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OneCrazyDiamond

(2,029 posts)
Tue Sep 9, 2014, 09:55 AM Sep 2014

'Alarm bells' as greenhouse gases hit new high: UN

Source: AFP/Yahoo

Geneva (AFP) - Surging carbon dioxide levels boosted greenhouse gases in the atmosphere to a new high in 2013, amid worrying signs that absorption by land and sea is waning, the UN warned Tuesday.

"An alarm bell is ringing," Michel Jarraud, head of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), told reporters in Geneva.

In its annual report on Earth-warming greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the UN agency said concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2), methane and nitrous oxide all broke records in 2013.

"We know without any doubt that our climate is changing and our weather is becoming more extreme due to human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels," Jarraud said.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/greenhouse-gas-levels-atmosphere-hit-high-un-073557254.html

24 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
'Alarm bells' as greenhouse gases hit new high: UN (Original Post) OneCrazyDiamond Sep 2014 OP
kick, kick, kick..... daleanime Sep 2014 #1
Our politicians are largely silent AgingAmerican Sep 2014 #2
Wouldn't you think they would at least be motivated out of concern for their own children... deurbano Sep 2014 #5
They probably know it's too late. PSPS Sep 2014 #9
You mean, by Peter Wadhams? AverageJoe90 Sep 2014 #15
Might as well hit the snooze on the alarm. geomon666 Sep 2014 #3
Yes, but without burning oil billionaires can't become trillionaires in the next decade. valerief Sep 2014 #4
Burning oil billionaires? FiveGoodMen Sep 2014 #11
Bwah, I must have been commatose to have forgotten the comma! valerief Sep 2014 #12
Kif Kroker: Captain, may I have a word with you? Xipe Totec Sep 2014 #6
... F4lconF16 Sep 2014 #10
Humans appear to be genetically predisposed to ignore threats like this GliderGuider Sep 2014 #7
"Humans appear to be genetically predisposed to ignore threats like this" *facepalm*. AverageJoe90 Sep 2014 #14
Evolutionary psychology is "woo"? GliderGuider Sep 2014 #16
Yes, I know what EvoPsych is. AverageJoe90 Sep 2014 #17
Your disapproval of an established academic discipline is irrelevant. GliderGuider Sep 2014 #20
Some recent scientific support for my views, from a peer-reviewed journal: GliderGuider Sep 2014 #22
Interesting thesis, to be sure, but it doesn't necessarily prove the point you were trying to make. AverageJoe90 Sep 2014 #23
Nothing "necessarily" proves anything if you don't want it to. nt GliderGuider Sep 2014 #24
And the frog says, "This pot is getting a little warm, but I'm sure everything will be OK. pampango Sep 2014 #8
Kicked and recommended. Uncle Joe Sep 2014 #13
By returning organic matter into our agricultural soils, we could sink a lot of carbon quickly. greatlaurel Sep 2014 #18
This is a disturbing concentration for CO2. greatlaurel Sep 2014 #19
Yawn... sendero Sep 2014 #21

deurbano

(2,891 posts)
5. Wouldn't you think they would at least be motivated out of concern for their own children...
Tue Sep 9, 2014, 02:43 PM
Sep 2014

... or grandchildren?

PSPS

(13,512 posts)
9. They probably know it's too late.
Tue Sep 9, 2014, 04:39 PM
Sep 2014

Emissions from 50's automobiles are still in the atmosphere. And, with the rapidly increasing rate of methane being released from melting permafrost, we may well be at the point where, even if we were to cut CO2 emissions to zero today, the feedback loop would insure that it keeps going. The arctic ocean is predicted to be completely ice free in the summer beginning next year. (Summer is the only season that matters in the arctic because that's the only season it receives sunlight.)

