Comment by maxxxxx | Hacker News Reader

Comment by maxxxxx | Hacker News Reader

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" It can destroy all human civilization."

I think saying stuff like this should be avoided. There is almost no chance that civilization will be destroyed. There will be major problems but the world won't go under. By making up total doom scenarios credibility of climate change proponents goes down a lot in my view.

We tend to believe our current level of civilization is stable because it got never challenged by climate changing this fast. Probably it is not about ending all human culture but about rolling back decades or centuries in a lot of regions. I remember how Sandy interrupted gas supply in New York. People took extreme measurements to get what was 'needed' - civilized was something different.

Just because English lacks the ability to adequately express the far-reaching consequences of untackled Climate Change shouldn't stop us from trying to get the message around. If you think there are better phrases, don't keep them for yourself.

Also permanent advertisement has exploited the alarming features of language. Do you really still expect to trigger immediate action by saying 'please'?

If you want climate change to be taken seriously don't use extreme language. Otherwise it's too easy to be called alarmist and nothing will happen.

If you want climate change to be taken seriously don't use half-hearted language. Otherwise it's too easy for the problem to be called insignificant and nothing will happen.

Unfortunately no matter what strategy is taken, someone will complain at how the message is phrased.

Note that it said "civilization", not "human kind". Fast climate change could innudate coastal regions, forcing mass migrations inland. Fast climate change may exceed agriculture's ability to adapt, leading to food shortages.

If the starving workers that keep infrastructure running (power plants, sewage plants, municipal water suppliers, etc) decide to go hunt for food instead of work, then that infrastructure may fail.

Once basic infrastructure fails, it won't take long for civilization to collapse too.

Our systems of civil society are fairly robust, but at some point those major problems become greater than our ability to cope. Unfortunately, "almost no chance" and "no chance" are not the same thing.

It just seems highly unlikely to me. Even if 90% of the world becomes uninhabitable there is still plenty of space left for a lot of people. You can lose 90% or even 99% of world population and will still have a lot of people left. Not saying this is a good thing but I just don't believe civilization will get totally wiped out. Emphasis is on "totally".

I think you are equating "human civilization" with "humanity". I agree that some people are likely to survive a catastrophe, but I don't think that what we think of as civilization is likely to survive a 90% or 99% population reduction.

Or as lifeformed put it elsewhere: "Destroying all civilization doesn't mean destroying all humans, but just the structures that hold society together. A runaway heating scenario may be a pretty effective way of doing that - all crops die, wars for food, nukes get used."

Let's say temps rise by 10 degrees and sea levels rise a lot. I would think there will still be a lot of areas that will be inhabitable. I don't think that the atmosphere will become unbreathable. I think you can have a pretty sophisticated civilization with 100 million or even 10 million people.

Again, I am not saying these things are OK. We should worry about displacing millions of people and probably wars but civilization dying seems overblown and damaging to the argument that we should be doing something.

Of course the planet will be inhabitable. Will there be any of us to inhabit it? Or will war break out because of population migration due to the effects of climate change? I don't know the answer to the first question, but the second one is easy -- it's already happening.

These are important issues but I still doubt civilization will get destroyed. Let's warn of likely scenarios. These are bad enough. No need for exaggeration that then can easily be refuted.

Africa is undergoing a mass migration leading to local wars. The Middle East is subject to the same pressure. There’s plenty of evidence that this is directly leading to European immigration and the rise of nationalist movements. None of this is exaggerated — it is current reality.

If 90% of the world becomes uninhabitable, you and your millions of very close neighbors will have nothing to eat.

> There is almost no chance that civilization will be destroyed.

How do you know?

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