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The “good news” here is that probabilities of 6C warming are reduced from what they have been historically. If you’re paying any attention you are aware that 6C

• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• the-dude 5y ago
  > Indeed we are already seeing strong negative effects from warming I keep reading this over and over, everywhere. Yet sea level rise at the Dutch coast has not accelerated and is at a steady 1.5-2mm/yr for over a century. https://www.klimaatfeiten.nl/gevolgen/zeespiegel/nederland-zee https://www.klimaatfeiten.nl/gevolgen/zeespiegel/nederland-z...
  • sailingparrot 5y ago
    It's a dynamic and complex system, not all metrics tracking the consequences of climate change will be evolving in perfect synchrony, and they will not change everywhere in the same way. Also sea level does not rise equally all around the globe: "Sea level rise at specific locations may be more or less than the global average due to local factors such as land subsidence from natural processes and withdrawal of groundwater and fossil fuels, changes in regional ocean currents, and whether the land is still rebounding from the compressive weight of Ice Age glaciers." [1] Looking at a single metric from a single place is quite shallow reasoning. Ask a Canadian if they are already seeing strong negative effects from warming and you will get the exact opposite reaction from you after what happened there over the last year. [1]: https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/sealevel.html https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/sealevel.html
    • GekkePrutser 5y ago
      Not just Canada. I'm the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany there were massive river floods this year leading to great loss of life. The Netherlands had more physical mitigations so was spared the deaths but it was still a disaster
    • the-dude 5y ago
      Yet nobody seems to produce sea level graphs with an accelerating trend from anywhere. Yet for the The Netherlands we have 4 measuring stations which are consistent. Your link only mentions 'and the rate has increased in recent decades' but then only talks about sea level rise. Nobody is disputing sea level is rising : we have exited an ice age. And before you accuse me of shallow reasoning : why don't you come up with the graphs?
      • sailingparrot 5y ago
        > "And before you accuse me of shallow reasoning : why don't you come up with the graphs?" Because that's irrelevant to my point? That sea level is rising or not, and specifically in The Netherlands at that, cannot reasonably be used as a proxy to decide whether or not we are globally starting to feel the consequence of global warming. But here is a graph anyway: https://royalsociety.org/topics-policy/projects/climate-change-evidence-causes/question-14/ https://royalsociety.org/topics-policy/projects/climate-chan... And here is another one: https://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/climate-change-global-sea-level https://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/... And here is a quote: "The rate of sea level rise has accelerated considerably relative to the pre-industrial era. Over the twentieth century, global sea level increased at an average rate of about 2 mm yr–1, which is substantially larger than the rate of the previous three millennia. Furthermore, evidence now exists for additional acceleration during the twentieth century" [2] But I see you are pulling your climate facts from a website that states "The warming is beneficial for people and nature" and "Large-scale use of 'renewable' energy is bad for nature and the environment", so I don't really know why I am bothering arguing with you. [2] https://www.researchgate.net/publication/49588416_Global_Sea_Level_Rise_Recent_Progress_and_Challenges_for_the_Decade_to_Come https://www.researchgate.net/publication/49588416_Global_Sea...
  • thatfrenchguy 5y ago
    « Let me cherry pick one thing that has not gone wrong yet so I don’t have to worry about this » is how you become RIM.
  • sulam 5y ago
    Go back 20 or 30 years and the "story" with warming was sea level rise. However, as we learn more about how ecosystems respond to increased temperatures, we've learned that there's many more things to worry about than whether or not Miami Beach millionaires are going to have to add a floor to their garages. For instance, heat waves are hotter now than they used to be, leading to increased mortality rates in the very young and very old in areas that don't have reliable cooling available. Places like, oh, Paris. Entire populations are being displaced in mountain communities where fresh water came from snow/glacier melt, but now the glacier is gone and the snow doesn't accumulate anymore. Watch this space, because this could easily be a source of water problems in California before long, since most of Northern California's water supply depends on the Sierra snow pack. (Although, real talk: we should just stop giving almost all the water to farmers to grow more almonds). Sea level rise has caused recurrent tidal flooding across the Eastern seaboard and those effects are coming to the West coast and Hawaii next. Because of this, coastal communities are getting their flood plain boundaries redrawn by FEMA, leading to increased home insurance costs and disclosures that directly affect property values. Beetle populations have exploded as they can both overwinter more easily and, in some places, now have two breeding cycles a year instead of one. This in turn means trees are being killed by beetle infestations in NA at a rate that is literally higher than what is burned every year in wildfires. I could go on...
    • bonzini 5y ago
      > areas that don't have reliable cooling available. Places like, oh, Paris Most of Europe has extremely poor cooling of buildings even without AC. Stop making buildings black and add outdoor blinds instead of living in a greenhouse (the kind of stuff that is super common in Mediterranean countries), that will already help a lot. Trying to solve the problem with more electricity is making it worse, not better.
