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Occasional Thoughts on Climate Change


donsutherland1
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13 hours ago, Typhoon Tip said:

Dr. Sonja Gupta recently put up an op ed on CNN ... wanna side four months ago at this point?  But it fascinatingly discussed the untenable nature of Global Warming .. which probably the difficulty in accepting  AGW is thus directly-causally related/precipitating. 

"...Human beings are just not wired to understand global warming..." 

This may or may not be true, but I wonder if what this Nakamura is writing is what happens when we mash-up greater than average I.Q. and mental faculties with that untenability - you get this sort of product.  Wrong ... yet well-delivered, and thus what's ( interestingly untenable) is how the lay-person's inability to appropriately think critically, on-the-fly, when his information passes inside.  There are a lot of dubious disconnects in these statements - ...it's like instead of conflating ( the usual mistake in the denier narratives/mantra), he takes the opposite tact and well ... these systems are less effectually influencing one another.  

 

I dont know if we can make general statements like that about all of humanity- I do think the average person has problems dealing with large issues and likes to break things down into simpler/smaller samples.  Something that takes relatively large time scales or large distances in space is something the average person has problems with comprehending, but those who work in these fields and those who avidly read about them are better at handling them.

The complications come in when monetary interests step in and muddy the waters and make it even harder on the average person and confuse them with outright lies.

 

 

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On 10/8/2019 at 4:36 AM, LibertyBell said:

I dont know if we can make general statements like that about all of humanity- I do think the average person has problems dealing with large issues and likes to break things down into simpler/smaller samples.  Something that takes relatively large time scales or large distances in space is something the average person has problems with comprehending, but those who work in these fields and those who avidly read about them are better at handling them.

The complications come in when monetary interests step in and muddy the waters and make it even harder on the average person and confuse them with outright lies.

 

 

We can't ...

His use is/was a common vocal-contextual trope - "human beings" in that context doesn't mean were damning all to hell for some unredeemable limitation... It usually means 'the majority'?

I don't have a problem with that based upon evidences.  "People" (same idea..) need examples ... ones that appeal, directly, to one of the five major senses before they believe any kind threat is real ( more of psychological take there but a good one, because the individuals integrate the modes of the mean).

If they don't get that tactility, they 'tend to' be like that typical water-cooler head nods and lip service politeness thing - "yeah yeah, right - sounds true. Interesting"  

I agree that it shouldn't be as assessment applicable of ALL who walk under shade or sun but I don't believe that was the intent ... if he was precise, which titling contexts seldom are, he might have said people too often tend not to be wired for -

I agree that people have trouble with larger specter ( if they even can see it for that matter) of what the issue is about - it's almost like they hear what it will mean, and since they don't get why, and don't directly sense the evidences ( above ), they knee jerk deny.  The 'whys' requires component analytic decomposition into constituency aspects, such that one can then see how it all fits together -..  heh, not many folks engage in that sort of mathematical processing as a general rule. That's part of the "untenable" nature of it right there, tho. Some can, few do, save one or two... and they get ignored.  Humanity ignoring it's own pathway to destruction might be a road paved long before modern treks ever walked - it happened when evolution chose the great brain experiment.  

Being a bit spacious if not even specious-for-fun in that description, admittedly.  But still, that's what is meant by not wired to see it. If we were born with a gene for it, we would be compelled not to buy plastic, burn paper with chemicals that make the smoke look black. Gas and oil technologies would have be vetted for consequence before accessing their stored chemical energies in a rush for profit. We just would have emerged different tech along the way - unwittingly, in concert with the gestalt of Gaia-health, perfunctorily.  

Most have to study math and complain while doing it...and are happy to have survived their B.A. (if they get that far or beyond).  To that end, that is what Dr. Gupta is talking about - it's not as tenable to the commoner as we ( unfortunately) need it to be, and even many who rank "above" the hoi polloi for that matter are either having problems doing so, or ...   

..that's the moral/ethic arm of the denier stuff.  Which is related to your monetary interest thing.  Some are just flat out self-centered to the point where they fight is really against god - speaking euphemistically. They are really pissed at the finality of life and flip the bird to reality and the universe for ending theirs at the end of 80 or 90 years if they're lucky, so they're burning all their bridges and partying one way or the other..  That's all rhetoric for this "it won't happen in my life-time" mantra you come across once in a while. 

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Everything needs to go right (100 percent of the time) for Type 0 civilizations to function correctly for a long period of time (1-2 millennium). Keep in mind the fossil-fuel era has only existed for about 250 years and we are already at the end of the road (apparently). Subtle things matter like how you educate the population, your cultural values (religion versus secular), the uniformity of your education, childhood nutrition, eugenics (keeping the IQ above a certain level).

It's much easier to walk away from civilization than struggle and adapt civilization to human needs. There's a reason why we still haven't been able to debunk the Fermi paradox. People have collectively chosen to walk away from the long-term reality of our situation and we are looking to pay the ultimate price for our indifference.

When you take a step back and abandon your hubris it's easy to see how the wealth inequality and general unfairness of our world is tied into our unsustainable future. We are not giving people a fair run at life and we are exposing young people to unnecessary risks for no clear reason.

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18 hours ago, Typhoon Tip said:

We can't ...

His use is/was a common vocal-contextual trope - "human beings" in that context doesn't mean were damning all to hell for some unredeemable limitation... It usually means 'the majority'?

I don't have a problem with that based upon evidences.  "People" (same idea..) need examples ... ones that appeal, directly, to one of the five major senses before they believe any kind threat is real ( more of psychological take there but a good one, because the individuals integrate the modes of the mean).

If they don't get that tactility, they 'tend to' be like that typical water-cooler head nods and lip service politeness thing - "yeah yeah, right - sounds true. Interesting"  

I agree that it shouldn't be as assessment applicable of ALL who walk under shade or sun but I don't believe that was the intent ... if he was precise, which titling contexts seldom are, he might have said people too often tend not to be wired for -

I agree that people have trouble with larger specter ( if they even can see it for that matter) of what the issue is about - it's almost like they hear what it will mean, and since they don't get why, and don't directly sense the evidences ( above ), they knee jerk deny.  The 'whys' requires component analytic decomposition into constituency aspects, such that one can then see how it all fits together -..  heh, not many folks engage in that sort of mathematical processing as a general rule. That's part of the "untenable" nature of it right there, tho. Some can, few do, save one or two... and they get ignored.  Humanity ignoring it's own pathway to destruction might be a road paved long before modern treks ever walked - it happened when evolution chose the great brain experiment.  

Being a bit spacious if not even specious-for-fun in that description, admittedly.  But still, that's what is meant by not wired to see it. If we were born with a gene for it, we would be.  Most have to study math and complain while doing it...and are happy to have survived their B.A..  To that end, that is what Dr. Gupta is talking about - it's not as tenable to the commoner as we ( unfortunately) need it to be, and even many who rank "above" the hoi polloi for that matter are either having problems doing so, or ...   

..that's the moral/ethic arm of the denier stuff.  Which is related to your monetary interest thing.  Some are just flat out self-centered to the point where they fight is really against god - speaking euphemistically. They are really pissed at the finality of life and flip the bird to reality and the universe for ending theirs at the end of 80 or 90 years if they're lucky, so they're burning all their bridges and partying one way or the other..  That's all rhetoric for this "it won't happen in my life-time" mantra you come across once in a while. 

Education, education, education, not the kind that teaches you facts and hard skills, but the kind that teaches you how to think, reason and look deeply, that's the only hope for our species. Until proven otherwise I will assume that intelligent life arises quite often in our universe, it seems designed for life (in so many particulars: i.e. gravity, the specific properties of H2O, oxidation-reduction, etc...not sure if these imply a sense of agency there); at any rate, most if not all self-aware species I'm guessing "progress" to precisely the point where humankind presently sits and because technological evolution inherently outpaces biological evolution for multi-cellular critters, they, in essence, commit species-wide suicide.

 

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24 minutes ago, adiabatic13 said:

Education, education, education, not the kind that teaches you facts and hard skills, but the kind that teaches you how to think, reason and look deeply, that's the only hope for our species. Until proven otherwise I will assume that intelligent life arises quite often in our universe, it seems designed for life (in so many particulars: i.e. gravity, the specific properties of H2O, oxidation-reduction, etc...not sure if these imply a sense of agency there); at any rate, most if not all self-aware species I'm guessing "progress" to precisely the point where humankind presently sits and because technological evolution inherently outpaces biological evolution for multi-cellular critters, they, in essence, commit species-wide suicide.

 

It is not obvious that human style intelligence is a common feature anywhere, afawk it has evolved just once in the several hundred million years that multi cellular life has existed on this earth.

Actually the constraint is even stricter, industrial technology is only a few hundred years old, so about a millionth of the multi cellular life span. That suggests intelligent life as we know it is a very fleeting apparition, even if we assume that it has longevity once achieved. However, as noted, the lack of wisdom which humans are showing in their dealing with their own biosphere strongly suggests longevity may be limited for our technological society.

