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Page added on July 17, 2017
The Problem With Climate Doomsday Reporting
It’s not often that an article about climate change becomes one of the most hotly debated issues on the internet — especially in the midst of a controversial G20 summit.
But that exact thing happened following the publication of a lengthy essay in New York Magazine titled “The Uninhabitable Earth: Famine, Economic Collapse, a Sun that Cooks Us: What Climate Change Could Wreak — Sooner Than You Think.”
In the course of 7,200 words, author David Wallace-Wells chronicled the possible impacts of catastrophic climate change if current emissions trends are maintained, including, but certainly not limited to: mass permafrost melt and methane leaks, mass extinctions, fatal heat waves, drought and food insecurity, diseases and viruses, “rolling death smog,” global conflict and war, economic collapse and ocean acidification.
Slate political writer Jamelle Bouie described the essay on Twitter as “something that will haunt your nightmares.”
It’s a fair assessment. Reading it feels like a series of punches in the gut, triggering emotions like despair, hopelessness and resignation.
But here’s the thing: many climate psychologists and communicators consider those feelings to be the very opposite of what will compel people to action.
“Based on my research on climate communications, this article is exactly what we don’t need,” says Per Espen Stoknes, Norwegian psychologist and author of What We Think About When We Try Not to Think About Global Warming: Toward a New Psychology of Climate Action, in an interview with DeSmog Canada.
“It only serves to further alarm the already alarmed segment of people. ”
Climate Psychologists Recommends ‘Positivity Ratio’ of 3:1
Let’s get one thing out of the way.
Critics of the New York Magazine article — and other instances of doomsday journalism — are not anti-science. These are all people who firmly recognize the severity of catastrophic climate change, and are certainly not petitioning for a bury-your-head-in-the-sand approach, shielding the public from the potential horrors.
Rather, they suggest that most people will only process such facts about climate change if it’s framed in an appropriate way that acknowledges how individuals and societies respond to potentially traumatic threats.
“It’s really important to understand that it’s not just about facts and numbers, but having a way for people to interpret them and know there’s something they can do,” says Kari Marie Norgaard, associate professor of sociology and environmental studies at the University of Oregon and author of Living in Denial: Climate Change, Emotions, and Everyday Life, in an interview with DeSmog Canada.
Stoknes notes there’s a well-known “positivity ratio” for optimal engagement of a 3:1 ratio of opportunities to threats. He says the New York Magazine piece was around nine threats to every one proposed solution.
In other words, a tripling of the ratio in the wrong direction.
Article Sticks to Hard Science, Ignoring Role of Social Sciences
The author of the New York Magazine article has already responded to a series of criticisms on Twitter, including on the scientific merit of some of his claims.
A rather revealing moment was when Wallace-Wells replied to a critique from renowned futurist Alex Steffen — who had described the article as “one long council of despair” — by suggesting that “my own feeling is that ignorance about what’s at stake is a much bigger problem.”
The clear implication is that Wallace-Wells assumes a confronting of ignorance about scientific facts could help compel people to action and avoid the most dangerous manifestations of climate change.
But Daniel Aldana Cohen — assistant professor of sociology at the University of Pennsylvania and author of the response piece in Jacobin titled “New York Mag’s Climate Disaster Porn Gets It Painfully Wrong” — suggests in an interview with DeSmog Canada that Wallace-Well’s approach indicates a failure to engage with any questions about broader sociopolitical systems.
“I think in the politics of climate change, a narrow idea of climate science is fetishized,” says Cohen, adding that even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change largely fails to include social sciences in working group reports.
“It feels like the most realistic, the most unvarnished truth is what the science predicts,” he continues. “But the thing is that in some way, climate science registers the impact of human activity, but it’s not actually an integrated account of the dynamic feedback between social and political activities and physical events in the atmosphere.”
In other words, Wallace-Wells’ article sketches out a narrative of catastrophic climate change that assumes people don’t act on the knowledge of the situation.
But in a cruel twist, by only focusing on the science without any attempt to contextualize it in society or political systems, it could well have the reverse effect by making readers feel even more powerless.
