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> the real problem is in other countries It's worse than that. And this always receives a negative reaction...yet this is the truth nobody seems to want to ta

> the real problem is in other countries It's worse than that. And this always receives a negative reaction...yet this is the truth nobody seems to want to talk about save a very few brave researchers: We can't do a thing about it. Period. I've written about this many times. This isn't about denying climate change or our contribution to atmospheric CO2 concentration --that would be silly, it's as real as it gets. This is about pulling our heads out of the sand to take a look at the data in order to understand what it is screaming at us very loudly. It goes something like this: If humanity --all of us-- left the planet tomorrow and we took all of our technology, cars, planes, buildings --everything-- with us...it would take somewhere in the range of 50K to 100K years for atmospheric CO2 to come down by 100 ppm (which is roughly what we need). This isn't me saying it. This is the very accurate data we have. We know, with a very high degree of certainty, what the atmosphere looked like and how long it took for CO2 to increase and decrease when humanity was but a bunch of apes on trees. This data is provided to us by the 800,000 years of ice core atmospheric data we already have. Ice core atmospheric composition sampling is a highly accurate way to learn about what the atmosphere looked like in the past. And, again, to be redundant, we have data going back 800,000 years. This means we KNOW how the atmosphere behaved when we were not here. This also means we KNOW how it will behave is we all left. If it takes the planet 50,000 to 100,000 years for a 100 ppm reduction there's NOTHING we can do at a small scale (solar panels world-wide, stop using cars, stop using planes, ban all fossil fuels, etc.) that will accelerate the slope at all. If we stay on the planet the rate of change is GREATER than 50K to 100K for 100 ppm, because we are contributing more CO2 to the equation. Please don't take my word for it. Look at the data and you should have the same revelation about this issue I had many years ago. This does not mean we should not make an effort to clean-up our act, there are many reasons for which this is a good idea and none of them anything to do with climate change. I does mean we need to not lie to ourselves and start having real conversations about this stuff rather than, on the one hand, denying it, and, on the other, thinking we can actually affect planetary scale problems with truly insignificant measures. Hint: Everything is insignificant when compared to humanity leaving the planet. Both extreme positions are unreasonable and delusional. Finally, a problem: Scientists, researchers, don't want to talk about this reality because their careers would be over if they did. At the very least their grants would evaporate. This is a terrible side-effect of the religion climate change has become. We need to free our researchers so that they can be honest about what we know and we can put them to work on how to deal with reality. Here's were you will find the 800,000 years of ice core data: https://cdiac.ess-dive.lbl.gov/images/air_bubbles_historical.jpg https://cdiac.ess-dive.lbl.gov/images/air_bubbles_historical... https://cdiac.ess-dive.lbl.gov/trends/co2/ice_core_co2.html https://cdiac.ess-dive.lbl.gov/trends/co2/ice_core_co2.html Here's a paper that explains why it is that atmospheric CO2 will continue to rise exponentially even if we switch the the most optimal forms of renewable energy world-wide: https://storage.googleapis.com/pub-tools-public-publication-data/pdf/43326.pdf https://storage.googleapis.com/pub-tools-public-publication-... I have looked into this issue in depth and I have yet to find any argument or proposed solution that can do better than all of humanity leaving the planet, which is to say we can't fix it. We better start talking about how to live with it soon rather than propose ridiculous "solutions" that are far more likely to kill us all than fix anything.

