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The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

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Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

#151

Post by _y5hn »

There being an energy imbalance in the world comes from somewhere. It could not have come, at least not so fast, without an imbalance in the human psyche for the last couple of hundred years.

How much is enough, when is enough enough, what is my purpose for existing, how can I be of service while not being taken advantaged of, and without unreasonable demands?

There is a need for reckoning, though it needs to start from within.

This crisis may be of a more spiritual nature than is evident on the surface.

Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

#152

Post by zumu »

poorjohnmacafee wrote: post #116
andi999 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you use AC during nighttime you never get adapted to the heat. Try slowly phasing it out.

That's contradictory to leading sleep scientists like Matthew Walker, Peter Attia, etc. which is clear about need for chilly environment for sleep quality, eg < 21C. Granted, sleep science isn't oriented towards the genetics of the tropics yet, but there's plenty of evidence about temperature and sleep quality for more northern genetics anyway.

Stop it with the genetics talk, unless you want to cite some research.

Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

#153

Post by namdnay »

poorjohnmacafee wrote: post #147
ghshephard wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having lived in Singapore for five years (2012-2017) (and worked out in the field for about 50% of that time) I can say that Singapore is one of the milder places to live. It never ever gets particularly hot (I genuinely can't recall a 100+ degree day in the entire time I was there), and the humidity, while, "sticky" is never really extreme. The thing that gets to you is that the climate never seems to change (with t…

> I can say that Singapore is one of the milder places to live. It never ever gets particularly hot Singapore is almost exactly on the equator. UV readings get up to 11 each day (extreme), whereas the most I ever saw in say SF was 5. Your experience is one experience, mine is that it's a sauna every day of the year. I've experienced extremely hot days in terms of subjective experience of WBT as explained in article.…

But what are you comparing it to? Anywhere tropical (or even mediterranean) is going to seem hot compared to SF. Not being able to run until the evening and getting sunburn at 5.30pm are standard in a mediterranean summer too

Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

#154

Post by lostlogin »

JPKab wrote: post #72
poorjohnmacafee wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I sometimes feel like I'm at death's door when jogging outdoors. Myself and some Westerners I know haven't "adapted", even after years being here. The strategy is just always have ice water in hand if outdoors for prolonged time. I sometimes get laughed at for not adjusting to the heat, but I think it's just too much for some genetic lineages from outside tropics. Unfortunately a large percentage of folks in HDB…

I used to work construction and when I was a teenager I worked on farms growing up in the rural South. If you work outside all day you adapt very quickly to it. During the adjustment period you are chugging water all the time but you eventually adjust. It's a circulation adaptation that's been observed with special forces recruits.

> If you work outside all day you adapt very quickly to it.

Sort of yes, sort of no. In some industries, those who do hard labour in heat have a terrible death rate from kidney disease. There is a lot in the news about this in relation to sugarcane workers. Eg: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/oct/14/kidney-disease...

Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

#155

Post by Clewza313 »

poorjohnmacafee wrote: post #147
ghshephard wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having lived in Singapore for five years (2012-2017) (and worked out in the field for about 50% of that time) I can say that Singapore is one of the milder places to live. It never ever gets particularly hot (I genuinely can't recall a 100+ degree day in the entire time I was there), and the humidity, while, "sticky" is never really extreme. The thing that gets to you is that the climate never seems to change (with t…

> I can say that Singapore is one of the milder places to live. It never ever gets particularly hot Singapore is almost exactly on the equator. UV readings get up to 11 each day (extreme), whereas the most I ever saw in say SF was 5. Your experience is one experience, mine is that it's a sauna every day of the year. I've experienced extremely hot days in terms of subjective experience of WBT as explained in article.…

As a fellow Singapore resident, it's undoubtedly hot. The parent's point was that there are places like the Gulf that are unquestionably hotter.

I once visited Kuwait in August, and it was 52 degrees in the shade with near-100% humidity. I genuinely do not understand how some people survive there today without aircon, much less how they will do so if temps go up a few more degrees.

Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

#156

Post by Clewza313 »

Johnny555 wrote: post #37

Similar question to this that I've been wondering this wildfire season -- at what point is AQI (Air Quality Index) too severe for human tolerance? The scale tops out at 500, what happens to a person if the air is even worse than that? Some sensors near Medford, OR are reading in the upper 400's and even low 500's -- what happens if it hits what would be the 1000's if the scale went that high? I'm mostly thinking of p…

There are a bunch of cities in China and India where AQI peaks at well over 1000. As you'd expect, the long-term health effects are similar to chain smoking, but it doesn't cause healthy people to drop dead on the spot or anything. Asthmatics, on the hand, are in for a bad time.

Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

#157

Post by estebank »

yosito wrote: post #137
sershe wrote: post #136

There are 4 broad scenarios according to which (or a combination thereof) the climate emergency will develop: 1) In a giant case of prisoners' dilemma, the humanity will coordinate worldwide and rise to the occasion, massively cut emissions, tax carbon, build out renewables, etc. 2) There will be massive technological breakthru-s in carbon capture and/or energy production and/or geo-engineering (and I am not talking…

I think the most likely scenario is 5) The climate changes, and humanity adapts to live in the new climate.

Humanity adapts and carries on. People are fucked.

Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

#158

Post by andrei_says_ »

boplicity wrote: post #2

Kim Stanley Robinson's recent book The Ministry For the Future starts with a very disturbing scenario: A heatwave with a "web bulb" temperature of 35 Celsius. It turns out, in those temperatures, even young and healthy people can't survive. Combined with power outages, as happens in the book, everyone living under such a heat wave will likely die. It's looking increasingly likely that such heatwaves are possible in t…

I started reading it and it’s the most grabbing and realistic writing on climate collapse that I’ve encountered to date.

The prediction of how people react to the changes - from individuals to institutions to governments is spot on.

Highly recommended.

Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

#159

Post by mrow84 »

chrisco255 wrote: post #102
mrow84 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think that having more extreme weather events will reduce the number of weather related deaths, or increase them?

Deaths from natural disasters are at or near civilizational all time lows on a fractional basis of the population, see quote below. This trend in lower deaths should continue. It is not clear to me that we are experiencing more extreme weather events than 100 years ago. We haven't had anything like the Dust Bowl (1930s) or the Great Chinese Famine that killed 45 million ( https://alphahistory.com/chineserevolution/gr…

Your confusion is caused by conflating two effects: the reduction in impacts from extreme weather driven by improved technology and scientific knowledge, and the increase in impacts driven by an increase in the frequency and severity of extreme weather events.

The reductions you discuss are attributable to the first of those two effects. Climate change drives the second. If we mitigate climate change then we can spare ourselves the increases attributable to the second effect.

You may reply that the first effect can always outpace the second, but I hope with some thought you can recognise that there is no evidence to support that claim, and it is essentially just an article of faith.

Re: The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance (2020)

#160

Post by twic »

sudhirj wrote: post #88

There are two cities in India that are pretty close by where this difference is very clear. Chennai is on the coast, while Bangalore is inland at a higher altitude while they’re both pretty much the same latitude. The difference in perception even if the dry bulb temperature is the same is insane. In Bangalore I can always find shade and it’ll be cool instantly, but in Chennai my whole body is always soaking wet, my…

It's striking to me that according to the map in figure 4, the parts of the Indian subcontinent most at risk are in the Indus and Ganges valleys. Areas hundreds of miles further south (including Chennai and Bangalore) are safe!

Why is this? I see that the south is much more mountainous [1], whereas the Indus and Ganges valleys are very flat (hence that term "Indo-Gangetic Plain"). Is it just the combination of being low-altitude, being inland, and having lots of water? Or are there also differences in prevailing wind, or something else?

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/jcdtvi/relief_map_...

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