This isn’t a new problem: Stoknes notes that as identified by James Painter of Oxford University’s Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, about 80 per cent of media coverage on the last Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment report used “catastrophe framing,” with less than 10 per cent using “opportunity framing.”
“It’s not just about pointing your fingers at the climate skeptics and saying that’s the problem,” Norgaard says.
“Of course, it’s a major problem. But the apathy or acquiescence of the majority of people who are aware and do care is a larger problem. It’s about how we mobilize those people.”
If Framed Correctly, Idea of Apocalypse Can Help People Imagine Alternatives
Stoknes argues that thinking about such a sobering subject as apocalypse or death, if done correctly, can actually help people conceptualize new ways of thinking and being.
“This psychological approach to the apocalypse is very important, and I found it completely absent in the article,” he says. “It is not about predicting a certain year in the future of linear time, when everything will be collapsing. Maybe this notion is more like a call in the here and now, calling attention to the urgent need for a deep rethink of where we are and letting go of some cherished Western notions that we’ve been stuck in over the last century.”
Such a sentiment is echoed by climate psychologist Renee Lertzman and author of Environmental Melancholia: Psychoanalytic Dimensions of Engagement, who emphasizes in an interview with DeSmog Canada that predictable fault lines have formed in the wake of the New York Magazine piece.
A key factor for her is how humans actually process information that may be challenging and bring up difficult feelings. She says the consensus is that we can become “cognitively impaired” when the brain’s limbic system becomes activated, resulting in reduced capacity to have functions for strategy, foresight, collaboration and tolerance.
“That goes out the window when your limbic system is activated, which arguably articles like this are going to do,” she says. “The best way to deal with that reality is to address how we can soothe and disarm our defences.”
‘We Need to Also Be Engaged in Collective Political Action and Solutions’
That’s certainly not going to be an easy feat. But there are plenty of initiatives out there that are embracing a bit more nuance.
Lertzman points to Project Drawdown — an attempt to compile the 100 top solutions to climate change — as a powerful initiative, although she suggests “even that is missing the emotional taking stock of where we are.” Cohen shouted out the work of the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication and Texas Tech climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe.
But central to progressing beyond the gridlock of current climate discourse is likely via bringing it closer to the local level, where people feel they can actually influence things.
CBC’s new podcast 2050: Degrees of Change is a good example of this. While it paints a dramatic picture of life in B.C. under climate change, it also uses a scenario under which the world has drastically decreased greenhouse gas emissions.
“We wanted listeners to end off realizing this is a middle of the road scenario and things could be worse and they could be better depending on what we choose to do now,” Johanna Wagstaffe, podcast host and CBC senior meteorologist, told DeSmog Canada.
Norgaard says engaging with issues on a local level can give people a leverage point into even greater engagement.
“We really need to on the one hand be aware that it’s something we need to respond to as a collective,” she says. “Riding your bike is great, but we need to also be engaged in collective political action and solutions. That’s part of what helps people to do something proactive that’s real.”
36 Comments on "The Problem With Climate Doomsday Reporting"
Ghung on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 2:30 pm
““It’s really important to understand that it’s not just about facts and numbers, but having a way for people to interpret them and know there’s something they can do,”
Assumes there’s something we can do at this point, and gives the human collective far too much credit. Humans, as a group, are reactionary,, not progressive or sane.
rockman on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 4:10 pm
Ghung – Lots of interesting thoughts. Many interesting aspects touched upon. And still missing the most important aspect to changing the climate deterioration path we’re on. Emphasized here: “…Project Drawdown — an attempt to compile the 100 top solutions…she suggests “even that is missing the emotional taking stock of where we are.”
No that isn’t the most important missing aspect. Want to guess how many of those “100 solutions” don’t include a honest economic evaluation of the cost to implement? We’ve gone over this time and again: yes: replacing all the 1.3 BILLION ICE’s on the planet in a reasonable amount of time with EV’s charged by renewable energy sources is a big fix. And that cost? Ahh…don’t need those details…it’s still a great “solution”.
