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I've been having a bit of an existential crisis about this recently. Is sustainability even possible anymore? We are obviously living beyond the capacity of the

I've been having a bit of an existential crisis about this recently. Is sustainability even possible anymore? We are obviously living beyond the capacity of the earth to cope right now. But is it even possible to sustain this many people (at current standards of living with foreseeable technology)?

umanwizard 10y ago
Nah.
lprubin 10y ago
Not having kids may be one of the biggest forms of environmental activism.
- fratlas 10y ago
  This. I had an argument with a friend because I said having more than 3 kids is selfish, and conversely, having fewer kids (or adopting) is selfless and should be praised. They retorted saying it should be part of an individual's freedom to have as many as they wish. I think after a few more generations we may be looking at a world wide child policy (similar to China).
  - eru 10y ago
    Why? Global population is already forecast to peak pretty soon.
    - kmonsen 10y ago
      The forecast may or may not happen. Everyone having at most 1-2 kids would help.
      - eru 10y ago
        Lots of Europeans, Chinese, Japanese, etc opting for zero already.
        fratlas 10y ago
        The problem lies in developing nations.
        eru 10y ago
        They release drastically less CO2 than the richer people do.
        fratlas 10y ago
        Their growth rate, not their emissions. US is double per capita, but China is double for actual emissions. Sheer scale.
    - m_mueller 10y ago
      The sooner the better. According to the most realistic climate models, the point of no return for ~2 degree global average warming is already over. We don't have a good idea at what point truly catastrophic damage is going to occur (by which I mainly mean something like a Siberian clathrate gun that could hypothetically drastically warm the climate within a human lifetime). Continuing the current path of CO2 increase, every 10 years increases the risk for a runaway warming process. What's worse is that our models aren't good enough to say with certainty how high this risk is (or that it doesn't exist). So really, the time we live in now is what counts and every little bit we do, helps. If you want some scary reading material, start here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abrupt_climate_change https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abrupt_climate_change https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian–Triassic_extinction_event https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian–Triassic_extinction_ev... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis (Please note: This article seems to change its message regularly. it's best to go for the source material instead).
      - goldenkey 10y ago
        Holy shit! The methane clathrate gun is scary stuff..so basically there's a temperature that we dont exactly know that could eradicate our species in some kind if irreversible chain reaction. And almost no one talks about it.. Ive never heard of MCG before, thanks for your post.
        m_mueller 10y ago
        Exactly. The most infuriating thing about it is that people keep debating about how serious we should take this. Even that wiki article seems to be poisoned by deniers. I quote from a previous comment of mine: > "Research carried out in 2008 in the Siberian Arctic has shown millions of tons of methane being released, apparently through perforations in the seabed permafrost,[20] with concentrations in some regions reaching up to 100 times normal levels.[22][23] The excess methane has been detected in localized hotspots in the outfall of the Lena River and the border between the Laptev Sea and the East Siberian Sea. Some melting may be the result of geological heating, but more thawing is believed to be due to the greatly increased volumes of meltwater being discharged from the Siberian rivers flowing north.[24] Current methane release has previously been estimated at 0.5 Mt per year.[25] Shakhova et al. (2008) estimate that not less than 1,400 Gt of carbon is presently locked up as methane and methane hydrates under the Arctic submarine permafrost, and 5–10% of that area is subject to puncturing by open taliks. They conclude that "release of up to 50 Gt of predicted amount of hydrate storage [is] highly possible for abrupt release at any time". That would increase the methane content of the planet's atmosphere by a factor of twelve,[26][27] equivalent in greenhouse effect to a doubling in the current level of CO2." Yet in the same section, you know what the introduction text reads currently? > "Most deposits of methane clathrate are in sediments too deep to respond rapidly, and modelling by Archer (2007) suggests the methane forcing should remain a minor component of the overall greenhouse effect.[17] Clathrate deposits destabilize from the deepest part of their stability zone, which is typically hundreds of metres below the seabed. A sustained increase in sea temperature will warm its way through the sediment eventually, and cause the shallowest, most marginal clathrate to start to break down; but it will typically take on the order of a thousand years or more for the temperature signal to get through.[17]" So let me get this straight: Because someone found a model from 2007 that makes things look mostly fine, we ignore empirical data from 2008 that shows that a Clathrate Gun of 50 Gt could go off at any time? Please someone tell me how I'm wrong just so I don't have to go crazy here.
  - nsxwolf 10y ago
    Oh come off it hardly anyone has kids anymore. US population growth is very slow and due purely to immigration. Populations in many countries are in free fall. China's one child policy has created a demographic disaster with insufficient girls born. This Paul Erlich stuff is so 1970s.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
  - edanm 10y ago
    I don't think it's that clear cut. Other than the personal freedom aspect, which I agree with, you can also argue that more people == more scientists/engineers/minds working on advancing our technological capabilities. This is arguably the number one thing that will lead to a solution.
- kmonsen 10y ago
  I am not sure, I wonder if having kids mean you will care more about the future?
- brc 10y ago
  Your whole reason for being, the thing that gets you out of bed and searching for food, is your in-built desire to recreate and nurture life. Intentionally rejecting that is a massive commitment to make, given the very long term consequences of it. In short, go have some kids, bring them up well and enjoy the benefits. Our biology is tribe-based and ingrained, so it's smart to work with that and be part of a tribe. We all die alone, but those that die surrounded by love feel less lonely in all the decades up to that final point. That's your Dna rewarding you for a job well done.
  - throw12241 10y ago
