NationStates Jolt Archive

Do you think we'll avoid the worst effects of climate change? Do you think we'll stop all the doomsday scenarios? Do you think Bangladesh will still exist in 50 years?

Personally, I don't. We've known about this for too long. We've known the Polar Bear will die out, we did nothing. Now it's become all trendy to talk about it, but nothing is changing, and nothing will change.

I'm not worried for myself, because I know that we in the first world don't have too much to fear from weather. I know that millions of people in the third world will die, and even more will become refugees, travelling to Europe and the US to find a new place to live.

But what do you reckon?

It doesn't really bother me that much, come to think of it, since I am going to die before 25 and all.-sigh-

Sucks for you guys though :)

Do you think we'll avoid the worst effects of climate change? Do you think we'll stop all the doomsday scenarios? Do you think Bangladesh will still exist in 50 years?

Personally, I don't. We've known about this for too long. We've known the Polar Bear will die out, we did nothing. Now it's become all trendy to talk about it, but nothing is changing, and nothing will change.

I'm not worried for myself, because I know that we in the first world don't have too much to fear from weather. I know that millions of people in the third world will die, and even more will become refugees, travelling to Europe and the US to find a new place to live.

But what do you reckon?

We've known about it too long?

Hardly. Hell, as little as 30 years ago, we feared 'global cooling'.

I have hope that once a new flavor of the month cause has replaced global warming as something for the media, politicians and alarmists to sink their teeth into, the work to understand, learn from and learn to live with environment(including climate change) can really begin.

No, despite the best efforts to the contrary, I think we're fucked in that department.

I have hope, however, that once the shit hits the fan technological process will rapidly accelerate out of desperation and we might be able to halt or reverse some of the damage. Or find other solutions.

We've known about it too long?

Hardly. Hell, as little as 30 years ago, we feared 'global cooling'.

I have hope that once a new flavor of the month cause has replaced global warming as something for the media, politicians and alarmists to sink their teeth into, the work to understand, learn from and learn to live with environment(including climate change) can really begin.

How about "Global normality" Where everything stays the same! :)

How about "Global normality" Where everything stays the same! :)

:eek: That WOULD be cause for alarm! :eek:

I have hope. We have proved to be adaptable to enviroments that are really not friendly to us, space being just one example. I think we'll find a way to survive and fix the damage.

How about "Global normality" Where everything stays the same! :)

Because the planet, and life on it, would probably be dying at that point without change...

We've known about it too long?
I can remember being told about greenhouse gasses when I was a little kid. That must be almost 15 years ago now. So we've had plenty of time to respond.

We haven't, so just because now it's all trendy to go on about climate change I don't see anyone important lifting a finger to do anything about it.

I can remember being told about greenhouse gasses when I was a little kid. That must be almost 15 years ago now. So we've had plenty of time to respond.

We haven't, so just because now it's all trendy to go on about climate change I don't see anyone important lifting a finger to do anything about it.

And personally, I fear people lifting a finger to do something about it. I don't want people messing with climate yet. If ever. I don't trust environmental sciences. Especially meteorology and climatology. I'm certainly not willing to gamble Earth's future on their guesses.

We're all fucked. Nah, but I don't think we can expect to keep our standard of life. If every chinese and indian wants the SUV and the speedboat it's just not going to hold up. The whole infrastructure of the world is depending on some having alot less than others, there's no way of denying that. But do the average swede, american joe, brit or german really wanna buy that sneaker for 300 bucks instead of 90? Think not... its way more convenient to stuff your fingers in your ears and go 'lalala'. Too bad.

I thought we were doing something, reducing emissions from factories and cars, planting more trees, recycling, crap like that. What the hell have we been doing?! :p

I have little hope. Right now, I think all we can do is cut our pollution so we don't do any more damage than has already done. I've already accepted that my hometown will not exist in the future (for the record, I'm not from San Francisco proper, but a flat penis/banana shaped island in the San Francisco bay called Alameda that nobody's ever heard of). It's sad, though sometimes I wonder if in 50 years when things get all shitty, I'll be able to laugh cynically and say "told you so."

I have little hope. Right now, I think all we can do is cut our pollution so we don't do any more damage than has already done. I've already accepted that my hometown will not exist in the future (for the record, I'm not from San Francisco proper, but a flat penis/banana shaped island in the San Francisco bay called Alameda that nobody's ever heard of). It's sad, though sometimes I wonder if in 50 years when things get all shitty, I'll be able to laugh cynically and say "told you so."

