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Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

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Re: Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

#241

Post by thaumaturgy »

mbostleman wrote: post #234
thaumaturgy wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Only that people tend to accept narratives that are repeated over and over without critically questioning them. Sure, but the challenge is that critically questioning a common narrative takes significantly more effort than a quick review of a single dataset, especially when that narrative is coming from a fairly large body of professional researchers in multiple fields. This is a big problem right now in the politi…

I didn’t draw a conclusion. This is now the third time that I’ve pointed that out. It seems like you badly need me to do that to make your point somehow. Is this causing you to not see it when I write it? Secondly I’m not sure I’m “indicting” anyone. Only observing that there was absolutely zero knowledge about facts behind the situation and no ability to respond to my two minute gathering of facts. This isn’t an ind…

From your first comment:

> Without getting in to a lot of detail, the source I found was very reliable and did not show any upward (or downward) trend in either count of fires or total acreage on an annual basis since the 1960s. I pointed this out - not as proof that climate change did not affect fires - but as a simple data point that didn't seem to match his assertion.

That is called a "conclusion", no matter how many weasel-words you salt it with or how many times you say, "no, really, I wasn't drawing a conclusion". You've since walked it back to, "oh, I meant there wasn't a significant trend", and I shrugged and accepted that and replied solely to your criticism of other people.

Which was:

> Only that people tend to accept narratives that are repeated over and over without critically questioning them.

And now, you're choosing to expand from "people aren't critically questioning things" to, "oh, actually, I meant that they aren't thinking at all". Before you do that, you might want to think a little bit more about epistemic learned helplessness.

> Only observing that there was absolutely zero knowledge about facts behind the situation and no ability to respond to my two minute gathering of facts.

Nice, you're doubling down. Well, your "two minute gathering of facts", first, was erroneous, and second, your "observation" was either obvious, or wrong, pick your flavor. Obviously, people accept any manner of statements without personally verifying them. Nobody has the resources to become an expert on every bit of news coming from legions of researchers or journalists, and further, if they spend just two minutes attempting to verify a single factoid in something, they may well get it wrong, as you did.

Instead, people rely on other people to develop the specialized knowledge required to gather and synthesize the facts of a subject, and then other people still to report on that. It's imperfect, and sometimes (often) somebody somewhere in that chain gets something wrong, but it's still a better approach than armchairing everything you read, which has a far greater chance of leading you to the wrong ... well, "question", I guess, instead of "conclusion".

By the way, re-framing conclusions as questions is such a well-known tactic that it has a name: https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Just_asking_questions

Re: Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

#242

Post by southern_cross »

zaroth wrote: post #180
jellicle wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They put Miami's expected sea level rise at 0 to 1 feet over the next century That's a false description of what NOAA says. The sea level trend is an instantaneous rate, not a projection of any sort.

“The relative sea level trend is 2.39 mm/year with a 95% confidence interval of +/- 0.43 mm/year based on monthly mean sea level data from 1931 to 1981 which is equivalent to a change of 0.78 feet in 100 years.”

The last time I did the math (it's been a while now), assuming that I did this correctly it showed that the current rate of sea level rise is something like half the average rate of the last ten to fifteen thousand years. So the current rate would basically have to double just to get us back to the long-term average. And it might very well do that someday, and do so perfectly naturally, too. (Nobody has ever said that the natural rise in sea level has stopped since the beginning of the last interglacial period.) But that wouldn't be good news for places like Miami.

Re: Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

#243

Post by lotsofpulp »

hanbura wrote: post #153
lotsofpulp wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some risks are not insurable since they're guaranteed to happen. That's why no private insurance company will offer flood insurance, but since these owners of capital have enough political clout, they are able to secure a taxpayer funded bailout fund (nation flood insurance program).

I am guaranteed to die at some point. Yet (at least in Germany) I can go to a private insurance company, agree to pay a few euros each month and in return they pay out 10000€ when I die to cover my funeral, no questions about cause of death asked. It's an insurance that is guaranteed to pay out, but it still insures against uncertainty because I don't know when I will die. Flood insurance is fundamentally the same, t…

In order for the insurance company to pay you 10,000 euros when you die, they have to collect that much from you plus their operating expenses minus the investment gains expected over your expected lifetime. This is whole life insurance, and it's usually a better idea to stick the money into index funds and avoid paying the insurance company for their operating expenses.

And we're not talking about a 10,000 euro loss here, when a home gets flooded, the loss is likely six figures or more since houses aren't cheap. Most people can't afford insurance for a likely loss of $100,000.

There are many large geographically diverse insurance companies, and there is a reason all of them stay away from flood insurance. There's no buyer for the amount of premium they would have to charge.

Re: Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

#244

Post by h4b4n3r0 »

chollida1 wrote: post #9

Start worrying when the banks stop offering mortgages to people trying to buy property in south beach. I remember when Katrina flooded New Orleans, lots of people were asking why rebuild the city when it almost certainly will flood like that again. And the answer was a simple, do you know how much it would cost to relocate everyone? What does it do to the economy when almost everyones largest asset(their house) is wo…

Actually start worrying when insurance companies start refusing to insure properties there against flooding. Estimating risks is their bread and butter, they will know.

I’ve actually discovered (from the Yale “Financial Markets” MOOC) that US government uses mandatory insurance to get people to move out of areas which are likely to be flooded, etc. USG makes the insurance mandatory, and insurance companies, quite predictably, price just about everyone out. People either pay through the nose or move out.

