Climate Roulette

They say that everyone who finally gets it about climate change has an "Oh, shit" moment--an instant when the full scientific implications become clear and they suddenly realize what a horrifically dangerous situation humanity has created for itself. Listening to the speeches, groundbreaking in their way, that President Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao delivered September 22 at the UN Summit on Climate Change, I was reminded of my most recent "Oh, shit" moment. Speaking to an invitation-only conference at New Mexico's Santa Fe Institute, Hans Joachim Schellnhuber divulged the findings of a study so new he had not yet briefed German Chancellor Angela Merkel about it. The study has now been published. If its conclusions are correct --and Schellnhuber ranks among the world's half-dozen most eminent climate scientists-- it has monumental implications... it goes a giant step beyond the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change... the world as a whole must be carbon-emission-free by... http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/10/13-7