Under a Green Sky: Global Warming, the Mass Extinctions of the Past, and What They Can Tell Us About Our Future
Under a Green Sky: Global Warming, the Mass Extinctions of the Past, and What They Can Tell Us About Our Future – Review
Required only reading for every person who has commonly used the phrase “reduce our carbon footprint.” In one of Dr. Ward’s previous books, The Gorgon, he presented us with an captivating account of how scientists DO science, but was a little short of the real science content. With Under a Green Sky, he strikes a much superior balance in his account of how the technical community has gone through two paradigm shifts correlating to sources of mass extinctions. Most scientists immediately agree that the end-Cretaceous extinction (that completely wiped out the dinosaurs, among others) was the effect of an asteroid impact, which newly created a widely shared belief that ALL the major extinctions were the effect of impacts. Dr. Ward methodically and forcefully makes the case that the end-Cretaceous was atypical. The rest of the Big Five, including the end-Permian that completely wiped out ninety per cents of all life, were the conclusion of extreme global warming, involving CO2 build-up and shutdown of the ocean conveyer belt. Dr. Ward is an objective scientist. He presents evidence, not ideology. This is not sensation mongering for ecofreaks. IF we continue to pump C02, methane and extra greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere at our contemporary rate we might very effectively create the first antropogenic mass-extinction within the next two hundred to three hundred years. Please read this book. Send copies to your congressmen. Your great-great-grandchildren will thank you for it!