    That seems a bit of a stretch... There's no inbuilt point to life, but people try desperately to find one because evolution gave us some kind of drive for meaning, whatever that is. Don't mistake reproduction for some kind of divine purpose, it just is. Don't mistake anything for purpose. Purpose is a concept central to goal directed planning, but it is a construct of the mind. Since humans give purpose to things, humans cannot be assigned a purpose except as a way to use them for some other means. You are right though -- finding cuties gets me out of bed, but believe me I'm using birth control.
m_mueller 10y ago
The way I see it, sooner or later it will come down to atmospheric engineering (i.e. managing reflective airborne molecules, like an artificial volcanic winter). The question will be wether we have this technology sorted out until the situation becomes desperate and whether the world will be politically stable enough for an entity to take responsibility over this - it's going to be like a sword of damocles over everyone's heads and once we've started with this we can't go back (because everyone will keep burning fossil fuel until it has run out).
- throwaway5752 10y ago
  How does that address ocean acidification?
  - eanzenberg 10y ago
    A solution could include CO2 sequestration
  - fragsworth 10y ago
    Maybe we can neutralize that by dumping basic solutions into the ocean?
  - m_mueller 10y ago
    It doesn't. It won't be pretty, it's basically fighting for survival of the human species at that point.
  - refurb 10y ago
    Because ocean acidification is caused by atmospheric CO2? Pull CO2 out of the atmosphere and you'll reduce the amount of CO2 dissolved in the ocean.
zmmmmm 10y ago
You might benefit from reading this book: https://www.withouthotair.com/ https://www.withouthotair.com/ Obviously there's no simple naive answer to your question, but essentially to a first approximation the answer is yes, it's possible. The changes we need to implement are pretty dramatic and some particular things don't look very viable (say, regular people making frequent international flights), but aside from those it's entirely doable and reasonably affordable. It's purely a matter of willpower.
- Steko 10y ago
  {not a quote from link but the conversation reminded me of this} I would not rule out the chance to preserve a nucleus of human specimens. It would be quite easy... at the bottom of ah...some of our deeper mineshafts. Radioactivity would never penetrate a mine some thousands of feet deep, and in a matter of weeks, sufficient improvements in drilling space could easily be provided... It would not be difficult, Nuclear reactors could, heh... provide power almost indefinitely. Greenhouses could maintain plant life. Animals could be bred and slaughtered. A quick survey would have to be made of all the available mine sites in the country, but I would guess that dwelling space for several hundred thousands of our people could easily be provided. [Selecting who would go down] could easily be accomplished with a computer set and programmed to accept factors from youth, health, sexual fertility, intelligence, and a cross-section of necessary skills. Of course, it would be absolutely vital that our top government and military men be included to foster and impart the required principles of leadership and tradition. Q: Wouldn't this nucleus of survivors be so grief-stricken and anguished that they'd, well, envy the dead and not want to go on living? When they go down into the mine, everyone would still be alive. There would be no shocking memories, and the prevailing emotion will be one of nostalgia for those left behind, combined with a spirit of bold curiosity for the adventure ahead! Ahhh!
  - quasse 10y ago
    This sounds essentially like the plot of the Book of Ember series if anyone (or their kids) is into post-apocalyptic cave living fiction.
erichocean 10y ago
I'm curious as well. If myself (or someone else) were to develop a zero-emission approach to electricity generation (non-nuclear) that could handle "base load" and did not involve filling up the landscape with solar panels (or their moral equivalent), and did not produce waste, would that even help any more? We globally consume about 20,000 terawatt-hours of electricity right now annually, and in the US, electricity generation is 30% of total CO2 emissions. Presumably, if there was additional power for electric vehicles, we could also reduce overall emissions even further by moving away from gasoline. But at this point, even NO emissions seems pointless to work towards—we're already screwed. It seems like instead of pursuing lower emissions, we need to work towards reducing the CO2 that's already in the atmosphere.
- jamesdsadler 10y ago
  At some point it will become feasible to capture CO2 on a large scale and reduce CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. So, not screwed yet.
  - eru 10y ago
    If you have enough energy to spend, capturing CO2 is quite feasible.
- DougWebb 10y ago
  Large-scale engineering, the kind we'd need to do large-scale cleaning of the atmosphere, or large-scale high-efficiency hydroponic farming, or building huge earthworks to protect cities from rising sea levels, or anything else we might need to do to deal with global warming, is driven by large-scale energy production. Without energy, we can't do the things we need to do to survive without a lot of pain, suffering, and death. With plentiful energy, we can do the things we know we need to do, and new technological advancements become possible. I wouldn't rule out nuclear energy. There are risks, but it can produce a lot of energy in a small space, and the waste is much lower volume and easier to contain than chemical energy production. In my opinion, we should've built up our nuclear energy production over the past 30 years so that coal and oil could've been phased out by now, while we developed viable solar energy tech to replace the nuclear tech.
fabled_giraffe 10y ago
I believe in global warming, but I also think a higher or lower temperature Earth with a greater level of CO2 just means that different organisms will thrive. We think that we have damaged the Earth, but the Earth is much, much older than us, and we've barely made a dent if you consider the full lifetime of everything that ever will be. Now- if we had started a global thermonuclear war and eradicated all life on Earth, I wouldn't be saying that, but all we have done is to change the temperature and the atmosphere a little, which has serious consequences for the way things currently are, but in the end it will just mean different organisms take over and what grows where will change. If anything, the thing we need to be concerned about is being ready for changes, which will happen. We might need to grow different sorts of foods, focus on better insulation for our homes or move underground or underwater. We may need new laws to avoid wasting resources. But, there is no reason to be depressed about it. Those things will happen with time.
