Humans will be extinct in 100 years says eminent scientist

[haele]

49. Food production and potable water. A 10 degree difference (up or down) during spring affects crops.

Too warm a winter, we lose orchards (apples, cherries, nuts, peaches, etc...) because it's not cold enough to set blossoms. An warmer than normal or inconsistent late winter/spring, we can lose a high percentage of our grains, animal fodder and early vegetables as they start sprouting before the spring thaw is over or flooding can mess with fields. Not enough snowpack, drought - there's not enough water to take agriculture through to winter.
And you aren't going to get most American farmers and Agri-businesses to suddenly change their farming practices for more drought-compatible practices "overnight" because: 1) most American farmland is already tilled, which makes it more water dependent as the soil drains too quickly to keep the roots moist, 2) most American independent farmers can't wait out the three/four years it takes to properly restore their farmed soil for drought resistant farming, 3) Most agri-business pretend that their patented "drought resistant" seeds are truly drought resistant by themselves, and they don't have to change their farming practices as well as their crop rotation processes in America to maintain the level of production they have now, and 4) most farm animals aren't able to handle the physical stress of both temperature increases and climate change along with the current "cost effective" farming/ranching practices.

That means food shortages and high prices. Which means population stress which increases both social morbidity and general craziness.
We in the US are really very selfishly nasty when it comes to not being able to just get what we want when we want it, especially when the financial interest of those who control most of the resources for survival outweighs their social interests so all the mitigations we could put in place to correct the problems and make life better/easier for everyone become "just too expensive". Culturally, we tend to tell ourselves it's better to get rid of the weakest links in society, totally forgetting that as we start getting rid of the "dead-wood" beneath us, we're going to eventually find ourselves with nothing below us and those above us will cut us
out as dead-wood in their efforts to stay on sound footing.

Psychopaths (including organizational constructs that are now considered "people&quot don't care what happens to anything or anyone so long they can survive in comfort one day longer than whatever is around them. If they're the last ones left standing before burning up the world, so be it.
And we as a species tend to put psychopaths in charge, because they're so damn impressive in their displays of wealth and confidence...they must be better than us, look how rich they are!

So yeah, if things keep going the way they are going - without a radical change happening right now - I can see humans and most species on earth as we know it going extinct. Maybe not in 100 years, but I still doubt the generation of my grand-daughter's grand children will have much of a world left for them to live in. And it'll be the collective "our" fault, because we prefer to just throw money at our "problems" and try to buy them off than spending time, curiosity, effort, and informed sacrifice.

Haele