It matters because of what it causes. Global Warming is a very simple term to describe a very large process, and doesn't actually mean "the world is just getting warmer."
Climate change is an increasing trapping of energy within the atmosphere, this causes several affects. Erratic weather is the most immediate cause of this increased energy. From this increased energy we see more hurricanes, tornadoes, polar vortexes and blizzards, amongst other storms. Obviously these are not very fun things to go through.
As mentioned, blizzards and polar vortexes are caused by this trapping of energy, which is why global warming isn't the best word. As people see cold storms being caused by it they begin to dismiss the entire concept, unfortunately there isn't really a term that will explain it in it's entirety and still be understandable by everyone, so we'll still with "climate change" for now.
As weather becomes more erratic and energy builds within the atmosphere, the average global temperature does indeed increase as a side effect over a long period of time. The storms, erratic weather patterns, and increasing temperature effect "keystone" aspects of ecosystems across the planet. Keystone aspects of ecosystem are called this because that play an unusually important role in maintaining the entire ecosystem, change in weather and temperature can seriously impact these factors causing ecosystems to weaken and eventually collapse.
At this point the weather is erratic, there is an increase in severe weather, average temperature is increased, energy is trapped within the atmosphere and ecosystems are beginning to break down. This not even taking into account the melting of ice caps as temperatures increase. There is one species that all of this benefits -- algae.
We are not algae.
And this is why it affects us negatively.
It's the rate of change that's the problem. It might force us out of buildings we haven't finished paying for, or change habitats faster than the plants and animals can naturally migrate or evolve.
Evacuating New York because of flooding, or replacing the subway system with gondolas, or building a sea wall around Manhattan would all be very expensive.
If you buy your food, just about now you should start to see prices increase.
That will become much more obvious toward the end of the summer.
We really have no say in co2 levels, these are determined by temperature, which in turn is determined by the Sun.
100% of people who are paid because of the pretend global warming problem will always say that there is a problem. Would you tell your boss that you weren't needed ?
What a bunch of brainwashed twits, believing all the propaganda they have been told.
To understand what a warmer world would be like, it would be sensible to look at the last time our world was warmer. the holocene optimum http://r.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0SO8z4TV...
This period 9000 to 5000 yrs ago was when all the great civilizations started, a time when the Sahara had rivers and lakes and lots of animals.
Unfortunately our world is not warming.
Because we are the cause
I bet when you begin to starve, you'll find out.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stern_Revie...
It mattered to Neanderthal Man
It matters because we inhabit the planet. More critical, though, is that the AGW hypothesis is seriously flawed...and could lead to very serious consequences. Please ignore the propaganda...and DO support a push for research and development of renewable energy sources and better means of propulsion.
I know climate change will affect the lives of many animals and people, why else does it matter to us?
climate change is no big deal as long as your house is 100 feet above the present sea level .
LOL linlyons!!! It costs nothing to harvest your own food, but your environmentalist friends seem to be more greedy than George Soros and have surely had a hand in "jacking up" the cost of foods with all of the environmental regulations passed through Government. We can't just let things be. Can't drink certain water because it is the natural habitat of a certain endangered fish so then you have to spend time and energy to find a new source. Gotta pay a Government surveyor just to locate a drink of water that isn't environmentally protected.
Liberal thinking on matters might as well be renamed - "Communism"
" ... The IPCC attributes 20th century global warming primarily to CO2 on the basis of climate modeling, claiming that the increase in solar activity during the 20th century was insufficient to cause the observed warming. Thus, it is claimed, CO2 is by default the only other possible cause of the warming [they don't know how to model ocean oscillations, so those are automatically & conveniently excluded as a cause].
However, climate models are programmed with solar forcing that is 5-13 times less than found by state-of-the-art solar activity reconstructions. ... "
" ... For example, the NASA-GISS climate model uses a solar forcing assumption which shows solar activity increased during the 20th century by only about 0.3 Watts per meter squared [W/m2]. Contemporary solar activity reconstructions, however, show that solar activity increased during the 20th century by 1.5 - 4 W/m2 or 5 - 13 times more than assumed by the NASA-GISS model. Reconstructed Total Solar Irradiance [TSI] shows an increase of ~ 4 W/m2 over the 20th century. Solar forcing based on these modern reconstructions is 1 - 2.6 times higher than the alleged forcing from increased greenhouse gases during the 20th century. In addition, climate models do not consider any of the multiple solar amplification mechanisms which have been described in the literature. Thus, the IPCC and others dismiss the role of the Sun in climate by conveniently assuming solar activity changed 5 - 13 times less than the research indicates.
In addition, since solar forcing was much higher than assumed by the models, this implies that CO2 forcing was significantly less than assumed by the models. ... "
Climate Science (IP CC) is all about having political control of the Planet and nothing else. I'm sure Margaret Thatcher was well-intended when she offered money to prove that CO2 caused Global Warming back in 1988, but her original idea (thwarting off the oil cartels and the coal miner's union) has been kidnapped by environmental zealots.
End of story!
