So Does This Mean The Environmentalists Are Wrong About Global Warming As Well

Hey folks, remember how we have been hearing that the rain forests are being destroyed & the horrible ecological effect that was having? Well guess what, it turns out they were wrong. Although many of them still won't admit it. What is really happenning is that the rain forest is proving to be a lot more resiliant than people were willing to admit.

According to a recent NY Times article (link below) the rain forests in Central & South America may be growing back at up to a rate of 50 to 1. "By one estimate, for every acre of rain forest cut down each year, more than 50 acres of new forest are growing in the tropics on land that was once farmed, logged or ravaged by natural disaster."

"With the heat and rainfall in tropical Panama, new growth is remarkably fast. Within 15 years, abandoned land can contain trees more than 100 feet high. Within 20, a thick rain-forest canopy forms again."

But this is nothing new as the article goes on to point out "Here in the lush, misty hills, it is easy to see rain-forest destruction as part of a centuries-old cycle of human civilization and wilderness, in which each in turn is cleared and replaced by the other. The Mayans first cleared lands here that are now dense forest. The area around Gamboa, cleared when the Panama Canal was built, now looks to the untrained eye like the wildest of jungles."

Of course the wacko environmentalists refuse to face the fact that God made the Earth a lot more resiliant that they want to admit.

Dr. Bill Laurance, a senior scientist at the Smithsonian is trying to downplay the truth. He claims that there is no comparison. "Now the rain forest is being felled by industrial forestry, agriculture, the oil and gas industry — and it’s globalized, where every stick of timber is being cut in Congo is sent to China and one bulldozer does a lot more damage than 1,000 farmers with machetes,' he said."

he also tries to say that what is there is not real rain forest. “Yes, there are forests growing back, but not all forests are equal.”

Scoffingly he added: “This is a caricature of a rain forest! There’s no canopy, there’s too much light, there are only a few species. There is a lot of change all around here whittling away at the forest, from highways to development.”

Sorry guy, but the facts in this case seem to prove you WRONG!. 1st of all, you are acting like the old rain forest was never cut down & grew back. You know damn well that the rain forest has never been sancrosanct. You also make it sound like the up to 50 to 1 regrowth rate isn't happenning when you know damn well it is.

You also ignore the fact that the rain forest is recovering & growing at a much faster rate than we were told it could. As the article points out, in the 90s for Panama alone the rain forest grew back 4% for every 1.3% cut.

I am not for wholesale destruction. We do need to be good stewards as we exercise the dominion God gave us over the land. Something we haven't always done well.

But it is becoming clearer that the alarmist global warming radical environmentalist gang doesn't know what they are talking about. We saw this with Rev. Malthus' alarmist claims about population outstipping food growth at the start of the 19th Century. A mistake that was repeated by Paul Ehrlich in the 60s.

Climate change is natural. There are periods of warmer temperatures, there are ice ages, etc. Over time some land becomes desert while other land has become fertile as a result of those changes. it is all a part of the cycle.

In the end, when you look at all these claims, the 1 common factor is an attack on human beings. Their view seems to be that man is not the crown of God's creation. Or that God even had anything to do with it in the 1st place. They say that man should stop reproducing. That means using artificial birth control & abortion as means to do so. & that leads us back to the good old "culture of death".

As I said before, I am not condoning wholesale destruction. That is not what God told us to do. Or responsiblility is to use the gifts God has given us as good stewards. I am all for developing more energy efficient autos, electronics etc. But that isn't what this is about.

As Papa Benedetto pointed out in his 2010 message for the World Day of Peace: "There exists a certain reciprocity: as we care for creation, we realize that God, through creation, cares for us." He was absolutely right. We can discover the loving care of God as we properly care for creation & use it as God intended.

But he went on to point something else out that the "greenies" who tried to coopt the Pope for their agenda ignored. "On the other hand, a correct understanding of the relationship between man and the environment will not end by absolutizing nature or by considering it more important than the human person. If the Church’s magisterium expresses grave misgivings about notions of the environment inspired by ecocentrism and biocentrism, it is because such notions eliminate the difference of identity and worth between the human person and other living things. In the name of a supposedly egalitarian vision of the “dignity” of all living creatures, such notions end up abolishing the distinctiveness and superior role of human beings. They also open the way to a new pantheism tinged with neo-paganism, which would see the source of man’s salvation in nature alone, understood in purely naturalistic terms."

Papa Benedetto goes on to say: "The Church, for her part, is concerned that the question be approached in a balanced way, with respect for the “grammar” which the Creator has inscribed in his handiwork by giving man the role of a steward and administrator with responsibility over creation, a role which man must certainly not abuse, but also one which he may not abdicate. In the same way, the opposite position, which would absolutize technology and human power, results in a grave assault not only on nature, but also on human dignity itself."

Again I repeat, we are called to be good stewards. But we can't make nature a god either. It is quite clear that the "grammer" God has inscribed in creation is such that we can develop things in a proper way that makes the world better for all without destroying the environment. But the way these "greenies" are going about it isn't the proper way, especially when it turns man into something totally different that what God made him as, the crown of creation made in the image & likeness of God. Something that can't be said about anything else, plant, animal or mineral.

Source: New Jungles Prompt a Debate on Rain Forests