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What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

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Re: What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

#101

Post by reallydude »

ivalm wrote: post #49
reallydude wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The survival of our technological civilization is very much uncertain. It has been since the nuclear age. If someone wanted to take meaningful action, they would be sinking container ships. In aggregate, they contribute to more pollution (of all kinds), than most singular countries. Nobody is going to war over this, so it's inevitable. If it's inevitable, it's not healthy to pretend otherwise. The earth will survive,…

> 150 degree weather Now that's a hyperbole. > No water Invest in desalination, like Israel and other rich middle eastern countries.

> 150 degree weather

I guess that depends on what you consider "weather" If I said "ground temperature", would it matter to the discussion? 60C (140F) was the Average temp in the triassic. With the amount of water in the air plus the carbon dioxide, I expect to see that in places a couple generations after I die...which is the time period I've referenced (political instability).

The highest ground temperature recorded was 201 degrees at Furnace Creek on July 15, 1972, according to the National Park Service. The maximum air temperature for that day was 128. All types of bad things happen at that point. Water evaporates rapidly at 150, so who cares where the water comes from. It's gone or containers rupture as it turns gaseous. What temperature the air is, doesn't matter.

Re: What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

#102

Post by robomartin »

adrianN wrote: post #54
robomartin wrote: post #41

The problem with climate change is that it has now solidly left the realm of the scientific to enter politics. Here’s the truth: We cannot do a thing about it. This is scientific fact, not my opinion. I invite everyone to reproduce my conclusion. Here’s how to do it: Question: How long would it take for a 100 ppm drop in atmospheric CO2 concentration if humanity, along with all of our technology, evaporated from this…

You can suck carbon out of the atmosphere faster than the geological processes that do it naturally. But that of course doesn't matter if you work on the assumption that it's ridiculous to stop burning fossil fuels. Many people believe that it's possible and actually not hard, just expensive.

No, you cannot.

Do the math on how much energy and resources would be required to do what you are suggesting at a global scale.

That’s the problem with all of these great sounding ideas, nobody bothers to quantify them —particularly at a planetary scale.

EDIT: Just noticed your comment about burning fuels.

I need to clarify something. And this is important. I have never --ever-- said (and I've written about this a few times on HN) that migrating away from fossil fuels is a bad idea. It's a great idea. We should do it to the extent possible. I've done my part, I installed a 13 kW solar power system at my home and we are on track to switch to 100% electric vehicles within, say, a year.

What is NOT OK is pretending that this is going to "save the planet". Our migration away from fossil fuels will do absolutely nothing of note --zero-- as far as reversing atmospheric CO2 accumulation. This has been studied and published. The conclusion was, to paraphrase, "even if we migrated the entire planet to the MOST OPTIMAL FORMS of renewable energy sources, atmospheric CO2 accumulation would continue to INCREASE EXPONENTIALLY".

In other words, even if we did the impossible (total migration to renewable sources at a global is likely impossible). Why? BECAUSE THE BASELINE IS 75,000 YEARS with NO HUMANS ON EARTH.

BTW, I am not yelling, using caps for emphasis.

We can discuss facts or that which we wish were facts. The difference is that we are never going to improve anything if we insist on ignoring reality.

It is OK to say "all of these proposals are nonsense", if, in fact, they are. It would be the same if politicians were proposing to save humanity by reducing the planet's gravitational constant by 10%. Ridiculous, but I bet someone out there could make a fictional case about the idea and collect an audience...just like the flat earth geniuses.

Re: What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

#103

Post by robomartin »

gshdg wrote: post #76
robomartin wrote: post #41

The problem with climate change is that it has now solidly left the realm of the scientific to enter politics. Here’s the truth: We cannot do a thing about it. This is scientific fact, not my opinion. I invite everyone to reproduce my conclusion. Here’s how to do it: Question: How long would it take for a 100 ppm drop in atmospheric CO2 concentration if humanity, along with all of our technology, evaporated from this…

We may not be able to remove that CO2, but we could stop adding more.

True enough, but that isn’t going to solve anything.

The problem, again, is that when you actually look into the reality of such a proposal it crumbles very quickly.

Remember, the baseline is in the order of 75,000 years if humanity evaporates from the planet. Do anything LESS than that and it will take longer.

Re: What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

#104

Post by basch »

gambiting wrote: post #43
Bombthecat wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But would there be a difference between 5 and 6?

From what I understand no - warming by 5 degrees will cause all phytoplankton to die off and as a result we'll run out of oxygen(not immediately of course, but we inevitably will).

Wouldnt it be a really really long time to run out of oxygen?

“What would happen if we combusted every living cell on Earth?” it asked. That is, Peters wanted to know what would happen to the atmosphere if you burned down not just the Amazon, but every forest on Earth, every blade of grass, every moss and lichen-spackled patch of rock, all the flowers and bees, all the orchids and hummingbirds, all the phytoplankton, zooplankton, whales, starfish, bacteria, giraffes, hyraxes, coatimundis, oarfish, albatrosses, mushrooms, placozoans—all of it, besides the humans.

