Nut Nut's Attempt At A Book About Politics & Society
Dear Forum Members,
Over in the poker threads, they have members who blog about their poker experience. I've been wanting
Following chart speaks for itself. From 2020, it shows how steep the necessary adaptation curve would have been at past points in time. It's 2025 .... we haven't started reducing CO2 emissions.
From the latest IPCC Synthesis Report (2023)
All global modelled pathways that limit warming to 1.5°C (>50%) with no or limited overshoot, and those that limit warming to 2°C (>67%), involve rapid and deep and, in most cases,
immediate greenhouse gas emissions reductions in all sectors this decade. Global net zero CO2 emissions are reached for these pathway categories, in the early 2050s and around the early
2070s, respectively.
None of this is happening. 43% of the American public stands behind a raving lunatic who had the audacity to insult the entire UN and call climate change a hoax.
Instead of tightening our belts, we're blowing up bitcoin which is a completely unnecessary bubble / extravagance which increases world electricity demand by 1%. We're building AI data centers for a product with no market.
An honest climate scientist who would say that it's too late ? Why would anyone pay them ? Scientists have a conflict of interest ..... if they say we've gone too far, they don't eat.
We're not taking action. Unless you call slamming our foot on the accelerator and racing toward the cliff "action".
You can't find a single mainstream scientist who will come out and say that our action is adequate.
Suppose we got our actions up to mainstream standards/targets. Do you think that would suffice to stave off the worse case - end of civilization as we know it - scenarios?
Suppose we got our actions up to mainstream standards/targets. Do you think that would suffice to stave off the worse case - end of civilization as we know it - scenarios?
That's a good question. Honestly, I don't know. None of us has a crystal ball which allows us to see the future in high resolution.
One of the things which I have attempted to do here is illuminate the forces which explain why we are not taking action. These forces are part of our nature. If we are unable to have a conversation about our nature and what it truly means in order to adapt and cooperate politically in order to realize those actions, then we are not going to take those actions.
It's a very tricky thing .... we have a feature of our consciousness which has been historically advantageous for millions of years of evolution. And suddenly that feature becomes malignant. It's not anyone's fault or a conspiracy .... it's just like a time bomb that was embedded in us by nature and now it's exploding.
I'm wearing two hats. From a logical perspective ..... end of civilization is an extremely high likelihood. From a visceral perspective, I can't acquiesce to that. I have to try and figure out the formula to trigger some awakening. That's a low probability endeavor but it gives me some purpose. Even though from all appearances I'm ornery and antagonistic .... deep down I want everyone to be happy. I would like life on Earth to be groovy.
One of the biggest obstacles to changes is fear.
People want to have as much control as possible over their access to their survival needs. A pile of currency in the form of an investment statement with a bunch of symbols (a dollar sign with a bunch of commas) is what they 've been brainwashed to believe guarantees them the access that they crave. That's been the system their entire lives and they have no reason to imagine that it will change.
People hold onto money tightly. It's creates a boundary between themselves and other people. It's our property and anyone who wants to take it away is trespassing on our property. Trespassers are a threat that need to be neutralized. Defending our turf has been a healthy part of our evolutionary learning.
But where does money come from in a capitalist society ? It is derived from a supply and demand economy in which the supply is derived from the Earth which is a collective asset. So capitalism involves claiming a piece of the shared Earth as one's turf. The problem is that our waste products don't stake confined to our individual turf. The atmosphere is all mixed. The water systems are highly mixed.
So, while it is still possible, we need to pivot to a system in which we remove the fear of access to survival needs by guaranteeing those becomes society's highest priority. We make food, shelter, medical care, education, etc all part of universal basic income in return for people letting go of that investment statement with all of those symbols. It would be very strange ..... people would have to figure out other ways to choose mates than by how much money they have.
It's very doable .... if we were all born into such a system, it would be relatively simple to perpetuate. But we have to transition away from a system in which we feel a need to hoard for ourselves. in preparation for a threat from others. We would have to start seeing ourselves as part of a pack instead of a separate and vulnerable individual.
