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> But if a billion people have to move within 20 or 30 years because large poor cities can no longer be defended against the sea or because technology to deal w

> But if a billion people have to move within 20 or 30 years because large poor cities can no longer be defended against the sea or because technology to deal with desertification That seems perfectly reasonable. Nowhere near doom and gloom. There's no doom there, that I can see. Moving a billion people is not that big of a deal, as long as there is incentive. The idea that "the sea" will push people around has been going on forever and doesn't cause mass migrations in terms of the earth. It's the food and distribution a population has to worry about that will cause trouble. Everything else is well within human abilities to mitigate (even when average lifespans decrease by a few decades).

sgc 8y ago
It's very hard to even respond to you. Moving a billion people is not that hard? Unbelievable ignorance, hubris, and/or FUD.
- ThomPete 8y ago
  If you believe climate change is going to have that effect on us what other choice do we have?
  - sgc 8y ago
    We have no other choice probably. But I have no idea what the point of saying it's going to be easy when nothing even remotely close has happened in the history of humanity, and we can't even deal with infrastructure problems for a few thousand people at a time due to the incredible greed inherent to human society. It is rather a humanity breaking event that approaches, and its weight is heartbreaking.
ForHackernews 8y ago
Moving a 1,000,000,000 people is not that difficult? Do you have any idea what you're talking about? That would be the largest migration in human history, by a wide margin. Recently, we've had something on the order of 2,500,000 people moving to Europe and it's widely seen as somewhere between a crisis and a catastrophe.
- TooBrokeToBeg 8y ago
  > Do you have any idea what you're talking about? I think I have a better conceptualization than many people "discussing" this issue. > That would be the largest migration in human history, by a wide margin Nope. How many people have migrated from mexico to the US over the last 50 years? Are you assuming that one day 1 million people wake up and everyone has to move because the ocean is rising? How many feet to permanently displace 1 million over what time and how far do you really think anyone will go? You get people living next to live volcanos in Hawaii where the largest island is kinda the size of Orange County, CA. smh Calm down and rethink what we're talking about.
  - ForHackernews 8y ago
    > Nope. How many people have migrated from mexico to the US over the last 50 years? A hell of a lot fewer than a billion (again: 1,000,000,000) given that the entire US population is only ~400,000,000 today. I expect the average HN user to have better numeracy than this.

sgc 8y ago

It's very hard to even respond to you. Moving a billion people is not that hard? Unbelievable ignorance, hubris, and/or FUD.

ThomPete 8y ago
If you believe climate change is going to have that effect on us what other choice do we have?
- sgc 8y ago
  We have no other choice probably. But I have no idea what the point of saying it's going to be easy when nothing even remotely close has happened in the history of humanity, and we can't even deal with infrastructure problems for a few thousand people at a time due to the incredible greed inherent to human society. It is rather a humanity breaking event that approaches, and its weight is heartbreaking.

ForHackernews 8y ago

Moving a 1,000,000,000 people is not that difficult? Do you have any idea what you're talking about? That would be the largest migration in human history, by a wide margin. Recently, we've had something on the order of 2,500,000 people moving to Europe and it's widely seen as somewhere between a crisis and a catastrophe.

TooBrokeToBeg 8y ago
> Do you have any idea what you're talking about? I think I have a better conceptualization than many people "discussing" this issue. > That would be the largest migration in human history, by a wide margin Nope. How many people have migrated from mexico to the US over the last 50 years? Are you assuming that one day 1 million people wake up and everyone has to move because the ocean is rising? How many feet to permanently displace 1 million over what time and how far do you really think anyone will go? You get people living next to live volcanos in Hawaii where the largest island is kinda the size of Orange County, CA. smh Calm down and rethink what we're talking about.
- ForHackernews 8y ago
  > Nope. How many people have migrated from mexico to the US over the last 50 years? A hell of a lot fewer than a billion (again: 1,000,000,000) given that the entire US population is only ~400,000,000 today. I expect the average HN user to have better numeracy than this.