BBC News - Viewpoint: Small steps offer no respite from climate effects

[Professor Kevin Anderson, the director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research] There is currently nothing substantive to suggest we are heading for anything other than a 4C rise in temperature, possibly as early as the 2060s.

Yet over a pint of ale or sharing a coffee it is hard to find any scientist seriously engaged in climate change who considers a 4C rise within this century as anything other than catastrophic for both human society and ecosystems.

Moreover, ask those same scientists if 4C is likely to be as high as it could get prior to the temperature beginning to fall, and many will shake their heads pointing to a range of discontinuities (tipping points) that may see us witness temperatures increasing well beyond 4C.