“Up and down, up and down – that is how temperature and climate have always gone in the past and there is no proof they are not still doing exactly the same now. In other words, climate change is entirely natural phenomenon, nothing to do with burning of fossil fuels” David Bellamy
Discuss the extent to which you agree with this statement
Climate change is the change in the temperature on the earth, which is linked to human activity, due to the change in the atmosphere needed to change the climate on earth. However David Bellamy and many other geographers believe that climate change is entirely natural phenomenon. The earth is a well-balance system and has always adapted to what has happened on the earth, such as tectonics, and climate has always gone “up and down, up and down” maybe this is natural, but could humans controlled an “up” in the climate. In this essay, I will discuss whether climate change is a natural phenomenon, like what David Bellamy says, or whether climate change is due to human activity, such as burning fossil fuels.
David Bellamy wrote “climate has always gone in the past and there is no proof they are not still doing exactly the same now” and this could be true, historical data shows that this has happened in the past. In the Middle Ages, from art and literature we can be shown that there was a period in Britain, that there was cold winters and summers, we could see this by artists painting frozen river and lakes and people playing on them, showing that Britain would have has an arctic climate. However period before hand this cold period Britain climate was like a Mediterrean climate, we also know it by looking at historical record, and the fact that wine was produced in Britain. This agrees with David Bellamy theory that we are going up in the temperature of the British Isles and we will go down in temperate.
Another theory is that is that CO2 is good for the environment; climate change is often linked to the burning of fossil fuels, however CO2 helps to trap the heat from the sun to regulate the global temperatures, and it is likely without this ‘greenhouse gas’ the majority of life on earth wouldn’t be able to survive. We do know that CO2 has been on the increase, however not all sources of CO2 are from humans, the other sources are natural, which backs up David Bellamy theory.
However humans do have a part in the increasing CO2 directly with burning of fossil fuels, we can’t deny the change on the 47 billion year planet since the human race has developed, we have complete changed how the earth ‘operates’. From using up the majority of the earth natural resource has been our biggest impact on the world, by using the natural resources has help or growth in the world, but it have led to increased amounts of ‘greenhouse gas’ being released, such as fossil fuel and CO2. This is why many scientists believe that we are to blame for the increase changes in climate change. However scientist hypothesis have been proved, like high temperatures in cities, and high levels of pollution in the cities, in cities like Beijing, China.
However anti-climate change activists disagree with the scientific theory, says that level of CO2 produce by human is relativity small, and we can’t directly be the only source of CO2, and David Bellamy agree with this and says its “is entirely natural phenomenon”. On the other hand the world population is now over 7 billion and growing and in the past we many of had a small effect on the earth, but now this could be changing, we are now all using fossil fuels, from MEDC and LEDC and the effect of climate warming is effect every part of our civilisationis changing from water shortages, and maybe we do need to try and stop climate change, but it is a natural phenomenon.
I do agree with this statement, I agree that climate change is natural phenomenon, and we don’t have a part to play in the warming of our planet, as well as temperature and climate have always gone in the past, we can see that from the Ice Age to 400AD – 1000AD (warm period) that temperature does go “up and down, up and down”