Consider the greatest concentration of “greenies” on the planet. And while European motor fuel consumption is down from its peak in 1995 it has plateaued at a level for the last 10 years at a volume greater then at anytime before 1990. And when has the green volume ratcheted up the most in the last 100 years: the last 10 years when we’ve seen only a rather minor decrease in consumption. And that’s with increased fuel economy in the last decade and expansion of mass transportation. And yet no meaningful decrease in motor fuel consumption during that time.
https://www.indexmundi.com/energy/?region=eu&product=gasoline&graph=consumption
And then there’s the USA: “August 2016 was the biggest month ever for U.S. gasoline consumption. Americans used a staggering 9.7 million barrels per day. The new peak comes as a surprise to many. In 2012, energy expert Daniel Yergin said, “The U.S. has already reached what we can call ‘peak demand.'” Many others agreed. The U.S. Department of Energy forecast in 2012 that U.S. gasoline consumption would steadily decline for the foreseeable future.
This seemed to make sense at the time. U.S. gasoline consumption had declined for five years in a row and, in 2012, was a million barrels per day below its July 2007 peak. Also in August 2012, President Obama had just announced aggressive new fuel economy standards that would push average vehicle fuel economy to 54 miles per gallon.
Fast forward to 2016, and U.S. gasoline consumption has increased steadily four years in a row. We now have a new peak. This dramatic reversal has important consequences for petroleum markets, the environment and the U.S. economy.”
https://phys.org/news/2016-09-gasoline-consumption-higher.html
So what’s the problem? Haven’t folks heard enough about the dangers of climate change? So consider that driving less cost NOTHING to reduce CO2 emissions. In fact those citizens would save money by driving less.
So these folks and our European cousins are the ones who would support politicians significantly increasing the cost of driving? Or propose some other method of significantly decreasing their access to motor fuels? Same can be said for China and India…except much worse.
So these are the same folks who will voluntarily spend $trillions to “save the planet”? And if you say yes when will it start because it ain’t begun yet. LOL.
Dredd on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 4:43 pm
Dying is haaaarrrrdddd weerrrkkkk (Germ Warfare Comes To America).
Dredd on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 4:46 pm
rockman,
“a[n] honest economic evaluation of the cost to implement?”
Yeah, how much it cost to not kill a planet Boss Man?
Dorky mass murderers gotta count their pennies.
Apneaman on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 4:47 pm
Journalist James Wilt is entitled to his view on the evidence same as me. There are climate scientists and biologists who disagree and have a very dire prediction for the human future.
Here is scientist Paul Beckwiths take after some main stream media darling computer climate modellers poo pooed on that doomy NY Mag article from last week.
Abrupt Climate Mayhem Now, in Spite of Main-Stream-Climatologist Posturing
“Quite frankly, I am sick and tired of people, especially main-stream-talking-head-scientists, downplaying the huge unprecedented threats that are accumulating daily and will soon take down our civilizations. Our world is one that is full of specialists, with no ability to join-the-dots and recognize that humanities existence, and that of our entire ecosystems of plants and animals is degrading rapidly. Even exponentially.
From my chair, I categorically state that anybody who downplays the significance and importance of our planets peril is part of the problem, and needs to get with the program or step aside so that the rest of us can do what is needed. The public needs the truth, no matter how bad it is to have any hope of changing course. And the truth is truly awful, at present.”
https://paulbeckwith.net/2017/07/14/abrupt-climate-mayhem-now-in-spite-of-main-stream-climatologist-posturing/
Dredd on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 4:50 pm
Tweeter (R-RU) and the monkey man gonna drill baby drill (Beware of the Sycophant Epidemic).
Apneaman on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 5:11 pm
I don’t have a ton of faith in what the media darling main stream computer climate modellers proclaim. They were off by many decades on the speed and severity of much climate phenomena.
Climate Science Predictions Prove Too Conservative
Checking 20 years worth of projections shows that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has consistently underestimated the pace and impacts of global warming
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/climate-science-predictions-prove-too-conservative/
But it’s ok now we have adjusted our models and we won’t have anymore massive underestimates again. Perfect from here to eternity. Sure thang.
What about completely missing this:
News on a new source of sub sea methane the rock star climate modellers said not to worry about.
