
Apocalyptic Claims About Climate Change Are Wrong - hsnewman
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/11/25/why-everything-they-say-about-climate-change-is-wrong/#4dd5de4912d6
======
bryanlarsen
Apocalyptic claims about climate change _from both sides_ are wrong.

As the article says, climate change won't destroy human civilization.

Halting climate change won't destroy the economy, nor would it significantly
affect it. It'd cost on the order of a trillion dollars. That's a crazy amount
of money, but the US can and will spend that kind of money regularly. For
instance, it's comparable to the Iraq War or the Apollo project. It's less
than WWII.

And it's not like the trillion would disappear; it's being spent in the
economy. And via the broken windows measurement fallacy of economics, it would
likely increase our GDP rather than decrease it.

~~~
coldpie
Yeah, this is the most frustrating part of all this. Halting climate change
isn't even _that_ hard and would clearly benefit billions of people. It just
affects the pocketbooks of a couple of rich people, so we can't do it, and
instead spin our tires with dumb nit-picking articles like this one.

~~~
WarDores
The hard part is international collaboration. Getting China and India on board
has been a non-starter so far, and they're far and away the largest
contributors.

~~~
vkou
No, they aren't. India's per capita CO2 output is tiny. China's is middle of
the road. Per capita is the only way we can talk about CO2, because otherwise
we get true absurdities, like Denmark or Ireland being allowed to pollute as
much as the US. (The world will not support 200 countries polluting ad much as
the US.)

There's also a simple solution to getting trade partners on board. It's called
a carbon tariff.

~~~
dominotw
> India's per capita CO2 output is tiny.

being tiny now implies incredible room for growth given growth rates of those
countries, which is actually an arugment for more action not less.

> Per capita is the only way we can talk about CO2

Wouldn't it also mean India and china won't have to do anything for decades
till they get to same per capita as USA ?

~~~
yibg
It would mean China needs to stop emitting more per capita and the US (and
other developed countries) needs to reduce its emissions per capita.

~~~
dominotw
> It would mean China needs to stop emitting more per capita

No it doesn't following GP's chain of logic. It doesn't need to do anything
till the point it hits US per capita.

~~~
wutbrodo
"doesn't need to do anything" is a qualifier that _you_ added, apparently
based on a gross misunderstanding of the conversation. We're talking about
defining an ideal target here, with deference paid to the fact that the status
quo poses some inertia. If we're talking about an idealized frictionless
vacuum, everybody would snap to the same emissions per capita, at the level
required to forestall the negative effects of climate change. This would imply
a substantial reduction of US emissions and perhaps an increase or small
decrease in Indo-China emissions; increasing China to US levels doesn't make
sense in any model, idealized or otherwise. Given that inertia means that the
US reduction can't be immediate and drastic, it still suggests that mroe of
the burden for emission reduction falls on the US than on India and China.

~~~
dominotw
I admit don't really understand what target would china and india have per
capita under this model.

Why would any burden fall on china/india given they are already on the low end
of per capita.

Can you define what burden falls on them under your per capita model?

------
tyre
The threats of climate change are not that some biblical flood rises up to
swallow humanity.

The danger of climate change is that incremental sea level rise would put tens
of millions of people underwater.

Could they move? Absolutely. And we clearly have enough land to move people
around, both globally and in many countries.

The danger is whether we can make those migrations without civil unrest. What
land is taken for them to move to? What about Vietnam, where most of the
country is projected to be underwater by 2050? We’re going to just move
millions of Vietnamese and no one is going to be upset?

If we look today at the relatively tiny migration of people into the United
States and Europe, we can see how quickly voters swing far right as The Other
settles in.

The trickle down of these effects is tremendous.

~~~
Cthulhu_
Not to mention famine; it's not so much natural disasters that'll kill a lot
of people (after all, we're pretty good at moving out of the way, building
shelters / dikes, etc), but it's going to be failed crops. This is already
happening, and has happend in the past - all it takes is one hot / dry summer
for a country and millions of people to be at risk.

Climate change means the chance of a hot / dry summer (or long / cold winter)
will increase. Sure, at the time it seems like a fluke, and sure especially
the more wealthy countries will be able to survive well enough, but at the
same time it will cost lives. The poorest and disadvantaged will likely be the
first to go, those that can't afford the gradually increasing prices of food.

And the problem will become bigger as the climate change becomes more
widespread. We can (as a collective) survive a year of famine well enough, but
what if crops fail two or three years in a row?

~~~
marcyb5st
Agreed. Some studies link climate change as the trigger of famine/conflicts
that lead to the Arab Springs [1].

Those events also generated few millions refugees and, here in Europe, we are
already unable to act. I can see that when this phenomenon will get 100s or
1000s time more severe wars will be fought for securing food/land (IMHO likely
it will happen in south-east Asia at some point [2]).

[1]
[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S095937801...](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959378018301596?via%3Dihub)

[2]
[https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/3/8/e1603322](https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/3/8/e1603322)

------
ilikehurdles
Forbes is a hosted blogspam platform. You pay them, they publish you, and
folks permanently stuck in the 90s think they're reading something that
legitimate journalists and editors were involved in. In this case, we have the
pleasure of reading an anti-renewable campaigner's entirely siloed views of
the impact of climate change and an argument for how everything will be ok and
all the scientists are wrong.

But articles involving mis-targeted casual skepticism make us feel nice and ok
with the status quo so we share them, because articles about the need to act
are uncomfortable to digest.

~~~
alexandercrohde
All of that may be true, but I think doesn't address the claims of the
article.

The article says " Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez ... said, “The world is going to
end in 12 years if we don't address climate change.” " That's unscientific
claim by Cortez. I think the point that exaggeration undermines your
credibility is an important fact.

I believe that those of us who push a cause so hard that we lose sight of
facts actually hurt the cause, because we alienate all the objective-truth-
seekers.

