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This is the most depressing chart in the world

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Re: This is the most depressing chart in the world

#51

Post by VLM »

npalli wrote: post #41

If you look at the underlying table [1], it looks like they will miss it again. Most importantly they keep forecasting China to grow at >6% in the short term. China is in a deep transition right now, 50% of their economy is in investment (building stuff mostly). This was fine in 2008-2011, but right now that has to stop, very quickly. They have run out of productive investments that make sense. Even if they grow at 0…

"They have run out of productive investments that make sense."

This used to be the definition and justification of recessions. Liquidate recent bad investments so we can start over on a stronger more stable base. At least in the old days.

Now we do coverups and bailouts to delay and increase the inevitable. That's not going to end well.

Re: This is the most depressing chart in the world

#52

Post by rorykoehler »

dozzie wrote: post #19
coldtea wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, damn that scientific consensus.

This scientific consensus already made several heavily wrong estimates. And mind you, we don't have a working, proven model of climate change. We only have some speculations based on some proxy variables, and those speculations tend to ignore most basic physics or statistics (e.g. discussing changes of temperature that are way below observational errors currently possible, or focus on marginal CO2 concentration, whil…

Regardless I love breathing in the shit air in my city when I go on a bike ride. It's really nice. No problem here, things are perfect, move along.

Re: This is the most depressing chart in the world

#53

Post by vaadu »

cel1ne wrote: post #37
dozzie wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This scientific consensus already made several heavily wrong estimates. And mind you, we don't have a working, proven model of climate change. We only have some speculations based on some proxy variables, and those speculations tend to ignore most basic physics or statistics (e.g. discussing changes of temperature that are way below observational errors currently possible, or focus on marginal CO2 concentration, whil…

So there are thousands of climate scientists which came, over and over again, to the same conclusion: that the extent of current heating is caused by co2 release, which is caused by coal-burning by mankind. Those have all made several mistakes and continue to make them and the 15 scientists or so who are of a different opinion are probably right? Is that what you are saying?

Maybe the skeptics don't like the idea of the alarmists hiding the raw data and then telling us what the results say.

Re: This is the most depressing chart in the world

#54

Post by haimez »

collyw wrote: post #29
dmm wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the absence of growth the only way for an individual to get more resources is to take it from someone else. Life becomes a zero-sum game. This is a qualitative change. The game stops being who can make the most pie to who can take the most.

Certain people seem to have more than enough to share around. Instead they seem to concentrate on accumulating more of it by (often by taking it from other people).

Sounds like you're proposing the zero sum outcome.

Re: This is the most depressing chart in the world

#55

Post by rorykoehler »

drjesusphd wrote: post #5
baldfat wrote: post #3

I have very little understanding about economics but I always am scared of large GDP growth because it seems like that is when we go into recession due to bubbles. 1980s led to the recession of the early 1990s. The mid 1990s growth became the 2007-2009 "Great Recession." So this shows growth and it is steady so I don't find this depressing. edited one word

The problem is that slow, steady growth cannot support capitalism. In order to convince investors to risk their money, the economy must promise a more handsome return on their investment. That's why it's "bad news" when the economy "only" grows by 1-2% per year.

I know it's extremely unpopular with a segment of the economic/political philosophy fundamentalists but maybe it's time to accept that capitalism is flawed and not a cure all solution. Just because something worked under a certain set of conditions doesn't mean it will work well if at all under another set of conditions. Our conditions are clearly changing and we should adapt accordingly.

Re: This is the most depressing chart in the world

#56

Post by Aeolos »

dozzie wrote: post #45
cel1ne wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So there are thousands of climate scientists which came, over and over again, to the same conclusion: that the extent of current heating is caused by co2 release, which is caused by coal-burning by mankind. Those have all made several mistakes and continue to make them and the 15 scientists or so who are of a different opinion are probably right? Is that what you are saying?

