Hacker News Reader

Comment by ClumsyPilot | Hacker News Reader

> I find that extremely hard to believe

failed harvests around the world and famines killing millions are an absolute certainty.

Millions yes, but probably livestock first, because a large part of Earth's agricultural production goes into feeding it, not humans directly.

Maybe not. The bulk of livestock are fed with marketed foods, whereas the vulnerable people are subsistence farmers who depend on their own crops.

I would like to make a wager

Would you indeed? I'll take any bet you'd care to place, the San Fernando Valley is sinking feet per year in places due to the volume of water we're pulling out of aquifers right now to support agriculture and the Colorado River doesn't even make it to the Gulf of Mexico anymore for identical reasons. That's the state of play right now at 0 degrees additional warming.

I would like to make a bet specifically targeting the parent comment's absolute certainty that there will be failed harvests that cause the deaths of millions. When do we expect this to happen? How much time would have to pass without it happening to cause you to reconsider the inevitability of this specific prediction?

Ok, $100 USD says that a crop failure resulting in at least 2 million excess deaths happens within the next 20 years, let’s round to <= 31st December, 2042.

Of course by then $100 USD will have the purchasing power of ~$10 USD, so it’s not the riskiest bet on my part.

So these will be starvation deaths? I like looking at excess deaths, so we need to look at the base rate of starvation, and I'd like to go per capita, as I expect population to continue to increase substantially and more people to die of all causes year over year as a result. Can we do $10k?

Most of them will probably have disease as the proximate cause. Dysentery and/or infectious diseases that in well-nourished populations isn't too much of a problem.

Some of them may have armed conflict as the proximate cause. The civil war in Syria had as one of its triggers a prolonged drought with associated crop failures, partly attributed to climate change.

Right, I think we can come up with an agreeable or used an established definition of famine deaths that includes these. I'm taking a closer look at this our world in data page to try to come up with well-defined terms.

https://ourworldindata.org/famines

During the Little Ice Age in Europe there generally was a higher death rate (shorter life expectancy). Food production per capita declined, and while most people didn't outright starve to death they became weaker and more vulnerable to disease.

Given the dual famines in Somalia and Ethiopia right now I expect we should hit the millions dead target within the next 18 months. How long were you thinking we'd have to wait?

Oh yeah I forgot about that, that could do it. Maybe that's where the certainty comes from. My genuine belief is that there will continue be droughts and wars that cause famines and the excess deaths that come with them, but that the overall trend of famine-related deaths per capita will continue to trend downwards despite climate change. I think war and other geopolitical disruptions are the greatest threats to food security.

If you believe famine is going to trend down I encourage you to take a hard look at what percentage of arable land globally is currently in use (we're close to maxed out), how much of that agriculture is dependent upon non-renewable water sources (aquifers), or other water sources that will be impacted by warming. Toss in topsoil depletion, erosion, and desertification. I am fairly certain that a sober look at these things will paint a much grimmer picture of the future.

Yes, this is exactly where I disagree strongly. Malthus and his imitators have all been horribly wrong. I will concede that there is ultimately a finite amount of stuff in the universe, but looking at any apparent hard limits like you suggest has been a recipe for undue pessimism. For example, I don't think "arable land" is a fixed resource.

Anything seems possible when you don't know what you're talking about. There is no spare agricultural capacity to be had anywhere on this planet and the required inputs are both not something we can replace and dwindling.

I know what I'm talking about! I'm talking about how the food ain't gonna run out. If that makes me stupid, then so be it. I'll be stupid and right.

Where are you expecting all of this bonus food to come from? Mars?

And completely different from 'uninhabitable'.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com