Deaths from climate change

[crazydoc]

they actually mean that they don't believe that all hell will break loose, there will be fire and brimstone falling from the skies, and world destruction in a matter of a few decades.

It may be a slow process that's already happening, and we can't really tell yet if it's just a transient aberration or a rising progressive slope. Common sense tells me that the more energy trapped by the earth, then more energetic atmospheric, land, and ocean events are likely to occur, and probably more frequently. These are likely to cause significant disruptions in societal and other human endeavors, not to mention environmental disasters.

My fear is that by the time progressive climate change becomes established "fact" it will likely be too late to alter its course, and the time to try to do something about it is now.

 

[user 37518]

It may be a slow process that's already happening, and we can't really tell yet if it's just a transient aberration or a rising progressive slope. Common sense tells me that the more energy trapped by the earth, then more energetic atmospheric, land, and ocean events are likely to occur, and probably more frequently. These are likely to cause significant disruptions in societal and other human endeavors, not to mention environmental disasters.

My fear is that by the time progressive climate change becomes established "fact" it will likely be too late to alter its course, and the time to try to do something about it is now.

Yes, all of what you say is valid and might be true, as long as we agree that it remains in the realm of speculation, which some people present as a hard science, as true as 1+1=2. Common sense fails all the time, just as it failed Lord Kelvin when he predicted in the 1800s that in 400 years all the oxygen in the world would be exhausted due to fuel burning projections, a theory that was completely destroyed in the 1980s when marine photosynthesis was discovered.

Or what about something more recent? the famous Simon–Ehrlich wager who made a bet that there would be massive resource scarcity in a single decade, with Ehrlich (a biologist) claiming: "If I were a gambler I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000". The result: "The bet was formalized on September 29, 1980, with September 29, 1990, as the payoff date. Ehrlich lost the bet, as all five commodities that were bet on declined in price from 1980 through 1990, the wager period."

Its the same thing year after year, what I call variations of the Y2K problem.

That is usually what happens: whilst scientist stimulate their intellect with doomsday theories, the general public is left confused and in panic just because they hear it coming from the lips of someone they consider an authority.

 

[scott2000]

My fear is that by the time progressive climate change becomes established "fact" it will likely be too late to alter its course

Any excuses for failures kinda suck

 

[Matador]

I have already mentioned this in the past, but science is not a voting system, the ad populum fallacy is something very common, I already gave examples of this in previous posts.

And as I have already mentioned, system science(s) are about preponderance of evidence, not falsifiable theorems. It's the underlying reason why holding a snowball in Congress is so ridiculous. It's not about speculation, its about likelihood of outcomes.

Climate change is ultimately about risk mitigation: I almost wonder if those pushing back against mitigation strategies against climate change also refuse to buy insurance like auto or life. I mean, it's just some beancounter calculating risk, right? Nobody can guarantee when anyone will die, or be found at fault in the car accident, so insurance is just a scam, right? Insurance isn't about correctly predicting the future, it's about mitigating risk (financial, legal, etc) should that future come to pass.

 

[user 37518]

I almost wonder if those pushing back against mitigation strategies against climate change also refuse to buy insurance like auto or life. I mean, it's just some beancounter calculating risk, right? Nobody can guarantee when anyone will die, or be found at fault in the car accident, so insurance is just a scam, right? Insurance isn't about correctly predicting the future, it's about mitigating risk (financial, legal, etc) should that future come to pass.

Well, no need to wonder, if you can present probabilistic evidence for climate disaster, with the same degree of certainty of an actuary working at a car insurance company, you might be on to something.

 

[cyrano]

In all honesty, what do you mean with "low STEM voters" and exactly what is believing in climate change? This is the problem with speculative science, basically there are always reasons that can be found to refute the other side because there is no solid proof of either posture. I have already mentioned this in the past, but science is not a voting system, the ad populum fallacy is something very common, I already gave examples of this in previous posts.

"Low STEM voters" ©JR.

I read that as people with little science training AND little interest in the matter. Those wo make remarks like "it was hot in my youth too".