 

AverageJoe90

(10,745 posts)
15. You mean, by Peter Wadhams?
Wed Sep 10, 2014, 08:25 PM
Sep 2014

Pardon me, but unless something truly bizarre happens(and I mean, perhaps bizarre enough to defy all known climate thermodynamics), the Arctic isn't going totally ice free next year. Maybe in the next decade, but not next year.

geomon666

(7,512 posts)
3. Might as well hit the snooze on the alarm.
Tue Sep 9, 2014, 11:39 AM
Sep 2014

Those in a position to do anything about it, won't. Time to start thinking of ways of future survival as a species.

valerief

(53,235 posts)
4. Yes, but without burning oil billionaires can't become trillionaires in the next decade.
Tue Sep 9, 2014, 11:46 AM
Sep 2014

And THAT is the most important thing in the world, even more important than saving the world.

FiveGoodMen

(20,018 posts)
11. Burning oil billionaires?
Wed Sep 10, 2014, 12:28 PM
Sep 2014

I can see how that would be fun but not how it would produce trillionaires

valerief

(53,235 posts)
12. Bwah, I must have been commatose to have forgotten the comma!
Wed Sep 10, 2014, 12:33 PM
Sep 2014
Yes, but without burning oil, billionaires can't become trillionaires in the next decade.

Xipe Totec

(43,872 posts)
6. Kif Kroker: Captain, may I have a word with you?
Tue Sep 9, 2014, 02:53 PM
Sep 2014

Captain Zapp Brannigan: No.

Kif Kroker: It's an emergency, sir.

Captain Zapp Brannigan: Come back when it's a catastrophe.

a huge rumbling is heard

Captain Zapp Brannigan: Oh, very well.

 

GliderGuider

(21,088 posts)
7. Humans appear to be genetically predisposed to ignore threats like this
Tue Sep 9, 2014, 03:54 PM
Sep 2014

Or at least to give them a very low priority compared to immediate, concrete threats like job losses, slowing economic growth or who is doing what to whom in the Middle East.

We have what amounts to a hard-wired "discount function" for risk:

http://www.paulchefurka.ca/Hyperbolic%20Discount%20Functions.html

Why is it so difficult to generate concern for events that are seen as belonging to the future even though their consequences may be dire? Why is it so easy to generate concern for much smaller events that are happening right now? Consider the outpouring of generosity that happens when a local family without insurance is burned out of their home. In a single day the community will respond more than they would to a year's worth haranguing by Climate Change activists.

This happens, apparently, because of the way we're wired. It is the result of many millenia of mutation, genetic drift and natural selection - selection that favoured people who responded immediately to threats or rewards. Those individuals that did not respond immediately (perhaps they didn't run from the tiger or eat the food that was in front of them) were more likely to be "selected out" of the gene pool. They were the original Darwin Award winners. This selection reinforced our responses to immediate and clearly understood rewards or dangers. In fact, the further away in time the reward or danger was, the lower our response to it became, because its influence on our survival was correspondingly less. Even if we waited to run until the tiger got closer, the chances were good that we would escape anyway, so there was no need to leave our meal just yet. This idea is known as the "discount rate". It's the same concept used by banks, where the present value of a future event is discounted depending on how far in the future it is.

While banks use a linear discount rate (expressed as a percentage), there is strong evidence that human beings use a more complex function that comes from different parts of our brain. The more primitive parts (the brain stem and limbic system) are concerned with immediate survival and emotional responses. They are much less capable of long-term evaluation, but provoke the strongest reactions to pleasure or fear. The neocortex, on the other hand, is our thinking brain. It analyzes, predicts and plans for the future, but has more limited access to our emotional triggers.

As a result, immediate threats or rewards that require no deep analysis tend to activate the "earlier" portions of our brain and prompt very strong responses. More abstract threats and rewards identified through the analytical capability of our neocortex don't activate our limbic system, and so usually prompt a much less intense reaction. In addition, emotions easily override the intellect, so you get reactions like, "Yes, I think Global Warming is important, but I have a date tonight with the hottest guy on the face of the planet!" That's not a lack of concern for the future, it's a direct result of the way we are constructed. It's because of our hard-wired "hyperbolic discount function". Immediate and concrete concerns always strongly outweigh the distant and abstract; it's the reason we got this far as a species. The discount function is called "hyperbolic" because it falls off rapidly at first, then flattens out as time passes. Events that are very near term evoke a sense of urgency that falls off steeply as the time horizon passes from the domain of the limbic system to the domain of the neocortex, resulting in the characteristic shape of a hyperbolic curve:


As a result I don't hold out any hope that we will change our ways before the emergency becomes a full-blown planetary catastrophe.
 