In the big scheme of evolutionary history, the current system is a very short-lived one. It has certainly been dominant and beneficial for several millennia, but it has become obsolete. The system will die .... if we cling to the system like we cling to our money, then we will die with it. I hope we choose life. I like life. As Tyrion Lannister said .... "life is full of possibilities".
I don't think our human nature is as self destructive as you suggest. I do think our wiring is best suited for scarcity and issues come up once we have all our basic needs met.
But we figure things out. Social Security being a good example. That's basically a microcosm of what you're talking about. I mean imagine what it would be like out there without it.... millions of homeless elderly who chose immediate gratification.
When I was watching that Sagan video I thought about that 'environmental protection plan for your children" concept I was talking about up thread. Checks a lot of the right boxes especially because it sort of frames itself as a choice rather than forced.
My hunch is that your opinion is based upon incomplete knowledge of the feedback loops we've initiated.
Have you ever been curious to investigate how previous mass extinctions have been triggered ? Are you interested in the history of the ebb and flow of life on Earth ?
I find it interesting and I would be happy to share if you want to listen.
From the perspective of a biologist, life is defined by the presence of a cellular entity which can reproduce with dividing DNA in its nucleus. By that definition, the Earth was created lifeless.
But the Earth was very chemically active from the beginning. There were lots of chemical reactions taking place.
The 4 letters of the DNA language arose before the language itself. They bonded together in strings and made 3 letter words called codons. They are called codons because they are decoded to make amino acids, the building block of proteins. Nature provided a way of rearranging the letters to make different words and sentences .... the process of rearrangement is called mutation.
Eventually a cellular entity with ~ 3 million letters of DNA had arrived at a place where it could divide into two daughter cells in a process called mitosis and life was on.
This was all taking place on a planet with virtually no oxygen in the atmosphere. A version of Earth which was completely inhospitable to humans.
After a few billion years, the process of mutation led to a different type of single celled organism called cyanobacteria. This organism had a special quality .... a form of metabolism called oxygenic photosynthesis. Basically, the organism was able to use water, carbon dioxide and sunlight to create atmospheric oxygen and glucose which is the building block of plant life. These single celled creatures were responsible for the oxygen and plants which were to nurture the future population of animals.
In terms of what would eventually prove important to humans, this was arguably the most important development on Earth for the first 4 billion years.
Eventually life becomes more complex.
One cell absorbs another cell and the absorbed cell becomes an energy powerhouse of the new cell called a mitochondria giving rise to a new type of life called eukaryotes. Multi-celled organisms arise.
Sexual reproduction (meiosis) comes along and we have a brand new way of mixing DNA in addition to mutation and diversity begins emerging more rapidly.
Physical conditions on the planet change radically due to volcanic and tectonic forces. Life ebbs and flows with the physical changes. Each version of the planet is ideally suited to a different cast of characters.
About 250 million years ago, we still didn't have mammals, but we had 4 letter creatures which resembled dinosaurs including herbivores and carnivores. And then the biggest mass extinction of all came along .... the end Permian and it almost wiped out all life on Earth.
The mass extinction arrived in stages. Beginning with a mass lava filled volcanic explosion that created what are now the Siberian Traps. An explosion that covered the Earth with something like 1M km2 of lava.
The original burst of lava was accompanied by sulfate aerosols which cooled the Earth. Then came the CO2 release which warmed the Earth and oceans (an event which we are emulating at smaller scale at the moment) ...... the CO2 warmed the atmosphere and oceans and caused their de-oxygenation killing off most life in the ocean. Then the oceans warmed so much that they shot out a great deal of methane from the ocean floor and the temperature on Earth jumped another 10-15C.
Everything on the surface perished. We owe our existence to some pre-mammalian 4 legged creatures called cynodonts who were able to live below the Earth's surface on roots and tubers.
After the proverbial dust settled and Earth conditions became more habitable, the cynodonts rapidly mutated into a variety of new species, including mammals and dinosaurs.
