byLiving Simply Global Climate Change Global Climate Change, popularly and erroneously known as “Global Warming”, is a serious and accelerating problem. Rapid shifts in climate have been responsible for majorextinction events in the Earth's history , such as the one that eradicated dinosaurs. We are in the midst of a similarly rapid and large-scale shift in climate now, and it threatens all of us with calamity. So it is true that climate does cycle due to natural causes, but two points are germane: (1) Rapid climate change produces majorperturbations in the Earth's ecosystem, and since human beings depend on this ecosystem, we will suffer massive problems as the result of the current extremely rapid shift in climate. So even it it weren't largely anthropogenic (caused by humans, which the d ata clearly show it is), would that matter? If a massive asteroid were hurtling toward Earth, threatening large-scale catastrophe on the human race, would we decline to try and avert this disaster simply because it wasn't human-caused? (2) The fact that this most recent climate change event is anthropogenic actually provides a reason forhope. If we are the major cause of climate change, the chances are much better that we can stop or even reverse the damage we have done, thereby saving ourselves from the consequenc es of this disaster. So the question becomes: what are we doing that causes our climate to change, and what can we do to mitigate this effect? Concentrated Animal Feed Operations Some of the biggest contributers to anthropogenic climate change, which rarely get mentioned to the general public, are Concentrated Animal Feed Operations, or CAFOs. These include dairies, from which we get milk and cheese, and hog farms, from which we get bacon, ham, sausage, and so on.
