英一半民众认为气候变化非人为所致
Almost half of Britons do not believe human behaviour is the main cause of global warming, a new poll showed Sunday, a day before world leaders begin crunch climate talks in Copenhagen.
The ICM survey for The Sunday Telegraph newspaper found 52 percent of respondents thought humans were largely responsible for modern day rises in temperatures, but 39 percent said climate change had not yet been proven to be man-made.
A further seven percent did not believe climate change was happening at all.
Meanwhile, 23 percent thought climate change was "the most serious problem faced by man", with 58 percent saying it was merely "one of a number of serious problems", while 17 percent said it was "not a very serious problem".
The findings are likely to concern world leaders such as Prime Minister Gordon Brown who believe an international deal in Copenhagen on cutting greenhouse gas emissions is the best way to combat climate change.
They follow a row over leaked emails from a key climate research unit at the University of East Anglia, which sparked claims that scientists were trying to suppress data which did not support the view that climate change is happening.
Some US lawmakers and a top Saudi official have said the emails undermine the science of climate change.
However, Brown this weekend said people who denied man's impact on global warming were "behind-the-times, anti-science, flat-earth climate sceptics".
ICM questioned 1,001 adults by telephone on December 2-3.
上周日公布的一项最新民意调查显示，近一半的英国人认为人类行为并非导致全球变暖的主要原因。该调查结果公布于哥本哈根气候峰会召开的前一天。
这项受《星期日电讯报》委托，由ICM调查机构开展的民调发现，52%的受访者认为人类应对气候变暖负主要责任，但39%的受访者称没有证据证明气候变化是人为所致。
另有7%的受访者认为气候变化根本没有发生。
同时，23%的受访者认为气候变化是“人类所面临的最严峻的问题”，58%的人称气候变化只是“诸多严峻问题中的其中一个”，而17%的受访者认为“气候变化并没有那么严重“。
调查结果可能会让包括戈登•布朗首相在内的各国首脑们感到担忧，在他们看来，在哥本哈根达成一项旨在减少温室气体排放的国际协议是对抗气候变化的最好办法。
此前，英国东安格里亚大学的气候研究中心泄露的电子邮件引发了一场争论，有人认为，这些泄露邮件表现出科学家们试图抑制不支持气候变化观点的数据的意思。
美国一些立法者和沙特阿拉伯的一名高级官员说这些电子邮件破坏了气候变化的科学。
然而，布朗首相在上周末表示，那些否认人类对全球变暖影响的人是“落伍的、反科学的、坚持地球平面说的气候变化怀疑论者”。
ICM机构在12月2日至3日对1001个成年人进行了电话调查。
Vocabulary:
crunch: to perform operations on; manipulate or process 进行
row:a boisterous disturbance or quarrel 吵架；公开争论
