I like Ripple. He uses proper logic.

Maybe progress is taking a step back. Less machines. Less people. More balance.

I don't think even climate change will make us give up technology.

You haven't been paying close attention to the research ripple. For example you say "es, we're probably going to move past the 2 degree tipping point. Yes, that's probably going to start a rapid cascade of climate destabilizing effects (permafrost methane, etc.)" You might have missed that despite the fact that human CO2 production has leveled off in recent years from fossil fuels, CO2 concentrations are increasing at the fastest rate ever in 2016 and 2017. If it isn't humans pumping it out, there's only one other possibility: the earth isn't absorbing CO2 the way it was" That is, we're aren't Probably going to start" but rather "that process is well under way." Also, please also take a look at events on the west antarctic ice sheet where decomposition is happening vastly sooner and faster than prior predictions on a scale of centuries to decades faster.
In addition, even 1 degree warmer than now (2.5 degrees warming) would give everything in the US south of nebraska the climate of Arizona. With a loss of roughly one third of the surface freshwater, that a LOT of lost agricultural production. Of coruse, we're likely looking at four or five degrees of warming. That's roughly the "no ice caps, no rainforests" model. Pretty much teh whole US is desert. Much of Europe would host palms and mangroves, much as during the early eocene. Basically, our current range of food crops wouldn't really be able to survive summers anywhere away from the coasts. Maybe we could live on taro in Siberia (except of course the soils is crappy as hell). Of course the eocene had a CO2eq level similar to today, not 20% higher, which is where we are headed. If you head north of 5degrees warming, we're talking conditions like the Permian where 95% of species were wiped out. here's a hint, a few humans might survive such an event, but I wouldn't be on it.

So, actually, yes it is grounded in the most recent research, which I suspect I have read and you have not.
That's not "logic" Manwe, it's pulling stuff out of his nethers because it is comforting. Comforting but wrong.

As for nuclear war, that remains considerably unlikely, as opposed to climate change, which is certain.

Steven C, if you mean stone tools, I agree with you. If you think we'll still have the economic infrastructure to run power generators, you're not paying attention.

@ripple : "Yes, I agree that anthropogenic climate change is a ticking clock that will steadily destroy some of the most valuable parts of human civilization. Coastal cities and nations will suffer, food security will suffer, weather will be less predictable and more lethal."

Just imagine the economic collapse, government struggle to collect any taxes, publi services shut down, people flee cities which can no longer import food.

Yeah, it will hit the poor first, but the point where an economy fails also takes out the rich. Unless they are prepared for a cashless society in advance (And every billionaire should probably invest a million or two in materials while the economy makes them cheap... But who knows how many are prepared?).

Until we had public sanatation london as a city only grew from inward migration, more people died in the city than were being born.

That is at least some growth, if all trade systems collapse, that means no fertiliser or gas to fuel our industrialised farms, no transport vechiles to bring food to cities; every city in the world is basically fucked (~3.5 billion people).

That is the kind of collapse i'm talking about - not everyone dead (like in a nuclear winter, where no food will grow) - but economic collapse which tears all our inter-dependent economies apart...

I had an alternate view to post... But now i'm rushing off

@Leon: "I'm glad that the failed Western EU countries, which are being destroyed by Middle Eastern barbarians by the moment, disapprove of President Trump." The EU hasn't failed, nor is it being destroyed, but leaving those details aside why would this please you?

@SteveC, when was the last time yoy built a computer chip from raw materials?

The problem is we depend on everyone else to know how our technology works, to grow us food. We trust in a system of laws which only works if everyone believes they work. Sure, i might be able to build a generator from scavanged scrap yard materials, i may even be able to repair a broken one. But i'm not going to e making copper wire to conduct anything, and i've no idea how to properly dope a semi-conductor to make a transistor.

If the interdependent trade network which 'globalised' the world over the last 50-75 years compeltely collapses, and farms can't produce enough food, and govenments can't collect tax. Then our 'technology' is going to largely need to be re-invented... Because everything will turn to shit otherwise.

