Climate Change - Reality Check - The Blind Leading the Blind
This is an essay that I had originally posted at TOS, but I have cut it up, and have performed some editing (removed a few expletives, tried to fix some grammar lol) and sliced into several smaller, easily digestible "parts", this being part 1, of 5.
REALITY CHECK
[video:https://youtu.be/nTCoU85dsLM align:center]
What my non scientific eyes tell me, is that, we are already close to the tipping point(1) of run away climate change now, but “humanity” is failing to respond in a “responsible” manner. While I know many are pleased by our president's effort's toward this end, as well as the recent signing of the Paris Climate agreement by so many countries was encouraging, however the “reality” is that the Paris agreement falls woefully short in many areas, but most importantly, the target of reducing global emissions to limit temperature rise:
The agreement sets out a global action plan to put the world on track to avoid dangerous climate change by limiting global warming to well below 2°C. (They target 1.5°C as the “magic number”)
First and for most what do they mean 
, avoid dangerous climate change? Heck, that is already happening now.
Take Syria for example. The country wasn't thrown into turmoil because of the Arab Spring, as many MSM and their paid pundits like to claim, it was the huge drought(2) that Syria experienced starting in about 2006, that forced tens of thousands of farmers and their families, into the cities, which over loaded their “systems” ability to deal with the huge influx of people and all the ramifications that influx brought with it.
From ClimateSecurity.Org:
From 2006-2011, up to 60% of Syria’s land experienced, in the terms of one expert, “the worst long-term drought and most severe set of crop failures since agricultural civilizations began in the Fertile Crescent many millennia ago.” According to a special case study from last year’s Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction (GAR), of the most vulnerable Syrians dependent on agriculture, particularly in the northeast governorate of Hassakeh (but also in the south), “nearly 75 percent…suffered total crop failure.” Herders in the northeast lost around 85% of their livestock, affecting 1.3 million people.
Got that?
“the worst crop failures since the agricultural civilization began in the Fertile Crescent many millennia ago. “
(How can I scream that at the top of my lungs, without seemling like a raging lunatic?)
Also according to the same article:
The reasons for the collapse of Syria’s farmland are a complex interplay of variables, including climate change, natural resource mis-management, and demographic dynamics.
A NOAA study study published last October in the Journal of Climate found strong and observable evidence that the recent prolonged period of drought in the Mediterranean littoral and the Middle East is linked to climate change. On top of this, the study also found worrying agreement between observed climate impacts, and future projections from climate models. A recent model of climate change impacts on Syria conducted by conducted by IFPRI, for example, projects that if current rates of global greenhouse gas emissions continue, yields of rainfed crops in the country may decline “between 29 and 57 percent from 2010 to 2050.”
(bold emphasis mine)
Let me stop here a second and speak a little about "systems" for a moment. Whether you believe me or not, "everything" is a part of some "system", and as we go through and categorize the number of differing systems, both man made and the natural systems, like our solar "system". We forget, it seems, just how interconnected and interdependent these "systems" are on one another and just how dependent our species are on them functioning with in a tiny window of narrow parameters, that enable our existence in the first place.
Clean water, clean air, a clean environment, all are essential elements for human survival but we, as a species have impact our natural systems to such a great affect, they are no longer able to recover as quickly. While these systems are hugely resilient, like anything is the universe, apply to much pressure, wear it out too much and things go boom!
But unlike the boom of a brilliant super nova in deep space, climate change is the slow boiling frog. We're cooked before we know it. But let's not forget either, that the fire on this burner has been cooking for more than 25 years. In the early 90's we were told we have about a decade to prepare for climate change. It's nearly 30 years down the road. (Hello, we're in boiling water, just thought I say something! 
)
Well from my understanding, we haven't hit the “magic number” yet, but climate change is already having seriously dangerous, and not to mention deadly impacts. With a 1.5°C or 2°C rise in global average surface temperatures, we will see more and more of this. Social and government systems will overload to the point of collapse and possible chaos.
From the Independent(3):
“It means hotter global temperatures, more extreme weather events like heatwaves and floods, melting ice, rising sea levels and increased acidity of the oceans. This is happening now and we are moving into unchartered territory at a frightening speed,” said Michel Jarraud, the secretary general of the WMO.
