MORE GLOBAL WARMING, PLEASE!

            (Image from medievaltours.ro)

Everyone is terrified that global warming may happen.  But global warming would be an improvement for most people around the globe.

Global warming is predicted to cause the earth to warm as much as 3 degrees fahrenheit.  That is about where it was during the last warming period, which was in medieval times from about 1000-1300.   Scientists call it the "Little Climactic Optimum" or LCO, here.  In plainer English, that means the climate was "optimal" - just about ideal.  J.R. Dunn writes:

"How warm was it during the LCO?  Areas in the (English) Midlands and Scotland that cannot grow crops today were regularly farmed.  England was known for its wine exports.

"The average height of Britons around A.D. 1000 was close to six feet, thanks to good nutrition.  The small stature of the British lower classes (and the Irish) later in the millenium is an artifact of lower temperatures.  People of the 20th century were the first Europeans in centuries to grow to their "true" stature - and most had to grow up in the USA to do it.

"In fact, famine - and its partner, plague - appears to have taken a hike for several centuries.  We have records of only a handful of famines during the LCO, and few mass outbreaks of disease.  The bubonic plague itself appears to have retreated to its heartland of Central Asia."

But this warming period was followed by the "Little Ice Age," from about 1300-1850.  Dunn writes:

"The climate closed down.  Rains ruined crops and washed away entire seacoast towns.  Far to the north, the great colonies of Iceland and Greenland faltered and began to fade away.  Famine returned to Europe, and with it the plague, in one of the greatest mass deaths ever witnessed by humanity.  The bright centuries were replaced by the dance of death and a dank and morbid religiosity.  The focus of culture shifted to the warm Mediterranean.  It remained cold, within certain broad limits, for six hundred years.  The chill only lifted in the 1850s, when our current warming actually began."

What does that leave to be concerned about? 

Possible increases in storms, which is uncertain.  Dunn recounts that storms over the North Atlantic were so much worse after the warm period that the Vikings could no longer go on their long voyages over open ocean.  Apparently storms were much fewer and less powerful in the warm period.

Possible increases in ocean levels, if enough of the polar ice caps melt - which is also uncertain, as ice is increasing at the South Pole while decreasing at the North Pole.  But if the ocean levels do rise, it should be gradual.  There would be time to build dikes around Manhattan Island if needed, for instance.

All in all, even if there is global warming, it seems not to be the problem that the Greenies claim.  As history clearly shows, a global warming of the size they predict would be better for the world as a whole.

Comments

[Ben Blankenship]

Gerry, it's too bad we won't be around to enjoy hearing those "we're to blame for global warming" experts eat their words.

It would be almost as fun as reading about the capitulations of those prior "getting colder" experts back in our heyday.

At least there's the hope that in whatever form our afterlife assumes, we just might be able to tune in on such deliberations about our "endangered" earth. It will outlast us all.

[Rue-Mur]

Mankind (and Womankind - for those who feel excluded) is the result of the recent "Ice Ages" phase of Earth's weather. The Earth is normally much warmer as it transits (with the Solar System) around the Milky Way. So if the planet is exiting its cool phase and heading for its Spring, Summer, Fall phases. That's Life! Guess we'll just have to get used to it. 'Bout time too! At least the temperatures will match the latest Paris fashions. Course you do understand, in about 140 million years we're all going to have pretty dark tans. You know, the kind where there's no difference al all, anywhere on your bod (aka: no tan lines from underwear:-). Cheer up! You and I won't be here anyway. Oh! And our hair, did I mention the hair?