There is also currently an estimated 10% chance it climbs to 11 degrees higher....which would indeed be an extinction level event.

And i'm not talking about what happens when climate change hits, i am just looking at complexity levels. Which become increasingly expensive to maintain. Nuclear war, or global food shortages, or climate change, or an asteroid impact, or a pulsar coming too close, or a rogue super intelligent AI who doesn't care about humans.

We can also pass a tipping point where everything goes away.

**At least cities, but about half of humans currently live in cities, and the rest of the land isn't going to absorb those kid of numbers.

Even just a small collapse, like the fall of the soviet union, or the last global financial crisis are examples of entire economic systems near collapse. Russia has western help to re-balance yer economy, and the US survived by racking up more and more debt. International trade stumbled but didn't grind to a halt.

But that is not guarenteed to happen. There is no law of economics which says the complex systems can't collapse.

@orathaic and Ogion
You both seem to have a pretty solid handle on the research you've been reading. You'd be doing me a favor if you could send it my way. It seems as though I've allowed myself become optimistic and to slip behind the times. Not good habits to be in for a scientist. I look forward to a deluge of literature.

I'm pretty sure many countries were not fans of the foreign policies of Obama, Bush, or Clinton either. The America image has been suffering for a very long time with their bullying.

@Ripple, i'm not very uptodate on climate research (although i don't think i claimed to be). I an also willing to admit that it is entirely possible we will geo-engineer the earth before run-away climate change has a chance to destroy our conplexity (requires more complexity, cheap sources of power, many more computer processors connected in ever more complex ways, including human computation - google that term if you're bot familiar with it). It is possible that we have just seen some of the most amazing breakthroughs in AI (with a computer learning how to beat the best human at Go) and the application of this breakthrough will be enough to save us - with ever more and deeper levels of complexity - ie engineering the clinate is really fucking dangerous, and politically complex beyond the mere engineering difficulties.

There is room to be optimistic. I might be more optimistic if we'd had any amazing fusion breakthroughs in the last 40 years (though the sun is doin all its own fusion, and the economics of solar panels may be looking really good now-a-days...

I'm not sure we will get there soon enough. I wish i had a good link for you on chaos and complexity, but i think you need to look at all the nonlinear systems. As a physicist, i know that it is only in recent decades that we've gotten to understand the first bit about complexity theory (or chaos and complexity) but as a biochemist i feel sure you are aware of some of the iteresting dynamics you can get in non-linear systems. (Where the energy released from one pair of atoms reacting is enough to trigger more than one other pair, you can get a non-linear respond - like an explosion... Of course this can disperse all the atoms preventing any more pair from reacting. In biology you get even deeper relationships between 'elements' the basic cell or organism. Or even the protein or pharmaceutical, you must understand the complexity and gow sompler systems are prefered unless the more complex one grants some advantage... Well we don't know whether this whole complex technological revolution will blow up on us or find a point of homeostasis.

I fear if i linked you to the wiki article on chaos and complexity, it would fail to find the focus on the bit that i find fascinating. But the fact is i can see the bronze age collapse in terms of the complex non-linear system that it was. I'm sorry if i have failed to convey that.

Optomistically, more energy collected from the sun means more complexity which can be supported on the earth. Fusion here on earth would also be nice...

@fulminator, did you see the bit of the article where Obama had a massive better performance in foreign opinion. Conpared to both before and after his two terms.

And this despite his actuons being only a little better than Bush (he did ban torture, but really does he deserve a pat on the back for bot being an asshole? Especially when he murdered more people with drone strikes than any other world leader) Obama had great PR, great charisma and he took the effort to appeal to a foreign audience...

Europeans in particular had a lot of respect for Obama.

You "scientists" are full of speculation and shit and not much else.

