# Climate Change



## AMOS

Has anyone else had strange weather patterns for the last few years? I live in S.E. New England and we've had more brutal wind storms than I can remember at any other point in my life (I'm 59) The occasional Hurricane we get are dismal compared to our Nor'Easters and other bad wind storms that seem to come out of nowhere. several people I know are convinced there's something funny going on, if these are natural cycles, then they are some pretty brutal cycles. I'm a Conservative that believes man is creating some of this mess, but it's not limited to that. I feel it's coinciding with other natural cycles. Sun, Planet etc.. but surely record high CO2 levels in the atmosphere for the last half decade or so must be doing something.

I'm looking for any input from your part of the country/world, and if things have been getting extreme, or even if things haven't changed at all.


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## Dumple Stilzkin

Where I live, the weather is much more erratic. We used to have slow smooth transitions between seasons, now we will have a 32 degree day, followed by a a 60 degree day. The summers are becoming hotter, we set a record this last summer at 116.


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## AMOS

Dumple Stilzkin said:


> Where I live, the weather is much more erratic. We used to have slow smooth transitions between seasons, now we will have a 32 degree day, followed by a a 60 degree day. The summers are becoming hotter, we set a record this last summer at 116.


We bounce around a lot too, it can be 60 one day, snow the next. This Winter was worse than the last few, but in general Winters have been warmer here and much less snow than normal. It gets very humid in the Summer here so 85-90 feels much hotter.


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## zappatton2

It's kinda sad that these discussions tend to get filed into "politics", when they should be in some heading of "what to do about this thing that credible scientists are stating clearly with overwhelming evidence is happening and going to mess a lot of things up for us and ecosystems worldwide".


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## Lorcan Ward

We are starting to get more hot spells during the summer and milder Winters which is great for our agriculture and low vitamin D levels but not nice to see the weather causing so much trouble in other parts of the world.


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## AMOS

zappatton2 said:


> It's kinda sad that these discussions tend to get filed into "politics", when they should be in some heading of "what to do about this thing that credible scientists are stating clearly with overwhelming evidence is happening and going to mess a lot of things up for us and ecosystems worldwide".


I know what you mean, I thought about that before posting but since they usually get heated, I put it in here.


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## ScottThunes1960

zappatton2 said:


> It's kinda sad that these discussions tend to get filed into "politics", when they should be in some heading of "what to do about this thing that credible scientists are stating clearly with overwhelming evidence is happening and going to mess a lot of things up for us and ecosystems worldwide" on a seven string guitar messageboard.



Fixed!


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## zappatton2

AMOS said:


> I know what you mean, I thought about that before posting but since they usually get heated, I put it in here.


I didn't intend to imply you _shouldn't _be posting it here, just that it's kinda tragic from a broader perspective how the topic tends to get framed.


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## odibrom

I live in the south west of Europe and am 45 now. I remember to have winters when I was a kid. Summers are hotter than ever...

... regarding on what to do to about this, there are lots of actions to take, but I believe that the most important begins with the self, with our own habits, liberties and whims. We should be more conscious about our surroundings and the effects our choices have on the rest of the world. We should think in the real price tag that comes along with the "cheap", "easy", "fast" and "new"... and what is fashionable (which goes means clothes, wear, food, high tech, consumables, life style choices/options and so on)...

Best rule of thumb would be to buy local... everything, either food, clothes or cars. This will greatly reduce the carbon footprint of shipping things around the globe, which is HUGE.

Second best rule of thumb is to avoid as possible processed / industrial food, for it will reduce hugely the impact that packages have on the planet, either as garbage when tossed after its purpose is fulfilled as it is a huge waste of the planet resources.

Then, our whims/vices take the best out of us. Lets get disciplined an consume only what we really need. Excesses are inexcusable. We NEED to use our reason and behave as the rational beings we advertise ourselves of being. Let's act accordingly, shall we?

It is sai that "meat production" is one of the biggest causes of de-florestation and gas emissions. The problem is not "eating meat" on itself but on the methods to make it accessible to mass consumers... the problem is the "mass consumers", which we urgently must stop being and become conscious ones. personally, I'm almost vegan, eating only some yogurts and ice-creams at my parents about once a week or less, and am veggie since late 1995. I've also stopped going to fast food restaurants as an habit (sure, once in a while, but less than once a month) and prefer the whole food approach to the "ready made"/ industrial shit. yeah, it takes time and has a learning curve, but we all know this is the way.

... more bicycles and less cars...

... Reuse, reduce and recycle/upcycle...

All this starts in the self, not in politics. In order to change a country, one must start at the individual, the politics / politicians will follow or fall/fail. So, do we, who care, have the guts and balls to be an example for others to follow and as so become a force of change? This is the way... you know it.


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## sleewell

Much milder winters here, warmer summers. The high wind events are more common too.


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## CanserDYI

Well I live in Ohio where weather has always been Florida in the summer, Canada in the winter, but these last few years have been absolutely insane with weather, you will literally wear shorts and T shirt one day and a full arctic gear the next. hell it was in the 10s literally 2 days ago, today is supposed to be 70.

In my entire life I've never seen such wild changes back and forth like it has done in the past few years, to me, it feels like climate change is absolutely happening right in front of our eyes, and yes, it's man perpetuated.


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## Demiurge

This winter has held a record for the number of times I've shoveled snow in the morning and could see bare lawn by the evening.


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## Drew

AMOS said:


> Has anyone else had strange weather patterns for the last few years? I live in S.E. New England and we've had more brutal wind storms than I can remember at any other point in my life (I'm 59) The occasional Hurricane we get are dismal compared to our Nor'Easters and other bad wind storms that seem to come out of nowhere. several people I know are convinced there's something funny going on, if these are natural cycles, then they are some pretty brutal cycles. I'm a Conservative that believes man is creating some of this mess, but it's not limited to that. I feel it's coinciding with other natural cycles. Sun, Planet etc.. but surely record high CO2 levels in the atmosphere for the last half decade or so must be doing something.
> 
> I'm looking for any input from your part of the country/world, and if things have been getting extreme, or even if things haven't changed at all.



While I suppose we can't technically rule out "sun and planet cycles" as a contributing factor, the explanation that requires the fewest angels dancing on the head of a pin is the strong correlation between atmospheric CO2 and average global temperatures, and the fact that higher temperatures mean temperature "volatility" is getting higher, which makes "extreme" weather a lot more likely. 

Fun visualization from NASA:

https://www.reddit.com/r/nextfuckinglevel/comments/tejc0l/the_clever_people_at_nasa_have_created_this/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf

Here in Boston, our winters have GENERALLY gotten milder even in the ~15 years I've lived here, with winter accumulation not sticking until later and later in the year (last couple years, we didn't have permanent snow on the ground until January) but with a number of blizzards setting all time snowfall records. Several years ago we hit a patch where a noreaster hit the city without fail every Sunday night into Monday in February, and, in a year where we had only gotten 1-2" of snow before the month, broke our annual snowfall record getting over 10' of snow, almost entirely in a span of 5 weeks. This past winter, we had either the second highest or highest one day snowfall total on record, with some cities reporting as much as 36" of snow in 24 hours - my neighborhood was comparatively spared but we even got just under two feet in a single day. 

And, yes, I've noticed more, and windier, windy days lately. And, tangentially related, our "king's tide" high tide days are higher than ever, and in a few instances we've had some waterfront flooding.

But suggesting we actually DO anything about it... that makes you a godless commie that hates America, right?


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## mbardu

There's not a lot of room for debate TBH.
Climate change is here, and largely human made.
Anecdotal weather is not climate, but when weather is changed systematically and everywhere, then it's pretty clear.

At this point sadly it looks like we're already past the point of no return if we're being realistic.

Most developing countries (with the biggest growing population) want modernization and couldn't care less about their climate impact per capita; while most "solutions" sold to developed countries (consumer responsibility, electric cars, solar etc) are mostly useless lies.

It's only getting worse and is going to need a miraculous technological revolution to get a shot at fixing the issue.
And I mean a _real _solution. Not one that is just about moving the problem somewhere else such as selling our carbon footprint to others or going to "poor" countries to mine tons of rare metals at a disgusting environmental cost.

We're pretty f*cked, but I guess at least the boomers get to enjoy their last few years of retirement and then peace out before it gets _too _bad.


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## StevenC

Bring back nuclear power!


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## AMOS

A professor is saying the solar magnetic activity will drop by 60 percent between 2030 and 2040, creating a mini ice age. I'm due to retire in 2033 and my days of land surveying will be over


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## wheresthefbomb

I have noticed milder winters and more/worse fires during the summer over my time living here. We get a lot more unusually warm days during winter which results in more frequent freezing rain conditions. That has always happened but it's much more frequent now. The stretches of extreme subzero temperatures are shorter and less severe. It's been ten years since I remember a solid stretch of -50°F in town, even -40° is less common these days.

We did have a record-setting cold winter a few years ago, but it was "just" colder on average. It didn't exhibit those extremes and didn't feel especially cold, but also living in a place like this warps your perception of what is "cold." 

Perhaps most strikingly, we have a proper Fall season now that we did not have before. It used to be more or less that the leaves would drop and then the snow would start falling and it would all be over in maybe a week or two tops. Now we have this extended season of leaves on the ground and cool weather with no snow or proper winter conditions.

One unexpectedly positive (for now) result of this is that our short, intense growing season is becoming longer.


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## Steinmetzify

I hear this a lot and think people take it the wrong way. It’s not ‘climate change’ it’s just climate.

If you subscribe to the theory of evolution, the Earth is over 4 billion years old. People talking about ‘it’s a lot hotter than it was when I was a kid’ even being 60 years old or whatever, that’s an attosecond in the Earth’s lifetime. This has gone on and on and on for billions of years, and will continue to do so.

On a smaller scale, the city of Denver is on a 7 year cycle. The rainiest summers it rains for about an hour a day between 2-4pm every day. Slows down the next year, smaller the year after and so on. 7 years after the first one the cycle starts all over again and pretty much always has the entire time I’ve been alive, at least (I’m 48 btw).

Committees and meetings and taxing people so we can ‘fix climate change’ is pretty arrogant thinking to me, especially considering there are always going to be people that don’t subscribe to this and won’t do anything to help anyway. China, Russia, India etc are never going to stop burning coal until it’s all gone, and that’s almost a 3rd of the world’s population.

Not ragging on people that are genuinely trying to help the environment in any way but trying to change a billions year old cycle seems rather futile to me.


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## wheresthefbomb

Steinmetzify said:


> I hear this a lot and think people take it the wrong way. It’s not ‘climate change’ it’s just climate.
> 
> If you subscribe to the theory of evolution, the Earth is over 4 billion years old. People talking about ‘it’s a lot hotter than it was when I was a kid’ even being 60 years old or whatever, that’s an attosecond in the Earth’s lifetime. This has gone on and on and on for billions of years, and will continue to do so.
> 
> On a smaller scale, the city of Denver is on a 7 year cycle. The rainiest summers it rains for about an hour a day between 2-4pm every day. Slows down the next year, smaller the year after and so on. 7 years after the first one the cycle starts all over again and pretty much always has the entire time I’ve been alive, at least (I’m 48 btw).
> 
> Committees and meetings and taxing people so we can ‘fix climate change’ is pretty arrogant thinking to me, especially considering there are always going to be people that don’t subscribe to this and won’t do anything to help anyway. China, Russia, India etc are never going to stop burning coal until it’s all gone, and that’s almost a 3rd of the world’s population.
> 
> Not ragging on people that are genuinely trying to help the environment in any way but trying to change a billions year old cycle seems rather futile to me.



I am not a scientist, but my very basic understanding is that while all of existence operates on cycles, the trends we are seeing now are unprecedented on the scale of global history and will have accordingly unprecedented results. I'm just some guy looking at the weather, but the people drawing scientific conclusions are looking at a much bigger picture than that.


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## Empryrean

Not sure if related to climate but I live in california where we now have a fire season that I don't remember existed like 10 years ago. Usually mid summer/ autumn I can expect the sky to be grey and shittier than usual with some days of ash lightly coating the sidewalk and cars. I think it's fair to say I might just be nostalgic about the past but a fire season is objectively quite shitty imo


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## odibrom

... I forgot to mention in my previous post that, THIS winter (South of Europe... which is still WINTER), I think I can count the rain days by the fingers of one hand. I used to do the opposite, count the sunny days with the fingers of one hand. Just as a reference, January and February had NO RAIN DAYS, and March's rainy days were kind of a joke... unfortunately...


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## Drew

Steinmetzify said:


> I hear this a lot and think people take it the wrong way. It’s not ‘climate change’ it’s just climate.
> 
> If you subscribe to the theory of evolution, the Earth is over 4 billion years old. People talking about ‘it’s a lot hotter than it was when I was a kid’ even being 60 years old or whatever, that’s an attosecond in the Earth’s lifetime. This has gone on and on and on for billions of years, and will continue to do so.
> 
> On a smaller scale, the city of Denver is on a 7 year cycle. The rainiest summers it rains for about an hour a day between 2-4pm every day. Slows down the next year, smaller the year after and so on. 7 years after the first one the cycle starts all over again and pretty much always has the entire time I’ve been alive, at least (I’m 48 btw).
> 
> Committees and meetings and taxing people so we can ‘fix climate change’ is pretty arrogant thinking to me, especially considering there are always going to be people that don’t subscribe to this and won’t do anything to help anyway. China, Russia, India etc are never going to stop burning coal until it’s all gone, and that’s almost a 3rd of the world’s population.
> 
> Not ragging on people that are genuinely trying to help the environment in any way but trying to change a billions year old cycle seems rather futile to me.


There are a couple things in this post that need to be unpacked.

1) If you subscribe to any part of the study of _geology_, the earth is more than 4 billion years old. We radiocarbon date rocks, not life forms. Life's been around a long fucking time too, but the planet was around at least a billion years earlier. I'm not sure why you're referencing evolution, unless maybe that's the one like 20% of the country doesn't believe in because of religion.

2) Denver may indeed be on a seven year cycle. That doesn't disprove that temperatures, worldwide, have risen measurably over the last 50 years. IT just adds another factor to overlay on top of that. 

3) Say you're right and Denver is on a seven year cycle. A non-human-caused, naturally occurring cycle that man has nothing to do with. Arguing that human-caused climate change based on someone's experience over 30-50 years is "too short to be meaningful," but then talking about natural multi-year climate cycles that occur over a fraction of that time is, well, hard to reconcile. Either the climate CAN change in a period of years, or it can't. And, based on no shortage of scientific data, the planet is warming. Significantly, and rapidly. 





4) You're not ragging on people who want to address climate change, you just think they're arrogant and you don't want to pay taxes. Gotcha.


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## Steinmetzify

Drew said:


> 4) You're not ragging on people who want to address climate change, you just think they're arrogant and you don't want to pay taxes. Gotcha.



Yes.


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## Adieu

Steinmetzify said:


> ...I’m 48 btw)....
> 
> ... futile to me.




Ah, an adept of the valiant school of "I plan to be dead before this becomes a major problem"

Got it


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## Steinmetzify

Adieu said:


> Ah, an adept of the valiant school of "I plan to be dead before this becomes a major problem"
> 
> Got it



It’s a first world problem. People are relaxed and comfortable and need to find things to worry about. 

You trying to tell me that if we were all alive 70,000 years ago there would have been giant meetings and committees to talk about how cold it was getting and that we needed to fix it? Going to build more fires or something?

It’s a simplistic view of an invented problem, and despite the fact that people like you like to rag on people like me, nothing that you can do is going to change anything, nor will anyone else. People do the bare minimum and call it good. Posting things on a Facebook wall doesn’t fix anything, sharing something on IG doesn’t fix anything, and demeaning someone because they don’t happen to agree with you has never fixed anything either. 

Nobody is going to give up cars or cell phones or fast food or god forbid guitars; until all of those things happen, people are just talking because it’s the latest buzzword crap.


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## jaxadam

Steinmetzify said:


> It’s a first world problem. People are relaxed and comfortable and need to find things to worry about.
> 
> You trying to tell me that if we were all alive 70,000 years ago there would have been giant meetings and committees to talk about how cold it was getting and that we needed to fix it? Going to build more fires or something?
> 
> It’s a simplistic view of an invented problem, and despite the fact that people like you like to rag on people like me, nothing that you can do is going to change anything, nor will anyone else. People do the bare minimum and call it good. Posting things on a Facebook wall doesn’t fix anything, sharing something on IG doesn’t fix anything, and demeaning someone because they don’t happen to agree with you has never fixed anything either.
> 
> Nobody is going to give up cars or cell phones or fast food or god forbid guitars; until all of those things happen, people are just talking because it’s the latest buzzword crap.



We'll just get to the next geologic ice age a little faster, but I'm not sure what we're gonna do once we get there. Good thing is it will last a few million years, so we'll have plenty of time to think about it!


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## StevenC

Steinmetzify said:


> It’s a first world problem. People are relaxed and comfortable and need to find things to worry about.
> 
> You trying to tell me that if we were all alive 70,000 years ago there would have been giant meetings and committees to talk about how cold it was getting and that we needed to fix it? Going to build more fires or something?


You're really missing what this conversation is about. The issue isn't climate change, the issue is human influenced climate change.


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## AMOS

There were record high's in the 1800's, but I'm sure the weird weather patterns and high CO2 levels didn't exist back then. I've read many articles where scientists agree the planet and sun have cycles, but what they're also saying is the high CO2 content in the atmosphere makes these cycles much worse. We're going to have cooling periods where the heat isn't there, but the strange weather will continue to get worse.


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## littlebadboy

I'm a science teacher. I am doing my part by promoting to my students the importance of lessening their carbon footprint when their time comes.

The recent leap of technology developments coincides with all the graph spikes of everything that's not good. Our planet is dependent on the balance of our water cycles and there is a disruption of it going on. Everything in this world is balanced but we humans are causing the disruptions. 

My family switched to solar panels and working on transitioning as much appliances as we can to electric instead of gas.

Yep, let's be responsible Earth citizens for the sake of our children, and their childrens' children. Please.


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## jaxadam

littlebadboy said:


> I'm a science teacher. I am doing my part by promoting to my students the importance of lessening their carbon footprint when their time comes.
> 
> The recent leap of technology developments coincides with all the graph spikes of everything that's not good. Our planet is dependent on the balance of our water cycles and there is a disruption of it going on. Everything in this world is balanced but we humans are causing the disruptions.
> 
> My family switched to solar panels and working on transitioning as much appliances as we can to electric instead of gas.
> 
> Yep, let's be responsible Earth citizens for the sake of our children, and their childrens' children. Please.



Quite a few of the houses in our neighborhood have photovoltaic systems. Ours unfortunately by the way it sits will not work. I’d say a ton of my neighbors have Teslas, and there is a rapid charging facility right up the road that I see quite a few at at any given time. 

Florida (mainly Florida Power and Light) has swaths of fields dedicated to solar farms, which I found fascinating and fantastic. For all this state gets wrong, it does get some stuff right. Don’t fuck with the St. Johns Water Management District.

I have a buddy who is an energy trader, and we’ve had discussions about going green. He seems to think that it will really make a lot of things worse in pricing, consumption, and reliability which will inevitable just affect a bottom dollar, and we all know that’s really the most important thing.


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## AMOS

If I go solar I have to remove too many trees, robbing Peter to pay Paul?


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## profwoot

littlebadboy said:


> I'm a science teacher. I am doing my part by promoting to my students the importance of lessening their carbon footprint when their time comes.
> 
> The recent leap of technology developments coincides with all the graph spikes of everything that's not good. Our planet is dependent on the balance of our water cycles and there is a disruption of it going on. Everything in this world is balanced but we humans are causing the disruptions.
> 
> My family switched to solar panels and working on transitioning as much appliances as we can to electric instead of gas.
> 
> Yep, let's be responsible Earth citizens for the sake of our children, and their childrens' children. Please.


I appreciate your efforts, but you should also be aware that the idea of a "carbon footprint" was invented by an oil company in an effort to shift blame onto ordinary people instead of the corporations responsible for the vast majority of the problem. It's quite similar to how the 1% work hard to keep the culture war going to prevent the much-needed class war.


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## mbardu

profwoot said:


> I appreciate your efforts, but you should also be aware that the idea of a "carbon footprint" was invented by an oil company in an effort to shift blame onto ordinary people instead of the corporations responsible for the vast majority of the problem. It's quite similar to how the 1% work hard to keep the culture war going to prevent the much-needed class war.



Also, if you are "transitioning" to new appliances for virtuous purposes, be very careful about what you pick.
Many times existing stuff that may not be _quite _optimal energy-wise is still way better than throwing away and buying brand new stuff that will actually have a worse lifetime impact (manufacturing footprint included) as the existing stuff. New EVs and things like lightbulbs are good examples of that.
Sadly a lot of that has now been coopted and greenwashed to offer yet another profit motive; yet another incentive to buy new stuff and feed into the need for more and more growth in the same economic system that caused this mess in the first place... Just that now it's also cynically branded and promoted under the guise of supposedly "green" industries.

The only real answer is to just consume less and also penalize industry owners rather than just the consumers...but we all know that's not going to happen.


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## littlebadboy

At this point, I really would like to make an effort by doing something I think is good, rather than doing nothing but blame "the man".



AMOS said:


> If I go solar I have to remove too many trees, robbing Peter to pay Paul?



In our case, we only had to cut a few branches to clear the roof.


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## Drew

Steinmetzify said:


> It’s a first world problem. People are relaxed and comfortable and need to find things to worry about.
> 
> You trying to tell me that if we were all alive 70,000 years ago there would have been giant meetings and committees to talk about how cold it was getting and that we needed to fix it? Going to build more fires or something?


