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‘We should have better answers by now’: climate scientists baffled by unexpected pace of heating

Temperatures above 50C used to be a rarity confined to two or three global hotspots, but the World Meteorological Organization noted that at least 10 countries have reported this level of searing heat in the past year: the US, Mexico, Morocco, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iran, Pakistan, India and China.

In Iran, the heat index – a measure that also includes humidity – has come perilously close to 60C, far above the level considered safe for humans.

Heatwaves are now commonplace elsewhere, killing the most vulnerable, worsening inequality and threatening the wellbeing of future generations. Unicef calculates a quarter of the world’s children are already exposed to frequent heatwaves, and this will rise to almost 100% by mid-century.

undergroundoverground , (edited )

The reason nothing will be done is because the only realistic option we have to save our planets ability to sustain life is economic degrowth.

We don’t have enough of the minerals we need to go fully nuclear or renewable and even getting close would use up vast amounts of the very same energy were looking to save in the first place.

As the record levels of equality directly after ww2 showed, economic degrowth due to nearly all the men being at war, only results in the loss of the super rich which is why they’ll never allow economic degrowth.

We all work too much, produce too much and pollute too much. Worse, we’re all forced to produce the very wealth thats used to force us into wage-slavery and kill our planet.

The answer is and will always be the strategic refusal of labour, above what we need to survive and have a good quality of life. This, by default, will result in economic degrowth.

Want to sit around and do nothing to save the planet? Well, now you can.

Samvega OP ,

The answer is and will always be the strategic refusal of labour, above what we need to survive and have some quality of life. This, by default, will result in economic degrowth.

It’s at the point where I don’t accept the label of being human. Humans lack the logic and morality I identify with.

explodicle ,

What are you then? A primate? A posthuman?

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Is this the start of a furry fic

Samvega OP ,

Autistic people identify as non-, or other-than- human in other ways than furry, e.g. Machinekin or Alienkin.

Me? I just don’t want the label of human, because I don’t respect human society.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

You don’t have to be autistic for any of this. Also, never said the only other option besides human was furry. I merely ASKED if this was the start of a furry fic due to the romantic tension and pacing of the comments

Samvega OP , (edited )

I’m a living being who does not want to associate with humans.

Autistic people are more likely to be Therian (identify as partly non-human and non-humanoid animal): Therianthropy: Wellbeing, Schizotypy, and Autism in Individuals Who Self-Identify as Non-Human, Clegg et al., Society & Animals 2019.

Looking at some brief descriptions of the terms (I’m only mildly aware of them) there is also the related group of Otherkin, who identify as not fully human, but do identify full with human-like sapience. The personal experiences of a ‘Machinekin’ (identifying as part sapient robot) are presented in _ Exploring Other-Than-Human Identity: Religious Experiences in the Life-Story of a Machinekin _, Shea, S.C, 2020, published in Religions. Neve discusses the relationship between autism and feeling othered in terms of gender and non-human Machinekin identity first hand.

Searching for autistic and otherkin, I find regular discussions in autistic spaces about how people believe their otherkin and autistic identities and experiences overlap. Much of this is in Autism / Neurodivergence discords, which can’t be searched. However, these discords provide a managed group of fellow travellers with information that doesn’t leak out to search engines. Nevertheless, some discussion about this is searchable. Here’s one comment:

Alienkin. So much wrong planet syndrome. Hi, yes. Not alien, definitely relate to alienness though.

So much of my life spent asking “Why do neurotypicals do X thing?” only to later find out that they do it because it’s done, it’s their social identity. If their social identity mows the lawn, they mow the lawn. It doesn’t matter that there’s a cost of noise pollution and ecological destruction. They do it because their social identity does it. If their social identity revolved around jumping off of cliffs, they’d do that too. It’s why there’s so much “acceptable” ritual sacrifice, war, and other such horrific acts of atrocity throughout human history.

So I definitely relate to alienness. To do something “because it is done, the done thing” is the most utterly bizarre and strange concept to me. I understand to do something if it might be ethical, or kind, or clever, with an accompanying reason. But because “it is done?” It’s bizarre.

Another discussion is titled “Does being autistic feel like being a robot who is trying to learn how to be human?” Top responses agree to this, giving various explanations of why it occurs, or how it feels, including:

I feel more like I’m missing a sense. It’s like in every interaction in a group there is a second conversation only I can’t hear that tells people when It’s their turn to speak and elaborates on what the person means. I’m watching everything and analyzing everything to try to figure out what everyone else is getting that I’m not.

and

Yea kinda, or like an alien, who forgot his human handbook on scp147, if you have seen the show resident alien, I related a sadly large amount to the alien.

and

That’s why folks called me Dr. Spock growing up. I come from Vulcan, live long and prosper

There are questions about this on sites like Quora, with responses like “I’ve known since I was a kid that I had autism, so this might not relate to me. However, as a kid, I called myself an alien in this world. It’s probably common when it comes to robots, but I was an alien to this world.”

areyouevenreal ,

Unless you are legitimately an alien or a cat or something that somehow got on Lemmy (and I apologize if this is the case), then you are a human. You can’t identify your way out of being a member of this species.

The fact my fellow autistic people are disidentifying from humanity is extremely concerning. Even worse I can understand why given the behaviour of so many humans being what it is. Plus constantly being marginalized in human societies doesn’t help.

The solution though isn’t to stop identifying as being human and pretend to be something else. The solution is to re-evaluate what being human is. Too much emphasis in popular culture is placed on humanity or being human as some positive thing where someone who is truly human couldn’t be the villain or the mass murderer. The reality is the human race is broad and doing a genocide is just as human as inventing the vaccine for TB. Those things we can do because we are human, with human capabilities. Another animal wouldn’t think to make a vaccine, or to do a genocide, they do what they because of instincts, learned behavior, and survival.

Samvega OP ,

Unless you are legitimately

I’m legitimately someone who has no emotional connection to humans as a group.

The solution though isn’t to stop identifying as being human and pretend to be something else.

Fun fact: a lot about what it means to be humans is also pretending to be human. Apart from the observable biological / genetic / genealogical classification differences, everything else about humanity is entirely created by humans, and they can disagree about many features of it.

I have no interest in that pretence. I do not identify with humans. If you want to change that, endorse society / the majority to attempt to feed all children. That’s my moral benchmark for when I will feel like I align with human principles.

Another animal wouldn’t think to make a vaccine

I am absolutely and completely sure that time and space are both infinite, and therefore the chance of us being the only intelligent life is zero.
I am also absolutely and completely sure that, given that time and space is infinite, and cosmological time involves the destruction and rebirth of the existence of matter itself in a cyclical process, that humans are - given an objective view of cosmological time - no more important than any other animal. We, and all our works, are just as transient.

areyouevenreal , (edited )

Fun fact: a lot about what it means to be humans is also pretending to be human. Apart from the observable biological / genetic / genealogical classification differences, everything else about humanity is entirely created by humans, and they can disagree about many features of it.

Humanity is a species. Homo sapiens. Anyone claiming otherwise has fallen into the trap set by movies and popular culture about inhumane actions, dehumanizing the other, and every other time people who are homo sapiens are not teated as humans.

I have no interest in that pretence. I do not identify with humans. If you want to change that, endorse society / the majority to attempt to feed all children. That’s my moral benchmark for when I will feel like I align with human principles.

There is no single moral standard for our entire species. In fact while I am here I will say there is no proof for any kind of morality even existing in the objective universe. It’s an entirely made up concept. If we ever encounter aliens of what have you there is a good chance they have radically different behavioral standards for their species than ours.

I am absolutely and completely sure that time and space are both infinite, and therefore the chance of us being the only intelligent life is zero.
I am also absolutely and completely sure that, given that time and space is infinite, and cosmological time involves the destruction and rebirth of the existence of matter itself in a cyclical process, that humans are - given an objective view of cosmological time - no more important than any other animal. We, and all our works, are just as transient.

Well that escalated quickly. You went from plausible science to making up bullshit very quickly.

destruction and rebirth of the existence of matter itself in a cyclical process

Yeah you apparently don’t know much about modern physics.

Weather or not aliens do exist changes nothing about the fact you are human. You can’t escape that incontrovertible biological fact. Don’t even try. Stop listening to society cry “oh the humanity” and actually look at the facts. Humanity is just an intelligent species, not a moral standard to cling to or something to turn around and reject.

Samvega OP , (edited )

Thank you for telling me you don’t respect my Buddhist beliefs, it’s been very interesting.

Very good job at making me want to identify with humans more, as well.

areyouevenreal ,

I had no idea you were Buddhist. Yeah I don’t respect epistemological claims of any religion without evidence and neither should you. I am not going to treat Buddhism any better than Christianity just because they got a few things right regarding mediation. There are two things you should always remember: What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

Edit: the fact you thought you had me cornered there is hilarious. The “you don’t respect my beliefs” card doesn’t work when making unscientific claims, or just in general when talking to a rational person.

Samvega OP , (edited )

Yeah I don’t respect

I can see.

A rational person can see that major features of a moral system can be defined by objective reasoning. If I prefer to live than to die, killing is wrong. If I prefer to have my needs met rather than neglecting, helping others to meet their needs is correct. If I prefer health… I prefer to be treated with respect… and so on.

Asserting that there are aliens who prefer to die, kill, feel pain, die of starvation, be sick, be treated without respect etc. does not seem realistic as it is not logically possible. How long would those aliens survive? We can only surmise aliens who ignore these facts, which is perfectly understandable, because ignorance is a common state. Someone who pretends that hurting other is moral because “I’m better” is not being objective, which is why living beings clearly spend so much time rationalising.

In this sense, Buddhism’s ethics have some striking parallels with those of Classical Greek philosophers, esp. Socrates.

areyouevenreal ,

This is a distraction. This whole conversation started talking about you not identifying as human, and me pointing out that human is just a biological category. To believe otherwise is to buy into propaganda written by humans directed and directed at other humans who’s behavior they want to influence in some way. You still haven’t actually countered this argument.

Though I will say you seem to be confusing natural selection, individual or group desires, and morality with each other. You need to get you’re head straight on what the differences are before you start making arguments about morality. I would argue that objective morality doesn’t exist. You’re kind of right about how subjective morality came to be, but you might want to work on the details. Plenty of animals even on earth sacrifice themselves for their children, as the aim in natural selection isn’t survival or the individual but survival of the genes. People have used this lens to explain things like racism and genocide as preserving people with similar genes to yourself, but I would have no idea if that is actually the case as I am not an evolutionary biologist.

AngryCommieKender ,

Uranium is extremely common on Earth. What minerals are we lacking to go nuclear? If you were arguing that we need to switch the type of reactors we use, I could see that. A lack of fissile material isn’t an issue.

undergroundoverground ,

If I remember correctly, we don’t have enough of it to go fully nuclear with our current energy demands. More so, we’ve mined nearly all of the soil thats anything above 0.02% uranium. As such, not only do we not have enough on the planet, getting it and refining it would almost defeat the whole point of doing so in the first place.

It is a problem in that there might be plenty of it but that doesn’t mean there’s enough.

Just to be clear, I’m not saying we have to go back to the stone ages. Its just that we can’t afford the super rich anymore.

Ohmmy ,

Pretty sure there’s enough weapons grade plutonium to run the US for 100 years in decommissioned nuclear weapons alone.

I think 100 years is enough time to build pumped hydro storage and renewables like solar/wind.

undergroundoverground ,

The problem is that there a major, major shortage of one of the isotopes needed to re-enrich weapons grade uranium (pu 238). Thats before you get to the vast energy inefficiency of doing it which isn’t a problem, if you’re just decommissioning them anyway and you don’t care about energy consumption. However, in this instance, you would need to worry about energy consumption as well as the isotope there won’t be enough of to convert even a fraction of it.

Again, even if you had 100 years, there aren’t enough of the specialist minerals needed for hydro storage and renewables.

Essentially theres" a hole in our bucket."

The only answer is degrowth.

Ohmmy ,

cnbc.com/…/nuclear-waste-us-could-power-the-us-fo…

specialist minerals needed for hydro storage and renewables

What specialist materials are we talking about? Wind, solar, and pumped hydro use primarily copper, silicon, carbon, and concrete.

undergroundoverground ,

I’m not saying it can’t be converted or that the amount couldn’t, if refined, potentially fuel America for a number of years. So, I’m not sure what the link was for. I said its not feasible, due to the inefficiency of doing it on mass.

What about the energy transition materials like lithium, nickel and cobalt? We don’t have enough of those. All the windmills in the world won’t help, if you can’t convert motion into electricity.

Even then, copper looks to be facing an impending shortage. More still, refining enough silicone to supply the world with and keep up with increased demand of energy would have a colossal carbon footprint, almost big enough to cancel out the benefit. You’ll have to start refining soil thats 0.000000000001% silicone before you got even halfway through. Yeah, we have loads of these things but getting enough of it, in a pure enough form, to power the whole world simply isn’t realistic.

We can’t keep up with the speed that we increase our energy usage with the resources we have on the planet. Its a circular problem with only one solution. I’m not saying we have to go back to the primitive. We just have the treat the planet as though its resources are finite.

They’ll sell us any flavour of distraction other than “work less, do less, slow down and enjoy life more.” Whatever way you cut it, its the only answer.

aesthelete ,

They’ll sell us any flavour of distraction other than “work less, do less, slow down and enjoy life more.” Whatever way you cut it, its the only answer.

It’s really telling that this is regarded as such a terrible thing by almost everyone.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Thank your local homeless person for doing their part in degrowth and underconsumption. Socrates and Jesus were finally vindicated. They really are the saints here.

Ohmmy ,

You seem to be trying to push a narrative that I don’t oppose as if I do. I support degrowth but your reasons are flawed.

Pumped Hydro, solar, and wind don’t really use lithium, nickel, or cobalt. Those are mostly used in NCM Liion cells that none of these use. Permanent magnets would probably be the biggest headache tbh.

Idk why we’d need silicone, we’re not making sex toys here. /s silicon is most common in sand and rocks, something there is plenty of basically everywhere.

I don’t care what you’re saying for this circular problem. I’ve literally not addressed it once because I agree with you, I just don’t agree with your reasoning.

undergroundoverground ,

Pushing a narrative is an interesting description of it.

You have to be able to store energy from renewables. How do you plan to store it without those? How to you plan for the shortfall of natural energy compared to energy consumption when you can’t meet it with nuclear?

I’m saying you because you’re claiming my reasons are flawed. I’m glad we agree on degrowth though.

Its late here and maybe I got confused. I thought I was talking about refined silicon though. Even though that’s still wrong lol.