“Every year we report a new record in greenhouse gas concentrations. Every year we say that time is running out. We have to act now to slash greenhouse gas emissions if we are to have a chance to keep the increase in temperatures to manageable levels,” Mr Jarraud said.
(bold emphasis mine)
A 2°C rise in global average surface temperatures across the planet, in reality, is going to have a huge impact on our civilization. A prolonged drought in Syria, help along by climate change, led to over a million people mass migrating to the cities, which as a result of the government and society inability to respond (ineffective "systems"), lead to a civil war, that has opened the way for ISIS, and more mass migrations to Europe, which is threatening to destabilize Europe. (Does that qualify for a dangerous impact? Just saying...)
It started as a drought and in just ten years, over 250K, or more, are dead. Some estimate a figure as low as 150K, while some put the figure as high as more that 470K(4). How about hundreds of thousands of innocent people, dead? Will that do for a figure?
Another example of dangerous climate change that is already happening , From RollingStone:
Historians may look to 2015 as the year when shit really started hitting the fan. Some snapshots: In just the past few months, record-setting heat waves in Pakistan and India each killed more than 1,000 people.
(bold emphasis mine)
Excuse me while I retort, "dangerous climate change, WTF are you talking about, it's already happening and we haven't begun to mitigate anything".
Heck, we are already balancing precariously on the edge of climate Armageddon (multiple positive feed back loops), and 2°C rise in global average surface temperatures will bring about unimaginable chaos across large swaths of our planet.
Not to mention this magic number in the Paris agreement, is nothing but fiction. A number developed through political consensus, not science. But we are in uncharted waters, the blind leading the blind as it were. 
References:
1 - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the US
2 - Climate Security.Org
3 - Independent
4 - New York Times
Comments
Too, right, mate. Thanks for an excellent essay on climate
change realities. It is THE issue of our time and matter may be far, far, worse than we have thought.
I posted this in one of joe's EB posts last week. It's from the Arctic scientists blog:
Read the Arctic scientists position on human extinction in the near, near future:
http://arctic-news.blogspot.ca/p/extinction.html
Thanks again for this highly timely essay.
Resilience: practical action to improve things we can control.
3D+: developing language for postmodern spirituality.
Thanks for the link
Oh man, YIKES!
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
Please put this in your tags.....
Open Thread
It will pin it as an Open Thread to the top right-hand side of the page for 24 hours. You put so much work into this video and it is so good that it should have a chance to be seen by others.
Note
If others could please repost this diary and the video around, it would be much appreciated.
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
I put them (tags) in
but I don't know if I did it right (lol)
Thanks!
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
Hi RR...
I added the correct tag for you, we don't use the hash tags here so when you added it as #Open Thread it wont work. Only Open Thread will work.
Thanks for the outstanding essay and video.
Oh wow, thanks Jtc
Thank you C99p!
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
Read this and weep or rant or both (your choice)
Toxic Slime Spreads Across World's Oceans as Climate Disruption Continues Apace
Nero fiddles comes to mind.
"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott
The cited article should scare
the crap out of any sane person. My conclusion is that a large percentage of TPTB are just not sane.
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"
Hi RR, yes, it is a bracing thought, eh? It's a vey good site;
Sam Carana is the scientist with the remarkable gift for creating accessible graphs, a rare talent.
The problem with the IPCC reports is, one, they're usually so late as to be outdated. The reason they're always late is the interminable negotiations between scientists and politicians about what's acceptable to most governments. The Arctic though, is the boiler plate of climate change. A number of years ago, I noticed that the Arctic scientists were increasingly diverging from IPCC reports. They became increasingly frank and increasingly willing to present their results in unfiltered language. Nowadays, they're shouting from the rooftops, which is rather unusual behaviour for scientists.
Thanks very much for this most timely and needed series.
Resilience: practical action to improve things we can control.
3D+: developing language for postmodern spirituality.
Jill Stein 2016
It would be a miracle, but we really need one!
