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Doomsday predictions about millions dying in India is an age old trope since 1947. You could find such tropes in "Moon is the harsh Mistress" or "Le Camp des Sa

Doomsday predictions about millions dying in India is an age old trope since 1947. You could find such tropes in "Moon is the harsh Mistress" or "Le Camp des Saints" which sounded like the doomsday scenarios being talked about in this very thread. While I understand that the climate change will hit India hard, (I witnessed it this summer personally), I still think we should not be quick to jump to assuming the destitution of millions as if it was a simple matter of statistics. I have faith in science, human resilience and ingenuity and I tend to believe that the future doesn't have to be so grim and humans will find a way.

mschuster91 4y ago
> I have faith in science, human resilience and ingenuity and I tend to believe that the future doesn't have to be so grim and humans will find a way. Unfortunately, if humanity wants to prevent that outcome, we would have to start doing massive changes now. Relying on "humanity will find a way to work around in 30 years" is foolish, simply because when the expected progress doesn't happen in this time frame, humanity in 30 years is going to have to commit much more effort and resources than if current humanity would start now.
dsr_ 4y ago
Humans have trouble finding a way to live in wet-bulb temperatures above 36C. Being in the shade and properly hydrated is not enough.
- bryanlarsen 4y ago
  Humans thrive in Houston which has a similar problem. They thrive through pervasive air conditioning and spending very little time outside. It's a crappy solution for many different reasons but it does seem to be the direction we're heading.
  - signal11 4y ago
    Houston is hot, but wet bulb temperatures > 35 C (95 F) -- different from standard air temperature -- are a different story. Afaik, for healthy humans, staying outside > 35 C (not 36 C) for even long durations is physiologically impossible. Even healthy humans have trouble from 31 C (87.8 F). I don't have access to historic wet bulb data, but Houston appears to be in the mid-70s[1]. Places which have wet bulb temps > 35 C essentially shut down outside. You can use air conditioning indoors, but unless you have a Fremen-esque suit for outdoor workers, you can kiss outdoor activity goodbye in the daytime. In reality this mean the place essentially shuts down during the day. E.g. in Pakistan last year[2]. Being interested in history, I'm particularly mindful many historians speculate that climate change was responsible for ending the earliest known civilization in this area[3]. [1] http://cms.ashrae.biz/weatherdata/STATIONS/722430_p.pdf http://cms.ashrae.biz/weatherdata/STATIONS/722430_p.pdf [2] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/climate-and-people/hotter-human-body-can-handle-pakistan-city-broils-worlds-highest/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/climate-and-people... [3] https://www.whoi.edu/press-room/news-release/climate-change-likely-caused-migration--demise-of-ancient-indus-valley-civilization/ https://www.whoi.edu/press-room/news-release/climate-change-...
    - bryanlarsen 4y ago
      That sounds like Houston. Outside work is done in the early morning and outside play is done in the evening. During the middle of the day everybody stays inside in air conditioned buildings or vehicles. It's the wealth of Houston that makes this possible. Pakistan and India will adapt it as soon as they're wealthy enough. It'll come at a lower wealth point than Houston because their problem is more severe than Houston's.
      - signal11 4y ago
        > That sounds like Houston. I think it's a little different. Houston by your account struggles in the afternoons today -- similar to parts of Spain and Portugal, but it's only at peak wet bulb ~75..76 F going by ASHRAE[1] data. Wet bulb 88 F is much worse, and 95 F is really when the human body gives up. Again, this is wet bulb, not air temperature. But if anyone has peak wet bulb data for major US cities, please share! It'd be an awesome resource. [1] American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers, https://www.ashrae.org/ https://www.ashrae.org/
  - saiya-jin 4y ago
    I don't think you understand Indian reality. AC is, was and will be luxury in places where entire villages are cut from electricity randomly and for a long time. They don't have any network capacity to handle tons of ACs. And hundreds of millions are still so desperately poor they wouldn't be able to afford one and run it anyway.
    - bryanlarsen 4y ago
