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> As the article says, climate change won't destroy human civilization. It's likely climate change itself won't destroy human civilization. Food shortages, mas

> As the article says, climate change won't destroy human civilization. It's likely climate change itself won't destroy human civilization. Food shortages, massive wildfires (which climate change contribute to), rising sea levels, and changing weather patterns will have huge and unpredictable effects on global politics. What the downstream effects of those changes will be is extremely hard to predict, but the chances of a nightmare outcome are far greater than the chances civilization will remain largely unchanged over the next 20-30 years. The good news is the most likely scenario is things will just keep getting shittier slowly and we'll avoid any sort of apocalypse. We'll just leave our grandkids a super-shitty world. Yay Us!

kindatrue 7y ago
>We'll just leave our grandkids a super-shitty world. But just think of GDP as people continually try to patch the super-shitty world!
- undersuit 7y ago
  Is this a Broken Windows Theory thing?
  - lordnacho 7y ago
    That would make sense. You'd measure GDP, which is a gross figure. But making your life livable again doesn't help your net. Just like if you feel you need bodyguards, are you as well off as someone who spends the same on something he doesn't feel compelled to buy?
asjw 7y ago
> We'll just leave our grandkids a super-shitty world. Yay Us! What if it's exactly what they deserve? Who knows, maybe if we leave an healthy planet with an healthy economy and a bright future, they will colonize and destroy some other civilization...
- bdamm 7y ago
  Is this like saying that hard working people come out of traumatic childhoods, so we should be sure to throw some trauma into all children's experience? I think they deserve as much of a chance as we had. Here we are almost 80 years after WWII and we're still seeing the effects of that calamity. This stuff doesn't just go away, it goes away with a lot of work, work that we may not be able to afford. That is pretty bleak.
- givinguflac 7y ago
  If you want others to suffer as you've suffered because you turned out alright, you did not turn out alright.
ratboy666 7y ago
Did you actually READ the article. The article stated that the situation is good, and getting better. "The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) forecasts crop yields increasing 30% by 2050. And the poorest parts of the world, like sub-Saharan Africa, are expected to see increases of 80 to 90%." Yay Us! (to quote you). This is a spectacular outcome. Unless, you don't like people who live in sub-Saharan Africa...
- ball_of_lint 7y ago
  Hopefully there's more to life than having enough food to eat.
- cowmoo728 7y ago
  This doesn't contradict warnings that our current agricultural systems are prone to sudden collapse. Soil erosion, water pollution, changing weather patterns, and over reliance on fertilizer and pesticides in a monoculture environment could cause a precipitous drop in yields over just a few years. We may be over spending from the credit card, so to speak.
- hnmullany 7y ago
  The region most at risk of famine-driven political change is North India - if the wheat growing belt shifts far enough because of climate change there will be massive disruption. African agricultural productivity is so low that proper technical (and institutional) investment can easily cover the expected (large) population growth in the 21st cent. Climate change will be catastrophic if we don't decarbonize sufficiently, but it will not be apocalyptic.
- ogre_codes 7y ago
  Your point seems to be that so long as we can keep shoveling food into people's mouths, the rest of the effects of climate change are irrelevant. That's bullshit. As the climate shifts "natural disasters" increase and make many places less habitable. We're already seeing this now and it's only getting worse. As these places slowly become uninhabitable, people immigrate or die and poor people are on the cusp of that. I suppose this article is from Forbes so it's all about how fairly wealthy people will fair so the chipper attitude makes sense.
tomatotomato37 7y ago
Food shortages aren't going to happen as long as seed companies are still creating GMOs to cheaply grow crops in places that they have no right existing in combined with world superpowers are still subsidizing the hell out of agriculture for bread & circus reasons. You'd lose the small independent farmers growing organic avacodas or whatever but the big staple crops aren't going at risk at all from climate change. Not to say our food production couldn't collapse from a superbug decimating a monculture of wheat or something, but that happening would be completely independent of how healthy Earth's climate is

kindatrue 7y ago

>We'll just leave our grandkids a super-shitty world. But just think of GDP as people continually try to patch the super-shitty world!

undersuit 7y ago
Is this a Broken Windows Theory thing?
- lordnacho 7y ago
  That would make sense. You'd measure GDP, which is a gross figure. But making your life livable again doesn't help your net. Just like if you feel you need bodyguards, are you as well off as someone who spends the same on something he doesn't feel compelled to buy?

asjw 7y ago

> We'll just leave our grandkids a super-shitty world. Yay Us! What if it's exactly what they deserve? Who knows, maybe if we leave an healthy planet with an healthy economy and a bright future, they will colonize and destroy some other civilization...

bdamm 7y ago
Is this like saying that hard working people come out of traumatic childhoods, so we should be sure to throw some trauma into all children's experience? I think they deserve as much of a chance as we had. Here we are almost 80 years after WWII and we're still seeing the effects of that calamity. This stuff doesn't just go away, it goes away with a lot of work, work that we may not be able to afford. That is pretty bleak.
givinguflac 7y ago
If you want others to suffer as you've suffered because you turned out alright, you did not turn out alright.

ratboy666 7y ago

Did you actually READ the article. The article stated that the situation is good, and getting better. "The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) forecasts crop yields increasing 30% by 2050. And the poorest parts of the world, like sub-Saharan Africa, are expected to see increases of 80 to 90%." Yay Us! (to quote you). This is a spectacular outcome. Unless, you don't like people who live in sub-Saharan Africa...

ball_of_lint 7y ago
Hopefully there's more to life than having enough food to eat.
cowmoo728 7y ago
This doesn't contradict warnings that our current agricultural systems are prone to sudden collapse. Soil erosion, water pollution, changing weather patterns, and over reliance on fertilizer and pesticides in a monoculture environment could cause a precipitous drop in yields over just a few years. We may be over spending from the credit card, so to speak.
hnmullany 7y ago
The region most at risk of famine-driven political change is North India - if the wheat growing belt shifts far enough because of climate change there will be massive disruption. African agricultural productivity is so low that proper technical (and institutional) investment can easily cover the expected (large) population growth in the 21st cent. Climate change will be catastrophic if we don't decarbonize sufficiently, but it will not be apocalyptic.
ogre_codes 7y ago
Your point seems to be that so long as we can keep shoveling food into people's mouths, the rest of the effects of climate change are irrelevant. That's bullshit. As the climate shifts "natural disasters" increase and make many places less habitable. We're already seeing this now and it's only getting worse. As these places slowly become uninhabitable, people immigrate or die and poor people are on the cusp of that. I suppose this article is from Forbes so it's all about how fairly wealthy people will fair so the chipper attitude makes sense.

tomatotomato37 7y ago

Food shortages aren't going to happen as long as seed companies are still creating GMOs to cheaply grow crops in places that they have no right existing in combined with world superpowers are still subsidizing the hell out of agriculture for bread & circus reasons. You'd lose the small independent farmers growing organic avacodas or whatever but the big staple crops aren't going at risk at all from climate change. Not to say our food production couldn't collapse from a superbug decimating a monculture of wheat or something, but that happening would be completely independent of how healthy Earth's climate is