Interesting. I live a couple hours northeast of Anchorage, Alaska. It is a remote, mountainous area that is also in a rain shadow to some extent, thus fairly dry. I was having dinner recently with a local who has lived here his whole life of 60+ years. He said it is remarkable the increase in shrubs, trees, and general greening of the area since when he was a teenager. Places that were open tundra are now impassable. I'm sure some is increase in temperature, but CO2 could also be a factor.
Alaska has seen the biggest changes in temperatures in the US. It's not a good thing.
> Over the past 60 years, the average temperature across Alaska has increased by approximately 3°F. This increase is more than twice the warming seen in the rest of the United States.
According to NASA, "A quarter to half of Earth’s vegetated lands has shown significant greening over the last 35 years largely due to rising levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide"
"Studies have shown that increased concentrations of carbon dioxide increase photosynthesis, spurring plant growth."
"Results showed that carbon dioxide fertilization explains 70 percent of the greening effect, said co-author Ranga Myneni, a professor in the Department of Earth and Environment at Boston University. “The second most important driver is nitrogen, at 9 percent. So we see what an outsized role CO2 plays in this process.”"
I don't get the down votes. You seem to have provided an interesting source that counters the parent's hunch. Must be that folks don't like the silver lining to a maybe-uninhabitable-by-humans environment.
They are distorting the truth, either parroting that narrative out of genuine ignorance or an attempt to start some goal-post-moving trolling. At this point, informed people that would have typically countered are tired of seeing the same behavior on every other social media site. Dunning-Kruger, astroturfing, trolling - doesn't matter, just downvote the garbage.
I'm not going to engage with it either. That kind of statement is just begging for a response because the goal moves in any number of directions - look, plants will sequester all our carbon! Solar minimum will counter human climate change! More food for people! It's all a conspiracy!
No.
There's a reason those climate change reports can be 100s of pages long. Scientists have done very thorough public research, accounting for all those variables - the conclusion is, we're fucked.
All the science is complicated but completely public. Trust the summary provided by the consensus of journalists covering the scientific consensus of raw research - that's called an educated opinion. Alternatively, roll up your own sleeves and probe the research yourself.
Never let some online rando's idle musings erode your opinions. If it sounds too good to be true, it is.
I understand how strong the opinions and feelings run on this topic, but please don't break the HN guidelines by name-calling ("online rando") or insinuating astroturfing or bad faith. We have those rules for good reason and everyone needs to stick to them here, even when we most don't feel like it.
We’re not fucked. It’s just easier to believe that we are.
The fact is... we don’t really know what will happen. Our world will be different, some animals may be gone, some will be better off than ever, but humans will still be here. The inhabitants of Earth have survived far worse conditions and events in the past.
The idea that humans are guaranteed to survive is very naive. If all asians and africans increase their co2 footprint to first world levels and we don't stop polluting for 100 years it could very well mean the death of all humans because of a lack of oxygen which is mostly produced by plankton.
I’m concerned by climate change and fully aware that it could and likely will be disastrous. But the reflexive attacks on indications and mere implications of silver linings is annoying. It’s easy to look up that climate has destabilized, but our capacity to withstand instability has increased more. Technology and development has made the world safer for us, in spite of climate change, and it’s not clear that we won’t be able to mitigate and withstand changes in the future.
Yes, but how many, and who. It's still an existential threat to invididuals, when you don't know what conditions that will make up that survivability. Now that it is apparent that there is the distinct possibility of people dying within our lifetimes, even if not many, it's a concern. It's basically "Evolution has decided that the time has come to select the strongest, and I don't know if I or my loved ones are strong enough."
But nobody wants to have the discussion under the conditions you specify. Because this means whatever solution is put forward
1) is limited in how much it is allowed to reduce economic activity (what point is there in saving humanity if you have to do it through famine ?)
