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The Uninhabitable Earth

nymag.com

238 pointsyuvadam240 comments

A few observations:

Trying to scare people into behavior does not work very well. The Catholic Church spent centuries threatening people with eternal hell if they had extra-marital sex, and people still had extra-marital sex. Studies have shown that abstinence only sex education results in more teen pregnancies. Thomas Malthus saw an impending famine and begged people to have fewer children. People did not listen.

What works is "magic science." A solution that allows people to behave the way hey do, and we come up with a solution that just works. Birth control has resulted in a decline in teen pregnancies and population stabilization where it is available. The green revolution is able to feed people, without most people having to do anything different in how they eat.

The other thing is that people don't really think this is a true emergency. An evidence for this is the quote "What if global warming is wrong and we made the planet better?" If it is a true emergency, we should be doing stuff that make the planet worse if it is wrong. We should be pushing nuclear power - even to the the point of reducing existing safety regulations. A Chernobyl every decade is preferable to global warming. Politically, we should be willing to trade existing environmental regulation for those which reduce CO2. For example, what if we traded the Endangered species act for a carbon tax?

Third, we should be pushing for research and funding for climate adaptation at his point. The focus has been on mitigation, but it should switch to adaptation. We should be working on scaling up and testing models of carbon sequestration and Geo engineering.

EDIT: Per cbennett's comment, changed prevention to mitigation and mitigation to adaptation to be more in line with official terminology.

Preliminary but important point: what you call prevention is typically called 'mitigation' by the UNFCCC, NASA, and other environmental orgs, while what you have called mitigation is typically 'adaptation' [1]. I know this is jargon, but if you have conversations with folks in the environmental/climate field it can in the best case provide instant rapport to at least be speaking the same language, and in the worst case, at least prevent serious mis-understandings.

>>The other thing is that people don't really think this is a true emergency. An evidence for this is the quote "What if global warming is wrong and we made the planet better?" If it is a true emergency, we should be doing stuff that make the planet worse if it is wrong. We should be pushing nuclear power - even to the the point of reducing existing safety regulations. A Chernobyl every decade is preferable to global warming. Politically, we should be willing to trade existing environmental regulation for those which reduce CO2.

-Human perception of danger/emergency has, from the evolutionary perspective, been optimized for concrete, near-term events/entities, eg terrorism, explosions, enemies. On the other hand ,it has not prepared us for preparing against abstract, medium to long term adversaries, eg planetary or physics scale changes that threaten civilization, malevolent ETs, malevolent super-intelligences [AIs].. etc etc.

-Even if this weren't true and we didn't have these unfortunate cognitive bias, your argument about broad public wisdom of emergency relies upon a well-informed populace that is familiar with statistics, and the scientific methods. Unfortunately, that is not the case in almost every advanced Representative state on the planet. This broad ignorance renders the ambient public awarness point you have made quite moot.

-Finally, I see the logic behind the 'what if global warming is wrong and the planet gets better' case as analogical to Pascal's wager, or the false postive; what you forgot to mention is the false negative, which is metaphorically relatively similar to the outcome of Pascals (Hell/Earth becomes like Hell).

[1] https://climate.nasa.gov/solutions/adaptation-mitigation/

>Birth control has resulted in a decline in teen pregnancies and population stabilization where it is available.

Birth control has also contributed to escalated rates of dysgenic fertility. Smarter people use it and don't pass their genes on, while those with worse future planning abilities disregard it and have more children.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289615...

I strongly support nuclear power, and although I kind of understand their points of view, I can't stop thinking those opposing nuclear power is not serious about climate change.

>I can't stop thinking those opposing nuclear power is not serious about climate change.

They mostly are I think, they're just completely ignorant and naive and unrealistic about all the solutions. The strongly anti-nuclear people (esp. those a decade ago and longer) seem to really think that everyone's going to suddenly stop driving cars and start walking and biking everywhere.

However, that said, it's getting more and more realistic to forgo nuclear power while still reducing greenhouse gas emissions, thanks to renewables, especially solar power. PV power is getting cheaper all the time, and Germany for instance produces a large fraction of their power with it despite Germany not being an especially sunny country. So it's getting more and more realistic to oppose nuclear power while still supporting policies to reduce climate change, and not be completely naive and ignorant as in the past. The main problem with solar is storage, due to its transient generation nature.

Long time nuclear opponents advocating renewables were right in hindsight: If all the post WWII nuclear R&D resources had been spent on renewables instead of military derived reactor designs, we would have had cost effective renewables for years now.

Instead, nuclear is still not commercially competitive, having swallowed globally untold amounts of tax money away from other research.

The latest gen reactor projects are very pyrrhic victories for nonfossil energy.

They are ignorant, but nuclear power proponents have most done a terrible job of selling their argument. They keep selling the benefits while downplaying the safety concerns. The correct strategy is to treat the safety concerns as being of primary importance and treat the benefits as an unfortunate necessity.

It does not matter what the actual risk incidence and hazards are. You do not overcome bias by talking people into submission to the evidence. that works great in peer view and in school but it does not work in the real world because the population you need to convince does not have sufficient spare intellectual capacity to process that.

If you want to sell nuclear power you offer reactor designs that are new, you over-engineer for safety, you say you're taking profit out of the equation, you fire anyone who makes even the smallest mistake, and you drink a glass of any wastewater (or equivalent depending on reactor design).

The public believes, with some reason, that anything nuclear either explodes or contaminates things. No amount of reasoned argument is going to change this perception. The way to change it is to make the plants look different and have the operators and sponsors of the plants live next to the nuclear plant with their families. Not say that it's perfectly safe, show that it's perfectly safe.

I am not against nuclear, just want to point out that while this might have been true in the past, the price decline in solar means nuclear now looses on price. (Perhaps as stable base load where hydro is not already in place...but energy storage might be cheaper than nuclear too)

Not disagreeing with the ineffectiveness of abstinence on unwanted pregnancy, I just would like to point out that I don't think the Catholic church was trying (directly) to address extra-marital pregnancy. Their primary/direct goal was to prevent extra-marital sex - which their teachings do seem to affect. Your comment could be read as a criticism that the "Catholic leaders were dumb - can't they see that birth control education is more effective?" - which is a wrong line of thinking because that is not the issue that the Catholic leaders were trying to address.

Yeah the Catholic Church has never been against pregnancy...

> Trying to scare people into behavior does not work very well. The Catholic Church spent centuries threatening people with eternal hell if they had extra-marital sex, and people still had extra-marital sex. Studies have shown that abstinence only sex education results in more teen pregnancies. Thomas Malthus saw an impending famine and begged people to have fewer children. People did not listen.

How do you know it didn't work, unless you think the only way it could be evaluated as having "worked" is if there were zero extra-marital sex and children born out of wedlock? My sense is that this was at least partially effective in discouraging the behaviors you describe.

> What works is "magic science." A solution that allows people to behave the way hey do, and we come up with a solution that just works. Birth control has resulted in a decline in teen pregnancies and population stabilization where it is available. The green revolution is able to feed people, without most people having to do anything different in how they eat.

We don't have the necessary magical science. We cannot continue behaving the way we are and expect to reach a point where we can realistically develop it, we will die or decline significantly as a species well before then. Yes, we can feed more people now, but a big part of what's driving climate change is emissions and other side effects from that. Our current behaviors are killing us.

> The other thing is that people don't really think this is a true emergency. An evidence for this is the quote "What if global warming is wrong and we made the planet better?" If it is a true emergency, we should be doing stuff that make the planet worse if it is wrong.

This is a non-sequitur. If you are injured or ill and taken to an emergency room, most effective treatments will not automatically make you worse if the diagnosis is incorrect. In some extreme cases this is true, but taking your line of reasoning would mean that only in such cases would the situation be considered an emergency. We have many, many tools available to us to slow the problem at least and allow ourselves additional time to prepare and react, the problem is that we are not doing them.

My sense is that we will not really be able to address this as a species until we hit some of the disaster points described in the article. When 50k+ people in the US die several summers in a row simply from heat (expect that within a decade), then perhaps we'll take it more seriously. Unfortunately, it might legitimately be too late at that point to even adjust quickly enough.

The Climate Leadership Council is an organization of Republican Party elders with an extremely solid proposal to immediately reduce carbon emissions through a carbon fee, which is a market-based mechanism to reflect the true cost of carbon at the source.

Link to proposal: https://www.clcouncil.org/our-plan/ Link to TED talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/ted_halstead_a_climate_solution_wh...

I would have applauded this...a decade ago. The proposal itself is a fine thing, but heralding it as 'the right strategy for our political moment' (1) is asinine.

~1/3 of the population has bought into the idea that climate change is a hoax, and that Tea Party conservative demographic has essentially wrested control of the Republican party from the well-intentioned paternalists that used to run it. Appeals to rationality and institutional consensus are unlikely to be effective when you have a large demographic that has lost trust not just in the media but in the notion of the university (2).

While the authors of the proposal are entirely right about both the current political conditions and necessity of bold action, they are no facing an intractable political problem: generating the political capital required to make this a reality demands large-scale public buy-in, most of which will naturally come from the more liberal side of the political spectrum. But the more they do so, the more intense the opposition will be, and this is a made-to-order target for the right: taxes go up! on gas and oil, the previous bodily fluids of the our psychic economy! at the behest of global elites! You can hear the cries of 'Agenda 21!!!' already.

This is a reconstructive policy, and that's great, but it is going nowhere until our existing political crisis is resolved, which is probably 5 years at a minimum.

1. https://www.clcouncil.org/the-right-strategy-for-our-politic...

2. http://www.people-press.org/2017/07/10/sharp-partisan-divisi...

So what, if not this, is the right strategy for our political moment?

Force the constitutional convention that the right is advocating for ahead of their schedule and encourage peaceful mass assembly for the airing of various grievances. Institutional consensus has evaporated and the US is in dire need of an administrative and political reboot, so the choices are between doing that in an orderly way through the existing constitutional mechanism or waiting for it to just happen, which will be a lot messier.

Right wing political strategists have sought an article V convention for years, ostensibly to introduce a balanced budget amendment but in all likelihood with other strategic considerations in mind. The liberal left abhors the idea, both because of (wholly legitimate) suspicion at the origin and motivations of the proponents and (less creditably) because of basic conflict/risk aversion.

The right's national electoral strategy is to maintain power through the 2018 midterms (expanding it in a midterm election is historically rare) and control enough state legislatures by 2020 to trigger the convention, at which point all bets are off. I judge that they have a moderately good chance of succeeding with this strategy, not least because of superior political skills at procedural manipulation, but largely because of a smaller and more homogenous winning coalition.

Democrats and the left in general have been resisting this pull, but have lost the strategic initiative. They should, therefore, reverse course and seek to accelerate the process as rapidly as possible - because once the Convention is underway, procedural norms go out the window and power politics take their place. Employing the right's political momentum against them, within the scope of the existing constitutional framework, is by far the best strategic option. The alternative is at least a decade of political trench warfare, civil unrest, and international and institutional drift which could result in a catastrophic decline.

To me it is the difference between actually finding a solution and deciding that failure to fix X is a moral failing.

Trying to scare people into behavior does not work very well.

What works is "magic science."

Are these the only two options? What about education, radical changes in awareness (and self-awareness), a move toward genuine sense of responsibility toward others as well as to the commons -- is all of that, off the table?

And what if "magic science" fails us this time? Or is that "unthinkable"?

Education takes a generation or two to work even for simple things, and what you're asking for is deep and fundamental. Surely you have noticed by now that a good quarter of the US population views all forms of public education with hostility. Think also how long it has taken for obviously sensible ideas to catch on, and then consider the much greater difficulty of inculcating abstract moral and political concepts.

