next the tundra melts and releases an insane amount of methane. we are so screwed.
I doubt humans will go extinct, but yeah... we're screwed.
Human culture and civilisation might.
When you go and disturb that steady state by say releasing a million years worth of carbon sequestration over a century, you destabilize the whole thing.
Like a top spinning it all of a sudden collapses. And then humans realize that we were really just along for the ride & do not have a chance to re-stabilize.
and this gaia: https://twistedsifter.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/mother_gai... ?
What if Human technological advancement is Earths plan to regulate itself?
I’m not sure what I think about the “climate change” issue, but I maintain a reserve of skepticism towards proclamations of apocalyptic doom.
A) Humans, and all living things, are screwed from the get go. A guaranteed calamity awaits us all.
I think contributes to a lack of perspective that is not helpful, and possibley harmful. On a number of levels, personal and political.
B) The fact that climate change gets far more discussion and attention than the ongoing calamity of US military conduct is telling. It tells me that climate change, which is complex, and only ameliorated by levels of global cooperation never seen before, serves as a “boogie man” for the “politically aware.”
Organizing against the conduct of corporate war, as it operates globally, presents far more “low hanging fruit” for positive outcomes, at doable price levels.
Yet, there are no serious (meaning electable) politicians in the US who have an opposition to the crazy influence of corporate money. The military spending (and its corruption) is protected from scrutiny by seemingly insurmountable social structures.
Yet, achieving meaningful reductions in military activities, if not spending, is within the realm of imaginable. It is far more doable than the level of global cooperation that is required to reduce carbon emissions. But people who might be inclined to support collective efforts to clean up the corporate-military-political complex are demoralized.
The Republicans apparently pride themselves on taken the worst possible courses of action on challenging problems. They are working to undercut the science of climate change!
Frankly, I see global action on significant greenhouse gas reductions as impossible.
So, somehow, liberal minded folks have found a perfect subject to project their sense of hopeless futility in “global warming”, an almost intractable problem.
In the meantime, there are unexplored opportunities to improve our communities, and world, all around us.
If we, the US, could somehow turn the corner on the lunatic resistance to gun control, and then make some active progress on military misadventures, maybe Americans might think about giving up on meat.
(1) Global warming is a runaway process already well underway.
(2) Our political and economic system are too short-sighted to deal with existential threats that will only come to fruition 100 years from now. CEOs look at quarterly numbers; political leaders think as far as the next election.
(3) Humans do not seem to naturally plan beyond their own lifetimes. This makes evolutionary sense, but we evolved back before we could cook the planet.
(4) Global warming is happening way faster than most natural selection. Fruit flies may be just fine.
> achieving meaningful reductions in military activities, if not spending, is within the realm of imaginable. It is far more doable than the level of global cooperation that is required to reduce carbon emissions.
I disagree here. There are extremely low-cost ways to wean humanity from fossil fuels. Solar energy prices have been coming down dramatically, to the point where utility companies might switch away from coal out of self-interest. A nudge in the right direction, instead of "drill baby drill" and "bring coal back," could have a huge effect down the line. Unfortunately, we seem unable to plan on those timescales.
I see it as inevitable.
It might now be voluntary but it will happen as eventually we will reach a point where choice will not be an option and it will be a direct consequences of the lack of cheap energy sources, lack of food, economic collapse, massive reduction in population and so on.
Doing it voluntary now would help dealing with the upcoming catastrophic events and not doing it means playing it the hard way. But eventually human production of greenhouse gases will be greatly reduced, probably to pre industrial levels.
It is quite obvious that we are collectively failing to deal with climate change and that this could be the great filter according to the fermi paradox where humans disappear. Climate change sure has the potential to remove current condition favorable to human life on the planet as it has already happened in the past.
https://twistedsifter.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/mother_gai...
That's not to say it would be pleasant -- a rapid population reduction from 7 billion to under a million would not be pretty -- but extinction is hard.
Same with breathable air, how would humans adapt to an athmosphere composition without oxygen as happens when earth magnetic field is weaken during geomagnetic reversals ?
My point is we are facing an ongoing mass extinction event and based on current knowledge of previous events humans being wiped out is a possibility. Based on the number of species that are extinct, extinction is not that hard specially during a mass extinction event.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis
Edit: also had to track down this video from the UN climate change conference. The Wikipedia article tends to down play it periodically.