Nicholas Stern: 'I got it wrong on climate change – it's far, far worse'

[NoOneMan]

39. "in a way that ensures that adjustments will be made..."

What if we cannot feasibly make adjustments?

I like to post this, because its a great visualization:



1) Will the land up north be as productive as the US farm land?
a) How has glacial activity impacted the potential productivity of the soil?
b) How will the Canadian winters (with substantially less winter daylight) impact our normal expectations for winter crops?
c) What will be the feedback from deforestation to turn forest land into farm land?
d) How many years will it take to raise this land to the productivity needed to feed everyone?
2) What will this do to US trade activity, once it has to import masses of staples produced with lower subsidies and Canadian policies (which make food prices much higher up north)? Will the economy be able to produce enough wealth so that all citizens have access to the quantities of food they need, at imported rates, presuming enough can even be harvested?
3) If we are running out of things to pour on soil (like potash), and running out of soil that we can throw it on, are you sure we can even find enough acres (probably more than current) to produce the same amount of food we currently do at our agrarian apex?
4) What makes you think the market will magically adjust to fulfil everyone's needs? Markets adjust to make the most amount of profit for shareholders. That may or may not include keeping everyone fed.

Your faith that our markets or technology will find a super-duper fix is akin to religion. Many past civilizations have fallen when they could not find fixes to their limits. Suddenly, your faith has declared we are exceptional.