Also we should remember that not all climate change is bad; there can be change that is beneficial to human society. A greened Sahara for example.

World is already way too hot, and almost all kinds of what would seem like the "better" effects of climate change have big catches to it, like biodiversity loss.

I don't think a "greened Sahara" is possible without purposefully doing it, but assuming it is, is it worth to have more Sahel land for 2m water rise and more illnesses worsened or brought about by air pollution? It might be interesting to plot out the economic and death goods/bads.

We can change the kinds of pollution we put out purposefully, and make it cleaner to produce more of CO2 and less of the bad stuff. And new species can be developed to make up for the lost ones; so I believe the trade offs could be lessened in exchange for a vast amount of arable land.

Also we should remember that not all climate change is bad; there can be change that is beneficial to human society. A greened Sahara for example.

Nope. Even if you manage to make it non-desertic, the saharan soil is just about useless.

There may have other examples, this isn't one of them.

Edited 2/24/2017 16:13:26

If every country gave just %5 of their yearly income to a western based space program then we will be colonizing planets in 15 years and in 150 years....

Personally, I think that more thought should be given as to how to reverse climate change rather than just how to prevent it. If we were to, for example, make a machine to suck up a whole bunch of carbon, you would essentially solve the problem without hurting any businesses that currently rely on fossil fuels.

I'm not extremely well-educated on this, but it seems like if the problem is too many carbon emmissions then the solution is to get rid of some of the carbon, not to get rid of the energy sources that are making the carbon. Am I missing something here?

If we were to, for example, make a machine to suck up a whole bunch of carbon

it's called a tree

^ lol

get rid of some of the carbon, not to get rid of the energy sources that are making the carbon. Am I missing something here?

Without going into the details, CO₂ is a pretty stable molecule, it's hard to rid. If we would, we could.

Edited 2/25/2017 00:08:44

yeah! no carbon!

Carbons the real poison, ye know?

@MGSB

Yes the earth has very recently settled into a 180-280 zone for CO2, and very very recently settled into a 400 zone, however, using only the past few thousand years is lying by omission when talking about the history of earth as a whole.

https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/co2_temperature_historical.png

*cough* it doesn't look like a very high spike now does it?

You are taking data from eons ago and comparing it to times which are much more sensitive to small fluctuations. You need to consider the state of the earth through the end of the Precambrian, Cambrian, etc, and understand that if you walked on the earth, it would look, feel, and be very different then the one we stand on today.

Also we should remember that not all climate change is bad; there can be change that is beneficial to human society. A greened Sahara for example.

That isn't going to happen, it seems. Rather, dry areas have been getting dryer, and wet areas wetter, seems to be the current trend.

Edited 2/24/2017 23:15:00

@Bonsai

Unfortunately, politicians with an agenda don't give a shit about facts and evidence, but as John Oliver once said "You can't bring feelings to a fact fight!"

Agree totally. Just ramming facts down others throats won't stop them from believing their own thing (or stop them from taking money from lobbyists.) The solution to this question is not a simple one: how do you stop oil-backed politicians from pushing anti-climate change on their agendas? Perhaps if we could eliminate bribery, but I don't see how that can happen in a corrupted system.

Edited 2/24/2017 22:59:05

@knyte-

Just because nyc is underwater does not mean the human race can survive such a shift. It may cause extreme issues, however, the true range of temperatures that humans can exist comfortably should not be taken at "nyc underwater". You also assume that humans would not be able to come up with something innovative to counter the sea level rise. I would say, however, that NYC is not the only place underwater if it goes underwater... and there would definitely be major problems in such a scenario.

Edited 2/24/2017 22:56:48

@Zephyrum

There are many temperature/weather fenomenae that we cannot predict, and don't understand, such as the El Niño and the La Niña. Given the world has proven to us it can just randomly heat or cool whenever it feels like it (whatever causes it is yet unknown), I wouldn't be surprised if the main factor of the heating is something we're disconsidering or unaware of rather than pollution itself.

This is going into a bit off topic, but as a meteorology major, I cannot resist mentioning that we do know more about the ENSO oscillation than you think. El Niño is caused when the normal ocean currents stop dragging cold water up the Peruvian coast. This consequently results in an eastward drift of warm seawater from the Central Pacific to invade the area. The fish all die or swim away, due to the lack of nutrients in the water, and the unusually warm area of the sea results in significant weather pattern changes observed globally. El Niño has been going on ever since South America Split from Africa, and does not account for the significant increase in global mean temperature.

The opposite is La Niña. This phenomenon occurs when the ocean currents are stronger than normal, pushing cold water deep into the Central Pacific. As you can imagine, this also has significant affects on the weather (not opposite to that of La Niña, though, contray to popular belif), which are globally significant. Once again, La Niña, like El Niño, has been going on ever since South America Split from Africa, and does not account for the significant increase in global mean temperate.

I also noticed this statement:

Given we had a colder point when population was booming and industry being born (Little Ice Age), it's pretty hard to predict the weather's patterns, no matter how hard we try.

The climate change debate should not directly involve weather. It should involve climate. Although we are starting to see increased instances where we get unexplained massive storms out of nowhere, or crazy snowstorms or heat waves, etc, the baseline will always remain the same: climate =/= weather. Climate is your average atmospheric phenomena over a long period of times, and weather is the atmospheric phenomena that you observe within a single day. As you may have heard "climate is what you expect, weather is what you get".

Edited 2/24/2017 23:12:53

That isn't going to happen, it seems. Rather, dry areas have been getting dryer, and wet areas wetter, seems to be the current trend.

Well honestly I didn't mean greening the Sahara through CO2 emissions in some climate sorcery, just start fighting back at the expansion of the desert and then start pushing back on it.

You are taking data from eons ago and comparing it to times which are much more sensitive to small fluctuations. You need to consider the state of the earth through the end of the Precambrian, Cambrian, etc, and understand that if you walked on the earth, it would look, feel, and be very different then the one we stand on today.

I understand that the earth from before mammals and lizards was very different, tsh, I just dislike lying through omission which is what showing only the past 1000 years is when you're talking about such a timescale.

Well honestly I didn't mean greening the Sahara through CO2 emissions in some climate sorcery, just start fighting back at the expansion of the desert and then start pushing back on it.

But this is ecosystem destruction in a different sense. Desert, whether it seems useful or not, is a vital ecosystem in and of itself. The desert sands of sahara are actually what allows the Amazon Rainforest to be so green and lush, believe it or not.

understand that the earth from before mammals and lizards was very different, tsh, I just dislike lying through omission which is what showing only the past 1000 years is when you're talking about such a timescale

This is an interesting point, worthy of making note of in my research. Thank you.

I believe climate change is a natural issue not caused by humans originally, However I believe that humans have subtly sped this up over the years. But not enough for me to give a shit.

Edited 2/25/2017 18:09:21

^ you don't have to click on his profile to know that he's from a southern state

Edited 2/25/2017 20:23:06

@Knyte: thx for the paper, I started reading it and it looks like a good one so I most definitely will read it in full.
This is a very nice and funny chart: https://xkcd.com/1732/

As to the "debate" (ain't a debate when 99% of scientists agree on a scientific phenomenon) well i really don't understand why people would not accept what scientists from all over the world are saying. Especially when the consequences could be huge to our way of living.
I get why a the oil and coal industry denies it, but apart from that, why do regular people think they should have an opinion on whether or not they should "believe" it? That's beyond me

Please explain to me how and why the scientists from all over the world are gathering together once in a while in order to engage in a massive plot to spread misinformation about the supposed fact that humans are affecting the climate...sigh