- castratikron 10y ago
  But will we be able to eat the different organisms that will thrive in this environment? What happens when today's staple crops no longer produce the yields we need to sustain our civilization?
  - fabled_giraffe 10y ago
    During the little ice age, people ate things that grew in colder climates, like potatoes. We will find a way to survive, and we have more technology now to help than we did then.
  - rosser 10y ago
    Get ready to enjoy eating things made from jellyfish. Like, a lot of them.
    - Tushon 10y ago
      I would venture that seaweed or algae is more likely.
ak217 10y ago
No, sustainability is an empty concept in a future where the status quo is past the point of no return (which we're already in). We will need to move a hell of a lot faster than the Paris Agreement to prevent huge die-offs of people and loss of biodiversity. We're going to need a Manhattan Project for carbon sequestration.
- stale2002 10y ago
  People have been saying there would be a die off since the 80s. Did you ever read the population bomb? We'll adapt like we always do.
ChuckMcM 10y ago
> But is it even possible to sustain this many people (at > current standards of living with foreseeable technology)? Absolutely, there is a tremendous amount of waste which is not recaptured due to economic rather than technological reasons. Further there are technologies (like nuclear power and breeder reactors) which can provide energy forever (for all practical purposes). And ultimately the survival of humans can be reduced to simply to energy, energy to grow food, energy to process wastes, and energy to communicate and interact. Modern nuclear submarines stay submerged under the ocean for 6 months, only coming up for consumables such as food. A companion "farm" sub (not that such a thing currently exists, but is certainly possible given the extent of aquaculture today) could provide the necessary consumable. Letting the submarine pair exist under the ocean until its nuclear fuel ran out. Add a third submarine that has a breeder reactor and a fuel reprocessing pipeline and you've got a permanent colony. It still requires Newport News to build more subs but you get the picture. With enough energy you can support the entire predicted population of the planet. But emotionally, there are bigger problems. Nation states and large population groups are at risk of starvation and deprivation as a direct result of climate change. And those at risk populations are not getting any support from the people who are putatively putting them at risk. So emotionally, an existential crisis is probably justified.
fulafel 10y ago
Everyone driving cars and eating meat is not sustainable.
mikekchar 10y ago
I'm going to suggest 2 things which have historically been unpopular in my postings :-) 1. We don't need to sustain this many people 2. We don't need to sustain this standard of living The first one is pretty straight forward, although it's going to take another 100 years to sort out (barring a major disaster). Shifting child bearing years from the early 20's to the early 30's and changing cultural habits so that each family has only 1 or 2 children will do this for us. However to fix this problem, people need to be willing to share the wealth of the world a little bit more equitably. Improving the situation of women around the world has to be a very high priority as well. But if you look at what's happened in the last 50 years or so, it's pretty impressive. I actually have a lot of confidence that we will reach a slightly declining population within the next century. Either way, I just don't see a problem. Fixing this issue will make the world better, not worse. Obviously there are difficult economic challenges to consider, but again I think if we solve them it will only make life better for everyone. Standard of living is similar. I think we're probably going to have to cut back a certain amount. But I don't think this is bad in any way. We're used to doing things like driving anywhere we want to go in a personal car. But if you go to Europe these days you will find that many cities and towns have opted to do away with cars in their town centres. This reduces some convenience, but massively improves the centre of the town. It means you have to park on the outskirts and either walk or take public transit into the centre. Likewise we can get rid of a lot of things we don't need. I would literally ban clothes driers if I were king of the world. What a useless waste of energy. You are very slightly inconvenienced by having to hang your clothes outside. Of course you can't do that immediately because many apartment buildings have no access to the outside. Again, over 100 years we can dramatically improve this situation. Other things are the way we heat/cool/light buildings. Why should it be 21 degrees C every single day inside regardless of the weather outside? What the heck is wrong with having seasons? What's wrong with having a night time? Some people would obviously rather have it the way it is now, but given that I personally live with an apartment that goes above 30C in the summer and below 5C in the winter, I can attest that it doesn't dramatically affect my standard of living. In many ways I prefer it. I was in Tokyo a few weeks ago. There are many more people on the streets in Ueno at 2am than at lunch time. Yes, it's fun, but is this really essential to our culture? Do we really suffer as a society by having to sleep during the night? Most of our energy usage is in manufacturing and transporting things. We may have to do with less. But imagine if goods were 2 or 3 times the price they are now. Suddenly there is a reason to make higher quality goods with craftsmanship. If energy is priced higher than labour, suddenly there is a reason to train people to do a craft/skill. Suddenly there is a reason to buy a frying pan and not throw the damn thing out until well after you are dead. Seriously, do we need to buy crappy furniture, cooking utensils, clothes, etc, etc and replace them every 2 or 3 years??? Is this really a higher standard of living? I remember reading a small book on the ecology of older cultures. You would buy 1 or 2 nice sets of clothes. When they got worn, you would wear them for every day use. When they got too worn for that, you would cut them up and make cleaning rags out of them. When they got too worn/dirty for that, you burned them for heat. Is this really worse that having a closet full of clothes from 30 years ago, waiting for a revival of that style? Good grief, clothes end up in land fill and we manufacture brand new rags for cleaning which also end up in land fill. It's almost criminal. Enough rant :-) Like I said, from my previous rants on the subject, I realise it is not such a popular viewpoint, but I invite you to consider that dealing with constraints does not necessarily make your life worse. We're spoiled to a certain degree and having to do without has the potential to let us grow as a culture.
brooklyndavs 10y ago
