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Re:Massive glacier collapse by snowwrestler on Monday February 04, 2013 @06:32PM (#5167996)
I interpretted kjackson2012's question to be something like "Houses have burned down throughout history. Why should we give special consideration to this house?" To which I think a reasonable response is, "because this is the house we live in now."

BTW, I interpretted your post to be something like "houses have burned down throughout history. Let's start trying to make all our stuff fireproof just in case." To which I think a reasonable response is "let's figure out how fires are most likely to start, and do what we can to prevent a fire in the first place."

The fundamental question is whether we can do anything to slow or stop the global warming trend that we see today. Scientifically speaking, we know that the answer is yes: if we reduce the rate at which we produce greenhouse gases, we will reduce the expected warming. Whether that is politically feasible is a whole 'nother question.

Re:Massive glacier collapse by ChuckMcM on Monday February 04, 2013 @07:39PM (#5168287)
Ok, I think I understand your position. Let me ask what may be a tricky question.

The same body of science that you appeal to has noted that relative to the geologic record we are 'overdue' (or 'about due' depending on who you read) for a glacial event (aka an Ice Age). Given that, how would you score the sequence of events that humans managed to scale back their CO2 emissions and the world then subsequently plunges into an ice age which probably destroys civilization as we know it?

You may find that question is not as much a straw man as it first appears (or a false dichotomy), ice ages are a perfectly valid climate 'state' on our planet. Some literature would have you believe that the planet is usually an ice ball and periodically warms, but I haven't found those papers as compelling.

However, that we cannot, with certainty, rule out another ice age occurring as the 'normal' course of events suggests to me that the next millenium's climate is going to be different regardless of our actions. So I tend to favor a policy where we invest in survivability and mitigation and research, in that order.

Re:Massive glacier collapse by snowwrestler on Monday February 04, 2013 @11:54PM (#5169201)
Warming and cooling are both physically possible, but they can't happen simultaneously. One or the other is more likely in the near future.

The climate has such a huge impact on human society that we cannot invest to mitigate all outcomes equally. A major reason to fund scientific study of the climate (beyond the intellectual joy of finding things out) is to rigorously and continuously quantify the likelihood of potential climate changes, so we know where to invest.

The overwhelming conclusion right now is that warming is the most likely change in the near future. If you surveyed 1,000 climate researchers tomorrow, I'd be surprised if even 1 said that imminent glaciation is more likely than imminent warming.

Now, that could change, but if it does then the same scientific research that warned us of global warming would warm us of global cooling. But right now it's not, so it would be wasteful to start sending parkas to Florida.

Now, you might ask how we should invest our money in the face of coming warming, and that is a very good question. How much should we invest in changing our energy sources vs., say, building sea walls around low-lying cities like New York or Washington, DC?

To have such a discussion we would first need to accept the information we are getting from scientists--but it is here that we are stuck as a society. People simply do not want to accept it, so right now there is little investment in any direction.