Scientist call for rationing in the 'developed' world

So he had to fly from the UK to Cancun, Mexico just to say this?

Seems a tad hypocritical...

[ETR3(SS)]

So does this rationing apply to this clown or is he exempt because he's "an important member of the climate research community"? Oh and lets be honest here, they're not in Cancun during the end of November to discus climate change, they're there for the better weather and vacation time.

[Rockstar]

... Unless emissions are reduced dramatically in the next ten years the world is set to see temperatures rise by more than 4C (7.2F) by as early as the 2060s, causing floods, droughts and mass migration....

What is up with this obsession of setting TEN YEAR deadlines? Wasn't it 11 years ago we heard the same deadline for the end of civilization because of global warming? They said it is over, no mas, end of the line, we all gonna die. Wasn't there a few blithering idiots here at SUBSIM regirgitating the same crap? Where are they now?

[NeonSamurai]

The problem though is that things are getting worse not better. Globally emissions are increasing, not decreasing, and unless something is done relatively soon (especially given how slowly we as a species tend to react to such stuff), we will hit the tipping over point which would be catastrophic for our species, and many other species that we share the planet with.

Worse though, the closer and closer we get to the tipping point, the more extreme the change would have to be to counter it, and the less likely we are to implement it in time.


Anyhow you guys are using a whole wack of different fallacies (false arguments) in your statements (strawman, ad hominem, tu quoque, red herring, and several others). http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/

[Sammi79]

It has been my opinion for a time that our 'developed' consumer countries are extremely wasteful in terms of goods/resources/energy. As to wether or not the human species advances in technology and wasteful actions have caused or are going to cause global climate changes is neither here nor there, as global climate changes occur naturally in vast cycles and sometimes very rapidly without any interference from us. Energy and resources are the real problem. Energy and resource requirements grow and grow, and then grow some more as the consuming population increases. There is a finite amount of energy that can be harnessed from our environment with our available technology. At some point in the future we will require more energy than it is possible to extract from sunlight/carbon fuels/uranium atoms/magnets(if you believe that!). At that point, important things will stop working. This will compound the problem, and will result in a human catastrophe certainly involving large scale famine and drought, as the energy required to gather enough resources is exhausted.

The next problem may make the above irrelavant however, if we continue to gather our energy and resources in ways that damage our own environment (and this cannot be denied) poisoning the air, land and sea with carbon fumes/nuclear waste/pesticides... that list could go on for pages... then, aswell as inadvertantly causing the extinction of many of earths myriad species, we WILL cause an extinction of... you guessed it, ourselves. (that's not such a big deal if like me you believe that life will go on, human or not. All things have their end.)

Air is the single most important resource on the planet, closely followed by fresh water. Most large scale (developed world company scale) energy and resource industries are currently unable to operate without poisoning one or both of these two things.

On topic, the key is - we consume too much, much more than we need. If we ALL try to consume less or closer to what we actually need, pressure will be taken off the energy and resource gathering process and give us the time we need to develop clean methods and technologies and to replace the old ones. Of course in the developed world this may mean giving up a few or possibly many of the multitude of luxuries that abound within our societies. Just don't forget, they are luxuries, not neccessities. We CAN do without - giant refridgerators/blue toilet water/endless cheap supplies of cash crops - tea, tobbacco, sugar/personal automobiles/microwave walky-talkies... to pick a few I personally would have no trouble giving up.

I would have a rather harder time being told I wasn't allowed a personal computer though, as a thorough-bred consumer myself.


An attitude change is required - when you see a 7 foot LCD covering your mates wall you think 'Wow! that's amazing I bet my Xbox would look fantastic on that!' but what you should be thinking is 'My word! what on earth do you need a screen like that for? surely that is a waste of electricity?' If governments could somehow make people think large & expensive = wasteful & irresponsible rather than large & expensive = I'm considerably richer than you. It could maybe be done similar to the way smoking has been villefied here in the UK - the kids no longer think its cool.

my 1 dollar and 55 cents,

Sam.

[Ducimus]

Originally Posted by NeonSamurai

The problem though is that things are getting worse not better. Globally emissions are increasing, not decreasing, and unless something is done relatively soon (especially given how slowly we as a species tend to react to such stuff), we will hit the tipping over point which would be catastrophic for our species, and many other species that we share the planet with.

