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Advice for a climate change apocalypse

kentucky.com

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Re: Advice for a climate change apocalypse

#41
post #28

Something else to consider, that the article doesn't really touch, is the pace of change. Even at global-disaster scale, climate change moves pretty slowly. The ocean may rise a couple of meters, but it's not rising a couple of meters later this afternoon. Interesting thing to think about... in the past century, Earth's population has quadrupled, with most of that occurring along coastlines. That means we built enoug…

This is what I was thinking. People seem to think of climate change as something like a tornado or something. Sea level, for example, rises so slowly that you can simply abandon the land on the coast that we start to lose and keep expanding inward. The easily flooded areas from more potent storms will probably be abandoned, too, over time. It won't be fun, for sure, but I don't see civilization falling any time soon.

It's not like an event labeled "climate change" is going to hit us next Thursday and we're suddenly going to be reduced to roving bands of survivors who will be wishing they had signed up for that survival training class yesterday.

I'd worry more about getting our government officials to put more resources into disaster preparedness than I would how to start a fire or how best to lead a band of frightened survivors.

Re: Advice for a climate change apocalypse

#42
Post-apocalyse could be fun. But why wait? You can move to Slab City if that's your thing.

I play a game sometimes in my head. It's a kind of speculative daydream. In this daydream, I'm sitting around a campfire with my band of fellow survivors. Things have calmed down and we've settled into a groove. The "game" has no name, but if it did it would be called "nostagia". Everyone goes around the circle and says something they miss from the old civ that they took for granted:

"Q-tips"

"Asprin"

"Fucking morphine"

"I miss my dentist."

The breakdown of civilization will be horrifying.

I have been a self-decribed "Apocalyptic" since sometime in my early teens. I took a look at what people were up to in re; technology and the environment and decided that we could kiss our asses good-bye in maybe fifty years. That was about thirty years ago and we are right on schedule.

The first problem is going to be water. Then food. There's only about three days worth of food in a modern city at any given time. If the production and transportation system seriously breaks down for more than a week over a large enough area... Well, as the fellow from New Guinea said to the missionary, "If God didn't want us to eat people He wouldn't have made us out of meat." Check your history books if you dare, but I don't advise it unless you have a strong stomach. Heh.

Best advice to survive a serious breakdown of civilization: "Live someplace three days farther than a hungry person can walk."

The best time to prepare for this bleak future is now, before it happens. If you're not prepared to move to the middle of nowhere and set up a self-sufficient homestead then you had better get serious about fixing our global problems.

This is where "it will be empathy, generosity, and courage that we need to survive. Kindness and fairness will be more valuable than any survival skill. Then as now, social and leadership skills will be valued. We will have to work together. We will have to grow food, educate ourselves, and give people a reason to persevere. The needs will be enormous, and we cannot run away from that. Humans evolved attributes such as generosity, altruism, and cooperation because we need them to survive. Armed with those skills, we will turn towards the problem, not away from it. We will face the need, and we will have to solve it together. That is the only option. That’s what survival looks like."

It's this moment right now. You're living it. This is what the breakdown of civilization looks and feels like. Where are the insects? Where are the birds? The weather is weird. There are strange signs in the Heavens. Someone is trying to tell you something.

We have solutions.

Permaculture and other kinds of applied ecology can save our bacon: it's fun and easy to get back in touch with Nature (and she's delighted to have you back!) Things like the "Core Transformation Process" are algorithms for overcoming our problems and baggage. It's there, it works. Or just "Non-Violent Communication", etc. Or find Jesus and live up to His expectations.

Change your life, start with your diet, it's healthy to eat food grown in healthy ecosystems: foster some. We can do this, "we have the technology", it's up to us.

Re: Advice for a climate change apocalypse

#43
post #39
post #3

I've thought a bit about this and come to the conclusion that the best way to survive is not to have anything others would want. If you have nothing others want you will not be attacked for it and have to defend yourself. That will get you past the first wave of deaths: holding on to our old way of life thinking 'property' is important. It's best if you can actually walk to an area where there is protection from the…

This is the "rugged individualist fantasy" that the author talks about. I admit many of us have fantasies of climate-change-apocalypse working out like that, but the author is correct: we will not be facing a sudden collapse of society allowing small bands of survivors to go live on farms, at least not in the first world. Instead, in the first world, the effects we'll feel are billions of climate refugees moving acro…

More like nightmares.