"But is it even possible to sustain this many people (at current standards of living with foreseeable technology)?" In short no. The reason being the current system requires endless growth (measured currently in GDP) in order sustain this many people with current standards of living. Of course current standards of living are not enough, especially for people in poverty around with world. If growth doesn't continue the entire economic system grinds to a halt. However, endless growth confined to a closed system (Earth) is not sustainable not only for the climate but also for resources like water, food, etc. Geoengineering is just another foolish attempt of humans to try to bend the planet to our wishes. This line of thinking, that we are somehow better than the earth, somehow removed from all earth systems as a species, is what got us in this mess in the first place. Yes, I realize the irony of saying this on a forum with readers, like myself, who solve technical problems for a living. Parts of the environmental movement are now starting to focus on economic system change for this very reason.
- sergiosgc 10y ago
  > The reason being the current system requires endless growth (measured currently in GDP) in order sustain this many people with current standards of living. I don't think we are anywhere near the growth limit on the planet. (Economic) Growth is mostly limited by energy use, and current tech can handle growth for about a century. Add technological evolution, and we're easily in the 500 years range of energy use increase. By then, all bets are off. Heck, for the 100 year span all bets are off.
- tim333 10y ago
  It's not true that the economic system requires endless growth. The EU and Japan haven't grown much in recent times and life goes on. The electorate quite like growth though and will tend to vote for governments that provide it.
brc 10y ago
I would suggest you stop worrying and get on with your biological imperative to reproduce your dna, only in slightly variated pattern to ensure parasites and viruses are kept guessing. Also know that people have been grappling with this question for centuries and every doomsday prediction has turned out to be wrong. So there is cause for optimism.
- dredmorbius 10y ago
  Every previous civilisation met its doomsday. They weren't, however, globe-spanning comprehensive complex and ultimately fragile systems.
dredmorbius 10y ago
Quite probably not, though the fundamental problem's been apparent since the late 18th century. No, not a typo. Fossil fuels, population, pollution, mineral resources, topsoil, water. There are numerous problems. You might want to look up the WorldWatch Institute who have done a lot of basic work here. Pick up a standard ecology text (say, Odum), and you'll find this discussed. Figuring out how to run fast and hot for a long time is difficult.
hyperpallium 10y ago
Earth can cope, we mightn't. Nature looks very harmonious to us, but we only see the sustainable species (alive now, and very few are fossilised and found). Many many species must have evolved that created conditions unfavourable to themselves - we only see the ones that didn't. (Organisms have an effect on their environment, favourable, unfavourable or neutral). Consider a plant that encourages swampy conditions. If it thrives in those conditions, great. If it doesn't, it will evolve itself away. There's speculation that Earth's oxygen atmosphere destroyed the life that created it. Though most changes and extinctions are local. Intelligence is such a dramatic, effectful evolution, it may take several iterations before a sustainable version arises (if possible). Perhaps this has happened on Earth already. In the Drake equation, L is very low (how long technological civilizations usually last).
shirro 10y ago
Agricultural production areas and crops will probably have to shift to follow climate and rainfall. I don't want to go all doom and gloom but there is going to be a substantial economic (and perhaps human) cost for future generations. The people behind climate change denial are basically exercising generational warfare. They are attacking the future of young people and their offspring to maximise the profits of predominantly elderly investors.
omginternets 10y ago
>Is sustainability even possible anymore? Yes, but it clearly involves population control. We should be sending birth-control, not food, to developing nations.
- mikeash 10y ago
  Birth control doesn't help when people want to have lots of children. Having lots of children is an essential survival strategy in a poor country. If you want them to have fewer children, make them wealthier.
  - omginternets 10y ago
    I'm not convinced by that argument (though I've heard it before). This strikes me as assuming the births are planned, whereas I don't see how they possibly could be. Enriching these countries is certainly part of the solution, but controlling population is part of the solution towards enriching them in the first place.
tim333 10y ago
>Is sustainability even possible anymore? Yeah sure. The only thing we're really unsustainable on is burning fossil fuels. Solar is growing exponentially and at the current rate would be able to replace most fossil fuel use in a few decades.
bprieto 10y ago
Yes, sustainability is possible. No, we are not living beyond the capacity of the earth. Yes, it's possible to sustain this many people, and some billions more. Because the very concept of "resources" is not fixed. In the Paleolythic, all of Eurasia and Africa only had resources to sustain a few hundred of thousands of humans. Petrol wasn't a resource, coal wasn't a resource, even land wasn't a resource. When we learnt to grow crops and tame animals the resources grew to let the same land sustain some millions of people. And in the past 50 years, Borlaug's Green Revolution [1] turned all of 70's predictions of doom like The Population Bomb false. We have now more food than ever, and more resources than ever. And that's if we call "resources" just the things that we can use now. In 50 years, people will be worrying about running out of X, where X will be a thing that we now don't think about as a resource. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug
coryfklein 10y ago
This advice isn't for everyone, but personally my study of philosophy has led to adopting nihilism which has, surprisingly, reduced my anxiety about concerns like OP's. It is this almost backward reasoning that since life is meaningless, it really isn't this gigantic tragedy even if the earth is destroyed by a giant planetary collision and the human race is destroyed. In the grand scheme of things, I don't matter, the human race doesn't matter, and neither does the earth. I will still do what I can to improve my life and others' lives, but accepting this nihilism has allowed me to free myself from the paralyzing anxiety and inaction caused by overvaluing human life. This, in turn, enables me further to make healthy contribution and add what little meaning I actually can to our existence here.

