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The global climate has been changing since time immemorial, and the inhabitants of the Earth have had to either adapt to these changes, or disappear. Some changes have been slowly evolving over millenniums; others have been faster, evolving over centuries, or even decades. Whilst in the past climatic change has been due to natural causes, the past century has seen such rapid changes, and indications of more changes to come, that only a combination of natural and man-induced causes can explain it. So, while climate change is not new, the present pace and scale of it is worrying, to the extent that it now dominates the global political discourse.