[HN Gopher] Greenland ice sheet is close to a melting point of n...
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       Greenland ice sheet is close to a melting point of no return
        
       Author : geox
       Score  : 162 points
       Date   : 2023-03-27 18:34 UTC (4 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (news.agu.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (news.agu.org)
        
       | vaseko wrote:
       | Soros is saying [1] if not solved withing ten years, it will cost
       | exponentially more to restore the balance. Bellow in [1] there is
       | a video proposing a device to recreate the albedo effect using
       | see water. For Soros climate change is the biggest security
       | thread, only after this he talks about wars and geopolitics.
       | 
       | [1] https://www.georgesoros.com/2023/02/16/remarks-delivered-
       | at-...
        
       | adrianN wrote:
       | Ah well, here we go. I guess it's what we deserve for sitting on
       | our hands for fifty years. So long and thanks for all the fish.
        
         | nomel wrote:
         | For reference, high tide where I am is ~20ft. Winter storms
         | bring it up another 20. This will definitely require moving
         | inland, but definitely not a "thanks for all the fish"
         | scenario.
        
           | foobarian wrote:
           | Yeah if anything you'll have more access to fish now! _sob_
        
             | pferde wrote:
             | Not really, fish will die out soon after plankton goes,
             | which won't be long...
        
       | gshubert17 wrote:
       | The mass of the Greenland ice sheet is about 2.5 E15 tonnes. The
       | average melt rate between 2003 and 2016 was about 2.5 E11
       | tonnes/year. At this rate it would take 10,000 years to melt
       | completely.
       | 
       | But the melt rate is increasing with increasing average
       | temperatures. Wikipedia quotes a melt of 5 E 11 tonnes in 2019.
       | Perhaps the doubling time is about 10 years? At that rate it'd
       | take about 5,000 years to melt away.
       | 
       | Five thousand years is a long time only if the melt rate remains
       | the same. If the melt rate continues to double every decade, then
       | 12 doublings increases the melt rate to 4000 * 5 E 11 = 2 E 15
       | tonnes/year. Then the Greenland ice cap could be gone in about
       | 120 years.
        
         | Someone wrote:
         | > But the melt rate is increasing with increasing average
         | temperatures. Wikipedia quotes a melt of 5 E 11 tonnes in 2019.
         | Perhaps the doubling time is about 10 years? At that rate it'd
         | take about 5,000 years to melt away.
         | 
         | At that doubled rate it would take 5,000 years, but if that
         | rate doubles every 10 years, at the rate 10 years from now, it
         | would take 2,500, at the rate 20 years from now 1,250, at the
         | rate 100 years from now about 5.
        
       | effnorwood wrote:
       | [dead]
        
       | el_don_almighty wrote:
       | Every sunset sees the point of no return
       | 
       | Every time you lay down on your pillow,
       | 
       | your eyes close on a world to which you can never return
       | 
       | Thus it has always been and always shall be
        
       | truthwhisperer wrote:
       | [dead]
        
       | lofaszvanitt wrote:
       | There are a lot of reporting going on about taking ice samples
       | from these areas. What do those ice samples say about the last
       | few thousands of years. How temperature fluctuated, can they
       | estimate the ice sheet coverage for the last x thousand years and
       | if so, what does it say? What if it melts, can it ever freeze
       | again, creating the same block of ice as before?
        
       | andrewstuart wrote:
       | The truth is the human race can do nothing about the pending
       | environmental disaster.
       | 
       | Nothing has worked on a scale large enough to make any
       | difference.
       | 
       | Greed and nationalism and small mindedness and selfishness and
       | war prevent humanity from addressing its fate.
       | 
       | It's going to be nasty future for those who survive and this
       | period will simply be the time in history in which humanity knew
       | and did nothing.
        
       | the_third_wave wrote:
       | These reports are the modern versions of the men walking around
       | the city with sandwich boards proclaiming the end of the world
       | [1]. When you asked them what it was which made them believe so
       | you'd get some rambling story of how the lord had given them
       | signs in their breakfast porridge, ask these climate prophets
       | what makes them believe the point of no return has come and they
       | point at their models which have shown them the end is coming.
       | The difference between these two is that the former at least got
       | a good breakfast out of their medium.
       | 
       | Is the climate not changing then? Of course it is, always has and
       | always will. Do humans not influence the climate then? Of course
       | they do, especially since the industrial revolution. Does this
       | portend a catastrophe? Well... there opinions vary. I'm convinced
       | the changing climate will poise some problems which will be dealt
       | with - just like humans have always dealt with the changing
       | climate. The difference here is that there are more humans -
       | which could make things more difficult - who have more advanced
       | technology - which will make things easier. Assuming cooler minds
       | prevail and the sabre rattling around the world does not lead to
       | a bigger conflict I'm convinced humanity as a whole will make it
       | through whatever changes the climate makes to come out richer and
       | more advanced still.
       | 
       | Would we be better off if we were not as reliant on fossil energy
       | sources? Yes, we certainly would given the pollution - and I'm
       | talking about true pollution here, not CO2 - involved in the
       | winning and use of these sources. Build more nukes, get serious
       | with fusion, develop a sane form of hydrogen storage, go for it.
       | Not because of the climate boogeyman but because of the above
       | reason as well as the fact that these energy sources are
       | concentrated in some of the more troublesome regions in the world
       | where they have already led to numerous conflicts.
       | 
       | Do I trust climate models? No, I do not and with reason. I did
       | study this stuff a few decades ago when the models were 'less
       | advanced' than they are now. I know of too many fudge factors in
       | these models, too many adjustments which are made to make them
       | follow the observations where the reason for and effect of those
       | adjustments are not understood. From what I have been able to
       | keep up with things are not much different now - apart from far
       | faster computers and more complex models with more parameters and
       | their accompanying fudge factors.
       | 
       | [1]
       | https://therionorteline.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/lead64.j...
        
       | itronitron wrote:
       | I am always confused as to why they don't include a graphic that
       | shows how a melting glacier or ice shelf translates into
       | worldwide ocean level rise. The common intuition is that Earth's
       | oceans are vast so any amount of above sea level mass going into
       | them isn't going to change sea level that much.
       | 
       | I haven't yet seen a graphic yet that explains the calculation,
       | and I'm left cynically thinking that they are mistakenly using a
       | Mercator projection when calculating the contribution for
       | Greenland.
       | 
       | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercator_projection#/media/Fil...
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | runesofdoom wrote:
       | From, _Yes, Minister_ ,
       | 
       | "Stage 1: We say nothing is going to happen.
       | 
       | Stage 2: We say something may be about to happen, but we should
       | do nothing about it.
       | 
       | Stage 3: We say maybe we should do something about it, but
       | there's nothing we can do.
       | 
       | Stage 4: We say maybe there was something, but it's too late
       | now."
        
         | robocat wrote:
         | https://youtube.com/watch?v=nSXIetP5iak
        
       | tomp wrote:
       | Non-clickbait title: it's halfway there.
        
