Politics key to solving global warming crisis
Humans are driving a “catastrophic” change to the world, visiting Professor Rob Davies from the physics department said to students Nov. 20.
Davies was invited to speak by Associate Professor Robert Schmidt who spoke highly of Davies’ ability to simplify the complex matter of climate change.
“Rob Davies has the ability to take the complexity at the global climate change and discuss what we know and what we don’t know,” Schmidt said. “It is the responsibility of the university to prepare our students for the future. Global climate change is an important part of that future.”
Davies spoke about the difficulty of the issue of climate change, but established that global warming does exist, humans are indeed the principal drivers of this climate change and that the consequences are catastrophic to human life.
He said 98 percent of scientists agree climate change is a serious issue, and the U.S. needs to reduce 90 percent of its green house emissions by the year 2010. He said much of these emissions come from developed countries, and failure to reduce these emissions would lead to increased temperatures, drought, climate refugees and resource conflicts.
“The odds are too big not to do anything,” Davies said.
Davies said some politicians like President-elect Barack Obama and California’s Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger have been really supportive of the idea of reduced green house emissions.
“Politics is how we deal with risk,” Davies said, advising students to get involved politically by periodically sending e-mails to their senators.
“Be a citizen, and make sure politicians are doing something,” Davies said.
–daphne.bukirwa@aggiemail.usu.edu