AverageJoe90

(10,745 posts)
14. "Humans appear to be genetically predisposed to ignore threats like this" *facepalm*.
Wed Sep 10, 2014, 08:23 PM
Sep 2014
I hate to say this, GG, but are you ever going to reconsider any of the woo that you've been posting on this site? Because this is one of the worst examples I've ever seen.
 

GliderGuider

(21,088 posts)
16. Evolutionary psychology is "woo"?
Wed Sep 10, 2014, 09:53 PM
Sep 2014

Because that's exactly what this is.

Here is a link and excerpt from a primer written by two leading proponents at UCSB, if you're unfamiliar with the field (it's relatively new):

http://www.cep.ucsb.edu/primer.html

The goal of research in evolutionary psychology is to discover and understand the design of the human mind. Evolutionary psychology is an approach to psychology, in which knowledge and principles from evolutionary biology are put to use in research on the structure of the human mind. It is not an area of study, like vision, reasoning, or social behavior. It is a way of thinking about psychology that can be applied to any topic within it.

In this view, the mind is a set of information-processing machines that were designed by natural selection to solve adaptive problems faced by our hunter-gatherer ancestors. This way of thinking about the brain, mind, and behavior is changing how scientists approach old topics, and opening up new ones. This chapter is a primer on the concepts and arguments that animate it.


 

AverageJoe90

(10,745 posts)
17. Yes, I know what EvoPsych is.
Wed Sep 10, 2014, 11:58 PM
Sep 2014

And frankly, I'm not a big fan of it, because a lot of it IS, unfortunately, woo.

Of course, you have a right to your opinion. as I do mine, although stuff like what you've posted here, is really better suited for Creative Speculation, rather than any serious discussion on climate change.

 

GliderGuider

(21,088 posts)
20. Your disapproval of an established academic discipline is irrelevant.
Thu Sep 11, 2014, 07:10 AM
Sep 2014

It's a well-established fact that humans have an overwhelmingly short-term focus when it comes to choosing behaviors. This is evident in our prioritization of both short-term risks and rewards at every level from the personal to the nation-state. This pattern goes back as far in human history as we can see. Examples include the salinization of the ancient Indus valley due to irrigation, that indicates a focus on short-term crop production rather than the long-term risk to the land, and some of the human-induced civilizational collapses described by Jared Diamond.

Where do you think the short-termism that is endemic to human psychology comes from if it doesn't have an evolutionary origin?

 

AverageJoe90

(10,745 posts)
23. Interesting thesis, to be sure, but it doesn't necessarily prove the point you were trying to make.
Sat Sep 13, 2014, 03:36 PM
Sep 2014

E.O.M.

pampango

(24,692 posts)
8. And the frog says, "This pot is getting a little warm, but I'm sure everything will be OK.
Tue Sep 9, 2014, 04:01 PM
Sep 2014

It's getting hotter and hotter, but it is not unbearable yet. Is dealing with the problem really worth the effort?"

greatlaurel

(2,004 posts)
18. By returning organic matter into our agricultural soils, we could sink a lot of carbon quickly.
Thu Sep 11, 2014, 12:29 AM
Sep 2014

We have lost most of the organic matter from our soils. We have a very ready carbon sink in every country if increasing organic matter to our soils became a top priority. Unfortunately, that will reduce our dependence on fossil fuel based fertilizers and cut into corporate profits.

The book, Dirt, by Dr. Montgomery talks about the carbon sink potential for soils, in one chapter. It is a really great book with tons of interesting information. He covers a lot of history about agricultural practices and the impacts on human events from those practices. He is an outstanding writer.

greatlaurel

(2,004 posts)
19. This is a disturbing concentration for CO2.
Thu Sep 11, 2014, 12:34 AM
Sep 2014

There is lots we can do to help stave off the worst impacts, but time is running short. I am completely stunned at the deniers lack of concern for future generations. My only explanation is they are in the dangerously stupid category of people.

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