Ryan ChartrandBiology professor Lars Tomanek spoke about the effects of global warming to an audience of more than 60 students and faculty members in the Fisher Science building Friday afternoon.
Tomanek gave a presentation titled “Global Climate Change; Can We Meet the Challenge” that described the impacts climate change has on the world.
Climate change is a highly- charged topic, but Tomanek tackled the topic providing his non-pessimistic stance that humans will have to deal with it fully in the near future.
“It’s an exciting time to reinvent everything from plastic to the way we live life- how we are eating, everything will eventually be different,” said Tomanek.
A lot of the information covered in the presentation included various facts and figures from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
The professor added that scientists are underestimating how quickly the glaciers are melting, and stressed the effects climate change has on organisms and ecosystems.
Tomanek correlated the fatalities from recent heat waves in Paris and Chicago to global warming and emphasized human impact on the earth.
“We are not just overpopulated; we are also overconsumers,” said Tomanek.
In a question and answer session, a student asked how to respond to those who do not believe in global warming and how to confront them, in regards to recent Mustang Daily columns.
“For unreasonable skeptics, have the facts ready – but you don’t want to be dogmatic,” Tomanek said.