umanwizard 10y ago

Nah.

lprubin 10y ago

Not having kids may be one of the biggest forms of environmental activism.

fratlas 10y ago
This. I had an argument with a friend because I said having more than 3 kids is selfish, and conversely, having fewer kids (or adopting) is selfless and should be praised. They retorted saying it should be part of an individual's freedom to have as many as they wish. I think after a few more generations we may be looking at a world wide child policy (similar to China).
- eru 10y ago
  Why? Global population is already forecast to peak pretty soon.
  - kmonsen 10y ago
    The forecast may or may not happen. Everyone having at most 1-2 kids would help.
    - eru 10y ago
      Lots of Europeans, Chinese, Japanese, etc opting for zero already.
      - fratlas 10y ago
        The problem lies in developing nations.
        eru 10y ago
        They release drastically less CO2 than the richer people do.
        fratlas 10y ago
        Their growth rate, not their emissions. US is double per capita, but China is double for actual emissions. Sheer scale.
  - m_mueller 10y ago
    The sooner the better. According to the most realistic climate models, the point of no return for ~2 degree global average warming is already over. We don't have a good idea at what point truly catastrophic damage is going to occur (by which I mainly mean something like a Siberian clathrate gun that could hypothetically drastically warm the climate within a human lifetime). Continuing the current path of CO2 increase, every 10 years increases the risk for a runaway warming process. What's worse is that our models aren't good enough to say with certainty how high this risk is (or that it doesn't exist). So really, the time we live in now is what counts and every little bit we do, helps. If you want some scary reading material, start here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abrupt_climate_change https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abrupt_climate_change https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian–Triassic_extinction_event https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian–Triassic_extinction_ev... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis (Please note: This article seems to change its message regularly. it's best to go for the source material instead).
    - goldenkey 10y ago
      Holy shit! The methane clathrate gun is scary stuff..so basically there's a temperature that we dont exactly know that could eradicate our species in some kind if irreversible chain reaction. And almost no one talks about it.. Ive never heard of MCG before, thanks for your post.
      - m_mueller 10y ago
        Exactly. The most infuriating thing about it is that people keep debating about how serious we should take this. Even that wiki article seems to be poisoned by deniers. I quote from a previous comment of mine: > "Research carried out in 2008 in the Siberian Arctic has shown millions of tons of methane being released, apparently through perforations in the seabed permafrost,[20] with concentrations in some regions reaching up to 100 times normal levels.[22][23] The excess methane has been detected in localized hotspots in the outfall of the Lena River and the border between the Laptev Sea and the East Siberian Sea. Some melting may be the result of geological heating, but more thawing is believed to be due to the greatly increased volumes of meltwater being discharged from the Siberian rivers flowing north.[24] Current methane release has previously been estimated at 0.5 Mt per year.[25] Shakhova et al. (2008) estimate that not less than 1,400 Gt of carbon is presently locked up as methane and methane hydrates under the Arctic submarine permafrost, and 5–10% of that area is subject to puncturing by open taliks. They conclude that "release of up to 50 Gt of predicted amount of hydrate storage [is] highly possible for abrupt release at any time". That would increase the methane content of the planet's atmosphere by a factor of twelve,[26][27] equivalent in greenhouse effect to a doubling in the current level of CO2." Yet in the same section, you know what the introduction text reads currently? > "Most deposits of methane clathrate are in sediments too deep to respond rapidly, and modelling by Archer (2007) suggests the methane forcing should remain a minor component of the overall greenhouse effect.[17] Clathrate deposits destabilize from the deepest part of their stability zone, which is typically hundreds of metres below the seabed. A sustained increase in sea temperature will warm its way through the sediment eventually, and cause the shallowest, most marginal clathrate to start to break down; but it will typically take on the order of a thousand years or more for the temperature signal to get through.[17]" So let me get this straight: Because someone found a model from 2007 that makes things look mostly fine, we ignore empirical data from 2008 that shows that a Clathrate Gun of 50 Gt could go off at any time? Please someone tell me how I'm wrong just so I don't have to go crazy here.
- nsxwolf 10y ago
  Oh come off it hardly anyone has kids anymore. US population growth is very slow and due purely to immigration. Populations in many countries are in free fall. China's one child policy has created a demographic disaster with insufficient girls born. This Paul Erlich stuff is so 1970s.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- edanm 10y ago
  I don't think it's that clear cut. Other than the personal freedom aspect, which I agree with, you can also argue that more people == more scientists/engineers/minds working on advancing our technological capabilities. This is arguably the number one thing that will lead to a solution.
kmonsen 10y ago
I am not sure, I wonder if having kids mean you will care more about the future?
brc 10y ago
Your whole reason for being, the thing that gets you out of bed and searching for food, is your in-built desire to recreate and nurture life. Intentionally rejecting that is a massive commitment to make, given the very long term consequences of it. In short, go have some kids, bring them up well and enjoy the benefits. Our biology is tribe-based and ingrained, so it's smart to work with that and be part of a tribe. We all die alone, but those that die surrounded by love feel less lonely in all the decades up to that final point. That's your Dna rewarding you for a job well done.
- throw12241 10y ago
  That seems a bit of a stretch... There's no inbuilt point to life, but people try desperately to find one because evolution gave us some kind of drive for meaning, whatever that is. Don't mistake reproduction for some kind of divine purpose, it just is. Don't mistake anything for purpose. Purpose is a concept central to goal directed planning, but it is a construct of the mind. Since humans give purpose to things, humans cannot be assigned a purpose except as a way to use them for some other means. You are right though -- finding cuties gets me out of bed, but believe me I'm using birth control.

