As the year moves toward its close, those who have a mind to might consider pausing at some point for a moment or two of silence for the passing of a great one. Yes, remember Nelson Mandela, but I'm thinking of the passing of one even greater: the loss of the chance for a habitable earth, the loss of a future for the community of complex life.
This was the year when essentially every major relevant research body and top researcher concluded that we are toast, explicitly or implicitly.
--Hansen, the top US climatologist, the now-former head of climate research at NASA, writing that we have to immediately start immediately reducing emissions by at least 6% per year and start massive untested sequestration efforts, thing that he knows and we know will not happen;
--Anderson, the top UK climatologist, head of Tyndall Centre for the CC Research, saying that industrialized countries must start immediately reducing emissions by 10% to have even a chance of avoiding the too-high-anyway 2 degree C mark;
--International Energy Agency, concluding that the fossil-death-fuel projects that are planned and/or in the works commit us to about 6 degrees C by about 2100;
--PriceCooperWaterhouse, pretty much the same thing;
--Potsdam Institute, ditto
--et cetera, et cetera...
Even the mealy-mouthed IPCC concluded that unproven and likely disastrous massive geoengineering processes now are a necessary major part of any viable strategy going forward, that is, that the impossible was now necessary in order to avoid the unthinkable.
So the doom that has been our specialty of some of us on these fora is now basic to the published sober judgment of the folks that spend most of their time looking at the big picture and have the expertise to truly make that call. Those who prefer delusion will continue to delude themselves. But they can no longer point to the people who know the most in the relevant areas to back up their fantasies.
Those of us who prefer our glasses un-rose-tinted have to decide what to do with these facts. I prefer to continue to try to not be a major contributor to the sh!t storm, to fight where I can against the worst of the perpetrators, and to continue to let people know the nature of our predicament. Others here and elsewhere maychoose whatever path seems suitable to them.
But perhaps it is also appropriate to take a silent moment now, a reflective pause in the season's hubbub, to acknowledge the passing of a great planet. We cannot know if there will ever be another such.
ETA:
Another cheery note:
“There is nothing that can be agreed in 2015 that would be consistent with the 2 degrees,” says Yvo de Boer, who was executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in 2009, when attempts to reach a deal at a summit in Copenhagen crumbled.
“The only way that a 2015 agreement can achieve a 2-degree goal is to shut down the whole global economy.”
“Some scientists are indicating we should make plans to adapt to a 4C world,” Leifer comments. “While prudent, one wonders what portion of the living population now could adapt to such a world, and my view is that it’s just a few thousand people [seeking refuge] in the Arctic or Antarctica.”
http://www.salon.com/2013/12/17/the_great_dying_redux_shocking_parallels_between_ancient_mass_extinction_and_climate_change_partner/Happy Holidays!