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I think people are understandably cautious about large scale interventions in complex systems. It's not like we've got a test Earth ready to do a dummy run on.

I think people are understandably cautious about large scale interventions in complex systems. It's not like we've got a test Earth ready to do a dummy run on. We're making changes directly to production here. (I do think we'll ultimately need to do something like this simply because the cost of not doing it is too high but I understand why people are scared by it, and it's not just down to belief in wood spirits).

beowulfey 4y ago
Yes, definitely this is part of it for me. The other reason I’m concerned (although, agree it’s probably necessary) is that I’m wary of any solution that we can’t undo if it goes awry.
schnitzelstoat 4y ago
Also it means we won't actually solve the core problem that is greenhouse gas emissions. Instead we'll just continually pump up some aerosols to ensure the heating doesn't get too bad. And if we ever fail to do so then we'll face incredible heating.
- blitzar 4y ago
  We can just produce more greenhouse gasses to make the aerosols we pump into the atmosphere to undo just one of the many effects of the greenhouse gasses in our atmosphere.
- bhargav 4y ago
  No one wants to tell us fatties to not eat farmed animals, and not drive cars okay? /s
  - mandmandam 4y ago
    Fossil fuel companies knew about climate change and deliberately spent decades obfuscating the issue and warping discourse. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/exxon-knew-about-climate-change-almost-40-years-ago/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/exxon-knew-about-... https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jul/08/exxon-climate-change-1981-climate-denier-funding https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jul/08/exxon-cl... https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2018/sep/19/shell-and-exxons-secret-1980s-climate-change-warnings https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97... The audacious PR plot that seeded doubt about climate change: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-62225696 https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-62225696 Etc, etc, etc. So, blaming people for having stupid opinions that various companies spent billions injecting into the discourse seems misguided. At best.
    - ForRealsies 4y ago
    - o_1 4y ago
      we're we supposed to all stop driving cars?
      - tingol 4y ago
        Or not build out a continent to suit cars and not people? Disgusting city planning that lead to not having a car being nearly impossible in the US.
        treeman79 4y ago
        Bus line was closed for 2 years from Covid. Absolutely no chance I’ll trust a city enough to give up my car.
      - grive 4y ago
        We are supposed to stop designing cities around cars, yes.
      - mandmandam 4y ago
        It's pretty universally accepted that investing in public transport and trains 40 years ago would have led to an awesome economic boon, while dramatically lowering emissions. As mentioned, planning could have been much better. And every poor decision there has some car or oil corporation's fingerprints on it. We could have spent much more on solar, nuclear, and other cleaner power. We could have punished media and politicians that helped sell out our planets future for some slimy oil dollars. There's a lot we could have done. But instead we have takes like yours; a direct result of 40 years of FUD and misinformation. Do you have the faintest idea what those cars, those cows, those oil spills and methane leaks cost us? And they're going to cost much much more.
        bhargav 4y ago
        I guess not everyone realizes that /s means sarcasm? I don’t disagree that oil and use of oil has caused a negative impact on Earth lol. I don’t think we could’ve done anything in the last fourty years nor do I think we can do anything to stop. It’s too late. There’s no way we can stop the use of oil and cars now. Sure we can switch to electric, but I don’t think that will stop the snowball. It’s too entrenched and part of our life now. Sure we can be altruistic and ban the sale of non-EVs but what about all the millions of cars that are already in the streets? The oil pockets are too deep for government to just ban existing vehicles. In fact the governments have caused wars to protect their oil assets…
- usrusr 4y ago
  otoh, greenhouse gas emissions will eventually drop anyways, from running out of fuel. Even our best somewhat realistic plans of stopping emissions aren't that much better than what we should be doing in preparation of impeding scarcity anyways... Mitigation is no substitute for prevention, we'll need both anyways (unless we fast-track ourselves into oblivion using the nuclear arsenal cheat code)
- nine_k 4y ago