Pockmark fields off Helgoland
Jul 11, 2017
Researchers discover methane vents in the German Bight
https://www.marum.de/en/Discover/Pockmark-fields-off-Helgoland.html
Abrupt emergence of a large pockmark field in the German Bight, southeastern North Sea
“These observations most probably describe a reoccurring phenomenon in shallow shelf seas, which may have been overlooked before because of the transient nature of shallow water bedforms and technology limitations of high resolution bathymetric mapping.”
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-05536-1
Overlooked. So they missed it, but trust what we say there is no reason to be doomy. Everything is under control. We know best.
If you were a top scientists or the government and you knew it was too late, too far gone, would you announce it to the world?
18 months ago.
Top Climate Expert: Crisis is Worse Than We Think & Scientists Are Self-Censoring to Downplay Risk
“We speak with one of the world’s leading climate scientists who has come to the Paris talks with a shocking message: The climate crisis is more severe than even many scientists have acknowledged. Kevin Anderson is deputy director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research and professor of energy and climate change at the University of Manchester in Britain. He has said many scientists are self-censoring their work to downplay the severity of the climate crisis.”
https://www.democracynow.org/2015/12/8/top_climate_expert_crisis_is_worse
Oh come on now. We all know the authorities would never hide bad shit from the public. No precedent for that whatsoever in the history of civilization.
I don’t need the science anymore. All the predictions have come to pass and faster than previously expected. I just count the AGW jacked disasters and the pace and intensity are rising. Oh and unlike the useless IPCC, I factor in the positive feedbacks which they don’t.
Plantagenet on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 5:52 pm
Of course the politicians don’t want people to be alarmed about climate change. Look at the phony Paris Accords—Obama and the rest of the phonies pretend that by signing this document they have done something about climate change and claim this agreement will keep global warming under 2°C—but when you look at the Paris Accords say they actually lock big CO2 emissions INCREASES—just the opposite of what is needed—and more CO2 means more Global Warming is coming.
Cheers!
Makati1 on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 7:14 pm
Plant, you have the correct view of the Paris Accords. Eyewash for the public but BAU behind the scenes. At least Trump is not even pretending to do anything.
We have hit the hockey stick part of the extinction graph. All the ‘HOPE’ in the world is not going to change our fate one small bit. Human nature is to keep doing what feels good for as long as it lasts, then fight over the last grain of sugar in the Petri dish. We do not deserve to survive. We have wasted our world. Maybe the next dominant species will be smarter.
Outcast_Searcher on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 7:58 pm
Makati1, you’re right.
So trying the “scare the crap out of ’em using the unvarnished ugly facts” (if we don’t change things a LOT) seems like a worthwhile Hail Mary pass, even if it’s only that.
A good follow-up to that article, which would address Rockman’s point, is to be specfic on how much it WOULD cost and what it would take (say, pick a middle ground scenario to push hard for only 3 or 4 degrees of warming, and actively removing LOTS of carbon ASAP).
Now, is it even possible to do it and have people have any hope of middle class lifestyles? How rapidly must the global population shrink? How quickly must we adopt EV’s en masse?
At this point the average person HAS NO CLUE of the scope of the change needed. I keep seeing idiot political proposals for a tiny carbon tax that will supposedly save us. As if something that doesn’t DRASTICALLY reduce FF burning very quickly will make a dent.
I don’t think I’ve seen ONE credible proposal for a HUGE carbon tax. Until we do, the politicians aren’t serious.
So why not scare the crap out of people in the mean time? Coddling and deluding them clearly isn’t working.
Makati1 on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 8:07 pm
Outcast, I think it would take shutting down all gas and oil wells tomorrow, forever. Perhaps losing 1/2 of the earth’s population the next day. And even then, I doubt it would change the course we are on. We have passed too many tripping points. Like a roller coaster dropping from that first great height, we cannot stop until the end of the ride. Extinction. Buckle up!
Makati1 on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 8:09 pm
BTW Outcast. I do not think that the ‘people’ want to know. They sense it but want BAU in their pretend world for as long as they can enjoy it. That is why we are doomed. The choice is extinction by Mother Nature and natural laws or… nuclear war.
Outcast_Searcher on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 8:45 pm
Makati1, you may be right.
But we’ll never know if we don’t try. Buying significant amount of time would have to help, at least relative to what’s coming when we just sit here gleefully burning FF’s as though there are no consequences.
