these statements big enough to fit an excuse for carrying on as we are. Shrieking at them is not going to succeed.

 

Our first response has to be to accept that this denial is an entirely natural phenomenon. The facts of global warming are inherently weird, and they run contrary to our evolved instincts. If you burn an odourless, colourless gas in Europe, it will cause the Arctic to melt and Bangladesh to drown and the American Mid-West to dry up? By living our normal lives, doing all the things we have been brought up doing, we can make great swathes of the planet uninhabitable? If your first response is incredulity, then you're a normal human being.

 

It's tempting to allow this first response to harden into a dogma, and use it to cover your eyes. The oil and gas industries have been spending billions to encourage us to stay stuck there, because their profits will plummet when we make the transition to a low-carbon society. But the basic science isn't actually very complicated, or hard to grasp. As more carbon dioxide is pumped into the atmosphere, the world gets warmer. Every single year since 1917 has been hotter than 1917. Every single year since 1956 has been hotter than 1956. Every single year since 1992 has been hotter than 1992. And on, and on. If we dramatically increase the carbon dioxide even more – as we are – we will dramatically increase the warming. Many parts of the world will dry up or flood or burn.

 

This is such an uncomfortable claim that I too I have tried to grasp at any straw that suggests it is wrong. One of the most tempting has come in the past few weeks, when the emails of the Hadley Centre at the University of East Anglia were hacked into, and seem on an initial reading to show that a few of their scientists were misrepresenting their research to suggest the problem is slightly worse than it is. Some people have seized on it as a fatal blow – a Pentagon Papers for global warming.

 

But then I looked at the facts. It was discovered more than a century ago that burning fossil fuels would release warming gases and therefore increase global temperatures, and since then, hundreds of thousands of scientists have independently reached the conclusion that it will have terrible consequences. It would be very surprising if, somewhere among them, there wasn't a charlatan or two who over-hyped their work. Such people exist in every single field of science (and they are deplorable).

 

So let's knock out the Hadley Centre's evidence. Here are just a fraction of the major scientific organisations that have independently verified the evidence that man-made global warming is real, and dangerous: Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, L'Academie des Sciences, the Indian National Science Academy, the US National Academy of Sciences, the Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina, the UK's Royal Society, the Academia Brasileira de Ciencias, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Russian Academy of Sciences, the US Environmental Protection Agency... I could fill this entire article with these names.

 

And they haven't only used one method to study the evidence. They've used satellite data, sea level measurements, borehole analysis, sea ice melt, permafrost melt, glacial melt, drought analysis, and on and on. All of this evidence from all of these scientists using all these methods has pointed in one direction. As the conservative journalist Hugo Rifkind put it, the Hadley Centre no more discredits climate science than Harold Shipman discredits GPs.

 

A study for the journal Science randomly sampled 928 published peer-reviewed scientific papers that used the words "climate change". It found that 100 per cent – every single one – agreed it is being fuelled by human activity. There is no debate among climate scientists. There are a few scientists who don't conduct research into the climate who disagree, but going to them to find out how global warming works is a bit like going to a chiropodist and asking her to look at your ears.

 

Part of the confusion in the public mind seems to stem from the failure to understand that two things are happening at once. There has always been – and always will be – natural variation in the climate. The ebb from hot to cold is part of Planet Earth. But on top of that, we are adding a large human blast of warming – and it is disrupting the natural rhythm. So when, in opinion polls, people say warming is "natural", they are right, but it's only one part of the story.

 

Once you have grasped this, it's easy to see through the claim that global warming stopped in 1998 and the world has been cooling ever since. In 1998, two things came together: the natural warming process of El Nino was at its peak, and our human emissions of warming gases were also rising – so we got the hottest year ever recorded. Then El Nino abated, but the carbon emissions kept up. That's why the world has remained far warmer than before – eight of the 10 hottest years on record have happened in the past decade – without quite reaching the same peak. Again: if we carry on pumping out warming gases, we will carry on getting warmer.

 

That's why I won't use the word "sceptic" to describe the people who deny the link between releasing warming gases and the planet getting warmer. I am a sceptic. I have looked at the evidence highly critically, desperate for flaws. The overwhelming majority of scientists are sceptics: the whole nature of scientific endeavour is to check and check and check again for a flaw in your theory or your evidence. Any properly sceptical analysis leads to the conclusion that man-made global warming is real. Denial is something different: it is when no evidence, no matter how overwhelming, could convince you. It is a faith-based position.

