'mass extinctions' had CO2 levels we're now veering towards, study warns | Hacker News Reader

'mass extinctions' had CO2 levels we're now veering towards, study warns

livescience.com

36 pointsBrajeshwar31 comments

Sliding off-topic...

I have mixed feelings on the Agriculture reference. There are areas that are being cut down for livestock and agriculture... I think that at in many places as or bigger issues come down the the lack of regenerative agriculture. There's a heavy reliance on chemical fertilizers, a lack of crop and livestock rotation, and just draining soil of life.

Humanity as literally optimized food production to the point where it's more detrimental than good.

Simple correlation not causation. The acidification may be causal or may not. The extinction cause may have been something else. Live Science is marginally better than the Guardian. Further, I routinely see IPCC studies politicized or misrepresented.

[ The oceans soak up atmospheric carbon dioxide, which turns the water more acidic, reducing the availability of calcium carbonate ions needed for organisms to build their skeletons and shells.]

All true but still not necessarily casual.

of course not, this is the effect.

So where did the CO2 in the previous mass extinctions come from? No cars, no factories, no people. So a natural process? And yet today, it all comes from human sources? When I see such reasoning, I conclude politics not science.

The human sources are well-documented. Natural sources of equivalent severity/magnitude are not. That kinda narrows things down. We're doing in hundreds (tens, even!) of years what nature needed thousands or millions to do.

Actually, it's not. With the focus on anthropomorphic sources, it ignores other natural processes or discounts them completely. Having watched this "campaign"unfold for nearly 60 years, and watching it morph every time the predictions proved wrong, tells me that politics trumps science. What we see today is seldom science. Science isn't spearheaded by the types of Al Gore, Bill Nye, and Greta Thurnberg. Even Obama's climate guy was more skeptical than the pablum dispensed by the Guardian, Live Science, Scientific American, et. al. Follow the money.

you are ignoring basic calculus, m f{x} is not politics.

you are making horrible assertions, that reveal a lack of contextual cues.

Not ignoring calculus at all. But just because someone constructs an equation that correlates with results doesn’t mean a model is correct.

that took you a while, you are however ignoring prompts that dont correlate with your model, or your output constraints. you will never be able to interpret subjective context in prompt unless you make major improvements with statistical vectoring.

> With the focus on anthropomorphic sources, it ignores other natural processes or discounts them completely.

The natural processes are fully accounted for. They are a tiny blip compared to manmade sources. Again: historical CO2 rises like this took thousands or even millions of years, whereas the one we're witnessing right now has taken maybe two hundred at most. The difference is from the manmade contributions. If you disagree, then you can present the sources you believe to be major contributors at your leisure.

> Having watched this "campaign"unfold for nearly 60 years, and watching it morph every time the predictions proved wrong

Revising hypotheses and theories with new information is literally the point of science.

> Follow the money.

Indeed. The fossil fuel industry peddling coal and oil has thrown around plenty of money to convince you that they're blameless. The meat industry torching the Amazon for farmland has thrown around plenty of money to convince you that they're blameless. Follow the money.

The people who only have 30-40 years left are killing the planet for future generations.

On top of that, there are proposals to prevent younger people from voting (on the grounds that they don't have children yet, so the future doesn't matter to them):

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/elon-musk-...

I’m skeptical that when the next generation takes over there will be a huge change. It easy to blame boomers but it doesn’t appear there is a huge appetite for a reduction in carbon footprint that would include significantly less travel on airplanes, less energy usage and diet changes for reducing meat consumption.

Every generation I know of has blamed the world's problems on the older generation and claimed that when they take over, things will be different. So far, anyway, those generational changes haven't resulted in such things being different.

The problem isn't with any specific generation.

Does anyone know how likely we are to actually get to 800 ppm ? Would that require doubling our CO2 output or would our current levels of CO2 output get us there?

yes it will get us there and we will begin to see issues with quality and yield of food crops, as well as biospheric issues related to plants.

we have already observed increased issues with fisheries related to deoxygenation,carbonation,and thermal extrema

failure of photosynthesis due to elevated CO2, and temperature is in the near future

I found this forecast

https://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/CO2-model-vs...

The world's biggest polluters don't care. Studies can't compel them to do anything. Regulations can, but many countries don't have many because they are desperate for the business or are corrupt. Even the US is sluggish when it comes to regulations- since Reagan, the very concept has been demonized to the point of barely existing. There are politicians who call the EPA evil. Literally.

So don't tell me about this. Preach it at Davos or the G whatever number this year summit. or a place like Epstein's island where the movers and shakers party. Those are the assholes who need to change. Sadly, only they can save this planet, and they are way busy focusing on making more and more billions they may not even live to spend.

Don't worry, they all have plans to be carbon neutral by 2050. They're not acting on those plans, and 2050 is 20 years too late, but they have plans!

2050 is 70 years too late. Give or take.

Preaching the avoidance of a 20th potential co2 correlated mass extinction event may appear to be a valid first response to the actual environmental anxiety crisis many of us are experiencing, but this won't work, as we need more clarity and honesty, as we do need to face facts first.

The first fact is that we, individually and collectively, don't care. Given the chance, most of us would gladly live the shielded work from home air conditioned suburban suv life in some well irrigated arizonian gated community. We, as a species, are craving exactly that.

Second fact, polluting corporations and corrupted officials are only meeting demand. Everybody and their neighbors are demanding ever more fossil energy and mined minerals, like fuels, plastics, trips, entertainment and smart devices.

Third fact is my favourite: given the right circonstances, existential crisis are hugely profitable. Think of all these people who would sell a sibling for a chance at migrating to the first world. These people are all ripe for major exploitation, and luckily, some folks are already there to feed them lies and take their cash.

Fourth fact is the most amazing one: we could just end all the nonsense if we would just be content and stop demanding. Stop the crave. Stop envy. This is a crisis based on supply and demand. Just stop demanding for what you don't already have. Maybe start doing stuff yourself instead. Stop demand, supply will end.

Fifth fact, the most fascinating: nobody will stop demanding, quite the contrary. And we will most probably hit more than a wall.

Sixth fact: we will survive this. This is an experimentation in how far we can go given unlimited supply. The answer is: not far.

The sixth fact is far from a foregone conclusion. There is absolutely nothing special about humans which would protect us from extinction.

That's up for debate, for sure. My hopes are derived from the survival abililities of some close genetic cousins. Rats comes to mind. I do believe we could endure and thrive in much more hardship than we already have in any past period. We'll know soon enough.

> The first fact is that we, individually and collectively, don't care.

Just a pedantic niggle: I dispute the "individually" in there. Some individuals don't care, but quite a few do.

You're absolutely right, I for one do care, a lot. Then, I feel _most_ don't, and since _most_ is driving this train we're in, I feel we have to deliver the message in all the possible ways it can be, including a toned down dismissive one. I know from experience that the _in your face_ affirmative way gets rammed-in the pickup truck way every single freakin time. So maybe one should try other ways. Our mileage may vary, of course.

> The world's biggest polluters don't care.

The US and EU's (#2 and #3 biggest polluting regions) annual GHG emissions have been decreasing each year. (This accounts for trade.) It's probably not an accident.

It increased in 2022 in the US

https://rhg.com/research/us-greenhouse-gas-emissions-2022/

OK, but I think it’s still below 2019 if I’m reading that chart right. Covid makes the last few years difficult to compare.

yea, it's could be a blip in the overall trend. Let's hope.

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