Radical changes in awareness (and self-awareness) would be a fine thing, but frankly I think most people know about climate change already; some of them refuse to believe it, some of them would just prefer not to believe it, and some of them just don't care. The more public service announcements you make, the more they'll be denounced as satanic/communist/whatever propaganda.

Honestly, if you really want an outbreak of radical self-awareness, cross your fingers, hire every young organic chemist you can find, and start producing industrial quantities of LSD. That is not a facetious suggestion; psychedelics yield unpredictable but powerful changes in consciousness and can have a lasting impact on perception and behavior precisely because they subvert standard epistemological filters.

A move toward genuine sense of responsibility toward others is something that often emerges out of the shared experience of disaster. Just as you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink, you can lead people towards enlightenment but you can't make them think. Experience is the great teacher. Since we'd obviously rather not use disaster as our classroom, it's incumbent on us to create experiences that are sufficiently meaningful to alter behavior.

I would also add that with education, at least in the US, not only would it take too long, but it's actually going backwards. Just look at the anti-vaxxer movement.

If you really want an outbreak of radical self-awareness, cross your fingers, hire every young organic chemist you can find, and start producing industrial quantities of LSD.

But that brings us back to "magic science".

> The green revolution is able to feed people, without most people having to do anything different in how they eat.

I feel Norman Borlaug (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug) is worth mentioning. As Penn Jillette put it, he's probably saved billions of lives.

We need more Norman Borlaugs, and they need more recognition. This I believe because I agree with you: sure, we could still fix things, but we're not going to. So we better start coming up with ways to handle this. Think of it like creating a mail alias for someone who keeps misspelling an email address. It's a technological solution to a people problem that you can't fix (not easily), only on a much, much bigger scale. We hear people all the time here ask "how can I change the world through X?" or "what should I do with my life?" The answer is simple, but not easy: apply yourself to fixing this mess we've gotten ourself into, because if you don't, your children (or even you) will suffer the consequences.

The other thing is that people don't really think this is a true emergency.

(Raises hand.)

Get back to me when Al Gore, Leo DiCaprio, and a thousand other wealthy frauds who lecture me about my SUV swear off flying on private jets.

When the people who keep telling me AGW is an emergency actually start acting like it's an emergency, I might take them seriously.

This is not an intellectually honest argument. Did it ever occur to you that Al Gore and Leo DiCaprio might be rationally self-interested agents who don't care about the damage they cause to others by flying private jets? They talk about global warming because it gains them social status - that fact alone does not tell you whether global warming is real or not. You are taking their two-faced behavior as evidence against global warming, when it is not evidence.

>You are taking their two-faced behavior as evidence against global warming...

You cannot logically conclude that based on what I wrote.

That's the clear implication from what you wrote - did you not write it to dismiss the likelihood of global warming being caused by humans, and severe?

> That's the clear implication from what you wrote

It is absolutely NOT the clear implication from what I wrote.

But while we're on the subject, do you have any theories as to why the people who wring their hands about the dire emergency that AGW supposedly is, never seem to call out rich, left-wing celebrities or rich left-wing tech moguls for their planet-destroying lifestyles?

I can easily answer that question: some do, but you don't listen to them. Some don't because they understood you don't care about them doing so.

You're not interested in why they do or don't do it, in fact. You're merely interested in making a whataboutist point.

>I can easily answer that question: some do, but you don't listen to them. Some don't because they understood you don't care about them doing so.

You're not interested in why they do or don't do it, in fact. You're merely interested in making a whataboutist point.

Are you omniscient? You seem to think you are.

When stating facts is criticized as fear mongering by "intellectuals," you know the world is irreversibly fucked

It's pretty hopeless. I used to think we'd adjust in time, but that was when the decline looked more linear (or at least I thought it looked more linear).

Of the many people who I know who are seriously concerned re climate change, I'd say 2 have taken truly meaningful steps .

It's not the handful of climate change deniers that's the problem. It's the overwhelming number of people who want to say they're green, but still own two cars, never take public transport, eat meat daily, live in big houses, and buy buy buy.

If you think climate change is a serious issue. If you're concerned that scientists are now talking about the low single-digit years we have to change. If you have kids. Why the *@#! aren't you taking drastic change?

What kind of drastic change should one take? Not having kids, OK, drastic but doable. Cutting out meat, driving less, etc, OK.

But what about the rest of the production chain that assumes you're the same as everyone else (whom continues to use and depend on that production chain), which is an ocean of waste compared to what any single person can do? We can individually push the needle very slightly, but it does nothing to push the needle on our behalf within the bigger economic machine. All those wasteful international processes are pushing forward faster than ever. It's like we're bleeding out and you just recommended dabbing the wound with a string of thread.

What are some realistic things that an individual or group of individuals can do to prepare?

Move north, I suppose, ahead of the great land rush to come.

Although there might be opportunities for beach-front surf shops on tropical Baffin Island, good luck getting customers when the rest of the world has gone to hell.

Customers aren't often a concern for the subsistence farmer, although I suppose you might sell or barter any surplus - though you may be better advised to share it freely and so build goodwill.

Re kids: I was saying if you have kids, surely that's even more reason to act.

I'm not a survivalist. No idea if you want to prepare? Move north and stock up on guns, ammo, seed, water and soil?

But, I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. Well over 50% of Americans and Europeans view climate change as a threat. That's 500 million of the most affluent humans on the planet. The "economic machine", by which I assume you mean $3 bottled water, SUV, McMansions, beef, exists for them; not the other way around.

The energy consumption (and therefore carbon emissions) per capita in the west/US comes almost entirely from the feedback loop between single-family-detached housing and the car-or-two it takes to live in that kind of sprawled out lifestyle. Put another way, Transportation and Housing (heating & cooling) are the #1 and #2 sources of carbon emissions for suburban, exurban and rural dwellers.

People who simply live in urban cores automatically cut their carbon emissions in half: http://coolclimate.berkeley.edu/maps

If you live in a 5+ unit building, do not own a car, rarely fly, sign up for your utilities low-carbon supply option, and cut out red meat, its possible to be a full order of magnitude below the american average. http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Am...

So the #1 thing an American can do to fight climate change is be "pro-city". Move there. Encourage building/density there. Help fix the schools. Use, vote for, and demand more and better public transit.

People who insist on having a yard and several feet of air-gap between them and their neighbors are the real climate change deniers.

Sadly, being "pro-city" is extremely political. Even if we could set aside people's personal preferences, I'm not sure how we start to overcome the ideological gap between urban and rural residents...

> So the #1 thing an American can do to fight climate change is be "pro-city". Move there. Encourage building/density there. Help fix the schools. Use, vote for, and demand more and better public transit.

This seems nearly as impossible as direct political action against climate change. Effectively, none of the current residents of cities want anyone else to move there, let alone allow more development, especially of greater density. Cities themselves seem to be pretty uniformly terrible at scaling-up to support larger populations. NYC's subways seem pretty close to crippling failure as-is.

I don't prefer revolution, but some kind of significant 'shake-up' seems pretty inevitable given the ossification of all of the relevant 'systems'.

This is another area where technology is hugely beneficial. Not everyone can move to a city, but people who drive to work could work remotely one day a week. Hell, let's make it Friday, who wouldn't like that? There are few office-type jobs that one just CAN'T do remotely at least one day a week, so you've cut a significant part of the emissions of a significant part of the American population.

And this can be instituted as an economic incentive; employers could get a tax credit or something in exchange for the proportion of work they allow employees to do remotely.

Are American cities ready to build enough housing and infrastructure to handle a collective influx of over 120,000,000 Americans currently living in suburbs and rural areas? HA! I wouldn't and actually couldn't (financially) move to a major city as it stands barring a pretty sumptuous raise or downsizing from my 2 BR apartment to a studio. Rents are ridiculous, taxes are higher, air is much more polluted, traffic is horrible, public transit is hit or miss and often unreliable. If all of that improved I might reconsider, and I'll land my flying pig on my urban apartment balcony when that happens. For all the mayors' talk about meeting the Paris accords, or as "enlightened" as many cities think they are (looking at you SanFran), many of those cities will need their own bastille day where the city zoning laws are literally torn up burned in the streets before being "pro-city" is even reasonable for anyone lower than upper-middle-class.

Complete revolution would be ideal for meaningful change but is highly unlikely. As it stands we have to adapt existing systems to be clean, or at least cleaner. That means LED light bulbs, more solar (rooftop or grid) and wind/hydro/geothermal where possible, and electric vehicles. Which is where we're heading right now. Given the current rate of expansion, I imagine suburban emissions from housing/transportation will drop drastically over the next 50 years. Meanwhile those yards are carbon sinks.

The problem with American cities is NIMBYism: existing property owners are the ones with control of the zoning and the approval for new construction. So SanFran can't replace its too-small housing with lots of high-density high-rises because the people who own the other land there don't want it.

The fix for this is to move control of zoning and construction permits to the state level.

>"People who insist on having a yard and several feet of air-gap between them and their neighbors are the real climate change deniers."

Why are we the climate change deniers? What about those of us with yards that are completely edible and green and don't require our food to be hauled in from across the country? I don't think the issue is as cut-and-dry as you make it sound. I'd also recommend you look into the agricultural and food supply chain for these large dense cities.

>So the #1 thing an American can do to fight climate change is be "pro-city". Move there.

I love the idea of higher-density living, the problem is that it's simply unaffordable for a large part of the population. They can only afford houses with yards and several feet of air-gap, as you put it. How do you propose to fix this?

For example, look at Japan. In Tokyo, you can rent a small (very small) efficiency apartment for perhaps $500, according to what I hear on YouTube. A larger one big enough for a couple might be $900 or $1000. Such a place will be clean, safe, and just a few minutes' walk from the subway. Now look at NYC: there's no possible way you'll find something to rent at that price in a place that's at all safe. So telling people to "move there" is really rather asinine; are you going to pay me $1500/month so I can afford a livable apartment in Manhattan? (I'll make up the other $1000 on my own, your $1500 is a subsidy)

As long as the property owners in a municipality have all the power over building and density, we're going to have this problem.

just nuking each other when resources get sparse should do the trick, the planet will be fine either way.

Unless we survive long enough to cause runaway greenhouse effect.

Realistically, you should make communities local and more self-sufficient, like they used to be.

This idea that you have to commute 20 miles to work every day, in a personal car, is less than 100 years old. People used to grow up, live, work, and marry and raise families in their villages. Not many would travel all the time. Mozart was probably the most traveled of his time, and he probably didn't go half as many miles as the average worker today.

Make it so people can work from home. Give them an unconditional basic income so they don't have to work.

The problem is capitalism, as much as many people here don't like to hear it. Capitalism is great at what it does -- but it doesn't care about externalities. If a person runs out of food, capitalism doesn't care. If a species goes extinct, the world is turned into farms and monocultures, or the planet is polluted or resources are depleted, capitalism won't care until it's done.

Self-sufficiency is rife with its own inefficiencies.

For example, using Mozarts timeframe and attempting it place it on our current planet leads to a situation where no logical comparison can be made. He is from around 1800, there were around 900 million people at the time. You could grow enough locally to feed the population locally in most places. This is no longer true. Mass transportation of food, water, and resources for survival are currently necessary.

The problem is not capitalism, the problem is people

Pretty much every living creature goes through stages of increased resource availability -> growth -> overshooting population capacity or resource reduction -> population reduction. As we can see, overpopulation of raccoons, antelopes, and alligators isn't caused by capitalism, it is caused by the biological imperative to breed -> consume -> breed -> consume. Furthermore your willingness to blame capitalism blinds you to knowledge and an impartial view of what is occurring. Such as, most first world capitalistic countries are experiencing population stagnation. Japan, US, and western Europe all have decreasing population, until you take immigration into account. Also many non-capitalistic countries have terrible problems with pollution (Russia anyone?), thereby again rendering your premise that capitalism is the problem. Blaming the wrong thing never fixed the problem, whipping boys don't lead to solutions.

