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I take his point about predictions not factoring in any sort of human mitigation, though. It's pretty obvious to me that inventing ways to fight or even reverse

I take his point about predictions not factoring in any sort of human mitigation, though. It's pretty obvious to me that inventing ways to fight or even reverse global warming (basically, geoengineering) is going to become the defining scientific and industrial challenge of our (grand-)childrens' era. Think solid-state electronics or genomics but on an entirely larger, more urgent scale. Pretty much the only thing keeping me hopeful these days is that we've scarcely even begun to really try and combat this problem.

semi-extrinsic 10y ago
Mitigation isn't a big technological challenge per se. The big showstopper is the fear of the unknown unknowns; the remote possibility that despite our careful science and engineering, the cure ends up being worse than the disease. Because we only have one shot, and no "undo" button, large scale geoengineering will be put off for as long as possible.
cardamomo 10y ago
We need to start mitigation research now, not pass it along to our children's generation. The reason for today's urgency in addressing global warming is that previous generations kicked the can down the road to us.
shouldbworking 10y ago
Someone else in the thread mentioned releasing sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere to cause global cooling. To me, the notion of getting the entire planet to reduce their CO2 production is laughable. People are still sold as slaves and dying of starvation in some parts of the world. If global warming becomes a threat to humanity the only realistic solution is technological. It sounds like we already have the tech needed to cool the Earth as much as we want but we're still making a ton of noise about the impossible mission of controlling global carbon emissions.
- 35bge57dtjku 10y ago
  So because someone simply mentioned using a single chemical to cool the atmosphere, you assume that it would work and that it would work at a large enough scale to fix everything? That sounds like a textbook case of believing everything you hear.
  - shouldbworking 10y ago
    It's well known that large volcanic eruptions have caused global cooling for a few years that's severe enough to lower the temperature of earths surface several degrees. I don't think anyone can deny that it's possible to cool the Earth by putting stuff in the upper atmosphere because we've already seen it happen during recorded history.
    - hyperbovine 10y ago
      The Tambora phenomenon is well documented. But that does nothing to solve other problems like e.g. ocean acidification, and potentially causes many problems of its own. It's a really complex system and we need to spend way more time and money understanding it than we currently are.
- bonzini 10y ago
  Sulphur dioxide causes acid rains. This used to be a huge problem in Europe even, and stopping the burning of coal in Germany has more or less solved it. I wouldn't be so eager to release SO2 in the atmosphere.

semi-extrinsic 10y ago

Mitigation isn't a big technological challenge per se. The big showstopper is the fear of the unknown unknowns; the remote possibility that despite our careful science and engineering, the cure ends up being worse than the disease. Because we only have one shot, and no "undo" button, large scale geoengineering will be put off for as long as possible.

cardamomo 10y ago

We need to start mitigation research now, not pass it along to our children's generation. The reason for today's urgency in addressing global warming is that previous generations kicked the can down the road to us.

shouldbworking 10y ago

Someone else in the thread mentioned releasing sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere to cause global cooling. To me, the notion of getting the entire planet to reduce their CO2 production is laughable. People are still sold as slaves and dying of starvation in some parts of the world. If global warming becomes a threat to humanity the only realistic solution is technological. It sounds like we already have the tech needed to cool the Earth as much as we want but we're still making a ton of noise about the impossible mission of controlling global carbon emissions.

35bge57dtjku 10y ago
So because someone simply mentioned using a single chemical to cool the atmosphere, you assume that it would work and that it would work at a large enough scale to fix everything? That sounds like a textbook case of believing everything you hear.
- shouldbworking 10y ago
  It's well known that large volcanic eruptions have caused global cooling for a few years that's severe enough to lower the temperature of earths surface several degrees. I don't think anyone can deny that it's possible to cool the Earth by putting stuff in the upper atmosphere because we've already seen it happen during recorded history.
  - hyperbovine 10y ago
    The Tambora phenomenon is well documented. But that does nothing to solve other problems like e.g. ocean acidification, and potentially causes many problems of its own. It's a really complex system and we need to spend way more time and money understanding it than we currently are.
bonzini 10y ago
Sulphur dioxide causes acid rains. This used to be a huge problem in Europe even, and stopping the burning of coal in Germany has more or less solved it. I wouldn't be so eager to release SO2 in the atmosphere.