12 ms·

Siberian heatwave of 2020 almost impossible without climate change

88 points by tannhaeuser 6y ago

skymer 6y ago
The title understates the authors' actual claim: "We found ... that this event would have effectively been impossible without human-induced climate change." If someone wants to take the time to read the whole 35-page study, it would be interesting to know whether "human-induced climate change" is now just a synonym for "climate change", or is part of their research.
- MCOfficer 6y ago
  Unverified guess: it's to distinguish the rapid climate change happening since the 1850s from the slow, natural climate change that has been known to happen over millennia.
EGreg 6y ago
I know we have been gaslighted a lot by the right wing about climate change, but honestly, what can we do about it? The current lockdowns and limits on travel achieved the largest drop in fossil fuel usage probably ever done in human history. As people choose to work from home, and as more people go vegan, these trends may continue. And? We need carbon sequestration, maybe. PS: will the sun entering a cooling period have any serious effect at all on Earth?
- zajd 6y ago
  lol
- take_a_breath 6y ago
  ==As people choose to work from home, and as more people go vegan, these trends may continue. And?== Neither of these things are guaranteed to continue after COVID passes. More Westerners going vegan doesn’t automatically lower emissions if people in developing countries continue to grow their meat intake. On the flip side, if people move out of urban cores and increase online shopping, those might have a negative impact on emissions. Edit: Seems like people are misinterpreting the "negative impact on emissions". By that phrase, I meant that more personalized delivery and suburban living may very well lead to an increase in emissions. Apologies for the confusion.
  - zeroonetwothree 6y ago
    Online shopping is way more efficient than in person shopping. Not only is the net transit time shorter, but stores are very costly in terms of energy use and logistics.
    - tannhaeuser 6y ago
      Citations please. Delivery services driving items around, with laws even mandating full money-back without questions asked in eg Germany (inviting people to order clothes in a couple of candidate sizes and lots of retoure) are heavy on emissions as well.
  - EGreg 6y ago
    People moving out of urban cores increases emissions, because they now have to build and heat/cool more homes, and most importantly — commute to work. Suburbia is probably one of the biggest contributors to fossil fuel usage.
    - claydavisss 6y ago
      Yet the ruling class continues to willfully induce a migration out of dense urban cores by permitting and accelerating their decay. Reduction in law enforcement is just one more move in that direction, following a decades-long regime of permissive attitudes towards homelessness. They want us out of cities, so we're out.
    - take_a_breath 6y ago
      We agree, it was a poorly written phrase. Please see the edit.
  - Larrikin 6y ago
    How does needing a car to go everywhere in a rural or suburban environment decrease emissions?
    - take_a_breath 6y ago
- daliusd 6y ago
  And there are many more ideas what can be done: https://drawdown.org/solutions https://drawdown.org/solutions
- jl6 6y ago
  Two kids max. Plant-based diet. Treat others kindly.
  - gspr 6y ago
    > Two kids max. Luckily, it's becoming increasingly clear that that part will sort itself out without any kind of draconian China-style laws to forcibly limit family sizes: https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30677-2 https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30677-2 That the population is developing in manageable ways in most of the world is one of the good news that will really help us on our way. The recipe is well-known by now: give women control over their own bodies and their own lives, and provide a social safety net that at a minimum is strong enough that having a large amount of children as an insurance stops making sense. IT WORKS :-)
    - raxxorrax 6y ago
      He, this is realized in the country I live in and we import migrants to stabilize our heavily ailing pension system.
    - lopmotr 6y ago
      It's not manageable, it's below replacement which is a risk of disaster if it's not increased. It seems we need poverty to make new humans and we're running out of poverty.
      - gspr 6y ago
        What? The Earth has plenty of humans. We're decades away from a falling population globally, and even then we probably have centuries to bring birth rates back up before disaster strikes (well, disaster with underpopulation as its cause). Also, bringing the rates back up should be easy enough when needed.
      - jl6 6y ago
