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I'm not qualified to assess whether we have actually passed the tipping point yet, however it can't be far off judging from a) the apparant rate of increase in key degredation indicators and b) the inceasing noises of alarm from the scientific community. The stuff highlighted on the BBC's Planet under Pressure alone is enough to bring one out in a sickeningly cold sweat!
I think what will sink us in the end is the snails pace of meaningful global action - our collective inability to get our act together and do stuff that will mitigate the very serious environmental problems we face. It really is a case of short-term minority profiteering verus long majority survival ('long' in this context being around 100-200 years).
For many years now I have been arguing that issue of human Vs natural process is something of a red herring in the climate change debate. The important thing is how we adapt to this new environment. It is clear that Kyoto (and now Motreal) will have almost no real impact on the 'causes' of change... and with great sadness it seems they do not even begin to address what we do about the 'effects'.
Personally I think Bush and his Neo-Con's have already worked out that we are in a more or less hopeless situation. Publically they
hide behind a psuedo-religeous mask of the denaial of science - privately I suspect they see no point in taking economically painful decisions now when their chances of success are practically nil. My only issue with this stance is that I'd prefer they just said this outright - but such is politics.
We may now truely have reached The End Of Days...
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