I’ve been proposing a basic concept of (at least in first world countries) charging literally a dollar a POUND (not ton) for CO2 burning.
So that would be about $20 for one gallon of gasoline.
Now THAT should greatly alter how much people drive, WHAT they drive, and right quick.
And that’s the kind of scale I think is needed.
But of course it’s a good two orders of magnitude above what any politician I’ve read discuss.
And of course, this could be offset with reduced income taxes (which the liberals would hate, I know).
But it would be massive and it would have an impact.
If we had started a couple of decades ago it could have been phased in. Doing that now is very dangerous, but not doing it would likely CRUSH the global economy like a bug.
I’d still rather go down fighting, but I’m a stubborn jerk when it comes to certain principles, so that’s just me.
…
And no, there’s no chance in hell I think we’ll do even 10% of something like that any time soon. Pathetic.
Makati1 on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 9:11 pm
Outcast, try if you want. But you outnumbered by about 100,000 to one in this world.
I don’t fight against impossible odds. I just prep as much as possible to make the decline less painful. And … we all die in the end anyway. About 100 Americans will get in their cars this AM and never come home. Another hundred will be murdered in the U$ today. About 10,000 more will die of disease caused by their lifestyle. I do not worry about death. It happens.
Ghung on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 9:31 pm
Outcast_Searcher; “So why not scare the crap out of people in the mean time? Coddling and deluding them clearly isn’t working.”
Again, assumes people will tolerate that – that enough people won’t insist it’s all fake news or overblown alarmism as they already do. Are you going to shut down the denial machines while you’re at it?
Whatever changes occur will be forced and won’t be pretty.
DerHundistlos on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 9:45 pm
@ Ghung and Dredd
Well stated, people.
So now we need to sugar coat reality to make it more appetizing for the denialists? Jesus. The fact of the matter is quite simply nothing will happen until a major climate related catastrophe personally affects YOU.
The denialists know deep down the truth. Denialism is just another coping mechanism, albeit destructive.
DerHundistlos on Mon, 17th Jul 2017 10:13 pm
@ Mak
Also well stated. Most people do not want to know the unvarnished truth.
Personally, I have an intuition that something is going to impact humanity in a big way and soon. Funny thing, most people know this as well, which explains societies angst.
dohboi on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 12:42 am
This is really quite a pathetic article. The first point about some stupid, made up 3:1 ratio is basically saying right out that journalists are required to lie to people because readers are too childish to handle truth if it ever gets more than 25% ugly.
Makati1 on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 1:05 am
Derhund, I am amazed everyday that the shit doesn’t hit the fan. I would never have guessed that so many things would be tried to prevent it. Zero interest loans, fogging a mirror as being the only credit check, etc. Not to mention the blatant lies and propaganda spewing from every government and MSM orifice.
I stand outside the U$ and watch the chaos and police state unfold into a ‘1984’ nightmare. Only the truly deaf and blind cannot see what is happening, but the power of denial is strong in some, and it is put out of their minds as they shop at Walmart for some more Chinese made junk they don’t need with a credit card that is about maxed out.
Americans are perhaps the most spoiled, immoral people left on earth. With only a few exceptions, they support their terrorist government because they like the bennies that flow from it’s teats. The 2X4 of reality is really going to hurt when it hits them, and yes, I too feel that time is fast approaching.
Cloggie on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 2:40 am
Tired of Being Wrong, Climate Alarmists Move Doomsday to Next Century
https://twitter.com/corbettreport/status/887177986415370240
http://ijr.com/the-declaration/2017/07/922200-tired-wrong-climate-alarmists-move-doomsday-next-century/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social
B-b-but doesn’t that mean that the Apneaturd has been lying to us all the time?
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
Between 1980 and 2017 the average interpolated Arctic sea ice area declined from 12.7 to 11.0 million km2.
Climate Guru Al Gore claimed in 2009 that by 2014 there was a 75% chance that the ice cap would disappear completely in the Summer of 2014.
http://1389blog.com/pix/al-gore-breathing-fire-and-brimstone.jpg
I say in 2017 that there is 100% chance that Al Gore is a lying and scheming globalist politician.
