Climate Change
Climate change is upon us and presents challenges of a kind the human species has never faced before. Even now the most vulnerable of us are being adversely affected. Eventually all people will be impacted by crop failures, damage from increased weather volatility, land loss due to rising ocean levels.
The associated questions are:
1. Should we try to do something about it? Or let it take it's course?
2. If we should intervene, what's the best way to do that?
3. What are the philosophical implications of the situation?
The associated questions are:
1. Should we try to do something about it? Or let it take it's course?
2. If we should intervene, what's the best way to do that?
3. What are the philosophical implications of the situation?
Comments (69)
2. Best way to do it is to stop catering society to corporations who's profit relies on the continued use of that which escalates climate change. Maybe install a global financial model and fund that help companies who's goal it is to research and build sustainability and/or fight the change that is and has already happening, while putting financial pressure on everything that ignores the problem. A global tax on corporations who doesn't care about environmental destruction and let that tax money go straight into the R&D of solutions. An economy that push funding from the bad actors over to the good actors. On top of that raise awareness, fight for better education in school, ban social media algorithms that relies on a rage-bait attention-economy which leads to promotion of misinformation and disinformation and the degradation of the ability of critical thinking. Use heavy sanctions and tariffs against nations who do not comply with this global operation for solutions.
3. I don't think there are much philosophical implications of this. There is an ongoing problem that needs to be fixed globally. That's pretty much it. I think that any debate is part of people getting fooled into being zealots for powerful forces to debate something that fundamentally needs no debate. The problem with climate change is on the level of engineering, science, research, societal change in day to day behaviors, and with the resources and governmental funding of it all. It's a fact of the matter problem that needs a global collective of solutions. The philosophical questions may have to do with how to manage the societal consequences of solving these problems, but the ethics are pretty clear. Especially considering that the mild inconvenience of having to comply with helping this change for the better is far better than the destruction of entire communities and nations who's among those that will be affected the worst by these climate changes. On top of that, the work itself to change the world for the better will employ and give jobs to millions of people.
So I don't think it needs to be debated much. It's a huge global problem and the discussion should be primarily on what solutions that can be made to both mitigate escalation of the effects, and to stop the effects we are already seeing, and will definitely going to see in the future.
In practical terms, no there isn't an end-date. In strict scientific terms, if we exhaust all available sources of CO2, then yes, the atmosphere's CO2 level will return to present day levels in about 100,000 years, with the cost of acidic oceans. The climate will go through an extreme spike in temperature that will last for a few thousand years. This is per David Archer, although I haven't seen him update his figures to account for fracking capability, so it may be off.
Quoting Christoffer
There are no scientists predicting that the human species won't survive the worst case scenario. Will civilization as we know it survive it? We don't know.
Sounds like a wonderful future for any species that thrives in such conditions. Not much for humans, and especially any human who like to have some nature left to enjoy. There might be some who want to live in grey boxes, half-suffocating through all the technology used to make life sustaining in these conditions. Like cosplaying astronauts on another planet for thousands of years. :party:
Quoting frank
"Bye bye" doesn't have to mean we go extinct. Only that anything we value of life today goes extinct. I don't think any rational human being in their right mind would prefer any worst case scenario if the option means mild inconvenience right now. On top of that, there are tons of changes to society that may even bring better conditions for people right now. For instance, the lowering of smog and particles in the air is linked to increased death and health issues. And even if you survive well in those conditions, just listen to people who goes to Oslo or Stockholm describing the experience of almost no air pollution in the city compared to something like New York. I remember when I was in New York the first time and the very first thing I noticed was how got damn disgusting the air is. Getting away from such smog is like being freed from being choked. Mitigating that is to both mitigate escalation of climate change, but also directly helping people directly, both in terms of health and in terms of just a better life quality in the cities.
Like... the question that should be asked should rather be; What do we gain of not doing anything? What do we gain by perpetuating everything that pollutes the air and speeds up climate change?
Some would argue that we gain economic growth, but do we really? Growth can't be sustained forever and there's actual growth in transforming the industry into sustainability as well, not to speak of the other innovations that can accidently come out of such research, similar to how we pushed the process of the moon landing, leading to a lot of innovations and inventions we today take for granted. And that was for a done for the reason of bragging rights.
Just think about how the need for better electric vehicles. It will require new battery technology, and that financial push may solve batteries for vehicles, but at a certain point it would transform how we use batteries overall, with gear that become smaller, more effective and have new functions, just because a new battery technology was invented.
