What climate change is not

Discussion in 'Earth Science' started by billvon, Jan 28, 2020.

  1. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    There's no doubt that climate change is here, and accelerating, and that it will have a big (and negative) impact on future generations. Sea level rise will cause the mass migration of millions (and a fair number of deaths.) Precipitation changes will increase flooding in some areas and reduce rain in other areas. Warming will increase droughts and wildfires. We will see mass extinctions, as we have every time we've had a rapid climate shift in the past.

    However, there are many things it is _not_. It does not mean the extinction of Mankind. It does not mean the end of life as we know it. It does not mean that most of the US (or even most of Florida) will be underwater by 2100. And the world will not end in 12 years.

    Climate change will not "force habitat construction upon us" in a way akin to "Noah's Ark." We will not reach an "extinction threshold." We will not see all the forests die. Such breathless predictions, although generally offered with the agenda of combating climate change denial, will tend to have the opposite effect - by predicting futures that never occur.
     
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  3. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

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    While accepting much of what you say, as you also say, it will have a dramatic effect on future generations...some far more then others....


     
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  5. exchemist Valued Senior Member

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    True enough. Like you, I find hysterical overstatement damaging to the credibility of the argument.

    But I'm intrigued by what prompted you to post this today. Have you heard or read something in particular that has triggered this reaction?
     
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  7. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    That post was actually an attempt to move the off-topic discussion in the "misogynists and misandrists" thread to a more appropriate thread.
     
  8. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    and succeeded... well done!
     
  9. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    While I agree with the main message, that being that Climate change is real, I disagree with overly optimistic predictions you are suggesting.
    Before responding in any detail to your excellent thread topic I wanted to share a recent article by our National broadcaster the ABC.
    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-01...l-warming-six-groups-rebecca-huntley/11893384

    In the article the author attempts to explain what is perceived as 6 groups of current opinion on the subject of climate change and based on surveys (?) the percentages of population to each of these groups.
    below is an image file taken from that article and is pretty much self explanatory. ( it relates to the USA population only (?) )

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!




    Limitations:
    As with all surveys published by vested interest groups one has to assume a certain amount of embellishment and confirmation bias may be present.
    Note also that the population involved in the survey is 18yo+ and only a mere 1303 data points and probably conducted by way of online participation.

    Given the small numbers and no reference to location (other than Americans) the survey only serves to create an impression of opinions, more than any objectively real reality IMO.

    The reason I posted the above:

    I have stated or implied in other threads that in my personal opinion, Human nature as it is today, will ensure that NO meaningful reduction in CO2 output will occur until the situation becomes a life or death one. The consequences of global warming have to be imminent and as such it will be way to late to do anything once those consequences are experienced by those who are responsible for managing our global CO2 output.
    Example: The recent unprecedented catastrophic wild fires in Australia released a massive amount of CO2 into the atmosphere. 10million hectares that due to drought or low water will probably not grow back any time soon. Thus the net CO2 gain to the atmosphere will not be properly re-sequestered by new growth. With further wild fires predicted basically until there simply isn't anything left to burn.

    I posted the above survey and article to highlight this point.
    The Noah's Ark analogy is quite appropriate IMO
    Evidence of a lost cause:
    Currently Australia is opening it's largest Coal mine ( Adani ) to supply India and Bangladesh with coal for their rapid development of coal fired power stations. Numerous new developments are under construction in both these nations and Adani coal is only a part of it.

    Suffice to say that there is ample evidence that Human demand for energy via coal and natural gas is increasing and is currently being filled by further development of the fossil fuel industry.

    Reductions in CO2 will not occur in fact quite the opposite is most likely. IMO
    Therefore one can surmise that by the time we humans decide to stop producing CO2 in such vast amounts our fate as a race will be sealed.

    That this planet may very well become uninhabitable for any animal with out the protection of artificial sustainable habitats whether subterranean, on the surface or under the oceans...or even in orbit...

    Our Human nature will force us to sleep walk in to the nightmare our lack of vision has created.
     
    Last edited: Jan 28, 2020
  10. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    Sorry, was not intending to be optimistic. I am pessimistic, and think we will greatly increase human suffering (as well as damaging the ecosystem.)
    OK let's go with that. Let's say future fires will be 1000 times as bad, and will happen every year. That means that 25,000 people will die every year from them. Compare that to the 30,000 people killed by traffic accidents every year in the US alone. Both are certainly bad - and both deserve action. Neither one will end humanity.
    Noah built an ark to save humanity (and indeed the Earth's ecosystem) because outside of his ark, every single living thing that lived on dry land died. That's not going to happen.

    If you want to go Biblical (which is in general a poor idea) consider one of the plagues as a better example - something that surely made their lives miserable, but that did not destroy humanity.
    That is unsupported, hysterical nonsense. Canada is going to get too hot for animals?
     
  11. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    Just thought this could do with a little irony and sarcasm...
    so please excuse my emotional response...
    Damaging ecosystems! Try destroying ecosystems that are not able to ever recover...
    Try restoring an animal population after it has become extinct.

