Wake Up Before We're All Under Water
Unless you're listening to the fundanutters who think they can just use up the earth before "The Rapture," or to politicians so deep in the pockets of people who'd like to continue business as usual, and damn the cost to the environment...you might actually believe what the scientists are saying -- that global warming is a real problem.
Wired's Mark Anderson interviews Elizabeth Kolbert, author of a three-part New Yorker series on climate change, asking her where we're headed, and how grim it's looking to those in the know:
Wired News: Many people seem to think that climate change is an issue involving a few scientists, not society as a whole. But your book makes it clear that climate change is more than just a science story.Elizabeth Kolbert: I really tried to impress upon people ... how we cannot wait. Even now, as global warming is starting to be made manifest in the world, we have determined the climate now for the next half-century. We will not see the full effects of what we have done for decades. (NASA climate scientist) James Hansen said, if we continue on this path, then by the end of this century, we will have committed ourselves to a world that is so warm as to be practically a different planet.
WN: Isn't part of the problem that people associate "warm" with comfortable?
Kolbert: People think, "I won't have to go to Florida anymore. Florida will come to me." People should realize that warmth doesn't mean Florida. It means New York is underwater. It may be that certain places like Siberia are more comfy, but it also means that they have no water. If people say, "Why should I be worried about global warming?" I think the answer is, "Do you like to eat?"
WN: You talk about David Rind's work -- predicting rampant drought conditions afflicting much of the continental United States within 50 years if greenhouse gas emissions continue at business-as-usual levels.
Kolbert: (In the book) he says that, "I wouldn't be surprised if by 2100 most things are destroyed." But he's certainly a very cool guy, not a hysterical person. He's a scientist, and he's just looking at the evidence.
WN: On the other hand, sometimes societal change can happen very quickly. Hit a social tipping point, and suddenly everything's different. And that could be a very good thing.
Kolbert: I think you do see out there in the world ... an increasing awareness. We here in the Northeast just barely had a winter. I think that anyone who has lived through the past winters certainly has been given pause. So we're starting to see the argument that "there's nothing going on" dissipating.
Then you get to the second question, and that's what are we going to do about it? If you want to be really brutally honest, this is not a problem that can be solved. The warming that we've seen so far is estimated to be only half of what (the CO2 already in the atmosphere will cause). It's a problem that you can only say, "In order to prevent this from becoming absolutely catastrophic, perhaps we can do this." But that (is) going to take a monumental effort.
Kolbert talks more about her series here. And here's her book on the subject, Field Notes On A Catastrophe.
No, no, no.
Crid at March 31, 2006 7:05 AM
Yes?
Amy Alkon at March 31, 2006 8:08 AM
I'm not alarmed about the idea of climate change - the evidence is everywhere in history. What alarms me is the idea that it's always "party time" for the public.
Go buy a scooter, folks, and drive less. There isn't any easy way to reduce consumption. Maybe your home is too boring to stay there because of its occupants, but market forces will have you paying to drive somewhere in short order.
Radwaste at March 31, 2006 10:51 AM
Count me in the category of people who believe that there is a human component to CO2 emissions and possible climate change, but who does not agree with the general class of 'solutions' that are presented by the literati.
I'm a firm believer that the progression of technology is more likely to solve our problems than the calls for 'rolling back the clock' of human behaviour.
There still is some question about how much of the problem is anthropogenic, and how much is caused by external events, and what the proper solution to each part of the equation may be.
If we were to find out that the entire problem of global climate change came from non-human events, to what degree are we required to intervene?
While I agree that there is a significant human component to our current atmospheric composition, there still remains the determination of the degree of alteration and the particular activity that is required to address it.
If it were proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that every bit of our currently identified climate changes were entirely natural, would we still feel compelled to 'fix' the problem?
I do think that we should make any reasonable effort to ameliorate the contribution we make to the climate, but I also think that there is only so much we can do to a system with so much inertia. It may not seem like all that much comfort, but the world is not in any danger, as it has survived much worse.