        2 is only just below replacement rate, which means a manageable gradual reduction rather than the demographic cliff-edge of 0 or 1 or the unsustainable boundless growth of 3+. At that rate it will be centuries before the world starts running out of people - plenty of time to anticipate and start planning more kids again.
- mistrial9 6y ago
  According to a 2017 Scoping Plan published by the California Air Resources Board, the overall challenge in this part of the world breaks down into activity sectors, and then change or mitigation on the activity in those sectors. Ironically, you are speaking your concern at a time when there is actually a new chance for movement in the positive direction. This particular report is easily found at the CARB website as scoping_plan_2017.pdf
- zentiggr 6y ago
  It feels to me like too many conservatives identify with the goal of simply having or making the most money, and damn any other consequences. How do we demonize greed / powerlust, and make cooperative goals more attractive?
  - alfred564 6y ago
    How about teaching of Jesus? Would they listen?
- tannhaeuser 6y ago
  For a start, we could look into investing corona-induced stimulus funds sustainably (rather than, say, subsidizing air travel). Only last year, Fridays for Future protests were a thing in many parts of the world. Today, it seems we're busy longing for yesterday. All the while the young FfF generation will have to pay back in one way or another. The perspective to take away something positive from coronavirus could go a long way towards political support for sustainability.
- raxxorrax 6y ago
  I fear it would require redefining the goals of our economies. I don't see that happening in reality though. A CO2 tax can help a bit, but even that would not change rising emission levels too much. The costs would just be countered by more growth. It isn't just that everything gets a little too hot, we also generally use too many resources: https://www.overshootday.org/ https://www.overshootday.org/ Working from home obviously helps, but transportation is almost inconsequential. I think it is responsible for around 15% of emissions and that includes every form of logistic emitter. Individual traffic doesn't help but wouldn't necessarily be an issue and people are dependent on it outside of the largest cities. Agriculture on the other hand is one of the largest factors next to power generation. If every developing country reaches the industrial stage, we will surely fail hard. So technological transfer to developing countries is a necessity, so they can skip this development state for greener alternatives. That is an obligation developed countries need to acknowledge. Technological progress can help too, but I don't think it is a good idea to depend on it alone.
  - jeffbee 6y ago
    In the USA transportation is 30% of carbon emissions and in California, where at least some nominal progress has been made toward carbon emissions from utilities, transportation is over 40%.
    - raxxorrax 6y ago
      Crazy. Is there a breakdown for these? Maybe due to large airports or giant logistic centres? Or perhaps California emits few CO2 so that is has become a larger factor percentage wise?
      - jeffbee 6y ago
        For California it's the latter: the denominator has gotten smaller while transportation has stayed flat. It's a mistake to try to blame it on trucks and airports. Private passenger cars are the majority. Air travel is 25x smaller. https://ww3.arb.ca.gov/cc/inventory/pubs/reports/2000_2017/ghg_inventory_trends_00-17.pdf https://ww3.arb.ca.gov/cc/inventory/pubs/reports/2000_2017/g...
- bmn__ 6y ago
  > I know we have been gaslighted a lot by the right wing about climate change, but honestly, what can we do about it? Just don't listen to them? This isn't rocket surgery. Once you realise something is propaganda and false narratives, it becomes easy to avoid it or point out to others who might be more susceptible.
- ericvanular 6y ago
  Hey EGreg, we're generating ideas, sharing feedback, and building climate solutions over at https://collective.energy https://collective.energy if you'd like to join a community of no-nonsense doers
novaRom 6y ago
Global warming is more complex. For example, we have extremely cold summer with lowest night temperatures under 10°C even in July (average low of last years is at least 14°C).
- mempko 6y ago
  Worldwide , the summer is one of the hottest on record. It's only colder in parts of North America
  - alvarlagerlof 6y ago
    Pretty damn cold here in Sweden too
  - rangibaby 6y ago
    So far it’s noticeably cooler and wetter in the main island of Japan compared to the last few years
    - goblin89 6y ago
      The relationship between climate and weather can be locally counterintuitive. When a lot of ice starts to melt, you get colder weather. At a smaller scale I got acquainted with this paradox as a child—where I grew up, every spring temperatures drop substantially for a period of time as rivers and lesser ice caps unfreeze. “Why is it getting colder?” “Because it is getting hotter!” At larger scales, if say parts of Arctic melt, that would cool a lot of air, and where this airmass ends up there will be cold weather.
