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Course Overview:

The goal of this class is to provide the basic scientific background for understanding global environmental change – past, present, and future.  You are all no doubt familiar with predictions that the Earth’s climate will become much warmer in coming decades, as a result of human-induced changes in the composition of the atmosphere.  You may also be aware of predictions that global warming will result in other forms of environmental change, such as shrinkage of glaciers or changes in the frequency of large floods.  It is important to recognize, however, that Earth’s climate has changed dramatically in past, for reasons unrelated to human activity.  As a result, natural vegetation underwent major changes, glaciers and deserts expanded or shrank, and large floods became more or less frequent.  Also, climate is not the only factor in environmental change.  Especially in the past few hundred years, humans have had major direct impacts on their physical environment.

To critically evaluate predictions of global warming and other types of future environmental change, and to distinguish the role of human activity from other factors, it is essential to understand the basic processes that shape the global environment.  In particular it is important to understand the earth as a system, consisting of complex and interlinked subsystems (e.g. the atmosphere, oceans, lithosphere, biosphere).  The first part of this course will cover the Earth’s atmosphere, emphasizing the processes that control weather, climate, and the earth’s energy balance.  We will then discuss examples and possible causes of climate change in the past and future.  The second part of the course will review the geologic, geomorphic, and biologic components of the earth system.

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