The real problem is what it will do to human habitation. I think we'll manage somehow, we pretty much always have. Most of the extreme predictions of the more apocolyptic will almost certainly not happen.
Dale at March 31, 2006 11:05 PM
Dale, you're a brother. It's excellent that you use the word "reasonable" as opposed to something like "We need to do what we can..." I disagree with you, but we could at least talk about it without each of us keeping our hands on our wallet.
Crid at March 31, 2006 11:57 PM
Dale writes:
Strange question. We're required to intervene to the point that our planet remains inhabitable, and allows those who live on this planet to remain doing so.
If we were to find out that climate change had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with us, would we simply just shrug and say, "Let the planet heat up so that the tropics become uninhabitable, the polar caps melt and leave us with less dry land to accomodate the billions that live here."
We have to intervene to the point in which the race can survive, regardless of how it was caused. Whether or not human activity is the cause of our problems, the alternative is dying.
Patrick at April 2, 2006 9:22 PM
Patrick,
While I would conditionally agree with you, the point I'm making concerns the viewpoints of those who express that there is some 'natural' state that the earth exists within.
Within that viewpoint, if we were to prove that there were no human influenced changes to the earths climate (i.e. solar output increase, etc.), then it would follow that we should not interfere with the 'natural' state of things.
I actually agree that we should do what we can (within reason) to ensure that earth is habitable for humans. However, given the wide range of what humans seem to be capable of handling in terms of their environment, that then begs the question of what we would call 'habitable'.
The mere flooding of coastal areas, as bad as that may be, does not necessarily equate to uninhabitability. From about 1300 to about 1850, the earth existed in what is called a 'little ice age', and there is evidence that within that period, the energy output of the sun was reduced. It may also be true that industrialization (and the side effects thereof) contributed to bringing us out of that period.
As the dominant form of life on this planet (and the only one with the ability to alter our environment with specificity), we *are* going to alter that environment, with or without a plan.
The problem is, we don't really know, with any real certainty, what effects our actions will engender on the climate as a whole. Our climate models are imprecise, at best, and we have doomsayers making claims on all sides of the betting table, from massive droughts to flooding to an ice age caused by melting polar ice.
The earth's climate is, by definition, a complex system, and complex systems CANNOT be modelled reliably, no matter how much horsepower or data you may have. Even the most miniscule change in starting conditions, or the smallest inaccuracy of the underlying data can produce VAST changes in the outcome of the model predictions.
The best we can do is a sort of statistical trend analysis, and even that is fraught with interpretive difficulty.
I firmly believe that, since we cannot know, in either direction, what effects our actions will have on the climate, we should make whatever reasonable efforts we can to ameliorate our impact. I also believe that we are bound, by instinct and attitude to maximize our ability to thrive in whatever environment we find ourselves, and that it is our moral right to ensure that we can continue to exist, even if that means a massive effort to alter the climate (in ANY fashion). My only caveat to that is that, at this point in time, we have only the very slightest awareness of what effects our actions may have, and we should take the smallest actions we must until such time as our knowledge is equal to the task.
Dale at April 2, 2006 10:26 PM
Something happened 65 million years ago... I think it was called the Cambrian explosion. (You can't hold me to the particulars, I'm a telecom major). There was some catastrophic event after which the number of species on the planet increased tremendously (explosively), fueled largely on the waste of earlier life forms (now called atmosphere, and built over the preceding BILLIONs of years of less interesting life forms). But the organisms that gave us air didn't do so for our benefit. They were just kicking out waste, and we happen to find it agreeable.
How much do YOU owe your descendants 100,000 generations from now? Not so much.
Sink or swim, babe. It's a natural thing.
Crid at April 4, 2006 3:45 PM
http://znakinet.blogspot.com ykcbggf
wkzky at March 27, 2008 3:37 AM
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