One drastic change would be to abandon capitalism and the idea of growth. Instead, we should be focusing on sustainability which is completely at odds with capitalism.

We need to start making products that are designed to last a long time as opposed to them having been built for planned obsolescence. We need to start abandoning throw away things like plastic containers. For example, Coca-Cola produces a staggering 100 billion disposalbe plastic bottles http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/coca-cola-pl... a year. We have to start moving heavy industry off fossils. We have to move away from combustion engines, and need to abandon cars in general.

The reality of the situation is that most contribution to climate change comes from industrial sources and not individuals.

A 100 companies are responsible for over 70% of all emissions. That's what would need to change, and that's just not going to happen in time. https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10...

What's going to happen is that majority of humanity will simply die off. If enough humans are left alive to carry on civilization, hopefully they will have learned something from that.

The system has evolved to make change very difficult. One part of this post on ZeroHedge shows you the supply chain involved with just a ketchup. 52 transport and process stages. Fifty-two.

"Just how energy inefficient the food system is can be seen in the crazy case of the Swedish tomato ketchup. Researchers at the Swedish Institute for Food and Biotechnology analysed the production of tomato ketchup. The study considered the production of inputs to agriculture, tomato cultivation and conversion to tomato paste (in Italy), the processing and packaging of the paste and other ingredients into tomato ketchup in Sweden and the retail and storage of the final product. All this involved more than 52 transport and process stages.

The aseptic bags used to package the tomato paste were produced in the Netherlands and transported to Italy to be filled, placed in steel barrels, and then moved to Sweden. The five layered, red bottles were either produced in the UK or Sweden with materials form Japan, Italy, Belgium, the USA and Denmark. The polypropylene (PP) screw-cap of the bottle and plug, made from low density polyethylene (LDPE), was produced in Denmark and transported to Sweden. Additionally, LDPE shrink-film and corrugated cardboard were used to distribute the final product. Labels, glue and ink were not included in the analysis."

Source: http://www.321energy.com/editorials/church/church040205.html

How does an individual affect change when something as basic as a bottle of ketchup is clearly part of the world that'd built itself with disregard for its impact on the planet?

ZeroHedge Post: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-06-24/why-next-recession-...

I managed to find the original PDF : http://infohouse.p2ric.org/ref/37/36505.pdf

Re-optimizing said supply chains in an oil constrained, and eventually oil free world seems extremely non-trivial. I wonder if we will soon have to scale up the methods (both computationally, & in human/practical industrial re-organization terms) to plot new paths and then connect them, before the graph changes so much that the potential for profit disappears.

In the near term,I could see human engineers using deep learning or other computational methods for multi-scale optimization to reduce costs and carbon footprint based on locality of original sources (food/biofuels/..) In the medium term, I would bet that AI agents will exist precisely to optimize these tasks. There's hundreds of billions to be (re)-made in (re)-wiring the economy properly.

You should read Homebrew Industrial Revolution by Kevin Carson, particularly his break down of the Industrial Revolution. Mostly the IR was driven by state actors or those who could influence them such as with the UK's Enclosure Act which forced peasants to work in factories and in the US with the transcontinental railroad which was lobbied for by industrial interests on the East coast who wanted a slice of the West coast pie of regional production/consumption. Basically, everything up to this point is the result of capitalism and its owners who are protected from market forces of regional and local production/consumption which would follow more closely than what we have today where companies literally throw away brand new shoes and electronics to keep their prices high.

Seems like that metric is about as useful as LOC

How is this inefficient? I definitely think that markets have the potential to be very inefficient, but do we know that the alternatives to this are any more efficient? Economies of scale often do make it more efficient for all of a particular kind of product to be produced in one location and then shipped to wherever they're needed. The fact that there are 52 steps to the process says nothing about the actual efficiency of it. It's just a play to ignorance to the fact that almost all products we enjoy go through a similarly complicated supply chain.

It's only inefficient in the sense that it expends more gas (thus leading to higher emissions) than is strictly necessary. However, I also assume that it is cheaper for food to be distributed and processed in this manner; this is usually what people mean by "efficient".

> It's the overwhelming number of people who want to say they're green, but still own two cars, never take public transport, eat meat daily, live in big houses, and buy buy buy.

The car and the "buy, buy, buy" are the only real problems. Cut those two out and the big houses and meat aren't a big deal (or are at least workeable).

Probably the biggest thing you could do to help the environment is not buy any kind of mobile device and to run your computer into the ground.

I don't know about all meat but the deforestation for cattle ranching and feed, methane produced by the beasts themselves, and other factors seem to be fairly significant. The much greater energy requirements to light, heat, and cool big houses should not be discounted so easily either.

>The much greater energy requirements to light, heat, and cool big houses should not be discounted so easily either.

Heat and cool, yes. Light, no, not any more. Lighting is really pretty insignificant now thanks to LEDs, and getting constantly better as the older incandescents get replaced.

Home heating and meat consumption are the biggest emitters of greenhouse gases. The creation of the mobile device is peanuts in comparison.

>Home heating and meat consumption are the biggest emitters of greenhouse gases.

What? Citation needed. That's complete BS. See here:

https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/sources-greenhouse-gas-emis...

The #1 cause of greenhouse gases is electricity production. #2 is transportation (cars, trucks, planes, ships, trains).

Commercial and residential (including home heating) is only 12%, and agriculture is only 9%.

You're right about mobile devices being peanuts though.

Just thinking out loud here, but if the arctic somehow contains more carbon and methane than all we've released into the atmosphere (can someone explain why that is???) then can't we:

1) Coat the entire arctic with a more reflective compound, so it will not be as likely to melt under the same summer temperatures... the expense of this would be far less than the fallout later. This may interfere with some life in the arctic that depends on surface ice somehow. But considering the rest of the planet will have to adapt in the alternative scenario, I'd say this life would have to adapt. I doubt it has much effect on the rest of the world.

2) Do one of those sci-fi thingies where a compound is discovered which instantly causes a chain reaction to crystallize e.g. water at much higher temperatures than the current melting point. Salt can lower the melting point of water. Isn't there anything that can raise it? But obviously we wouldn't have enough of that compound to just inject into the ice. I've seen spontaneous crystallization of water into ice at room temperature when you hit a bottle. Maybe something like this can be done on a more permanent basis.

3) Release reflective material into the atmosphere (like in nuclear winter) to counteract the greenhouse gas effect and hope this doesn't somehow cause deadly pollution in some other way. After all, the Earth can only radiate energy into space, convection with the vacuum of space doesn't really transfer heat away much at all. But we can reflect the sun's radiation to the Earth, and limit the heating up that way.

4) Instead of reflective material, you can fly satellites into space where they cast a shadow on the Earth (assuming the sun is far enough, I haven't done the calculations, it might be possible that small satellites or gas clouds can cast a shadow on the Earth just like the moon's umbra will in August 19th this year). And in that case we can try to reflect a lot of the energy that way. Of course, they would have to be SUPER reflective and have a high surface area, or they'd heat up within a decade rendering them useless.

There are lots of good ideas for reducing or eliminating the harm of climate change. But they're sacrilegious because people worry they might lull others into not trying to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. I'm pretty confident we'll do something like this to fix it when it comes.

These are not very good gen-engineering ideas but we may be compelled to engage in gen-engineering of some kind. It will be risky, with side effects that we'll know but more worrying will be the unintended effects that we didn't predict. They more we can do to reduce our negative output, the less ham-fisted tinkering with the planet's systems we'll have to do.

Well, suppose all the people who want to be green go ahead and cut back to one car, go vegetarian, live in a smaller house, etc. etc. Maybe if everyone is really dedicated, we could all cut our emissions in half. So then what? We're still all emitting way more CO2 than the planet can absorb; climate change would still happen, it'd just be happening a bit more slowly.

We're not going to realistically solve this problem by all making personal sacrifices, because even in the best case, where everyone chips in, it's only enough to slow the bleeding. If we really want to truly solve this mess, we need to promote truly sustainable technologies that scale well and appeal to everyone.

Don't put solar panels on your house out of a personal sense of guilt about your own emissions, put them on your house because it grows the market for solar, stimulates research into better panels, and helps push forward the economies of scale that are needed to make renewables cost competitive with fossil fuels. Don't buy an electric car because you want to pollute less, buy an electric car because you want to fund the continued technological improvements of electric cars in general.

We're all focusing way too much on merely slowing down the death of the planet when we should be focusing on fixing the problem altogether. Don't aim for a slower death, aim for a faster transition to carbon-neutral. If we all feel that the planet is doomed anyway, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because it's a lot harder to motivate ourselves to try and fix a problem that feels unfixable.

>>Don't put solar panels on your house out of a personal sense of guilt about your own emissions, put them on your house because it grows the market for solar, stimulates research into better panels, and helps push forward the economies of scale that are needed to make renewables cost competitive with fossil fuels

Or don't live in a house in the suburbs. Opt for medium or high-density residential areas, which are far more efficient in terms of both land and utility use.

They are, but they're also frequently far more expensive, and downright unaffordable to many people compared to much larger homes in more rural areas. In the big city near me, a little condo in a high-rise can easily cost $400k. But a couple hours away from the city I can buy a house for $50k or $75k. People who have no hope of earning enough money for a $400k condo (even though jobs in the city usually pay a little more) can frequently afford one of those rural properties.

> If you're concerned that scientists are now talking about the low single-digit years we have to change.

This type of alarmism does not help anyone. The "authorities" have been saying "single digit years" for decades, not "just now". The average person has seen very little change causing more denialism to spread.

Please stop.

> "It's not the handful of climate change deniers that's the problem. It's the overwhelming number of people who want to say they're green."

We see time and time again that laws are required to achieve massive rapid change and reduce the economic impact of that change.

In 1974 one could have spent thousands on a custom installed catalytic converter. That "green" person would have experienced a great financial burden and see no measurable impact on air quality. It would have been a foolish decision. That's why we need laws and that is why the handful of climate change deniers, that have a disproportionate influence on policy, are so dangerous.

How one votes is what matters (mattered) most.

This is why I'm so concerned about the trend that SUV sales are outpacing Sedan sales. Whereas sedans used to be the "default" car a decade ago, SUVs are now taking their place [0].

All things being equal, a smaller car (sedan) should get better MPG than a larger car (SUV) [1].

And yet it seems that people's efforts to reduce their environmental footprint is focused on recycling a plastic cup here and there [2].

A very general trend over the past few decades shows us that the price of gas / gallon has increased. So Americans' response to this is: I need to buy a bigger car? A pollution tax would certainly help but is far too big of a thing to accomplish in the short-term.

I've been contemplating a sort of "big car" tax for a number of reasons, and increased gasoline consumption / environmental impact is a key item on that list. (Non-environmental items include (1) the danger they pose to other drivers in smaller vehicles, and (2) the race-to-the-bottom condition no. 1 imposes, since more and more people will want larger vehicles when they feel threatened by the presence of large vehicles on the road, leading to a positive reinforcement cycle)

[0] http://www.driveprime.com/blog-suv-and-crossover-sales-outpa... [1] http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/Find.do?action=sbs&id=37918&i... [2] https://youtu.be/eNx9tvCrvv8?t=1m10s

Granted some people buy gratuitously large vehicles, but for many there is a practical purpose: moving large amounts of stuff. Whether it's multiple bags of mulch, dorm room furniture, sports equipment, more than 3 kids, or just lots of luggage for a family road trip, there's definitely an advantage to a big car there. Not to mention better performance in snow depending on model.

In any case, one we get non-luxury electric SUVs the point will largely be moot.

I think people delude themselves into thinking they're purchasing an SUV to transport a lot of stuff or to travel with kids, when in reality drivers nonetheless drive alone.

