
We do not have 12 years to stop catastrophic climate change - jxub
https://variable-variability.blogspot.com/2018/12/no-we-do-not-have-only-12-years-to-stop-climate-change.html
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projektfu
There are some brick walls out there, we're just not sure how or when they'll
arrive. Nonlinear, sudden events like ice shelf destruction, clathrate
evolution or thermohaline current disruption are unpredictable and potentially
catastrophic.

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _unpredictable and potentially catastrophic_

One thing climate scientists have done a poor job around is messaging how,
specifically, climate change will cause harm. There was a lot of hyperbole
over the past decades which approximated "everyone dies." That's obviously
untrue. In an age where we're training to filter out B.S., that might have led
to the baby being thrown out with the bathwater.

~~~
cm2187
Also global warming advocates mixed genuine scientific considerations with all
sorts of anti-capitalism, anti-growth arguments which is the best way to lose
trust from the conservative/republican opinion.

~~~
adamzochowski
Anti Growth is not necessarily a bad argument, just a long term view argument.
Growth requires work and that requires energy. There is a limit of energy we
can use. At certain point we will use more energy than earth can cool off.

An economic growth of 2% every year is unsustainable long term.

There is a parable story called "Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist"
that tries to go into this further.
[https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2012/04/economist-meets-
physicist...](https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2012/04/economist-meets-physicist/)

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _Growth requires work and that requires energy_

No it doesn't. "Energy intensity...is calculated as units of energy per unit
of GDP" [1]. It fell nearly 1/3 from 1990 to 2015 [2].

Growth is a measure on value. Value is subjective. It is not intrinsically
linked to material or energy use. (For example, modern computers use far less
energy and material than older computers while delivering far more value. More
extremely, consider many purely-digital goods.)

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_intensity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_intensity)

[2]
[https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=27032](https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=27032)

~~~
adamzochowski
I am not sure which part of the statement you highlighted you asserted is
wrong? That:

a) Growth doesn't require work?

b) Work doesn't require energy?

From what you included, since 1980 to 2016, energy usage has doubled, from
281btu to 572btu [1].

Yes, we can become more efficient with the energy we use, but we still use
energy, and we still use more of it. If we can use energy without generating
heat, then we are good.

Additionally, dangerous part is that, as we are more efficient, we find new
use of resource that gobbles up the efficiency gains. [2]

[1]
[https://www.eia.gov/beta/international/data/browser/#/?c=410...](https://www.eia.gov/beta/international/data/browser/#/?c=4100000002000060000000000000g000200000000000000001&ug=4&vs=INTL.44-1-AFRC-
QBTU.A&vo=0&v=H&end=2016) (scroll down to chart to see world consumption)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox)

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man-and-laptop
There's an argument that models of the Earth's climate can _not_ be made
especially accurate. This is because of chaotic behaviour in the underlying
differential equations, and the likely presence of unknown factors that
influence the Earth's climate but are not present in these models.

But this is actually an argument in _favour_ of reducing carbon emissions. If
we're dealing with a system we can't understand, where messing with it could
cause immense damage to humankind, then maybe that's enough of a reason to
stop messing with it.

In general, whenever you're taking a risk with a potentially massive downside,
where the outcome is hard to predict (because of chaos, "unknown unknowns"),
then you should stop taking that risk.

_________________________________________

Regarding what to do about climate change, Taleb has a theory called "minority
rule" that could help here. It says that an intransigent minority, maybe
around ~1% of people, can force a passive majority to do the things they want.
A good example of this is kosher / halal food in the US / Europe, where an
intransigent minority of people have forced a large percentage of food to be
certified kosher / halal, perhaps unintentionally. As such, the solution to
reducing emissions might be to set up an environmental "beth din" which
certifies whether a product is "environmentally kosher" or not. If an
intransigent minority only consumes products that are certified
environmentally kosher, the passive majority will fall in line.

~~~
ThomPete
You have to dig deeper to make the right analysis here, your view is very 1st
world-centric.

To the poor people living right now, they are already living with their life
at stake to them it's not an actual argument. They need access to cheap
reliable energy right now and frankly, don't care about climate change.

Talebs minority rule is not a universal rule it's a contextual rule which is
important to understand.

~~~
true_religion
Poor people globally are consuming an order of magnitude less energy than rich
people in rich counties.

Honestly, excluding them from this analysis makes sense because of this, and
additionally because we have no way of affecting change outside of our own
nations.

~~~
ThomPete
Thats not the point. The point is that they cant use our fancy solar grids for
anything, they are trying to make it to the next day and ex coal and oil are
more useful to them right now than any discussion about climate change, mother
nature is already killing them

Excluding them is antihuman.

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jeletonskelly
Greenhouse output reduction is an approach that is very obviously failing. It
requires too many conflicted parties to align and devote resources.

We have to start viewing climate change mitigation as an engineering problem.
We need aggressive investment in carbon and methane capture. If it can't be a
profitable endeavor then governments need to make the investment for the
public good.

~~~
shuntress
Unfortunately that still requires people to accept some facts that seem to be
subject to aggressive misinformation campaigns.

People looking for real discussion about these issues online in places like
this are met with a constant barrage of "climate change doesn't real"

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _People looking for real discussion about these issues online in places like
> this are met with a constant barrage of "climate change doesn't real"_

France shows a different side to the problem. The French accept that climate
change is happening [1]. Yet even simple measures are popularly opposed. That
implies climate scepticism is a symptom, not a cause, of inaction.

[1] [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-08/french-
vo...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-08/french-voters-worry-
more-about-climate-change-than-eu-neighbors)

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arvinsim
My opinion about why governments/corporations seem apathetic towards climate
change can be summed up with this quote

> It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends
> upon his not understanding it.

