End of the World . Co2 levels

[LillyJones]

Apologies for such a naff question and first post .

My 13 year old daughter is driving the family crazy with her conspiracy theory’s and it’s now starting to effect Jess my 6y

“I need a rebuttal a counter argument to this”

So if you look at the graph co2 levels are at a 500 million year LOW yes low , but since the industrial revolution it’s gone from 0.03 , to just under 0.04 today

This is where it gets bewildering .

My daughter claims if it drops below 0.02 all organic life ceases to exist due to the lack of co2 , life’s building blocks .

She then claims they will blame the decrease of organic life on climate change leading to more draconian laws …

Please Please help 🙏

ps
I’ve checked the graph it’s correct and her 0.02 hypothesis is also correct.

Climate change law student here.

She is just wrong on the CO2 levels. Flat wrong. They are at levels that haven’t been seen (as high) in millions of years and they’ve never risen this quickly before.

She may well be right about what would happen if it goes below 0.02 percent but that is NOT the issue we are facing. If she panics about anything it ought to be the opposite which will already be affecting her life and definitely will in the future.

Where are you getting the 0.02/3/4 numbers from?
That graph has numbers in the hundreds and thousands

amazing thank you
could you give me the correct number now . Is it 0.04

Here

https://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/climate-change-atmospheric-carbon-dioxide

4.16 today .., thanks

what happens if it does drop to under 0.02

When co2 levels are incredibly high in the long distant past there wasn't much life on earth ? I think things were pretty nasty in earths early days

I also want to point out that we are 50% likely to be absolutely doomed at 450ppm (I’m assuming this equates to 0.045 in the units you’re using). Maybe point out to your daughter in gentler language that maybe plants need CO2 to survive, but they also need rain, fertile ground, not to be baked to death in the soil they stand it. Maybe also point out phenomena such as algal blooms as examples of why plants getting over fed as it were is a bad idea.

Can you explain why at 0.045 we are doomed . Please

Not in huge detail because I’m not a scientist and don’t have 600 pages to explain. However, the internationally recognised political and legal consensus (cf the IPCC and CCC) based on scientific opinion and probably giving us more leeway that we actually have, is that we will cross a number of tipping points as we approach or get around the level of 450ppm, leading to crisis such as a huge increase in extreme weather, crop failure, migration of pests and diseases, famines, huge mass migration, precipitous sea level rise, extinctions including in those species which are crucial to ecosystems which provide food for humans and animals, etc etc. Worst case scenario is that we enter a runaway spiral into hothouse earth conditions and end up with temperatures incompatible with human life for at least part of the year over most of the world without the time or resources to adapt, let alone helping wildlife adapt.

Ok thanks for your time