SwedishAdvocate
Active Member
Raffy, Volker, tigerade and ggies. Good posts by all of you.
That seems like a good plan…
That seems like a good plan…
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Climate Change / Global Warming Discussion
- Thread starter Raffy.Roma
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@SwedishAdvocate
I also some months ago thought that a CO2 concentration in the atmosphere of 350 ppm was possible within 2050. But then from the studies that I did I realized that on the contrary only two possible scenarios are possible (see post #634):
1) A CO2 concentration of 450 ppm in 2050 if we reduce CO2 emissions by 20% within 2020 and 90% within 2050.
2) A CO2 concentration of 550 ppm in 2050 if we reduce CO2 emissions by 10% within 2020 and 80% within 2050.
I think that if we want to be realistic we must try to get first scenario (and it will be hard to get this target), because if we will get the second scenario the Earth will be very different with respect to today.
I also some months ago thought that a CO2 concentration in the atmosphere of 350 ppm was possible within 2050. But then from the studies that I did I realized that on the contrary only two possible scenarios are possible (see post #634):
1) A CO2 concentration of 450 ppm in 2050 if we reduce CO2 emissions by 20% within 2020 and 90% within 2050.
2) A CO2 concentration of 550 ppm in 2050 if we reduce CO2 emissions by 10% within 2020 and 80% within 2050.
I think that if we want to be realistic we must try to get first scenario (and it will be hard to get this target), because if we will get the second scenario the Earth will be very different with respect to today.
This LiveScience op-ed from Michael Mann, which is excellent by the way, was posted on Yahoo News. That is great because Yahoo News commentators are almost 100% climate change deniers.
Michael Mann: Climate-Change Deniers Must Stop Distorting the Evidence (Op-Ed) - Yahoo News
Michael Mann: Climate-Change Deniers Must Stop Distorting the Evidence (Op-Ed) - Yahoo News
The sad part is that what some of my conservative co-workers said is, "I don't care about the environment, all I care about is the money". So basically, the only way to make folks like that change is to incorporate the costs of environmental damage in the products they purchase. (Not that any politician would ever do that.)
From this tiny, localized article. An important statement from Bill McKibben that I agree with:
Green Tip of the Week: divest from fossil fuel industry | Opinion
My response would be: "All the possible goods you could buy with that money came from the same place, Planet Earth, including the money itself. Through millions of years of evolution, the planet has given us everything we needed or could possibly want. Every tribe, country, or civilization has depended on natural resources. Unfortunately, the planet could certainly be engineered to be less hospitable for humans, and less ideal for human civilization. And with that, we may see poverty on a scale we can't imagine".
Green Tip of the Week: divest from fossil fuel industry | Opinion
My response would be: "All the possible goods you could buy with that money came from the same place, Planet Earth, including the money itself. Through millions of years of evolution, the planet has given us everything we needed or could possibly want. Every tribe, country, or civilization has depended on natural resources. Unfortunately, the planet could certainly be engineered to be less hospitable for humans, and less ideal for human civilization. And with that, we may see poverty on a scale we can't imagine".
The key lesson to take away from this is that the economy matters. It is tough for people to care about the environment when they are struggling financially. Many environmental programs died around 2009 with the financial crisis. It is impossible to fund those state and local programs when their budgets are imploding.
there is almost zero environmental awareness in the developing world. They just want to get out of poverty.
if policies don't recognize this fact, they are doomed to fail during the next recession.
I would like to report a part from the above linked article:
"By aggressively promoting change and advocating unconventional practices, activists become associated with hostile militancy and unconventionality or eccentricity."
IMO extreme behaviours are never useful to promote ideals and this is true also for enviromentalism of course.
@tigerade
Main thing is that the debate on Climate Change is open so that people can realize what are the risks involved with Climate Change and become aware that something has to be done with respect to this matter.
Main thing is that the debate on Climate Change is open so that people can realize what are the risks involved with Climate Change and become aware that something has to be done with respect to this matter.
I would argue that you can't get 2 billion people in the developing world to worry about 10,000 Walruses or the city of Miami. It just isn't going to happen.
Honestly - I don't care much about either of those 2 things. Do I care enough to make significant changes in my fossil fuel use - absolutely. Am I willing to dramatically change my life for them - probably not.
The passion/extremism in the environmental movement is its downfall as it alienates the rest of the world.
Extreme weather events being tied to climate change is really really hard to prove. Look at this year's tropical systems - it is conceivable that in a warmer world, the tropical Atlantic basin may actually calm down. As we all know, energy is produced by the differences in temperature. It is perfectly logical to think that as things warm, the delta T actually goes down. The inability to explain this year's storm activity is another example of how hard these predictions are to make. My point is just that claiming any and all bad things on climate change is extremism that will come back to bite you in the ....
An example of the same idea is the change from "global warming" to "climate change" made much of the thinking world skeptical. The scientists rush to conclusion that warming is what we would see (after claiming cooling many years before) and now change is what we'll see --- Is it any wonder much of the world is skeptical? The hubris of the scientists has destroyed their credibility. Combine that with people's fear of change and you have a catastrophic pattern that makes 350 ppm in 2050 so untenable that even talking about it hurts the movement. Why discuss an impossibility? It is like a civilization without crime.
Honestly - I don't care much about either of those 2 things. Do I care enough to make significant changes in my fossil fuel use - absolutely. Am I willing to dramatically change my life for them - probably not.
The passion/extremism in the environmental movement is its downfall as it alienates the rest of the world.
Extreme weather events being tied to climate change is really really hard to prove. Look at this year's tropical systems - it is conceivable that in a warmer world, the tropical Atlantic basin may actually calm down. As we all know, energy is produced by the differences in temperature. It is perfectly logical to think that as things warm, the delta T actually goes down. The inability to explain this year's storm activity is another example of how hard these predictions are to make. My point is just that claiming any and all bad things on climate change is extremism that will come back to bite you in the ....
An example of the same idea is the change from "global warming" to "climate change" made much of the thinking world skeptical. The scientists rush to conclusion that warming is what we would see (after claiming cooling many years before) and now change is what we'll see --- Is it any wonder much of the world is skeptical? The hubris of the scientists has destroyed their credibility. Combine that with people's fear of change and you have a catastrophic pattern that makes 350 ppm in 2050 so untenable that even talking about it hurts the movement. Why discuss an impossibility? It is like a civilization without crime.
JRP3
Hyperactive Member
The same.
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I agree that a CO2 concentration in the atmosphere of 350 ppm in 2050 is impossible (see my post #662) but from my studies I came to the conclusion that a CO2 concentration in the atmosphere of 450 ppm in 2050 is possible (see my post #634). The other choice is a CO2 concentration of 550 ppm in the atmosphere and in this case the Earth will be very different with respect to today. I don't think that we will like the situation of a CO2 concentration in the atmosphere of 550 ppm.
SwedishAdvocate
Active Member
I just had to 'save' that post!
So David, are you trying to say that if you own a for-profit private correctional facility, then why would you want a society without crime?
That is exactly what 350.org tries to not be. The group organized a ring around the White House to protest the the Keystone project and it was shoulder to shoulder 5 rows deep of people. They are not about being negative, but using positive messages, so they dress nice and have signs that are quotes directly from Obama talking about wanting to change the laws dealing with climate change. It helped sway Obama to review the Keystone project a little longer and here we are today.....
Agree. When I said that the 350.org looked a little bit extreme was because IMO it's not possible to get a concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere of 350 ppm in 2050, not for the way this organization behaves.
In case I didn't explain it good enough last time:
Is extreme weather caused by global warming?
What change?
Global warming vs climate change
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