Edit: reading further into the thread, looks like they already are refusing to insure. Move TF out.

Re: Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

#245

Post by h4b4n3r0 »

okmokmz wrote: post #98
legulere wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The banks will just ask for flood insurance.

Except flood insurance doesn't appear to be economically viable in those areas >More than 861,000 of them do not have flood insurance. And for homes in those counties that aren't designated flood zones, the numbers are even worse. >Those four counties have a population about 5 million people, and include the Florida Keys, Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Naples. >And there's still cause for concern about homes and business…

>> Except flood insurance doesn't appear to be economically viable in those areas

That’s by design. They don’t want you to build there.

Re: Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

#246

Post by joe5150 »

fabricexpert wrote: post #80

This article is kind of infuriating. Just bring the facts up and talk about them, instead of describing people. I think this is one of the more critical parts (along with the stuff about water supply getting contaminated): > Barring a stupendous reversal in greenhouse gas emissions, the rising Atlantic will cover much of Miami by the end of this century. The economic effects will be devastating: Zillow Inc. estimates…

I think what you want is an encyclopedia article. Some (a lot) of us enjoy reading about people, places, and the narratives of their lives and struggles.

Re: Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

#247

Post by aaronbrethorst »

psychometry wrote: post #22
erentz wrote: post #3

I’ve never understood how the parts of the country most affected by sea level rise have been so vociferously against it being real. When the BP spill happened and they had all the local mayors and politicians crying about the damage to their coast, I couldn’t understand why no one had the cajones to ask them why they cared so much about their coast being damaged now, when they were completely fine with it being gone…

I think there's been a brain drain happening in a lot of red states in recent decades. The educated people who have the ability and will to leave often do, leaving behind an increasingly ignorant population. It's coincidental that this same geographic region will be most affected by sea level rise, although nowhere on earth will be immune to the effects of climate change.

For Republicans, there's a correlation between level of education and climate change denialism:

Climate change divides Americans, but in an unlikely way: The more education that Democrats and Republicans have, the more their beliefs in climate change diverge.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/11/14/upshot/climat...

Re: Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

#248

Post by mbostleman »

thaumaturgy wrote: post #241
mbostleman wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn’t draw a conclusion. This is now the third time that I’ve pointed that out. It seems like you badly need me to do that to make your point somehow. Is this causing you to not see it when I write it? Secondly I’m not sure I’m “indicting” anyone. Only observing that there was absolutely zero knowledge about facts behind the situation and no ability to respond to my two minute gathering of facts. This isn’t an ind…

From your first comment: > Without getting in to a lot of detail, the source I found was very reliable and did not show any upward (or downward) trend in either count of fires or total acreage on an annual basis since the 1960s. I pointed this out - not as proof that climate change did not affect fires - but as a simple data point that didn't seem to match his assertion. That is called a "conclusion", no matter how m…

He said, "Too bad climate change is causing more fires" I said, "I just looked at this data and don't see a big trend. Even if there was a trend, how do you know it's climate change?" He said, "I have no idea, I just assumed that from what I heard"

I didn't have a conclusion then, and I don't have one now. If you take out two 3-year clusters in the last decade there is no trend at all. And 35 years of reliable data seems a little light to me. One would think we'd need several centuries to get real confidence.

But what I really question, are variables that would affect the numbers and size of fires such as how many were created by people, and the amount of effort put towards fighting them. The data we're looking at is not an observation of just nature. But it seems to be treated as if it is.

Re: Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

#249

Post by Timmah »

mikestew wrote: post #168
leereeves wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True. And some scientists believe that rate is accelerating, for example Steve Nerem et al: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/02/180212150739.h... That accelerating projection "has the potential to double the total sea level rise by 2100 as compared to projections that assume a constant rate -- to more than 60 cm instead of about 30". Two feet instead of one. I still don't see where six feet is coming from.

I still don't see where six feet is coming from. I read $SOMEWHERE recently that the the worst case scenario predicted six feet. But that's, IIRC, if we do absolutely nothing, the methane in the Arctic is all released, and Greenland melts. The more likely scenario is somewhere from 1-3 feet. So unless memory fails me, the article didn't just pull it out of its arse, but a source would've been nice rather than just th…

I read $SOMEWHERE that most sea level rise is/will be due to thermal expansion of water, not melting ice.

Re: Miami Will Be Underwater Soon. Its Drinking Water Could Go First

#250

Post by Timmah »

akiselev wrote: post #215
mbostleman wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. I think the issue is that mainstream "journalism" is actually entertainment in all respects other than the fact that it carries a fairly widespread credibility among its audience as not being entertainment but rather a factual, verifiable source of information - one that is beyond the audience's ability to understand. Sort of like the unquestioning acceptance that many give to doctors or lawyers because (it is a…

The National Interagency Fire Center stats for fire suppression costs paint a completely different picture [1]. While the total number of fires has decreased by about 10-20% since 1985, the size of the fires in acres and the amount of money spent has skyrocketed. The annual average from 1985 to 1989 is ~2.9 million acres while from 2013-2017 the average was over twice that at ~6.7 million acres. Furthermore, inflatio…

The increasing cost of a service has nothing to do with climate change. The cost of everything has gone up since 1985.
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