Random thoughts on Intelligent Stupid People

I was talking about the NASA administrator's ignornance of the Global Warming Issue, now known as Global Climate Change, and then I never posted anything about it. Suffice it to say, I've heard plenty of ignorance on this issue. And here's the biggie.

Everybody, everywhere, when they discuss Global Warming, they have a tendancy to get fixated on rising sea levels. Then we have those who say basically, well, the Dutch build dykes, so could we. Unfortunately, this missed the bigger issues of the majority of the world's population live near the coasts, and the majority of the world's poor live close to sea level. Few people have been discussing the massive migration issues that will happen as sea levels rise.

And there is a huge elephant in the room that is barely acknowledged, Global Weather Patterns will change. This is barely touched on when people talk about the large influx of fresh water shutting down the major circulatory system of the oceans, notably the Gulf Stream. This could lead to a refreezing of northern Europe, etc.

That's the least of my worries. We are already seeing plants and animals migrating and changing their habitats because of the warming. There's now discussion about how animals might "fall off the tops of mountains" as the climate they need, along the slopes of mountains, keeps moving up to higher elevations, until it won't be there anymore, or the animals and plants run out of oxygen.

But here's the real kicker. Global weather patterns will change. This means where it's dry it might be wet. And where it's wet it might become dry. Or it maybe wet and dry at the wrong times. So what does this mean?

Crops fail. Dustbowl conditions. Plants grow in ways that are harmful. We're unable to plant or harvest which leads to crop rot. We're unable to feed our source animals which grow sickly.

Or, you could get what's happening in Germany right now. Germany has an extra month of growing season, and that's expanding. It might get to the point that German Farmers have an extra growing season in a year. Sounds great, doesn't it? Until you realize that the lack of a longer winter means the wheat mold doesn't die off as hard. So while they have a longer growing season, they have poorer crop yields.

This winter, which was warm, didn't kill off all the insects as much as they did in previous years, so the specific mosquito that carries the West Nile virus will have a larger population this year. As in a multiples of the previous years.

Not many people are dicussing these issues which are impacting us right at this moment.