      India went from 5% with air conditioning in 2017 to 13% with air conditioning in 2022. It's projected to hit 69% in 2040.[1] It's also well suited for solar power, and the price of solar power has dropped 90% per decade for the last 5 decades, and that trend looks to continue. Getting air conditioning to most Indians is a difficult problem, but it's an easier problem than solving climate change or accommodating 1.3 billion climate refugees. 1: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwiUi466iav6AhWtHjQIHQMgCz8QFnoECAMQAw&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.deccanherald.com%2Fnational%2Findias-ac-requirement-is-set-to-rise-steeply-shows-study-1049050.html&usg=AOvVaw0m6OxLNYP3mEsY-mYFbf63 https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&c...
toss1 4y ago
Well before the '08 financial crisis, I started noticing that whenever I looked at the world through the lens of science and innovation, the future looked insanely bright, but whenever I looked through the lens of politics, it looks like we're sooo screwed. The next decade and a half, with the rise of authoritarianism and populism, and the clear and miserable failure of the Grand Experiment — that openness and trade would bring liberal democracy to authoritarian states like RUS and CCP — merely make it even more obvious that governance is forked, and not in a good way. Overall, it looks like the technology trend is from 1) barely possible, to 2) scaled up and dirty, to 3) scaled up, efficient, clean, and sustainable. We're sort of moving from Stage 2 to Stage 3. But, can we get there in time? The disaster is already upon us, faster than expected, and there are a number of tipping points and feedback loops just starting to come into play (e.g., lower reflectance at the poles, melting permafrost set to release gigatons of stored methane which is ~22x more potent a greenhouse gas than CO2, etc.). The politics are obviously decades behind where they need to be, and the VC money is only beginning to see the opportunity in clean energy after focusing for decades on worthless internet trends instead of real hard innovation. Will it still be enough for some breakthrough as the mountain we must climb becomes even steeper?
- kiliantics 4y ago
  If you looked through the lens of science for the last few decades, you would also have seen a growing alarm over the climate/ecological crisis that has been developing, evidence for which was well established since the 70s and earlier. Not insanely bright if you ask me but actually pretty bleak really and nowadays down right abysmal.
  - toss1 4y ago
    Yes, I saw that, mostly I was thinking about the new developments, and the pace of those developments - it seemed that we could easily outrun it. But, the political will seems lukewarm, at best.
signal11 4y ago
> Doomsday predictions about millions dying in India is an age old trope since 1947 I agree a lot of these scenarios are 'doomsday', but the risk is real and hard to plan for / budget. You're effectively fighting history (Indus Valley and its history with climate change), and human biology -- you cannot be outside when wet bulb > 35 C even if you're fully healthy. For older / less-well people, > wet bulb 31 C can be a problem. And India will be very middle-aged by 2040 with an increasing older population. You're also fighting greed. Bangalore was told, repeatedly, that building apartments in flood plains wasn't smart. The message was ignored. Heck, even after the recent floods, it's unlikely this policy will change. India has a construction boom right now -- this is happening elsewhere too. Managing these within budgetary constraints and the large population impacted will be challenging. It's not doomsday by any means -- e.g. the Konkan coast will probably be fine. But what happens when Vidarbha (already relatively poor and home to extremely cruel summers) gets worse -- can we stop people from migrating en masse? How will you stop millions of people internally migrating in a country with no border controls? How this gets worse: Forget about en masse migrations. That's doomsday you say. Okay. But even a small uptick in migration figures will have massive consequences for already-overstretched Indian cities. > I have faith in science, human resilience and ingenuity and I tend to believe that the future doesn't have to be so grim and humans will find a way. Faith is great, but India hasn't invested in good urban planning or healthcare (the scenes in small-town India in early 2021 come to mind). To be fair, many other countries haven't either. So the pessimist in me says that a Katrina-style or 2022 Pakistan-style floods event can be especially traumatic for such countries.

