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To explain the amount of carbon 12 that we see in the geologic record
對于地質記錄中發現大量碳-12的解釋是，
we need to warm up the bottom water by somewhere in the order of about 5℃
海底某處的水溫可能升高了大約5℃。
He published his results in 1999. He couldn't have anticipated their effect.
他于1999年發表了這一研究結果，其反響出乎他的意料。
5,000 miles away in England, however, Paul Wignall read Dickens's findings with growing interest.
在5000英里之外的英國，Paul Wignall以極大的興趣拜讀了Dickens的發現。
Suddenly realized that in fact a lot of his ideas as to how to explain carbon 12 increases
我突然意識到他的很多觀點正好能解釋碳-12激增的原因，
may actually apply to the story we're getting from Greenland.
補全了我們從格陵蘭帶回來的那個故事。
It's a kind of a missing link in the story for the Permian extinction.
它正是二疊紀生物大滅絕故事中漏掉的一環。
Wignall now began to speculate.
此時Wignall開始思考。
What would be the effect on the world's climate of so much methane?
這么多甲烷會對全球氣候造成何種影響呢？
It's one of the most potent greenhouse gases known to man.
它是人類已知最強的溫室氣體。
Wignall constructed a rough climate model, using the carbon 12 as a guide to the quantities of methane.
Wignall建了一個簡單的氣候模型，用碳-12作為甲烷數量的標記。
It's not that straightforward to work out just how significant the impact of this methane release would be,
它并不能直接研究出這些甲烷釋放后的影響有多大，
but it's possible to work out the volumes emitted using the evidence from the carbon 12 increase,
但是能通過碳-12的增量計算出甲烷釋放的熱量，
and these certainly suggest that there may have been sufficient methane going into the atmosphere to perhaps increase global temperatures by 4/5℃.
結果表明只要有足夠的甲烷進入大氣就能使全球氣溫上升4-5℃。
