Which World : Global Destinies, Regional Choices - Scenarios for the 21st Century

?Today, humanity faces a fundamentally different challenge ? that of managing a planet and a global human civilization in ways that will sustain both indefinitely. What makes this task less than easy are the pace and complexity of change. Over the next half century, human society will undergo a profound demographic transformation, experience fundamental shifts in the global balance of economic and political power, and cope with nearly continuous technological change. These transformations are inevitable ? the forces that compel them are already in place ? but their outcomes are far from fixed? This book is about the future, but not in the sense of making predictions. Rather it suggests how to think about the future. Because human destiny is not predetermined, this book explores not just one but several possible worlds, each embodying a very different vision of the future. Implicit in these contrasting visions is a choice: which world do we prefer; which world do we want to pass on to our children and grandchildren?? From chapter 1 In the publicity surrounding global warming, climate scientists are usually the experts consulted by the media. We rarely hear from geologists, who for almost two hundred years have been studying the history of Earth's dramatic and repeated climate revolutions, as revealed in the evidence of rocks and landscapes. This book, written by a geologist, describes the important contributions that geology has made to our understanding of climate change. What emerges is a much more complex and nuanced picture than is usually presented. While the average person often gets the impression that the Earth's climate would be essentially stable if it weren't for the deleterious effects of greenhouse gases, in fact the history of the earth over many millennia reveals a constantly changing climate. As the author explains, several long cold eras have been punctuated by shorter warm periods. The most recent of these warm spells, the one in which we are now living, started ten thousand years ago; based on previous patterns, we should be about due for the return of another frigid epoch. Some scientists even think that the warming of the planet caused by man-made greenhouse gasses tied to agriculture in the past few thousand years may have held off the next ice age. Though this may be possible, much remains uncertain. But what is clearly known is that major climate shifts can be appallingly rapid—occurring over as little as twenty or thirty years. One danger of dumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere is that they may increase the chance that this "climate switch" will be thrown, with catastrophic effects on worldwide agriculture. Besides her discussion of climate, the author includes chapters on how early naturalists pieced together the complicated geological history of Earth, and she teaches the reader how to interpret the evidence of rock formations and landscape patterns all around us. Accessible and engagingly written, this book is essential reading for anyone looking to understand one of our most important contemporary debates. Accessible and engagingly written, this book is essential reading for anyone looking to understand one of our most important contemporary debates. In the publicity surrounding global warming, climate scientists are usually the experts consulted by the media. We rarely hear from geologists, who for almost two hundred years have been studying the history of Earth's dramatic and repeated climate revolutions, as revealed in the evidence of rocks and landscapes. This book, written by a geologist, describes the important contributions that geology has made to our understanding of climate change. What emerges is a much more complex and nuanced picture than is usually presented. While the average person often gets the impression that the Earth's climate would be essentially stable if it weren't for the deleterious effects of greenhouse gases, in fact the history of the earth over many millennia reveals a constantly changing climate. As the author explains, several long cold eras have been punctuated by shorter warm periods. The most recent of these warm spells, the one in which we are now living, started ten thousand years ago; based on previous patterns, we should be about due for the return of another frigid epoch. Some scientists even think that the warming of the planet caused by man-made greenhouse gasses tied to agriculture in the past few thousand years may have held off the next ice age. Though this may be possible, much remains uncertain. But what is clearly known is that major climate shifts can be appallingly rapid-occurring over as little as twenty or thirty years. One danger of dumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere is that they may increase the chance that this "climate switch" will be thrown, with catastrophic effects on worldwide agriculture. Besides her discussion of climate, the author includes chapters on how early naturalists pieced together the complicated geological history of Earth, and she teaches the reader how to interpret the evidence of rock formations and landscape patterns all around us The author identifies three possible outcomes from late-1990s trends, and analyzes the prospects for each of the world's regions. The scenarios are "Market World" - in which market forces and new technology will lead to rising prosperity but greater inequality and insecurity, a future in which markets rule and global corporations dominate; "Fortress World" - a grimmer future in which islands of prosperity are surrounded by oceans of poverty and despair, a future of conflict and violence, social chaos and growing environmental degradation; and "Transformed World" - a future in which fundamental social and political changes offer hope of fulfilling human aspirations The humanity faces a fundamentally different challenge - that of managing a planet and a global human civilization in ways that will sustain both indefinitely. This book suggests how to think about the future. It explores several possible worlds, each embodying a different vision of the future. Offers an overview of the contributions geology has made to the study of climate change and the nuanced picture it presents of a climate that has gone through constant change over the course of millennia Suitable for understanding on of the world's important contemporary debates, this volume describes the important contributions that geology has made to our understanding of climate change.