  We don't seem to need to emit much more greenhouse gases, the amount present in the atmosphere is going to keep Earth heated for a long enough time. But if we wanted more, think about all the methane that thawing Siberian and Canadian permafrost will release.
- giantg2 4y ago
  We can't address the GHG issue fast enough, so that pretty much means we'd have to try other stuff. They could certainly be worked in parallel.
  - yeasurebut 4y ago
    We had conversations about going to the moon and we got there in 10 years. Talk about producing less disposable crap, driving less, flying less, and cutting military budgets, everyone gets “exercise their 2A rights” in the US.
    - jasonlotito 4y ago
      We couldn't get people to wear a simple mask. Drying less? You have politicians that would attack you for even suggesting that. We've been trying to talk about climate for a long time. Clearly, a good portion of the country doesn't care.
      - TurkishPoptart 4y ago
        Because even if every American stopped driving _tomorrow_, we are still going to have the effects of climate change anyway. We can't stop India and China from developing, so instead of trying to limit the rights of Americans to do something which might not even help, it's better to develop a solution such as in TFA.
    - BobbyJo 4y ago
      Cost. The "cost" of all of those things is "too high" for the average American, as evidenced by the reaction to such proposals. So, we gotta do something else.
    - treeman79 4y ago
      If the US drastically cut its military budget the world will go to war fast. China will take anything it wants. Our huge over bloated military keeps a lot of countries in check. WW1 we went home and ignored the world. 20 years everyone was back at it. We didn’t leave after WW2. Longest period of peace in history.
- krolden 4y ago
  Just put a giant ice cube in the ocean every now and then
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  It absolutely does not mean we can't solve the core problem. You can work on two things at once. You can take medicine to treat disease while you work to fix the underlying root cause
chiefalchemist 4y ago
We'd be wise to ask, "What could go wrong?" It's the question we didn't ask about burning fossil fuels. We got our answer the hard way. Have we learned from that? The cost of not doing might be high. The cost of trying to further manipulate the atmospheric "market" might be worse. Then what?
- tormeh 4y ago
  We got the answer to that 80 years ago. It's not that we fail to imagine what could go wrong. It's that we don't act on our knowledge. If we had course-corrected when we became aware of global warming we wouldn't have a problem.
- DennisP 4y ago
  Or the cost of not doing geoengineering might be higher. You can't just look at one side of the risks.
cgeier 4y ago
Which makes sense, but we are already doing very large scale interventions with releasing a lot of greenhouse gases (and also other stuff).
- arcticfox 4y ago
  Yes, I am confused how an intentional intervention is so frowned upon when unintentional interventions are done on a continuous basis: mass deforestation, mass greenhouse emissions, mass oceanic acidification, satellite deorbiting, mass air transit, massive water redistribution projects etc Maybe the key to not face the scrutiny of non-interventionists is to mask the intervention as an unrelated commercial venture, in which case it should be pretty much good to go.
  - DharmaPolice 4y ago
    Most of the things you mention (e.g. deforestation, water redistribution) are things people worry about. In fact, the people worried about large scale interventions are usually also the people most worried about emissions, deforestation, ocean acidification, etc. So I don't think there's much hypocrisy here.
  - tablespoon 4y ago
    > Yes, I am confused how an intentional intervention is so frowned upon when unintentional interventions are done on a continuous basis...? What's so confusing? By the nature of being intentional, an intentional intervention can be stopped before it does harm. It's weird logic to think caution should be thrown to the wind because some bad unintentional things weren't prevented.
    - DennisP 4y ago
      But a lot of people freak out about attempting geoengineering at all, even at a small scale. There's a UN treaty prohibiting it. No treaty prohibiting the emission of 36 billion tons of CO2 every year though.
BeefWellington 4y ago
Further to your point, our history is littered with examples of, to steal the Jurassic Park bit, being "so preoccupied with whether or not they could, that they didn't stop to think if they should". Things like moving horrible invasive ecologically devastating species around to "solve a problem" or "it looks pretty" (Cane Toads, Rabbits, and Kudzu, for example) have had dire results. Cloud seeding is definitely a well practiced thing by now, but it's unclear what the short and long term effects are if we do it at a significant (continent or hemispheric) scale. I'd love for it to work out and for humanity to actually deflect the looming impacts of climate change.

