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I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video]

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Re: I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video]

#791

Post by defrost »

wredue wrote: post #789
t0bia_s wrote: post #726

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet you don't know nothing, you believe in catastrophic scenarios. We can measure anecdotaly that temperature is slightly rising. The reason why is it happening and happend in history multiple times is topic for debate that we can explore. However your tone is not open for debate and use exactly same words as those you fight against.

It is not “up for debate” that various gasses cause a rise in temperature. You are pretending that our scientific knowledge is at 1600 levels to come to your insane conclusions. You claim that I’m not open for debate, but it’s actually just that there is no debate here. You’re a just printing demonstrable lies on to the internet, for what?

Cutting to the guts of the question:

> How do you know?

posed in ignorance (perhaps genuine ignorance, perhaps feigned) above, we (humans) have been measuring gas properties in isolation for 200 years (and more) and have been specifically measuring (and storing as bottled samples) atmospheric gas composition since the start of the Cold War.. seventy odd years or so now.

Much of our high quality environmental data comes from cold war research - ocean tempretures were first mapped at large scale by Scripps in order to use thermoclines to pinpoint submarines and other sounds in water.

In the civilian arena, Cape Grim is of interest: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Grim_Air_Archive

https://researchdata.edu.au/cape-grim-air-archive/678420

This and other global references informs us about the changing atmospheric makeup and other experiments inform us about the increase in trapped heat from incoming solar radiation.

Re: I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video]

#792

Post by xnx »

wkjagt wrote: post #380
adrianN wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humanity is quite resilient. I’m confident that we’ll survive. However I’m much more pessimistic about technological civilization surviving.

There’s more than just humans and their tech here to worry about though. I get so depressed when I hear people describe the gravity of climate change only in terms of the chance of survival of us humans.

The current extinction event is the most depressing part. A lot of environmental changes can be undone, but bringing back thousands of species is impossible https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction

Re: I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video]

#793

Post by trimethylpurine »

ianburrell wrote: post #734
trimethylpurine wrote: post #678

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'll still mine oil for tires and roads, and you'll have gasoline as a byproduct. You'll use the gasoline to mine lithium and to transport used batteries. And you'll bury the batteries somewhere out of sight. Just like we're doing with nuclear. None of these solutions actually help preserve live. Life can thrive in a carbon rich atmosphere. It has before. But many years from now when the lithium batteries decay and…

There is no problem mining oil for tires and roads. The carbon is sequestered. The problem is burning fossil fuels and producing CO2. Also, tires and roads are a byproduct of refining, and much less is produced than gasoline. Mining lithium doesn't require gasoline. Mining can be electrified like many other things. Probably easier to electrify than long distance transport since it is short distances. Nuclear waste is…

> The problem is burning fossil fuels and producing CO2.

That's one problem. But I'm aware that CO2 is not the ONLY danger to the environment. Hopefully you are also aware of that and can discuss the topic beyond only CO2. We obviously wouldn't replace CO2 with methane, right? So let's talk about the environment, not just CO2.

>Mining lithium doesn't require gasoline.

Name one mine that doesn't use gasoline to mine, haul, store, or transport. Good luck.

>The radioactive products decay on short time scale.

At least 3% of the waste from any reactor is extremely harmful for many thousands of years. The other 97% is irrelevant. Why did you bring it up? Seems dishonest.

Citation: https://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fu...

>Lithium batteries aren't a problem if they did decay.

Sure if you manage to keep them all really far away from each other. High concentrations of anything is a problem. Even a basic Wikipedia search can help you here. Leaked evaporation pools, water contamination, huge amounts of water usage in production, etc.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impacts_of_lit...

Go ahead and keep downvoting. Each downvote proves exactly what I'm saying; it's unacceptable to even discuss better solutions.

Re: I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video]

#795

Post by trimethylpurine »

ianai wrote: post #664
trimethylpurine wrote: post #661

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gas was just under $4 a liter every time I've been to Europe. That's about $16/gallon. People were driving to work, and sitting in traffic, just like they do in the US.

For there, that'd be 32/gallon with the old figure I used.

Do you have any example of a country driving less when fuel costs were ALWAYS higher? I would guess short term, yes, but eventually people will drive just as much, and they will spend less on housing, which will decrease costs of housing to allow for a larger portion of income to pay for gas. That seems like basic economics to me. Unless, you have a real world example that contrasts that. People still have to get to work. They still have to pick up their kids from school. It doesn't matter what gas costs. They still have to. Just like they are paying double for it in Europe today, they will pay whatever it costs.

