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I thought the claim was that the earth's environment is subject to critical transitions, that critical transitions are by their very nature highly disruptive on
by ktizo 14y ago
I thought the claim was that the earth's environment is subject to critical transitions, that critical transitions are by their very nature highly disruptive on all levels of a system, and that if you statistically map the environment then it looks strongly as though we look like we are approaching another one rather quickly.
The thing is, if we are approaching a critical transition then it is very hard to say what the precise outcome would be as the whole point of these events is that they are highly chaotic. Is a bit like asking where a particular molecule of water is going to be after boiling a pan half dry.
- apsec112 14y ago"Transitions" is way too vague to mean anything. What will "transition"? The climate? Another climate transition on the order of the most recent interglacial beginning seems reasonable (+3-5 C over centuries), but if that's what "critical transition" means, we've been through dozens over the last million years and are none the worse for wear. (At least if you just look at species count.) What would the actual negative consequences of such a transition be? Would they outweigh the positive consequences? Would they outweigh the cost of avoidance measures, taking into account the probability that those avoidance measures won't work? The avoidance measures here are extreme even by extreme standards - we're talking a comparable cost to a global thermonuclear war (large decrease in population, large semi-permanent decrease in global GDP). We need numbers here, guys. Numbers.
- ktizo 14y agoA critical transition is a mathematical definition related to a fundamental change in the structure of a system. Here's something pretty relevant if you want to know what they mean by this phrase - http://arxiv.org/abs/1101.2908 http://arxiv.org/abs/1101.2908