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I used to cite facts like those in these charts to try to convince myself or others that things are on an upward trajectory and that we’re just at a local minim

I used to cite facts like those in these charts to try to convince myself or others that things are on an upward trajectory and that we’re just at a local minimim, if anything. But man, I just can’t stomach it anymore. Most of the points made by these charts will be moot at best and reversed at worse if the concerns outlined in that latest climate report come true, and we’ve got politicians and a population who at best don’t give a shit. It seems naive to try to make the “everything is getting better!” point anymore.

kauffj 8y ago
My understanding is that the IPCC estimates put the costs of climate change at ~2% of world GDP, and more aggressive estimates still have it under 10%. Is there a reason that cost would eliminate all of the gains cited in this article? Or are you basing the expected impacts off of another source?
- coldtea 8y ago
  >My understanding is that the IPCC estimates put the costs of climate change at ~2% of world GDP, and more aggressive estimates still have it under 10%. Kind of like the initial Titanic captain's estimates after the impact with the iceberg? The IPCC is a bureaucracy, it's job is to balance climate change control demands with requirements from businesses and governments to "not do much" because doing what's appropriate is bad for business and goes against the hysterics for "continuous growth" on which modern policy and economy is based on...
- el_benhameen 8y ago
  I’m not so concerned with the fiscal costs, and I think it’s short-sighted to think of the problem as one that can be solved or ameliorated by moving dollars and percentages around. The human and environmental costs, dollars aside, are staggering and painful to think about. E.g. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/10/07/climate/ipcc-report-half-degree.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/10/07/climate/ipcc-... 37% of world population exposed to extreme heat waves and an additional 400 million people exposed to extreme drought at a 2 degree increase. And they’ll be angry, and they’ll either find somewhere else to go en masse or will suffer even more if they can’t leave.
  - incangold 8y ago
    It is excruciating to think about. The consternation in Europe at a million or so Syrian refugees has been grotesque. Let alone hundreds of millions trying to get in, at the same time Southern Europe is having crop failures itself due to drought.
- incangold 8y ago
  That’s the IPCC estimate assuming we take urgent global action now. But instead of taking urgent global action, Brazil are about to open the rain forest to agri-business; the White House does not believe it is possible to stop climate change and is rolling back environmental protections and pulling out of the Paris Accord (which was nowhere near enough in the first place, and which none of the other signatories were achieving anyway); and Europe is distracted by Brexit and demagoguery. China are looking more serious, but are also pissing in the wind at current levels of effort. The IPCC report is in any case probably extremely optimistic on the impact of releasing the methane stored in permafrost. That could catapult temperatures up far too quickly for the ecosystem to adapt to, or even humanity to adapt to, even if we science very, very hard. So 1.5 degrees is what we get if we put in unprecedented effort that none of the important countries are showing any signs of doing, and also if we use probably-optimistic models. At least 4 degrees is more likely on current trajectory, and that is absolutely terrifying. North of that we get into the end of civilisation in anything like its current form. Also, arguably the most important gains of the last decades are from what used to be called the developing world dragging itself out of poverty. A disproportionate share of the economic and human cost of climate collapse will fall on those countries. Which doesn’t seem very fair because they haven’t had enough time to significantly contribute to or benefit from burning hydrocarbons. It is quite frustrating because doing what we need to do to stop all of this is relatively simple, if quite difficult, is basically inevitable anyway because renewables are increasingly cheaper than fossil fuels, and will make the world better in all sorts of other ways. Get your shit together humanity.
