Climate doomism!

[Risottia]

All you need is carbon taxes and nuclear power.

Do you think they're going to happen soon?

[Heloin]

We were on our way to be saved, as we would be going to Mars and established a colony there.

Unfortunately, the billionaires decided to focus on Twitter and postpone space exploration for a while.

Exactly, how would a colony on Mars "save" some 8 billions of humans on Earth?

I've read Prince of Mars, we're all going to have swashbuckling fun with martins.

[Chan Island]

I used to be suicidal. I recognise the fatalism as what tried to kill me. Congratulations on that self-fulfilling prophecy of yours, you must be so smart to have predicted that if nothing happens, nothing happens. Good job!

Pessimism is an easy way to shock-absorb disappointment, but spiteful optimism is a powerful force in activism and governance if defeat makes you pissed instead of pessed. At this point, things will get real uncomfy, but opportunity to save it from going right up the ass (negatively) is so ample you'd have to willingly ignore it. Also, this is handily at the feet of a few people with the vast majority of the global population being innocent. Don't throw the 8 billion babies out with the bath water. (also, don't waste water)

Meanwhile, urbanism is growing rapidly as a political idea. Cars are starting to lose out worldwide, which is fucking huge. Capitalism appears to be on a defensive with the way public opinion is going. Hell, Russia's war is making Europe push for less fossil fuel reliance at record speed in a continent that is already incredibly green. Even with Africa's economies developing, many networks can skip over many pollutants entirely in modernising. The worst country in the world, Australia, may begin to pay attention to the damage it sponsors finally. The Stateside social movement, which is massive, is essentially married to green activism.

My personal sticky issue is nuclear power, which is efficient in all but being built (and mining for uranium) while other renewables are extremely flexible and if decentralised work beautifully. My perspective is heavily Southern Californian, where the sun is always available, winds are seasonally strong and there's nowhere to build a nuclear facility that won't get destroyed in the earthquakes that will happen or the fires that also will happen. Even I, a car liker man, will gladly take a long car (bus), wild chugger (train), or lil beepbeep metro (tram).

Maybe even collapse is something to look forward to, if the way things stubbornly go gets duplexed to hell. I find the 2040 estimate way too absolute. At this rate, any collapse that is coming will be partial and only affect certain sectors which will probably be the spots already causing problems. The pandemic is what I would consider a partial collapse, and the cultural impact of the good that happened for the climate and the massive cuts in emissions during pieces of it won't be forgotten. It's tough and there will be sacrifices, but why not put a guilty economic system on the chopping block for once instead of, say, all of humanity?

I had to personally save my life, and I'll be absolutely fucked if I'll just close my eyes and roll over to let something take it from me or anyone else again. Kick misanthropy in the stomach repeatedly!

You... I like you.

That's all.

[Big Jim P]

I don't think you've actually lived through any real doomsday predictions though? Like, about the closest thing I can think of for that statement would be some of the scares in the Cold War, and to say those were bullshit is questionable with hindsight given we know WW3 almost started a few times.

We also had y2k, the Mayan apocalypse, the new ice ace and new plagues.

Plus every time the party in charge changes, the other side predicts doomsday.

[Big Jim P]

We also had y2k, the Mayan apocalypse, the new ice ace and new plagues.

Who ever thought that Y2K was going to end the world?

I was actually looking forward to that one. I can still do things without a computer.

[Big Jim P]

the people who thought it would trigger MAD when launch detection systems went haywire.

That sounds less like "I lived through a predicted doomsday" and more like "I lived through some silly people believing a silly thing".

And this is no different.

[Big Jim P]

If you're only looking at doomsday predicitons that actually were true then you're missing the point of why hes cynical about them.

Talking as if any of these others have had oil companies researching them for ages before they hit the academic mainstream (which they covered up and was only recently brought to light), have had physicists and geophysicists and climatologists screaming for the past few decades about them, had a bunch of their predictions come true, etc...

Are we still ten years away from total meltdown?

[Ifreann]

That sounds less like "I lived through a predicted doomsday" and more like "I lived through some silly people believing a silly thing".

And this is no different.

This is very different.

[Red Lake Circle]

Talking as if any of these others have had oil companies researching them for ages before they hit the academic mainstream (which they covered up and was only recently brought to light), have had physicists and geophysicists and climatologists screaming for the past few decades about them, had a bunch of their predictions come true, etc...

Are we still ten years away from total meltdown?

