[HN Gopher] The Busy Worker's Handbook to the Apocalypse
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The Busy Worker's Handbook to the Apocalypse
Author : myshpa
Score : 17 points
Date : 2023-08-29 20:32 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (medium.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (medium.com)
| myshpa wrote:
| This is an apocalypse that would be caused by climate change.
| However, we're already in the overshoot, and what's missing are:
|
| - Industrial and animal agriculture (the leading drivers of
| deforestation & biodiversity loss, etc.)
|
| - Dwindling biodiversity (with animal species experiencing a 70%
| decline in the last 50 years and 1 million species being driven
| to extinction)
|
| - Droughts (linked to deforestation)
|
| - AMOC collapse
|
| - Zoonotic / plant diseases
|
| The diminished biodiversity could easily lead to significant crop
| failures.
|
| Preventing the collapse could be relatively straightforward at
| this point. We're still in a position where action could be taken
| with relative ease.
|
| However, achieving this would necessitate an immediate shift away
| from fossil fuels (which is hindered by the financial system's
| need for continuous growth) and a reform of agriculture.
|
| Additionally, we would need to focus on carbon sequestration in
| our soils and forests while temperatures are still at levels that
| allow for this.
|
| We can't wait for technological solutions, as they can't be
| developed at the scale and within the timeline needed.
| bath_ wrote:
| This is horribly depressing, to the point where if we're so
| doomed in the next 10 years I ask:
|
| - Why do I care what happens?
|
| - Why do I go on living?
|
| - Most importantly, what is the solution, or mitigation, or any
| level of alternative other than accepting defeat?
|
| It's harsh, but I feel that at this point, if you're not offering
| _some_ kind of solution to this issue, then what is the answer
| other than to smile and wave as we descend into this
| "apocalypse".
|
| I understand this may not be a popular approach, but I have to
| _believe_ that we can avoid this scenario, because otherwise I
| lose all motivation to even try. Even if all is doomed, I have to
| try.
| [deleted]
| nuancebydefault wrote:
| We will try, and chances are, imo, big that we will succeed. We
| do not see the whole picture.
| myshpa wrote:
| Nobody is at the wheel, and nobody's really solving this.
| Nothing that has been done so far has made a dent. We're
| still consuming and polluting more and more, and we're not
| just driving to the cliff with the pedal to the floor; we're
| already beyond the ledge.
| pram wrote:
| So if we're doomed, where would be the best place to live in the
| US? Pacific Northwest? Alaska? Maine?
| Condition1952 wrote:
| near a river and a forest with a group of tightly connected
| people who can work the field, I imagine
| myshpa wrote:
| I'd worry about the violence that will bring, marauders,
| slavery, etc. That river may run dry. The forest may burn
| down. That field may be useless in a changed climate or
| without pollinators. Who knows how it will play out?
| nuancebydefault wrote:
| It's easy to conclude that the author of the article did their
| homework well, they should be lauded.
|
| The key questions are:
|
| - Assume 6 degrees increase by 2100. (>10 percent probability)
| Assume mass famine and displacement of people. What would be the
| impact on population? 9 percent, 99 percent or 100 percent
| decrease? In fact there is nothing that could simulate these
| events. Compare it to covid, the figures went up exponentially
| and there was no single model that could simulate today's
| situation, just a few years later.
|
| - What will be the state of technology in 2043? Impossible to
| predict, let alone in 2100. I believe science and technology is
| really the key factor determining our future.
|
| - With mass death rates, how will the human genome respond? Quite
| impossible to predict (crf covid mutations/human immune system
| adaptation)
|
| It is clear the climate situation is bad and getting worse (cfr
| covid times). But there is no model that can predict the state of
| human kind 20 years from now.
| Condition1952 wrote:
| One billion death by the end of the century. The study does not
| hint to a reduction in world population, thought.
|
| >as a rough rule of thumb, burning roughly 1000 tons of fossil
| carbon (creating 3700 tons of CO2) causes one future premature
| death. Measuring carbon emissions in human lives not only makes
| the numbers easier to understand for nonexperts but also
| clarifies energy policy priorities: clearly, allowing a policy
| to cause manslaughter is intuitively unacceptable. The high
| death tolls that can be attributed to current carbon emissions
| and that follow from this analysis have immediate and direct
| energy policy implications.
|
| https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/16/16/6074
| nine_zeros wrote:
| Some of those graphs map exactly to the rising stock market over
| decades.
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