anonymoose
Classical Liberal
Too many farting cows.
Global Heat Wave
- Thread starter Oneuli
- Start date
Too many farting cows.
anonymoose
Classical Liberal
Party like it's 1984!
Last edited:
moon
Satire for Sanity
It's time the world was run by vegetarians.
reagansghost
eternal
that's a big part of the problem, chopping down CO2 absorbing forests to increase the cattle population and thus methane gas
anonymoose
Classical Liberal
Too late. We passed the point of no return yrs. ago. Kill yourself or party.
anonymoose
Classical Liberal
Crickets apparently.
Something approximating California. Of course, tweaks and adjustments are always necessary.
Our state passed AB 32 in 2006, and has made significant progress in reducing GHG emissions.
That, in spite of being told by some Deniers that addressing climate change would crash the economy.
The fact is since AB 32 passed in 2006, California's economy, on balance, has boomed.
Nose Picker
Verified User
Things do not bode well for future generations and by that I don't mean just the current children but theirs as well.
anonymoose
Classical Liberal
Good. I'd rather have my eyes gouged out than live in CA.
anonymoose
Classical Liberal
Easy solution. Don't have children.
The right-wingers have tried a whole range of rhetorical flourishes in the face of climate change. First, they argued the warming wasn't happening. Then, when it became undeniable, they shifted to arguing that the warming was a natural thing and had nothing to do with humans. Then, when that argument was destroyed, they tried for a bit to argue that the warming would be a net positive for people. When that was demolished, some moved on to arguing that although the warming was happening and was mostly because of human activities, anything that would bring down greenhouse gas emissions would be so economically devastating that we dare not do it. Then, when prices for many of the most promising strategies for reducing GHG dropped radically in price (like solar, which can already out-compete coal), so that their economic argument no longer made sense, some went to arguing that there was no point in doing anything, because all the damage was already baked-in.
The constant, all along, is that the science never mattered to these people. The point was to avoid regulation of industry, and so any argument, no matter how silly, would appeal to them, as long as it supported avoiding regulation.
The truth is, a lot of damage is already baked in.... but every day we avoid doing something, we bake in yet more. We can still change course in a way that will mean the planet stays livable for humans into the indefinite future. In fact, we are probably centuries away from having "baked in" total extinction. At this point, it's a question of just how bad things get before they reach a new equilibrium. We can still be buying ounces of prevention in lieu of pounds of cures. But the same people who have been wrong every step of the way are telling us not to bother. Why would you believe them?
There is no scientific consensus that human life on this planet won't exist a century or more from now. Far from it. That's a fringe position. Although the majority of scientists foresee very serious hardship, resulting in billions of premature deaths and serious diminution of quality of life, human life will go on. We decide, every single day, how those future humans will live. If phony fatalism drives us to apathy, we are doing them a grave injustice.
Nonsense. That's a bit like telling an alcoholic that he's already passed a point of no return for liver damage, so he should just kill himself or party. Although it may be true that his liver has already suffered damage that can't be fixed, that doesn't mean there's no point in stopping drinking. Unless he's literally in an intensive-care state, he is still going to be in a position where good choices can extend his life and improve his quality of life. The climate is like that, only over a potential timeline of countless generations, rather than just one lifetime. Every day we pass a different "point of no return" -- a new point where some additional damage is "locked in." But it's not a binary system, where either everything is fine or humans are an extinct species on a barren planet. It's a smooth continuum. Act now and things will keep getting worse, but they'll eventually plateau at a point better than they would have if we'd delayed acting for another ten years. What will be the long-term human carrying capacity of this planet with a decent average quality of life? It's impossible to say, but it's clear the answer changes from day to day, as we continue to do long-term harm to our ecosystem. The more damage we tolerate, the worse the answer, but it will be a long time before the answer is zero. So, tell the phony fatalists to fuck themselves. This is too important for their bullshit.
reagansghost
eternal
Those are great sentiments and well presented, but in my view irrelevant. Your first paragraph was spot on, couldn't have put it better
problem is there are too many developing nations increasing emissions, and too much money to be made by Big Energy worldwide to make ANY significant decreases/progress
II.2 Annual CO2 emissions
If we forget the cumulative time dimension and focus only on annual emissions, how do more recent annual emission trends compare? In the chart below, we can view annual CO2 emissions by country. You can select a range of countries to compare through time in the "chart" tab, or alternatively click on a country on the "map" tab to see its time series. In support of the cumulative chart we explored above, we can see that the annual trends of European and North American nations have grown much earlier than in other regions.
