Fuck Chuck Yeager in his decomposing eye sockets.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Anything more than a four degree rise in temperature, and we're going to have serious problems surviving as a species in large and sophisticated enough societies to undertake space travel.

That's my concern.

Well then, we should stop doing things that increase the earth's temperature.

lol.

[Doktor Howl]

I mean, how long do we have to get it right before the planet becomes inhospitable due to the sun's expansion? About a billion years, minimum?

A billion years. We only started using sharp rocks what, three million years ago?

If we can somehow just not kill ourselves off, I think odds are whatever our descendants have evolved into can make it into space by then, if we really want to.

To avoid killing ourselves off, we're going to need to do something about our population.

Interesting note:  At the world's first "Earth Summit", 30 years back, nobody was even allowed to SAY the word "population" because it might offend people religiously.

This species is a dead end.  Intelligence seems to be a fatal mutation.

I hope this species isn't a dead end. I mean, we're still monkeys, and we act like it, but I hope we're still a viable link on the evolutionary chain, to be eventually replaced by descendants who are more cooperative and less competitive. If we evolved into a more cooperative species with some foresight, we'd feed and educate people instead of burning villages to steal oil, and instead of having famine-riddled continents full of dying babies we'd have well-fed people who read and use contraceptives.

You can actually see a change, interestingly enough.

We were just going over this with HR at work (we do weird shit for classes).

People born before 1945 ("Traditionalists") tend to value authority for its own sake (oook!).
People born from 46-65 ("Boomers") tend to value loyalty.
People born from 66-85 (Gen X) tend to value competence.
People born from 86-forward (Gen Y) tend to value relationships and talent.

Gradual improvement.

Also, the birth RATE is slowing down, which is good, but we still have more than 7 Bn monkeys, which is bad.  Could go either way.

[Cain]

Anything more than a four degree rise in temperature, and we're going to have serious problems surviving as a species in large and sophisticated enough societies to undertake space travel.

That's my concern.

Well then, we should stop doing things that increase the earth's temperature.

lol.

That's what I keep trying to tell them.  BUT GLOBAL WARMING WILL MEAN WE WONT HAVE TO GO TO SPAIN FOR SUMMER THOUGH, LOL!

[Doktor Howl]

Anything more than a four degree rise in temperature, and we're going to have serious problems surviving as a species in large and sophisticated enough societies to undertake space travel.

That's my concern.

Well then, we should stop doing things that increase the earth's temperature.

lol.

That's what I keep trying to tell them.  BUT GLOBAL WARMING WILL MEAN WE WONT HAVE TO GO TO SPAIN FOR SUMMER THOUGH, LOL!

England cannot be allowed to thaw.  Just saying.  The world is already a dystopian nightmare as it is.

[Cain]

Anything more than a four degree rise in temperature, and we're going to have serious problems surviving as a species in large and sophisticated enough societies to undertake space travel.

That's my concern.

Rises in temperature tend to fling back into ice ages, and we have already demonstrated that - as a species - we can survive those.

And then it's just another 6,000 years or so before we figure out how to build cities again.  Rinse, repeat.

I think after 4 degrees it can be become a self-sustaining process, unfortunately.  Desertification right up into the arctic circle.

[Cain]

Anything more than a four degree rise in temperature, and we're going to have serious problems surviving as a species in large and sophisticated enough societies to undertake space travel.

That's my concern.

Well then, we should stop doing things that increase the earth's temperature.

lol.

That's what I keep trying to tell them.  BUT GLOBAL WARMING WILL MEAN WE WONT HAVE TO GO TO SPAIN FOR SUMMER THOUGH, LOL!

England cannot be allowed to thaw.  Just saying.  The world is already a dystopian nightmare as it is.

On the other hand, Spain would be spared the onslaught of English tourists in the summer.  I can see them backing this plan.

[Doktor Howl]

Anything more than a four degree rise in temperature, and we're going to have serious problems surviving as a species in large and sophisticated enough societies to undertake space travel.

That's my concern.

Rises in temperature tend to fling back into ice ages, and we have already demonstrated that - as a species - we can survive those.

And then it's just another 6,000 years or so before we figure out how to build cities again.  Rinse, repeat.

I think after 4 degrees it can be become a self-sustaining process, unfortunately.  Desertification right up into the arctic circle.

I'll have to look that up.  More heat means more evaporation, which means more reflected sunlight, or some such thing.

[Doktor Howl]

Anything more than a four degree rise in temperature, and we're going to have serious problems surviving as a species in large and sophisticated enough societies to undertake space travel.

That's my concern.

Well then, we should stop doing things that increase the earth's temperature.

lol.

That's what I keep trying to tell them.  BUT GLOBAL WARMING WILL MEAN WE WONT HAVE TO GO TO SPAIN FOR SUMMER THOUGH, LOL!

