Environmentalism and Predicted Disaster

Well haven't been doomed yet so most past such predictions were wrong. What Ehrlich failed to detect included then new and fast growing effects on human fertility as the development of modern societies in previously undeveloped parts of the world was even then causing very rapid declines in fertility (# births/female) across the Mideast, South Asia and later Africa. That process is continuing in the developed world and the natural fertility of most western States is now below the equilibrium level. Population will continue to rise slowly as life expectancy rises and immigration adds to the population of developed countries, but after a decade or so it will start to fall. The changes already at work confounded Ehrlich's prediction and now it is apparent we will likely face the opposite problem in the coming century.

With Respect to Global warming there is indeed a very good case to be made by geological studies that the fast rising CO2 atmospheric concentrations do indeed have the potential to upset the feedback loops that heretofore have limited and reversed the many geological cycles our earth has undergone. There is indeed, in my view, sufficient evidence to cause us to begin doing something about it - in effect to find ways of preserving and expanding the economic and physical welfare of humans without adding so much carbon to the atmosphere, and perhaps to reverse some that have already occurred. I believe most of the controversy involves the time estimated to be available and the means advocated to get there.

Wind & solar power and electric vehicles won't get us there. Contemporary nuclear power generators to have such potential, but they are ruled out by most AGW zealots. That is irrational. Indeed the very authoritarian government managed measures they advocate are more likely in my view to produce poverty revolution and wars than any appreciable improvement in the geological cycles. It will likely take some time to sort out all this stuff and create the necessary balanced and rational approach to the problem- one that also protects existing human interests and welfare.

To piggy back on this - this predicted doom/disaster is a prediction if all else stays the same - meaning if we continue as we are yes there will be a disaster.

It is a prediction and 1)predictions are not perfect; 2)something outside could change the prediction; 3)something internal could change the prediction

This isn't true.. They are predicting more storms and higher water levels coming from higher levels of.carbon in the atmosphere.

I think you are making a logical stretch that doesn't work. If you are saying it is the rate that os staying the same....then you are making the same argument as the population bomb or the other disasters.

maxdancona-

Thank you.

What do you think will occur and why?

I think the science behind climate change is convincing. I think sea levels will rise, and global temperature will increase.

I believe the political left is going beyond what the science is saying to exaggerate the crisis.

I think the threat is serious and that we should take serious steps to drastically reducr carbon emissions.

Its based primarily upon probabalistic modelling (sort of like all the "Spaghettin models" that try to track hurricane paths going out several days. Here weve got many solutions to the deterministic stuff that has already been calculated within known bounds . (like F=Ma) when 2 are known w can easily plop in the third dependent.

Probablistic modeling includes a whole barrel of statistical and finite element/difference differential solutions, or even variograms and kriged values.
Its a tool, and aint 100% factual, but close enough to predict outcomes when we are already feeling effects. When dealing with time and a series of events we dont even imagine yet, we can only do a mathematical "best guess". We int know about Chandler wobbles or Dangard Oeschger cycles. Hell we arent even certain of the pathway the Gulf stream is taking at depth. However we can predict fairly closely the effects IF the pathway were within a range of WHAT IT APPEARS TO BE.

However, whe peopl actually deny the overall effects of GW that we feel right now, and call it "junk science", ALL of that assertion is built upon ignorance, defiant pure ignorance at best.

I suspect that an important missing element in the debate so far has to do with the, as yet unaddressed, issues of human economic welfare and political stability that also attend any organized effort to address this problem. While the science involved here may be very good, it is, as Farmerman noted above, unable to make all the detailed predictions that people often demand on such difficult issues. The AGW issues and the remedies that may be applied have enormous potential to affect all aspects of human life on the planet, and the tumult of human history should remind us that peace, freedom and prosperity are not guaranteed things.

Though the science here is large real and not "junk" there has indeed been a great deal of "junk" policy put forward by advocates who often misuse science to put forward flawed and likely harmful proposals (often styled as "demands" ) that could easily lead to mass poverty, tyranny and war - and very likely no solution to the geological issue involved.

We need to (1) reduce emissions now using all effective means available. including the substitution of natural gas for petroleum and coal; (2) recognize the wind & solar power, electrical vehicles and rationing, though needed, won't alone solve the problem (3) maximize the use of all available efficient non emitting sources of power, including nuclear ; and (4) protect our political and economic freedom as we develop the improved technologies needed to continue these advances. (Socialism, bureaucratic rule and regulation strangle innovation, yielding only poverty, mediocracy and tyranny; They are not a good way to meet this challenge.)