It was always "x time until it's too late to reverse course," thank God the climatic trends keep suggesting that we have just a liiiittle bit more time than we thought we did

[Dogmeat]

Are we still ten years away from total meltdown?

It was always "x time until it's too late to reverse course," thank God the climatic trends keep suggesting that we have just a liiiittle bit more time than we thought we did

They, in fact, do not.

It is currently too late to reverse course. It has been for a while now. Now it's just a question of how bad "bad" gets.

[Washington Resistance Army]

Are we still ten years away from total meltdown?

It was always "x time until it's too late to reverse course," thank God the climatic trends keep suggesting that we have just a liiiittle bit more time than we thought we did

A fair bit of evidence actually says it's already too late to reverse course. Now we're mainly arguing over how much action we should take to minimize the damage.

[Red Lake Circle]

It was always "x time until it's too late to reverse course," thank God the climatic trends keep suggesting that we have just a liiiittle bit more time than we thought we did

A fair bit of evidence actually says it's already too late to reverse course. Now we're mainly arguing over how much action we should take to minimize the damage.

Oh, sure, I just mean that we're still at the point of some return; if we act now, the climate will return to equilibrium, but it'll still heat up a lot more first and then take millennia for it to return to the state it's in today.

[Sky Reavers]

I know, this question is heretical. But what if this predicted end of the world and collapse of civilization just won't happen at all?

Yes, it might happen in worst case scenario, but what if it won't? That's gonna put lots of doomsayers in a rather awkward position...

[Washington Resistance Army]

I know, this question is heretical. But what if this predicted end of the world and collapse of civilization just won't happen at all?

Yes, it might happen, but what if it won't? That's gonna put lots of doomsayers in a rather awkward position...

Framing it as the "end of the world" is rather inaccurate. The world will still exist, as will humans, a great portion of the planet will just become very hard to live in, natural disasters will become more common and more severe, crop yields will fall as the heat kills off more and more of them, water will become more scarce etc.

The real kicker is though, this is already happening and if you go back in the data 10 years or so you can watch it get worse in real time.

[Sky Reavers]

Framing it as the "end of the world" is rather inaccurate. The world will still exist, as will humans, a great portion of the planet will just become very hard to live in, natural disasters will become more common and more severe, crop yields will fall as the heat kills off more and more of them, water will become more scarce etc.

The real kicker is though, this is already happening and if you go back in the data 10 years or so you can watch it get worse in real time.

I wonder, if some new opportunities will appear? Which were impossible under old climate?

Either way, I belive, there still will be stuff to drink and eat. Yes, there will be problems, but when there weren't any?

[Ifreann]

I know, this question is heretical. But what if this predicted end of the world and collapse of civilization just won't happen at all?

Yes, it might happen in worst case scenario, but what if it won't? That's gonna put lots of doomsayers in a rather awkward position...

Climate change isn't really a matter of speculation. It's happening now. The question at hand is how bad it gets before we stop changing the climate.

[Washington Resistance Army]

Framing it as the "end of the world" is rather inaccurate. The world will still exist, as will humans, a great portion of the planet will just become very hard to live in, natural disasters will become more common and more severe, crop yields will fall as the heat kills off more and more of them, water will become more scarce etc.

The real kicker is though, this is already happening and if you go back in the data 10 years or so you can watch it get worse in real time.

I wonder, if some new opportunities will appear? Which were impossible under old climate?

Either way, I belive, there still will be stuff to drink and eat. Yes, there will be problems, but when there weren't any?

We're rapidly approaching the point where there isn't enough to eat or drink for everyone. Even just using the United States as an isolated example, nearly half the country is in a severe drought and it's only getting worse as aquifers dry up and there's less snow in the winters to melt.

[Aghwank]

climate change aint bad enough to extinct humanity

[Seangoli]

I wonder, if some new opportunities will appear? Which were impossible under old climate?

Either way, I belive, there still will be stuff to drink and eat. Yes, there will be problems, but when there weren't any?

We're rapidly approaching the point where there isn't enough to eat or drink for everyone. Even just using the United States as an isolated example, nearly half the country is in a severe drought and it's only getting worse as aquifers dry up and there's less snow in the winters to melt.

This actually isn't true. We have plenty of food and water in the world for a quite a lot more people. People are just stubbornly refusing to live where the water is, and instead living where it isn't. Food surpluses also exist, however due to economics the surpluses are stored or destroyed depending on what it it.

These problems are regional, and in no small part based on economics and not on the reality of the situation. We are a long ways off of not, in actuality, having enough water or food to feed everyone.