Marilyn
"Make dirt, not war." eyo
And Trump would be the end of the world as we know it
Love Jill and may vote for her but look at the chart here;
Clinton vs. Trump: A Sharp Divide Over Energy and the Environment
The political revolution continues
Too little, too late
Clinton plans for us to generate 25% of our energy with renewables by 2025. Exactly the kind of incrementalism that will kill us. Ten more years of making the problem worse and then what? 50% by 2035, 10 more years of making the problem worse? 75% by 2045, 10 more years of making the problem worse? We don't have this kind of time. Better than Trump? Sure. World saving? Nope. This is a perfect example of why I plan to vote for Jill Stein.
I have a friend in Oklahoma. Their utility switched to wind power and their utility bills went DOWN. I followed up on that and found the Oklahoma wind blog noting that they have the potential capacity to generate 1/3 of the power for the entire country.
We have the technology to do 100% right now and cost the ratepayer LESS. The only reason to keep it down to 25% is so the Kochs and their ilk continue to make money off fossil fuels. This is corporate sycophantism at its worst.
Please check out Pet Vet Help, consider joining us to help pets, and follow me @ElenaCarlena on Twitter! Thank you.
The Paris Climate accords are weak in at least two ways
One is that each country determines its own contribution to greenhouse gas reduction and a second is that the contributions are not legally binding. I fear that we will see little or no lessening of greenhouse gas emissions, until the crap hits the fan to such an extent that even the pitiful excuses for human beings that populate the governments of the world can not ignore the problems any longer. A 2 degree target is too high, but I will be very surprised if we meet that number.
The critical issue is not that of climate change.
Rather, the pivotal issue is that of climate change mitigation, and of how it can possibly be attained. In a piece to come out in a future issue of Knowledge Cultures, I will be arguing that physical climate change mitigation is being faked by the powers that be, who don't want to see it happen because it would upset their political-economic applecarts. A utopian makeover for society and for technology thus stands as a prerequisite for physical climate change mitigation.
“When there's no fight over programme, the election becomes a casting exercise. Trump's win is the unstoppable consequence of this situation.” - Jean-Luc Melanchon
I would not go as far as to use the word Utopian. What is needed
is capital "S" socialism where economies can be planned for sustainability and where everyone has close-to-equal access to clean water; medical services; food grown in a sustainable manner; and a plethora of related human scale necessities. Plus, a lack of corruption from the leadership. It will fail if the new leaders behave like those who control the political economy now.
Faced with this existential event which has been long predicted, starting in the 1960s by Soviet and American scientists, we need to rid ourselves of the people who have failed to act and the system that pays them not to act.
The daunting task is to create a movement that is coherent and sustainable and singlemindedly pursues the only option available to civilization. Solidarity. There I said it. How to achieve it, I don't know. But...at least we know the cause - global monopoly capitalism and the forces it commands to keep itself in power, so that's a start, albeit not much of one.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
The label is not important.
Even something like "libertarian ecosocialism," which offers even more information, is still going to confuse people. Of all of the labels, "utopian" is the one with the greatest degree of generality, and can thus be used to discuss the whole of what the people believe together with what needs to be done.
As for planning economies, the urgent need is that of phasing out the fossil economy as quickly as possible. One way would be to follow a three-step process, for example:
1) have the US government open a motor vehicle business, manufacturing only electric vehicles.
2) offer to trade in everyone's fossil-burning vehicles for equivalent electric vehicles.
3) shut off the gas pumps at some point.
This sort of thing could be used for replacement of fossil fuels throughout the spectrum of use.
“When there's no fight over programme, the election becomes a casting exercise. Trump's win is the unstoppable consequence of this situation.” - Jean-Luc Melanchon
I like those steps
And it has the advantage of keeping it simple without a lot of noise. If we can spend trillions on defense and spying on ourselves and others it seems to me we could easily transfer some of that to creating electric vehicles. Maybe even add electric trains to the mix (although that may add too much complication and maybe should be its own three step.)
glitterscale
The critical issue is not that of climate change.
Rather, the pivotal issue is that of climate change mitigation, and of how it can possibly be attained. In a piece to come out in a future issue of Knowledge Cultures, I will be arguing that physical climate change mitigation is being faked by the powers that be, who don't want to see it happen because it would upset their political-economic applecarts. A utopian makeover for society and for technology thus stands as a prerequisite for physical climate change mitigation.