    It is like suggesting the rain forests of the Sahara Desert are able to recover...

    ok... sorry about that...lol
     
  12. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    The current animal population of Canada will not survive warming. As the speed of adaptation is simply not possible. IMO
    Example: With out sea ice how long will Polar Bears survive?
    Also you possibly are not considering the amount of methane stored in Canada (permafrost) and how rapidly this may effect Global warming as it melts....and just how extreme temperatures may become.
     
    Last edited: Jan 28, 2020
  13. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    "will not survive" is a bit of a bold claim.

    They will migrate north. And they will adapt.

    We are seeing possum here, moving north, but have not yet adapted. Their itty-bitty toes are getting frozen. But they're surviving.
     
  14. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    Estimates are out there that suggest the Arctic will have ice free summers as early as 2030.

    2018..
    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/feb/01/polar-bears-climate-change

    https://www.biologicaldiversity.org...arctic_meltdown/arctic_extinction_report.html
    How long can a polar bear survive with out ice? Can they survive an entire summer season with out ice?
    If not, then most will have perished by 2030.
     
  15. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    Lots of possum to snack on...
     
  16. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    The current animal population of Canada will not survive until the end of the day. Millions will die. (And millions will hatch, or be born, or bud.) And tomorrow there will be a new animal population.

    However, there will be an animal population of Canada that survives the worst possible extremes of the IPCC predictions. It has done so in the past, with temperatures and CO2 concentrations that are far, far in excess of anything the IPCC is predicting.

    They probably will not in their current form. We will probably see them evolve into pizzlies (or the equivalent.)
    Will they be more extreme than a global temperature average of 90F? Nope. And life on Earth not only survived that period - it caused a population explosion.
     
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  17. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    edit: googled results require subscription... sorry..
     
  18. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    32 deg Celsius...average

    hmmmm... the last heat waves here were in excess of 42deg C.
    How long does it take for animals to expire during an extreme heat event?
    Sorry... just rambling...
    an average of 32 deg C is achieved by what min, max deviations according to the IPCC report? ( rhetorical)
    Knowing the predicted
    average max =?
    average min=?
    would be helpful....
    ( just to create perspective)
    I am pretty sure but not certain that the IPCC reports do not include those figures...
    Montreal heat wave:
    https://www.bangkokpost.com/world/1713912/arctic-heat-wave-hits-worlds-northernmost-settlement
    21 deg c (900kms from North pole) 17/July/2019
     
    Last edited: Jan 29, 2020
  19. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    One observation I would make about this is that there are hints that we're on the verge of another mass extinction event in the Earth's history, and this one is due largely to human activity. Species are currently disappearing at a much faster than usual rate. What we are doing to the climate is killing off many species, right now.

    There's a reason scientists have started referring to a new geological era - the anthropocene.
     
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  20. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    ...is that before or after they die from heat exhaustion...?
     
  21. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    I would say further that we are not on the verge of one, we are plumb in the middle of one - and have already done much of the damage ourselves. We've wiped out megafauna on every continent except Africa (and a few places in India.) I've seen estimates that we will cause the extinction of between 15% and 50% of the remaining species on the planet, after already killing off at least 25% over the past quarter million years. And 99% of that hasn't been due to climate - it's been due to us destroying habitats, introducing predators and just plain eating all of an existing species.

    But let's calibrate that against past extinctions:
    Late Devonian 75%
    End Ordovician 86%
    End Permian 96%
    End Triassic 80%
    End Cretaceous 76%

    So we're not even going to make it into the top 5.

    Again, that's not to say that this extinction we are causing is minor, or that it's OK. It's not. But we are not going to go extinct - and we're not going to "end life as we know it" or anything like that. The future will look different, with new species evolving to take the place of old ones, and with species migrating with the climate (and dying out when they can't.) But there will be as much life as there is now, even if it's dramatically different.
     
  22. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    a good read:
    Tipping point in climate change:
    If the climate tips into a hothouse Earth scenario, some scientists warn of food and water shortages, hundreds of millions of people being displaced by rising sea levels, unhealthy and unlivable conditions, and coastal storms having larger impacts.[34] Runaway climate change of 4–5 °C can make swathes of the planet around the equator uninhabitable, with sea levels up to 60 metres (197 ft) higher than they are today.[50] Humans cannot survive if the air is too moist and hot, which would happen for the majority of human populations if global temperatures rise by 11–12 °C, as land masses warm faster than the global average.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tipping_points_in_the_climate_system
    and
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runaway_greenhouse_effect

    With out reduction of CO2 emissions and maintenance or acceleration of CO2 production including the methane bomb effect how long have we got before we have to build sustainable habitats to ensure human survival?
    Not long IMO...
    and there are variables we are even now still unaware of I would assume.
     
  23. exchemist Valued Senior Member

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    Oh I see. I had not been following that thread, I must admit.
     

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