Considering we can’t even get heads or state or imagining-they’re-heads-of-states to not:
- Wage war on neighboring countries.
- Try to usurp their own government.
- Promote wild conspiracy theories.
- Be ragingly against personal freedom even in the US, the countries that is supposedly all about that.
- Be ragingly anti-intellectual.
… I really have exactly zero hope we can do shit-all about climate issues. We can’t even handle far smaller and far more benign (by comparison) issues on a national level, what hope do we have to handle things that require everyone to pull in the same direction, on an international one.
… I really have exactly zero hope we can do shit-all about climate issues. We can’t even handle far smaller and far more benign (by comparison) issues on a national level, what hope do we have to handle things that require everyone to pull in the same direction, on an international one.
you wanna hear something even more depressing? people first started talking about the greenhouse effect (though it wasn’t called that,) in 1824. (Fourrier and Pouilett were the first two. Fourier in 1824, and pouillet in 1836 or so,). In 1896, we have the first scientist getting concerned about it. that credit goes to Svanta Arrhenius.
Oh. and Popular Mechanics ran an article about it being a problem in 1912. complete with this picture:
In short. We’ve known for over a century and still fucked the earth up.“A few centuries… That’s next week’s problem. No one I ever know will be alive to see that.”
I have a real issue with this.
We have been (detrimentally) geoengineering the climate for centuries by pumping out co2 and that has been done by nations wherever and whenever they have wanted.
If a country wants to start a program of beneficial geoengineering why should that be stopped?
Because we don’t know wtf we’re doing when it comes to geoengineering?
You are right, best do nothing as we slowly die.
We know what we need to do (stop using fossil fuels for starters), but corporations and governments won’t do it, so yeah, we’re probably pretty screwed.
It might backfire and cause more problems.
Excuse my ignorance but with the way things are going. It’s doesn’t look like we have much to lose.
Do you remember hearing about Tambora, Krakatoa and their global effects? Do you remember ozone crisis? How we found out about the severity of the impact lead had on people? Acid rain? Nuclear winter?
Effective and thus extensive geoengineering requires an understanding of biogeochemical processes that we don’t have.
Well we didn’t solve those by doing nothing. And given how unwilling we seem to be in reducing our footprint. I’d say this is our only viable way.
The only way is endangering food supply and if we stop we might have hyper climate change?
Nuclear winter didn’t happen and the jury is out of it could happen that way. Everyone knew lead was bad but the thought was because it was heavier than air the dust would settle quickly, tests in real life conditions showed that it didn’t. The ozone thing yeah give you that.
But we HAVE so much to loose. At the moment, even a worse case scenario is one when earth goes on and adapts. Even humans would likely survive. And it’s not even decided we’ll get that.
But as proven time and time again by the shitty predictions we are getting, we don’t have anything close to a true understanding of the systems in which we live.
So on top of that, you’d prefer a single nation, most likely with economic interests well active in their decision making, to try and forcefully modify the system we don’t really understand?
Count me out.
I would love to live in a world where a few powerful nation did have such influnce that their economic interests didn’t screw over the world. But i was born in a world like that.
At the moment, even a worse case scenario is one when earth goes on and adapts. Even humans would likely survive. And it’s not even decided we’ll get that.
What makes you think this? Do you have a source for this? I am genuinely curious here.
How? All the ideas that are being looked at come from natural cycles that are being exploited. No one is talking about releasing some chemical that no one understands up there they are talking about causing algae blooms, inducing acid rain in the middle of the oceans, and painting stuff white. This isn’t cutting edge. Also it isn’t a one and done deal, it will require constant infusing of cash.
We know that sulfur and dust in the area lowers temperatures. The experiment has been run before. Look at average temperatures and see what happens around the WW2 era where steel has to be made using cheap dirty sulfur rich coal quickly.
We know painting stuff white makes it reflect more energy.
We know that alga eats a lot of carbon and sinks. We also know that alga is always limited by a few trace elements it can’t get enough of.
None of this stuff is new. All of it is going to cost a fortune every single year. Presumably if somehow someway painting stuff white made things go crazy we would stop spending tax dollars on it.
We know what we did to cause the problem. Anything we do to mitigate the effects of what we did will only encourage us to continue making those same mistakes.
Forget carbon offsets, just reduce carbon emissions and greenhouse gases. Forget geoengineering and carbon capture. Just tax emissions and budget for carbon neutral infrastructure and reducing car dependence.
Anything we do to fix the climate that doesn’t stop us from screwing up the climate will only enable further mistakes.
Yeah, carbon offsets amd the whole carbon footprint ullahit are just businesses blaming the public to deflect attention so they can keep on doing whatever they want. Just like blaming the public for water shortages when the vast, vast majority is used for industry.
I’m going to assume they aren’t counting industry in that.
