Are the humans causing Global Warming?

Question

I don't understand what CO2 is and i want to know what it is so i can know if people are causing global warming

Answer 1

CO2 is carbon dioxide. It's a biproduct of burning fossil fuels such as gasoline, among other things. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas which allows light to pass through and then traps the heat inside, which warms the Earth. As we emit more CO2, the greenhouse effect gets greater and the planet gets hotter. Scientists have concluded that human greenhouse gas emissions are responsible for about 80-90% of the global warming over the past 40 years.

Answer 2

CO2 is a natural part of our environment. The earth has carbon based life forms. We are all carbon based life forms. Carbon is the natural energy that feeds life on earth. We get carbon from food. Plants get carbon from air.

Animal life forms take in oxygen in the air and carbon through food. Plants have no other means to get carbon except through absorbing it in the air through CO2.

Animals absorb carbon through food and oxygen from the air and any additional carbon that isn't processed as energy gets released as CO2 when we breath out. The amount is minimal and can't effect climate change.

The theory of Global warming suggests that there is too much CO2 in the air and not enough carbon sinks such as plant life to absorb it.

The way humans are said to increase CO2 is through the use of fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are mostly ancient plankton and in the case of coal, plants, that have biodegraded into a concentrated energy source. This energy is gathered by heating which creates an action potential between the original state of the fuel and the gas that is produced afterwords. We have more energy coming out than goes in during the change of thermodynamic state. The gas releases the CO2 that would have been trapped in the earth for thousands of years.

This is the extra CO2 that Global Warming scientists are talking about. The question is, is this enough to cause drastic climate change? This is what all the arguments are about.

A second tier of arguments have to do with solutions to the global warming problem if CO2 is the cause. Governments and industry are talking about an across the board carbon tax which will filter down to higher expenses for everybody. Carbon trading which put s all the power with the oil companies. Carbon offsetting which can actually destroy environments while companies make a quick buck by planting mono-culturally and destroying the natural environments.

Answer 3

Definitely not! CO2 come from many sources. Volcanoes, some plants, animals, forest fires, CO2 also increases when temperature increases. Don't trust Wikipedia for everything. Like many things on the intranet it's only as good as the source and the sources aren't checked. CO2 is one molecule carbon and two molecules oxygen. Some plants make CO2 and some use it to make oxygen. Cars are very little of the so called problem. I heard that most of the green houses gases that come from cars happens in the manufacturing process and not even while driving them! If you concentrate on driving cars then you are missing 99% of the problem (if you think there is a problem). It's just a trick by liberals to get people to hate america. It's strange that so many americans are so quick to hate america but don't move out!

Answer 4

CO2 is produced when most any thing is burned with an exception of hydrogen. The global warming is a scam so the con artiest can rob from the poor. Follow the money ,look at Gore and how much he has made from it. I will not be part of robing from the poor.

Answer 5

Humans help speed up the process of global warming by the gas emissions from cars and other types of polution. Global warming occurs naturally though, due to the decay of feces from other animals. Humans are not the only cause of global warming.

Answer 6

Although it is impossible to state categorically that humans emitted CO2 in the atmosphere has not increased the temperature, it is also impossible, based on our current understanding and technology, to say how much the temperature may have increased due to our contribution of atmospheric CO2. The truth is that we really don't know but there is a political movement dedicated to falsely claiming that they know more than they actually do. Some of the claims by these people represent scientists looking for grants and some is from people with a leftist political slant looking to limit or control industry.

Answer 7

CO2 is a greenhouse gas and it's the most common greenhouse gas in our atmosphere besides water vapor (which only stays in our atmosphere for a few weeks while CO2 stays for hundreds of years).

The greenhouse effect on earth makes the difference between -18 degrees Celsius and our current +14 degrees Celsius so it's basically a good thing.

Since industrialization the amount of this greenhouse gas in our atmosphere has increased with 35% compared to (high) preindustrial levels (from 280 ppm to 385 ppm) and it's believed to increase temperatures. Human emissions and use of fossil fuel is the only possible reason for the increase.

Answer 8

dana1981 has the best answer. I'd just like to add that the extra CO2 that is causing the problem definitely comes from burning fossil fuels. We know this because of the isotopic abundances of the carbon and oxygen in those CO2 molecules. Therefore, the source for most of the extra CO2 is human consumption of fossil fuels.

About half the answers about global warming on Yahoo! Answers are lies and propaganda spread by anti-warming advocates. These people are willing to risk the lives of their great-grandchildren, in order to avoid making hard economic choices today.

Answer 9

Carbon dioxide is a green house gas. Simplified: When sun light reaches Earth it is short wave length. It is the reflected ,or absorbed, by Earth's surface. The absorbed light is then re - emitted as long wave radiation. This long wave radiation can be picked up by the green house gases and is then sent back out in all directions. About 50 % of this reaches Earth heating it a second time.

Answer 10

No. There is no way humans can change something as huge as the climate.

The Earth naturally warms or cools over time as there is no such thing as a static climate.

However there are many hucksters out their who will play on your ignorance, your sympathy, your guilt, to pry you from your money.

Please read "The State Of Fear" written by Dr. Michael Crichton, for good and fully researched information about the facts of "global warming".