someone posted this in the thinker's cult. I thought it should be in NSG. Please read it all.
This is an important issue.
I think at this point there’s no question about the presence of global warming. I believe in the direct relation between CO2 and temperature in the atmosphere. If this is true, then we are causing global warming. When miners would work, they sometimes would bring a canary into the mine and if there were any toxic gases present underground, then the canary (being delicate and sensitive) would die before any humans, thus the miners would know to get out of the mine. In other words the canary was a detector and also the first to go. In the same way skiing is like one canary to global warming. The last time that New York State received no snow in a single winter was about 200 years ago around the year 1800. If conditions keep up until spring, then this will be the second year on record in New York's history without snowfall. Followed shortly by the rest of the northeast of the United States, and other vast areas. In my opinion at this point in time we cannot stop global warming. If an overnight miracle was to occur (every single person on the planet was to stop driving their gas-fueled cars, burning fossil fuels, etc.), we would still be able to do nothing because of the CO2, which has already been emitted. I believe that skiing in the northeast is the first significant canary.
If this is true, then Humans as a species will discontinue exponential growth and reach a carrying capacity much earlier than expected. A carrying capacity is when the growth of a species' population is limited by a part of its environment. Usually this is a natural resource. Seeing as humans are the first species in Earth's history that can reason and solve complex problems, we were able to correct several possible causes for a carrying capacity on our species.
I don't see a way to solve the problem of the rising temperature in the atmosphere seeing as it is too big for us to control and change to match our intentions (in this case our intention is to continue our lifestyles with unaffected population growth as a relevant issue). It is likely that many species will become extinct because of global warming for the reason that each cannot conform to the abrupt climate change. No individual knows how much the temperature will rise, but it is not insane for an individual to say there could be a time where even humans cannot conform to it.
With an unbearably hot environment, many problems develop, which challenge our survival. Most importantly, the food web that supports our consumption would break down; the lack of food alone would be an insurmountable carrying capacity. Thus, we would have a carrying capacity on our species. We would take a large hit to our population while to the rest of the animal kingdom this would be an extinction of mass proportion.
We are able to build bridges, trains, cars, ships, airplanes, buildings, atomic bombs, even spaceships and computers. This issue is different than others; the influence is entirely environmental (not economic) and most importantly it will not be in support of our luxuries, instead it will be a in threat of our survival. It is nowhere written that humans continue to live forever. We call ourselves an intelligent species but more so we are greedy. We only use our intelligence to attempt to quench our thirst for material objects. Unfortunately and inconveniently, we naturally waste our brilliance on relatively insignificant purposes while space and time passes us by. But we are not a perfect species.
The canary is already dead.
This is an important issue.
I think at this point there’s no question about the presence of global warming. I believe in the direct relation between CO2 and temperature in the atmosphere. If this is true, then we are causing global warming. When miners would work, they sometimes would bring a canary into the mine and if there were any toxic gases present underground, then the canary (being delicate and sensitive) would die before any humans, thus the miners would know to get out of the mine. In other words the canary was a detector and also the first to go. In the same way skiing is like one canary to global warming. The last time that New York State received no snow in a single winter was about 200 years ago around the year 1800. If conditions keep up until spring, then this will be the second year on record in New York's history without snowfall. Followed shortly by the rest of the northeast of the United States, and other vast areas. In my opinion at this point in time we cannot stop global warming. If an overnight miracle was to occur (every single person on the planet was to stop driving their gas-fueled cars, burning fossil fuels, etc.), we would still be able to do nothing because of the CO2, which has already been emitted. I believe that skiing in the northeast is the first significant canary.
If this is true, then Humans as a species will discontinue exponential growth and reach a carrying capacity much earlier than expected. A carrying capacity is when the growth of a species' population is limited by a part of its environment. Usually this is a natural resource. Seeing as humans are the first species in Earth's history that can reason and solve complex problems, we were able to correct several possible causes for a carrying capacity on our species.
I don't see a way to solve the problem of the rising temperature in the atmosphere seeing as it is too big for us to control and change to match our intentions (in this case our intention is to continue our lifestyles with unaffected population growth as a relevant issue). It is likely that many species will become extinct because of global warming for the reason that each cannot conform to the abrupt climate change. No individual knows how much the temperature will rise, but it is not insane for an individual to say there could be a time where even humans cannot conform to it.
With an unbearably hot environment, many problems develop, which challenge our survival. Most importantly, the food web that supports our consumption would break down; the lack of food alone would be an insurmountable carrying capacity. Thus, we would have a carrying capacity on our species. We would take a large hit to our population while to the rest of the animal kingdom this would be an extinction of mass proportion.
We are able to build bridges, trains, cars, ships, airplanes, buildings, atomic bombs, even spaceships and computers. This issue is different than others; the influence is entirely environmental (not economic) and most importantly it will not be in support of our luxuries, instead it will be a in threat of our survival. It is nowhere written that humans continue to live forever. We call ourselves an intelligent species but more so we are greedy. We only use our intelligence to attempt to quench our thirst for material objects. Unfortunately and inconveniently, we naturally waste our brilliance on relatively insignificant purposes while space and time passes us by. But we are not a perfect species.
The canary is already dead.
