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Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

scientificamerican.com

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Re: Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

#91

Post by yongjik »

throwaway9990 wrote: post #31
czechdeveloper wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This vastly underestimates human capacity to destroy earth, which is also reason why lost of people do not believe in climate change to begin with. If we go, all vertebrates go too. At least all cat and bigger sized. Life will survive, but I would not call if "fine". Is it still fine if it's only microscopic life? When it stops being fine?

Dinosaurs died off. Earth is fine. I think unless we start blowing up Earth with nuclear weapons on purpose, it will be fine. If humans are gone today, the CO2 levels will go back to normal pretty quickly with plenty of animals surviving all over the place.

"At this rate most major cities will have to be abandoned in X years."

"Meh, dinosaurs have come and gone. The Earth will be fine."

"...To combat this, we need budget. Starting this year, your tax will increase by five percent."

"Murder! Fire! Revolution! How dare you!"

...happens all the time.

Re: Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

#92

Post by srdev »

throwaway9990 wrote: post #42
worldsayshi wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Earth will be fine I'm so tired of hearing this empty phrase being used. Sure it was fun as a punchline but move along already. It's such a derailment of the discussion. It doesn't state what we mean by "earth" - is it the rock, the ecosystem, life itself? And it implies that the "earth" that is fine is the one that we actually should care about. I have no idea, because the way it's used is not really falsifiable a…

Not sure why you're tired of it since I haven't heard this argument used much. Regardless, when I say Earth, I mean the rock and likely ecosystems that currently exist and might develop on it. I think these things cannot be easily separated that's why Earth is used.

It’s used in nearly every climate change discussion. Its not particularly profound or thought provoking.

Re: Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

#93

Post by koonsolo »

throwaway9990 wrote: post #31
czechdeveloper wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This vastly underestimates human capacity to destroy earth, which is also reason why lost of people do not believe in climate change to begin with. If we go, all vertebrates go too. At least all cat and bigger sized. Life will survive, but I would not call if "fine". Is it still fine if it's only microscopic life? When it stops being fine?

Dinosaurs died off. Earth is fine. I think unless we start blowing up Earth with nuclear weapons on purpose, it will be fine. If humans are gone today, the CO2 levels will go back to normal pretty quickly with plenty of animals surviving all over the place.

So what if we blow up Earth? Even if we would blow up the sun, the Milky Way will be fine, and so will all other galaxies around us.

No worries. ;P

Re: Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

#94

Post by dwaltrip »

Tharkun wrote: post #70
TeMPOraL wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As a community, HN seems to think nuclear energy is easy while carpooling or flying less are misguided wastes of effort. Yes, because it's the truth. Knowing that reflects understanding. It's orders of magnitude easier to design[0] a nuclear reactor than it is to get a meaningful number of people to voluntarily refrain from flying, or even driving cars. Getting lots of people to agree on something, especially when…

That's an interesting perspective, and one I hadn't considered before. I have to admit that it only fuels my fatalism. If people can't be convinced not to (e.g.) throw their trash out the window, then I can't help but despair.

This is where public policy, international agreements (with teeth), and other such things come into play, as they have the potential to modify the dynamics and incentives driving the harmful activity.

Not that this makes it easy...

Re: Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

#95

Post by danieka »

dpwm wrote: post #9
swampthinker wrote: post #2

I hate this feeling of hopelessness regarding global warming. It feels like even if you were a billionaire/massive corp, at some point you would say "wow we should stop, or else there won't even be a world to spend this money in".

