5 ms·

> 15 years is nonsense because it's beyond the time horizon of political office. Future politicians won't feel obligated by their predecessors commitments and c

> 15 years is nonsense because it's beyond the time horizon of political office. Future politicians won't feel obligated by their predecessors commitments and current ones will just kick the can on meaningful action. Living in California over the past month feels apocalyptic. This year isn't isolated and it's likely to repeat, refreshing in voters minds why this policy was put in place.

kristopolous 6y ago
It'll certainly get far worse. The rapidity of the increase has fundamentally destabilized the global climate The Arctic was 65 degrees above average this summer with days reaching over 100. The temperature difference between the latitudes that governed the jet streams and global sea circulation has been fundamentally disrupted That's why you're getting muggy 80 degree nights in California now. Meanwhile that cooling system has wobbled lopsided like a melting hat bringing arctic cold weather and crop failure to a bunch of northern latitudes. In the mid-latitudes, the tropical glaciers in places like the Himalayas that are the water supply for over a billion people are in an accelerating decline causing unprecedented flooding, soil erosion and soon, starvation. Meanwhile ocean acidification is making the bottom of the food chain unable to survive and thus causes a cascading effect leading to a global ocean dieoff. At the same time, the ice sheets are breaking up so rapidly that glaciologists can't even keep up with it and at least one fell to his death this year because things are happening to quickly to survey. And then there's that insect apocalypse. All the while humans are making bold proclamations and patting themselves on the back while they point fingers at the "other countries" as if it's a game. Global feedbacks due to the emissions have chains of effects that can be mapped out over decades. If we magically stopped all emission right now, there's still years of warming and disaster baked in until any kind of stability (reversal in our lifetime is frankly out of the question) We're not doing that though. Instead, pipelines slated to last 40 years are being constructed as I type this. Exploratory missions for drilling that wouldn't even start until years from now are still being done. More coal power plants were funded and greenlit just last month. They won't even start until years from now. We're still committing ourselves to an oil future despite all of this. Over half the greenhouse gases were emitted After we started the annual global climate summits. It has done effectively nothing. So yes, things will be getting worse. These are the good days. Look up "alien resurrection deleted ending"... Except for the space crafts, I don't think the depiction is inaccurate unless we take major life altering action immediately. The window to start an "ambitious" 15-year transition closed somewhere around 1990. The world will eventually recover. The carbon dioxide emitted from the car that just rolled down the street, 90% of it will finally be gone in 100,000 years. The coral reef will recover in 2,000,000 years from the ocean acidification since 1950. We'll get to a level of biodiversity equal to 1930 by about 10,000,000AD. Even the amount of fossil fuels we burned in the past 200 years will eventually come back in 400,000,000 years --- but that's only if we somehow stop today. We're not doing that.
- ogre_codes 6y ago
  > but that's only if we somehow stop today. We're not doing that. There is literally nothing we can do to stop what's going to happen over the next hundred years. Elimination of emissions and massive investment in CO2 capture over the next hundred years might make the next hundred less terrible? So my philosophy is to try and enjoy what we have as much as I possibly can and vote and support what little change I can. Sadly, as climate declines, I suspect there will be a negative feedback loop. Economies will decline and the capability & willpower to invest in the future will decline along with the funds needed to improve the world.
  - kristopolous 6y ago
    We have a responsibility to those not yet born to shepherd this world. I wish for future generations to look back at our time and say it was humanity's finest hour. It's our duty to be nothing less. Our time is now, we are our only hope.
    - ogre_codes 6y ago
      > I wish for future generations to look back at our time and say it was humanity's finest hour. Finest hour? It's 90 seconds to midnight... if we're gonna shine, we don't have an hour! I'm with you though.
    - raytracer 6y ago
      It's possible to actively support positive change at the same time as having little hope our collective actions will avert catastrophic climate change.
  - dimnsionofsound 6y ago
    Agreed. I'm not having kids and trying not to get too down on the daily about the future of our species. Based on what I know about human nature I see almost no realistic way out of this without some sort of technological deus-ex-machina to come and save us.
- raytracer 6y ago
syshum 6y ago
This year problems also was not caused by Climate Change (at least not the primary cause) but rather decades and decades of Poor forest management and poor infrastructure maintenance which has nothing to do with eliminating gas burning cars. Even if you reverse all carbon output today, if you do not change the forest management you will still have massive fires, and if you do not improve infrastructure maintenance you are still going to have brown outs and black outs in summer
- kristopolous 6y ago
  Ok, why then are the largest fires in Russia, Australia, Canada, and Bolivia? Is that also bad management from the Democrats? Cool let's look at US only, because that will be your reply. We have the 2004 Alaska fire, the 2017 Montana wildfire or the fires in Idaho and Georgia in 2007 that were over 500,000 acres. Are those also meddling Democrats and Environmentalists? What about the largest fire in Kansas history that went into Oklahoma in 2016. The largest fire in Utah was in 2007 as well. When doing a proper survey, there's literally not a shred of empirical evidence to back your claim. This is a global phenomena exhibiting exactly zero bias towards any particular political party. We're at the anger/bargaining stage of denialism with some people. Which is fine, but it shouldn't be used as a basis for public policy.
  - syshum 6y ago
    I never claimed a political party was to blame, and It is not a CA only problem, the US Forest Service has had decades of bad management as well under both Republicans and Democrats It is a GOVERNMENT problem, both parties are terrible. >>We have the 2004 Alaska fire, the 2017 Montana wildfire or the fires in Idaho and Georgia in 2007 that were over 500,000 acres Isnt that kinda of the point, the claim is that Climate change is the cause, but fires of this kind have been happening for decades Fire happen in forests, and proper forest management will lessen their impact (it will not prevent them) Forest fires have been happening since before humans existed on this plant, and they will continue to happen long after we have killed ourselves with our own stupidity
    - 6y ago

