Extinction Rebellion

[Nicolo Barella]

20 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

Yep.

 

Not only are tech fixes more likely to be acceptable to people around the world, looking at long term civilisational survival they're the only option anyway.

 

The problem is that there are a lot of vested interests (agri and oil lobby to name but two) invested in maintaining the status quo. That's why making the big changes politically can be difficult.

You're right of course, it is simply very depressing

[leicsmac]

24 minutes ago, Nicolo Barella said:

You're right of course, it is simply very depressing

That it is.

 

But don't worry, there's still time, and still a chance.

[Nalis]

On 28/08/2021 at 01:22, ozleicester said:

The discussions that are being held here and in millions of homes and workplaces are because XR are driving awareness. Without the protests...NOTHING would be happening.

A whole lot of old people especially (and by old i mean 35+) would still just be focussing on themselves and not the future of the planet.

I think that comment in your 2nd paragraph is a bit unfair on the over 35s, I know over 60s who are a very proactive on the subject and know under 35s who are either climate change deniers or simply dont give a shit.

Edited 30 August 2021 by Nalis

[ozleicester]

2 hours ago, Nalis said:

I think that comment in your 2nd paragraph is a bit unfair on the over 35s, I know over 60s who are a very proactive on the subject and know under 35s who are either climate change deniers or simply dont give a shit.

I thought i was careful to say "A whole lot".. not all.

I am old... and i am very active in trying to change things... but in my experience, a lot of those over 35 are less interested in saving the earth, than in grabbing as many $$ as possible no matter the impact....and yes.. greed and stupidity runs strong amongst many under 35s as well.

#notall

[Nalis]

4 minutes ago, ozleicester said:

I thought i was careful to say "A whole lot".. not all.

I am old... and i am very active in trying to change things... but in my experience, a lot of those over 35 are less interested in saving the earth, than in grabbing as many $$ as possible no matter the impact....and yes.. greed and stupidity runs strong amongst many under 35s as well.

#notall

Fair enough on the clarification. 

[ozleicester]

10 minutes ago, Nalis said:

Fair enough on the clarification. 

All good

[WigstonWanderer]

On 28/08/2021 at 08:22, ozleicester said:

The discussions that are being held here and in millions of homes and workplaces are because XR are driving awareness. Without the protests...NOTHING would be happening.

A whole lot of old people especially (and by old i mean 35+) would still just be focussing on themselves and not the future of the planet.

[nnfox]

11 hours ago, Fightforever said:

One of the easier fixes would be to do something about cattle the amount of land used for cattle and cattle itself. It always blows my mind how much land we use for cattle in comparison to how much we use for ourselves as humans. I am in no way a vegan but I find it ridiculous how much resources we put into one type of animal that creates so much pollution. This is just for the USA. Imagine being a starving kid and looking at that graph. Stuff like fake meat look very promising as replacements and they use much less resources to create.

 

If you want to fix climate change most fixes have to be tech fixes. Imagine being a state like Nigeria and being told by wealthy westerners that due to climate change they can't export their only real export that's worth any value (oil). That's asking for countless civil wars in the 3rd world it's just very unrealistic. Some people look down on tech fixes to our enviroment which always has baffled me. Industries all have their own unique case for causing pollution coming up with bespoke solutions for each one in every state and company in the world would just be unfeasible.

We need the G7 to put serious funding into carbon capturing tech or creating bacteria that eat greenhouse gasses and churn out oxygen. Give them the funding and tone down the regulation and you would be suprised how creative scientists can be. We found a covid vaccine way quicker than estimated I don't see why without an effort we can't do something about climate change. We need to put more money into thorium reactors as well. The capability to create thorium reactors has been around for ages but no one has given it any investment and the usual scaremongering over anything nuclear has pretty much made it so no progress has been made on that front.

I seem to recall seeing somewhere that if the Chinese adopted the same appetite for beef as the Americans, there would not be enough land on the planet to satisfy the demand.  Crazy.

