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Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

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Re: Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

#131

Post by Arnt »

amelius wrote: post #3

Perhaps a stupid question, but why wouldn't coral reefs naturally move to colder areas (closer to the poles)? EDIT: turns out they do: https://e360.yale.edu/features/as-oceans-warm-tropical-coral...

You already have several answers, but I want to add a different one.

A bird that was very common when I was a boy is dying now. Why doesn't it just move a few km northwards, to where the temperature is right for it? It doesn't because it needs craggy islands in a shallow sea and the right temperature range.

A lot of species can move, but that doesn't mean that there are many suitable new locations. What we have now has been optimised for the current geography and climate over a long, long time. Shifting all the locations 100km isn't likely to produce as many geography/climate matches.

Re: Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

#132

Post by TomSwirly »

ghiculescu wrote: post #52

I grew up in Queensland. During school in the late 90s, we were taught the same thing, except the reef was meant to already be gone by today. When I visited a few years ago, it was stunning. Hopefully this report won’t come true either, but it is hard to believe anyone predicting what Australia will be like in 2100. In any case, particularly on a forum like this, we should argue about what technological ideas we can…

> When I visited a few years ago, it was stunning. Hopefully this report won’t come true either

"A few years ago, the one part I visited was stunning, so there isn't an issue at all."

But in fact half of the reef has died since then: https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/04/since-20...

> we should argue about what technological ideas we can use to radically transform this gloomy prediction of the future

The two issues are rising water temperatures due to global heating; and outflows of nutrients and to a lesser extent, effluent, due to industrial agriculture, mostly animal agriculture.

For the first one, we need to give up fossil fuels which means cutting down our consumption; for the second, we need to cut down our consumption of resource-intensive, waste-intensive foods.

There isn't going to be some magical "technological idea" where we can continue on much longer with our two centuries of unchecked exponential growth in consumption, and exponential growth in pollution, and not devastate our biosphere.

People have been telling me for decades about such a solution and yet it never comes. Each new technology just spurs people on to new levels of obsessive consumption and waste.

Re: Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

#133

Post by paulcole »

barryhoodlum wrote: post #115
paulcole wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get downvoted everytime I say this, but if someone wants to make a difference: 1. Don’t eat meat. 2. Don’t get in airplanes. 3. Don’t drive a car. 4. Live in as small a house/apartment as you can. 5. Don’t have kids. It turns out that when people ask, “But what can I do?” What they really mean is “What can I do that won’t really inconvenience me that much?”

The world doesn't work in this "bottom up" way. It's top down.

What do you think people should do?

Re: Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

#134

Post by paulcole »

hnick wrote: post #108
paulcole wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get downvoted everytime I say this, but if someone wants to make a difference: 1. Don’t eat meat. 2. Don’t get in airplanes. 3. Don’t drive a car. 4. Live in as small a house/apartment as you can. 5. Don’t have kids. It turns out that when people ask, “But what can I do?” What they really mean is “What can I do that won’t really inconvenience me that much?”

The Tragedy of the Commons is a rebuttal to this.

What do you think people should do?

Re: Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

#135

Post by diplodocusaur »

shrubby wrote: post #116
ip26 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the 'good' state In simple terms my understanding is, high biodiversity. More diversity is correlated with resilience, adaptability, etc.

https://imgur.com/a/Yy59VjX this shows exactly what we've done to biodiversity. Biomass of farm animals, human and wildlife compared. The equivalent ratio is present everywhere we go.

awfully biased. At least link to the actual study

Re: Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

#136

Post by pfdietz »

diplodocusaur wrote: post #60

Suppose we ceased to exist. Are we certain that nature would 'repair' itself? What's the 'good' state measured by (objective function)? If we don't have it defined, I don't think we fully understand our relationship with the natural world and how to fix it.

> Are we certain that nature would 'repair' itself?

Our mere presence casts an anthropic shadow over observations of how likely disastrous environmental outcomes have been. For example, any extinction worse than the end Permian extinction would likely have prevented mammals from surviving, and humans then evolving. So just by our presence we can rule out the occurrence of such an event, even if (without us) it could perhaps have been likely.

Perhaps planets like Earth are just normally unstable, falling into states that destroy their biospheres, and Earth itself has been extremely lucky. There's no reason to think that luck will continue.

