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Comment by verisimi | Hacker News Reader

But, if the climate is warmer, we would live more comfortably, not to forget that we could grow more food.

I'm basically saying, change in itself is not a terrible occurrence - there are pros and cons. Stasis or no change, is arguably worse, imo. Must we keep things the same, or can we develop our adaptability? With all our tech, we should be able to manage things better than ever, if we want.

Change is not a disaster.

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The climate being warmer on average is perhaps better understood as the climate being more energetic. More heat energy in the atmosphere means more and stronger storms, greater flooding, heat waves, and so on. It's not just that things are bit more comfortable now.

We can't grow more food when one food growing area is innundated or torn up by hurricanes while another is crushed by drought.

>The climate being warmer on average is perhaps better understood as the climate being more energetic.

Thanks for this perspective; otherwise I hadn't previously understood why the weather was expected to become more severe with global warming!

The fact that change in the abstract can be good or bad doesn't mean specific changes don't make things worse. But maybe more importantly, the rate of change makes a huge difference. If change happens too rapidly, as human driven climate change seems to be, you don't have time to sufficiently adapt to take advantage of the new pros or offset the cons.

Climate change will make a lot of places less habitable while making some places more so. Great, it balances out, right? Except most people live in the places that are habitable now, and if the habitable areas change overnight (in relative terms), billions of people are going to suddenly be living in the wrong places. Natural climate change over tens of thousands of years would give populations plenty of time to migrate, as has happened in the past. Human driven climate change over 100 years will not.

If, will, might, etc.

But have you seen anything that resembles a rapid change?

Putting aside the media alarmists, I have seen nothing that can't be explained as change. The beaches of my childhood are still there at the same height etc. Yes there have been fires (that I put down to forest mismanagement) and floods which will occur if you build on flood plains and if you cut down trees.

So, I don't see rapid change.

You should re watch al gore's original inconvenient truth film and see how well that has aged. He sounds like the proverbial boy who shouting fire in the cinema. Given his eco-investments, his actions are really better explained as a marketing exercise to will line his pockets.

It's not a rapid change. It's a slow change from about a century ago to projections about a century in the future.

Another directly-observable-by-laymen example is the start of cherry blossom season: https://www.sciencealert.com/japan-s-cherry-blossoms-burst-i...

This comment is profoundly ignorant of the nature of anthropogenic climate change. It doesn't mean that "things will get warmer and happier for everyone."

It means severe water shortages, mass migration of climate refugees, xenophobia and the resulting political turmoil, huge increases in lung cancer from wildfire smoke, frequent flooding, destruction of infrastructure to the tune of billions of dollars, mass extinction of species, etc.

We don't even know what happens when certain feedback loops get triggered and a flywheel accelerant effect begins.

I moved north because fuck the heat, so speak for yourself nerd.

Fair enough, but most people prefer a warmer climate, where it is easier to live, do outdoors pursuits, grow food, use less resources (for heating). But each to their own!

Take away air conditioning and most people with the means would move to a more temperate location.

> easier to live, do outdoors pursuits, grow food, use less resources (for heating)

Have you seen… the desert?

Moving as a form of adaption towards changing environmental conditions? You might be on to something here! Are scientists aware of this method?

Gotta find a new pile of sand to thrust your head into at some point, right?

No you dipshit I reject your premise.

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