~~~
noelsusman
Objective truth seekers aren't alienated by hyperbolic comments from
individuals. If they were then by definition they wouldn't be objective truth
seekers.

~~~
alexandercrohde
Sure they are.

Every now and then somebody says something so hyperbolic I have to ask "Am I
really a democrat?"

If somebody asks do I believe in global warming I want to be able to answer
"Yes" not "Yes but"

------
DennisP
Scientists are not saying we'll all die in 12 years. What they _are_ saying is
that if we're not rapidly reducing emissions by then, we're unlikely to avoid
a tipping point where the planet is emitting its own greenhouse gases, and
will take things several degrees further with no more help from us.

A great book on the effects of climate change is _Six Degrees_ by Mark Lynas,
who read 3000 peer-reviewed papers on climate change and summarized them, with
extensive references. It was published in 2007 but from what I've seen it's
holding up well. Four degrees is grim; it won't make us go extinct but it's a
horrible mess nonetheless.

One claim in the article was that food production will be fine. In fact, there
are agricultural areas feeding hundreds of millions of people which are
dependent on glacier melt during dry seasons. Those glaciers are going away.
Another issue is that prime areas for growing grain are moving towards the
poles; the new "best" areas are smaller and have poorer soil. We're also
losing topsoil, from a combination of droughts with occasional torrential
rainfalls.

I can't think of any other problem that people think is fine because it's not
bad enough to make us go extinct. "Bad healthcare system? Well, it won't wipe
us all out, we're fine." And we're experiencing effects of climate change
already, e.g. with the forest fires in California.

------
jmull
Ah, the modern approach to climate change denial: OK, climate change is real
and caused by people [ya think?], but it's more of a problem of koalas and
gorillas and not a big problem for people. And what we really need to do is
burn more coal.

Complete BS.

E.g. the rationale of burning coal is that if India burns more coal they'll
become wealthier faster and that will push the birthrate down, which will
result in fewer people using less energy. That obviously makes no sense since
wealthier nations have much higher per-capita carbon emissions which far more
than offsets lower population growth. E.g. the US has ~8x the per-capita
carbon emissions of India. (Now a constant change in the rate of population
growth will overcome that difference in enough time -- but there's no reason
to expect the difference to be constant. In fact, no exponential phenomenon
holds a constant rate of growth for long since it must soon outstrip the
environment that allows it.)

The only reason an intelligent person would make such a easily refutable
untrue claim is because it's in their personal self interests to do so... It's
a con and they are making money. (It's not too hard to guess where the money
might be coming from, BTW)

Of course these guys love the environmentalist lunatic fringe. They are easy
to dislike and easy to argue against. And as long as you can keep the focus on
them you don't have to address real objects.

The idea that climate change will have a minor impact on GDP is also terribly
wrong. The essential dynamic of the climate change crisis is that we are
"borrowing from the future" \-- we're emitting a lot of carbon now for short
term gain vs costs that won't come due for the long term. But the GDP
projections are based on the effect of climate change on our GDP in the
_recent past_. It's like taking cash advances on a 40% no-minimum payment
credit card and saying: "this won't screw up my financial future, look at how
much money I've had in my pocket over the last week... At this rate, I'll
always have money in my pocket." But the reality is the bill is going to come
due.

~~~
titzer
> E.g. the US has ~8x the per-capita carbon emissions of India.

Thank you for pointing out the very obvious elephant in the room: _both_ China
and India, nearly 3 billion people, _cannot live like the United States_ , but
they are on a trajectory to do so, and we in the west have no moral high
ground to tell them no. This is the #1 reason we are totally hosed in the long
run.

~~~
pas
That's not even remotely sound. Any country can live like the US. The
technology is there, it has been there for 50 years. Nuclear energy, electric
vehicles, better insulation and building heat/energy management, and so on.

Plus, it's not like those countries would even want to live like the US. No,
they want better. Public transportation, affordable healthcare and education,
and so on.

------
Xixi
After reading Merchants of Doubt, I always read any article about the
environment with a pinch of salt. Going through the author list of articles
published on Forbes: he definitely has a clear pro-nuclear bias, and a strong
anti-renewable bias. Digging further, his organization, Environmental
Progress, is indeed largely considered to be little more than a pro-nuclear
lobby group. Michael Shellenberger himself is largely perceived as a nuclear
salesman.

At a personal level I used to be rather pro-nuclear, but certainly not anti-
renewable. In any case, I think it can be helpful for the readers to have a
little bit of background when reading such articles.

~~~
slantaclaus
His background doesn’t qualify him to speak on environmental issues anyway, in
my opinion. No more than any well read layman anyway.

Shellenberger was raised in Greeley, Colorado and attended college at Earlham
College, a Quaker school in Richmond, Indiana.[79][80] He went on to receive a
master's degree in Cultural Anthropology from the University of California,
Santa Cruz.

------
chunkyslink
The climate change issue is not isolated. It is intrinsically linked with
ecocide, species extinction and the poisoning of all natural environments. The
slide into an apocalyptic state will be caused by all of these together. So
viewing it in a silo is dangerous and incorrect. IMO.

~~~
breakyerself
I agree. There is a lot of risk in the coming decades ecologically and climate
change is just one component of that. There is also ocean acidification,
topsoil depletion, habitat destruction, oxygen reduction in the oceans,
collateral damage from pesticide and fertilizer use, etc. We are putting
harmful pressure on the natural world from every conceivable direction.

------
empath75
I want you all to read this article he wrote on wind energy and tell me
seriously that he is arguing in good faith:

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/06/26...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/06/26/why-
wind-turbines-threaten-endangered-species-with-extinction/#6517461f64b4)

~~~
johnmorrison
Wind energy is not a good idea, I think Mike is arguing in good faith here and
absolutely right.

Nuclear, solar, hydro, even natural gas are all better solutions in the ways
that matter. Wind is the least reliable resource of out of them all and we
seriously shouldn't be generating our energy from intermolecular kinetic
interactions, that is the lowest level of density. There's a reason the whole
world adopted fossil fuels - the breaking of chemical bonds allowed us to
harness unprecedented amounts of power.

Not to mention wind turbines, as the industry stands right now, rely on an
increasingly ridiculous amount of sulfur hexafluoride being placed in
effective GHG landmines, posing an unknown threat to global temperatures.