Re: I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video]

#796

Post by wolverine876 »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #700
neilk wrote: post #688

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s too pessimistic. Dozens of countries have some kind of carbon tax right now. Important and influential jurisdictions like California, also have them. Even oil-producing regions have them. They are universally rather timid in their scope, and politically fragile. So maybe they aren’t going to get us there, at least not in their current form. But it’s going too far to say they just don’t exist or can’t exist. We…

“Enlightened self interest” is randian nonsense. That’s how we got here in the first place Ask Lybia how nuclear disarmament went Go count all the slaves supplying the global market for chocolate, cobalt, mica, vanilla etc... How about prisoners in the US making .20-.50c/hr making license plates or literally picking cotton on a former slave plantation in alabama. Or how about slave labor in the form of migrant childr…

I don't understand your point: There are bad things in the world, so everything is bad? We could point to lots of good things too.

In fact, you live better - far better - than anyone in history. It's not even close. It was built by the post-war 'neoliberal' order, on a foundation of human rights and free markets.

For us to quit and complain after all the work our predecessors did, remaining optimistic and working in a much starker situation - after depressions and world wars - would be pathetic abdication of our duties.

Re: I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video]

#798

Post by wolverine876 »

dsign wrote: post #628

We need a phase transition in our thinking about climate change, because our current way of thinking is taking us nowhere. - All human activities, in different degrees, contribute to climate change. Don't believe me? Say that you bike to the office everyday. You enjoy your commute, you never develop a heart condition, and in the course of your long prosperous life you have three kids and nine grandchildren, own sever…

> our current way of thinking is taking us nowhere.

What some people are doing is obstructing us from going anywhere. We need to stop acting helpless, stand up for what we believe, fight (peacefully), stop the post-truth nonsense that supports these people, and vote them out of office.

> All human activities, in different degrees, contribute to climate change.

It's kinda true, because of the Second Law of Thermodynamics (and ignoring activities that actively reduce climate change, like installing insulation or voting certain people out of office), but meaningless. Riding a bike and riding a private jet both contribute to climate change, but that's a pointless statement.

> Say that you bike to the office everyday. You enjoy your commute, you never develop a heart condition, and in the course of your long prosperous life you have three kids and nine grandchildren, own several dogs and get a bigger house. In other words, your climate footprint all of the sudden is greater than if you had used a polluting car and died of a heart attack when you turned forty.

That's restating the Second Law, in a sense. But we can do all those things, and still prevent climate change by using different technologies.

> We have the knowledge, the technology and the means to live in domes in the vast deserts of this planet, to go to the moon or to live in space habitats anywhere in the solar system.

What do you conclude from that?

Re: I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video]

#799

Post by Aerroon »

Erratic6576 wrote: post #764
Aerroon wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's estimated that we couldn't support much more than half the world population without the Haber-Bosch process. Industrial fertilizers are just that important. With hunter gatherers you'd be talking about orders of magnitude fewer people.

We should have never let the population levels grow havoc as the H&B process was introduced. We reduced famines for a few centuries or less while the population in the most polluting countries exploded. Now, we risk famines and a possible slow death due to extreme drought due to the climate change created by the fossil Fuel Industry, in the billions The implementation of the H&BP was irresponsible and reckless.

I would argue the opposite. It has led to the greatest improvement of human life in history and prehistory. It's one of the cornerstones of our technological progress. It has staved off immense amounts of suffering. Even if it doesn't last it was worthwhile, because we at least have a chance to deal with future problems like climate change. Staying as a pre-industrial society would never have given us this chance.

Re: I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video]

#800

Post by AndrewKemendo »

wolverine876 wrote: post #796
AndrewKemendo wrote: post #700

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Enlightened self interest” is randian nonsense. That’s how we got here in the first place Ask Lybia how nuclear disarmament went Go count all the slaves supplying the global market for chocolate, cobalt, mica, vanilla etc... How about prisoners in the US making .20-.50c/hr making license plates or literally picking cotton on a former slave plantation in alabama. Or how about slave labor in the form of migrant childr…

I don't understand your point: There are bad things in the world, so everything is bad? We could point to lots of good things too. In fact, you live better - far better - than anyone in history. It's not even close. It was built by the post-war 'neoliberal' order, on a foundation of human rights and free markets. For us to quit and complain after all the work our predecessors did, remaining optimistic and working in…

I’m not sure what to tell you here cause you’re not looking at reality because life is hard for a lot of people and getting harder.

I suggest you read this:

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rstb.2022.026...

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