Go Speed Racer on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 3:56 am
In the 1970’s we had 2 woofers and 2 tweeters.
Now all we have, is 1 great big tweeter.
q on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 4:30 am
All economically recoverable fossil resources will be extracted and burned because people are too addicted and no article (regardless of how it is presented) will change it.
Davy on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 5:08 am
If our only problem was climate change then there would be a small amount of hope. Imagine we found a real transition energy paradigm and had the resources to achieve a transition quickly. Imagine population at around 1BIL with people living more ecologically balanced lives. Imagine an ecosystem not in decline and failure for more reasons than climate. I could go on and on so let’s try not to get to narrow on the apocalyptic genera.
We are out of planetary scale. Our physical and mental composition is not psychologically scaled to be organized into 7BIL people. We did not have the time to evolve for it. A significant amount of our emotions are still hunter gatherer. Our wisdom is based on free choice and individual rights to peruse happiness. Real wisdom must entertain the thought of no and less not open every door ahead in a craze of curiosity. Combine the lack of species self-control with techno affluence, multiple available destructive lifestyles and 7BIL people and try to tell me our biggest problem is climate change. One of our biggest problems is climate change.
Climate is likely lost but the time frame is uncertain. We have warmed the oceans and we are melting vital planetary ice that provides widespread habitable climate. We should be preparing or at least aware that habitability will be compressing and narrowing. Some areas will not be habitable and those that are will be less so. Maybe a few new places will open up but that does not help our current civilization because you just don’t transplant civilizations anymore. There was a time when humans could move on to greener pasture. We are now in every pasture and the pastures are browning.
I am glad we had the NYT article. I hope it scare the shit out of some fake greens and lying politicians. Yet, it really does not matter because we are a late term civilization. We are caught in catch 22 predicaments. We need to lower population and consumption but we can’t per our economic paradigms of growth. At this point the dangers of economic breakdown are worse in the very short term than any other issue. Billions will die in a Minsky moment of financial paralysis. When the trucks stop death occurs within a weeks.
The other issue is psychological. We have a late term civilization beset by multiple catch 22 predicaments but we also must cooperate. To cooperate you need confidence. If we are too forceful with the bad news we may stop the cooperation. We may start warring more. More warring is as dangerous as an economic Minsky moment. This points to the immediate importance of keeping those not awakened positive about solutions. Go ahead and feed them the purgative of doom but keep the punch bowl near of techno solutions and remind the reality blinded sheeple of how exceptional humans are.
I am a realist and not positive or negative based. I am both. When you combine the two you get a balance of disposition. I live my life happy but with the surreal of seeing doom everywhere. It motivates me to be more careful and more focused on the basics of survival. Seeing doom everywhere also gives me an appreciation of the comforts and the relationships I have now. When I get pissed or get my ass kicked by life I can reflect on how bad it can really get at any time. This knocks me back to reality. I stress less about money and getting somewhere when I realize how important being appreciative of happiness now. The happiness I talk of is of the simple sort not the modern sort. I also find it very interesting and academic to watch this whole process unfold. It is fascinating to be a student of doom
If only it were climate change. We have so many issues and they are converging. They are converging quickly and without the type of techno breakthroughs we were having when I was a kid. Then in the 60’s life was a wonder. We are going into space and so many new products were appearing every year. You had the feeling of exceptionalism and progress. I don’t have that anymore. Sure we have the digital revolution but I am seeing through that. What are we today but a hollowed out species of apes attached to unnatural material of plastics and heavy metals that allows the most dangerous part of our brain to get lost in fantasy and laziness. We are already ruined by a car culture and oil based consumerism. Still, you can have a wonderful life now if you can have perspective. Having perspective in my opinion is embracing doom, preparing accordingly, and appreciating the simple happiness of the here and now. That is unless you are the several billion living the horrors of personal collapse. I don’t have an answer for them.
forbin on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 8:45 am
too many people , too little time , china and india will burn the coal we dont burn
CO2 at or past 410 pbb already
too late
sorry just too late
Dredd on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 11:10 am
“Two Bay Area counties and a Southern California city concerned about rising sea levels sued 37 of the world’s biggest oil and coal companies Monday, claiming the fossil fuel giants should pay for damages wrought by climate change — a first-of-its-kind challenge that some liken to the high-stakes litigation of the tobacco industry in the 1990s.”