They also aren't exactly safe to humans. People die trying to fix burning wind
turbines.

The physics are bad, the economics are bad, and the tech is bad. We really
don't need wind.

------
DocSavage
From the article: All of this helps explain why IPCC anticipates climate
change will have a modest impact on economic growth. By 2100, IPCC projects
the global economy will be 300 to 500% larger than it is today. Both IPCC and
the Nobel-winning Yale economist, William Nordhaus, predict that warming of
2.5°C and 4°C would reduce gross domestic product (GDP) by 2% and 5% over that
same period.

Question: Aside from what I assume are massive error bars on projecting
economic growth due to scientific models 80 years in the future, I read that
most of the models do not assume climate change impacts actual growth and
therefore is exempt from compounding. On the other hand they use compounding
to extrapolate growth. It seems odd that escalating climate damages as
outlined in the reports would not impose a sizable tax. Anyone with more
detailed knowledge of long-term economic projections care to comment on this?

~~~
ncmncm
All these compounding projections assume business-as-usual. What will be the
effect of global thermonuclear war on projections? How about megadeaths from
famine? Or global transition to fascism in response to mass migration? What
about all the frozen methane at the poles thawing, and the permafrost
decaying, causing a runaway vicious cycle?

All of these things make the sedate trend predictions nonsense, so all are
routinely discounted as part of the projection. But in sum the risks of these
events make the probability of the projection's accuracy nil.

------
adrianN
IMHO we don't understand enough about ecology to say what will happen if
global temperatures change as rapidly as they're forecast to change. It never
happened before on such a short timescale, afaik.

For example many humans rely on fishing for a large part of their protein, but
marine ecosystems are already collapsing from overfishing. What will happen if
climate change also negatively affect them? Insects are also rapidly declining
everywhere, how sure are we about their importance for our food supply?

------
Vinnl
> What about sea level rise? IPCC estimates sea level could rise two feet (0.6
> meters) by 2100. Does that sound apocalyptic or even “unmanageable”?

It's not really the thought that sea levels might rise that makes it feel
apocalyptic; it's the fear that the change becomes irreversible. We've always
been told that if temperatures rise too much (possibly from 2 degrees
onwards), the effect will become self-enforcing: as the ice caps melt, less
heat is reflected back into space, which will cause temperatures to rise,
which causes more ice caps to melt, etc.

I have no idea about the validity of those fears, but it would be nice if the
article addressed it.

(And w.r.t. the Netherlands adapting to sea levels 400 years ago...
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Sea_flood_of_1953](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Sea_flood_of_1953))

------
halfjoking
There are plausible scenarios where billions can die in less than 10 years:

[http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/extinction.html](http://arctic-
news.blogspot.com/p/extinction.html)

That's why we need geoengineering solutions right now. But there's no funding
to test geoengineering solutions because the IPCC is so conservative and has a
long track record of always underestimating the rate of climate change. Like
the article says IPCC claims that major changes are years away. They've been
consistently wrong every 5 years, and the speed at which their predictions
diverge from reality is accelerating.

If we put real effort in limiting carbon emissions and investigating
geoengineering there are almost no downsides... on the other hand if the IPCC
is wrong we're all dead. Which option would you rather have?

~~~
GVIrish
Yes we really need to invest heavily in exploring geoengineering solutions
while we still have time. Those solutions may have major trade offs, but the
sooner we have an idea of what those are, the better. But I think the reality
is that we're going to need geoengineering to either reverse or delay off some
of the worst effects of climate changes.

Meanwhile we still need to reduce emissions as much as we can.

------
Akababa
I feel like posting this on HN is preaching to the choir. Anyone with an ounce
of critical thinking skills is not going to take claims that "the world is
ending" at face value, nor dismiss evidence of climate change.

On the other hand, there will always be incentives for politicians and
journalists to sensationalize issues. It's just that HN isn't their target
audience.

------
AnthonyMouse
> “It doesn’t sound like it makes sense. Coal is terrible for carbon. But it’s
> by burning a lot of coal that they make themselves wealthier, and by making
> themselves wealthier they have fewer children, and you don’t have as many
> people burning carbon, you might be better off in 2070.”

This is craziest thing in this article. You obviously burn less carbon by
switching fully to alternatives and burning no carbon at all than any
reduction you could get by reducing the birth rate. Even cutting carbon
emissions per person in half would do more than you could get from any
plausible decline in birth rates, and an implausibly large decline in birth
rates would bring its own set of very serious problems.

And the fertility rate in India is now at the population replacement rate and
falling. It's now below the population replacement rate in First World
countries. Which is already problematic for efforts to switch to non-carbon
fuels, because of the economic consequences -- a larger number of retirees per
working person leaves fewer resources to spend switching to alternative fuels.

------
Vysero
Suggested title alteration: "Why Apocalyptic Claims About Climate Change Are
Not Helping"

As far as I can tell there is accredited and reliable science both for and
against the idea that global warming will bring about seriously consequences
if left unchecked.

That being said, I agree with the authors sentiment that polarizing people on
the issue isn't helping. Fear mongering and alarmism is not the answer as far
as I can see. If we want to get the world motivated a different approach is
needed; you catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar, as they say.

~~~
Lutger
I've stopped believing that, we’ve done this approach for 30 years now and it
had no effect. It would be foolish to think continuing on the same path will
give the same result.

A better approach would be to start with the truth.

~~~
Vysero
"A better approach would be to start with the truth." If someone had this down
to brass tacks I would agree but they don't. There is immense contradiction
here even among the brightest minds in the world.

------
xwowsersx
Wow. That clip of Andrew Neil interviewing Extinction Rebellion is quite
telling [https://youtu.be/pO1TTcETyuU](https://youtu.be/pO1TTcETyuU)

------
rebuilder
Here's the scenario that gives me the willies:

Wet bulb temperatures in South Asia and the Persian Gulf reach dangerous or
outright fatal levels. Depending on the location, two degrees of warming is
enough.

