NASA has created an animated video showing the changes in global temperatures from 1880 to 2011.  Whether you believe humans are responsible for global warming or not, it would certainly appear, according this data (and a seemingly endless string of other evidence) that the Earth is most definitely warming up.

If you’re concerned about the actual Earth, allow me to impart to you some Carlin-esque wisdom:

“The planet will be here for a long, long, LONG time after we’re gone, and it will heal itself, it will cleanse itself, ’cause that’s what it does. It’s a self-correcting system. The air and the water will recover, the earth will be renewed. And if it’s true that plastic is not degradable, well, the planet will simply incorporate plastic into a new paradigm: the earth plus plastic. The earth doesn’t share our prejudice toward plastic. Plastic came out of the earth. The earth probably sees plastic as just another one of its children. Could be the only reason the earth allowed us to be spawned from it in the first place. It wanted plastic for itself. Didn’t know how to make it. Needed us. Could be the answer to our age-old egocentric philosophical question, “Why are we here?”

Plastic… asshole.””