I just see no point in not doing anything about climate change, to not fund research and innovation that mitigate climate change, or to not put pressure on industries that pollute our air and make our living conditions rather depressing. Like... why?
Could you share the sources of these kinds of predictions?
Quoting Christoffer
And here is the well known philosophical conundrum. No rational person living today will experience the worst case scenario. That scenario wouldn't come into existence until well after we're all gone. How do we put in place a solution to a problem that our descendants might have? You might say we aren't evolved to handle that kind of problem. We have no experience with it. We don't even know how to approach the question.
Quoting Christoffer
The wise say, "First do no harm." Approaching the problem in a childish, semi-psychotic manner is a recipe for making things worse than they would be otherwise. It's better to start with a sober evaluation of the parameters of the problem. What are the long-range predictions? What sorts of efforts now would actually make a difference in the long run?
You can just search further on possible scenarios for increased global degrees continuously going up.
And asking for sources is irrelevant because I'm no climate scientist, and I don't think you are either. But I trust what independent researchers arrive at in their scenarios and data. It's not a philosophical discussion, it's a scientific one. And climate change that's not mitigated will lead to extreme temperature.
Why do i need to cite any sources to entertain the idea that such a world would be fucking awful to live in? If it's even possible to do so for us. :chin:
It's like... I'm going to put you in a container and I'm going to put that in the sun so the temperature increases as well as change the composition of air vs co2 and pollutions, and then you are going to rate your experience after living there for a while compared to living outside of it. But before I do I will say that I think you won't like it... and then you ask me for sources on why you would have an experience I would consider awful. :brow:
Quoting frank
If you're a depressed nihilistic teenager I'd see where you are coming from, but a responsible adult that isn't clinically a narcissist or a psychopath will have some inclination to care for the future. Especially those with children. I mean, my children's children might experience it, or their children and so on. At what point do I accept that my family going forward a couple of generations are far away from me temporally that I can say "I don't give a fuck"?
If I were in a position in which I need to care for myself or my loved ones right now in present time, then that is fine if in conflict with caring for the future; but that's a false dichotomy and it also doesn't matter. The problem with climate change is a global one that requires a change of a lot of things in society so an individual shouldn't really have to experience more than mild inconveniences around the changes necessary.
If you ask someone if they are willing to risk an absolute hell hole of a planet in the future just to not have to be mildly inconvenienced in the present and they answer yes, then I would simply call that person a fucking idiot who's uncapable of even the most basic moral thinking.
Why would the positive consequences of my actions and decisions today be any different if they happen right now somewhere else in the world, or if they happen temporally later? If I make, for instance, decisions today on what clothes to buy on the moral ground that I don't want to support child labor, then it doesn't matter that I don't witness the positive consequences of my moral actions, it has an effect on the world, on other people. Why would a temporal difference be different?
I really don't get the perspective that we shouldn't care about the future because we won't feel or experience the positive consequences. We have a moral responsibility to care, otherwise it's just nihilism and I don't really care for their viewpoint as it's just a dead end. There's no point in debating morals with a nihilist anymore than arguing with a brick wall.
Quoting frank
What? The consequence is predicted based on the science, exactly how it turns out is unclear, but there's no prediction that says anything other than "bad" in capital letters. And the solution is to make sure the scenarios doesn't happen at all or becomes mitigated enough to not reach critical levels.
Sorry, but this question seems to just ignore basic understanding of climate change overall?
Quoting frank
This makes no sense whatsoever. What do you mean not evolved? We haven't evolved to type messages on a forum either but through the process of science and innovations in engineering we are able to do so. Just like we are able to produce pollutions that destroy the environment and the means to discover how bad it is and is becoming.
We have a lot of approaches. The only ones denying this are climate science deniers who simply don't understand the science but gladly comments on it like they do. They're unimportant and irrelevant as they're not rational enough to be relevant to the issues and researching solutions.
Quoting frank
Climate scientists have already done this to death. The only ones who oppose the solutions or models are the ones who are uneducated science deniers and downright idiots, either clinically or psychologically skewed by echo chambers.
Sorry, but I thought this was supposed to be a new and more rational discussion on climate change, but I see it will just keep going in the spirit of earlier threads.
I'm not interested in continuing if this is the level the discussion is at.