~~~
shittyadmin
It's basically this but multiplied by the number of countries on the planet -
including rapidly developing countries which need the energy.

Complaining about climate change is a luxury for the rich, if you didn't have
refrigeration at home your priorities would probably look much different.

Heck, just look at the French Yellow Jacket protests, it's clear the policies
arguably needed to combat climate change are harmful to the lower and middle
class even in western countries. Especially when those policies are often used
to subsidize electric cars or energy efficient windows for those who can
afford such things - effectively an inverse transfer payment.

I fear the only way we have a shot at solving this is with cheap, clean energy
tech that doesn't yet exist.

~~~
hackeraccount
That's exactly correct. And yet people talk about reducing growth. That is
opposite of what we need. AGW is the worry of people with money.

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jordan801
I think the whole point of putting a "wall" on it, is to create a sense of
urgency. It's more effective psychologically to say, fix it by X date, than it
is to say, well, you know, just do what you can.

~~~
dwighttk
The danger though is that people will remember that you said “we only have ten
years” in ten years and say to themselves “doesn’t seem so bad to me, why
should I change anything now?”

~~~
radarsat1
> in ten years and say to themselves "doesn’t seem so bad to me..."

except we don't have to wait 10 years, it is already bad. We are already
seeing pretty drastic changes in weather patterns are we not?

~~~
dwighttk
"doesn't seem so bad to me..." can be thought in response to a very broad
range of situations

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peterwwillis
I'm pretty sure that if given the chance, the majority of the human population
will continue to delay acting for as long as possible. I think basic
psychology backs this up, as we all tend to value immediate gains over long
term ones, and one example of procrastination is the delay of action due to
fear.

Personally I expect the worst. I don't have faith that the body of humanity
will seriously act to save itself. I think we should start planning on how to
survive a very hot planet.

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jxub
This is the second post of this type that I posted that has been removed from
the front page (I think, or below the point threshold but unlikely with 32
points and 27 comments at 1 hour).

Can someone shed some light on that?

~~~
patrickg_zill
HN doesn't exist in order to amplify your blog posts...

~~~
jxub
Well, I'm not the author and I don't know if any of the guidelines were
breached, but good point anyway about not complaining stupidly, sorry for
that.

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ThomPete
“We” have much more than that. I find it borderline amoral that the IPCC do
nothing to stop the catastrophist interpretations of the actual science.

~~~
onion2k
_“We” have much more than that. I find it borderline amoral that the IPCC do
nothing to stop the catastrophist interpretations of the actual science._

We don't though. Not really. Not because we have to act within 12 years, but
because we have to act _at some point_. If we always say that the given
deadline is wrong and we have more time then _eventually_ we'll be wrong. It
makes a lot of sense to start now if only because that way we can spread the
cost out over a longer period of time.

~~~
hanniabu
Also that "more time" means unbearable living conditions. People think that of
humans can still live on the Earth that it means we have more time, but the
fact is that we'll be living in a planet that can no longer support us
comfortably due to crop limitations, mass plant die off, mass species die off
on land and sea, wildfires droughts and other natural disasters, etc

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patrickg_zill
"We have ten years to save the world" \- a statement made repeatedly during
the last 30 years.

~~~
jordan801
Yeah, the world, most likely, isn't going to end in ten years. But in ten
years, if we don't do anything, fifty years from now, it's all going to be
way, way worse.

~~~
gaius
That is completely true. But it is also true that if someone says X will
happen in time T and at time T+1 it hadn’t happened then warning of X won’t be
taken seriously next time, even if they only meant to highlight the urgency of
the situation by presenting a shorter timeframe. It will be difficult to
communicate that “this time we really mean it”. That’s the fundamental problem
right now.

~~~
Oletros
> That is completely true. But it is also true that if someone says X will
> happen in time T and at time T+1 it hadn’t happened then warning of X won’t
> be taken seriously next time

I think we are confussing what scientist say with what media says

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petermcneeley
The facts are irrelevant at this stage this is purely politics. The poor and
middle class do not want to be penalized for climate change (French yellow
jacket protests are most visible example of this). This is just bluffing
between economic groups.

~~~
shuntress
The facts are not irrelevant and it is extremely misleading to imply that
large scale action intended to counteract climate change is somehow required
to negatively impact poor or lower-middle-class groups.

~~~
benmmurphy
The alternative claim that large scale action won't negatively impact poor or
lower middle class groups is more bizarre. Let's assume that there is a cost
to counteracting climate change. it is not some kind of free lunch.

Then this is only going to not negatively impact the poor or lower-middle
class groups if they can push all the cost onto other groups. However, then
you have to ask yourself why haven't the poor or lower middle class groups
been able to carve out a larger slice of the pie by increasing transfers from
other groups to themselves.

So suddenly these other groups are going to act more generously to the poor
and lower middle class over climate change but not generally. That seems a bit
of a leap.