We had thousands of astrology and magic practicioners. It didn't make astrology or magic true in any way. You know what makes modern physics true? Falsifiability and verifiability. You build a theory, make predictions, develop an experiment, and then conduct the experiment, multiple times. Climatology stops after the first two. Granted, astronomy and cosmology operate in similar way to climatology, but we don't estab…

> You know what makes modern physics true? Falsifiability and verifiability. You build a theory, make predictions, develop an experiment, and then conduct the experiment, multiple times. Climatology stops after the first two.

This is, obviously and demonstrably, wrong. The data is out there, the methodologies are out there, and there is tons of related open-source software. You can conduct your own experiments and come to your own conclusions.

This guy [1][2], for example, did, and imagine what: he independently verified what 99% of climate scientists have been saying.

Why don't you give it a go? Put your money where your mouth is and see for yourself what is true and what isn't.

Edit: to the poster below, the data is public, just a quick google search away. For example [3].

[1] http://forums.sandiegouniontribune.com/showpost.php?p=533737...

[2] http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/01/thorough-not-thorough...

[3] ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/v3/

Re: This is the most depressing chart in the world

#57

Post by Aeolos »

vaadu wrote: post #53
cel1ne wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So there are thousands of climate scientists which came, over and over again, to the same conclusion: that the extent of current heating is caused by co2 release, which is caused by coal-burning by mankind. Those have all made several mistakes and continue to make them and the 15 scientists or so who are of a different opinion are probably right? Is that what you are saying?

Maybe the skeptics don't like the idea of the alarmists hiding the raw data and then telling us what the results say.

ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ghcn/v3/

1. RTFM

2. Use high-school level math

3. Post your results to hackernews for discussion

Up to the challenge?

Re: This is the most depressing chart in the world

#58

Post by coldtea »

dmm wrote: post #27
coldtea wrote: post #12

Why should we expect or even want constant growth? Is current level of growth even sustainable? (regarding environment, lifestyle issues --stress, depression, etc.--, quality of production, time for people to adapt to new paradigms, etc)? How about less "growth" and better distribution, more quality, less rat racing?

In the absence of growth the only way for an individual to get more resources is to take it from someone else. Life becomes a zero-sum game. This is a qualitative change. The game stops being who can make the most pie to who can take the most.

>In the absence of growth the only way for an individual to get more resources is to take it from someone else.

Part of my point is that there are more than enough resources, what's needed is better distribution. Plus some scaling down the over-consumption of crap.

Besides this "taking it from someone else" is already the case with the growth model, were not only a tiny fraction of the population has a huge percentage of the world's wealth (debt aside, I know those arguments too), but people can be making $1000 Armani suits for 12 hours a day in the third world just to have the same, or even worse, quality of life as they did before their country was forced into globalization.

For centuries the growth depended on plundering the third world, as colonialists, neo-colonialists, slave owners, democrary-bringers etc, plus heavy internal forcing of people (e.g. the rural population) to become factory workers.

Now we've come to the point technologically that we don't need all those people anyway -- not even the service industry which we invented as a stop gap to have people employed.

Re: This is the most depressing chart in the world

#59

Post by coldtea »

dozzie wrote: post #19
coldtea wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, damn that scientific consensus.

This scientific consensus already made several heavily wrong estimates. And mind you, we don't have a working, proven model of climate change. We only have some speculations based on some proxy variables, and those speculations tend to ignore most basic physics or statistics (e.g. discussing changes of temperature that are way below observational errors currently possible, or focus on marginal CO2 concentration, whil…

>This scientific consensus already made several heavily wrong estimates.

So we should trust something else over that?

Re: This is the most depressing chart in the world

#60

Post by pjc50 »

dozzie wrote: post #14
claudius wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, if the first assumption doesn’t hold, we’ll have to restrict our usage even more. Short of dimming the sun, I don’t see how you can keep “all this carbon in atmosphere” and still only get 2°C.

If the first assumption doesn't hold, restricting ourselves will not matter. > Short of dimming the sun, I don’t see how you can keep “all this carbon in atmosphere” and still only get 2°C. This one assumes the carbon is main or even major substance that keeps heat on Earth. You do realize that we have much more water in the atmosphere, and water keeps heat much better than carbon? It's not as simple as "more carbon,…

Yes, and there's a positive feedback loop between the two ("forcing").
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