It's not even the taxes, it's the collectivism, isn't it? This is twice now you've mentioned "meetings and committees." American rugged individualism, every man for himself, zero interest in working together and making small sacrifices for the greater good...? Why should YOU have to worry about something that probably won't impact you? Utah won't flood until the sea levels rise a couple thousand feet, so what's the big deal?

Climate change is absolutely a third world problem. In the US, coastal property owners are going to have some problems, and cities built on the coast are going to have to engage in some pretty major infrastructure projects (New Orleans is at the forefront, but New York and my Boston are probably not far behind). The difference, of course, is for the most part we can afford to address the consequences. The third world can't. 



https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/11/01/marshall-islands-sea-levels-cop26-tina-stege/










Climate Change and the Sinking Island States in the Pacific


Small island nations are exposed to multi-dimensional climate crises such as ocean level rise, flooding, coastal erosion, inundation of agricultural lands, drying up of drinking water and sea acidification, which endangers fish life and stock.




www.e-ir.info


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## bostjan

This is a huge topic. But I'd just say simply read some unbiased texts about it.

Solar cycles are actually quite predictable, and, actually, near a nadir rather than a zenith. Earth's natural cycle of climate is less predictable, and maybe it's far more open to interpretation as well, but that is also generally expected to be heading into a colder spell rather than a warm spell.

The greenhouse effect is not just real, but it ought to make intuitive sense. You put more insulating gas into the atmosphere, the warmer the Earth becomes. Furthermore, simply doing the basic science and mathematics yields some pretty profound results. People burn 100 million barrels of oil per day. One barrel of oil equals 6 billion joules of energy, and all of that energy ultimately ends up as heat, whether it's useful as something else on its way there or not. But that's 220 pentillion joules (220 EJ) of energy a year. The mass of the Earth's atmosphere is 5 Eg, and the heat capacity is (maxmum) 700 J/kg (of air at STP, it'll be much less at higher elevation, but that just makes this estimate bigger). 220 EJ x 5 Eg / 700 J/kg°C ~ 0.1°C/year. 

So there you go, just from the heat that escapes from burning fossil fuels at the rate we burn fossil fuels, we ought to expect a measurable trend in the increase of temperature of the atmosphere. Not sure how anyone can refute that mathematics except to somehow argue that the heat is escaping somewhere, but then I'd be interested to know where those people think that the heat goes.


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## StevenC

It is also important to remember that the greenhouse effect is a vitally important part of human existence and we wouldn't be here without it. But crucially it is a very finely balanced effect, much like how there is a range of habitable distance from the sun.


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## jaxadam

StevenC said:


> much like how there is a range of habitable distance from the sun.



Yep, roughly 1 AU!


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## AMOS

Drew said:


> It's not even the taxes, it's the collectivism, isn't it? This is twice now you've mentioned "meetings and committees." American rugged individualism, every man for himself, zero interest in working together and making small sacrifices for the greater good...? Why should YOU have to worry about something that probably won't impact you? Utah won't flood until the sea levels rise a couple thousand feet, so what's the big deal?
> 
> Climate change is absolutely a third world problem. In the US, coastal property owners are going to have some problems, and cities built on the coast are going to have to engage in some pretty major infrastructure projects (New Orleans is at the forefront, but New York and my Boston are probably not far behind). The difference, of course, is for the most part we can afford to address the consequences. The third world can't.
> 
> 
> 
> https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/11/01/marshall-islands-sea-levels-cop26-tina-stege/
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Climate Change and the Sinking Island States in the Pacific
> 
> 
> Small island nations are exposed to multi-dimensional climate crises such as ocean level rise, flooding, coastal erosion, inundation of agricultural lands, drying up of drinking water and sea acidification, which endangers fish life and stock.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.e-ir.info


Maybe after several more decades we'll see higher oceans to the point where it's an issue in Louisiana and maybe Houston. Gore's book went way overboard "there will be fish swimming in the streets of Long Island by 2013" and 2016 was the point of no return date. The ocean has risen globally 3.4 MM per year since 1993, so that's about 1 inch per 7.5 years at the current rate. Start planning Boston  I'm a land surveyor down here on the Cape, this will bring me more sea wall work eventually.


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## odibrom

bostjan said:


> This is a huge topic. But I'd just say simply read some unbiased texts about it.
> 
> Solar cycles are actually quite predictable, and, actually, near a nadir rather than a zenith. Earth's natural cycle of climate is less predictable, and maybe it's far more open to interpretation as well, but that is also generally expected to be heading into a colder spell rather than a warm spell.
> 
> The greenhouse effect is not just real, but it ought to make intuitive sense. You put more insulating gas into the atmosphere, the warmer the Earth becomes. Furthermore, simply doing the basic science and mathematics yields some pretty profound results. People burn 100 million barrels of oil per day. One barrel of oil equals 6 billion joules of energy, and all of that energy ultimately ends up as heat, whether it's useful as something else on its way there or not. But that's 220 pentillion joules (220 EJ) of energy a year. The mass of the Earth's atmosphere is 5 Eg, and the heat capacity is (maxmum) 700 J/kg (of air at STP, it'll be much less at higher elevation, but that just makes this estimate bigger). 220 EJ x 5 Eg / 700 J/kg°C ~ 0.1°C/year.
> 
> So there you go, just from the heat that escapes from burning fossil fuels at the rate we burn fossil fuels, we ought to expect a measurable trend in the increase of temperature of the atmosphere. Not sure how anyone can refute that mathematics except to somehow argue that the heat is escaping somewhere, but then I'd be interested to know where those people think that the heat goes.


Someone should explore the link between climate change deniers and flat earthers... I bet they're most likely the same people..


----------



## jaxadam

odibrom said:


> Someone should explore the link between climate change deniers and flat earthers... I bet they're most likely the same people..



Can’t have climate with a flat earth, that shit’ll just blow right off the edge!


----------



## Drew

AMOS said:


> Maybe after several more decades we'll see higher oceans to the point where it's an issue in Louisiana and maybe Houston. Gore's book went way overboard "there will be fish swimming in the streets of Long Island by 2013" and 2016 was the point of no return date. The ocean has risen globally 3.4 MM per year since 1993, so that's about 1 inch per 7.5 years at the current rate. Start planning Boston  I'm a land surveyor down here on the Cape, this will bring me more sea wall work eventually.


Silver linings, right?

But, I think it's worth keeping in mind that climate science is_ fiendishly_ complex, and while there's a lot of disagreement in... how to say this... the models may disagree in expected values on a given date, and there may be a wide range of estimates out there.... but they all agree in _direction_. No model is saying global ocean levels are going to fall. No model is saying the planet will be cooler in 2100 than it is today. There may be a lot of disagreement on if current CO2 emission levels continue, we're going to warm 1.8 degrees C, 2.1 degrees C, or 3.5 degrees C.... but that's the kind of disagreement you can have estimating the magnitude of the impact in a field where our understandings are rapidly evolving. We may disagree on magnitude but no one who actually studies this stuff in enough detail to have an informed opinion disagrees that human CO2 emissions _are_ impacting global temperatures and pushing them up, with potentially disastrous consequences.


----------



## eaeolian

Steinmetzify said:


> Not ragging on people that are genuinely trying to help the environment in any way but trying to change a billions year old cycle seems rather futile to me.



We already have. Both evolution and climate, at scale. We've been altering the composition of forests for thousands of years. We've changed the evolution of plants and animals to suit our needs, and we've definitely changed atmospheric CO2 levels. We've destroyed multiple species with deforestation and pollution, and changed million-year-old lifecycles in the ocean by overfishing. We didn't understand that we were doing it at the time, and some of it might be unrecoverable, but attempting to shore up own own damage is at least a start. We may be a blip in the geologic timeline, but that blip is pretty important to us as a species.


----------



## eaeolian

Steinmetzify said:


> Yes.


Well, at least you're honest about it.


----------



## eaeolian

AMOS said:


> There were record high's in the 1800's, but I'm sure the weird weather patterns and high CO2 levels didn't exist back then. I've read many articles where scientists agree the planet and sun have cycles, but what they're also saying is the high CO2 content in the atmosphere makes these cycles much worse. We're going to have cooling periods where the heat isn't there, but the strange weather will continue to get worse.



Yes, the planet and the sun have cycles. The rate of climate change currently occurring is unprecedented when compared to those historical cycles. Apples != Oranges.

I'm going to print it out big and obvious for you:

NO SERIOUS CLIMATE SCIENTIST DENIES THAT GLOBAL TEMPERATURES ARE RISING, AND THAT HUMANS ARE TO BLAME FOR IT.

There's no room for debate about it. The only question is how fast the changes will happen.

As for it being a first world problem:





__





Al Gore's movie 'An Inconvenient Truth' says sea levels could rise up to 20 feet. Is this true? - Scienceline


Asks Steve from Florida




scienceline.org





“An enormous number of people live within one meter of sea level. It is something like 145 million people,” says glacier expert Harper. “Most of these are in third world Asia where they have few resources to adapt to change. Even in the US, the costs will be enormous,” he adds.

So, no, it isn't a first-world problem. It's a real-world problem.


----------



## CovertSovietBear

Steinmetzify said:


> It’s a first world problem. People are relaxed and comfortable and need to find things to worry about.
> 
> You trying to tell me that if we were all alive 70,000 years ago there would have been giant meetings and committees to talk about how cold it was getting and that we needed to fix it? Going to build more fires or something?



Not sure how ancient hominids would even have that capability nor have that problem. The amount of humans back then is dwarfed by the massive amount of humans alive today and therefor don't have equal impact.

The only thing manufactured is lack of wanting to care about what we've seen from satellite, oceanic and atmospheric data.
The nerds doing the heavy science lifting sure don't care about much except reliable data which can be recapitulated.

Your logic more/less aligns with this guy: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/26/senate-james-inhofe-snowball-climate-change
"Oh hey it's cold outside, climate change isn't real" lol okie dokie


----------



## Xaios

Quick aside just to talk about the weather, there have definitely been marked changes in temperature and precipitation in the 18 years I've lived here. This place used to be classified as semi-arid, but that will change if the precipitation we've been experiencing for the last 3 years keeps up. The last two winters have set new historical records for snowpack in the region, and the one before (2019/2020) is also in the top-10. Last year's melt resulted in the worst flooding we've ever seen in the region, and this years is anticipated to be possibly even worse. We're also not just seeing more snow in the winter, but more rain in the summer as well. Summer 2020 was especially heinous, we couldn't string more than 2 days in a row of sunshine until December in what is normally a pretty sunny place.

This isn't anecdotal either. I do tech support for a solar PV system installer, and one of my winter projects is aggregating our customers' production data over the previous year and comparing it to both original modeling as well as historical data, and the data is clear as day: virtually all of our customers in the local region generated around 10-20% less from their PV systems in 2020 and 2021 than they did in years prior.


----------



## CovertSovietBear

Xaios said:


> Quick aside just to talk about the weather, there have definitely been marked changes in temperature and precipitation in the 18 years I've lived here. This place used to be classified as semi-arid, but that will change if the precipitation we've been experiencing for the last 3 years keeps up. The last two winters have set new historical records for snowpack in the region, and the one before (2019/2020) is also in the top-10. Last year's melt resulted in the worst flooding we've ever seen in the region, and this years is anticipated to be possibly even worse. We're also not just seeing more snow in the winter, but more rain in the summer as well. Summer 2020 was especially heinous, we couldn't string more than 2 days in a row of sunshine until December in what is normally a pretty sunny place.
> 
> This isn't anecdotal either. I do tech support for a solar PV system installer, and one of my winter projects is aggregating our customers' production data over the previous year and comparing it to both original modeling as well as historical data, and the data is clear as day: virtually all of our customers in the local region generated around 10-20% less from their PV systems in 2020 and 2021 than they did in years prior.


The data don't lie but people do


----------



## Xaios

CovertSovietBear said:


> The data don't lie but people do


Not really part of the equation in this case. They're not self-reporting, I'm pulling the information directly from their hardware.


----------



## Steinmetzify

Drew said:


> It's not even the taxes, it's the collectivism, isn't it? This is twice now you've mentioned "meetings and committees." American rugged individualism, every man for himself, zero interest in working together and making small sacrifices for the greater good...? Why should YOU have to worry about something that probably won't impact you? Utah won't flood until the sea levels rise a couple thousand feet, so what's the big deal?
> 
> Climate change is absolutely a third world problem. In the US, coastal property owners are going to have some problems, and cities built on the coast are going to have to engage in some pretty major infrastructure projects (New Orleans is at the forefront, but New York and my Boston are probably not far behind). The difference, of course, is for the most part we can afford to address the consequences. The third world can't.
> 
> 
> 
> https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/11/01/marshall-islands-sea-levels-cop26-tina-stege/
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Climate Change and the Sinking Island States in the Pacific
> 
> 
> Small island nations are exposed to multi-dimensional climate crises such as ocean level rise, flooding, coastal erosion, inundation of agricultural lands, drying up of drinking water and sea acidification, which endangers fish life and stock.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.e-ir.info



Bro ok. You and me have always been cool and I’ll do this one more time in the spirit of that.

I don’t have a single problem with humans collectively banding together to assimilate a problem. No one in my life could ever say that. They’ve been there and done and seen me do shit.

My problem stems from Congress or the Senate proclaiming problems and demanding that we deal with them from their mount.

Fuck that. It’s not their proclamation or their deal to tell US what we need to deal with, they’re supposed to be representatives of the fuckin PEOPLE, we should tell THEM wtf they need to be handling.

The part that I get irritated with is not what you and I and @CanserDYI are going to DO, it’s the fact that the people sitting in gilded mansions are screaming at us based on what their constituents are demanding they do.

I will simply not be told that I need to ‘band up and fix/handle’ whatever the random ‘elected politicians’ fix whatever they say we need to do in order to fix the infected problem of the day.

Is it a real thing? Of course. Yeah but Gore was talking about how there weren’t going to be any fucking trees by 2008. Wrong and proved wrong by simple existence of trees. This is a man that had political assistance and scientific backing in 2001. Moron.

This is not real science, this is a fucking scare tactic. You know this, you’re an intelligent man. The fact that they’re saying ‘THIS’ doesn’t mean that it’s going to be valid inside of 10 years, and you KNOW this and have seen this happen JUST ON THIS FORUM, aside from everything you’ve seen happen in the outside world.

Today, maybe. Tomorrow? Just no. It won’t happen, it can’t happen and you know it.

Please calm down and get with me here.

Is ‘whatever term’ a real thing? Sure. Is there really anything you or I can do about it compared to mega corporations stopping production and handling the problems? Not really. Can we try? Sure. Is it GOING TO BE EFFECTIVE? Dunno.

Willing to try like I always have.

Don’t think mega committees TALKING WITHOUT ACCOMPLISHING ANYTHING are going to do any better than you and I in a room with a solid plan, but hey….any other option?

Nah

I really don’t like being in contention on what I consider my home forum, but fuck it. I am not a liberal/democrat, I won’t pretend to be for a guitar’s sake and I won’t bow down to anyone’s opinion just because it’s a different one from mine.

@Drew you and I have always been cool, political opinions aside. I hope this says something about me and my opinions and that we’re still cool after you read this.

If not hey. bounce me and I’ll go elsewhere, it’s just a guitar forum.


----------



## narad

Steinmetzify said:


> I hear this a lot and think people take it the wrong way. It’s not ‘climate change’ it’s just climate.
> 
> If you subscribe to the theory of evolution, the Earth is over 4 billion years old. *People talking about ‘it’s a lot hotter than it was when I was a kid’ even being 60 years old or whatever, that’s an attosecond in the Earth’s lifetime.* This has gone on and on and on for billions of years, and will continue to do so.
> 
> On a smaller scale, the city of Denver is on a 7 year cycle. The rainiest summers it rains for about an hour a day between 2-4pm every day. Slows down the next year, smaller the year after and so on. 7 years after the first one the cycle starts all over again and pretty much always has the entire time I’ve been alive, at least (I’m 48 btw).
> 
> Committees and meetings and taxing people so we can ‘fix climate change’ is pretty arrogant thinking to me, especially considering there are always going to be people that don’t subscribe to this and won’t do anything to help anyway. China, Russia, India etc are never going to stop burning coal until it’s all gone, and that’s almost a 3rd of the world’s population.
> 
> Not ragging on people that are genuinely trying to help the environment in any way but trying to change a billions year old cycle seems rather futile to me.



You're so close! That is like an attosecond. And yet in that attosecond...


----------



## thraxil

narad said:


> You're so close! That is like an attosecond. And yet in that attosecond...


In fairness (and it's annoying because I'm on your side), that graph is pretty deceptive with the left-axis scaling not starting at zero. An increase from 280 to 420 ppm is definitely significant and scary, but it feels manipulative when it's shown that way.


----------



## zappatton2

Let's agree that when we discuss climate change, we exclude references to Al Gore, celebrities or self-serving politicians. None of these people are climate scientists, and even when their message that this is a real and serious issue is entirely on point, they can't exactly be relied upon when looking at the specifics.

Personally, I think too much tends to get offloaded on the individual, when addressing the issue requires broader systemic change. In how we plan cities, our economy, how we invest in new technology, etc., and these do depend on political will, but politicians should be listening to expertise in those fields, and should be taking the advise of legitimate scientific institutions, rather than plugging policy that disproportionately targets the working class, while larger greenhouse gas emitters continue with "business as usual". This just sours the common worker and the political will to take real steps to address the issue.

It's like taxes; the US working class often faces a higher tax burden than many nations considered "socialist" by the American public, and gets dramatically less in return, while the wealthy and corporate oligopolies have successfully offloaded their own tax burdens through persistent lobbying. As such, the average Joe American has become convinced that taxation itself is punitive, rather than a means of actually uplifting the working class through public investments in education and a social safety net. Change needs to come from the top-down for a measured effect, IMO.


----------



## narad

thraxil said:


> In fairness (and it's annoying because I'm on your side), that graph is pretty deceptive with the left-axis scaling not starting at zero. An increase from 280 to 420 ppm is definitely significant and scary, but it feels manipulative when it's shown that way.


Sure, one should be aware of the axis, but I don't think it weakens the point.


----------



## profwoot

Srsly is it like 2010 again when every discussion about climate change turned into attacking/defending Al Fucking Gore? Regardless of what he did or didn't say, the climate reality so far has generally been worse than consensus climate projections, presumably because the braindead mob has been so successful instilling a fear of being alarmist within the scientific community. Well, that and even the most complex models can't account for every little feedback loop in the system.

Humans are skull fucking the climate for ourselves and other life on the planet right now, and the majority of Americans care about that and want to knock it off (at least in principle). Denying it's even happening at this point is pure selfishness; wanting it to continue so future generations are even more fucked is even more selfish.

Anyone who thinks climate change isn't real, isn't caused by humans, or isn't a massive fucking problem has put their trust in propagandists. You are being used to provide cover for and further enrich the 1%. Reevaluate your sources.


----------



## mbardu

Steinmetzify said:


> Bro ok. You and me have always been cool and I’ll do this one more time in the spirit of that.
> 
> I don’t have a single problem with humans collectively banding together to assimilate a problem. No one in my life could ever say that. They’ve been there and done and seen me do shit.
> 
> My problem stems from Congress or the Senate proclaiming problems and demanding that we deal with them from their mount.
> 
> Fuck that. It’s not their proclamation or their deal to tell US what we need to deal with, they’re supposed to be representatives of the fuckin PEOPLE, we should tell THEM wtf they need to be handling.
> 
> The part that I get irritated with is not what you and I and @CanserDYI are going to DO, it’s the fact that the people sitting in gilded mansions are screaming at us based on what their constituents are demanding they do.
> 
> I will simply not be told that I need to ‘band up and fix/handle’ whatever the random ‘elected politicians’ fix whatever they say we need to do in order to fix the infected problem of the day.
> 
> Is it a real thing? Of course. Yeah but Gore was talking about how there weren’t going to be any fucking trees by 2008. Wrong and proved wrong by simple existence of trees. This is a man that had political assistance and scientific backing in 2001. Moron.
> 
> This is not real science, this is a fucking scare tactic. You know this, you’re an intelligent man. The fact that they’re saying ‘THIS’ doesn’t mean that it’s going to be valid inside of 10 years, and you KNOW this and have seen this happen JUST ON THIS FORUM, aside from everything you’ve seen happen in the outside world.
> 
> Today, maybe. Tomorrow? Just no. It won’t happen, it can’t happen and you know it.
> 
> Please calm down and get with me here.
> 
> Is ‘whatever term’ a real thing? Sure. Is there really anything you or I can do about it compared to mega corporations stopping production and handling the problems? Not really. Can we try? Sure. Is it GOING TO BE EFFECTIVE? Dunno.
> 
> Willing to try like I always have.
> 
> Don’t think mega committees TALKING WITHOUT ACCOMPLISHING ANYTHING are going to do any better than you and I in a room with a solid plan, but hey….any other option?
> 
> Nah
> 
> I really don’t like being in contention on what I consider my home forum, but fuck it. I am not a liberal/democrat, I won’t pretend to be for a guitar’s sake and I won’t bow down to anyone’s opinion just because it’s a different one from mine.
> 
> @Drew you and I have always been cool, political opinions aside. I hope this says something about me and my opinions and that we’re still cool after you read this.
> 
> If not hey. bounce me and I’ll go elsewhere, it’s just a guitar forum.



Scare tactics are on both sides of the aisle sadly.
If we trusted what the right says Obamacare would have killed all grandmas and we'd all be living in gay-conversion gulags by now and yet here we are.

Climate change is not made up by politicians though. It's not cherrypicked narratives from some crooks in order to fit a point. It's definite evidence agreed upon by every scientist on the topic. It's both anecdotal observations that have become generalized and systematic analysis worldwide.

