

Study predicts imminent irreversible planetary collapse - ca98am79
http://www.sfu.ca/pamr/media-releases/2012/study-predicts-imminent-irreversible-planetary-collapse.html

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jerrya
_Study predicts imminent irreversible planetary collapse ... and modem tax_

    
    
        Imminent Death Of The Net Predicted!: prov.
    
            [Usenet] Since Usenet first got off the ground in 1980--81, it
            has grown exponentially, approximately doubling in size every
            year. On the other hand, most people feel the signal-to-noise
            ratio of Usenet has dropped steadily. These trends led, as far
            back as mid-1983, to predictions of the imminent collapse (or
            death) of the net. Ten years and numerous doublings later,
            enough of these gloomy prognostications have been confounded
            that the phrase “Imminent Death Of The Net Predicted!” has
            become a running joke, hauled out any time someone grumbles
            about the S/N ratio or the huge and steadily increasing
            volume, or the possible loss of a key node or link, or the
            potential for lawsuits when ignoramuses post copyrighted
            material, etc., etc., etc
    
    

[http://catb.org/jargon/html/I/Imminent-Death-Of-The-Net-
Pred...](http://catb.org/jargon/html/I/Imminent-Death-Of-The-Net-
Predicted-.html)

------
vasco
Being able to accept the fact that we as individuals die, what is the thing
that stop us from accepting that we as a civilization, and as a species will
eventually cease to exist? The planet will still be here and there will surely
be life left once conditions don't permit humans to survive, but even if it
should be impossible for life to persist on Earth, so what? It's not like
Nature and the Universe were made for us to eventually dominate and expand,
they just exist and so do we, for a while.

PS: Obviously I don't think we should just nuke everything because we're
/eventually/ going to die, but I find the general fear and surprise at the
fact that we as a species could cease to exist interesting. Like we're
entitled to live forever because the Universe is ours or something.

~~~
saraid216
I accept that we'll cease to exist someday (at the very least, we'll
definitely be gone by the heat death of the universe), but I don't really see
any reason not to try to delay that point as far as possible, by whatever
means possible.

I mean... why the hell not?

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apsec112
It's almost amusing that this summary (don't have journal access, so haven't
read the paper) doesn't bother to name any _negative consequences_ of this so-
called "planetary collapse". It's just "Shit. Bad stuff will happen. We're all
doomed.", without even saying what the bad stuff _is_. Are they worried about
agriculture? Species extinction? Disease? They don't say. How on Earth are we
supposed to evaluate the likelihood of claims without knowing what the hell
the claims are?

~~~
eschulte
"the planet’s ecosystems, as we know them, could irreversibly collapse in the
proverbial blink of an eye" seems like a fairly straightforward clearcut
negative consequence.

They're worried that ecosystems (those networks of interacting species) will
collapse (meaning the ecosystem dynamics change and the vast majority of the
species who rely on and compose the ecosystem go extinct).

~~~
apsec112
That seems like obvious nonsense - eg. mile-wide asteroid impacts, which are
much larger in terms of energy release than all nuclear arsenals combined,
don't cause mass extinctions. But it at least gets credit for being a specific
claim. Just saying "collapse" is vague, and could arguably apply to just about
anything.

~~~
anthonyb
Oh for fuck's sake, just read the paper:

    
    
      BOX 1: Past planetary-scale critical transitions and state shifts
    
      Last glacial–interglacial transition18,24. The critical transition was a
      rapid warm–cold–warm fluctuation in climate between 14,300 and
      11,000 yr ago, and the most pronounced biotic changes occurred
      between 12,900 and 11,300 yr ago24,27,30,54.
    
      The major biotic changes were the extinction of about half of the
      species of large-bodied mammals, several species of large birds and
      reptiles, and a few species of small animals30; a significant decrease in
      local and regional biodiversity as geographic ranges shifted
      individualistically, which also resulted in novel species
      assemblages37,49,53,54; and a global increase in human biomass and
      spread of humans to all continents27.
    
      The pre-transition global state was a glacial stage that lasted about
      100,000 yr and the post-transition global state is an interglacial that
      Earth has been in for approximately 11,000 yr. The global forcings
      were orbitally induced, cyclic variations in solar insolation that caused
      rapid global warming. Direct and indirect of effects of humans
      probably contributed to extinctions of megafauna and subsequent
      ecological restructuring.
    

So: collapse means widespread species and biosphere change, extinctions of
large mammals. All this with relatively small forcings due to solar radiation
changes.

~~~
InclinedPlane
Congratulations, you've stated the theory with far more specificity and a
greater degree of testability than the paper's authors managed.

