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A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

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Re: A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

#101

Post by tialaramex »

Jeff_Brown wrote: post #80
jackyinger wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The skepticism is from people who are making money emitting CO2 and don’t want to stop making money in the same old way. It is well documented that oil companies have been sewing skepticism for decades, go figure.

The idea that a producer is at fault and not also the consumer paying them to do that is strange to me.

Blaming the consumer is a time-honoured way to ensure nothing is done. The consumer can't pick options which don't exist, so the producer says oh well, you can either burn coal or you can go without light - there's no mention that the producer doesn't have to burn coal to make electricity, just straight to blaming you for wanting light.

Re: A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

#102

Post by satvikpendem »

hliyan wrote: post #32

I recently finished rewatching The Three Body Problem in which (spoilers follow) the world panics and goes into overdrive because an alien invasion is due in... 400 years. If the current climate trends continue, vast areas of the Earth may not be suitable for habitation within half that time, and we still can't seem to convince some people this is real. Granted I was a climate change skeptic myself until about 10 yea…

> the world panics and goes into overdrive because an alien invasion is due in... 400 years.

It's the difference between Chinese planning philosophy versus the West's.

Re: A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

#103

Post by rwyinuse »

dmitrygr wrote: post #79
CalRobert wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The crazy thing is that we have basically everything we need right now. You can live in a well-insulated fully electric home powered by renewable energy and have most things you need within a walk, bike, or public transport ride away, _OR_ use an electric car for the things that aren't. If you combine that with a mostly-plant based diet (or at _least_ swapping chicken for most of your beef and lamb) and have 2 kids o…

Western nations reducing will DO nothing - it is too small a fraction of greenhouse emissions. The large fraction is coming form india and china. And they do not have electric everything. they don't even have running water in most places.

Your view is outdated. China is building renewable power generation at an extremely high rate, and also exporting cheap solar panels worldwide. China has a higher share of electric vehicles in cities than most of Europe and America does. It appears their emissions are now starting to go down as a result, although the economy keeps growing.

India still has a long way to go, but China is doing the right things. Same can't be said about USA under current administration.

Re: A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

#104

Post by anonym29 »

awjlogan wrote: post #76
anonym29 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>So, exactly what is the source of skepticism? We should define climate skepticism, to avoid indicting a strawman. I'd start with my definition, as someone with unorthodox views on climate that often place me at odds with progressives. It may be easier to start with the elements we agree on. Is the climate changing? Yes, obviously, visibly, measurably. Do human activities, including burning of coal and hydrocarbons,…

Your car can go at 0 kph and 100 kph. It’s the rate of the change that kills you, not the speed.

Poor analogy. 23° C global average temperature increase, even slowly, will end a lot of life if nothing is done to address impacts. The rate of change isn't what causes those deaths; for 23° C warming, the terminal metric is indeed itself what kills, not the rate of change getting there.

That said, another section I've largely left out above is that it's effectively impossible to coordinate global action to meaningfully reduce human emissions from current levels. Europe and the US have actually already had declining emissions levels for decades now. This isn't a philosophy problem that you can talk your way to a solution on, it's a human psychology and game theory problem.

Trying to voluntarily convince global south nations to not adopt carbon-positive energy sources that solve real problems in the third world, and instead telling them to exclusively adopt your preferred alternatives (which do come with tradeoffs, be them in cost, complexity, availability/reliability) to appease what people facing food scarcity due to a lack of refrigeration due to a lack of electricity would consider "first world concerns" is an exercise in futility, and has some thematic emotional rhymes with colonial pasts where wealthy westerners demanded sacrifice from the global poor for the comfort of the wealthy westerners. It's a very tone-deaf plea.

Re: A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

#105

Post by monster_truck »

Metacelsus wrote: post #89

Hmm, Science just had a news article saying the AMOC was doing OK: https://www.science.org/content/article/ocean-current-warms-...