What if Alameda is still there in 50 years though?

What if Alameda is still there in 50 years though?

then I will say "told you so" to the fear-mongerers

Man, I've got Hope, Faith and Chastity, and at $300/hr/girl, these bitches better have vaginas like God's...
Oh yeah, Charlie's paying us a visit too, of course *snf*

Right now, we are kicking the planet. Every time we kick the planet, the planet kicks back. And the planet, being a lot bigger than us, also kicks a lot harder. Global warming, natural disasters, oceanic dead zones, toxic pollution, disease pandemics, droughts, famine, resistant pests and pathogens, collapsing fish stocks, coral bleaching, all of these are not merely symptoms of the vast ecological abuse we have collectively heaped upon the world, what they represent is self-correction measures. The planet, as a system in equilibrium, reacts to anything that alters the equilibrium. Right now, we are throwing the equilibrium off and the planet is reacting, trying to remove the source of the disorder (us) and restore the balance. Eventually, the only way for the planet to self-correct will be to eliminate the human race entirely, unless we can cease to be a thorn in the Earth's side.
The deciding factor of humankind's progress will be, barring some unforseen miracle (faster-than-light transport, for example), our ability to give up the notion of adapting ecosystems to us and instead adapt ourselves back to our ecosystems. It is no coincidence that hunter-gatherer societies and even traditional pastorialists have strong ethical senses of connection to and respect for their environment. In this case, the origin of these ethical senses are entirely pragmatic: those who learned to respect their environment survived. Those who did not learn, did not survive. The moral imperative only arrived later. Now we have been distracted from either the pragmatic survival needs or the accompanying moral imperative, but they have not ceased to be vital. We must rediscover those principles. We must regain our recognition of the importance of sustainability, not as a moral luxury, but as a matter of our continued existence on this planet.
So what can be done about it? This is, unfortunately, not a question with an easy answer. Part of the reason that there has been little meaningful response is that large industrial economies have a substantial inertia regarding change. It's like trying to turn an oil tanker in a narrow passage. Developing nations lack any other model to follow as a sustainable, "ecological" economic model has yet to be implemented in full on any sort of large scale, and so they turn to heavy oil-dependent industrialization as well. This results not only in a fossil-fuel economy doomed by diminishing supply and hegemony by foreign governments and multinational corporations, but also tends to lead those nations into a destructive cycle of boom-and-bust economics and escalating debt. If a sustainable "ecological" economic model can successfully be implemented, it would provide a powerful alternative for developing nations allowing them to become self-reliant and, possibly, to survive after the collapse of the oil economy while traditional industrial economies (such as our own) will not. Costa Rica is attempting this; they have pledged to wean themselves completely from non-renewable energy by next year. They also are pioneering renewable uses of their natural resources, such as ecotourism, permaculture, and recycling.

What if Alameda is still there in 50 years though?

With it's elevation of like 2 feet? If Greenland melts, it's fucked. I'd be happy that it's still there though. Weather might have changed though.

I thought we were doing something, reducing emissions from factories and cars, planting more trees, recycling, crap like that. What the hell have we been doing?! :p
Kidding ourselves.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/ggccebro/images/New%20Fig%205.gif

As for the poll question, it's a given that there will be significant climate change. At this point the problem is irrevocable. Global warming is happening, it will get worse, and it will (and already is) have a huge impact upon human civilization and the health of the planet and the biosphere. The question is not Will climate change happen? but How bad will we allow it to get? We can survive this. Our hands will get dirty even under the best of circumstances, but we can still salvage human society, adapt, and learn to live harmoniously with our life support system. Or we can keep doing what we're doing and eventually watch our civilization collapse as the biosphere finally decides to return to equilibrium and select us out of existence. My worry is that, as a civilization, we're choosing the latter.

What's a significant climate change? It it the total colapse of the biosphere inside a century, or is it the decimation of ecosystems & resources on a global basis, resulting in the death of millions & the extinction of various species?

If it's the former, the answer is no. If it's the latter, the answer's yes. It's already happening, and though the changes are small, they don't need to be very big at all, before millions die. 50 million climate refugees from 3rd world countries & twice as many dead isn't unrealistic over a 50 year timeframe. Makes wars on error, 3,000 dead business men & 500,000 dead Iraqis seem pretty inconsequential, don't it?

I think in the great scheme of things, what we do is irrelevant. All we can do is adapt to the environment around us. The Earth's been here a long time and we've only just arrived, when we're long gone the Earth will still be here.