- jacquesm 6y ago
  You are confusing weather and climate.
  - doublesCs 6y ago
    > You are confusing weather and climate. As a non-native english speaker, I wasn't aware these were different things, and you didn't clarify. Could you explain the difference insofar as it's related to this conversation? The dictionary didn't help much; they still look like synonyms to me. Weather[1] 1 : the state of the atmosphere with respect to heat or cold, wetness or dryness, calm or storm, clearness or cloudiness Climate[2] 1 : a region of the earth having specified climatic conditions 2 : a : the average course or condition of the weather at a place usually over a period of years as exhibited by temperature, wind velocity, and precipitation b : the prevailing set of conditions (as of temperature and humidity) indoors a climate-controlled office 3 : the prevailing influence or environmental conditions characterizing a group or period : atmosphere [1] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/weather https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/weather [2] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/climate https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/climate
SwiftyBug 6y ago
It's unbelievable that we're still trying to convince people that human-caused climate change is a fact. We are doomed.
- cowmoo728 6y ago
  We're still convincing a significant portion of the US population that covid-19 is real. Climate change is dramatically harder in two ways: 1. the timescale is decades and centuries, not weeks and months 2. there is a trillion dollar financial interest against fighting climate change Given what we're seeing with covid-19 and how much harder climate change is to deal with, I'm not optimistic.
  - colmvp 6y ago
    When I was younger, I believed all we needed was to give people information to get a better grasp on reality. That was my optimism about the potential good of the internet: the ability to access a wealth of information. Now that I'm older and have spent a lot of years reading discussion boards, my stance is people will predominantly gravitate towards sources that justify their position regardless of whether their source(s) have been wrong before.
    - dTal 6y ago
      Alas, it's true - people are not perfectly rational reasoning machines, because we aren't superintelligent with the ability to weigh every fact we've ever encountered at once. We rely on heuristics to get by. But the imperviousness of obviously wrong beliefs in the face of what you consider rational evidence should not be taken as license to give up! Consider - if people tend to want to stick to their wrongness in the face of contradictory evidence, the wrongness still had to come from somewhere. All beliefs are caused by something, even if the cause would not meet a scientifically rigorous definition of "evidence". There's always logic in it, even if the logic isn't immediately apparent. For example, "Hard-code the beliefs of the people around you when young" and "Reject evidence that upends a large proportion of your worldview" are both highly logical heuristics that, incidentally, probably aren't nearly as likely to get you stuck in dysfunctional local attractors when attacking problems like "hungry tigers" as opposed to "gigascale global realpolitik". All I'm saying is - don't be too cynical. At the end of the day, the truth still matters, and all we can do is keep plugging away at it. The wall is thick but not impenetrable, and we have come a long way already.
MarvinYork 6y ago
I'm pretty sure that's part of Russia's long-term plan. Thawing out Siberia to get at its natural resources. This was only possible because Western countries could not agree on a climate plan. Thanks to the distractions created by Russia's bot army: Trump, Brexit...
stormdennis 6y ago
Seeing kids swimming in a lake in Siberia, they were having a good time at least. Also I'll long have fond memories of the year 2018. Being snowbound for a week (unprecedented here since 1947) and then a long glorious Summer. Bliss. BTW, I don't have a car any more (I've been solely remote working for 5 years), last time I flew was six years ago so yeah I'm doing my bit for the planet but I'm going to enjoy the good it brings and not worry about it.
- kiliantics 6y ago
