If little ice ages occur at regular intervals then global warming takes place between them. What we don’t know yet is, will the period between 1850 and the next little ice age be warmer than the intervals between little ice ages that preceded it? If so, is the variation significant? In other words is the current warming part of a cyclical or a permanent trend? Unfortunately it’s too early to know the answers.

To be sure, the natural causes of climate change are complex, but the point is they do occur and have occurred long before the industrial age and will continue to occur in the future.

Measuring and understanding the effects of climate change are also complex. As Juliet Eilperin, in her article “Scientists Disagree On Link Between Storms, Warming, Same Data, Different Conclusions,” in the August 20, 2006 edition of the Washington Post noted, “A year after Hurricane Katrina and other major storms battered the U.S. coast, the question of whether hurricanes are becoming more destructive because of global warming has become perhaps the most hotly contested question in the scientific debate over climate change.”

Second, and equally obvious, given what we know about the volume of carbon dioxide (CO2) released into the atmosphere in recent decades as the result of human activity and the marginal rise in mean global temperatures, hypotheses about human causes for global warming are not unreasonable. Since the dawn of the industrial revolution CO2 levels, the principal culprit in the global warming debate, have increased by 40 percent, most of that since 1945, to about 0.057 percent by weight. In the 20th century The Earth's average near-surface atmospheric temperature has risen 1.1 degrees Fahrenheit. This is no smoking gun; however, correlation is not cause and effect.

It’s worth noting here that CO2 is not officially listed as a pollutant under US law. Nevertheless, the US Supreme Court recently decided it to weigh whether the US must regulate new car emissions, including CO2, to combat global warming. Such a Supreme Court decision would have far reaching effects. Both sides of the global warming debate should have a field day with this one. Even if the Supreme Court rules in favor of regulating CO2 emissions, this still doesn’t constitute proof that human activity is the principal cause of global warming.

In any event, regardless of how this court case comes out, it won’t settle the issue. The fierce debate over global warming will continue because the implications are so huge. If the direst global warming predictions are correct, and if global warming is man made, the implications for civilization are immense. Governments would be compelled to do something about it, redirecting resources from other issues sufficient to do the job.

Based on nothing more than the information contained in this short article, common sense suggests the verdict is still not in. It’s not likely to be in for some time. Even if we acknowledge that global warming is occurring, if Las Vegas were setting the odds in a contest between natural or man made causes, at this point they would be dead even. Common sense also suggests that, more likely than not, both natural and man-made causes are the culprits. It’s just a matter of assigning percentages.

Some will argue that we can’t afford to wait until all the facts are known. If worst-case predictions prove accurate, it could be too late to avert disaster if we don’t do what we can now. Fair enough. We’ve been taking steps to reduce air and water pollution for decades now. Americans on all sides of the political landscape have become environmentally conscious. We should take reasonable and prudent measures to reduce greenhouse gasses as an insurance policy. Most Americans would support that.

On the other hand, overreaction can have it’s own detrimental effects. The United States rejected the infamous Kyoto treaty, for example, because of the devastating impact it would have had on economic growth in the United States and other industrialized nations and because countries like China were excluded. If human activity is not the principal cause of global warming, or if the extent of global warming won’t be as severe as some predict, the cure may be more harmful to the patient than the disease. 

Finally, making global warming a partisan political issue only makes people dig in their heals. It prevents them from looking at the evidence objectively. While it’s easier said than done, lowering the temperature of the debate would provide a cooler atmosphere for a less divisive search for the truth. The media could greatly improve the situation if it didn’t take so much pleasure in stirring the pot.

If you must have something to worry about, we live in a very turbulent and dangerous world. Earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes, and hurricanes, not necessarily caused by global warming, are a much more imminent threat to human life.