“When there's no fight over programme, the election becomes a casting exercise. Trump's win is the unstoppable consequence of this situation.” - Jean-Luc Melanchon
We are on the verge
of some serious poopy hitting the fan...
[video:https://youtu.be/OoztduCa1uw]
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
I traveled from Cochrane, Ontario, to the shore of an arm of the
Arctic Ocean, James Bay, and traversed the world's largest expanse of muskeg(tundra). This vast area contained uncounted tons of sequestered methane.
The muskeg is thawing and with the thaw comes the release of methane, a much more potent greenhouse gas on the order of 25 times that of CO2.
The high northern latitudes are warming much faster than the rest of the planet(as predicted) and a reversal of CO2 into the atmosphere must be accomplished so that temperatures cool enough to refreeze the muskeg. As was pointed out by Soviet scientists decades ago, the melting of the Arctic ice unleashes a positive feedback loop where the more ice and snow that melts, the faster the earth warms.
A methane bomb awaits us.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
A diary the C99p community can be proud of. Thanks RR /nt
https://www.euronews.com/live
Oh Wow,...
many thanks Mimi...my goodness, I'm all
and 
!
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
I agree with Mimi, RR. Extremely important topic, backed up
by facts, and beautiful creative video. And about the right length! I look forward to reading more.
Please check out Pet Vet Help, consider joining us to help pets, and follow me @ElenaCarlena on Twitter! Thank you.
16 months
We'll have our answer in 16 months. Global average temperatures for the year just past are announced in January.
Over the last 2 billion years the Earth has existed in range of global average temperatures of 12 to 22 degrees (everything in Celcius). During the Permian extinction thermal maximum it peaked up to 23 degrees - 90 percent of marine species went extinct and 95 percent of terrestrial species went extinct. The temperature range is just 10 degrees. Few if any mammals can exist at 22 degrees. We won't be one of them. We aren't the most resilient species, much as we might like to think so.
GAT for 2016 will probably be around 15 C (we'll have the correct number in January). Ideal temperatures for humans, human civilization, and the plant and animal communities we rely upon is probably around 13.5 C (the GAT prior to the invention of the steam engine and the large scale combustion of fossil fuels).
It's not simply a matter of the absolute temperature, it's also the rate of temperature change. A forest or coral reef can migrate to a more suitable microclimate over the course of thousands of years. The same change in temperature over 50 years will simply kill it.
The same is true for humanity. I firmly believe that if we had 500 years to deal with climate change we could fix it. If we only have 50 years we're screwed. We simply can't make the sort of social and economic changes required, invent and deploy the technology required in one or two generations. We can't adapt fast enough and we'll go extinct.
So which is it?
The conventional wisdom in the climatology community is that climate change can't happen much faster than 1 degree per century, and generally a climate change event extends over thousands of years.
A recent theory (some papers have been published, it's still very controversial) is "rapid climate change", that the full change happens over long time frames, but that the rate is not uniform. After a long period of gradual change the climate flips to a new state in a matter of decades, followed by a long period where it reaches final equilibrium. The rapid "flip" happens at a rate of 1 degree per decade, or even faster. The mechanism may be positive feedbacks (papers about positive feedbacks started to be published in 2009, the year after the cut off date for the IPCC fifth assessment).
We've seen a lot of warming during the current El Nino, almost 3 times what we saw during the record El Nino 18 years ago. In fact, it looks like we now have a background rate of 0.1 C per year on top of the El Nino effect. Which is one degree per decade. Which is rapid climate change.
El Nino is over, we've switched back to the La Nina pattern. We expect some cooling as the extra heat radiates into space. This should mostly occur over the next year (2017).
16 months from now, when the 2017 GAT is announced, we can expect one of the following:
- A drop back to under 1 degree of warming over the 1880s baseline. Yes, it really was just El Nino, which for some reason gave us 3 times the temperature rise from a slighly smaller amount of heat.
- Little or no drop in temperature from 2016, as the background rise of 0.1 C per year cancels the expected (from the 1997-1998 cooling) drop as El Nino fades away. The background temperature rise is confirmed, rapid climate change is confirmed, we're screwed.