I am pissed off at liberals for playing politics with Global Climate change. (Yes, I am pissed off at liberals in general. Sue me.)

The Green New Deal links action on climate change with a host of other political agenda that have nothing to do with climate. If they believed that climate change was an existential threat, they would deal with it separately (and be willing to compromise on the other issues).

Nuclear power is an answer to climate change since it offers fairly cheap power with zero emissions. GM crops are an answer to climate change since they make it possible to grow more food on less land.

People who separate climate change from liberal politics have my respect. You gain credibility when you support measures that are good for the planet even when they don't fit a partisan political ideology.

Its based primarily upon probabalistic modelling (sort of like all the "Spaghetti models" that try to track hurricane paths going out several days. Here weve got many solutions to the deterministic stuff that has already been calculated within known bounds . (like F=Ma) when 2 are known w can easily plop in the third dependent.

Probabalistic modeling includes a whole barrel of statistical and finite element/difference differential solutions, or even variograms and kriged values.
Its a tool, and aint 100% factual, but close enough to predict outcomes when we are already feeling effects. When dealing with time and a series of events we dont even imagine yet, we can only do a mathematical "best guess". We int know about Chandler wobbles or Dangard Oeschger cycles. Hell we arent even certain of the pathway the Gulf stream is taking at depth. However we can predict fairly closely the effects IF the pathway were within a range of WHAT IT APPEARS TO BE.

However, whe peopl actually deny the overall effects of GW that we feel right now, and call it "junk science", ALL of that assertion is built upon ignorance, defiant pure ignorance at best.

Actually there is a lot of "reasonable action" implied there. We should begin to apply some easily accomplished technologies that reduce all sorts of greenhouse gases and see what actually happens. The Thunberg girl was quite correct in that, while everyone seems to agree about the impacts, and most advanced nations have pledged to begin (by agreements ), noone is rally moving on to do really anything, and we, a world leader in the past, have taken ome mean ass steps backward.
Do something and see what happens is what Id like to see.

Using the economic benefit "based on uncontrolled pollutants" argument is kinda silly to begin with. Since most of us agree that we cant fully quantitate the effects our species has had, to do NOTHING, will , in itself, probably destroy any future economic capacity. We see the severe declins of C3 plants (most all useable plants are C3's).
That, and several other climate driven effects ,Probalistically, predict some dire consequences that we do not know whether we can remediate from.
To just sit and argue about a given , is about as unintelligent an approach we can carry out. Its about our entire species has begun a terminal game of "Climate Russian Roulette"

Appeals to an economic argument are moronic. That's what Greta was saying when she told the UN that all they can talk about is their money. The Tory leader in the upcoming Canadian election, Andrew Scheer, does nothing but talk about economics and the Canadian petroleum industry, on the day all the other candidates were at climate change rallies. Obama issued an executive order just over three years ago requiring the petroleum industry to end methane pollution from their operations. Plump has recently vacated that order. Meanwhile, the newest fundamentalist religious fanatics--the vegans--attribute all methane in the atmosphere to hog and steer farts--as though there were no wildlife and no petroleum industry.

We inhabit a madhouse. Does anyone have a fiddle I can borrow?

1) I am very curious about how you do anything to solve the climate changes without economics. Even Obama worried about the economic impact of his executive orders.

Any realistic measure to address the climate crisis will involve economics.

2) More of the methane in the atmosphere comes from agriculture than from the petroleum industry. Agriculture is a human activity, humans are raising a billion cows. Cows produce more methane than most other animals in nature.

3) Sorry, I don't have a fiddle.

Even if that is true (I kinda doubt it because oceanic algae and C3 plants emit more methane in times of darkness than ag animals), Even if true, the actual amount of greenhouse gases emitted by FOSSIL FUELS is an order of magnitude (or two) higher than all livestock because there are several gases associated with Climate Change (NOx SOx CO2 CH4). Thats the vegan argument and most of it is found on DOT COM sites (not edu or org or Gov)

maxdancona-

Well put. I share your view.

With reference to the political left going beyond science to exaggerate the crisis, I wish to cite Saikat Chakrabarti, the former Chief of Staff to U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Mr. Chakrabarti told the Washington Post, “t wasn’t originally a climate thing at all . . . we really think of it as a how-do-you-change-the-entire-economy."