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| Earthrise :) |
The world got the most beautiful present that day.
It was just a picture, a picture taken by the astronauts of Apollo 8-the first humans to orbit the moon. It was an image of Earth as seen from outer space.A blue glowing marble with green and yellow patches and white swirls all over it. Beautiful. Breathtaking.
Imagine what the people back on Earth here must have felt when they saw their home for the very first time.
That home, our home, is in danger and it’s time to wake up.
As the sun shines upon us, the greenhouse gases in our atmosphere, primarily carbon dioxide, trap some of the heat energy before the rest bounces back off into space.
Now, this is a good thing. Because this is what makes our planet warm enough to be the home of millions of species. This is indeed the reason why we all exist.
So, what is the bad news?
Well, as you are reading my first blog post, at this very moment, during that one breath you are taking, believe it or not, around 900 tons of carbon dioxide have already been emitted into the atmosphere. ( For those whose synapses are slow at transmitting the nerve impulses, no, you should not stop breathing out, I’m only referring to the time you take to exhale. :P )
And unfortunately, you take more than one breath in a day, don’t you?
So, you can imagine the blistering rate at which carbon dioxide is building up.
How is the Earth responding to that?
Global warming. Climate change. Drastic weather conditions. Melting of the polar ice caps. Rising sea levels.
All that scientists predicted are starting to become reality.
Just this one thing where they have perhaps gone wrong.
Since the early twentieth century, the global temperature has increased by 0.8 degree Celsius and it was expected to rise a further 2 degree Celsius during this century until recent studies showed that even if we stopped all our carbon emissions today, we are going to blow past 2 degree Celsius.If we keep doing what we are doing, we are now on track for a 6 degree Celsius rise. Things are already starting to look ugly for a 0.8 degree Celsius rise. So, I’ll let your imagination fill in the blanks for a 6 degree Celsius one. So, what are we going to do?
How will we survive?
Will we survive?
Maybe evolution will take place. Maybe our bodies will develop new structures to help us adapt to very high temperatures. Maybe we’ll find new sources of food.
But a more interesting idea has been put forward. Professor Stephen Hawking, one of the leading scientists in the world, suggested that a disaster such as ‘nuclear war or global warming’ would obliterate the planet within a thousand years. And he predicted that humans will colonise Mars.
Looks like a science fiction movie, doesn’t it?
People, we have already started to work on a mission known as Mars One to establish a permanent human colony on the Red Planet by 2025. Unbelievable, isn’t it? Well as Nelson Mandela said ‘It always seems impossible until it’s done.'
But still, we can’t afford to lose our blue planet, can we?
1.So,go turn off the lights in that room nobody is using.
2.Turn off that TV no one is watching.
3.Close the tap while brushing your teeth.
4.Always decide what you want before opening the refrigerator.
5.Use fluorescent light bulbs and energy-saving appliances.
6. Make the blue planet a little greener. Plant trees.
You are just a few clicks away from knowing more. (Long live google! :P)