       | Forestessential wrote:
       | most recent global warming threat
        
       | aaa_aaa wrote:
       | If they are so sure about amounts I expect a date.
        
         | antibasilisk wrote:
         | BOE by 2030.
        
         | Eumenes wrote:
         | Ask Al Gore
        
         | nomel wrote:
         | This doesn't make sense. Volume is measurable. Satellites do
         | it. There's little prediction, it has already been done.
         | Predicting when something will happen, in the future, is much
         | harder.
         | 
         | For example, you could measure a hamburger in front of me.
         | Predicting when, and if, I'll eat it is much harder.
        
       | zamfi wrote:
       | Let me preface this by saying that I believe climate change and
       | decarbonization to be one of the critical challenges of our time.
       | That said...
       | 
       | This article's title and its content are completely at odds.
       | Here's a critical passage:
       | 
       | > As the ice sheet melts, its surface will be at ever-lower
       | elevations, exposed to warmer air temperatures. Warmer air
       | temperatures accelerate melt, making it drop and warm further.
       | Global air temperatures have to remain elevated for hundreds of
       | years or even longer for this feedback loop to become effective;
       | a quick blip of 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit)
       | wouldn't trigger it, Honing said. But once the ice crosses the
       | threshold, it would inevitably continue to melt. Even if
       | atmospheric carbon dioxide were reduced to pre-industrial levels,
       | it wouldn't be enough to allow the ice sheet to regrow
       | substantially.
       | 
       | > "We cannot continue carbon emissions at the same rate for much
       | longer without risking crossing the tipping points," Honing said.
       | "Most of the ice sheet melting won't occur in the next decade,
       | but it won't be too long before we will not be able to work
       | against it anymore."
       | 
       | So...we potentially have hundreds of years to bring temperatures
       | back down before the "tipping point" triggers? Forgive me for not
       | being super alarmed.
       | 
       | 100 years ago we'd just barely started dumping carbon into the
       | atmosphere. That is a long time.
       | 
       | EDIT: to be clear, yes of course it not enough to stop dumping
       | carbon into the atmosphere in the next hundred years, but it does
       | give us (potentially) decades to figure out large-scale carbon
       | capture and sequestration even if we exceed the thresholds
       | described here (1000 gigatons).
        
         | Scarblac wrote:
         | Well, once the CO2 is in the air and stays there, the warming
         | will happen. Then hundreds of years later the threshold is
         | passed and then even removing it from the air (something we
         | can't do) won't help anymore.
         | 
         | Once we've emitted enough CO2 to reach 2 degrees warming, it
         | will almost certainly happen that all the ice melts. And
         | there's a point where that will be certain, even if we learn
         | how to remove all CO2 we emitted from the atmosphere. Is how I
         | read it.
         | 
         | The ice on this island is enough to cause about 7m of global
         | sea level rise on its own, iirc.
        
           | BirAdam wrote:
           | Well, if that's an accurate measure of sea level rise, then
           | ocean salinity would drop significantly and cool the planet
           | very rapidly, and by quite a bit. Not sure what outcome of
           | that would be, but dramatic sudden cooling would likely
           | devastate agriculture.
        
             | bell-cot wrote:
             | Are you thinking of this theory? Greenland Melts ==> North
             | Atlantic Salinity Falls ==> North Atlantic Ocean Currents
             | Disrupted ==> Local Cooling of Northern Europe
             | 
             | If so, sed 's/cool the planet/cool Northern Europe/' Though
             | yes, it'd be locally pretty dire for agriculture. Maybe
             | they could switch to farming fish in all the newly-flooded
             | lowlands...
        
               | mikrotikker wrote:
               | The fish will be dead from all the nitrogen run off.
        
           | gridspy wrote:
           | Fortunately the CO2 does eventually leave our atmosphere,
           | given about 50 years.
        
             | Scarblac wrote:
             | That's a lot faster than the numbers I usually see (e.g.
             | Google says 300 to 1000 years).
        
             | [deleted]
        
             | folsom wrote:
             | What is the process that removes CO2?
        
               | thechao wrote:
               | The snowball Earth's (both of them) were caused by excess
               | serpentine weathering. Serpentine is one of the most
               | common minerals in the Earth's crust -- like 80% of it.
               | The serpentine is covered in limestone (and other things)
               | which prevents warm-saline erosion of the serpentine,
               | directly. If you look at the tailings from the coal mines
               | in the TVA, you could "just" ship those tailings to the
               | Gulf coast (using the old train systems) and cause a
               | major glacial period, quite quickly, by grinding up the
               | tailings & dumping them in a mile wide strip from Corpus
               | Christi to Miami.
        
               | akiselev wrote:
               | _> Serpentine is one of the most common minerals in the
               | Earth 's crust -- like 80% of it._
               | 
               | Serpentines are common but they do not make up 80% of the
               | crust. Feldspars are the most common minerals in the
               | crust and they make up less than 60% of it [1].
               | 
               | [1] https://deq.nc.gov/energy-mineral-and-land-
               | resources/geologi...
        
               | JumpCrisscross wrote:
               | > _What is the process that removes CO2?_
               | 
               | Lots of them [1]. (No free lunch, though. Oceans
               | absorbing carbon makes them acidic.)
               | 
               | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_sink
        
         | gridspy wrote:
         | No, the story is that we begin the melting by raising the
         | earth's temperature a little. You'd think that if we reduced
         | our carbon emissions, the ice would stop melting.
         | 
         | > But once the ice crosses the threshold, it would inevitably
         | continue to melt
         | 
         | Bear in mind that the atmosphere retains carbon dioxide for ~50
         | years, that other melt events are dumping methane into the
         | atmosphere from permafrost. It's not just one factor heating
         | the planet.
        
           | tzs wrote:
           | > Bear in mind that the atmosphere retains carbon dioxide for
           | ~50 years
           | 
           | It's 300-1000 years [1].
           | 
           | [1] https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2915/the-atmosphere-
           | getting-a-...
        
             | hypertele-Xii wrote:
             | Good thing plants eat carbon dioxide then, so we don't need
             | to wait for it to break down by itself. The more CO2 in the
             | atmosphere, the more plants grow and convert it to oxygen.
        
               | gridspy wrote:
               | Plants only store the CO2 until they decompose a
               | relatively short time later. The only way to end up with
               | a net decrease in CO2 this way is to bury the plants
               | deep. Of course that is the process that initially
               | created coal.
        
           | realworldperson wrote:
           | [dead]
        
           | graeme wrote:
           | >You'd think that if we reduced our carbon emissions, the ice
           | would stop melting.
           | 
           | People think of climate change like a river. You reduce
           | emissions, you reduce the size of the emissions, you reduce
           | the size of the problem.
           | 
           | But it's more like a bathtub. Emissions are the water filling
           | the tub, but the real problem is the water level already in
           | the tub. If you reduce emissions, you reduce the size of the
           | flow into the tub. But....water is still flowing in and the
           | water is still rising.
           | 
           | If we had zero emissions it would take earth systems much
           | much longer than 50 years to bring things back down to where
           | they were.
        
