this post was submitted on 11 Oct 2023
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Then it's hard to be optimistic about the future - if we don't make a drastic alteration to energy then we are heading for rises in temperature that are going to make some parts of the planet inhabitable,. leading to water wars and huge displaced populations moving north. This will play into the hands of right wing populists and the political system will be under the kind of strain we haven't seen in a century. That's for as long as we can keep what might still pass for civilisation limping along.
We have time. I may not be optimistic about the outcome now but in 5 or 10 years I expect the political landscape to be very different. I can already see that many many many people care about the issue and are working every day to change things.
We had time 20 years ago. We no longer have time.
Yep, it's the reason I don't have kids. It feels selfish to have something for myself that will spend most of its life suffering.
It all depends on where the tipping points are, and there’s still a lot of uncertainty. If we can stop making things worse before we hit major irreversible changes to our environment, we can eke it out
Permafrost is already melting in alarming amounts. We'd probably have to take drastic action immediately. I don't mean in a few years or a decade. Now like, this year. But that's not going to happen.
Thanks a lot: you made me look it up. The Wikipedia article has more potential climate tipping than I was aware of, and near the beginning they talk about fears of a tipping point cascade. I think that’s the end of my internet tonight
We don't have time - we had time 15-20 years ago and did less than the minimum required, so we will hit +1.5 degrees C very soon, which itself is bad, but we are easily on track for +2C and probably worse. That's disastrous. And this isn't factoring in other feedback loops that might kick in and make this irreversible, like widespread melting of the permafrost or the methane hydrates in the deep ocean (both of which have already started and will only get worse).
In the developed world, we have made gains in medicine and technology, but that just means this could be as good as it gets.
Is there hope? Sure. If China switched off all its coal-fired power stations and used gas, nuclear and renewables we'd be back on track for only hitting +1.5C and it would possibly buy us enough time to build renewables, make viable fusion reactors, etc. However, they already know this and aren't making any moves to change when no-one else is - for example, Germany are looking to bring their coal-fired power stations back online this Winter.