Manila Observatory Executive Director Fr. Jose Ramon “Jett” Villarin used a body-temperature analogy to explain the urgency of global warming, comparing the Earth’s current 1.1 to 1.2 degree Celsius temperature rise to a person running a low-grade fever—one that could escalate to hospitalization-level severity if left unaddressed.
Villarin, a physicist and member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change team that received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007, made the comparison in an interview on DZRH News program Special on Saturday on June 20.
“Parang sa katawan, ‘di ba kapag 37 degrees sabi natin normal. Pero noong pandemya, anong nangyari? Minomonitor natin kung 1 degree na ba ‘yan. Kapag plus 2 degrees, 39 na ‘yan, ‘di ba? Kapag 39, naku, lagnat na ‘yan. Kapag plus 3 degrees, 40, diretso na ‘yan sa ospital,” Villarin said.
He said the planet, like the human body, currently sits at a low-grade fever stage, but a rise to 2 degrees Celsius would mark a serious escalation requiring urgent global action.
“Nasa sinat, oo, tama ‘yung analogy na ‘yan. Kapag naging 2 degrees, talagang kailangan may gawin na tayo tungkol sa pag-iinit ng mundo,” Villarin said.
Villarin explained that while the human body has natural mechanisms to cool itself, such as sweating, and the planet similarly has stabilizing mechanisms involving cloud cover and heat regulation, human activity has disrupted these natural equilibrium processes.
He said the danger lies not in the size of the number itself, but in the pace of change—warming that used to occur over very long timescales is now happening within a few decades, a rate of change the planet’s natural systems were not built to absorb.
