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Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

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Re: Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

#111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's simply not the case that it's going to turn the world into some unlivable hell-scape. There's just no basis for that belief in the actual evidence. I think what GP presented is too mild . What I personally fear is this: increasing migration pressure from the most affected areas and contention for resources starts triggering wars, at which point the global economy collapses, at which point at least half of the…

> contention for resources starts triggering wars There is no economic or historical basis for this. When resources become more scare people begin looking into alternatives or alternate extraction methods. This is how the iron age came to be. Iron was common to many local areas, but the tin to make bronze had to be imported from far away. It took innovation to develop the necessary techniques for iron smelting which…

> or that everybody needs to go to war to protect their strategic assets in the middle east.

Do you follow news at all?

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-aramco-fire-trump/t...

Re: Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

#112
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're the only one talking about not giving a crap. Don't strawman my argument. 50-100cm of sea-level rise over a period of 100 years is a non-issue really. Most places won't be affected and those that will be have time to employ one of the three strategies mentioned. Everyone alive will be dead before it starts to really bite - that does not equate to permission "not to give a crap" to be perfectly clear. It's also…

1 meter is on top of about that much subsidence and storm surge increase. Most of Langley Air Force Base and much of adjacent NASA Langley will be below high tide level, not counting storm surge. My neighbor's house (who are trying to sell) will be under nearly a meter of water. This is not "non-issue." We're talking only about 80 years from now. Within living memory. And we're already seeing impact. https://coast.no…

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Re: Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

#113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> contention for resources starts triggering wars There is no economic or historical basis for this. When resources become more scare people begin looking into alternatives or alternate extraction methods. This is how the iron age came to be. Iron was common to many local areas, but the tin to make bronze had to be imported from far away. It took innovation to develop the necessary techniques for iron smelting which…

There is this theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classic_Maya_collapse#Systemic... as well as this theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_Bronze_Age_collapse#Envir... Societies have collapsed before, and it's likely to happen again. Climate change looks like an extremely good trigger for such an event. It's unclear whether we would be able to recover, or how long it would take.

I absolutely agree, but those two collapse examples are extremely complicated. Historians generally conclude the collapse is due to political instability, barbarian invasions, disruptions to international trade, in-fighting, collapse of agriculture (likely due to climate change) and various other factors.

All of these various competing problems can be summarized into three categories: economic, defense, and political. By far the least critical of those three is defense. I am saying this as a military office who has studied history. If you are wealthy you can fund a better military and better defensive protections. If you are poor but you are politically united and guided by strong leadership you will still probably figure it out. If your economy or food supply fall apart you likely won't have the political unity necessary to mount a strong defense. Likewise if the people are disenfranchised or selfishly entitled there will be less political will to prop up the economy.

Re: Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

#114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> contention for resources starts triggering wars There is no economic or historical basis for this. When resources become more scare people begin looking into alternatives or alternate extraction methods. This is how the iron age came to be. Iron was common to many local areas, but the tin to make bronze had to be imported from far away. It took innovation to develop the necessary techniques for iron smelting which…

The end of the Bronze Age in fact did coincide with a major civilizational collapse: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_Bronze_Age_collapse

The societal collapse at that point was a major motivation for the discovery of the iron age. Once the collapse started the supply of tin was instantly eliminated, and thus eliminated bronze. Had these people had iron tools a bit earlier they could have held out longer against some of the barbarian invasions.

Re: Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

#115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> contention for resources starts triggering wars There is no economic or historical basis for this. When resources become more scare people begin looking into alternatives or alternate extraction methods. This is how the iron age came to be. Iron was common to many local areas, but the tin to make bronze had to be imported from far away. It took innovation to develop the necessary techniques for iron smelting which…

"There is no economic or historical basis for this. When resources become more scare people begin looking into alternatives or alternate extraction methods. " It seems obvious they're talking about food. I am not sure you're closely looked at hydraulic fracturing. One doesn't simply talk about petroleum production, they talk about the IRR of energy projects. That is a fair proxy for whether it takes more energy to ge…

Food is an economic data point, frequently a commodity. I know people want to think of as something more special or somehow different, but it isn't. When cheap industrial food goes away the population suffers and the remainder of people who shake out figure it out from other available options. I observed this in Afghanistan.