           | upsidesinclude wrote:
           | >have to remain elevated for hundreds of years or even longer
           | for this feedback loop to become effective.
           | 
           | To further reiterate:
           | 
           | hundreds of years or _even longer_ for this feedback loop to
           | _become_ effective.
        
         | Belituio wrote:
         | 100 years is not a lot. Your kids kids will already be
         | affected.
         | 
         | It feels very short sides.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | alex_young wrote:
         | From the same page:                 Previous research
         | identified global warming of between 1 degree to 3 degrees
         | Celsius (1.8 to 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit) as the threshold beyond
         | which the Greenland Ice Sheet will melt irreversibly.
         | 
         | We're already at 1.2c above pre-industrial levels. Although it
         | will take a long period of exposure to warm air for the ice to
         | melt, we've already been doing that for a long time. It doesn't
         | seem reasonable to say we have hundreds of years to figure out
         | a solution.
        
           | epolanski wrote:
           | Only 1.2?
           | 
           | Definitely feels like much more.
        
           | kiliantics wrote:
           | > It doesn't seem reasonable to say we have hundreds of years
           | to figure out a solution.
           | 
           | We've also known about the global warming problem in great
           | detail for well over 50 years at this point. Since then we
           | haven't figured it out but made it worse -- most of our
           | cumulative emissions have happened in just the last 50 years.
           | Why do people still think we can figure this out in a matter
           | of decades without having to drastically change our fossil
           | fuel habits?
        
             | crispinb wrote:
             | > Why do people still think ...
             | 
             | Because people haven't come to terms with the fact that
             | humans are not Children of God nor disembodied Cartesian
             | rational calculators, but actually a loquacious and
             | smartish hominid, designed by selection for small group
             | interaction. There is nothing to suggest this species is
             | capable of planet-level cooperation towards a communally-
             | decided end.
             | 
             | Add to that the fact that path-dependent history has placed
             | that species today in a situation where it's organised into
             | huge 17thC mutually-hostile groups ("States"), incapable of
             | anything more than opportunistic cooperation because of
             | their religious and anachronistic founding concept
             | ("sovereignty"). Most people have no idea that this
             | contingent organisation is not the natural and inevitable
             | state of the world, so aren't open to the possibility that
             | it dooms them to sclerotic inability to face today's
             | challenges.
        
               | tejohnso wrote:
               | > There is nothing to suggest this species is capable of
               | planet-level cooperation towards a communally-decided
               | end.
               | 
               | Absolutely. In fact there is _plenty_ to suggest to me
               | that this species is completely incapable of that level
               | of cooperation.
        
             | taylodl wrote:
             | Kick the can down the road. Nothing to see here. Let our
             | progeny figure out how to clean up the mess we created.
             | We're doing the same thing with our debt, too.
             | 
             | I'm just going to put it out there - our progeny is going
             | to _hate our guts._
             | 
             | Then again, maybe afterward humanity will hold us up as an
             | example for what _not_ to do, how _not_ to solve global
             | problems. They 'll be able to use history to quickly and
             | effectively shut down the naysayers. Of course that's
             | assuming they bother to learn anything from history...I
             | mean _we_ sure as hell haven 't!
        
         | lozenge wrote:
         | Stopping emissions (which isn't even in the Overton window)
         | means CO2 concentration will slowly reduce.
         | 
         | "Between 65% and 80% of CO2 released into the air dissolves
         | into the ocean over a period of 20-200 years. The rest is
         | removed by slower processes that take up to several hundreds of
         | thousands of years, including chemical weathering and rock
         | formation. This means that once in the atmosphere, carbon
         | dioxide can continue to affect climate for thousands of years."
         | 
         | During the time of elevated CO2 levels, the temperature
         | continues to rise.
        
         | Arnt wrote:
         | Temperature is a function of elevation. It's saying that if you
         | move the surface down by removing the top layer of material
         | (ice), the temperature at the surface increases, _all else
         | being equal_ including the temperature at sea level.
         | 
         | The effect is real, and big enough to feel with the naked skin.
         | One generally says one kelvin per 100m elevation, although the
         | Greenland surface will be different from that rule of thumb.
        
           | saiya-jin wrote:
           | > One generally says one kelvin per 100m elevation
           | 
           | That's not true in Europe nor Asia nor South America nor
           | Africa, although I didn't climb mountains specifically in
           | Greenland to be factual. Better value is cca 0.6C per 100m,
           | or 6C per 1km (sorry, no conversion to feet/yard vs F and
           | similar fun games for lazy sunday afternoon... seriously,
           | with all the love, fix this shit guys, we are not living in
           | 15th century when similar stuff was common and accepted).
           | 
           | It depends on many factors including humidity and local
           | meteorology.
           | 
           | That part discussed about moving surface down doesn't make
           | sense - you can lower glacier only to base rock/soil level.
           | But at this level, where glacier starts, its already the
           | dreaded temperature they want to avoid, so glaciers should be
           | melting from the bottom with this logic. If they mean that
           | once ice melts the rock temperature rises well yeah, that's a
           | no brainer, its a different surface. Ice has surface
           | temperature below/around 0, any rock hit with sun can easily
           | surpass that even during winter.
           | 
           | I know reality is more complex out there, one of my todos is
           | to have sleepover (no tent) on nearby Mer de Glace in
           | Chamonix, France. Just me, gazillion stars, mountains
           | crumbling around me and glacier cracking beneath my ass.
        
             | czinck wrote:
             | >But at this level, where glacier starts, its already the
             | dreaded temperature they want to avoid, so glaciers should
             | be melting from the bottom with this logic.
             | 
             | Yes, that's generally what happens to glaciers even
             | ignoring climate change. The bottom melts, but is replaced
             | by snow/ice that accumulated on top. Glaciers grow top
             | down, not bottom up. But, if you lower the top so it's
             | warmer, less ice accumulates, which can't replace all that
             | melts, and so you get net shrinking.
        
       | dvh wrote:
       | https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8b/To...
        
         | saiya-jin wrote:
         | so Greenland will soon have an inland lake
        
       | neerd wrote:
       | Does anyone have suggestions for how an individual can feel like
       | they're actually doing something. I already make donations to
       | organizations that advocate for climate activism, vote at local
       | and national level for candidates what support climate action,
       | and in my own live I try to be conscious about the environment
       | impacts or my lifestyle and purchases. Despite all that I still
       | feel like I'm changing nothing. I still feel like there are
       | theses colossal and obvious problems bearing down on our species
       | and all I can do is watch it happen. I hate this feeling of
       | helplessness.
        
         | BurningFrog wrote:
         | The truth is that whatever you or I do personally has no effect
         | at all globally on this.
         | 
         | That's also true of hundreds of global and international
         | problems.
         | 
         | The best approach is to accept that which you cannot change.
        