m_mueller 10y ago

The way I see it, sooner or later it will come down to atmospheric engineering (i.e. managing reflective airborne molecules, like an artificial volcanic winter). The question will be wether we have this technology sorted out until the situation becomes desperate and whether the world will be politically stable enough for an entity to take responsibility over this - it's going to be like a sword of damocles over everyone's heads and once we've started with this we can't go back (because everyone will keep burning fossil fuel until it has run out).

throwaway5752 10y ago
How does that address ocean acidification?
- eanzenberg 10y ago
  A solution could include CO2 sequestration
- fragsworth 10y ago
  Maybe we can neutralize that by dumping basic solutions into the ocean?
- m_mueller 10y ago
  It doesn't. It won't be pretty, it's basically fighting for survival of the human species at that point.
- refurb 10y ago
  Because ocean acidification is caused by atmospheric CO2? Pull CO2 out of the atmosphere and you'll reduce the amount of CO2 dissolved in the ocean.

zmmmmm 10y ago

You might benefit from reading this book: https://www.withouthotair.com/ https://www.withouthotair.com/ Obviously there's no simple naive answer to your question, but essentially to a first approximation the answer is yes, it's possible. The changes we need to implement are pretty dramatic and some particular things don't look very viable (say, regular people making frequent international flights), but aside from those it's entirely doable and reasonably affordable. It's purely a matter of willpower.

Steko 10y ago
{not a quote from link but the conversation reminded me of this} I would not rule out the chance to preserve a nucleus of human specimens. It would be quite easy... at the bottom of ah...some of our deeper mineshafts. Radioactivity would never penetrate a mine some thousands of feet deep, and in a matter of weeks, sufficient improvements in drilling space could easily be provided... It would not be difficult, Nuclear reactors could, heh... provide power almost indefinitely. Greenhouses could maintain plant life. Animals could be bred and slaughtered. A quick survey would have to be made of all the available mine sites in the country, but I would guess that dwelling space for several hundred thousands of our people could easily be provided. [Selecting who would go down] could easily be accomplished with a computer set and programmed to accept factors from youth, health, sexual fertility, intelligence, and a cross-section of necessary skills. Of course, it would be absolutely vital that our top government and military men be included to foster and impart the required principles of leadership and tradition. Q: Wouldn't this nucleus of survivors be so grief-stricken and anguished that they'd, well, envy the dead and not want to go on living? When they go down into the mine, everyone would still be alive. There would be no shocking memories, and the prevailing emotion will be one of nostalgia for those left behind, combined with a spirit of bold curiosity for the adventure ahead! Ahhh!
- quasse 10y ago
  This sounds essentially like the plot of the Book of Ember series if anyone (or their kids) is into post-apocalyptic cave living fiction.

erichocean 10y ago

I'm curious as well. If myself (or someone else) were to develop a zero-emission approach to electricity generation (non-nuclear) that could handle "base load" and did not involve filling up the landscape with solar panels (or their moral equivalent), and did not produce waste, would that even help any more? We globally consume about 20,000 terawatt-hours of electricity right now annually, and in the US, electricity generation is 30% of total CO2 emissions. Presumably, if there was additional power for electric vehicles, we could also reduce overall emissions even further by moving away from gasoline. But at this point, even NO emissions seems pointless to work towards—we're already screwed. It seems like instead of pursuing lower emissions, we need to work towards reducing the CO2 that's already in the atmosphere.

jamesdsadler 10y ago
At some point it will become feasible to capture CO2 on a large scale and reduce CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. So, not screwed yet.
- eru 10y ago
  If you have enough energy to spend, capturing CO2 is quite feasible.
DougWebb 10y ago
Large-scale engineering, the kind we'd need to do large-scale cleaning of the atmosphere, or large-scale high-efficiency hydroponic farming, or building huge earthworks to protect cities from rising sea levels, or anything else we might need to do to deal with global warming, is driven by large-scale energy production. Without energy, we can't do the things we need to do to survive without a lot of pain, suffering, and death. With plentiful energy, we can do the things we know we need to do, and new technological advancements become possible. I wouldn't rule out nuclear energy. There are risks, but it can produce a lot of energy in a small space, and the waste is much lower volume and easier to contain than chemical energy production. In my opinion, we should've built up our nuclear energy production over the past 30 years so that coal and oil could've been phased out by now, while we developed viable solar energy tech to replace the nuclear tech.

fabled_giraffe 10y ago

I believe in global warming, but I also think a higher or lower temperature Earth with a greater level of CO2 just means that different organisms will thrive. We think that we have damaged the Earth, but the Earth is much, much older than us, and we've barely made a dent if you consider the full lifetime of everything that ever will be. Now- if we had started a global thermonuclear war and eradicated all life on Earth, I wouldn't be saying that, but all we have done is to change the temperature and the atmosphere a little, which has serious consequences for the way things currently are, but in the end it will just mean different organisms take over and what grows where will change. If anything, the thing we need to be concerned about is being ready for changes, which will happen. We might need to grow different sorts of foods, focus on better insulation for our homes or move underground or underwater. We may need new laws to avoid wasting resources. But, there is no reason to be depressed about it. Those things will happen with time.

