Climate change: just how f***ed are we?

[obsessedwithsleep]

Obviously it's on my mind at the moment and it seems that nothing of any significance is being done. Like we're just watching those juggernaut come down the road and not even trying to the move the car.

Anyway, as the title says: how awful will the future be? What is the most likely degree rise by 2100? What does this actually mean in reality?

Would love to hear people's thoughts and wisdom.

This, and some. This is the latest panic, which will soon be replaced by the latest knee jerk material.

We’ve already experienced the worst of the climate change caused Tsunamis…eg the one that flooded Doggerland back in prehistoric times. There’s not enough ice sheets left to cause massive Tsunamis 🫤 Tsunamis for millenia are now only caused by tectonic plates- undersea earthquakes and volcanic eruptions which have fuck all to do with CO2 emissions and climate change.

It’s not climate change denial to factually state what the sea level rises per year actually are? It sort of puts things into their proper perspective.

It’s not climate change denial to state that while it’s a crisis, it’s not one that is going to cause the literal end of the world.

I'm not denying the ever-present trend of changes in temperature, hence me mentioning my family observing it for the past couple of centuries.

I'm just not pro the preposterous idea of our generation being able to affect it (that includes causing and/or stopping the climate change )!

The world will survive. People won't . We are so arrogant we think we can control everything . Most of everything that has ever lived has died out at some point. So will we. Earth will do better without us. No point worrying. Planet has warmed and cooled since its conception. It's just now we are on it.

I agree with you @Bednobsbroomsticks and I really do hope the human race die out and relatively soon.

Yes in the Ice Age when temperatures dropped by 6C in 6mos to 10yrs…far more drastic than an increase of 1.5C in 150yrs, there were fewer people and guess what the only technology they had was fire and sewing animal skins into clothes. You seriously think humanity today which survived that with so little then is going to just go extinct? Please

Climate flip is unproven but if its accurate, then we could see the collapse of civilisation (as we know it) very quickly.

The world can support 10bn with a modern lifestyle. All we have to do is finish weaning ourselves off fossil fuels and finish cutting pollution. In fact going back to a pre-industrial lifestyle would be worse on the planet than a modern lifestyle as we’d be back to burning wood/coal for heat, dumping raw sewage in rivers, getting 1/10th the crop yield per acre, and so on and so on

A wish list, "finish?" no country is even coming close, in fact the main polluter countries are all in denial/or doing absolutely zero to change.

We are are burning fossil fuels at alarming rates and polluting rivers and seas at record levels, be it industrial, plastics or human waste.

Correct, we cannot, within our lives but what we may be able to do is change the course of global climate over the next 100+ years.

Our Grandchildren deserve nothing less.

We can make changes now that will affect the weather in 2050

Many of us will hope to be alive then

I don't think we're "fucked" at all by climate change, most of us will be long dead by the time the worst problems hit. 2100 is so far in the future it's not worth worrying about, just as nobody in 1940 cared about what would be going on today - now, as then, there are far more immediate problems to tackle.

Solving the cost of living crisis, the housing crisis, the wage stagnation crisis, the energy crisis, all of these are more urgent problems, as are modern slavery, mass migration, rape conviction levels, the Russian war and countless other things.

A 1.5C rise by 2050, a 4.5C rise by 2100 or whatever figure gets thrown around is irrelevant to me. If I'm still alive in the 2050s I'll be a pensioner, probably a poor one, so if anything an increase in global temperature will be a positive thing for me because I won't have to have the heating on so much.

It's hard to take the "won't somebody PLEASE think of the children!" brigade seriously. Humans have never cared what impact their present behaviour might have on future generations, because they're already struggling to get by themselves. My taxes partly go towards servicing our national debt, some of which was accrued before I was born and certainly before I could vote. People have to pay for the actions of those who came before them, that's always the way.

If you are genuinely worried about future generations, just don't have children.

If we increased the CO2 ppm by a certain amount in the last 30 years by turning oil into smoke, then we should he able to reduce it over the next 30 years by working as hard to not burn oil as we did to burn it.

I wonder if there are genuinely many people who believe this or if it’s mostly Astro turfers? Trouble is of course that the Astro turfers are designed to get actual, gullible believers.

Our economic system will collapse if people stopped having children. The solution to a lot of the problems you mentioned, can also help moderate climate change and stop bio diversity loss.

however, we won’t have as many billionaires or maybe no billionaire at all. What we have to do is to direct human labour, creativity and ingenuity towards solutions that benefit us and not necessarily create profit.