  - incangold 8y ago
    I forgot to mention Australia, which is trying to expand coal because it is currently governed by absolutely awful people.
  - kauffj 8y ago
    A quick attempt to find costs for 4 degrees C found ~7% of GDP, which would be inline with the figures from my original post. Source (first result for "gdp global warming 4 degree celsius"): https://phys.org/news/2018-08-trillion-lost-temperatures-degrees.html https://phys.org/news/2018-08-trillion-lost-temperatures-deg... Do you have alternative numbers? 7% of GDP is a big hit, but it's not "end of civilization".
- TheOtherHobbes 8y ago
  Your understanding is wrong. There is no attempt to estimate costs in the most recent IPCC reports. There is, however, a long catalog of horrors, including major biosphere die-offs on land and sea, massive forced migrations, loss of food security and corresponding loss of political and military stability, drought, sea level rise, and vastly increased probability of extreme weather damage. This is not about GPP, this is about the fact that terraforming a planet to make it less, not more, hospitable to its native ecology is quite astoundingly stupid.
opportune 8y ago
This is for the entire planet. In a lot of developed countries like the US, the standard of living has mostly been stagnant for 80%+ of people for decades.
- el_benhameen 8y ago
  Sure, and my point is not that these gains are meaningless for the people who have e.g. been lifted out of extreme poverty. My point is that having improved or solved those problems will be for naught if the giganting looming one reverses those gains. Given the enormity of that problem, taking an attitude of “but things are actually getting better!” is either shortsighted or willfully obtuse.
graeme 8y ago
This is my view of it. I mean, I'm very glad we don't have worsening poverty + environmental catastrophe (with equal emissions I mean). That wouldn't be worse than now, but the medium term prognosis looks pretty grim unless we figure a way to suck carbon from the air at scale. Making incredible gains that reverse within a couple decades isn't much of a feat.
nutjob2 8y ago
Your comment is like complaining about an island paradise, because there is a violent storm outside. It's still an island paradise, and the storm will pass.
- el_benhameen 8y ago
  Can you expand on why you think the storm will safely pass? Because by most estimates, the storm is going to stick around for a long time and destroy or make uninhabitable much of the island.
- incangold 8y ago
  There are no islands, there is no outside.
ghufran_syed 8y ago
You might want to consider some alternative views, for example this article from Stanford seems reasonable in the tone of its discussion: https://www.hoover.org/research/our-latest-global-warming-scare https://www.hoover.org/research/our-latest-global-warming-sc... While human effects on global climate certainly have to be considered, the idea that 200 years of industrial human civilization is enough to meaningfully alter global climate implies that if we wanted to, we could terraform other planets within just a few 100 years - which I’m sure is wrong. Or we would need to somehow make the case that this particular planet was in an unstable equilibrium, so our actions were somehow enough to knock things out of equilibrium, which I also doubt: If the earth’s climate equilibrium was so unstable, I doubt mankind would have survived this long. “Don’t sell your coat” by Harold Ambler is another well-argued discussion of some of these issues. Of course, some people would argue that you shouldn’t even consider alternative views on this topic, because it’s “climate change denial” - reminds me of the fundamentalist Muslim priests I would have to listen to growing up, telling me not to listen to the “unbelievers” because they would corrupt my mind.. :)
- arbitrary_name 8y ago
  I find your argument somewhat specious. Terraforming entire planets in a few hundred years is feasible, if you devote significant resources of the entire human race to it i.e we have had a drastic impact on the climate by pumping trillions of tons of carbon into the atmosphere. The equivalent effort on Mars would be impossible due to cost, but on earth it was a by-product of an already profitable process (extract and burn fossil fuels, cut down forests).