beowulfey 4y ago

Yes, definitely this is part of it for me. The other reason I’m concerned (although, agree it’s probably necessary) is that I’m wary of any solution that we can’t undo if it goes awry.

schnitzelstoat 4y ago

Also it means we won't actually solve the core problem that is greenhouse gas emissions. Instead we'll just continually pump up some aerosols to ensure the heating doesn't get too bad. And if we ever fail to do so then we'll face incredible heating.

blitzar 4y ago
We can just produce more greenhouse gasses to make the aerosols we pump into the atmosphere to undo just one of the many effects of the greenhouse gasses in our atmosphere.
bhargav 4y ago
No one wants to tell us fatties to not eat farmed animals, and not drive cars okay? /s
- mandmandam 4y ago
  Fossil fuel companies knew about climate change and deliberately spent decades obfuscating the issue and warping discourse. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/exxon-knew-about-climate-change-almost-40-years-ago/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/exxon-knew-about-... https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jul/08/exxon-climate-change-1981-climate-denier-funding https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jul/08/exxon-cl... https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2018/sep/19/shell-and-exxons-secret-1980s-climate-change-warnings https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97... The audacious PR plot that seeded doubt about climate change: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-62225696 https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-62225696 Etc, etc, etc. So, blaming people for having stupid opinions that various companies spent billions injecting into the discourse seems misguided. At best.
  - ForRealsies 4y ago
  - o_1 4y ago
    we're we supposed to all stop driving cars?
    - tingol 4y ago
      Or not build out a continent to suit cars and not people? Disgusting city planning that lead to not having a car being nearly impossible in the US.
      - treeman79 4y ago
        Bus line was closed for 2 years from Covid. Absolutely no chance I’ll trust a city enough to give up my car.
    - grive 4y ago
      We are supposed to stop designing cities around cars, yes.
    - mandmandam 4y ago
      It's pretty universally accepted that investing in public transport and trains 40 years ago would have led to an awesome economic boon, while dramatically lowering emissions. As mentioned, planning could have been much better. And every poor decision there has some car or oil corporation's fingerprints on it. We could have spent much more on solar, nuclear, and other cleaner power. We could have punished media and politicians that helped sell out our planets future for some slimy oil dollars. There's a lot we could have done. But instead we have takes like yours; a direct result of 40 years of FUD and misinformation. Do you have the faintest idea what those cars, those cows, those oil spills and methane leaks cost us? And they're going to cost much much more.
      - bhargav 4y ago
        I guess not everyone realizes that /s means sarcasm? I don’t disagree that oil and use of oil has caused a negative impact on Earth lol. I don’t think we could’ve done anything in the last fourty years nor do I think we can do anything to stop. It’s too late. There’s no way we can stop the use of oil and cars now. Sure we can switch to electric, but I don’t think that will stop the snowball. It’s too entrenched and part of our life now. Sure we can be altruistic and ban the sale of non-EVs but what about all the millions of cars that are already in the streets? The oil pockets are too deep for government to just ban existing vehicles. In fact the governments have caused wars to protect their oil assets…
usrusr 4y ago
otoh, greenhouse gas emissions will eventually drop anyways, from running out of fuel. Even our best somewhat realistic plans of stopping emissions aren't that much better than what we should be doing in preparation of impeding scarcity anyways... Mitigation is no substitute for prevention, we'll need both anyways (unless we fast-track ourselves into oblivion using the nuclear arsenal cheat code)
nine_k 4y ago
We don't seem to need to emit much more greenhouse gases, the amount present in the atmosphere is going to keep Earth heated for a long enough time. But if we wanted more, think about all the methane that thawing Siberian and Canadian permafrost will release.
giantg2 4y ago
We can't address the GHG issue fast enough, so that pretty much means we'd have to try other stuff. They could certainly be worked in parallel.
- yeasurebut 4y ago
  We had conversations about going to the moon and we got there in 10 years. Talk about producing less disposable crap, driving less, flying less, and cutting military budgets, everyone gets “exercise their 2A rights” in the US.
  - jasonlotito 4y ago
    We couldn't get people to wear a simple mask. Drying less? You have politicians that would attack you for even suggesting that. We've been trying to talk about climate for a long time. Clearly, a good portion of the country doesn't care.
    - TurkishPoptart 4y ago
      Because even if every American stopped driving _tomorrow_, we are still going to have the effects of climate change anyway. We can't stop India and China from developing, so instead of trying to limit the rights of Americans to do something which might not even help, it's better to develop a solution such as in TFA.
  - BobbyJo 4y ago
    Cost. The "cost" of all of those things is "too high" for the average American, as evidenced by the reaction to such proposals. So, we gotta do something else.
  - treeman79 4y ago
    If the US drastically cut its military budget the world will go to war fast. China will take anything it wants. Our huge over bloated military keeps a lot of countries in check. WW1 we went home and ignored the world. 20 years everyone was back at it. We didn’t leave after WW2. Longest period of peace in history.
krolden 4y ago
Just put a giant ice cube in the ocean every now and then
s1artibartfast 4y ago
It absolutely does not mean we can't solve the core problem. You can work on two things at once. You can take medicine to treat disease while you work to fix the underlying root cause