Re: Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

#137

Post by ghastmaster »

npunt wrote: post #24
ghastmaster wrote: post #20

I find it hard to believe that ancient creatures that have lived through this many times in history are somehow unable to do it again. The temperature estimates in the article do not eclipse highs in fairly recent history. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_periods_and_events_in_... Nor does the rate of change exceed that of what the earth experienced as recently as 8k years before present. https://en.wikipedia.or…

This article implies temperature is the culprit but I was under the impression the problem is more ocean acidification caused by co2, which happens to also cause temperature rise. While temperatures have fluctuated over the millennia, the last time co2 was this high (400+ppm) was maybe 30 million years ago: https://earth.org/data_visualization/a-brief-history-of-co2/ Another thing to remember is the tendency for us t…

The prevailing theory is that ocean acidification (OA) and global temperature are tied to atmospheric CO2 levels(as illustrated in image 1 in my OP). Given that relationship, any historical change in one would correspond to a change in the other.

Re: Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

#138

Post by ghastmaster »

hillbillydilly wrote: post #51
ghastmaster wrote: post #20

I find it hard to believe that ancient creatures that have lived through this many times in history are somehow unable to do it again. The temperature estimates in the article do not eclipse highs in fairly recent history. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_periods_and_events_in_... Nor does the rate of change exceed that of what the earth experienced as recently as 8k years before present. https://en.wikipedia.or…

low effort climate denialism posts- oversimplified, pedantic and contrarian, for what? "Oceans Acidifying Faster Today Than in Past 300 Million Years" https://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=123324 seriously two clicks.

Please use full sentences and reply to my argument or observation, not my intention. It took me a minute to decipher what exactly you were saying because your reply was not clear.

Key points from your link:

> About 56 million years ago, a mysterious surge of carbon into the atmosphere warmed the planet and turned the oceans corrosive. In about 5,000 years, atmospheric carbon doubled to 1,800 parts per million (ppm), and average global temperatures rose by about 6 degrees Celsius.

> In the last hundred years, rising carbon dioxide from human activities has lowered ocean pH by 0.1 unit, an acidification rate at least 10 times faster than 56 million years ago, says Hönisch.

What I cannot figure out is why if OA and global temps are dependent on atmospheric CO2, why has there not been major die offs in recent history(particularly 8k years before present. It seems to be that OA is particularly hard to study.

Re: Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

#139

Post by mikedilger »

klyrs wrote: post #41
mikedilger wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The report sites a lot of papers, many of which by one report author Hoegh-Guldberg who has been studying reefs and claiming they are at risk since at least 1999. One of the latest of those papers puts it like this (ideas which the article does not accurately represent): "Even if the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement are achieved, coral reefs are likely to decline by 70–90% relative to their current abundance by m…

That sounds pretty doomed to me. They're saying that mass destruction is inevitable, and the best path forward is to protect habitat that's got the best chance of future regrowth. Of course, "best chance" is according to imperfect modeling and optimism that people will actually get their shit together on the Paris treaty in the next 30 years. And if 70-90% loss doesn't sound like "doom" to you, may I have 80% of your…

If it's doomed, why bother?

If it's at risk, I can still be motivated to do something to save it.

Re: Barrier Reef doomed as up to 99% of coral at risk, report finds

#140

Post by hnnameblah365 »

Grimm1 wrote: post #129
hnnameblah365 wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Until humans find something capable of the level of creation that humans deem higher order, then human logic is the only viable measurement? This is a circular argument for anthropocentrism. It makes no attempt to define any of its qualifying characteristics from outside the human perspective. To some, coral reefs, rainforests, and biodiversity are all a level of creation higher order than what humans can produce. Th…

Sure, but I'd have to grant you anything other than the human perspective matters most first and you've already assumed it does where as I remain unconvinced. You made a pretty out there statement and I provided what is in all likely hood the common opinion. I think the burden is on you here if you want people not to believe humans, of which I assume you and I are a part of, and our perspectives matter the most. Unti…

I agree that most people are unquestioning anthropocentrists and that itself is fine. I disagree that it's the responsibility of everything else on the planet to meet us at the table. It should be humanity's job to close the communication gap. Consider it an act of benevolence if you must.

I don't view it as a deficiency in other species' ability to communicate. It's a deficiency in our ability to listen. The reefs are speaking up, they're literally laying their lives on the line and the 'body' count is communication to humans that we should stop. It's not just coral, we are in the middle of a mass extinction event. One that just so happens to correlate with the exponential growth of humanity.

I think it's fair for people to question direct participation in exponential population growth. More people for more people's sake is not a solution, it's a problem. Of course this leads to a lot of really bad ideas about population control. Its a hard problem to solve, but I argue it's the same class of hardness as getting people to change their behavior in the middle of a mass extinction that doesn't impact them with anything but second order effects.

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