If you’re refuting my reasons for degrowth on the basis that we can use nuclear and renewables to get around it, then its a circular problem. The energy needed to make enough to do it, with our current energy usage, with a rising population would cause so much carbon emissions. They’re just so inefficient.

What would your reasons for degrowth be then? I’d genuinely like to know.

areyouevenreal ,

Go read my other comment. Batteries don’t need rare materials for grid scale storage. It’s the small ones in phones that need things like Nickel, Cobalt, and Lithium to be as energy dense as possible. Grid storage began phasing out Nickel and Cobalt a while ago and will eventually phase out Lithium as Sodium batteries get better and cheaper.

Current nuclear is a sad joke compared to what we learned we could do even 50 years ago. The initial investment for nuclear is always expensive, but the pay off is cheap energy for like 40 or 50 years. While it does release CO2 to make new reactors there are ways around even that. Using less or no concrete would be a great start. Making iron is kind of hard though, I will give you that. Maybe we will have to switch to aluminum or something.

Consumer electronics are probably the biggest problem we can’t solve right now. That’s why we need devices made to last and things like the right to repair. Getting rid of individual vehicles would really help too, as trains can accept power straight from the grid without needing huge batteries.

undergroundoverground ,

But they haven’t phased them out and we have nothing close to the grid storage we would need to switch to renewables. Even then, they will never provide the amount of energy we need to meet current usage.

At our current rate of usage, we will run out of viable uranium sources within 80 years. If we switched the worlds energy to nuclear, it wouldn’t last 5.

The only realistic option is for the world to use less.

areyouevenreal ,

At our current rate of usage, we will run out of viable uranium sources within 80 years. If we switched the worlds energy to nuclear, it wouldn’t last 5.

This is completely absurd as I keep telling you. The vast majority of the uranium in “spent” nuclear fuel is untouched. Current reactors are a joke compared to what even the Soviet Union could come up with in 1980. Imagine leaving over 90% of your meal on the table and calling it spent.

undergroundoverground ,

You can declare it to be thus and such all you like. I keel telling you, we will run out of what we know exists now within 80 or 90 years, at current usage.

You just don’t like it and that’s not the same as it not being true.

I keep telling you, the energy cost of doing it makes it non viable, as any kind of meaningful solution but you keep repeating it all the same.

areyouevenreal ,

You can declare it to be thus and such all you like. I keel telling you, we will run out of what we know exists now within 80 or 90 years, at current usage.

What do keels have to do with nuclear power? Unless we are talking about submarines?

You just don’t like it and that’s not the same as it not being true.

No it isn’t true. For a start you are focusing only on concentrated diposits. There is enough uranium to last humanity in sea water for 100 years, it’s just hard to get at. You’re also completely ignoring U-238, and Thorium. You haven’t even provided a source once. Since apparently sources aren’t necessary I might as well tell you that there is enough uranium in you’re house to power the entire world for a billion years and that you need to stop hoarding it. See I can make up things too.

I keep telling you, the energy cost of doing it makes it non viable, as any kind of meaningful solution but you keep repeating it all the same.

What energy cost? Reactors produce energy on average, not remove it. That’s as true for the fast breeder reactors I sourced as it is for conventional nuclear reactors. Do you actually have any evidence for any of this bullshit?

undergroundoverground , (edited )

Sources aren’t necessarily for widely accepted facts. You just don’t like what you’re hearing and want to sealion it away.

Like I said, getting it and refining it is the problem.

Don’t worry, its clear that you’ve been making things up the whole time. I’m happy to provide sources for serious people, having serious conversations. Not you and your jokes.

You provided one source that fast breeder reactors were built in the former soviet union. Had you been refuting me saying “no other fuel can ever be used” it might have been a useful link. However, I didn’t. So, it wasn’t useful.

Reactors don’t produce or create energy. They release it. Are you trying to tell me that you literally can’t understand a scenario where the energy cost of refining and or gathering something could be more than what is eventually released?

If you think I’m going to waste my life researching links to prove, to your personal satisfaction, everything that you just plain don’t like then you really are deluded.

areyouevenreal ,

Sources aren’t necessarily for widely accepted facts. You just don’t like what you’re hearing and want to sealion it away.

It’s not a widely accepted fact at all. Ask three different scientists and you will get three different anwsers.

It isn’t sealioning when I provide sources and you don’t.

Don’t worry, its clear that you’ve been making things up the whole time. I’m happy to provide sources for serious people, having serious conversations. Not you and your jokes.

Where have I done that? I am the one coming at you with actual sources and reading material. You have no proof. They say every accusation is a confession, and that’s exactly what this is.

You provided one source that fast breeder reactors were built in the former soviet union. Had you been refuting me saying “no other fuel can ever be used” it might have been a useful link. However, I didn’t. So, it wasn’t useful.

Actually I did. Twice no less. I gave you the Thorium fuel cycle, where you make your own Uranium from Thorium. I also gave the fuel cycle using U-238, which is a different isotope to the U-235 used by current reactors.

I am out right now but I can point you to more sources and better explanations of fuel cycles than mine feel free to ask. Honestly though I think you would just ignore them anyway. If you want to find them yourself look at the molten salt reactor experiments, progress made on LFTR reactors, or the third shipping port reactor in the USA. Those are all experimental I will admit, which is why I pointed to the Soviet and Russian reactors first that produce and use Plutonium, as those are less experimental.

Note I am not talking about fusion reactor technology, as while that’s very promising it isn’t even close to being implemented. If that does become viable at some point then all of this becomes irrelevant anyway, as fusion is likely to be the best available power source at that point.

Reactors don’t produce or create energy. They release it. Are you trying to tell me that you literally can’t understand a scenario where the energy cost of refining and or gathering something could be more than what is eventually released?

Okay so maybe my wording is a little off I will give you that. You are correct that energy is neither created nor destroyed.

undergroundoverground ,

They say every accusation is a confession, and that’s exactly what this is.

Yeah, I stopped reading at the lazy recycled rhetoric.

As you love sources to much, provide a source showing that our energy consumption can increase perpetually

Or is that not how things work?

areyouevenreal ,

Yeah, I stopped reading at the lazy recycled rhetoric.

You mean like the rhetoric you have been using this entire time?

As you love sources to much, provide a source showing that our energy consumption can increase perpetually

Or is that not how things work?

That’s not what I am saying. Go and read up on what fertile and fissile are. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fertile_material

You can convert a fertile material to a fissile material, then fission that to produce energy. The energy though was already in the fertile material to begin with plus a little bit from the neutrons you added. Eventually you will run out of fertile material, but that’s a long way away. For example’s sake you would might start with Th-232 which is fertile, add a neutron to get U-233, then fission U-233 to get energy plus some smaller elements called fission products. All of this is nuclear engineering 101. I am not a nuclear physicist and even I understand this.

You can’t call everything you don’t understand or don’t know about made up. It would actually be funny if it wasn’t so depressing. The lack of scientific literacy some people have, and the unwillingness to learn you and others demonstrate is truly sad. It wouldn’t even be so bad if you were willing to admit you don’t know and just walk away. I can understand and respect not caring about nuclear enough to actually research it so long as you are willing to admit that. Instead you are sat there arguing about basic principles of nuclear physics and engineering, the kind of things I learned in sixth form, and calling me a liar just because I know more than you do.

Ragnarok314159 ,

Neo magnets would be an issue to scale, but there are previous generation magnet material that will work just fine. It’s not as strong is all.

areyouevenreal ,

Most of the big generators on the grid don’t even have permanent magnets. They use electromagnets. This means they need some electricity to be added to get them started up, but once they are running they are self-sustaining. Normally that initial jolt is provided by backup generator or by battery.

Ragnarok314159 ,

The posts are interesting (I didn’t look at all of them) but I am weary of accepting all the conclusions drawn. S/He states a lot of facts, but then does a “therefore it must be (this)”

areyouevenreal ,

What about the energy transition materials like lithium, nickel and cobalt? We don’t have enough of those. All the windmills in the world won’t help, if you can’t convert motion into electricity.

We literally don’t need any of those. Grid scale storage I don’t think has used Nickel and Cobalt for some time, as the best way is to use Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries which need fewer replacements (longer cycle life) and are less volatile (explosive). Sodium batteries remove the need for even Lithium. Sodium is many times more abundant btw. As bad as they are Lead Acid batteries are also an option, as well as many other battery technologies made with less rare earth materials. Heck you could just do pumped hydro and not worry about batteries at all.

You also don’t need any of those materials to make electricity from motion. A generator is a fairly simple device needing only coils of wire and a few moving parts. Some need permanent magnets but even that isn’t hard really. Storing power was always the problem, not making it.

Likewise current reactors are a joke in terms of fuel efficiency. Basing any estimate on current reactor technology being used is kind of silly, as we already know we can do so much better. The majority of earth’s nuclear fuel is in fertile materials, not fissile materials. We have known this for a long time by the way. Decades ago countries like the USA and Japan were doing research into reactors using U-238, more than 100 times as abundant as U-235. It has been demonstrated that breeder reactors for Plutonium from U-238 are feasible even 50 or 60 years ago. The reason we don’t do this is because U-235 reactors were determined to be cheaper, and probably safer. I think sacrificing some safety and cost is necessary when up against something like climate change. With modern technology I am sure safety issues could be reduced or eliminated. Likewise Thorium is a thing, but that’s more experimental than U-238 to Plutonium technology.

If we are talking about solar panels: just don’t. Solar panels are mostly glass and silicon. I believe some rarer materials are needed to make them as efficient as they are now, but that doesn’t mean they are actually needed. In fact why bother with solar panels at all? They aren’t even the most efficient way of turning solar power into useful energy. Solar systems that work using mirrors to heat molten salt have their own energy storage built-in, and don’t require exotic materials, and are more efficient anyway. They might require more investment, or be more complex to deploy, but overall they are a great option.

Degrowth might be necessary in the short term. Long term wise though humanity very much has room to grow further. We haven’t even talked about mining the moon yet, and if we can’t do that we are very much screwed anyway. Being dependant on one planet is horrifically bad for long term survivability. You think climate change is an extinction level event? Try a gamma ray blast from a pulsar.

All you’ve really demonstrated is that you don’t understand technology specifically renewables and nuclear. There is a real concern with lack of rare materials, but not for renewables. The real issue is computers. Modern computers and especially smartphones need a lot of rare things. So constantly replacing your smartphone might not be practical anymore, and things like battery life and processing speed might actually get worse for a while as we are forced to use alternative materials. Not really a huge deal in the scheme of things though.

Also thinking the rich elite are the only people consuming things at an unsustainable rate is hilarious. They use more resources per person obviously, but the number of them is also really small. If you actually looked into it you would probably find that lost of the consuming of resources is to support the lower and middle classes. Don’t get me wrong oil executives are a real issue because of how they effect government policy and the behaviour of the rest of society. They do deserve a significant share of the blame. Not every rich person is an oil executive though. Having ultra rich people around is bad but this isn’t the reason why.

undergroundoverground ,

You don’t need any of those things…well other than the nickel in the coils I specificallymention and the other components that I clearly know nothing about…

Pipe dreams are lovely and all that but until we have something more solid, its best to dismiss the use of other isotopes as it’ll take a decade just to build the power station needed to make the energy. Thats before we get to the time it will actually take to fully research it all.

You’re attempting to argue that I don’t know about renewables or the technology necessary to go green and you’re talking about mining THE MOON in order to, wait for it, lower carbon emissions of all things.

The fucking moon

No wonder you found it so funny. I never said “the rich elite are the only people consuming things at an unsustainable rate.” Honestly, you’re hilarious for attempting to twist what was said into that. Have some intellectual integrity please.

You’ve failed so hard at an “akshually” but please do carry on. As I guessed, you’re against degrowth as anything but a temporary measure and rather than having the spine to come out and stand for it, you try waffle instead.

Just want to leave this here, in case you choose to delete it later

If you actually looked into it you would probably find that lost of the consuming of resources is to support the lower and middle classes

areyouevenreal ,

You don’t need any of those things…well other than the nickel in the coils I specificallymention and the other components that I clearly know nothing about…

Nickel in generator coils? What? They are mode from copper. Sometimes aluminum because it’s cheaper than copper. The majority of nickel isn’t even used in things like batteries, it’s used to make steel alloys like stainless steel and heat resistant alloys used for engine parts. Also you keep pretending all of these material aren’t recyclable. Metals can be reshaped an indefinite number of times. It’s like arguing you can only use water once.

Pipe dreams are lovely and all that but until we have something more solid, its best to dismiss the use of other isotopes as it’ll take a decade just to build the power station needed to make the energy. That’s before we get to the time it will actually take to fully research it all.

I am not talking about a pipedream. I am talking about something that was actually implemented in the soviet union. This isn’t Thorium that has never had a commerical implementation that was successful. Both of these reactors are still operational:

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BN-800_reactor

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BN-600_reactor

There is even a third one that has now been decommissioned, but still operated for around 20 years.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BN-350_reactor

You’re attempting to argue that I don’t know about renewables or the technology necessary to go green and you’re talking about mining THE MOON in order to, wait for it, lower carbon emissions of all things.

The fucking moon

You’re lost again. I am talking about doing that in the long term after we have decarbonized.

No wonder you found it so funny. I never said “the rich elite are the only people consuming things at an unsustainable rate.” Honestly, you’re hilarious for attempting to twist what was said into that. Have some intellectual integrity please.

Given you kept talking about the elite and how they can’t exist in your degrowth scenario, it seemed to me that blame was implied. I am not being dishonest here. If anything you are the one changing goal posts by doing the whole I didn’t say that routine when it’s clearly implied.

You’ve failed so hard at an “akshually” but please do carry on. As I guessed, you’re against degrowth as anything but a temporary measure and rather than having the spine to come out and stand for it, you try waffle instead.

Yes. Did I not say it isn’t necessary in the long term? I thought I stated it pretty clearly. I don’t support long term degrowth anymore than I support shrinking the human population long term. Maybe the population of earth specifically, but not the population of all humanity.

I am still waiting for a response to that last quote. I think you’ve found something you can’t dispute.

undergroundoverground ,

Good job there isn’t a copper shortage coming …

Oh wait

Nickel is used in the alloys needed in wind turbines and solar panels.

Theres no factual basis to what you’re saying. You’re just declaring utter bollocks to be thus and such.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BN-800_reactor

Youre saying they don’t use uranium or are you trying to move the goal posts again?

Oh, I see, mining the moon is a solution for when we’ve already fixed the problem. No wonder it was so confusing.

it seemed to me that blame was implied.

No, you just made that up and its not implied. They can’t exist without vast amounts of excess labour being undertaken. Im saying its two birds with one stone. That doesn’t mean I’m saying that they made all the emissions. If that’s genuinely what you read from those words then you have a problem. Youre just grasping at straws here.