I've read articles about Syria being the first casualty in the coming migrant wars due to climate change.

Re: Advice for a climate change apocalypse

#44
post #3

I've thought a bit about this and come to the conclusion that the best way to survive is not to have anything others would want. If you have nothing others want you will not be attacked for it and have to defend yourself. That will get you past the first wave of deaths: holding on to our old way of life thinking 'property' is important. It's best if you can actually walk to an area where there is protection from the…

So basically, don't be a woman?

If you intrinsically have something people want and you're physically weak, you'd best make friends with Samuel Colt, the great equalizer.

Re: Advice for a climate change apocalypse

#45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't the mob run away after a few people in front got shot? I'm sure there are historical examples for comparison.

Your children are starving. You can (a) run away and watch them starve or (b) rush the compound and hope to get some food. Threats -- and demonstrations -- of violence are only reliable if the person being threatened has something to lose.

>Threats -- and demonstrations -- of violence are only reliable if the person being threatened has something to lose.

I'm not convinced that people would be rational about their prospects if they were being shot at.

Re: Advice for a climate change apocalypse

#46
post #28

Something else to consider, that the article doesn't really touch, is the pace of change. Even at global-disaster scale, climate change moves pretty slowly. The ocean may rise a couple of meters, but it's not rising a couple of meters later this afternoon. Interesting thing to think about... in the past century, Earth's population has quadrupled, with most of that occurring along coastlines. That means we built enoug…

Climate may change slow (by human standards, not by climate's standards), but civilization collapse can be pretty much flip-of-a-switch instantaneous.

Re: Advice for a climate change apocalypse

#47

John Baez's blog has a series on how civilizations collapse, first looking at the Anasazi, and then how one might model it using agent-based modeling and also looking at general collapse through differential equations: https://johncarlosbaez.wordpress.com/2013/01/20/anasazi-amer... https://johncarlosbaez.wordpress.com/2013/01/24/anasazi-amer... https://johncarlosbaez.wordpress.com/2014/03/25/civilization... https://j…

Connections was one of my favorite shows when I was younger, and it played on cable. I think it was the Discovery channel, as hard as that is to imagine now. I really miss the Discovery channel of my youth, when it was a gateway to science and history, and not primarily a vehicle of reality TV programming. At least I assume it still is, I abandoned it long ago (not long after it abandoned me).

Re: Advice for a climate change apocalypse

#49
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the "rugged individualist fantasy" that the author talks about. I admit many of us have fantasies of climate-change-apocalypse working out like that, but the author is correct: we will not be facing a sudden collapse of society allowing small bands of survivors to go live on farms, at least not in the first world. Instead, in the first world, the effects we'll feel are billions of climate refugees moving acro…

More like nightmares. I've read articles about Syria being the first casualty in the coming migrant wars due to climate change.

I posted a comment about this a few days ago and got downvoted into oblivion. Seems like hn doesn't take the climate refugee threat seriously.

Re: Advice for a climate change apocalypse

#50
post #46
post #28

Something else to consider, that the article doesn't really touch, is the pace of change. Even at global-disaster scale, climate change moves pretty slowly. The ocean may rise a couple of meters, but it's not rising a couple of meters later this afternoon. Interesting thing to think about... in the past century, Earth's population has quadrupled, with most of that occurring along coastlines. That means we built enoug…

Climate may change slow (by human standards, not by climate's standards), but civilization collapse can be pretty much flip-of-a-switch instantaneous.

Right. But climate change may not be a fast enough trigger to cause an instantaneous collapse of civilization.

And at what scale are we talking? A local community, or a nation, or the world? The instantaneous collapse of global civilization, with no instantaneous trigger, seems unlikely to me. The idea that no government will be able to stand and keep order, from the UN to the US on down to every town in the world? Nah.

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