by Gaochao Yi, Kaijun Zheng and Yinjiazi Huang
BEIJING, Dec. 17 (Xinhua) -- Though many may not know of the 1916 Danish silent film "The End of the World," few cannot help but have heard of the 2009 American movie "2012."
The doomsday parallel in the two feature films, however, has been moving from theatrical worry to real-life scare in less than a century.
It is this threat that has led humans to their latest round of meetings that are aimed at slowing, if not stopping, the clock that is ticking toward the termination of a cosmic cycle for every life form that occupies the earth.
Being neither the predicted collision with Halley's comet nor the calculated Maya's calendar expiration, the looming end-game is nothing but a paradox of humans annihilating themselves by destroying the environment they live in and rely on for everything in life.
Miseries caused by armed conflicts aside, climate change has dealt humanity a hand of adverse elements that are threatening to dictate the world's attention for many years to come.
The change, an ironic outcome of the human activities of civilization and industrialization and militarization, has been altering not only the physical state of Mother Earth but also the chemical formation of her atmosphere as well.
The World Meteorology Organization said recently that the period from 2000 to 2009 was likely to be one of the warmest decades ever, in that eight of its 10 years are among the 10 warmest ever recorded.
The 1980s, 1990s and 2000s are the warmest decades since 1850 when instrumental records began. The 2000s were warmer than the 1990s which in turn were warmer than the 1980s.
The negative effects of climate change already range from such tangibles as food and water scarcity to virus mutations to pollution via solids, fluids and gases.
In addition, the Maldivians and Nepalese are getting a taste of what global warming might cause in the next century at the very least and in a millennium at most.
People may not have to wait a millennium or even 100 years or so, however, to see the submersion of the Maldives because of rising sea levels or the threat to Nepal caused by Himalayan glacier melt.
Al Gore, the former U.S. vice president, presented to world leaders in Copenhagen a report that claimed there is a 75-percent chance that the entire Arctic polar ice cap could disappear in the summertime as soon as five to seven years from now.
The UN-sponsored scientific network Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change has predicted a worst-case scenario for 2100 of oceans rising by at least 60 centimeters.
That, the panel said, would increase by 50 percent the chance of flooding 24 of the world's 33 major river deltas, some as fertile and productive as those in the Nile, Mekong, Amazon and Yangtze.
As many as 500 million people reside in and around those deltas.
Humans, the Maldivians and Nepalese included, are also faced with other urgent threats as well.
"The pandemic continues to evolve and throw up unknowns, new challenges and new concerns," said James Palmer, a World Health Organization media officer. "It is too early to say whether we are seeing a peak of pandemic influenza activity (A/H1N1) across the Northern Hemisphere."
Humans were not long ago and are presently still bothered by such diseases as SARS and avian flu.
A/H1N1, avian flu and SARS are all air-borne contagious diseases and their predecessors were big killers, claiming the second most number of humans to full-blown world wars.
As the rising seas encroach on fertile, productive deltas across the world, humans have to grow more food on less available land to maintain a sustainable global demand-supply mechanism.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the world food governing body, is not particularly optimistic about such sustainability, in spite of new global food security governance mechanisms.
The FAO held a summit in Rome this year while there were 1.02 billion people, one sixth of the world's population, suffering from hunger and malnutrition. That number of hungry people is larger than at any other time in history, and a child dies of malnutrition every six seconds.
"We are alarmed that the number of people suffering from hunger and poverty now exceeds 1 billion. This is an unacceptable blight on the lives, livelihoods and dignity of one-sixth of the world's population," the FAO summit participants said in a joint declaration.
Despite the statement, FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf was unhappy with the meeting.
He said world leaders merely "committed to general goals without setting precise dates for the total eradication of hunger in the world nor figures regarding the funds necessary to increasing agriculture investments in order to double food production by 2025."
The FAO said under-investment in agriculture, particularly in the developing world, has been a root cause of the global food problem.
If unwillingness and unpreparedness makes dealing with climate change difficult, then what of all of the problems linked to global warming? Such calamities as food scarcity and disease could merge into an unstoppable tsunami as catastrophic, if not more so, as those depicted in the "The End of the World" or "2012."
Once in that state, coupled with the tendency of governments to politicize climate change, humans can only make do with what they have instead of being able to improve the fortunes of mankind.
There, however, still seems to be hope that the world's leaders will agree in Copenhagen to next year spell out the emissions reduction formula that will become a legally binding global treaty.
Coincidentally, that treaty would take effect in "2012," when the first phase of the Kyoto Protocol comes to an end.
U.S. scientist condemns doomsday film "2012"
LOS ANGELES, Nov. 13 (Xinhua) -- A NASA scientist has condemned the doomsday film "2012" and launched a web site, "Ask an Astrobiologist," to quell the fears it is raising.
The film, now showing in the U.S., is the latest and most high-profile public airing of an ancient Mayan prediction that a world cataclysm will occur on the winter solstice in 2012. There have been many books and TV shows on the theory but "2012" has had a much greater impact, creating widespread public fear that the prediction may be correct. Full story
Binding climate deal expected in 2010 as Copenhagen conference approaches end
COPENHAGEN, Dec. 16 (Xinhua) -- UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday called on negotiators at the climate talks in Copenhagen to complete a legally binding climate treaty "as early as possible in 2010."
"Our goal is to lay the foundation for a legally binding climate treaty as early as possible in 2010," Ban told the opening session of the high level segment of the UN climate change conference. Full story
still exist," said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu at a regular news briefing. Full story
China has great expectations for climate talks, urges more efforts
COPENHAGEN, Dec. 15 (Xinhua) -- China has great expectations for the ongoing climate talks in Copenhagen, and has called on all parties concerned to exert more efforts to ensure the success of the conference.
Xie Zhenhua, head of the Chinese delegation to the UN-led climate conference, said Monday that progress has been made at the climate talks but negotiators were still engaged in heated debates over some key issues. Full story
Special report: Premier Wen Attends Copenhagen Climate Summit
