23 ms·

Clarification because the headline is written to mislead: "Their model suggests that the current could begin collapsing anywhere from 2025 to 2095."

VelesDude 2y ago
Oilprice.com is always like that. Everything always sounds urgent regardless of the actual content. The 2025 date while possible, is much less likely than a middle of the range date. That said, with the rate that dates relating to climate issues keep getting moved forwards, I would be surprised if in 5 years we dates like between 2030-2060 being proposed.
- Guthur 2y ago
  And when it doesn't harken well move on to some other hyperbolic doomsday, this has literally been going on for thousands of years. Humans have constantly, hubristically , predicting the end of the planet and humanity based on the existence of humanity for millennia. They are selling, always selling.
  - pfannkuchen 2y ago
    Yeah the way it rhymes with an apocalypse cult is pretty interesting. (Not asserting that it is an apocalypse cult of course)
  - VelesDude 2y ago
    There is a decent book on this called 'Apocalypse Not' by John Michael Greer that covers the history of all these end times predictions. Good thing for putting these kinds of claims in perspective. Yes, we have big issues facing us, some we can solve, some we can merely respond too. But we have to be mindful about some of the alarmist language that can be used. While many want to alarm people into action, it can also become fear that paralyze folks from doing any action.
    - BlueTemplar 2y ago
      And he's also very critical about the "other side of the coin" : "business as usual, mankind to the stars" predictions. He's IMHO a bit too complacent about some of the now possible worst case scenarios : yes, the end of the current Ice Age (that Homo has evolved in) likely won't be the end of mankind, but when thinking about the Earth returning into a more normal state, you have to remember that it also involved periods where most of it was too hot for mammals to inhabit, that the Sun is slightly hotter now, and that a potential future Arctic & Antarctic jungles civilization will still kind of suck because it still involves months-long nights and days.
    - exe34 2y ago
      > we have to be mindful about some of the alarmist language Exactly! It probably won't drive us to extinction - a mere few billions will starve/suffer from extreme weather events/die in miserable conditions. A fair price to pay for better returns for shareholders!
      - EnigmaFlare 2y ago
        Got a source for that? Billions starving sounds like part of the unscientific alarmism.
        defrost 2y ago
        FWIW the UN FAO (Food and Agriculture) Climate change and food security: risks and responses report maps out multiple scenarios based on degrees of response to the various climate change possibilities. These include "billions" (ie > 2 billion) facing hunger, food insecurity and starvation to varying levels .. which is not hard to imagine given that the 2015 number for that was already 0.8 billion and the world population will be increasing until 2050 at least. I'll assume that those interested can find and read the report for themselves.
        EnigmaFlare 2y ago
        Do you have a link? All links I can find are broken ones to the FAO's website which doesn't seem to have it. But even what you said doesn't mean billions will starve or die from miserable conditions. Maybe billions will have to put on a raincoat as they're "suffering" from more rain than usual. This is the problem with alarmism - exaggerated claims that aren't coming from science.
- schiffern 2y ago
  > dates relating to climate issues keep getting moved forwards Funny how when the exact same thing happened measuring the charge of the electron (ie not deviating around the ultimate value, but systematically moving in one direction), it became the quintessential example—literally taught in schools—for detecting confirmation bias in scientific data. https://scipython.com/blog/measurements-of-the-electron-charge-over-time/ https://scipython.com/blog/measurements-of-the-electron-char... If the climate numbers are always being revised upward, it strongly indicates that the original predictions were being systematically fudged downwards. It's not hard to see why: governments and institutions don't want to be accused of "alarmism."
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - BlueTemplar 2y ago
    Your source looks like Feynman has perhaps embellished that story. Also, isn't it quite different when there's a canonical measurement (Millikan) versus where there isn't one (climate change) ?
    - schiffern 2y ago
      >isn't it quite different when there's a canonical measurement Not really. For an unbiased estimator the "revisions" should be random (half upward and half downward), so if you're always making improvements in one direction you can infer some sort of systematic bias.
moritzwarhier 2y ago
I don't think that "as early as 2025" is dishonest regarding the measurements and facts. Sure, the headline is written in a way that draws attention, but it is not dishonest clickbait or written to mislead, IMO. Others here have hinted at the so-called "hot-model" fallacy, which is relevant to the timeline. [^1] Apart from that, the article does make clear that "collapse" can be a gradual process. Even climate change effects that hit very suddenly in a climatological sense can easily spread out over hundreds of years. This does not in any way rule out tipping points with extreme changes that wreck ecosystems, e.g. average temperatures dropping or rising by 10 degrees Celsius over 20 years in some regions. [1] Sabine Hossenfelder has a great video on this topic, should be findable by querying "climate sensitivity". The search results I find are mostly (affirmative) statements of that "hot model Problem", such as this article: https://www.science.org/content/article/use-too-hot-climate-models-exaggerates-impacts-global-warming https://www.science.org/content/article/use-too-hot-climate-... I am not a climate scientist, but I have heard the claim that the models that best model 2020-2024 (especially 2023-24) disprortionately often fall into the category of having been dismissed for being "too extreme" before.