• someguydave 5y ago
  what effects of global warming do we see today, exactly?
  • gameswithgo 5y ago
    warmer temperatures, warmer oceans, more acidic oceans, higher oceans.
  • stevage 5y ago
    More frequent and more damaging bushfires, hurricanes, droughts, heat waves, cold snaps,
  • cranekam 5y ago
    Permanent loss of glaciers, vastly longer fire seasons, melting permafrost, coral bleaching, loss of farmland, etc. And anecdotally winters are just much less cold these days (I’m in Northern Europe).
• coolso 5y ago
  > The “good news” here is that probabilities of 6C warming are reduced from what they have been historically. So I guess it’s a good thing we didn’t listen to the old science and go scorched earth to prevent what they thought would happen. The question becomes, why should people trust or believe the new science any more than the old? What if that’s also greatly exaggerated? Sometimes I wish science were treated more like the fallible concept it is, rather than a religion whose followers can be more fervent than even the most fundamentalist of [insert religion here]
  • sulam 5y ago
    In general, this bias towards preferring data that preserves the status quo vs data that tells us we need to be active in anticipating and mitigating future risks is 1) very human and 2) detrimental to long term success, regardless of the domain in question. I don't blame you for having doubts, and you're probably aware that scientists also have doubts. That doesn't mean they shouldn't do their work, and give us the best information they have with the tools at their disposal. Regarding climate change specifically, I make the point that we are seeing effects already because it neutralizes this line of reasoning entirely. This isn't about some future risk that we can see debated in academic journals of questionable provenance. This is about real effects that are happening today.
  • pl-94 5y ago
    Why do you think it is good thing we waited so long? The carbon budget to not go over 1.5C is now pretty much used. Without aerosols, it is even likely that we have already overshoot 1.5C. Adaption and reduction would have been so much easier if it were better anticipated.
  • rixed 5y ago
    When you base a prediction on something else then science and it turns out to be too alarming, that's exaggerating. When science predicts something that turns out to be too alarming, that's the model being perfectible. What else do you suggest we should trust, if not science?
• mrjangles 5y ago
  > Indeed we are already seeing strong negative effects from warming despite only 1C I think you are spending too much time listening to the media and not enough listening to what academics are saying. Anthropologists have learned to identify historical warming periods in our history because they are characterized by an explosion of human civilization and life on earth around the world. A large part of the reason the earth currently holds 7 billion people without the mass starvation predicted by academics in the 1960s is because of the current warming period that started around 1870. As for current academic thought on there matter, there is a large amount of work that predicts up to 2C of more warming could continue to be beneficial for humans. These facts appear in the IPCC reports as summarized here, for example https://www.netzerowatch.com/richard-tol-moderate-global-warming-is-good-for-the-world/ https://www.netzerowatch.com/richard-tol-moderate-global-war.... Also this recent study predicts up to 3C of warming could be beneficial https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/12/18/3575/htm#B4-energies-12-03575 https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/12/18/3575/htm#B4-energies-12...
  • polotics 5y ago
    Wow, one of these is super old and does not really say what you write it does, the other one only considers heating costs dropping, with no mention of rebuilding burnt houses, replanting forests, etc etc...
    • mrjangles 5y ago
      >Wow, one of these is super old 2015 is super old? >and does not really say what you write it does to quote the letter: Since 2009, however, more estimates of the economic impact of climate change have been published. These new results do affect the fitted trend, but not in the way suggested by Mr Ward. The new trend shows positive impacts for warming up to about two degrees global warming, just like the old trend did. The new trend, however, shows markedly less negative impacts for more profound warming than did the old trend. In other words, in the last five years, we have become less pessimistic about the impacts of climate change. How is this not what I said?
  • sulam 5y ago
    The second study says that the economic benefits of warmer winters in terms of less energy needed for warming homes is economically positive as compared to the costs of cooling homes due to warmer summers etc. I’m not going to try and fact check the paper, but even accepting it at face value it’s obviously a very narrow view of the overall economic impact of global warming and no one should take this paper and derive the claim that 3C of warming will be good for the economy. The first link is a response to a criticism of a paper by Richard Tol that has had to be revised twice now and at this point is unclear if, post-correction, it truly supports the thesis, that warming may be good for the economy. Tol is an economist who has stated that warming will be economically positive at higher latitudes and economically negative below these latitudes. His math says if you live north of Montreal you should be better off due to a warmer climate. Those south of Montreal (or Munich/Paris for those of you in Europe) will be negatively affected. If you live in Alaska, Siberia or Scandinavia you may appreciate this analysis. Myself, not so much. If this is the strength of the support for the case that I shouldn’t be worried about a few degrees of warming, I may be a little less worried than I should be!
• fuzzfactor 5y ago
  50 years from now someone will dig up this report and say "they knew about it all the way back then, why didn't they take more effective action?"