  The only way we can really "do our bit" is by actively pushing for systemic change, not by making change on an individual level. Because, unless you make it easier for the average human (not the cushy middle class westerner that can work remotely) not to contribute to greater carbon output, it won't make a difference. Rather than buying long-lasting products as an individuals say (instead of the fast-fashion or planned obsolescence products that most people buy), we could push for legislation that makes those products less available and helps people to buy more natural-resource-efficient-in-the-long-term products. Most people, who are not well off, have no choice but to buy the cheap stuff that breaks soon. Most people have to drive in a carbon-emitting car to work because there is no electrified public transit. Most investors prefer to build products in a cheap way that they can flip fast because it leads to greater returns. Until we can collectively reverse the logic of this system, we will not be "doing our part". We need to be up in arms and posing real challenges to the people in power that could change this situation, until they do change it sufficiently. Protests have not been working, boycotts have not been working. There are not many options left apart from general strikes or all out revolt. As you can see, the youth have actually understood this and have been on a school strike for nearly 2 years. However, this is not a sufficient threat to those in power and it must grow and include everyone else before we will see meaningful change.
  - stormdennis 6y ago
    I'm not a consumer by nature. I spend less than €100 a year on clothes I'd say, I cut my own hair, I wear clothes over and over till they fall apart, I shower a couple of times a week. I'm not middle class by anything other than mentality maybe. The nearest public transport to me is a bus stop 2 miles away with a few buses per day. I coppice trees grow vegetables. The worst I do for the planet is eat meat and drink milk. To be honest I'm a bit tired of listening to lectures from people who in their own lives are green at the margins but think nothing of taking a flight.
eloff 6y ago
I've been thinking that there are a very small number of countries that will hurt less from climate change, possibly even benefiting on the whole. Canada, Russia, the Nordic countries, maybe Mongolia. Because these countries have relatively few vulnerable coastal cities, and a lot of land that's too cold to do much with. Yeah some places will get drier, but some will get wetter too (I think overall it gets wetter, but that doesn't mean much to people in areas that turn into deserts.) Anyway I like to talk to people about it because I've noticed a very visceral reaction among progressives (translation: it gets down-voted on HN) that there could be any "winners" in climate change. It has to be all bad. They might well be right, but I think my point is still valid. Again, I'm not sure these countries will "win" but they'll be relative winners in a game full of negative prizes. If you disagree, engage with me, don't just click on the arrow.
- cyberdrunk 6y ago
  > Canada, Russia, the Nordic countries, maybe Mongolia. Dunno about others, but the Internet says that Russia is worried about the warming, because it thaws the permafrost, which makes the ground in the cold wilderness unstable, which is very dangerous for all the resource extraction and transportation (pipelines) infrastructure that they have in Siberia. Once the now-rock-solid ground starts turning into a swamp, they will have trouble keeping the infra intact.
  - eloff 6y ago
    Yes, that's likely to happen. In Canada as well. But the cost of doing that seems minor compared to the value of so much forests and cropland expanding northward.
    - rbanffy 6y ago
      Well... If temperatures continue rising, there will be a strong push towards abandoning that infrastructure.
      - eloff 6y ago
mtgp1000 6y ago
>In places such as Siberia, a hotter climate can have devastating effects, not just on the local wildlife and people who live there, but also on the world’s climate system as a whole, for example through thawing permafrost, reduced snow cover and melting ice. My biggest issue with climate alarmism is that sources universally consider only the negative outcomes of climate change. Thawing permafrost also opens up an enormous amount of arable and habitable land. Some species will benefit from warmer temperatures and extended ranges (and that's not just insects). Not to mention that neither the change or the rate is unprecedented according to geologic data. The world is very unlikely to end, human migration and economic impact will be gradual (≈100) years, and people need to consider that mitigation of climate change at this point is also not "free" when they ask people to go vegan (yeah, right).
fokinsean 6y ago
I saw this theory floating around. Haven't done much research but it sounds "plausible". Could Siberia warming be due to the ocean around it heating? The magnetic poles have been moving increasingly faster towards Siberia in the last few years. These poles move because of underground streams of the molten core deep below. Could these new flows potentially heat the earth's surface and the ocean above?
trekrich 6y ago
Or maybe this happens over the millions of years the earth has been here!?

