Post AiOkpcBMoWOAoSfQem by Pollinators@epicure.social
(DIR) More posts by Pollinators@epicure.social
(DIR) Post #AiOkpVeX5gYkYtG7e4 by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-28T18:41:56Z
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A useful & startling chart: "A look back at half a billion years of earth’s #climate history. Within about 25 years we will be entering a temperature realm not seen since the #Pliocene 3 million years ago." [Article is one year old.]https://medium.com/@samyoureyes/the-busy-workers-handbook-to-the-apocalypse-7790666afde7
(DIR) Post #AiOkpWLQWCs2hvKNVI by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-28T19:37:40Z
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2/ Snip "“The idea of growth #economics is about to be phased out whether we like it or not. The economic model behind materialism, consumerism, & the social constructs associated with that, will have to go. We’ve got no choice there… The purpose of this work is to show the shortcomings of the existing paradigm. What will happen is we’ve got to make a better plan: once we understand our true boundary conditions, what will we really do?” Dr Simon Michaux of the Finnish geological survey#permaculture #design
(DIR) Post #AiOkpWtoSMNOQZPq6K by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-28T20:49:18Z
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3/ Snip "Capitalism has forced the hyper-specialization of various regions into profitable mono-cultures which create single points of failure in the #food system. Just one example: 90% of the green leafy vegetables produced in the US from Nov — Mar are grown in the Yuma, AZ area. We import beef from South America & fruits from all over the globe. Staple grains have become just another globally traded commodity like steel or rubber. What this means is that practically nowhere in the developed world, & most especially not in the US, can people support themselves on locally produced foods. #Farmers markets are in no way capable of offsetting a major gap in imported foods. We are completely dependent on a highly complex global logistics chain in order to eat."
(DIR) Post #AiOkpXg1Z6wOq5yLFQ by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-28T21:01:41Z
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4/ snip "Globally, approx 45% of crops (by calories) are grown not for human consumption but for animal feed & fuels. “The proportions are even more striking in the United States, where just 27% of crop calories are consumed directly — wheat, say, or fruits & vegetables grown in California. By contrast, more than 67% of crops — particularly all the soy grown in the Midwest — goes to animal feed. And a portion of the rest goes to ethanol & other biofuels."
(DIR) Post #AiOkpYElTwjKZqE5Oi by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-28T21:04:37Z
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5/snip "The supply system fragility described above obviously affects far more than just food supply. All other critical supplies & materials needed for civilization similarly depend on foreign production, marine shipping, ports, truck drivers, warehouses, etc. Similar to the grocery store experiment, try going to your local hardware / home-improvement store & look at some “Made In _” labels. Just a couple examples: I found plywood made in Brazil & 1x4 lumber from Sweden.Every aspect of our globalized supply chain is hyperfragile. When shocks eventually exceed the system’s resiliency, for example if a climate-caused #famine creates gaps in those “essential workers” so taken for granted during #covid, citizens of industrialized countries will experience shortages of building materials, gasoline/diesel, car repair parts, etc. Those shortages will create feedbacks affecting other sectors. A hyperfragile system pushed beyond its limit will experience impacts far exceeding the magnitude of the shock."
(DIR) Post #AiOkpYkfZKFcAn9Z7w by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-28T21:10:54Z
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6/ snip "Global warming doesn’t just mean temperatures getting warmer, it also means increasing extremes & variability. The hallmark of the #holocene was climatic stability. We’ve left that era behind.“Extremely Hot Summers in the Northern Hemisphere have gone from happening 0.1% of the time in 1951–1980 to 22.1% of the time in 2009–2019. That is over a 200x (20,000%) increase!”
(DIR) Post #AiOkpZWAiiFSY7NVAW by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-29T00:47:31Z
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7/ snip "#Insurance is an easily overlooked but critically important factor to the stability of civilization. As Roger Hallam put it recently: “no insurance, no economy.” All property values in the US are underpinned by disaster insurance. If a property is in a #flood zone, #fire zone, earthquake zone, etc, you must carry the relevant #disaster insurance or you cannot get financing. If your property is deemed too high risk for insurance, no one is going to buy it because they will not be able to get financing. If insurers pull out of an area, the property values will tank, essentially becoming stranded assets. If businesses leave then residents don’t have jobs. It’s yet another example of a fragile system with a clearly defined breaking point that, once passed, will cause tremendous cascading impacts."
