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Comment by hehdhdjehehegwv | Hacker News Reader

The good news is you’ve taken your foot off the gas. The bad news is the car is going 100mph and there is a cliff edge in 10 feet.

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Nailed it. We're confusing the second derivative (how much are we "accelerating" pollution) with the real scalar value of interest (distance from the pollution "cliff"). Taking your foot off the gas does nothing. Putting your foot hard on the brakes may not even do anything! Momentum do what it do.

If humanity can't work through these fundamental math and science comprehension problems, we're doomed.

Given that (with regard to greenhouse gasses) we've a) unlocked positive feedback emission loops from tropical & arctic methane and b) still pumping increasing amounts of carbon into the air, it's clear to anyone paying attention that we've already fallen off the cliff.

We're just hovering for a second like Wile E Coyote.

I often wonder if Looney Tunes physics explains more about our world than classical economics…

Is a) actually clear at this time? My impression is that there are some questions about methane levels, but I don't know if sources of them are clear given that humans activity also causes a lot of methane emissions. But yes, apparently we also just had the largest ever recorded jump in CO2 levels at 4.7ppm year-over-year and the sea surface temperature data over the last year is sobering.

The best news is that your hush puppies are ready: youtube.com/watch?v=L7eFdTGC3N4

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