Anecdotally, as I've said, SUVs have simply replaced Sedans as the "default" car on the road. And as you may know, the "default" car in America has a single driver.

> In any case, one we get non-luxury electric SUVs the point will largely be moot.

I disagree on the basis of the positive reinforcement cycle causing people to buy larger cars in the first place. From speaking to other drivers and listening to them as they think out their thought process when deciding what new car to buy, the #1 reason people want to drive an SUV is safety (which may include the point you made about performance in snow).

Not that I have anything against safety itself, but you must see the arms race that can occur from seeking safety in a larger vehicle. When other people are driving larger vehicles around you, you may feel endangered and thus buy a larger car yourself. That causes other drivers to buy larger cars in turn. No one can have "the biggest car". They only keep getting bigger.

So this notion that electric SUVs are going to save us is moot, I believe. People will still clamor for larger (now-electric) SUVs for their safety, reducing their eMPG (electric-equivalent MPG).

My fiancee inherited an SUV when her parents moved back to their country of origin, and it really is much better than my compact sedan for moving furniture.

A U-Haul is even better for moving furniture, and is cheap & easy to rent occasionally. Optimize for the common case, not the rare.

My utility trailer is far better than your SUV for hauling furniture, appliances, mulch, etc. And for the 363 days of the year that I'm not hauling anything needing that much capacity, my economy car gets far better fuel economy than your SUV while also being safer to drive because it's smaller, faster, and more agile, and doesn't roll over so easily so I can avoid accidents better.

Well sure SUVs, even electric ones will never be the most efficient forms of transportation. But if most or all of that energy comes from carbon neutral sources that relative inefficiency doesn't hurt all that much.

And I don't see the safety slope going much further than Vans/Pickups/SUVs. Are people going to start demanding de-militarized MRAPs for safety purposes? I doubt it. The safety cycle you describe is driven by the original users of the vehicles. Ex: Someone buys an SUV because they do a lot of kayaking/camping. That person gets in an accient with a smaller car and totals said smaller car while the SUV has a few dents in the bumper. Some people see this on the news, freak out and buy SUVs so now all things are equal. End of cycle. The kayaker doesn't buy another, bigger SUV, or upgrade to an 18 wheeler just to compete.

I used to drive a four door sedan(Chevy Impala) and was perfectly happy with it (My then 17 year old daughter totaled it, going up against another Impala). When the time came to find it's replacement I had to meet a certain pragmatic requirement. My wife has now had six back surgeries. When her mini-van needed to be in the shop for a few days we realized that she has a substantial amount of difficulty getting out of even a large car like my Impala. We needed a second vehicle that she could basically enter/exit easily. I now drive a small'ish SUV (Kia Sorento). My Impala was probably more sturdily built, I certainly didn't feel un-safe in it.

> I think people delude themselves into thinking they're purchasing an SUV to...travel with kids...

There has been a big change in the US that pushed many families to select SUV's and bigger cars in general: child seats became mandatory. These were rare during the 70's and earlier. They take up quite a lot of space when rear-facing (and if you use them strictly according to guidelines, they will be installed rear-facing for a very big part of their service life).

During the 70's it wasn't unusual to see families cramming groceries and shopping items in between where their children sat in the car, and anywhere else the items would fit, for that matter; you can't do that any longer, and in fact higher child safety awareness in cars even discourages that practice because of the possibility those items become missiles during an accident.

Nor is this practice recommended for where the adults sit. So a lot of families end up going with SUV's or minivans (why station wagons are not picked is another tragic story), to have enough to safely carry passengers, shopping, and sports/activity gear.

So yes, you can advocate for smaller cars, but you should be up front about the trade-off. Either more trips are made, wasting time, money and fuel, and/or safety is compromised, and/or lifestyles are drastically altered. To sell these compromises, you have to offer a benefit more compelling than "catastrophic outcome that doesn't affect you now might be averted". I'm not saying we shouldn't adopt small cars (I bike most days myself), I'm laying out the reality on the ground to convince the mass of developed world citizens to adopt them.

>multiple bags of mulch, dorm room furniture, sports equipment, more than 3 kids, or just lots of luggage for a family road trip

How are these practical purposes? The mulch can stay on the lawn or you could compost it at home; moving dorm room furniture twice a year for 2-4 years does not justify a large vehicle; sports equipment sounds like an attempt to justify a few trips each year into the mountains for a trip to a Ski resort; kids make sense I feel sorry for my parents when I was a child with two siblings stuffed into a 1993 Kia Sephia during road trips, but you could also just not have kids, this is a discussion on ways to reduce climate changes effects and drivers not increase them; and if you have an occasional need for lots of luggage you can do what my parents did for the Kia and put a travel box on top.

You have to transport the mulch from the store somehow. If you've got a dozen bags, it adds up. Doing summer and winter sessions I moved in and out of dorms at least 4 times a year. My family also took 5+ hour multi-week road trips to see distant relatives when I was a kid. You'd be surprised how much luggage that can entail.

These types of things things might be occasional, maybe every few weeks at most, but to me that justifies buying the larger vehicle. It may not be the ideal solution, but that's hardly a reason not to use it.

As for not having kids... yeah no. I don't understand how anyone who wants kids can even entertain that thought. Like telling me I should just chop off an arm so my body can conserve resources.

>You have to transport the mulch from the store somehow. If you've got a dozen bags, it adds up.

See I thought you meant yard waste from your own yard to a landfill. Arguing that you need a SUV for a purchase of mulch from a store still can't be justified. Rent a vehicle for like $20 for the day. You cannot not live long enough to beat an entry level sedan and a yearly one day rental compared to even an entry level SUV, much less a full-size SUV. Heck get two entry level sedans for the price of one entry level SUV, now you can haul 8 people and your mulch, while using less gas than the full-size SUV and being able to improve your routing.

>Doing summer and winter sessions I moved in and out of dorms at least 4 times a year.

"Hey when I do this really odd exception it throws a wrench in normal plans." I really don't know what entails needing a SUV to move in and out 4 times a year. Renting a Uhaul will be cheaper than the yearly insurance premium difference between a small vehicle and a large SUV. Or if you could stand to be away from a lot of it when staying at what I assume is your parent's fully furnished house when you aren't in school you could rent a storage unit instead of dragging all your knick-knacks across the country.

>My family also took 5+ hour multi-week road trips to see distant relatives when I was a kid. You'd be surprised how much luggage that can entail.

My family did that same and we'd just attach the cargo box to the top of the vehicle and make my sister not pack 2 giant suitcases. The occasional need for lots of cargo capacity doesn't necessitate always having the capacity.

>As for not having kids... yeah no.

What about less kids? What about not having them all at the same time, i.e. you can have a little car because the kids are separated by 15+ years?

>Like telling me I should just chop off an arm so my body can conserve resources.

Well why did you grow that extra arm? Child bearing is relatively optional.

If you need to move more than 3 kids, you need to get a minivan. But most suburban people don't, they get the more gas-guzzling SUVs instead. Minivans can also haul a lot more cargo; SUVs are generally rather poor at that.

For most people who rarely move cargo, and don't have so many kids, a much more sensible solution is to get a small/midsize car, and use a utility trailer when you need to move things. My economy car can easily move a washing machine and dryer, or a large riding mower, something that pretty much no SUV can do, thanks to a trailer. While I'm pulling a trailer I get fuel economy similar to a midsize SUV, but it's not often I'm pulling the trailer so the rest of the time I'm getting 40mpg.

Electric SUVs will still consumer significantly more energy than electric cars. You can't change basic physics.

Depends on the SUV. Minivans are fine, I grew up riding in one. Trailers are cool if you have a car with a hitch. I'm not even sure if my sedan's even capable of having a hitch attached without some sort of bumper replacement.

Regardless, my point isn't that SUVs are the perfect solution, just that they have their uses. Could those uses be accomplished by something slightly more efficient? Maybe, but that doesn't make buying the SUV borderline criminal like some here seem to believe.

Case in point, if 10 years from now we have electric SUVs that are completely powered by solar/wind/clean energy, why do you care if it's slightly less efficient? Talk about splitting hairs...

>Depends on the SUV.

No, it doesn't. The requirement is more than 3 kids. A small or midsize SUV has the same passenger capacity as a sedan (5: 2 in front, 3 in back), so now you're talking about a large 3-row SUV. There's no possible way a large 3-row SUV gets better efficiency than a typical minivan.

> Trailers are cool if you have a car with a hitch. I'm not even sure if my sedan's even capable of having a hitch attached without some sort of bumper replacement.

Wrong. Any normal sedan has a hitch available. Check out Curt, Hidden Hitch, Reese, etc. etrailer.com carries most makes. I'd be surprised if you could find any car other than maybe a Smart which doesn't have a hitch available. Even a Prius has a hitch available.

>Regardless, my point isn't that SUVs are the perfect solution, just that they have their uses.

No, they really don't, except for off-roading, which isn't something you need to do on a regular basis anyway unless you're some kind of far-out rural dweller (and even there, a Subaru will probably work just fine). Other vehicles can do the same job but much better. People: minivan. Cargo: 4x8 or 5x8 utility trailer. Worse, SUVs are dangerous: they're far more prone to rolling over, and can be rolled even by high winds.

>Case in point, if 10 years from now we have electric SUVs that are completely powered by solar/wind/clean energy

Why would you want something so inferior, even if you could reduce the energy requirement? And it's still never going to be that low. Electric is better, but not that much better: hundreds of millions of people driving eSUVs is still far more energy than those same people driving e-cars. You can't get around the basic laws of physics: more mass and higher wind resistance = more energy.

At least around here if you ask people why they, as the only person in the vehicle, drive something so big many will answer, "so, I win". The idea being that in an accident the larger vehicle will provide more protection.

Soon we will all be driving semi-tractors just so we can "win" against the largest vehicles on the road.

> A pollution tax would certainly help but is far too big of a thing to accomplish in the short-term.

There's no need for a big car tax or a pollution tax. We could just end the massive fuel subsidies we have in the US. Of course that is also unlikely to be accomplished in the short term.

Just to add a little context, people were buying huge cars back in the early years of the century (remember Hummers?). Then rising gas prices, the financial crisis, and Obama's election made that unfashionable. Now many people feel better off economically and are buying the large cars they secretly wanted anyway.

The big energy producers love this message because it results in nothing happening. The only way we will solve this problem is by attacking it at the source, by shifting taxes to carbon.

The average person has a hard enough time with immediate issues: overeating, exercising, saving for retirement, substance dependencies. So, personal life changes as response to climate change is not something we should rely on.

I doubt those two people have actually taken truly meaningful steps, unless they're powerful politicians, business leaders, or high up in a relevant regulatory agency.

This is the root of the problem: the actions of most individuals don't matter no matter what they are. Let's say I switch entirely to renewable energy, stop eating meat, buy local food, and do every other thing possible to reduce my footprint. Great, now I've added, what, an extra half a second to the time we have before catastrophe? It just doesn't matter.

Everyone working together is what makes a difference, of course, but that's hard. It's not just a matter of convincing everyone to act individually.

This lazy cynicism is far too commonplace, and easily countered: If a whole lot of people added their half-seconds together, it would matter a whole lot.

You either care enough to change your behavior or you don't. Don't pass your lack of courage of conviction off onto nameless "...politicians, business leaders or [those] high up in a relevant regulatory agency."

I already addressed that in the last paragraph of my comment. Yes, if a whole lot of people did it together, it would matter a lot. And if wishes were horses, we'd all be eating steak.

It takes a completely different approach to get a lot of people to take action than it does to take action myself. If I want other people to change their lives, I need to convince them to do it, or force them to do it, or come up with great new technology that allows them to do it while making their lives better, or something like that. If I want to change my own life, I need to buy different stuff, use different stuff, eat different stuff, etc. The two are essentially unrelated.