This alone results in the displacement of hundreds of millions of people. That
it would happen in India is very worrying because of the tensions with
Pakistan, and the danger of nuclear war between the two states. As for the
Gulf, well, that area is not exactly stable even today.

So what happens if several hundred million people relocate, while at the same
time different lower-key consequences of climate change such as rising sea
levels, increasing storm damage and the economic upheaval of having to give up
fossil fuels contribute to instability and international tensions? Europe went
nuts with the Syrian refugees we got recently, a real crisis will topple
governments.

Will we somehow rally and discover a co-operative spirit in ourselves, that
will let us manage the various crises peacefully through treaties and
diplomacy? It sure doesn't seem like that is the kind of political paradigm
that's being built now.

Not to put too fine a point on it, how do we avoid WW3 in the above scenario?

------
perfunctory
> no credible scientific body has ever said climate change threatens the
> collapse of civilization

WWII didn't lead to the collapse of civilisation either. I wouldn't envy
anyone who lived through it though.

------
bastardchild
I see a lot of claims in there that sound reasonable, but with others I just
don't know how to take them.

We won't have a problem with growing crops because we don't have now? That's a
nice idea you got there, but we fail at distributing food as needed right now.
Why would we get any better at it when growing it as before is getting harder?

I'm also not sure where these estimates of growing food supply are coming
from. I mean, maybe? But certainly not by growing the same kind of crops in
the same regions as now, cause at least in central Europe we are feeling the
issues with that already. The last summers and falls just grew continuously
worse with last year being an utter disaster. If we don't want to continue
artificially watering everything, I guess we have to set for crops that need
less water and more sun.

------
davidw
Just saw this today, which is extremely relevant in the US:

[https://www.sightline.org/2019/11/27/end-apartment-bans-
to-s...](https://www.sightline.org/2019/11/27/end-apartment-bans-to-save-the-
planet-un-climate-report-says/)

------
jellicle
The "apocalyptic claims" about climate change are actually __consensus
minimums __from large numbers of climate scientists. Headlines should
generally read something like this:

"Thousands of climate scientists come together and agree that the minimum
amount of climate change we can expect is XXXXXX"

That's what consensus means, of course. The minimum that everyone agrees on is
what is published. If you look at, say, median predictions of the group, it
will probably be much worse than these IPCC reports describe (and indeed, the
IPCC reports get much worse with each new edition as even the climate
sluggards can no longer deny the weight of incoming evidence).

That should put the overall problem into very stark relief.

------
jillesvangurp
There's only two questions you should answer regarding risk assessments: \-
how certain are you that you are right? 100% is not credible answer for anyone
in this debate. \- can you afford being wrong?

The difference between the two sides here is that of one the answer to the
second question is yes and for the other one it's no. If you are a climate
change skeptic you might lean to being probably or very probably right about
that but not 100%. The consequence of not acting because of that if you are
wrong is that we mess up the planet. Vice versa, the risk is much lower and we
are looking at maybe doing things at a bit extra cost that don't do long term
harm.

~~~
GVIrish
That's how I try to frame things too. We have basically four possibilities.

-We do nothing about climate change -> Climate change is actually not a problem. No money wasted

-We do nothing about climate change -> Climate change is real and devastates civilization

-We address climate change and switch to renewables -> Climate change is actually not a problem and we wasted money/resources

-We address climate change and switch to renewables -> Climate change is real and we avert disaster through our action

In my mind, even if expend the effort to switch to a more sustainable economy
and somehow climate change was overblown, that's not a terrible outcome. We'll
have cleaner air, less waste, and won't have to worry about oil so much. But
if we don't make the switch and we're wrong, it is absolutely ruinous for the
future of humanity.

It's like when someone gets bitten by a possibly rabid animal. Yeah, the
vaccine shots are painful and it would suck if you took them when they weren't
necessary. But if you were actually bitten by a rabid animal and don't get the
shots _you will die_.

------
Junk_Collector
Some discussion from when it was last posted

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21630333](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21630333)

~~~
paulddraper
Looks like HN dup detection didn't prevent it because the this has
#7b9cacd212d6 on the end of the URL.

Even though there is no anchor tag with that value...

------
refurb
Wow. That was a remarkably balanced article on climate change.

~~~
Lutger
Not really, its full of mistakes and half truths. I'll try to post some after
I'm on a proper machine.

------
drdeca
Misread the title as “which claims”, not “why claims.

The title that I imagined seemed more intriguing, as it seemed to suggest (a
belief that) that some of the apocalyptic claims were true, but that some were
false (and a desire to clarify which ones those are, perhaps in order to make
the true ones more believed?).

------
rsclient
Hey -- weirdly, the "koalas may go extinct" comment is being made by Forbes
magazine itself! Here's the chain: The current article is by Michael
Shellenberger. It references a tweet by Bill McKibben. Bill's tweet directly
quotes a Forbes article by Forbes writer Trevor Nace.

------
socialdemocrat
It is not that Michael Shellenberger is wrong, he is mostly right and I also
like to point out to people that we are not facing extinction.

However I have a major issue about how he goes about presenting this message.
He is unnecessarily provocative and dismissive in a way where he ends up being
a useful tool for climate deniers.

While his nuclear power advocacy is absolutely a relevant alternative to
discuss, he spends so much energy attacking renewable energy solutions such as
wind and solar that all he really ends up doing is providing ammunition for
climate deniers.

Far too many of the nuclear fans don't actually believe in climate change.
They push nuclear as a way to dismiss efforts to introduce wind and solar
power.

Michael Shellenberger simply cannot read his audience.

And civilization collapse is absolutely possible. The way he reasons about
numbers is wrong. It is the equivalent of arguing that the 1929 crash was
irrelevant because hey were were richer afterwards than in 1900 and we managed
just find back then.

He thinks just in terms of absolute numbers, when relative change is usually
MORE important. If you suddenly get a 50% cut in your income from one year to
another that will have huge impact on your family. It makes no sense to argue
that 10 years ago you made 50% less and managed just fine.

Back then you had adapted your lifestyle to those costs. Now you are paying
for a bigger house, car, college for your kids etc. A sudden 50% drop in
income is a big hit to adjust to.

Germans in the 1930s were much better off than poor people in Africa. Yet the
decline in income they experience radicalized the population and led to the
rise of Hitler. France on the eve of the French revolution was richer than in
classical times. But crop harvest failures due to climate change radicalized
the country and led to the French revolution.

This is the danger of climate change. Sudden changes in living conditions in
various countries can tip the scales and spark revolutions.