I think everything that is here is the accumulation of several billion years of the Sun's energy so what we do in a few years is pointless, it's gonna happen anyway, just another cycle we're only seeing a microscopic fraction of, just a drop in the ocean.

my hope isn't in what we may or may not be able to avoid, though of course i'd prefer more avoidance of some of the more brutal capacities our species is possessed of, even what we are seeing of that now, but rather in the kind of world we will be able, perhapse even forced to, build for outselves, AFTER the oil is gone and a few other things like that.

=^^=
.../\...

I think in the great scheme of things, what we do is irrelevant. All we can do is adapt to the environment around us. The Earth's been here a long time and we've only just arrived, when we're long gone the Earth will still be here.

I think everything that is here is the accumulation of several billion years of the Sun's energy so what we do in a few years is pointless, it's gonna happen anyway, just another cycle we're only seeing a microscopic fraction of, just a drop in the ocean.Isn't that pretty much the same as saying "I think in the great scheme of things, it doesn't matter if I kill myself & every last member of my family"?

It might not matter in a million years, but hurting ourselves & eachother is still hurting ourselves & eachother. If we can avoid it, why shouldn't we? It is, after all, not terribly good fun to hurt ourselves & eachother for no reason.

Well, "drastic" is of course a matter of definition.
But I do think that we will see a shift of climate zones and ecosystems that will severely affect mankind. I'm not a climate expert nor a geologist, so I can't really predict how much land mass might end up flooded by what time, but I do think it'll be significant.

And personally, I fear people lifting a finger to do something about it. I don't want people messing with climate yet. If ever. I don't trust environmental sciences. Especially meteorology and climatology. I'm certainly not willing to gamble Earth's future on their guesses.

Whats wrong with just cutting down on the pollutants a bit? I dont mean climate engineering or anything fancy, just reducing the impact of ourselves on the environment.

Isn't that pretty much the same as saying "I think in the great scheme of things, it doesn't matter if I kill myself & every last member of my family"?

It might not matter in a million years, but hurting ourselves & eachother is still hurting ourselves & eachother. If we can avoid it, why shouldn't we? It is, after all, not terribly good fun to hurt ourselves & eachother for no reason.

That's being a bit dramatic!

What I'm saying is, whatever you do to try and 'save' the planet is pointless, the environment will change and the best you can do is change with it. The Earth has cycles, we have to adapt because you can't change the cycle no matter how much you think we can. You might be able to slow down emmissions but the damage is done. A bit like exposing photographic paper to light, very easy to do and a tad harder to undo.

I have hope. I hope that the world holds off on becoming a pain to live in... until I die

hell no! the world is going to hell in a handbasket, might as well enjoy the ride.
fuck it!

Whats wrong with just cutting down on the pollutants a bit? I dont mean climate engineering or anything fancy, just reducing the impact of ourselves on the environment.

Absolutely nothing. But when people talk about giant mirrors in space and aerosols to increase global dimming, I start to get really nervous and look at my back yard thinking that it might be a good place for an underground bunker. :p

I'm all for lowering our ecological impact. Reducing energy usage, promoting recycling and trying to reduce our use of lumber and paper are all great things. BUT that message is being drowned out. When was the last time you've seen a major magazine article on the plight of the rain forest? Or the benefits of hemp over lumber in manufacturing? Environmental activism is getting squashed by a single overemphasized aspect of it. Global warming is just a symptom of poor ecological knowledge and equilibrium. It isn't even the most dangerous one. And when I hear people suggesting that scientists do something about global warming without standing back and looking at the bigger ecological picture, I get very nervous. The number of projects to control or reproduce even a limited biosphere or environment that have succeeded as planned stands(to the best of my knowledge) at zero. I don't trust them to manipulate climate!

http://www.seanbonner.com/blog/archives/piratesarecool.jpg

The facts are there for us all to see.

http://www.seanbonner.com/blog/archives/piratesarecool.jpg

The facts are there for us all to see.

Must be true, my boss is a pirate.

Whether or not Global warming is a direct cause of humans is irrelevant when one sees that humans are actually polluting the earth, you can't hide from that, well you probably can but i doubt that chemical waste is meant to be pumped into fresh water.

Also are you proud of the fact that your city is surrounded by a wall of smog?
Yeah dude kudos for you, you live in a place with dirty air, bravo.:rolleyes:

Tis what i think of people who ignore pollution and it's potential spawn Global warming, perhaps if an attempt was made to clean up the world there would be a marked difference in climates for the better, doing nothing doesn't make you right.