triceratops 7y ago
Cool so we've moved from "global warming isn't happening" to "it's happening but we can't do anything so let's make the best of it". Going 100% renewable alone isn't enough. We also need afforestation programs and carbon capture programs on a massive scale.
- robomartin 7y ago
  Well, nobody said there's rule that says reality has to align with how we would like things to be. The problem is greater than that. I urge you to read the paper and look at the data. We are talking about planetary scale issues here, which means solving the problem in 50 or 100 years by forcing it (chemically or whatever) is far more likely to kill all life on this planet than to fix anything at all. And, so, sadly, 100% renewable --which is impossible-- and reforestation will not do it either. First of all, aside from the fact that 100% renewable --again, global, planetary scale-- is impossible, we already know that, if we did that, atmospheric CO2 levels would continue to rise exponentially. That's the paper I linked to in my comment. That leaves reforestation. So, we start with atmospheric CO2 continuing to rise exponentially and want trees to fix it. Here's the other dose of reality, which comes from a simple question: How did the planet "fix it" on its own when we were not around? Simple: - Trees grew - Storms, cyclones, hurricanes, rain And it took 50,000 to 100,000 years for that to drop atmospheric CO2 by 100 ppm. Again, please, don't take my word for it, I'm just another delusional moron, go look at the data and challenge that. I'd be very interested in learning I am wrong and how. The other question is: How did the planet cause CO2 levels to rise? Simple: - Massive continental scale fires burning for tens of thousands of years Look at what's going on in Australia. Even with all of our technology we can't stop it. I have no idea how much CO2 got injected into the atmosphere so far but it can't be trivial. Now imagine that at a global scale, with massive country and continent scale fires raging unimpeded. That's how the planet did it. Which brings me back to the reforestation issue. Yes, we need to restore the Amazon and other areas. What we've done is criminal. However, we are not going to fix the problem in 100 years by doing this. We can't. The other danger is, once again, fires. If we plant trees on every available square meter --assuming that was possible-- we would be creating massive amounts of fuel for fires much larger than what we are seeing in Australia. In other words, just planting trees isn't a solution at all, and doing it without an understanding of the dangers involved could kill more life on earth than the alternatives. It's a very difficult problem. I don't claim to have any solution. All I know is that we are not discussing the truth. All we have are two religious camps, one saying it isn't real and the other saying we have to destroy entire economies to fix it in 50 years. Both are crazy.

triceratops 7y ago

Cool so we've moved from "global warming isn't happening" to "it's happening but we can't do anything so let's make the best of it". Going 100% renewable alone isn't enough. We also need afforestation programs and carbon capture programs on a massive scale.

robomartin 7y ago
Well, nobody said there's rule that says reality has to align with how we would like things to be. The problem is greater than that. I urge you to read the paper and look at the data. We are talking about planetary scale issues here, which means solving the problem in 50 or 100 years by forcing it (chemically or whatever) is far more likely to kill all life on this planet than to fix anything at all. And, so, sadly, 100% renewable --which is impossible-- and reforestation will not do it either. First of all, aside from the fact that 100% renewable --again, global, planetary scale-- is impossible, we already know that, if we did that, atmospheric CO2 levels would continue to rise exponentially. That's the paper I linked to in my comment. That leaves reforestation. So, we start with atmospheric CO2 continuing to rise exponentially and want trees to fix it. Here's the other dose of reality, which comes from a simple question: How did the planet "fix it" on its own when we were not around? Simple: - Trees grew - Storms, cyclones, hurricanes, rain And it took 50,000 to 100,000 years for that to drop atmospheric CO2 by 100 ppm. Again, please, don't take my word for it, I'm just another delusional moron, go look at the data and challenge that. I'd be very interested in learning I am wrong and how. The other question is: How did the planet cause CO2 levels to rise? Simple: - Massive continental scale fires burning for tens of thousands of years Look at what's going on in Australia. Even with all of our technology we can't stop it. I have no idea how much CO2 got injected into the atmosphere so far but it can't be trivial. Now imagine that at a global scale, with massive country and continent scale fires raging unimpeded. That's how the planet did it. Which brings me back to the reforestation issue. Yes, we need to restore the Amazon and other areas. What we've done is criminal. However, we are not going to fix the problem in 100 years by doing this. We can't. The other danger is, once again, fires. If we plant trees on every available square meter --assuming that was possible-- we would be creating massive amounts of fuel for fires much larger than what we are seeing in Australia. In other words, just planting trees isn't a solution at all, and doing it without an understanding of the dangers involved could kill more life on earth than the alternatives. It's a very difficult problem. I don't claim to have any solution. All I know is that we are not discussing the truth. All we have are two religious camps, one saying it isn't real and the other saying we have to destroy entire economies to fix it in 50 years. Both are crazy.