(DIR) Post #AiOkpZhs1Dbd8OqqP2 by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-29T00:55:21Z
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8/ snip "Bill Rees is one of a number of #climate scientists who portray #climatechange as one symptom of a larger planetary problem of ecological #overshoot. In this excellent lecture (https://youtu.be/9oVTHKzC7TM) he briefly touches on: ocean acidification, freshwater contamination, #deforestation, soil #erosion, #desertification, overfishing and species #extinctions."Key quotes:“It’s not just mammals. Wild bird populations are also tumbling. Domestic poultry now constitute 70% of the world’s avian biomass. Average populations of thousands of monitored species of wild vertebrates, birds, fish, mammals, amphibians, have declined ~60% since 1970. Populations of #invertebrates, including essential #pollinators, are also in free-fall: Butterflies down 53%; beetles down 49%, bumblebees down 46%… All species monitored by WWF are down 68–70% in just 50 years.”"
(DIR) Post #AiOkpb0LC1yV9yV6pc by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-29T01:02:07Z
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9/ snip "On average, the planet has lost 1% of its phytoplankton every year since 1900… “Over a century, this becomes a huge, huge decline,." Worm’s team estimates #phytoplankton numbers have plummeted 40% since 1950. What’s more, phytoplankton numbers were more likely to dwindle in areas of the ocean that were warming. The loss of phytoplankton is a huge problem for marine food chains, because every creature in the ocean either eats phytoplankton or eats other organisms that depend on it. If their numbers decrease, the populations of these species drop as well. “The rest of the food web would basically contract". Even more chilling… is the potential impact on our atmosphere. The ocean absorbs 40% of the CO2 humans emit. Phytoplankton convert that CO2 into oxygen or die & bury it at the bottom of the ocean. If the phytoplankton are disappearing, the ocean as a carbon sink is declining, & that means more #CO2 will stay in the atmosphere instead of being dissolved in the ocean.”"
(DIR) Post #AiOkpbf6kSaJCPZfNI by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-29T01:08:48Z
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10/ snip😮 😲 😬 "Billionaires are, by definition, psychopaths. It is impossible to earn a billion dollars. Take a salary, let’s say $500,000/yr, & calculate how long you'd have to work, spending nothing, to earn your first billion. At $500k/yr it would take 2,000 years. Or, if you simply steal $3 from every single American, you can make a billion in a single year. Billionaires’ wealth comes only from wage theft from workers. It is never earned. It is estimated that ~5% of deaths in the US are attributable to poverty, making every billionaire a de-facto mass murderer. No one becomes a billionaire because they are intelligent or talented. They become billionaires because they are able to rob millions of other people into poverty, destitution, & early death & still sleep soundly at night. These are the people determining our future. They are brain damaged by power. If you are banking on billionaires saving the planet because “it’s in their best interest,” you misunderstand their interests."
(DIR) Post #AiOkpcBMoWOAoSfQem by Pollinators@epicure.social
2024-05-29T01:13:18Z
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@KeithDJohnson. Say it again. Billionaires’ wealth comes only from wage theft from workers.
(DIR) Post #AiOkpcfV0UUYJulUci by KeithDJohnson@sfba.social
2024-05-29T01:23:52Z
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11/ snip "Crop production depends on a stable #climate. It is not a matter of “if” but of “when” a significant #catastrophe occurs. A globally significant #famine is going to happen. It could happen in 2 years or it could take 10–15. I can’t know that. But trends are clear. When it happens, the import-dependent US will not be spared. The biggest, most critical failure of imagination is how people assume the US govt will respond to this catastrophe. Capitalism solves shortages by increasing price. Other countries may take a more humane approach to #food rationing, but the US govt is absolutely not going to supply emergency rations to the public. The poor will simply starve.The US govt is preparing for #ClimateChange by hiring 100,000 additional police officers, an approximately 15% increase to our already obscenely bloated, militarized, domestic occupation force of ~680,000. This is America’s climate change adaptation plan: more #police."
(DIR) Post #AiOkppIw1hAPVhJ9l2 by Ricardus@mastodon.sdf.org
2024-05-29T23:12:58Z
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@Pollinators @KeithDJohnson Preach.