You're right, I don't care enough to change my behavior. That's because the effort/reward ratio is completely busted. The reward is indistinguishable from zero, so I'd need to care an essentially infinite amount.

This is super interesting to me, because in the Seattle bubble I live in, I feel like everyone my age has at most 1 car, often 0. Usually a small car (I have a compact prius) and drives transit the vast majority of the time. We also are very good about recycling and composting within the city.

Given the evidence of all of recorded history and archaeological evidence, how is the denial of economics any better than climate change denial? We have many, many examples of environmental changes combined with misaligned incentives bringing about the end of many civilizations.

(Just one example, for which new media exists: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkMP328eU5Q )

As another HN commenter on this post noted, you can't overturn people's incentives through moralizing about some abstract fear. Even when pursuing an obvious course of justice, Gandhi knew that you must align with people's day to day incentives. It does no one good to rail against the stupidity of the masses and the greed of corporations. We need to figure out how to align everyone's incentives.

you can't, in the short term. There are no good long-term solutions that are not going to cause some acute pain in the short term. Deep down everyone knows this, and the increasing viciousness of politics is, under the surface debates, a fight over who is going to have to bear that pain and to what degree.

You can align market forces. It's going to be a hard sell working against entrenched interests, however.

https://www.ted.com/talks/ted_halstead_a_climate_solution_wh...

If you look at the changes of carbon emission per country, the U.S. emission has decreased in the last 20 years. China's emission has tripled in the same period:

https://cdn.static-economist.com/sites/default/files/images/...

The main reason is the growth of Chinese economy. So if you want to make real impact, help the next emerging economies to grow without incurring huge growth in emissions. For example, if you look at the per-capital carbon emission by country:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_di...

China's is half of that of US, while India's is 1/8. Imagine if the India's number grow 4 times to that of China's, any saving in the U.S. will be completely cancelled out and some. In fact, U.S. can cut its emission to 0, and India only needs to grow its number to 75% of that of China's to cancel out the U.S. improvement.

I'd very much like my next employer to be one that is actively working toward climate solutions, and has a large leverage. Any suggestions?

Obvious choices would be Tesla (any large automaker with a serious electric program), or a political organization with sane and pragmatic environmental goals.

If you're in the US, I'd check out some of the national laboratories: https://science.energy.gov/laboratories/

US Government research jobs these days really don't get anything done. You'll spend a career there shuffling paper and accomplishing zero.

  It's the overwhelming number of people who want to say 
  they're green, but still own two cars, never take public 
  transport, eat meat daily, live in big houses, and buy 
  buy buy.

This is the classic neoliberal "individual responsibility" framing, meant to cast global warming purely as a personal moral issue, and deflect attention from regulating corporations, which burn the majority of fossil fuels. Ending corn ethanol and oil industry subsidies will do far more than guilting people to buy electric cars.

It's a tragedy of the Commons problem. I'd vote in a heart beat to make meat consumption illegal, even completely burninh the usage of fossil fuels and even to attack countries that refuse to do the same. However, if only I stop eating meat and driving my car the only thing that will happen is that my quality of life gets lowered.

If you feel like watching more hopeful content on the subject, there is Allan Savory's TED talk about how to stop desertification[1], and Freeman Dyson's speech called "heretic thoughts about science and society"[2].

Basically, those speakers suggest climate change is an issue that can be solved with better land management. Soil is extremely good at absorbing Carbon Dioxide. Isn't it why there is so little CO2 in the atmosphere (0.04%)? We just need to make sure the process does indeed happen.

When one looks at the map of Earth, the vastness of the desert areas is scary. Yet there are reasons to believe this is relatively recent. The Sahara was wet few thousands years ago, the American deserts became so mostly because of the considerable environmental changes brought by Europeans.

Desertification is much scarier than climate change, and it did not wait for the industrial revolution to happen. Reversing desertification is probably not impossible (after all it is being attempted already in many places around the world, like in Africa[3] and China[4]), and it might very well reverse climate change as a bonus.

I personally wish more effort and public attention was diverted to it.

1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpTHi7O66pI

2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xFLjUt2leM

3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Green_Wall

4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-North_Shelter_Forest_Pro...

Re. reversing desertification:

Came across this technique - imprinting - recently - seems interesting:

Imprinting soils – Creating Instant Edge for Large Scale Revegetation of Barren Lands:

1) https://permaculturenews.org/2012/09/19/imprinting-soils-cre... Excerpt:

[ Imprinting is a method for instantly adding what permaculturists call the ‘edge effect’ to soils, utilising a heavy and dimpled/wedged roller to ‘imprint’ soils with patterned depressions. The bottom of these depressions then become collection points for all the crucial elements needed for seed germination and soil building: seeds themselves, water, organic matter (including plant debris and animal manure) and wind-blown silt and clay particles. ]

Check the before and after photos in the article.

2) http://imprinting.org/

Bio of Dr. Robert Dixon, who started this:

3) http://imprinting.org/biography.htm

Woah, that's very interesting.

It's pretty well-established that analyzing land based on gross regional characteristics is a disaster for reasons like these - the relevance of a given patch of soil to erosion resistance or vegetation support can change massively over miles or even yards. Sometimes protecting 100 acres of exposed, average land is less useful than protecting a single acre of liminal ground that holds back stream or wind erosion, or helps to germinate the next 'stage' of vegetation.

What's totally new to me is the idea of going out and making seminal land like this. Finding it is hard, protecting it is harder, but making it? There's an idea that could actually be compatible with the sort of bulk-analysis development governments are capable of.

This seems to at least have the potential to really matter, and be far more usable than most grand environmental schemes.

Yes, it does seem so. Also, though I haven't checked the financial aspects, it seems like it could be done at somewhat low cost, and still be effective to some extent - e.g. not only the machine-driven imprinting, but might be possible to do it manually by humans (using some hand-operated tools, like even just spades/shovels, or something a bit more sophisticated). And that could be decided on a case-by-case basis depending on availability and cost of the human labor vs. cost of the imprinting machine (the tractor with an attachment or whatever it is).

>Soil is extremely good at absorbing Carbon Dioxide. Isn't it why there is so little CO2 in the atmosphere (0.04%)? We just need to make sure the process does indeed happen.

Nonsense hand waving. Nobody has a coherent plan for how to "just" make that happen. The people who think they have a coherent plan haven't opened up excel or a napkin to do some preliminary math about the scale involved.

One of the major problems we have is that this amazing carbon sink is being destroyed, there have been quite a few years where slash and burn in rainforests has competed with the burning of fuels as the major source of carbon emissions. We face a major challenge to halt that, but to actually reverse it entirely and aim for a radical recreation and expansion seems ambitious. My understanding was that rainforests take hundreds, perhaps thousands of years to develop.

The problem is that by focusing on rainforests, we also unfairly target some of the poorest countries on earth. Coming from westerners, who essentially deforested an entire continent (Europe) and chopped down and replanted another one (US/Canada), this message is highly hypocritical. If you're a poor farmer making $3000/year in Brazil or Indonesia you don't give two shits about what some latte-sipping American thinks about the rainforest, you're worried about feeding your family and getting your kids a good education.

The solution is to actually subsidize these farms out of chopping down the rainforest. If you pay the farmer $5k to not slash and burn the rainforest so they can plant their crops there, they won't because that income is almost as much as they would make anyway. The problem is, this doesn't really work at scale. But that's economics; if we truly valued the rain forest as much as we said we did, we would be willing to pay to keep it around (like Norway actually does).

>>The problem is that by focusing on rainforests, we also unfairly target some of the poorest countries on earth.

Those poor countries will be hit -- in fact are already hit -- the hardest by climate change.

Here's a plan:

Hire 1 billion people to do the remediation work. Hire another 100 million people to do the science to figure out what proper remediation work looks like. Hire another 100 million people to design video games that walk the 1 billion workers through the process, and can accommodate differences in IQ, learning style, and work life needs. Then hire an additional 100 million people who will document the workers lives, and create media experiences to fund the effort. The work can also be funded by creating eco-resort experiences, selling food byproducts, etc.

No need for advanced technology, just very detailed instructional games paired with good quality basic tools and 1 billion people worth of labor.

Seems perfectly actionable to me. You just have to start with four people: the worker, the scientist, the game designer, and the media producer, and iterate until it's working well and then infect the global population virally.

I'd agree with you if it was 1950, we'd have a very difficult time of it going through traditional political/social channels. But it's 2017, and with software the problem seems very tractable.

Hope without plans is useless. Hope is not a strategy. This is pretty much just prayer, and a grain of sand in the vastness of problems caused by climate change. Nothing to do with solving permafrost thawing, nothing do with solving the heat shock created by extreme climates, no solutions for ocean acidification.

> Hope without plans is useless.

So is despair. Reversing desertification will sink tons of CO2 back into the ground.

I did not realize the physiological effects would be as severe:

> The fraction of carbon dioxide is growing: It just crossed 400 parts per million, and high-end estimates extrapolating from current trends suggest it will hit 1,000 ppm by 2100. At that concentration, compared to the air we breathe now, human cognitive ability declines by 21 percent.

My father certifies hospital gas systems in the US. He's measured CO2 levels in urban areas around 498ppm. Hospital air, the air piped to patients, has a limit of 500ppm. Soon hospitals will have to put CO2 scrubbers on their air supplies just like astronauts.

Maybe head mounted CO2 scrubbers will become fashion accessories for the 1%.

How is CO2 a problem in breathable air? To humans, it's a harmless and inert gas, just like nitrogen. The real problem is too little O2, which humans require for respiration. Obviously, too much CO2 could displace O2 and reduce O2 levels, but it's not the CO2 that's an actual problem (i.e., if the CO2 displaced only N2, and O2 levels stayed the same, you wouldn't have a problem).

So having a CO2 scrubber doesn't seem to make any sense to me, you need something that keeps the O2 levels up. That may be a CO2 scrubber (pulling the carbon atom off the CO2), or it may be more feasible to just carry an oxygen bottle as many elderly people do today. I suspect the latter is the case; if it were feasible to have a portable CO2 scrubber to improve your O2 levels, they would have done it already for all these people.

It is harmful in large concentrations as it displaces oxygen (cf. dry ice pool accidents).

True, and dangerous; this even happens naturally when volcanos displace oxygen and create lethal stretches of depressed ground. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mazuku)

But not the issue here. CO2 is a tiny fraction of the atmosphere, and apocalyptic global warming happens well before O2 displacement becomes an issue. Bear in mind that humans can function effectively up to several thousand meters - the O2 loss from low pressure is vastly larger than any possible CO2 displacement.

If CO2 is going to have physiological effects via the atmosphere, it's based on chronic exposure and high blood concentrations. There are some studies suggesting that causes cognitive harm, and others suggesting it doesn't.

This relies on several common misconceptions.

Earth's atmosphere is only about 0.03% carbon dioxide. CO2 levels high enough to cause catastrophic global warming still wouldn't displace enough oxygen to matter to humans - it would be a smaller change than a few thousand feet of elevation, which is entirely safe.

The second issue: CO2 is not inert in the human body. It's not used for any crucial reactions, but it's more relevant to us than N2 (largely inert at STP, not while diving) and vastly more reactive than He. That's why divers commonly use Trimix (O2, N2, He), and deep divers use Heliox (O2, He). CO2 is present in solution in your bloodstream at all times, partly as an output of chemical reactions and partly absorbed from the air.

Among other roles, CO2 levels are detected in human lungs - high CO2, not low O2, is what makes you feel the burning "need to breath" sensation. That's why hyperventilating is a common cause of shallow-water blackouts - it lowers blood CO2 levels more than it increases O2 levels, allowing you to run out of air without feeling it.