~~~
anthonyb
I'm just paraphrasing the paper. Everything that I said was in there, if you
cared to look.

~~~
InclinedPlane
I've read it. The purpose of a scientific paper is to state its assumptions
and suppositions clearly. The fact that this one doesn't even manage that is a
big knock against it, aside from the fact that the basic "theory" is
fundamentally not falsifiable.

~~~
anthonyb
It's really not that hard to work out. That you don't know what "collapse"
means in the context of an ecosystem is not the fault of the paper.

It's like arguing that a CS paper doesn't define what "compiler" means; there
is a basic level of literacy expected when reading scientific papers.

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rnemo
I hate being that person, but I have to honestly ask, if the scientific
community as a whole cannot agree on exactly how much effect humans personally
cause to the environment today, how can anyone claim with the level of surety
that these people seem to have that something major is going to happen, that
humans can mitigate, within a lifetime?

~~~
goodside
Public uncertainty does not prevent isolated individuals from getting science
done. There's no reason to suspect that publicized uncertainty about global
warming has anything to do with objective difficulty in obtaining solid
evidence rather than its tendency to attract polemicists, cranks, and
opinionated amateurs.

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gdacuna
"This study concludes we better not exceed the 50 per cent mark of wholesale
transformation of Earth’s surface or we won’t be able to delay, never mind
avert, a planetary collapse. We’ve already reached the 43 per cent mark
through our conversion of landscapes into agricultural and urban areas, making
Earth increasingly susceptible to an environmental epidemic."

I'm guessing this really means the land surface of the Earth, rather than the
Earth's surface as a whole, as ~70% of the Earth's surface is water. Without
access to the paper itself, I can't say whether or not this is an issue with
the "media release" or the research itself, of course.

~~~
planetguy
The study doesn't actually say anything of the sort anyway, what it says is a
typically vague:

 _" It is still unknown, however, what percentage of Earth’s ecosystems
actually have to be transformed to new states by the direct action of humans
for rapid state changes to be triggered in remaining ‘natural’ systems. That
percentage may be knowable only in retrospect, but, judging from landscape-
scale observations and simulations66, 67, 68, 69, 70, it can reasonably be
expected to be as low as 50% (ref. 68), or even lower if the interaction
effects of many local ecosystem transformations cause sufficiently large
global-scale forcings to emerge."_

or in other words, "fuck, I dunno, half?"

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jboggan
"They are not all accounted for, the lost seeing-stones. We do not know who
else may be watching."

This sort of study is not science and only as good as the quality of their
assumptions. I'm glad the authors and all participants got their names in a
prestigious journal and I hope it helps their careers.

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stretchwithme
I think we don't know the long term effects of the things we are doing.

But the usual cure people propose, a massive expansion of government, is worse
than the disease. It will ultimately lead to more wars and an end to dealing
with threats to our existence.

But doing nothing is not viable either. We need to get control of the planet.
We simply cannot just let the next ice age or global warming occur.

This sort of thing is the ultimate "tragedy of the commons". And some of those
most familiar with that concept seem the least likely to apply it the effects
of technology.

~~~
saraid216
Last I checked, we haven't had a civil war in a while. If we had a decently
sized "massive expansion of government" on, say, a planetary scale (for a
planet-sized problem), wouldn't that therefore lead to less wars?

~~~
stretchwithme
Since government is creating massive problems already, such as the global debt
crisis, I really don't think all encompassing planetary government is a good
idea at all.

People seem to think nothing could ever go wrong with such a concept. But
history tells another story about government. We've had some very bad
totalitarian governments. I'd rather not trust any single organization that
will never face any competition.

I'm not saying its a bad idea to coordinate with other countries on specific
issues. That's what treaties are for. Even there, some pretty bad ideas can be
agreed upon. At least countries can leave a treaty that proves to be a
disaster.

~~~
saraid216
> I'd rather not trust any single organization that will never face any
> competition.

Neither would I. That would be silly.

Can you tell me what government is? In my experience, people who are afraid of
governments becoming totalitarian cannot seem to grasp what the government
itself is. Would you be an exception to this trend?

~~~
stretchwithme
A sovereign government is a monopoly on the use of force over a given
territory. I would hate to have no ability to escape a government if it became
tyrannical. A global government makes escape impossible.

~~~
saraid216
What does "monopoly" mean, in this case? Where's the line between "I can punch
your nose" and "I can shoot you dead" and "This is a military"? I assume
joining an underground resistance is unpalatable?

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theorique
OK, so what's the game plan?