Re: Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

#116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There is no economic or historical basis for this. When resources become more scare people begin looking into alternatives or alternate extraction methods. " It seems obvious they're talking about food. I am not sure you're closely looked at hydraulic fracturing. One doesn't simply talk about petroleum production, they talk about the IRR of energy projects. That is a fair proxy for whether it takes more energy to ge…

Food is an economic data point, frequently a commodity. I know people want to think of as something more special or somehow different, but it isn't. When cheap industrial food goes away the population suffers and the remainder of people who shake out figure it out from other available options. I observed this in Afghanistan.

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Re: Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

#117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the assertion isn't that the world is going to end 10 years from now. It's more that unless we pull off a miracle in the next 10 years, it's essentially going to end this century.

Still not going to happen.

Yes it is.

And I can continue that all day long.

When you are standing on the rails with a high-speed train rushing towards you and your buddy next to you is yelling "LET'S GET OF THE RAILS OR WE'RE GOING TO DIE!", that's not alarmist. But you try to make it look like that.

Seriously. Looking at your history of comments, climate change denials seems to be one of your things, so trying to reach you is probably a lost cause.

Yes, the world is burning. Yes, the ecosystem is failing. Yes, hordes of hungry refugees will roam the planet (probably even Alberta!). Yes, civilization is going to collapse.

(If we don't get our shit together REALLY quickly, which I doubt we will).

Sticking your fingers in your ears, sticking your head into the sand, singing "LALALA" very loudly and calling people 'alarmist' is not going to change that.

But hey! Après moi, le déluge!

At least we will have had the most awesome orgy of consumption and self-deception, like, ever.

Awesome!

Re: Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

#118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There is no economic or historical basis for this. When resources become more scare people begin looking into alternatives or alternate extraction methods. " It seems obvious they're talking about food. I am not sure you're closely looked at hydraulic fracturing. One doesn't simply talk about petroleum production, they talk about the IRR of energy projects. That is a fair proxy for whether it takes more energy to ge…

Food is an economic data point, frequently a commodity. I know people want to think of as something more special or somehow different, but it isn't. When cheap industrial food goes away the population suffers and the remainder of people who shake out figure it out from other available options. I observed this in Afghanistan.

Just so I can reverse your convenient sterilization of terms, On a global scale you are talking about millions of people starving to death.

Re: Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

#119
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> India will eventually have the largest total emissions, which is fine because per capita is really low. Earth doesn't care about "emission per capita" though, it just cares about the total sum of emissions... So "India eventually [having] the largest total emissions" means a huge extra tonnage of emissions will be added to the already troubling amounts... So, the per capita number is mainly relevant in regards to f…

What the Earth doesn't care about is the arbitrary lines in the sand we declare to be this nation or that.

What Earth does care about, is when you decide that's a good idea to have on average more than 4 children per couple over the last 2 generations in India [1] instead of only 2 or even less children per couple like in USA or the EU [2].

[1] https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/IND/india/fertility-ra...

[2] https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/fert...

Every country has a set of natural resources at its disposal. It should manage and cherish those resources and not overtax them. If a country decides it's a good idea to perpetually grow their population when all they have are the same set of natural resources available, then well, the onus is on them to figure out how to do it without destroying everything.

Re: Charts show how little progress has been made in limiting greenhouse emissions

#120
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still not going to happen.

Yes it is. And I can continue that all day long. When you are standing on the rails with a high-speed train rushing towards you and your buddy next to you is yelling "LET'S GET OF THE RAILS OR WE'RE GOING TO DIE!", that's not alarmist. But you try to make it look like that. Seriously. Looking at your history of comments, climate change denials seems to be one of your things, so trying to reach you is probably a lost…

That's a pretty pessimistic view, with no basis in reality.

Fact is, the world has more people than ever, yet is richer than ever, there's less poverty and hunger than ever, the world is more peaceful than ever, and there's certainly no signs of collapse and certainly not in 1 decade smh...

If you truly believe that we're a decade away from collapse, why aren't you stockpiling food and weapons in a bunker? Because there's no sign of political will from the major CO2 emitters to curb emissions so your worst case scenario is definitely happening, right? People say these things, yet I don't see any of the climate alarmists actually doing things to indicate that they're alarmed...

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