Predicting the Weather -- 100 Years From Now

Laurie David’s Feb. 11 commentary, “Snubbing Kyoto: Our Monumental Shame,” is not going to convince most Americans that we have made a mistake by not signing the Kyoto Protocol.

Is global warming truly, as David tells readers, “the greatest security crisis in the world”? I doubt it, and I also doubt that the Kyoto Protocol will have much impact on world climate change -- its targets are not low enough.

I do not doubt, nor does Michael Crichton (summarily dissed by David), that Earth’s temperature has been warming in recent decades. Nor do I doubt that humans have contributed to that warming, though by how much no one is certain.

Earth’s climate has changed repeatedly. A thousand years ago, Earth’s climate was as warm as it is today, or nearly so, yet by around 1300 a Little Ice Age began to develop, and that colder period ended only around 1850. Computer-model predictions for what Earth’s temperature will be 100 years from now remain, at the very least, debatable.

Gary L. Peters

Professor of Geography

and Planning

Cal State Chico