kristopolous 6y ago

It'll certainly get far worse. The rapidity of the increase has fundamentally destabilized the global climate The Arctic was 65 degrees above average this summer with days reaching over 100. The temperature difference between the latitudes that governed the jet streams and global sea circulation has been fundamentally disrupted That's why you're getting muggy 80 degree nights in California now. Meanwhile that cooling system has wobbled lopsided like a melting hat bringing arctic cold weather and crop failure to a bunch of northern latitudes. In the mid-latitudes, the tropical glaciers in places like the Himalayas that are the water supply for over a billion people are in an accelerating decline causing unprecedented flooding, soil erosion and soon, starvation. Meanwhile ocean acidification is making the bottom of the food chain unable to survive and thus causes a cascading effect leading to a global ocean dieoff. At the same time, the ice sheets are breaking up so rapidly that glaciologists can't even keep up with it and at least one fell to his death this year because things are happening to quickly to survey. And then there's that insect apocalypse. All the while humans are making bold proclamations and patting themselves on the back while they point fingers at the "other countries" as if it's a game. Global feedbacks due to the emissions have chains of effects that can be mapped out over decades. If we magically stopped all emission right now, there's still years of warming and disaster baked in until any kind of stability (reversal in our lifetime is frankly out of the question) We're not doing that though. Instead, pipelines slated to last 40 years are being constructed as I type this. Exploratory missions for drilling that wouldn't even start until years from now are still being done. More coal power plants were funded and greenlit just last month. They won't even start until years from now. We're still committing ourselves to an oil future despite all of this. Over half the greenhouse gases were emitted After we started the annual global climate summits. It has done effectively nothing. So yes, things will be getting worse. These are the good days. Look up "alien resurrection deleted ending"... Except for the space crafts, I don't think the depiction is inaccurate unless we take major life altering action immediately. The window to start an "ambitious" 15-year transition closed somewhere around 1990. The world will eventually recover. The carbon dioxide emitted from the car that just rolled down the street, 90% of it will finally be gone in 100,000 years. The coral reef will recover in 2,000,000 years from the ocean acidification since 1950. We'll get to a level of biodiversity equal to 1930 by about 10,000,000AD. Even the amount of fossil fuels we burned in the past 200 years will eventually come back in 400,000,000 years --- but that's only if we somehow stop today. We're not doing that.

ogre_codes 6y ago
> but that's only if we somehow stop today. We're not doing that. There is literally nothing we can do to stop what's going to happen over the next hundred years. Elimination of emissions and massive investment in CO2 capture over the next hundred years might make the next hundred less terrible? So my philosophy is to try and enjoy what we have as much as I possibly can and vote and support what little change I can. Sadly, as climate declines, I suspect there will be a negative feedback loop. Economies will decline and the capability & willpower to invest in the future will decline along with the funds needed to improve the world.
- kristopolous 6y ago
  We have a responsibility to those not yet born to shepherd this world. I wish for future generations to look back at our time and say it was humanity's finest hour. It's our duty to be nothing less. Our time is now, we are our only hope.
  - ogre_codes 6y ago
    > I wish for future generations to look back at our time and say it was humanity's finest hour. Finest hour? It's 90 seconds to midnight... if we're gonna shine, we don't have an hour! I'm with you though.
  - raytracer 6y ago
    It's possible to actively support positive change at the same time as having little hope our collective actions will avert catastrophic climate change.
- dimnsionofsound 6y ago
  Agreed. I'm not having kids and trying not to get too down on the daily about the future of our species. Based on what I know about human nature I see almost no realistic way out of this without some sort of technological deus-ex-machina to come and save us.
raytracer 6y ago

syshum 6y ago

This year problems also was not caused by Climate Change (at least not the primary cause) but rather decades and decades of Poor forest management and poor infrastructure maintenance which has nothing to do with eliminating gas burning cars. Even if you reverse all carbon output today, if you do not change the forest management you will still have massive fires, and if you do not improve infrastructure maintenance you are still going to have brown outs and black outs in summer

kristopolous 6y ago
Ok, why then are the largest fires in Russia, Australia, Canada, and Bolivia? Is that also bad management from the Democrats? Cool let's look at US only, because that will be your reply. We have the 2004 Alaska fire, the 2017 Montana wildfire or the fires in Idaho and Georgia in 2007 that were over 500,000 acres. Are those also meddling Democrats and Environmentalists? What about the largest fire in Kansas history that went into Oklahoma in 2016. The largest fire in Utah was in 2007 as well. When doing a proper survey, there's literally not a shred of empirical evidence to back your claim. This is a global phenomena exhibiting exactly zero bias towards any particular political party. We're at the anger/bargaining stage of denialism with some people. Which is fine, but it shouldn't be used as a basis for public policy.
- syshum 6y ago
  I never claimed a political party was to blame, and It is not a CA only problem, the US Forest Service has had decades of bad management as well under both Republicans and Democrats It is a GOVERNMENT problem, both parties are terrible. >>We have the 2004 Alaska fire, the 2017 Montana wildfire or the fires in Idaho and Georgia in 2007 that were over 500,000 acres Isnt that kinda of the point, the claim is that Climate change is the cause, but fires of this kind have been happening for decades Fire happen in forests, and proper forest management will lessen their impact (it will not prevent them) Forest fires have been happening since before humans existed on this plant, and they will continue to happen long after we have killed ourselves with our own stupidity
  - 6y ago