It took a long time to drag out of you.

Well, far be for me to have to explain to you the finite nature of the planet you find yourself on. Who knows, maybe perpetual growth on a finite planet is possible? Maybe all the scientists and the laws on entropy are wrong and youre right? Maybe thats a thing that could happen in the real world?

I am still waiting for a response to that last quote. I think you’ve found something you can’t dispute.

Omg, yeah, you got me. I can’t dispute that there are more “lower” and middle class people in the world. Well done you.

areyouevenreal ,

Youre saying they don’t use uranium or are you trying to move the goal posts again?

Nope not at all. Do you understand what an isotope is? The vast majority of Uranium on earth is U-238. Ordinary reactors mainly use U-235 with less usage of U-238. If you look at the composition of “spent” fuel you would see most of it is unreacted Uranium. Likewise the depleted uranium produced in manufacturing new reactor fuel can also be used by turning it into Plutonium.

Normally when people talk about running out of Uranium they are talking about U-235. Since you have provided no source I can only presume this is what you mean. If you could link your source we could actually talk about it.

You might want to actually read up on closing the fuel cycle, this is where you reuse previously used fuel. One of the reactors I am talking about uses plutonium as part of it’s fuel source. Plutonium can only have come from other reactors, meaning it’s reusing either material from nuclear weapons that was originally produced in military reactors, or from waste produced by other civilian power reactors. It’s called a breeder reactor because it produces more fissile material than it actually burns. This fissile material comes from converting fertile U-238 into fissile Plutonium. All of this stuff is a google search away.

Here are some places you can start learning about this stuff:

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactor-grade_plutonium

This is again without getting into the Thorium fuel cycle which involves converting Thorium-232 into Uranium-233. This has been done before in the USA but only on a small scale. If this could be scaled up you could make your own Uranium without mining it. It would require some U-235 to start with but would become self-sustaining in a couple of years. You can read about it here:

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium_fuel_cycle

Oh, I see, mining the moon is a solution for when we’ve already fixed the problem. No wonder it was so confusing

I am talking about plans for expansion once the global warming situation is resolved. I probably should have stated this more clearly which is my fault. I apologize for causing confusion.

Also pretending Nuclear is the only option is even more funny. Solar and wind are the cheaper energy sources. There are plenty of other options too like geothermal, tidal, hydro, and so on.

Honestly man just take the loss and actually read up on stuff next time. It’s great for your education to actually learn how science and technology works, instead of grasping at straws. You’ve painted yourself into a corner where regardless of whether you are correct or not you don’t actually understand enough to defend your arguments. You aren’t informed enough to determine if things like degrowth are actually necessary or not. Heck I am not informed enough to make those decisions either, and I understand this stuff better than you do, especially the basics of nuclear fuel cycles. Ultimately this comes down to engineering and scientific considerations, and frankly you don’t strike me as an engineer. While I am a scientist this isn’t my area either, and I shouldn’t be called on to make policy decisions in this area.

undergroundoverground ,

I mean, you could Google “uranium shortage” and find what you need very quickly. Again, I’m not spending my evening teaching you and providing you with sources that you’re unable to refute in any way, despite your best efforts. I’m sure you’ve convinced yourself that anyone who doesn’t do that for you must be wrong but thats just not how the world works.

I’ve already told you how there isn’t enough of the materials we need to make sufficient numbers of solar panels or wind turbines, let alone figure out a way to store the energy for when we need it later.

Why is the default position that there has to be enough of what we need to do that, unless proven wrong?

Degrowth doesn’t have to mean smaller.

I used to do research too but then I left for a career that paid more. Not that something like that would make me right or more believable, of course. No, that would be ridiculous.

Im not really sure why you decided to bring up your career in an unrelated field. Honestly, if I was arguing for perpetual growth on a finite planet, I wouldn’t tell anyone I was a scientist, let alone demand someone “take the L” for having to explain to you that our energy consumption can’t grow perpetually.

areyouevenreal ,

I mean, you could Google “uranium shortage” and find what you need very quickly. Again, I’m not spending my evening teaching you and providing you with sources that you’re unable to refute in any way, despite your best efforts. I’m sure you’ve convinced yourself that anyone who doesn’t do that for you must be wrong but thats just not how the world works.

Yeah there will eventually be a shortage of U-235. I fully admit that. There isn’t and won’t be a shortage of either Th-232 or U-238 for over 100 years at least. By then we will probably have found something else. That’s just thinking about nuclear fission as well. To me nuclear fission is about filling in the gaps that renewables can’t cover until we work out energy storage, nuclear fusion, neutrinovoltaics, or something entirely new. Nuclear fission is one of the best power sources we have today, but I don’t expect that to always be the case.

Nuclear fusion uses completely different fuels (no uranium, plutonium, or thorium) that have their own sourcing considerations. Getting fuel sources for fusion might legitimately be a problem, but we don’t know that yet as we haven’t picked which kinds of fusion fuel we are going to use yet. Current experiments involve things like tritium which have to be made artificially from other isotopes like deuterium using particle accelerators or nuclear reactors. This is used at the moment because it’s the easiest to do fusion with. There are other options though, and eventually we might work out how to do fusion with ordinary hydrogen (protium/H1). Since hydrogen (specifically protium/H1) is the most abundant material or isotope in the Universe and is found in everyday water that’s obviously the best option if we can build a reactor to use it.

I’ve already told you how there isn’t enough of the materials we need to make sufficient numbers of solar panels or wind turbines, let alone figure out a way to store the energy for when we need it later.

Why use solar panels? You can use concentrated solar power that doesn’t rely on photovoltaics. You instead use mirrors to heat up water or salt, that then drives a turbine or a thermochemical reaction. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentrated_solar_power

Also what materials are we running out of for solar panels? From what I have seen there are multiple ways to make solar panels using different materials, some more efficient than others. Most of them seem to be made from a mixture of silicon, glass, and metal. All of which are fairly abundant material, and at least some of which can be recycled.

Wind turbines are essentially glorified windmills with an electric generator hooked up. They can be made from any number of materials. Thus includes wood for the part that catches the wind. Likewise the generator portion can be made from any number of metals so long as they can be turned into wires. Steel and aluminum aren’t as good as copper for sure, but they still work in a pinch. There are already multiple designs in use throughout the world and at different scales. They are built the way they are now because it gives the best return on investment. That’s just how capitalism works, for better or for worse. It’s not hard to imagine a world where we use something else because we ran out of the cheapest available material and it’s cheaper to use something different than to recycle it.

You also conveniently forget that recycling is a thing. In physics matter and energy is conserved. You can convert matter into energy and back again too. Even when you burn something like a fossil fuel it doesn’t just disappear, it becomes things like carbon dioxide or water as I am sure you know. With enough time and energy you can turn that carbon dioxide back into coal or diesel or whatever is you started with, or into something else entirely. The only things you can truly run out of is lack of entropy. Entropy can only increase, so matter in a low entropy state is always at a premium.

I’ve already told you how there isn’t enough of the materials we need to make sufficient numbers of solar panels or wind turbines, let alone figure out a way to store the energy for when we need it later.

Storage is indeed a problem I will give you that. Part of the solution to this is new technologies like sodium ion batteries that are gaining traction at the moment. Some of it will come from closing down factories when power is low, and starting them back up when there is a surplus.

Degrowth isn’t even a complete solution either. While I strongly disagree that the economy can grow to infinity like some economists believe, I also don’t think it can shrink forever too. There needs to be give and take. I believe the economy should grow and shrink in accordance with people’s needs and the available resources. To me the extreme pro growth and degrowth movements are both extremists.

undergroundoverground ,

Jesus christ, is this the closest thing you’ve had to human interaction today or something?

areyouevenreal ,

I was trying to be reasonable with you. It seems you’re not actually capable of that if this is how you want to respond.

undergroundoverground ,

If that was what you were trying to do, you failed. Honestly, I don’t care enough about any subject to have to deal with you or your incessant ranting and poor social skills.

You didn’t like something you read online. Your objection is noted.

areyouevenreal ,

Okay let’s recap what actually happened here:

You support an extremely radical economic policy. This would be fine except your reasons for supporting it are based on a misunderstanding of science, technology, and economics. I call you out on it and you repeatedly call me a liar for explaining stuff that’s well known science and engineering just because you don’t understand it and it goes against your position. Then you attack me personally and insult my social skills despite everything you just did.

Honestly I hope I never have to deal with you again. You’re incapable of admitting you don’t know something if that something doesn’t support your argument. Despite supporting what I thought was a left wing position you use the exact same tactic as right wing where everything you don’t like or don’t understand just doesn’t exist.

I really hope you were lying about working as a researcher. Someone with your attitude should never be allowed anywhere near academia or science. I am glad you stopped being a researcher, and I hope you never get a job in that field again. The amount of damage you could do or have already done I dread to think.

undergroundoverground ,

You think you’re arguing your point but you’re not. You’re arguing mine.

areyouevenreal ,

uranium shortage

Fyi I had a quick look and all I can see is sources saying we need to build more uranium mines by 2030 to meet demand. Nothing about the earth running out.

areyouevenreal , (edited )

Im not really sure why you decided to bring up your career in an unrelated field. Honestly, if I was arguing for perpetual growth on a finite planet, I wouldn’t tell anyone I was a scientist, let alone demand someone “take the L” for having to explain to you that our energy consumption can’t grow perpetually.

I never argued for perpetual growth on earth. I think you’ve completely missed what I am talking about. I only started arguing with you because it became obvious you had no idea what you were talking about with regards to renewables and nuclear.

If you had started off by explaining that degrowth to you just meant not expanding infinitely on earth then most of this argument wouldn’t have even happened. I don’t support infinite growth on one planet either. I support expanding out into the solar system and even further away in the long term, but even that obviously has it’s limits somewhere.

To me it sounded like you were saying we can’t move to renewables without shrinking the economy massively and tanking standards of living.

Looking back at this argument I can see it’s one of those where neither party actually understands the others position, and is actually just arguing against what they think the other person believes.

primrosepathspeedrun ,

we need to get rid of them anyway, but do we have enough nuclear fuel, when combined with renewables+batteries, for base load?

undergroundoverground ,

Sure, I’m all for getting rid of them but it really seems to be the only option. It really won’t be that bad. It’ll just mean we can’t all take the piss with energy, lose the super rich, eat less meat and do a lot less work.

Its that we’ve all been made to see the idea of degrowth as something terrible because the rich would be the first thing to go. You just can’t have the rich without a vast amounts of excess production.

Please think about this: why shouldnt working less and polluting less be the first thing we should try, if we really wanted to save the planet etc.?

primrosepathspeedrun ,

I completely agree, but I also think we should be pursuing every avenue of possible solution simultaneously, some of which might be energy intensive. I have the feeling we are far more climate-fucked than is immediately apparent.

clouder300 ,

Thats WAY too expensive and takes way to long to build. Renewables are the answer. Sun, wind.

AngryCommieKender ,

Not enough rhodium and rubidium on earth to achieve that.

areyouevenreal ,

Since when do you need either of those to build a wind turbine? We are talking about very simple machines here, plenty of ways to build one.

AngryCommieKender ,

Need those for solar. They specified sun and wind.

areyouevenreal ,

You don’t need photovoltaics to use solar power. Never heard of the solar power tower? Or the ones using molten salt for heat storage?

AngryCommieKender , (edited )

The earth receives just over 1 billion watts of raw energy from the sun daily. Using that energy to boil steam to turn tubines caps that energy generation ability to 105,566,992 watts of power if we capture all the solar radiation that hits earth.

Humanity currently uses 17.5 terrawatts of power daily. How do you make up the 99% shortfall? Little hint, wind and hydroelectric isn’t enough to make up that gap. Nuclear is currently our only option outside of asteroid mining.

Edited: I read the number wrong.

areyouevenreal , (edited )

Humanity currently uses 17.5 terrawatts of power daily.

This makes zero sense. Do you mean terrawatt hour daily, or do you mean terrawatts averaged over a day? Terrawatts are a measure or power, not energy. Watts are joules per second. You can say you average a certain power in watts over a day.

Anyway since you can’t be trusted with basic physics apparently I am going to work it out myself.

We generate around 180,000 TWh per year according to our world in data. That’s about 493 TWh per day if we assume 365 days a year. That’s the same as 1774800 terrajoules per day. Since we are looking for joules per second (watts), we can then divide by the number of seconds in a day, which is 86400 seconds. This gives us 1774800/86400 = 20 TW. So you somehow got close to the right anwser without actually understanding the units involved.

The part where you are actually way off the mark is the 1 billion watt figure. According to MIT the sun actually gives us 173,000 TW continuously, or 173 PW (pettawatts). So 20 TW is tiny in comparison. Obviously I don’t expect us to capture all of that, but we are talking about things that aren’t even in the same units, nevermind order of magnitude. How you managed to get this so utterly wrong I have no idea. Just looking at it I can tell that number isn’t right, as China are planning to have 1200GW of solar capacity (that’s 1200 billion watts) by the end of 2024 according to The Guardian.

Solar power towers are reported between 12% and 25% efficient at demonstration scales according to wikipedia. Yet you are claiming just above 1% efficiency. This dosen’t sound like a great deal, but if you look into it photovoltaics aren’t doing that much better. It turns out that current commerical products only offer around 21.5% according to this wikipedia article. This varies a lot depending on how old the panel is (they degrade), how it was built, what proportion is shaded, if it moves to track the sun and so on. Both of these technologies have room for improvement. Panel efficiency can vary anywhere from up to 40.6% down to as low as 8.2% https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_panel#/media/File:NREL_PV_Module_Record_Efficiency_Chart.png.

Edit: You have made youself an example of why we need more scientific and numerical literacy. How you got numbers so hilariously wrong is truly beyond me.

AngryCommieKender ,

Got the numbers wrong because I relied on a quick search and got bad sources, apparently. I wasn’t claiming 1% efficiency, I calculated it at a generous 28%. The 1% is what was being produced vs what DDG said we needed.

areyouevenreal ,

No you didn’t. 28% percent of 1 gigawatt is 280 megawatts. I was incorrect to say 1%, but you didn’t exactly get it right either. 106 megawatts (or 105,566,992 watts as you put it, which is weirdly specific) is closer to 10%. I beg you check both your sources and your maths in future before you reply to someone.

Zacryon ,
@Zacryon@feddit.org avatar

Uranium is extremely common on Earth.

I wouldn’t be so uncritical about this. Depending on rate of consumption (and data source) the world’s Uranium supplies will last for about 50 to 200 years. (The latter a low demand scenario based on current consumption rates.)