[Fightforever]

14 hours ago, Nicolo Barella said:

We have all we the tools we need right now to make huge changes to our footprint. Change the focus of subsidies from corn/cattle in the West, develop nuclear reactors, build better train systems, so many obvious fixes that would have huge impacts that are very achievable. Technological advances will help us but we shouldn't be relying on them - with political will, we could very easily start making huge positive impacts. It is depressing that the biggest pushes are from ultimately smaller issues like plastic bags/straws

Your last sentence is the perfect example of what actual virtue signalling is. McDonalds making cardboard straws while having the £1 Cheeseburger that has a much higher carbon footprint is the perfect example of a company trying to save face rather than actually caring about the issue at hand.

[nnfox]

19 minutes ago, Fightforever said:

Your last sentence is the perfect example of what actual virtue signalling is. McDonalds making cardboard straws while having the £1 Cheeseburger that has a much higher carbon footprint is the perfect example of a company trying to save face rather than actually caring about the issue at hand.

To be fair, the plastic is more about the disgusting state we leave our oceans and the damage that does.

 

Carbon emissions are just part of the terrible legacy we are leaving for future generations.

[Heathrow fox]

2 hours ago, nnfox said:

To be fair, the plastic is more about the disgusting state we leave our oceans and the damage that does.

 

Carbon emissions are just part of the terrible legacy we are leaving for future generations.

The plastic issue concerns me more than climate change tbh.We are now drinking eating and breathing it in to our bodies every single day.Yet plastic consumption seems to be going up not down.Just a quick observation on recycling day tells me that,and of course we all know that most of it will end up being burned or dumped in someone else’s sea anyway.

[dsr-burnley]

9 hours ago, nnfox said:

I seem to recall seeing somewhere that if the Chinese adopted the same appetite for beef as the Americans, there would not be enough land on the planet to satisfy the demand.  Crazy.

In a CAFO (intensive cattle farm), 100,000 cattle live in 1.25 square miles.  (That's about 7 yards x 6 yards each.)  Each cow produces approx 430 lbs of meat, and the average American eats 82 lbs of beef each year.  So each cow feeds 5 people. 

 

Therefore to feed 8 billion people, we would need 1.6 billion cattle per year, which is 20,000 square miles.  OK, Let's assume that each cow takes two years to grow and that extra space is needed for breeding and so forth.  Call it 80,000 square miles.  As a guidleine, the earth's total land area is 57 million square miles, over by a factor of 700.  Even allowing for ice caps, we could cope.

 

Of course, you may not like intensive farming.  So instead, let's look at this site on self sufficiency.  A cow, apparently, needs 1.8 acres of pasture to live, Two cows, 3.6 acres, and kill one cow per year to feed five people = 0.72 acres per person.  That's 9 million square miles, which may be getting a bit tight.  But I doubt the Chinese will have qualms about intensive farming, so they will have room.  (Or maybe they'll have pigs, which take up a lot less space.)

 

Incidentally, the site says wheat, corn, and vegetables for one person takes up 1.4 acres.  Has anyone any specific figures that explain why it's so high relative to the cows, when we're constantly being told that meat uses far more land than non-meat?

 

https://permaculturism.com/how-much-land-does-it-take-to-feed-one-person/

Edited 31 August 2021 by dsr-burnley

[leicsmac]

3 hours ago, Heathrow fox said:

The plastic issue concerns me more than climate change tbh.We are now drinking eating and breathing it in to our bodies every single day.Yet plastic consumption seems to be going up not down.Just a quick observation on recycling day tells me that,and of course we all know that most of it will end up being burned or dumped in someone else’s sea anyway.

Plastic pollution is certainly a problem and one that needs to be looked at more. However I'm unsure that is has quite the same potential for devastation as climate change does.

 

But we do need to be looking closely at addressing both.

 

41 minutes ago, dsr-burnley said:

In a CAFO (intensive cattle farm), 100,000 cattle live in 1.25 square miles.  (That's about 7 yards x 6 yards each.)  Each cow produces approx 430 lbs of meat, and the average American eats 82 lbs of beef each year.  So each cow feeds 5 people. 

 

Therefore to feed 8 billion people, we would need 1.6 billion cattle per year, which is 20,000 square miles.  OK, Let's assume that each cow takes two years to grow and that extra space is needed for breeding and so forth.  Call it 80,000 square miles.  As a guidleine, the earth's total land area is 57 million square miles, over by a factor of 700.  Even allowing for ice caps, we could cope.

