What does global warming mean for some species on the planet?

That's a question that this report has been trying to answer, and the results are hardly optimistic for some species:

Some climates may disappear from Earth entirely, not just from their current locations, while new climates could develop if the planet continues to warm, a study says.

Such changes would endanger some plants and animals while providing new opportunities for others, said John W. Williams, an assistant professor of geography at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
[...]
Tropical regions in particular may face unexpected changes, particularly the rain forests in the Amazon and Indonesia, Williams' researchers concluded.

This was surprising, Williams said in a telephone interview, since the tropics tend to have little variation in weather.

But that also means temperature changes of 3 or 4 degrees in these regions might have more impact than a change of 5 to 8 degrees in a region that is accustomed to regular changes.

Species living in tropical areas may be less able to adapt, he said, adding that that is speculative and needs further study.
[...]
And they said mountain areas such as in Peruvian and Colombian Andes and regions such as Siberia and southern Australia face a risk of climates disappearing altogether.

That doesn't mean these regions would have no climate at all -- rather their climate would change and the conditions currently in these areas would not occur elsewhere on Earth.

That would pose a risk to species living in those areas, Williams observed.

And then there's this tidbit:

"The potential consequences and how these new regimes will be populated are poorly known, and the potential for new threats to humans through disease vectors could be a real danger," he said.

Besides obviously feeling upset because entire species of animals and plants might be lost forever, two things are particularly worrying here.

First, the fact that some of the most at risk climates (and by extension all the living organisms they envelop) are in the rain forests, where thousands of species of animals and plants haven't been studied or even discovered yet, and they are often the source of many of the medicines that cure us.

Second, the fact that new climates could give rise to unknown species that could pose real threats to our health or even survival.

I'd say those two risks alone are worth fighting global warming. Unless you're George Bush.