kauffj 8y ago

My understanding is that the IPCC estimates put the costs of climate change at ~2% of world GDP, and more aggressive estimates still have it under 10%. Is there a reason that cost would eliminate all of the gains cited in this article? Or are you basing the expected impacts off of another source?

coldtea 8y ago
>My understanding is that the IPCC estimates put the costs of climate change at ~2% of world GDP, and more aggressive estimates still have it under 10%. Kind of like the initial Titanic captain's estimates after the impact with the iceberg? The IPCC is a bureaucracy, it's job is to balance climate change control demands with requirements from businesses and governments to "not do much" because doing what's appropriate is bad for business and goes against the hysterics for "continuous growth" on which modern policy and economy is based on...
el_benhameen 8y ago
I’m not so concerned with the fiscal costs, and I think it’s short-sighted to think of the problem as one that can be solved or ameliorated by moving dollars and percentages around. The human and environmental costs, dollars aside, are staggering and painful to think about. E.g. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/10/07/climate/ipcc-report-half-degree.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/10/07/climate/ipcc-... 37% of world population exposed to extreme heat waves and an additional 400 million people exposed to extreme drought at a 2 degree increase. And they’ll be angry, and they’ll either find somewhere else to go en masse or will suffer even more if they can’t leave.
- incangold 8y ago
  It is excruciating to think about. The consternation in Europe at a million or so Syrian refugees has been grotesque. Let alone hundreds of millions trying to get in, at the same time Southern Europe is having crop failures itself due to drought.
incangold 8y ago
That’s the IPCC estimate assuming we take urgent global action now. But instead of taking urgent global action, Brazil are about to open the rain forest to agri-business; the White House does not believe it is possible to stop climate change and is rolling back environmental protections and pulling out of the Paris Accord (which was nowhere near enough in the first place, and which none of the other signatories were achieving anyway); and Europe is distracted by Brexit and demagoguery. China are looking more serious, but are also pissing in the wind at current levels of effort. The IPCC report is in any case probably extremely optimistic on the impact of releasing the methane stored in permafrost. That could catapult temperatures up far too quickly for the ecosystem to adapt to, or even humanity to adapt to, even if we science very, very hard. So 1.5 degrees is what we get if we put in unprecedented effort that none of the important countries are showing any signs of doing, and also if we use probably-optimistic models. At least 4 degrees is more likely on current trajectory, and that is absolutely terrifying. North of that we get into the end of civilisation in anything like its current form. Also, arguably the most important gains of the last decades are from what used to be called the developing world dragging itself out of poverty. A disproportionate share of the economic and human cost of climate collapse will fall on those countries. Which doesn’t seem very fair because they haven’t had enough time to significantly contribute to or benefit from burning hydrocarbons. It is quite frustrating because doing what we need to do to stop all of this is relatively simple, if quite difficult, is basically inevitable anyway because renewables are increasingly cheaper than fossil fuels, and will make the world better in all sorts of other ways. Get your shit together humanity.
- incangold 8y ago
  I forgot to mention Australia, which is trying to expand coal because it is currently governed by absolutely awful people.
- kauffj 8y ago
  A quick attempt to find costs for 4 degrees C found ~7% of GDP, which would be inline with the figures from my original post. Source (first result for "gdp global warming 4 degree celsius"): https://phys.org/news/2018-08-trillion-lost-temperatures-degrees.html https://phys.org/news/2018-08-trillion-lost-temperatures-deg... Do you have alternative numbers? 7% of GDP is a big hit, but it's not "end of civilization".
TheOtherHobbes 8y ago
Your understanding is wrong. There is no attempt to estimate costs in the most recent IPCC reports. There is, however, a long catalog of horrors, including major biosphere die-offs on land and sea, massive forced migrations, loss of food security and corresponding loss of political and military stability, drought, sea level rise, and vastly increased probability of extreme weather damage. This is not about GPP, this is about the fact that terraforming a planet to make it less, not more, hospitable to its native ecology is quite astoundingly stupid.

opportune 8y ago

This is for the entire planet. In a lot of developed countries like the US, the standard of living has mostly been stagnant for 80%+ of people for decades.

el_benhameen 8y ago
Sure, and my point is not that these gains are meaningless for the people who have e.g. been lifted out of extreme poverty. My point is that having improved or solved those problems will be for naught if the giganting looming one reverses those gains. Given the enormity of that problem, taking an attitude of “but things are actually getting better!” is either shortsighted or willfully obtuse.

graeme 8y ago

This is my view of it. I mean, I'm very glad we don't have worsening poverty + environmental catastrophe (with equal emissions I mean). That wouldn't be worse than now, but the medium term prognosis looks pretty grim unless we figure a way to suck carbon from the air at scale. Making incredible gains that reverse within a couple decades isn't much of a feat.

nutjob2 8y ago

Your comment is like complaining about an island paradise, because there is a violent storm outside. It's still an island paradise, and the storm will pass.

el_benhameen 8y ago
Can you expand on why you think the storm will safely pass? Because by most estimates, the storm is going to stick around for a long time and destroy or make uninhabitable much of the island.
incangold 8y ago
There are no islands, there is no outside.

ghufran_syed 8y ago

You might want to consider some alternative views, for example this article from Stanford seems reasonable in the tone of its discussion: https://www.hoover.org/research/our-latest-global-warming-scare https://www.hoover.org/research/our-latest-global-warming-sc... While human effects on global climate certainly have to be considered, the idea that 200 years of industrial human civilization is enough to meaningfully alter global climate implies that if we wanted to, we could terraform other planets within just a few 100 years - which I’m sure is wrong. Or we would need to somehow make the case that this particular planet was in an unstable equilibrium, so our actions were somehow enough to knock things out of equilibrium, which I also doubt: If the earth’s climate equilibrium was so unstable, I doubt mankind would have survived this long. “Don’t sell your coat” by Harold Ambler is another well-argued discussion of some of these issues. Of course, some people would argue that you shouldn’t even consider alternative views on this topic, because it’s “climate change denial” - reminds me of the fundamentalist Muslim priests I would have to listen to growing up, telling me not to listen to the “unbelievers” because they would corrupt my mind.. :)

arbitrary_name 8y ago
I find your argument somewhat specious. Terraforming entire planets in a few hundred years is feasible, if you devote significant resources of the entire human race to it i.e we have had a drastic impact on the climate by pumping trillions of tons of carbon into the atmosphere. The equivalent effort on Mars would be impossible due to cost, but on earth it was a by-product of an already profitable process (extract and burn fossil fuels, cut down forests).