 

So let's – for the sake of argument – make an extraordinary and unjustified concession to the deniers. Let's imagine there was only a 50 per cent chance that virtually all the world's climate scientists are wrong. Would that be a risk worth taking? Are you prepared to take a 50-50 gamble on the habitability of the planet? Is the prospect of getting our energy from the wind and the waves and the sun so terrible that's not worth it on even these wildly optimistic odds?

 

Imagine you are about to get on a plane with your family. A huge group of qualified airline mechanics approach you on the tarmac and explain they've studied the engine for many years and they're sure it will crash if you get on board. They show you their previous predictions of plane crashes, which have overwhelmingly been proven right. Then a group of vets, journalists, and plumbers tell they have looked at the diagrams and it's perfectly obvious to them the plane is safe and that airplane mechanics – all of them, everywhere – are scamming you. Would you get on the plane? That is our choice at Copenhagen.

This is the key reason why something needs doing:

 

A ream of scientific studies now suggest we could be on course for 6°C of global warming this century. It doesn't sound like much at first. But the last time the world warmed by six degrees so fast was at the end of the Permian period, 251 million years ago. The result? Almost everything on earth died.

 

The only survivors were a few shelled creatures in the oceans, and a pig-like creature that had the land to itself for millions of years. The earth was racked by "hypercanes" – hurricanes so strong they even left their mark on the ocean floor. Oxygen levels in the atmosphere plunged to 15 per cent; low enough to leave any fast-moving animal gasping for breath. These six degrees of separation stand between us and a planet we do not recognise and cannot live on.

 

We CAN do something about this. We just have to open our f***ing eyes and stop denying a truth purely for the sake of pursuing profit. What the f*** is that money going to do when we're all dead?

We CAN do something about this. We just have to open our f***ing eyes and stop denying a truth purely for the sake of pursuing profit. What the f*** is that money going to do when we're all dead?

 

True, but maybe the human species dying out might just be the "Natural Order"... Happened with the Dinosaurs didn't it...? Of course the fact that we're doing it to ourselves is particularly ironic... The Dinosaurs died out as a consequence of nature, we're actively killing our planet and our own method of survival, and this is what is particularly insane about unfettered Capitalism and unfettered Economic Growth.... Even the likes of Adam Smith were never in favour of NO controls at all... There has to be balance between man and nature, in this age of over-consumption, there really is none... We are killing ourselves, and we will go the way of the Dinosuars eventually... But, maybe this is how it's meant to be, one species dominates for a time and then is killed off, then another species evolves and dominates.... Perhaps next time, it will be insect lifeforms, or arachnids...? Cockroaches can survive a nuclear fallout, so, it seems the next species to evolve and dominate would indeed be insect in nature....

Well the Earth's definitely getting hotter, but it could be a natural process, as we move further from the last ice age the planet heats up. And some scientists have considered that the Earth could orbit at different distances from the sun, even a slight distance change would affect temperature I suppose.

 

Anyway, get out your energy saver lightbulbs and don't leave things on standby :kink:

People say that the earth warming is a "natural cycle", but not at this speed. If this were a natural cycle, i.e. any change ever recorded over the earth's history, there would be no noticeable difference in a lifetime, or even 10 lifetimes. If you look at the climate graph the earth was indeed warming before the 1900s, but not at the rate we're seeing now. And just because the earth hasn't been warming this decade (depending on how you manipulate the data), it doesn't the earth isn't warming. The trend is still there. Just because the earth is warming doesn't mean each year has to be hotter than the previous.

Well, this is really part of the problem BrayFish... We are disrupting that natural cycle by elongating our lives.... It's fast becoming a lot more than "three score and ten" these days.... In fact if one were to look to history again, one would see that the average life expectancies were shorter a few hundred years ago.... Heck, even in Victorian times.... The problem of overpopulation and overconsumption is not a "scare tactic", it's very, very real, oil and gas supplies are NOT infinite mate.... I'd also say that when you have women in their 50s going off for IVF treatment, this is also an ethical issue, because it also disrupts the natural order... Should this be allowed...? Personally, I really, really dont know.....

 

That's not really what my post was about. My post was saying that AT THE MOMENT, and that could mean one day or it could mean a billion years, I do not believe there is enough concrete evidence that we are currently damaging the Earth beyond repair. Of course we should make changes to cut down emissions and such, but we should not let this whole thing completely run our lives, and we can't let it scare us too much because for all we know maybe absolutely NOTHING will happen, at least before we die. I think overconsuming non-renewable energy sources is far bigger a problem than 'global warming' (I stand by my opinion that global warming is a lie, and we're just in a natural cycle).