castratikron 10y ago
But will we be able to eat the different organisms that will thrive in this environment? What happens when today's staple crops no longer produce the yields we need to sustain our civilization?
- fabled_giraffe 10y ago
  During the little ice age, people ate things that grew in colder climates, like potatoes. We will find a way to survive, and we have more technology now to help than we did then.
- rosser 10y ago
  Get ready to enjoy eating things made from jellyfish. Like, a lot of them.
  - Tushon 10y ago
    I would venture that seaweed or algae is more likely.

ak217 10y ago

No, sustainability is an empty concept in a future where the status quo is past the point of no return (which we're already in). We will need to move a hell of a lot faster than the Paris Agreement to prevent huge die-offs of people and loss of biodiversity. We're going to need a Manhattan Project for carbon sequestration.

stale2002 10y ago
People have been saying there would be a die off since the 80s. Did you ever read the population bomb? We'll adapt like we always do.

ChuckMcM 10y ago

> But is it even possible to sustain this many people (at > current standards of living with foreseeable technology)? Absolutely, there is a tremendous amount of waste which is not recaptured due to economic rather than technological reasons. Further there are technologies (like nuclear power and breeder reactors) which can provide energy forever (for all practical purposes). And ultimately the survival of humans can be reduced to simply to energy, energy to grow food, energy to process wastes, and energy to communicate and interact. Modern nuclear submarines stay submerged under the ocean for 6 months, only coming up for consumables such as food. A companion "farm" sub (not that such a thing currently exists, but is certainly possible given the extent of aquaculture today) could provide the necessary consumable. Letting the submarine pair exist under the ocean until its nuclear fuel ran out. Add a third submarine that has a breeder reactor and a fuel reprocessing pipeline and you've got a permanent colony. It still requires Newport News to build more subs but you get the picture. With enough energy you can support the entire predicted population of the planet. But emotionally, there are bigger problems. Nation states and large population groups are at risk of starvation and deprivation as a direct result of climate change. And those at risk populations are not getting any support from the people who are putatively putting them at risk. So emotionally, an existential crisis is probably justified.

fulafel 10y ago

Everyone driving cars and eating meat is not sustainable.

mikekchar 10y ago

I'm going to suggest 2 things which have historically been unpopular in my postings :-) 1. We don't need to sustain this many people 2. We don't need to sustain this standard of living The first one is pretty straight forward, although it's going to take another 100 years to sort out (barring a major disaster). Shifting child bearing years from the early 20's to the early 30's and changing cultural habits so that each family has only 1 or 2 children will do this for us. However to fix this problem, people need to be willing to share the wealth of the world a little bit more equitably. Improving the situation of women around the world has to be a very high priority as well. But if you look at what's happened in the last 50 years or so, it's pretty impressive. I actually have a lot of confidence that we will reach a slightly declining population within the next century. Either way, I just don't see a problem. Fixing this issue will make the world better, not worse. Obviously there are difficult economic challenges to consider, but again I think if we solve them it will only make life better for everyone. Standard of living is similar. I think we're probably going to have to cut back a certain amount. But I don't think this is bad in any way. We're used to doing things like driving anywhere we want to go in a personal car. But if you go to Europe these days you will find that many cities and towns have opted to do away with cars in their town centres. This reduces some convenience, but massively improves the centre of the town. It means you have to park on the outskirts and either walk or take public transit into the centre. Likewise we can get rid of a lot of things we don't need. I would literally ban clothes driers if I were king of the world. What a useless waste of energy. You are very slightly inconvenienced by having to hang your clothes outside. Of course you can't do that immediately because many apartment buildings have no access to the outside. Again, over 100 years we can dramatically improve this situation. Other things are the way we heat/cool/light buildings. Why should it be 21 degrees C every single day inside regardless of the weather outside? What the heck is wrong with having seasons? What's wrong with having a night time? Some people would obviously rather have it the way it is now, but given that I personally live with an apartment that goes above 30C in the summer and below 5C in the winter, I can attest that it doesn't dramatically affect my standard of living. In many ways I prefer it. I was in Tokyo a few weeks ago. There are many more people on the streets in Ueno at 2am than at lunch time. Yes, it's fun, but is this really essential to our culture? Do we really suffer as a society by having to sleep during the night? Most of our energy usage is in manufacturing and transporting things. We may have to do with less. But imagine if goods were 2 or 3 times the price they are now. Suddenly there is a reason to make higher quality goods with craftsmanship. If energy is priced higher than labour, suddenly there is a reason to train people to do a craft/skill. Suddenly there is a reason to buy a frying pan and not throw the damn thing out until well after you are dead. Seriously, do we need to buy crappy furniture, cooking utensils, clothes, etc, etc and replace them every 2 or 3 years??? Is this really a higher standard of living? I remember reading a small book on the ecology of older cultures. You would buy 1 or 2 nice sets of clothes. When they got worn, you would wear them for every day use. When they got too worn for that, you would cut them up and make cleaning rags out of them. When they got too worn/dirty for that, you burned them for heat. Is this really worse that having a closet full of clothes from 30 years ago, waiting for a revival of that style? Good grief, clothes end up in land fill and we manufacture brand new rags for cleaning which also end up in land fill. It's almost criminal. Enough rant :-) Like I said, from my previous rants on the subject, I realise it is not such a popular viewpoint, but I invite you to consider that dealing with constraints does not necessarily make your life worse. We're spoiled to a certain degree and having to do without has the potential to let us grow as a culture.