88 points by tannhaeuser 6y ago

The title understates the authors' actual claim: "We found ... that this event would have effectively been impossible without human-induced climate change." If someone wants to take the time to read the whole 35-page study, it would be interesting to know whether "human-induced climate change" is now just a synonym for "climate change", or is part of their research.

MCOfficer 6y ago
Unverified guess: it's to distinguish the rapid climate change happening since the 1850s from the slow, natural climate change that has been known to happen over millennia.

EGreg 6y ago

I know we have been gaslighted a lot by the right wing about climate change, but honestly, what can we do about it? The current lockdowns and limits on travel achieved the largest drop in fossil fuel usage probably ever done in human history. As people choose to work from home, and as more people go vegan, these trends may continue. And? We need carbon sequestration, maybe. PS: will the sun entering a cooling period have any serious effect at all on Earth?

zajd 6y ago
lol
take_a_breath 6y ago
==As people choose to work from home, and as more people go vegan, these trends may continue. And?== Neither of these things are guaranteed to continue after COVID passes. More Westerners going vegan doesn’t automatically lower emissions if people in developing countries continue to grow their meat intake. On the flip side, if people move out of urban cores and increase online shopping, those might have a negative impact on emissions. Edit: Seems like people are misinterpreting the "negative impact on emissions". By that phrase, I meant that more personalized delivery and suburban living may very well lead to an increase in emissions. Apologies for the confusion.
- zeroonetwothree 6y ago
  Online shopping is way more efficient than in person shopping. Not only is the net transit time shorter, but stores are very costly in terms of energy use and logistics.
  - tannhaeuser 6y ago
    Citations please. Delivery services driving items around, with laws even mandating full money-back without questions asked in eg Germany (inviting people to order clothes in a couple of candidate sizes and lots of retoure) are heavy on emissions as well.
- EGreg 6y ago
  People moving out of urban cores increases emissions, because they now have to build and heat/cool more homes, and most importantly — commute to work. Suburbia is probably one of the biggest contributors to fossil fuel usage.
  - claydavisss 6y ago
    Yet the ruling class continues to willfully induce a migration out of dense urban cores by permitting and accelerating their decay. Reduction in law enforcement is just one more move in that direction, following a decades-long regime of permissive attitudes towards homelessness. They want us out of cities, so we're out.
  - take_a_breath 6y ago
    We agree, it was a poorly written phrase. Please see the edit.
- Larrikin 6y ago
  How does needing a car to go everywhere in a rural or suburban environment decrease emissions?
  - take_a_breath 6y ago
daliusd 6y ago
And there are many more ideas what can be done: https://drawdown.org/solutions https://drawdown.org/solutions
jl6 6y ago
Two kids max. Plant-based diet. Treat others kindly.
- gspr 6y ago
  > Two kids max. Luckily, it's becoming increasingly clear that that part will sort itself out without any kind of draconian China-style laws to forcibly limit family sizes: https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30677-2 https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30677-2 That the population is developing in manageable ways in most of the world is one of the good news that will really help us on our way. The recipe is well-known by now: give women control over their own bodies and their own lives, and provide a social safety net that at a minimum is strong enough that having a large amount of children as an insurance stops making sense. IT WORKS :-)
  - raxxorrax 6y ago
    He, this is realized in the country I live in and we import migrants to stabilize our heavily ailing pension system.
  - lopmotr 6y ago
    It's not manageable, it's below replacement which is a risk of disaster if it's not increased. It seems we need poverty to make new humans and we're running out of poverty.
    - gspr 6y ago
      What? The Earth has plenty of humans. We're decades away from a falling population globally, and even then we probably have centuries to bring birth rates back up before disaster strikes (well, disaster with underpopulation as its cause). Also, bringing the rates back up should be easy enough when needed.