There's some data suggesting that elevated CO2 levels cause cognitive impairment, which can become quite serious. There's other data (e.g. from nuclear submarines) showing that humans can tolerate CO2 with minimal effect. No one has reconciled this neatly, but it's definitely not true that O2 displacement is the problem.

Very informative, thanks.

This level of impairment conflicts with data from military studies, for example ...

> CO2 at 40,000 ppm for 2 weeks did not affect performance on multiple tests of cognitive function in physically fit young airmen

https://www.nap.edu/read/11170/chapter/5#54

but it is something certainly worth further investigation.

> Twenty-four volunteers, ages 18-23, were selected for their motivation and their excellent health.

If only we were all 18-23 years old in excellent health. The amount of abuse sustained and the speed of recovery my 20 year old self could sustain compared to my 30 year old self is truly astonishing.

When you're young, your body can compensate in a myriad ways you aren't even thinking about, that obviously weren't measured in the study.

It's a good start but not really relevant to the possible scenarios.

1. Dubious sample selection (perfect health, probably above average cognitive ability as well)

2. High levels/short term exposure rather than moderate levels & long term exposure (1+ year)

3. Tests were likely too simple and did not require a high level of abstraction/cognition in the first place.

I know sample n=1, but I've experienced increased anxiety and lower energy levels at ppms as low as 2000-3000, which you can easily encounter in a poorly ventilated room.

Here's the LBNL study behind the article claims for comparison ...

https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/1104789/

But seems to be in line with NASA findings:

https://thinkprogress.org/its-taking-less-co2-than-expected-...

Also, the general safety limit for co2 is around 5000 ppm for up to 8 hours - higher than that, and headaches and other effects will manifest.

I'm quite surprised that "no effect" could be seen at 40k ppm - I wonder if there were some limits to the cognitive tests (like the difference between proving a difficult mathematical theorem vs doing some Calculus).

Air indoors (and I'm cars!) routinely reaches these levels, easily.

This is a controversial finding, and not well-accepted nor even abided by where it is a literal life and death matter, like in nuclear submarines [1] or the ISS. Either the LLNL experiment is somehow flawed, or systems designs that crew members depend upon for their lives for months at a time without any pause for the past few decades are poorly designed. By Occam's Razor, I'd rather look at the relatively simpler experiment first before I looked at these complex life support systems, and if anyone is to pursue the LLNL study further, they probably should start there. I'm willing to buy the hypothesis there are cognitive differences, but they would have to adequately explain what has been going on in submarines and the ISS that we missed earlier.

[1] https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/10/17/claim-co2-makes-you-s...

Why the hell is the author mixing Fahrenheit and Celsius degrees?

Paragraph one: " for instance, where humidity routinely tops 90 percent, simply moving around outside when it’s over 105 degrees Fahrenheit would be lethal"

Paragraph two: "At 11 or 12 degrees of warming, more than half the world’s population, as distributed today, would die of direct heat. "

Same paragraph: "At present, most regions reach a wet-bulb maximum of 26 or 27 degrees Celsius; the true red line for habitability is 35 degrees"

Paragraph three: " As I type that sentence, in the California desert in mid-June, it is 121 degrees outside my door. "

Just....why?

I stumbled upon this one too. I suppose the author consulted various sources and forgot to normalize units afterwards.

I'm an american and if you told me it was 27C outside I wouldn't know whether that was hot or cold until I reflected for a moment and compared that number to cpu core temps.

Ignorance on my part, certainly, and not excusable but perhaps typical.

Out of interest, why don't you capitalize "American"?

Edit: I'm genuinely curious and not asking to annoy anyone; I might be misunderstanding grammar rules or rules of HN. I ask because I'm not sure this was a mistake; all over the web I see people who write with good grammar, but never capitalize "American". Is it considered rude to capitalize "American"?

I don't know about OP, but in some languages(Polish for example) you capitalize proper nouns(so you would capitalize America) but not adjectives(so American or Polish or German would never be capitalized) - so it could be just a cross-language mistake.

HN frowns on meta discussion.

For what it's worth, it should be capitalized but I suspect Americans don't formally discuss themselves in the third person enough to have that grammar rule down.

I don't even mind the fact that he used one or the other, it's just that mixing units in a scientific article doesn't seem very....professional for me.

Especially since increase by 12 degrees Celsius != increase by 12 degrees Fahrenheit. So in that paragraph where he talks about 11-12 degrees increase being lethal, you don't have all information necessary.

I never remember the formula, but I know that 0 is freezing and 20 is room temp so I fudge it from there and know that 27 is warm, but not really hot.

This always reminds me of this cartoon https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/514325219919218393/

"What if it's a big hoax and we create a better world for nothing?"

I think the key point that the article makes is that fossil fuels have enabled much of the industrialisation of the 20th and 21st century but it is also beginning to make certain areas of the world uninhabitable and yet we still seem to want to ignore the warning signs. A shift from fossil fuels and a focus on carbon capture technologies is hopefully not too late.

PS: I do keep reminding my dad that he should sell his house on the Indian River in Florida.

Your quote demonstrates that global warming is either not all that bad or you are not advocating enough stuff to fix it. If it really is an emergency and is that bad, we should be doing stuff that would make our world worse if we are wrong.

Well, a lot of scientists do advocate to keep warming to below 1.5 C, but that is not seriously pursued because it is not considered to be economically realistic or politically viable. The Paris trajectory is aiming for 2C, and hoping that it won't end up being significantly more. That is, not making the okay the enemy of the good, or good the enemy of the perfect.

like the hoax of recent satellite observations being remapped upward to show increased heat lead by a member who has no expertise in the area? it was predicted many years ago that even those who were in the field would be forced to change their numbers to be in agreement, instead someone else stepped in and did so.

hoax or fraud, some of what both sides qualifies. the trouble is there is so much money at stake that it corrupts research.

> it was predicted many years ago that even those who were in the field would be forced to change their numbers to be in agreement,

Who has changed the numbers?

Do you have sources for those predictions?

> hoax or fraud, some of what both sides qualifies.

I suppose that you can give some sources for those fraud accusations, isn't?

An analysis of possible solutions: http://www.drawdown.org/solutions-summary-by-rank

Number 1 based on plausibility is refrigerant management.

I have a story about that. Someone I knew in Eastern Europe working with large refrigeration equipment hoarded the bad kind of Freon knowing it would go up in price as the supplies dwindle. Then they charged an increasingly high price for it on the black market. Eventually equipment that uses that king of refrigerant will break down beyond repair but that might take a while. Industrial equipment like that often built reliably and is pretty maintainable.

This is just one individual business owner. I am sure there are more. So officially on paper it might look it's all good and "we've eliminate CFCs" but with corruption mixed in things are not that simple.

Guys like the one you describe are a rounding error in modern industrial refrigeration. Like a major company may use him they transition to modern equipment but at the scale they need he would raise all sorts of red flags not just in government regulators but insurance and investors doing their diligence. They are going to want to know why an expensive line item is going out.

TLDR; you're friends business model doesn't scale and relies on very unique edge cases.

I wish articles like this that are backed up by tons of research, interviews, etc. would cite sources inline (in a manner similar to Wikipedia). I want to at least skim some of the background research, but I'm reducing to copying and pasting sections of this article into Google.

What we really need is WWII-style, society-wide action on this count--remember the days of Meatless Mondays, saving your cans to make bullets, mailing your binoculars to the Navy. Even if it's confined to the parts of society that actually believe global warming is a serious threat, making pro-climate living a social norm could have a tremendous effect.

How about we just take the step and say that eating beef, in any circumstance, is morally wrong? Even if you can find some beef that you think is ecologically responsible, your are promoting the practice which is perhaps most central to global warming, after driving a large gasoline car.

Right now, some very hot areas are becoming uninhabitable, and low-lying coastal areas are being flooded. In the US, this has already hit a few areas hard, such as Phoenix AZ [1] and Miami FL.[2]

Phoenix is breaking heat records again this week. The number of days of extreme heat each summer keeps increasing. Phoenix also has limited water sources; it's a city in a desert, after all.

Miami now floods regularly. Levees and berms don't help much; the ground is too porous. Pumping helps; at least a dozen huge pumps have been installed, with many more to come. This is a stopgap measure, the mayor of Miami admits.

[1] http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-phoenix-climate-adapt-20... [2] http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20170403-miamis-fight-agains...

The article worked... I am alarmed.

Is there anything I can do with software that would make a difference? Currently, the only things that are coming to mind are simple carbon footprint calculators or infographics/visualization of data, which imo would not be that impactful. I would love to hear ideas

Earn as much money as you possibly can and donate it all to lobbying groups to put a price on GHG emissions or to preserve the amazon rainforest.

Bret Victor has a page on his site about this.[0] The first hit when I searched for "visualization" was:

"The core technologies in energy storage tend to be physics-based, but software plays essential roles in the form of design tools, simulation tools, and control systems. My favorite example is the inexplicably gorgeous Materials Project, a database and visualization tool for material properties, funded by the Department of Energy’s Vehicle Technologies Program to help invent better batteries."

It's a lengthy page with lots of good ideas, and seeds that might germinate more ideas of your own.

[0]http://worrydream.com/ClimateChange/

I will give it a read, thanks so much!

And in the USA, we are led by people who seem almost uniquely incapable of grappling with our societies hard problems. Sad.

Elon Musk leads America more than Donald Trump does, trust me. Don't get discouraged because Donny has become President. They hardly do anything interesting.

I meant "led" on every level. Our president is a symptom of a much larger problem of know-nothingism and myopic greed. We're in a social tailspin, with no clear way out.

And it's absurd to think that Elon Musk has more power or influence as an industrialist than the POTUS, Trump or not.

We're in a social tailspin because no one is willing to step up and make solutions for our enormous problems. Elon Musk is coming up with solutions, and if you exist in the sphere around him, the social tailspin is much, much less, because there is a purpose to life and a reason to commit yourself to your work.

Donald will have a much, much smaller impact on the future of the USA than Elon will.

I share your enthusiasm about Elon Musk's projects, but that strikes me as painfully naive. I'm skeptical we'll manage to exit the Trump era without irreparable harm. But it's beyond clear that the work that needs to be done to address our numerous ongoing crises isn't being done, and that's what's problematic, even if Trump doesn't launch the nukes.

That's the worst-case scenario, and every official source indicates that it's Trump's prerogative alone to decide whether to unleash a nuclear assault. So unless Elon Musk has the ability to shutdown a nuclear war, your assertion is based on blind faith, and not on a rational evaluation of the situation.

But even that's beside the point. We need a society that's oriented around bold ideas to set us on a sustainable track. In your language, far more Musks in business and government. One of them is not going to do the trick.

Average person's priorities:

I > My family > My home > My life convenience > My country > Other human beings > Planet Earth.

This is what the average person expects from other people:

Planet Earth > Other human beings > Their country > their family > them

And you wonder why we fail to combat climate change?

Because a lot of people seem to think that doing the best for themselves will end up as the best thing for society, or for the planet. Adam Smith dealt with this from the start, there is an amazing moral alchemy in capitalism which allows for improvements in your own life to drive improvements in society, but there are caveats and limits. And ideologues do not like dealing with that kind of nuance.

Unfortunately the impact you have on any of these is in the same order as you list the priorities. That's making it so that if you prioritize planet earth over your family the only change you'll likely see is your family being less well off. That practically guaranteed inaction. That's why we need to enforce good behavior via laws not only on a national but on a global level. It's mindboggling to me that climate agreements are entirely voluntary.

the climate window that has allowed for human life is very narrow, even by the standards of planetary history

I remember when I was little, reading the Carl Sagan Cosmos book. It was based on the TV show, and had this really interesting section where it had pictures of what will happen on earth as the sun expands to a Red Giant [1].

That really stuck with me and ever since, it's clear to me that we humans live in a temporary golden period for the possibility of our form of life. Whether we burn ourselves out or wait for the environment to do it, the end result in a billion years is that there aren't humans in our form around anymore.