But worse yet- you seem to believe that congress is making that stuff up for nefarious reasons....but for what? Has fighting climate change as an emergency entrenched on your liberties somehow?
Has it enriched some leftist congressman that you dislike?
The US does basically _nothing _and spends basically _nothing _on fighting climate change!
If you are concerned about lies and manipulations and political scams that Washington comes up with to take away what should rightfully belong to the people, you should be angry against the military industrial complex or the state of the health industry in this country (among other things).
Against climate change, we've had maybe a couple of token gestures here or there? _Maybe _we've seen a couple of things that were quickly coopted for profit? But actual substance, the grand total of effort we put in fighting climate change is basically 0.

Also- what does "screaming at us based on what their constituents are demanding they do" even mean? It should precisely be the job of politicians to do what the constituents are demanding. It would be awesome if they did their job. But they don't. They do what FOX and their rich donors demand they do. So we end up with no healthcare and every tax $ spent on oil subsidies or the F-35 program.

If your problem is just not liking being told what to do, then maybe check the actual data for yourself to see the track that we are currently on? This way it won't come from the mouth of the democrats that you dislike?
Then you can decide for yourself that we should do something about it.
Or maybe not, you can decide that you don't care because it won't impact you that much right away, or future generations can suffer and it's not your problem. It's the boomer attitude after all, you're not alone. But if so, then you're not going to get the moral high ground in that debate.


----------



## bostjan

Steinmetzify said:


> Nah



The truth is that we cannot accurately predict the future, but we can predict to the best of our abilities.

Even when the talking head personalities were saying 10 meters of sea level rise and shooting disaster movies to try to guilt everyone were exaggerating hyperbole for public consumption for the sake of shocking everyone, there still were actual scientific studies trying to do a good job predicting where the climate was going, and I don't think that those were too inaccurate.

So, rather than point at Al Gore and try to say "he's dumb, therefore, climate science is fake," maybe try to take the points that qualified people are making and scrutinize those. Otherwise, we won't be able to trust any science, since politicians are notoriously awful at doing science or even paraphrasing it.

As far as the government is concerned, it's sticky. As I said, politicians are terrible at getting science right. I'd go so far as to say that they generally have a difficult time even understanding how facts work. But, since climate change has the potential to greatly affect us all, we cannot expect laissez-faire environmental protection by big businesses and people in general to produce results. I guess one way to look at it is that there is no reason to expect this to get any better ever, since people just have in their very nature to refuse to make cooperative sacrifices, and maybe that would be a frighteningly valid point.

Or maybe disease or nuclear war will take us all out before climate change has a chance to become our primary worry.

But thanks for your perspective in this, it's much needed to re-evaluate our own positions on a daily basis through challenging them.


----------



## mbardu

narad said:


> Sure, one should be aware of the axis, but I don't think it weakens the point.



It doesn't strengthen the point either. It doesn't have to anyway, the data is pretty clear as it is.
But what it does do is give ammo to people who say that one side is being biased and extremist.


----------



## AMOS

My question is, when are China and India going to be held accountable? people gave Trump crap for pulling out of the Paris Climate Accords, which equaled nothing as the damage had already been done by that point. Masks were mandatory in Chinese cities for at least the last decade because the air simply isn't healthy. My point is every time someone complains about Climate Change they seem to exclude China, right now they're the main culprit.


----------



## mbardu

AMOS said:


> My question is, when are China and India going to be held accountable? people gave Trump crap for pulling out of the Paris Climate Accords, which equaled nothing as the damage had already been done by that point. Masks were mandatory in Chinese cities for at least the last decade because the air simply isn't healthy. My point is every time someone complains about Climate Change they seem to exclude China, right now they're the main culprit.



Per capita, China and India are doing way better than most "western" countries. Same for all developing countries by the way.
Plus if all those countries were to stop in their tracks _today_, the effect on lifestyle in "western" countries would also be more than what most people would be OK with.

No cheap crap to buy at the dollar store, no carbon offset to hide our emissions, no shipping waste elsewhere so that it's out of sight, no degenerate mining for the fancy EVs.
Why are Chinese coal plants running their factories 24/7? None of that is on China or India, it's very much the American way of life that's driving it.
We just exported the pollution, that's all.

Edit: and don't get me wrong, I'd be all for it. Less consumption, locally, less immediate gratification and short term profits, more durability and long term thinking. Stop a lot of that nonsense.
But when you see some people dig their heels in at even the bare hypothetical notion of the idea of maybe making an effort at some point....the outrage that maybe they would have to be _told _what to do (the horror...)....
Do we realistically expect people to give up their comfort and their SUVs and their new phone and new Chinese toy every day?


----------



## tedtan

bostjan said:


> I'd go so far as to say that they generally have a difficult time even understanding how facts work.


I’m not sure that politicians don’t understand how facts work. I think it’s worse - they don’t care about facts.

Ideally, these people are elected by the people to represent us, but in practice, we have a system wherein the job of a politician is to get elected, and in order to accomplish that, they need to tell enough people what they want to hear to get their vote. This leads to politicians pandering to groups of people just to get their vote with no concern for what those people actually think or want. And it happens on both sides of the aisle.

In short, politicians are lying sacks of shit whose job it is to get (re)elected. And if they’re not corrupt going into the job, they’re either soon corrupted once they take office or they move on from the job post haste - politics is no place a “real” person can survive long.


----------



## tedtan

mbardu said:


> Per capita, China and India are doing way better than most "western" countries.


But per capita, those two countries alone have 1) almost 1/3 of the world’s overall population, and 2) populations that live very far below western standards, to the point that food and clean water are not always available. So by dint of the fact of their massive population size, the per capita results are greatly skewed.


----------



## Gabriel 1313

AMOS said:


> Has anyone else had strange weather patterns for the last few years? I live in S.E. New England and we've had more brutal wind storms than I can remember at any other point in my life (I'm 59) The occasional Hurricane we get are dismal compared to our Nor'Easters and other bad wind storms that seem to come out of nowhere. several people I know are convinced there's something funny going on, if these are natural cycles, then they are some pretty brutal cycles. I'm a Conservative that believes man is creating some of this mess, but it's not limited to that. I feel it's coinciding with other natural cycles. Sun, Planet etc.. but surely record high CO2 levels in the atmosphere for the last half decade or so must be doing something.
> 
> 
> Here in Montana, our winters have been dissapearing the last several years. I actually got a little sun-burnt yesterday. we usally have a bbig dump of snow in March, not this year.
> I'm looking for any input from your part of the country/world, and if things have been getting extreme, or even if things haven't changed at all.



I tell people on social media, if you don't believe in climate change, it's very apparent in Montana, where we have a point of reference to compare to. the Earth is getting hotter, Montana is getting hotter every year. we broke recorded heat records last summer. I'm finding that the people who bought into the Covid bullshit, also don't believe in climate change. it is this mentallity that will destroy any hope for change. critical thinking is a must. the facts are right in front of us, people need to wake up and start believing in something other than themselves.


----------



## mbardu

tedtan said:


> But per capita, those two countries alone have 1) almost 1/3 of the world’s overall population, and 2) populations that live very far below western standards, to the point that food and clean water are not always available.



Well actually on a per capita basis, their contribution to the world population is the same as ours.
Approximately 1 person per person 

In all seriousness though, the point remains. Their countries would not be polluting nearly as much if it were not for 1-Western demand for cheap crap and 2-Appeal of getting to the same unreasonable western standard of living


----------



## tedtan

I agree, the western lifestyle is the real issue.


----------



## Drew

Steinmetzify said:


> @Drew you and I have always been cool, political opinions aside. I hope this says something about me and my opinions and that we’re still cool after you read this.
> 
> If not hey. bounce me and I’ll go elsewhere, it’s just a guitar forum.


Honestly, I appreciate your taking the time to write this.  

And GOD KNOWS I often share your frustration with the political process.  

But I also think broken clocks can still be right on occasion, and at gunpoint I can point to things I think fuckin' _Donald Trump_ got right.  I think climate change may be one of those examples. The scientific evidence is clear and incontrovertible. There's growing political will to tackle the problem, not just on the left but - and while you'll never get anyone in Washington to admit this - on the right, where the more rural composition of the GOP means a lot of Republicans voters are a bit more exposed to effects than urban liberals, and I think we've now reached majority support within GOP voters that climate change is a problem that needs to be addressed. 

Yeah, I find the committee process frustrating sometimes too... but this country was basically founded by committee, our laws were written by committee, and while at times trying to get anything done feels downright Sisyphean, it CAN happen and we're closing on what I would consider critical mass to get something done.


----------



## Drew

AMOS said:


> My question is, when are China and India going to be held accountable? people gave Trump crap for pulling out of the Paris Climate Accords, which equaled nothing as the damage had already been done by that point. Masks were mandatory in Chinese cities for at least the last decade because the air simply isn't healthy. My point is every time someone complains about Climate Change they seem to exclude China, right now they're the main culprit.


This is a big question, honestly. And, we may be too late. 

But, maybe 10-12 years ago I spent a couple months in India for work, and I left the States being very concerned about climate change, but thinking it was our obligation to address the problem since while India and China were (at the tiime) as large if not slightly larger total emitters, we emitted much more per capita.

My time in India horrified me. The cities I was in were so smog-covered, the only time I got a sunburn was when on a weekend afternoon I got out hiking in the Deccan Traps. I think it's very easy in the US to underestimate the magnitude of the problem overseas. 

But, honestly, it goes a lot beyond that. It's less about who's at fault, who's the culprit, and who's accountable... and more that in a developing economy, you don't have the same existing infrastructure that we do here in the states, so you have a rare chance to think about it and think about how it _should_ be, and not how it is currently. Thanks to a combination of Detroit and Eisenhower, the US transportation grid is predicated on car ownership - cars are an essential fact of life for most of the country, and it's very hard to be an adult in America without one. Cities are a notable exception, maybe... but, in the part of India I was in, while there was some highway infrastructure, there was a lot of dirt roads in use too, and whilemost people didn't own cars, it was a status symbol and most of the "white collar" workers I met either relied on company car service to get to and from work, or rickshaws. It's silly... but the opportunity to, instead of building a network of highways, instead to build a high speed rail network and invest in fast, reliable mass transit could go a LONG way to keeping per capita emissions from ever approaching the levels of the US.

I think it's things like that, taking a long hard look at aspects of American life that are highly CO2 intensive, and thinking about how you could build a modern life that minimizes those aspects... the emerging world has a chance to get that right, in ways that we would first have to undo before we could do. I don't think it's about who's the culprit, so much as who has the opportunity here.


----------



## AMOS

mbardu said:


> No cheap crap to buy at the dollar store, no carbon offset to hide our emissions, no shipping waste elsewhere so that it's out of sight, no degenerate mining for the fancy EVs.
> Why are Chinese coal plants running their factories 24/7? None of that is on China or India, it's very much the American way of life that's driving it.
> We just exported the pollution, that's all.


Maybe they can export a vacuum tube plant back this way


----------



## AMOS

mbardu said:


> Well actually on a per capita basis, their contribution to the world population is the same as ours.
> Approximately 1 person per person
> 
> In all seriousness though, the point remains. Their countries would not be polluting nearly as much if it were not for 1-Western demand for cheap crap and 2-Appeal of getting to the same unreasonable western standard of living


We didn't force them to take our dirty businesses, the greedy company owners here in the USA didn't want to pay American workers what they wanted so the Chinese Govt said sure! Bring your companies here and put our people to work. The Chinese are smart enough to know what the dangers are of some types of industry, they just felt their economy was more important. If they really cared, their human rights record would be much better than it is.


----------



## mbardu

AMOS said:


> We didn't force them to take our dirty businesses, the greedy company owners here in the USA didn't want to pay American workers what they wanted so the Chinese Govt said sure! Bring your companies here and put our people to work. The Chinese are smart enough to know what the dangers are of some types of industry, they just felt their economy was more important. If they really cared, their human rights record would be much better than it is.



Oh for sure, the Chinese gov is pretty crappy.
And sending business/factories overseas to China is largely supported by the US companies.

Doesn't change the problem though.
If people want tons of cheap crap produced to match all their whims, it will have *mostly* the same environmental impact whether it's done in China or in Europe or in the Americas.
Bit less in practice due to less shipping and maybe "cleaner" factories...
But if you don't reduce the demand, the production will remain, and the lofty overconsumption seen here will have the population in countries like India/China wanting the same lifestyles...except for 10 times more people.


----------



## CovertSovietBear

Gabial said:


> I tell people on social media, if you don't believe in climate change, it's very apparent in Montana, where we have a point of reference to compare to. the Earth is getting hotter, Montana is getting hotter every year. we broke recorded heat records last summer. I'm finding that the people who bought into the Covid bullshit, also don't believe in climate change. it is this mentallity that will destroy any hope for change. critical thinking is a must. the facts are right in front of us, people need to wake up and start believing in something other than themselves.


Been to Hamilton Montana (sometimes Missoula) a few times in March/April. Usually really nice weather, sometimes I'd have to wear a hoodie but gorgeous backdrop. Other than science at RML there wasn't much to do up there


----------



## Gabriel 1313

Still that way, but we live enchanted lives compared to most.


----------



## AMOS

Drew said:


> This is a big question, honestly. And, we may be too late.
> 
> But, maybe 10-12 years ago I spent a couple months in India for work, and I left the States being very concerned about climate change, but thinking it was our obligation to address the problem since while India and China were (at the tiime) as large if not slightly larger total emitters, we emitted much more per capita.
> 
> My time in India horrified me. The cities I was in were so smog-covered, the only time I got a sunburn was when on a weekend afternoon I got out hiking in the Deccan Traps. I think it's very easy in the US to underestimate the magnitude of the problem overseas.
> 
> But, honestly, it goes a lot beyond that. It's less about who's at fault, who's the culprit, and who's accountable... and more that in a developing economy, you don't have the same existing infrastructure that we do here in the states, so you have a rare chance to think about it and think about how it _should_ be, and not how it is currently. Thanks to a combination of Detroit and Eisenhower, the US transportation grid is predicated on car ownership - cars are an essential fact of life for most of the country, and it's very hard to be an adult in America without one. Cities are a notable exception, maybe... but, in the part of India I was in, while there was some highway infrastructure, there was a lot of dirt roads in use too, and whilemost people didn't own cars, it was a status symbol and most of the "white collar" workers I met either relied on company car service to get to and from work, or rickshaws. It's silly... but the opportunity to, instead of building a network of highways, instead to build a high speed rail network and invest in fast, reliable mass transit could go a LONG way to keeping per capita emissions from ever approaching the levels of the US.
> 
> I think it's things like that, taking a long hard look at aspects of American life that are highly CO2 intensive, and thinking about how you could build a modern life that minimizes those aspects... the emerging world has a chance to get that right, in ways that we would first have to undo before we could do. I don't think it's about who's the culprit, so much as who has the opportunity here.


Some scientists said years ago that southern India could be un livable very shortly, on top of the smog it's Arizona hot with Florida humidity.


----------



## High Plains Drifter

AMOS said:


> ... Arizona hot with Florida humidity.


Ah... Texas!


----------



## Drew

AMOS said:


> Some scientists said years ago that southern India could be un livable very shortly, on top of the smog it's Arizona hot with Florida humidity.


Parts of India already have begun to cross the "too hot to support human life" threshold on at least a few occasions over the summer. Like, not merely unpleasant to live there, like Florida, but people who do not have the means to escape the heat are dying.









India Heat Wave, Soaring Up to 123 Degrees, Has Killed at Least 36 (Published 2019)


The government warned that the extreme temperatures, which have struck large parts of northern and central India, might continue as the arrival of monsoon rains has been delayed.




www.nytimes.com





I've been out in low-mid 100s before, and once in particular after doing a 65 mile ride from the Cape back to Boston on a 99-degree day back in the summer of 2020 gave myself bad enough heat exhaustion that I damned near blacked out every time i stopped moving and lost the - slight - cooling effect of the breeze. Ended up having to lie on my front porch for about ten minutes, and then stopped on my first floor landing because I couldn't make it all the way upstairs in a single go, and took a cold shower and then laid wrapped in a wet towel in front of an AC unit until my fiancee got home. That's about as bad as it gets in Boston. 

I can't _imagine_ trying to function in 123 degree heat.


----------



## tedtan

I’ve been in temps of 122 degrees in Arizona and that really sucked, but its arid desert. I don’t want to imagine adding humidity into the equation.


----------



## jaxadam

tedtan said:


> I’ve been in temps of 122 degrees in Arizona and that really sucked, but its arid desert. I don’t want to imagine adding humidity into the equation.



108 with 90% humidity in Florida is terrible. Even 86 at 8 am with 100% humidity is unbearable.


----------



## bostjan

I've been in 100 °F low humidity plenty of times out west and it honestly didn't bother me at all. But every time I've been to Florida in the summer, I've been miserable the entire time. I'd take 100 °F arid weather over 80 °F 100% humidity, easily.


----------



## tedtan

jaxadam said:


> 108 with 90% humidity in Florida is terrible. Even 86 at 8 am with 100% humidity is unbearable.


I’m in Houston, so it’s typically around 102-105 with 90-plus percent humidity during summer here and I wouldn’t want to increase the heat here, either.


----------



## AMOS

jaxadam said:


> 108 with 90% humidity in Florida is terrible. Even 86 at 8 am with 100% humidity is unbearable.


No wonder the snowbirds go back and forth from Cape Cod to Florida


----------



## Xaios

I believe the immortal words of Hank Hill are applicable to this discussion:


----------



## nightflameauto

We have some massive extremes temperature wise that we never used to see. Like, it'll be below freezing one day, almost down to 0F, then the next it'll be in the eighties, then the next it'll be back to freezing. Just wild swings back and forth in what should be either spring or fall.

As far as overall warmer? I grew up in the midwest and remember building fences on the farm on a day it hit 118F with something like 85% or 90% humidity. You'd have to carry a huge jug of icewater and essentially douse yourself with it every few minutes just to wash the salt out of your clothes from the sweat. Oh, and grandpa's old trick from his youth, carry a bottle of pickle juice with you to replenish the salt when you started to feel like you were gonna pass out. Brutal.

I haven't seen heat like that in about fifteen or twenty years, so I can't say we're overall getting warmer, but we're definitely getting more extreme swings in short periods. The way we can go from mid eighties to blizzard and fuck-you-cold is ridiculous, and not something we would have seen twenty years ago at all.


----------



## bostjan

nightflameauto said:


> We have some massive extremes temperature wise that we never used to see. Like, it'll be below freezing one day, almost down to 0F, then the next it'll be in the eighties, then the next it'll be back to freezing. Just wild swings back and forth in what should be either spring or fall.
> 
> As far as overall warmer? I grew up in the midwest and remember building fences on the farm on a day it hit 118F with something like 85% or 90% humidity. You'd have to carry a huge jug of icewater and essentially douse yourself with it every few minutes just to wash the salt out of your clothes from the sweat. Oh, and grandpa's old trick from his youth, carry a bottle of pickle juice with you to replenish the salt when you started to feel like you were gonna pass out. Brutal.
> 
> I haven't seen heat like that in about fifteen or twenty years, so I can't say we're overall getting warmer, but we're definitely getting more extreme swings in short periods. The way we can go from mid eighties to blizzard and fuck-you-cold is ridiculous, and not something we would have seen twenty years ago at all.


I've moved around a bit, so it doesn't sink in with me so much, but the locals here in VT are shocked whenever it gets above 90 °F (32 °C). I'm sure it's been warmer, but summer here is getting a little longer from year-to-year. When I moved here 12.5 years ago, the first couple of winters were brutal for me, -40° lows, and the high for the entire month of January (and first two weeks of February) well below 0 °F (-18 °C). It was cold enough that ticks couldn't survive the winter here. Now the ticks are everywhere and there's rarely even an entire week below zero (Fahrenheit). I think last winter was the coldest in more than five years, and it still wasn't as bad as the first two or three years I lived here.

But these personal experiences are anecdotes about one place over a short span of time. We have data on this which is much more of a complete story. The problem is that people, for whatever good or bad reasons, don't want to believe this data (if the Earth is getting warmer, why are my feet cold?). And it's not just climate change, we saw the same thing with covid, with people questioning (which is good) but not following any sort of logical process before assessing risks (which is bad).


----------



## nightflameauto

bostjan said:


> But these personal experiences are anecdotes about one place over a short span of time. We have data on this which is much more of a complete story. The problem is that people, for whatever good or bad reasons, don't want to believe this data (if the Earth is getting warmer, why are my feet cold?). And it's not just climate change, we saw the same thing with covid, with people questioning (which is good) but not following any sort of logical process before assessing risks (which is bad).


I fully agree with your statement. I'll pull a standard quote when climate is being discussed, "Weather isn't climate." And individual experiences of weather aren't climate either. I've spent a lot of time studying mass extinction events and the causes, which has lead me into all sorts of interesting data about actual climate. But people don't much like discussing it in dry data terms. And even if we do discuss it in dry data terms, it's pretty bland.

So we tell each other anecdotes about our own experiences and how they've changed over time because that's much easier for the average person to swallow than the massive amounts of data they'd have to sift through to get a real sense of the enormity of the issue. I mean, I've been studying some of this in one form or another for nearly forty years, and I feel like I barely have a handle on it. Granted, I'm in that gray zone where I know almost enough about it to realize how much more there is to know than what I already know, if that makes sense. So trying to share what I know about the subject of climate feels incredibly daunting, especially if I don't know the entire audience and how deep they are into it.

I do remember having good conversations about it with my uncle, who spent a good chunk of his life studying it as well.

I do think there's a tendency for the general public to either ignore or go out of their way to distort real actual facts in a lot of subjects these days. Unless it's about Will Smith having his Kanye moment. That's apparently far more important to most than this silly climate change conversation.