Technological advancements may push these limits. Possibly even into 10.000 to 60.000 years, when filtering active substances from seawater, which is currently quite a timeframe to consider it long-term sustainable even for a limited resource. However, we’re not there yet.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

We also use thorium which is much more abundant than uranium.

primrosepathspeedrun ,

the reason nothing will be done

nothing will be done peacefully. plenty could be done.

see, the ultra rich die either way. either they kill everyone, including themselves, and end all life, or someone kills them. those are the only two outcomes here.

I mean, i guess they could just fuck off and stop being super rich. fuckerberg could be a creepy robot man who lives above his kinda cringe MMA dojo or something, but they’re not going to do that. I don’t think they’re psychologically capable of it.

Ragnarok314159 ,

It’s not so much Zuck and Elon, it’s the people above them. If the oil companies, banks, or military industrial complex wanted Elon gone he would be erased in less than 24 hours. They are the ones controlling the strings, and all they want is more power.

primrosepathspeedrun ,

just using them as examples because we know their names and a bit of their character. they COULD abandon their shit, stop fucking people over, stop trying to have control, and just be on the shitty side of normal people, and nobody who didn’t have to interact with their sleazy asses would fucking care.

except my argument is that they genuinely can’t. not because we wouldn’t let them, nto because it wouldn’t work, but because their brains are broken and they are incapable of letting go, and the only future we will ever get must be taken from their cold dead hands.

Ragnarok314159 ,

That makes sense. Thank you for responding.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Have you seen this person’s posts on Reddit?

www.reddit.com/user/backcountrydrifter/

They have some interesting sources and connections for how Elon maybe plays a part in all this. I don’t buy everything they say, but they do have good interviews and articles explaining Epstein, Trump, Putin, and MBS, and even Elon and how they relate. It’s worth perusing if you have time.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Elon is a little untouchable because of his Saudi connections (and yes I do think MBS would order a hit on him no problem, but he’s doing a service for them rn). And Zuck owns Meta which has the most users on its social sites worldwide iirc. Modern day currency isn’t always in capital- these days attention and clout are worth a LOT. Ad revenue is worth a lot. Less and less people are watching TV, so propaganda has to get in front of viewers in unique ways now.

LustyArgonianMana , (edited )
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Remember the Titanic sub? How those rich guys thought they knew more than scientists and engineers? When they died, I realized that was exactly what they were doing with our planet. They will kill us all for their ego and hubris. Quite clearly. That’s why they are building their bunkers and super cities and not allowing governments to actually address this issue - they think they’ll come out on top. And there’s evidence they’ve thought this since at least the 70s, so this implies a couple generations of them plotting to kill us.

primrosepathspeedrun ,

then governments can;t be trusted with the future of humanity. which I think I agree with.

but it’s not just their ego and hubris; it’s also their paranoia and addiction.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

What? What do you think a government is?

primrosepathspeedrun ,

a monopoly on the use of violence, for the purpose of entrenching inequality. also sometimes they build infrastructure so we don’t kill them, because actually controlling people with violence is profoundly inefficient.

racemaniac ,

I kind of hate this kind of narrative here.

Yeah, capitalism is shit etc… but let’s get to the real root cause: we’re all still animals, and want our pack to be the best. The root issue isn’t money, it’s power. Many societies wouldn’t mind degrowth if it didn’t mean all the others would bury them & dance on their grave.

If one single country would actually degrow, all the others would dominate it financially, loot it for all its worth, and unless it can completely 100% sustain itself without outside trade (pretty much impossible in our globalized society), it would mostly collapse. And even if it could sustain itself, the power imbalance would be so huge we’d run in all other kinds of issues soon (hey, why not just conquer that country that is pretty much powerless now?)

Imo we’re all just animals knowing we’re headed for extinction, but at the same time it’s a big game of chicken on the road, the first to stray from this path will get fucked in so many ways by all the others who see their chance to improve their situation… And imo capitalism isn’t the cause of that, but one of the results of this. It’s just another way for us to compete and try to fuck eachother over like the animals we still are.

So either we get to some near global agreement on how to get out of this situation, or we just keep doing far too little since… what’s the point of trying to improve things if it just means you get annihilated by those that don’t, and things will remain the same despite your best efforts…

mojo_raisin ,

So either we get to some near global agreement on how to get out of this situation, or we just keep doing far too little since… what’s the point of trying to improve things if it just means you get annihilated by those that don’t, and things will remain the same despite your best efforts…

I feel like the way out is global and cultural in nature, and I think it’s in progress now, in fact we’re doing it now, talking about this on Lemmy. This wasn’t practical, wasn’t being done outside of “elite circles” before a decade or so ago. This global conversation is going to take some time and have bumps, but it’s happening, this is novel on this planet.

What I hope comes of this, and seems to be happening, perhaps slower than I’d like, is a paradigm shift in the way we think about ourselves, others, our communities, our situation, and our goals. We need a new “mythology” that allows us to live on this planet sustainably, and it only needs to be true enough and could even be done transparently and with purpose.

I feel like our species is in a existential battle and almost nobody (at least on the left-ish) is talking strategy. As if any valid strategy (e.g. “capitalism”, “communism”, “competition”, “religion”, “growth” “zero sum” etc) has been identified by the 1960s and we’re all just battling amongst 20th century ideas for domination.

I’m thinkiing stuff like this (sorry for the poor organization of my thoughts, to lazy to cleanup)

Define some axioms/statements that are mostly true and fairly agreeable, not based in faith, not limited by materialism.

  • Most people would be happy to just live and thrive and don’t feel a need to dominate others or hoard resources
  • There is a tiny number of people who do feel a need to dominate and/or hoard
  • We are all vulnerable to propaganda
  • Nobody is inherently better or more deserving than anyone else
  • Nobody is entitled to the time or labor of anyone (except a child being entitled to their parents)
  • Nobody actually knows the meaning of life or the nature of reality (not even materialists).
  • Our own conscious experience is all we can be certain of, nobody knows any absolute truths
  • The most logical assumption is that others’ experience is similar to my own
  • I don’t want to suffer or be coerced, I don’t feel others are entitled to cause me to suffer or coerce my behavior
  • It’s ok to defend myself against those trying to harm or coerce my behavior, dominate or hoard at my or my community’s expense
  • If I cause another to suffer or coerce their behavior I should expect a response

–> The goal of these axioms is not to get everyone to agree to them, it’s to blaze a new path that can evolve into the way, to plant a seed that can inspire moving in new directions.

A set of explicit stated axioms allows taking the next steps and figure out how to evolve into a sustainable culture. Clear eyed strategy and goals are why the Heritage Foundation is making progress and the left is not.

Strategy like this could allow a better understanding of who and what the actual threats are and identify appropriate responses to them.

–> The “global agreement” will not be a formal inter-governmental thing, it will be loosely coupled set of cultural evolutions spurred by global conversations happening now.

TopRamenBinLaden ,

I feel like the way out is global and cultural in nature,

I agree that it starts with a sense of a global community. Instead of people considering themselves a citizen of their homecountry, they need to switch to the mindset of being a citizen of Earth.

We now have the technology to get past the language barrier, so it is more possible to get people together, talking about our future as a species more than anytime in our history.

One thing that could help is some sort of globally available social media, or forum that automatically translate to the language of the reader. Imagine if a Chinese person could post something in Chinese, but English speakers could read and respond in English, and vice versa.

D1G17AL ,

One point I have to disagree on is the point you made about nuclear energy. Its untrue. If we switched to primarily using nuclear energy we would be able to successfully power the majority of the species using that technology. Its fear that stops us. Everyone is worried about another Chernobyl or Fukushima. When the logical course of action would be to find tectonically stable sites for any nuclear facilities. That’d be number one to solving a lot of meltdown concerns. The other would be to use well researched and planned designs. Chernobyl was a faulty design for a reactor that should never have been allowed to be produced.

Lookup Thorium reactors. Those are the true future of nuclear technology. Thorium is also abundant when compared to Uranium or Plutonium. It does not have the same weaponization issues. It does not produce the same high levels of radiation. It is also safer to handle and store once depleted.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium_fuel_cycle#Thorium-… "Using breeder reactors, known thorium and uranium resources can both generate world-scale energy for thousands of years. "

Literally with nuclear power we can power the whole world for the next 2,000 to 3,000 years. Possibly longer. It’s fear that holds us back on this.

mojo_raisin ,

nuclear energy we would be able to successfully power the majority of the species using that technology

But that energy will be used for what? To mine for more minerals, create more waste, destroy more land, and make more species extinct? Our problem is not a shortage of energy nor is it even a problem of the efficiency or cleanliness of the energy. It’s a problem of our species living far beyond the sustainable bounds of the planet.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

For carbon sequestration, which also needs to happen. Not only do we need to not put out more carbon into the atmosphere, but we also need to sequester atmospheric carbon. A LOT of it.

We are living beyond several planetary bounds but if we made our energy not release carbon, it would be a huge start. Harm reduction is valid.

mojo_raisin ,

For carbon sequestration, which also needs to happen.

Agree, but I think virtually all methods typically talked about are nonsense. Using massive fossil resources to design, build, and maintain giant machines or many smaller machines will ultimately do little to slow ecological collapse even if it does reduce carbon somewhat after some years needed to break even on production. The only sequestration method I’ve ever heard about that makes any sense to me is neighborhood scale production and use of biochar (and avoiding buying any sort of purpose made biochar device that required fossil resources to produce and ship to you). I make biochar in my backyard fire pit (which is a low smoke design) with used coffee tins (i.e. trash) and use the resulting biochar and ash in my compost.

Harm reduction is valid.

Agree, Any and all scientifically backed methods to allow us time for degrowth should be considered. I’m not convinced nuclear energy should be a significant part of this though, too many downsides and risks.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Yes and majority of time and expense that goes into building nuclear reactors is due to regulations, espeically NIMBY/fear based regulations. They have to hire teams of special lawyers for these and cases last years. That’s why when you see people describing the cost and time of building these, they always start at the planning stage which can include years of legal battles.

And these lawyers are usually nuclear engineers who went to law school afterwards, so they are pretty expensive to staff.

PetteriSkaffari ,

Biggest thing against nuclear power is the cost associated with it. Other, sustainable sources of energy like wind and solar, combined with hydrogen and batteries, are way cheaper due to their simplicity. Thorium reactors are a nice idea but need so much development (costs) that they will take a while to become a reality, if ever at all. Probably nuclear fusion will be available sooner than thorium fission for power generation, which also needs decades of development. And then there’s still the problem of nuclear waste. Maybe not a huge problem, but still one without a viable solution.

b161 ,

Capitalism is a death cult.

Samvega OP ,

Living and dying are the same process. You can’t be born without dying. You could say biology condemns us all - very loosely - to a cult of death, as we must all participate.

Capitalism is worse than that. Capitalism is an ideology of exploitation. I’m fine with dying, it’s my fault for being born. I don’t see why I must submit to exploitation while I do, temporarily, exist.

KillingTimeItself ,

it’s my fault for being born.

is it? I don’t recall ever asking to be born, i’m pretty sure that just kind of happened.

lath ,

Just because you can’t recall it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. As a spermatozoon, you eagerly swam towards that egg, then that egg could have chosen to abort at any time. Yet here you are alive. You chose to be here. Deal with it, accept it and move on with your life.

KillingTimeItself ,

Just because you can’t recall it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. As a spermatozoon, you eagerly swam towards that egg, then that egg could have chosen to abort at any time. Yet here you are alive. You chose to be here. Deal with it, accept it and move on with your life.

does a delusional person choose to have delusions?

Things that are outside of our psychological realm, and physical control are quite literally something we have no control over.

lath ,

Yeah, there are plenty of things we have little to no control over.

Having delusions is one of them for sure, but can we say for certain we don’t at least influence what those delusions are or which direction they take?

KillingTimeItself ,

i mean you probably influence them, but much like dreams, are they really representative of anything other than your mind left to its own devices?

Human conception may start at the sperm race, but human consciousness doesn’t begin until a few years into childhood, so at the end of the day, who knows.

lath ,

Can thought be considered a process that begins after being affected by an external stimulus? And without prior experience on which to base our response, we can only react according to the conditions set by that stimulus?

So is it truly we who control our thoughts or are we just acting in a predetermined set of reactionary impulses based on the accumulation of our personal experiences and gained knowledge over our lifetime so far?

We who are so easily influenced into outrage by trigger phrases specific to our fears or spurred into action by resonating soundbites promising our desires, are those our thoughts or are they just the mind left to its own devices?

I really don’t know. But it’s probably some food for thought in a way.

KillingTimeItself ,

Can thought be considered a process that begins after being affected by an external stimulus? And without prior experience on which to base our response, we can only react according to the conditions set by that stimulus?

thought must be influenced by some level of internal stimulation, as you can deprive your senses and still think. Likewise, before you have the capability of memory, you are not conscious, it is simply impossible. Consciousness is directly tied to the ability to remember. Thusly it must be some mix of the two, life experiences, and remembered experiences.

Just one or the other is incapable of providing anything interesting.

You have to have some level over the control of your thoughts, otherwise you wouldn’t be capable of typing, or speaking, or most things in life really. If everything is predetermined it has to be predetermined at a higher level, quantum mechanics and multiverse theory for example. In some capacity, the vast majority of judgements we make in our lifetimes is based on the cumulative life experience we have gained, as well as a ability to engage in critical thinking allowing us to process said experience and to formulate an action to follow.

We who are so easily influenced into outrage by trigger phrases specific to our fears or spurred into action by resonating soundbites promising our desires, are those our thoughts or are they just the mind left to its own devices?

both, kind of. The mind left to it’s own devices will formulate thoughts for you to hold, it doesn’t like the lack of thought and understanding, it’s probably the reasoning behind religion, and it’s certainly the driver behind science. We’re also social animals, and as a result we like to conform to the pack, it’s what keeps us alive, so if other people are saying something, we have some fundamental level of bias against the alternative. Racism is a good example of this.

lath ,

thought must be influenced by some level of internal stimulation, as you can deprive your senses and still think. Likewise, before you have the capability of memory, you are not conscious, it is simply impossible. Consciousness is directly tied to the ability to remember. Thusly it must be some mix of the two, life experiences, and remembered experiences.

Isn’t the internal stimulation just the nervous system zapping things to get a response? And doesn’t that need a trigger to get it going?

Anyway, I feel like I’m heading into contested territory here, but I gotta ask. At which point can we consider babies as conscious?

Most people will claim their earliest memory is at the age of 4 or 5 years old. So that time is probably considered as the general start of conscious identity. Yet some have reported that simulating the conditions in a womb such as sleeping in a fetal position or floating aimlessly within a larger body of water will grant them an instinctual sense of serenity. So it can be argued that at some level, we remember our time in the womb, even though we are not able to recall it directly.

