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Ok, firstly: "But how do you go from 'CO2 traps heat' to 'We're screwed!'" Honestly, I don't know, that's why I didn't do that! That said, with our current un

Ok, firstly: "But how do you go from 'CO2 traps heat' to 'We're screwed!'" Honestly, I don't know, that's why I didn't do that! That said, with our current understanding, not just that CO2 traps heat, but how much heat a certain concentration of CO2 traps, we are able to anticipate a certain rise in temperature. Yes, there is maybe some unknown process that will interrupt this rise in temperature, but for the time being we know of no mechanism that will do so. Do you want to bet the planet on the idea that there is an unknown process, for which we have no evidence, that is going to stop the planet from warming up dramatically, as our models predict it will in the absence of such an unknown factor? If I were to say to you "Hey, our current projections show that if we continue fishing Blue Fin Tuna at the current rate, they will go extinct in 15 years", do you consider it a reasonable response to say "Tuna population change is a complicated phenomenum. Maybe there's something that we've missed which means that the tuna population will bounce back, regardless of our fishing levels. Therefore, let's keep on fishing as we always have."? Because that's pretty much what you seem to be arguing for with respect to climate change.

krschultz 15y ago
That's not what I'm arguing at all. These models show that temperatures are going to rise. Your tuna model shows that tuna populations will fall after overfishing. At the end of my climate model, I have a world with a higher average temperature. At the end of your tuna model, we have a world with no tuna. I fully agree with both of those. But the consequences are a lot less clear. Obviously a world with no tuna is one where I don't like the menu at a sushi restaurent as much. I want to avoid that, I see a negative consequence there directly related to the model, no other models required. What is the negative consequence of higher average temperatures? There are models showing things like more storms, higher sea levels, drought, etc etc etc. Those are definitely things we want to avoid. But those secondary models are a hell of a lot less concrete than the temperature models. We might have more drought in some places but more crop yield in others. If we have more storms obviously there is more cloud formation - won't that be a negative feedback on temperature? Those things are a lot harder to show and thats what I don't think has been sufficiently proven. We aren't really concerned with the change in temperature. We are concerned with the consequences of the change in temperature on the world's weather. That is a significant difference.

krschultz 15y ago

That's not what I'm arguing at all. These models show that temperatures are going to rise. Your tuna model shows that tuna populations will fall after overfishing. At the end of my climate model, I have a world with a higher average temperature. At the end of your tuna model, we have a world with no tuna. I fully agree with both of those. But the consequences are a lot less clear. Obviously a world with no tuna is one where I don't like the menu at a sushi restaurent as much. I want to avoid that, I see a negative consequence there directly related to the model, no other models required. What is the negative consequence of higher average temperatures? There are models showing things like more storms, higher sea levels, drought, etc etc etc. Those are definitely things we want to avoid. But those secondary models are a hell of a lot less concrete than the temperature models. We might have more drought in some places but more crop yield in others. If we have more storms obviously there is more cloud formation - won't that be a negative feedback on temperature? Those things are a lot harder to show and thats what I don't think has been sufficiently proven. We aren't really concerned with the change in temperature. We are concerned with the consequences of the change in temperature on the world's weather. That is a significant difference.