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This month is the planet’s hottest on record by far – and hottest in 120k years

cnn.com

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Re: This month is the planet’s hottest on record by far – and hottest in 120k years

#141

Post by listenallyall »

sebmellen wrote: post #102
HideousKojima wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or what if we destroy the world economy and personal freedom/autonomy in the process?

If you think protecting the climate will destroy the economy and personal freedom, you’re mistaken. The biggest threat to a thriving world economy with high degrees of personal freedom is climate change.

> The biggest threat to a thriving world economy with high degrees of personal freedom

I would suggest it is lack of low-cost, easily-accessible energy. Energy has been the driving force behind virtually every technological and economic advance in the past century.

Re: This month is the planet’s hottest on record by far – and hottest in 120k years

#142

Post by ZeroGravitas »

NelsonMinar wrote: post #78

It's also likely to be the coolest July for the next twenty to hundred+ years. Enjoy it while you can!

Clearly you're not factoring in the nuclear winters that the third and fourth world wars will provide for us within that timespan if climate change destabilises world politics to the predictable degree.

Re: This month is the planet’s hottest on record by far – and hottest in 120k years

#143

Post by ZeroGravitas »

ChildOfChaos wrote: post #59

Meanwhile in the UK summer has been grey, rainy and miserable.

> June's average mean temperature, calculated from the average daytime and nighttime temperature from across the UK, of 15.8C beats the previous record of 14.9C (set in both 1940 and 1976) by 0.9C. It was the hottest June since records began in 1884

Re: This month is the planet’s hottest on record by far – and hottest in 120k years

#144

Post by gottorf »

Earw0rm wrote: post #69
danudey wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> regulating demand-side is not a solution I think it's more accurate to say that consumer-side regulation is not a solution. I'm willing to bet there are tons of industries out there that can significantly reduce their energy usage, but it's either undesirable from a profit perspective or infeasible from a cost perspective. That said, the "obvious" solution at this point seems to be larger supplies of non-carbon-rel…

The problem is that high-energy regimes can crowd out low-energy designs that actually produce better outcomes in terms of well-being. As with food calories: either for an individual or a population group, if you don't have enough, more is very, very much better. This is not the same as more being always better. Sometimes the same or less in a smarter implementation produces better outcomes, and sometimes it takes a…

> The same additional amount in the hands of the top 80% or so of Western hands would be frittered away to no noticeable benefit - we could get by with a lot less.

We could, but getting by with less out of choice is much better than getting by with less out of deprivation (like you said, "if you don't have enough, more is very, very much better"). And if your solution involves a large group of people depriving themselves to benefit those on another side of the world, I'm afraid there's no historical evidence to suggest that it will work even a little bit.

> sometimes it takes a regulatory shove to get there.

Almost all the time, additional powers granted to the government for that regulatory shove are not relinquished. Virtually all the time, a government that is powerful enough eventually becomes tyrannical. We have to weigh that very real possibility against the cost of what appears to be inefficient outcomes.

Re: This month is the planet’s hottest on record by far – and hottest in 120k years

#145

Post by shdh »

Deceleration isn't really an option. Many developing nations are going to continue to have increasing energy needs. To ask these countries to reduce their energy requirements is to ask their citizens to live a lower standard of life. Hypocritical of those in the West to make that request.

The only real solution is to make energy ubiquitous and plentiful. Governments should be investing 100's billions of dollars into fusion tech. I don't think there is any vision or foresight. Ironically, Oppenheimer came out this year highlighting the development of Los Alamos and the impact of federal projects.

Re: This month is the planet’s hottest on record by far – and hottest in 120k years

#148

Post by zosima »

ajkjk wrote: post #31
briantakita wrote: post #17

There were no precise instruments 120k years ago. The historical record used is a hodge podge of proxy data. Much modern temperature data was US centric. Also, there is controversy over the placement of temperature stations (e.g. on an urban heat island, next to an airport, near exhaust vents). Factors were added to temperature modesl (there were higher apples to apples temperature readings in the 1930s). Many region…

You must be aware that dismissing very-overtly-obvious climate claims out of hand makes you sound very dubious, right? Super "merchants-of-doubt"y. The only way to deliver this opinion in a non-suspect way would be something like: "I'm aware that all metrics show it's the hottest month on record, and everyone is experiencing that everywhere, but ". Like, it is obvious in the last fifty years. Your argument is "well m…

Far from everyone experiences this as a particularly hot summer. There has been some warm days around the Mediterranean, US and china, but talking to people in e.g. central and northern Europe and India it has been, probably cooler, than average.

Re: This month is the planet’s hottest on record by far – and hottest in 120k years

#149

Post by whatshisface »

adamrezich wrote: post #105
whatshisface wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The metaphor would be more profound if you could also apply it to a McDonalds. :-)

I'm afraid to ask but… what would the McDonald's Rapture be? and McDonald's Original Sin for that matter. plus, McDonald's Salvation seems pretty straightforward to me… regardless, the Church of McDonald's, for all of their other shortcomings as a Church, doesn't seem to fit the profile of "doom cult", so I'm not too concerned about them.

The McDonalds Armageddon (I think climate change is more of an Armageddon than a rapture) is what happens to you after you commit too many McDonalds sins, which are the menu items. :-)

Re: This month is the planet’s hottest on record by far – and hottest in 120k years

#150

Post by slily »

wombat-man wrote: post #90

Cool, well, we just have to wait for enough people on the planet to believe in the problem and then we'll get right on it.

Strawmen notwithstanding, the main controversy today is about governments as well as non-elected organizations (like the WEF) calling for increased central control over ordinary citizens and adopting tyrannical measures to reduce the standard of living and increase the cost of energy, food, travel and so on, using "climate crisis" as a vague excuse to invoke some sense of urgency in the hopes that people are stupid enough to say yes to policies that widen the wealth gap and further impoverish the working class.

If you're already well off (like most HN posters, probably) then you might not care if the leader of your country tells you that you will have to reduce your standard of living for the sake of the environment (and keep in mind that they rarely make those claims based on realistic analyses). If you are barely making ends meet and don't know if you will be able to retire after toiling your whole life like many people it is a harder sell. For example, where I live my electricity provider is harassing me to switch to "clean" energy sources, coyly admitting that the price will be higher in fine print. Turns out they entice people to join only to increase their prices later (see https://www.thedailybeast.com/cleanchoice-energy-is-the-snea...). Can you afford to pay double or triple the price for energy? What if you had to? Some of us cannot afford to run air conditioning at a certain price.

Some still think that this is a mere "conspiracy theory", but the messaging is slowly becoming more explicit about this power grab. I'm talking about some national government figures talking about lowering your standards out loud. Less obvious tells are organizations connected to governments setting lofty "sustainability" goals which involve reducing energy footprints to a level that is impossible to achieve without significantly impoverishing nations. Farmers forced to reduce their use of nitrogen fertilizer are the appetizer.

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