~~~
GVIrish
> It is not that Michael Shellenberger is wrong, he is mostly right and I also
> like to point out to people that we are not facing extinction.

I think he is wrong on this in that if we don't address climate change, we are
on the road to extinction. It won't happen in our lifetimes but on a timescale
of hundreds of years or a few thousand it may indeed happen.

The CO2 released in the atmosphere can stay there for thousands of years, and
once we cross certain temperature thresholds there are feedback loops that
will make things hotter still. We're talking about 2 degrees C by the year
2100, but what about 2200, 2300, 2500?

If we don't get things under control, at some point modern civilization is
going to start breaking down, and at that point carbon sequestration or
geoengineering measures that could fix things, simply won't be possible. After
that point, humanity would just be a passenger on a ride to a planet
inhospitable for human life.

> And civilization collapse is absolutely possible. The way he reasons about
> numbers is wrong. It is the equivalent of arguing that the 1929 crash was
> irrelevant because hey were were richer afterwards than in 1900 and we
> managed just find back then.

> He thinks just in terms of absolute numbers, when relative change is usually
> MORE important. If you suddenly get a 50% cut in your income from one year
> to another that will have huge impact on your family. It makes no sense to
> argue that 10 years ago you made 50% less and managed just fine.

Absolutely. I think he fails to account for the fact that climate change makes
it much more likely that parts of the world will experience devastating
collapses that will be difficult, if not impossible to recover from. There are
parts of the world now that are unstable and poor, what's going to happen to
them when wide scale weather disasters and resource shortages hit entire
regions?

------
beardedman
Should read: Why Apocalyptic Claims About Anything Are Wrong

------
bsenftner
Clear as daylight, journalism is in crisis. This article is primarily about
how our climate change reporting is exaggerated to dangerous levels. I'd go
further and say journalism's purpose to society is in danger of everyone
loosing faith in our ability to honestly self report. If we don't believe the
news, everyone is operating on an unknown assessment of any given situation.
Given the necessity to "fill in the blanks" when you don't trust reporting,
people quickly exaggerate themselves away from reality. As respect and
accuracy of news reporting drops, we all become blind. Seems like a very
difficult nose dive to pull out of: our news media is how society talks to
itself, that is in crisis.

~~~
ghostbrainalpha
And the "journalism in crisis" article is posted by an unpaid contributor,
disguised as legitimate reporting, and the author who is basically a lobbyist
for the nuclear industry doesn't have to disclose their motives for writing
the article.

------
request_id
[https://www.wiseinternational.org/nuclear-
monitor/853/exposi...](https://www.wiseinternational.org/nuclear-
monitor/853/exposing-misinformation-michael-shellenberger-and-environmental-
progress)

------
throwaway5752
The author Shellenberger is a somewhat controversial figure and is launching a
political career. I don't have time to write more but people should read about
him and make up their own minds for what it means when reading his oped.

------
peterashford
It's not like XR represent the scientific consensus. I really don't know why
people exercise their time worrying about what groups like them say. We don't
seriously worry about what your climate change denying uncle thinks about
climate change so why worry about what non scientists on the other side of the
debate think?

------
carapace
(I was going to write a heartfelt cry for the Monarch butterfly. But if you
can't see the horror of extinction I don't know how to make you. "We have no
law to fit your crime.")

One way or another, our civilization is going to change radically in the next
couple of decades.

We will have to make radical changes to how we grow food:
[https://www.wri.org/blog/2019/11/water-could-limit-our-
abili...](https://www.wri.org/blog/2019/11/water-could-limit-our-ability-feed-
world-these-9-graphics-explain-why)

> There’s an anthropologist friend of mine, a guy called Steve LeBlanc–he runs
> the Peabody Museum in Harvard–who wrote a book once called “Constant
> Battles” about pre-civilized human beings and how they actually lived. Not
> the fantasy version, where they lived in, you know, the Garden of Eden and
> wore flowers in their hair, but the real ancient world where food shortages,
> including ones that you could die from, were a regular occasion. And his
> rule of thumb is “people always raid before they starve.”

[https://spaswell.wordpress.com/2016/11/18/dr-gwynne-dyer-
geo...](https://spaswell.wordpress.com/2016/11/18/dr-gwynne-dyer-geopolitics-
in-a-hotter-world-ubc-talk-transcribed-sept-2010/)

> “We shouldn’t be forced to choose between lifting people out of poverty and
> doing something for the climate.”

That's not the issue.

The question before us is whether or not to rejoin Nature after our divorce or
continue on the exploitative blind path and crash, _hard_.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_and_Thou](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_and_Thou)
Nature is I-Thou not I-it
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18736698](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18736698)

We have the technology (applied ecology) to "save" ourselves in a fun and
graceful way: [http://tobyhemenway.com/videos/redesigning-civilization-
with...](http://tobyhemenway.com/videos/redesigning-civilization-with-
permaculture/) Including carbon-neutral fuel production:
[http://alcoholcanbeagas.com/](http://alcoholcanbeagas.com/)

------
jokoon
I'm not sure climate change would not be felt by billions.

Food prices, drought and heatwaves are big threats.

------
tempsy
Who said the world is ending in 10 years? IIRC this timeline refers to the
number of years we have to curb C02 emissions below a certain threshold to
give us a 50/50 chance of reducing a level of warming that would be
detrimental to humanity.

------
BurningFrog
Some say exaggerated alarmism is justified because people need to be scared to
act.

But I wonder how many suicides it provokes :(

~~~
Jamwinner
It provokes more distrust when people arent fooled, and it harms your case
with the very people you seek to convince. It seems right to you, because it
is preaching to the choir. But skeptics see the huge amount of (well
intentioned) misinformation and make judgements, right or wrong.

