Sea levels rising much faster than expected.

[Callisto]

Scary stuff: www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hxaLcCqkcxx0YkNZZr48y1XsLb3wD96R8DLO0

Plus the fact that if any government did make the hard decisions that would curb our climate-wrecking lifestyles we would vote them out quick-smart.

We can't pass this buck onto governments. The Government is us and we need to all take personal responsibility.

(That last paragraph is possibly the most hypocritical thing I've ever written..

the UK, Tasmania, Alaska? Anywhere else?

Can't remember exactly ...but hardly anywhere else.
Certainly he predicts that Southern Europe will be unfarmable by 2030 thus massive immigration to Northen Europe.
Further north thanus will eventually become to wet due to rising sea levels.
The Americas will become deserts as will main land Aus.
Basically there will no loger be sufficent land to feed us all, there will be massive wars over territor.
Human kind will reduce to manageable levels and the earth will prevail.

Yes, it's always a bit when people talk about saving the planet.

The planet is going to be just fine. It's us (and all the currently living species that we take with us) that are screwed.

Yes, that's his hypothesis.
People say he is the voic eof doom but he says not. In fact he says the opposite.
He also says human kindis too hardy to die out alltogether. Just that we will be reduced greatly in number.

I recently read Gaia's Revenge (or The Revenge of Gaia, maybe) by James Lovelock and he makes the arguement that the earth is a living organism in it's own right and reacts to outside stimuli, in this case atmostpheric CO2, as any living organism would. I found quite a lot of it tree-huggish in the extreme (and I'm a tree-hugger and proud) but it makes for interesting and disturbing reading.

I hope it isn't too late, Prince Charles says we have 100 months to save ourselves. I think it is a convenient number, but if we don't do something drastic within the next few years we are all doomed. There will be energy wars followed by water wars followed by territory wars for the last habitable bits of the planet. China has already depleted a major aquifer that feeds one of the big river systems (can't remember off hand which one) and they have a massive desertification problem. They are already buying up or bankrolling South American countries grain production, to the detriment of the rainforest.

And the negative feedback thing - not just in the Amazon where just a small temperature rise of 1C-2C will see mass animal & plant extinction, but in the perma-frost of Siberia, Northern Canada and Alaska which will result in a huge rise in the levels of atmostpheric methane - which means that beyond a certain tipping point there will be no recovery, and warming will happen at a much faster rate.

And then there is the acidification and pollution of the sea (the Pacific gyre plastic island is as big as North America), the barreness of soil in developed countries because chemical fertiliser strips the goodness out of the soil, the death of honeybees which means that whole swathes of food crops won't grow. The list is endless.

why are we not interested in this though? Why has it still failed to capture the public imagination? Only if it does so will governments act. There is a real problem that even here, in educated, Middle Class [generally!] MN land just not that many people seem interested. And it is the biggest thing affecting the future of our children, our main concern on MN.

LOL. Might get your toes wet though.

I often thinh about it Ruty.
I see myself going about my business, cooking meals, writing my books, nagging the kids to send thank you cards and I wonder what I'm doing?
Should I not be learning to hunt, fish and build fences instead.

i would secretly love to do that Litchick. I am always nagging at dh, saying lets sell up an buy some land somewhere, etc, he thinks i wouldn't last 5 minutes and need my home comforts, but as we all may well be heading that way anyway, better to do it sooner rather than later...

Perhaps we should run an MN collective. Oi, Riven, about that land in Alaska...

pmsl FioFio

I suppose there is a merit to our living halfway up a bloody mountain in Scotland.

I think the feeling helpless has a lot to do with it. And most of the things you're advised to do are both minuscule in effect and negative don't fly, don't drive, switch off. I don't fly but almost everyone else I know does, so I can't really kid myself that my non-flying is remotely beneficial. Even if I decide to give up altogether and compost myself slowly (aerobically, natch) in the nearest field, it still won't save the situation.

I bet if each of us had our own little planet that lived or died by our own efforts, we'd suddenly be much more motivated to change. It's the collective responsibility and collective action that's the huge obstacle.

I think it is more to do with the 'never happen to me' mindset, or less generously, the 'I'm alright Jack' mindset. Most people can't imagine millions starving in Europe, it only ever happens in 3rd world countries so who gives a shit?

Why are sea levels rising though? Where is the extra water coming from? Dara O'Briain mentioned this on tv once and he's a physicist. So, I looked up this to check he was right . Help please scientists.

I think your answer is on that page:

"Note that this argument applies only if the ice cube is made of the same water as the water that it is floating in. This is true, for example, with the Arctic ice pack, which is made of frozen sea water. However, it is not true for Antarctic icebergs, which are blocks of fresh-water ice from the continent that are floating in salt-water sea. In this case, we must take into account that the salt water is denser than the fresh water. The fresh-water iceberg still weighs as much as the weight of the displaced salt water, but because of the difference in density, the volume of melted fresh water will be slightly greater than the displaced volume of salt water -- so when the iceberg melts, the water level will rise, although the difference is very small.

If the ice is melting due to a rise in temperature of the water, then the water level might rise because of thermal expansion - related to, but not because of, the ice melting.

If the ice was totally or partly supported on the bottom of the vessel (or sea), then when it melts the water level will certainly rise. In the limit, if there was no water in the vessel at the start of the experiment, there clearly will be at the end, and it is obvious the water level has risen. This is a key problem resulting from global warming ? melting ice that was covering land areas such as Antarctica and Greenland is adding to sea levels."

(Note: I think this answers your question. Am a dunce about this sort of thing)

Ah, hadn't read all of it.

I have been actively losing sleep over this since i heard. It scares the crap out of me. Also obsessing about the Mayan Prophesy re 2012 (as you do) and while I would love to think that on the one hand perhaps it could all be really positive and force us all to change our ridiculous unsustainable lifestyles and ideals for a better future, I just worry that it will be all doom and gloom. Then I feel hideously guilty for having kids knowing that this is the situation.

And sometimes, I think I've been worrying about all this since I was about 10 and I might has well fly or not recycle cos what's the fucking point. (I don't - but I do sometimes wish I could stop worrying about it, it must be so nice to be one of those people who doesn't give a shit.)

Tinker, when people say it's going to rise due to polar ice melting they are partly right. The floating ice (ie: most of the artcic ice)won't make a difference, but the huge amount of ice on antarctica is not supported by water as it's on the land mass there, so if that melts and flows into the sea then the levels rise. The same is true of the ice on greenland, and northern Canadian glaciers etc.