Human Activites Are The Main Factor In The Warming Of The Earth

I waive this round per the rules. I thank RationalMadman (back from his hiatus) for accepting this debate.

Pro is correct and honestly I cannot be bothered with this debate. I was going to play devil's advocate but the problem is that the conspiracy theories that deny global warming still admit that human activity is at play and is a major factor, when compared with the others. 

I always thought that people who deny climate change were silly and I still do, however what I found while trying to research things for the Con side is that while you can dismiss the warming being dangerous, you can't deny that human activity is the main factor in it unless you really think that solar flares are entirely to blame.

If random sun activity was able to warm the entire Earth without human activity altering it by much, then why is it that the ice age happened at all? surely, either the Earth would get warmer over time or colder over time.

I am willing to take this loss because honestly I don't see a way to win it without talking bullshit that Pro will obviously call me out on. I agree with conspiracy theorists on the original global warming being invented by Margaret Thatcher and NASA to justify nuclear weapons development under the facade of 'nuclear energy research' but this doesn't mean that it's a lie, it ended up being a very convenient truth.

My argument is brief as CON has already conceded the debate in a way.

In the Fourth National Climate Assessment, a non-partisan, unbiased, strictly science-based study, headed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and using sources from countless peer-reviewed texts published in highly-regarded scientific journals, they found that "average temperature has increased by about 1.8°F from 1901 to 2016...and by 1.2°F (0.65°C) for the period 1986–2015 as compared to 1901–1960...and observational evidence does not support any credible natural explanations for this amount of warming; instead, the evidence consistently points to human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse or heat-trapping gases, as the dominant cause." This is a key observation as many people who deny that climate change is as critical an issue as some people frame it to be base their arguments upon the fact that we have no idea what will happen in the future, and therefore we cannot start taking precautionary measures.

We can also observe that these changes are taking place due to human activity. If we look at FIG 2.1 in CH 2 of the Fourth National Climate Assessment which can be found here, we can toggle the graph to include only Natural Drivers of climate change. Volcanic activity is the prominent one and in most cases, it, in fact, decreases global temperature, as you can see the large downward peaks that form in a stalactitic fashion when a major volcanic event takes place, as I believe that the downward peaks coincide with the eruptions of Krakatoa, Kilauea, and Pinatubo, respectively, which released major clouds of ash into the air that caused less solar rays to enter the atmosphere. If we toggle the graph instead to feature just greenhouse gases, we can see that there has been a more than a major rise in activity.

We can consult FIG 2.2 in CH 2 of the Fourth National Climate Assessment, which can be found here. If this trend of increasing carbon emissions continues, we could be facing a temperature change of anywhere from 0.4° to 8.5°F, with a range of either 0.4° to 2.7°F if carbon emissions have already peaked, which is highly unlikely, 1.7° to 4.4°F if carbon emissions will peak around 2050, which, although possible, is still unlikely, and 4.2° to 8.5°F if carbon emissions keep increasing. If we consult FIG 2.3 in CH 2 of the Fourth National Climate Assessment, which can be found here, we can see that this change could have catastrophic effects on sea levels, where the best-case scenario would cause sea levels to rise anywhere from about 0.3 to 0.9m, and worst-case scenario would cause sea levels to rise anywhere from about 0.5 to 2.3m. 

There are many other side effects that would occur if carbon emissions kept increasing, and as you can see, I only scratched the surface of the report, taking information from just one chapter out of a total of 29, which cover almost everything from national topics to information about specific regions to possible responses. With this, I conclude my argument.

Forfeit

CON has forfeited.

  

CON has forfeited.

           

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