The purpose of this retelling is that we're currently emulating the process of this great historical mass extinction by transforming the chemistry of the atmosphere and ocean. I don't understand how anyone can arrive at the conclusion that we're not being self-destructive if they grasp this parallel.
My hunch is that your opinion is based upon incomplete knowledge of the feedback loops we've initiated.
Have you ever been curious to investigate how previous mass extinctions have been triggered ? Are you interested in the history of the ebb and flow of life on Earth ?
I find it interesting and I would be happy to share if you want to listen.
This forum’s already been through its natural selection phase. You’re not the brightest bulb in the room. So when you make a factual claim and someone says, “That’s wrong,” the odds are near100% you are wrong.
And eveyryone in this thread already has at least a general grasp of everything you’re explaining so you don’t need to walk us through freshman bio.
But the point and to your tone, did you know Canada was under two miles of solid ice not all that long ago? Do you know that anyone with a functional brainstem would show less than 100% confidence when modeling what happens as that ice starts to melt.
Do you understand that virtually everything you’re arguing depends on those same kinds of models?
Do you know that well-established, highly credentialed climatologists like Michael Mann and Katharine Hayhoe are saying that *doomism* and *denial* are basically the same side of the coin, Doomer?
It's not like there's a shortage of books out there explaining this stuff.
All you're doing with this book project is trying to smuggle your doomer-mongering into legitimate science.
Do you know that well-established, highly credentialed climatologists like Michael Mann and Katharine Hayhoe are saying that *doomism* and *denial* are basically the same side of the coin, Doomer?
Mann and Hayhoe have become prominent voices because they have told the story the corporate media establishment wants to be told.
Mann's credibility has taken a deep hit with losses in a lawsuit which involved a decision that he and his legal team fabricated information delivered in trial proceedings. Following his twitter handle in recent years, he has effectively morphed into a Democratic establishment lackey. He stepped down from his role at U Penn recently due to his political remarks about Charlie Kirk.
Mann and Hayhoe are not at the forefront of any current meaningful climate research. They do have credentials .... but they are media personalities.
Here's an article which demonstrates the friction in the climate science community between a non media darling like James Hansen (who is much more respected in the community of climate scientists) and Michael Mann.
Hansen and his team is telling the world that much more warming is in the pipeline and Mann is telling the world that everything will be fine if we hit net zero by 2050.
The best quote from the article.
We find Mann’s rebuttal of Hansen’s claims unconvincing. Crucially, Mann does not engage directly with Hansen’s analysis of new data covering the last 65 million years.
Your problem is that you are gullible and that your understanding is very thin. You blindly accept the representations of corporate media as to who the credible scientists are.
Mann is peddling a completely nonsensical version of reality .... that the feedback loops don't exist and the temperature will somehow stabilize immediately if we reach net zero.
Mann is peddling a completely nonsensical version of reality .... that the feedback loops don't exist and the temperature will somehow stabilize immediately if we reach net zero.
Like anyone is going to believe some rando on a poker forum over them.
Nah there's a very obvious reason why you're posting on here instead serious boards where people will just blow your cherry-picked arguments out of the water.
But you know what, if you do want to establish some actual credibility on here, maybe do just that instead trying to play big fish in the little pond. My hunch is you probably already have and it worked out about as well for you as the orbit tangent.
You want to know what you can do to convince me, there you go.
James Hansen is not a rando on a poker forum.
Neither is Carl Sagan. Or Johan Rockstrom. Or Stephan Rahmsorf, Eric Rignot, Jennifer Francis, Keri Emanuel.
These are the giants in climate science.
Michael Mann recently lost over $1M in a lawsuit that he originated for inventing false claims in order to try and win a defamation suit against defendants. He's a proven liar.
He's disappeared from the climate science arena since then and you're using him as some paragon of virtue.
I don't expect gullible people like you to believe me.
