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Comment by zizee | Hacker News Reader

The point of trying to address climate change is not that it's impossible for us to adapt, it's that to adapt to the predicted rate of change is going to be a lot more expensive/disruptive than trying to slow the change to more natural levels.

> In general I think too much emphasis is placed on trying to preserve the current climate as is, and too little on trying to make this planet a good place to live for generations to come

This is on the money.

> The climate changes we are seeing now are not extraordinary

The rate of change is extraordinary, and makes it expensive/different to adjust.

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The rate of change over the last 150 years has certainly been dramatic. But it’s nothing extraordinary over the course of Earth’s history. There’s been roughly 30 million 150-year periods in Earth’s history and given the planet’s violent past - massive impacts, supervolcanoes - it’s statistically absurd to think ours is the most extreme.

It doesn't have to be anywhere near the most extreme for all of us to die.

We're not all going to die, but my point stands.

It's not about the earth shifting, it's what happens to all of the human processes, trade, infrastructure, farm production, and human lives along the way.

i know i sound like a denier but havent we existed through extremes of weather up until now? why would more of the same be fatal? im dubious about the apocalyptic parts. no doubt the climate is warming, but the sky is falling?? not so sure

I personally don't think we'll all die due to climate change, but i could easily see it set off massive problems like wars over resource shortages.

The pandemic demonstrated that the global economy is a finely tuned machine. It doesn't take much to upset the operation of such a beast, and a big interruption could have massive unforseen consequences.

Think about it like a complex, mission critical software system. Are you going to make big changes in many key areas and rush them out to prod? Or do you want to release them individually over time.

Compounding effects.

Imagine a snowball rolling down the mountain that turns into a basketball sized ball, that into a mountain sized ball, that turns into a planet sized ball.

There are numerous periods throughout human history where we have almost gone extinct, and several where we have had under 10,000 people worldwide.

and we did that 10k bottleneck with wooden spears....

XKCD has an excellent timeline that shows that, yes, it is actually extraordinary.

https://xkcd.com/1732/

This one is also interesting, goes back much further in time:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidbressan/2024/09/22/new-stu...

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