Help the Polar Bears!

By: Sandra Stoner

This has been an exciting yet tense weekend for several reasons. Most of us celebrated Halloween Friday night (and maybe Saturday night as well?), we all turned our clocks back to enjoy an extra hour Saturday night, and hopefully ALL of us are gearing ourselves up to vote on Tuesday in one of the biggest presidential elections of our lifetimes.

But, how many of us heard the news that scientists have proved that the rising temperatures in both Polar Regions has definitely been caused by humans? This is some of the biggest news yet- we can finally say to those non-believers of global warming that it IS happening and it IS because of us.

Computer models showed that the effects we are witnessing in both Polar Regions are “not consistent” with natural climate changes and instead relate well to factors caused by humans, such as greenhouse gases.

And what are these effects?

Most importantly, both Polar Regions (Antarctica and the Arctic) are warming at much faster rates than other areas of our globe. So global warming is affecting these areas earlier than it will be affecting where you and I live. The ice is melting at alarming rates, breaking off and disappearing into the ocean. Many of you may have seen the consequences of this in Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth.

Polar Bears are suffering as a direct result of the rise of temperature. This year, on May 14th, Polar Bears were officially added to the list of threatened species. Check out this website for information on what Polar Bears face as well as ways that you can personally help.

Lastly, and perhaps more seemingly important to most readers, our own communities face devastating storms and extreme weather conditions due to the overall rise in global temperature.

Thus, the most important outcome of this wonderful scientific break-through is that we can finally move past the initial debate of whether or not global warming is caused by humans or not, and start to do something about it! It is easy to find national and international organizations dedicated towards making a difference…. http://www.globalwarming.net/
http://www.stopglobalwarming.org/
http://www.worldviewofglobalwarming.org/

…but what about local organizations that you can attend? Global Warming Meet-Up groups are everywhere so you should definitely check out your local meeting.

Most importantly, spread the word! It is likely that a lot of people are unaware of these scientists’ findings, what with Halloween, Daylight Savings, and the Election upon us. But after Tuesday we won’t have to talk about the polls anymore, so use your extra conversation time to throw in the fact that global warming is definitely caused by humans.