           | epolanski wrote:
           | I really dislike those arguments. It's like why bother
           | voting, one vote does not change much.
           | 
           | You can be conscious about your consumption and set great
           | examples. Or you can decide you don't care and keep ordering
           | stuff on amazon every day, shove meat and fish everyday in
           | your mouth, change car every few years while flying regularly
           | and pretend is somebody's else problem.
        
           | dleslie wrote:
           | That's really not true, and we have the largest experiment on
           | collective behaviour in history to show this. COVID lockdowns
           | had an _enormous_ impact on carbon emissions.
           | 
           | Everyone should fight to WFH, even if you hate it, because
           | the benefit to reducing carbon emissions is known and
           | significant.
        
             | jjbickerstaffe wrote:
             | IIRC Covid reduced emissions by about 7%. Then they went
             | back up. That's big... but not as big as the 10% reductions
             | we actually need _every year_
        
         | lozenge wrote:
         | Don't have kids.
         | 
         | You feel like you're changing nothing because you are. It's
         | logically impossible to have an impact as one person of
         | billions.
        
         | driftless_zone wrote:
         | Made this account just to say: with regards to climate change,
         | it's tough because your impact is largely limited to voting +
         | "negative actions" such as flying or driving less, eating less
         | meat, etc. Voting obviously doesn't happen often, and
         | attempting to reduce your carbon footprint is awesome but imo
         | not exactly morale-boosting.
         | 
         | That said, there are other related causes you can give time and
         | effort to that have a direct positive impact, such as
         | volunteering in ecological restoration in your free time.
         | Protecting native biodiversity and restoring ecosystems-- which
         | are becoming every-more-threatened due to climate change,
         | habitat fragmentation, and invasive species-- is very rewarding
         | work, and more accessible than most people realize. No prior
         | experience or tools needed, just time and energy. You can
         | search for "environmental volunteering" or "ecological
         | volunteering" for wherever you live, and decent odds there are
         | options for you to choose from.
        
         | 0xbadcafebee wrote:
         | I work in climate change. I changed my job in order to do so.
         | The pace of change feels glacial (badum-bum). The same can be
         | said of politics, and everything else that involves way too
         | many interests fighting over a very small set of resources. You
         | will never not feel helpless.
         | 
         | Greta Thunberg probably felt helpless. But she turned that
         | feeling into anger, and that anger into action. Henry Rollins
         | said he stays angry, because he doesn't want to accept what's
         | wrong with the world. (I don't think he has as positive an
         | impact as Greta, though)
         | 
         | You, yourself, _cannot_ fix the world 's problems. Neither can
         | Greta or Rollins. But if you really feel like you're not doing
         | enough, then hold yourself accountable. List the things you do
         | every day to affect change. Just write down what you're doing.
         | Then when your inner voice says "What the hell are you doing
         | about it?", answer it. If your inner voice says "That's not
         | enough", then do more. Or don't! But be at peace with your
         | decisions.
        
           | chollida1 wrote:
           | > Greta Thunberg probably felt helpless. But she turned that
           | feeling into anger, and that anger into action.
           | 
           | Serious question.
           | 
           | What impact has she had? I haven't seen any changes from her
           | actions. People knew about climate change before she came
           | around. What changes did she create?
        
             | 0xbadcafebee wrote:
             | * * *
        
             | heleninboodler wrote:
             | The biggest impact I've seen is that a lot of people are
             | very angry at her for some reason.
        
         | tejohnso wrote:
         | > how an individual can feel like they're actually doing
         | something
         | 
         | That's going to depend on the individual. Some people feel just
         | fine driving a hybrid automobile every day as their big
         | contribution. Some people quit eating meat, quit flying, quit
         | driving altogether, and some even protest. Of course there are
         | many options and many different levels of guilt and
         | helplessness that individuals deal with.
         | 
         | But perhaps you could address your need to feel like you're
         | doing something. You don't have to do anything. You can give
         | yourself some slack. This isn't a problem that you caused, and
         | it's not a problem you're going to solve.
         | 
         | What do you do when a loved one is in the later stages of
         | terminal cancer? Do you fret and feel like you need to do
         | something? Do you yell at the doctors to try one last thing? Do
         | you cry over loss? Maybe but eventually in a healthy person
         | that will all end. Once someone is in hospice, it's time to
         | work toward acceptance and appreciation and to try to enjoy the
         | last bit of time left as much as one can. We're in a sort of
         | planetary hospice situation right now.
        
         | iLoveOncall wrote:
         | Buy a lot of AC machines but make them cool the outside and put
         | the exhaust in your house!
        
         | mongol wrote:
         | What sacrifices can you do in your own life? That is certainly
         | the easiest and most certain way you can contribute. The impact
         | will be limited no doubt, but the most obvious place to start.
        
           | airstrike wrote:
           | _> What sacrifices can you do in your own life? That is
           | certainly the easiest and most certain way you can
           | contribute. The impact will be limited no doubt, but the most
           | obvious place to start._
           | 
           | Respectfully, I think a better plan is to work hard to reach
           | a position of power and/or leadership, and then make changes
           | that affect millions. Minor changes in my household have
           | relatively zero impact in the big picture.
        
             | dpedu wrote:
             | I think you'll find it very difficult to convince people to
             | make a sacrifice that you are not willing to make yourself.
             | Or are you talking about forcing them?
        
         | kulahan wrote:
         | Climate change is genuinely one of the few things where
         | grassroots movements (pun not intended) can have an outsized
         | impact. Kill your lawn, replace it with native plants, and you
         | can create an absolute oasis for animals that are losing more
         | of their habitats year after year.
         | 
         | This can be a refuge for thousands of animals, give you tons of
         | cool stuff to watch go on in your back yard, and it'll almost
         | certainly save you money as the plants won't struggle to grow
         | and thrive in your area.
        
         | epolanski wrote:
         | Consume less, buy less material stuff, eat less meat/fish, have
         | less than 3 children, set a good example without becoming
         | annoying to family and peers.
         | 
         | Don't over stress it though. You can't change the world but you
         | can set great seeds with examples.
        
         | imwithstoopid wrote:
         | live like its 1880
         | 
         | buy stuff as if the garbage man does not exist...in 1880 they
         | didn't have trash removal
         | 
         | buy one set of clothes you wear pretty much every day until
         | they fall off of you
         | 
         | buy a few tools that will last you forever
         | 
         | no more disposable anything, remember the trash man doesn't
         | exist
         | 
         | wash clothes by hand
         | 
         | cook everything yourself, even better grow your own food
         | 
         | sorry no biking, rubber is an industrial process...you walk
         | everywhere just like great grampa did
         | 
         | no need to worry about fossil fuels...you won't be using them
         | in any capacity other than maybe a nice fire in the winter in
         | your wood burning stove which will be the only "appliance" you
         | own (good news - they last forever!)
         | 
         | etc etc
         | 
         | this is probably what sustainable living looks like until we
         | get star trek matter synthesizers
         | 
         | you'll never get a date living like this but you'll also never
         | again worry about 98% of the crap of modern life
        
           | RC_ITR wrote:
           | >live like its 1880
           | 
           | >sorry no biking, rubber is an industrial process
           | 
           | Bicycles had rubber tires as early as 1870 and before that,
           | rubber was widely available in the 18th Century.
           | 
           | If you're going to snark, at least snark correctly.
        
