Final thoughts

This should be my final post. Instead of writing about any paper in specific, I think it would be more fruitful if I wrote about some of my conclusions regarding the topic of extreme climate change in the Amazon Rainforest. First of all, the Amazon can apparently really take a beating. It has been around for millions of years (exactly how many is more difficult to determine), and survived extreme changes in climate over prolonged periods of time, including the last glacial maximum. Therefore, gradual shifts in temperature and precipitation, while affecting the forest, historically do not seem to pose a threat to its existence.

However, this does not mean, by any stretch of the imagination, that the Amazon Rainforest is safe. First of all, current levels of carbon dioxide and human impact have no historical precedent, so while there may be some comfort in realizing how resistant the rainforest has been, it is outweighed by how much the rainforest has suffered since the industrial era. Secondly, the current changes in precipitation and increased seasonality also lack a clear precedent in the history of the Amazon, as do El Niño/La Niña events. Finally, while the potential effects of current human impact and global climactic conditions are already difficult enough to comprehend, unless there are significant changes, these conditions will only become more extreme and further away from any precedent.
While nobody can predict the future, and historical analogues are at most helpful suggestions as to what may happen, what is certain is that anthropogenic effects on the Amazon can and have been damaging to the forest. While studies with models to predict the future of the rainforest and neighboring ecosystems paint several different pictures of what tomorrow might be like, they also reflect the degree of uncertainty towards the upcoming decades and centuries. Studies can become more in depth, and models more accurate, but it does not change what is already known and certain, that humans are destroying the Amazon. Burning, cutting, and polluting the forest are all clearly and unequivocally harmful. These actions are most realistically within the control of people and governments, and can be changed so as to mitigate any effects on the climate of the Amazon, not to mention the physical dimensions of the forest.

Which question is more important? If the resilient past of the Amazonian Rainforest will guarantee its future, or if we are willing to pay the price to find out?