------
braindead_in
The author seems to approach climate science as exact science. It is not.
Predictions could be just way off the mark. There might be just a catastrophic
failure and the food chain might collapse. The 6% drop in crop yields might
just become a 50% drop. Climate scientists don't know shit. If they knew, they
would be proposing solutions.

~~~
WhompingWindows
Climate scientists do know many things, the problem is it's hard to accurately
quantify the rate at which changes will occur, which is so important to us
because we only have a limited amount of time to change our energy system.
Look at the IEA for example, they attempted to model the energy mix going
forward and have been wrong about how quickly renewables would be
adopted...basically every single year, they get it wrong. It's just very very
hard to forecast and predict, but you're throwing out the baby with the
bathwater saying they "don't know shit."

And they ARE proposing solutions by the barrelfull, the problem is politicians
and many corporations simply don't listen and don't act.

------
jorblumesea
The issue is many of those arguing against the severity of climate change are
generally bad faith actors. I think we can all agree the world will not end,
but the ramifications are huge.

~~~
WhompingWindows
Yeah, there are a few comments in this thread that reek of bad faith acting.
How do we objectively examine the physics and chemistry of our planet's heat
and atmosphere when we have GOP denialists and shills sharking around in all
of society's public squares? On the one hand, we have concerned, career-
scientists who want to help animals and plants and their home planet; on the
other hand, we seem to have those looking to make a buck or be contrarian or
take denialist views because that's what the GOP does, and people seem to take
all the views of their side these days.

------
vpribish
Forbes is worthless, post from another source

------
ptah
nitpicking like this is a waste of time

------
projektfu
"I'm passionate about climate change." \-- every person who is not a
conspiracy theorist but wants to kick the can down the road.

------
rihegher
Yes they are wrong but what about apocalyptic claims about ressources
depletion?

------
major505
Is good to read some common sense. It`s a rare ting to see these days.

------
apocalypstyx
Personal summation:

Reference the IPCC as if it were fact, when the general consensus seems to be
much of it is too conservative.

>Apocalyptic statements like these have real-world impacts. In September, a
group of British psychologists said children are increasingly suffering from
anxiety from the frightening discourse around climate change.

One day they're also going to find out they're going to die (unless their rich
enough for cryonics, storage tanks that will be incinerated when this planet
is engulfed by its sun, (or if they Jameson Satellite themselves, they can
look forward to waiting to be evaporated by cosmic dust (or in the really long
term, the decay of all the matter in the universe, or the big crunch (but of
course the majority of scientists don't absolutely agree on any of that, so
there's still hope))))

>And last week, an XR co-founder said a genocide like the Holocaust was
“happening again, on a far greater scale, and in plain sight”

We don't need climate change for this, they're already going on in Africa and
South America and China, so we're good in that department no matter what.

>There is good evidence that the catastrophist framing of climate change is
self-defeating because it alienates and polarizes many people.

The opposite of polarization is uniformity. We could be uniform changing or
staying the same, but since we're already here, might a well save the energy.
Stay calm and carry on.

>First, no credible scientific body has ever said climate change threatens the
collapse of civilization much less the extinction of the human species.

Oh.

>It’s not like climate doesn’t matter. It’s that climate change is outweighed
by other factors. Earlier this year, researchers found that climate “has
affected organized armed conflict within countries. However, other drivers,
such as low socioeconomic development and low capabilities of the state, are
judged to be substantially more influential.”

This really seems like an isolated version of climate change, it somehow only
effects the climate and nothing else. (Cue reminder of Australian politician
talking about leaking oil tanker having been 'towed out the the environment'.)
Also, give me an economy long enough and things'll move.

>That last part may be true, but it’s also true that economic development has
made us less vulnerable, which is why there was a 99.7% decline in the death
toll from natural disasters since its peak in 1931.

More capitalism completely solves the problems that capitalism created, you
just aren't using enough (also it's not pure enough). (Also it's the most
powerful force humans have ever created (except we didn't create it because
it's 'natural') and it can and can't change the world. Invincible when you
need it to be, a drop in the bucket when you need it to be (and, again, with
more of it we can fix everything [citation needed].))

>Wheat yields increased 100 to 300% around the world since the 1960s, while a
study of 30 models found that yields would decline by 6% for every one degree
Celsius increase in temperature.

What about soil microbes, worms, sourcing the components of the fertilizers
that explicitly made that growth possible? So, yes, temperature alone won't do
much. And to pull a Fox news talking point: green houses are hot, plants love
green houses, so growing things will be better than ever.

>Rates of future yield growth depend far more on whether poor nations get
access to tractors, irrigation, and fertilizer than on climate change, says
FAO.

The more countries and people who do things exactly as we do (aka 'raised out
of poverty[1]') the better. Our way of life if the not only the rightest but
_the_ right and this must be reproduced across all the corners of the universe
(Bezos and Musk will take it to mars and beyond).

[1] in the vein of this article: just to be clear: I'm not pro poverty.

>One of the reasons I work on climate change is because I worry about the
impact it could have on endangered species.

>As tragic as animal extinctions are, they do not threaten human civilization.

The world is like a zoo, all of these things are only there for our amusement,
to look cute.

>Should we worry about koalas? Absolutely!

Eh, stinky, perpetually high, walking chlamydia infestations, not cute.
Recommend reject from planet Earth. (See also mosquitoes.)

>“It doesn’t sound like it makes sense. Coal is terrible for carbon. But it’s
by burning a lot of coal that they make themselves wealthier, and by making
themselves wealthier they have fewer children, and you don’t have as many
people burning carbon, you might be better off in 2070.”

Didn't I already mention something about further the spread of a particular
set of ideological dispositions? I think so. One might get the idea that, at
their core(s), the Republican and Democratic both fundamentally predicated on
defending an ideology that shall remain nameless, and that their main
disagreement seems to be in regards to _how_ to do that.

