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Here is Carl Sagan's original essay on climate change in 1980 where he warned specifically about global cooling based on deforestation: https://gizmodo.com/here

Here is Carl Sagan's original essay on climate change in 1980 where he warned specifically about global cooling based on deforestation: https://gizmodo.com/heres-carl-sagans-original-essay-on-the-dangers-of-cl-1481304135 https://gizmodo.com/heres-carl-sagans-original-essay-on-the-... 5 years later he testified to Congress about the dangers of excess CO2 emissions causing runaway warming: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wp-WiNXH6hI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wp-WiNXH6hI On the surface these two messages may seem contradictory but underlying both is a consistent message that excessive man-made changes to a delicate highly non-linear system are dangerous to our survival as a species.

foobarian 3y ago
> dangerous to our survival as a species. Elephant in the room: dangerous to continued exponential growth of our species' population count.
- notfish 3y ago
  Am I misunderstanding you? Sure, we probably won’t be able to continue expanding exponentially, but to be honest I don’t really care if we grow forever or stay steady at 10 billion. There’s a significant, nonzero risk of complete species death though, a matter about which I care a great deal. Extinction is worse than stagnation.
- pyrale 3y ago
  Counterpoint: the countries most responsible for messing with planetary balance are not the ones experiencing significant population growth.
- j0057 3y ago
  There's good evidence that if we can alleviate poverty and child mortality everywhere, fertility rates will start coming down like they have in richer countries and we'll end up at 10-11 billion people.
atoav 3y ago
One thing that I have learned as someone who interacts with highly non-linear systems from an engineering perspective is that the outcome can be unpredictable. That is annoying when you are working with the stuff, but when you are living inside that system, that is downright suicidal. Sure. If you are lucky nothing happens. If.

foobarian 3y ago

> dangerous to our survival as a species. Elephant in the room: dangerous to continued exponential growth of our species' population count.

notfish 3y ago
Am I misunderstanding you? Sure, we probably won’t be able to continue expanding exponentially, but to be honest I don’t really care if we grow forever or stay steady at 10 billion. There’s a significant, nonzero risk of complete species death though, a matter about which I care a great deal. Extinction is worse than stagnation.
pyrale 3y ago
Counterpoint: the countries most responsible for messing with planetary balance are not the ones experiencing significant population growth.
j0057 3y ago
There's good evidence that if we can alleviate poverty and child mortality everywhere, fertility rates will start coming down like they have in richer countries and we'll end up at 10-11 billion people.

atoav 3y ago

One thing that I have learned as someone who interacts with highly non-linear systems from an engineering perspective is that the outcome can be unpredictable. That is annoying when you are working with the stuff, but when you are living inside that system, that is downright suicidal. Sure. If you are lucky nothing happens. If.