And I’ve seen babies aged around 1-2 years old trying (unsuccessfully) to hide from their parents in order to attempt an action that had been forbidden several times before.

How early does our capability to store memory actually start? And at which point will the amount of stored and remembered experience be enough to count as consciousness?

KillingTimeItself ,

Isn’t the internal stimulation just the nervous system zapping things to get a response? And doesn’t that need a trigger to get it going?

yes but between external stimuli, vision for example, and internal stimulation, memories, you generally need both in order to be able to conceptualize it and make practical use of it.

Anyway, I feel like I’m heading into contested territory here, but I gotta ask. At which point can we consider babies as conscious?

personally, by the time memory is formulated and they can start to remember things. Otherwise it’s debatable whether or not something can experience in a conscious literal sense, the effects of pain and suffering. We know that most animals must experience some level of consciousness, but between birth and the capability of general consciousness, the specific level of consciousness available is not very clear to anybody.

We know that newborns have a lot of fundamental primal responses, holding their breath, hanging onto things, facial recognition. ETC. we know that young animals also experience similar things, though it’s contested how much of this is just a primal built in, or a learned behavior.

And if we’re talking about learned behavior in the context of consciousness it’s even weirder because the matchbox tic tac toe (MENACE) experiment proves that a collection of matchboxes playing tic tac toe can clearly demonstrate the ability to learn and reflectively act upon it’s learned experience, however, it is in no way a conscious entity, it is merely a statistical representation of a conscious entity.

if we’re talking about consciousness in the form of abortion, generally i follow up to about the first trimester, with the usual “if deemed necessary” post first trimester. As most abortions happen very early on. Although realistically, i’m never going to have children, so it’s not really my problem to deal with, so my ultimate opinion doesn’t exist past “non infringement of rights”

Most people will claim their earliest memory is at the age of 4 or 5 years old. So that time is probably considered as the general start of conscious identity. Yet some have reported that simulating the conditions in a womb such as sleeping in a fetal position or floating aimlessly within a larger body of water will grant them an instinctual sense of serenity. So it can be argued that at some level, we remember our time in the womb, even though we are not able to recall it directly.

i believe it’s about 2-5 years old that memory starts to develop in general, though don’t quote me on that. I don’t think it’s “remembering being in the womb” so much as it is post-hoc rationalization and creation of those memories, and also primal programming that influences us to be receptive to those things more generally. It could also be in the case of fetal position, that a subtle psychological reasoning is present. Having your extremities nearer to the rest of your body means you have less to worry about, and puts you in a more defensible position for example.

And I’ve seen babies aged around 1-2 years old trying (unsuccessfully) to hide from their parents in order to attempt an action that had been forbidden several times before.

we see similar things with animals as well, birds, dogs, cats etc. They all do similar things, and they almost definitely have a lesser level of consciousness. In fact we ascribe them a higher level of consciousness than they likely have. It’s attributable to a simple level of relations between objects. Doing X is bad because Y doesn’t like it. Therefore if i do X outside of the existence of Y it is no longer bad. Which is probably a reason that we see this behaviorism. Though it is obviously later learned that regardless of what happens and where, it is bad. And we do still see that behavior with a guilt response upon being caught. Though presumably this is due to some level of independent thought.

How early does our capability to store memory actually start? And at which point will the amount of stored and remembered experience be enough to count as consciousness?

I’m a bit of an absolutist in regards to this one, but i think that generally, the first thing you can remember, constitutes your first memory. However i don’t think it has to be something that you explicitly remembered as your brain can segregate things into different groups, and intentionally block out certain parts of it, while making others more explicitly important, but even that aspect, has an influence on your memory, the things you remember, and your general behaviorism so i would count that as “memory” also, even though it’s probably not.

How early does our capability to store memory actually start? And at which point will the amount of stored and remembered experience be enough to count as consciousness?

Consciousness as a concept is pretty tricky to nail properly in a sterilized environment, but personally i subscribe to the meta theory, where once you can personally conceptualize your own consciousness, the second you realize you are capable of being a conscious entity, is the second where you gain consciousness.

as for how it starts, it’s pretty clear through biology that it’s related to the structures of the brain, neurons inside of the brain and the paths built between them that are made more robust through continual usage are what constitute the ability to remember things, if you do not use them, you lose them, and it makes way for new paths and new memories to form, however there is generally some form of residual memory, similar to how data is written to disk and deleted.

apologies if this is somewhat schizo and badly formatted, i’m writing this while listening to a debate and playing factorio in the background, and i also spent some time talking in discord, so it’s probably a little bit disjointed lol.

lath ,

It’s a very nice set of replies. Quite pleasant to read. Thank you for the whole thing.

KillingTimeItself ,

np, i enjoy philosophy so this kind of thing is rather cathartic for me lol. Although that probably makes me mentally disturbed to some degree, such is life though. The most disturbed people are the most interesting/productive. The normal ones are boring.

lath ,

I’m of the belief that we’re all a little disturbed in some way, only that most people prefer the comfort of boring over the satisfaction of disturbing. And the most boring of people are simply better at hiding their quirks.

KillingTimeItself ,

yeah, i think similarly, though i think there is a spectrum of disturbedness, where at a certain point, your disturbedness outclasses your normalcy and you simply no longer fit in with normal people enough to daylight as a normal person.

Most normal people are a little disturbed, but not significantly enough to experience life outside of that range, whatever it is.

Whereas most disturbed people are somewhere outside of that range, and as a result, usually have some sort of “disturbance radar” which let’s them identify people who they should, and shouldn’t be following.

It’s certainly an interesting experience. It’s as if there’s a “socially normal” bubble, and then people who exist outside of that are kind of just, on their own. It’s like a latch circuit. It’s unlatched until it reaches the threshold where it latches, and once that threshold is reached, it’s pretty much stuck there until forcibly unlatched.

Samvega OP ,

I’m a Buddhist.

KillingTimeItself ,

i’m not familiar with Buddhism so if there is something i’m missing here, that would be why lol.

UnderpantsWeevil ,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

I don’t recall ever asking to be born

Who would do the asking and what would be providing the answer?

KillingTimeItself ,

this is a good question, amusingly enough there is no answer, philosophy sucks.

lath ,

That’s because you’re a sinner and exploiting sinners isn’t to be punished, but praised. Exploit your fellow sinners, make them toil in suffering and you too shall redeem salvation in the form of stock options and tax evasion.

Samvega OP ,

That’s the spirit! We must sacrifice the newborns to harvest better stock options.

suction , (edited )

If you’re fine with dying, Tepco is still looking for guys to clean up under Fukushima. They ran out of old gambling addicts who had big debts with the Yakuza.

spyd3r ,
@spyd3r@sh.itjust.works avatar

And yet its the least worst functional economic system we currently have…

GoodEye8 ,

“it’s the least worst way to spiral into definite hell on earth” doesn’t really sound that positive.

It doesn’t matter how “safe” capitalism is, it’s not solving our problems and we need something different.

20hzservers ,

“Wow this cancer sure is good at growing and staying alive!”

Leg ,
@Leg@sh.itjust.works avatar

Capitalism has a historical tendency of imperializing all over the place and sabotaging other systems. It did not earn its spot as “best”, despite what capitalistic propaganda would have you believe.

b161 ,

Can’t believe people are saying this meme.

Zoboomafoo ,

Global warming is a test. We’re failing the test, so the warming is going to start accelerating until we learn our lesson

SendMePhotos ,

Mother Nature, Earth, or Gaia, is an organism. In my loose perspective, I like to think that this is it’s “fever” attempt at eliminating the virus.

Hackworth ,

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/871966bd-ce30-4cb7-8ed4-d59c9bf84ae0.jpeg

Zacryon ,
@Zacryon@feddit.org avatar

And thereby eliminating a whole bunch of other species than just humans as well.

Although I’m totally in for the occasional misanthropy, I don’t like seeing it as “just a fever” anymore as too many species will go down. Life will probably persevere in the end, but so will probably a bunch of rich shitpieces, who are significantly responsible for this fever in the first place.

SendMePhotos ,

Our world has gone through many life cycles in the past. At the beginning, was darkness, at the end, probably the same (unless it’s a Futurama time cycle).

The earth will continue on and life will find a way. At this time, we, as humans, have screwed the pooch and now the pooch will screw us. We used the earth and culled it’s resources. We are taking no consideration to the world around us, and instead focus on ourselves alone.

All of the movies about aliens are true. Humans are selfish, greedy, parasites.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

What are you basing this on? Like what scientific knowledge exactly? That life will find a way? You realize the “scientist” in Jurassic Park who said that wasn’t a real scientist???

Look at every other planet. Do any of them have life? What makes you so blindingly confident this planet won’t join them? We are in a mass extinction right now due to unprecedented rapid climate change. The only life left might just be extremophiles and they may never be able to evolve to be multicellular. And not even extremopjiles can survive everything.

That people are so casual about this shows a profound lack of scientific knowledge.

SendMePhotos ,

Calm down there, sport. I don’t have to cite sources or be factually correct to have a conversation about my perspective and pop culture references.

LustyArgonianMana , (edited )
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Um but you’re talking about a scientific phenomenon so if you want people to value your thoughts, it’s good to support them with evidence

You don’t have to do anything ofc. It just bothers me to see people say that George Carlin quote “the planet will be fine,” the Jurassic Park quote “life will find a way,” or the idea that the planet is alive and will kill us off like a fever. Because all of those things are downplaying the seriousness of what’s actually happening. From my PoV, what you’re doing is very close to climate change denialism and it stops people from realizing how serious things are right now. Literally right now.

SendMePhotos ,

I’m posting on the internet on a place that is not super populated. I have no followers and want to gain nothing from these aside from conversation, learning, and my version of social interaction. Climate change is real. It’s a very real threat to all life. I do what I can, donate to places I agree with, and advocate for groups that need to be heard. I do believe that life will find a way, because we came from nothing to begin with. Species have been destroyed, life was reborn. Civilization have been destroyed and rebuilt.

If life does not find a way, then it’s the end of the road for our relative area. We succumb to silence like the rest.

D1G17AL ,

And we have evidence for at least 6 other major mass extinction events. Yet life on this planet found a way to survive and re-evolve. Quit being so fucking pedantic about something so silly.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

I’m not being pedantic, I’m openly disagreeing with the idea that life “must” or absolutely will carry on. There’s no such guarantee. That you hold onto that is a cope but not reality. That’s fine if you need to do that ig but I disagree.

Maeve ,

Our carcasses could end up being petrochemicals of the emerging life forms.

SendMePhotos ,

Ooh! I hope I get to be coolant!

Zoboomafoo , (edited )

Humans aren’t selfish, greedy, parasites. We just get brainwashed into being that way by our culture

SendMePhotos ,

Hard to disagree with a famous lemur.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

The earth, by any definition, is not alive. Sure there are ecological systems that interact with each other, but there’s absolutely no guarantee they are able.to address issues together in an environment. I highly recommend Half Earth by EO Wilson explaining about species diversity loss and ecology.

It’s important that we realize that life is the exception. None of the other planets have conditions needed to support life. Our planet would be fine to join them. It doesn’t care about fevers or anything. It isn’t alive.

lightsblinken ,

i feel like you could describe a human body that way also :)

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

No, by definition of what’s alive, which is already scientifically described. That’s my entire point, is that the people commenting on this are laypeople without scientific understanding or basis. I’m trying to correct that because our scientific ignorance is literally killing us.

A rock is not alive. A volcano is not alive. This is grade school science. This is what “biology” is.

www.khanacademy.org/science/…/what-is-life

Properties of life

Biologists have identified various traits common to all the living organisms we know of. Although nonliving things may show some of these characteristic traits, only living things show all of them.

  1. Organization Living things are highly organized, meaning they contain specialized, coordinated parts. All living organisms are made up of one or more cells, which are considered the fundamental units of life.
  1. Metabolism Life depends on an enormous number of interlocking chemical reactions. These reactions make it possible for organisms to do work—such as moving around or catching prey—as well as growing, reproducing, and maintaining the structure of their bodies. Living things must use energy and consume nutrients to carry out the chemical reactions that sustain life. The sum total of the biochemical reactions occurring in an organism is called its metabolism.
  1. Homeostasis Living organisms regulate their internal environment to maintain the relatively narrow range of conditions needed for cell function. For instance, your body temperature needs to be kept relatively close to 98.6 [^\circ]F (37 [^\circ]C). This maintenance of a stable internal environment, even in the face of a changing external environment, is known as homeostasis.
  1. Growth Living organisms undergo regulated growth. Individual cells become larger in size, and multicellular organisms accumulate many cells through cell division. You yourself started out as a single cell and now have tens of trillions of cells in your body [^1]! Growth depends on anabolic pathways that build large, complex molecules such as proteins and DNA, the genetic material.
  1. Reproduction Living organisms can reproduce themselves to create new organisms. Reproduction can be either asexual, involving a single parent organism, or sexual, requiring two parents. Single-celled organisms, like the dividing bacterium shown in the left panel of the image at right, can reproduce themselves simply by splitting in two!
  1. Response Living organisms show “irritability,” meaning that they respond to stimuli or changes in their environment. For instance, people pull their hand away—fast!—from a flame; many plants turn toward the sun; and unicellular organisms may migrate toward a source of nutrients or away from a noxious chemical.
  1. Evolution Populations of living organisms can undergo evolution, meaning that the genetic makeup of a population may change over time. In some cases, evolution involves natural selection, in which a heritable trait, such as darker fur color or narrower beak shape, lets organisms survive and reproduce better in a particular environment. Over generations, a heritable trait that provides a fitness advantage may become more and more common in a population, making the population better suited to its environment. This process is called adaptation.

We can see how earth as a planet doesn’t qualify as a living organism based on these 7 parameters. Metaphorically calling earth “living” to describe the various interacting systems and ecologies is common but not in this context with climate change and insisting the earth will actually repair itself like a living organism.

I’m all for philosophically wondering about stuff, but we need to have an agreement on terms and what they mean. And in this case, these terms are already defined amd we know the planet isn’t able to heal itself to address climate change. That’s just a cope.

blind3rdeye ,

And I’d be ok with this. I see that humans are failing the test. I think it would be totally fair for us to take some really huge losses as a consequence of our collective hubris. But the thing that makes me sad and angry is that we’re taking down everything else with us.

