When people think about the risks of climate change, the idea of abrupt changes is pretty scary. Movies like “The Day After Tomorrow” feed that fear, with visions of unimaginable storms and populations fleeing to escape rapidly changing temperatures.
While Hollywood clearly takes liberties with the speed and magnitude of disasters, several recent studies have raised real-world alarms that a crucial ocean current that circulates heat to northern countries might shut down this century, with potentially disastrous consequences.
