When it is human stupidity that has caused climate change, why do so many think that humans will be able to avoid exceeding the 2C target?
Humans have not caused climate change per se, more like unknowingly - at least to some degree. Something every evolving species on a habitable planet in the Universe encounters, burning fossil fuels at one point.
Then the fact that our Society is primarily driven by decisions made at the top, via elected officials, or people who influence power over them. We are well aware of climate change and that it means problems since at least the 80s, theoretically enough time to act. But it seems that we as individuals for the most part are too busy with everyday life, our work, with newly obtained technologies
in the information age, to understand the gravity of what future temperature rise entails.
So on the one side you have the concerned educated guy who understands the science, or at least is cautious enough about the looming fundamental changes, and on the other side the influencers who make the rules. And in some progressive countries this seems to work actually, for example Denmark or Scotland with their 100% renewable energy generation targets. Germany also has a great commitment to solar and wind power, but most cars on the street are still spewing fossil fuel exhaust, and coal power plants are still running.
To better understand our actions we can go back into the past and see many civilizations failed before us, even today as we speak many nations have collapsed or are on the bring to it, because of war, or economic mismanagement, sometimes enhanced by climatic factors, a trend very likely to become more pronounced, hence more strain for weaker nations in the years ahead.
Recently, i came across the theory that our overly optimistic attitude toward the future, the idea that everything will be better, is partially responsible for the situation today, or the lack of actions taken today. While i long regarded myself as an optimist, i think to be more of a pessimist now, or maybe just a pragmatic realist.
If we can draw any conclusion from the past, at large, simplified, then it almost seems as if our species unknowingly only learns from collapse.
Joseph Tainter talks Energy, Collapse, and Society (2015)
Walter Scheidel on Society, Collapse and Equality However, if you want big change, sometimes it is good if you have exactly the opposite direction taken, which apparently will make more and more people uncomfortable. And then the overly optimistic attitude that human imagination, research and inventions will somehow come up at a later time with a fix. Happened quite often actually, but first all other options were exhausted. But those problems are very small in comparison to altering the chemistry of the atmosphere and oceans. The question is, will it be too late by then to avert more serious harm, harm on an extinction level, for our and the other species on the planet.
Basically large scale catastrophes are required to change the behavior of our species at large, but the catastrophes which come with a much warmer world have the power to destroy our civilization. And then factor into that equation the nuclear power capabilities of many nations. A 2 degree and beyond world, disrupted by climate chaos makes people even more trigger happy. This means that there will likely be an exponential rise of various sorts of catastrophes (Flooded coastlines, flooded agricultural land, flooded power plants, flooded dumb sites, heatwaves overwhelming the energy grid, food shortages, plagues, diseases, financial loses because beach property becomes worthless, contamination of the water and food chain related to flooding, precipitation events damaging infrastructure, properties, the toll on the psyche of individuals affected, warmer temperatures result in more violent tendencies, and so on)
No, i do not think that we will avoid 2 degree temperature rise, because i have yet to see an emission chart and the required actions to make this miracle happen.