Archive for Scaremongering

Sleepless bears

Yet another disturbing sign of global warming reported in the Independent:

In a December in which bumblebees, butterflies and even swallows have been on the wing in Britain, European brown bears have been lumbering through the forests of Spain’s Cantabrian mountains, when normally they would already be in their long, annual sleep.

Global dimming, more global warming

This is the second frightening blog I’m posting in 2 days.  Sorry about that.  I just watched a video clip which I was pointed to by Jeff Berg, who I know from Post Carbon Toronto.  This is perhaps the most frightening clip I’ve ever seen on global warming.  As always, I hope that the worst-case scenarios it portrays are entirely wrong.  But once again, I question, who would want to take that chance?

What the movie explains in excruciating detail, is the effect that pollutants in the atmosphere have of shielding us from the worst effects of global warming.      Read more »

Ocean burp hazard

For anyone who is still not terrified enough about global warming, here’s another scary possibility about how the Earth can revolt to our tampering.

Here’s a charming story (complete with video) about bacteria which thrive in warm oceans in low-oxygen conditions and produce sewer gas (hydrogen sulfide).  Enormous blooms of this gas are thought to be responsible for 4 mass extinctions and a dozen smaller ones, and are associated with warmer oceans caused by rising levels of carbon dioxide.  The warming trends of these past extinctions are thought to have been brought on by volcanic activity.  This time, we’re just doing it to ourselves.