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57 minutes ago, adiabatic13 said:

Education, education, education, not the kind that teaches you facts and hard skills, but the kind that teaches you how to think, reason and look deeply, that's the only hope for our species. Until proven otherwise I will assume that intelligent life arises quite often in our universe, it seems designed for life (in so many particulars: i.e. gravity, the specific properties of H2O, oxidation-reduction, etc...not sure if these imply a sense of agency there); at any rate, most if not all self-aware species I'm guessing "progress" to precisely the point where humankind presently sits and because technological evolution inherently outpaces biological evolution for multi-cellular critters, they, in essence, commit species-wide suicide.

 

Yup... agreed on the bold HUGELY.  I have a personal hypothesis that relates:  The modern conveniences of the Industrial Revolution are creating a society of apathy, which ultimately leads to partial failure in accessing the intellects of its population precipitates, along with 'putting to sleep' the morality that is believed to be emerged from the consciousness rooted in executive higher mental functions - those that are needed in a more cooperative/cooperating landscape.  This is a particular con in the total pros and cons assessment of the IR - and there are pros ( I'm not meaning to damn the IR ). It is/has forced changes in how Humanity engages both at the individual, but in the collective sense, however.  Cooperation suffers... The last million and half years of an evolutionary process that many don't even believe occurred, much less are aware, created a species uniquely dependent upon one another to survive.  That's abruptly, instantaneously on a geological scale, become less needed - IR has effectively cut those requirements. And, nature abhors a vacuum. 

In the absence of those cooperative circuitry's .. how do the minds of the denizens get wired?  I dunno - ask Columbine?  We are unwittingly IN a vast sociological experiment - i.e., an evolutionary turn..etc etc etc. It's not that clear and cut, though, either. I mean, obviously... we are not all nut-jobs.  But it really is a human failing ( IR or not ), where we try to put boundaries and definitions ...overtly quantize Nature into nice neat, tidy police work concepts and disciplines... when reality is actually more like "the Cloud"  Seamlessly interacting probability curves.  IR's over provision is, despite being a distinction that is non-ubiquitous among all humans, increasing the probability of errant vectors in the population.  

The latter stuff you mention is intriguing. Your content reminds me of that which circulates the Sci-Fi underground, the "kill-switch" hypothesis ... You used the term 'agency,' which is a loaded jest ha.  But, agency could also mean that no species is allowed to exceed this "Civilization 0" rank.  Kill-switchers believe we must be flirting with doing so, perhaps driven to do so, in fulfillment of that over-arcing Cosmic theme.  There are more philosophical approaches.  Take, the "Fermi Paradox" for example.  The simplified - maybe - mutilated version goes:  If the Universe is so favorably organized in such a way to promote the evolution of life, ... where is everybody ? 

Wiki' actually has a decent entry ...though I would not recommend anyone use that source as gospel by any stretch.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox

 

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2 hours ago, etudiant said:

It is not obvious that human style intelligence is a common feature anywhere, afawk it has evolved just once in the several hundred million years that multi cellular life has existed on this earth.

Actually the constraint is even stricter, industrial technology is only a few hundred years old, so about a millionth of the multi cellular life span. That suggests intelligent life as we know it is a very fleeting apparition, even if we assume that it has longevity once achieved. However, as noted, the lack of wisdom which humans are showing in their dealing with their own biosphere strongly suggests longevity may be limited for our technological society.

I guess the devil's in the semantics, huh :) 

I mean, what is meant by "very" in that context.   As in ... almost never?  Or how about, once.  

Or, even if just rare, really, we are not capable of comprehending how truly vast the cosmos is.  Rare could be 1 per galaxy.  Well, there are uncountable numbers of galaxies - and whenever cosmologists get to a consensus re how many there may be ( give or take exponents ) there's a trend of having to up that count by additional exponents ever couple of decades of ever refining deep field, astronomical observation technologies. 

The impetus being... who know how many their are, but the numbers is really too vast - so vast in fact that to even consider it a limited number escapes all practical meaning and therefore we can get into whether any such limit actually exists ( more a philosophy ).  But, each galaxy that can be studied, there is estimated to average hundreds of trillions of stars ... Yes, the Milky Way alone has 200 trillion stars, all of which are - presently scienced and considered to be gravitation anchors for planets ... which are also gravitational wells that concentrate potentially volatile chemistry and the building blocks of life as we know it - not to mention the hypothetical bio-chemistry ... to which the adage amid scholars and scientists of the cosmological field often refer, "if you can imagine it ... the odds are, the Universe is doing it somewhere."    No imagine having to multiply all that latter intrascale galactic factoidal array by a an 'incomprehensible to the point of essentially escaping all effective meaningly' large number and well ... you get something like quasi-infinity. 

Rare, ironically... becomes a huge number

Something else - simple logic would beg - must be going on to limit the observation of other advanced civilizations.  I read a lot. I get exposed to lots of hypothesis and counter-hypothesis in the yin and yang of speculation in these matters.. It seems to me that dumb luck plays a role too.  Hell, for all we know,... there really is "A Galaxy Far Far Away ..." that has species interacting like the 401 outside of Los Angeles.  We just happen to be circumstantially distanced like a Baluga hunter's bivouac Igloo ... ephemerally set out upon a glared white landscape too desolately removed and blinded by other lights to know or even know how to see that a proverbial 401 exists.. 

That would be funny premise for some sort of sci fi...  We are, at long last, encountered by a transgressing extraterrestrial exploring species that's like, " where are your constituencies...?"     "Pardon - constituencies?"   "Wait.. your species has none... as in 0 contacts?!  How is that possible"

Through it all .. one thing that always struck me is, we can see the light from distantly red-shifted structures .. these objects that only came into exposure after putting a telescope fixated on a previously black region of interstellar space, for hundreds of hours...  slowly capturing sparse photon at a time.. to finally create an image of galaxies some 13 billion light years away.   Yet, we cannot detect the after glow - assuming these species obey the same physical laws that appears the entire Cosmos has to... - of these outre worlds.  We should be able to hear their song long after they've evolved and or annihilated away. Throw a rock in a lake on a glassy still morning and the water returns to that same mirror reflecting serenity with no echo, signifying nothing took place there ... Yet the wave permeates a mile or more arcing outward away ... To any detecting source that may be that mile away, the arc arrives and it carries a message of something that appears to have just happened.  Yes yes ..we all know this ...  But, there are no rings - the point being, did the stone ever happen in the first place.  That's less the annihilation thing, and more the Fermi paradox..and that, despite having the technological capacity to detect red shifted objects, in deep field Astronomy, that are 13 billion light years away there's nothing else but that light. It's definitely a head scratcher.

The other aspect .. this could all be moot if the little green men ( and women ) are communicating with some other form of aggregate electromagnetism ..or even if something more sci-fi were involved. 

 

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Given that voters in most countries are divided on their level of concern about climate change, I think the best political solution is to reshape the paradigm and take climate change out of the equation to some extent, focusing instead on benefits in general from alternative (non-fossil-fuel) energy sources. If there are demonstrable benefits from such a transition, then the climate change issue fades into the background. 

Another change in political emphasis should be towards mitigation of problems. Whether the alleged problems are caused by AGW, other forms of natural variability, or non-climate factors, these problems need to be addressed. For example, forest fires (or wildfires) are said to be increasing. Maybe they are, maybe not. But more to the point, an advanced society should be able to manage this problem. It is probably more cpmplex than just AGW forcing more fires. There are questions like changing lifestyles (the exurban population increasing rapidly), interface questions, and philosophies about fighting or containing fires. So that sort of climate-related issue can be approached as a self-contained problem that the climate is not a key factor in controlling, in fact it would make a lot of sense to have large changes in our management of the wildfire issue, regardless of what the climate is doing or not doing. 

To some extent, I think the climate "emergency" is overblown hype, those who peddle it for political gain seem to have no knowledge whatsoever of the range of past weather and climate events. There may be subtle changes as part of AGW, or what we see may be just inevitable natural variability. Either way, it's a safe bet that nothing we do will actually change the future weather observed on our planet by more than a very slight amount. So knowing that, we should have mitigation strategies in place, rather than dealing in these fantasies about paying a tax on carbon to change the weather. That simply isn't going to happen, no matter how many people say so with whatever level of urgency and passion.If the oceans begin to rise in a more dramatic fashion, what can be done about it? Plans must be drawn up for protection or even removal of critical infrastructure, and populations at risk, but only when it becomes apparent that there is no alternative. I don't say this to make denial a policy, I say it because it is the only rational approach. The political parties who deal in a tax-to-solve approach are just deluding themselves and their voters. Their plans cannot possibly work. 

Mitigation might include diversion of some ocean water into massive desalination/irrigation projects which are needed anyway for other reasons. This is what we should be doing, rather than taxing carbon. 