Human nature is to be concerned only about ones own prosperity. If it won't effect the individual directly, they typically will not care. The people in charge do not care about what might happen after they're dead.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Ducimus

Human nature is to be concerned only about ones own prosperity. If it won't effect the individual directly, they typically will not care. The people in charge do not care about what might happen after they're dead.

Yes. History shows that although natural tribes and primitive people also can destroy their environment and by that contribute to their own extic ntion, this does not seem to happen as often with communities that by geography are crunshed into a limited and relatively small space (a small island) with limited resources, where every individual is fully exposed to the attention-.taking of any other living in this community, and has everybody else in sight. By that people calculate what conseqeunces the other'S behavior has for himself, and the other way around. Often, this leads to self-maintaining resource-management, strict birth-control, and the formation of a leadership structure legitimised as long as it protects these essential needs, and gets kicked if it acts selfish. However, even such environments are no guarantee that the people lioving in them screw them.

An example for the above model working, is the small island of Tikopia, 5 km2 in size, and Tonga, 750 km2 in size, which both harboured stable local civilisation by humans for over 3000 years by running self-maintaining resource-management and strict birth control that was dersigned so that the population was kept stable. An example for the model failing, is the Easter Island.

Centralised, totalitarian social structures also are helpful in enforcing resource management and necessary but maybe unpopular measures. Helpful it is also when those making decisions and governing a society, cannot escape the negative conseqeunces of events hitting a society, no matter whether they are self-emerging or the result of policies.

An example for this is Japan. During the Tokugawa era and after the Shoguns practically had taken over the power over the united empire, precious woods were in danger to become rare due to the excessive use of wood in Japanese economy (woodfires in households) and house- and castle-building. The totalitarian power structure allowe dthe Shogun to enforce self-maintaining foreswt-management, if for no other reason to save his own wealth. Today, the Islands of Japan are still covered with woods and forest, they make up for roughly 70% of the natiopn's territory, and the forest management in Japan probably is the most efficient and self-maintaining in all the world, running an economic model that satisfies the demands of the economy as well as prfeserving the forests. The system is described to run in a better way than in Germany or America or Canada or Sweden.

7 billion people on this globe, climbing. This is madness, total madness. I estimate this globe can maintain just 1-1.5 billion at max, if you want the model surviving for longer than just a few generations. The most important answer to the needs of the future is birth control and population management, finding ways to drastically reduce global population levels all over the globe. If we fail to achieve that, then all other ways to tackle environment changes and shortening of resources necessarily will fail in the medium and long run. Reducing global population by 80% over the next 30-50 years must become an absolute top issue of politics. If we do not manage to acchieve this in a civilised way, then nature will - without caring for humane solutions and civilisational values.

[NeonSamurai]

Just a quick comment, but the only reason why Japan has so many forests is because they import a lot of wood from countries like Canada. Demand is considerably higher then what the country produces.


But ya, in the end human short sightedness and greed will get us in the end. Countless civilizations have been wiped out because of this and not paying attention to the warning signs. The problem this time though is we are a global civilization now.

[Torvald Von Mansee]

Originally Posted by NeonSamurai

The problem though is that things are getting worse not better. Globally emissions are increasing, not decreasing, and unless something is done relatively soon (especially given how slowly we as a species tend to react to such stuff), we will hit the tipping over point which would be catastrophic for our species, and many other species that we share the planet with.

Worse though, the closer and closer we get to the tipping point, the more extreme the change would have to be to counter it, and the less likely we are to implement it in time.


Anyhow you guys are using a whole wack of different fallacies (false arguments) in your statements (strawman, ad hominem, tu quoque, red herring, and several others). http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/

I think it's cute how the Usual Suspects seem to be ignoring this post.

I guess if you likely have nothing to counter with, you ignore.

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Torvald Von Mansee

I think it's cute how the Usual Suspects seem to be ignoring this post.

You've used that exact phrase before.

I guess if you likely have nothing to counter with, you ignore.

As opposed to you, who never has anything to say, but you say it anyway.