I believe the article says it is uncertain if climate change is responsible for the gradual weakening. It is gradually weakening though. This el nino should be a banger

Re: A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

#106

Post by drc500free »

esafak wrote: post #74
Tarsul wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In most countries the public "believes" in climate change. But it don't matter: People still consume much more than the planet can bear. Because they like to consume. And because they don't want to change "if no one else does it" (tragedy of the commons). So you're asking the wrong question (maybe not for a US audience, I give you that). The real question would be: How to change the behavior of a population? My best…

A carbon tax would change behavior in short order. The challenge is introducing then maintaining it; people can always vote it out. I think left-leaning jurisdictions should definitely give it a try.

Carbon taxes are massively regressive. There is no political coalition that simultaneously wants to act against climate change and doesn’t mind driving further income inequality.

Re: A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

#107

Post by [deleted] »

anonym29 wrote: post #91
card_zero wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to be saying the temperature change is mainly natural? But the expected natural change in the present era is slow and downward, I think. I mean you have two separate points here, one is "adapt" and the other is "nothing can be done", which itself can be picked apart into different specific things that can't be done, such as on the one hand getting everybody to behave themselves conscientiously with one mind,…

I am saying that earth's average temperature has raised by 23° C before with zero human impact, and it will raise by as much as 23° C again, even if you cut all human carbon emissions to zero overnight (itself an effective impossibility for other reasons). The average global temperature raising by even 2°C has catastrophic and devastating impacts to humanity, to say nothing of it raising by 20°. We can't stop or prev…

[deleted]

Re: A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

#108

Post by anonym29 »

card_zero wrote: post #100
anonym29 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am saying that earth's average temperature has raised by 23° C before with zero human impact, and it will raise by as much as 23° C again, even if you cut all human carbon emissions to zero overnight (itself an effective impossibility for other reasons). The average global temperature raising by even 2°C has catastrophic and devastating impacts to humanity, to say nothing of it raising by 20°. We can't stop or prev…

There's two reasons why temperature increases can't be stopped (without actually sending the heat away somewhere, such as into space): the first one is lag in the system if we cut emissions to zero, and the second is natural change in maybe 300 million years. Why bother mentioning the second of those?

This is a strawman. The natural change happens orders of magnitude faster than 300 million years.

Also, is there a way to move heat into space that doesn't require adding more heat into the atmosphere than is removed from the expulsion? Or do you just mean this as a hypothetical example?

Re: A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

#109

Post by w4der »

anonym29 wrote: post #91
card_zero wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to be saying the temperature change is mainly natural? But the expected natural change in the present era is slow and downward, I think. I mean you have two separate points here, one is "adapt" and the other is "nothing can be done", which itself can be picked apart into different specific things that can't be done, such as on the one hand getting everybody to behave themselves conscientiously with one mind,…

I am saying that earth's average temperature has raised by 23° C before with zero human impact, and it will raise by as much as 23° C again, even if you cut all human carbon emissions to zero overnight (itself an effective impossibility for other reasons). The average global temperature raising by even 2°C has catastrophic and devastating impacts to humanity, to say nothing of it raising by 20°. We can't stop or prev…

You are leaving out the rate at which the temperature has fallen and risen in the past and how that compares with the rising seen in recent decades.

Re: A 'cold blob' in the Atlantic could be a sign of AMOC shutdown

#110

Post by margalabargala »

satvikpendem wrote: post #102
hliyan wrote: post #32

I recently finished rewatching The Three Body Problem in which (spoilers follow) the world panics and goes into overdrive because an alien invasion is due in... 400 years. If the current climate trends continue, vast areas of the Earth may not be suitable for habitation within half that time, and we still can't seem to convince some people this is real. Granted I was a climate change skeptic myself until about 10 yea…

> the world panics and goes into overdrive because an alien invasion is due in... 400 years. It's the difference between Chinese planning philosophy versus the West's.

Not really. There are plenty of Western entities that think in centuries (e.g. the Catholic Church) and plenty of.Chinese entities that are chasing the next moment (all the companies who cut standards on product because "to them it is the same").

This is true about the instantaneous state of the governments of the US and China rather than some intrinsic permanent cultural quality.

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