Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns • Hacker News Board

Re: Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns

#41

Post by akuji1993 » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 2:34 PM UTC

Shoh3pif wrote: post #3

akuji1993 wrote: post #2

I'm absolutely certain with governments moving this slow right now, making small goals for 2050, getting courted by lobbies to not push through massive restrictions, probably most of these very dark predictions will come true. I, as a concerned citizen can do nothing against the corporations ruling our society, overruling politicians or outright controlling them directly. We are probably beyond any point of return. T…

> I, as a concerned citizen can do nothing against the corporations ruling our society Defenestrations, torches and pitchforks have been traditional solutions to rulers not acting in the interest of the populace. Of course more peaceful means are preferable but the option needs to be kept on the table to remember why we have and want democratic solutions in the first place.

At least for my country, you can scream as loud as you want, people just complain about you being louder than the Television. Nothing will happen, because governments have kept the majority of the people at a low enough education that they either don't understand or don't care about these things at all. I can always see people zoning out when I talk to them about this topic. Nobody cares, because they know they won't make a difference if they do anyway.

Re: Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns

#42

Post by rabidrat » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 2:35 PM UTC

skywhopper wrote: post #36

avar wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You as a concerned citizen can do plenty on your own. Most people could cut down their emissions and other environmental impacts by 50% easily if they really cared. The problem is that most people don't really care that much when push comes to shove, and in aggregate this is the reason for why we're moving so slowly on climate change.

There are limits to what individuals can do. Take automobile fuel efficiency. Cars these days are way more efficient and cleaner than they were fifty years ago, and they perform far better. Consumer choice would never have made this happen in response to market forces. You couldn't buy an efficient, high-performance car in the late 60s even if you wanted to. Companies needed an incentive to invest for the long-long t…

And then there is Jevons' Paradox: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox

Re: Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns

#43

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 2:36 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns

#44

Post by akuji1993 » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 2:36 PM UTC

avar wrote: post #8

akuji1993 wrote: post #2

I'm absolutely certain with governments moving this slow right now, making small goals for 2050, getting courted by lobbies to not push through massive restrictions, probably most of these very dark predictions will come true. I, as a concerned citizen can do nothing against the corporations ruling our society, overruling politicians or outright controlling them directly. We are probably beyond any point of return. T…

You as a concerned citizen can do plenty on your own. Most people could cut down their emissions and other environmental impacts by 50% easily if they really cared. The problem is that most people don't really care that much when push comes to shove, and in aggregate this is the reason for why we're moving so slowly on climate change.

As positive as we should paint this, when somebody does this, it doesn't at all solve the problem. Corporations and Governments need to be kept at a level that stops climate change, to make a difference.

Citizens need a reeducation regarding meat, regarding travel, regarding transportation of goods and what the globalization does to the environment. The biggest change can only be triggered by either overthrowing the government or forcing them in some other way to start worrying about this.

Re: Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns

#45

Post by akuji1993 » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 2:38 PM UTC

megaman22 wrote: post #26

rntz wrote: post #6

> "hothouse" temperatures could stabilize 4°C to 5°C (39 to 41 Fahrenheit) higher than pre-industrial levels. A change of 4-5°C is a change of 7-9 degrees Fahrenheit, not 39-41.

Pre-industrial levels when we were still coming out of significant cooling period. In every other period of human history, increased average temperatures have coincided with golden ages. Depending on where you peg your baseline for what "normal" temperatures are, the projections can look more or less scary. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Warm_Period https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_Warm_Period I'm suspicio…

You realize what the current development looks like on a chart right?

https://climate.nasa.gov/evidence/

Re: Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns

#46

Post by Buldak » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 2:39 PM UTC

Shoh3pif wrote: post #3

akuji1993 wrote: post #2

I'm absolutely certain with governments moving this slow right now, making small goals for 2050, getting courted by lobbies to not push through massive restrictions, probably most of these very dark predictions will come true. I, as a concerned citizen can do nothing against the corporations ruling our society, overruling politicians or outright controlling them directly. We are probably beyond any point of return. T…

> I, as a concerned citizen can do nothing against the corporations ruling our society Defenestrations, torches and pitchforks have been traditional solutions to rulers not acting in the interest of the populace. Of course more peaceful means are preferable but the option needs to be kept on the table to remember why we have and want democratic solutions in the first place.

>Defenestrations, torches and pitchforks have been traditional solutions to rulers not acting in the interest of the populace.

I'd guess the people involved in those rebellions felt the effects of bad governance much more acutely and directly than people do (currently ...) vis-à-vis climate change.

Re: Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns

#47

Post by EADGBE » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 2:39 PM UTC

0xfaded wrote: post #12

rntz wrote: post #6

> "hothouse" temperatures could stabilize 4°C to 5°C (39 to 41 Fahrenheit) higher than pre-industrial levels. A change of 4-5°C is a change of 7-9 degrees Fahrenheit, not 39-41.

Lol, looks like the Google result of "convert 4C to Fahrenheit". In the authors defence, it isn't their fault the Americans still use Fahrenheit.

It's assuring to know their conceptualization of F is equal to my conceptualization of C (Read: some tricky math is required, none-the-less).

Re: Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns

#48

Post by jbattle » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 2:39 PM UTC

zerealshadowban wrote: post #22

mapleoin wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/indicators/global-an... > According to different observational records of global average annual near-surface (land and ocean) temperature, the last decade (2008–2017) was 0.89 °C to 0.93 °C warmer than the pre-industrial average, which makes it the warmest decade on record. Of the 17 warmest years on record, 16 have occurred since 2000. The year 2017 was one of the world’s thre…

What exactly is "the pre-industrial average"? does that correspond to the Little Ice Age? why is that a good reference point, or baseline for comparison? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ice_Age

why don't you spend 25 seconds googling?

Re: Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns

#49

Post by patrickg_zill » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 2:40 PM UTC

fallingfrog wrote: post #35

patrickg_zill wrote: post #29

I have been hearing this since the mid 1980s. I wouldn't have heard of it before, because before then scientists were telling us that the climate was going to get a lot cooler...

The "global cooling" thing is just throwing sand in our eyes- and you know it. Everything you've heard about global warming has been true the whole time, and you haven't been listening. I keep trying to wrap my head around the worldview of someone whose commitment to ideology is so powerful that they are willing to condemn their grandchildren to such suffering. It has to be some kind of religious thing.

Everyone who said during the 1970s that we should be afraid of global cooling are the same people who now demand that we believe them on global warming.

Oceanic thermocline: explain the data we have and the mathematical model we have to cover this phenomenon.

You can't, because you don't actually know. You just blindly believe it, don't you?

Re: Earth at risk of becoming 'hothouse' if tipping point reached, report warns

#50

Post by usaar333 » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 2:43 PM UTC

jacobsheehy wrote: post #37

_Codemonkeyism wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People know their personal largest impact is cars and meat. But personal convenience has always beaten doing the right thing.

This is absolutely not true. People don't know that. Ask 2000 people on the street in a southern red state what their contribution to climate change is. I bet you get 0s back. "Taht fake thing isn't real" - "My car doesn't pollute you schmuck" - "the Earth is here for us to pollute it, that's what god said", etc. People do not know that their largest personal impact is cars and meat. They just don't know that at all…

Go to a highly educated Silicon Valley tech company. Survey around. How many of these people eat beef? How many take frequent vacations via plane?

Per capita, especially due to the plane travel, their emissions are probably as high as someone in a southern red state. Personal convenience beats doing the right ting.