“We now have direct evidence that not only was the ice gone, but that plants and insects were living there,”…Near‑complete melting of Greenland’s ice over the next centuries to a few millennia would lead to some 23 feet of sea‑level rise.
We all hem and haw endlessly about how bad the climate change problem is, but by not collectively DOING something about it, we’re leaving it up the countries that actually have the biggest populations and have the most at stake in taking drastic action.
In America or Europe we are talking about building sea-walls and flood control systems, spending billions or trillions on preparing for rising sea levels.
What about India? China? Southeast Asia? They have far more to lose from extreme weather and wet-bulb heat events and far more people with lives at risk and less resources to put into massive concrete walls around their coastal cities. How are we going to feel when they start seeing extreme, unilateral options as viable? If they decide to do drastic geoengineering projects like shading the earth with aerosols or orbital shields, we could all suffer if those projects have unintended consequences. (The climate is complicated, yo.)
This is such a good point about the global power dynamics. The rate of melt is actually accelrating faster than most models predicted even 10 years ago. Countries with less resources might resort to desperate geoengineering measures becuase they literally can’t wait for the rest of us to get our act together.
US/EU could have done a lot for long time, but they don’t care about the root problem. There is no need to pull out your selected countries as somehow needing more oversight than the West. We are the cause of this problem. The question is more, how do we ensure competition stays away from existential processes and ecological systems that we all need ?
Clickbait title. I don’t plan to be living over the next few centuries or millennia. There are plenty of reasons to not buy a beach house but this ain’t one of them.
OTOH, you’ve yet to encounter any conclusive evidence that you’re mortal.
Honestly, I’m 195cm so in all likelihood I’m mortal than most people on average
Well, tall people have it harder with pumping blood, so you might be mortaller.
I don’t plan to be living over the next few centuries or millennia.
It’s hard to read this without hearing a “I got mine, so f everyone after me” in it. When you talk about this with your friends, maybe consider rephrasing it?
I think if the title said something like “cities of the world could flood in the next century” rather than “don’t buy a beach house”, you would have a point. But that’s not the case here.
When we stopped caring about our communities, we stopped caring about being a part of something bigger and capitalism has taught us all to just sit and stew in our own depression and our own emotions. Boomer generation 2.0.
Agreed with everything except boomer generation 2.0. The younger generations DO care, but we’re powerless thanks to the boomers who cannot give up control to the younger generations.
Completely different attitudes, completely different causes.
I think that’s kind of a tongue in cheek joke.
Regular people don’t respect the actual issue at hand(like yourself a little) trying to portray it as relevant or something they can understand is important for scientists to do.
Unfortunately science and the truth are worthless if morons don’t understand them.
Only if we let them stay in power…