- A small increase of temperature over 2016. The background rate isn't fixed, it's exponential. We're exponentially screwed.
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
Two things that really scare me about all this
first, is the lack of a WWII mobilization effort towards mitigation, as Cassiodorus mentions. Second is "tipping points", especially a huge and sudden release of both carbon and methane from the permafrost across the northern hemisphere, will result in an overwhelming escalation that our "man made systems" won't be able to handle.
And then it's a Mad Max future for humanity in short order.
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
Mad Max would represent a soft landing (n/t)
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
Hi Woodsdweller, it is so good to "see" you again. I just got
back from a summer break in the garden. I remember your knowledge and clarity.
I think the Arctic News blog's forecast of 10C increase by 2026 may be close to reality. As you say, we're screwed and exponentially so. I saw recently that Guy McPherson stopped updating his monster climate essay over at Nature Bats Last. I agree with his choice: what's the fucking point of updating the latest scientific results when it's chrystal clear we're fucked and each successive study just reconfirms that it will happen even faster than we thought yesterday? I remember when he introduced the first of the secondary feedbacks into his essay and just marveling when it reached ten! Last I saw he had close to 70 such secondary feedbacks. Yikes.
It's real good to see you again, mate, g
Resilience: practical action to improve things we can control.
3D+: developing language for postmodern spirituality.
Hi, Gerrit (waves)
I read arctic news, but I don't consider them authoritative.
A few years back they made wild claims about methane levels in the arctic going exponential based on one data point, which turned out to be a faulty sensor. That gets you a failing grade on a high school paper.
Now, those readings are routine across all sensors. They got the right result with utterly flawed data. Go figure.
10 C in 10 years is yet another order of magnitude over "rapid climate change". I'm not convinced, but if it is true we'll see very shortly, like in a year or two. A prediction like that doesn't leave much room for waiting around.
3 C in 300 years can be mitigated, and planetary engineering solutions implemented to start to restore the atmosphere.
3 C in 30 years means total collapse of agriculture, mass starvation, breakdown of industrial civilization and social order, and then things get really bad.
3 C in 3 years is inconceivable.
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
Right on, woodsdweller. Yes, I'd put Arctic News at the one
end of the spectrum and the IPCC at the other. If reality approaches the IPCC end, sure, there's a snowball's change, providing human nature could change. If it approaches even the middle of that spectrum, we have too many problems. If it's towards the Arctic News end, it's a brief, brutal Quest For Fire future.
I would so much appreciate if you would inform us as you get the incoming data over the next 24 months. I trust your judgement and would be glad to adapt my thinking along the lines you would propose. This was Sam Carana's graph from earlier this year:
There will be a dip during the middle of the year as El Nino faded, but where will it end? You're closer to the scientific interface and I hope you'll help us understand what's happening.
Cheers, mate, and thanks,
Resilience: practical action to improve things we can control.
3D+: developing language for postmodern spirituality.
Also . . . loved your video . . .
Very nice, despite the grim topic.
Marilyn
"Make dirt, not war." eyo
Thanks
golly, I'm like totally
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
You are one very talented guy....
Thank you so much for making the video. I love it and your essay. I tweeted and FB'd your diary, and I know a couple of our friends on FB have already reposted it.
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
Thank you
I appreciate it very much.
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
Great essay, great video, including music, which was
perfectly chosen.
I'm sure you are aware of EO Wilson's "Half - Earth" that 1/2 of our planet should be set aside and left alone:
link: http://eowilsonfoundation.org/half-earth-our-planet-s-fight-for-life/
Don't believe everything you think.
E.O. Wilson has been a long time effective advocate for
biodiversity. His recommendations on maintaining biodiversity are sound and it's too bad he has been ignored by the political apparatus.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
Biodiversity won't mean anything predictable with climate change
Migratory species might adapt. Polar bears lose polar. Trees don't walk too fast. Many fish can't live in warmer, more-acidic oceans. And then there are the micro-flora and-fauna. Wilson's idea is good, it's probably too late.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
Genetic diversity within a population helps the species adapt
to changing environmental conditions in most studied cases. GMO crops with their needed inputs and monoculture type of agriculture reduces biodiversity both by number of species and by genetic diversity within species.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
Thank you
for both for the comments and the resource link. Actually I wasn't aware
, but find it very interesting and will read about it more.