A lot of them don't even know what climate change means. I'm currently working with workers that have very little schooling. That doesn't mean they're not intelligent, but they seem to have developed their own "knowledge" over the years. It's sometimes very hard to reason with them, because the knowledge turned into religion. As they get older, they are less open to change. I tend to try to avoid changing their routines. The best way to get them to accept change is by somehow finding a way to make 'em discover the solution in their own time, but that's not easy and sometimes impossible due to time constraints. And sometimes, they're simply right, despite what the specialists propose.

Of course, some are just not intelligent at all, but that's not their fault, is it?

The conundrum for politicians is that they often have to decide matters they don't even completely understand themselves. Like climate change.

The politicians that use emotional arguments in stead of logical ones seem to be winning the last few decades. Over here, that's the extreme right wing party that's still blaming other language groups for nearly everything that goes wrong. It's an easy version of "us and them". I'm waiting for one of them to state that climate change came with immigration...

 

[cyrano]

Well, no need to wonder, if you can present probabilistic evidence for climate disaster, with the same degree of certainty of an actuary working at a car insurance company, you might be on to something.

Come on.

Weather prediction models have become very precise. Of course, it's still not absolute certainty.

Now look at what happened in Hungary. Weather prediction service said it might storm on the national feast (like your 4th of July). That happened a few years ago. A number of people were hurt, a few even died.

The govt postponed the fireworks for a week. It didn't storm and the tabloids started shouting "commies at work", "treason" and other usual BS.

The right wing national party who pull the strings in Hungary atm fired the heads of the meteorological service.

Happened in Italy too, with, again right wing politicians, suing geologists for not being alarming enough when they predicted an earthquake.

Continuing like that will simply make all scientists go mute.

It's the way nationalists change their tune all the time that makes me puke sometimes.

 

[JohnRoberts]

John, the reason I ask about what is meant with "believing in climate change" is due to the fact that, yes, climate change is an objective fact, but most of the time when people say that someone doesn't believe in climate change, they actually mean that they don't believe that all hell will break loose, there will be fire and brimstone falling from the skies, and world destruction in a matter of a few decades. Its the hidden meaning behind the words that I want to know.

I am surely repeating myself.

The objective fact that climate is changing is the "fast thinking" hook for the "fast thinking/slow thinking" logic trap. If the hook (that the globe is warming) is accepted as truth, then many don't bother to question the if-then premise that says we must reduce/eliminate all use of cost effective fossil fuels.

Most people would not embrace the draconian policies that get slipped in without a shred of critical thinking. The scaled down bbb bill renamed "inflation reduction" to reflect the actual voter concerns, contains hundreds of $B in climate spending that voters weren't asking for.

For example CA is considering outlawing sales of gas powered cars by 2035... I'll give them an O for optimistic.

JR

 

[Matador]

Well, no need to wonder, if you can present probabilistic evidence for climate disaster, with the same degree of certainty of an actuary working at a car insurance company, you might be on to something.

"With the same degree of certainty as probabilistic evidence"? That seems to be a contradiction.

Chapter 6 from the 2022 IPCC report goes into just this extensively, along with confidence factors and underlying data on present observations ("Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability").

 

[AnalogPackrat]

And as I have already mentioned, system science(s) are about preponderance of evidence, not falsifiable theorems.

No, it's not. Preponderance of the evidence is the bar for most civil court trial outcomes in the US. Science is about proposing theories, testing them rigorously with carefully designed experiments, publishing peer-reviewed results, and having other scientists repeat your tests and reproduce your results (or propose and implement better tests that are published and reproduced by others).

It's the underlying reason why holding a snowball in Congress is so ridiculous. It's not about speculation, its about likelihood of outcomes.

Again, not the case for actual science. ******** medium (5-25 years) to long term (over 25 years) future predictions often rely on poorly based statistics.

Climate change is ultimately about risk mitigation: I almost wonder if those pushing back against mitigation strategies against climate change also refuse to buy insurance like auto or life.

It's about unproven theories and is less rigorous than actuarial tables.

I mean, it's just some beancounter calculating risk, right? Nobody can guarantee when anyone will die, or be found at fault in the car accident, so insurance is just a scam, right? Insurance isn't about correctly predicting the future, it's about mitigating risk (financial, legal, etc) should that future come to pass.

