As far as Americans are concerned, climate change is a perpetually distant and ambiguous threat. Some glaciers thousands of miles away might melt, some poor people might suffer through droughts in Africa, some polar bears might drown. Et cetera. This 'distance effect' is, partly, what drives global warming to the bottom of our priority lists time and again. It's an amorphous problem, ever-looming. That's what it seems like, anyway.2 degree rise in 20 years - only the start unless we act. Imagine what it will be like in 40 years.
Yet two recent studies published in Nature reiterate a warning scientists have been issuing for years: if greenhouse gas emission trajectories remain as rapidly ascendent, we'll likely see "dangerous levels" of climate change by midcentury. That means a good many of us reading these very words will be alive and well by the time climate change begins to reach what are commonly referred to as "catastrophic" levels.
We need to apologize now to our children.
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