             | selimthegrim wrote:
             | You're guttaing his percha, but apparently he's rubber and
             | you're glue.
        
           | snozolli wrote:
           | _sorry no biking, rubber is an industrial process...you walk
           | everywhere just like great grampa did_
           | 
           | This is ridiculous. If petroleum were used solely to produce
           | bicycle tires and things like seals for appliances, the world
           | would be unimaginably 'greener'.
           | 
           | That entire list is just disingenuous, defeatist nonsense.
        
             | EngManagerIsMe wrote:
             | Biking is demonstrably more efficient than walking. And
             | electric bikes are _even_ more energy efficient than
             | biking.
             | 
             | Sure, manufacturing a bike takes some energy, but there's
             | huge value in people using e-bikes to get everywhere.
        
             | imwithstoopid wrote:
             | Nope.
             | 
             | Get the best minds in the world together and ask for an
             | action plan for salvaging climate within two
             | generations...100% chance it will be some variation of
             | "live like its 1880"
        
               | snozolli wrote:
               | Get the best minds in the world together and ask them and
               | they'll say you're talking out your ass.
               | 
               | See how useless that argument is?
        
               | [deleted]
        
           | awb wrote:
           | > you'll never get a date living like this
           | 
           | There are plenty of people around the world that live like
           | this and want to raise their family this way.
           | 
           | And lots of intentional living communities.
           | 
           | But location is everything.
        
           | [deleted]
        
           | BirAdam wrote:
           | This would mean massive deforestation to heat and build with
           | wood. That means much more carbon than most people currently
           | produce with less land taking it in. Burning wood ain't the
           | answer. Also, 1800s was the era where coal became available
           | for businesses and the wealthy, and that's also a bad idea.
           | To suggest no major energy source would likewise be bad as
           | billions would die.
        
             | imwithstoopid wrote:
             | Okay 1680
        
         | globular-toast wrote:
         | Not having children is the best thing you can do.
        
         | camdenlock wrote:
         | The feeling of helplessness you're describing has been
         | intentionally taught to you. It's what keeps the religion
         | going. "If only I could do MORE..."
        
         | CatWChainsaw wrote:
         | Degrowth. There is no way to square this circle. Sorry.
        
           | Lammy wrote:
           | "Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance
           | with nature."
        
             | CatWChainsaw wrote:
             | Had to look that up, a quote from the now-destroyed Georgia
             | Guidestones, apparently. Hard to tell what _your_ message
             | is when there 's literally nothing but the quote to give
             | you context.
        
         | dpedu wrote:
         | > Despite all that I still feel like I'm changing nothing.
         | 
         | You're doing the right thing. Saving the planet isn't sexy.
         | It's getting a few more years out of your old car instead of
         | buying another. It's skipping a few generations of iPhone and
         | making your current device last longer. It's skipping that
         | vacation to Aruba this year. It's researching dozens of brands
         | at your supermarket and being a patron of those with better
         | practices, rather than those you prefer.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | khaki54 wrote:
         | The best thing you can do in continue to innovate and build
         | more efficient things. We can use that technology to stop
         | wasting resources, stop pushing negative externalities to the
         | environment, and rapidly bring the entirety of the planet out
         | of abject poverty where they are more concerned about where
         | dinner is coming from than their environment, local or global.
        
           | ChatGTP wrote:
           | I hate the way now, we're all making it worse by leaning
           | on"AI".
           | 
           | People can't even write code now without it being a carbon
           | intensive activity, it's pretty insane...we just can't stop.
        
           | dleslie wrote:
           | The most important innovation is behavioural: if we
           | collectively stop travelling by ICE to a remote office, we
           | can meaningfully and significantly reduce global emissions.
           | 
           | WFH isn't just a pandemic response measure, it's a climate
           | change measure. We should all fight to WFH, even if we hate
           | it, to reduce carbon emissions.
        
             | STM32F030R8 wrote:
             | How does this get shoehorned into every thread?
        
         | offmycloud wrote:
         | Figure out how to stop China from building a new coal-fired
         | power plant every week.
        
           | pharmakom wrote:
           | Emissions per capita in China are not even that high though.
        
             | bcrosby95 wrote:
             | I didn't realize it was a per capita problem. Maybe we can
             | breed our way out of it so the global emissions per capita
             | will be better and the environment will be happy.
        
         | rngname22 wrote:
         | Voting, protests, labor / general strikes, riots, and
         | revolutions.
         | 
         | Easier said than done though.
        
           | kiliantics wrote:
           | This is the best answer. Voting and consuming differently are
           | not impactful enough. Only mass labour movements will get the
           | wheels turning. The proof is all there in recent history.
        
           | nomel wrote:
           | It would take the majority of the population giving up the
           | majority of the luxuries they have. Getting everyone to agree
           | with that is the tricky part.
        
         | jenadine wrote:
         | All I can think of is to build many nuclear power plant in a
         | remote place, and use the energy to do carbon capture, somehow.
         | 
         | That's based on the assumption that the CO2 removed from the
         | atmosphere is worse that the produced nuclear waste.
        
         | bell-cot wrote:
         | Daydream: Chain all the politicians to rocks within a foot of
         | sea level, so they'll actually care.
         | 
         | More practically, try to downsize your life and carbon
         | footprint. Avoid the performative virtue of buying lots of
         | "green" things. (Many goods like EV's have a huge carbon
         | footprint to manufacture. And eco-tourism via airplane is right
         | out.)
         | 
         | And maybe donate to a non-profit or two that are trying to
         | mitigate the harm that climate change is causing to people much
         | less fortunate than you.
        
           | PeterisP wrote:
           | > Chain all the politicians to rocks within a foot of sea
           | level, so they'll actually care.
           | 
           | The policies which are currently in place are not there
           | because of the desires of some handful of politicians but
           | because of the desires of the masses. If you'd banish all the
           | current politicians, their replacements still wouldn't be
           | able to enact policies of rapid decarbonization, degrowth and
           | an actually enforced major reduction in consumption of
           | energy, goods and transportation, because their constituents
           | wouldn't accept that.
        
         | kfrzcode wrote:
         | Turn off the feeds; don't listen to the talking heads. I'm not
         | saying to be ill informed or under informed, but curate your
         | information feeds such that they're challenging you to do due
         | diligence; read journal articles that cite sources and avoid
         | anything that has an advertisement like the bubonic plague.
         | 
         | Distend social media and focus on high-quality, low-throughput
         | content. Rationality is not based in the vox of the masses.
        