Thanks
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
We've been an infection, and a fever may cure the earth of us.
Very sad. Our place in the system has been been ugly. Maybe we were better as small hunter-gatherer tribes.
Thank you JtC or whoever front paged this. Right decision
for myriad of reasons.
Don't believe everything you think.
A climate change essay...
will make the front page quicker than any other. This is THE issue of our times, IMHO.
It is the existential issue facing humanity but comments are
scarce on thoughtful diaries on this topic.
It's not too hard to understand even though earth's climate is a wonderfully complex system and not fully understood.
I think a lot of resistance to climate change, and the biosphere in general, is that it can be traced back to Karl Marx & Frederick Engels and Soviet scientists were early researchers into this. In the USA, Barry Commoner was a socialist and Odum, a major contributor to our understanding of ecosystems, was a leftist. Rachael Carson would not find a welcome-home in the neoliberal world.
That said, these scientists have gotten it correctly as have many dozens of non-household names in all fields dealing with the situation.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
I'm starting with the man in the mirror
My avatar is a picture of my Nissan LEAF. It's an electric vehicle with no gas tank, no internal combustion engine, and no tailpipe. It goes up to 84 miles on a single charge. That's fine for me: my work commute is 17.5 miles each way, and when I get home I can plug it in in my garage and charge it overnight.
Aside from the joy of not burning fossil fuel this car has muscle. Gas burners seem so sluggish once you start driving electric.
I realize this is not a solution for everyone but if you have a short enough commute and a place to charge your car I strongly encourage you to join me and go electric.
"Please clap." -- Jeb Bush
I desperately want to go electric.
Unfortunately, I need a vehicle with a much, MUCH greater range than is currently available in anything except the Tesla Model S (and even that would require a stop to recharge on my annual trips), and that is just staggeringly out of anything even close to my budget. I needed a replacement for my old car sooner rather than later, and between the time until the Model 3 comes out and the years it's going to take them to get through their preorders, waiting for that wasn't feasible, either.
I got a 2016 Prius a couple months ago, which I have been enjoying very much and view as stepping stone to being able to move to a fully electric vehicle. It's been averaging around 56mpg, a massive improvement over my 2007 V6 Accord. Most of my driving is city driving, so I was getting 15mpg when I was lucky. I'm really hoping that the Model 3 is successful and lights a fire under other manufacturers to produce EVs that have a much greater range than is currently available at the lower price points. Should that happen, I absolutely plan on going full electric with my next car. I wish I could have with this one.
Unfortunately I live in Kentucky, which means disgusting coal power and no alternative available. So, I will also have to either move (which I would not mind AT ALL), or invest in a solar setup.
Economic: -9.13, Social: -8.56
I've never owned a car, and have had a good life
in spite of it. I live downtown and walk or bus everywhere. I am no trying to become a vegan as I learned that 51% of climate change/global warming/pollution is caused by animal agriculture. It's greater than that caused by travel.
I applaud you for getting your travel off fossil fuel.
To thine own self be true.
Outstanding essay and video!
This essay is one of the best I have ever seen published here. I am looking forward to the rest in your series. Your video is beautiful, haunting and frightening. Excellent work!
PS, I am linking on Twitter and Facebook too.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
XKCD today had a nice presentation
Earth Temperature Timeline
We can’t save the world by playing by the rules, because the rules have to be changed.
- Greta Thunberg
Bill McKibben tells me I am right thinking it's getting hotter
hotter than ever before.It is hotter than ever.
Even my son, who fears the cold more than the heat, agreed with me that it's easier to protect yourself from the cold than protect yourself from the extreme heat. Voila.
https://www.euronews.com/live
I can always, well almost always
find a way to get warm, but cooling off, I don't do so well in the heat anymore.
In my old age, my body is freaking out a bit. If it gets too hot or cold, I break out in massive hives that feel like acid on my skin and itch like hell. It's been a while since I've experienced a break out, but it's awful none the less. My histamine levels are freaked out or something. One of these days when I'm able to afford health insurance, I'll get it checked out, but in the mean time, I'm like a fricking hermit.