Emissions from a number of growing economies have been increasing rapidly over the last few decades. Fast-forwarding to annual emissions in 2014, we can see that a number of low to middle income nations are now within the top global emitters. In fact, China is now the largest emitter, followed by (in order) the US, EU-28, India, Russia, Indonesia, Brazil, Japan, Canada and Mexico. Note that a number of nations that are already top emitters are likely to continue to increase emissions as they undergo development.
In contrast to CO2 emissions growth in low to middle income economies, trends across many high income nations have stabilized, and in several cases decreased in recent decades. Despite this downward trend across some nations, emissions growth in transitioning economies dominates the global trend—as such, global annual emissions have continued to increase over this period.
https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-other-greenhouse-gas-emissions
I'm saying spending a fortune buying Prius' or other EV's may keep mankind viable for a whopping decade or less....and am all for recycling and such, keep the place halfway clean til we adios
and yeah, I know, I'm a pessimist
Action at the federal level is unlikely while Trump remains in power. However, even prior to 2020, things can be done at the state level. A good model would be the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative done in the Northeast. In a vacuum of federal leadership, large groups of states should get together and act. With most of the richest states being liberal, there's a lot of economic power there if they'll get together and coordinate it. In many ways, they can effectively dictate terms to the rest of the country -- for example, if enough states get together and agree no cars can be sold or registered there without XYZ controls, it becomes economically infeasible to even bother making cars that don't satisfy the XYZ controls in the US, since such models are locked out of all of the most lucrative markets. To some extent, Texas already throws its weight around when it comes to textbooks, and California does so in various other ways. But if you have California join up with WA, OR, NY, NJ, Maryland, and the New England states, for example, you've got the weight equivalent to one of the world's largest nations, right there. Coordinate with Canada on matters, and you have even more leverage.
Instituting a cap-and-trade system would be a great step. We should also favor more urban settlement, since urban areas are vastly more carbon efficient than rural ones. And we should try to make those cities as carbon efficient as possible, by imposing efficiency standards on new buildings, and investing heavily in public transit, while trying to keep cities walkable. We may also want to think about incentives for businesses that allow "work from home" for employees that don't really need to be in the office, since commuting accounts for a fair amount of carbon output.
cawacko
Well-known member
Definite irony that some of the biggest environmentalists are also the biggest NIMBY's
If you're looking for a navel-gazing semantic debate, you've come to the wrong place. I don't give a crap whether you call it a "global heat wave" or, instead, "a decades-long stretch when average global temperatures have exceeded the norms established over preceding millenia." The latter may be a lot wordier than the former, but if wordy is your thing, that's fine. The word games are pointless. The important thing is the underlying reality.
Incorrect. Obama didn't pay a penny.
Yes. We have already "locked in" a lot of damage, and we're seeing it in the form of increased refugee issues, extreme weather, species decline, etc. It turns out the "soothsayers" were right. They went out on a limb with various predictions that were proven to be uncannily accurate. Meanwhile, none of the denialist cretins were on the record correctly predicting the warming, the sea level rise, etc., so why listen to them now? Why not listen to those who have been shown to know what they were talking about?
montgomery
Verified User
I have nothing to disagree with you over what you're saying. But you'll have to excuse me from joining with you in any impassioned pleas to the people on this forum. It's just going to be lost to stupid people.
I will say though, that if you are expecting any substantial change happening, it's not going to be within the establishment or the two major parties. If we have anything in common on that then I'm sure we'll find something to talk about.
It may encourage you to know that I believe Canada's establishment will amend itself in line with what happens in America first. I think we have the right Prime Minister in place with the ambitions to make change but without the balls to do it in the face of US pressure. Understandably so if one appreciates the power of US sanctions, blackmail, etc.
So we'll see? I don't think Trump is going to be much of a negative factor after January when he has to proclaim his intentions on being the pres for another 4. I'm pretty convinced that he will be persuaded to not try. Mueller will apply the pressure he has and Trump will understand the big downside. Likely to his family members. The first sign will be the R's in congress leaving his side. There's not long to wait. Then climate change discussion can get back to being serious again.