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On 10/8/2019 at 3:38 PM, Typhoon Tip said:

We can't ...

His use is/was a common vocal-contextual trope - "human beings" in that context doesn't mean were damning all to hell for some unredeemable limitation... It usually means 'the majority'?

I don't have a problem with that based upon evidences.  "People" (same idea..) need examples ... ones that appeal, directly, to one of the five major senses before they believe any kind threat is real ( more of psychological take there but a good one, because the individuals integrate the modes of the mean).

If they don't get that tactility, they 'tend to' be like that typical water-cooler head nods and lip service politeness thing - "yeah yeah, right - sounds true. Interesting"  

I agree that it shouldn't be as assessment applicable of ALL who walk under shade or sun but I don't believe that was the intent ... if he was precise, which titling contexts seldom are, he might have said people too often tend not to be wired for -

I agree that people have trouble with larger specter ( if they even can see it for that matter) of what the issue is about - it's almost like they hear what it will mean, and since they don't get why, and don't directly sense the evidences ( above ), they knee jerk deny.  The 'whys' requires component analytic decomposition into constituency aspects, such that one can then see how it all fits together -..  heh, not many folks engage in that sort of mathematical processing as a general rule. That's part of the "untenable" nature of it right there, tho. Some can, few do, save one or two... and they get ignored.  Humanity ignoring it's own pathway to destruction might be a road paved long before modern treks ever walked - it happened when evolution chose the great brain experiment.  

Being a bit spacious if not even specious-for-fun in that description, admittedly.  But still, that's what is meant by not wired to see it. If we were born with a gene for it, we would be compelled not to buy plastic, burn paper with chemicals that make the smoke look black. Gas and oil technologies would have be vetted for consequence before accessing their stored chemical energies in a rush for profit. We just would have emerged different tech along the way - unwittingly, in concert with the gestalt of Gaia-health, perfunctorily.  

Most have to study math and complain while doing it...and are happy to have survived their B.A. (if they get that far or beyond).  To that end, that is what Dr. Gupta is talking about - it's not as tenable to the commoner as we ( unfortunately) need it to be, and even many who rank "above" the hoi polloi for that matter are either having problems doing so, or ...   

..that's the moral/ethic arm of the denier stuff.  Which is related to your monetary interest thing.  Some are just flat out self-centered to the point where they fight is really against god - speaking euphemistically. They are really pissed at the finality of life and flip the bird to reality and the universe for ending theirs at the end of 80 or 90 years if they're lucky, so they're burning all their bridges and partying one way or the other..  That's all rhetoric for this "it won't happen in my life-time" mantra you come across once in a while. 

It reminds me of what happens on the world stage sometimes- like for example, the Saudis' war crimes in Yemen of starving and killing children didn't get the outcry that killing one journalist caused.  When something terrible happens to thousands or millions of people I think it's harder to elicit sympathy from the general public than one terrible act against one human being.

The human brain has its limitations unless one is trained to understand those limitations and find ways around them.

And about harmful things like fossil fuels, our minds seem to put things on the proverbial back burner if we think the consequences are years down the road, and find it difficult to comprehend changes occurring more rapidly- which is exactly what's going on now.  Our minds are prisoners of the moment.  I believe politicians know and take advantage of how the human mind works to assert their own agendas.  It's why thousands of scientific studies can be ignored by the general public in favor of some insignificant political diatribe that feeds into the public's distrust of authority.

 

 

 

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7 hours ago, Roger Smith said:

Given that voters in most countries are divided on their level of concern about climate change, I think the best political solution is to reshape the paradigm and take climate change out of the equation to some extent, focusing instead on benefits in general from alternative (non-fossil-fuel) energy sources. If there are demonstrable benefits from such a transition, then the climate change issue fades into the background. 

Another change in political emphasis should be towards mitigation of problems. Whether the alleged problems are caused by AGW, other forms of natural variability, or non-climate factors, these problems need to be addressed. For example, forest fires (or wildfires) are said to be increasing. Maybe they are, maybe not. But more to the point, an advanced society should be able to manage this problem. It is probably more cpmplex than just AGW forcing more fires. There are questions like changing lifestyles (the exurban population increasing rapidly), interface questions, and philosophies about fighting or containing fires. So that sort of climate-related issue can be approached as a self-contained problem that the climate is not a key factor in controlling, in fact it would make a lot of sense to have large changes in our management of the wildfire issue, regardless of what the climate is doing or not doing. 

To some extent, I think the climate "emergency" is overblown hype, those who peddle it for political gain seem to have no knowledge whatsoever of the range of past weather and climate events. There may be subtle changes as part of AGW, or what we see may be just inevitable natural variability. Either way, it's a safe bet that nothing we do will actually change the future weather observed on our planet by more than a very slight amount. So knowing that, we should have mitigation strategies in place, rather than dealing in these fantasies about paying a tax on carbon to change the weather. That simply isn't going to happen, no matter how many people say so with whatever level of urgency and passion.If the oceans begin to rise in a more dramatic fashion, what can be done about it? Plans must be drawn up for protection or even removal of critical infrastructure, and populations at risk, but only when it becomes apparent that there is no alternative. I don't say this to make denial a policy, I say it because it is the only rational approach. The political parties who deal in a tax-to-solve approach are just deluding themselves and their voters. Their plans cannot possibly work. 

Mitigation might include diversion of some ocean water into massive desalination/irrigation projects which are needed anyway for other reasons. This is what we should be doing, rather than taxing carbon. 

There is much less pollution from using green technologies, especially in and near big cities.   Reducing asthma rates is a big deal.   I've looked at prices of EVs and generally find they cost much less than fossil fuel powered vehicles, and now have much longer ranges before they need to be recharged and can be charged much more quickly now too.  The technology is developing very rapidly.

 

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On 10/9/2019 at 11:08 AM, Typhoon Tip said:

I guess the devil's in the semantics, huh :) 

I mean, what is meant by "very" in that context.   As in ... almost never?  Or how about, once.  

Or, even if just rare, really, we are not capable of comprehending how truly vast the cosmos is.  Rare could be 1 per galaxy.  Well, there are uncountable numbers of galaxies - and whenever cosmologists get to a consensus re how many there may be ( give or take exponents ) there's a trend of having to up that count by additional exponents ever couple of decades of ever refining deep field, astronomical observation technologies. 

The impetus being... who know how many their are, but the numbers is really too vast - so vast in fact that to even consider it a limited number escapes all practical meaning and therefore we can get into whether any such limit actually exists ( more a philosophy ).  But, each galaxy that can be studied, there is estimated to average hundreds of trillions of stars ... Yes, the Milky Way alone has 200 trillion stars, all of which are - presently scienced and considered to be gravitation anchors for planets ... which are also gravitational wells that concentrate potentially volatile chemistry and the building blocks of life as we know it - not to mention the hypothetical bio-chemistry ... to which the adage amid scholars and scientists of the cosmological field often refer, "if you can imagine it ... the odds are, the Universe is doing it somewhere."    No imagine having to multiply all that latter intrascale galactic factoidal array by a an 'incomprehensible to the point of essentially escaping all effective meaningly' large number and well ... you get something like quasi-infinity. 

Rare, ironically... becomes a huge number

Something else - simple logic would beg - must be going on to limit the observation of other advanced civilizations.  I read a lot. I get exposed to lots of hypothesis and counter-hypothesis in the yin and yang of speculation in these matters.. It seems to me that dumb luck plays a role too.  Hell, for all we know,... there really is "A Galaxy Far Far Away ..." that has species interacting like the 401 outside of Los Angeles.  We just happen to be circumstantially distanced like a Baluga hunter's bivouac Igloo ... ephemerally set out upon a glared white landscape too desolately removed and blinded by other lights to know or even know how to see that a proverbial 401 exists.. 

That would be funny premise for some sort of sci fi...  We are, at long last, encountered by a transgressing extraterrestrial exploring species that's like, " where are your constituencies...?"     "Pardon - constituencies?"   "Wait.. your species has none... as in 0 contacts?!  How is that possible"

Through it all .. one thing that always struck me is, we can see the light from distantly red-shifted structures .. these objects that only came into exposure after putting a telescope fixated on a previously black region of interstellar space, for hundreds of hours...  slowly capturing sparse photon at a time.. to finally create an image of galaxies some 13 billion light years away.   Yet, we cannot detect the after glow - assuming these species obey the same physical laws that appears the entire Cosmos has to... - of these outre worlds.  We should be able to hear their song long after they've evolved and or annihilated away. Throw a rock in a lake on a glassy still morning and the water returns to that same mirror reflecting serenity with no echo, signifying nothing took place there ... Yet the wave permeates a mile or more arcing outward away ... To any detecting source that may be that mile away, the arc arrives and it carries a message of something that appears to have just happened.  Yes yes ..we all know this ...  But, there are no rings - the point being, did the stone ever happen in the first place.  That's less the annihilation thing, and more the Fermi paradox..and that, despite having the technological capacity to detect red shifted objects, in deep field Astronomy, that are 13 billion light years away there's nothing else but that light. It's definitely a head scratcher.

