Comment by sethrin | Hacker News Reader

Comment by sethrin | Hacker News Reader

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> The climate system is one endless positive negative feedback system and we don't have enough data to say anything truly conclusive other than the climate is changing and things are getting hotter.

The no-feedback warming per doubling of CO2 is 3.7 W/m^2, which is held to be roughly equivalent to 1 degree of global temperature. There are some fairly readily ascertainable facts about climate change, sufficient to demonstrate that it is happening, and that it is caused by human CO2 emissions. The Earth is a complex system, but the critical effects are at the top of the atmosphere, which is much less complex. The lower bound for the warming effects is consequently very well known. And it's not so much the case that there are large quantities of this other well-known greenhouse gas lying around, and more like we misnamed this planet. There is uncertainty when trying to model anything, but I'm afraid at this point the "not a serious problem" warming scenarios have been ruled out.

These problems are definitely going to be serious. But how serious they will be and whether or not all the doom and gloom is justified depends on how our societies react to the challenges.

It depends on how quickly we can develop technology and make it available to everyone. It depends on how quickly people can adapt to migration situations. It depends on countless non linear interactions that are unpredictable.

I think what we can say is that the pace of change is absolutely crucial. If land is lost to deserts or to the sea at a pace noticable only by asking your great grand parents, then I think we're good.

But if a billion people have to move within 20 or 30 years because large poor cities can no longer be defended against the sea or because technology to deal with desertification is only available to rich countries then I fear the gloom and doom is more than justified.

Well, considering that nearly 2 billion will die in the normal course over the next 30 years, I would suspect it's not as big a deal as you make out.

None of the infrastructure in s low-lying city like Miami is designed to last more than a few decades anyway. Gradually move a bit inland, or elevate foundations, or throw up a levee. Big woop. Not that big of a deal. Pretty much every structure standing -- every road, bridge, airport -- is going to be demolished and replaced within the next century anyway.

Infrastructure is generally built to last for a very long time. The average US bridge is 42 years old with many over 100 years old. Further, the tendency is to not move when the ocean rises just look at Venice. People are going to move as otherwise useful infrastructure is destroyed at vast expense.

> But if a billion people have to move within 20 or 30 years because large poor cities can no longer be defended against the sea or because technology to deal with desertification

That seems perfectly reasonable. Nowhere near doom and gloom. There's no doom there, that I can see. Moving a billion people is not that big of a deal, as long as there is incentive. The idea that "the sea" will push people around has been going on forever and doesn't cause mass migrations in terms of the earth. It's the food and distribution a population has to worry about that will cause trouble. Everything else is well within human abilities to mitigate (even when average lifespans decrease by a few decades).

It's very hard to even respond to you. Moving a billion people is not that hard? Unbelievable ignorance, hubris, and/or FUD.

If you believe climate change is going to have that effect on us what other choice do we have?

We have no other choice probably. But I have no idea what the point of saying it's going to be easy when nothing even remotely close has happened in the history of humanity, and we can't even deal with infrastructure problems for a few thousand people at a time due to the incredible greed inherent to human society. It is rather a humanity breaking event that approaches, and its weight is heartbreaking.

Moving a 1,000,000,000 people is not that difficult? Do you have any idea what you're talking about? That would be the largest migration in human history, by a wide margin.

Recently, we've had something on the order of 2,500,000 people moving to Europe and it's widely seen as somewhere between a crisis and a catastrophe.

> Do you have any idea what you're talking about?

I think I have a better conceptualization than many people "discussing" this issue.

> That would be the largest migration in human history, by a wide margin

Nope. How many people have migrated from mexico to the US over the last 50 years? Are you assuming that one day 1 million people wake up and everyone has to move because the ocean is rising? How many feet to permanently displace 1 million over what time and how far do you really think anyone will go? You get people living next to live volcanos in Hawaii where the largest island is kinda the size of Orange County, CA. smh

Calm down and rethink what we're talking about.

> Nope. How many people have migrated from mexico to the US over the last 50 years?

A hell of a lot fewer than a billion (again: 1,000,000,000) given that the entire US population is only ~400,000,000 today.

I expect the average HN user to have better numeracy than this.

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