brooklyndavs 10y ago

"But is it even possible to sustain this many people (at current standards of living with foreseeable technology)?" In short no. The reason being the current system requires endless growth (measured currently in GDP) in order sustain this many people with current standards of living. Of course current standards of living are not enough, especially for people in poverty around with world. If growth doesn't continue the entire economic system grinds to a halt. However, endless growth confined to a closed system (Earth) is not sustainable not only for the climate but also for resources like water, food, etc. Geoengineering is just another foolish attempt of humans to try to bend the planet to our wishes. This line of thinking, that we are somehow better than the earth, somehow removed from all earth systems as a species, is what got us in this mess in the first place. Yes, I realize the irony of saying this on a forum with readers, like myself, who solve technical problems for a living. Parts of the environmental movement are now starting to focus on economic system change for this very reason.

sergiosgc 10y ago
> The reason being the current system requires endless growth (measured currently in GDP) in order sustain this many people with current standards of living. I don't think we are anywhere near the growth limit on the planet. (Economic) Growth is mostly limited by energy use, and current tech can handle growth for about a century. Add technological evolution, and we're easily in the 500 years range of energy use increase. By then, all bets are off. Heck, for the 100 year span all bets are off.
tim333 10y ago
It's not true that the economic system requires endless growth. The EU and Japan haven't grown much in recent times and life goes on. The electorate quite like growth though and will tend to vote for governments that provide it.

brc 10y ago

I would suggest you stop worrying and get on with your biological imperative to reproduce your dna, only in slightly variated pattern to ensure parasites and viruses are kept guessing. Also know that people have been grappling with this question for centuries and every doomsday prediction has turned out to be wrong. So there is cause for optimism.

dredmorbius 10y ago
Every previous civilisation met its doomsday. They weren't, however, globe-spanning comprehensive complex and ultimately fragile systems.

dredmorbius 10y ago

Quite probably not, though the fundamental problem's been apparent since the late 18th century. No, not a typo. Fossil fuels, population, pollution, mineral resources, topsoil, water. There are numerous problems. You might want to look up the WorldWatch Institute who have done a lot of basic work here. Pick up a standard ecology text (say, Odum), and you'll find this discussed. Figuring out how to run fast and hot for a long time is difficult.

hyperpallium 10y ago

Earth can cope, we mightn't. Nature looks very harmonious to us, but we only see the sustainable species (alive now, and very few are fossilised and found). Many many species must have evolved that created conditions unfavourable to themselves - we only see the ones that didn't. (Organisms have an effect on their environment, favourable, unfavourable or neutral). Consider a plant that encourages swampy conditions. If it thrives in those conditions, great. If it doesn't, it will evolve itself away. There's speculation that Earth's oxygen atmosphere destroyed the life that created it. Though most changes and extinctions are local. Intelligence is such a dramatic, effectful evolution, it may take several iterations before a sustainable version arises (if possible). Perhaps this has happened on Earth already. In the Drake equation, L is very low (how long technological civilizations usually last).

shirro 10y ago

Agricultural production areas and crops will probably have to shift to follow climate and rainfall. I don't want to go all doom and gloom but there is going to be a substantial economic (and perhaps human) cost for future generations. The people behind climate change denial are basically exercising generational warfare. They are attacking the future of young people and their offspring to maximise the profits of predominantly elderly investors.

omginternets 10y ago

>Is sustainability even possible anymore? Yes, but it clearly involves population control. We should be sending birth-control, not food, to developing nations.

mikeash 10y ago
Birth control doesn't help when people want to have lots of children. Having lots of children is an essential survival strategy in a poor country. If you want them to have fewer children, make them wealthier.
- omginternets 10y ago
  I'm not convinced by that argument (though I've heard it before). This strikes me as assuming the births are planned, whereas I don't see how they possibly could be. Enriching these countries is certainly part of the solution, but controlling population is part of the solution towards enriching them in the first place.

tim333 10y ago

>Is sustainability even possible anymore? Yeah sure. The only thing we're really unsustainable on is burning fossil fuels. Solar is growing exponentially and at the current rate would be able to replace most fossil fuel use in a few decades.

bprieto 10y ago

Yes, sustainability is possible. No, we are not living beyond the capacity of the earth. Yes, it's possible to sustain this many people, and some billions more. Because the very concept of "resources" is not fixed. In the Paleolythic, all of Eurasia and Africa only had resources to sustain a few hundred of thousands of humans. Petrol wasn't a resource, coal wasn't a resource, even land wasn't a resource. When we learnt to grow crops and tame animals the resources grew to let the same land sustain some millions of people. And in the past 50 years, Borlaug's Green Revolution [1] turned all of 70's predictions of doom like The Population Bomb false. We have now more food than ever, and more resources than ever. And that's if we call "resources" just the things that we can use now. In 50 years, people will be worrying about running out of X, where X will be a thing that we now don't think about as a resource. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug

coryfklein 10y ago

This advice isn't for everyone, but personally my study of philosophy has led to adopting nihilism which has, surprisingly, reduced my anxiety about concerns like OP's. It is this almost backward reasoning that since life is meaningless, it really isn't this gigantic tragedy even if the earth is destroyed by a giant planetary collision and the human race is destroyed. In the grand scheme of things, I don't matter, the human race doesn't matter, and neither does the earth. I will still do what I can to improve my life and others' lives, but accepting this nihilism has allowed me to free myself from the paralyzing anxiety and inaction caused by overvaluing human life. This, in turn, enables me further to make healthy contribution and add what little meaning I actually can to our existence here.