Is Environmental Catastrophe Imminent?

"Recently, I came across a frightening report published by the US National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - the nation's most august scientific body. Yet, because there was no visually provocative content, the report had received only a couple of short paragraphs tucked away inside a few newspapers. Here is what the academy had to say: it is possible that the global warming trend projected over the course of the next 100 years could, all of a sudden and without warning, dramatically accelerate in just a handful of years - forcing a qualitative new climatic regime which could undermine ecosystems and human settlements throughout the world, leaving little or no time for plants, animals and humans to adjust."