Real scientists doing real science: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUJ81rqU_UA

Aaaand MyxisMe demonstrates that charming conservative characteristic of not being smart or hard working enough to understand evidence and so dismissing it as not eviedence because you wouldn't recognize evidence if it crawled up your butt and died there


In facts olease check out the AR5 and the THOUSANDS of references, each one a painstaking study to elucidate one part of the puzzle. Funny, how scientists "only have speculation" but still manage to make all your electronic, medicines, machines, and pretty much everything else in modern society work. Those scientists sure do get lucky speculating how the world works without, you know, piecing together evidence over centuries

Please, just crawl back into your cave, mmmkay?

"why would this please you?"

If failing countries disapprove of us, it must mean we're doing something different than them which can only be good.

@ leon1122 This attitude is precisely the sort of unaware tribalism, American exceptionalism, and downright hateful sort of thing I admonished against earlier.

The real question is, given that attitude as a starting point, how does the rest of the world go about winning someone over? What happens when the people you need most are more proud of their own ignorance than they are willing to contribute to a global crisis?

"If failing countries disapprove of us, it must mean we're doing something different than them which can only be good."

Firstly, as I already pointed out Europe is not "failing".

Secondly, even if they were is the US so lacking in a compass that you must judge it in comparison to failed states.

@ Myxlsme..You make these assertions about scientific research....and your "qualifications" ( science based from a recognised University ?) are. ???... PS Facebook and Wikipedia don't quite "cut the mustard"...you appear to be more like a "Scientology graduate"

@ leon1122..."applying" your convoluted "logic" the driver full of drugs and alcohol speeding along the freeway "must be doing something right" because they are "doing something different" from all the other motorists driving sober, drug free and under the speed limit and carefully.
Do you have any idea just how stupid your posts are ?

MM, no, leon and Myxis don't know how stupid their posts are. They're prime examples of Americans, and why it is in steep decline.

Ripple, tribalism is precisely what the world needs more of. It prevents the downfall of one country from being the downfall of the whole world.

diplomat, I know what direction I want the US to take, but the rejection by the failing EU states is still great affirmation.

Major, that's a terrible analogy. A better one would be a sober driver driving under the speed limit, while a group of drunk, speeding motorists speed by while hurling insults.

Tribalism leads to disintegration. Didn't you study the Civil War?

"If failing countries disapprove of us, it must mean we're doing something different than them which can only be good."

What a dense logical fallacy.

A is bad
B is not A

Therefore B is good.

Lol.

@"Ripple, tribalism is precisely what the world needs more of. It prevents the downfall of one country from being the downfall of the whole world"

This much i will give you.

You need an extremely isolationist society, one which refuses to trade externally or send military expeditions out.

Though the Soviet Union is a pretty good exMple, when it fell apart it was so isolated economically from the rest of the world there was no global collapse (though look at population graphs from any post-soviet country, you can see a steep and sudden decline in the early 90s, follwed in most cases by continued decline... Except perhaps in Russia which looks like it stabilised).

But to really save the world you would need isolation in economic terms - which has been deemed less profitable by the power that be - neo-cons and neo-liberals currently running the world, corporate interests pushing treaties like TTIP and TTP (and CETA).

There is another example, one which is thousands of years old. The last Chinese empire, the Qing, which ended in the 1912; was for centuries a global economic powerhouse. The were completely self-sufficient, and traded only whem the felt like - until the Opium Wars and superior european technology forced them to open the treaty ports.

They would have survived any collapse of European economic powers, and continued on their way. China was a perfect example of what you want for America. And will most likely never happen.

But the consequences of isolationism will be the same as they were for China. Now the Chinese have a more outward looking perspective, and they will soon regain their position as the single largest economic power on this globe. While acting in their long term interest by curbing CO2 emissions and investing massively in green technolgies - they will soon be the worlds largest producer of solar panels (for example), if they aren't already. And the US will be left to become a third rate power.

China will not go to war with the US until it knows it can win, and by then it will not need to.