         | mbgerring wrote:
         | Quit your job and go to work full time on climate. Start here:
         | https://climatebase.org
        
           | EngManagerIsMe wrote:
           | So I looked through Climatebase, and I found it hard to
           | evaluate the companies listed. There's plenty of listings,
           | but no (easy) way to say, "Show me one entry per company, for
           | every company hiring engineering leaders." I either got
           | drowned in "this company has 35 reqs open, so here's 35
           | entries" or "you've narrowed your filters so much that you
           | only see two companies".
           | 
           | Not quite easy to figure out "Which set of _companies_ are
           | hiring for a role I can fulfill? "
           | 
           | Edit: And within moments, I of course find the URL to do
           | _exactly_ what I want: https://climatebase.org/organizations?
           | l=&q=Engineering%3A+So...
        
           | scrollaway wrote:
           | This is the only correct answer from all of these. The highly
           | educated are far more likely to make a significant difference
           | especially if they have knowledge that spans multiple fields.
        
             | imwithstoopid wrote:
             | exactly, fly all over the world and tell the dirt poor
             | uneducated masses about the dangers of carbon emissions!
             | 
             | and then realize the dirt poor uneducated masses already
             | have a low carbon footprint because THEY'RE DIRT POOR
        
               | mbgerring wrote:
               | What are you talking about? "Work on climate" means
               | "build the infrastructure to enable the transition away
               | from fossil fuel dependence," not... whatever imaginary
               | demon you're fighting with here.
        
               | scrollaway wrote:
               | What the f are you talking about?
        
               | robocat wrote:
               | A reliable approximation for your carbon footprint is
               | your total spending, which is closely related to your
               | income.
               | 
               | If your income is very low, you are quite simply not
               | spending much on climate warming activities.
               | 
               | There are some exceptions to the rule, but it is a valid
               | generalisation.
        
         | EngManagerIsMe wrote:
         | I bought some forest land, and I'm restoring it to riparian
         | habitat. It's not world changing, but if a few hundred acres
         | can be returned to a natural state and grow large, carbon
         | sucking trees, I feel like I'll have done a net good over my
         | life.
         | 
         | This required giving up on some other goals though. I don't
         | know that there's a lot you can do that is sacrifice free.
         | 
         | I've also gone to a mostly vegetarian diet -- preferring to
         | source meat _only_ from local farmers I 've met in person. If I
         | haven't met the farmer, I won't eat the meat. This reduces the
         | amount of meat I eat, but still lets me seek it out. Maybe this
         | helps, maybe it doesn't, but it's a pretty easy rule to follow
         | that doesn't require me to be a strict vegetarian. I can have
         | my beef stew as a treat, but also know that I'm not
         | contributing to a massive industry of wasteful excess with
         | every meal.
        
         | xupybd wrote:
         | I strongly believe engineers will solve this not politicians.
        
           | Nevermark wrote:
           | The engineers have alternatives to more than enough cases
           | where greenhouse gasses are produced or released.
           | 
           | The "political" problem is how to solve the economics
           | problem. As long as society "subsidizes" damage to the
           | environment, by not charging the damagers, then damage will
           | continue to be extremely lucrative and near impossible to
           | stop.
           | 
           | But the incentives for Big Energy to resist change are so
           | huge, that I don't see a timely solution without explicitly
           | co-opting them.
           | 
           | I.e. solving their economic problem to solve our
           | environmental problem.
           | 
           | Get every Big Energy CFO into a room and establish what kind
           | of incentives they would need to find hard CO2 drawdown
           | legislation a financially attractive opportunity worth
           | pursuing with greener alternatives en masse.
           | 
           | New massive subsidies for Big Energy would not be a fair use
           | of citizen's taxes. But the alternative of continuing to
           | "subsidize" their destruction of the environment is far more
           | costly.
           | 
           | And the side benefits of greater energy security and
           | independence, international stability, etc., would be worth a
           | great deal too.
        
           | ashes-of-sol wrote:
           | [dead]
        
           | pharmakom wrote:
           | Either that or game over. Totally agree that humans cannot
           | coordinate on this scale.
        
         | awb wrote:
         | Leading by example is a great place to start.
         | 
         | Otherwise you have to make green choices a win/win or change
         | people's minds.
         | 
         | EVs are a good example of a win/win. Most people weren't
         | willing to sacrifice range or power in their vehicles. But now
         | that the range and power is there and electricity is cheaper
         | than gas it's more of a win/win.
         | 
         | Changing minds is a lot harder.
        
           | fnimick wrote:
           | What about not having a personal vehicle at all?
        
             | [deleted]
        
         | Scarblac wrote:
         | Friends of mine work at a company called Satelligence (
         | https://satelligence.com/ ).
         | 
         | They use satellite data to check that various countries and
         | companies _keep their promises_. E.g., a country receives money
         | based on the promise that some rain forest is protected, then
         | they are paid to check that no logging takes place there.
         | 
         | That's one of the few use cases for _software_ that I believe
         | can actually help.
        
       | ryandrake wrote:
       | Every time there's an article about climate change, it's always
       | about how we're "close to the point of no return." It's felt like
       | the Truck Almost Hitting The Pole GIF[1] for like 10 years now.
       | Has anything actually gone past the point of no return?
       | 
       | I'll almost be relieved when we're officially inevitably
       | fucked... at least these "nearly there!" articles won't keep
       | popping up.
       | 
       | 1: https://tenor.com/view/truck-crash-test-pole-doesnt-reach-
       | gi...
        
         | vintermann wrote:
         | > Has anything actually gone past the point of no return?
         | 
         | We won't know when we pass points of no return until well after
         | we're past them (and even then, living in denial may be an
         | understandable option). To know if the brakes will work, you
         | have to actually step on the brake first.
         | 
         | But we have lost a lot of biodiversity as a result of global
         | warming, yes. Things like palsa bogs which won't come back for
         | a long time even if climate returns to preindustrial tomorrow.
        
         | libraryatnight wrote:
         | I imagine to the people watching and warning it's a lot more
         | visible and obvious. I also think there's varying degrees of
         | fucked, so we're already fucked, but we can be more fucked so
         | even as things indeed get fucked we still read articles about
         | how there's still fucking on the docket.
         | 
         | I think a lot about this article from Harpers in 2015:
         | https://harpers.org/archive/2015/04/rotten-ice/
         | 
         | In it there are scientists that more or less say we were in
         | mitigation phase then, not prevention.
        
         | wing-_-nuts wrote:
         | That's because you're reading about different 'points of no
         | return'. Originally, we were trying to keep the world as we
         | knew it. There was a big push for 'absolutely no more than 350
         | ppm!'. That came and went. Then it was '1.5c', or a world that
         | looks vaguely as healthy as what we have now, but every
         | scientist who's actually done the research _knows_ this is a
         | pipe dream '. Year by year, we're slowly dooming ourselves to a
         | worse and worse fate. It's _still_ worthwhile to act, because
         | things can _always_ get worse. What happens when Pakistan and
         | India are nuclear armed nations each others throats over water
         | rights to the Indus river?
         | 
         | Nobody says 'game over' because that's not helpful. It can
         | always get worse, and hope and action is the only way it ever
         | gets better.
        