    - jl6 6y ago
      2 is only just below replacement rate, which means a manageable gradual reduction rather than the demographic cliff-edge of 0 or 1 or the unsustainable boundless growth of 3+. At that rate it will be centuries before the world starts running out of people - plenty of time to anticipate and start planning more kids again.
mistrial9 6y ago
According to a 2017 Scoping Plan published by the California Air Resources Board, the overall challenge in this part of the world breaks down into activity sectors, and then change or mitigation on the activity in those sectors. Ironically, you are speaking your concern at a time when there is actually a new chance for movement in the positive direction. This particular report is easily found at the CARB website as scoping_plan_2017.pdf
zentiggr 6y ago
It feels to me like too many conservatives identify with the goal of simply having or making the most money, and damn any other consequences. How do we demonize greed / powerlust, and make cooperative goals more attractive?
- alfred564 6y ago
  How about teaching of Jesus? Would they listen?
tannhaeuser 6y ago
For a start, we could look into investing corona-induced stimulus funds sustainably (rather than, say, subsidizing air travel). Only last year, Fridays for Future protests were a thing in many parts of the world. Today, it seems we're busy longing for yesterday. All the while the young FfF generation will have to pay back in one way or another. The perspective to take away something positive from coronavirus could go a long way towards political support for sustainability.
raxxorrax 6y ago
I fear it would require redefining the goals of our economies. I don't see that happening in reality though. A CO2 tax can help a bit, but even that would not change rising emission levels too much. The costs would just be countered by more growth. It isn't just that everything gets a little too hot, we also generally use too many resources: https://www.overshootday.org/ https://www.overshootday.org/ Working from home obviously helps, but transportation is almost inconsequential. I think it is responsible for around 15% of emissions and that includes every form of logistic emitter. Individual traffic doesn't help but wouldn't necessarily be an issue and people are dependent on it outside of the largest cities. Agriculture on the other hand is one of the largest factors next to power generation. If every developing country reaches the industrial stage, we will surely fail hard. So technological transfer to developing countries is a necessity, so they can skip this development state for greener alternatives. That is an obligation developed countries need to acknowledge. Technological progress can help too, but I don't think it is a good idea to depend on it alone.
- jeffbee 6y ago
  In the USA transportation is 30% of carbon emissions and in California, where at least some nominal progress has been made toward carbon emissions from utilities, transportation is over 40%.
  - raxxorrax 6y ago
    Crazy. Is there a breakdown for these? Maybe due to large airports or giant logistic centres? Or perhaps California emits few CO2 so that is has become a larger factor percentage wise?
    - jeffbee 6y ago
      For California it's the latter: the denominator has gotten smaller while transportation has stayed flat. It's a mistake to try to blame it on trucks and airports. Private passenger cars are the majority. Air travel is 25x smaller. https://ww3.arb.ca.gov/cc/inventory/pubs/reports/2000_2017/ghg_inventory_trends_00-17.pdf https://ww3.arb.ca.gov/cc/inventory/pubs/reports/2000_2017/g...
bmn__ 6y ago
> I know we have been gaslighted a lot by the right wing about climate change, but honestly, what can we do about it? Just don't listen to them? This isn't rocket surgery. Once you realise something is propaganda and false narratives, it becomes easy to avoid it or point out to others who might be more susceptible.
ericvanular 6y ago
Hey EGreg, we're generating ideas, sharing feedback, and building climate solutions over at https://collective.energy https://collective.energy if you'd like to join a community of no-nonsense doers

novaRom 6y ago

Global warming is more complex. For example, we have extremely cold summer with lowest night temperatures under 10°C even in July (average low of last years is at least 14°C).