(SFGate)
Dredd on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 11:57 am
“When Rising Seas Hit Home: Hard Choices Ahead for Hundreds of US Coastal Communities (2017)” – (Union of Concerned Scientists).
peakyeast on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 1:08 pm
“In other words, Wallace-Wells’ article sketches out a narrative of catastrophic climate change that assumes people don’t act on the knowledge of the situation.”
Looking at the big picture since 1970.. .. Indeed we have not acted on ANY information available. The longer this continues the larger the likelihood that the ever growing changes will NOT be accepted…
That is the problem of waiting – while exponentially worsening the problems… Suddenly its going to be VERY HARD.
Btw. we are already there… Noone will accept the changes required to mitigate climate changes – natural or otherwise. Even in the best of times and with all our current knowledge there will not be a solution that does not include population reduction and rebuilding the environment. Both items still escalating at full speed.
Apneaman on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 2:40 pm
Clog, lying? Oh ya the never ending stream of record breaking weather disasters I provide links to are all fabricated. Every one of the disasters is stage by climate scientists looking for grant money. They have speicial powers to magicaly cause record breaking wildfires that now burn entire towns to the ground and record amounts of rain fall [Rain Bombs] and they are making the ocean go into the street and peoples living rooms on a regular basis along the coasts and they are using HAARP to cause multi years record droughts and record breaking heatwaves across wide swaths of the entire northern hemisphere.
clogscum, we all know that when denier tards have ZERO answers to these worsening and more frequent AGW jacked events they revert to playing the “Al Gore” card (now you have extended that to an Apenaman card) or some bunk consensuses study by unqualified scientists and engineers with bachelors degrees who have never studied climate let alone published any work on it.
I kind of like that you and the hangers on are still fumbling and flailing away in your denier death throes. It’s like y’all are on a mission to prove to the world just how fucking stupid you are – very amusing. Flat Earthers to the bitter end eh?
Apneaman on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 3:23 pm
peakyeast, your observation that no one is prepared has been noted by a few, very few, others.
Chris Hedges and Christian Parenti on the Deep-Reaching Ramifications of Climate Change (Video)
“Many states have been “systematically reduced to the point where they can’t respond” to climate change, “even if they wanted to,” Parenti says. ”
http://www.truthdig.com/avbooth/item/chris_hedges_climate_conflict_christian_parenti_20170624
Cloggie on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 4:17 pm
Clog, lying? Oh ya the never ending stream of record breaking weather disasters I provide links to are all fabricated.
You speak French, right? What you are doing with your floods and rains is hineininterpretieren. You interpret your sensationalist events as a direct consequence of “climate change”. The truth is that these events are as old as Mother Earth herself.
Apneaman on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 4:42 pm
Bigger, Hotter, Faster: Canada’s Wildfires are Changing and We’re Not Ready
“I posed two questions to a number of experts: “Do you think there will be another Fort McMurray-like fire in the future? If so, where do you think it will happen?”
Everyone agreed on the first question. Fort McMurray was not an anomaly. It will happen again, sooner rather than later, and likely with deadly consequences.”
https://www.desmog.ca/2017/07/17/bigger-hotter-faster-canada-s-wildfires-are-changing-and-we-re-not-ready
Ya it happened in Gatlinburg, Tennessee and Santa Olga, Chile, all within a 10 span. Techno industrial civilization cannot prevent it’s cities from burning down due to AGW jacked wildfires and these are the good ole days of AGW concequences – wait til it gets really bad.
Canada wildfires: almost 40,000 evacuated in British Columbia amid state of emergency
Australian firefighters called in to help as blazes burning across western province are expected to worsen
“krepnek said the area burned for the wildfire season was estimated at 188,000 hectares (465,000 acres), costing the province C$90m ($70.92m).
British Columbia has announced C$100m in emergency funds. The Canadian Red Cross will hand out stipends of C$600 for displaced people.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/18/canada-wildfires-evacuated-british-columbia-state-of-emergency
Put the $100 million on the next generation credit card like everything else.