There’s such a huge diversity of life, basically just minding its own business in a totally sustainable way. It’s been like that for billions of years. More than 1,000,000,000 years. But then humans work out that burning stuff is an easy way to do mass-production, and in less then 1000 years things start turning to shit - for everyone. That’s so unfair. If it was just our own house we were burning down, I’d say its fair. But we’re burning down the whole world. We’re already causing mass extinction, and by all predictions it is going to get much much worse.

KillingTimeItself ,

it’ll all return in due time, the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs was a major extinction event in the same caliber as global warming is likely to be.

John_McMurray ,

Oh ffs We are literally the most likely species to survive any of that.

postmateDumbass ,

Bacteria, viruses, insects all way more likely to survive.

The bigger and more complex generally means more likely to run out of something.

John_McMurray ,

Patience, mostly.

Samvega OP ,

“Ignorance” is not “patience”, you have the former, not the latter.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

No, we aren’t

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adh2458

This planetary boundaries framework update finds that six of the nine boundaries are transgressed, suggesting that Earth is now well outside of the safe operating space for humanity.

The planetary boundaries framework (1, 2) draws upon Earth system science (3). It identifies nine processes that are critical for maintaining the stability and resilience of Earth system as a whole. All are presently heavily perturbed by human activities. The framework aims to delineate and quantify levels of anthropogenic perturbation that, if respected, would allow Earth to remain in a “Holocene-like” interglacial state. In such a state, global environmental functions and life-support systems remain similar to those experienced over the past ~10,000 years rather than changing into a state without analog in human history. This Holocene period, which began with the end of the last ice age and during which agriculture and modern civilizations evolved, was characterized by relatively stable and warm planetary conditions. Human activities have now brought Earth outside of the Holocene’s window of environmental variability, giving rise to the proposed Anthropocene epoch.

Samvega OP ,

Check the post history of the person you’re replying to, they’re pretty blatantly ridiculous.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

My general operating principle is that even if this person is engaging in bad faith, there may be other people lurking who want this info or who have similar questions who would be too nervous to comment or ask. So I give info anyway for others.

Samvega OP ,

That’s a very good point! I found your post interesting, myself, so thank you.

Samvega OP ,

I hope humans are not very survivable, because then we wouldn’t have humans like you around.

UnderpantsWeevil ,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

Humans are famously good at surviving in the desert. That’s why so much of human civilization exists at the center of large land masses in arid climates.

KillingTimeItself ,

well its probably cockroaches and bacterium, or some weird bullshit species that exists.

CitizenKong ,

If we continue on like this, it’ll be more like the Permian-Triassic Extinction 250 million years ago, which was also due to increased CO2 in the atmosphere and which killed 90 percent of all life.

KillingTimeItself ,

gotta love extinction science

John_McMurray ,

Maybe ten thousand years. That last ice age ending literally changed everything but yeah, ok, let’s pretend its hundreds of millions of years the same.

Maeve ,

Other organisms and natural disasters do that, too. Ice ages, meteors, waves of diseases. The difference seems to be we have the consciousness to predict consequences, then decide whether to embark upon a path of behavior, or continue it when latent consequences emerge. I guess the question ends up being whether the course chosen is "natural," and how can we know, since plenty of organisms kill the host, while also surviving and even propagating? Then observation also changes the behavior of things. And we don't kill everything. Just whatever life is left continues to evolve in expected and unexpected ways.

monkeyslikebananas2 ,

“I want to play a game”

Maybe John Kramer has gone too far this time.

postmateDumbass ,

Or until the test is complete and humanity has failed.

Like will the bacteria survive the self cleaning cycle?

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Probably some extremophiles, tardigrades at least. Depends on how the planetary boundaries get crossed. Hope horseshoe crabs and lichens and some birds make it through. Those guys have been around so long for us to mess it up for them.

UnderpantsWeevil ,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

Algae are having an amazing time right now.

LustyArgonianMana , (edited )
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

It’s one of their biggest moments since multicellular life evolved

SoleInvictus , (edited )

Like Life on earth has survived more extreme environments before. Not only microbes but multicellular life should be fine.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Source for this prediction? What are you basing this on?

npr.org/…/the-great-dying-nearly-erased-life-on-e…

SoleInvictus , (edited )

Great question, I glad you asked. When I said both multicellular and microbial life would be fine, what I meant is it’s unlikely either would be wiped totally out.

As highlighted in the article you linked, only about 90% of [multicellular] species died out during the Permian-Triassic Extinction Event, specifically the “things have been worse before” situation I was thinking about. Also noted in the article is that the conditions we’re experiencing now are not to the same degree although we’re observing events similar to what we understand may have happened during the Permian-Triassic Extinction, again to a much lesser degree.

Keep in mind atmospheric CO2 levels were estimated to be around 2500 ppm, about 6 times greater than our current levels of around 420 ppm. Preindustrial CO2 levels were 270 ppm, so we’ve added about 150 ppm. It’s not all that much but it’s enough to start changing things for the worse for many of the planet’s current inhabitants.

As to microbial life, I’m a microbiologist so I know my microbes. They as a whole are far more resilient and will outlast all multicellular life. Some thrive in conditions where no multicellular life on Earth could survive. Even if conditions were so hostile than no microbes could survive, some form endospores. These are incredibly resilient little escape pods that can remain viable for millions of years, then reactivate when conditions are better, reconstituting back to bacteria.

While extinctions are frankly depressing, they do open ecological niches into which other species with suitable traits can expand and, given time and selective pressure, differentiate. For example, all we’d need is mice and a suitable food source to survive and, a few million years later, the earth will be covered with various species decended from both of them.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

When you said life would be fine, what you meant was it may MOSTLY all die and may take millions of years to evolve again. That’s not “fine.”

Second, we really don’t know that it will ever evolve again or that other conditions won’t deteriorate. Bacteria can’t live in molten lava. Biology has a general upper and lower limit before things start denaturizing. Our moon is further away and the earth isn’t as young as it once was. The conditions that gave rise to life so long ago might not be replicable enough in the future.

I agree that it’s likely extremophiles at least will survive. I don’t take for granted that it definitely will happen and I don’t call it “fine.”

SoleInvictus , (edited )

I pretty distinctly defined when I meant by saying “fine” in my follow-up comment. If you want to pretend I meant something different so you can “prove me wrong”, that’s “fine” (define that however suits you.).

That, along with the rest of your comment, suggests you’re just more interested in feeling you’re right at all costs instead of actually discussing the topic, so I’m out.

Edit: I had to look - of course you downvoted me. LOL.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Yes, you moved the goalposts to have “fine” include what I do not consider “fine.” This is part ofntthe disagreement we have here. Agree to disagree ig.

I mean go ahead, be out. Have a good day. You don’t have to believe as I do, and your last comment also made it seem you were “happy I asked.”

SoleInvictus ,

Tl;dr: I was genuinely happy until you showed yourself to be a petty, intellectually dishonest person.

I was genuinely happy you asked. I hoped we’d have an interesting conversation. What I received in response was the type of comment I haven’t seen as much of since leaving Reddit: unnecessarily antagonistic and full of bad arguments, seemingly for no other purpose than to state “nuh uh, you’re wrong!”.

You start by telling me that the intended meaning of my words wasn’t what I explained, followed up by how the meaning you instead fabricated for me is wrong. Now you’re calling my explaining my original meaning further, even before you generated this artificial contention, “moving goal posts”. That doesn’t hold up under even the merest scrutiny. Again, you’re just looking to score metaphorical points, but you don’t do it by the merit of your own arguments - you instead pick apart my statements, but dishonestly. It’s bizarre.

Then you follow up with several outlandish responses that only make sense if you ignored my previous comment. My comment was about how things have been massively worse on earth before and life has pulled through, with stated logic and references. Your response? “Well, life can’t survive beyond certain bounds and the moon is further away, and the conditions from which life arose may not happen again”. Pretty clear you didn’t even bother to understand my comment before your rebuttal. Again, just looking to dunk.

Plus you downvoted me for a response I took quite a bit of time to write, all in good faith. So yeah, to the block list you go.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Lol it’s genuinely wild to say life is “fine” while admitting a large extinction is taking place and may require millions of years to re-evolve. It does seem like “moving goalposts” (a sign of sophistry on your part) to include this in the definition of “fine.”

I agreed to disagree there though.

Yes, conditions for life were in some ways harsher. But we have new conditions that make it harsh in a different way, and we don’t have the same conditions as before when multicellular life first evolved (ypur claim that life will definitely evolve again).

Maybe I’m not “looking to dunk,” and you’re just losing?

I’m free to downvote whatever. That’s how Lemmy works.

Sorry you took this exchange so personally lol. Weird of you to start insulting and getting grouchy when I agreed to disagree previously as a matter of different perspective.

bashbeerbash ,

I believe a mix of runaway elitism + ecological devastation is the Great Filter. We’re at our great filter and definitely will not overcome considering the galactic evidence.

SuckitM0ds ,

this is a great insight. i think most of us think of the filter being some kind of nuclear armageddon, but it’s probably something much more boring like this.

fine_sandy_bottom ,

This is certainly a credible assertion, but it’s very broad.

As in, runaway elitism is probably relevant to almost all civilisation-ending catastrophes.

bashbeerbash , (edited )

I don’t know exactly what to call it and I don’t want to sound like my agenda is just anti-capitalism. For a brief, 250yr period, humanity (not all, but enough of) valued science and reasoned law as the highest, most advanced expressions of our civilization. The enlightenment age brought about modernity as we know it based on science and liberal law (no kings above the law). Now we’ve devolved back to every nation basically establishing new oligarchich aristocracies no law can touch (the historic normal), and it’s definitely too late to correct course. No untouchable nobilities or kings will save this realm. So yeah, the great filter in my view is about letting elites be accountable to no one, with no interest other than accretion, rule things into the ground. And yeah that’s the broad gist of my point about a pretty broad theory. Most think the great filter as an asteroid or nuke. For me it’s runaway elitism that probably ends most civilizations which is why there’s no one out there.

Jeanschyso ,

A test for what? From where? I don’t get it

Leg ,
@Leg@sh.itjust.works avatar

A test of long-term sustainable viability, conducted by the limitations within the forces of nature that we audaciously call our home.

DarkSpectrum ,

What if humanity was created to cause climate change for the next phase of Earth’s biological evolution? Is no-one considering a grander plan than what happens to humans?

John_McMurray ,

Maybe, just maybe, if things are not behaving as expected, then maybe the cause isn’t what theory says. Look at that list of countries. All contain deserts. All of whom I was taught experience these temperatures when I was in school in the eighties. I’m fucking old with a long memory.

StupidBrotherInLaw ,

LOL, what now? Are you claiming countries are experiencing significantly higher temperatures than forecasted due to having or being in deserts?

boogetyboo ,
@boogetyboo@aussie.zone avatar

Dude, he remembers things being hot in hot places. I don’t know why we even measure things and keep records. This bloke just remembers!

acchariya ,

Yeah it’s currently like 77 degrees in Florida right now at 8 am. pretty comfortable, so much for all the global warming talk!

John_McMurray ,

Look at the list and fucking think.

Samvega OP ,

Look at that list of countries. All contain deserts.

Think about what, the fact you might have early dementia?

LANIK2000 ,

All I’m thinking is that we recorded the highest temperatures in a desert in all human history. Almost whopping 10 degrees celsius above the previously recorded record. Sweet Jesus that’s a lot… That’s not fucking natural. What will it take for you to admit that a place known for being hot might be a bit too hot? Maybe once all creatures and plants in deserts cease to exist? Or does it all need to turn to glass before maybe, just maybe it’s a bit hotter then it should?

StupidBrotherInLaw ,

The problem is I am thinking and what you’re saying makes no sense. It seems like you’re also unable to explain this, so I suspect you didn’t think about it yourself.

Samvega OP ,

All of whom I was taught experience these temperatures when I was in school in the eighties.

If they only experienced those temperatures in the 80s, when you were at school, it wouldn’t be hot now. QED.

Maybe, just maybe, if things are not behaving as expected, then maybe the cause isn’t what theory says.

Yes. Maybe the cause is that you went to school in the 80s.

John_McMurray ,

That is not sound logic whatsoever, it’s just mindless snark.

Samvega OP ,

No, I was making fun of you, because I found your statement to be so poorly expressed, bizarre, and - where readable - so highly ridiculous to potentially indicate the possibility that your thinking (such as it is) on this issue is beneath contempt. Goodbye now.

werefreeatlast ,

The answer is aluminum roofing! I was a the beach a couple of weeks ago and you just couldn’t step on the hot magma for any amount of time. But if you sat down on the shadeless aluminum benches provided by the idiots at the government, you were welcome to the best feeling of freezing your ass off while searing your nuts off. It’s aluminum, we know it can reflect like 90% of all incoming light including heat and UV…and Wi-Fi. But I much rather have antennas that allow phone communications than to have to run the AC non stop even when the house has more insulation than my fridge.

UnderpantsWeevil ,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

110⁰ heat wave in a high humidity climate

“Have you tried switching out your shingled roof for aluminum?”

Like, idk, maybe this can save a few bucks on your AC bill. But this isn’t magic. It can’t keep the air getting into your house from being superheated.

werefreeatlast ,

But it isolates radiated heat. You’ll have to pump heat built up inside. But also, aluminum radiators pointing upward can help reduce climate temperatures similar to the way trees do. Trees absorb the heat and shade the ground. These would shade and reflect heat creating a cooler area underneath if heat is not actively being generated…no humans or computers or pets. So not a silver bullet but just makes me so puzzled to see people using tar, which pollutes the ground, and steel which perfectly absorbs heat. No, the best solution is to use aluminum.

evranch ,

steel which perfectly absorbs heat. No, the best solution is to use aluminum.

Aluminum is far more thermally conductive and makes both a far better radiator and absorber of heat. Ultimately it’s a coating that does the absorbing though, as shiny metal reflects IR regardless of the material. Source: I work with this stuff

Light coloured or reflective roofs do make sense though and that’s why traditional homes in most hot climates are painted white.

werefreeatlast ,

Yes. Ideally you want a sandwich aluminum -steel - aluminum. But that’s not ideal. Sometimes you see this in heat shields around exhaust systems. But nothing beats experience. The fact is that if you put a sheet of tar roofing, a sheet of steel and a sheet of aluminum under the sun, the tar will get melty, the steel will get fucking hot and the aluminum will be nice and cool to the touch. Sure you can spray aluminum onto the steel or the tar but it won’t be as efficient and you won’t get the reflective properties that aluminum has. Remember the wavelength of heat is past the 0.1um and it’s up to 100um, so most coatings are not that thick and most roughnesses are not that rough locally where it matters. Machined aluminum for example will have a local roughnesses less than 25um, sometimes under 1um.

laverabe ,

Aluminum oxidizes and no longer reflects after long term exposure to moisture. It would have to be painted white, which is really no different than current metal roofing.