The other aspect .. this could all be moot if the little green men ( and women ) are communicating with some other form of aggregate electromagnetism ..or even if something more sci-fi were involved. 

 

I concur that the Great Filter may be ahead of us and that's why we haven't found any sentient intelligence in the universe.  To be fair though, our detection methods are very limited and we have no idea what to look for.  Life could even exist in interstellar space and if it were advanced enough, it would be indistinguishable from natural processes.  I say this because we've already found advanced organic compounds in interstellar space.  And life need not even be organic (or made of matter.)  There are lots of possibilities......

 

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On 10/9/2019 at 11:08 AM, Typhoon Tip said:

I guess the devil's in the semantics, huh :) 

I mean, what is meant by "very" in that context.   As in ... almost never?  Or how about, once.  

Or, even if just rare, really, we are not capable of comprehending how truly vast the cosmos is.  Rare could be 1 per galaxy.  Well, there are uncountable numbers of galaxies - and whenever cosmologists get to a consensus re how many there may be ( give or take exponents ) there's a trend of having to up that count by additional exponents ever couple of decades of ever refining deep field, astronomical observation technologies. 

The impetus being... who know how many their are, but the numbers is really too vast - so vast in fact that to even consider it a limited number escapes all practical meaning and therefore we can get into whether any such limit actually exists ( more a philosophy ).  But, each galaxy that can be studied, there is estimated to average hundreds of trillions of stars ... Yes, the Milky Way alone has 200 trillion stars, all of which are - presently scienced and considered to be gravitation anchors for planets ... which are also gravitational wells that concentrate potentially volatile chemistry and the building blocks of life as we know it - not to mention the hypothetical bio-chemistry ... to which the adage amid scholars and scientists of the cosmological field often refer, "if you can imagine it ... the odds are, the Universe is doing it somewhere."    No imagine having to multiply all that latter intrascale galactic factoidal array by a an 'incomprehensible to the point of essentially escaping all effective meaningly' large number and well ... you get something like quasi-infinity. 

Rare, ironically... becomes a huge number

Something else - simple logic would beg - must be going on to limit the observation of other advanced civilizations.  I read a lot. I get exposed to lots of hypothesis and counter-hypothesis in the yin and yang of speculation in these matters.. It seems to me that dumb luck plays a role too.  Hell, for all we know,... there really is "A Galaxy Far Far Away ..." that has species interacting like the 401 outside of Los Angeles.  We just happen to be circumstantially distanced like a Baluga hunter's bivouac Igloo ... ephemerally set out upon a glared white landscape too desolately removed and blinded by other lights to know or even know how to see that a proverbial 401 exists.. 

That would be funny premise for some sort of sci fi...  We are, at long last, encountered by a transgressing extraterrestrial exploring species that's like, " where are your constituencies...?"     "Pardon - constituencies?"   "Wait.. your species has none... as in 0 contacts?!  How is that possible"

Through it all .. one thing that always struck me is, we can see the light from distantly red-shifted structures .. these objects that only came into exposure after putting a telescope fixated on a previously black region of interstellar space, for hundreds of hours...  slowly capturing sparse photon at a time.. to finally create an image of galaxies some 13 billion light years away.   Yet, we cannot detect the after glow - assuming these species obey the same physical laws that appears the entire Cosmos has to... - of these outre worlds.  We should be able to hear their song long after they've evolved and or annihilated away. Throw a rock in a lake on a glassy still morning and the water returns to that same mirror reflecting serenity with no echo, signifying nothing took place there ... Yet the wave permeates a mile or more arcing outward away ... To any detecting source that may be that mile away, the arc arrives and it carries a message of something that appears to have just happened.  Yes yes ..we all know this ...  But, there are no rings - the point being, did the stone ever happen in the first place.  That's less the annihilation thing, and more the Fermi paradox..and that, despite having the technological capacity to detect red shifted objects, in deep field Astronomy, that are 13 billion light years away there's nothing else but that light. It's definitely a head scratcher.

The other aspect .. this could all be moot if the little green men ( and women ) are communicating with some other form of aggregate electromagnetism ..or even if something more sci-fi were involved. 

 

Want to read the kind of things that can happen to a society that is governed by fear?  Read this classic short story- Nightfall

http://www.astro.sunysb.edu/fwalter/AST389/TEXTS/Nightfall.htm

 

That was later extended to novel-length, but I have always found the short story version to be most poignant:

and here is another one that has a shocking ending about how our universe ends (and begins?)  The Last Question:

https://www.multivax.com/last_question.html

 

It's amazing these were written so long ago and yet are so timely.

And for those who wonder if our universe (and other possible universes) are the product of intelligent design, just look at all the places the number 137 seems to show up.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/137_(number)

 

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FWIW we've found a planet that has water vapor in its atmosphere about 100 LY away, it's a super earth 8 times more massive than our planet but in its star's habitable zone.  Next stage is to look for oxygen in the atmosphere, which would be an indicator of life being present, since (as far as we know) for oxygen to remain in an atmosphere, life must be present.

 

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https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/world-was-just-issued-12-year-ultimatum-climate-change-180970489/

 

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/meet-the-money-behind-the-climate-denial-movement-180948204/

According to Brulle's research, the 91 think tanks and advocacy organizations and trade associations that make up the American climate denial industry pull down just shy of a billion dollars each year, money used to lobby or sway public opinion on climate change and other issues.

“The anti-climate effort has been largely underwritten by conservative billionaires,” says the Guardian, “often working through secretive funding networks. They have displaced corporations as the prime supporters of 91 think tanks, advocacy groups and industry associations which have worked to block action on climate change.”

This is exactly why we need to sue the heck out of billionaires, the only language they understand is money and the only way to castrate their power is to take away the one thing they love.

That's where the 10-12 year figure comes from- from IPCC itself.  And it was underreported in the media..... unless you consume PBS and NPR of course.  The money of corrupt corporations behind the oligarchical movement of denial is instrumental also of course.

But evidence in the new report, in which a team of 91 scientists from 40 countries analyzed over 6,000 scientific studies, shows that the future is bleaker than once thought. A 2-degree-Celsius rise in temperatures would spell widespread disaster. Even if the world manages to shave off that extra 0.5 degrees, we’ll still be well on our way to flooded coastlines, intensified droughts and debilitated industries. A seemingly small 1.5-degree-Celsius bump in temperature would also alter weather worldwide, wreaking havoc on agriculture and natural ecosystems, and cost about $54 trillion in damages, according to the report. Because agriculture is the leading source of income in already poor countries, it’s likely that a crippling wave of poverty would ensue.

To make matters worse, the world is already clocking in at 1-degree-Celsius warmer than preindustrial levels, which means we’re more than halfway there. At the rate we’re going, global temperatures are set to hit the mark by 2040—unless a lot changes, and fast.

“Limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius is possible within the laws of chemistry and physics," energy policy expert Jim Skea of Imperial College London, one of the authors of the report, explains to Christopher Joyce at NPR. “But doing so would require unprecedented changes.”

Among them would be a 40 to 50 percent reduction in emissions by 2030—a mere 12 years from now—and a completely carbon-neutral world by 2050. Usage of coal as an electricity source would also have to take a significant plunge to make room for renewable energy, such as wind and solar, Davenport reports.

Climate scientists warn that these goals probably won’t be met without some serious new technological firepower designed to suck greenhouse gases back out of the air. Considering that such techniques could save us even in the event that we overshoot the 1.5-degree-Celsius mark, this route sounds pretty appealing. There’s just one problem: We still have to invent and conventionalize some of these tools before we can actually put them into use, Joyce reports.

Currently, a few experimental methods exist that can snatch carbon dioxide directly out of the air, but at up to $1,000 per ton of carbon dioxide, the price tag of such carbon capture is staggering—and billions of tons await extraction.

“The best way to remove carbon dioxide from the air,” explains MIT engineer Howard Herzog in his book Carbon Capture, is “to not release it into the air in the first place,” Joyce reports.

But the hurdles to clear aren’t just technological. As Davenport reports, the new study’s authors have already conceded that dampening the rise in temperature is probably “politically unlikely.” President Donald Trump announced intent to withdraw from the United States from the Paris agreement in 2017; it is now the only country publically opposing the accord. A recent U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration report estimated that maintaining the administration’s current course will yield a 4-degree Celsius (7-degree Fahrenheit) rise in temperature for the planet as a whole by the end of the current century. The report explicitly acknowledges the human impact on climate, but instead uses the data to justify continued non-action. In other words, the administration is arguing that our “fate is already sealed,” reports The Washington Post.