This piece (below) was in response to the Canadian government and media and sheeple who were all pretending the Fort Mac fire was a one off and not connected to AGW. Canada is a big soft denial nation. So much for scoring in the top 5 in global education every year eh?
Here’s what the science really says about Fort McMurray and climate change
“But Flannigan, a professor of wildland fire from the University of Alberta, and many other climate change scientists agree that while the Fort McMurray fires cannot be directly linked to the carbon pollution produced by humans, Canadian wildfire activity of the past few years is well above average. And it’s connected to the warming climate.
In terms of the total areas destroyed by fires, there’s an unmistakable escalation, they say.”
http://www.nationalobserver.com/2016/06/03/analysis/heres-what-science-really-says-about-fort-mcmurray-and-climate-change
Apneaman on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 5:11 pm
Watch: Dramatic Rescues Show Intensity of China’s Deadly Floods
Both professional rescuers and helpful neighbors pitched in across south and central China to aid those who were stranded by extreme flooding.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/07/china-flooding-rescue-video-spd/
Do all the rescue and repair expenses count towards the GDP? Well, it’s all good then.
“Historically, flooding is common in south and central China during the rainy season from June through September, but the Chinese government has stated that extreme weather events like rainstorms and typhoons are happening more often in recent years. This season’s floods have killed dozens of people and displaced more than a million so far.”
Apneaman on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 5:18 pm
AGW gonna wipe out the Euro culture.
Flooding Damages Three Paintings and Multiple Rooms at the Louvre
France’s National Library and Ministry of Culture also suffered water damage during a deluge on the night of July 9.
“Several sections of the world’s most-visited art museum were temporarily closed to the public because of the storms, which dumped more than two and a half inches of rain on Paris overnight — including nearly two inches in the span of a single hour. Rooms devoted to Islamic art and Roman artifacts from the eastern Mediterranean sustained water damage, and a false ceiling in the latter gallery was damaged and is undergoing repairs.”
https://hyperallergic.com/390883/flooding-damages-three-paintings-and-multiple-rooms-at-the-louvre/
Oh well, half the shit in the museum was stolen during imperial conquests and such. Islamic art? Where & how they get that? Us white folks don’t care about any stinking Islamic art since Muslims is all freedom stealing N hating terrorists – FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, SAVE THE CHRISTIAN ART!!
Cloggie on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 5:36 pm
“Flooding Damages Three Paintings and Multiple Rooms at the Louvre”
More than a decade ago I worked in Paris for IBM-Peugeot on a remote car diagnostics project. To have something to do during the weekends I became “Ami du Louvre” for 50 euro and visited the museum at least ten times.
Can’t remember having seen much Islamic art though.
Greek, Roman, a little Egyptian and of course European.
But Islamic?
Apneaman on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 6:14 pm
clogdenier, first, there is no such thing as ‘mother nature’. I would have thought an atheist like you would not believe in fairy earth goddesses.
Would you care to explain this sensationalism? These events either have blown the record book away or they haven’t – they have.
What is your counter explanation to decades worth of scientific predictions coming true with the only errors being ‘faster than expected’?
You don’t have any other explanation..at all. NOTHING but mud slinging.
You can cry sensationalism all you want, but the fact remains that civilization is taking an ever greater shit kicking from AGW consequences. It’s speeding up and it will not stop for many centuries and probably millennia. This is just AGW, there are a shit load of other consequences under the umbrella of overshoot.
Apneaman on Tue, 18th Jul 2017 6:18 pm
Today’s Extreme Heat May Become Norm Within a Decade
Ten Hottest Years All Since 1998
” When 2015 blew the record for hottest year out of the water, it made headlines around the world. But a heat record that was so remarkable only two years ago will be just another year by 2040 at the latest, and possibly as early as 2020, regardless of whether the greenhouse gas emissions warming the planet are curtailed.
“At the moment, it doesn’t seem like such a big deal when we have record-hot summers or years,” study leader Sophie Lewis, a climate researcher at Australian National University, said in an email. “But this study really shows the nasty side of our current records becoming more frequent in the near future.”
http://www.fasterthanexpected.com/2017/07/14/todays-extreme-heat-may-become-norm-within-a-decade/