Which does bring up a good point though… all we need is some really environmentally friendly and long lasting white paint (that doesn’t get dirty) and we could easily slow down climate change. Unfortunately white paint gets dirty real quick and the dirt absorbs radiation the same as a dark paint.

werefreeatlast ,

Anodized aluminum absorbs some heat, but that’s only one single light pass. Or well two passes. But that’s way better than aluminum with white bird poop on it which is easily cleaned. Clear anodized aluminum or white reflective aluminum would be quite superior to anything out there.

glitchdx ,

Anyone who is “baffled” is either lying or hasn’t been paying attention.

I like to link this video when the subject comes up.

youtu.be/oTdpdFUTyqs?si=2iWPf4a_taAAouRf

Samvega OP ,

By definition, ideology is based on fantasy ideal. And the concept that ‘human economic growth is primarily good’ is a fantasy that can’t tolerate the reality of that economic growth harming our world.

would_be_appreciated ,

This isn’t just climate deniers though - even those that were expecting significant climate shifts are still seeing higher than expected. This isn’t “huh, things are getting hotter, who would’ve thought?” This is “we knew it would get hotter, but we predicted it would take longer.” We thought we were fucked, but we’re actually double fucked.

WoahWoah ,

The issue here is that leading climate scientists are saying our current models aren’t accounting for the actual reported climate, and they’re not sure why it’s off. They’re hoping the new NASA climate program will provide more data for the causes. Currently it’s not explainable by CO2 emissions, sulfur from boats, volcanoes, etc, all of which when factored in still don’t account for more than 90% of how much warmer it is getting.

Yes, human caused global warming is real and happening. The big concern right now is it’s happening much faster than expected and we have no good, proven theory as to why. That’s a problem.

Samvega OP ,

There are also some comments about aircon not being a good answer if solely relied on, including:

One of the key effects of heatwaves, which send demand for electricity soaring and cause extreme storms that stress electrical grids, is to cause blackouts. Blackouts mean no more air-con. A recent study suggested a blackout lasting just two days could hospitalise more than half of Phoenix residents and kill 12,000, mostly in their own homes. This is why the author Jeff Goodell warns of a “heat Katrina”: you thought the hurricane in New Orleans was bad?

SnotFlickerman , (edited )
@SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Further, what happens when everyone knows the power isn’t coming back and instead the roads out of Phoenix all get backed up and people die in the heat of their cars trying to escape the heat of Phoenix. Because heat can kill a lot of vehicles, and a lot of people have ill-maintained vehicles, meaning roads being completely blocked from escape can happen fast.

I really think Phoenix will become the first mass casualty event from climate change in the USA.

EDIT: Obligatory Peggy Hill. Peggy gets it.

https://i.imgur.com/AwIoPDt.jpeg

Rhaedas ,

That's one of those nightmare thoughts - when the power goes out, what do people usually do for a while? Wait for it to come back on. Someone is coming to fix it, right? Much of modern society is built upon such assumptions, and it mostly works. So I think you're right for some, but many would perish at home, trying to outlast the day (and what if the night doesn't cool?)

TachyonTele ,

And then their food goes bad. Three days of starvation is all it takes to eat cake.

Rhaedas ,

Water also disappears. At some point water is being pumped by a power source. I suppose that's more when people get driven out, by hunger and thirst than by just curiosity or a plan. So much easier to leave before things go bad, but like Katrina showed, mobility is a class thing, some people can't leave like that.

TachyonTele ,

Yup absolutely. Hopefully the people can do something about it actually do something. Not you and me, I mean the corporations that got us into this mess in the first place.

evasive_chimpanzee ,

Lots of cars > lots of traffic > stopped cars > radiators don’t cool > cars break down > roads blocked

catloaf ,

Car radiators have fans. They can idle indefinitely. You’re more likely to eventually run out of gas.

Edit: oh you mean because of the heat. I don’t think that’s going to be an issue, ambient temp is still going to be far below the roughly 200°F of an engine.

SnotFlickerman ,
@SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Do you not live in the USA? Do you not realize how many people are driving around old beaters that can absolutely get overheated in such an environment?

In my hometown more than half the driveways are filled with multiple beater-ass cars, most of which don’t work and are just sort of rotting. They just keep adding new ones by buying more shitty vehicles that die quickly and doing the same cycle over again.

catloaf ,

I do live in the USA. I’m pretty sure that no parts of the US are predicted to remotely approach 200°F air temperature.

I actually drive a beater myself. But if the coolant pump or radiator fan aren’t working, you’re not going to be driving it very far, regardless of air temperature.

neonred ,

if anyone else was wondering, 200 °F are 93.33333 °C

Blaster_M ,

This assumes a car with a working cooling system. How many people have old cars with bad head gaskets or a radiator leak and “just fill it with water” and not fix the problem, only to find that pure water isn’t enough, as modern cars will walk up and down from 185-235F, which will blow steam before the fans kick on. They never noticed because they only drove a few miles a day, not long or hard enough to find out there is a real problem and not a nuisance.

Sir_Kevin ,
@Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Most people buy the cheapest car batteries they can get. As a Floridian I can tell you, the heat destroys these things faster than most people realize. Everyone is already strapped for cash so they’re going to be driving around with batteries that barely start their car for months before it finally leaves them stranded.

grue ,

EDIT: Obligatory Peggy Hill. Peggy gets it.

And considering how rarely she “got” things, that’s saying a lot!

Trainguyrom ,

Realistically it’ll be when people can no longer insure their homes when we see the first mass migrations. Florida is already at the point where only state insurance will cover hurricane prone areas, and it sounds like that currently costs $7k/year. Anyone have any bets for if it’ll be the southwest suffering more frequent more severe fires that gets it first or Florida and neighboring states from more severe hurricanes?

Reyali ,

That’s when it becomes Rita as opposed to “heat Katrina”.

For folks who don’t remember/know about Rita because they didn’t live through it, less than a month after Katrina a record-breaking cat 5 hurricane was heading for Texas. Everyone still had Katrina on their minds and panicked. Millions of people (literally estimated as 2.5–3.7 million) evacuated, or tried.

The highways out of Houston came to a total standstill. About 100 people died before the storm even hit land because of the evacuation. And then the hurricane itself was nbd; the evacuation was literally the worst part.

Know_not_Scotty_does ,

Frankly, I am amazed it has not already happened in Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, or Austin. The power grid here in Texas is a disaster and the weather conditions are unforgiving. At least in the desert you can do evaporative cooling. That doesn’t work where its hot and humid.

Sir_Kevin ,
@Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

It has. Some weak ass cat-1 hurricane killed like a dozen people in TX earlier this year. The winds didn’t harm anyone directly but it knocked out power for a few days in places. That’s all it takes when temps are well above 100F.

Know_not_Scotty_does ,

Yeah, I was in that storm. We were without power for 3 days. Fortunately it was not over 100f that during that stretch but It would have been so much worse if it had been. I personally know people who were without power for almost 2 weeks after it came through. Centerpoint was negligent in maintinging their equipment, right of ways, and getting their crews where they should have been.

I_Miss_Daniel ,

I keep an old evaporative unit in the shed just in case. It only needs 70 watts and can thus run for quite a long time off a car battery or similar. Add a basic camping solar panel and you’re more or less set for the day as long as you have water and don’t live in a really high humidity place.

Sir_Kevin ,
@Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Air conditioners will soon be considered life support. In some places it will be a death sentence to have a power outrage. This isn’t speculation. It’s already happening.

31337 ,

A significant amount of greenhouse gasses are emitted because of air conditioning. It’s a feedback loop.

Samvega OP ,

I said that air con made global warming worse on Reddit a few years ago, got massively downvoting.

THE TRUTH HURTS!

SnotFlickerman ,
@SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

I get downvoted for asking for cars with manual roll up windows because spending electricity on rolling up a car window is negligent when its easy as fuck to do by hand.

But if you add up all the electricity used since automatic windows were invented, power used to roll up and down windows, in aggregate its no small amount. It adds up.

But nooooo manual roll up windows is a step too far.

Samvega OP ,

I gues convenience is more important than waste, to most people.

Grandwolf319 ,

Wait really? Do you mean by the electricity generation or by a refrigerant process?

I know those processes are inefficient and create overall heat in the system as they can’t create cool but only push heat, there should be no green house emission, just heat generation.

Are you saying extra heat will stay in the atmosphere? That’s not good but it’s not the same as carbon which allows heat to build up.

31337 ,

The power used by AC is responsible for ~3% of global emissions. I can’t find data about the impact of refrigerants ATM, but I assume it’s significant because of their extremely high “global-warming-potential.” I’m guessing a significant amount of emissions come from the manufacture of refrigerants, and a significant amount of refrigerants leak out of systems when they fail (or are improperly disposed of).

icosahedron ,

wow have we procrastinated real climate action long enough yet?

NauticalNoodle ,

Nope

Commiunism ,

Doubt procrastination will stop even after 60-70 becomes a new high in those countries and people start dying en masse

ironhydroxide ,

“But mah profits!!!”

umbrella ,
@umbrella@lemmy.ml avatar

we are way past that point, its just that it takes a while to heat up.

suction ,

Yes we have ages ago. So might as well relax and keep posting

ChickenLadyLovesLife ,

climate scientists baffled by unexpected pace of heating

Could it be … fossil fuel producers lying about their output of greenhouse gases? Nah.

Samvega OP ,

“Are you telling me that our valued wealth creators are capable of… lying???”

x00z ,
@x00z@lemmy.world avatar

Don’t forget countries, especially China.

If these companies and countries could just show their real numbers, we could be at least be helping each other better.

AA5B ,

You don’t have to lie if you don’t measure …… for example, methane leaks from natural gas drilling, refining and distribution

primrosepathspeedrun , (edited )

oh it’s much worse than that. not that it isn’t also that and them doing that isn’t the reason we didn’t get started mitigating this shit seventy years ago when we wouldn’t have needed substantial sacrifices.

see, climate scientists are scientists. that means they can only announce what they KNOW, what they can be very confident in, what IS in the data.

the thing about climate change is; it’s full of unknowns, most of them bad. so they can’t say “we have had this many unknown unknowns pop up and fuck our shit up, and expect (range of numbers) more”, because that’s predictive, and it’s useful, but its not SCIENCE, because science is inherently a very conservative bedrock-of-knowledge try-not-to-give-permission-to-fuck-up paradigm of knowledge. that’s not a flaw generally, it’s why we can trust it and why it’s hard to compromise, but generals and combat sports athletes do not choose their actions scientifically-it’s too fucking slow, and they would all fucking die/get punched in the face and lose literally every single time.

so while they have calculated the known dangers of the path we’re tumbling down, they can’t really include the assumption that there was a military base here during a civil war 20 years ago, and both sides in that conflict really liked land mines. they can only point to specific mine fields they know about, even if that’s way less than any other site that was involved in that conflict.

so however bad a climate scientist says it’s going to be, dude, holy shit, it’s going to be so much fucking worse. however much time they say we have, we have less than that. how much worse? how much less? no fucking clue.

no way to know unless we sit on our asses and let it happen, at which point everyone dies.

LustyArgonianMana ,
@LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world avatar

Yes, can’t emphasize this enough. It worse than predicted. And it’s all exponentially getting worse.

primrosepathspeedrun ,

its fine though. our masters are aware of it now, so we don’t need to do anything about it. everything fine.

Zacryon ,
@Zacryon@feddit.org avatar

Aren’t climate scientists also measuring atmospheric composition levels around the world to track this, usivg satellites and whatnot? I.e., do they really rely that much on self reported data?

postmateDumbass ,

The fossil fuel companies would fund like 9 studies for every independant one.

TheDemonBuer ,
@TheDemonBuer@lemmy.world avatar

If the world was warming even faster than scientists thought it would, seemingly jumping years ahead of predictions, would that mean even more crucial decades of action had been lost?

Yes. Yes it would.

magnetosphere ,
@magnetosphere@fedia.io avatar

“Action”? I think they mean “dithering and superficial half measures”.

aniki ,

Just five more COPE conferences and then we can finally start!

TheBat ,
@TheBat@lemmy.world avatar

Time to start having ROPE conferences tbh

sp3tr4l ,

Rivers in Alaska have been running bronzish-orange… because the permafrost is melting.

The ‘perma’ frost, is melting.

That has huge amounts of methane locked up in at.

Which is 8 to 80x more effective at being a greenhouse gas than CO2.

And also ancient bacteria that could cause previously unknown kinds of diseases in wildlife and possibly humans, they now may or may not be seeping into the environment.

…

We have already had a consecutive 12 months at or above 1.5C global average temps, as of last month.

…

Shit’s looking pretty bleak.

FollyDolly ,
@FollyDolly@lemmy.world avatar

Glaciers are reaching tipping points as well. Insane heat waves at both poles. It’s over guys. Most poeple don’t realize it yet but it’s over. Those glaciers and poles took an entire iceage to form, and they are not going to come back.

TheBat ,
@TheBat@lemmy.world avatar

And yet people are having kids…

EmpathicVagrant ,

Fucking baffles me.

TheBat ,
@TheBat@lemmy.world avatar

Fucking baffles me.

Nothing baffling about it. It’s just two (or more) people having consensual fun.

Or so I’ve been told…

leftzero ,

Contraceptives exist, as do abortives in case the first ones fail.

The only two reasons anyone would have kids as the world is going are ignorance, or a sadistic desire to watch said kids suffer. In which case the fun is certainly not consensual (or shared) on the victim’s part.

cheddar ,
@cheddar@programming.dev avatar

Let me tell you, most people don’t doomscroll 24/7. People have kids because that’s what chemistry in their bodies makes them want, that’s what drives us and other species to procreate. Things are bad, but these arrogant and condescending comments are extremely stupid. You aren’t better or smarter than people who have kids.

leftzero ,

Let me tell you, most people don’t doomscroll 24/7

That’s no excuse for wilful ignorance.

People have kids because that’s what chemistry in their bodies makes them want, that’s what drives us and other species to procreate.

Healthy people also have the ability to control their animal impulses. If you want sex, use contraceptives. If you for some reason want children, adopt.

Things are bad, but these arrogant and condescending comments are extremely stupid.

You’re projecting now. What’s arrogant, selfish, and extremely stupid (and downright sadistic) is to bring more children into this fucked up world.

You aren’t better or smarter than people who have kids.

At least I’m not responsible for the suffering and eventual death of any other human beings.

Having children is morally equivalent to murder by itself (you are directly responsible for your children’s future deaths, which wouldn’t be possible if you hadn’t caused them to be alive to start with), these days it’s murder and torture.

rekorse ,

You must be tons of fun at…well pretty much anywhere.

