this post was submitted on 11 Aug 2023
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Climate - truthful information about climate, related activism and politics.

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Discussion of climate, how it is changing, activism around that, the politics, and the energy systems change we need in order to stabilize things.

As a starting point, the burning of fossil fuels, and to a lesser extent deforestation and release of methane are responsible for the warming in recent decades: Graph of temperature as observed with significant warming, and simulated without added greenhouse gases and other anthropogentic changes, which shows no significant warming

How much each change to the atmosphere has warmed the world: IPCC AR6 Figure 2 - Thee bar charts: first chart: how much each gas has warmed the world.  About 1C of total warming.  Second chart:  about 1.5C of total warming from well-mixed greenhouse gases, offset by 0.4C of cooling from aerosols and negligible influence from changes to solar output, volcanoes, and internal variability.  Third chart: about 1.25C of warming from CO2, 0.5C from methane, and a bunch more in small quantities from other gases.  About 0.5C of cooling with large error bars from SO2.

Recommended actions to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the near future:

Anti-science, inactivism, and unsupported conspiracy theories are not ok here.

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[–] Depress_Mode 85 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

No, this timeline started with “Shit, our calculations show that we might ruin the world in just a few decades at this rate. Oh, well. Probably best not to mention this to anyone.”

[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 year ago (5 children)

Do you think they're thinking "we'll be dead before things get really bad and fuck our kids" or "if we make our families super wealthy they'll be feudal lords after civilization collapses"?

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[–] [email protected] 45 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

This xkcd is what finally resolved the "is it us or natural variation" question for me: https://xkcd.com/1732/

[–] Asimo 20 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It's always the rate of change.

I remember a few years ago people arguing the temperatures have changed before and that theres billions spent on climate change and it's all propaganda.

They wouldn't listen to the rate of change argument then or acknowledge the trillions spent in industries causing climate change. I'm not sure they've changed their minds still ( I refused to engage them any further) but this is the challenge - so many people believe what they want to believe and don't want the hard truth.

[–] Kage520 12 points 1 year ago

The Inconvenient Truth. That was so aptly named. Humans will do anything for the sake of convenience and climate change is quite inconvenient. Maybe if we make burning up the planet MORE inconvenient then it will change. Ridiculous taxes for carbon output sounds nice. Those tax dollars then spent on cloud seeding for the short term and carbon capture for the long term.

[–] SuddenDownpour 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

A lot of people love rationalising their own beliefs but hate reasoning out what's right and wrong. It makes me lose faith in humanity.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

A lot? We all need to be aware that we are able to hold on to faulty beliefs. We are only human.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Especially now with the amount of fake news

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[–] Burn_The_Right 33 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

There's no oops or fuck about it. They are gleefully driving us off the cliff like Thelma and Louise with conservatives cheering the whole way down.

The best we can hope for is to exact some form of harsh justice before nature has its way with them. We are already dead either way. Will they die in luxury or will they die in the streets with the rest of us?

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago

Oops was in the 90s and fuck hit about 2005. Climate scientists knew it.

Though in the 90's, which is when I got my biology degree, they assumed they'd be dead before it got really bad. Consider that oops 2.0

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

The "oops" and "fuck" are the public who are successfully reached by oil giant marketing and propaganda, the majority of people who think the first two statements are true and won't enjoy the final results.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago

This meme forgot to include when BP started pushing the 'Carbon Footprint' propaganda, to offset blame from corporations onto regular folk.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago (1 children)

We've entered the 'this is the new normal now, get used to it' phase.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 1 year ago (1 children)

"climate change is real, but it's too late so why change anything now?"

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago

Maybe we should do something about it but there's nothing we can do.

I notice more and more people trying to push us into stage 4 - "Maybe there was something we could have done but it's too late now" - just so we can put all of the uncomfortable guilt behind us.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Don't disagree with this at all, just noting that the start of that line could be stretched much further back, we have known that human consumption of coal was having/would have a detrimental impact on climate for well over 100 years 1856, 1902, 1912
source

Sadly in that timeline, profit has always mattered more than humanity (or the planet).

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[–] rockSlayer 23 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The fucking crazy part is that we had climate change models from the 1890s that are still proving to be relatively accurate. Shell had data in the 70s that proved the use of fossil fuels were directly causing climate change. They knew, hid the evidence, and lied to us. They didn't just deny the evidence.