mempko 6y ago
Worldwide , the summer is one of the hottest on record. It's only colder in parts of North America
- alvarlagerlof 6y ago
  Pretty damn cold here in Sweden too
- rangibaby 6y ago
  So far it’s noticeably cooler and wetter in the main island of Japan compared to the last few years
  - goblin89 6y ago
    The relationship between climate and weather can be locally counterintuitive. When a lot of ice starts to melt, you get colder weather. At a smaller scale I got acquainted with this paradox as a child—where I grew up, every spring temperatures drop substantially for a period of time as rivers and lesser ice caps unfreeze. “Why is it getting colder?” “Because it is getting hotter!” At larger scales, if say parts of Arctic melt, that would cool a lot of air, and where this airmass ends up there will be cold weather.
jacquesm 6y ago
You are confusing weather and climate.
- doublesCs 6y ago
  > You are confusing weather and climate. As a non-native english speaker, I wasn't aware these were different things, and you didn't clarify. Could you explain the difference insofar as it's related to this conversation? The dictionary didn't help much; they still look like synonyms to me. Weather[1] 1 : the state of the atmosphere with respect to heat or cold, wetness or dryness, calm or storm, clearness or cloudiness Climate[2] 1 : a region of the earth having specified climatic conditions 2 : a : the average course or condition of the weather at a place usually over a period of years as exhibited by temperature, wind velocity, and precipitation b : the prevailing set of conditions (as of temperature and humidity) indoors a climate-controlled office 3 : the prevailing influence or environmental conditions characterizing a group or period : atmosphere [1] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/weather https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/weather [2] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/climate https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/climate

SwiftyBug 6y ago

It's unbelievable that we're still trying to convince people that human-caused climate change is a fact. We are doomed.

cowmoo728 6y ago
We're still convincing a significant portion of the US population that covid-19 is real. Climate change is dramatically harder in two ways: 1. the timescale is decades and centuries, not weeks and months 2. there is a trillion dollar financial interest against fighting climate change Given what we're seeing with covid-19 and how much harder climate change is to deal with, I'm not optimistic.
- colmvp 6y ago
  When I was younger, I believed all we needed was to give people information to get a better grasp on reality. That was my optimism about the potential good of the internet: the ability to access a wealth of information. Now that I'm older and have spent a lot of years reading discussion boards, my stance is people will predominantly gravitate towards sources that justify their position regardless of whether their source(s) have been wrong before.
  - dTal 6y ago
    Alas, it's true - people are not perfectly rational reasoning machines, because we aren't superintelligent with the ability to weigh every fact we've ever encountered at once. We rely on heuristics to get by. But the imperviousness of obviously wrong beliefs in the face of what you consider rational evidence should not be taken as license to give up! Consider - if people tend to want to stick to their wrongness in the face of contradictory evidence, the wrongness still had to come from somewhere. All beliefs are caused by something, even if the cause would not meet a scientifically rigorous definition of "evidence". There's always logic in it, even if the logic isn't immediately apparent. For example, "Hard-code the beliefs of the people around you when young" and "Reject evidence that upends a large proportion of your worldview" are both highly logical heuristics that, incidentally, probably aren't nearly as likely to get you stuck in dysfunctional local attractors when attacking problems like "hungry tigers" as opposed to "gigascale global realpolitik". All I'm saying is - don't be too cynical. At the end of the day, the truth still matters, and all we can do is keep plugging away at it. The wall is thick but not impenetrable, and we have come a long way already.

MarvinYork 6y ago

I'm pretty sure that's part of Russia's long-term plan. Thawing out Siberia to get at its natural resources. This was only possible because Western countries could not agree on a climate plan. Thanks to the distractions created by Russia's bot army: Trump, Brexit...

stormdennis 6y ago

Seeing kids swimming in a lake in Siberia, they were having a good time at least. Also I'll long have fond memories of the year 2018. Being snowbound for a week (unprecedented here since 1947) and then a long glorious Summer. Bliss. BTW, I don't have a car any more (I've been solely remote working for 5 years), last time I flew was six years ago so yeah I'm doing my bit for the planet but I'm going to enjoy the good it brings and not worry about it.

