[quote=“chenille, post:12, topic:18337”]
Global warming is not a hipster way of saying pollution, but rather it is something like acid rain or ozone depletion, recognizing the peculiarly distant effects of one particular sort of pollution.[/quote]
No, I have to disagree. Acid rain is not an averaged metric, it is literally sulphuric acid that falls from the sky. Right here, right now I can measure the acidity of the snow that just fell. The buildings around here that are made of stone which is vulnerable to the acid are literally rotting away. Ozone’s a better comparison, but it’s still not really an averaged metric representing no particular exact place and having little applicability to everyday life - the phrase “ozone depletion” refers to actual ozone that’s physically gone (so your personal chance of skin cancer is higher, because there’s measurably more UV hitting you).
I don’t think acid rain and ozone depletion have been in any sense “staved off”. Last I checked they were both still going strong.
I do hope people will someday take climate change and pollution very seriously; I certainly do. But I don’t think the politicized buzzphrase “global warming” is of any real use to anyone but climatologists and right-wing rabble-rousers.
