Natural Cycles

Any time something moves a natural cycle strongly away from its central balance point, such as dramatically increasing the CO2 level in the Earth's atmosphere, natural responses are triggered, the causal factors are destroyed or significantly reduced,  counterbalances are strengthened, and the change eventually swings the cycle back in the opposite direction.   These changes may be disastrous to some of the existing life forms such as humans.   Runaway Global Warming (as described below)  is an example of this natural corrective process. 

Runaway Global Warming:   At the present time, (2010) human overpopulation **rgw3  and human activity have dramatically increased the level of CO2 in the atmosphere.   Among other things, the CO2  increase has  triggered a major natural response in the Arctic tundra where 100 billion tons of methane are frozen in the biomass.    Methane is about twenty times more destructive to the environment than carbon dioxide.   As methane decays it is transformed into carbon dioxide.   

Human overpopulation and human activity have caused the Earth's temperature to rise by about two degrees Fahrenheit, and that temperature shift is causing the release of this methane gas.   In the present cycle, each summer, the arctic temperature is l little warmer than it was the year before.   If allowed to continue, the rate of change will continue to increase.   The CO2 levels will soon  be rising much higher and much faster.   (The rate of change is exponential, 1-2-4-8-16-32, and not linear, 1-2-3-4-5-6.)   Some experts say that just one more degree of temperature rise will cause the Arctic carbon-release-system to become irreversible.   If that happens, the temperature will rapidly increase by about eighteen degrees Fahrenheit causing most large life forms on the entire planet to become extinct.   Most, if not all,  humans will also die.    

The problem creators (humans) will have, in essence, committed collective suicide.   The human population no longer polluting the atmosphere.   Excessive, unnatural CO2 release into the atmosphere will also end.   The high level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will slowly be reduced by the remaining trees and plants, and life will continue at a completely new level, without human interference.   

Other Cycles:   Excessive carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere is only one of dozens of major environmental changes that humans have triggered -- over-population, air pollution, water pollution, soil erosion, species extinction, deforestation, and the list goes on.   In many cases the changes are almost invisible, and are certainly not visible to an untrained observer. 

Seen or unseen, the consequences of these changes are beginning to show up in large and all-too-often, dramatic ways.   Hurricane Katrina is an obvious example.   The highly unusual forest fires in the southeastern United States (April 2009)  is another example.   Natural habitats are being devastated by the introduction of unwanted species.   Killer bees and fire ants are an example of this.   

Through pollution, over-fishing, and callous misuse of coastal waters, the ocean, itself, is being dramatically altered and many vital life forms are in danger of becoming extinct.   The wholesale disappearance of frogs, bats, and bees are additional, major change that are initially hard to notice, but that will  eventually result is dramatic, negative consequences.   All this needs attention, but for the moment lets focus on the excess of CO2  in the atmosphere.