Well, I wanted to know if I could hate Trump more, this will do it.
Aside from the huge distances, personally I think weāve never contacted any advanced alien life simply because there isnāt any. Not because itās super rare (though that may be true) but rather they never make it. Evolutionary principles are probably universal, meaning evolution on other worlds would most likely track with evolutionary processes here and thus inevitably face the four choices presented here.
Using their mathematical model, the researchers found four potential scenarios that might occur in a civilization-planet system:
- Die-off: The population and the planetās state (indicated by something like its average temperature) rise very quickly. Eventually, the population peaks and then declines rapidly as the rising planetary temperature makes conditions harder to survive. A steady population level is achieved, but itās only a fraction of the peak population. āImagine if 7 out of 10 people you knew died quickly,ā Frank says. āItās not clear a complex technological civilization could survive that kind of change.ā
- Sustainability: The population and the temperature rise but eventually both come to steady values without any catastrophic effects. This scenario occurs in the models when the population recognizes it is having a negative effect on the planet and switches from using high-impact resources, such as oil, to low-impact resources, such as solar energy.
- Collapse without resource change: The population and temperature both rise rapidly until the population reaches a peak and drops precipitously. In these models civilization collapses, though it is not clear if the species itself completely dies outs.
- Collapse with resource change: The population and the temperature rise, but the population recognizes it is causing a problem and switches from high-impact resources to low-impact resources. Things appear to level off for a while, but the response turns out to have come too late, and the population collapses anyway.
Itās a terrible day for the planet.
Far-right candidate Jair Bolsonaro won ~46% of the first round vote in Brazilās presidential election. This guy wants to pull out the Paris Agreement and open up the Amazon even further to agriBusiness. I mean, at least he didnāt win outright, but unless something extraordinary happens (please oh please let something extraordinary happen) he will win the second round.
Meanwhile, the IPCC reminds us how screwed we are. āLimiting global warming to 1.5Ā°C would require rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of societyā
I just posted the same thing in another thread with a link on the peril facing the Amazon. The loss is going to be incalculable. When deforestation happens, it happens very, very fast. I feel worse today than I did in November, 2016.
Hereās the political map for results from someone on twitter giving the Brazil elections serious coverage; they will probably end up like Turkey.
Was going to post about the climate conference in S. Korea. So more reading I guess. Just when I think things canāt possibly get worse, they get worse.
I am right there with you.
I have never been to the Amazon, but I have been to the Pantanal (a region of rich wildlife that is on the precipice). I feel really bad for the animals.
Same here. Kinda feels overwhelming sometimes.
The problem is, those people want jobs and economic development. In a sane world, the rich western democracies and China would pay Brazil not to deforest. But we canāt even produce the political will to cut our own greenhouse gas emissions or to spur demand growth to create jobs here. No way anyone enacts policies that involve sending our tax dollars to Brazil.
Honestly, at this point, thereās clearly not going to be a change in behavior to deal with it.
If thereās Hope for the future, itās going to be that smart scientists figure out things like rapid, efficient carbon sequestration from the atmosphere or some other crazy thing.
Norway paid Brazil after deforestation slowed, but this is from 2017 so they may have stopped. The EU and China could do it as you say, but China is responsible for a lot of environmental degradation world wide, while Poland and Hungary have kinda broken the EU.
Generally speaking, countries that rely solely on exploiting their natural resources do not develop in any way that helps their people (DR Congo is the poster child for this, it might be the worst place on earth, which is saying something.) The Guardian, the Independent and Mongabay cover these stories extensively, and with rare exception they are all unrelentingly depressing.
Thatās kind of humanity in a nutshell. āMy behavior is bad, but Iām not going to change, hope someone bails me out.ā Iām starting to think the opposite is going to happen and weāre heading for a new ādark ageā of sorts.
I would like to ask the hive mind for some pointers as to what we can do as individuals to help the world. I have only come up with the following personally:
- Vote for politicians who will actually use their power to help the environment and deal with the suggestions offered by the worldās top scientists
- Only buy from companies who are actively managing a low or zero carbon footprint (are there any internet resources for this?)
- Use public transport/walking/biking when viable instead of using your car
- Spread the word of the above with whomever we meet and install these good values in our children as well
I welcome any of your other suggestions on this.
Use less electricity (turn shit off!) and install solar panels.
Let your home be warmer in the summer (78-80) and colder in the winter (60-65).
Eat less or no meat.
Buy fresh local fruits and vegetables, to reduce packaging and transport impact.
Reduce or eliminate air travel.
I ran my house in north central Phoenix for 10 years on a 10.5 kWh solar farm on the roof. Kept the house around 82 in the summer and never ran the heat in the winter. My total electricity cost was around $100 per year. I had net metering, which helped, but which is probably no longer available, which means you probably have to buy a storage system to get the same effect. If I had stayed there, I planned to buy a plug-in electric car to store excess electricity and eliminate gas costs & impact. Instead, I fled the dystopia.
The installed cost of a 10 kW solar system is about $30k today, which means with the 30% federal tax credit it will cost you about $21k. If you save $200 per month in electricity costs, it will pay for itself in less than 10 years.
Well, I think humans are capable of figuring this one out.
If not, the problem solves itself as a bunch of humans die.
Assuming this is accurate:
Then if I cut beef, lamb and cheese out my diet or greatly reduce my consumption thereof and stick more to chicken and tuna then this should have a positive impact.
At the risk of going down the rabbit hole of insufferable environmentalism: tuna isnt especially well positioned from a sustainable-fisheries perspective. Assuming that the carbon cost of most wild-caught fish are similar, there are probably other better fish alternatives.
(From the linked sources, farmed salmon is about on par with pork).
Seeing Republicans seemlessly shift from āclimate change isnāt realā to āitās too late to do anything, we would have had to start 20 years agoā is making me boil with rage. Jesus.
Republicans arenāt so good with the word āstopā - they like to plow right ahead, as weāve seen so recently in the Senate. Gotta just lie and misdirect their way around the consequences of their actions.
I think Gaia isnāt going to be persuaded by those lies, however. A reckoning is coming, and itās not the one the evangelicals are anticipating. Or maybe it is.
So for the past few months Iāve been on a very nearly vegetarian diet. The only meat Iāve had was clams Iāve caught myself, and a pack of pork riblets that I bought because they were $1.28lb.
But otherwise Iāve had no meat since July. Not out of ethical considerations, but practical and financial ones (my work relocation and maintaining two habitations is a strain).
But cheese is a bridge too far. Cutting out cheese is not only not feasible, I have no intention of even trying. Ask me to stop eating beef? Sure. Pork? Eh Iāll cope. Cheese? I WILL CUT YOU!
Mediterranean Diet. Not only is it good for you, it has a much smaller climate footprint.
The Trump Administration
