With all the recent worries about the Earth warming up, it needs to be pointed out that rising temperatures may be bad but falling temperatures would undoubtedly be much worse:
When the environment is an evolutionary system that is based on adaption and survival of the fittest them how do you define damage? In terms of toxins/poisons its easy to do but in terms of temperature change then life has always adapted to it and either survived or perished depending depending on the ability to relocate. There is also the argument that if you help a species, make it easier then, like man you make them weaker. We are much less physiologically able to adapt than we have ever been because the comforts of our technologies have meant many of our evolutionary traits for survival are not being used. A variation in temperature could cause a change in habitats for many species. For some it will be a reduction of habitat and others an increase in habitat. Historically speaking there is no evidence that any warm period wiped out the earth or life on it. Rather the warm periods of the earth are when life has flourished on earth, vegetation has proliferated and habitats have increased. Whilst much has been made in global warming alarmism about cuddly polar bears becoming extinct (in fact polar bear numbers have increased fivefold), there has been little mention of all the species that would extend and increase their habits further poleward as the earth warmed and thus proliferate. Man likewise has been called a child of the tropics, look at how all our houses are heated to tropical temperatures and again history shows us during the warm periods civilizations flourish as does food supply.
However when we look at the cold this is quite a different story. The cold decimates nearly all life on earth as habitats are restricted, growing seasons reduce, vegetation is covered in snow and civilisations perish — history has given us ample examples of this. If we simply look at a microcosm of nature we see that animals living in cold areas often have to hibernate, their bodies adapted to the lack of food for a large part of the year. This is what the cold is all about.
