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Ice

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Re: Ice

#11

Post by seibelj »

ndespres wrote: post #9
seibelj wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What also disgusts me are so-called environmentalists that stick their fingers in their ears and ignore reality. For example solar panels and wind farms aren’t going to get our carbon footprint to zero anytime soon - the technology is decades (maybe?) away to store and transmit this power to non-sunny and non-windy areas, and there is no solution for their intermittent power generation during extended periods of low-…

I think you're final paragraph is contradictory. I think the environmental impact of our limitless energy consumption so far is clear. Reducing consumption is the only way to reduce further impact. Modern society uses a lot of unnecessary energy in part because someone gets to make a lot of money now and leave this life before the consequences of unfettered destruction come due.

You are using vastly more energy than a hunter gatherer did, or someone in the Middle Ages. Where do we draw the line? Isn’t it unfair that you use a computer, air conditioning, TV, etc. when you don’t really need it? And what happens when every other human uses as much power as Western citizens do? It’s quite hypocritical to say it’s ok for you, but not for the rest of the world.

I say, we should have as much power as possible, generated as cleanly as possible, and the lowest possible cost. This is how we move society forwards.

Re: Ice

#12

Post by ncmncm »

throwaway5752 wrote: post #7

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/no-there-wasnt-an... should accompany this. The whole younger Dryas advanced civilization think could have been avoided entirely and the point about ice melt rates would have been fine.

That SA article has been overtaken by events.

We still don't have any evidence of early, drowned civilizations, but the comet strike now seems to be responsible for extinctions in both South America and Africa. As an aside, you don't need a crater. Multiple airbursts over a wide area, Tunguska style, provide plenty of devastation.

You might be able to believe in mass extinctions caused by newly arrived humans in South America, but explaining the African ones the same way ought to get you funny looks. The more you think about that, the less plausible human responsibility for the American extinctions becomes.

Re: Ice

#13

Post by throwaway2048 »

tashi wrote: post #8
seibelj wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What also disgusts me are so-called environmentalists that stick their fingers in their ears and ignore reality. For example solar panels and wind farms aren’t going to get our carbon footprint to zero anytime soon - the technology is decades (maybe?) away to store and transmit this power to non-sunny and non-windy areas, and there is no solution for their intermittent power generation during extended periods of low-…

Why is this an important argument to have now? As long as millions of voters believe the climate isn't changing or don't understand what kind of damage it's going to do, it seems like focusing on these details just adds to the noise.

Thats the goal

Re: Ice

#14

Post by zaroth »

seibelj wrote: post #10
tashi wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is this an important argument to have now? As long as millions of voters believe the climate isn't changing or don't understand what kind of damage it's going to do, it seems like focusing on these details just adds to the noise.

No, because the organized environmental movement is convincing us that putting solar panels on our roofs and driving electric cars are somehow going to save the planet, when they won’t even make a tiny dent! Yet we are all expected to pay out the ass in tax rebates to subsidize these boondoggles. I support rational and efficient energy policies, but our current system is bonkers! For example I got a 25% tax rebate re…

Your skylight anecdote aside, the EV rebates are about subsidizing the creation of an entirely new trillion dollar industry around batteries and electrification. They are about moving up the “manufacturing learning curve” at an accelerated rate on this new technology. And they are also about geopolitically moving away from oil.

The relatively meager environmental gains along the way are dwarfed by the larger environmental gain that start really compounding after 15-20 years of investment on this particular technological path and energy policy.

Re: Ice

#15

Post by waiseristy »

If you want to learn more about the Missoula floods

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJo8m4oKc6k

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1BFb_uYlFQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7eqBtc2tv0

And then you can come to your own conclusions on whether or not you believe in the meteor impact theory, rapid destabilization theory, etc. But, I have a feeling the solution is simpler. It only takes one tiny stream of water to make it's way through the glacier and start eroding away at it. If you've seen videos of dams collapsing, they also start from the smallest of trickles which quickly turns into a feedback loop of more erosive power.

Re: Ice

#16

Post by zaroth »

seibelj wrote: post #11
ndespres wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're final paragraph is contradictory. I think the environmental impact of our limitless energy consumption so far is clear. Reducing consumption is the only way to reduce further impact. Modern society uses a lot of unnecessary energy in part because someone gets to make a lot of money now and leave this life before the consequences of unfettered destruction come due.

You are using vastly more energy than a hunter gatherer did, or someone in the Middle Ages. Where do we draw the line? Isn’t it unfair that you use a computer, air conditioning, TV, etc. when you don’t really need it? And what happens when every other human uses as much power as Western citizens do? It’s quite hypocritical to say it’s ok for you, but not for the rest of the world. I say, we should have as much power…

US CO2 emissions have been falling for more than a decade and are at 1990s levels, and will continue to fall.

Energy is the lifeblood of civilization. Reducing the cost of energy, and widespread availability of energy is responsible for saving perhaps a billion lives and bettering nearly 10 billion lives over the last century (that is to say, basically all of them).

The idea of putting a stranglehold on worldwide energy production or access is abhorrent when you look at the on-the-ground effects that such a policy would actually have on people’s lives. As you rightly point out, the most marginalized people worst of all.

Even if we could somehow stop industry from emitting even a gram of CO2 on 1/1/2021 going forward, the climate models still predict their 10 meter sea level rise just given the current greenhouse levels persisting.

The only answer is technological, and in my opinion it’s frankly not even going to be that complicated of a problem given the resources and technology available circa 2050 to deal with it.

Franky, solar shades seemed a lot harder of an ask pre-Starship. Looking forward to seeing SN8 reach for 60km in the near future.

Re: Ice

#17

Post by doctoboggan »

waiseristy wrote: post #15

If you want to learn more about the Missoula floods https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJo8m4oKc6k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1BFb_uYlFQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7eqBtc2tv0 And then you can come to your own conclusions on whether or not you believe in the meteor impact theory, rapid destabilization theory, etc. But, I have a feeling the solution is simpler. It only takes one tiny stream of water to make it…

Another good video: https://youtu.be/YWZgfPGtQEs

Re: Ice

#18

Post by shawnb576 »

ncmncm wrote: post #12
throwaway5752 wrote: post #7

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/no-there-wasnt-an... should accompany this. The whole younger Dryas advanced civilization think could have been avoided entirely and the point about ice melt rates would have been fine.

That SA article has been overtaken by events. We still don't have any evidence of early, drowned civilizations, but the comet strike now seems to be responsible for extinctions in both South America and Africa. As an aside, you don't need a crater. Multiple airbursts over a wide area, Tunguska style, provide plenty of devastation. You might be able to believe in mass extinctions caused by newly arrived humans in Sout…

Do you have citations for this?

Re: Ice

#19

Post by xmprt »

muglug wrote: post #5
code_duck wrote: post #3

While I was reading this article, I was redirected to a spurious "Update Adobe Flash" page.

Ditto. Those scammers really need to find a new target. Flash is so 2006.

I think these scammers know exactly who their target is.

Re: Ice

#20

Post by undersuit »

I lived in Missoula, MT for over a decade after my father moved us there for his law schooling. I knew vaguely about Glacial Lake Missoula, but seeing the actual effects as I traveled from Missoula to my parents new home in the Tri-cities-WA really hammered home the size of the floods. And then again when I flew into Pasco from Seattle and I saw the cliffs that funneled the floods south. I suspect my geologist father always knew where he was going.
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