Peters pulled up the next slide. After this unthinkable planetary immolation, the concentration of oxygen in the atmosphere dropped from 20.9 percent to 20.4 percent. CO2 rose from 400 parts per million to 900—less, even, than it does in the worst-case scenarios for fossil-fuel emissions by 2100. By burning every living thing on Earth.

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/08/amazon-f...

Re: What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

#105

Post by leereeves »

gambiting wrote: post #43
Bombthecat wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But would there be a difference between 5 and 6?

From what I understand no - warming by 5 degrees will cause all phytoplankton to die off and as a result we'll run out of oxygen(not immediately of course, but we inevitably will).

The world was once 8C to 14C hotter than it is now (during the Eocene) and it didn't run out of oxygen. In fact, this was the epoch when modern mammals took over the world.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geologic_temperature_record#/m...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eocene

Re: What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

#106

Post by leereeves »

tw04 wrote: post #59
i_am_proteus wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which all conveniently line up with one major political platform. "If you frightened by the coming climate cataclysm, then you should also agree with me on everything ." It's very well-written, but it's not rational. The content is more political than scientific.

It doesn't matter in the least if you agree with a candidate on everything. This one specific subject should be a deal breaker though, regardless of just about any other stance. Your opinion on free market is irrelevant in the face of Extinction.

Alarmism only discredits the effort to respond to climate change.

Re: What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

#107

Post by ivalm »

reallydude wrote: post #101
ivalm wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 150 degree weather Now that's a hyperbole. > No water Invest in desalination, like Israel and other rich middle eastern countries.

> 150 degree weather I guess that depends on what you consider "weather" If I said "ground temperature", would it matter to the discussion? 60C (140F) was the Average temp in the triassic. With the amount of water in the air plus the carbon dioxide, I expect to see that in places a couple generations after I die...which is the time period I've referenced (political instability). The highest ground temperature recorde…

When people talk about "temperature" they mean air temperature, look at any weather forecast. Human survival is largely dependent on air temperature. While water does evaporate faster at 150 than at, say, 100, it is still well below boiling and not hard to contain -- 150 is a somewhat cooled cup of tea/coffee. Underground piping will be much colder than ground temperature.

At any rate, temperature increase forecasts for the next 100 years are all in the O(1 degree C) range. There are many reasons to mitigate climate change/decrease green house gas output/fight pollution, but let's not spread FUD.

Re: What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

#108

Post by manicdee »

hakfoo wrote: post #87
frabbit wrote: post #38

I have heard meat-eating car-drivers push this line of thinking for at least two decades. You know the sort of person: willing to rag on the republicans or the Koch brothers for being bad, but ultimately unwilling to do anything except moan about how it is all too hard.

Individual decisions are not going to affect economic signals meaningfully. How many Brazillian ranchers stop clear-cutting if you or I go vegan? The impact on their market is essentially immeasurable. In contrast, a state level policy can move the needle. If the rest of the world slaps a $10/kg tariff on Amazonian beef, their business collapses rapidly. Of course, then we get into unknown consequences where we don't…

If you think individual decisions are not going to send economic signals, ask the US car industry about ICE sales.

Re: What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

#109

Post by manicdee »

tormeh wrote: post #2

Really disheartened that it will hit during my lifetime. Had hoped to dodge it, really. How do you, as an individual, prepare for this?

Climate apocalypse is not something that “hits” it is something that grows. It started decades ago and will get gradually worse over time.

What you as an individual can do to prepare is put pressure on the suppliers of goods and services (including your government) to take their role seriously and reduce emissions. Stop using single-use plastics, stop buying groceries that are individually shrink-wrapped. Buy fresh fruit and vegetables and prepare your own meals. Walk where you can, try to use public transport for commuting (it takes longer, but someone else is driving so you can do your morning and evening reading & correspondence on the bus/train)

Basically do everything you can to reduce your energy consumption, both directly and indirectly. Energy consumptions is a very good proxy for personal contribution to emissions, including the embodied energy in things like plastic utensils and fast food wrappers/boxes/bags.

Rather than watching a movie on Netflix, read a book. The internet services and domestic devices used to watch a movie will consume more energy during that movie session than a year of reading on a tablet or paper books (with a bed lamp book light).

Apart from overpopulation, the biggest contribution to global emissions is the extreme energy consumption lifestyle of western countries. We offshore a lot of the production and point the finger at China, but China’s emissions are mainly from manufacturing and transport which is mostly for products being sent to western countries.

Re: What if we stopped pretending the climate apocalypse can be stopped?

#110

Post by hackeraccount »

i_am_proteus wrote: post #33
jbattle wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you read the article? That's not what it's about at all. The author is saying that we aren't going to "stop" climate change. So instead we should be strategizing how to proactively invest in systems (both natural and man-made) to make them more resilient in the face of changes to come.

Which all conveniently line up with one major political platform. "If you frightened by the coming climate cataclysm, then you should also agree with me on everything ." It's very well-written, but it's not rational. The content is more political than scientific.

Certainly true but decidedly not unusual. To the degree I'm a climate change skeptic it's largely because everyone seems to be using it as a stick to beat some political horse.
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