[Red Lake Circle]

climate change aint bad enough to extinct humanity

You're right, it's just going to make everyone's lives incredibly terrible and trigger another mass extinction for a bunch of other species

[Sky Reavers]

We're rapidly approaching the point where there isn't enough to eat or drink for everyone. Even just using the United States as an isolated example, nearly half the country is in a severe drought and it's only getting worse as aquifers dry up and there's less snow in the winters to melt.

Maybe, maybe not. After all, this is an extrapolation of existing data. After all, back in 1894, there was a prediction, that London will be buried under horse manure. This was named "Great Manure Crisis". Still... there should be a plan in case if food crisis really happens.

[Washington Resistance Army]

We're rapidly approaching the point where there isn't enough to eat or drink for everyone. Even just using the United States as an isolated example, nearly half the country is in a severe drought and it's only getting worse as aquifers dry up and there's less snow in the winters to melt.

This actually isn't true. We have plenty of food and water in the world for a quite a lot more people. People are just stubbornly refusing to live where the water is, and instead living where it isn't. Food surpluses also exist, however due to economics the surpluses are stored or destroyed depending on what it it.

These problems are regional, and in no small part based on economics and not on the reality of the situation. We are a long ways off of not, in actuality, having enough water or food to feed everyone.

While some of it is economic in nature, we are losing a startling amount of crop growth to extreme weather. France's wheat yield this year has already decreased by something like 20-30% because of the heat, India had to cancel a bunch of exports because a heatwave destroyed a large portion of their harvest for the year, China's rice harvest this year isn't looking too good, anecdotally I lost plants already and know others who have as well in the States to unusual weather etc etc. It's gotten bad enough the UN has been sounding the alarm on it for a while.

Also Putin's harebrained idiocy really isn't helping food security.

[Sky Reavers]

While some of it is economic in nature, we are losing a startling amount of crop growth to extreme weather. France's wheat yield this year has already decreased by something like 20-30% because of the heat, India had to cancel a bunch of exports because a heatwave destroyed a large portion of their harvest for the year, China's rice harvest this year isn't looking too good, anecdotally I lost plants already and know others who have as well in the States to unusual weather etc etc. It's gotten bad enough the UN has been sounding the alarm on it for a while.

Also Putin's harebrained idiocy really isn't helping food security.

Yeah, with all this situation in Black sea, Ukraine can't export as much as before. I wonder, what happens next? And how does one survive if everything really goes bad? I hope not, or else I'll have to celebrate 2024 New Year eve... in some spiritual realm. Wonder, what it's like there?

Still, guess I am both cursed and blessed by living in Ukraine...

[Haganham]

climate change aint bad enough to extinct humanity

You're right, it's just going to make everyone's lives incredibly terrible and trigger another mass extinction for a bunch of other species

Jokes on it, our lives are already incredibly terrible.

[Nouveau Yathrib]

Options 3 and 7. We were always fucked on some level, and would still be even if net global CO2 emissions dropped to 0 tomorrow. But it's better to be less fucked than more fucked, and the faster we reduce our collective carbon footprint, the less fucked over we'll be in the medium and long run.

That being said, we're also incredibly reliant on fossil fuels for things that don't involve burning them, and will definitely need oil and natural gas to transition away from burning fossil fuels for energy consumption.

https://time.com/6175734/reliance-on-fossil-fuels/

The Modern World Can't Exist Without These Four Ingredients. They All Require Fossil Fuels

Four materials rank highest on the scale of necessity, forming what I have called the four pillars of modern civilization: cement, steel, plastics, and ammonia are needed in larger quantities than are other essential inputs. The world now produces annually about 4.5 billion tons of cement, 1.8 billion tons of steel, nearly 400 million tons of plastics, and 180 million tons of ammonia. But it is ammonia that deserves the top position as our most important material: its synthesis is the basis of all nitrogen fertilizers, and without their applications it would be impossible to feed, at current levels, nearly half of today’s nearly 8 billion people.

Modern economies will always be tied to massive material flows, whether those of ammonia-based fertilizers to feed the still-growing global population; plastics, steel, and cement needed for new tools, machines, structures, and infrastructures; or new inputs required to produce solar cells, wind turbines, electric cars, and storage batteries. And until all energies used to extract and process these materials come from renewable conversions, modern civilization will remain fundamentally dependent on the fossil fuels used in the production of these indispensable materials. No artificial intelligence designs, no apps, no claims of coming “dematerialization” will change that.