2) is limited in how much global warming is allowed
Nobody has any such solutions, except for geoengineering, at which point humanity simply takes direct control of global climate. That means someone, probably in Washington or perhaps Brussels or Beijing, simply decides whether crops in the Sahara will work out this year or not. Are they responsible for the failed yields ? How about fuckups (which we can pretty much assume will happen) ? How about sacrificing one area to save another when they're at war ?
Also this tech is probably pretty easily weaponized.
Things are going to change a lot, yes. It might require a lot of changes to the way we live, yes. It might have some really tragic consequences, yes.
But speaking about climate change as if the apocalypse were nigh and there were nothing that could be done about it is not only counter-productive, but has played an important part in guaranteeing the situation got as bad as it has (remember Al Gore saying that, by 2014, there would be no ice at the poles? Do you think people who heard that are more or less likely to pay attention to climate change, now that 2014 has come and gone and the ice caps are still there, even if smaller?)
Whoa whoa whoa, wait a minute. Argument by credential is a logical fallacy. It may be used in defense of a true point, but we should be very hesitant to assume because most/some/many experts agree on a point that the thinking is done.
Now, I agree with you that climate science and forecasting is complex. However, the reports are public and known for anyone doubting, and the organization is highly transparent[0].
All hail the "experts", except for Dr. Valentina Zharkova, Dr. Heinrich Svensmark, Dr. John Casey, & Dr. Freeman Dyson; don't listen to these heretics of the faith.
I didn’t know some of these names so I looked all of them up. Cribbed from Wikipedia and their web pages:
[Zharkova is] a Professor in Mathematics at Northumbria University. [She has a] BSc/MSc in Applied Mathematics and Astronomy, a Ph.D. in Astrophysics, certificate in project management.
Henrik Svensmark (born 1958) is a physicist and professor in the Division of Solar System Physics at the Danish National Space Institute (DTU Space) in Copenhagen. He is known for his theory on the effects of cosmic rays on cloud formation as an indirect cause of global warming.
Casey received his B.S in physics and math from Jacksonville State University and his MA in Management from Webster University.
Freeman John Dyson FRS (born 15 December 1923) is a British theoretical physicist and mathematician known for his work in quantum electrodynamics, solid-state physics, astronomy and nuclear engineering.
Great but CO2 levels are still rising. I could care less if the planet is covered with jungle from pole to pole if the heat makes it unlivable in large portions of it.
Not really good for us or for a stable climate, but probably good for plants. Plants love CO2
> We are in a cooling period, which means we need all the help we can get growing food.
We might have some cold winters, but global average temperatures are going up, a lot. Globally we are in no danger of not being able to grow food due to cold temperatures (though local effects from disrupting ocean currents are still very possible ofc).
Want to make a difference on climate change as a technologist? Feel free to join these communities actively looking for support and with ongoing projects (that are alive):
Of note: CSIRO appears to have lost some of its independence under Australia's current government[1], probably because "we're harming the planet" doesn't help sell coal[2]. The UN (and virtually every national scientific body) consider desertification (alongside water misuse and land degradation, both of which precede desertification) to be a serious concern[3].
Edit: To be clear, that doesn't mean these results are fabricated or incorrect. I'm calling into question the decision to emphasize them over the overwhelmingly negative effects of climate change on Australia[4].
I agree with your questioning, but find it a bit odd to do so in response to this particular paper if you're really not suggesting some sort of political bias. CSIRO is not 'emphasizing' this paper - it's just one of many news releases.
As for the findings themselves - they're interesting if not unexpected. They don't in themselves have any significant practical implications (positive or negative) as Australian deserts are in zones that the BAU scenario will make too hot for human habitation by the end of this century.
> I agree with your questioning, but find it a bit odd to do so in response to this particular paper if you're really not suggesting some sort of political bias.
Sorry if this wasn't clear: I am (or was, see the following graf) suggesting a political bias (or at the very least a willingness to turn a blind eye).
