Feasible in what sense? If every nation converts to nuclear power and we start building large scale scrubbers, we could at least reverse some of the changes we've already contributed.
Is that feasible for our generation? No. — Tate
electrification of everything, is what is needed, — ChatteringMonkey
Forget scrubbers, concentrations of greenhouse gasses in the air are to small to make it worth it to actively pull them out. — ChatteringMonkey
Times are definitely a changing. — ChatteringMonkey
I think nuclear is the higher priority, though. Electricity is mostly generated by coal or gas. — Tate
Really? Is there research on that? Just curious. — Tate
Yes, but it doesn't seem to be in the direction of global cooperation. And democratic governments are generally screwed. Apathy takes over. — Tate
Nuclear is electricity-production — ChatteringMonkey
We have scrubbers already as prototypes, but they seem woefully inefficient energy-wise, and therefor hardly scalable... which makes sense if you consider that greenhouses gasses, while high enough to raise temperature, are still very small concentrations in the air. — ChatteringMonkey
think it could go any way still. Apathy, or even open conflict because of higher stressed relations and scarcity, are all definite possibilities... but so is cooperation, for instance if the need is truly high. In WWII the US and the USSR commies were besties and fighting side by side to defeat the fascists... go figure. — ChatteringMonkey
I know there's people focusing especially on existential risk, for humans to survive as a species, but frankly I couldn't care less about "the species" if the world is turned into an arid hothouse where most of the other species have died off and only small portions of the globe are really livable without technological assistance. Seriously, I don't get this type of reasoning, it's like saying to someone you will lose most of your limbs, your eyes, your stomach etc, but don't be alarmed we can keep you alive just fine by hooking you up to this machine for the rest of your life. — ChatteringMonkey
Yes, I know. I just meant that switching to electric cars won't limit CO2 emissions until we have a replacement for coal and gas power plants. — Tate
Forests scrub the atmosphere every summer. I think we can come up with something. Or at least it's too early to give up. — Tate
You're saying a global catastrophe could be the solution to global conflict. Could be. — Tate
I really find this hard to believe.I was talking to two ladies with whom I otherwise chit chat about the weather, gardening, and such. — baker
The signed treaties have made some progress. The Montreal Protocol have almost eliminated CFCs and the Paris agreement for net-zero emissions.You think the UN will take over and make the revolution? — Olivier5
Wrong models won't just alienate those that aren't already convinced, they simply can contribute to wrong policies. It's not just pep talk. If a forecast is ulitmately proven wrong, we cannot excuse it because "it supported the good cause". Something "for the cause" isn't the way to make models about the future, especially the ones that you base your actual policies on. The issues are complex, not so simple to be good or evil as people want them to be. And furthermore, to criticize models about their validity when they are wrong isn't some "climate denier" scheme, it's basic way to do science. And strawmanning this, like responding "oh, so you are denying climate change?", doesn't help. The models really need to be accurate, realistic and not simple extrapolations from linear models, where the end result is that you are forecasting the year when the human race, or all species, are extinct.Ok, maybe I agree that this kind of alarmism as a political strategy isn't all that helpful, in that it potentially alienates those that weren't already convinced even further. — ChatteringMonkey
fertility rates have gone down — ssu
Now to think how your attitude that you outline above would fare in such real world situations. Both of them are middle class ladies in their fifties. You think calling them morons would somehow be helpful?
I actually doubt that there exist studies on this particular topic. But if I remember correctly, there are those studies where people were being insulted prior to taking an IQ test and the people did worse on those tests. This certainly speaks against your attitude.
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The supremacist attitude that some environmental activists have certainly isn't getting through to such people, and if anything, it's only making them dig their heels in even more. — baker
it goes both ways. The environmental activists need to earn their right to be taken seriously as well. — baker
The models really need to be accurate, realistic and not simple extrapolations from linear models, where the end result is that you are forecasting the year when the human race, or all species, are extinct. — ssu
Check out this article. It's a review of several potential approaches. — Tate
The signed treaties have made some progress. The Montreal Protocol have almost eliminated CFCs and the Paris agreement for net-zero emissions. — L'éléphant
I can't read the whole article, only the abstract, but it does seem to be going for more or less the same conclusion as I have been earlier, namely that it works but isn't efficient/is to costly, which makes it doubtful that it could be scaled up. — ChatteringMonkey
Sorry about that. The body and conclusions aren't pessimistic. They admit it's going to be a challenge and conclude that multiple technologies are a better than a single solution. — Tate
-- Samuel ClemensNo people in the world ever did achieve their freedom by goody-goody talk and moral suasion: it being immutable law that all revolutions that will succeed, must begin in blood, whatever the answer afterward. If history teaches anything, it teaches that.
Prosperity and wealth is a sociological phenomenon, so yes, it hasn't got anything to do with biology.This probably isn't biological but more of a sociological phenomenon. — Agent Smith
We should recognize that if global warming is an automatic consequence of capitalism, we might as well say goodbye to each other. I would like to overcome capitalism, but it’s not in the relevant time scale. Global warming basically has to be taken care of within the framework of existing institutions, modifying them as necessary. That’s the problem we face.
When we turn to human nature, the first thing to remember is that we know essentially nothing about it. It’s what I work on all the time. There’s a few small areas where there’s some understanding of cognitive human nature and very little about the rest. It’s all surmise.
If it is true that human nature is incapable of dealing with problems developing over a longer term, if that’s a fact about the way humans are structured and organized, we can, again, say goodbye to one another. So let’s assume it’s not the case.
Then we work within a set of parameters. The fundamental institutions are not going to change in time. Human nature allows the possibility of thinking about what’s going to happen in a couple of decades, even centuries. Assume all that.
Then we turn to solutions. And there are solutions within that set of assumptions. So let’s proceed and work on them. If those assumptions happen to be wrong, tough for the human species. It’s what we have. — Noam Chomsky
There are solutions to climate change. Many of them are under way. Those who believe it’s hopeless are entitled to think so — they may be right. But we can’t act on that basis. — Xtrix
Oh I agree. But the problem is when the discourse stays on that level when making actual decisions. Politicians just love grandstanding and hence the problem is that rhetoric and actual decisions can part to totally different realms. When an administration that likely has few years to go until the next election makes an "ambitious" plan for the next twenty years, one can be doubtful of what actually will be done in the next decade or two.they're just using 'existential threat' as concept that isn't technical but rather figuratively and political, to indicate that it's going to be really really bad if we don't do anything. — ChatteringMonkey
Oh I agree. But the problem is when the discourse stays on that level when making actual decisions. Politicians just love grandstanding and hence the problem is that rhetoric and actual decisions can part to totally different realms. When an administration that likely has few years to go until the next election makes an "ambitious" plan for the next twenty years, one can be doubtful of what actually will be done in the next decade or two.
This is a basic problem especially in energy policy, which is quite central to the actual environment policy. Since at least 40 years the emphasis has been to "transfer to renewables". Well, that's really happening only now and the current energy crisis shows just how much dependent we are on oil and gas. — ssu
Prosperity and wealth is a sociological phenomenon, so yes, it hasn't got anything to do with biology. — ssu
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