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Published online 14 May 2008 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news.2008.823
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Warming world altering thousands of natural systems
Analysis shows effects of climate change on almost 30,000 biological and physical phenomena.
A comprehensive analysis of trends in tens of thousands of biological and physical systems has provided more evidence to bolster the near-universal view that man-made climate change is altering the behaviour of plants, animals, rivers and more.
The study, by an international research team featuring many members of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is a statistical analysis of observations of natural systems over time.
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The statement that "Human-caused climate change is having a broad range of impacts on physical and biological systems" is a misleading one. While the historical data used in the study may reveal a correlation between temperature and system behavior (at least in the locations for which there is data, i.e. the northern hemisphere), this does not mean that such temperature changes are caused by human activity. It is the careless wording of language containing implicit, unfounded assumptions such as this one that adds fuel to the "global warming" controversy.