What is the term for the long-term increase in Earth's average temperature due to human activities?

• A. Global warming
• B. Greenhouse effect
• C. Climate change
• D. Ozone depletion

Answer: (C)

Distinguishing a specific warming from broader climate changes.

The long-term rise in Earth’s average temperature caused by human activities is global warming. It points to the overall increase in how hot the planet is on average, driven largely by more heat-trapping greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane released from burning fossil fuels, farming, and industry.

Climate change, on the other hand, is the broader set of changes that stem from that warming—shifts in weather patterns, more extreme events, changes in precipitation, melting ice, and sea-level rise. So global warming explains the temperature increase itself, while climate change captures the wider environmental impacts that come with that warming.

The greenhouse effect is the natural process by which greenhouse gases trap heat and keep Earth warmer than it would be otherwise; human activity intensifies this effect, but the term for the warming trend itself is global warming. Ozone depletion involves thinning of the ozone layer and is a different issue linked to UV radiation, not the long-term temperature rise.