----------



## zappatton2

Meant to post this a few days back, but it is disconcerting that this shelf was from an area deemed stable, and wasn't the one everyone was expecting. Makes things that much more ominous. I had entertained thoughts of moving out to Victoria, but I don't think I'll be making any plans on going coastal any time soon. Maybe buy some worthless desert from Lex Luthor and hope the beach comes to me?


https://www.cbc.ca/news/science/east-antarctica-ice-shelf-collapse-1.6397863


----------



## Xaios




----------



## Mathemagician

AMOS said:


> Has anyone else had strange weather patterns for the last few years? I live in S.E. New England and we've had more brutal wind storms than I can remember at any other point in my life (I'm 59) The occasional Hurricane we get are dismal compared to our Nor'Easters and other bad wind storms that seem to come out of nowhere. several people I know are convinced there's something funny going on, if these are natural cycles, then they are some pretty brutal cycles. I'm a Conservative that believes man is creating some of this mess, but it's not limited to that. I feel it's coinciding with other natural cycles. Sun, Planet etc.. but surely record high CO2 levels in the atmosphere for the last half decade or so must be doing something.
> 
> I'm looking for any input from your part of the country/world, and if things have been getting extreme, or even if things haven't changed at all.



I’ll admit I skipped most of the thread OP. But I just wanted to commend you for even trying to consider information outside whatever your “typical bubble” is. Because that hard AF to do for all of us. 

I’m sure I’ve been blocked by a bunch of conservatives on this forum, but for what it’s worth climate change isn’t a political issue. 

If you like going outside and enjoying nature, we as in 7 billion people on earth are doing a lot to fuck it up way faster than nature’s “normal” changes. 

People a lot more educated than me with a lot more time can explain it in detail but what it boils down to is that we (as in the whole fucking planet) can either make massive changes to try to stem the steady median increase in temperature which leads to more drastic weather patterns globally, or we accept that these changes are only going to accelerate and drastically change how people live in a few decades time. Personally I don’t see this happening. 

Rising tides, changing ocean currents, ocean ecosystem destruction, worsening annual forest fires, mass migration, finite oil sources, etc don’t care about our political beliefs. 

Which can sound like hippy nonsense when it’s just how it be.


----------



## Drew

Mathemagician said:


> I’ll admit I skipped most of the thread OP. But I just wanted to commend you for even trying to consider information outside whatever your “typical bubble” is. Because that hard AF to do for all of us.
> 
> I’m sure I’ve been blocked by a bunch of conservatives on this forum, but for what it’s worth climate change isn’t a political issue.
> 
> If you like going outside and enjoying nature, we as in 7 billion people on earth are doing a lot to fuck it up way faster than nature’s “normal” changes.
> 
> People a lot more educated than me with a lot more time can explain it in detail but what it boils down to is that we (as in the whole fucking planet) can either make massive changes to try to stem the steady median increase in temperature which leads to more drastic weather patterns globally, or we accept that these changes are only going to accelerate and drastically change how people live in a few decades time. Personally I don’t see this happening.
> 
> Rising tides, changing ocean currents, ocean ecosystem destruction, worsening annual forest fires, mass migration, finite oil sources, etc don’t care about our political beliefs.
> 
> Which can sound like hippy nonsense when it’s just how it be.


I mean, if you like to ski, and it seems like anyone with money, conservative or liberal, likes to downhill ski, then you should really care about climate change. It's easy to gloss over and minimize some of the downsides when they're remote to you, but if you give a shit about winter recreation, at some point you have to pay the piper. New England ski seasons have been deteriorating for a while now, and it's not THAT long before Vail or Snowbird are getting hit too. 

As it stands soot accumulation on snow in the west from last year's widespread wildfires caused snow to melt a lot faster than it normally does.


----------



## nightflameauto

Drew said:


> I mean, if you like to ski, and it seems like anyone with money, conservative or liberal, likes to downhill ski, then you should really care about climate change. It's easy to gloss over and minimize some of the downsides when they're remote to you, but if you give a shit about winter recreation, at some point you have to pay the piper. New England ski seasons have been deteriorating for a while now, and it's not THAT long before Vail or Snowbird are getting hit too.
> 
> As it stands soot accumulation on snow in the west from last year's widespread wildfires caused snow to melt a lot faster than it normally does.


Semi-facetiously:
1. Fuck skiers in their stupid fucking fashionista faces.
2. Fuck snow. Kill it all with fire.

I mean, climate change is happening and I wish we'd do more to combat it, but I could never see snow again in my life and be perfectly happy. Too many days wasted on that white bullshit.


----------



## AMOS

Mathemagician said:


> I’ll admit I skipped most of the thread OP. But I just wanted to commend you for even trying to consider information outside whatever your “typical bubble” is. Because that hard AF to do for all of us.
> 
> I’m sure I’ve been blocked by a bunch of conservatives on this forum, but for what it’s worth climate change isn’t a political issue.
> 
> If you like going outside and enjoying nature, we as in 7 billion people on earth are doing a lot to fuck it up way faster than nature’s “normal” changes.
> 
> People a lot more educated than me with a lot more time can explain it in detail but what it boils down to is that we (as in the whole fucking planet) can either make massive changes to try to stem the steady median increase in temperature which leads to more drastic weather patterns globally, or we accept that these changes are only going to accelerate and drastically change how people live in a few decades time. Personally I don’t see this happening.
> 
> Rising tides, changing ocean currents, ocean ecosystem destruction, worsening annual forest fires, mass migration, finite oil sources, etc don’t care about our political beliefs.
> 
> Which can sound like hippy nonsense when it’s just how it be.


I'm not afraid to believe Science, on facebook I've deleted several conservative friends that just parrot the same shit over and over again. They won't even look at the facts


----------



## AMOS

Drew said:


> I mean, if you like to ski, and it seems like anyone with money, conservative or liberal, likes to downhill ski, then you should really care about climate change. It's easy to gloss over and minimize some of the downsides when they're remote to you, but if you give a shit about winter recreation, at some point you have to pay the piper. New England ski seasons have been deteriorating for a while now, and it's not THAT long before Vail or Snowbird are getting hit too.
> 
> As it stands soot accumulation on snow in the west from last year's widespread wildfires caused snow to melt a lot faster than it normally does.


From what I see down here on the Cape, it looks like northern MA and northern New England have been getting plenty of snow for skiing. We got 20" in one storm and a few smaller ones where it melts away 2 days later. The gulf stream flowing through the canal really helps us out in that respect.


----------



## AMOS

nightflameauto said:


> Semi-facetiously:
> 1. Fuck skiers in their stupid fucking fashionista faces.
> 2. Fuck snow. Kill it all with fire.
> 
> I mean, climate change is happening and I wish we'd do more to combat it, but I could never see snow again in my life and be perfectly happy. Too many days wasted on that white bullshit.


South Dakota? you guys get slammed every year don't you?


----------



## nightflameauto

AMOS said:


> South Dakota? you guys get slammed every year don't you?


Used to. Now it's a bit more varied. But usually once or twice a year you'll go to bed and it's dry ground, wake up and it's three feet deep with massive drifts across the driveway. Which is nice.

I used to live in Minnesota about thirty years ago. It was the same.


----------



## AMOS

nightflameauto said:


> Used to. Now it's a bit more varied. But usually once or twice a year you'll go to bed and it's dry ground, wake up and it's three feet deep with massive drifts across the driveway. Which is nice.
> 
> I used to live in Minnesota about thirty years ago. It was the same.


We used to get that here, we've had winters in the last 5 years where we've gotten 1 inch


----------



## Xaios

nightflameauto said:


> 2. Fuck snow. Kill it all with fire.


I live in the Yukon, and I wholeheartedly support this statement.


----------



## High Plains Drifter

As a dude living in Texas, this is me whenever we get even a single snowflake...


----------



## fantom

Mathemagician said:


> climate change isn’t a political issue.


Agree. Climate change on its own is a scientific interpretation of observed measurements.

The problem is that what we do with that information **is** a political issue. You need multiple governments to work together using their public resources for the betterment of their people. And when they don't agree whether or not it is worth the cost, or they see wasted fossil fuels that enrich their constituents, they will make it a political issue.


----------



## Mathemagician

7 billion fucking people. And a handful of companies use their $$$ to ensure they can musical chairs their way to bleed out the last drop until the music stops. 

And then that is politicized on down to where regular people think either nothing needs to be done, or that just using paper straws is all that needs to be done. 

Because that makes for good “us versus them” nightly talk show content.


----------



## Drew

nightflameauto said:


> Semi-facetiously:
> 1. Fuck skiers in their stupid fucking fashionista faces.
> 2. Fuck snow. Kill it all with fire.
> 
> I mean, climate change is happening and I wish we'd do more to combat it, but I could never see snow again in my life and be perfectly happy. Too many days wasted on that white bullshit.


*checks location* 

Ah, yes...


----------



## Drew

AMOS said:


> From what I see down here on the Cape, it looks like northern MA and northern New England have been getting plenty of snow for skiing. We got 20" in one storm and a few smaller ones where it melts away 2 days later. The gulf stream flowing through the canal really helps us out in that respect.


I grew up in northwest MA, way up near the border with Vermont and NY. Backcountry downhill skiing on Mt Greylock used to be a big thing out there, but in the last decade, it's been extremely variable. Some buddies of mine out there got a few days on the mountain these days, but for the most part a big storm would blow through, and then a couple days later the freeze/thaw cycle would turn large patches to ice or bare grass in places where it was exposed to the sun. That didn't used to be the case. 

Way up in the mountain towns you'll still find pretty good backcountry XC skiing and snowshoeing, but in the valleys, it's tough.


----------



## bostjan

Drew said:


> I mean, if you like to ski, and it seems like anyone with money, conservative or liberal, likes to downhill ski, then you should really care about climate change. It's easy to gloss over and minimize some of the downsides when they're remote to you, but if you give a shit about winter recreation, at some point you have to pay the piper. New England ski seasons have been deteriorating for a while now, and it's not THAT long before Vail or Snowbird are getting hit too.
> 
> As it stands soot accumulation on snow in the west from last year's widespread wildfires caused snow to melt a lot faster than it normally does.


If you're super-rich, though, you won't care, because water skiing in warm weather is also fun. If sea levels rise and the Earth gets warmer, it's just more room for their yachts and summer fun.


----------



## AMOS

I don't think anyone does much about it. Democrats push green energy and they get campaign contributions when big contracts are gotten by solar and wind companies. The same way Republicans get campaign contributions when big oil or coal companies get contracts. It's all a dog and pony show


----------



## Drew

AMOS said:


> I don't think anyone does much about it. Democrats push green energy and they get campaign contributions when big contracts are gotten by solar and wind companies. The same way Republicans get campaign contributions when big oil or coal companies get contracts. It's all a dog and pony show


While we're talking about big campaign contributions from coal and oil, let's not forget Joe Manchin, D-WV.


----------



## Drew

Thinking about this over the weekend, while spending a decent amount of time driving. 

Anyone who thinks humanity is powerless to exact change on this kind of national, continental, or global scale needs to go drive along an interstate. 

When I was a kid, it was a really big deal to see a bird of prey along a highway. They were rare enough when I was a kid, and even a young adult, you'd never see them, and when you did, they'd stick out in your memory. 

The last five or so years, they've been everywhere. I see them in the city a lot more, but I also probably saw a half dozen red tailed hawks hunting over the highways and neighboring fields, or perched in trees, in a two hour drive. They've become so not-rare that honestly it shouldn't be notable at all to see them, save for the fact they really are rather dramatic animals. 

But, there's two reasons for this, one maybe not great, and the other a lot more so - we've had a string of mild winters, meaning rodent populations are up, in turn supporting more predators, which is concerning. However, the big reason is we banned DDT back in the 70s, and wild bird of prey populations are finally starting to rebound. Hell, on one or two occasions I've seen bald eagles over the highway in New England, which I'd never even seen one in the flesh in the wild until my late 20s, in Nova Scotia. 

It may not be easy, and it may take time, but we CAN change our environment for the better.


----------



## wheresthefbomb

Drew said:


> It may not be easy, and it may take time, but we CAN change our environment for the better.



I don't question whether we _can_, I question whether the inherent profit motivations and myopic decision making attendant to capitalism will _allow_ us to.

Also I don't really question it, so much as try not to think about the overwhelming inevitable likelihood that it will see us plunge directly off the cliff to face whatever new horrors await us.


----------



## Drew

wheresthefbomb said:


> I don't question whether we _can_, I question whether the inherent profit motivations and myopic decision making attendant to capitalism will _allow_ us to.
> 
> Also I don't really question it, so much as try not to think about the overwhelming inevitable likelihood that it will see us plunge directly off the cliff to face whatever new horrors await us.


All these are reasonable concerns... But, at the same time, raptor populations have rebounded all over the US, in the wake of our banning DDT. The hole in the ozone layer has started to heal, too. All the earlier environmental concerns from the 70s and 80s and 90s that were the big existential threats of that generation were things that we actually seem to be beating. There's no reason at all that the concerns of the 2000s and 2010s can't be beat too.


----------



## bostjan

It's a little more of a complicated situation that might be apparently obvious, especially in pop culture, where attention spans are measured in seconds...

Global temperatures are rising, and they are rising more slowly than we had feared, and much of the world has made strides in kerbing pollution; however, what remains unclear is how all of these things interact.

For one, going by grand climate cycles, we should be deep enough into a span of relative cool right now. Solar output is heading toward a minimum. The ice caps should be heading toward a maximum. The Earth has proven to be more resilient against man-made temperature changes than just about anyone thought in the 80's or 90's. On the other hand, the temperature spike we saw as a result of 9/11 and the grounding of air traffic leading to the settling of particles in the air was not as profound when air traffic reached its nadir during the covid pandemic, but, then again, maybe some of the decreased pollution we have seen the past two years has something to do with the economic downturn due to covid. Another great factor in the decrease in pollution probably has a lot to do with the relative peace in the latter half of the 20th century. As it looks as though that precarious status in world politics may come to an end soon, and nations compete economically not just for superiority any longer, but for their own survival, the Earth stands a chance at becoming polluted more quickly than we had ever seen in the past.

It's not all sunshine and roses, but it's not all doom and gloom, either. But the future could hold either result, and the margin between those two outcomes may be much thinner than we'd like to think.


----------



## jaxadam

Well, everyone keeps saying the storms keep getting worse and worse, but I mean, look at Jupiter! Look at how big ass of a storm that is, and we haven’t been back there for thousands of years!


----------



## AMOS

Last few hurricanes that came up north were a joke. Our Nor'easters make them look like a mild case of the sprinkles.


----------



## jaxadam

AMOS said:


> Last few hurricanes that came up north were a joke. Our Nor'easters make them look like a mild case of the sprinkles.



One of my neighbors is from Connecticut, and he said the nor'easterns up there were worse than the hurricanes down here.


----------



## AMOS

jaxadam said:


> One of my neighbors is from Connecticut, and he said the nor'easterns up there were worse than the hurricanes down here.


Could be, except for the big ones like Katrina etc.


----------



## AMOS

We have a small one hitting late tonight, 50-55 mph gusts


----------



## nightflameauto

AMOS said:


> We have a small one hitting late tonight, 50-55 mph gusts


In South Dakota that's known as your average afternoon.


----------



## mmr007

Refreezing poles feasible and cheap, new study finds: A subpolar-focused stratospheric aerosol injection deployment scenario


Refreezing the poles by reducing incoming sunlight would be both feasible and remarkably cheap, according to new research.



www.sciencedaily.com





It doesn't seem any legitimate or reputable scientific journal is releasing this....just internet websites sourcing....but could this please be true?


----------



## eaeolian

Drew said:


> All these are reasonable concerns... But, at the same time, raptor populations have rebounded all over the US, in the wake of our banning DDT. The hole in the ozone layer has started to heal, too. All the earlier environmental concerns from the 70s and 80s and 90s that were the big existential threats of that generation were things that we actually seem to be beating. There's no reason at all that the concerns of the 2000s and 2010s can't be beat too.


The pessimist in me says that was a different world, though - it's much easier to care about something other than money when you're staring nuclear annihilation in the face, oddly enough. Also, the adults were mostly in charge, which absolutely is not the case in half the world now.
Plus, the U.S. Government led on the ozone hole issue. I absolutely cannot see that happening today. Hell, my state's Governor is attempting to do an end run around our legislature to get VA out of the regional climate accord we're in - a deeply unpopular move among the populous parts of the state, but one that helps "the economy" in some nebulous way...
We have the technological ability to dig ourselves out of this hole, eventually. I just don't think we have the political will.


----------



## eaeolian

mmr007 said:


> Refreezing poles feasible and cheap, new study finds: A subpolar-focused stratospheric aerosol injection deployment scenario
> 
> 
> Refreezing the poles by reducing incoming sunlight would be both feasible and remarkably cheap, according to new research.
> 
> 
> 
> www.sciencedaily.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> It doesn't seem any legitimate or reputable scientific journal is releasing this....just internet websites sourcing....but could this please be true?


Yes, there's never been any unintended consequences from doing anything like this...


----------



## bostjan

eaeolian said:


> Yes, there's never been any unintended consequences from doing anything like this...



Not like that plan sounds like anything a 1990's supervillain would come up with...








C. Montgomerey Burns said:


> _Since the beginning of time, man has yearned to destroy the sun. I will do the next best thing: block it out._”


----------



## wheresthefbomb

If we all just ran an AC unit outside year-round, the problem would be solved in no time!


----------



## vilk




----------



## Glades

jaxadam said:


> Well, everyone keeps saying the storms keep getting worse and worse, but I mean, look at Jupiter! Look at how big ass of a storm that is, and we haven’t been back there for thousands of year



Data shows that natural disasters are actually trending down and there is no heat wave trend. Source in the picture.

Be suspicious of alarmists. They are profiting from it. Trust the data.


----------



## StevenC

Glades said:


> Data shows that natural disasters are actually trending down and there is no heat wave trend. Source in the picture.
> 
> Be suspicious of alarmists. They are profiting from it. Trust the data.


Can you cite these graphs please?


----------



## mmr007

Glades said:


> Data shows that natural disasters are actually trending down and there is no heat wave trend. Source in the picture.
> 
> Be suspicious of alarmists. They are profiting from it. Trust the data.


Stop. Seriously. You're just being jealous of the tone wood troll thread attention.


----------



## Glades

StevenC said:


> Can you cite these graphs please?


Sources are on the graphs.


----------



## jaxadam

What graphs? One’s a midi roll and one’s a compressor plug-in.


----------



## guitaardvark

Glades said:


> Data shows that natural disasters are actually trending down and there is no heat wave trend. Source in the picture.
> 
> Be suspicious of alarmists. They are profiting from it. Trust the data.


People are concerned about climate change because they trust data. Many credible sources have released tons of data that reflects an increase in heat waves and natural disasters. There's clear data here that gives context to the graphs, which is important in divisive, complex discussions: https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indicators-heat-waves

It would also help the discussion if you'd explain why climate alarmism is profitable when positing a claim like that. The general consensus is that fossil fuels, petrochemicals, and all of the other industries that are responsible for climate change are extremely lucrative, and they're the ones who are profiting off of blocking climate legislation.


----------



## lost_horizon

Glades said:


> Data shows that natural disasters are actually trending down and there is no heat wave trend. Source in the picture.
> 
> Be suspicious of alarmists. They are profiting from it. Trust the data.


Scientist here, finally some good data.

If Climate Change was worse in the latter half of the 20th century then natural disasters would have been going up, but they aren't so it's like an inverse relationship. Plus we are better at recovering and minimising harm from them. So all doom and gloom and pissing and moaning from Al Gore to IPCC was for nothing. The worry and angst inflicted on billions of people for something that never arrived is rubbish. 

They still can't find a link between climate change in hurricanes which have decreased.


There is evidence for a slowing of tropical cyclone propagation speeds over the continental U.S. over the past century, but these observed changes have not yet been confidently linked to anthropogenic climate change.
There is no strong evidence of century-scale increasing trends in U.S. landfalling hurricanes or major hurricanes, Similarly for Atlantic _basin-wide_ hurricanes (after adjusting for observing capabilities), there is not strong evidence for an increase since the late 1800s in hurricanes, major hurricanes, or the proportion of hurricanes that reach major hurricane intensity.









Changes in Atlantic major hurricane frequency since the late-19th century - Nature Communications


How tropical cyclones have varied in intensity and frequency in the past is not well known as longer records are rare. Here, the authors show that changes in observing practices explain the recorded century scale increase in Atlantic major hurricane frequency, and recent increases are not part...




www.nature.com





Love how when they don't find a trend they say there is still a trend and it is being masked LOL. Love how the RAW data shows massively reduced hurricane activity and they found a way to make it now appear this way.




Too much time has passed for these rubbish predictions to be true yet they still keep making them. They keep saying tipping point, disaster etc. and it doesn't eventuate.

California has been in mega drought for 1000 of the last 10000 years. Don't live there if you aren't willing to deal with that for decades or longer. And that was before people drove SUVs.

Some Asian countries and cities exist in valleys that were under water just 4000 years ago. When the ice on those mountains melt (which it has before without cow farts and plastic straws) those places will be flooded and uninhabitable for 100 years or more.

The earth wasn't invented yesterday. We have millions of years of geological and geophysical data. 50% of an entire state in Australia used to be underwater, and now 2 million people live there in that zone. It will be underwater again. To pretend it isn't is foolish. Earth is not a steady state planet it has crazy weather that varies or changes every single year due to a whole bunch of reasons. If the angle of the orbit changes we are mostly dead.

I don't agree that solar and electric cars are the answer, solar panels are replaced every 20 years and electric car batteries can't be recycled easily (5x more expensive to recycle than mine fresh) so it is an exercise in futility. Batteries are required to backup solar, needing more minerals. I can only see these Lithium stores lasting 20-30 years. Zinc Bromide or other battery systems should be used along with nuclear. I don't care about the environmental aspects and advantages of these, of which there are many. It just is more efficient and less waste for the entire product lifecycle. Only rich people in the top 1% of earners globally have electric cars, they can at least do it without destroying the earth.


