Scientists are finally starting to come out of the closet on global warming and its consequences, according to this indepth new article on the subject on stuff.co.nz, entitled “Climate change forecast getting worse“.

Here are a few choice quotes:

In recent months, a cascade of new scientific evidence on climate change has made even mainstream scientists increasingly concerned about what lies ahead.

“Over the past few months in particular, knowledgeable scientists have got more concerned that there might not be just a gradual bit of warming, but there could be some more substantial and worrying things happen,” says Dr David Wratt, leader of the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research’s national climate centre.

Among the public, many believe the main scientific debate is whether climate change is for real.

After all, American President George Bush is reluctant to address climate change, so perhaps there is something to what the sceptics say.

But for scientists, the caravan moved on some time ago. Now the most urgent question is not whether climate change is real, but how serious and rapid it will be, and whether it will soon be too late to do anything to stop it.

Look, let’s not argue over whether it is the result of carbon dioxide emissions, or whether it’s caused by human industry or cow farts - the fact of the matter is that it’s happening.

Don’t expect your puny human governments or your kept scientists to be able to protect you either.

Here’s what they have to say on the matter:

Until now the IPCC has assumed it would take thousands of years for even a few metres of sea-level rise. At that rate, humans, plants and animals would have plenty of time to adapt.

But new research is leading some scientists to suggest sea levels could rise over hundreds of years instead of thousands. Studies over the past two or three years have found ice shelves around the Antarctic Peninsula are rapidly disintegrating, and the edge of the Greenland Ice Sheet is melting. Other studies have observed rapid recession of Arctic sea ice.

Anyway, read more of the scientist’s speculation in the referenced article, and then ponder this little point that any geek can tell you - the weather system is chaotic. In fact it was the study of weather systems that first lead to the development of chaos theory. That means that it is a “nonlinear dynamical system that under certain conditions exhibits a phenomenon known as chaos, which is characterised by a sensitivity to initial conditions (see butterfly effect). As a result of this sensitivity, the behavior of systems that exhibit chaos appears to be random, even though the model of the system is deterministic in the sense that it is well defined and contains no random parameters. Examples of such systems include the atmosphere, the solar system, plate tectonics, turbulent fluids, economies, and population growth.”

Check out that link on the butterfly effect.

Effectively it lets you know that scientifically we understand that we can’t say what will happen, and should prepare for the absolute worst. When scientists say: “Oh, don’t worry, it’s only changing at the rate of x% per year which means that ….” they are spouting nonsense. Chaotic systems can go from one state to a complete different one with a slight change in initial conditions. A change of 0.01 degree Celsius can be the difference between an unusually warm summer and an ice age overnight - literally. And there is no way scientists can predict this.

This is why the Vedas, and Bhagavad-gita in particular tell us not to try to do things based on empirical research, but to live principle-centered lives governed by dharma, or revealed guiding principles that allow us to align ourselves with harmonic systems.