Zmena klímy – možný dopad (nielen) na obyvateľstvo - Prohuman

years. Therefore, the so-called climatic changes that are observed at the present
time (in individual decades) cannot be referred to with this term. In order to avoid
the misuse, and the negative connotation, the short vacillations should instead
be regarded as climate variability, a natural characteristic of climate. To end the
terminological deliberation it must be mentioned that changes in weather conditions
and climatic changes should not be confused and used interchangeably.
Climate changes – a scientific or political subject?
Climate changes have been a particularly important issue for merely the last twenty
years. It made room for the debate on what happens to climate, what will humanity
experience in the nearest future, and in what way our lives will be altered
due to the climatic changes. Here and there, disturbing opinions were made: that
the current climatic changes are a proven reality and they may lead to a paralysis
of the civilisation. There is no doubt that all these beliefs and questions come from
the man himself, his struggle to uncover “the tomorrow”. But what really causes
the subject so significant, are the alarming news on the severe weather phenomena,
which come from around the world nearly every day.
The reports worry us and force to the question the security of even the nearest
future. Certainly, the mass media play an important role in forming our behaviour
and views in this regard. The beginning of the 21st century, when telecommunication
has developed largely, allows them to transmit information on literally
everything, including meteorological and climatic phenomena. Thus, among
many valuable pieces of information, one can find irresponsible pseudoscientific
claims of some of the researchers. What is more, certain political groups put pressure
on them in order to fulfill their interests. As a result, a mass of dreadful, truly
horrific, titles appear every day around the world in newspapers, magazines and
reports. The imaginary depiction of immediate global warming, such us in the
film “The Day After Tomorrow”, are far from optimistic. Similar attitude can be
ascribed to significant scientific studies and reports, for instance in the so-called
“Pentagon Report” presented in October 2003 by P. Schwartz and D. Randall. In
addition to describing the catastrophic socio-economic visions, it also relates to
a real scenario of climate cooling in many parts of the world in the nearest hundreds
of years.
The origin of climate change – man or nature?
We observe a lot of upsetting extreme meteorological events (Katz, Brown 1992,
Stephenson 2002, Ustrnul, Wypych, Kosowski 2012). Can they be related to climatic
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