Climate Change: Post up your Phd. dissertation, coward

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Climate Change: Post up your Phd. dissertation, coward

America Inc.: Nov 22, 2013; I plan to live forever, of course, but barring that I'd settle for a couple thousand years. Even 500 would be pretty nice.

smoke sumthin bitch posted:

we should be trying to elevate the living standards of our fellow man and pull him up to our level not the opposite

Arkane posted:

Hundreds of millions of Indians live in extreme poverty. Lifting them out of that is their #1 priority, not whether Earth is 1-2 C warmer a hundred years from now.

The people who are going to get shafted the most by climate change are the poor, if reducing emissions is supposed to help anybody it's supposed to help them.
Maybe we can reduce our own emissions more to accommodate, but it doesn't change the fact that developing countries like India are going to be digging their own graves if they don't commit to reducing emissions overall, not just intensity.

# ¿ Dec 1, 2015 00:10

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 08:45

America Inc.: Nov 22, 2013; I plan to live forever, of course, but barring that I'd settle for a couple thousand years. Even 500 would be pretty nice.

Arkane posted:

The point of growing the economy (and energy usage) is that they won't be poor anymore. India has a hunger problem now. Do you think India will have a hunger problem in a few decades?

There's unlikely to be many, if any, poor countries at all in a few decades, not even in Africa. There will be poorer countries, but lack of food, water, and electricity will be gone. Poor countries are able to modernize much more quickly than in the past.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eztiFr2qrm8

# ¿ Dec 1, 2015 01:39

America Inc.: Nov 22, 2013; I plan to live forever, of course, but barring that I'd settle for a couple thousand years. Even 500 would be pretty nice.

Dreylad posted:

I believe in an article recently some scientists said that given the current progress towards cutting emissions 2 degrees is inevitable and keeping it under would require drastic emission cuts every year for 20 years starting this year which is very very unlikely.

So yeah, probably not going to happen but it's always surprising what our societies can accomplish when aligned towards a common goal.

It actually seems like the limit that will be reached from COP21 is 2.7C.

# ¿ Dec 12, 2015 22:59

America Inc.: Nov 22, 2013; I plan to live forever, of course, but barring that I'd settle for a couple thousand years. Even 500 would be pretty nice.

Your Dunkle Sans posted:

Would things be noticeably different today with regard to climate change had the U.S. signed the Kyoto Protocol back in the 1990s?

Also, any idea if this will be the warmest year on record yet? It's in the 70s here in the Midwest, it's messing with my head.

And yeah, I agree with that one poster saying a lot of Westerners basically live in a constant climate controlled box (car, office, home, etc) so they end up being skeptical/oblivious of climate change as a result. I spent a semester in northern India (Dharamsala) in college, it was extremely apparent what toll climate change was taking on the environment there.

As impractical as it may be due to the negotiating strength of the dominant countries at the table (US, etc), there should be some kind of reparations from developed countries to developing and undeveloped ones. The latter tend to bear the brunt of the former's excesses and have more to less with rising sea levels, increasing temperatures, etc

It doesn't appear that this agreement has anything on reparations.
Here is the adoption (section on Loss and Damage starts at 48), and the Warsaw Mechanism

quote:

52. Agrees that Article 8 [page 26] of the Agreement does not involve or provide a basis for any
liability or compensation;

America Inc. fucked around with this message at 23:09 on Dec 12, 2015

# ¿ Dec 12, 2015 23:04

America Inc.: Nov 22, 2013; I plan to live forever, of course, but barring that I'd settle for a couple thousand years. Even 500 would be pretty nice.

I wonder if climate change is an indication of the diminishing capability of humans to understand and control as individuals the civilization they have created and the world that civilization interacts with.
It was only until the invention of the atom bomb that humanity was first presented with a problem that could end humanity if humanity collectively failed to confront it. But the scale of the problem was limited by the fact that enriching weapons-grade uranium and assembling a nuclear arsenal were and still are only really possible with a massive, organized state apparatus (and thus developing a nuclear arsenal is also obvious to outside nations and allows for reaction). These states that develop nuclear arsenals usually have clear, defined geopolitical goals and thus what they would use nuclear weapons for is also usually clear and defined (at least more so than a random terrorist group). Not everybody can make a nuclear weapon and contribute to the problem of nuclear proliferation.

However, climate and ecological change present a broader, more complex, and more difficult kind of problem because it is a byproduct of the very processes by which civilization sustains itself and grows. We all, in some way, contribute to the problem of climate and ecological change. Effective action on climate change requires action not only by states, but by corporations and individuals on a global scale.
Climate and ecological change, for many people especially in the developed world, is also not as evident and visceral as nuclear annihilation, and requires individuals to have some knowledge of climate science, deforestation, energy generation, agricultural land use, pollution, and other issues. Climate and ecological change are highly systemic problems with modern society and thus require a solution from multiple fronts of public policy. Already it becomes quite difficult for your average voting citizen, and maybe even policymakers, to have a full grasp of the issue and its solution.

I apologize for the ramble, but I wonder even if civilization can survive the anthropocene, if humanity might in the future present itself with a problem that is beyond the mental capacities of ordinary humans to fully understand and thus present a solution to. A probably well-known example.

E: I thought about writing this post after reading this.

America Inc. fucked around with this message at 11:17 on Jan 8, 2016

# ¿ Jan 8, 2016 11:09

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 08:45

America Inc.: Nov 22, 2013; I plan to live forever, of course, but barring that I'd settle for a couple thousand years. Even 500 would be pretty nice.

Do climate models have any problems grappling with the Ludic Fallacy?

# ¿ Jan 22, 2016 13:41

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Climate Change: Post up your Phd. dissertation, coward