         | netrus wrote:
         | A lot of this can be explained by our moving of the goalpost
         | towards still attainable goals. At the moment it's the 1.5C
         | goal, that is becoming more and more unrealistic. But of course
         | we will aim for 2C after that, because its still better than
         | 2.5C, etc. This communication strategy backfires to some
         | degree, but it is not inconsistent.
         | 
         | This article talks about 7m of sea level rise over the next
         | couple hundreds of years. That's pretty bad, but its easy to
         | imagine something even worse.
        
         | pharmakom wrote:
         | I'm sure we will feel that way in 50 years time :)
        
         | phpisthebest wrote:
         | Global Warming will be here Two days before the day after
         | tomorrow... We didn't listen.... We Didn't listen......
        
         | vlunkr wrote:
         | Applies to the Doomsday Clock as well.
         | 
         | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doomsday_Clock
         | 
         | Someone ought to make a parody clock at this point.
        
           | STM32F030R8 wrote:
           | Oh that's a funny read. Somehow 2023 is the closest we've
           | ever been to global catastrophe? I'm not saying it's out of
           | the question this year but those jokers really think now is
           | worse than at any point in the cold war? Really? Well you
           | know what they say about broken clocks...
        
           | danjoredd wrote:
           | The me getting a GF clock will reach midnight sooner than
           | that thing
        
         | andrewstuart wrote:
         | Have you missed the events of the past few years?
         | 
         | The droughts, the floods, the fires?
        
           | STM32F030R8 wrote:
           | Not trying to be snarky but... those happen literally every
           | year.
        
         | munificent wrote:
         | The way to visualize this is that the truck is instead a
         | hundred-mile long train whose engine is in the back and we are
         | all on it in different cars.
         | 
         | The front of the train has _already_ hit the pole. Cars nearest
         | the front are already crumpling, killing thousands and leading
         | millions to migrate farther back into the train.
         | 
         | Meanwhile, those of us fortunate enough to be in cars farther
         | down the line are starting to get cynical about doomsaying
         | because when we look around us, all of our cars seem mostly
         | fine. Sure, maybe we hear a little rattling (food prices, heat
         | waves, more hurricanes every year), but that's just random
         | chance, right?
         | 
         | And, sure, maybe it seems like more and more people keep
         | showing up from cars closer to the front with the luggage and
         | settling into our cars, which are--if we're totally honest--
         | starting to get a little crowded.
         | 
         | But the train is fine, right? We look out the window and the
         | scenery is still trundling by just fine so there's no reason to
         | stop the engine, right?
        
         | la_fayette wrote:
         | Funny GIF :)
        
         | EngManagerIsMe wrote:
         | Species extinction is very real, and ongoing. There's little
         | more irreversible than a whole species ceasing to exist.
        
         | wolpoli wrote:
         | The headline is talking about a point of no return for a
         | specific threshold or feedback loop, and there seem to be no
         | end of those, for decades to come. As for the "we're fucked"
         | point of no return, we'll still need to first precisely define
         | it.
        
         | nostrademons wrote:
         | We already are officially inevitably fucked. If you corner a
         | climate scientist in private and point out the real
         | implications of their work, they might even admit it.
         | 
         | The problem is you can't admit that we're officially inevitably
         | fucked in public. If you did that, funding for climate science
         | and climate mitigation would dry up, because there's nothing we
         | can realistically do about it. Trust in governments would
         | evaporate - the purpose of a government is to keep us all safe,
         | but if we're all fucked anyway, it'll quickly become every man
         | for themselves. Currency would lose its value, because it
         | assumes that there will be a future better than the present
         | where you might want to buy things. So everybody has an
         | incentive to parrot the "Things are looking bad, we have a
         | serious problem, but if we all band together and lower our
         | emissions we can solve it!" line.
        
           | nickpp wrote:
           | > there's nothing we can realistically do about it
           | 
           | There _is_ something we can do about it: we can keep
           | improving, evolving, getting better. The solution will only
           | be found in the future, with tools maybe outside of our grasp
           | today.
           | 
           | Nothing is inevitable, until it happened. Till then, you and
           | every other pessimist cand still be proven wrong. My money is
           | on the creativity and ingenuity of the race that started in
           | the trees, went to the moon and is currently birthing an even
           | greater intelligence.
        
           | [deleted]
        
           | Timon3 wrote:
           | It's not quite this binary. Yes, we're fucked. But the less
           | we do, the worse we're fucked. It's better to have a glimmer
           | of hope and use that to unfuck what you can.
        
             | nostrademons wrote:
             | That's true but also risks misallocating resources to
             | efforts that won't make a big difference now when we should
             | be focusing on mitigation rather than avoidance.
             | 
             | If we had taken Al Gore's warnings in the 80s and began an
             | aggressive push to move off of fossil fuels then, we could
             | perhaps have avoided the whole climate change problem. We
             | didn't, and we can't now. Instead, the rational approach is
             | to accept that the climate will change, there will be
             | consequences of this, and then do our best to avoid the
             | worst effects of the consequences. That includes:
             | 
             | We should be building seawalls and flood barriers around
             | major low-lying areas. Every major city should have an
             | evacuation plan for how to get everyone out in a natural
             | disaster. If the road capacity for this doesn't exist, we
             | should build it. We need systems in place to deal with mass
             | migration. We need housing tech, ways to quickly build
             | housing in new locations because the population is soon
             | going to be forced to move to new locations. We should be
             | researching ways to add back the seed diversity that we've
             | extinguished over the past 60 years, because major
             | agricultural staples are soon going to be out of their
             | climate windows. We need _local_ renewable energy - the
             | biggest benefit of renewables isn 't going to be reducing
             | carbon emissions (it's too late for that), it's divorcing
             | ourselves from global energy supply chains that are going
             | to get increasingly unreliable.
             | 
             | My wife works in climate investing, which was a sleepy
             | backwater when she started 12 years ago but now is the hot
             | field to be. There's billions of dollars in capital chasing
             | hare-brained carbon capture schemes that have basically 0%
             | chance of working. That capital should instead go into
             | mitigation efforts, programs that accept that we're fucked
             | but try to avoid the worst effects of that. But if
             | anything, government policy is going _the opposite_ way -
             | we 're making it _harder_ to migrate, _refusing_ to build
             | housing or transportation infrastructure, telling people
             | they 're on their own when a hurricane hits, and
             | centralizing seed ownership under Monsanto.
        