~~~
huggyface
We're doomed, so load up on ammo, water, and forget about the conservation
thing because it's futile.

~~~
tutuca
Funny thing is that the megaphone holder is the one with the keys to the gun
locker....

------
sakopov
It takes a certain skill to write a scientific paper with little to no
scientific explanation. :)

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maxk42
Why is this shit on Hacker News, let alone any sort of scientific publication?

------
Mz
Environmental Studies major here who used to argue this type thing a lot
online. Soundbite version of my general position:

 _It's the end of the world as we know it. And I feel fine._

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planetguy
Alright, I've just read the paper and I'm surprised that it got published in
Nature. I mean, as far as crystal ball gazing goes, saying that "shit might,
y'know, change in the future and stuff" is pretty reliable, but I'm not really
sure how it counts as _science_.

Link to actual paper (may or may not work outside the ivory tower I currently
occupy, someone please check and let me know):
[http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v486/n7401/full/nature1...](http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v486/n7401/full/nature11018.html)

edit: Apparently it doesn't, but try this one (pdf)
[http://www.stanford.edu/group/hadlylab/pdfs/Barnoskyetal2012...](http://www.stanford.edu/group/hadlylab/pdfs/Barnoskyetal2012.pdf)

~~~
SwellJoe
The paper is pretty calm and careful about predictions, as far as I can tell.
What assertion from the paper (which is behind a paywall at Nature.com, but
can be found free online via sneaky methods like googling the title),
specifically, do you feel is unsubstantiated or overblown?

Current models of the entire planetary ecosystem are admittedly quite
primitive, but they often _have_ proven to be predictive. That which is
predictive and reproduce-able is science, by my reckoning. And, this paper is
drawing on expertise across an extremely broad spectrum of real research, not
merely models or educated guesstimation.

~~~
astrofinch
What is a specific scenario, aside from the climate change scenario we all
know about, that could lead to collapse that's discussed in the paper?

~~~
anthonyb
They seem to be talking specifically about biospheric interactions, so it'll
likely be some sort of domino effect, something like:

Frog A goes extinct, frog A just happens to eat beetle B.

Without (as much) predation pressure, beetle B goes completely fucking nuts
and eats everything in sight, including most of the forests in the area,
crops, etc.

Everything in the area starves, the ecosystem collapses, and you're left with
scrub, beetles and widespread erosion until something else can colonise the
area and start a new ecosystem.

------
excuse-me
The planet is fine it's not going to collapse.

A few species on a thin smear of biosphere on the outside of the planet might
be in trouble - but the planet is perfectly safe until the sun expands.

~~~
roc
Why stop there then? If you've decided that 'safe' indicates the continuation
of the mass that comprises our planet, and not the particular, temporarily-
compatible, form it takes today, then why even worry about the expansion of
the sun? Or a collision which may shatter it? In how many ways is an asteroid
cloud meaningfully less 'safe' than a single barren rock of comparable mass?

I mean, you've already dispensed with the anthropocentric definition of "safe"
that implies "for human civilization". So why stop at the anthropocentric
definition of "planet"?

Why not take comfort in the fact that matter can neither be created nor
destroyed, and as such, even being baked by the sun or destroyed in a
collision of galaxies or pulled into a star or black hole will leave the
energy that comprises "Earth" quite safe and sound?

If we want to imply that man is insignificant, surely the fact that our planet
_itself_ is insignificant would only underscore that point.

~~~
jcdreads
It's sarcasm. (viz. George Carlin,
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGOBm2J4tn0> at about 2:20 in; the whole thing
is classic Carlin at his most abrasive.)

~~~
roc
I'm a big fan of George Carlin, but that point was still irrelevant and
largely self-defeating when he first popularized it.

For such an astute student of language, with an eye toward practicality over
formality, I don't know how he could see a difference between his complaint
that the colloquial 'save the planet' implied rather than explicitly expressed
a human point of reference and his many rants against unnecessarily precise
techno-jargon. (see: PTSD, pre-boarding, etc)

The only useful value in highlighting that 'save the planet' implies 'so we
can still live here', is to draw attention to how the knee-jerk response to
such slogans and policy suggestions [1] is the height of arrogance/ignorance.

But rather than exposing the absurdity of that knee-jerk response, his little
rant has served as _ammunition_ for that response, shifting the expectation of
evidence of lasting harm to an intellectual game of pointless abstraction. [2]

As such it started, and continues, to bother me.

So, again, if you find any legitimate comfort in the idea of the planet
continuing on without us (As Carlin may well have) there's no good reason to
stop at that level of abstraction.

And if you just want to complain about colloquial language, generally
speaking, that pursuit winds up on the receiving end of the bulk of Carlin's
analysis of language.

[1] In short: dismissing any potential for a legitimate concern about
defending life as we know it by casting conservationist policies as the work
of extremists or dismissing any potential for damage by humans by suggesting
that we're powerless to truly harm nature.

[2] E.g. "We may turn America's breadbasket into a dust bowl - but after we
all starve to death, things will grow again!" As if that matters to the
conservationist or their opponent, being as they would both have starved to
death.

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berdon
This is very reminiscent of "The Day After Tomorrow"...

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kennethcwilbur
They have a crystal ball?!?!