[Rockstar]

Originally Posted by Torvald Von Mansee

I think it's cute how the Usual Suspects seem to be ignoring this post.

I guess if you likely have nothing to counter with, you ignore.

Well I guess I did when I mentioned being told by your sources there was ten years left and then the world would suffer it's end. What about the ice age in 74? Still alive. The warming of 2k. Yep, still alive. Global emissions rising will now lead to our demise, Tell me what makes this different why should I believe this anymore than I did the other?

Next don't come here telling me what I or even 'we' should be doing to prevent your catastrophy. It's your end of the world as we know it story so tell me what YOU are doing about it right now not what could be done or you're gonna do. Enlighten me, because if it is as bad as you and your sources are making it out to be. I would think you have by now taken some very drastic measures. I'm sure you have done your part by now and set some example haven't you? Tell us obi-wan what have you done to stem the tide. With the end of the world right around the corner (again) I'm sure you have gone far above and beyond the call of duty, right?

[NeonSamurai]

Originally Posted by Rockstar

Well I guess I did when I mentioned being told by your sources there was ten years left and then the world would suffer it's end. What about the ice age in 74? Still alive. The warming of 2k. Yep, still alive. Global emissions rising will now lead to our demise, Tell me what makes this different why should I believe this anymore than I did the other?

Next don't come here telling me what I or even 'we' should be doing to prevent your catastrophy. It's your end of the world as we know it story so tell me what YOU are doing about it right now. Enlighten me, because if it is as bad as you and your sources are making it out to be. I would think you have by now taken some very drastic measures. I'm sure you have done your part by now and set some example haven't you? Tell us obi-wan what have you done to stem the tide. With the end of the world right around the corner (again) I'm sure you have gone far above and beyond the call of duty, right?

Hmm, please offer citations showing that most of the scientific community in the field was on board with those other claims you bring up please, particularly the 73 ice age theory, as the 2k warming as you put it is still alive and well and with strong support from the scientific community. The warming trend is still going on last I looked at the research material (which according to current evidence is clearly tied to global emission rates).

Me, I am doing what I can as a private citizen, I use public transport most of the time (a tank of gas for my car usually lasts 2-3 months), I try to limit the amount of energy I consume by using less heat in the winter and hardly any ac in the summer, I try to limit my creation of garbage and not buy a lot of junky consumer products, I also try to use energy efficient products with long life spans. That is just some of what I do. It is going to take a heck of a lot more then that, but it's about all I can do as one single person on my own.


But whatever, I know full well I am not going to change minds here. So many here seem to be tied up in rhetoric (often politically motivated rhetoric) so strongly, that even after offering piles of documented evidence that tears that rhetoric to shreds, people still cling as tenaciously as ever to it. It's like religious belief, but that is not very surprising considering almost all the counter arguments ever presented to me are entirely belief based, with no supporting empirical evidence, or peer reviewed research to back the claims up. Which is why I made the fallacies comment in my first post, as that is almost all I ever tend to see.

Originally Posted by Torvald Von Mansee

I think it's cute how the Usual Suspects seem to be ignoring this post.

I guess if you likely have nothing to counter with, you ignore.

And I guess your sitting on a pedal bike that is hooked to a generator
to produce the power that runs your computer and stuff?

And that hook up to the 'Net has no effect on Global warming right?

[GoldenRivet]

Originally Posted by Rockstar

What is up with this obsession of setting TEN YEAR deadlines? Wasn't it 11 years ago we heard the same deadline for the end of civilization because of global warming? They said it is over, no mas, end of the line, we all gonna die. Wasn't there a few blithering idiots here at SUBSIM regirgitating the same crap? Where are they now?

I can think of about 5 times that the world was sure to end in my lifetime.

for as long as i have been alive, there have been all the "signs" of the looming apocalypse.

I remember talking to my mom about this ages ago and she said "Yep... pretty much been that way for as long as i've been alive too."

LOL

[August]

Originally Posted by ETR3(SS)

Oh and lets be honest here, they're not in Cancun during the end of November to discus climate change, they're there for the better weather and vacation time.

You hit the nail square on that one ETR3. The hypocrisy is so obvious it should be apparent even to the UN.