mschuster91 4y ago

> I have faith in science, human resilience and ingenuity and I tend to believe that the future doesn't have to be so grim and humans will find a way. Unfortunately, if humanity wants to prevent that outcome, we would have to start doing massive changes now. Relying on "humanity will find a way to work around in 30 years" is foolish, simply because when the expected progress doesn't happen in this time frame, humanity in 30 years is going to have to commit much more effort and resources than if current humanity would start now.

dsr_ 4y ago

Humans have trouble finding a way to live in wet-bulb temperatures above 36C. Being in the shade and properly hydrated is not enough.

bryanlarsen 4y ago
Humans thrive in Houston which has a similar problem. They thrive through pervasive air conditioning and spending very little time outside. It's a crappy solution for many different reasons but it does seem to be the direction we're heading.
- signal11 4y ago
  Houston is hot, but wet bulb temperatures > 35 C (95 F) -- different from standard air temperature -- are a different story. Afaik, for healthy humans, staying outside > 35 C (not 36 C) for even long durations is physiologically impossible. Even healthy humans have trouble from 31 C (87.8 F). I don't have access to historic wet bulb data, but Houston appears to be in the mid-70s[1]. Places which have wet bulb temps > 35 C essentially shut down outside. You can use air conditioning indoors, but unless you have a Fremen-esque suit for outdoor workers, you can kiss outdoor activity goodbye in the daytime. In reality this mean the place essentially shuts down during the day. E.g. in Pakistan last year[2]. Being interested in history, I'm particularly mindful many historians speculate that climate change was responsible for ending the earliest known civilization in this area[3]. [1] http://cms.ashrae.biz/weatherdata/STATIONS/722430_p.pdf http://cms.ashrae.biz/weatherdata/STATIONS/722430_p.pdf [2] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/climate-and-people/hotter-human-body-can-handle-pakistan-city-broils-worlds-highest/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/climate-and-people... [3] https://www.whoi.edu/press-room/news-release/climate-change-likely-caused-migration--demise-of-ancient-indus-valley-civilization/ https://www.whoi.edu/press-room/news-release/climate-change-...
  - bryanlarsen 4y ago
    That sounds like Houston. Outside work is done in the early morning and outside play is done in the evening. During the middle of the day everybody stays inside in air conditioned buildings or vehicles. It's the wealth of Houston that makes this possible. Pakistan and India will adapt it as soon as they're wealthy enough. It'll come at a lower wealth point than Houston because their problem is more severe than Houston's.
    - signal11 4y ago
      > That sounds like Houston. I think it's a little different. Houston by your account struggles in the afternoons today -- similar to parts of Spain and Portugal, but it's only at peak wet bulb ~75..76 F going by ASHRAE[1] data. Wet bulb 88 F is much worse, and 95 F is really when the human body gives up. Again, this is wet bulb, not air temperature. But if anyone has peak wet bulb data for major US cities, please share! It'd be an awesome resource. [1] American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers, https://www.ashrae.org/ https://www.ashrae.org/
- saiya-jin 4y ago
  I don't think you understand Indian reality. AC is, was and will be luxury in places where entire villages are cut from electricity randomly and for a long time. They don't have any network capacity to handle tons of ACs. And hundreds of millions are still so desperately poor they wouldn't be able to afford one and run it anyway.
  - bryanlarsen 4y ago
    India went from 5% with air conditioning in 2017 to 13% with air conditioning in 2022. It's projected to hit 69% in 2040.[1] It's also well suited for solar power, and the price of solar power has dropped 90% per decade for the last 5 decades, and that trend looks to continue. Getting air conditioning to most Indians is a difficult problem, but it's an easier problem than solving climate change or accommodating 1.3 billion climate refugees. 1: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwiUi466iav6AhWtHjQIHQMgCz8QFnoECAMQAw&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.deccanherald.com%2Fnational%2Findias-ac-requirement-is-set-to-rise-steeply-shows-study-1049050.html&usg=AOvVaw0m6OxLNYP3mEsY-mYFbf63 https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&c...

toss1 4y ago

Well before the '08 financial crisis, I started noticing that whenever I looked at the world through the lens of science and innovation, the future looked insanely bright, but whenever I looked through the lens of politics, it looks like we're sooo screwed. The next decade and a half, with the rise of authoritarianism and populism, and the clear and miserable failure of the Grand Experiment — that openness and trade would bring liberal democracy to authoritarian states like RUS and CCP — merely make it even more obvious that governance is forked, and not in a good way. Overall, it looks like the technology trend is from 1) barely possible, to 2) scaled up and dirty, to 3) scaled up, efficient, clean, and sustainable. We're sort of moving from Stage 2 to Stage 3. But, can we get there in time? The disaster is already upon us, faster than expected, and there are a number of tipping points and feedback loops just starting to come into play (e.g., lower reflectance at the poles, melting permafrost set to release gigatons of stored methane which is ~22x more potent a greenhouse gas than CO2, etc.). The politics are obviously decades behind where they need to be, and the VC money is only beginning to see the opportunity in clean energy after focusing for decades on worthless internet trends instead of real hard innovation. Will it still be enough for some breakthrough as the mountain we must climb becomes even steeper?

kiliantics 4y ago
If you looked through the lens of science for the last few decades, you would also have seen a growing alarm over the climate/ecological crisis that has been developing, evidence for which was well established since the 70s and earlier. Not insanely bright if you ask me but actually pretty bleak really and nowadays down right abysmal.
- toss1 4y ago
  Yes, I saw that, mostly I was thinking about the new developments, and the pace of those developments - it seemed that we could easily outrun it. But, the political will seems lukewarm, at best.

signal11 4y ago

> Doomsday predictions about millions dying in India is an age old trope since 1947 I agree a lot of these scenarios are 'doomsday', but the risk is real and hard to plan for / budget. You're effectively fighting history (Indus Valley and its history with climate change), and human biology -- you cannot be outside when wet bulb > 35 C even if you're fully healthy. For older / less-well people, > wet bulb 31 C can be a problem. And India will be very middle-aged by 2040 with an increasing older population. You're also fighting greed. Bangalore was told, repeatedly, that building apartments in flood plains wasn't smart. The message was ignored. Heck, even after the recent floods, it's unlikely this policy will change. India has a construction boom right now -- this is happening elsewhere too. Managing these within budgetary constraints and the large population impacted will be challenging. It's not doomsday by any means -- e.g. the Konkan coast will probably be fine. But what happens when Vidarbha (already relatively poor and home to extremely cruel summers) gets worse -- can we stop people from migrating en masse? How will you stop millions of people internally migrating in a country with no border controls? How this gets worse: Forget about en masse migrations. That's doomsday you say. Okay. But even a small uptick in migration figures will have massive consequences for already-overstretched Indian cities. > I have faith in science, human resilience and ingenuity and I tend to believe that the future doesn't have to be so grim and humans will find a way. Faith is great, but India hasn't invested in good urban planning or healthcare (the scenes in small-town India in early 2021 come to mind). To be fair, many other countries haven't either. So the pessimist in me says that a Katrina-style or 2022 Pakistan-style floods event can be especially traumatic for such countries.