So whenever climate action comes up I ask: What is the end state that you are seeking? Is the goal to permanently solidify an undefined homeostasis? For what group? Are you trying to make northern Africa green again?

Again though, seems to be in vain cause it's all going to burn up in a few million years anyway. Climate action isn't TRULY long term thinking.

We have a tiny window that we can possibly engineer ourselves into a new form of intelligence. Lets work on that so that these biological issues, and our fate as a (transitional) species aren't issues anymore.

[1]http://static1.1.sqspcdn.com/static/f/398013/24076923/138732...

Ok. Let's start by ensuring that our children and grandchildren have a livable environment in which to perform that work.

Agreed. The one caveat I would make is in a case where something accelerated singularity tech, but was worse for warming/volatility, I would do the former.

Well, I'd argue it's all about buying time. Obviously nothing lasts forever, but that's no reason to throw the baby out with the bath-water.

If we can buy our species another couple centuries on this planet, we can probably start looking at leaving. But if we continue on this accelerated doomsday course we won't have time to re-imagine the "form" of our species.

Also agree. I think we can practically do things that make sense economically, as well as environmentally that are no brainers like transitioning to renewable resources, solar, geo etc...

The challenge is the lifestyle changes that transitioning economies expect in terms of total household energy expenditures. I think the biggest thing is helping developing and transitioning economies continue to raise their standard of living but through renewable resources, and not just piling more coal onto the fire.

>We have a tiny window that we can possibly engineer ourselves into a new form of intelligence. Lets work on that so that these biological issues, and our fate as a (transitional) species aren't issues anymore.

What about the entropic heat death of the universe? Seems to be in vain cause its all gonna settle to an equilibrium of nothingness. Transhuman action isn't TRULY long term thinking

You joke but I struggle with that existential question all the time.

I have a few silly theories about it, but it's a real philosophical problem.

Sometimes a big enough difference in quantity is a difference in quality. The difference between Earth surviving a 100 years or a billion is pretty significant. I can't even imagine how large a billion years is - it's just a mind bogglingly huge number. But my grand children will be around in a century - I might even be if medical technology improves or cryonics works. So it would be nice if the Earth is still in a nice state by then.

Yes well, the earth isn't going to be uniformly uninhabitable in anything like the near future.

> So whenever climate action comes up I ask: What is the end state that you are seeking? Is the goal to permanently solidify an undefined homeostasis? For what group? Are you trying to make northern Africa green again?

That's all philosophical and nice, but it's just like asking everyone in the lower Mississippi basin "So what is the end game here? The river has changed its courses throughout geological history. Are we trying to lock it up in an artificial stasis?" And we could save billions of dollars spent on trying to artificially keep the river from flooding half of Arkansas.

Somehow I don't think they would appreciate my wisdom.

(In fact, it's actually worse; at least we don't have a "water industry" increasing the flow of the Mississippi every year and saying "But water is essential for life!")

I grew up in Houston and for part of my life, we lived in a flood plane. From 2001-2008 our house flooded three times during Alison, Rita, and Ike. I moved out in 2002. I told my mom, maybe at a certain point you take the hint and move. So she did in 2010 right before the county expanded the Bayou system to that area.

So yea, migration should be considered a standard part of life.

Commentary from a noted scientist:

https://www.facebook.com/MichaelMannScientist/posts/14705390...

He quibbles a single data point and says, "Don't panic."

It's silly to think we're unable to change. Nearly all of the CO2 emissions were done in just a generation. Post-world war 2 industrialization, automation and globalization caused the vast majority of CO2. There are still people alive today who lived through WO2. Why are we talking like this is an insurmountable problem, that the momentum is just too big? It literally took /one/ average human life span to get where we are. It could take less than one to go back to pre-industrial levels. And it's not just a matter of better technology, it's mostly a matter of social adaptation. If we're dead set on infinite growth (in terms of consumption, GDP, population) we're going to have a problem with or without climate change. The fix is: a smaller population, less consumption, and less production. But that's contrary to /everything/ capitalism stands for. The problem is thus not so much technology, but rather the socio-economic paradigm we're in. How to change this without going all "you dumb communist beta cuck snowflake"? I don't know. But here are some ideas:

- Incentivize less spending by "anti-ads" (could be interesting to add as an ad blocker), basically ads that signal that you /don't/ need what's advertised. Interesting AI problem that can piggyback off of all the stuff that's being done in the ad space itself

- Implement economic incentives for CO2 scrubbing, by carbon-tax, subsidies or secondary effects (e.g. useful non-fuel biproducts, or things like greener living spaces / habitable deserts)

- Stop subsidizing fossil fuels, agriculture, etc. Will it hike up the prices? Sure, but that's kinda the idea.

- Look at the big picture first. Driving your car less, LED bulbs, sure…they kinda work. It's somewhat of a moot point with cargoships that almost burn raw oil, equivalent to the CO2 output of a small city. This is an optimization problem: try to do the big things first.

- Slow down. We define the pace at which society moves. Do you /really really really/ need that stuff in 24hours door-to-door? Do you /really really/ need to commute 8 hours each day? These are human choices. The natural world is kinda reluctant about our endeavors. There's no reason why everything must be done /yesterday/ … helps with mental health issues too.

- Incentivize a culture where "moon-shot" ideas are given a chance. There are many ways we can make a big dent, but often costing billions to build. We have no problem building 250 million dollar warplanes (and buy hundreds of them), no problems building half a billion dollar coal plants. Really, no problem with billion dollar sports matches. In fact, we seem to applaud these things. But when talking about rooftop solar, heliostat installations, CO2 scrubbing, planting trees it's all "cost cost cost". We need to rethink that.

And be kind to all living things. We're in for a tough ride either way. Just try to show some compassion and help those who need it more than you do.

Or that's what I try to tell myself when I'm utterly depressed about it https://joelkuiper.eu/change

Joel, why do you live your life in a way that does not appease your true desires and concerns? You know that your current job and path is off course. Why are you sticking with it?

>It's silly to think we're unable to change. Nearly all of the CO2 emissions were done in just a generation.

We are unable to change. You're talking about change for the worse there (in environmental terms), not change for the better.

Show me one instance in history where a human society avoided disaster. It hasn't happened. Every human society has peaked at some point, and then collapsed. Ancient Rome didn't go from controlling most of Europe and northern Africa to being a stable power among many; it collapsed entirely. Other earlier Middle Eastern societies didn't even fare that well; all that's left of them is a few ruins at best.

Humans are pretty good at going from nothing and building up a society in a short time, but they aren't any good at dealing with problems that arise in that society over time, especially if they're compounded by environmental problems. So human societies are always "upwards or bust". What makes you think it'll be different this time?

As for all your ideas, ask yourself this: will the voting population vote for candidates who tell them they're going to enact these policies?

Wish for the best, prepare for the worst.

I've grappled with this for the last 7 years. I wanted to build a platform to address this problem but I eventually realized self-interest is the strongest force in the world and that most people are not ready to consider that they may be part of the problem AND own up to it enough to change their day-to-day lifestyle. It's much easier to point a finger at world leaders, corporations, or the developing world's use of coal.

I've finally let go of eating meat. I don't buy things unless I need them and I use them until they are no longer usable. My hobbies are exploring the outdoors, improving my fitness/meditation routine each day, and creating brands, experiences, and campaigns.

I am saving money for a cabin in the Rockies and a camper van to explore all of North America. I am building an agency to work remotely and accept clients that I feel I can help in a substantial way. I've given my ambitions of 'saving the world' or being a part of the world of SV or NYC.

Well, it worked. I'm worried, and I'm turning off some electronics I normally leave on.

Are you going to stop eating meat?

is there a way to significantly cut down on my carbon footprint by only eating certain animals?

look into farm to plate supply chains

If you eat a lot of farm-raised beef and then start getting all those calories from chicken instead it will indeed be a significant reduction of your carbon footprint.

If you give up air travel, while you're at it, you might cut it just as much again, or more. (depending, of course, on how much you fly).

Chicken is best, pork second and beef the worst. The difference is bigger than you'd expect.

Ruminant meats (beef, lamb, goat) have a higher GHG impact due to enteric fermentation producing methane.

Numerically, you can't cut a lot of your GHG impact by reducing/switching meat consumption if you are living an ordinary middle class first world lifestyle in other respects.

https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/overview-greenhouse-gases

Methane accounts for about 10% of warming from anthropogenic US GHG emissions. Enteric fermentation in ruminants accounts for 25% of that 10%, and agricultural manure another 10%. So you can cut maybe 25% of 10% (2.5%) from baseline-American emissions by eliminating red meat from your diet, or 35% of 10% (3.5%) by eliminating animal products altogether.

It's similar in the European Union:

http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/...

Agriculture accounts for 10% of emissions, and meat production is just a portion of that.

Personal dietary changes are at least quick and inexpensive, even if they don't lead to deep emissions reductions. I stopped eating red meat a few years ago because of a family history of heart attacks. It actually saved money on my grocery bills.

Cows are the only animals that can turn indigestible (for human) grasslands, and deserts, into rich, plant diverse carbon sinks that produce food for humans.

It sounds very grim, is there any chance/hope of us getting out of this situation or is it just beyond any action at this point? I get the feeling from the article we're doomed.

It's the little things the author mentions, that impressed me. For example the prevalence of Malaria. A higher temperature can increase the lifecycle rate of the parasite by a factor of 10.

I was also unaware that higher temperatures increased sport fouls and criminal behaviour.

>> I was also unaware that higher temperatures increased sport fouls and criminal behaviour.

They also cause an increase in air traffic.

Don't worry, this is a pure climate alarmist. You can tell by this quote and others:

"But no matter how well-informed you are, you are surely not alarmed enough."

This person is literally saying we need to be alarmed.

I really didn't understand the part where they said methane has 34 times the greenhouse effect as carbon over a period of time and then changes the timeframe to bring the multiplier put to 84 times. To me it felt a lot like when congress talks about deficits over a decade - well actually they talk about reductions over a decade so it's times 10 and increases are just annual. Anyway, there is a difference between methane and CO2 but to try to make it sound worse by talking about time is just another alarmist tactic.

Regardless of your stance, this article is intended to be alarmist and even says so. IMHO it is not worthy of HN.

your post reminds me of when actual bad guys call the investigation against them a witch hunt.

>> This person is literally saying we need to be alarmed.

And why shouldn't we (he) be doing that? Actually the author's goal is transparent, to shake up perception, to provide fodder in the imagination of folks to ultimately change how urgently we treat this in public forums. I thought this was a quite trenchant point (from the article):

>>Over the past decades, our culture has gone apocalyptic with zombie movies and Mad Max dystopias, perhaps the collective result of displaced climate anxiety, and yet when it comes to contemplating real-world warming dangers, we suffer from an incredible failure of imagination. The reasons for that are many: the timid language of scientific probabilities, which the climatologist James Hansen once called “scientific reticence” in a paper chastising scientists for editing their own observations so conscientiously that they failed to communicate how dire the threat really was; the fact that the country is dominated by a group of technocrats who believe any problem can be solved and an opposing culture that doesn’t even see warming as a problem worth addressing;

Back to you: >>I really didn't understand the part where they said methane has 34 times the greenhouse effect as carbon over a period of time and then changes the timeframe to bring the multiplier put to 84 times.

I also thought this statement was scientifically unclear, but I think the author was trying to say that the rate of methane release increases, thus, the impact on climate systems multiplies relative to an equivalent release of CO2 in that period (100 yrs v 24 yrs). If someone else can mention exactly how he got from 34x to 84x though, id love to hear it; i didn't get it.. I do want to mention, however the 30x GHG effect number is not set in stone. In fact, depending on the rate of release, there may be 'force multipliers' depending on how (quickly) ecosystems can absorb and use these gases. Ominously, this multiplier seems to go up anyways as temps rise. [1]

[1] http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v507/n7493/full/nature1...