I second that. :up:
The reason is that I don't find the questions being asked on the level of rational discourse that is apt for this time in history, or morally overall. We know enough, we need to do more and the ethics are sane. Anyone objecting to that are either uninformed, a nihilist or an egotist only caring for themselves. I'm not interested in entertaining such perspectives on this topic as I find them irrelevant, uninteresting and self-defeating. There's no point in arguing with ideals and ideas that have no meaning to anyone outside of themselves. Their lack of universal meaning or pursuit of universal meaning means they are irrelevant for finding answers that is of any importance to the collective of everyone.
Please define what an "independent researcher" is.
Quoting Robert Eccles
Reducing pollution accelerates global warming. How do we solve this catch-22?
This article was published on 02 November 2023
https://www.euronews.com/green/2023/11/02/reducing-pollution-accelerates-global-warming-how-do-we-solve-this-catch-22
Air pollution, a global scourge that kills millions of people a year, is shielding us from the full force of the sun.
Stripped of its toxic shield, which scatters and reflects solar radiation, China's average temperatures have gone up by 0.7 degrees Celsius since 2014 (note - this is since 2014, not since pre-industrial times).
This has triggered fiercer heatwaves, according to a review of meteorological data by news agency Reuters and confirmed by six leading climate experts.
The removal of the air pollution - a term scientists call 'unmasking' - may have had a greater effect on temperatures in some industrial Chinese cities over the last decade than the warming from greenhouse gases themselves, the scientists say.
They say efforts to improve air quality could actually push the world into catastrophic warming scenarios and irreversible impacts.
"Aerosols are masking one-third of the heating of the planet," says Paulo Artaxo, an environmental physicist and lead author of the chapter on short-lived climate pollutants in the most recent round of reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), completed this year.
"If you implement technologies to reduce air pollution, this will accelerate - very significantly - global warming in the short term."
During heatwaves, the unmasking effect can be even more pronounced. Laura Wilcox, a climate scientist who studies the effects of aerosols at the UK's University of Reading, says a computer simulation showed that the rapid decline in SO2 in China could raise temperatures on extreme-heat days by as much as 2C.
Which scenario do you prefer?
1) - have air pollution and lower temperatures and kill millions of people a year
2) - have improved air quality and higher temperatures and potentially catastrophic warming scenarios and irreversible impacts and possibly kill billions of people
If you think I'm going to engage in a discussion with you, then you wasted a lot of digital ink and time.
That's okay. I hope that you enjoy your clean air while you are suffering from catastrophic global warming.
One of the many solutions offered for global warming involved seeding clouds. It would be intentional pollution. It may still be on the table.
Any global solution to climate change requires international cooperation and funding. So the proposed solution is doomed from the start.
Seeding clouds may have other undesirable consequences. Seeding clouds above one country could have flow on effects to other countries. The other countries might not like that.
Some people will probably revert back to the stone age. People who are isolated will.
If that ever happens then it would be long after I am dead. So I don't worry too much about it.
But I am optimistic that technology and/or AI will save us from reverting to the stone age. Of course, that assumes that AI doesn't enslave us or eradicate us first.? :scream:
It's just isolated groups that lose skills.
Economic and business groups are starting to think yes. Some of us have been saying it for a long time.
https://iccwbo.org/news-publications/policies-reports/new-report-extreme-weather-events-cost-economy-2-trillion-over-the-last-decade/
https://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/2025/new-report-from-bcg-and-cambridge-on-climate-change-investment/
https://www.bcg.com/publications/2025/investing-in-climate-action
But Frank, who pays the costs and who gets the benefits?
Are they the same people?
This will be a conservative estimate(which one would expect with an economic assessment), it wont include shocks and breakdowns in societies, or unexpected weather and geological events. All of which will accompany the overall trend. Which in turn will increase in frequency, as the gap between the state prior to a human induced climate change and the current state becomes wider.
Do reports like this consider areas of sensitivity for population wellbeing. Such as fresh water and food supply? Because these can be greatly affected by destabilisation of weather patterns, even with the small temperature changes we have experienced so far. We have a large human population which requires fresh water and food daily, it wont take much for this dependency to become strained. Desertification can happen quite suddenly in some regions resulting in the loss of large areas of productive farmland. Which seems to be happening in California at this time. Other areas can be susceptible to destabilised weather patterns, such as most of Europe at the moment.
What happens when there are water and food shortages. Destabilisation of populations and societies. Another likely development is societal collapse, political turmoil and the spread of warfare. Things we are already seeing in the continent of Africa.
Now when discussing mitigation and adaptation, are we assuming away these other risks? Surely if there is societal collapse, severe water, or food shortages in a country, this will reduce their willingness, or ability to make the changes required. If this were to start to happen in larger countries, it would have a more significant slowing effect on the progress of the required changes.