Hitting the 1.5-degree-Celsius goal won’t be easy. But saving a mere half-degree could make a huge difference in some parts of the world. For instance, it could pull corals back from the brink of complete eradication—an inevitable fate with a 2-degree-Celsius rise—and ease the severity of climate-related poverty, food shortages and water stress, Watts at The Guardian reports. And with scientists and government officials raising global alarm bells, perhaps there is hope that we can yet forestall the devastation.

“We have a monumental task in front of us, but it’s not impossible,” study co-author and climate scientist Natalie Mahowald of Cornell University tells Joyce at NPR. “This is our chance to decide what [the next 50 years] will look like.”


 

 

 

 

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19 hours ago, Roger Smith said:

Given that voters in most countries are divided on their level of concern about climate change, I think the best political solution is to reshape the paradigm and take climate change out of the equation to some extent, focusing instead on benefits in general from alternative (non-fossil-fuel) energy sources. If there are demonstrable benefits from such a transition, then the climate change issue fades into the background. 

Another change in political emphasis should be towards mitigation of problems. Whether the alleged problems are caused by AGW, other forms of natural variability, or non-climate factors, these problems need to be addressed. For example, forest fires (or wildfires) are said to be increasing. Maybe they are, maybe not. But more to the point, an advanced society should be able to manage this problem. It is probably more cpmplex than just AGW forcing more fires. There are questions like changing lifestyles (the exurban population increasing rapidly), interface questions, and philosophies about fighting or containing fires. So that sort of climate-related issue can be approached as a self-contained problem that the climate is not a key factor in controlling, in fact it would make a lot of sense to have large changes in our management of the wildfire issue, regardless of what the climate is doing or not doing. 

To some extent, I think the climate "emergency" is overblown hype, those who peddle it for political gain seem to have no knowledge whatsoever of the range of past weather and climate events. There may be subtle changes as part of AGW, or what we see may be just inevitable natural variability. Either way, it's a safe bet that nothing we do will actually change the future weather observed on our planet by more than a very slight amount. So knowing that, we should have mitigation strategies in place, rather than dealing in these fantasies about paying a tax on carbon to change the weather. That simply isn't going to happen, no matter how many people say so with whatever level of urgency and passion.If the oceans begin to rise in a more dramatic fashion, what can be done about it? Plans must be drawn up for protection or even removal of critical infrastructure, and populations at risk, but only when it becomes apparent that there is no alternative. I don't say this to make denial a policy, I say it because it is the only rational approach. The political parties who deal in a tax-to-solve approach are just deluding themselves and their voters. Their plans cannot possibly work. 

Mitigation might include diversion of some ocean water into massive desalination/irrigation projects which are needed anyway for other reasons. This is what we should be doing, rather than taxing carbon. 

This. We need a convincing argument and escape hatch for the Peak Oil problem which will hit us around 2040 on the BAU path.

Quote

I concur that the Great Filter may be ahead of us and that's why we haven't found any sentient intelligence in the universe.  To be fair though, our detection methods are very limited and we have no idea what to look for.  Life could even exist in interstellar space and if it were advanced enough, it would be indistinguishable from natural processes.  I say this because we've already found advanced organic compounds in interstellar space.  And life need not even be organic (or made of matter.)  There are lots of possibilities......

As it stands now ... there are are 2 possible explanations for the existence and vastness of the universe. (and it's emptiness)

1.) All other planets, galaxies, and suns are byproducts of an environment designed to create us and only us, i.e. the sheer impossibility of our existence has been overcome by infinite possibility.

2.) The universe is of unintelligent design and our existence is largely a mistake. As some have subscribed to it as a cancer or metastasis arising out of the wider universe. Thus we are heading to the dustbin in short order. The true purpose of the universe remains illusive and it is assumed to be the base reality of existence (this is not the case in outcome #1).

Option #1 makes our fate far more insidious. It implies that we have squandered the opportunity of a lifetime for short-term hubris and greed. The ultimate hell analogy comes to breakfast. We may be the last generation of humans to exist. It's sort of a classical argument between emotion and science (good vs.evil or Kairos vs. Chronos). Not to say emotion is unintelligent rather it is more capable of detecting evidence beyond the realm of empirical reasoning.

Kairos (Ancient Greek: καιρός) is an Ancient Greek word meaning the right, critical, or opportune moment.[1] The ancient Greeks had two words for time: chronos (χρόνος) and kairos. The former refers to chronological or sequential time, while the latter signifies a proper or opportune time for action. While chronos is quantitative, kairos has a qualitative, permanent nature.[2] Kairos also means weather in Modern Greek. The plural, καιροί (kairoi (Ancient and Modern Greek)) means the times. Kairos is a term, idea, and practice that has been applied in several fields including classical rhetoric, modern rhetoric, digital media, Christian theology, and science.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Yesterday was Utqiagvik's (formerly Barrow) 9th October minimum temperature of 30° or above. That is the second highest figure on record. Only October 2016 with 15 had more. The frequency of such elevated minimum temperatures in October has increased dramatically in recent years.

2015-2019 has accounted for 4 of the nine cases in which Utqiagvik recorded more than 3 days with minimum temperatures of 30° or above in October. The 1981-2010 base mean was 1.1 days. The latest 30-year period (1990-2019) has an average of 2.2. The average for the past 10 years is 4.2. Put another way, the average for the past 10 years would rank as the 8th highest such figure on record. Records go back to 1920.

The increase in such October warmth has coincided with a dramatic decline in October Arctic sea ice extent. During the 1990-99 period, Arctic sea ice extent averaged 8.497 million square kilometers. During the 2009-18 period, it has averaged 6.466 million square kilometers, a 23.9% decline.

During the October 1-18 period, which includes 2019 data, Arctic sea ice extent averaged 7.962 million square kilometers. During the 2009-18 period, it has averaged 5.737 million square kilometers, a 27.9% decline from the 1990s. For 2010-19, the average has been 5.603 million square kilometers (which includes the record low 4.776 million square kilometers from this year, which broke the old mark of 5.046 million square kilometers from 2007). The most-recent 10-year average is 29.6% lower than that during the 1990s.

Finally, the following is the breakdown of record-breaking or record-tying warm minimum temperatures during October at Utqiagvik:

2000 or later: 20 days
2010 or later: 17 days
2015 or later: 8 days

2019: 4 days:

October 10: 34° (old record: 33°, 1926)
October 11: 32° (tied record set in 2016)
October 16: 33° (old record: 31°, 1993)
October 17: 32° (old record: 28°, 1951 and 2011)

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  • 2 weeks later...

From the Arctic ice thread:

1 hour ago, LibertyBell said:
Thought I should post this update, especially with the recent historic forest fires all over California and now in Los Angeles!
 
 
The climate science is settled on direct causal links to California wildfires.  
 
Whether it is drier droughts, or whiplashes to wetness, the jet stream is acting freakishly.  
 
The fingerprints of climate change are all over this current event.
 
 
 
 

To Maue's credit on this issue, he also tweeted, " I used to be skeptical of these jet-stream & climate links but the evidence has become overwhelming in just the past 2-years."  While Maue has often taken skeptical positions on climate change-related matters, he has also displayed a willingness to be open to evidence, as noted above.

Unfortunately, there are still individuals in the field (e.g., https://twitter.com/WeiZhangAtmos) who seek to poison understanding, e.g., his evidence-free claim that there is no climate change link to the fires (https://twitter.com/WeiZhangAtmos/status/1188795586906120194). Notice that he cited no papers. He provided no references to scientific research, even as he complained about a lack of "scientific analysis." That complaint was almost certainly an attempt to deflect attention from his lack of scientific evidence to dismiss the climate change link to the wildfires in order to lead others to believe that there is no scientific foundation for the climate change link for such fires. 

In fact, contrary to Zhang's claim, numerous papers have been published on the topic. Two recent papers:

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019EF001210

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0153589

Zhang's bluster was hollow and lacked scientific merit.

The lack of scientific merit should not be surprising. If one goes through his Twitter stream, one finds retweets of conspiracy theories e.g., baseless claims that the UK's Met Office is deliberately hiding UK temperature anomaly maps prior to 2000, as well as trolling and name-calling (e.g., https://twitter.com/WeiZhangAtmos/status/1187782675924475904).

Those who troll on the Internet and/or peddle conspiracy theories should not be taken seriously in any serious endeavor, particularly an evidence-centered field such as science.

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5 minutes ago, donsutherland1 said:

From the Arctic ice thread:

To Maue's credit on this issue, he also tweeted, " I used to be skeptical of these jet-stream & climate links but the evidence has become overwhelming in just the past 2-years."  While Maue has often taken skeptical positions on climate change-related matters, he has also displayed a willingness to be open to evidence, as noted above.