I have multiple types of insurance, a fire extinguisher, a firearm, seatbelts, anti-lock brakes, airbags, and other rational risk mitigators. The climate is not and never has been static. We are far frim understanding the complex interactions of the many variables that affect our climate. Hubris only leads to distrust in "the science."

 

[user 37518]

Come on.

Weather prediction models have become very precise. Of course, it's still not absolute certainty.

Now look at what happened in Hungary. Weather prediction service said it might storm on the national feast (like your 4th of July). That happened a few years ago. A number of people were hurt, a few even died.

The govt postponed the fireworks for a week. It didn't storm and the tabloids started shouting "commies at work", "treason" and other usual BS.

The right wing national party who pull the strings in Hungary atm fired the heads of the meteorological service.

Happened in Italy too, with, again right wing politicians, suing geologists for not being alarming enough when they predicted an earthquake.

Continuing like that will simply make all scientists go mute.

It's the way nationalists change their tune all the time that makes me puke sometimes.

Predicting a storm in a few days time is very different from predicting the weather 50 years into the future, and even the one week prognostics fail continuously, that is why you cant look further in time. It is very different to state that it will rain tomorrow, than to state that the world will be over in 50 years.

The weather prediction models they use to determine if there will be rain tomorrow are not the same models they are using to determine the climate catastrophe, and if they are, the more reason not to trust them.

 

[user 37518]

"With the same degree of certainty as probabilistic evidence"? That seems to be a contradiction.

Chapter 6 from the 2022 IPCC report goes into just this extensively, along with confidence factors and underlying data on present observations ("Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability").

The "confidence interval", which is part of statistics and probability, amounts to the amount of certainty one has on a probabilistic assessment Confidence interval - Wikipedia.

If you can provide a 95-99% confidence in your prognostics for climate disaster in 2050 or whatever the doomsday date is these days, rather than a 99% confidence interval in present observations, I would say you have a good argument, what I would describe as probabilistic evidence. Otherwise, it is speculation or weak probability.

 

[Matador]

An important scientific innovation rarely makes its way by gradually winning over and converting its opponents… What does happen is that its opponents gradually die out and that the growing generation is familiarized with the idea from the beginning.

 

[user 37518]

Ad populum fallacy, I don't know what is the point for that graph, and why the center for climate change publishes that graph, is it supposed to be evidence of something?

I don't like Osho very much, but he said something very true that applies to that graph (and many other things):

"Democracy is a government for the people, by the people, and of the people, but the people are ********...."

 

[cyrano]

Predicting a storm in a few days time is very different from predicting the weather 50 years into the future, and even the one week prognostics fail continuously, that is why you cant look further in time. It is very different to state that it will rain tomorrow, than to state that the world will be over in 50 years.

The weather prediction models they use to determine if there will be rain tomorrow are not the same models they are using to determine the climate catastrophe, and if they are, the more reason not to trust them.

That's not the point. Even Newton's law got amended. There's always a degree of uncertainty. That's essential to science. You'll never have pure, perfect truth.

It's the reaction to that uncertainty. The gross lack of respect for scientists and science shows that some people only understand fascism as logic.

Also, weather predictions don't fail continuously. They're right most of the time. I'm amazed at how precise they usually are. That is, you have to understand that if the prediction tells you it's gonna rain, it doesn't mean it's gonna rain exactly where you happen to be...

In fact, some of my current workforce considers me a weather oracle. Usually I know when it's gonna rain, almost to the minute.

My secret is that I read/watch the report directly, without interpretation of a news reader or TV weather celebrity. And I've been comparing with those, as a hobby. Temps on TV/radio usually are plainly wrong. They don't fi even seem to understand that it's often cooler at the coast, but routinely just report the highest numbers in summer and the lowest in winter. Some even add a bit, just for sensation, I suppose.

Nobody is even pretending to predict the weather in 50 years. Warming of the oceans is an objective number. Do you think that that rise will stop in our lifetime? Haven't you noticed polar ice caps and gletschers are melting away? Just take a look at sattellite pics over the years. Yes, these "predictions" get amended too. Rise of sea levels is higher than predicted. But it's just a very tiny bit higher...