Shouldnt you be abstaining from technology to postobn here since you are now responsible for at least someone’s suffering or death?

How can you even get past all your own faults and mistakes to pass judgment on people with kids in the first place?

aesthelete ,

Having children is morally equivalent to murder by itself (you are directly responsible for your children’s future deaths, which wouldn’t be possible if you hadn’t caused them to be alive to start with), these days it’s murder and torture.

I’m basically an antinatalist and even I think this is a stretch. There’s even a thing called the repugnant conclusion that en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mere_addition_paradox says that having more people on Earth with a worse standard of living is preferable to having fewer with a better standard of living, because joy, goodness, whatever can only be experienced by bringing feeling beings into the world.

I know life can be hard sometimes but it has its pleasant moments as well, and appears to us based on pure instinct and everything else to be much preferable to non-existence.

Yes, we’re mortal beings, but the ending of a thing isn’t its entire story, and being so fixated upon that isn’t very healthy. Besides perhaps hyperbolic teenagers most people alive are grateful for the experience even knowing that it won’t last forever.

histic ,

You need help like actually. just because everything isn’t perfect doesn’t mean there isn’t beauty to still be seen in this world. Stop staring at the news all day and just enjoy life and help where you can until you can’t anymore.

rekorse ,

Third option, they just disagree with you entirely.

superkret ,

The entire point of trying to save the climate and environment is to keep the world a nice place for our kids.

TheBat ,
@TheBat@lemmy.world avatar

In that case, that ship has long sailed.

superkret ,

It can always get worse. There is no rock bottom.

aesthelete ,

Eh I’d say the last human going in the dirt is probably rock bottom.

philthi ,

We can easily stop having children then

DancingBear ,

No way man I only use paper straws

frezik ,

I hated that goddamn news cycle. Conservatives poisoned the well so much that you couldn’t argue against that dumb, pointless policy without being labeled a Heritage Foundation shill.

frezik ,

I haven’t seen anything from climate scientists that agrees with that level of doomerisim. They want to keep fighting against every 0.1C of warming we can, because that’s a worthwhile fight. Succumbing to climate nihilism is unhelpful, unscientific, and a self-fulfilling prophecy.

FollyDolly ,
@FollyDolly@lemmy.world avatar

With the release of this much methane this fast, we might as well be out of equation at this piont. And by this fast, I mean on a earth’s climate timescale, not a human one. How could we possibly stop what is already snowballing? We HAD our chance to stop this and we did nothing. It is too late now to do anything but survive the new world we have made.

frezik ,

What climate scientist agrees that we should give up because of unleashing permafrost methane?

I_Has_A_Hat ,

I can at least alleviate your worries of ancient bacteria.

Even our weakest antibiotics could wipe them out as they have evolved zero resistance to it. That’s assuming they can even infect humans in the first place.

Someonelol ,
@Someonelol@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

I’m no microbiologist but couldn’t the ancient bacteria hybridize with modern bacteria to develop antibiotic resistance similar to a wolf and dog hybrid having a tolerance to humans?

leftzero ,

Horizontal gene transfer is a thing amongst bacteria, so yeah, possibly (except in no way whatsoever like a wolf dog hybrid, entirely different mechanism).

There’s also ancient viruses, which are much more terrifying and probably have a better chance at having been preserved.

Enkrod ,

That’s not how bacteria multiply. There is horizontal gene-transfer, but that would be a very slim chance.

No ancient bacteria aren’t the problem, multi-resistant strains that have already evolved and are evolving in our clinics are the real problem, some bacteria that haven’t been an issue for quite some time, because our antibiotics simply killed them, have now developed resistances and are suddenly becoming deadly again.

E. Coli, Staphylococcus aureus and Salmonella, some of the most prevalent bacteria in humans are rapidly becoming multi-drug-resistant and resistant to desinfectants like chlorine. These superbugs already account for a shockingly high number of deaths in healthcare facilities and the situation is only getting worse as more and more countries use increasing amounts of antimicrobials, kickstarting microbial evolution into overdrive.

The_v ,

Have you ever looked up how long it takes for bacteria to evolve resistance after exposure to an antibiotic?

2-3 years… Yeah…

More concerning is a virus in my opinion. Jumping species is common and it’s the novelty to the immune system thats the danger. How much damage would an influenza strain from 3-4000 years combining with modern strains cause?

frezik ,

If that was all there was to it, no bacteria would be affected by antibiotics anymore. And yes, they’re less effective, but it’s far from an obsolete tool. We just have to be smarter about using them.

littlewonder ,

Definitely don’t watch the Arctic Sinkhole documentary from PBS Nova if you like sleeping at night. It’s all about the trapped methane in the permafrost and the trapped gasses under the permafrost. Shit is getting real scary. It wasn’t even sensationalist.

LarmyOfLone ,

“faster than expected” lol

D1G17AL ,

Its cause none of these systems are static or by themselves in a vacuum. There are feedback loops in all parts of our environment. Its not a coincidence that the temperature started to accelerate after the recent series of MAJOR volcanic eruptions in the many parts of the worlds oceans. Throw in the absolute monstrosity that is human industry and well the feedback there is more heat from industry combined with greenhouse gases means the the heat in those areas rises. What does heat do? It rises and moves outwards until it reaches equilibrium. Where is it cold? The arctic and antarctic. What’s happening in those places recently? Oh yeah huge spikes in temperature that are causing shifts by over 40-50 degrees Fahrenheit or about 8-10 degrees celsius. Sure it’s technically still freezing over the arctic and antarctic for portions of the year. However the arctic has, for the last several years during summer, been almost entirely ice free. The North fucking Pole is ice free during the summer time. That’s fucking insane. Everything feeds into everything else with our environment and climate.

Until more people in power actually understand these facts, we are all going to suffer needlessly.

Samvega OP ,

“It’s difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on not understanding it." -Upton Sinclair

Leg ,
@Leg@sh.itjust.works avatar

Plenty of powerful people know these things. The profit motive makes these things hard to care about. We will continue like this until options are gone.

SulaymanF ,

Impossible. Michael Crichton and the experts in Superfreakonomics assured us that scientists would be able to quickly implement geoengineering projects to reduce CO2 and cool the earth. /s

Samvega OP ,

Technology is great! Let’s incite hatred through social media.

StormWalker ,

I see a lot of doom and gloom in the comments here. Correct me if I’m wrong, but is not the main concern being that sea levels will rise and flood costal cities? Plus some parts of the world will be too hot to comfortably live? Human beings are remarkably creative when they need to be. Right now most are overweight watching TV and worried about stupid unimportant things. But if the need arose to build new towns/cities in higher and cooler locations, we have the man power. Literally BILLIONS of humans, some smart ones to plan it all, and the rest to build it. I don’t see an “end of humanity” or “don’t have kids” as being reasonable. Humanity will adapt. Please correct me if I’m missing something here.

mortalglowworm ,

I agree that humans are remarkably creative, and I agree “don’t have kids” is reasonable. But the “end of humanity” might come through this. However, I agree that we might be able to survive this. But please take it seriously. The whole climate crisis is a complex challenge by itself, and the politicization of it, along with the capitalistic interests, are complicating it further. We need urgent global action if we want humanity to survive.

Consider: Not all those billions of people will survive the sudden shift in climate. The breaking points in climate make everything super difficult to plan for. It is not just about finding higher ground that is climatic for humans, the whole agriculture will be a big problem. The climate will be so different from what we have right now, we are not perfectly sure how which crops would work where. We need globally aligned tests, knowledge sharing at the very best, along with all the action we need to take along with carbon emissions.

This challenge, is our biggest yet. We need a global, aligned, focused effort. But, we are far from it. The stress is causing conflict everywhere. Our international order is not up to coordinate this global effort, unfortunately. And if COVID-19 showed us what we can have on a global scale as a response, it means every nation state will turn inwards, try to fight against it by themselves while also fighting against everyone else. This problem is the crux. Our systems, our worldviews, our doctrine are not up for this fight ahead.

There is hope. But there is also a lot to despair about.

Samvega OP ,

And if COVID-19 showed us what we can have on a global scale as a response, it means every nation state will turn inwards, try to fight against it by themselves while also fighting against everyone else.

My money is on hot, stressed, scared people tending to vote for politicians who blame immigrants / feminists / queer people. Maybe there will even be sacrifices.

31337 ,

Sea levels rising is only one of the concerns. I think the biggest concern is the reduction of ariable land due to climate change. I.e. the carrying capacity of the Earth will decrease (and I’m of the opinion that the human species has already greatly overshot Earth’s carrying capacity; hence the current degradation of our environment).

I think the species will survive, but may experience a population crash (i.e. mass death), and severly reduced quality of life. I think having 1 or 2 kids is fine for now, and hope I’m wrong in my Malthusian-like thinking.

Pretzilla ,

Pretty spot on, except the part condemning only 1 or 2 kids to a horrible death is fine for now.

Yea I’m twisting your words around a bit, but really that’s the horrible reality I’m seeing.

It’s just very on point - too much to ask humans to stop procreating.

Samvega OP ,

Human beings are remarkably creative when they need to be.

Yes! Humans say they think children are important, then create situations where children are hungry, abused, or killed in war. Then they create rationalisations for that being inevitable, or acceptable, or even deserved.

Humans also create technology to ‘make the world better’, then use it to convince people as a group to do things which make the world worse.

Aren’t humans creative? They’re going to create a lack of humans eventually - isn’t that imaginative?

Please correct me if I’m missing something here.

Those in power often use crises to invent reasons to take more power, and to direct it against scapegoats. The point is not often to make the world better for everyone, the point is very often to make the world better for those who already have the most.

Zacryon ,
@Zacryon@feddit.org avatar

There is a lot more to it than rise of sea levels on the one hand and some places being too hot.

TL;DR: Climate change causes mass extinctions, ecosystem collapse, extreme weather, and life-threatening heat. Technology alone won’t save us; prevention is crucial. Ignoring climate action risks severe economic damage, comparable to a permanent Great Depression.

(Prepare for a great wall of fuck.)

In short (list is not exhaustive, there’s surely more which I also don’t know of or don’t think of right now):

  • Mass extinction of several species, which can’t keep up with the pace of climate change. You might have heard already how insect popluations dramatically declined in the past decades.
  • Extinction or even significant deaths and lack of offspring in various species leads to imbalance and collapse of entire eco systems.
  • Humans are part of and relying on functioning and healthy eco systems. Without them our very basis of life starts collapsing, leading to numerous human deaths and a lot of misery.
  • The occurence of extreme weather conditions as well as catastophes in consequence of climate change increases. The occasional summer storm might become less occasional, which is less of a problem. But so do floodings, hurricanes, tornadoes, droughts or forest fires increase. And those cost lives and do a lot of damage. We experience weather conditions in places today, which most common people would’ve deemed impossible or extremely unlikely at least. (Not every extreme weather condition is the result of climate change though. But a lot are. An entire field of attribution science has emerged to elaborate which catastrophe has been a direct cause of climate change.)
  • Increased temperatures, but especially heatwaves, are already now costing more and more lives and that’s not just some particular places with extremely hot temperatures, but it’s also occuring in entire nations known for more temperate conditions. For example in the EU.
  • Being “too hot” is only one side. You can survive 40°C or higher, if the air humidity is low. But due to global warming we can also observe time frames in regions where the air humidity plus temperature reaches such levels that people are exposed to life-threatening health risks already at 31°C. (See also “wet bulb temperature” in general.) Higher humidity makes it harder to cool ourselves by sweating, i.e., evaporative cooling. This is being observed more and more often in south-east asia and the middle east but also started to affect the USA in some regions (Texas, last year in 2023).

You might now understand a bit better why even a few degrees more around the globe incur existential threats.

Human beings are remarkably creative when they need to be. […] if the need arose […] some smart ones […] plan it all, and the rest […] build it

(Sorry for quoting you a bit more freely here.)
Technology can do much, but it is not magic. (I’m an engineering scientist, because I realised at some point that I can’t become a magician.) Entropy is a bitch and current solutions or attempts I know of regarding carbon capture are a nice idea at best, but in practise currently not feasibe and therefore a money-pit at worst. “Building higher and cooler” seems a naive approach given the scale and complexity of human lives and disregards the problems we’re facing due to climate change. I don’t mean that condescendingly, rather to highlight how massively impractical that approach would be on the one hand and no solution for most problems caused by climate change on the other hand.
I absolutely think that it’s necessary to continue research in that area, but until we have developed solutions which can tackle the problems we’ve caused in a significant way (which can still take decades until we’ve got large-scale applicable solutions), I think it’s best to practise prevention. Avoid contributing factors to climate change at allmost all costs.
Don’t put all your money on the “technology will save us”-horse.

By the way:
The people who think that climate and environmental protection are damaging the economy are short-sighted, as climate change is projected to cause a tremendous amount financial damage world-wide in the long-term. One of many many sources on this puts it like this:

when the researchers added in the possibility of a moderate 2 degrees of warming before the end of the century, this led to a decline in future GDP of between 30 and 50 percent by 210 […] In the U.S. alone […] A 50 percent decline in 2100 GDP relative to baseline means a loss of $56 trillion each year, which exceeds the current GDP. Such declines would leave individuals with “a 31 percent drop in purchasing power relative to a world without climate change,” Bilal adds. Such losses are “comparable to living in the 1929 Great Depression, forever,” he says.

harvardmagazine.com/…/harvard-economic-impact-cli…

Environmental protection is economical protection. They go hand-in-hand.

girlfreddy ,
@girlfreddy@lemmy.ca avatar

The new evidence that Greenland lived up to its verdant name in the not-so-distant past may represent an exciting scientific breakthrough, but it also heralds ominous possibilities for the future of humanity. Present-day atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are higher than they’ve been in millions of years; evidence of an ice-free Greenland in the more recent past means that it could take even less warming than once expected to deplete the continent’s all-important ice sheet. The frozen stronghold that covers Greenland contains enough fresh water to raise sea levels by 23 feet — a staggering volume that would reshape coastlines around the world.

nationalobserver.com/…/climate-desk-new-fossils-r…

Samvega OP ,

23 feet sounds like a lot.

I found a visualiser which goes up to 30 feet / 10m: coastal.climatecentral.org/map/6/5.3311/51.8749/?…

girlfreddy ,
@girlfreddy@lemmy.ca avatar

Crazy stuff. And what I posted was just for Greenland thawing, so doesn’t include the Arctic/Antarctic thaws.

In the not too distant future the world will lose a lot of coastline.

bad_alloc ,

In the not too distant future the world will lose a lot of coastline.

Which is where 80% of people live.

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