England cannot be allowed to thaw.  Just saying.  The world is already a dystopian nightmare as it is.

On the other hand, Spain would be spared the onslaught of English tourists in the summer.  I can see them backing this plan.

Look, it's bad enough that the Welsh and Scots run around unregulated.  If you people start spontaneously generating in the river Fleet, Spain will have far worse things to worry about than people running around in sweater vests, looking for a packet of "crisps".

[Cain]

Anything more than a four degree rise in temperature, and we're going to have serious problems surviving as a species in large and sophisticated enough societies to undertake space travel.

That's my concern.

Rises in temperature tend to fling back into ice ages, and we have already demonstrated that - as a species - we can survive those.

And then it's just another 6,000 years or so before we figure out how to build cities again.  Rinse, repeat.

I think after 4 degrees it can be become a self-sustaining process, unfortunately.  Desertification right up into the arctic circle.

I'll have to look that up.  More heat means more evaporation, which means more reflected sunlight, or some such thing.

Yeah.  You can see that now, with the increased rainfall in the UK over the past two decades.  And the government's plans here are projecting even larger amounts of rainfall for the next century.

But there is a tipping point for heat, and past that...things get nasty.  Feedback loops utterly wreck the environment.  I believe it is somewhere between 4-6 degrees, though of course there is a lot of debate on where the exact point is.

[Doktor Howl]

Anything more than a four degree rise in temperature, and we're going to have serious problems surviving as a species in large and sophisticated enough societies to undertake space travel.

That's my concern.

Rises in temperature tend to fling back into ice ages, and we have already demonstrated that - as a species - we can survive those.

And then it's just another 6,000 years or so before we figure out how to build cities again.  Rinse, repeat.

I think after 4 degrees it can be become a self-sustaining process, unfortunately.  Desertification right up into the arctic circle.

I'll have to look that up.  More heat means more evaporation, which means more reflected sunlight, or some such thing.

Yeah.  You can see that now, with the increased rainfall in the UK over the past two decades.  And the government's plans here are projecting even larger amounts of rainfall for the next century.

But there is a tipping point for heat, and past that...things get nasty.  Feedback loops utterly wreck the environment.  I believe it is somewhere between 4-6 degrees, though of course there is a lot of debate on where the exact point is.

No argument with that.  The question is whether it CAN get that hot, without the reflectivity thing throwing things back to the other extreme.

It's still raining in Arizona, incidentally.  The monsoon should have ended a month and a half ago.

[Triple Zero]

Is probably right, but this is 4-6 degrees in a climate. And climate is defined as the average yearly values in a large region over the course of 30 years. I remember the 30 years thing, quite sure about that I learned it in highschool.

That's the entire thing about "climate change", climate is only measured over long periods.

Anyway, with such a broad average, indeed a rise of 4-6 degrees is quite a big deal. And I think they're talking a global rise in temperature too.

So yeah that would be bad. The question is, how easy do we get there?

(btw a 4 degree rise in C or K equals a 7.2 rise in F)

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

There is some irony in the massive consumption of resources and extensive burning of fossil fuels in order to get us off the planet before we exhaust our resources and fuck the climate by burning fossil fuels.

I don't think we should be trusted with space travel until we stop that.

[Doktor Howl]

There is some irony in the massive consumption of resources and extensive burning of fossil fuels in order to get us off the planet before we exhaust our resources and fuck the climate by burning fossil fuels.

I don't think we should be trusted with space travel until we stop that.

Yeah, well, we may be "borrowing the planet from our children", but I notice there's no collateral.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

There is some irony in the massive consumption of resources and extensive burning of fossil fuels in order to get us off the planet before we exhaust our resources and fuck the climate by burning fossil fuels.

I don't think we should be trusted with space travel until we stop that.

Yeah, well, we may be "borrowing the planet from our children", but I notice there's no collateral.

[East Coast Hustle]

I mean, how long do we have to get it right before the planet becomes inhospitable due to the sun's expansion? About a billion years, minimum?

A billion years. We only started using sharp rocks what, three million years ago?

If we can somehow just not kill ourselves off, I think odds are whatever our descendants have evolved into can make it into space by then, if we really want to.

To avoid killing ourselves off, we're going to need to do something about our population.

Interesting note:  At the world's first "Earth Summit", 30 years back, nobody was even allowed to SAY the word "population" because it might offend people religiously.

This species is a dead end.  Intelligence seems to be a fatal mutation.

I hope this species isn't a dead end. I mean, we're still monkeys, and we act like it, but I hope we're still a viable link on the evolutionary chain, to be eventually replaced by descendants who are more cooperative and less competitive. If we evolved into a more cooperative species with some foresight, we'd feed and educate people instead of burning villages to steal oil, and instead of having famine-riddled continents full of dying babies we'd have well-fed people who read and use contraceptives.

Also, all of the unicorns would come back and poop rainbows everywhere. It would all be so pretty!