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Is global warming bad for us? I found this question on a weblog hosted by author Thomas. P. M. Barnett. A commenter named Brian asked: "One of the questions people fail to ask in the whole global warming issue, is that even if human activity is the root cause of warming, is it a bad thing and why?"That question always makes more sense at the beginning of winter when a little global warming doesn't seem to be such a bad thing. God knows I wonder the same thing when the wind chill dips into the teens.
It is a good question that deserves a more complete answer than any that I can give, but in simple terms this is how I understand things. Global warming -- whether caused by human activity or sun cycles or cow poop -- leads to climate change. The changes in the climate can be quite different depending on where you live.
Truth be told, for some folks the changes may be good or at least not too bad. Let's face it, if you live in North Dakota or upper Minnesota a little global warming could be a damn good thing come early February. And who can argue with a longer or earlier spring?
For others though, the changes can be quite detrimental. Climate change brings with it increasingly violent weather, shifts in crop zones, species migrations, increased disease. If you live in an area affected by these kinds of changes, then global warming is not so good.
The reason that climate change is not so much on everyone's radar is that the detrimental effects that are happening right now are being felt mostly in faraway places relative to Europe and the U.S. and among poorer people who can't blog about their daily lives.
If the adverse effects were being felt in New York you can bet the whole political climate would be quite different. Of course by the time that happens, it will be way too late to take any kind of effective action.
This essay first appeared in PlanetRestart.org.
