There is unequivocal evidence that Earth is warming
science.nasa.gov63 points by doener an hour ago
63 points by doener an hour ago
>There is unequivocal evidence that Earth is warming at an unprecedented rate. Human activity is the principal cause.
This document was last updated in October 2024, but I am a little surprised to see this still available on a .gov site.
I wonder if we should move beyond this messaging. It’s well known to the smart half of the population that climate change is happening. There is apparently some debate on the cause. But this point is mostly irrelevant, it is problem-oriented thinking. By keeping the conversation in the problem-realm you invite troglodytes into the conversation to insert their bullshit. Instead, if we move forward with “presumption of truth” solutions-based messaging, we can start to talk about what we’re going to do.
Climate control is something more people will be on board with compared to trying to have a conversation about climate science to a person who didn’t graduate high school.
Can’t wait for trump and his gestapo to deport the entirety of nasa for telling the truth
Why does NASA even have to do this? Build some cool rockets and get us to mars.
Living on Mars long-term is a practical impossibility. Certainly much, much harder than living on even a climate-changed Earth.
I’ve given up. I’ve long assumed for a year now we are heading for warming that is even worse than the worst projections and it’s all over. This has given me some peace, like accepting you’re going to die.
Everyone who can hear this has already heard it. Those who continue to pretend it is not happening are either deliberately deceptive so they can continue to make money from fossil fuels or unable to change their minds when faced by evidence due to identity politics.
My impression is that almost no one denies the warming itself, just the link to greenhouse gasses. That link is unfortunately much harder to prove than rising temperatures by itself. The proof is there nonetheless, but it's easier to cast doubt on it, and that's what certain groups have been doing.
>> My impression is that almost no one denies the warming itself, just the link to greenhouse gasses.
I fall in that category. My suspicion is that water vapor from air travel is by far the biggest contributor. I saw the blue skys after 9/11. I read the NASA guys that said daily temperature range increased measurably. I saw the blue skys again during Covid19.
I'm also of the opinion that anyone looking at historical data only going back 200,000 years or less is missing the larger picture. Sea levels are NOT at historic highs, we should expect them to rise further before receeding. We should expect glaciation again if we don't do anything, but speeding up warming IMHO is more likely to trigger glaciation that to "push through" whatever causes it and break the cycle (which would be a good thing).
So as a long-term thinker all this hype is just that. If you don't have a plan to end the glacier cycle you're just making a big deal out of a small change in time-scale due to reasons (CO2 vs H2O) that may well be the wrong ones.
But POTUS 5 months ago:
"If you look back years ago in the 1920s and the 1930s, they said global cooling will kill the world. We have to do something. Then they said global warming will kill the world, but then it started getting cooler. So now they just call it climate change because that way they can't miss. Climate change because if it goes higher or lower, whatever the hell happens, there's climate change. It's the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world, in my opinion. Climate change, no matter what happens, you're involved in that. No more global warming, no more global cooling. All of these predictions made by the United Nations and many others, often for bad reasons, were wrong. They were made by stupid people that have cost their country's fortunes and given those same countries no chance for success."
https://rollcall.com/factbase/trump/transcript/donald-trump-...
I've seen the full-court denial:
- it's not warming, or not significantly
- if it's warming, it's not because of humans, (or)
- if it's warming, it's beneficial
- if it's warming because of humans and that's bad, there's nothing we can do about it
People I've argued about this with will switch interchangeably between these. Press them hard enough on one issue, and they'll just switch to another. It's a game of whack-a-mole.
Or "Why does 2 degrees matter?"
Because when were 4 degrees cooler, NYC was under 1000 feet of ice. We really don't want to find out what 4 degrees hotter is like.
Same here. I'd also add "It's warming, caused by humans, harmful, but mitigating it would be even more harmful."
Basically, anyone capable of thinking about it logically has at this point reached the conclusion that it's real. Anyone arguing otherwise is therefore necessarily not thinking about it logically, and you have to expect things like shifting claims.
There are people that believe the warming, but don't believe it matters because the Earth used to be much hotter at some point in the past so it is a natural cycle. Yet they fail to realize that humans didn't exist then so there is no good reason to believe an Earth that hot can support human life.
I didn't even think the link to greenhouse gases is denied any more.
The merchants of doubt ran out the clock and what I hear from the former deniers I know is that it is too expensive and too late to do anything now, being warmer will be nicer, and CO2 is a fertilizer.
Even the qualification "in the last 10,000" years gives the doubters something else to dismiss global warming.
Oh wow, a true statement on a government website. I'm sure they'll take it down within a day.
Why did the Trump regime not discover and eradicate this heretical sentence?
I've shifted my mindset to abandon this idea that humanity will survive forever, or that we should strive to live as long as we can.
Intelligence is a scarcity and it cannot overcome the majority of people that are incredibly stupid or ignorant. So accepting that we are doomed relieves some of the stress. I won't have children to worry about their future, either.
I still live my life in such a way that minimizes my impact on the world as much as possible. I still surround myself with folks that want a better world. But there is no stopping the impending doom and I'm trying not to be miserable with the time I have.
Ultimately I think it will be a self correcting problem, but there is going to be an extremely long period of absolute hell. Global warming is eventually going to cause food and water scarcity on a level that will wipe out a huge percentage of the Earths population. Then the Earth will recover from there being fewer humans.
If in 3000 years we discover humans were completely wiped out to the last person I would be pretty surprised.
Humans won’t get wiped out, not by global warming atleast. It’s just going to suck and a lot of us will die.
So what are we going to do about China?
A troll response I presume. Or perhaps sarcasm without the indicator.
Not a troll comment. China produces as much or more CO2 as much as the next 5 countries combined.
It's logical to start with the king of greenhouse emissions if you want to stop global warming.
Not per capita. The US is still the worst large country. If you account for offshoring manufacturing then the US looks even worse.
There is no need for ordering right? All countries can start acting at the same time.