Peace On Earth

Another year, the warmest on record, and the evidence continues to mount that we are seriously fouling our own nest, permanently altering the relatively stable and mild climate conditions under which civilization arose and has flourished, and hitting the limits to growth on a finite planet - wild fluctuations of weather, catastrophic flooding, killer heat waves, melting ice sheets, destruction of forests, depletion of topsoil, acidifying oceans, "dead zones" at the mouths of our major rivers, species extinction. Bummer.

But hey, it's Christmas. We'll think about all that next year.

The news stories cataloged here come from a blog post (not written by me) entitled, "The Twelve Doomiest Stories of 2010". You can read the post and follow links to the actual stories here: http://www.desdemonadespair.net/2010/12/twelve-doomiest-stories-of-2010.html

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• animation
• climate
• change
• species
• extinction
• CO2
• build-up
• environmental
• crisis

[dissturbbed]

Just for sh--ts and giggles our math freeks wanted to know how long it would take oxygen to run out on our planet if all the plants died and we kept consuming fossil fuels. The answer they came up with is astonishing it would take 5000 years just to burn up one percent of the earths oxygen level. If you believe in peak oil and peak coal you know this would be impossible.

[Oilyboyd]

@dissturbbed The only astonishing thing about this incomprehensible statement is that your math freeks seem to have forgotten that human beings need to eat, and we get about 80% of our calories from grains in one form or another. Not to mention that simply eliminating plant life shreds your environmental support network. Your conclusion makes no sense.

[dissturbbed]

@Oilyboyd  They did it to show what it would take to burn up the oxygen in the earths atmosphere, not if life could go on without plants.

[Oilyboyd]

@dissturbbed We have the chance to "adapt" - it's called changing our collective behavior once we know the consequences. It does not appear to me that we are doing that, certainly not at a pace that would make a difference. What you are talking about is not "adaptation", it's just survival, and it's doubtful that anything like "civilization" would be possible given the most dire scenarios. Blithely dismissing the deaths of billions of human beings isn't just irresponsible, it's unconscionable.

[dissturbbed]

@Oilyboyd Well carbon dioxide is not going to do it neither a release of methane, it might raise the planets temperature a few degrees but not cause it to tip into oblivion. Not even a nuclear winter will exterminate all humanity IMO.

[dissturbbed]

@Oilyboyd yea this might be true for an animal, humans are way more adaptable. Who cares if we consume all our natural resources the planet will just have shed a few million or billion humans. There will always be fresh water, iron, sand, aluminun, mud, sunlight and a multitude of others to have some sort of a civilization. You dont need cars, trains, lightbulbs, cellphones, or etc. to survive.

[Oilyboyd]

@dissturbbed But we know that there were prior tipping points, changes (such as the addition of oxygen to the atmosphere) that permanently altered the conditions of life on this planet. They didn't turn us into Venus, because living systems were diverse and well-established enough, and given long periods of time, managed to self-regulate and find new forms in which to take advantage of the changed circumstances. But that's no guarantee that humanity can survive such radical short-term changes.

[Oilyboyd]

@dissturbbed Because there was life on board, and living systems apparently self-regulate their environment - up to a point. Past that point, wherever it is, conditions are so changed that something else comes along and opportunistically takes over the new niche, and whatever occupied it before goes extinct. In the current situation, that might be us. Yeast goes extinct in a petri dish after it's consumed all the resources and drowned in its own toxins. Are we smarter than yeast?

[dissturbbed]

@Oilyboyd Co2 was being released far more in the past than it is today and the reason is that the earths magma was a lot closer to the surface this caused more volcanic activity that released more co2 in the atmosphere. As time goes on the earths inner core cools down which has an effect on volcanic activity which has an effect on the amount of co2 released in the atmosphere. So the amount released today or in the past did not and will not cause cause a tipping point.

[dissturbbed]

@Oilyboyd Isnt that what i just said?? Now you explain why the planet didn't go passed this tipping point on the other thousands if not millions of other hot and cold cycles and why didn't we die off in the last ice age or other cycles like your predicting for this global warming. Venus is a totally different matter, the earth has 389 parts per million (0.039%) volume of carbon dioxide while VENUS has 96% carbon dioxide. Since the industrial revolution co2 has only increased 85 ppm.