 

Of course, you may not like intensive farming.  So instead, let's look at this site on self sufficiency.  A cow, apparently, needs 1.8 acres of pasture to live, Two cows, 3.6 acres, and kill one cow per year to feed five people = 0.72 acres per person.  That's 9 million square miles, which may be getting a bit tight.  But I doubt the Chinese will have qualms about intensive farming, so they will have room.  (Or maybe they'll have pigs, which take up a lot less space.)

 

Incidentally, the site says wheat, corn, and vegetables for one person takes up 1.4 acres.  Has anyone any specific figures that explain why it's so high relative to the cows, when we're constantly being told that meat uses far more land than non-meat?

 

https://permaculturism.com/how-much-land-does-it-take-to-feed-one-person/

Interesting.

 

You'd have to factor in how much of Earth's land area is unsuitable for this by being mountainous, too hot or too cold, though. That may well knock a fair bit off.

 

Personally I'd hope that lab-grown meat ends up taking off in a big way, it would help.

[MonkeyTennis?]

I find with XR I hold contradictory views that i struggle to reconcile:

 

It is true that more extreme, active protests have the effect of dragging maintstream popular opinion in certain directions (known as the 'Overton window'), so they probably do have a valuable effect. I may not agree with blocking roads, etc, but it helps to enhance general social acceptance that climate change requires action. So that's good, and there is value to what they do...

      ...but I also find them annoyingly fatalistic and unhelpfully focused on 'raising awareness' with weird avant garde stunts rather than actually doing anything proactively helpful. 'Raising awareness' is almost the easiest thing anyone can do about anything. 

 

With climate change more generally I really do think there is an urgent need to do something, and human industry is undeniably having an appalling effect on the global ecosystem. The images of floods and fires we have seen this year are truly frightening...

     ...but also people throughout history have always been keen to adopt apocalypic thinking, which in part a way of endlessly deferring dealing with real issues in the here and now, by focusing on somehow preventing a vaguer, partially imaginary future that never fully comes. Is climate change, sort of, in the same category? (A good example of this would be spending millions on green initiatives while many people are relying on food banks, etc - the probable enviromental catastrophe in the future is treated as a more urgent priority than poverty and hardship which is happening now. Is that because the thing in the future really is much more important and takes priority, or is that because the things in the present are so hard to resolve, that it's easier to say you are doing something about climate change - even though nothing really seems to work, at all, including almost total lockdown - because frankly, at least it looks like you are doing something about something?) 

 

 

[leicsmac]

12 minutes ago, MonkeyTennis? said:

I find with XR I hold contradictory views that i struggle to reconcile:

 

It is true that more extreme, active protests have the effect of dragging maintstream popular opinion in certain directions (known as the 'Overton window'), so they probably do have a valuable effect. I may not agree with blocking roads, etc, but it helps to enhance general social acceptance that climate change requires action. So that's good, and there is value to what they do...

      ...but I also find them annoyingly fatalistic and unhelpfully focused on 'raising awareness' with weird avant garde stunts rather than actually doing anything proactively helpful. 'Raising awareness' is almost the easiest thing anyone can do about anything. 

 

With climate change more generally I really do think there is an urgent need to do something, and human industry is undeniably having an appalling effect on the global ecosystem. The images of floods and fires we have seen this year are truly frightening...

     ...but also people throughout history have always been keen to adopt apocalypic thinking, which in part a way of endlessly deferring dealing with real issues in the here and now, by focusing on somehow preventing a vaguer, partially imaginary future that never fully comes. Is climate change, sort of, in the same category? (A good example of this would be spending millions on green initiatives while many people are relying on food banks, etc - the probable enviromental catastrophe in the future is treated as a more urgent priority than poverty and hardship which is happening now. Is that because the thing in the future really is much more important and takes priority, or is that because the things in the present are so hard to resolve, that it's easier to say you are doing something about climate change - even though nothing really seems to work, at all, including almost total lockdown - because frankly, at least it looks like you are doing something about something?) 

 

 

Before I fully engage on this one and give my answer to the question, I wouldn't mind some further clarity, as these two parts seem to be a little contradictory.

 

Exactly what level of threat do you think climate change represents? (As you seem to take it seriously in the first part but then are rather more blase about it in the second.)

