Last time I posed that question, someone tagged a known denialist and we had a 'nice' little discussion before they were perma-banned. Let's see what you're triggering this time.
Climate Change | UN Report: Code Red for humanity
- Thread starter Buster15
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I think we’re rapidly approaching the point where we will have to consider geoengineering out of necessity, despite the plethora of unknowns and irreversible consequences that that implies. The feedback loops we‘re triggering in the Arctic will be the final nail in the coffin.
Maybe? It will definitely make it worse, probably a lot worse, but right now it doesn't look like we can actually go full Venus or something like that. Let's hope so, anyway.
The last nail in the coffin for the hopes of achieving our carbon reduction targets, not all life on earth - if that’s what you mean by Venus.
Oh yeah, in that case I very much agree. I just sometimes feel like it needs saying that we're very unlikely to make the Earth uninhabitable, which feels like a low bar.
Yeah - those (less ice > less reflection of sunlight > more warming > less ice > etc.), and also in the subarctic (permafrost thaws > trapped methane released > more warming > more permafrost thaw > etc) really make it hard to put this genie back into its bottle...
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-59049770
+2.7C. Now that really is a Climate Catastrophe.
We are on course for a future that is nothing like it is today.
This just cannot be allowed to happen.
+2.7C. Now that really is a Climate Catastrophe.
We are on course for a future that is nothing like it is today.
This just cannot be allowed to happen.
It's a fitting epitaph for our triumphant unchallenged economic system that it will destroy the lives or livelihoods of a few billion people, partly because it can't stop people burning electricity for the sake of burning electricity.
I can't think of a lower hanging fruit and at the same time know with 100% certainty that nothing will be done to stop it. Markets rule governments drool.
I can't think of a lower hanging fruit and at the same time know with 100% certainty that nothing will be done to stop it. Markets rule governments drool.
Bitcoins to me seem like space tourism. Fabulously polluting and I have yet to discover a single real value-add for the world or humanity. But let's keep doing it for the sake of... erm... well, money?
Cause, you know, frivolous consumerism (and its profits) > environment.
Oh, that's just because you don't have 13.8 million Bitcoin.
I did write 'humanity', not 'individual humans in the short-term until their home is destroyed through some weather event that has become more frequent or otherwise worse due to climate change'.
How to stop it though...
China and Russia are not even going to Glasgow
Uk and France/ the eu are more focussed on fishing wars
Usa struggles to get a sizable chunk of the population to believe in climate change... can't even get the democratic party to agree legislation so really isn't in a position to push others to do more
Cop 26 was supposed to be the meeting where things had to happen... its shaping up to be an unmitigated disaster
I did write 'humanity', not 'individual humans in the short-term until their home is destroyed through some weather event that has become more frequent or otherwise worse due to climate change'.
Oh, I know. Obviously if you had 13.8 million Bitcoin you'd be able to help humanity by buying up all the world's corporations' stock and getting all the world's armies on your payroll. And that's just for starters.
The Supreme Court has an incredible amount of power in the US. That's even reflected in something like abortion, which is a legislative issue in almost every other country, not judicial. It all comes back to the extreme reverence for the constitution, I suppose. In Norway you only on the rarest of occasions have the supreme court making decisions on something being or not being constitutional, and I am pretty sure they would never take up the sorts of cases that the American supreme court hears.
Then again we did kind of subvert the whole separation of powers thing with parliamentarism, with executive power deriving directly from legislative power, so there are very different principles at play here.
I've just taken on some function as a back up for my team's anti-spam legislation point of contact. It's amazing how much effort governments put into stopping spam email but they hardly do shit about climate change. Priorities.
That is certainly the most likely outcome. But you can be sure that it will be spun to sound like a success.
The points you make are a typical example of modern politics. Completely short term thinking about votes.
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Why is that do you think?
Do they believe they are so vast that they can ride out any disruption caused by an increase in the temperature of the planet, or do they see an advantage in such things maybe accruing to them , or do they just don't believe it will happen?
What will be needed just to get these two to turn up at any future COP?
I think its a push back against the American driven existing world order
Basically if you want to engage china then your gonna have to engage china on china's terms ... as for putin I think its just any chance to undermine institutions and internationalism
That is a very good point.
To my very simple way of thinking, global threats to our very existence need to be responded to by being on a war footing. Essentially as with Covid.
But with man made climate change, we are going back to individual nation states refusing to collaborate for the common good. And unless you all have a common purpose, it will just end in failure.
Thank you for your response.
That is very interesting about China pushing back against American influence, isn't that a bit like saying "if you don't play with my ball, we are not playing"?
For the rest of the world, the West in particular, engaging China on their terms is something highly unlikely, at least in the short term, say for half a century or so; but by then of course China will have become the dominant world force/economy and it can do what it likes, but also by then if they have not engaged in the process then the planet's climate will have ' gone to hell in a hand cart' and the resulting chaos will include for China as well!
If China's long term plan is to be the dominant force/economy etc. on the planet by the next century, then surely they will want a planet capable of maintaining life and living standards that will allow their economy to flourish?
I suppose you could envisage that China is 'hanging back for bets', or trying to fix the odds in their favour, but its a high risk game, especially if Trump or someone similar gets back into power in the US.
God knows what Putin is up to, but its his rationale that might in the end prove the downfall of a successful worldwide Climate Change strategy/outcome and it appears no one, certainly not Europe, can or will attempt, to apply pressure to him.