BTW. If you really want >95% certainty, I suppose you never visit an MD. Most medical tests and most MDs don't even reach that number in half of the cases.

Oh, and another thing. The weather models used over here are exactly the same models used to study climate in most cases. Same database, same algos in the core. It just differs in scripting and output.

 

[user 37518]

That's not the point. Even Newton's law got amended. There's always a degree of uncertainty. That's essential to science. You'll never have pure, perfect truth.

It's the reaction to that uncertainty. The gross lack of respect for scientists and science shows that some people only understand fascism as logic.

Also, weather predictions don't fail continuously. They're right most of the time. I'm amazed at how precise they usually are. That is, you have to understand that if the prediction tells you it's gonna rain, it doesn't mean it's gonna rain exactly where you happen to be...

In fact, some of my current workforce considers me a weather oracle. Usually I know when it's gonna rain, almost to the minute.

My secret is that I read/watch the report directly, without interpretation of a news reader or TV weather celebrity. And I've been comparing with those, as a hobby. Temps on TV/radio usually are plainly wrong. They don't fi even seem to understand that it's often cooler at the coast, but routinely just report the highest numbers in summer and the lowest in winter. Some even add a bit, just for sensation, I suppose.

Nobody is even pretending to predict the weather in 50 years. Warming of the oceans is an objective number. Do you think that that rise will stop in our lifetime? Haven't you noticed polar ice caps and gletschers are melting away? Just take a look at sattellite pics over the years. Yes, these "predictions" get amended too. Rise of sea levels is higher than predicted. But it's just a very tiny bit higher...

BTW. If you really want >95% certainty, I suppose you never visit an MD. Most medical tests and most MDs don't even reach that number in half of the cases.

Oh, and another thing. The weather models used over here are exactly the same models used to study climate in most cases. Same database, same algos in the core. It just differs in scripting and output.

Again, like I said, if they are exactly the same models, the more reason not to trust them, the amount of error they display after weeks of looking ahead is staggering, not to mention decades. But, now that you mention it, I'll accept the same degree of uncertainty that Newton's laws had before amendment if you provide something equally strong for climate disaster.

 

[cyrano]

That's not the way these models are used. As I already said, nobody is predicting the weather in 50 years. I'm a bit amazed at your lack of understanding of statistics and error margins.

The precision you'd like to see for climate predictions, doesn't exist. It's even rare in most other sciences, except perhaps math.

Our ancestors valued the elder for their wisdom. It looks like the elder are turning into one of our primordial problems. Just like the Gauss curve is slowly obsoleting?

 

[user 37518]

That's not the way these models are used. As I already said, nobody is predicting the weather in 50 years. I'm a bit amazed at your lack of understanding of statistics and error margins.

The precision you'd like to see for climate predictions, doesn't exist. It's even rare in most other sciences, except perhaps math.

Our ancestors valued the elder for their wisdom. It looks like the elder are turning into one of our primordial problems. Just like the Gauss curve is slowly obsoleting?

No, my understanding of statistics and error margins is correct, the precision I would like to see in fact does not exist for these predictions, yet, these scientists talk like it does exist, so, what I am saying is that if they are going to pronounce as hard science that the world is going into climate catastrophe in some decades, then I expect hard science evidence, simple as that.

On the other hand, you are the one making the Newtonian amendment analogies to support your arguments, then blame ignorance on me for going along with your examples, and you tell me that only math has such degree of certainty, you can't have it both ways.

 

[cyrano]

These scientists don't talk about that kind of precision in climate research, or in any other science. It's just the popular press that turns their words into simplistic stories. Maybe you should read the research in stead of tabloids...

 

[user 37518]

These scientists don't talk about that kind of precision in climate research, or in any other science. It's just the popular press that turns their words into simplistic stories. Maybe you should read the research in stead of tabloids...

You are deviating and making a straw man, again, if you are going to mix hard science like Newtonian mechanics to claim that even that had to be amended, and then claim than no, that I do not understand statistics because only math and physics have such degree of certainty (BTW statistics is a branch of mathematics), you automatically refute yourself. You can't use hard science to make up your argument and then tell me that hard science shouldn't be used to compare it to, and that I should not read the tabloids.