>Emanuel and Wigley say the extreme rhetoric is making political agreement on
climate change harder.

All we have to do realize we need a away to talk about climate change while
the people making money of the situations that have led to it continue to do
so and everyone gets what they want. (In fact, even better, they should make
_more_ money off climate change. They can exercise Scrooge McDuck style by
swimming through the tunnels of their New Zealand bunkers. (After all, prepper
fantasy shouldn't be something only the lower classes get to access.))

>Happily, there is a plenty of middle ground between climate apocalypse and
climate denial.

The world isn't ending, you aren't dying. Won't someone _please_ think of the
children?

\---

In the future (since we now know there's going to be one, thank the god of the
market) maybe I should avoid reading Forbes before morning coffee-substitute
(which the god of the market also grants me, so thank you).

[Addendum]

Looking back on growing up in a semi-apocalyptic religious environment, I
can't ever remember anyone being worried about convincing us that the world
_wasn 't_ going to end. Maybe that says something. Maybe Not.

------
allovernow
>But in saying so, the XR spokesperson had grossly misrepresented the science.
“There is robust evidence of disasters displacing people worldwide,” notes
IPCC, “but limited evidence that climate change or sea-level rise is the
direct cause”

This has been bothering me a lot lately, journalists/reporters are running
wild, blaming all kinds of droughts, wildfires, and migrations on climate
change, particularly on NPR, but the truth is that these claims are no more
valid than deniers claiming unusual snowfall to be evidence against climate
change. Only long term, aggregate statistical data is a valid proxy for the
effects of climate change - one cannot cherry pick events for a phenomenon
which really has relatively tiny observable features on local time and space
scales.

~~~
jmull
> Only long term, aggregate statistical data is a valid proxy for the effects
> of climate change

It's not like it's hard to find. You can quibble about how certain media
outlets or stories make the point, but the overall point is both true and
important: climate change is real.

~~~
allovernow
> but the overall point is both true and important: climate change is real.

That doesn't excuse bad reporting, which is my point.

------
squidsurfer
The problem is the false religion of climate worship. Even prominent democrats
are letting the cat out of the bag and admitting it. Climate for these folks
is the vehicle that will let them bring their greater vision of socialist
change to America. Take a look at the green new deal - much of its focus was
on reshaping the economy in a socialist direction.

[https://thefederalist.com/2019/11/12/democratic-sen-mazie-
hi...](https://thefederalist.com/2019/11/12/democratic-sen-mazie-hirono-
believe-in-climate-change-as-though-its-a-religion/)

~~~
throwawaysea
I agree. There is a disturbing abuse of actual issues, primarily from the
progressive far-left, where words like 'justice' are used in a vague manner to
tie topics like climate change to racism, alleged economic oppression, and
other unrelated topics. This is true of the Justice Democrats' platform (the
PAC behind AOC, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, etc.), as well as fringe groups
like Extinction Rebellion.

For example see Green New Deal details, which pushes for "justice" and equity
(equality of outcome) and other policies unrelated to climate change, at
[https://www.factcheck.org/2019/02/the-facts-on-the-green-
new...](https://www.factcheck.org/2019/02/the-facts-on-the-green-new-deal/):

> Promote justice and equity by stopping current, preventing future, and
> repairing historic oppression of indigenous peoples, communities of color,
> migrant communities...

For another example see [https://extinctionrebellion.us/demands-
principles](https://extinctionrebellion.us/demands-principles), which asks for
reparations:

> We demand a just transition that prioritizes the most vulnerable people and
> indigenous sovereignty; establishes reparations and remediation led by and
> for Black people, Indigenous people, ...

As such, to me it does seem like these issues are being taken over and
misappropriated as carriers for unrelated policies, in order to build a
deceptive coalition or false consensus on the more controversial points.

------
robomartin
EDIT 2: On top because it belongs here. I always find it really disconcerting
when something like this is down-voted on HN rather than discussed at the
appropriate intellectual level. To me this is an indication of the deep-rooted
brainwashing that has permeated this issue. People simply refuse to think. I
have had this discussion with PhD level researchers in the field. Not one of
them over the last, say, ten years, was able to refute the super-simple
science and logic of this argument. In fact, what most will admit to me in
private is that this conclusion would make grants evaporate, and so nobody is
talking about it. It's far easier to make money and secure grants if you stick
with the bullshit that's floating out there. <end edit>

What frustrates me the most about the climate change mess is that it is now a
religion, on both sides of the argument. The truth isn’t being covered by
anyone because they are all making money or gaining votes with the nonsense.

First truth: We can’t do a thing about climate change. Nothing will “fix” it.

This is very easy to understand.

Go dig-up the last 800,000 years in atmospheric CO2 data from ice core
samples.

Curve fit lines to the large up and down cycles of approximately 100 ppm.

Measure the down slopes in years per 100 ppm.

The numbers you’ll get are in the range of 25,000 to 75,000 years for a 100
ppm drop. Let’s call it 50,000 average.

Now add a graph of total human population to this 800,000 year chart.

Identify the period when humanity represented less than 1% of current world
population, say, 70 million or less.

Calculate the down slope during that period. Still about 50,000 years for a
100 ppm drop.

Conclusion: If 99% of humanity and all of our technology evaporated from this
planet next Monday, it would take in the range of 50,000 years for a 100 ppm
drop in atmospheric CO2 concentration. In other words, the rate of change is
in the tens of thousands of years per 100 ppm.

We cannot “fix” this even if we all left earth.

Anyone proposing a solution has to explain how this would be better than
leaving the planet.

Example claim: No more planes, trains, autos or motorcycles to fix climate
change in 50 years.

Ridiculous.

This claims a ONE THOUSAND FOLD improvement on the rate of change
corresponding to all of humanity leaving the planet. That’s preposterous. In
fact, this will do nothing and might even make things worse.

If you claim a “fix” you have to explain how it will perform a thousand times
better than if seven billion people committed mass suicide next Monday.

We desperately need to start talking about reality and leave fantasy behind.

Climate change is real, and we are not going to fix it.

EDIT: Here's a link to the ice core sample atmospheric CO2 data. I urge you to
go through the steps I listed above and engage in some critical thinking
before commenting or down-voting this comment. If you disagree, explain why
and how we can do a thousand times better than if humanity left the planet.

[https://cdiac.ess-
dive.lbl.gov/images/air_bubbles_historical...](https://cdiac.ess-
dive.lbl.gov/images/air_bubbles_historical.jpg)

~~~
paulddraper
It is indeed disconcerting when even a place a reasonable as HN will downvote
without (as of yet) a single substantive argument.

