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OP here. No climate scientist, just someone who's been following climate change for a couple decades. Not a climate change denier by a long shot, if anything I'

OP here. No climate scientist, just someone who's been following climate change for a couple decades. Not a climate change denier by a long shot, if anything I've actually already made a bunch of large life decisions under the assumption that climate change is going to change this world quite a bit in the next few decades. The main accusation you make, that I (and other who are promoting this article) are suggesting that the scientists don't know what they are talking about, I actually plead guilty for that. I really do think we don't know what we're talking about anythign other than the primary assertion that we are warming this planet through our actions. I don't believe we actually have a real handle on the rate (we could be drastically under or overestimating) of climate change, and I definitely don't think we have an inkling on whether geoengineering efforts would work the way we expect it to. The main light bulb for me from this article is it has made me consider even planting trees as a geoengineering effort, as vicarious as other proposals like dumping iron in the ocean or particles into the stratosphere. Right now I would consider any effort at controlling global warming other than actually just reducing emissions as geoengineering. The most apt analogy I have found for geoengineering efforts like this was given by the comedian Bill Burr in a podcast, where he shits on a Ted talk about genetically engineering malaria mosquitos (https://youtu.be/vEZ0z0WSrUA https://youtu.be/vEZ0z0WSrUA ). I have seen similar over-confidence among my fellow scientitsts in biology, in complicated subjects like cancer, immunology and metabolism. Time and again, people will assert they have understood a system, make a drug, and it won't work, and then they will blame the failure on the same complexity they said they had conquered. We have made tremendous progress on all these scientific fronts (biology, climate science, etc) but the systems under study have become so complex, I would consider it a criminal offense if any scientist makes a claim that they really have figured out all the ramifications of their geoengineering plans. Criminal because I am worried that any major geoengineering effort if it goes wrong might be irreversible. Orders of magnitude more studies are needed IMO to make sure we understand these systems, and I don't think we are going to invest that effort until things get far, far worse. Until then I would prefer we err on the side of caution. Btw it's not just methane, they actually talk about a bunch of other potential issues (like VOCs) in that article. Also, this is nature mag, if you think nature mag is anti-science or climate change denying I'm not sure who else you think is your ally.

dahfizz 8y ago
It's a sad state of affairs when we dismiss everything we don't agree with as some conspiratorial piece of fake news. Yes, that type of content absolutely exists, but we should not let that excuse intellectual dishonesty.
mehrdadn 8y ago
> we could be drastically overestimating Would you mind explaining this bit? Besides [1], which hardly changes the big picture and came out literally last month, what evidence have you seen in the last couple decades of following climate change that suggest to you that the likelihood that we have been "drastically overestimating" the rate is anything comparable to the likelihood that we have been correct (if not underestimating)? From as far back as I can remember, the predictions have only stayed about the same or gotten more dire. They used to say weather patterns would get more intense, with more storms etc., and they indeed have. They say sea levels would rise and I really have no reason to believe they cannot calculate the rise correctly. I would think that if climate scientists had no idea what they're talking about, we could point to their erroneous predictions and prove them wrong? [1] https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/03/one-part-of-greenland-ice-growing/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/03/one-p...
- ramraj07 8y ago
  I definitely am not refuting the estimates by climate scientists about our worsening climate rates; I will totally assume that the rate they suggest is the expected value until proven otherwise. However, I will also not be surprised if things get far worse extremely fast, or if they actually suddenly start getting better (or slowing down). My only rationale for this belief is that as we go into warmer and warmer climate, we are also going into a territory that the scientists themselves have no real data for - literally uncharted territory. I'm sure they have run models to extrapolate their predictions but the actual fact that we are already experiencing climate that has not been seen for however amount of time means any prediction has to be taken with a slight grain of salt. Practically speaking, we always hear of the finding that global warming might release methane bodies or it's turning into a runaway chain reaction. We don't even know how many other chain reaction scenarios exist that have not even been considered. Similarly (though with orders of magnitude less likelihood even for me), there exists possibilities that excessive warming into uncharted temperatures might trigger some feedback that might slow this warming too. I'm not counting on it but I am not ready to % exclude it yet either.

dahfizz 8y ago

It's a sad state of affairs when we dismiss everything we don't agree with as some conspiratorial piece of fake news. Yes, that type of content absolutely exists, but we should not let that excuse intellectual dishonesty.

mehrdadn 8y ago

> we could be drastically overestimating Would you mind explaining this bit? Besides [1], which hardly changes the big picture and came out literally last month, what evidence have you seen in the last couple decades of following climate change that suggest to you that the likelihood that we have been "drastically overestimating" the rate is anything comparable to the likelihood that we have been correct (if not underestimating)? From as far back as I can remember, the predictions have only stayed about the same or gotten more dire. They used to say weather patterns would get more intense, with more storms etc., and they indeed have. They say sea levels would rise and I really have no reason to believe they cannot calculate the rise correctly. I would think that if climate scientists had no idea what they're talking about, we could point to their erroneous predictions and prove them wrong? [1] https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/03/one-part-of-greenland-ice-growing/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/03/one-p...

ramraj07 8y ago
I definitely am not refuting the estimates by climate scientists about our worsening climate rates; I will totally assume that the rate they suggest is the expected value until proven otherwise. However, I will also not be surprised if things get far worse extremely fast, or if they actually suddenly start getting better (or slowing down). My only rationale for this belief is that as we go into warmer and warmer climate, we are also going into a territory that the scientists themselves have no real data for - literally uncharted territory. I'm sure they have run models to extrapolate their predictions but the actual fact that we are already experiencing climate that has not been seen for however amount of time means any prediction has to be taken with a slight grain of salt. Practically speaking, we always hear of the finding that global warming might release methane bodies or it's turning into a runaway chain reaction. We don't even know how many other chain reaction scenarios exist that have not even been considered. Similarly (though with orders of magnitude less likelihood even for me), there exists possibilities that excessive warming into uncharted temperatures might trigger some feedback that might slow this warming too. I'm not counting on it but I am not ready to % exclude it yet either.