Consumer goods will get expensive and they should, otherwise we will not reduce our consumption but what if we didn’t pay as much for our housing or transportation.

It is all about where the resources go. Specially human labour.

I don't think we're "fucked" at all by climate change, most of us will be long dead by the time the worst problems hit. 2100 is so far in the future it's not worth worrying about, just as nobody in 1940 cared about what would be going on today - now, as then, there are far more immediate problems to tackle.
Are you just talking about the UK? Because worldwide many of the worst problems have already hit. Climate change isn’t so far in the future: it’s here, now. It’s just that 2100 is going to be worse.

2100 is so far in the future it's not worth worrying about

Fucking hell, what do you even say to this kind of gleeful nihilism? There are millions of people alive today who'll still be alive by 2100.

Que the replies but the climate has always changed by the denier`s, like those of us who have and still do study environmental matters were not aware.

The issue most of these gloss over or continently ignore is the RATE of change has been accelerated by anthropogenic actions. Species need time to adapt, evolve and migrate, natural fluctuations allow for this but the change in temperatures at the moment are occurring at an unprecedented level and species cannot act or evolve fast enough.

Take tree`s for example, oak tress take thousands of years to migrate (yes move) as they cannot cope with extrem heat. So in the UK they would need to migrate north. The same is to be said of many species the rate of adaptation is not on the same scale as the current trajectory for temperatures and events.

Whilst we might adapt technology to survive temporarily for ourselves, biodiversity and wildlife will not and we cannot survive on this planet with out the vital functions they provide. Its sheer ignorance by the media and news to constantly only focus on CO2 and claim this is pretty much the only climate issue there are bigger factors at stake.

The lack of knowledge is very depressing, that is being banded around. Off tangent watching C4 Leader debate for the conservatives the other night they asked Liz Truss about climate and she tried to discuss biodiversity and the clueless Krishnan Guru-Murthy latterly cut her off claiming we are discussing environmental issues, it is not only about carbon.

Indeed.

I think, between the outright deniers, the patronising head-patters and the I'm Alright Jack-ers, this is just about the most depressing thread I've ever read on here.

Plus looking around at the past year of global wildfires, fatal floods, famine, drought, displacement, glacier collapse, storms, and going “Eh, nothing bad has happened yet”. What more do people want to happen?!

It would be bloody lovely if we could limit climate change so this WAS the worst of it, and have all the deniers say “Look, nothing else happened! Told you so!” I’d take all their shit chat for that.

2100 is so far in the future it's not worth worrying about

Er have you noticed it's already 35 degrees in the South of England this morning and only 10am?! I wonder at people's breathtaking remarks sometimes I really do

We're not ready for it.

I sometimes think that those with power do nothing to stop it because they think their wealth will protect them. Maybe it will, for a while. They can move to places that will not be submerged, not in drought. Will be able to afford food and water.

As some previously have said, I have no expectation of.my children to have children because of climate change.

I understood from the paper published by Professor James Lovelock in 2006 that we’ve already passed the point of no return.

I'm surprised no mention of zombie Apocalypse too

Refugees will become the norm, then scarcity, then nationalism again, then finally a world war over resources.

Do you think that if this is our likely future there will be people with power who say no, this can't happen. Is there any hope of global powers working together rather than engaging in great power competition? This makes me feel so hopeless, for my children. I will encourage mine not to have their own when they grow up. And I'm so sad to say that.

I'm surprised no mention of zombie Apocalypse too

How stupid are you?

We are indeed fucked. Perhaps making jokes is the only way to go.

an increase in global temperature will be a positive thing for me because I won't have to have the heating on so much.

I cannot any more with this logic.

Only once in desperate situations. Until then though, they'd make do in less than ideal situations and just accept it.

They are happy to sit outside schools in range rovers with the car running the whole time, polluting the air. They are happy to fill pools every day, running down the water in reservoirs. They are happy to fly abroad, again polluting the earth. Happy to buy crap the kids don't need and then throwing it into the dump.

The other person was right. People want more not less and to hell with the consequences. People apparently NEED to drive 2 mins down the road to go to the shop, NEED to drive short distances to pick up their kids from school. My own neighbour does it, she can see the school from her house she's that close. But still drives each day. No disability at all before anyone tries that tactic, and still people decades ago with disabilities didn't drive everywhere. Yes it was more difficult, but they still did it as cars weren't as popular.

Realistically we need to eliminate everything polluting the earth, which includes all cars. No one will do it though. It's a 'tomorrow' problem, not a today problem. Good luck to your kids, their future is screwed.