I also just realized that this paper and summary were published in 2013, not this year. I don't know enough about Australian politics to know how independent CSIRO was then, but it's very possible that I'm wrong in impugning motives.
In any case, I think the hazard is still present: positive emphasis on the silver lining of what is otherwise an unmitigated disaster gives ammunition to denialists and (undeserved) psychological reprieve to the rest of us.
Anyway on the substance of the CSIRO issue you're right. The impression I get from the one person I half-know there, and what I read, is that it's in big trouble under a governmnent that is intent on politicising public services from top to bottom.
Having met a few at CSIRO, I'd tend to accept that they're real science-y scientists, meaning that they've never really had cause to be labelled as having strong political bias... But that's just my subjective word.
That said, all science is subject to bias according to its funding, particularly if not readily reproducible.
The CSIRO is an org that garners public and private funding.
From the narrative :
> This study was published in the US Geophysical Research Letters journal and was funded by CSIRO's Sustainable Agriculture Flagship, Water for a Healthy Country Flagship, the Australian Research Council and Land & Water Australia.
So, self funded with a few other gov interests thrown in. Is this enough to invalidate findings? Only if not reproducible... But has anyone tried?
Possible problems sometimes cited re CSIRO aren't so much to do with bias, as political pressure from above - similarly to the way the Aus Treasury has been corrupted by the present federal gov. A recent example from the media IIRC was them being given a single afternoon to sign off on the Adani groundwater management plan. It's a matter of what they are allowed to do (and report on) & under what conditions.
The greenhouse that I built in preschool agrees as well.
I don't think anybody disagrees that more CO2 means more plant growth. Please see the edit for why emphasizing this elementary fact is harmful (and worthy of suspiscion when coming from CSIRO).
Uhh... ok so does this research take into account both China and Africa has been spending $$$ billions on reversing desertification? They've been using new technology to make desert sand retain water, thus allowing certain types of trees & vegetation to grow in areas that previously couldn't sustain plant life.
Then there's the fact that China has spent over 30 years investigating how to use desalinated sea water to grow rice. Now they're able to grow rice fields in places that couldn't before.
The article makes clear that areas that aren't under the massive undesertification programs you bring up have shown the same results.
Kind of like how towns that got fluoride in the water and towns that didn't both experienced an increase in dental health during a period in which there were massive advances in dentistry and fluoride toothpaste became a thing.
More CO2 makes plants grow taller, but not with more grain. Being taller, grasses (like wheat) often snap and fall over, particularly in storms. Crop fail.
We are at the shallow end of the changes that are coming. An exponential increase in CO2, means an exponential increase in temperature, slowed down by ocean cooling. The current +1'C is almost beneficial, the predicted +3'C..+8'C in 2100 will be devastating. The rain-forests will go brown and fail before +4'c. But currently it all seems so lovely.
> To find a time when the planet’s air was consistently above 400 ppm you have to look much farther back to the warm part of the Miocene, some 16 million years ago, or the Early Oligocene, about 25 million years ago, when Earth was a very different place and its climate totally dissimilar from what we might expect today.
Towards the end Miocene was when grasses began to emerge significantly
> The higher organic content and water retention of the deeper and richer grassland soils, with long-term burial of carbon in sediments, produced a carbon and water vapor sink. This, combined with higher surface albedo and lower evapotranspiration of grassland, contributed to a cooler, drier climate. C4 grasses, which are able to assimilate carbon dioxide and water more efficiently than C3 grasses, expanded to become ecologically significant near the end of the Miocene between 6 and 7 million years ago.
It’s always amazing to me how much people hate seeing any facts that don’t overwhelmingly blame CO2 as some sort of pollutant. It’s beyond rational at this point and is almost certainly simply an emotional response now.
It's been well reported that climate change will mean different things for different people, and some of the effects will be beneficial in some way for some.
That doesn't wipe away the fact that even with these factors considered, CO2 is the primary cause of catastrophic, runaway climate change which will make Earth significantly less livable over the next few decades.