Methane deteriorates in the upper atmosphere fairly quickly, whereas CO2 sticks around. Methane is a dramatically better insulator than CO2, so in the short run its impact is higher, but when you stretch out the timescale, your methane is deteriorating while the CO2 sticks around, so the relative impact tilts slowly toward CO2.

While you are right that methane wont naturally stick around for ever, and that it breaks down sooner than CO2. After googling around a little, I finally managed to find the source of the author's two numbers, and in the end I am more troubled than ever :/

>>At issue is the global warming potential (GWP), a number that allows experts to compare methane with its better-known cousin, carbon dioxide. While CO2 persists in the atmosphere for centuries, or even millennia, methane warms the planet on steroids for a decade or two before decaying to CO2. In those short decades, methane warms the planet by 86 times as much as CO2, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. But policymakers typically ignore methane's warming potential over 20 years (GWP20) when assembling a nation's emissions inventory. Instead, they stretch out methane's warming impacts over a century, which makes the gas appear more benign than it is, experts said. The 100-year warming potential (GWP100) of methane is 34, according to the IPCC.[1]

Doesn't 'reducing' (really, normalizing) the GWP for the ~80 yrs of the 100yr period (when it is not existing) seem sort of like an accounting trick? In other words, if 20GT of CH4 were released next year from the Bering Sea into the atmosphere (this would be spectacularly bad), the overall shock to the climate/atmosphere systems is precisely the same.

[1]https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-bad-of-a-gree...

I got the same feeling. It's a pretty sensational article that leaves out a lot of details but simultaneously has some really good information.

Sensationalism is not a firm basis for serious debate or serious action. If anything is going to save the human race, it is technology, but to hear these breathless alarmists talk, they are anti-technology, anti-progress, and apparently want us all to live stacked up in massive cities with no real quality of life at all. I tend to see this as either an exhibition of control-freak tendencies or simply full-on communism. Either way, it sucks.

Full-communism?

Who is advocating for that?

>>to hear these breathless alarmists talk, they are anti-technology, anti-progress, and apparently want us all to live stacked up in massive cities with no real quality of life at all. I tend to see this as either an exhibition of control-freak tendencies or simply full-on communism.

Where is the second half of the article where, after discussing at length many bad possible outcomes, the guy goes on to propose detailed social engineering schemes to solve the looming planetary crisis??

Either you did not read this article closely, or you are simply trolling. In my opinion, the real ending of the piece was marvelously open-ended. The author concludes by highlighting the irrational , but quintessential human, tendency to see some bright-side to the whole thing-- here are our climate scientists like Hansen and others, that know the most and see of everyone how screwed we are, still maintaining some faith we'll figure it out. And they didn't need 'communism', 'mega city' or some other nebulous concept to help them to that conclusion-- it was/is either habitual, or fantastical.

You're right in that I never made it to the end, it was just that bad. It's like the weekend crap fearmonger articles you get on Zerohedge every weekend, albeit with better graphics. Not trolling.

Alright, fair enough.

To be honest I also at times thought the author's alarmism went a bit far and could have scared off serious readers, but as a general principle I still don't think its valid to critique someone on a basis that is non-existent: e.g., the author at no point explicitly endorsed any of the concepts or ideas you mentioned in the GP comment.

Do you dispute the accuracy of the statements made in the article, or just that they should be put in writing?

If you believe the article to be filled with lies, you could explain why.

If you just think it's filled with truths that should not be uttered, that seems to me like a rather strange position to take. The goal is to build political will in favor of government action that puts a price on CO2 emissions. Terrifying people about things that are truly terrifying, while not guaranteed to help a whole lot, is at worst not counterproductive. And if you happen to terrify/enlighten/educate the right handful of rich people it might just have a tremendous impact.

You're applying your feelings where there is well-informed scientific consensus on the matter. It's not sensationalism when the science backs it up. It's too bad you don't like it, but nobody really has anything to indicate the contrary.

Why the downvote? The article is clearly concern trolling. Look, if you are worried about overpopulation, the US isn't your primary area of concern. The US is not overpopulated and probably never will be. Maybe some US cities are, but compared to China, India, and Indonesia, we have no overpopulation problem. I'm not sure that "being alarmed" is a good state of mind to be in--Americans suffer from crisis fatigue as it is.

The human race isn't going to solve its problems without either leaving the earth or having a massive die-off. You first.

The article has nothing to do with overpopulation

Everything described by the fearmongers has to do with too much human activity. How is that not related to nearly 8 billion people on earth?

Fearmongers?

> Everything described by the fearmongers has to do with too much human activity

Then should read better, because it is not the case. Or perhaps you can give us links to those "fearmongers".

And by fearmongers youre not talking about climate scientists, isn't?

Yes, the article is blatant fear mongering. Every time a climate issue comes up it mentions human activity as the cause of all our problems. Outside of a Hail Mary technological solution, there is only one way to reduce human activity and that is to have fewer humans.

> Every time a climate issue comes up it mentions human activity as the cause of all our problems

Still waiting any source, but I suppose youd don't have any

What am I supposed to be doing? Proving a negative or something?

No, you should provide examples of scientific papers saying that the problem is too much human activity.

That was your claim.

And no, asking to reduce CO2 emissions is not saying that there is too much human activity

ALL of our problems of this sort are due to overpopulation. That's an unfortunate truth that nobody wants to talk about.

First off, the author is prodding people into action by scaring/alarming them. Thus, the entire point of this article is to highlight many of the bad long-tails (note I did not say WORST long tails, eg Clathrate Gun, or phytoplankton crash leading to global anoxia, because they almost instantly wipe out human life), which could give the impression we are more screwed than we are;

In other words, all of these happening is not a probable outcome (the article is not based on a statistical inference or climate model). However, as we climb up the \delta +C ladder, all of these effects/implications become increasingly probable. If you crank up \delta +C to +5C for instance, at least half if not all of these will occur (due to positive feedbacks eg albedo);

I would not say we are beyond the hope of any action at this point. There are two sub-sets of conventional actions being discussed in the context of official orgs, eg UNFCCC at the moment:

-Mitigation- reduce emissions directly,- eg turn off coal plants or plan to do so to dozens within the next few years, massively scale up solar adoption

-Adaptation- take actions now to reduce devastation from past [inertial] and unavoidable future emissions, e.g, invest in heat-proof seeds and crops for certain tropical biomes

Broadly, both are still possible. The former is notably more susceptible to political landmines and fossil fuel monopoly blocking than the latter, so a lot of climate scientists are urging folks to focus on the latter. Is it enough to save us? In terms of physics and climate systems--no, but metaphorically it could reduce pain like palliative care for the swathes of humanity, largely from tropical regions, who probably wont make it. The real heartbreaker here: mitigation is crucial to avoiding all the evil long-tails, but our poltical and economic systems seem allergic to it. How about just a little mitigation- eg lukewarm Paris implementation-- do we still miss some of the worst evils? Very unclear-- now we need to consult the statistical physicists.

There's a third bin too which I would call pure engineering solutions; These could involve for instance, building plants to suck CO2 out of the atmosphere [1], seeding the oceans with certain chemicals to increase Co2 oceanic uptake [2], or straight up engineering the atmosphere [3]. I listed those in increasing order of possible risk/backfiring (complexity of the climate engineering operation).

I invite anyone to clarify or add to which they think are feasible and infeasible amongst these; I listed this all for context, and not to advance a particular legal, moral, or political argument, although clearly there are a litany to be made.

[1] http://www.climeworks.com/ [2] https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070608142214.h... [3] https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Stratospheric_aerosol_injection_...

It's especially frustrating, because I genuinely feel we could actually solve this problem with relatively minor economic impact if we wanted to. There are dozens of realistic proposals around for limiting warming to 2-3 degrees. We just need to choose to do them. Instead the world's leading nation continues to elect anti-science morons to positions of power, and so we do nothing but head down this road to destruction. The 2100s are going to be super ugly, and frankly I'm glad I won't be around to see them.

This is an article to save and come back 20 years and read.

And in 20 years there'll be a whole new set of doomsday predictions and this'll be forgotten.

https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=earth%20day%20do...

Well, that's one way to bring up a bunch of sketchy information sources on a Google search result page.

Funny thing is that NONE of the links are scientific papers

Why is a world war, swiftly reducing populations and industrial output, is never considered among the solutions?

While horrifying, it is still better than total extinction.

It's not better than total extinction for those who die in the war.

Also, how do you know it is never considered among the solutions?

> It's not better than total extinction for those who die in the war.

But it's better totally.

> Also, how do you know it is never considered among the solutions?

Never seen it discussed.

Say we want to reduce our emissions 1/10 of their current rate. This would not be enough for long term climate stability but, if we did it soon, would greatly push back our deadline on elimination the other 10% to avert the bulk of the forecasted catastrophe.

There are two ways to reduce humanity's rate of CO2 emissions:

1. Reduce the number of people emitting CO2. 2. Reduce the amount of CO2 that each person emits.

You're complaining that noone ever considers option 1 which, as an approach to our desired 90% reduction in emissions requires that we kill off 90% of the world's population? Even for those lucky enough to be among the surviving 10%, fallout from the war and the loss of the other 90% will constitute a tremendous cost in terms of their standard of living. And it won't leave those survivors in a great position to figure out the (still necessary) elimination of their remaining emissions rate.

I, for one, am unlikely to be in the 10%, and hope this approach is dismissed by those with the power to enact it.

It's frequently discussed, just not as a solution to this particular problem.

Well, one of the clearest consequences of global warming is that an entire continent becomes habitable as well as a large part of the northern Canada and Russia. Everything I've read about global warming indicates an increase in arable land even when accounting for desertification.

The article specifically addresses and disagrees with this claim.

The article also claims that a rise in kidney disease in El Salvador is related to global warming without offering any evidence whatsoever. Correlation is not causation, right? I think that one specious claim undermines the entire article, quite frankly. El Salvador is a nation with all kinds of social problems including a population that is under-educated (to say the least) so I find it hard to believe that heat is the biggest problem there versus dirty water, ignorance of the need to stay hydrated, etc.

If you Google search on the El Salvador claim there seems to be a lot of other articles backing it up, like this one:

http://www.theage.com.au/good-weekend/climate-change-and-kid...

Nope, not a shred of evidence there, either. Just conjecture.

Extensive data with multiple very strong correlations, a very plausible biological explanation, and a perfect animal model. There is way, way more here than conjecture.

From the article:

"Pollyannaish plant physiologists will point out that the cereal-crop math applies only to those regions already at peak growing temperature, and they are right — theoretically, a warmer climate will make it easier to grow corn in Greenland. But as the pathbreaking work by Rosamond Naylor and David Battisti has shown, the tropics are already too hot to efficiently grow grain, and those places where grain is produced today are already at optimal growing temperature — which means even a small warming will push them down the slope of declining productivity. And you can’t easily move croplands north a few hundred miles, because yields in places like remote Canada and Russia are limited by the quality of soil there; it takes many centuries for the planet to produce optimally fertile dirt."

In the very long term, how can you dispute the benefit of human expansion in Antarctica? Humans have thrived in times when there was little glaciation and suffered in times of increased glaciation. The only benefit of glaciers is that we're accustomed to the climate they promote. I have no doubt that mankind could adjust to and thrive in a world without glaciers. It's ridiculous how afraid humans are to engineer their planet compared to a century ago.

I think Antarctica is 1/2 the size of North America. You have a house of 400m^2, I present you with a house of 100m^2 and invite you to consider the upside.

It's not a trade though, especially with most/all of Canada and Alaska becoming livable. Not to mention unrelated benefits. like year-round arctic navigation and safer navigation around Antarctica

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