Robert Bodnar was a lonely voice.

In a conference about climate change, he had the session whose title asked, "Does global warming offer any benefits to the Earth?"

Generally, the answer was negative at Virginia Tech's 25th Choices and Challenges forum, where Bodnar was among the presenters Thursday.

Nearly everyone agrees global warming will increase rainfall, Bodnar said. That could end droughts in Ethiopia and Somalia. It could alleviate water shortages.

As Greenland's ice sheets melt, Greenlanders will have pasture for dairy cows for the first time in hundreds of years. Farmers in central and northern Canada may be able to grow corn.

Churchill, a port on the Hudson Bay, is free of ice four months a year now, one month more than a decade ago. If that trend continues, Churchill could become an alternative to busier North American ports.

That could be a good thing, because Churchill's current big industry is catering to tourists who come to see polar bears.

Of course, "Global warming isn't being very kind to polar bears," Bodnar said. "It's not all peaches and cream here."

Bodnar's point wasn't so much that global warming is good, but that better understanding how some areas stand to benefit from climate change may lead to better preparation to deal with that change.

Nobody hissed, but some audience members were poised to challenge him.

Earlier at a panel discussion at the Lyric Theatre, University of Washington political scientist Karen Liftin said that believing a particular area will benefit from global warming in the long run would mean believing that area is divorced from every other area in the world. And Liftin doesn't believe that.

"Global climate change is for me the greatest teacher of global interdependence," she said.

Most of the responsibility for dealing with the problems rests with industrialized world, she said, because the industrialized world has caused most of the problem -- and has most of the resources available to fix it.

Liftin said she sees the growing crisis as a chance to rejoin the rest of creation, an opportunity to bring human systems back into line with natural systems.

The effect climate change is having on those systems is incontrovertible.

Richard Rich, a Tech political science professor, ticked off a list in a morning primer session on climate change: Arctic sea ice has declined 40 percent in depth and area since 1960; melting glaciers are reducing the seas' salinity; increased carbon dioxide is increasing the seas' acidity.

In Henry David Thoreau's day, the ice melted off Walden Pond about April 1. Last year, the Massachusetts pond never froze.

"Life is possible only because there is this greenhouse effect," Rich said. Without it, Earth's climate would be much like the moon's. But the increasing greenhouse effect is having a profound effect on climate. That frightens some people.

"What you see when you look back is that climate change has been a kind of serial killer of civilizations," author and journalist Eugene Linden said.

The difference between us and previous civilizations is they couldn't see the changes coming, he said, but we can.

It's actually good news that climate change is being caused by human activity, Linden said.

"If we started it, we can stop it," he said.

But it's already too late to stop it, speakers argued throughout the day. Greenhouse gases already in the system guarantee temperatures will rise. The question is how much they'll rise and what can be done to mitigate the effects.

Bodnar asserted there's not much individuals or countries can do. Even if per capita generation of greenhouse gases declines, the world's population will continue to increase and the global standard of living will increase, which will mean more energy consumption, more greenhouse gases and more climate change.

Liftin argued that the industrial world can and should help developing countries improve their standard of living in more efficient ways.

Other speakers insisted individuals can make a difference. Using more efficient light bulbs, eating food grown closer to home, driving less -- all these things would reduce greenhouse gases.

Bill Chameides, an atmospheric chemist working for Georgia Tech and Environmental Defense, said that if everybody in the U.S. skipped meat one day a week, the reduction in energy use would have the same effect as taking 8 million cars off the road.

Consumer spending drives the U.S. economy, panelists reminded their audience. Brenda Ekwurzel, with the Union of Concerned Scientists, said individual economic choices can accumulate a powerful political effect.

"We vote every day with our dollars," she said.