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Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

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Re: Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

#421

Post by openasocket »

virmundi wrote: post #408
openasocket wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hence Jesus saying it's easier to thread a fishing line through a needle Nit: it's thread a camel through the eye of the needle, not fishing line

Nope. That's just a shitty English translation. The Jews at the time were familiar with different types of ropes/threads. It is most likely that Jesus referred to the type of rope used in fishing which is much larger than a thread. http://www.biblicalhebrew.com/nt/camelneedle.htm

According to that link that is just one of several possible interpretations. In fact the author seems to prefer the "camel" translation, as there are contemporary examples of similar hyperbole.

Re: Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

#422

Post by Bedon292 »

kerbalspacepro wrote: post #330
harwoodleon wrote: post #207

This is very simple, but something most of the HN people won't be able to do. STOP FLYING! Passenger numbers have gone up in a step change with CO2 count over the last 50 years, contrails compound the effect. The sad thing is - you will all look at this message and think. Why should I have to change? Why me, surely someone else must fix this? Don't wait for governments, don't wait for industry. Make individual choice…

As a % of CO2 emissions, how much is flying?

According to this site about 2-3% of the global emissions. http://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2015/09/evolving-clima...

Seems like something other than flying might be a better target to reduce carbon emissions.

Re: Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

#423

Post by compton_effect »

delegate wrote: post #145

The message I"m getting is not that I have to prepare for something or change energy sources , it's that "our lifestyle is killing the planet much faster than we thought". CO2 levels is just one of a myriad of indicators that are off the scale now. By lifestyle I mean supermarkets and restaurants and iPhones and planes ... all the stuff that we're so proud of as a society. Winning, getting ahead, being number one, ou…

This is a really good summary of part of the point Harari was making in Homo Deus. Awesome book, Harari does a great job of explaining complex ideas for a wide audience.

Re: Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

#424

Post by nonbel »

drjesusphd wrote: post #413
nonbel wrote: post #398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"There are serious climate scientists saying that, its possible that a greenhouse effect similar to the PT event happening now, could push earth into a Venus like state." The Venus atmosphere is 50x thicker than Earth's, Venus is also ~1.4x closer to the sun. Where will all this extra atmospheric mass and incoming radiation come from?

Water is one of the strongest greenhouse gases around, and there's plenty of it in the oceans that can evaporate in a runaway process. Once that happens, we're the next Venus. Reaching that tipping point is quite difficult though, and would require additional warming besides fossil fuels. Methane-based runaway warming maybe? Or even basic thermodynamic heat sink effects (which we'll reach in about 200 years at the cu…

Can you find a "serious climate scientist" who is claiming this "oceans boiling away" scenario is plausible? Alternatively, can you put some basic numbers on that? What will the surface temp need to be to initiate the boiling away?

It looks like currently the TSI at Earth varies between 1315 and 1405 w/m^2 (a range of 90 w/m^2), which apparently has less effect on the temperature than the tilt of the earth. http://lasp.colorado.edu/lisird/sorce/sorce_tsi/index.html

Re: Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

#425

Post by lambdadmitry »

hwillis wrote: post #420
mirimir wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look, we're not "killing the planet". Humans are organisms like any other. Sure, human populations have spiked from millions to billions in recent millennia, and mean per capita resource utilization has increased dramatically. But that's just what organisms do. So anyway, the planet will be fine. Human civilization may collapse, given the risk of crop failure and war. But even humanity will survive. Edit: Many other…

>At present, the rate of extinction of species is estimated at 100 to 1,000 times higher than the "base" or historically typical rate of extinction (in terms of the natural evolution of the planet) and also the current rate of extinction is, therefore, 10 to 100 times higher than any of the previous mass extinctions in the history of Earth. From wikipedia, Holocene extinction. By what other metric could you possibly…

>Push as much co2 as possible into the air as quickly as possible to change global conditions enough to kill all plants at the same time

This makes no sense. How exactly an abundance of CO2 will "kill all plants" given that they are thriving on it? Let's say temperature rises further, like +10C rise. Desertification may kill some plants, sure. In the meantime, huge swaths of Siberia and Canada will stop being permafrost and transform back into thriving bogs, marshes and forests.