C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote
snarkily considering how easily people get hot on C99p
and how hard it is for them to stay cool, it looks climate change doesn't even stop here.
So, another guy, who has no health insurance among us. I think when the people in Congress and the White House get toasted or cooked at 100F regularly, they will finally see the need to provide the universal health insurance for all...or the cooks in the WH kitchen will throw them into the boiling soup.
Ooops, the heat makes me ga-ga. Though today it's nice in DC. There is hope ....
https://www.euronews.com/live
Heat is cumulative. Day after day of being hot without being
able to cool off at night can lead to sudden death.
If you were born and grew up in a cool to cold climate, some of your sweat producing pores don't function and you have difficulty ridding your body of excess heat.
Being hot, day and night, for a few days is dangerous even if you are able to stay fully hydrated.
Be careful.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
When you're cold, put on a hat
when you're hot, soak your feet in cool water. Works.
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
Climate change
is the most important issue we face as citizens of the world because it impacts all other issues, and every person, on the planet. Poor, rich or in between, no matter what our country, political affiliation or beliefs are, we all have to breathe, eat and drink water. Thanks for the essay. Reposted and shared the link.
Left you a comment on Youtube
....wonderful vid.
Thanks for this essay, looking forward to the upcoming chapters.
I rarely venture to TOP these days....missed your diary there.
Much better for overall mental and emotional health to read you here, in the safe place!
I once had the brilliant idea of going to the highest point...
I once had the brilliant idea of going to the highest point of Glacier National Park and burying a metal case with mementos of human life on earth hoping that maybe just maybe some aliens might retrieve it or maybe in the future a new form of human like intelligent life might evolve, and find it. Of course,all this after humanity kills itself off within the century.
Then of course I read about the melting of the glaciers with them soon to be gone. And I said fck-it. Any creature coming after us will give us no honor as we deserve none. For some reason, I think of this:
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvuM3DjvYf0]
I know of property in NYS ...
I know of property in NYS ... not too far from the city. It would be perfect for a solar farm but the utility infrastructure cannot accommodate it.
Go Bernie !!
Great essay. Great video. Thank you so much
for doing it.
I'm pretty sure that the other thing that happened in Syria is that the government decided to adopt some neoliberal "reforms" and sold its' stockpile of grain, which it had a history of distributing at below market prices in times of need.
So when the famine hit, there was no bread to distribute to those in the country side, who then left for the city in hope of bread first and jobs second. But there was no bread in the cities either. And no jobs.
This topic is more important than Hillary, thank you!
Thank you for posting it.
What are we going to do about it?
There are reports from The World Watch Institute that animal agriculture causes more global warming/climate change than travel. 51% of harmful pollution to our water, our air, our landscape comes from animal agriculture. So we can keep driving (for a while) but we should watch what we eat.
Cowspiracy. The Sustainability Secret with a new cut from executive producer Leonardo DiCaprio
Watch the film. It's on Netflix and it's online here: Cowspiracy.vhx.tv
This is not about methane or "cow farts" - that's the response given by most of the politicians in the film (followed by loud guffaws) when they were queried on the subject. It's about the massive damage to our water, air and landscape caused by mega animal agriculture.
To thine own self be true.
Good comment. We need to pay attention to all these
things without, however, setting priorities.
My worry about the growing push from those who are concerned by the scale of animal husbandry (to put animal murder politely) is similar to my concern about the push coming from the basic income folk. Namely, that the concern about the scale of animal husbandry and the basic income folks' concern about the coming of the robots can distract us from the simple fact that addressing our reliance upon fossil fuel is relatively easy if we have the political desire to do so.
Considering all the many problems we face in the world, it seems really important to me to keep focused and build up as large an "army" pushing for green energy as possible.
In doing so, we will then have the institutional structure to face all these other problems, including the scale of animal husbandry and dealing with the coming of the robots, etc....
Among other things, we will realize that any government can afford anything denominated in its' own unit of account, and that there are ways to create full employment (which is needed to address the rapidly shift to green energy), even if robots do all the jobs necessary for survival.
Still, I agree that massive animal husbandry is a problem for both our environment, as well as our morality, as massive scale seems to go along with unnessary cruelty.