Can we do away with term "Climate Change" and call what it is?

[NowsTheTime]

George Carlin did a bit on "soft language" how we create terminology that makes things seem less severe.


Is this is how we got to "climate change" instead of "global warming"? (Disclosure: I may be wrong here, but I don't ca

"Climate Change"? So it's changing. Is it warmer or colder? I don't know. No big deal! NO BIG DEAL!!!!

"Global Warming"? Sometimes I like to be a nice comfy warm. I'm not crazy about being cold? Nobody wants to be really COLD!!!

"Global Heating"? Oh, like heating my food on a stove? Hmm, sometimes stoves are hot? I could get a burned if I touched a hot stove. My finger would hurt! Doesn't Sound That Great. REALLY Doesn't Sound That Great.

"Global Burning"? OH HELL NO!!!!! GET ME OUTTA HERE!!!

[dlk]

1. After the record heat this summer, it shouldn't be as difficult

To use the more accurate term. Seeing (and sweating) is believing for Americans who have been resisting the science.

[jimfields33]

9. Until winter comes and it's negative 10 in some areas.

That’s why it had to change to climate change. Too many weather craziness to have it global warming or global cooling.

[dlk]

18. More extreme weather but generally warmer...

[Model35mech]

19. The upper midwest has seen rather more of this variability in the last 20-25 years

The focus of tv news is always shaped by meteorological events covered on the 5 O'clock news. So, todays and tomorrows and the day after's weather forecast is what we most get to know. Yesterday's weather events are interpreted as evidence in climate change, although climate change is evidenced by decades long trends rather than daily weather.

We tend to be rather less informed about the pattern shifts in the great gyres of the atmosphere and ocean currents. The old mostly steady pattern of the northern hemisphere's jet streams isn't so steady and doesn't steer cyclonic pressure systems as predictably. Now it's lots of omega-blocks and scrambled north-south oriented extremes due to more vigorous vertical oscillation in the altitudes of the high winds.

The northern atmospheric gyre has added a lot of energy and tends to remain strong even into spring. It also has oscillations and so it carries to southern WI deep Canadian cold every 4-6 weeks between Oct and May. So, we now get episodes of warm weather (false spring) a bit sooner. That makes a person dream about planting stone-fruit and grapes north to growing zone 4 , thus taking advantage of 'global warming. Unfortunately, such plantings get seriously frost bitten in deep cold snaps that can't be fully predicted, but are frequent during the now earlier blossoming. Yes, the plants grow, but fruit production depends on them getting through the new springtime without a deep freeze.

[Auggie]

2. "Global Death"

???

[Buns_of_Fire]

3. Climate Breakdown. Atmospheric Disintegration.

Time to use some words with nice, sharp teeth.

[peacebuzzard]

4. talented Carlin always makes my mood better.

what an icon. I sure do miss that guy.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

5. Global incineration? Climate catastrophe? Self immolation?

Worldwide cremation? Suicide by fossil fuels?

[Donkees]

6. It's also being called ''Climate Chaos''

[Cartoonist]

7. The end of the world

as we know it.

[hunter]

8. It's much worse than that.

This thing we call "economic productivity" isn't productivity at all. It is in fact a direct measure of the damage we are doing to whatever is left of our planet's natural environment and our own human spirit.

We're all living a fucking lie. Most of us suffer employment that is not making the world a better place and it's damned near impossible for any affluent or wealthy person to significantly reduce their own environmental footprint.

[dalton99a]

10. No shit

[marybourg]

11. No. Climate scientists said "global warming"

was not the right description, because the main change was going to be more extreme weather, not just warming, I think “climate chaos” is more apt, from what we’re seeing so far.

[Johnny2X2X]

12. Global Warming is more accurate

I think Climate Change being used is acquessing to skeptics too much, but it does leave room for all the impacts of Global Warming. Those impacts are that some regions actually get colder, not warmer.

Winters in Europe for instance are going to be much more severe with Global Warming because the Gulf Stream's great conveyor belt is being hindered or shut down. This is where warm water from the Caribean moves toward Western Europe, there it gets pushed to the surface by cold water coming from the Artic. This warmer water off the coast dramatically regulates the Winters in Europe. If not for this effect, the UK for instance would have Winters closer to Alaska's than to Southern Ohio's. Less cold water dramatically changes this effect. Western Europe simply does not have the infrastructure to deal with sub zero temperatures and several feet of snow a Winter than Canadians see every year. They don't have snowplows adequate for those types of Winters. Their homes aren't built for snow and ice like that. Their roads aren't built for it. Their utilities aren't built for it. Their crops and soil can't flourish with that, etc. etc. Even their livestock would struggle. If England has temps in near zero for weeks at a time, instead of the 45-50 they see in January on average, it would completely devastate that country.

So Global Warming is the most accurate term IMO, the globe is warming. That can mean all sorts of things depending on where you live. People in the Northern States in the US are often saying things like, "Milder Winters? Sign me up! Sounds great!" But that's not all we've signed up for. I am in Michigan for instance. Michigan relies on Lake Michigan to regulate weather systems, a wartmer Lake Michigan leads to more severe storms. So we just had a severe storm system, that spawned 7 tornadoes, a record for the state for 1 storm. And they were just the F0s that we usually see, there were strong F1s and even an F2. And the storm system that spawned them actually wasn't ever over the lake, it sprung up over land out of nothing. This was a storm more similar to what they see in the plains. The damage was unreal. We've been having severe wind storms every year now, the types of 60 mph steady winds we'd only see every 10 years just a few decades ago. And the effects on flora and fauna are immense too. Posion Ivy is totally out of control all across the state, it's never been more present as it's been shown to out compete other plants in the warmer weather. Ticks and other pests are multiplying damaging crops and livestock. The soil relies on freezing and thawing to aerate. And there's all sorts unknown unknowns that even the experts can predict right now. For all we know, Michigan could be the worst place for living in 50 years due to global warming, despite all the fresh water and what should be temperate weather. We just don't know all of the impacts, weather is already the most complex system that humans try to model and understand.

[Kid Berwyn]

13. Environmental Collapse

Planet's ability to support life is stressed to the breaking point.



Perhaps those with the means will share what's needed to survive, but I doubt it.

[question everything]

14. Climate Extreme

We have had severe winter and severe summer.

It used to be that when it was hot and steamy in August I wished for the arrival of December. Not this summer; not even with 34 days, so far of above 90. Average is 13.

[Autumn]

15. Climate breakdown.

[Fozzledick]

16. Sudden catastrophic climate change due to man-made global warming.

That's what it is.

Sorry if you can't fit that on a bumper sticker, but "What part of catastrophic climate change don't you understand?"
is the best rejoinder to deniers.

[roamer65]

17. Climate crisis.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jul/12/want-to-fight-climate-change-have-fewer-children

[Iggo]

20. We're dead either way.

At least this way, more people talk about it.