For christ sakes...... you have expressed your doubt that any of the consequences we are observing are due to human influences at all and possibly due to something natural. You just make it up as you go.
You're actually a wonderful foil ..... you check all of the boxes of ignorance.
I confess to being a rando. There are over 8 billion of us human rando's on Earth. Each one of us unique.
Gotta say John .... it's an interesting political position you're adopting ..... vouching for the integrity of oligarchic media.
You exemplify a person who has no gatekeeping function in terms of the ideas you allow into your head. You need to try some quality control.
Gotta say John .... it's an interesting political position you're adopting ..... vouching for the integrity of oligarchic media.
You exemplify a person who has no gatekeeping function in terms of the ideas you allow into your head. You need to try some quality control.
You asked me repeatedly what you could do to convince me and I told you. Go on a forum populated with the science crowd and make your case.
Are you willing to do that? Y/N
I am willing to bet most of the scientists on the IPCC report do not agree with the conclusions you’re drawing from their reports.
https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/syr/downl...
B.6 All global modelled pathways that limit warming to 1.5°C (>50%) with no or limited overshoot, and those that limit warming to 2°C (>67%), involve rapid and deep and, in most cases,
immediate greenhouse gas emissions reductions in all sectors this decade
Read what they are saying dude ...... in order to limit warming to 2C, we need to change human civilization immediately.
Instead .... we get politicians who cater to people like you who want to hide behind their ignorance and kick the can down the road ..... just like Carl Sagan presciently warned us 40 years ago.
You don't strike me as a troll John. Just cognitively impaired in some fashion.
I am willing to bet most of the scientists on the IPCC report do not agree with the conclusions you’re drawing from their reports.
What do you conclude from this .... what does any person who can read plain English conclude from this ?
B.6 All global modelled pathways that limit warming to 1.5°C (>50%) with no or limited overshoot, and those that limit warming to 2°C (>67%), involve rapid and deep and, in most cases,
immediate greenhouse gas emissions reductions in all sectors this decade
The final snap came around 2019 when Abramoff joined the panel of scientists reviewing the Sixth Assessment Report published in 2023 by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It concluded that while limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels as established by the 2015 Paris Agreement was slipping further out of reach, some of the irreversible changes could still be limited by “deep, rapid and sustained” reduction in emissions.
Abramoff was jarred by the data: “I remember feeling the enormity of all of the Earth systems that were already being affected by climate change and how little time we had to avert more catastrophic effects.”
Overwhelmed by the severity of the climate impacts and the resulting human suffering, Abramoff, who was completing her postdoctorate in France at the time, began volunteering for Extinction Rebellion, helping proofread the activist group’s documents and media statements. Once she returned to the US to take up her position at Oak Ridge, she was ready to risk arrest, which she did when she joined the global Scientist Rebellion protest in Washington, DC, on April 6.
She couldn’t sleep the night before, she recalls. However, she wasn’t nervous about the experience of being in a processing cell “but of not actually being able to accomplish the task, which was to chain myself with four other women to the White House gate”, she says. “And we managed it.”
Abramoff went on to be arrested six more times, most recently for chaining herself to the Mountain Valley Pipeline, whose approval US President Joe Biden signed into law last year. The $6.6bn pipeline, which is set to carry 56.6 million cubic metres (2 billion cubic feet) of shelled gas a day across West Virginia and Virginia, is estimated to emit 89 million metric tonnes of greenhouse gases a year.
In an opinion piece for The New York Times that she penned shortly after her dismissal from Oak Ridge, Abramoff describes how being a “well-behaved scientist” did not have any tangible effects. “I’m all for decorum, but not when it will cost us the earth,” she writes.
I'm curious if anyone can put together a cogent sentence or two which articulates the difference between what I'm saying and what that IPCC passage is saying ?
I doubt that anyone can or will. I suspect more deflection and people just heading back under their rocks.
Run along people ..... the plagues will come find us all before long. There's no Planet B and only a very select few are going to get an invitation to try and ride out the damage in Musk's space stations.