That's being a bit dramatic!More than your fatalism?What I'm saying is, whatever you do to try and 'save' the planet is pointless, the environment will change and the best you can do is change with it.People aren't talking about saving the planet. The planet's just fine & barring a dedicated, long term effort on our part to blow the damn thing to bits, it'll remain perfectly safe.
The present state of the biosphere is another matter entirely. It isn't fine, and it is very easy so devastate. And we mostly have the knowledge & resources to avoid doing it.The Earth has cycles, we have to adapt because you can't change the cycle no matter how much you think we can.That's just plain rubbish. The difference between the last iceage & pre-industrialization climate, is a total forcing of ca. 6.5W/m**2. That's the difference between a lush, green globe, and a shithole. It's also roughly equivalent to the total positive forcing caused by our industrial emissions. And given a similar timeframe, the result will be just as staggering.

Earth has natural cycles, yes. But not as long as we do what we're doing. The factors causing the natural cycles are tiny compared to what we're doing. You might be able to slow down emmissions but the damage is done. A bit like exposing photographic paper to light, very easy to do and a tad harder to undo.The climate is to a high degree self-regulating on all levels. Given time, the GHG concentrations will return to pre-industrial levels - assuming we dramatically cut back our GHG emissions.

It's true that there's a great deal of lag involved. Otherwise the world would've turned to shit before we knew there was a problem, but that lag also means that we have every possibility of preventing distasterous changes. The energy perturbance needs to be maintained to affect major change. We're the ones maintaining it. If we stop, it'll revert to equilibrium eventually. That, of course, will take several centuries, but most of that change will be fairly rapid, and accordingly, the quicker we act, the milder & slower the climate changes.

The example with your family, I thought, was rather apt, because it affects you in a rather significant way, and will be of little or no consequence in a thousand years. Global warming is much the same, except it probably won't be deadly for someone lucky enough to possess an internet connection. It probably will be for hordes of other people though.

Absolutely nothing. But when people talk about giant mirrors in space and aerosols to increase global dimming, I start to get really nervous and look at my back yard thinking that it might be a good place for an underground bunker. :p

I'm all for lowering our ecological impact. Reducing energy usage, promoting recycling and trying to reduce our use of lumber and paper are all great things. BUT that message is being drowned out. When was the last time you've seen a major magazine article on the plight of the rain forest? Or the benefits of hemp over lumber in manufacturing? Environmental activism is getting squashed by a single overemphasized aspect of it. Global warming is just a symptom of poor ecological knowledge and equilibrium. It isn't even the most dangerous one. And when I hear people suggesting that scientists do something about global warming without standing back and looking at the bigger ecological picture, I get very nervous. The number of projects to control or reproduce even a limited biosphere or environment that have succeeded as planned stands(to the best of my knowledge) at zero. I don't trust them to manipulate climate!

Trying to reverse the damage before stopping the damage that is being done is pointless. I've not heard anything about solar dimming mirrors or whatever, or controlling the weatehr, as that's just ridiculous. I mainly hear about using less energy, being more fuel efficient, finding sources of energy that don't pollute nearly as much, if at all, stuff like that.

I would agree that if we switched to using hemp paper for instance, that would be hugely beneificial to the environment, as hemp grows a lot faster than trees do (therefore making it more replaceable), so it would leave more trees alive to suck up carbon dioxide. You can make a lot of stuff out of hemp. The fact that it is illegal to grow in the US is one more example of how silly the US government is.

The main focus right now I think should be on trying to drastically cut the amount of crap we put into the air (this would be a good idea even if global warming wasn't happening), and being more responsible in using natural resources and consume less.

Absolutely nothing. But when people talk about giant mirrors in space and aerosols to increase global dimming, I start to get really nervous and look at my back yard thinking that it might be a good place for an underground bunker. :p

I'm all for lowering our ecological impact. Reducing energy usage, promoting recycling and trying to reduce our use of lumber and paper are all great things. BUT that message is being drowned out. When was the last time you've seen a major magazine article on the plight of the rain forest? Or the benefits of hemp over lumber in manufacturing? Environmental activism is getting squashed by a single overemphasized aspect of it. Global warming is just a symptom of poor ecological knowledge and equilibrium. It isn't even the most dangerous one. And when I hear people suggesting that scientists do something about global warming without standing back and looking at the bigger ecological picture, I get very nervous. The number of projects to control or reproduce even a limited biosphere or environment that have succeeded as planned stands(to the best of my knowledge) at zero. I don't trust them to manipulate climate!