 

 

[MonkeyTennis?]

17 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

Before I fully engage on this one and give my answer to the question, I wouldn't mind some further clarity, as these two parts seem to be a little contradictory.

 

Exactly what level of threat do you think climate change represents? (As you seem to take it seriously in the first part but then are rather more blase about it in the second.)

 

 

Well, I think the climate will become different in 10, 20, 30 years, and is more likely to become more and more inhospitable in more and more places over that period. I'm also convinced that we will see many more floods, and more widlfires, more frequently and closer to home. I also think the last hundred years (maybe much longer) have been relatively 'quiet' in terms of climate events, and geologocal activity more generally, and that this is coming to an end. And I totally believe that use of fossil fuels, the release of toxic chemicals into the air, intensive farming and mining, etc, has dramatically exacerbated these events, and continues to do so. So I guess that's a high threat level. 

 

But I don't currently think the planet will be rendered totally inhospitable for humans, I don't think climate change will cause societal collapse, I do think its probably 'liveable with' in some ways, but I'm aware that my view is perhaps warped because I live in Leciestershire and not, say, Australia. I don't really believe in the idea of an imminent apocalypse - which has always been just around the corner throughout human history. I actually think that when people effectively say 'The world is going to end if we don't do X,' it's a form of insane wishful thinking, if that makes sense, and its actually quite dangerous (because it excourages extreme actions, when we really need prosaic 'fixes.') 

 

 

[leicsmac]

16 minutes ago, MonkeyTennis? said:

Well, I think the climate will become different in 10, 20, 30 years, and is more likely to become more and more inhospitable in more and more places over that period. I'm also convinced that we will see many more floods, and more widlfires, more frequently and closer to home. I also think the last hundred years (maybe much longer) have been relatively 'quiet' in terms of climate events, and geologocal activity more generally, and that this is coming to an end. And I totally believe that use of fossil fuels, the release of toxic chemicals into the air, intensive farming and mining, etc, has dramatically exacerbated these events, and continues to do so. So I guess that's a high threat level. 

 

But I don't currently think the planet will be rendered totally inhospitable for humans, I don't think climate change will cause societal collapse, I do think its probably 'liveable with' in some ways, but I'm aware that my view is perhaps warped because I live in Leciestershire and not, say, Australia. I don't really believe in the idea of an imminent apocalypse - which has always been just around the corner throughout human history. I actually think that when people effectively say 'The world is going to end if we don't do X,' it's a form of insane wishful thinking, if that makes sense, and its actually quite dangerous (because it excourages extreme actions, when we really need prosaic 'fixes.') 

 

 

Thank you for the clarification.

 

I really don't think there's much to disagree with there tbh. The scientific data itself backs up the idea that climate change, while drastic, will in all likelihood not result in the extinction of humanity by itself. However, given certain circumstances that might result from it, I would suggest that societal collapse (as opposed to extinction) is possible. For example, a scenario where a powerful nation suddenly found itself with a shortage of food, potable water and living space due to it. They then decide to take land and resources from nearby places...by force. Such a could well end up where humans finish with the gun what they began with the power station and factory.

 

Long story short, it doesn't have to just be climate change alone that delivers the problems that lead to ruin here.

 

As such, though it likely isn't an apocalyptic threat, it does have the potential to set back humanity centuries given the wrong outcome, so it should be treated among the gravest of threats facing humanity right now. There aren't many bigger, put it that way.

 

I would agree that prosaic solutions involving tech would do the trick now, but they need to be implemented wider, and faster.

[nnfox]

One of the major consequences of climate change is that whilst the UK is fairly well positioned not to suffer terribly from extreme weather events as much as some other places, some parts of the world are likely to become inhospitable for humans, certainly to the extent where potentially hundreds of millions of people will look to relocate.  

 

You just need to look at the strain and panic displayed by nations close to the likes of Syria when 2m people were displaced.  Multiply that by at least 100x and what is now a distant problem in a far off land will present a very different problem much closer to home.  I think we'll start seeing the beginning of what will be the largest ever migration of people in the next 20 years.

[leicsmac]

7 minutes ago, nnfox said:

One of the major consequences of climate change is that whilst the UK is fairly well positioned not to suffer terribly from extreme weather events as much as some other places, some parts of the world are likely to become inhospitable for humans, certainly to the extent where potentially hundreds of millions of people will look to relocate.  