Unfortunately, there are still individuals in the field (e.g., https://twitter.com/WeiZhangAtmos) who seek to poison understanding, e.g., his evidence-free claim that there is no climate change link to the fires (https://twitter.com/WeiZhangAtmos/status/1188795586906120194). Notice that he cited no papers. He provided no references to scientific research, even as he complained about a lack of "scientific analysis." That complaint was almost certainly an attempt to deflect attention from his lack of scientific evidence to dismiss the climate change link to the wildfires in order to lead others to believe that there is no scientific foundation for the climate change link for such fires. 

In fact, contrary to Zhang's claim, numerous papers have been published on the topic. Two recent papers:

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019EF001210

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0153589

Zhang's bluster was hollow and lacked scientific merit.

The lack of scientific merit should not be surprising. If one goes through his Twitter stream, one finds retweets of conspiracy theories e.g., baseless claims that the UK's Met Office is deliberately hiding UK temperature anomaly maps prior to 2000, as well as trolling and name-calling (e.g., https://twitter.com/WeiZhangAtmos/status/1187782675924475904).

Those who troll on the Internet and/or peddle conspiracy theories should not be taken seriously in any serious endeavor, particularly an evidence-centered field such as science.

Unfortunately there are "scientists" who do this; I was researching cosmic rays and mass extinction events and found that there is a scientist who actually says cosmic rays are the main cause of current climate change.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_ray#Postulated_role_in_climate_change

A role for cosmic rays in climate was suggested by Edward P. Ney in 1959[100] and by Robert E. Dickinson in 1975.[101] It has been postulated that cosmic rays may have been responsible for major climatic change and mass-extinction in the past. According to Adrian Mellott and Mikhail Medvedev, 62-million-year cycles in biological marine populations correlate with the motion of the Earth relative to the galactic plane and increases in exposure to cosmic rays.[102] The researchers suggest that this and gamma ray bombardments deriving from local supernovae could have affected cancer and mutation rates, and might be linked to decisive alterations in the Earth's climate, and to the mass-extinctions of the Ordovician.[103][104]

Danish physicist Henrik Svensmark has controversially argued that because solar variation modulates the cosmic ray flux on Earth, they would consequently affect the rate of cloud formation and hence be an indirect cause of global warming.[105][106] Svensmark is one of several scientists outspokenly opposed to the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming, leading to concerns that the proposition that cosmic rays are connected to global warming could be ideologically biased rather than scientifically based.[107] Other scientists have vigorously criticized Svensmark for sloppy and inconsistent work: one example is adjustment of cloud data that understates error in lower cloud data, but not in high cloud data;[108] another example is "incorrect handling of the physical data" resulting in graphs that do not show the correlations they claim to show.[109] Despite Svensmark's assertions, galactic cosmic rays have shown no statistically significant influence on changes in cloud cover,[110] and demonstrated to have no causal relationship to changes in global temperature.[111]

Unfortunately this denialism shouts down the very real possibility that a supernova explosion induced cosmic ray barrage caused a relatively recent mass extinction event.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_ray#Possible_mass_extinction_factor

 

A handful of studies conclude that a nearby supernova or series of supernovas caused the Pliocene marine megafauna extinction event by substantially increasing radiation levels to hazardous amounts for large seafaring animals

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As the observed warming of the global climate, including the continuing rapid warming in the Arctic region despite gradually declining solar insolation, proceeds, the degree of scientific ignorance being pushed on Social Media to deflect attention from athnropogenic climate change is expanding. One stunning example:

CO2-11012019.jpg

https://twitter.com/EcoSenseNow/status/1190278220043579393

The hashtag, #CelebrateIgnorance would have been more appropriate. Let's take a look at the Eocene, which experienced the world's warmest temperatures since the extinction of the dinosaurs some 65 million years ago.

We show that sea surface temperatures near the North Pole increased from ∼18 °C to over 23 °C during this event. Such warm values imply the absence of ice and thus exclude the influence of ice-albedo feedbacks on this Arctic warming. At the same time, sea level rose while anoxic and euxinic conditions developed in the ocean's bottom waters and photic zone, respectively.

https://www.nature.com/articles/nature04668

We attribute a massive drop in dinoflagellate abundance and diversity at peak warmth to thermal stress, showing that the base of tropical food webs is vulnerable to rapid warming.

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/3/3/e1600891.short

Associated with the rapid carbon release during this event are profound environmental changes in the oceans including warming, deoxygenation and acidification. To evaluate the global extent of surface ocean acidification during the PETM, we present a compilation of new and published surface ocean carbonate chemistry and pH reconstructions from various palaeoceanographic settings. We use boron to calcium ratios (B/Ca) and boron isotopes (δ11B) in surface- and thermocline-dwelling planktonic foraminifera to reconstruct ocean carbonate chemistry and pH. Our records exhibit a B/Ca reduction of 30–40% and a δ11B decline of 1.0–1.2‰ coeval with the carbon isotope excursion. The tight coupling between boron proxies and carbon isotope records is consistent with the interpretation that oceanic absorption of the carbon released at the onset of the PETM resulted in widespread surface ocean acidification. The remarkable similarity among records from different ocean regions suggests that the degree of ocean carbonate change was globally near uniform.

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rsta.2017.0072

How does the anthropogenic rise in greenhouse gas emissions compare to that period? Research has found that "current carbon emission rates are nine to 10 times higher than those during the PETM."

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/02/190220112221.htm

Further, climate sensitivity could increase with the warming on account of feedbacks such as those concerning cloud processes.

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/9/eaax1874/tab-pdf

In the end, the growing extremes to which climate change deniers are now going to try to defend an indefensible case and evade their near total absence of scientific support demonstrates that the charlatans involved--in this case in tweeting, retweeting, or otherwise disseminating what amounts to quackery--should be ignored on any matters pertaining to science. Science is evidence-based. It is not an article of blind faith. Most definitely, it is not blind faith spiced by a combination of profound ignorance and a willingness to mislead. 

The body of scientific evidence for anthropogenic climate change is clear and overwhelming. Residual uncertainties exist, but the basic conclusion concerning the contribution of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions is now near unequivocal.

 

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46 minutes ago, donsutherland1 said:

As the observed warming of the global climate, including the continuing rapid warming in the Arctic region despite gradually declining solar insolation, proceeds, the degree of scientific ignorance being pushed on Social Media to deflect attention from athnropogenic climate change is expanding. One stunning example:

CO2-11012019.jpg

https://twitter.com/EcoSenseNow/status/1190278220043579393

The hashtag, #CelebrateIgnorance would have been more appropriate. Let's take a look at the Eocene, which experienced the world's warmest temperatures since the extinction of the dinosaurs some 65 million years ago.

We show that sea surface temperatures near the North Pole increased from ∼18 °C to over 23 °C during this event. Such warm values imply the absence of ice and thus exclude the influence of ice-albedo feedbacks on this Arctic warming. At the same time, sea level rose while anoxic and euxinic conditions developed in the ocean's bottom waters and photic zone, respectively.

https://www.nature.com/articles/nature04668

We attribute a massive drop in dinoflagellate abundance and diversity at peak warmth to thermal stress, showing that the base of tropical food webs is vulnerable to rapid warming.

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/3/3/e1600891.short

Associated with the rapid carbon release during this event are profound environmental changes in the oceans including warming, deoxygenation and acidification. To evaluate the global extent of surface ocean acidification during the PETM, we present a compilation of new and published surface ocean carbonate chemistry and pH reconstructions from various palaeoceanographic settings. We use boron to calcium ratios (B/Ca) and boron isotopes (δ11B) in surface- and thermocline-dwelling planktonic foraminifera to reconstruct ocean carbonate chemistry and pH. Our records exhibit a B/Ca reduction of 30–40% and a δ11B decline of 1.0–1.2‰ coeval with the carbon isotope excursion. The tight coupling between boron proxies and carbon isotope records is consistent with the interpretation that oceanic absorption of the carbon released at the onset of the PETM resulted in widespread surface ocean acidification. The remarkable similarity among records from different ocean regions suggests that the degree of ocean carbonate change was globally near uniform.

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rsta.2017.0072

How does the anthropogenic rise in greenhouse gas emissions compare to that period? Research has found that "current carbon emission rates are nine to 10 times higher than those during the PETM."

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/02/190220112221.htm

Further, climate sensitivity could increase with the warming on account of feedbacks such as those concerning cloud processes.

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/9/eaax1874/tab-pdf

In the end, the growing extremes to which climate change deniers are now going to try to defend an indefensible case and evade their near total absence of scientific support demonstrates that the charlatans involved--in this case in tweeting, retweeting, or otherwise disseminating what amounts to quackery--should be ignored on any matters pertaining to science. Science is evidence-based. It is not an article of blind faith. Most definitely, it is not blind faith spiced by a combination of profound ignorance and a willingness to mislead. 

The body of scientific evidence for anthropogenic climate change is clear and overwhelming. Residual uncertainties exist, but the basic conclusion concerning the contribution of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions is now near unequivocal.