[–] Hazdaz 21 points 1 year ago

You're missing an important step.

There's denial, then acceptance but brushing off blame, and then accepting blame but with apathy.

"OK fine, climate change is real, and it is caused by humans, but there's nothing we can do about it, so by bother?"

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 year ago

Except instead of oops it's 'the world is going to end anyway, so why not burn more oil?'

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Stage 1: "Climate change is my responsibility to fix as an average citizen!"

Stage 2: "Actually, fixing climate change is the responsibility of the megacorporations causing it."

Stage 3: "Climate change is my responsibility to fix as an average citizen!" (said while researching sabotage and mutual aid)

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (2 children)

The mastermind behind all this must be building fallout vault-like structures to allow people to survive the planet when all is said and done. They will rule the world in the end, perform experiments, whatever they want.

[–] lunarul 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I actually got a long ad on YouTube recently for luxury bunkers equipped with everything to go on for decades no matter what's going on outside. So yeah, that's a business now.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

What the hell is a luxury bunker?

Gold plated vault doors? Red carpet? Fancy mini bar soaps?

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The timeline for the earth to cool back off is a hundred thousand years. A bit too long to wait out in a bunker.

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[–] scottywh 14 points 1 year ago (2 children)

There should definitely be a BP stage in there too

[–] Zpiritual 4 points 1 year ago (3 children)
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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Now we're in the "take your Xanax while daddy Bill Gates fixes everything for you" phase.

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[–] Bytemeister 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

What really sucks is that we are penalizing newer, greener technologies in order to prop up older non-profitable technologies.

There is a huge subsidy in the US for coal power plants. That needs to wind down, preferably in the next 4 years.

A few states charge higher registration fees for hybrid and electric vehicles, while at the same time suppressing or almost eliminating the gas tax during post-pandemic inflation.

Certain groups are dead set on boiling the the frog here, without even realizing that they are a lobster in the same pot of water.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The worst part is that renewables and EVs are generally just better in every way.

Just because they don't go vroom vroom, a majority of the population don't like them.

[–] Bytemeister 3 points 1 year ago

Inb4 some idiot goes "but it takes metal mined from places and shipped across the ocean to make Teslas!!!"

Like your Ford Raptor is sustainably grown and harvested in small-plot ecologically friendly mom and pop truck farms....

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Lol. You think don't deny climate change today? Hawaii was bound to burn, and it had nothing to with climate change. (Just read the headline...)

They are going to kill us while trying to rob us of the vocabulary that explains how and why.

[–] Gradually_Adjusting 6 points 1 year ago

First thought, best thought. Hang oil billionaires at the Hague for crimes against humanity?

[–] DigitalTraveler42 6 points 1 year ago

I think we're currently in the "oops" phase heading towards "fuck"

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (8 children)
[–] NarrativeBear 14 points 1 year ago

Right at the beginning of Oops...

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Missing section: "OK its real and man made, but the fix is too inconvenient"

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

“This is because you didn’t recycle enough!”

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'll admit it, it was me. I mixed my paper with plastic. Sorry everyone.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

You doomed us! DOOMED!

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

Won't someone please just once consider the profits

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

Stuck in traffic huffing Exxon's fumes.

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[–] demlet 2 points 1 year ago

My personal human timeline:

  • End of dark ages up to industrial revolution: Wow, people are getting pretty dang smart, things are looking good for humanity.

  • Industrial revolution up to present: Well, on second thought...

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I don't care if it is caused by humans or natural causes ( and it's likely both). The issue is that it's a problem, because we've evolved to live in a cool environment (relative to wherever this is going). Part of responsibly using this planet we find ourselves on is terraforming it to sustainably and efficiently suit our needs. I support decarbonization because it helps. But due to other natural factors effecting our environment for the worse (as far as we as a species are concerned), we will need to take more artificial measures to cool the planet in the future.

But the first step is decarbonization. We have two choices - accept natural inefficiencies and extreme conditions, and slowly lose our intelligence in exchange for resilience (evolutionary "crabification"), or terraform the planet to a constant, efficient environment to continue developing as an intelligence.

We are caught, environmentally, in a neutral zone between extreme fluctuations that will continue until the earth cools entirely from its formation. We did not exist during the last extreme. And if we do not prevent the next, our species will not survive.

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