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I've come to terms with the fact that nothing is going to stop anthropogenic climate change and we'll just have to adapt to it. It's not a technical problem but
by api 8y ago
I've come to terms with the fact that nothing is going to stop anthropogenic climate change and we'll just have to adapt to it. It's not a technical problem but a political game-theoretic problem.
Major CO2 cuts would require a global all-cooperate (in a game theory sense) scenario and that's unlikely given that the payoff is very high for defecting. This is because global cuts in fossil fuel use would make fossil fuels incredibly cheap, increasing the economic advantage for nations that use them. This is going to be hugely appealing to developing nations with large populations. We already see this with China and India and pretty soon you're going to see it in Africa.
The only way I can see CO2 emission growth halting or reversing is a huge breakthrough in energy generation that results in something dramatically cheaper and easier to deploy and scale than fossil fuel. It would take Mr. Fusion (Back to the Future reference), solar and batteries that are just absolutely dirt cheap, or something equivalently awesome. I don't see anything like this arriving before CO2 hits 800-1000ppm.
We are pretty adaptable. A bio professor of mine was fond of saying that humans are like cockroaches and that this was a compliment coming from a biologist. We should be preparing to move Miami.
- taffer 8y ago> that's unlikely given that the payoff is very high for defecting. Trade policy (e.g. through the WTO) can be designed in a way that allows countries to internalise the damage caused by greenhouse gas emissions by imposing higher tariffs on countries that do not cooperate.
- ls612 8y agoBut you still need everyone else to cooperate. And in a multipolar world (or at least a world with some viable political blocs outside of the US led order) that will be difficult to say the least.
- sooheon 8y agoWhat makes you think the US is not the defector?
- api 8y agoMost of the world is defecting at the moment. Few are truly serious about cutting emissions dramatically. The US is relatively high (but by no means the highest) in per capita CO2 while China is the #1 emitter in total and also per dollar GDP (last I checked). The per dollar GDP number would make China the largest emitter in terms of carbon intensity of its economic activity.
- incangold 8y agoI’m too tired to respond in detail but this underestimates the scale of the problem. There is no “adapting” to the scenario if we don’t stop kicking out CO2. We’re talking billions dead and most large species extinct, over the course of decades at most, depending on how quickly the planet flips from one steady state to the next.
- jbay808 8y agoSea level rise would be no problem. Storms would be no problem. But it's hard to imagine how we could possibly adapt to the worst case scenario, which would be if runaway feedbacks triggered conditions similar to early mass extinctions... This old article from ScientificAmerican still keeps me up at night. http://burro.case.edu/Academics/USNA229/impactfromthedeep.pdf http://burro.case.edu/Academics/USNA229/impactfromthedeep.pd...
- incangold 8y agoExactly this. It scares the life out of me that even on HN, a community of generally scientifically-engaged people, the scale of the problem is often not understood. We are literally looking at the end of civilisation as currently constituted, and billions dead, and we are not doing anything close to enough.
- r00fus 8y agoYou're ignoring the gun about to go off: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis We already see ocean acidification and warming - if that triggers the release of methane deposits stored under the ocean, that's a potential extinction-level event (or at least a civilization reset back to the stone ages).
- api 8y agoI don't disagree that there are huge risks. I just don't think anyone is taking those potential massive risks seriously, and that includes a substantial number of environmentalists and the leaders of most of the world. Another thing that might cause change to actually happen is if we're "lucky" enough to get a "minor" catastrophe that totally changes global opinion but isn't anywhere near as massive as the stuff you're talking about.