 

You just need to look at the strain and panic displayed by nations close to the likes of Syria when 2m people were displaced.  Multiply that by at least 100x and what is now a distant problem in a far off land will present a very different problem much closer to home.  I think we'll start seeing the beginning of what will be the largest ever migration of people in the next 20 years.

Yep. And that will present political consequences that will raise tensions too.

[iniesta]

The climate is changing, it's always been changing, there is nothing humans can do to stop it and there are people trying to use it as an excuse to seize more power and money. 

 

I believe one of the main falsehoods about the global warming narrative is that the oil industry is against it, when in fact they are in it, because their revenues will rise through an artificial rationing of oil and gas. They, along with the financial industry stand to make a lot of money from carbon trading schemes.

[leicsmac]

6 hours ago, iniesta said:

The climate is changing, it's always been changing, there is nothing humans can do to stop it and there are people trying to use it as an excuse to seize more power and money. 

 

I believe one of the main falsehoods about the global warming narrative is that the oil industry is against it, when in fact they are in it, because their revenues will rise through an artificial rationing of oil and gas. They, along with the financial industry stand to make a lot of money from carbon trading schemes.

https://skepticalscience.com/climate-change-little-ice-age-medieval-warm-period.htm

 

And now humans are the dominant current change, which stands to reason that they might also be able to mitigate it, too.

 

Speaking personally, I'd rather not simply fold hands and wait for whatever the planet has in store for us and you don't see many rich and/or powerful scientists (even though there are no doubt other parties with a conspirational interest, yes).

 

The second paragraph makes more sense - of course such industries would try to position themselves to take maximum advantage of changes for the bottom line. Except, of course, that scientific fact is not a "narrative". One might as well say that gravity is a narrative, too.

[SpacedX]

11 hours ago, iniesta said:

The climate is changing

Correct. The combined land and ocean temperature has increased at an average rate of 0.13 degrees Fahrenheit ( 0.08 degrees Celsius) per decade since 1880; however, the average rate of increase since 1981 (0.18°C / 0.32°F) has been more than twice that rate.

 

11 hours ago, iniesta said:

it's always been changing, 

And for an explanation of why this is, perhaps start by familiarising yourself with stadials and interstadials, milankovitch cycles variations in the earth's orbit - obliquity/eccentricity, axial tilt and precession and the factors which govern atmospheric circulations and ocean currents.

 

Once you've done that, then take a look at the rate of pre-industrial/post industrial change.

 

That the rate and rapidity of observable and quantifiable exponential climate change over the last century is of anthropogenic origin is not subject to debate - it is unequivocal and consensual. Current greenhouse gas emission trends put the world on course for a 3.7-4.8°C temperature increase by 2100, which would be catastrophic. Even the commitments made under the Paris Agreement fell short of the cuts required to limit warming to a relatively safer 2°C. Even if all emissions are stopped immediately, effects will continue for centuries due to the cumulative impact of emissions already in the atmosphere. Meanwhile, nearly 800 million people globally are currently considered especially vulnerable to the effects of climate change.

 

Human activity is changing the Earth’s climate in ways unprecedented in hundreds of thousands of years, with some of the changes now inevitable and “irreversible”. As Christiana Figueres put it following the release of this month's IPCC report  "this is not climate change anymore. This is climate chaos."

 

11 hours ago, iniesta said:

there is nothing humans can do to stop it

And that there is the most dangerous of all of your misconceptions

 

[UpTheLeagueFox]

2 hours ago, Line-X said:

Perhaps start by familiarising yourself with stadials and interstadials, milankovitch cycles variations in the earth's orbit - obliquity/eccentricity, axial tilt and precession and the factors which govern atmospheric circulations and ocean currents. Once you've done that, then take a look at the rate of pre-industrial/post industrial change.

I'll do it later. I'm washing my hair 

[SpacedX]

Just now, UpTheLeagueFox said:

I'll do it later. I'm washing my hair 

Just the one?

 

 

[leicsmac]

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-58396975

 

Long story short: in this particular aspect, the world is changing...but we are adapting sort-of successfully to it.

 

In this one aspect, and for the time being.