----------



## narad

jaxadam said:


> What graphs? One’s a midi roll and one’s a compressor plug-in.



If we continue on the path we are now, there will be no high-end for future generations.


----------



## spudmunkey

The one graph is US only, so that's laughably irrelevant, even without including the increasing geographic variability¹.


¹ https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.0904495106


----------



## AMOS

lost_horizon said:


> I don't agree that solar and electric cars are the answer, solar panels are replaced every 20 years and electric car batteries can't be recycled easily (5x more expensive to recycle than mine fresh) so it is an exercise in futility. Batteries are required to backup solar, needing more minerals. I can only see these Lithium stores lasting 20-30 years. Zinc Bromide or other battery systems should be used along with nuclear. I don't care about the environmental aspects and advantages of these, of which there are many. It just is more efficient and less waste for the entire product lifecycle. Only rich people in the top 1% of earners globally have electric cars, they can at least do it without destroying the earth.


Argentina, Bolivia and the other countries that mine the Lithium are devastating their landscapes in order to do so. No tree huggers protesting that, and I thought the reduction of trees increased global temperatures?


----------



## lost_horizon

AMOS said:


> Argentina, Bolivia and the other countries that mine the Lithium are devastating their landscapes in order to do so. No tree huggers protesting that, and I thought the reduction of trees increased global temperatures?


Exactly, perverse when you think about it. Only 6.6 million hybrid or electric vehicles were sold in 2021. 4.6% of the total.

I prefer Toyota Hydrogen Combustion engine as well using one of the most plentiful resources on the planet: https://www.motorauthority.com/news/1135112_toyota-and-yamaha-tests-v-8-that-runs-on-hydrogen


----------



## eaeolian

lost_horizon said:


> Exactly, perverse when you think about it. Only 6.6 million hybrid or electric vehicles were sold in 2021. 4.6% of the total.
> 
> I prefer Toyota Hydrogen Combustion engine as well using one of the most plentiful resources on the planet: https://www.motorauthority.com/news/1135112_toyota-and-yamaha-tests-v-8-that-runs-on-hydrogen


Except making break-even on Hydrogen isn't there yet (most of it is still made from petroleum and has a higher carbon output than electric), but in principle I agree.


----------



## StevenC

AMOS said:


> Argentina, Bolivia and the other countries that mine the Lithium are devastating their landscapes in order to do so. No tree huggers protesting that, and I thought the reduction of trees increased global temperatures?


A lot of people are pretty pissed about what's happening in South America. Nice strawman. 


lost_horizon said:


> Exactly, perverse when you think about it. Only 6.6 million hybrid or electric vehicles were sold in 2021. 4.6% of the total.
> 
> I prefer Toyota Hydrogen Combustion engine as well using one of the most plentiful resources on the planet: https://www.motorauthority.com/news/1135112_toyota-and-yamaha-tests-v-8-that-runs-on-hydrogen


I used to be a big advocate of hydrogen cars, but it's not practical in any way. It's so much more difficult to refine, transport and store. People only like it because it looks like ICE infrastructure. Meanwhile the problem is specifically that ICE infrastructure is inefficient. Electric cars are fuel agnostic and therefore much more adaptable to low carbon futures.


----------



## CanserDYI

So are people here actually arguing that we should continue living in trash and pumping awful, harmful stuff into the atmosphere because some graphs "disprove global warming"? Even if you're right, like..thats the message you want to send? "Fuck the left, because they were wrong.....about fucking caring about me and my environments health?"

Like fucking christ, guys.


----------



## jaxadam

CanserDYI said:


> So are people here actually arguing that we should continue living in trash and pumping awful, harmful stuff into the atmosphere because some graphs "disprove global warming"? Even if you're right, like..thats the message you want to send? "Fuck the left, because they were wrong.....about fucking caring about me and my environments health?"
> 
> Like fucking christ, guys.



Like all of those aerosols that come out of spray cans for graffiti?


----------



## CanserDYI

jaxadam said:


> Like all of those aerosols that come out of spray cans for graffiti?


Me painting once every few years is a piss in the ocean of what Sunoco refinery does in my city alone every day. 

Lithium mining is arguably just as bad, but at least you can reuse the product you're mining.


----------



## bostjan

Glades said:


> Data shows that natural disasters are actually trending down and there is no heat wave trend. Source in the picture.
> 
> Be suspicious of alarmists. They are profiting from it. Trust the data.


I agree to be suspicious.

I could not access the source from Belgium. Here is a public source that states contrary facts: https://public.wmo.int/en/media/pre...-over-past-50-years-causing-more-damage-fewer

I'm not sure which is correct. It's easy to get sidetracked by focusing on the death tolls and dollar amounts of damage going up, but perhaps that's simply due to population growth and urban development. However, almost all of the sources I can find seem to state that the number of natural disasters _is _going up, so maybe it's just that we're better at recording them. Even so, looking at the trendline you presented, it doesn't look like a very good correlation anyway. I don't think we have enough data to say one way or the other, given the biases involved.

But the other source, you might want to read more carefully. Here is the very next graph presented:






What you presented seems a bit cherry-picked. Those are the six day spans with high temperatures over the 90th percentile. If the climate gets more extreme, you would expect to see fewer of those, as six days spans of anything stable will get less frequent and the 90th percentile of temperatures get higher.

We know that global temperatures are on the rise, despite solar activity being at a low. There are no explanations for why global temperatures should be up other than human activity. Hell, just do a simple calculation of how much heat is released by burning the amount of fossil fuels humans burn every year, and you'll see that there is an amount of heat output by human activity that is far higher than what the Earth can naturally dissipate, so there is every reason to believe that humans are causing excess heat to be released into planet Earth.

As for what would theoretically happen if humans just stopped, it's a stupid hypothetical, because we will never stop on our own. The facts couldn't get more straighforward about whether or not human activity affects global climate, the only things up for debate are how much and what would be effective in lessening the effects (if they are necessary).


----------



## jaxadam

CanserDYI said:


> Me painting once every few years is a piss in the ocean of what Sunoco refinery does in my city alone every day.
> 
> Lithium mining is arguably just as bad, but at least you can reuse the product you're mining.



Hey man we should all do our part, hell I use the same piece of toilet paper twice!


----------



## CanserDYI

jaxadam said:


> Hey man we should all do our part, hell I use the same piece of toilet paper twice!


Amateur, my family just uses a roman toilet sponge. 

I'm so left my house wasn't built with any right angles, bro. My shoes are bread bags.


----------



## jaxadam

CanserDYI said:


> Amateur, my family just uses a roman toilet sponge.
> 
> I'm so left my house wasn't built with any right angles, bro. My shoes are bread bags.



I tried the three seashells but it's not for me.


----------



## AMOS

lost_horizon said:


> Exactly, perverse when you think about it. Only 6.6 million hybrid or electric vehicles were sold in 2021. 4.6% of the total.
> 
> I prefer Toyota Hydrogen Combustion engine as well using one of the most plentiful resources on the planet: https://www.motorauthority.com/news/1135112_toyota-and-yamaha-tests-v-8-that-runs-on-hydrogen


People laugh at me when I say primitivism is the only way to save the planet. But if you think about it all other methods and beliefs destroy it. Mining is mining and no matter what you mine for it destroys trees.


----------



## StevenC

AMOS said:


> People laugh at me when I say primitivism is the only way to save the planet. But if you think about it all other methods and beliefs destroy it. Mining is mining and no matter what you mine for it destroys trees.


"People dying before 30 is the only way to stop people dying"


----------



## narad

I like the "Be suspicious of alarmists. They are profiting from it."

Be suspicious of non-alarmists. They are many of the most profitable companies on the planet.


----------



## mbardu

AMOS said:


> People laugh at me when I say primitivism is the only way to save the planet. But if you think about it all other methods and beliefs destroy it. Mining is mining and no matter what you mine for it destroys trees.



And even destroying trees is like the smallest issue with mining. You could easily re-plant trees for the surface of what we're mining, and they'd suck a good chunk of CO2 while growing. But the amount of energy (and resources in general) the industry uses is obscene...


----------



## mbardu

narad said:


> I like the "Be suspicious of alarmists. They are profiting from it."
> 
> Be suspicious of non-alarmists. They are many of the most profitable companies on the planet.



As a rule of thumb, everyone is trying to profit. 
So be suspicious of everyone.
Not even joking.


----------



## bostjan

StevenC said:


> "People dying before 30 is the only way to stop people dying"


Taken to extremes, it's not technically incorrect, but maybe just missing the point.

As far as the environment goes, humanity is in and of itself, a problem. As long as we exist, the environment will continuously get worse. Maybe not every year, but as an overall trend century to century, we make the environment worse.

It's a sad truth. Solar panels produce energy in a clean way, but there is no clean way to produce solar panels. And solar panels have a limited lifespan, so you'll have to continually produce more no matter how careful you are with them. So, using solar energy is necessarily more negatively impactful on the environment than just not using electricity. Wind turbines are the same way. There are tons of toxic chemicals released into the environment in the process of producing the blades, the towers, and the turbines themselves. And they are horribly unreliable, that is to say that they tend to explode or fall apart before they can produce enough energy to break even on investment. So, again, using wind energy has more negative impact on the environment than not using electricity at all.

The logical endpoint of all of those tracks is the same - that simply living a modern lifestyle is necessarily going to negatively impact the environment. Some paths are much much harsher than others, but the only way to _not_ negatively impact the environment is to go back to primitivism. Even that, IDK - if you breathe, you are releasing CO2. If you go to the bathroom, you are polluting something somewhere. Even if you stopped breathing, you'd leave a carcass behind that might already be full of toxic stuff. Life isn't a positive sum game, it isn't even a zero sum game. You take usable energy from the universe and convert it into unusable heat. It's just basic thermodynamics.

So what does that tell everyone? Well, the goal should never be to leave the world better off than you found it. If you want to reduce the negative impact you have on the world, that's great - probably just being aware of this much and having the desire to do better is most of the battle.


----------



## mbardu

bostjan said:


> Taken to extremes, it's not technically incorrect, but maybe just missing the point.
> 
> As far as the environment goes, humanity is in and of itself, a problem. As long as we exist, the environment will continuously get worse. Maybe not every year, but as an overall trend century to century, we make the environment worse.
> 
> It's a sad truth. Solar panels produce energy in a clean way, but there is no clean way to produce solar panels. And solar panels have a limited lifespan, so you'll have to continually produce more no matter how careful you are with them. So, using solar energy is necessarily more negatively impactful on the environment than just not using electricity. Wind turbines are the same way. There are tons of toxic chemicals released into the environment in the process of producing the blades, the towers, and the turbines themselves. And they are horribly unreliable, that is to say that they tend to explode or fall apart before they can produce enough energy to break even on investment. So, again, using wind energy has more negative impact on the environment than not using electricity at all.
> 
> The logical endpoint of all of those tracks is the same - that simply living a modern lifestyle is necessarily going to negatively impact the environment. Some paths are much much harsher than others, but the only way to _not_ negatively impact the environment is to go back to primitivism. Even that, IDK - if you breathe, you are releasing CO2. If you go to the bathroom, you are polluting something somewhere. Even if you stopped breathing, you'd leave a carcass behind that might already be full of toxic stuff. Life isn't a positive sum game, it isn't even a zero sum game. You take usable energy from the universe and convert it into unusable heat. It's just basic thermodynamics.
> 
> So what does that tell everyone? Well, the goal should never be to leave the world better off than you found it. If you want to reduce the negative impact you have on the world, that's great - probably just being aware of this much and having the desire to do better is most of the battle.



Today, for sure, we're not efficient.
Worst offenders- things like electric cars are probably _very _counterproductive to the actual preservation of "the environment".

But in theory at least, there would be no reason to think that nature as it is (through random evolution) is 100% efficient as-is at what it does. So you could imagine a utopia where, through things like fusion energy, AI-optimized design and actual recycling, we can become neutral to even more efficient than nature, and as such be able to have our own modern comfortable niches while not negatively impacting the surrounding "environment". Or being able to mould the environment even more than we do today.

But at the end of the day, the definition of "environment" is pretty nebulous. Even without humans the environment has had and will have its ebbs and flows. There were invasive species and extinction events before humans (albeit, not quite as accelerated), and at the end of the day, we only think of "the environment" as the one that supports and pleases us humans. There's no absolute criteria to what the environment "should" be, and it has not always favored beauty or diversity.
I don't even know what we'd do about the environment were we to end up in our utopia. Leave it untouched while we stay in our bubble? Preserve diversity or another metric even if artificially?

That's just theoretical though. We have maybe 10 "good" years left at this rate, and we're clearly not getting to that utopia with the current incentives, so it's all a moot point


----------



## narad

StevenC said:


> "People dying before 30 is the only way to stop people dying"



It's like people learned nothing from "Obsoletely Fabulous"


----------



## wheresthefbomb

AMOS said:


> People laugh at me when I say primitivism is the only way to save the planet. But if you think about it all other methods and beliefs destroy it. Mining is mining and no matter what you mine for it destroys trees.



I couldn't say why anyone else is laughing at you, but I'm laughing at you because you're either a secret socialist or don't understand the political and ideological legacy of anarchism. It's extremely hilarious to me that you've not only hitched your horse to a deeply leftist wagon, but one that is widely viewed as risible within broader far left, even anarchist circles. 

This is the kind of thing that you get when people think bernie or kamala is "the radical left."


----------



## AMOS

wheresthefbomb said:


> I couldn't say why anyone else is laughing at you, but I'm laughing at you because you're either a secret socialist or don't understand the political and ideological legacy of anarchism. It's extremely hilarious to me that you've not only hitched your horse to a deeply leftist wagon, but one that is widely viewed as risible within broader far left, even anarchist circles.
> 
> This is the kind of thing that you get when people think bernie or kamala is "the radical left."


I'm the farthest thing from leftist, Just ask anyone around here. In a society with very little industrialization, politics wouldn't need to exist. There would be no corporations or unions to suck up to.


----------



## nightflameauto

AMOS said:


> I'm the farthest thing from leftist, Just ask anyone around here. In a society with very little industrialization, politics wouldn't need to exist. There would be no corporations or unions to suck up to.


It's politics at a different level, but politics would still exist. Anytime you get more than two humans together, somebody wants to be the leader, and some other somebody is gonna wanna pick a fight with the leader.

I think what you may be thinking of is corruption. Awful hard to hide the corruption in a hunter/gatherer society of small tribes sometimes warring with each other. And look at us, all cozy on the opposite end of the spectrum where the political class don't even really feel the need to hide the corruption. In fact, we give it pretty names and parade it around the country like it's a good thing. Like, for instance, Lobbyists.


----------



## wheresthefbomb

AMOS said:


> I'm the farthest thing from leftist, Just ask anyone around here. In a society with very little industrialization, politics wouldn't need to exist. There would be no corporations or unions to suck up to.



Do you agree with the anti-capitalist conclusions of anarcho-primitivisim?


----------



## jaxadam

wheresthefbomb said:


> Do you agree with the anti-capitalist conclusions of anarcho-primitivisim?



Terms like these can be difficult, but can be understood through tough thorough thought though.


----------



## AMOS

wheresthefbomb said:


> Do you agree with the anti-capitalist conclusions of anarcho-primitivisim?


Yes, if there's no central Government then there's no central market system I would gather. I disagree with violent forms of Anarchism, it's not necessary. Antifa are wannabe's that found group discounts on Che Guevara T-shirts, but they know nothing about living beyond mom's basement. I believe in peaceful communities.


----------



## bostjan

Meh, politics isn't really a one-dimensional, nor a two-dimensional array of issues and positions. Especially when you get extreme, and the ends of the spectrum start to look more alike than different.


----------



## AMOS

StevenC said:


> "People dying before 30 is the only way to stop people dying"


Which system do you prefer, Logan's Run or Soylent Green?


----------



## StevenC

AMOS said:


> Which system do you prefer, Logan's Run or Soylent Green?


What maniac thinks that should be the question?


----------



## eaeolian

jaxadam said:


> Terms like these can be difficult, but can be understood through tough thorough thought though.


How long have you been saving that?


----------



## eaeolian

AMOS said:


> Which system do you prefer, Logan's Run or Soylent Green?


The original Logan's Run, where 16-21 is a wild ride, then...


----------



## narad

AMOS said:


> Yes, if there's no central Government then there's no central market system I would gather. I disagree with violent forms of Anarchism, it's not necessary. Antifa are wannabe's that found group discounts on Che Guevara T-shirts, but they know nothing about living beyond mom's basement. I believe in peaceful communities.


No one who spends this much time on a guitar forum is self sufficient to such an extent that they would live a better life in some primitivistic world. It's just the pot calling the kettle black (with Che Guevara faces).


----------



## TedEH

AMOS said:


> Yes, if there's no central Government then there's no central market system I would gather. I disagree with violent forms of Anarchism, it's not necessary. Antifa are wannabe's that found group discounts on Che Guevara T-shirts, but they know nothing about living beyond mom's basement. I believe in peaceful communities.


I don't understand this....
if you have a peaceful community, then that sense of community is probably built on some form of sharing, which would form a market, and they'd need rules to keep that system from breaking down, or to "govern" it, so to speak. If you have no rules, you have no market, you have no community, you have no incentive to be peaceful. "Peace" doesn't just happen because people agree to be nice to eachother.


----------



## jaxadam

eaeolian said:


> How long have you been saving that?



The real jewels I drop around here seem to mostly go unnoticed, so I get to use them more than once! I thought my "mass confusion" one earlier today was pretty good but I think it might have flown over some heads.


----------



## lost_horizon

mbardu said:


> That's just theoretical though. We have maybe 10 "good" years left at this rate, and we're clearly not getting to that utopia with the current incentives, so it's all a moot point


(resets doomsday clock that was meant to destroy us all in 2013)

JUST 10 MORE YEARS GUYS!!

"The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) forecasts crop yields increasing 30% by 2050. And the poorest parts of the world, like sub-Saharan Africa, are expected to see increases of 80 to 90%.

... Wheat yields increased 100 to 300% around the world since the 1960s, while a study of 30 models found that yields would decline by 6% for every one degree Celsius increase in temperature."

I think what people forget is a system will always settle to the lowest energy state possible. The amount of methane in the atmosphere has been steadily increasing but we haven't seen as large an increase in temperature as expected. Methane is volatile and behaves differently in different parts of the atmosphere. It has chosen the state that has the lowest energy footprint. There is a high potential for warming physically but observations just don't match expectations.

The models suck.


----------



## narad

All the models suck but guy on guitar forum (who doesn't provide a model) has it all figured out? Doesn't sound very plausible. And of course there will be many victories for the environment in the future. Will they be enough to leave the earth with a sustainable and enjoyable environment? Is it worth trying to cut it as close as possible?


----------



## AMOS

eaeolian said:


> How long have you been saving that?


I had to read that several times myself


----------



## AMOS

TedEH said:


> I don't understand this....
> if you have a peaceful community, then that sense of community is probably built on some form of sharing, which would form a market, and they'd need rules to keep that system from breaking down, or to "govern" it, so to speak. If you have no rules, you have no market, you have no community, you have no incentive to be peaceful. "Peace" doesn't just happen because people agree to be nice to eachother.


It's never been tried with gigantic populations where we already have advanced technology, it's only been applied in the days of the clans. We have no idea how it'll work until it happens, and see how the populace reacts to it. When the planets resources are depleted we'll find out.


----------



## CanserDYI

"Captor X is the best thing ever"

"I'm an anarcho primitivist"

Fucking what, mate?


----------



## Glades

Is this the Cattle Decap thread?


----------



## TedEH

AMOS said:


> It's never been tried


I never tried jumping in front of a moving vehicle, but I'm pretty sure I know what would happen if I did.


----------



## MFB

TedEH said:


> I never tried jumping in front of a moving vehicle



Snowflake!


----------



## TedEH

MFB said:


> Snowflake!


Already? In September? Evidence of climate change....?


----------



## Xaios

TedEH said:


> Already? In September? Evidence of climate change....?


At this time of year?

At this time of day?

In this part of the country?

Localized entirely within your kitchen!?


----------



## Drew

Xaios said:


> At this time of year?
> 
> At this time of day?
> 
> In this part of the country?
> 
> Localized entirely within your kitchen!?


 

I mean, I don't see how there can be any serious discussion about whether or not climate change is happening at this point - it is. We've had some of the worst droughts on record in the US in the last decade, something obscene like one third of Pakistan is currently underwater after record-breaking flooding, after the massive European floods of the last couple years, and Atlantic hurricane frequency and intensity has increased measurably since the 80s when we had reliable enough sattelite data to start capturing them, despite whatever sort of article lost horizon just shared that seems to argue that it's not actually increasing because we were just missing a lot more hurricanes before that.  Meanwhile, the seven warmest years on record, with history going back to the 1800s, have all occurred since 2015, and each decade has been warmer than the one before it from the 1980s onwards. 

Like, maybe if you've been living under a rock, and that rock hasn't happened to be involved in a flood, a hurricane, or a wildfire, it's possible you somehow haven't noticed this... but even the GOP is grudgingly adopting climate change policies as part of their platform, if only so far that we ensure adequate access to fossil fuels while we figure something else out. But there's no serious room left to debate whether it's happening, the discussion is moving on to how we react to it.


----------



## bostjan

lost_horizon said:


> (resets doomsday clock that was meant to destroy us all in 2013)
> 
> JUST 10 MORE YEARS GUYS!!
> 
> "The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) forecasts crop yields increasing 30% by 2050. And the poorest parts of the world, like sub-Saharan Africa, are expected to see increases of 80 to 90%.
> 
> ... Wheat yields increased 100 to 300% around the world since the 1960s, while a study of 30 models found that yields would decline by 6% for every one degree Celsius increase in temperature."
> 
> I think what people forget is a system will always settle to the lowest energy state possible. The amount of methane in the atmosphere has been steadily increasing but we haven't seen as large an increase in temperature as expected. Methane is volatile and behaves differently in different parts of the atmosphere. It has chosen the state that has the lowest energy footprint. There is a high potential for warming physically but observations just don't match expectations.
> 
> The models suck.