Then there are the political ramifications, states like the U.S. Brazil(until recently) and Russia have a drill baby drill policy. As a result of the increase in populism and authoritarianism in recent decades. Failed states wont be mitigating, or adapting.
All in all its a rocky road ahead.
This touches on the philosophical conundrum I mentioned earlier. How do we plan for our children?
Some people plan for their welfare of their children and some don't.
Old people like me will not benefit much; the young will benefit, and their offspring. People with money will have to pay, again that's not me, by and large. Poor people cannot do much mitigating, they are too busy starving and trying to get somewhere else where there might be food and water available. Rich people do not have these problems, they can just jump on their obscenely luxurious yachts and sail off to somewhere more congenial. People who have migrated to Mars will not be affected except that imports may become more expensive.
When I read this question it made me wonder how many people don't have any children, and don't intend to have any. Would these people be highly motivated to leave the world in a state that is livable for the children that they don't have ( :grin: ) and their children's children, who will never exist ( :grin: ).
I did some searching on the internet and found an interesting study.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/nz/blog/living-single/202205/why-so-many-adults-think-they-will-never-have-children
Here are some quotes:
The number of adults who do not have kids, and do not think they will ever have kids, is growing.
Toward the end of 2021, the Pew Research Center surveyed adults in the U.S., ages 18 through 49, who did not already have children and asked them how likely it was that they would ever have children. A similar survey had already been conducted three years earlier, in 2018.
In 2018, 37 percent said it was not too likely or not at all likely that they would have children someday. By 2021, that number had increased to 44 percent.
The adults who said it was unlikely that they would ever have children were asked why. The number one reason was that they just did not want to have children. More than half, 56 percent, said that. The younger adults (those below 40) were even more likely than the older ones (ages 40-49) to say that they just didnt want to have kids: 60 percent, compared to 46 percent.
What are the implications of this on people's motivation to "save the planet" when they don't have any children (and possibly don't intend to have any). I realise that some childless people have nieces and nephews etc. and this may affect their motivation.
I would think rather that people are disinclined to have children because they feel helpless to prevent the approaching disasters, rather than they are demotivated to act to mitigate the disaster because they do not want children. This is what I mainly hear from my daughters and their friends. But obviously, "Apres moi le deluge" is not a new sentiment either. It's a very ugly one though.
This is another quote from the study:
The reasons the men and women gave for why they would probably never have kids, even though they probably did want them, were:
- Medical reasons (19 percent)
- Financial reasons (17 percent)
- No partner (15 percent)
- Thinking that they or their partner were too old (10 percent)
- The state of the world (9 percent)
- Climate change/the environment (5 percent)
- That their partner doesnt want kids (2 percent)
So this study found that only 5% of people gave Climate change/the environment as the reason why they would probably never have kids.
Well that's an interesting gloss. so they probably do want kids, but ... their position in the world, or the condition of the world is such that they do not want them.
But what is your answer to your own question in the light of this?
I think here the political situation or climate change are a very minor factor.
The bigger factor is simply the cultural change in the society and that you don't need children to take care of yourself when you get older. Starting a family is a big decision today and people tend to leave it quite late. And if they have children, few have more than two. Also loneliness is an endemic.
That the future is bad? I don't think that's really a reason for many.
Quoting unenlightened
I want to have a puppy, but I will probably never get one because of climate change.? :scream:
Just kidding. I want to have a puppy but I don't want to get one because of the cost involved.
Do I want to have a puppy?
- Yes and no.
- I do and I don't.
You can want something and not want it at the same time.
Whether you will probably never have the something is an educated guess about what will happen in the future.
Thank you for that revelation.
Quoting Agree-to-Disagree
This was your question that I wanted you to answer, since you didn't like my response very much.
Quoting ssu
And a cultural change in society is nothing to do with the political situation? The end of WW2 produced a baby boom; the prospect of WW3 might likewise account for a baby bust.
I believe that people who don't have any children, and don't intend to have any children, have less motivation to "save the planet" than people who have children, or intend to have children.
I think that most people are inherently selfish. People who have children usually want the best for their children and this can over-ride the inherent selfishness.
If you are not going to spend your money on children then what are you going to do with it? I think that you are likely to spend it on yourself to maximise your "enjoyment of life".
