who is surprised?

[rivendellrose]

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1153513,00.html

Yes, I'm being lazy again. No HTML.

So... are people actually surprised by this, out of curiosity? Did anybody in power actually miss the fact that this was likely?

Now, to be fair, I had no idea anyone theorized it would be so soon. But the likelihood of it happening? Sure. World gets hot from CO2, ice caps melt, the "conveyor belt" that moves the warm and cold water around the Atlantic crashes and disappears... and Western Europe turns into a popsicle, more or less, among other nasty effects --> World War Three.

The real question is whether this will change anybody's policies or ideas of how we should be going about.

Funny thing... there's something of a correlation in history between the temperature and the levels of human advancement and civilization. If you think something on this level wouldn't affect our social infrastructure, you're mad. I'm just hoping for it not being the last thing that makes evolution say "whoops... this humanity thing was a dead-end after all."

...

Anyway. Much love to all, especially to Fey, who I know is having the crappy few weeks from hell. I'm sorry, hun, and I hope things get better for you really soon.

Comments

[spazzychic.livejournal.com]

It doesn't mean the end of the world. It just means the end of the world for us. I'll be in my early 40s. Paugh. =P

How dumb are we when we decide greed> survival?

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Exactly. Although I doubt it'll mean the *end* of us, quite. We've got more to us than the modern world makes obvious. I believe in our ancestry, and I believe that all of that is still in us, though hidden in most people.

[spazzychic.livejournal.com]

But any way you slice it, this world of decadant, stupid living will end. There are 6 billion humans. I'm sure some of them will adapt, but a lot won't.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Oh hell yeah. On the other hand, that's sort of a good thing, in a way.... not that I want people to die, but just that people have to realize one way or another that we can't go on as we have been. And it might take catastrophe to realize that.

I hope not, though. I want to believe that people can be good and sane and reasonable. I really really do.

[(Anonymous)]

The american lifestyle won't change. The US thrives on international conflict and poverty. The reason we are the most profitable, powerful nation in the world is that we exploit other country's resources under the guise of economic and industrial development. Essentially, the less resources the rest of the world have, the more they have to give us in order to buy what they need on the U.S. controlled global market. South America, Eastern Europe, large portions of Asia, and Africa depend entirely on the IMF to function as economic entities. The only thing we have to worry about are the nukes, and our "friends" with nuclear weapons will be well taken care of. It's in the power establishment's best interest to keep at it, robber baron style. This is the way a nation becomes an empire. - Chris

Warming... or Dimming?

[(Anonymous)]

Not too sure about this one. Read the comments at this BoingBoing posting (http://boingboing.net/2004_02_01_archive.html#107764533618077223). Excerpt:


"Three years ago Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld picked [Andrew Marshall] to lead a sweeping review on military "transformation," the shift toward nimble forces and smart weapons.

When scientists' work on abrupt climate change popped onto his radar screen, Marshall tapped another eminent visionary, Peter Schwartz, to write a report on the national-security implications of the threat. Schwartz formerly headed planning at Royal Dutch/Shell Group and has since consulted with organizations ranging from the CIA to DreamWorks—he helped create futuristic scenarios for Steven Spielberg's film Minority Report. Schwartz and co-author Doug Randall at the Monitor Group's Global Business Network, a scenario-planning think tank in Emeryville, Calif., contacted top climate experts and pushed them to talk about what-ifs that they usually shy away from—at least in public.


The really interesting thing, I think, isn't so much global warming as global dimming. The Earth is slowly getting darker each year. Still something of an infant hypothesis.

Linkage:

Goodbye Sunshine - The Guardian (http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/feature/story/0,13026,1108853,00.html), Global Dimming: It Is Getting Darker At Ground Level - FuturePundit (http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/001854.html), a scientific abstract (http://convention.allacademic.com/aag2003/view_paper_info.html?pub_id=1120).

-- Josh

[gin2001.livejournal.com]

We talked about that in bio class last quarter. It's been denied on every level even though lots of scientists are coming to the same conlcusion. Problem is they're not sure WHEN it's going to happen, or how bad it's going to be. The prejections are the best they can come up with, and most is worst case scenario. No matter what though we're basically fucked. Makes me wonder if I want to bring kids into that.... :-/

The more I learn in bio, the more the world kinda freaks me out.....