Dennis,
I think a post by Canie some time ago said that these types of post were OK so not really off topic (is earth science). I've recently been very interested in the controversy between the global warming atheists and the global warming devout. But, despite being devout (is that a word? darn very hard to type after Friday beer ration...), the Bangladesh island needs to be put into context: devotees are discredited by overstating the problem: the Ganges-Bamaputra (sp?) delta is probably subsiding at least 10 mm/yr while the global sea level is going up between 1 and 3 mm/yr...so the island may have just sunk and/or been eroded away. The sea level did no go up enough in a few years to sink an island.
(the rapid subisence is due to 2 things: respond of crust to massive sediment load, and compaction of the sediments).
But, the problem is real and serious...more later..
Chris