Most people have no idea how fucked we actually are.

What happens after 2050? Climate change continues, even if the world goes completely carbon neutral. Economic damage continues.

Read the report, the only way to keep to 2 degrees is to pull carbon out of the atmosphere. The sequestation industry would have to be larger than the oil industry was at its peak.

Given that we can't even switch to renewables and plant trees, what are the odds we will subsidise an enormous industry to fix the atmosphere?

Actually, another interesting argument that gets ignored is that global warming is not proportional to emissions. You need exponential increase in emissions for a linear increase in warming. Therefore since we are actually close to starting to reduce our emissions, global warming will probably peak and then cool.

This is also in the IPCC's report, but gets ignored everywhere.

Reading LT3000s post on this is very insightful: https://lt3000.blogspot.com/2019/11/contrarianism-esg-invest...

While technically correct (except cooling), that insight is of limited value.

Eating habbits are a great parallel - I have been gaining weight during lockdown, and discussed it with a friend, and he replied "don't worry, you will only reach a certain weight and then stop growing." Well, thats true, but I don't want to reach equilibrium of 150kg. Similarly, 2 degrees is the point we will reach in 2050, the global equilibroum will be much higher. We will reach it asymptotically, but that doesnt help.

There will be no cooling, because the CO2 level in the atmosphere dictates the equilibrium point.

Further to the post, it is interesting but gives the impression of renewable technology as if we are still in the 70's. Firstly, coal is not neccessary, we have steel production with hydrogen instead of coal. Secondly, US is massively behind other developed nations, coal is gone or dissapearing from power generation of most major economies within 5 years.

Lastly it claims EU's carbon price is damaging for the economy, but thats a ridiculous claim - the price is absolutely miniscule. $25 means an average cost of ~150 per head per year. Thats nothing! Lastly, that money doesn't dissapear, it funds infrastructure, so we can reduce taxes elsewhere.

Except, the increase between 1950-2000 was the highest amount of emissions for any period of that duration. If you're looking for reassurance, that period is not the benchmark you should be taking for comparison. We are currently suffering the effects of our exploitation and devastation over that period, just as we are currently in a much better position because of banning CFCs in the 80s. Climate change isn't an instantaneous process.

The only problem is that if you tell everyone that we have plenty of time then nobody is going to do anything until it is too late. I hate sensationalism in both directions but as it is right now, humans certainly aren't going to stop at 2 degrees.

I disagree and would like to point out that "12 years" is a strawman. You've got to think a bit more long-term and about all effects on the environment and living conditions as a whole.

If you take an unbiased look at climate change, resource exhaustion, and species extinction, then it becomes hard to believe that mankind will have the conditions to thrive on Earth in 200 years from now. It may be possible, maybe with technological inventions, but it certainly doesn't look that way. We're only about 200 years into massive industrialization and have already damaged Earth on an unprecedented scale.

The current species extinction graph alone should worry people way more than it tends to do right now. Changes to the oceans are also extremely alarming, because certain conditions in the oceans could trigger a collapse of most of the ecosystem.

Are you sure GDP is the right metric to be looking at?

Suppose there was some event that killed all homeless people - it might not affect GDP much. Should we do let such event happen and conclude it's no big deal?

> Suppose there was some event that killed all homeless people

Yes, this is called homelessness.

OK, not all homeless people, or even most, but the survival rate for homelessness is absolutely terrible and few care. ( https://www.crisis.org.uk/media/236799/crisis_homelessness_k... "Homeless people are more likely to die young, with an average age of death of 47 years old and even lower for homeless women at 43")

Similarly with the millions of refugees coming from Syria and Libya, "let them die at sea" is a popular position and "murder them rather than letting them in" is gaining traction.

The pandemic has really opened my eyes to just how OK people are with the mass death of strangers.

> refugees

That example does not strengthen your case. While not unopposed, there are still lots and lots of pro refugee people and many countries let them in.

Homelessness is a far unsexier issue where you can absolutely say people don’t care enough, but refugees are more of a counterexample.

Climate change will primarily affect Asian and African countries. There will be the largest refugee crisis ever but nothing a bullet to the head can't fix.

Westerners, on the other hand, will just stay at home thanks to AC and pretend everything is fine.

Of course GDP won't be a big deal. By the time the worst effects are there the Chinese population will have aged to the point where getting rid of the elderly is better for the GDP than keeping them.

You should not lump all western nations together. In northern Europe AC doesn't happen at home for the most part. Here in Germany it's a luxury because of the high prices for electricity.

You need to check the projected size of national economies by 2050. India and China overtake US.

People with more money generally can afford more bullets. I wouldn't rely on them.

"live by the sword, die by the sword"

Less GDP will also probably mean less pollution, so hopefully things will even out at some point.

The Problem is the GDP isn't vanishing. It will just move to other places e.g. China.

The study was mentioning a decrease in world GDP, so I think my conclusion should stand (as China is part of the “world” that presumably will experience a 6% GDP decline).