Methane has increased about 700 parts per billion since 1950. That's actually a very tiny absolute amount. The expected greenhouse effect from that is not insignificant, but pretty small in comparison to other gases which have had so much more increase in concentration.

Could you be more specific about how is has "chosen" the lowest energy footprint?

Which models are you criticizing? Are you looking at the rough model for how one vaguely defined aspect of agriculture would be affected by climate change and using that as evidence for your disbelief in the models for climate change itself? Because that's the way your message comes off.


----------



## wheresthefbomb

Xaios said:


> At this time of year?
> 
> At this time of day?
> 
> In this part of the country?
> 
> Localized entirely within your kitchen!?



There's a fucking snowflake in my kitchen right now!!

(it's me, I'm the snowflake)


----------



## CanserDYI

wheresthefbomb said:


> There's a fucking snowflake in my kitchen right now!!
> 
> (it's me, I'm the snowflake)


Thought about getting a snowflake tattoo as a kind of "owning" of the word as I'm pretty proud of most things I get called a snowflake for.


----------



## mbardu

lost_horizon said:


> we haven't seen as large an increase in temperature as expected.



Wut


----------



## CanserDYI

Made me think of this thread.


----------



## wheresthefbomb

CanserDYI said:


> View attachment 114700
> 
> Made me think of this thread.



classic


----------



## lost_horizon

bostjan said:


> Methane has increased about 700 parts per billion since 1950. That's actually a very tiny absolute amount. The expected greenhouse effect from that is not insignificant, but pretty small in comparison to other gases which have had so much more increase in concentration.


Methanes in their models are predicted to have 13x the warming vs C02 from methane, it has not shown up, why? Please stop asking me questions, I didn't write the models, I didn't write the papers based upon modelling (not real world data), I didn't say it was going to happen. Your questions should be directed at people who made these predictions. This is the whole basis for the 'Cow farts - stop eating meat' fallacy. We paid these people billions of dollars, hold them accountable.


bostjan said:


> Could you be more specific about how is has "chosen" the lowest energy footprint?


Yes, methane is very volatile and spontaneously combusts or is oxidised all on it's own after about 12 years. It will do whatever is easiest for it not the behaviour that will result in the most warming. Methane will break down ASAP, in fact the more energy methane absorbs it makes it break down even faster into less warming compounds.


bostjan said:


> Which models are you criticizing? Are you looking at the rough model for how one vaguely defined aspect of agriculture would be affected by climate change and using that as evidence for your disbelief in the models for climate change itself? Because that's the way your message comes off.


All of the models, Sea level, ocean warming, temperature, agriculture. They are consistently wrong and the behaviour is to double down on them, reset the clock and say 'in x years' according to the same models, that thing will now change x by year x. They should be honest and say 'We got it wrong' or 'we don't know' because if they were honest they would.

The methane stuff affects food production, taxes, company accounts and peoples lives. They need to be honest about it.

As an instrument technician the tolerances these people put on things is insane. When i am weighing a gram of material in front of me I am not even sure of the weight of something due to the tolerance of the equipment, using the most accurate balance in the world. When people are measuring the temperature from space, from a variety of different sources and equipment, in particular locations and not in other locations and modelling it and averaging for the entire year there is only one way your tolerance goes up, vastly. When someone shows you a heatmap of the earth, know that there is no measurements for a majority of the earth and it is inferred. NOAA saying the earth in 2021 was 0.13 Degrees cooler than 2020 is impossible to say and riddled with errors and uncertainty.

Pronounced differences between observed and CMIP5-simulated multidecadal climate variability in the twentieth century​


https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/2017GL074016



Forecasting global climate change​


https://www.researchgate.net/publication/284482158_Forecasting_global_climate_change



I don't doubt the climate is changing, I don't doubt humans are responsible. I believe we need to lessen our use of carbon based fuels and go nuclear. When the models are 8 x worse than a model that just says it would be the same temperature forever how can people or the public trust them? These models do not model the past, let alone the future. It shouldn't be controversial to say when there is now so much evidence for the uncertainty and failure of the models.


----------



## bostjan

@lost_horizon

I ask you questions because you are the only one trying to argue that everything else is wrong. If no one is allowed to ask for clarification, it's a huge red flag that you are just talking out of your ass.

I'd suggest reading that first source more carefully. Or just generally either do research more carefully or else choose your arguments better. It's about how to improve the models, and it even makes it clear that it's not calling any of them out for being wrong. 

As for methane... if it's 13x worse, but the increase in concentration is tens of thousands of times less, what does that mean? What is your point? Do you know what methane becomes when it oxidizes?

Much of what the earlier models predicted was based on the industrial practices at the time, and I recall the majority of them stating such. Even the idiotic sensationalist mainstream media at the time reflected that. Blaming scientists for getting that wrong is dumb. If your mom told you, as a kid, that you'd flunk out of school if you didn't do your homework, you can't do your homework and then say "I told you I wouldn't flunk out!"


----------



## Drew

bostjan said:


> Much of what the earlier models predicted was based on the industrial practices at the time, and I recall the majority of them stating such. Even the idiotic sensationalist mainstream media at the time reflected that. Blaming scientists for getting that wrong is dumb. If your mom told you, as a kid, that you'd flunk out of school if you didn't do your homework, you can't do your homework and then say "I told you I wouldn't flunk out!"


Excellent metaphor.


----------



## lost_horizon

bostjan said:


> @lost_horizon
> 
> I ask you questions because you are the only one trying to argue that everything else is wrong. If no one is allowed to ask for clarification, it's a huge red flag that you are just talking out of your ass.


Sources quoting multiple studies supplied for your clarification. Your opinion of talking out my ass is discarded. Have you ever published a scientific or research paper? it is immaterial whether I have or you have or not. Look at the information and come to a reasonable conclusion. I am not a science snob, all these papers are accessible for anyone to look at. Did you look at them and come to an alternate conclusion, that they were all accurate?


bostjan said:


> I'd suggest reading that first source more carefully. Or just generally either do research more carefully or else choose your arguments better. It's about how to improve the models, and it even makes it clear that it's not calling any of them out for being wrong.


For the Laymen:
"Global and regional warming trends over the course of the twentieth century have been nonuniform, with decadal and longer periods of faster or slower warming, or even cooling. Here we show that state-of-the-art global models used to predict climate* fail to adequately reproduce such multidecadal climate variations*. In particular, the models *underestimate the magnitude of the observed variability and misrepresent its spatial pattern*. Therefore, our ability to interpret the observed climate change using these models is limited." 


bostjan said:


> As for methane... if it's 13x worse, but the increase in concentration is tens of thousands of times less, what does that mean? What is your point? Do you know what methane becomes when it oxidizes?





Methane hasn't met modelled methane, but who would've have expected models to be accurate. According to this graph, methane has major things to do with emissions. Methane has steadily gone up but even the lowest of those temperature increases haven't show up. Therefore it shouldn't be possible to have an earth this cool according to the NOAA at +0.84 C (as at 2021 below all other lines on that graph)) and have methane that high. Once again I didn't make these predictions, NOAA did. They were wrong.
Is this year 10 chemistry or my university Quantum Phenomena 2 class? Carbon Dioxide and Water. Absorbing less infra red per gram than methane.


bostjan said:


> Much of what the earlier models predicted was based on the industrial practices at the time, and I recall the majority of them stating such. Even the idiotic sensationalist mainstream media at the time reflected that. Blaming scientists for getting that wrong is dumb. If your mom told you, as a kid, that you'd flunk out of school if you didn't do your homework, you can't do your homework and then say "I told you I wouldn't flunk out!"


No, they were based upon one thing, increasing CO2 emissions causing increased temperature, less rain and more storms. CO2 emissions have increased. Warming has not increased as much as they said. They argued about how much warming would be for each ppm CO2, ranging from alot to a little. Even then the actual figure was much lower than the lowest band expected. Are you arguing they were not?


----------



## Drew

lost_horizon said:


> No, they were based upon one thing, increasing CO2 emissions causing increased temperature, less rain and more storms. CO2 emissions have increased. Warming has not increased as much as they said. They argued about how much warming would be for each ppm CO2, ranging from alot to a little. Even then the actual figure was much lower than the lowest band expected. Are you arguing they were not?


Are you arguing that virtually every model didn't get the _direction_ of the impact right, even if the initial modeling of the _magnitude_ wasn't right? 

It's not like the world is cooling and storms are getting more moderate.


----------



## zappatton2

What an insane week! I've got a lot of family out in Nova Scotia, and a few in Florida too, the coverage has been terrifying to follow. Hope everyone around here who is in affected areas is going okay.

How long before this thread becomes the climate disaster check-in thread?


----------



## Drew

zappatton2 said:


> What an insane week! I've got a lot of family out in Nova Scotia, and a few in Florida too, the coverage has been terrifying to follow. Hope everyone around here who is in affected areas is going okay.
> 
> How long before this thread becomes the climate disaster check-in thread?


Any day now, I'd say. 

Initial estimates for Ian are at least 21 dead and damage in the $65-100B range, and the storm is just hitting North Carolina as a Cat 1, after strengthening over the ocean again. Should be one of the most expensive hurricanes on record at the rate things are going.


----------



## jaxadam

A buddy of mine who lives in Cape Coral (where the storm came up 2 mph shy of a Cat 5) sent me these.


----------



## bostjan

lost_horizon said:


> it is immaterial whether I have or you have or not.


OK. Then why bring this up?

Your quote from the article reinforces exactly what I've said. Maybe you think I'm saying something other than what I am saying or you think that the article is saying something other than what it's saying... I don't know. 

A CO2 increase of 100 ppm was predicted to result in a temperature rise of 2 °C, so, I don't understand why <100 ppb of methane (1000x less amount at 14x more effect per unit concentration) would be predicted to result in more than 0.84 °C. Right? So, what's missing?


----------



## mmr007

jaxadam said:


> A buddy of mine who lives in Cape Coral (where the storm came up 2 mph shy of a Cat 5) sent me these.


The deep state did that. Vote Trump and all weather worries go away.





__





Far-right pundits baselessly claim Hurricane Ian was created by the 'deep state' to target Gov. Ron DeSantis and other red states: 'They are angry with us'






www.msn.com


----------



## narad

jaxadam said:


> A buddy of mine who lives in Cape Coral (where the storm came up 2 mph shy of a Cat 5) sent me these.



Though being florida I'm not sure what these places looked like pre-hurricane


----------



## Drew

Wait.


mmr007 said:


> The deep state did that. Vote Trump and all weather worries go away.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> __
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Far-right pundits baselessly claim Hurricane Ian was created by the 'deep state' to target Gov. Ron DeSantis and other red states: 'They are angry with us'
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.msn.com


You're not kidding.


----------



## mmr007

Drew said:


> Wait.
> 
> You're not kidding.


No I am not. I don't know if it's the jewish space lasers or if Soros and the dems have developed another arsenal of weather changing devices that cause hurricanes that never happened before Kamala Harris was VP, but yes....we live in a world where articles that use to be in the Onion are now real.

I have never been for voter restrictions but seriously, people who believe this shit should not be allowed to vote.


----------



## wheresthefbomb

mmr007 said:


> No I am not. I don't know if it's the jewish space lasers or if Soros and the dems have developed another arsenal of weather changing devices that cause hurricanes that never happened before Kamala Harris was VP, but yes....we live in a world where articles that use to be in the Onion are now real.
> 
> I have never been for voter restrictions but seriously, people who believe this shit should not be allowed to vote.



well HAARP was defunded so it's gotta be something else


----------



## eaeolian

wheresthefbomb said:


> well HAARP was defunded so it's gotta be something else


They *say* it was defunded...


----------



## Drew

mmr007 said:


> No I am not. I don't know if it's the jewish space lasers or if Soros and the dems have developed another arsenal of weather changing devices that cause hurricanes that never happened before Kamala Harris was VP, but yes....we live in a world where articles that use to be in the Onion are now real.
> 
> I have never been for voter restrictions but seriously, people who believe this shit should not be allowed to vote.


The best two parts of this is the Deep State has developed a Weather Control Device, and 1) they're using it to influence presidential elections, rather than inventing an Election Control Device, which of course the far-right thinks the Deep State already has otherwise Trump would have won, and 2) the best way they could think of to use their Weather Control Device to influence an election was running a hurricane through Ft Meyers in September.


----------



## StevenC

eaeolian said:


> They *say* it was defunded...




It never got funded at all

EDIT: broken link to Haarp Machine Indiegogo

EDIT 2: I give up


----------



## mmr007

I wish the democratic deep state would use those rain making machines over here in California. Do I have to think of everything around here? Jeez....


----------



## wheresthefbomb

StevenC said:


> It never got funded at all
> 
> EDIT: broken link to Haarp Machine Indiegogo
> 
> EDIT 2: I give up




I used to do a radio show called Drone Church 8am monday mornings (gotta hit that drive time commute), mostly drone metal with a smattering of other heavies and a blend of satirical and actual news

for a while we were claiming to be running a bake sale to raise the $7.5m operating budget to keep HAARP open, got a lot of kooky phonecall s about that one


----------



## Glades

Well put. This is exactly what happened here.


----------



## jaxadam

Glades said:


> Well put. This is exactly what happened here.



Not here…. I had to rake this shit up myself!


----------



## zappatton2

Glades said:


> Well put. This is exactly what happened here.


Well put? Reads to me like more "culture war" nonsense when it's the last thing that anyone needs right now.


----------



## wheresthefbomb

Glades said:


> Well put. This is exactly what happened here.



this dude sounds fragile as shit.

most men in the lower 48 have no real concept of what it is to be tough, hard, self -sufficient, whatever else their decrepit cowboy mythos tells them about themselves. I'll take the subie-driving cabin-dwelling cardboard-recycling gun-toting lesbian hippie lady next door over some dipshit trucker from Florida when heavy, dirty, cold, nasty shit needs done (and done right) every single time.

not that it should matter, but my best friend is a bearded bisexual truck driver, and another dear friend is an immensely gay heavy equipment operator who works on his diesel truck in his spare time. either of them exudes masculinity on a level that most men can't begin to step to.

the real question here, though, is who the fuck drives a windmill?


----------



## MaxOfMetal

Glades said:


> Well put. This is exactly what happened here.



Tell me you've never seen an Asplundh crew without telling me you've never seen an Asplundh crew.


----------



## jaxadam

Windmills


----------



## wheresthefbomb

So he wanted to see convoys of headbanging SJW prius drivers? 

Well, at least we got that sorted out.


----------



## jaxadam




----------



## jaxadam

wheresthefbomb said:


> not that it should matter, but my best friend is a bearded bisexual truck driver, and another dear friend is an immensely gay heavy equipment operator who works on his diesel truck in his spare time. either of them exudes masculinity on a level that most men can't begin to step to.



You know, I’m having a really hard time buying this…. A diesel, when properly maintained, will hardly ever need any major work done. In your cold environment I would say though that it is imperative to keep the glow plugs plugged in.


----------



## spudmunkey

jaxadam said:


> You know, I’m having a really hard time buying this…. A diesel, when properly maintained, will hardly ever need any major work done. In your cold environment I would say though that it is imperative to keep the glow plugs plugged in.


Maintenance isn't the only thing one can do to "work on" a diesel truck. Tuning, aftermarket parts and upgrades, some people just like to keep everything super clean, etc.


----------



## TedEH

Glades said:


> Well put. This is exactly what happened here.


The "toxic" bit isn't that manly men are using their manly strength to manly help people. Manly. The problem is when you're selective about when (and to whom) you're helpful. Big ol 'rona swept the world, and all the Big Masculine Manly Trucker Men threw hissy fits over it instead of trying to help anyone. Ottawa occupation anyone?


----------



## wheresthefbomb

spudmunkey said:


> Maintenance isn't the only thing one can do to "work on" a diesel truck. Tuning, aftermarket parts and upgrades, some people just like to keep everything super clean, etc.



It was a decrepit piece of shit when my buddy bought it. Now it's a slightly-less-decrepit piece of shit. One day it will be an immortal beater.

Also tho, SSO's resident "clever guy" isn't a dense as he likes to pretend.


----------



## nightflameauto

Glades said:


> Well put. This is exactly what happened here.


Yes, awesome. During a time of crisis there are plenty of folks ready and willing to step up and spout more divisive bullshit. Bravo. Way to keep our expectations for our fellow man low during a bad time.


----------



## Drew

Glades said:


> Well put. This is exactly what happened here.


Where's the part where Rubio and Scott begged the federal government for aid, and then voted against it, for Political Reasons?


----------



## StevenC

Drew said:


> Where's the part where Rubio and Scott begged the federal government for aid, and then voted against it, for Political Reasons?


Gaetz too


----------



## Drew

StevenC said:


> Gaetz too


I'm sorry, I make it a point not to follow pedophiles, so I missed that.


----------



## StevenC

Drew said:


> I'm sorry, I make it a point not to follow pedophiles, so I missed that.


I respect that, but you have talked about Trump before so I wasn't sure.


----------



## spudmunkey

Drew said:


> Where's the part where Rubio and Scott begged the federal government for aid, and then voted against it, for Political Reasons?





StevenC said:


> Gaetz too



Literally every Florida member of both houses of Congress voted against it. Something like 12 or 16 congresspeople.


----------



## jaxadam

The US President's embarrasing slip of the tounge: "No one fucks with Biden"


Joe Biden is earning himself an unwanted reputation in the White House. Since he became President, he's had several unfortunate moments in which he's appeared completely...




amp.marca.com





This guy fucks.


----------



## nightflameauto

jaxadam said:


> The US President's embarrasing slip of the tounge: "No one fucks with Biden"
> 
> 
> Joe Biden is earning himself an unwanted reputation in the White House. Since he became President, he's had several unfortunate moments in which he's appeared completely...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> amp.marca.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This guy fucks.


You know, he should just own that one. When some reporter is dipshit enough to confront him about a slip like that, he should just be, "Damn right. I said it and I'll say it again. Just to clarify for you simpletons. Nobody. Fucks. With. Biden. Good day." *DROPS MIC*

Alt-take: So nice for the Democrats to finally have their Ronald Regan. The lights are on, but every once in a while you wonder if anybody's home.

Somebody give us a compelling candidate that doesn't make someone with a conscience want to run screaming the other direction? Please?


----------



## jaxadam

nightflameauto said:


> You know, he should just own that one. When some reporter is dipshit enough to confront him about a slip like that, he should just be, "Damn right. I said it and I'll say it again. Just to clarify for you simpletons. Nobody. Fucks. With. Biden. Good day." *DROPS MIC*
> 
> Alt-take: So nice for the Democrats to finally have their Ronald Regan. The lights are on, but every once in a while you wonder if anybody's home.
> 
> Somebody give us a compelling candidate that doesn't make someone with a conscience want to run screaming the other direction? Please?



See, I thought he said no one DUCKS a Biden in reference to the upcoming UFC PPV Trump backed out of because they wouldn’t sell the promotion to him.


----------



## wheresthefbomb

Legitimately, I don't think anyone _does_ fuck with him. I don't know anyone who voted for him because they thought he'd make a great president. All he had to do was not be Trump.


----------



## jaxadam




----------



## spudmunkey

jaxadam said:


> The US President's embarrasing slip of the tounge: "No one fucks with Biden"
> 
> 
> Joe Biden is earning himself an unwanted reputation in the White House. Since he became President, he's had several unfortunate moments in which he's appeared completely...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> amp.marca.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This guy fucks.


"Unwanted" and "embarrassing" are clearly projection.


----------



## bostjan

I want to think that there probably was no context. Biden just walked up to him and said a bunch of non sequiturs, and the mayor just agreed. Not because Biden is senile (not saying he's _not_), but because that's how I picture politicians talking to each other on a day-to-day basis. Here you expect a world leader at this level to say something profound, or, at least, motivational, and, instead, you get someone who just doesn't know what to do with his words the moment he's off script.


----------



## jaxadam

bostjan said:


> I want to think that there probably was no context. Biden just walked up to him and said a bunch of non sequiturs, and the mayor just agreed. Not because Biden is senile (not saying he's _not_), but because that's how I picture politicians talking to each other on a day-to-day basis. Here you expect a world leader at this level to say something profound, or, at least, motivational, and, instead, you get someone who just doesn't know what to do with his words the moment he's off script.



He’s no Salmon Chase, that’s for sure.


----------



## narad

jaxadam said:


> See, I thought he said no one DUCKS a Biden in reference to the upcoming UFC PPV Trump backed out of because they wouldn’t sell the promotion to him.



I heard Trump didn't make weight. Very unprofessional.


----------



## Drew

jaxadam said:


> The US President's embarrasing slip of the tounge: "No one fucks with Biden"
> 
> 
> Joe Biden is earning himself an unwanted reputation in the White House. Since he became President, he's had several unfortunate moments in which he's appeared completely...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> amp.marca.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This guy fucks.


All those "Lets Go Brandon" guys must be salivating now that they know he puts out!


----------



## jaxadam

We all know the real reason Biden is down in Florida right now is to scope out potential assisted living facilities.


----------



## Drew

jaxadam said:


> We all know the real reason Biden is down in Florida right now is to scope out potential assisted living facilities.


I hear there may be a room open at Mar-a-Lago soon!


----------



## wheresthefbomb

Drew said:


> I hear there may be a room open at Mar-a-Lago soon!



"Mar-a-Lago: Where nobody fucks with you."


----------



## jaxadam

Drew said:


> I hear there may be a room open at Mar-a-Lago soon!



He does need to go over there and retrieve some documents that’s for sure.


----------



## bostjan

Every president has said some dumb things...