I'm fairly ignorant on the matter and by default am very skeptical of this,
but damn would it be nice to have a real answer instead of some interesting
very light text at the bottom of the screen.

~~~
robomartin
I actually WANT to know if I am wrong and how. I have posted detailed
explanations of my perspective and findings on this on HN and other more
scientifically-minded discussion boards. I have never --ever-- in several
years, had anyone actually do the work and come back with actual science-based
objections or counterpoints.

The responses usually range from flat-out attacks to repeating what I will
call memes without one ounce of critical thinking applied. Things like "all we
need is more renewable energy" sources --something that has been completely
and utterly debunked for at least five years, if not ten.

This is so simple:

Show how we are going to do better (in terms of atmospheric CO2 concentration
reduction) than the historical rate of change corresponding to humanity not
being on this planet.

That is a tall order. Extraordinary claims that propose being able to fix the
problem in 50 or 100 years need to explain how we are going to deploy such
monumental amounts of energy, natural and man-made resources at such a scale
without killing us all.

We are talking about a claim to be able to affect change at a rate a THOUSAND
times faster than if humanity did not exist. It baffles me that nobody is
asking how this is possible.

Also --and this is really important-- I am NOT saying climate change is not
real. Quite to the contrary. All I am suggesting is that it is quite likely we
can't do a thing about it. These two things are separable and should be
treated separately. On the one hand we have the undisputed reality of climate
change and our contribution to the problem and, on the other, the potential
reality that there isn't a thing we can do about it.

And then the question becomes? If this is true, that we can't do a thing about
affecting climate change, what should we do? That's the conversation we need
to be having, not a bunch of hair-brained ideas promoted by ignorant
politicians for easy votes.

------
cfv
Forbes needs a swift reminder that you cannot breathe money.

------
joshypants
Three things are true:

* We cannot let despair prevent us from acting. The big changes needed are possible, and we need to accelerate them.

* We actually don't know with certainty how bad it is going to get.

* People, in general, are not scared enough right now.

~~~
bogwog
F.U.D. drove the world crazy during Y2K despite it not being an actual
problem. Maybe we need a little bit of that here?

~~~
Lendal
The difference being that in the 90's we actually did things to prevent Y2K
from becoming a problem.

~~~
paulddraper
Yes, that's what you found out when you stripped away the hysteria.

------
throwawaysea
Cliff Mass, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Washington,
recently wrote a similar blog post about climate alarmism:
[https://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2019/08/is-global-warming-
exi...](https://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2019/08/is-global-warming-existential-
threat.html)

> Global warming is a real issue and we are going to slowly warm our planet,
> resulting in substantial impacts (like less snowpack in the Cascades,
> increased river flooding in November, drier conditions in the subtropics,
> loss of Arctic sea ice). But the world will be a much richer place in 2100
> and mankind will find ways to adapt to many of the changes. And there is a
> good chance we will develop the technologies to reverse the increasing trend
> in greenhouse gases and eventually bring CO2 concentrations down to previous
> levels.

> Global warming does not offer an existential threat to mankind, and
> politicians and decision makers only undermine their credibility and make
> effective action less likely by their hype and exaggeration. And their
> unfounded claims of future catastrophe prevents broad national consensus and
> hurts vulnerable people who are made anxious and fearful. And just as bad,
> all this end of the world talk results in folks turning away from the issue,
> both out of fear and from intuition that a lot of hype is going on.

He also wrote a VERY disturbing post about how the university has tried to
censor him and retaliate against him because he would not kowtow to the
pressures of student and faculty activists, who are polluting universities
with their ideological fervor. I highly recommend that anyone interested in
protecting scholarly attitudes, academic rigor, and neutrality give this a
read: [https://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2019/10/the-university-of-
was...](https://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2019/10/the-university-of-washington-
should-not.html)

~~~
WhompingWindows
Someone who calls it global warming is a bit behind the times, and that's
typically how the GOP describes it. Sure, if certain areas just got a little
warmer, it'd be easy to adapt to. The problem is CLIMATE change, we rely on
our climate for crops, fish, lack of natural disasters, lack of drought, lack
of polar vortex, and on and on.

Unfortunately, I could believe a university atmosphere promotes ideological
fervor and suppresses neutrality in this cancel-culture, overly PC society.
But we really do need to stop using the term "global warming" in a serious
way, this is bad science.

~~~
SlowRobotAhead
Isn’t climate CHANGE saying “well, we don’t understand it well enough to
specifically say what it’s going to do”?

Seems like if we are making claims and enacting tax policy right now, we
should at least be able to predict it’ll warm or cool. No?

If the concern is sea levels rising, is that not warming?

~~~
WhompingWindows
Climate change communicates different areas will be affected differently. For
instance, the arctic warms incredibly fast, due to melting ice, reduced
albedo, and disrupted polar vortex. In contrast, the USA is not warming nearly
as fast as the arctic, but some areas are much more flood prone, hurricane
prone, or prone to extreme weather (high highs in AZ, CA, FL, low lows in
upper midwest (due to polar vortex aforementioned)).

So, global warming is technically true, the average heat content of the globe
is rising over time...but it's an outdated, over simplistic term because
"warming" does not tell us that each locality is going to face a different
reality. It's also used by skeptics to say "well, there's snow, so clearly
warming is a hoax" or "well, MN has record low temps, global warming is a
hoax." Actually it isn't, but ignorant politicians and voters may think it's a
hoax if they only look in their own zip code for warming, and not for
_climactic_ changes everywhere.

