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Comment by nielsbot | Hacker News Reader

I am terrified. Should I be?

No, that would lead to paralysis.

Learn to live in a world where climate change is happening and adjust accordingly. There is no way going back now. The party is coming to an end. We must go forward.

You don't have to solve this problem in one day by yourself. You probably cannot really "solve" it at all. It's time to let go of things we cannot save and hold on to those which grow valuable in the future.

I really resonate with this comment. The best way to 'deal' with climate change on an individual level is to always vote for folks who are trying to rein it in, to live your life with a minimal carbon footprint, and to create plans for larger, more intense weather events.

Even the high end of predictions aren't expecting an increase in intense weather events bigger than what you might get if you were a bit unlucky over the next century.

Any citations for that?

Why would insurance companies like Munich Re be studying and preparing for climate change then [1]?

[1] https://www.munichre.com/en/group/focus/climate-change/index...

Apparently they've been doing it for "more than 40 years." I'm guessing it's part of the general business of being an insurance company.

A large reinsurer has to evaluate trends in weather and the associated risks of e.g. storm damage, as for them every percentage point is meaningful.

However, you can treat them as an information source about risk - if there would be a significant increase in likelihood of extreme weather, then you'd see it reflected in the insurance rates, and if not - well, they have done the homework and are betting literal billions that the worry is just an exaggeration for now. If the insurance rates aren't doubling, then the risks haven't doubled for sure.

Love that spin. The low end of predictions is that the most stable of ecosystems will regularly experience the extreme weather previously reserved for "once-in-a-century" events in the most volatile regions.

On the "high-end" is a drastic change in the Earth's shape due to gravity with a meter+ of sea level rise around the equator, runaway exponential heating feedback loops triggered in Siberia and like half the ocean floor, and the depletion of almost all potable fresh water currently supplying a population of over 7 billion.

But yeah, if "unlucky over the next century" means the sun will go supernova, we're f-ing peachy!

Wrong. The low end is that extreme weather events get less frequent [1]. The high end is that they get more frequent -- but the amount is such that you're not going to get hit with more extreme weather over the next century than what you would get if you were a bit unlucky.

Your second paragraph isn't talking about weather events at all.

[1] https://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/faq-10-...

As far as I can tell the link you provide argues exactly the opposite of what you're saying:

> In a warmer future climate, there will be an increased risk of more intense, more frequent and longer-lasting heat waves.

> In a warmer future climate, most Atmosphere-Ocean General Circulation Models project increased summer dryness and winter wetness in most parts of the northern middle and high latitudes. Summer dryness indicates a greater risk of drought. Along with the risk of drying, there is an increased chance of intense precipitation and flooding due to the greater water-holding capacity of a warmer atmosphere.

> In concert with the results for increased extremes of intense precipitation, even if the wind strength of storms in a future climate did not change, there would be an increase in extreme rainfall intensity.

> There is evidence from modelling studies that future tropical cyclones could become more severe, with greater wind speeds and more intense precipitation. Studies suggest that such changes may already be underway; there are indications that the average number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes per year has increased over the past 30 years. Some modelling studies have projected a decrease in the number of tropical cyclones globally due to the increased stability of the tropical troposphere in a warmer climate, characterised by fewer weak storms and greater numbers of intense storms. A number of modelling studies have also projected a general tendency for more intense but fewer storms outside the tropics, with a tendency towards more extreme wind events and higher ocean waves in several regions in association with those deepened cyclones.

How do you get from that to your statement: 'The low end is that extreme weather events get less frequent'?

You are also simply repeating your assertion 'but the amount is such that you're not going to get hit with more extreme weather over the next century than what you would get if you were a bit unlucky', citing no evidence.

I imagine it's the sentence "Some modelling studies have projected a decrease in the number of tropical cyclones globally...", which represents a decrease in one particular (important) kind of extreme weather event, although it says that in this case the tropical cyclones that do occur could be more intense. However, that might be the only kind of extreme weather event that the linked document mentions might become rarer; it also mentions other kinds of events for which it only mentions increased likelihoods, not decreased likelihoods.

Actually its much more likely we'll be hit by a massive CME[1,2] rather than the Sun going Nova. That will destroy massive amounts of automation and compute power all at once which will rapidly destabilize highly automated economies.

But there is zero we can do about that so not worth getting worried over.

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-01-19/how-space...

[2] https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/2...

I often wonder what we'll die of. Direct consequence of global warming like flooding, tornado, or heat wave? A worldwide epidemic? Will wealth be relevant in saving us from mass famines? A more indirect way such as massive riots caused by, say, the global disorganization of wealth? A global methane event, bursting out of the oceans, and burning the whole atmosphere? Or simply Trump deciding that global warming can only be dodged by erasing half of human activities, killing 4bn people with some atomic bomb, "for the survival of the rest"?

I also wonder what will remain of our cities. Will scavenger humans haunt them for the next thousand years? How fast will they decay?

Probably not direct consequences, more indirect ones like riots. And if things get that bad, then maybe erasing half or 75% human activities WOULD be the only way, don't need a Trump to declare that.

Probably not any of that at all.

We will probably die of all the same old boring causes: heart disease, cancer, dementia and Alzheimer's.

Please read up on the scientific consensus.

No respectable scientist believes that a meter or 2 of sea level rise over the next 200 years is going to literally cause the world to end.

Read the science. Go with the facts. Not the fake consequences that no scientist believes is going to happen.

Yes. No one believes the world is going to end.

The scientific consensus is trillions of dollars in annual damages globally along with plausibly millions of lives lost. No big deal.

Not to mention massively reduced biodiversity as a result of mass extinction. But hey, if it doesn't kill you or cost money, it doesn't matter, right?

I don't understand your point, you're saying the scientific consensus is that we're not going to die, but I see a scientific consensus that keeps alerting us:

Tornadoes are already here and we believe they're more frequent because of GW. Epidemics are often quoted as a consequence of a warmer, more welcoming climate, along with the decay of bees, hence the famines. NYC is expected to be flooded several times before 2100. Scientists say we'll never keep it under 2 degrees, because of the acceleration of unforeseen methane emissions in permafrost, and they also say if we reach 6 degrees there will only be room for an order of magnitude fewer people on Earth. It all comes from scientists.

The only thing which I can see false in my parent comment is, we won't all die altogether from the same event, but I wasn't really saying that.

    > we believe they're more frequent because of GW

No, we actually still not sure about this.

The consensus is, we're sure. Doubts on the details shouldn't slow us from acting anyway.

Since when we are sure? Just a few weeks ago some scientist on BBC was talking about extreme events and was careful not to insist that they are a direct consequence of climate change (though there finally appears to be a link). I am aware about consensus on climate change, but not about direct link between it and more frequent or more severe occurrences of extreme weather events. Pretty much all agree that it is likely that changing climate "may likely" bring more of such events but are careful not to directly link any particular case with it.

I really don't get how you're blithely writing off 2 meters of sea level rise. Do you have any clue just how much value that'd destroy? Why do you value the lives of Bengalis living in low elevation areas so much less than your right to drive a gas guzzler cheaply?

Buy shares in houseboat companies. Short sell coastal property.

You are likely to loose your shirt short-selling coastal property. For short-selling to be profitable, what you are short-selling should decrease in value, and do so rather quickly. The reason is that in the mean time you are required to reimburse the person you're borrowing the asset from for the revenue he would have had, had he held on to it. In the case of property that is the rental revenue. Time works against you when short-selling.

Home prices in flood-prone areas are still rising (albeit slower than elsewhere) in the US [1]. At some point they will go down, but time your short-selling wrong, and you will loose money.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/24/science/global-warming-co...

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