George W Bush said:


> There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again.​


​


George HW Bush said:


> For seven and a half years I've worked alongside President Reagan. We've had triumphs. Made some mistakes. We've had some sex...uh...setbacks.





Ronald Reagan said:


> Well, I learned a lot...I went down to (Latin America) to find out from them and (learn) their views. You'd be surprised. They're all individual countries.





Bill Clinton said:


> It depends on what the meaning of the words 'is' is.



I'm sure you can find at least a dozen really puzzling and hilarious (in hindsight) quotes from GWB. He was a real headcase. And I'm sure there are some from Barack America from when he was president. Er, storybookman, er, Obama, you know, whatever his name was, best friends with the guy who you don't fuck with, er, what was that guy's name...

On one hand, it's fun to point and laugh at Trump being an asshole, if you are a republican, or Biden being a stammering pile of jelly, if you are a democrat. If you are independent, these people should all scare the bejezees out of you, since the guy bragging about how big his doomsday button is, is the guy who has the power to press that button and potentially destroy life on earth. Even something as silly as Biden insisting that a wheelchair-bound senator stand up is frightening, because, well, how well do you think Biden is paying attention to his briefs and whatnot when he can't even formulate a coherent thought some of the time. If he wasn't president, he'd probably be falling for phishing scams on the internet.

Like, imagine for a moment that the MLB decided to have each league nominate one team to go to the World Series, and play three games, with no one keeping score, and then, people would go out and vote for whichever team they think deserves to win, but, instead of counting those votes, the players from the other MLB teams all promise to vote on behalf of their fans, and that was how we determined who would win the pennant. Then, the leagues nominate the Diamondbacks and the Orioles as the two teams. That's pretty much how politics works, except, if a bad team wins the World Series, life goes on; if a bad person becomes president, you could end up with an angry mob breaking into the capitol and murdering police officers in order to change the result, or you could end up with Putin trying to take over the world, or you could end up with the worst public health crises for over a century, or worse.


----------



## nightflameauto

bostjan said:


> Every president has said some dumb things...
> 
> ​
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I'm sure you can find at least a dozen really puzzling and hilarious (in hindsight) quotes from GWB. He was a real headcase. And I'm sure there are some from Barack America from when he was president. Er, storybookman, er, Obama, you know, whatever his name was, best friends with the guy who you don't fuck with, er, what was that guy's name...
> 
> On one hand, it's fun to point and laugh at Trump being an asshole, if you are a republican, or Biden being a stammering pile of jelly, if you are a democrat. If you are independent, these people should all scare the bejezees out of you, since the guy bragging about how big his doomsday button is, is the guy who has the power to press that button and potentially destroy life on earth. Even something as silly as Biden insisting that a wheelchair-bound senator stand up is frightening, because, well, how well do you think Biden is paying attention to his briefs and whatnot when he can't even formulate a coherent thought some of the time. If he wasn't president, he'd probably be falling for phishing scams on the internet.
> 
> Like, imagine for a moment that the MLB decided to have each league nominate one team to go to the World Series, and play three games, with no one keeping score, and then, people would go out and vote for whichever team they think deserves to win, but, instead of counting those votes, the players from the other MLB teams all promise to vote on behalf of their fans, and that was how we determined who would win the pennant. Then, the leagues nominate the Diamondbacks and the Orioles as the two teams. That's pretty much how politics works, except, if a bad team wins the World Series, life goes on; if a bad person becomes president, you could end up with an angry mob breaking into the capitol and murdering police officers in order to change the result, or you could end up with Putin trying to take over the world, or you could end up with the worst public health crises for over a century, or worse.


As a mostly independent, though Democrat leaning to stop the crazed maniac contingent, allow me to quote an old favorite, Cyclone Temple:
"Sometimes I laugh, HA, laugh to keep from cryin'"

Hell, that should just be the stamp on every political process in America.


----------



## jaxadam

Drew said:


> I hear there may be a room open at Mar-a-Lago soon!



On second thought, he might need to drop Hunter off there!









Feds see enough evidence to charge Hunter Biden with tax, gun-buy crimes, report says — CNBC


Hunter Biden, son of President Joe Biden, revealed shortly after his father's defeat of President Donald Trump in 2020 that he was under criminal investigation.




apple.news


----------



## Glades

Not gonna lie, this was amazing. 3 days!


----------



## Drew

jaxadam said:


> He does need to go over there and retrieve some documents that’s for sure.


You saw the stories, i take it, that the National Archives are prtty sure Trump _still_ has classified documents in his possession, in other parts of the building than where the raid occurred?


----------



## lost_horizon

Drew said:


> Are you arguing that virtually every model didn't get the _direction_ of the impact right, even if the initial modeling of the _magnitude_ wasn't right?


No, I am arguing it is not an exact science and pretending it is is bull crap.


Drew said:


> It's not like the world is cooling and storms are getting more moderate.


The argument is the amount of warming (they fail to predict) so don't hang your hat on it and as for moderate, i am loving the slower less frequent storms:

There is evidence for a slowing of tropical cyclone propagation speeds over the continental U.S. over the past century, but these observed changes have not yet been confidently linked to anthropogenic climate change.
There is no strong evidence of century-scale increasing trends in U.S. landfalling hurricanes or major hurricanes, Similarly for Atlantic _basin-wide_ hurricanes (after adjusting for observing capabilities), there is not strong evidence for an increase since the late 1800s in hurricanes, major hurricanes, or the proportion of hurricanes that reach major hurricane intensity.


----------



## narad

lost_horizon said:


> No, I am arguing it is not an exact science and pretending it is is bull crap.


----------



## Drew

lost_horizon said:


> No, I am arguing it is not an exact science and pretending it is is bull crap.
> 
> The argument is the amount of warming (they fail to predict) so don't hang your hat on it and as for moderate, i am loving the slower less frequent storms:
> 
> There is evidence for a slowing of tropical cyclone propagation speeds over the continental U.S. over the past century, but these observed changes have not yet been confidently linked to anthropogenic climate change.
> There is no strong evidence of century-scale increasing trends in U.S. landfalling hurricanes or major hurricanes, Similarly for Atlantic _basin-wide_ hurricanes (after adjusting for observing capabilities), there is not strong evidence for an increase since the late 1800s in hurricanes, major hurricanes, or the proportion of hurricanes that reach major hurricane intensity.


Oh wait, it's not about _if_ warming is occuring, but rather if we can exactly predict how MUCH it's warming. Gotcha.  Again, there is _no serious debate_ that the earth is warming and very, very little peer-reviewed evidence that this is unrelated to CO2 emissions. 

Basically what you're saying is akin to just because we can't exactly model how fast a car coming right at us is accelerating, means it's standing still and we're definitely not about to get hit. Sure thing, boss.

We've covered that paper before. The gist is "there isn't an increase in severity or frequency of storms, provided we assume that we were just missing a lot of storms before." That's awfully tenuous, but hey, good on Nature for at least agreeing to run something this shaky, to give other scientists the opportunity to poke holes in it.


----------



## lost_horizon

Drew said:


> We've covered that paper before. The gist is "there isn't an increase in severity or frequency of storms, provided we assume that we were just missing a lot of storms before." That's awfully tenuous, but hey, good on Nature for at least agreeing to run something this shaky, to give other scientists the opportunity to poke holes in it.


Thanks to Nature for printing toilet paper instead of a science paper! There's nothing to poke holes in, it's all holes!


----------



## narad

lost_horizon said:


> Thanks to Nature for printing toilet paper instead of a science paper! There's nothing to poke holes in, it's all holes!


If it's all holes, I wouldn't recommend using it as toilet paper.


----------



## AMOS

lost_horizon said:


> No, I am arguing it is not an exact science and pretending it is is bull crap.
> 
> The argument is the amount of warming (they fail to predict) so don't hang your hat on it and as for moderate, i am loving the slower less frequent storms:
> 
> There is evidence for a slowing of tropical cyclone propagation speeds over the continental U.S. over the past century, but these observed changes have not yet been confidently linked to anthropogenic climate change.
> There is no strong evidence of century-scale increasing trends in U.S. landfalling hurricanes or major hurricanes, Similarly for Atlantic _basin-wide_ hurricanes (after adjusting for observing capabilities), there is not strong evidence for an increase since the late 1800s in hurricanes, major hurricanes, or the proportion of hurricanes that reach major hurricane intensity.


We've been heading towards a mini Ice Age according to several scientists, it's definitely not new news. I wonder what kind of instability that causes with the climate beforehand? No one's experienced it so they speculate that it creates random events.


----------



## Drew

lost_horizon said:


> Thanks to Nature for printing toilet paper instead of a science paper! There's nothing to poke holes in, it's all holes!


You're totally right, there absolutely COULD be a couple hundred angels dancing on the head of that pin.


----------



## AMOS

The population reached 8 Billion yesterday, they say the growth through 2050 will be slower than it was during the last decade. We've gained 1 Billion since 2010. I'm giving mankind 300 years tops, and we're all done. The climate in southern India is becoming too hot to live, this will force migrations north which will further congest large cities. And their population will surpass China shortly. Africa will die out first, followed by India, southern China, South America. Where will all those people go? By 2050 we're supposed to have 9.7 Billion.


----------



## vilk

Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov. The global population (which is actually 8 billion in the book) will all live in like 6 or 7 super cities that are covered by giant steel domes.


----------



## Glades

AMOS said:


> The population reached 8 Billion yesterday, they say the growth through 2050 will be slower than it was during the last decade. We've gained 1 Billion since 2010. I'm giving mankind 300 years tops, and we're all done. The climate in southern India is becoming too hot to live, this will force migrations north which will further congest large cities. And their population will surpass China shortly. Africa will die out first, followed by India, southern China, South America. Where will all those people go? By 2050 we're supposed to have 9.7 Billion.


Stop. Projections have population curves hitting a plateau. Many first world countries already have declining populations.
As 3rd world countries develop, the same will happen and population growth will stop.
If there is any issue with earth, is there will not be enough people.


----------



## Grindspine

AMOS said:


> Has anyone else had strange weather patterns for the last few years? I live in S.E. New England and we've had more brutal wind storms than I can remember at any other point in my life (I'm 59) The occasional Hurricane we get are dismal compared to our Nor'Easters and other bad wind storms that seem to come out of nowhere. several people I know are convinced there's something funny going on, if these are natural cycles, then they are some pretty brutal cycles. I'm a Conservative that believes man is creating some of this mess, but it's not limited to that. I feel it's coinciding with other natural cycles. Sun, Planet etc.. but surely record high CO2 levels in the atmosphere for the last half decade or so must be doing something.
> 
> I'm looking for any input from your part of the country/world, and if things have been getting extreme, or even if things haven't changed at all.


Winters when I was younger had wayyy more snow than they do now.

There is a model called the "daisyworld" model. A world covered with white daisies reflects more light, so does not get as hot over time. A world covered with dark daisies converts more infrared radiation to heat, so gets warmer over time. When applied to real world snow patterns, white snow reflects more light and resists heating as quickly as compared to cold areas without snow cover due to this different in reflected rather than absorbed radiation. Lack of snow eventually causes more heat in the atmosphere, which powers more extreme air movement, thus stronger storm activity.


----------



## Grindspine

AMOS said:


> The population reached 8 Billion yesterday, they say the growth through 2050 will be slower than it was during the last decade. We've gained 1 Billion since 2010. I'm giving mankind 300 years tops, and we're all done. The climate in southern India is becoming too hot to live, this will force migrations north which will further congest large cities. And their population will surpass China shortly. Africa will die out first, followed by India, southern China, South America. Where will all those people go? By 2050 we're supposed to have 9.7 Billion.


Yeah, people need to quit breeding so damn much.


----------



## Drew

Grindspine said:


> Winters when I was younger had wayyy more snow than they do now.
> 
> There is a model called the "daisyworld" model. A world covered with white daisies reflects more light, so does not get as hot over time. A world covered with dark daisies converts more infrared radiation to heat, so gets warmer over time. When applied to real world snow patterns, white snow reflects more light and resists heating as quickly as compared to cold areas without snow cover due to this different in reflected rather than absorbed radiation. Lack of snow eventually causes more heat in the atmosphere, which powers more extreme air movement, thus stronger storm activity.


There's another wrinkle to this, too - as climate change has led to more frequent, more severe droughts in parts of the world, wildfires have become larger. Wildfires in California and Colorado have been so bad in recent years that they've sent ash plumes into the atmosphere creating visble haze across the entire country, extending as far as here in Boston. In doing so, they've left soot accumulation on snowfields in the mountains of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. Soot is black and absorbs solar radiation, which not only does this increase the amount of retained radiation, but it causes snow to melt faster, running off for a shorter period of time, and leading to even greater drought conditions, and in turn more fires. 

For anyone bitching about "climate change isn't real because the models haven't gotten the changes exactly right," one of the big problems is the sheer number of little feedback loops like this that are so easy to overlook. Twenty years ago, were we thinking about the impact of accumulated soot on snowfields when modeling global temperatures? Probably not.


----------



## bostjan

Drew said:


> There's another wrinkle to this, too - as climate change has led to more frequent, more severe droughts in parts of the world, wildfires have become larger. Wildfires in California and Colorado have been so bad in recent years that they've sent ash plumes into the atmosphere creating visble haze across the entire country, extending as far as here in Boston. In doing so, they've left soot accumulation on snowfields in the mountains of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. Soot is black and absorbs solar radiation, which not only does this increase the amount of retained radiation, but it causes snow to melt faster, running off for a shorter period of time, and leading to even greater drought conditions, and in turn more fires.
> 
> For anyone bitching about "climate change isn't real because the models haven't gotten the changes exactly right," one of the big problems is the sheer number of little feedback loops like this that are so easy to overlook. Twenty years ago, were we thinking about the impact of accumulated soot on snowfields when modeling global temperatures? Probably not.


Yes.

I have always been perplexed when deniers say that climate change is bunk, and then go on to point out how many variables there are. In what other field would you have a best guess that 90%+ of experts agree is the best guess, which includes an action plan to stop things from getting so bad, and it'd be fair to dismiss the action plan because "well, we don't really know for certain if it'll get that bad?"

For example, if you were attacked by a raccoon, and you went to the doctor, and they did some tests, and said they were 90% certain that you had rabies, so you either get a painful shot in the stomach, or else you would likely die a horrible agonizing death, would you say "meh, 90%, that means 10% chance that I'm fine. I'll take my chances."? I just don't get it.

I mean, if anyone wants to get 100% philosophical, it's the nature of information and perception, that we never ever actually know something with 100% certainty. Usually there is a threshold where you pretty much neglect the uncertainty, but even if you have no idea what you are observing, if it's life-versus-death, you have to go with the most probably explanation for something. And if that most probably explanation is as certain as we are about our climate change models, that'd actually be a really good probability to take action.


----------



## Andromalia

The trees outside my place are barely beginning to yellow. It's the 18th of November, they should be naked at that point, with a few leftover brown leaves.



> We've gained 1 Billion since 2010. I'm giving mankind 300 years tops, and we're all done.


Not all billions are equal. When all is said and done, Africa is emitting 6% of the world CO2. I guess we could add a few more billion people in Africa and not notice. They're way less damaging than the 300 million americans, or the 440ish EU nationals. 

As a reminder, 7 countries are responsible for 70ish% of the total emissions, cumulative counted from 1850: The USA, China, Russia, Brazil, Indonesia, Germany and India.
If you want to count per inhabitant, the top offenders are NZ, Canada, Australia, the USA, Argentina and Qatar.

Those are the countries where population changes matter. Zimbabwe ? Not so much.
To note, some "poor" countries are following, most of them being actually rich countries where the oil money gets funneled to the corrupted elites while the rest of the population stays poor, such as Nigeria. 

Graphs and sources available there:








Quels sont les pays qui totalisent le plus d'émissions de CO2 depuis 1850 ?


Quand on prend le classement actuel des plus gros émetteurs de gaz à effet de serre, on trouve en première place la Chine, loin devant les États-Unis et l’Inde. Mais le réchauffement n’est pas...




www.futura-sciences.com




(in french, but the graphs can be read by anyone)


----------



## profwoot

Glades said:


> Stop. Projections have population curves hitting a plateau. Many first world countries already have declining populations.
> As 3rd world countries develop, the same will happen and population growth will stop.
> If there is any issue with earth, is there will not be enough people.


I'm inclined to agree, particularly when taking into account plummeting sperm counts worldwide (>50% over the last 40 years). Nobody seems to be talking about this, but conception becomes difficult at ~40M/ml and the average has already reached a bit less than 50M/ml so another generation at this rate and things might get dicey.


----------



## Grindspine

profwoot said:


> I'm inclined to agree, particularly when taking into account plummeting sperm counts worldwide (>50% over the last 40 years). Nobody seems to be talking about this, but conception becomes difficult at ~40M/ml and the average has already reached a bit less than 50M/ml so another generation at this rate and things might get dicey.


Thomas Malthus - Essay on the Principle of Population sounds like a necessary reading assignment for you.








An Essay on the Principle of Population - Wikipedia







en.wikipedia.org


----------



## jaxadam

The population of my house is 4 and sometimes I think that’s about 2 kids too many.


----------



## profwoot

Grindspine said:


> Thomas Malthus - Essay on the Principle of Population sounds like a necessary reading assignment for you.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> An Essay on the Principle of Population - Wikipedia
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> en.wikipedia.org


I'm familiar with his work. Why do you think it's relevant to dropping sperm counts?


----------



## Grindspine

Humans have nearly saturated what the earth can sustain, therefore, biologically, high sperm counts and making many babies per each male is no longer necessary for the species to survive.

Nobody is talking about it because it is a non-issue; it does not threaten the survival of the species nearly as much as climate change, overpopulation, famine, disease, class inequity, random meteor or comets, etc.


----------



## narad

jaxadam said:


> The population of my house is 4 and sometimes I think that’s about 2 kids too many.



That would have been an interesting alternate ending to _Sophie's Choice_.


----------



## spudmunkey

profwoot said:


> I'm inclined to agree, particularly when taking into account plummeting sperm counts worldwide (>50% over the last 40 years). Nobody seems to be talking about this, but conception becomes difficult at ~40M/ml and the average has already reached a bit less than 50M/ml so another generation at this rate and things might get dicey.



It used to be that people with higher sperm counts were more likely to get someone pregnant during sex, having more children, and passing down those traits faster than people with fewer children. Since people are having fewer children overall, there's a bit of balancing going on.

Do I think that forever chemicals, microplastics, hormones in meat, etc aren't having an effect? Of course not...but don't believe it to be the primary driver in the observed drop in sperm count. I think it's a _side effect_ of humanity having fewer children, not the cause.


----------



## profwoot

Your testes don't know that there are 8 billion people in the world, and there's certainly no selection pressure in favor of lower sperm counts going on. So while it might currently seem like a natural "balancing" that nobody should worry about, there is simply no biological mechanism by which that could occur. Sperm counts aren't "balancing"; they're dropping precipitously. Whatever is causing it is going to keep causing it until it becomes a big problem, unless we figure out what it is and remedy it.


----------



## Grindspine

profwoot said:


> Your testes don't know that there are 8 billion people in the world, and there's certainly no selection pressure in favor of lower sperm counts going on. So while it might currently seem like a natural "balancing" that nobody should worry about, there is simply no biological mechanism by which that could occur. Sperm counts aren't "balancing"; they're dropping precipitously. Whatever is causing it is going to keep causing it until it becomes a big problem, unless we figure out what it is and remedy it.


You are missing a fundamental point here. It is not selective pressure favoring low sperm counts, there is just a lack of pressure favoring high sperm counts.

Kinda like how something can sound "darker" by boosting the bass OR cutting the treble.


----------



## profwoot

Grindspine said:


> You are missing a fundamental point here. It is not selective pressure favoring low sperm counts, there is just a lack of pressure favoring high sperm counts.
> 
> Kinda like how something can sound "darker" by boosting the bass OR cutting the treble.


Lack of positive pressure != negative pressure. Also this is happening far too quickly to be the result of any kind of selection.


----------



## Grindspine

profwoot said:


> Lack of positive pressure != negative pressure. Also this is happening far too quickly to be the result of any kind of selection.
> 
> 
> profwoot said:
> 
> 
> 
> I'm inclined to agree, particularly when taking into account plummeting sperm counts worldwide (>50% over the last 40 years). Nobody seems to be talking about this, but conception becomes difficult at ~40M/ml and the average has already reached a bit less than 50M/ml so another generation at this rate and things might get dicey.
Click to expand...

40 years times roughly 8 billion people equals a fair amount of room for genetic drift.


----------



## profwoot

Grindspine said:


> 40 years times roughly 8 billion people equals a fair amount of room for genetic drift.


A. No it doesn't. That's two generations.

B. That has nothing to do with what we're talking about. A change like this would require very strong selection pressure over at least hundreds of generations.


----------



## Grindspine

profwoot said:


> A. No it doesn't. That's two generations.
> 
> B. That has nothing to do with what we're talking about. A change like this would require very strong selection pressure over at least hundreds of generations.


My knowledge and experience with population genetics in biology labs at an accredited university disagrees with your assessment.

Summing forty years as "two generations" does not take into account the sheer number of births to reach 8 billion people.


----------



## profwoot

Grindspine said:


> My knowledge and experience with population genetics in biology labs at an accredited university disagrees with your assessment.
> 
> Summing forty years as "two generations" does not take into account the sheer number of births to reach 8 billion people.


Let's not go credential dropping, son. If you think two generations or so of genetic drift, a random process, might be responsible for cutting sperm counts in half worldwide, then you weren't paying much attention during your brief stint in those _accredited university_ biology labs.

I get that everything sucks so everyone is on edge, but god damn do folks hang on tight to every little silly opinion.


