The Development of the Concept of Dangerous Anthropogenic Climate Change

From ancient times people suspected that over the course of centuries human activity could change the climate of a territory. Meanwhile the discovery of ice ages in the distant past proved that climate could change all by itself, perhaps even globally, with momentous consequences for human life. It seemed obvious that such massive changes could only be caused by forces vastly beyond anything that humanity could command. This article examines different aspects of climate change as an evolving threat to humanity in its anthropogenic contexts. It also explains the idea of climate change began to...

From ancient times people suspected that over the course of centuries human activity could change the climate of a territory. Meanwhile the discovery of ice ages in the distant past proved that climate could change all by itself, perhaps even globally, with momentous consequences for human life. It seemed obvious that such massive changes could only be caused by forces vastly beyond anything that humanity could command. This article examines different aspects of climate change as an evolving threat to humanity in its anthropogenic contexts. It also explains the idea of climate change began to worry some people in the 1930s. People had also started to realize that the human population and industry were increasing exponentially. It was in the early 1970s that the rise of environmentalism accompanied public doubts about the benefits of human activity for the planet.