VelesDude 2y ago

Oilprice.com is always like that. Everything always sounds urgent regardless of the actual content. The 2025 date while possible, is much less likely than a middle of the range date. That said, with the rate that dates relating to climate issues keep getting moved forwards, I would be surprised if in 5 years we dates like between 2030-2060 being proposed.

Guthur 2y ago
And when it doesn't harken well move on to some other hyperbolic doomsday, this has literally been going on for thousands of years. Humans have constantly, hubristically , predicting the end of the planet and humanity based on the existence of humanity for millennia. They are selling, always selling.
- pfannkuchen 2y ago
  Yeah the way it rhymes with an apocalypse cult is pretty interesting. (Not asserting that it is an apocalypse cult of course)
- VelesDude 2y ago
  There is a decent book on this called 'Apocalypse Not' by John Michael Greer that covers the history of all these end times predictions. Good thing for putting these kinds of claims in perspective. Yes, we have big issues facing us, some we can solve, some we can merely respond too. But we have to be mindful about some of the alarmist language that can be used. While many want to alarm people into action, it can also become fear that paralyze folks from doing any action.
  - BlueTemplar 2y ago
    And he's also very critical about the "other side of the coin" : "business as usual, mankind to the stars" predictions. He's IMHO a bit too complacent about some of the now possible worst case scenarios : yes, the end of the current Ice Age (that Homo has evolved in) likely won't be the end of mankind, but when thinking about the Earth returning into a more normal state, you have to remember that it also involved periods where most of it was too hot for mammals to inhabit, that the Sun is slightly hotter now, and that a potential future Arctic & Antarctic jungles civilization will still kind of suck because it still involves months-long nights and days.
  - exe34 2y ago
    > we have to be mindful about some of the alarmist language Exactly! It probably won't drive us to extinction - a mere few billions will starve/suffer from extreme weather events/die in miserable conditions. A fair price to pay for better returns for shareholders!
    - EnigmaFlare 2y ago
      Got a source for that? Billions starving sounds like part of the unscientific alarmism.
      - defrost 2y ago
        FWIW the UN FAO (Food and Agriculture) Climate change and food security: risks and responses report maps out multiple scenarios based on degrees of response to the various climate change possibilities. These include "billions" (ie > 2 billion) facing hunger, food insecurity and starvation to varying levels .. which is not hard to imagine given that the 2015 number for that was already 0.8 billion and the world population will be increasing until 2050 at least. I'll assume that those interested can find and read the report for themselves.
        EnigmaFlare 2y ago
        Do you have a link? All links I can find are broken ones to the FAO's website which doesn't seem to have it. But even what you said doesn't mean billions will starve or die from miserable conditions. Maybe billions will have to put on a raincoat as they're "suffering" from more rain than usual. This is the problem with alarmism - exaggerated claims that aren't coming from science.
schiffern 2y ago
> dates relating to climate issues keep getting moved forwards Funny how when the exact same thing happened measuring the charge of the electron (ie not deviating around the ultimate value, but systematically moving in one direction), it became the quintessential example—literally taught in schools—for detecting confirmation bias in scientific data. https://scipython.com/blog/measurements-of-the-electron-charge-over-time/ https://scipython.com/blog/measurements-of-the-electron-char... If the climate numbers are always being revised upward, it strongly indicates that the original predictions were being systematically fudged downwards. It's not hard to see why: governments and institutions don't want to be accused of "alarmism."
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- BlueTemplar 2y ago
  Your source looks like Feynman has perhaps embellished that story. Also, isn't it quite different when there's a canonical measurement (Millikan) versus where there isn't one (climate change) ?
  - schiffern 2y ago
    >isn't it quite different when there's a canonical measurement Not really. For an unbiased estimator the "revisions" should be random (half upward and half downward), so if you're always making improvements in one direction you can infer some sort of systematic bias.

moritzwarhier 2y ago

I don't think that "as early as 2025" is dishonest regarding the measurements and facts. Sure, the headline is written in a way that draws attention, but it is not dishonest clickbait or written to mislead, IMO. Others here have hinted at the so-called "hot-model" fallacy, which is relevant to the timeline. [^1] Apart from that, the article does make clear that "collapse" can be a gradual process. Even climate change effects that hit very suddenly in a climatological sense can easily spread out over hundreds of years. This does not in any way rule out tipping points with extreme changes that wreck ecosystems, e.g. average temperatures dropping or rising by 10 degrees Celsius over 20 years in some regions. [1] Sabine Hossenfelder has a great video on this topic, should be findable by querying "climate sensitivity". The search results I find are mostly (affirmative) statements of that "hot model Problem", such as this article: https://www.science.org/content/article/use-too-hot-climate-models-exaggerates-impacts-global-warming https://www.science.org/content/article/use-too-hot-climate-... I am not a climate scientist, but I have heard the claim that the models that best model 2020-2024 (especially 2023-24) disprortionately often fall into the category of having been dismissed for being "too extreme" before.