It’s not gonna work. Too much in the way of squabbling will be the end of a way of life for many living in future numerous and vast danger zones. It’s inevitable. Of course the Earth will be just fine although wildlife and habitats will be fecked for who knows. But then again the Earth could be be covered in mile of tar on it’s surface and sooner or later it will revive. It’s got billions of years left and doesn’t need us. We need it and we fecked it up for ourselves not the Earth.
Wearing clothes twice. What a wonderful sacrifice.
It may well not. I accept that. But we have to maintain optimism that some progress will be made.
And if some of the world governments are not prepared to 'join the party' then businessess are beginning to see the very real opportunities to innovate and transform. Not just the way they operate, but development of green energy and green technologies.
So I am optimistic that human ingenuity might just be enough to take us from a possible 2.7 down to close to 1.5C.
A slightly different angle, but as I think I've said before, I think insurance companies and banks will play a big role in this. They'll stop insuring a lot of stuff because they don't want to pay for easily predictable damages - like houses flooded because their area has become much more susceptible to flash floods following those new huge and sudden summer downpours. That will hit people hard (you can't sell a house that can't be insured, add the buyer can't get a mortgage), prompting governments into action, and so on.
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I'd like to think that too but aren't we supposed to be well into in the last five minutes to midnight, on the 'end of the world clock'... and there is no 'Fergie time' to add on
Less than 100 seconds away from midnight…I'd like to think that too but aren't we supposed to be well into in the last five minutes to midnight, on the 'end of the world clock'... and there is no 'Fergie time' to add on
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doomsday_Clock
There is of course that aspect.
As I see it, there are essentially 3 major players in this:
Governments.
Businessess.
Customers, the public.
The top 2 rely on the public, their customers.
So even if governments don't take the lead, businessess will still see opportunities to provide innovative solutions, providing we, the public provide the demand.
So it really is down to us to drive governments and businesses to produce solutions to this global challenge.
Of course it won't be easy to do. And it won't be quick. But as the younger generation become increasingly powerful consumers, change can happen.
Yeah, the 'won't be quick' is the obvious downside. Businesses and people don't transition that quickly. We need governments for the urgency, but they're not acting. So we need people and businesses to push them. But they don't transition that quickly by themselves. And so the circle goes.
Exactly. I am hopeful that governments will put into place sufficient policies to bridge the gap between the potential +2.7C and the required not greater than 1.5C. increase.
China is very much on two different paths though, on one hand they're converting to greener technologies at a far quicker pace than the west. On the other side they still have many areas and millions in poverty that require industrialisation quickly and cheaply.
They simply won't leave their own in poverty whilst the west after ignoring the issue for many decades now wants to fight climate change in relative luxury without sacrifice.
I mean we're still barely willing to do feck all here in the UK despite being a sizeable historic cause so why should countries in much worse situations do so?
The only way a global effort will work is a drastic change to our own lifestyles to match the sacrifices such countries would be making. We all know that won't happen though because it's not politically palatable and politicians can just say yeah but China.
We used to do Export for American brands, and boy for all their big quantity order they actually pay pittance. Maybe if they start paying more we can be more environmentally conscious. It's easy to make an environmentally friendly factory, doing so while maintaining profit is another.
Their list of compliance can cripple a factory pretty fast no small scale factory can meet their demand, minimum wages, labor holidays etc, even the number of toilets is inspected. They want a safe healthy working environment, which is noble. But they don't want to pay extra for the hassle, they've gone to poorer country like Bangladesh, Vietnam basically countries that are willing to bend over backwards taking this risky order. And there's no long term commitment when factories already invested in becoming compliance, they can just be gone without prior notice, not that it's against the law but that could quickly cripple factories with such a huge fix cost running to maintain compliance.
There's not many giants that can take US orders.
All perfectly true.
But you should not criticise China while we are all happy to export most of our manufacturing to China and the far east.
If we are really serious, we should be telling China that we will only import from them if they actually commit to phasing out coal fired power stations with green energy.
But we don't because we are wedded to cheap imports.
They are committed to that already it's just on a different timeline because they're not a completely service based economy like we are. They've invested far more than the EU for instance in solar and wind and they do more ecological grants to the third world than anyone else too.
From what i've read China even at their projected 2030 peak emissions will be far below the US in per capita emissions so i find the attention a bit misplaced.
Whether it's Saudi, Canada, or China those countries obviously need a longer transition. The fact we're hearing complaints that their 2060 timeline is a decade too long tells you the key players aren't being pragmatic. Why? Because they'd rather countries with a growing footprint take the hit rather than themselves as if it's nothing to do with them.
The UK has been able to reduce it's footprint quite drastically and with barely a sacrifice made but that won't be the story for most countries.
If what you say is true, then the world is going to ''hell in a hand cart' ...China included!
The Chinese have lifted millions of their people out of abject poverty and you can understand their wish to do so for many more of their citizens, but are they saying we are going to continue to build many coal fired power stations, to achieve this, because if so, then it wouldn't matter if the Western countries went back to the stone age, the end would still be the same?
It would appear that the Chinese have to stop the present programme of building such stations, whatever price they demand from other countries, but it alone will not make up for the malign effects of such coal-powered power stations. The US too also has to address serious issues in the same manner. If these two giants do not reign in their polluting, it matters little what everyone else does.
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Yeah, he's an idiot.
As usual. A case of moving his lips before he engaged his brain. Something he is prone to do in order to try and make himself sound clever.