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Changing weather patterns now out of sight, out of mind

Dear editor,

We are cooler and drier now so we can forget about last week. Forget 12 degree temperatures in December, ignore higher ocean water levels and a warmer atmosphere that holds more water.

We can ignore that the carbon dioxide molecules we are dumping in the atmosphere today and tomorrow will be there for at least a century continuing to warm the biosphere.

We can pretend that the ocean is not warming and melting Greenland and Antarctic ice from below.

We can tell ourselves that the scientists who forecast accelerating rising ocean levels are wrong. We can pretend that all the other predicted adverse effects of climate change on agriculture, ocean acidification, human health, forest fires, insect life cycles and so on won’t happen. Ignore the science that indicates that we are experiencing the first mild signs of something that will be either bad or devastating depending on what we do from now on. We can continue to rely on fossil fuels and invest in nothing else. Let’s not (us, a nation) do anything unless every other nation commits first. Leadership is not for us. Let’s not modernize our energy sources. Yes, let’s invest more tens of billions in pipelines, LNG plants, coal mines. The grandkids will be delighted to be left a “challenging” problem.

John Marton

Courtenay