Where the environment is concerned, the entire GEO project is about trying to understand the future consequences of our actions today. Let s start where governments start with the scientists.
Epidemics now spread fast around the world, with one million people a day crossing borders.
In other words, when new epidemics break out, like AIDS, the consequences are devastating. Like war itself, prevention is always the best course. When poverty over-rides everything else, people forget about the environment. If the Arctic ice caps melt, it could very well produce another ice age in northwest Europe. This would happen because cold water flowing south from the Arctic would slow, and possibly halt, the warm Gulf Stream current which now allows people in Scotland to grow palm trees along the coast.