chiefalchemist 4y ago

We'd be wise to ask, "What could go wrong?" It's the question we didn't ask about burning fossil fuels. We got our answer the hard way. Have we learned from that? The cost of not doing might be high. The cost of trying to further manipulate the atmospheric "market" might be worse. Then what?

tormeh 4y ago
We got the answer to that 80 years ago. It's not that we fail to imagine what could go wrong. It's that we don't act on our knowledge. If we had course-corrected when we became aware of global warming we wouldn't have a problem.
DennisP 4y ago
Or the cost of not doing geoengineering might be higher. You can't just look at one side of the risks.

cgeier 4y ago

Which makes sense, but we are already doing very large scale interventions with releasing a lot of greenhouse gases (and also other stuff).

arcticfox 4y ago
Yes, I am confused how an intentional intervention is so frowned upon when unintentional interventions are done on a continuous basis: mass deforestation, mass greenhouse emissions, mass oceanic acidification, satellite deorbiting, mass air transit, massive water redistribution projects etc Maybe the key to not face the scrutiny of non-interventionists is to mask the intervention as an unrelated commercial venture, in which case it should be pretty much good to go.
- DharmaPolice 4y ago
  Most of the things you mention (e.g. deforestation, water redistribution) are things people worry about. In fact, the people worried about large scale interventions are usually also the people most worried about emissions, deforestation, ocean acidification, etc. So I don't think there's much hypocrisy here.
- tablespoon 4y ago
  > Yes, I am confused how an intentional intervention is so frowned upon when unintentional interventions are done on a continuous basis...? What's so confusing? By the nature of being intentional, an intentional intervention can be stopped before it does harm. It's weird logic to think caution should be thrown to the wind because some bad unintentional things weren't prevented.
  - DennisP 4y ago
    But a lot of people freak out about attempting geoengineering at all, even at a small scale. There's a UN treaty prohibiting it. No treaty prohibiting the emission of 36 billion tons of CO2 every year though.

BeefWellington 4y ago

Further to your point, our history is littered with examples of, to steal the Jurassic Park bit, being "so preoccupied with whether or not they could, that they didn't stop to think if they should". Things like moving horrible invasive ecologically devastating species around to "solve a problem" or "it looks pretty" (Cane Toads, Rabbits, and Kudzu, for example) have had dire results. Cloud seeding is definitely a well practiced thing by now, but it's unclear what the short and long term effects are if we do it at a significant (continent or hemispheric) scale. I'd love for it to work out and for humanity to actually deflect the looming impacts of climate change.