Oh right I misunderstood what you were saying. I was reading an article in the New Scientist the other day talking about global warming. Suggestions to combat included:
1)Thousands of timey mirrors orbiting the earth to reflect some of the sunlight.
2)Blowing up a satellite of some sort so all the debris will stop the light getting to earth.
And my favourites:
3)Painting as much of the earth white as possible to reflect sunlight.
4)and ejecting huge clouds of sulphur into the atmosphere (i forget how this is supposed to help us)

Some of those just seem like they'd create so many more problems than they'd solve, so I'm with you on just reducing emissions.

3)Painting as much of the earth white as possible to reflect sunlight.
4)and ejecting huge clouds of sulphur into the atmosphere (i forget how this is supposed to help us)It's the same idea, basically. Sulphur is just painting the atmosphere. We did it with some effect up 'til the 70's. You might remember murmurings about global cooling back then. It happened, sulphur aerosol was the main reason, and when steps were taken to address the emissions, global warming kicked back into effect.
Some of those just seem like they'd create so many more problems than they'd solve, so I'm with you on just reducing emissions.Some? Try all. Every one of those suggestions utterly fail to address the cause & instead opt for killing symptoms by creating new (but very similar) problems with new (but very similar) symptoms. It's not like the major side effects aren't obvious. In the best possible situation, all any of those initiatives will do, is buy time while they compound the trouble to come.

Not unlike pissing one's pants to keep warm in a blizzard. Works just fine for a few short moments. Then it makes everything worse.

More than your fatalism?People aren't talking about saving the planet. The planet's just fine & barring a dedicated, long term effort on our part to blow the damn thing to bits, it'll remain perfectly safe....

The Earth is fine, the minor changes we try to make will make no change at all, this is reality not fatalism. I do my bit towards reducing emmissions, but me, you, a few thousand others will make no difference at all. It takes billions to make the difference. And to be honest, the majority of people that need to make the difference really couldn't care two hoots. If they did, Americans wouldn't be burning fossil fuels at the rate they are and China wouldn't be so keen at catching up to that burn rate. Bush has only just realised that the crap we pump into the air affects Americans too, as if the U.S. had a different air supply to the rest of us. Seems to me that changing the way you use energy is a good time to build the failing economy.

Last time I looked, the Earth is still a lush and green globe.

The Earth is fine, ... Last time I looked, the Earth is still a lush and green globe.The earth is not fine. Don't have Google Earth?

I think global warming can be slowed to a satisfactory extent by switching to non-fossil fuels and maybe doing something about methane emissions and automobiles, so hopefully we can avoid most of it. Anyway, judging by my location, I don't think I should suffer too much in the event of catastrophic natural disasters.

The earth is not fine. Don't have Google Earth?

Google Earth???? I don't use out of date information, I like to go out and see for myself.

I've just come back from the Dorset Coast. Apart from lots of crap washing up on the beach, I picked up 3 birds covered in diesel and pulled a dead dolphin onto the beach to record it's details. As grim as the world may appear to you, I still think it's a lush a green globe, I don't buy all this "the world is gonna end unless you stop driving and start eating mung beans grown in your garden".

People need to be educated on the impact they have on the environment around them. I have no issues with the energy I use because it has little impact.

Google Earth???? I don't use out of date information, I like to go out and see for myself.

Do you have a spaceship.... because otherwise you're probably just living in one of the green patches

Do you have a spaceship.... because otherwise you're probably just living in one of the green patches

PMSL, yeah, it's pretty green here but not at the moment because we have seasons here.

Do you have a spaceship.... because otherwise you're probably just living in one of the green patches

BTW, from space, the Earth is predominantly blue with a little white, lots of green with some burnt bits around the equator.

Do I have hope?

Well, I used to: a Bob Hope Camellia. But, because we are on stage 3 water restrictions on account of the drought I couldn't water it. Now it's dead.

I no longer have Hope.

We're all buggered, frankly.

What rally pisses me off, is that all weever do about climate change, is lower emissions of something or other, but o effectively save the planet we have to totally rethink our culture of consumerism and come up with something a little more sustainable. (But I live in one of the only parts of the world to avtually benefit from global waring, because wed have to growing seaons, the crops would grow larger because of more rainfall and we'd stay high and dry because of our climate. Oh, and we'd also have all of those pesky INdonesians to eat.)