Global Warming

[stanky]

After you take the deeper dive, do you expect to see a consensus of opinion in the scientific community?
As per 'tipping points', there's some slim possibilities of events that could alter the trajectory of the climate change.
One (not pretty) possibility is a nuclear war and the potential 'nuclear winter' that could follow.
Another could be a massive eruption of the sort that robbed the planet of summer while its air-born ash obscured the sunlight.
A third might be some sort of geo-engineering, which gets tossed around by scientists. So far, cautious heads prevail, but there might come a point wherein anything is worth a shot.

(Can hardly believe that our Ms Di Wundrin isn't here for her anti-disaster porn outlook.)

The seemingly delicate parameters for 'advanced' and 'diverse' eco-systems, such as the one humans are dependent on, might be analogous to our own, rather strict, operating temperature. A few degrees above normal (98.6 F) and we're in trouble.
As for life in genera, it's hard to imagine anything we can do that's bad enough to end it. Some of that deep sea life may not even 'notice' our most devastating actions. Various extremeophiles will likely continue existence in their remote niches. ^The chemosynthesis that takes place in the realm of deep sea vents should give us adequate relief if we're concerned that humans might end life on this planet. Likewise, such discoveries give more credence to the possibility (inevitability?) of life on other planets.

I wonder how long the thrill would last, should we discover something like a tube worm, living below the ice on one of Jupiter's moons?
Or must it be 'intelligent ' life to provide titillation? A basic anthropomorphic entity as depicted in so much sci-fi, must have a face with eyes and appendages, arranged in basic bi-lateral symmetry, before we get too excited.

Where i live, which is where Sam Clemens would flee to for the apocalypse (because it's ten years behind the times) things seem about the same as usual, before climate change became a thing. The hi and low temps for various months are not shocking. Rainfall remains well distributed; forests appear intact; no radical change is visually obvious. A deeper analyses is needed to become aware of the extreme alterations that are manifesting, which haven't (yet) been reflected in average temperature charts and graphs. If i had no knowledge of global occurrences, and could only observe my immediate surroundings, I'd have this to share:

Something has happened to the 'specialist' species. They're essentially gone. There's an up-tick in the generalist species, filling in the spaces once occupied by specialists. This is the apparent case with fauna and flora. I could make a long list of such observations...which, oddly enough, might not even be noticed by peers in the same eco-zone. Very few people take notice of that which doesn't have immediate impact on their lives. Why should they care if jewel weed is gone or if cabbage moths are so few that gardeners needn't defend their brocoli like they had been?

The canary in the coal mine, though, expired years ago.

[Meadmaker]

After you take the deeper dive, do you expect to see a consensus of opinion in the scientific community?

Yes.

"Consensus" is a bit of a problematic word, I suppose. What I expect is general agreement. For example, there is a consensus already in the scientific community that global warming is happening, and that it's man made. There's a consensus that we will see higher temperatures in the future, and there will be some degree of ice melting and sea levels rising as a result.

But how bad is it going to be? If it's bad enough to be an existential threat to humanity, or even to cause significant population decline as a result of starvation, I would expect to see that consensus, or at least a strong majority of scientists making comparable predictions. If I don't see it, I'm not going to worry about it.

Something has happened to the 'specialist' species. They're essentially gone. There's an up-tick in the generalist species, filling in the spaces once occupied by specialists. This is the apparent case with fauna and flora. I could make a long list of such observations...which, oddly enough, might not even be noticed by peers in the same eco-zone. Very few people take notice of that which doesn't have immediate impact on their lives. Why should they care if jewel weed is gone or if cabbage moths are so few that gardeners needn't defend their brocoli like they had been?

I looked up cabbage moths, because I was familiar with them in my youth. From what I read today, climate change is causing problems because cabbage moth range is increasing.

[sparks]

Looks like your (non cited) info is 3 years out of date. Does this make a difference to the debate? I don't know.

Do you?

[Admin]

But how bad is it going to be? If it's bad enough to be an existential threat to humanity, or even to cause significant population decline as a result of starvation, I would expect to see that consensus, or at least a strong majority of scientists making comparable predictions. If I don't see it, I'm not going to worry about it.

Some light reading for you:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9464613/

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/a ... 9286000058

https://phys.org/news/2023-10-life-eart ... imate.html

[arthwollipot]

After you take the deeper dive, do you expect to see a consensus of opinion in the scientific community?

Yes.

Because science is the process of describing reality at continually higher levels of detail, when the reality is that the globe is warming, scientists will tend to agree on that conclusion. You'll always get people exploring the fringes of science, but that's just science working the way it's designed. In the end, after you take the deeper dive, there will be a consensus on what reality is.

[stanky]

And yet, a deeper dive still, and you'll confront some ambiguity as to the nature of reality itself. The nuts and bolts become more subjective. Other universes may satisfy some maths. Climate change has its outliers, though the consensus is pretty strong.
If Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis (which he put little stock in) holds true, than we might expect the planet to muster up some corrective moves, that would favor life. Some people look to the sun as the culprit and the cure will come when the activity settles. Probably not mainstream science, though we do recognize periods of increased flares and ejections.

Aliens could come and fix it. Or Jesus. He's due in any minute. Too bad people that pray a lot probably don't believe in climate change. They probably don't pray for god to fix it.
We're in over our heads this time.

[sparks]

OK, OK. Once the permafrost starts melting then rotting Jeebus will order the outer spacians to cause the solar cme's to fix it!

[arthwollipot]

The nuts and bolts become more subjective.

No, they don't.

https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/real-3

[stanky]

nice.

(btw, I'm armed to the teeth, should you like to debate the nature of reality.)

In my version, we're all correct. The pixels will arrange themselves according to your needs. For me, they're mad of nothing...same as myself.
For others, it's nuts and bolts, all the way down.

[President Bush]

The pixels will arrange themselves according to your needs.

Please don't anthropomorphize patterns that influence the formation or transformation of other patterns. They hate that.