Moreover, there were times on Earth with widely higher temperatures. We are talking thousands of ppm of CO2 in the air and tropical flora on Antarctica. This didn't "end all life on Earth" at all.

Re: Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

#426

Post by gshubert17 »

specialist wrote: post #210
delegate wrote: post #145

The message I"m getting is not that I have to prepare for something or change energy sources , it's that "our lifestyle is killing the planet much faster than we thought". CO2 levels is just one of a myriad of indicators that are off the scale now. By lifestyle I mean supermarkets and restaurants and iPhones and planes ... all the stuff that we're so proud of as a society. Winning, getting ahead, being number one, ou…

"Ultimately it is the lack of spirituality in people that's killing the planet." Bad accounting is killing our planet. Neglecting important parts of the balance sheet creates perverse incentives.

Aren't the major forms of human organization -- corporations and nation-states -- effective ways to externalize costs?

Re: Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

#427

Post by nikcub »

adrianN wrote: post #227
qplex wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except here what you label as "pseudo spiritual" is actually the more realistic, scientific and moral way of seeing things. The iPhones and Supermarkets are of the dream reality. A world without consequences, where the Foxconn Factory Workers (or the mines of Congo) do not exist.

Foxconn factory workers have a lower suicide rate than the average Chinese.

They have a lower suicide rate than Silicon Valley ..

Re: Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

#428

Post by mirimir »

mac01021 wrote: post #418
mirimir wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's not a straw man. Yes, many species will go extinct. Human civilization will probably collapse. Maybe the human species will go extinct. But life will go on, and within a billion years, who will care? We wouldn't be here, but for the last major extinction event. Anyway, I'm not arguing for inaction. But I do think that it's too late. Exponentials and positive feedback are full of surprises.

So what's your point? Everyone knows that there will continue to be life on earth. Everyone knows that noone will care 1e9 years hence. Are you suggesting we shouldn't care either? Are you just trying to be "more correct" than other people by pointing out literal falsehoods in things that they've said even though noone is actually taking it literally? (That qualifies as a strawman argument) Either way, your statement…

Exaggeration doesn't help the argument that anthropogenic climate change is a serious problem.

I am not suggesting that we shouldn't care.

Maybe you're right that there's still a chance of averting catastrophic impact if "we get our act together over the next decade". That's what I've been arguing for decades. But in recent years, the signs of increasing rate of change and positive feedbacks have become much clearer.

What are the chances that the US will cut CO2 emissions by 50% in a decade or two? I'd say that it's about zero. Suburbanization is a huge conundrum. Plus all that old infrastructure. Not to mention the fact that a substantial minority thinks that it's all bullshit, that God is on our side, and that it's all part of immanent Armageddon.

Re: Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

#429

Post by gus_massa »

openasocket wrote: post #421
virmundi wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope. That's just a shitty English translation. The Jews at the time were familiar with different types of ropes/threads. It is most likely that Jesus referred to the type of rope used in fishing which is much larger than a thread. http://www.biblicalhebrew.com/nt/camelneedle.htm

According to that link that is just one of several possible interpretations. In fact the author seems to prefer the "camel" translation, as there are contemporary examples of similar hyperbole.

I agree. If "nor an elephant going through the eye of a needle" was a expression used previously, it's not so strange that they have a local version with a camel.

Re: Atmospheric CO2 levels accelerate upwards

#430

Post by mirimir »

kamaal wrote: post #411
mirimir wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's not a straw man. Yes, many species will go extinct. Human civilization will probably collapse. Maybe the human species will go extinct. But life will go on, and within a billion years, who will care? We wouldn't be here, but for the last major extinction event. Anyway, I'm not arguing for inaction. But I do think that it's too late. Exponentials and positive feedback are full of surprises.

>>But I do think that it's too late. Why? It doesn't look like we are staring extinction right in the face. Any talk of reasonable influence on climate is over a few centuries. So why do do you its 'late'?

Right. I doubt that climate change alone could lead to human extinction. But climate change could bring starvation, chaos and war. And there are tens of thousands of nuclear weapons.

But yes, probably not extinction.

More likely is collapse of industrial civilization. That will cut CO2 emissions, and climate will recover is a few centuries. Many other species will go extinct in the process, however. It'll be a major extinction event.

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