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.

Not so, the main problem is the western world using way more than their fair share of resources.

🙄

Perhaps “lots” was pushing it – about the same number as give period days off maybe. But certainly my company does and I know anecdotally of plenty that do, generally in the crunchy green end of industry.

To repay the compliment, @Discovereads, don't be so ridiculous. If we could all afford lithium-powered iPhones, who would choose, or be forced by hunger, to mine it? 'Developing' countries are capitalism's primary resource, 'developed' ones its primary market.

I didn't mention communism, though it's interesting that you did. It's true that Iron Curtain countries did not have a good environmental record (though we cannot know how they would be responding to the crisis now). But their 'communism' was simply state capitalism - a perversion which shifted ownership of the market from corporations to the state. I am as against that as I am against democratic capitalism. Other systems are available.

great! are you offering yourself up for sacrifice than?

You only have to watch the awful 'next prime minister' debates to see how screwed we are. All of them trying to out-do each other on 'economic growth' and rowing back from climate pledges, because suggesting that maybe endless growth isn't a good thing for the planet is electoral suicide.

We are not necessarily as fucked as many here are making out. But what we need to do is getting governments 100% focused on replacing oil,gas, coal with renewable energy ASAP. It’s the only way to limit the damage. Not fucking around for a decade on Daily Mail shite like Brexit and fixating on whether a few hundred people a week are arriving on dinghies and battling on woke stuff like statues etc etc.

Tax should be much higher but then people moan about that and want handouts to buy crap. Also no cut on fuel, the less people driving the better

No government is willing? Then why is it that the UKs total CO2 emissions have dropped to 1945 levels? “In per capita terms, CO2 emissions are now just 53% of the level 1890 and below that of 1860 – when the UK was the ‘workshop of the world’ – despite per capita real incomes being more than seven-fold higher. This has been achieved mainly by driving coal out of energy production and expanding GDP without increases in other fuels.”
voxeu.org/article/driving-uks-capita-carbon-dioxide-emissions-below-1860-levels

@WinterDeWinter is completely misguided to blame capitalism. The system of economic growth is a feature of all economies regardless of who owns the means of production- ie whether capitalist, socialist, communist, etc. Also economic growth doesn’t necessarily result in a negative impact to the environment. In addition how free a market is or is not is also a separate issue linked more to the powers of the government to regulate markets than to whether the market is operating in a capitalist or socialist or communist society.

David Attenborough has been saying about climate change for many years. Now the pidgeons are coming home to roost, I feel very sorry & scared for the next generation,our daughter will never have children because she doesn't want them to sort out if ever possible our despicable mess.

Since the climate has been changing for 4billion years, can anyone on this thread tell me what period from those 4billion years we should try to stabilise the current climate at?

We are already bankrupting the western world through net zero, I just can't understand why people think nothing is being done. Forcing up the cost of travel, car ownership, energy and so on is simply going to deny millions of people to anything other than subsisting off handouts. The war against farming in the US(Bill Gates buying all the farm land), in the Netherlands(seizing farms), the war in Ukraine(the biggest grain producer in Europe) will likely lead to mass starvation in the west. Get ready for that diet of bug protein.

In human history every period of a warming climate has led to better living standards, with longer life, less disease and a better diet with plentiful food. Periods of cooling have led to starvation, disease and mass death. At points in the last ice age there were as few as 10,000 humans alive on the planet.

The output of the sun has a huge effect on climate. There are signs we are heading to period of a grand solar minimum. If the temperatures in the northern hemisphere start to fall, we'll be longing for a couple of hot days in summer.

Population is NOT increasing to unsustainable levels. Birth rates have been falling and are continuing to fall, and not just in developed countries. The global population was always going to peak between 9 and 11 billion. As this century goes on the pressures on supply for food and water will start to fall.

We really need to stop the panic and get a sense of perspective, and we REALLY need to take a look at the flows of money around green activists and those pushing the green agenda. Its a grift of the highest order and has made some quite terrible people and companies very very very rich. People that will never live their life in the way they demand from the rest of us.

Lol. Communism isn’t “state capitalism”. You have no idea what you are talking about. There is no difference in “ownership of the market” between capitalism and communism.

And we do have communist countries in existence today….China for example. Care to tell me how awesome their environmental record is?

So what “other system is available” then?

A big factor is that there are too many people on the planet. The faster we slow population growth the better. And no, I don't give a shit if there's no one to look after me in the care home etc... and no, one of Tallulah's five children is not going to invent a solution for climate change...

They do for their mental health though, I hadn’t had a holiday for over 13 years and it showed, very stressed, especially with 2 severely autistic kids. Was a better parent afterwards.

Just do your bit, recycle, use reusable bags, try not to waste too much.

We're mere specs on this mighty planet and we get a mere spec of a chance at life in the grand scheme of things...just live your life. No amount of hand wringing will change things.

Be eco-aware but don't get all OCD about it.

The system of economic growth is a feature of all economies @Discovereads

No. Economic growth is a feature of economies which are fundamentally capitalist (including the former Soviet bloc, which was State Capitalist, as I mentioned above) or, to a lesser degree, feudalist (though this depends on how you define growth.)

As I mentioned, other systems are available.

Totally f**ked. It is our own fault - greed and selfishness. There needs to be a far greater conversation and understanding about carbon footprint & energy use.

Sick to death of people just pointing the finger at the oil & gas industry- they only produce fossil fuels because it gets consumed. Everything from fast fashion to pets count as energy consumption, not just cars & planes.

It’d need to be a myth to be a racist myth.

I think this is a very pertinent question and why isn't the Climate Change topic buzzing?

Wow! Some people love showing off their ignorance and stupidity.

This.
Every single one of us is responsible. Every one of us who is looking at mums net on a phone or pc that has been made in China. Every one of us who has eaten food brought from overseas, worn clothes made from factories in Asia or India, eaten foods that need rainforests to be chopped down in order to grow.
As humans we want our lives to be ‘better’. We want living standards to rise and we want more and more and more.
The only way to stop this is to go back to 1900 - 1950 standards of living when we had precious little. Then emmisions would be down becuse the need for making stuff wouldn’t be there.
It won’t work because none of us are willing to give up modern living. Who would give up 90% of their comforts forever? It just won’t happen.

The planet does naturally have cycles between ‘icehouse’ and ‘greenhouse’, we are still currently in an icehouse because we have permanent icecaps. The anthropogenic impacts on climate cannot be disregarded but the fact is the planet has been on the way to a greenhouse world for many millions of years, but human activity is speeding the process up.

Extinctions of life have been part of history since the beginning of life on earth-evolution and extinction go hand in hand.

Our impact on climate is significant but we aren’t causing an effect that wasn’t happening naturally even without our presence. Just to try to put it into perspective…! We think we control everything but we don’t

The Soviet bloc was communist. There is no such thing as “state capitalist” you are embarrassing yourself.

Please explain then how all the economies before capitalism was even invented happened to also be growth economies then? Such as every Ancient civilisation in Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas? And the medieval feudal economies- also all growth economies before capitalism.?

please tell me what other systems are available? You seem stumped.

Then it won’t be climate change that disintegrates and severely disrupts our lives but a total lack of human resources to keep countries running without a breakdown of society.

We are fucked but easiest thing is accept it.

Because the human race likes to supposedly keep moving forward and most governments don't care there is no stopping it.

It's interesting this is on a parenting forum where one of the worst things you can do in the west is have kids and have any more that 2 max. Mind you we have all the daily towel washers on her and other assorted things.

Enjoy it while you can.