 

I dont know why some people have so much trouble with this concept.  It's not hard to see how the industrial revolution has adversely affected the planet on a variety of levels.

Patrick Moore puzzles me, he used to be associated with Green Peace.  They kicked him out so he has an axe to grind with the planet?

He probably isn't well-versed enough in science to know that higher CO2 means plants have less nutritive value- they lose their content of certain minerals that we need- like zinc and iron.

 

 

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Reposting this here:

https://twitter.com/i/events/1191456175449088006

https://t.co/L02Ps9o1UT?amp=1

The innovations include an energy-trapping molecule, a storage system that promises to outperform traditional batteries and an energy-storing laminate coating that can be applied to windows and textiles.

 

https://t.co/krDcakrWmi?amp=1

 

Swedish scientists develop energy storing molecule that can be applied as a transparent coating to windows, houses, cars, clothes and release heat when exposed to a catalyst. Still a few years from commercialisation - but pretty amazing potential if it comes good.

 

https://t.co/z35BQWGHGI?amp=1

 

Scientists say they’ve figured out how to store solar power for decades, a major energy breakthrough

 

https://t.co/lNqEF9YcJJ?amp=1

 

Scientists in Sweden have figured out how to harness solar power, store it and release it on demand in the form of heat decades after it's been captured

 

https://t.co/kqsBusDxWM?amp=1

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21 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

Reposting this here:

https://twitter.com/i/events/1191456175449088006

https://t.co/L02Ps9o1UT?amp=1

The innovations include an energy-trapping molecule, a storage system that promises to outperform traditional batteries and an energy-storing laminate coating that can be applied to windows and textiles.

 

https://t.co/krDcakrWmi?amp=1

 

Swedish scientists develop energy storing molecule that can be applied as a transparent coating to windows, houses, cars, clothes and release heat when exposed to a catalyst. Still a few years from commercialisation - but pretty amazing potential if it comes good.

 

https://t.co/z35BQWGHGI?amp=1

 

Scientists say they’ve figured out how to store solar power for decades, a major energy breakthrough

 

https://t.co/lNqEF9YcJJ?amp=1

 

Scientists in Sweden have figured out how to harness solar power, store it and release it on demand in the form of heat decades after it's been captured

 

https://t.co/kqsBusDxWM?amp=1

All these links refer to the same Bloomberg article, which has very little detail. It is easy to store solar heat for decades, just grow some trees. 

The new molecule, cost unspecified,  stores and releases some unquantified amount of heat, but there is nothing about how fast or how the release is controlled.

At this point, the article seems click bait, rather than useful reporting. 

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25 minutes ago, etudiant said:

All these links refer to the same Bloomberg article, which has very little detail. It is easy to store solar heat for decades, just grow some trees. 

The new molecule, cost unspecified,  stores and releases some unquantified amount of heat, but there is nothing about how fast or how the release is controlled.

At this point, the article seems click bait, rather than useful reporting. 

They mention a catalyst and also that it's a few years away from commercial development.

 

https://twitter.com/i/events/1191456175449088006

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-11-04/moth-poulsen-s-energy-trapping-molecule-could-solve-solar-storage

The innovations include an energy-trapping molecule, a storage system that promises to outperform traditional batteries and an energy-storing laminate coating that can be applied to windows and textiles.

 

 

 

Swedish scientists develop energy storing molecule that can be applied as a transparent coating to windows, houses, cars, clothes and release heat when exposed to a catalyst. Still a few years from commercialisation - but pretty amazing potential if it comes good.

 

 

 

Scientists say they’ve figured out how to store solar power for decades, a major energy breakthrough

 

 

 

Scientists in Sweden have figured out how to harness solar power, store it and release it on demand in the form of heat decades after it's been captured

 

 

 

Scientists at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg have figured out how to harness the energy and keep it in reserve so it can be released on demand in the form of heat—even decades after it was captured. The innovations include an energy-trapping molecule, a storage system that promises to outperform traditional batteries, at least when it comes to heating, and an energy-storing laminate coating that can be applied to windows and textiles. The breakthroughs, from a team led by researcher Kasper Moth-Poulsen, have garnered praise within the scientific community. Now comes the real test: whether Moth-Poulsen can get investors to back his technology and take it to market.

 

 

The system starts with a liquid molecule made up of carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen. When hit by sunlight, the molecule draws in the sun’s energy and holds it until a catalyst triggers its release as heat. The researchers spent almost a decade and $2.5 million to create a specialized storage unit, which Moth-Poulsen, a 40-year-old professor in the department of chemistry and chemical engineering, says has the stability to outlast the 5-to 10-year life span of typical lithium-ion batteries on the market today.

The most advanced potential commercial use the team developed is a transparent coating that can be applied to home windows, a moving vehicle, or even clothing. The coating collects solar energy and releases heat, reducing electricity required for heating spaces and curbing carbon emissions. Moth-Poulsen is coating an entire building on campus to showcase the technology. The ideal use in the early going, he says, is in relatively small spaces. “This could be heating of electrical vehicles or in houses.”

 
 
 
 

A big unknown is whether the system can produce electricity. While Moth-Poulsen believes the potential exists, his team is focused for now on heating. His research group is one of about 15 trying to tackle climate change with molecular thermal solar systems. Part of what motivates them is the Paris Agreement, which commits signatories to pursue efforts to limit global warming to 1.5C (2.7F).

Moth-Poulsen plans to spin off a company that would advance the technology and says he’s in talks with venture capital investors. The storage unit could be commercially available in as little as six years and the coating in three, pending the $5 million of additional funding he estimates will be needed to bring the coating to market. In May he won the Arnbergska Prize from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for his solar energy projects.

The professor doesn’t have precise cost estimates for the technology but is aware that it will need to be affordable. One cost advantage is that the system doesn’t need any rare or expensive elements. Jeffrey Grossman, a professor in the department of materials science and engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who’s also developing energy storage molecules, calls the Chalmers University team’s work “crucial if we want to see this energy conversion storage approach commercialized.”

 

 

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It's worth it to mention it because when in the weeds of any crisis for that matter, the general human tendency toward histrionic reactionary thinking is primordially driven - in other words, as the individual integrates the society, et al, said society cannot help but react first, then, dust off.

Unfortunately, that doesn't lend to seeing the field above the weeds, which is a perspective that happens later, but is one that is needed now.   

The reality is, there are technologies that can make all these environmental toxicity dilemmas, Earth, Air and Sea a thing of the past. That's incontrovertible ... yet, excuses and rationalism start churning out of the "inability-to-acceptance" engine. And that spin-machine has the advantage in this sorely needed enlightenment battle - they are anchored in the status quo. 

If people from all walks and ranks of society could be made aware that they really don't have to sacrifice ( that much ...perhaps a little at first) of their current way of life in order for all to achieve the quasi utopic/harmonious coexistence with natural states, ... but they are being blocked from seeing that. It's fascinating "soft conspiracy," and how it is evasively dodging that awareness from even getting a toe-hold. And this soft conspiracy I call it, .. basically when common interests works toward a convergent goal, more so than anything paranoid or orchestrated by fine cigar smoke strata over top posh leathery dens of the cabal, they masterfully make the alternatives scary.  

You know where the real fear is?  The real fear is the owners of big industry ...and next of economic kin peering down the ladder.  It's their fear. They fear their gravy boats being emptied by a necessary redress in the the ways and means of a society they've also relied upon ignorance and assumption to exploit.  That which they've luxuriously presided over,  no longer favors the pot-liquor they'll need to make their gravy.  They know that.  We really are in some way living the end days of that cinema .. where the opulence realizes it's over, or denies that it must be. 

That's the infuriating aspect. From A G W, to plastic-ocean paradigms, and blah blah blah ... these are all directly a result of the Industrial Revolution and profligate blithe, all geared together by an ambitions everyone bought into spanning generations. Conned into thinking they, too, could win that American dream... 

And these are the societies that led the way when the IR occurred; they immediately channeled economic ambition, nothing else.  It's not so funny; the proportions are essentially correct. Closed combustion engines and/or the panoply of advancing chemistry ensued zero-gap conclusion: "we are going to make a fortune."  It wasn't, we are going to advance medicine in ways that extend human life so long and ubiquitously, we don't need to overpopulate. It wasn't ambitions in science in general, ...discovery truths. You know, I've over heard it expressed that organized religion got in the way of the advancing evolution of society ... I'd say money is just as powerful of a God. 

Which all that of course took place with zero checks-and-balances - can't have those getting in the way of the mighty dollar. Formulation/projection of ethics in the exploitation of natural resources ( necessary to power the Industrial Revolution ) along the way?  That had zero chance of taking place once IR tapped into money-reward-circuitry. 

