As climate change is one of the main reasons that peak food is imminent, it is disappointing that so many people are still climate change sceptics in spite of overwhelming evidence that warming is happening and is mainly the result of increased concentrations of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere due to human activity.
In many cases, people prefer not to know. The consequences of continuing to increase emissions are - for some people - too horrible to contemplate. Becausepossible solutions are difficult to implement, they convince themselves there is no problem.
Most people have gradually become aware of the serious nature of global warming over the past few years, but they have not taken the time to look at the evidence that would convince them completely.
In my case, as a layman, I realised there was a problem when I understood that the natural greenhouse effect
has given us a fairly benign climate in recent history and that without the presence of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere, life as we know it would not be possible. GHGs trap heat energy, reducing the amount that is radiated from the earth back into space acting as a partial blanket and causing a difference of about 21 degrees C between the average temperature that we would have and the actual average of the earth surface temperature.
By increasing the concentration of GHGs in the atmosphere we are now ENHANCING the greenhouse effect. The earth is responding just as we should expect it to by warming up.
So why are people surprised by the warming that is taking place?
It would be much more astonishing if the earth was not warming.