Quoting ssu
I agree with this comment. As women's opportunities in life have increased because of better education and more equality with men, they are devoting themselves to a career, marrying less, and having less children. In Japan marriage is becoming less common because women don't want to give up their "single" lifestyle and they don't want the burden of devoting their time to a husband (which is culturally expected).
What about fusion power? You seem to see the downfall of any solution. What about this one? :grin:
I think that fusion power sounds very promising. The big problems are getting it to work and getting it to work safely.
If you want a downfall then I would say that "if it sounds too good to be true then it probably is too good to be true".? :grin:
Yes. One of the problems I see with fusion is that if it works, it will be available to nations that can afford to build fusion power plants. A lot of poorer nations will be left burning whatever they have to burn.
Really? What safety issues exactly?
There are many places on the internet where the dangers and safety issues of fusion power are discussed.
This is a very detailed one:
Fusion reactors: Not what theyre cracked up to be
By Daniel Jassby
https://thebulletin.org/2017/04/fusion-reactors-not-what-theyre-cracked-up-to-be
Daniel Jassby was a principal research physicist at the Princeton Plasma Physics Lab until 1999. For 25 years he worked in areas of plasma physics and neutron production related to fusion energy research and development. He holds a PhD in astrophysical sciences from Princeton University.
Daniel Jassby points out that (as well as all of the other problems):
Quoting Daniel Jassby
If you do a Google search for "fusion power" then the AI overview includes the following
Neutron Radiation:
Fusion reactions produce high-energy neutrons that can damage materials, leading to swelling, embrittlement, and fatigue in reactor components.
Radioactive Waste:
Fusion reactors, while producing less radioactive waste than fission reactors, still generate radioactive materials, including tritium, which requires careful handling and disposal.
Tritium Handling and Leakage:
Tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen, is a key fuel for fusion, but its handling and potential leakage pose significant safety concerns.
Daniel Jassby's article says:
Tritium will be dispersed on the surfaces of the reaction vessel, particle injectors, pumping ducts, and other appendages. Corrosion in the heat exchange system, or a breach in the reactor vacuum ducts could result in the release of radioactive tritium into the atmosphere or local water resources. Tritium exchanges with hydrogen to produce tritiated water, which is biologically hazardous. The release of even tiny amounts of radioactive tritium from fission reactors into groundwater causes public consternation.
Gamma Radiation:
Fusion reactions also produce gamma radiation, which, combined with neutron radiation, can be dangerously high
Radioactive Waste Disposal:
While fusion waste is generally considered lower-level than fission waste, it still requires safe and long-term disposal.
Potential for Accidents:
Although fusion is not based on a chain reaction like fission, accidents involving the fusion reactor's containment or materials could still lead to radioactive releases.
Homo sapiens will also either adapt to their deteriorating environment, or their numbers will start being reduced, as we're seeing in declining child bearing rates.
It doesn't matter who or what gets the praise or the blame, homo sapiens will either show evolutionary intelligence or evolutionary ignorance.
All of us are part of this evolutionary movement in deciding intelligent or ignorant responses.
What if an organism could change the environment? They could change the environment to allow themselves to survive. Organisms are part of the environment, not separate from it.
Quoting alleybear
Evolution is a story that is read backwards. You don't know exactly what will happen in the future. An organism can try to predict the future but whether a decision is "intelligent" or "ignorant" can not be told in advance. For example, is creating AI an "intelligent" or "ignorant" decision?
To use AI for example, decisions about AI are being made in the now. Some of those decisions may help homo sapiens survive, and some of those decisions may be dangerous to survival. In this example, in each now, there are uncountable decisions being made all over the earth by homo sapiens on how to interact with this new environmental element. The evolutionary movement here is the accumulation of all of these decisions, both "intelligent" and "ignorant" over time, and the changes between homo sapiens and everything else in their environment as they incorporate the new environmental element of AI into their existence. This incorporation could be beneficial, detrimental, or be "not a big deal" to homo sapiens existence.
All of us are part of this evolutionary movement of incorporating AI into our existence, as we make our own decisions on how to interact or not interact, or are unknowingly interacting with AI.
Living things are architects: sometimes profoundly altering the earth to meet their needs. This has been going practically since life first appeared. People who think climate change is a moral issue because it's evil to transform the world are just misinformed about the nature of life.
The moral issue is about having the power to help our descendants, but failing to act on their behalves.
Do I have a moral duty to help YOUR descendants?
No. The moral issue I'm talking about has little to do with you in particular.
Then who does the moral issue that you are talking about apply to?
The human race
Morals are subjective. Not everybody shares your views.