----------



## narad

Grindspine said:


> My knowledge and experience with population genetics in biology labs at an accredited university disagrees with your assessment.
> 
> Summing forty years as "two generations" does not take into account the sheer number of births to reach 8 billion people.



Definitely not a good way to make an argument -- you might as well lead with some relevant pieces of information taught at the accredited university rather than basically shut-down discourse altogether. How you then weigh that evidence against the fact that the world is vastly different from last generation, and the previous generation, in terms of everything from environment to behavior, I don't know.

But it worries me that you're arguing against the importance of "generations" as a measuring unit when talking about selectional pressures.


----------



## Grindspine

profwoot said:


> Let's not go credential dropping, son. If you think two generations or so of genetic drift, a random process, might be responsible for cutting sperm counts in half worldwide, then you weren't paying much attention during your brief stint in those _accredited university_ biology labs.
> 
> I get that everything sucks so everyone is on edge, but god damn do folks hang on tight to every little silly opinion.


Mentioning some opinion based on relevant education is better for discourse than a patronizing tone with calling one "son".



narad said:


> Definitely not a good way to make an argument -- you might as well lead with some relevant pieces of information taught at the accredited university rather than basically shut-down discourse altogether. How you then weigh that evidence against the fact that the world is vastly different from last generation, and the previous generation, in terms of everything from environment to behavior, I don't know.
> 
> But it worries me that you're arguing against the importance of "generations" as a measuring unit when talking about selectional pressures.


Sperm counts drop as life expectancy increases. Sure, I could write a paper for you on the topic, but I have a mortgage to pay and you aren't paying me for my aforementioned knowledge and experience.


----------



## narad

Grindspine said:


> Sperm counts drop as life expectancy increases. Sure, I could write a paper for you on the topic, but I have a mortgage to pay and you aren't paying me for my aforementioned knowledge and experience.



I guess a mortgage to pay is today's version of "I have a proof but it is too long to fit into the margins"


----------



## bostjan

profwoot said:


> A. No it doesn't. That's two generations.
> 
> B. That has nothing to do with what we're talking about. A change like this would require very strong selection pressure over at least hundreds of generations.


His point is that, when there are thousands of options of people to choose to mate with, and there is less social and environmental pressure to mate at all, the process of selecting traits to pass on to the next generation is far more exclusive, which accounts for more rapid evolution of population traits. I don't know how strong the effect is, though


----------



## profwoot

Grindspine said:


> Mentioning some opinion based on relevant education is better for discourse than a patronizing tone with calling one "son".
> 
> 
> Sperm counts drop as life expectancy increases. Sure, I could write a paper for you on the topic, but I have a mortgage to pay and you aren't paying me for my aforementioned knowledge and experience.


There's no reason to think that any inverse correlation between sperm counts and life expectancy is causal in nature. Life expectancy increased as medicine (particularly obstetric/neonatal) got better and society in general got safer. Sperm counts started dropping later, only in the last several decades, after most of the life expectancy gains had already happened.


----------



## wheresthefbomb

even if we've inflicted lowered sperm counts on ourselves, in the grand scheme it sounds a lot like a natural system tending toward balance 

bring on the no-babies, I say!


----------



## nightflameauto

wheresthefbomb said:


> even if we've inflicted lowered sperm counts on ourselves, in the grand scheme it sounds a lot like a natural system tending toward balance
> 
> bring on the no-babies, I say!


In "modern" living there's three things that are certain:
1. You will pay. Oh, motherfucker, you will pay.
2. Death comes for all of us, regardless of how preachy you've been your entire life.
3. There is very, VERY little natural left to us in modern society.

Sedentary lifestyles lead to lowered testosterone production leads to lowered sperm count. Not a hard thing to sort out. While this isn't completely and 100% to blame, it's a big part of it. Granted, stuffing our faces with every chemical under the sun isn't helping much. Eating found grains, fresh killed meat, fresh eggs is a far cry from the polluted toxic radiated bullshit we can buy at most grocery stores. Also, spending most of your time out hunting, gathering, or running from danger is a far cry from sitting at a desk staring at artificial lights for 99.99% of your waking hours.

We didn't evolve to live this way. And we are paying the price. Each of us individually, and as a species.


----------



## Drew

Grindspine said:


> Thomas Malthus - Essay on the Principle of Population sounds like a necessary reading assignment for you.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> An Essay on the Principle of Population - Wikipedia
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> en.wikipedia.org


Malthus died in the 1830s. The irony here was, he was alive for the industrial revolution, but failed to see how the rapid increases in productivity would raise the human population above bare subsistence and allow society not to collapse back to barely above starvation level time and time again.



bostjan said:


> I have always been perplexed when deniers say that climate change is bunk, and then go on to point out how many variables there are. In what other field would you have a best guess that 90%+ of experts agree is the best guess, which includes an action plan to stop things from getting so bad, and it'd be fair to dismiss the action plan because "well, we don't really know for certain if it'll get that bad?"


I mean, beyond that, the fact that most of the "the models are wrong!" guys have shifted from saying that the models are wrong because they projected the planet to warm and it didn't, but from saying the models are wrong because they predicted more or less warming than we got. 

Like, the model may not precisely generate the correct value, but if it points you in the right direction, then it gets you close enough to make some policy decisions. True North isn't exactly Magnetic North, but for much of the globe you can still use a magnetic compass to navigate VERY effectively, you know?


----------



## wheresthefbomb

nightflameauto said:


> In "modern" living there's three things that are certain:
> 1. You will pay. Oh, motherfucker, you will pay.
> 2. Death comes for all of us, regardless of how preachy you've been your entire life.
> 3. There is very, VERY little natural left to us in modern society.
> 
> Sedentary lifestyles lead to lowered testosterone production leads to lowered sperm count. Not a hard thing to sort out. While this isn't completely and 100% to blame, it's a big part of it. Granted, stuffing our faces with every chemical under the sun isn't helping much. Eating found grains, fresh killed meat, fresh eggs is a far cry from the polluted toxic radiated bullshit we can buy at most grocery stores. Also, spending most of your time out hunting, gathering, or running from danger is a far cry from sitting at a desk staring at artificial lights for 99.99% of your waking hours.
> 
> We didn't evolve to live this way. And we are paying the price. Each of us individually, and as a species.



another perspective is that everything we do is necessarily "natural," if completely unprecedented and often deleterious to our own survival

I still say bring on the no-babies


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## nightflameauto

wheresthefbomb said:


> another perspective is that everything we do is necessarily "natural," if completely unprecedented and often deleterious to our own survival
> 
> I still say bring on the no-babies


Yeah, I try to be fairly understanding when it comes to different perspectives, but the perspective that everything humans do has to be natural just because we sprang from nature is a tough one to swallow. I know we aren't the only species to sometimes cause disasters for ourselves, but we are the only one that's managed to do it on a planetary wide scale. While some are proud of that, it doesn't feel very 'natural.'

Now, if somebody were to get nitty-gritty "where's the cutoff" about it on me, I'd say once you got a species spending more of its time shuffling virtual bullshit around rather than doing anything physical? You've slipped past natural. I'm sure there's some point, likely before the printing press, possibly around or even before the dark ages, where the line between natural and not natural was fairly blurry, but there's nothing natural about the way a modern American lives. Not even a little.

And hey, I'm all for less babies. If it brings extermination? Meh. I did care at one time. But I seriously think I went full George Carlin and gave the fuck up. We're not gonna turn ourselves around because that might impact the bottom line on the 1%. So the 1% will be all that's left, with a few token births allowed among the plebes so they can keep some servants around? Good for us. Full evolution to our final form and we deserve what we get.


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## Andromalia

Genetics and environment aren't the only selection factor,especially in the case of humans, where the evolutionary presure can be changed by conscious choices. Simple case: war. If the low sperm count but more technologically advanced decide to eradicate the high sperm count "threat", that's your pressure right there and it has nothing to do with genetics.


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## TakeNoPrisoners

profwoot said:


> Your testes don't know that there are 8 billion people in the world, and there's certainly no selection pressure in favor of lower sperm counts going on. So while it might currently seem like a natural "balancing" that nobody should worry about, there is simply no biological mechanism by which that could occur. Sperm counts aren't "balancing"; they're dropping precipitously. Whatever is causing it is going to keep causing it until it becomes a big problem, unless we figure out what it is and remedy it.


 I don’t think you can rule out that there is no selection pressure towards lower sperm count. Sperm production is tied to testosterone production which is largely driven by positive feedback from things like competition in physical activities, hierarchical societies and exercise in general. People living more sedate less active lives in which there is less dominance heiarxhies determined by aggressive behavior and agresssion is less accepted and encouraged will reduce testosterone production which in turn lowers sperm count. Also diet such as eating more soy and less meat can reduce testosterone there can be lots of environmental factors that are natural rather than simply toxic chemicals that may be driving people towards less sperm production. Also in general small tested are associated with more parenting in the mammals in general and so it’s also could be push towards males being more parenting and dedicated towards raising children. 

I agree may seem rather rapid for such an evolutionary change but evolution can take place quickly if there is pressure esp with something like this wherre it can more matter of epigentics and development and dramatic changes can take place without any genetic change. 


I seems like it’s all just speculation but I think it’s an interesting point.


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## TedEH

I have nothing constructive to add, but I love that our guitar forum has a "what's happening to our balls" thread disguised as a climate change politics bait thread.


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## TakeNoPrisoners

TedEH said:


> I have nothing constructive to add, but I love that our guitar forum has a "what's happening to our balls" thread disguised as a climate change politics bait thread.


Lol I was going to comment something how the hell did a thread about climate change turn into one about sperm count 

why is there climate change?

Answer: because you won’t stop touching yourself .. didn’t your mother ever warn you if you keep doing that you’re gonna make the sea levels rise!


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## Andromalia

TakeNoPrisoners said:


> why is there climate change?
> 
> Answer: because you won’t stop touching yourself


Sorry, I'm too hot for the world.


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## Grindspine

profwoot said:


> There's no reason to think that any inverse correlation between sperm counts and life expectancy is causal in nature. Life expectancy increased as medicine (particularly obstetric/neonatal) got better and society in general got safer. Sperm counts started dropping later, only in the last several decades, after most of the life expectancy gains had already happened.


Birth rates drop as life expectancy increases in general across populations. High infant mortality is correlated with very high birth rates and lower life expectancy as well.

There is a marked correlation. There is strong possibility of a causal relationship.


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## profwoot

Grindspine said:


> Birth rates drop as life expectancy increases in general across populations. High infant mortality is correlated with very high birth rates and lower life expectancy as well.
> 
> There is a marked correlation. There is strong possibility of a causal relationship.


Well yeah, this is anthropology 101 stuff. When kids stop dying parents stop having so many. Is this supposed to support your contention that sperm counts dropped as a result of natural evolutionary processes across the globe in two generations? Or are you actually saying that causal relationship is not because of parental choice but rather because as child mortality drops everyone's testes start exploding?


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## bostjan

Andromalia said:


> Genetics and environment aren't the only selection factor,especially in the case of humans, where the evolutionary presure can be changed by conscious choices. Simple case: war. If the low sperm count but more technologically advanced decide to eradicate the high sperm count "threat", that's your pressure right there and it has nothing to do with genetics.


Erm, well, it _might _have _something _to do with genetics, but it's all very poorly understood, at least in terms of what's considered mainstream acceptable science. There does seem to be some genetic drive on aggression, although it's certainly not stronger than environmental factors, but it does seem to exist to some unclear extent.

And there have been tons of computer simulations to show that entities (thinking of organisms here, but could be anything) who show aggression over obtaining resources tend to, well, obtain more resources. Even if a bunch of them die due to their aggressive behaviour, those who don't die usually obtain enough resources to create enough surplus progeny to make up for it.

So if the evolutionary pressure to have a high sperm count is underbalanced by the evolutionary pressure to aggressively steal resources from others of the same species, then the evolutionary pressure will favour aggression over sperm count and trend that direction.

Just editorializing here, but maybe that's why most peaceful independent cultures throughout history have ended up being abused by other more aggressive cultures, and highly aggressive cultures, for example the North Sentinalese, have persisted unchallenged for millennia.



TakeNoPrisoners said:


> Lol I was going to comment something how the hell did a thread about climate change turn into one about sperm count
> 
> why is there climate change?
> 
> Answer: because you won’t stop touching yourself .. didn’t your mother ever warn you if you keep doing that you’re gonna make the sea levels rise!



All that friction generates heat. 

I think that the general drift of the topic was something like: climate change is caused by humans (someone says "nu-uh," but then is rebuffed by heaps of evidence) - there are too many humans (someone says "nu-uh," but then is rebuffed by heaps of evidence) - there are now 8 billion humans - someone looking for a nit to pick makes some argument about sperm count lowering because of liberals and that will cause climate change to reverse itself - no one knowing how the fuck to react to that argument, so chaos ensues.


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## nightflameauto

It's all the #metoo movement's fault! See! I knew we could get there!


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## Andromalia

Soon some bragger will try to make it sound like it's because his fapping has an effect on tectonics.


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## nightflameauto

Andromalia said:


> Soon some bragger will try to make it sound like it's because his fapping has an effect on tectonics.


There's a fat-shaming joke just waiting to peek up over the edge of that comment.


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## Grindspine

profwoot said:


> Well yeah, this is anthropology 101 stuff. When kids stop dying parents stop having so many. Is this supposed to support your contention that sperm counts dropped as a result of natural evolutionary processes across the globe in two generations? Or are you actually saying that causal relationship is not because of parental choice but rather because as child mortality drops everyone's testes start exploding?


You're pretty well stuck on the two generations time limit on the concept.

I am viewing it as a long-term change that is more significantly manifesting within the recent generations.


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## profwoot

Grindspine said:


> You're pretty well stuck on the two generations time limit on the concept.
> 
> I am viewing it as a long-term change that is more significantly manifesting within the recent generations.


Why? Do you have data suggesting it started more than about two generations ago?


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## zappatton2

Well, just got my power back from what is being billed as an "unprecedented winter event" here in Ottawa. Lived here since the 90's, Ottawa weather has always been terrible in the winter, but I've never heard the wind sound like it was gonna rip my roof off. That's a new one for me.

Plus, apparently this isn't even the worst of it, so I'm doing all my bracing and layering up!


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## tedtan

This morning the temp here in Houston (I’m north of the actual city) was 12F/-11C, which is definitely colder than we typically see during the winter. And this is less than two years after the winter storm in February 2021 that shut the entire state’s power grid down for a week, so something is definitely going on.


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## TedEH

zappatton2 said:


> "unprecedented winter event" here in Ottawa


I'm just learning there's apparently a huge pileup on the 401 - and I'm suddenly very glad I made the choice to stay in today.


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## Demiurge

Today, we've had a couple inches of rain, winds violent enough to decapitate both light-up reindeer on my lawn, a couple gorgeous sun-showers, hail, and a ~40deg swing in temp. But this is New England.


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## Ralyks

Here in the Hudson Valley region of NY: This morning, 55 degrees. Now, at 9:20 pm EST, 10. And suppose to go lower.

In 4 days, I will experience 5 seasons.


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## wheresthefbomb

It's been a cold snap here, but, well, it's Alaska.  Warmed up to a balmy -4°F today.

I will say it's been a solid decade since I've felt a truly cold winter. We had one a few years ago that was apparently record cold on average, but it didn't feel it to me. What I remember is week-long stretches of -50°F, and it's been almost exactly ten years since anything remotely close to that.


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## Drew

Ralyks said:


> Here in the Hudson Valley region of NY: This morning, 55 degrees. Now, at 9:20 pm EST, 10. And suppose to go lower.
> 
> In 4 days, I will experience 5 seasons.


I left Boston for VT while the weather front moved through so there's a bit of extra noise here, but when I left Boston it was 54 and raining, it started snowing 10 minutes from my parents' place, and the temperature fell below freezing right as I pulled in their driveway. 

I packed my gravel bike, and gritted my teeth and went out for a spin the morning of Christmas Eve. It was 9 degrees. My rear derailleur (a Ultegra mechanical, for anyone into this stuff - very good gear) was struggling to shift in the cold, I could shift into lower gears easily enough, but downshifting into harder ones went from a little sticky to extremely sluggish within the first couple minutes. Don't know if there was still some moisture in the bike/cable that froze, or if it was just the cold itself. I was out for about an hour (and learned I REALLY need better cold weather shoe covers), and two miles from home my Garmin shut down because the battery couldn't physically deliver current in those conditions.  It was fucking rough. Magical, too, though.


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## AMOS

Buffalo got trounced, they always get lots of lake effect snow, but they got a little extra this time. We had 62 MPH gusts here on Cape Cod Friday night, surprisingly didn't lose power. No snow though!


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## bostjan

My house might have been the only one in Vermont that didn't lose power at all over the holiday weekend. I guess that's the best Christmas gift we could have asked for.

I'd never considered taking my bike out in this sort of weather. Usually, when I dust 'er off in March, I can't shift gears, and everything is kind of "creaky" until the temperature gets above 40°F. Mad props to anyone who rides in 9°F weather. I saw a guy this morning riding on the shoulder in the snow with tons of hidden tree branches the storm knocked down. If I still had my bike rack I would have offered him a ride in case he was just commuting...


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## Ralyks

My son's mother and her family are all in the Buffalo area. They were all safe and it sounds like they didn't lose power, but it sounds like it's one of the worst snow storms they ever had and a complete fucking mess, and apparently even a driving ban for 24ish hours.


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## zappatton2

I lost power on Friday from 5am to 12pm, so I got off lightly. Some places in Ontario and Quebec are still waiting to get reconnected.


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## Carrion Rocket

That freeze we had back in February 2021 took out the power for almost a full day and I had three pipes bust. 

Didn't lose power and only had one pipe bust this year. I'll call that a win. Knowing my luck, if I didn't get gas for the generator the power probably would've gone out.


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## Glades

We've had pretty mild weather here in South Florida (high 40s), so we can't complain.
But reading some of the reports from Buffalo, it's pretty terrifying. I pray you fellas up North are managing to stay warm and safe.


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## CanserDYI

We got just the edges of the storm here in Ohio and I'm miserable, I can't imagine what you guys are feeling.

I've got some truckers going through NY state and there are literally 20 foot high snow banks on either side of the highway, its insane! Stay safe, homies.

EDIT: Found a picture they sent us:





EDIT 2: Double checking this photo, I have no reason to believe they are pulling anything, but whats going on with the weirdness in this photo above? I'm just now really looking at it and it looks photoshopped?

EDIT 3: Hahahahaha  I never looked at it more than a glance, someone played photoshop on our boss....


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## MFB

Bro that shit looks photoshopped as hell; that's probably one of the Scandinavian countries as I don't think Buffalo is equipped/trained on how to make secure snow that high like they are.


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## bostjan

CanserDYI said:


> We got just the edges of the storm here in Ohio and I'm miserable, I can't imagine what you guys are feeling.
> 
> I've got some truckers going through NY state and there are literally 20 foot high snow banks on either side of the highway, its insane! Stay safe, homies.
> 
> EDIT: Found a picture they sent us:
> 
> View attachment 118885
> 
> 
> 
> EDIT 2: Double checking this photo, I have no reason to believe they are pulling anything, but whats going on with the weirdness in this photo above? I'm just now really looking at it and it looks photoshopped?


Haha, yeah, that is this photo:






with the American highway signs superimposed (facing the wrong direction).

But... it's not even that much of an exaggeration. Take a look at this real photo from Buffalo during the 2014 blizzard aftermath:


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## CanserDYI

God Damnit @bostjan  our boss got played by some truckers.


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## Shawn

bostjan said:


> My house might have been the only one in Vermont that didn't lose power at all over the holiday weekend. I guess that's the best Christmas gift we could have asked for.
> 
> I'd never considered taking my bike out in this sort of weather. Usually, when I dust 'er off in March, I can't shift gears, and everything is kind of "creaky" until the temperature gets above 40°F. Mad props to anyone who rides in 9°F weather. I saw a guy this morning riding on the shoulder in the snow with tons of hidden tree branches the storm knocked down. If I still had my bike rack I would have offered him a ride in case he was just commuting...


We lost power up here in southern Maine but luckily it was only for 6-12 hours and came back on Xmas eve at noon.


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## Drew

bostjan said:


> My house might have been the only one in Vermont that didn't lose power at all over the holiday weekend. I guess that's the best Christmas gift we could have asked for.
> 
> I'd never considered taking my bike out in this sort of weather. Usually, when I dust 'er off in March, I can't shift gears, and everything is kind of "creaky" until the temperature gets above 40°F. Mad props to anyone who rides in 9°F weather. I saw a guy this morning riding on the shoulder in the snow with tons of hidden tree branches the storm knocked down. If I still had my bike rack I would have offered him a ride in case he was just commuting...


Listen, I'm not saying going for a ride when it was 9 degrees was a _good idea_.


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## wheresthefbomb

I did winter biking for one year. I felt really badass but it _sucked. _-30°F was the absolute cutoff, I didn't have pogies (big bike mitten things) or any of the other modern winter biking paraphernalia and the Trek I was riding was in pretty sad shape. I had very few crashes, I've been biking on snow and ice my entire life.

Lots changes at those temps, but the most noticeable to me was that the grease in the freewheel gets really thick and after coasting it's often still just wide open, so that when you go to crank you instead use all that momentum to rock your knee on the handlebars.

My partner has one of those fancy fat bikes, too expensive for my blood though. I just go for walks during the winter now.


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## loganflynn294

Been living in Buffalo and it's suburbs my whole life, this last storm was fucking intense. I live super close to work, like a 2 minute drive. I closed down my store at just as the storm was getting really bad, took me about 30 minutes to get home. Could not see ANYTHING while trying to drive. Buffalo winters used to just be steady snow and cold from November until February, lately the temps are all over the place and the storms are getting stronger and stronger. We can deal with the snow, it's the 70 mph winds with blizzard conditions that cause all kinds of chaos.


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