When I read articles like this I feel a similar helplessness. I am reminded of Bob Mankoff's cartoon: https://cartoons.bobmankoff.com/52630

"Yes, the planet got destroyed. But for a beautiful moment in time we created a lot of value for shareholders."

https://www.newyorker.com/cartoon/a16995

Re: Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

#96

Post by woodandsteel »

throwaway9990 wrote: post #13
jacquesm wrote: post #5

The oceans are by far the most important eco system on the planet, they have tremendous capacity for healing and regeneration but once that gets pushed too far there may be no way back. And without the oceans alive the world will be hungry. There are many bad things the Trump administration might be remembered for domestically but internationally the most visible decision was the withdrawal from the climate change ac…

Posting from a throwaway because politics. Wouldn't there also be more different fish now especially in places that used to be covered by ice? Sure, some species might die off but you might get more new species as well. Some new fish perhaps that is good at living in lower oxygen concentration. Also, the fish that lived in the tropics can move to subtropics and so on. I see it as more of a change that's not really ba…

Due to the Earth being a sphere, the arctic is much smaller in area than the tropical oceans, so I assume it could have a lot fewer fish.

Re: Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

#97

Post by throwaway9990 »

dpwm wrote: post #30
throwaway9990 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adaptations can happen within a decade. Look into radiotrophic fungi near Chernobyl.

The adaptations you are talking about were in fungi, in the presence of radiation which didn't kill them. This is in comparison to fish, in which adaptations take a longer time, where the decrease in oxygen is a direct threat to life.

It has to be a threat to life. Otherwise, no fungi that had potential for such energy consumption would have been selected for.

Same with fish or birds. With fish, the ones that can live in a slightly lower O2 environment will be selected for and survive better than the ones who can't. Those that can't would die off because they won't be able to compete as well.

This adaptation can happen within a decade.

Re: Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

#98

Post by mehrdadn »

CapitalistCartr wrote: post #48
mehrdadn wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, if you're referring to biological magnification then yes, but that's not the problem we're talking about, right? We're talking about global warming, which leads to species dying off (due to habitat loss, etc.) rather than staying alive but accumulating toxins... that's where I don't get how things would be any different if we were lower in the food chain?

We have many more points of dependency. So a malfunction in the machinery of life is more likely to be disastrous the further up the pyramid one lives. At the apex of the pyramid, we are dependent on the entire pyramid being structurally sound. And consider: we are already in the midst of the worst die-off of species since the dinosaurs. So the pyramid is already crumbling.

> We have many more points of dependency. So a malfunction in the machinery of life is more likely to be disastrous the further up the pyramid one lives.

You're just repeating the claim, and again, I do not follow the logic. Again, my question is: why would it be less disastrous if we were lower in the food chain? It would help to give an example of a species at a lower position in our food web and explain why, if we took its position, we'd be better off.

Re: Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

#99

Post by mehrdadn »

jacquesm wrote: post #63
TeMPOraL wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure I understand the analogy. What classes of problems a house can develop structurally that are primarily visible standing on the roof, before the whole thing collapses? Or do you mean that even a partial collapse always affects things above it?

Any change in the structure of a house will typically affect the roofline. That's why checking the roofline is a very good thing to do when purchasing a house, if the roof is straight that is an important data point about walls and foundation supporting that roof. A sagging roof is a sure sign of problems in the rest of the building, rarely a sign of trouble with the roof itself.

I understand your logic about the house but I don't see why it is an apt analogy. It would help to explain what kinds of problems you are imagining for the house and what they could correspond to in the food web, both at the lower and upper levels.

Re: Ocean's Oxygen Starts Running Low (2016)

#100

Post by worldsayshi »

throwaway9990 wrote: post #42
worldsayshi wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Earth will be fine I'm so tired of hearing this empty phrase being used. Sure it was fun as a punchline but move along already. It's such a derailment of the discussion. It doesn't state what we mean by "earth" - is it the rock, the ecosystem, life itself? And it implies that the "earth" that is fine is the one that we actually should care about. I have no idea, because the way it's used is not really falsifiable a…

Not sure why you're tired of it since I haven't heard this argument used much. Regardless, when I say Earth, I mean the rock and likely ecosystems that currently exist and might develop on it. I think these things cannot be easily separated that's why Earth is used.

> and likely ecosystems that currently exist

Well if that's part of "Earth" then "Earth will be fine" is a lie.

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