I wasn't worried about climate change. Now I am.
I wasn't worried about climate change. Now I am.
Research paper referenced in the video that makes Dr. Hossenfelder very worried:
Global warming in the pipeline: https://academic.oup.com/oocc/article/3/1/kgad008/7335889
Abstract
Improved knowledge of glacial-to-interglacial global temperature change yields Charney (fast-feedback) equilibrium climate sensitivity 1.2 ± 0.3°C (2σ) per W/m2, which is 4.8°C ± 1.2°C for doubled CO2. Consistent analysis of temperature over the full Cenozoic era—including ‘slow’ feedbacks by ice sheets and trace gases—supports this sensitivity and implies that CO2 was 300–350 ppm in the Pliocene and about 450 ppm at transition to a nearly ice-free planet, exposing unrealistic lethargy of ice sheet models. Equilibrium global warming for today’s GHG amount is 10°C, which is reduced to 8°C by today’s human-made aerosols. Equilibrium warming is not ‘committed’ warming; rapid phaseout of GHG emissions would prevent most equilibrium warming from occurring. However, decline of aerosol emissions since 2010 should increase the 1970–2010 global warming rate of 0.18°C per decade to a post-2010 rate of at least 0.27°C per decade. Thus, under the present geopolitical approach to GHG emissions, global warming will exceed 1.5°C in the 2020s and 2°C before 2050. Impacts on people and nature will accelerate as global warming increases hydrologic (weather) extremes. The enormity of consequences demands a return to Holocene-level global temperature. Required actions include: (1) a global increasing price on GHG emissions accompanied by development of abundant, affordable, dispatchable clean energy, (2) East-West cooperation in a way that accommodates developing world needs, and (3) intervention with Earth’s radiation imbalance to phase down today’s massive human-made ‘geo-transformation’ of Earth’s climate. Current political crises present an opportunity for reset, especially if young people can grasp their situation.
My basic summary (I am NOT a climate scientist so someone tell me if I'm wrong and I HOPE this is wrong for my children), scientists had dismissed hotter climate models due to the fact that we didn't have historical data to prove them. Now folks are applying hotter models to predicting weather and the hotter models appear to be more accurate. So it looks like we're going to break 2C BEFORE 2050 and could hit highs of 8C-10C by the end of the century with our CURRENT levels of green house gases, not even including increasing those.
EDIT: Adding more sources:
Use of Short-Range Forecasts to Evaluate Fast Physics Processes Relevant for Climate Sensitivity: https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019MS001986
Short-term tests validate long-term estimates of climate change: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01484-5
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Because maybe people are feeling like this is all very questionable.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not denying climate change on a larger scale, I'm just saying that most of the studies that were used to say there's climate change and to push policies such as reducing the production of meat are, most likely, made to support such policy changes that in reality aren't driven by climate change but by some other economic / market factor.
Take a look at this: https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSL1N2XW1LX/
Meme comparing jugs of water and ice does not prove sea level rise is a hoax The meme is not proof that melting ice sheets do not cause sea levels to rise, however, and does not accurately represent the change in volume when land-based ice melts into the oceans. “The correct analogy for land ice melting isn't showing ice floating in a glass of ice water, it's adding a whole bunch of new ice to the glass,”
While the meme clearly fails to take in account all that mass of ice that sits on land it still has some truth to it because people like Al Gore said "I predict all ice caps will melt by 2014" something that we now know wasn't true.
Details, as usual, are very important and people like Al Gore carefully cherry-picked them in order to build their arguments and sell a view of the world that wasn't close the reality of things. We've been on this path with governments, public figures and large companies for a while now and people are just fed up of it all - that's why she gets downvotes on her videos.
How is the consumption of meat not a climate change issue? It produces a fuckton of greenhouse gases, uses an immense amount of water, and is actively contributing to monoculture crops in (for example) the Amazon.
What's your suggestion as alternative? Being vegan is even worse for the environment. Aren't Avocados also a monoculture?
We've to eat something and preferably not crickets. There's no excuse to cut on meat production, especially during the food crisis that Ukraine / Russia created for Europe.
Being vegan is absolutely not worse for the environment.
Yes it is, you're talking about mass producing tons of very specific plans, poisoning everything with monsanto and it required more land and for what's worth it might not be that healthy. We should eat about everything not just plants.
You know that livestock needs to eat, right ? And they eat a ton of food, we spend a lot of resources just to produce their food, and about health, the healthy amount of meat is way less that people eat today, people should eat less meat, not everyone needs to stop, but they should reduce.
@calzone_gigante @TCB13
And eating smaller animals has less GHGs than larger ones, like chickens that also eat our food scraps. I’d like to see Guinea pigs catch on, they’re a staple meat in South America
So first there is a difference between reduction of meat products and an elimination. Having people consume less meat is good and helpful even if they don't cut it out completely.
Second, as a vegetarian, I don't understand what you mean by producing a bunch of monocultures. Do you think vegans just sit around all day eating avocados? I eat very little dairy or egg, and my diet consists largely of beans, rice, chilli, bread, stir fry, tofu, peanuts/legumes, veggies, baked potatoes, sandwiches, etc. I eat a large variety of staple goods cooked into a variety of dishes from around the world, and classic American fare, just without meat. Avocados and other resource intensive crops like almonds are a minority of my diet by a large margin. Things like beyond meat is also an infrequent treat.
Edit: here's a decent article. https://www.nytimes.com/article/plant-based-diet.html
Generally speaking, a plant-based diet consists largely of vegetables, fruit, beans, legumes, grains and nuts, with little or no meat, dairy or fish.
Yet another major study has recently been published, showing that eating a plant-based diet is significantly better for the environment than eating a meat-based diet.
The research, conducted by Oxford University, found that people who follow a meat-free diet are responsible for 75 percent less in greenhouse gas emissions than those who eat meat every day, and that following a low-meat, vegetarian or pescatarian diet is proportionally less detrimental to land, water and biodiversity than a meat-heavy diet.
Referenced research: https://www.nature.com/articles/s43016-023-00795-w
And producing meat uses 2 to 7 times (depending on what animal) the amount of mass produced monoculture to feed the animals instead of just eating the food ourselves. Ideally animals would just eat scraps or graze on land not suitable for growing things, but the industry requires exact growth rates and predictable schedules in large volumes.
producing meat uses 2 to 7 times (depending on what animal) the amount of mass produced monoculture to feed the animals instead of just eating the food ourselves
most people don't want to eat the byproduct of soybean oil production, and we can't live on grass.
animals aren't fed stuff that would land on our plate (for the most part) so it's not like it's an option to just eat their feed instead of giving it to them.
Animals are just fed small amounts of byproduct in industrial agriculture right now. The largest part of the animal feed is soy itself, rice, wheat and corn and those are things we do eat.
I just wonder wtf you think the animals we eat are eating if not plants? Space magic?
Veganism is definitely better for the planet than meat eating. Just reducing how much meat you eat also helps. It's not hard, just take one step in the right direction
Crickets is a good alternative. Especially when sprinkled on avacado toast.
It just isn’t.
You're wrong. Meat production produces a lot of methane and carbon. It's also pretty poor for land and water usage.