Quoting frank
Acting to help our descendants has costs for us. It also has possible benefits for us. How far should we go to help our descendants. Should we go and live in caves so that our descendants can have a better life? The issue seems to one of compromise, and there will be a spectrum of opinions.
I have said before that I think that most people are inherently selfish. That isn't compatible with helping our descendants.
Beer drinkers exploit that yeast commit suicide by drowning in their excrements. ;)
Reminds me a bit of the commons.
It appears that there is a very large difference in Solar Energy Potential between summer and winter for latitudes that are not close to the equator.
How will countries that depend on solar energy cope with this situation?
Large, regionally variable shifts in diatom and dinoflagellate biomass in the North Atlantic over six decades
[sup] Crispin M Mutshinda, Zoe V Finkel, Andrew J Irwin · PLoS One · Jun 4, 2025[/sup]
A couple of percent fall in plankton a year in the North Atlantic.
Plankton is part of larger food chains and plays a role in capturing carbon dioxide.
They should have a reliable backstop of nuclear energy always available to shore up production shortages from renewables.
The worlds first solar-powered train in Australia ( Bridgestone Corporation · Jun 2019)
Discover World-First Solar Train in Byron Bay ( Elements of Byron · Apr 2023)
Byron Bay solar powered train ( Clean Energy Regulator, Australian Government · Sep 2024)
[sup] Phys.org · Aug 22, 2025[/sup]
The "accelerating" part is a downer. (Is that still a word?)
Evaluating IPCC Projections of Global Sea-Level Change From the Pre-Satellite Era
[sup] Earth's Future · Aug 22, 2025[/sup]
Probabilistic reconstruction of sea-level changes and their causes since 1900
[sup] Earth System Science Data · Jul 31, 2024[/sup]
How would more moving water in circulation manifest (in everyday life)? Low islands getting smaller seems a safe bet. Low fields becoming lakes? I'm guessing more flash floods in some places.
Look for information about what the world will be like in 2100. For instance, much of the Middle east will have become uninhabitable, with human life only possible near the coasts...
Quantifying the regional to global climate impacts of individual fossil fuel projects to inform decision-making
An image from that paper:
Excellent research. This project will kill over 400 Europeans.
Why limit your death analysis to climate change issues and not conduct it every time you build a car or road? People rarely die in open fields, but then you build a road and folks start get getting killed.
The solution wouldn't be the elimination of roads and cars, but in increased safety measures. Life is a dangerous venture, so we create seat belts and airbags. If it gets too hot, maybe we need more air conditioners.
This is the kind of analysis I would expect from Karoline Leavitt.
Science doesn't dictate action. It provides data from which to decide what is valued. That's always the case. Let's remove the question from climate change and just ask if we should produce trains. If each train results in X deaths, then we know that by not producing Y number of trains, we'll have XY less deaths. Certainly if one of my family members is destined for a train death, I'd like for there not to be deathtrains out there.
Saying something like maybe we need more air conditioners in relation to climate change is a dismissive, ignorant statement. And Im sure you know it. So why say it?
Yes, there are trade offs to building things. The externalities involved in fossil fuel infrastructure, extraction, and use are enormous and destructive, and have existed for decades. The damage to the ecosystem, apart from the floods, droughts, wildfires, and agricultural destruction is beyond comprehension.
To wave all this off with too hot? Try more air conditioners is something I felt compelled to call out.
"Under a middle-of-the-road emissions scenario, warming contributed by Scarborough would cause an additional 484 heat-related deaths in Europe alone by the end of the century, the researchers calculated. Taking into account a reduction in cold-related deaths in Europe, they estimate a net contribution of 118 additional deaths."
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/oct/13/woodside-scarborough-gas-project-emissions-could-cause-heat-deaths
That's about 1.5 European deaths a year from this project. Hanover is right. The average person is not going to be alarmed by that, nor should they. People know there is an inherent risk to everything, and a handful of deaths a year is a piddling human cost to pay for providing cheap electricity to a huge number of people. On a utilitarian calculus, how does 1 or 2 deaths (let's say it's 10 worldwide) a year compare to the utiles of providing electricity to, say, 100,000 extra households a year? How many lives will be saved/vastly improved by that increase in access to electricity every year?
Quoting Mikie
By 2100, the average temperature in Jerusalem will be 14-16 degrees hotter than it is now. The whole area will be well into irreversible desertification. There just won't be any water. The flora and fauna will become desert forms. Unless the human population turns into Fremen, no one will live there.