I don't even know if this is cynicism toward humanity, either.  Honestly, you almost give the page turner generation a pass, because countless generations suffered and died young and tragically through the millennia. Sensing the advantages of the IR, from every day access to basic provisions, to fending off diseases ... and just the gestalt for favoring outlooks in general: it was almost avenging the ghosts of those that never had those advantages.  So we leaped, and the party went nuts!  These ramification were yet to come, yet be discovered. All there was at the time was improving survival odds.  Nature is like that ... it doesn't invent things for the sake of invention, such that we do among our many charms. Nature only emerges out of necessity.  What part of the natural setting and Darwinism ever required asking if eating a turkey sandwich when one is starving now, might lead to a some calamity in a year.  These so called checks-and-balances, they were always administered by the limitations of the ecology. We come along with these powers of ingenuity, and have really outpaced those limitations. 

But that's not going to last forever.  And once the detrimental discoveries were evidenced and continue to do so, to persist along said detrimental course, I don't know what you call that - "collective sociopathy?" 

It's both.. There are captains of industry that are completely consumed in self and this mantra that they'll be dead in 100 years so it won't matter - they presently are the ballast of "string puller" movers and shakers, too. They could not be more self-centered and clearly failing baser moral culpability.  Yet, because they operate within the confines of the societal norm to do so, they are not perceived that way? That's partial in being the weeds. 

Then there are those that just don't know any better, because the cause-and-effect of the A in the A G W ...is just too untenable to their comprehension, so it is easier to just rely upon traditional nationalism, toe-the line and listen to the marketing that always gave comfort - that same social force that is put on the captain's cheerleaders and lobbyists, and special interests in general.  For the rest of us, we just watch the hands on the Doomsday clock tick closer to midnight, powerless to stop it. 

Now that humanity is evolved technologically enough ... many of that profligate ways and means used to power the industrial-complex ...and sate the greed-economic engine that generations spanning a time in history got to benefit and live like kings and queens, are no longer necessary.  Industry can be motivated by 'green' tech, to the extent that any reliance whatsoever upon the old fossil-fuel model can be so minor that the natural background geological/biological processes of this planet can absorb and make negligible.  

Yet, we won't do it, or, if we are, that adaptation is most likely too slow.  Nope, sate greed first or die - that's the epitaph of Humanity should this "non-sustainability" dictate policy. 

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I have a hypothesis growing ... one existentially based/anecdotal, but hey, ideas gotta start somewhere. 

Basically, we've already lost winters to global warming along the 45th parallel/ E of ORD.  Zomb!

Firstly, that doesn't mean it can't snow - don't panic just yet.  Though such a future is unavoidable some years to decades in the future, for now it just means that the averages are already now breaching a base-line that is too warm to support cryo months.  Most run-ins with cold and concomitant snows are going to be more pattern specific...thus, ephemeral in nature. 

We have to remember, there are no neat and tidy boundaries in the atmosphere.  Climate zones are moving N; we know this is true as it is being empirically shown, and, these emergence' fit climate models - both primitive and more recently sophisticated.  Be that as it may that does not mean it won't snow and get brutally cold, if perhaps spanning ever shorter duration(s) south of the perceived climate transition "boundaries" - virtual in nature...etc, etc. 

That all said, my hypothesis is that a climate transition virtual boundary has already shifted north of the Mid Atlantic and New England regions from central latitudes and S. 

Part of that is formulated by the personal observation that more and more ... we seem to not get cryo-supportive events/air masses S of the 45th parallel across the conus and locally, *unless* there is an antecedent -EPO.  It seems to be we are whittling away other teleconnectors that were always capable of doing it. 

The negative North Atlantic Oscillations seem less effectual in delivering cold - though they are rarefied in recent decade as a separate matter. 

The PNA can be positive, yet we're throwing up raining coastal storm types along the eastern seaboard, and also...as papers are publishing recently, the mean storm tracks are observed(ing) migrating N; these +PNA's are delivering more "Lakes Cutter" type tracks. Also a warmer trajectory for the TV-eastern OV/NE regions.  

The East Pacific Oscillation domain space is very high in latitude, up over the Alaskan sector and adjacent lower Beaufort sea and N Pac/ NW Territories of Canada, and in fact, ...overlaps the Arctic Oscillation domain space.  When that field is negative ( i.e., blocking heights and or directive cold loading into N/A), it is sort of like "the last of the cold delivery teleconnectors" to go.  The larger scale geological/geographical circumstance in the way N/A is situated and immediately relays off the Pacific, "encourages" the EPO to bulge, and tap cold - if we look at the last 240 months of NASA averages, we see a relative cool offset over N/A for this reason.  With the PNA and NAO seemingly reducing efficacy, the EPO has become much more the primary effective cold loading Canada and point south over the continent. The PNA and NAO, both seemed to to be less proficient in doing so within their own index correlations.

These ladder indices share much more domain space with mid latitudes - particularly true in the PNA.  The NAO is similar to the EPO, but ...the western limb of NAO's domain space is over a region of Canada that has been experiencing elevating temperatures even in winter months - so in the means..there's plausibility for research there, that perhaps the -NAOs are not as effective as they used to be at delivering cold to 40 N ( ORD-BOS). 

I have noticed that we are either partial/below normal temperature distribution/anomalies therein, with -EPOs, or... we seem to go right back to a new rest state that features vastly above normal temperatures.  It's like one or the other, with less "normal" days in between.  Normal days in climate ...they are almost as rare as any given departure, because they are just numbers that precipitate out of arithmetic means...  But, the scatter plots are showing greater departures/extremes - and that is more like the new normal.  If we took the EPO's out entirely?  I think we have 60 to 70 F winters. 

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John, TWC is hosting a climate change debate tonight at 8.  I found what Dr Rick Knabb said last night very illuminating.  He pointed to a collaboration of research between a few hundred scientists pointing to human overpopulation being the main cause behind all the other things we face (climate change, pollution, mass extinction, land usage, etc.)

 

He quoted this research:

 

https://theconversation.com/11-000-scientists-warn-climate-change-isnt-just-about-temperature-126261

 

 

 

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1 hour ago, LibertyBell said:

John, TWC is hosting a climate change debate tonight at 8.  I found what Dr Rick Knabb said last night very illuminating.  He pointed to a collaboration of research between a few hundred scientists pointing to human overpopulation being the main cause behind all the other things we face (climate change, pollution, mass extinction, land usage, etc.)

He quoted this research:

https://theconversation.com/11-000-scientists-warn-climate-change-isnt-just-about-temperature-126261

 

Not to be snarky but I don't agree that population is the problem in among its self.   

This may seem totally obvious because, well .. .it is, but, it's what the population does that is the problem - not the population. 

There is an important distinction.  

I'm sure those involved in any such debate are aware.. And perhaps there is a 'built in' assumption, one that is cynical where they're musing back and forth within the predilection that humanity is incapable of a non-profligate exploitation way of existence.  I could buy that ... I almost like that - almost.  Greed first! Evidence certainly seems to suggest so. To that, I have friends directly keyed into the circuit of Boston area university scientists, and they all agree ... the problem is more clearly a sociological one, more so than a geo-physical one.  Change attitudes... and the latter takes care of its self.  It's still just the population doing it.  If there were 8 billion people on this planet all living green - no problem. 

That can change?  But, people need to get burned to believe in the fire. That's the biggest problem with this ... the specter of climate change moves at a pace below the threshold of human senses.  People can't feel, see, taste or touch or hear it; though we are seeing that beginning to change with striking video.  Still, it's not in people's back yards enough.  'Soon as people feel the nausea, they'll stop sipping the cool-aide that it's okay to profligate - hell, begin to realize that the way we've done this thing since the Industrial Revolution is even profligate in the first place.  Generations have now lived and died, tucked inside the IR years since that great Human evolutionary turn begin to usurp Human societies... and their culture knows no other way. 

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12 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

Not to be snarky but I don't agree that population is the problem in among its self.   

This may seem totally obvious because, well .. .it is, but, it's what the population does that is the problem - not the population. 

That is an important distinction.  

I have friends directly keyed into the circuit of Boston area university scientist, and they all agree ... the problem with all of ecological calamities as they are related to GW, chemistry/toxification.. etc... is a sociological problem must more than a geo-physical one.  

Thats interesting and true in the sense that sociologically humankind seems to be ignorant to what they are doing, with their brains wired for short term profit not long term sustainability, however we must also look at how being densely populated in cities adversely affects our health, as well as the negative impact on endangered species with humans cutting down trees to build more homes (cutting down trees is also bad for the environment)  I do believe we will stabilize our population at some point, the question is, at what point will that be and will we avoid an ecological disaster.  Land usage, the consumption of meat and overconsumption in general are also issues.  I believe it was stated that the most efficient way to reduce one's carbon footprint is to have one less child.  Having one species dominate over the rest seems to unbalance nature and intricate ecosystems.

 

PS have you seen all the smog/air pollution issues going on in India?  It's unfortunate that breathing clean air, which should be a right, is so hard to come by!

 

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