Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

nature.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

251–260 of 324 posts

Re: A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

#251

Post by callalex »

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #15
rcarr wrote: post #11

Anyone else think that all these predictions are going to happen sooner rather than later in terms of the given prediction range? I can't help but think that a study focussing on a specific area like this one, antarctic sea ice, wildfire predictions etc must only be able to take so many variables into account and that second order effects, third order, fourth order and beyond from other climate subsystems are going t…

There is some P that all those unknown variables act in opposite directions, rather than the same direction. My guess is it's pretty close to 50% - otherwise they probably would've studied those variables. But predicting the future is basically impossible. So who knows. We're all basically guessing.

No, the entire field of climate science is not “basically guessing”. That’s not what scientific study is.

Re: A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

#252

Post by RandomLensman »

callalex wrote: post #248
RandomLensman wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, not a positive vision there: initially increasing costs with a very long payoff period (and also having to live through the change already backed into the climate for quite some time)? That cannot the best we can do - there has to be more we can get out of an energy transition. For example, could have an explicit policy of wanting lower energy costs in high cost places.

I must be misunderstanding what you are looking for, because my understanding of your wish for “lower energy costs in high cost places” sounds the same to me as wishing for everyone to be rich, nobody to be hungry, or for every child to have a pony.

Ponies aside, directionally the right way, I'd say.

Pushing down energy costs is certainly possible when switching energy sources (and also quite visible in data on effective costs per MWh for different technologies), however, it is rarely made an explicit target.

Re: A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

#253

Post by Brusco_RF »

callalex wrote: post #245
Brusco_RF wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's exceptionally relevant. Excuse my French, but this constant doomerism is really fucking up the kids. >"More than half of the 16- to 25-year-olds in the Lancet survey said they believe humanity is doomed. And close to 40 percent said that fears about the future have made them reluctant to have children of their own." [1] We gave an entire generation anxiety and depression, and it's going to wreak havoc on the fer…

Having a realistic picture of the future is important for long-term life planning. It is not the reporting of the facts that’s fuckin’ up the kids, it’s the facts themselves. Burying your head in the sand is not a valid technique when addressing anxieties, it only makes the inevitable emotional breakdown worse when things come to a head.

It is not a "fact" that climate change will cause our extinction. Point me to one serious report that says that. Your nonstop doomerism has half the kids believing that absolute lie.

Re: A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

#254

Post by Brusco_RF »

wittenbunk wrote: post #242
Brusco_RF wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, you're too deep in it. The natural rate of wildfire is about 5x higher than current levels, despite what breathless journalists will push. Check out this chart [1] before modern forest "management" kicked in. Modern conflagrations are a result of decades of snuffing out small fires. Also, I live in Arizona and I'm pretty sick of people telling me it's getting hotter. Its not. Our record temperature was set in 1…

My kid has barely been able to go outside this summer because of months of endless wildfires a thousand miles away...or am I in too deep with my lying eyes and wheezing lungs?

[flagged]

Re: A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

#255

Post by rob74 »

jacquesm wrote: post #212
throwaway290 wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As always I disagree... This is the attitude that "people in charge will do something for you, and if they don't I guess we'll cope" that is undemocratic and breeds passivity. if you are concerned about something it does not mean you must be non stop stressed or forever abandon your life for single cause. You can be concerned and act in constructive ways (lead by example, talk about it, raise the issue, vote, etc), m…

No, it is not that attitude at all. It is simply recognizing that there are some things that you will not be able to influence directly. The only time when you have a fractional input on this is at the voting booth and even there the chance is that climate change will not be expressly put on the ballot but you get a mixture of components that you will be able to locally influence. But that sort of mechanism isn't wel…

10 years ago: climate change? What climate change?

Today: oh yeah, climate change is real, but we should have done something about it 20 years ago, now it's too late...

Re: A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

#256

Post by leptons »

Brusco_RF wrote: post #204
Fricken wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kind of an irrelevant point to make. We're setting new emissions records, so nothing so far has been productive.

It's exceptionally relevant. Excuse my French, but this constant doomerism is really fucking up the kids. >"More than half of the 16- to 25-year-olds in the Lancet survey said they believe humanity is doomed. And close to 40 percent said that fears about the future have made them reluctant to have children of their own." [1] We gave an entire generation anxiety and depression, and it's going to wreak havoc on the fer…

>It's exceptionally relevant. Excuse my French, but this constant doomerism is really fucking up the kids.

Think of the children?? Lol, as if the environment being 20 degrees hotter isn't going to "fuck up the kids". The kinds should be worried. Many of them actually are worried and try to do something about it, it's the adults that won't listen or curb behaviors, or in many cases try at all - and at worst they call climate change "a hoax".

>We gave an entire generation anxiety and depression, and it's going to wreak havoc on the fertility rate in a decade or so.

That's a good thing, and is exactly what the planet needs - less humans. Every human added to the planet generates a non-zero amount of carbon. Adding more humans isn't the answer to anything, and it won't make anyone less worried for their future.

Re: A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

#257

Post by RandomLensman »

ddq wrote: post #250
RandomLensman wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just don't think that approach has worked well so far because there often isn't a near term positive vision to go alongside.

It's not an approach, it's step one. To develop answers you must first figure out the questions. I agree merely acknowledging the status quo as bad is not enough, but I fail to see how one would intentionally address issues without first understanding them.

For me, painting a picture of a dystopian world mixes socio-economic and physical predictions of very different forecast quality.

Re: A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

#258

Post by leptons »

Brusco_RF wrote: post #254
wittenbunk wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My kid has barely been able to go outside this summer because of months of endless wildfires a thousand miles away...or am I in too deep with my lying eyes and wheezing lungs?

[flagged]

[flagged]

Re: A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

#259

Post by jacquesm »

rob74 wrote: post #255
jacquesm wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it is not that attitude at all. It is simply recognizing that there are some things that you will not be able to influence directly. The only time when you have a fractional input on this is at the voting booth and even there the chance is that climate change will not be expressly put on the ballot but you get a mixture of components that you will be able to locally influence. But that sort of mechanism isn't wel…

10 years ago: climate change? What climate change? Today: oh yeah, climate change is real, but we should have done something about it 20 years ago, now it's too late...

Indeed. And the annoying thing is that it's the people that didn't believe in climate change 20 years ago that made that a reality. There was a HN comment about this long ago that summed up those stages nicely.

It's frustrating to me on a personal level. Back in the early '00s it was pretty clear to me that we were headed for a massive problem. I did what I could to cut all kinds of ways in which we - as a family - were contributing. But in the end it had zero effect because the real agents of change weren't budging, not even a micro meter. So here we are today. The house I live in is more than energy neutral (my plans have been accelerated a bit on account of Putin's madness). But I make myself no illusion that it will matter, it's just a token bit of resistance, a tiny drop of green in an ocean of black.

Things I wonder about (but no longer worry about): will my children make it through this crisis that we have created? Will our political institutions somehow survive? How big a population - assuming we survive in some numbers - will there be left and will there still be enough structure standing that we don't have to start all over from scratch?

If you really start to think about the possible consequences of climate change you won't be having many good nights of sleep going forward. And there isn't a thing that you personally are going to be able to do about it, except maybe as a figleaf for your personal mental health.

Very, very frustrating.

Re: A forthcoming collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation

#260

Post by dang »

Brusco_RF wrote: post #254
wittenbunk wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My kid has barely been able to go outside this summer because of months of endless wildfires a thousand miles away...or am I in too deep with my lying eyes and wheezing lungs?

[flagged]

Please don't cross into personal attack. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Post reply on HN