             | [deleted]
        
           | phpisthebest wrote:
           | >> Trust in governments would evaporate
           | 
           | I am unclear why anyone ever trusted government or believed
           | government would be the avenue for resolution of this problem
           | 
           | You either understand history, or you trust government, you
           | can not both understand history and trust government..
           | 
           | The second people put their trust in government was the
           | second humanity was fucked. In the best of time Government is
           | like fire, is a troublesome servant and a terrible master.
           | 
           | >the purpose of a government is to keep us all safe
           | 
           | When has that ever been the case... The purpose for
           | government is to provide a framework for non-violent dispute
           | resolution, and to safe guard natural rights and property),
           | and maybe form a national defense force. Not to provide
           | individual safety and security.
           | 
           | >>Currency would lose its value, because it assumes that
           | there will be a future better than the present where you
           | might want to buy things.
           | 
           | No fiat currency actually needs the future to look worse than
           | today to encourage spending today and discourage saving for
           | tomorrow. This is why fiat currency required inflation, and
           | why deflation is feared above all else with fiat currency.
           | You have to have spending today, you have to have people
           | spending in multiples of what they really have in currency
           | (i.e debt spending) and you have to have that in perpetuity.
           | 
           | In short, Fiat Currency is a legal pozi scheme that is
           | destined to fail at some point anyway....
        
           | akira2501 wrote:
           | > We already are officially inevitably fucked.
           | 
           | Well.. the second law of the thermodynamics guarantees that.
           | 
           | > The problem is you can't admit that we're officially
           | inevitably fucked in public.
           | 
           | I see several people attempting to start a career off of just
           | that, some of them are quite successful, even. It helps if
           | you add a lot of theocratic and pseudo-religious ideology
           | into your message. People need _something_ to latch on to
           | after all.
           | 
           | > because there's nothing we can realistically do about it.
           | 
           | We are a dynamic species. My proposition is we are currently
           | living through a sort of "modern dark ages." Government
           | imposition and corporate monopolization are at all time
           | highs, to the extent that most new wealth is captured and not
           | used to create new technologies and to progress the species.
           | This is an artificial situation and it is not sustainable.
           | 
           | If you let this cloud your judgement of what is possible you
           | may arrive at this position and feel it is logical. I suggest
           | to you that it is actually a form of insanity or odd
           | religious fervor to actually believe this.
           | 
           | Perhaps, in afterthought, more generously it's a desire to
           | not lose any current level of comfort that you enjoy while
           | "realistically" being able to solve the problem. A solution
           | to this problem will obviously require drastic and hopefully
           | generally positive change, something we've been known to do
           | sporadically many times before.
        
           | earthscienceman wrote:
           | I am a climate scientist that studies Greenland, can confirm:
           | we're (not-even-inevitably but currently) fucked.
        
             | patrickdavey wrote:
             | So, what's your plan?
        
               | earthscienceman wrote:
               | This is an interesting and open question. But I need you
               | to be _slightly_ more specific. In my research? For my
               | personal life? For the global economy?
        
               | CadmiumYellow wrote:
               | I'm most curious about your personal life!
        
               | patrickdavey wrote:
               | For your personal life mainly. I guess I'm most curious
               | about whether you're planning on where you're living etc
               | in the context of various forms of climate breakdown.
               | 
               | I'm also curious how many personal changes you've made
               | (flying less, vegetarian) when it seems like we need
               | massive government intervention to move the needle.
               | 
               | Thanks for replying!
        
             | travisporter wrote:
             | But it can get worse right? I mean before we become Venus
        
             | wing-_-nuts wrote:
             | What are you doing in your personal life? I've strongly
             | considered moving to the great lakes region, but most
             | likely caring for my parents will keep me in the south
             | east.
        
               | [deleted]
        
       | anonyfox wrote:
       | And still here we are, and no one yet has found an effective
       | argument that convinces people that: yes, this climate
       | catastrophe is real, on track to happen, and within our lifetime.
       | 
       | We, as humanity, know what causes it, why it happens, what can be
       | done to stop it, and even a few things to revert parts of it. The
       | knowledge is there. Scientists proved things. Engineers built
       | stuff.
       | 
       | The literally only thing is that we are currently unable to stop
       | this madness because of a lack of... motivation to do so.
       | 
       | There are numerous reasonings why this is the case, from
       | inequality to geopolitics over profitmaximization up to straight
       | out lying and denial. Many indeed have a point somewhere. It's
       | just that it doesn't matter if they have a point - the global
       | problem must be stopped, now.
       | 
       | Maybe... while many of us here on HN are busy prompt engineering
       | AIs... could we use that momentum to craft arguments for every
       | single person not willing to act for humanity?
        
         | ako wrote:
         | Unfortunately, the only proof I see is that you're expecting
         | too much from humans. We're just not very rational, and have a
         | problem doing the right thing. We believe in unproven stories
         | about gods, kill millions of people for temporary greed, power
         | or believing the wrong lies, and we lie and deceive to gain
         | power or wealth, and have a hard time sharing with those in
         | need (actually sending fugitives back to sea knowing they'll
         | drown). We've pretty much destroyed all life on earth, and are
         | close to destroying our ability to survive. Sometimes people
         | surprise you in a positive way, but overall it's pretty sad.
         | Maybe it's unavoidable, as these are the 'qualities' that made
         | humans successful, but it seems they'll now destroy a large
         | part of us (not for the first time, but at an unprecedented
         | scale).
        
           | slibhb wrote:
           | It seems that, shockingly, "people are an evil, ravenous
           | cancer hellbent on destroying their planet" isn't a story
           | that the masses find compelling.
        
         | onion2k wrote:
         | _And still here we are, and no one yet has found an effective
         | argument that convinces people that: yes, this climate
         | catastrophe is real, on track to happen, and within our
         | lifetime._
         | 
         | Everyone who 'doesn't believe in' climate change has a vested
         | interest in maintaining the status quo - they profit from
         | fossil fuels or from misinformation, or they're
         | narsessistically enjoying other people's discomfort from their
         | arguments, or they're just stupid. There is no point trying to
         | convince them. We have to fix the problems without their help.
        
       | goldforever wrote:
       | [dead]
        
       | maximinus_thrax wrote:
       | Real talk, anyone interested in jump-starting some sort of fund
       | to buy real estate in Greenland? We need to jump at the
       | opportunity! /s
        
       | horsh1 wrote:
       | How long until Greenland is green again?
        
       | padjo wrote:
       | I mean whatever about the physical reality, politically the ice
       | sheet is guaranteed to melt. There is essentially zero chance of
       | humans coordinating a global response to climate change that
       | achieves anything until things get much much worse
        
         | oezi wrote:
         | Humans have already achieved that many countries stopped
         | growing their emissions unchecked and are trying to reverse the
         | trend.
         | 
         | By means of initial subsidies renewables are now producing
         | cheaper energy than fossil sources. This causes the normal
         | market forces to act (economies of scale, tipping points, etc.)
         | which make it very likely that renewables will be the
         | predominant energy source of the 21st century.
        
           | padjo wrote:
           | Global emissions are still going up.
        
       | [deleted]
        
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