kiliantics 6y ago
The only way we can really "do our bit" is by actively pushing for systemic change, not by making change on an individual level. Because, unless you make it easier for the average human (not the cushy middle class westerner that can work remotely) not to contribute to greater carbon output, it won't make a difference. Rather than buying long-lasting products as an individuals say (instead of the fast-fashion or planned obsolescence products that most people buy), we could push for legislation that makes those products less available and helps people to buy more natural-resource-efficient-in-the-long-term products. Most people, who are not well off, have no choice but to buy the cheap stuff that breaks soon. Most people have to drive in a carbon-emitting car to work because there is no electrified public transit. Most investors prefer to build products in a cheap way that they can flip fast because it leads to greater returns. Until we can collectively reverse the logic of this system, we will not be "doing our part". We need to be up in arms and posing real challenges to the people in power that could change this situation, until they do change it sufficiently. Protests have not been working, boycotts have not been working. There are not many options left apart from general strikes or all out revolt. As you can see, the youth have actually understood this and have been on a school strike for nearly 2 years. However, this is not a sufficient threat to those in power and it must grow and include everyone else before we will see meaningful change.
- stormdennis 6y ago
  I'm not a consumer by nature. I spend less than €100 a year on clothes I'd say, I cut my own hair, I wear clothes over and over till they fall apart, I shower a couple of times a week. I'm not middle class by anything other than mentality maybe. The nearest public transport to me is a bus stop 2 miles away with a few buses per day. I coppice trees grow vegetables. The worst I do for the planet is eat meat and drink milk. To be honest I'm a bit tired of listening to lectures from people who in their own lives are green at the margins but think nothing of taking a flight.

eloff 6y ago

I've been thinking that there are a very small number of countries that will hurt less from climate change, possibly even benefiting on the whole. Canada, Russia, the Nordic countries, maybe Mongolia. Because these countries have relatively few vulnerable coastal cities, and a lot of land that's too cold to do much with. Yeah some places will get drier, but some will get wetter too (I think overall it gets wetter, but that doesn't mean much to people in areas that turn into deserts.) Anyway I like to talk to people about it because I've noticed a very visceral reaction among progressives (translation: it gets down-voted on HN) that there could be any "winners" in climate change. It has to be all bad. They might well be right, but I think my point is still valid. Again, I'm not sure these countries will "win" but they'll be relative winners in a game full of negative prizes. If you disagree, engage with me, don't just click on the arrow.

cyberdrunk 6y ago
> Canada, Russia, the Nordic countries, maybe Mongolia. Dunno about others, but the Internet says that Russia is worried about the warming, because it thaws the permafrost, which makes the ground in the cold wilderness unstable, which is very dangerous for all the resource extraction and transportation (pipelines) infrastructure that they have in Siberia. Once the now-rock-solid ground starts turning into a swamp, they will have trouble keeping the infra intact.
- eloff 6y ago
  Yes, that's likely to happen. In Canada as well. But the cost of doing that seems minor compared to the value of so much forests and cropland expanding northward.
  - rbanffy 6y ago
    Well... If temperatures continue rising, there will be a strong push towards abandoning that infrastructure.
    - eloff 6y ago

mtgp1000 6y ago

>In places such as Siberia, a hotter climate can have devastating effects, not just on the local wildlife and people who live there, but also on the world’s climate system as a whole, for example through thawing permafrost, reduced snow cover and melting ice. My biggest issue with climate alarmism is that sources universally consider only the negative outcomes of climate change. Thawing permafrost also opens up an enormous amount of arable and habitable land. Some species will benefit from warmer temperatures and extended ranges (and that's not just insects). Not to mention that neither the change or the rate is unprecedented according to geologic data. The world is very unlikely to end, human migration and economic impact will be gradual (≈100) years, and people need to consider that mitigation of climate change at this point is also not "free" when they ask people to go vegan (yeah, right).

fokinsean 6y ago

I saw this theory floating around. Haven't done much research but it sounds "plausible". Could Siberia warming be due to the ocean around it heating? The magnetic poles have been moving increasingly faster towards Siberia in the last few years. These poles move because of underground streams of the molten core deep below. Could these new flows potentially heat the earth's surface and the ocean above?

trekrich 6y ago

Or maybe this happens over the millions of years the earth has been here!?