Dahr Jamail | Mass Extinction: It's the End of the World as We Know It

[GliderGuider]

Dahr Jamail | Mass Extinction: It's the End of the World as We Know It

Guy McPherson is a professor emeritus of evolutionary biology, natural resources and ecology at the University of Arizona, and has been a climate change expert for 30 years. He has also become a controversial figure, due to the fact that he does not shy away from talking about the possibility of near-term human extinction.

While McPherson's perspective might sound like the stuff of science fiction, there is historical precedent for his predictions. Fifty-five million years ago, a 5-degree Celsius rise in average global temperatures seems to have occurred in just 13 years, according to a study published in the October 2013 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. A report in the August 2013 issue of Science revealed that in the near term, earth's climate will change 10 times faster than during any other moment in the last 65 million years.

Prior to that, the Permian mass extinction that occurred 250 million years ago, also known as the "Great Dying," was triggered by a massive lava flow in an area of Siberia that led to an increase in global temperatures of 6 degrees Celsius. That, in turn, caused the melting of frozen methane deposits under the seas. Released into the atmosphere, those gases caused temperatures to skyrocket further. All of this occurred over a period of approximately 80,000 years. The change in climate is thought to be the key to what caused the extinction of most species on the planet. In that extinction episode, it is estimated that 95 percent of all species were wiped out.

Today's current scientific and observable evidence strongly suggests we are in the midst of the same process - only this time it is anthropogenic, and happening exponentially faster than even the Permian mass extinction did.

In fact, a recently published study in Science Advances states, unequivocally, that the planet has officially entered its sixth mass extinction event. The study shows that species are already being killed off at rates much faster than they were during the other five extinction events, and warns ominously that humans could very likely be among the first wave of species to go extinct.

So if some feel that McPherson's thinking is extreme, when the myriad scientific reports he cites to back his claims are looked at squarely and the dots are connected, the perceived extremism begins to dissolve into a possible, or even likely, reality.

Just to repeat, this is not a certainty. It is, however a strong and rising probability. One with moderately apocalyptic implications. What's the appropriate response to a risk with consequences this great?

[mackdaddy]

1. I like your "Moderately Apocalyptic" comment...

I think that may be a bit like a little bit Pregnant though, or close to sorta f*cked. I really do like it....

I know I was jumped on when I first mentioned Guy McPherson in a response last summer when Dr. Box sent his text about "we are f'd" about the major methane plumes in the Arctic, and trying to explain why this could be so bad.

I have found that sometimes we need a metaphorical slap in the face to get us our of our "normalcy bias" in life. I have been involved in the solar/wind industry, but was not "alarmed" about climate change. That was something in the future, and the climate deniers are good enough that the argument looks like a coming on a schoolyard fight, you really do not know who the believe. But then last spring I saw Guy McPherson being interviewed on Thom Hartman's show, and he was describing this Near Term Human Extinction conjecture. What do you mean we could "all die in 20 or 30 years"??!!

I started doing a lot of reading on the subject, as much trying to disprove what he was saying as anything. I am not quite on board that all of humanity is going to die, but I am becoming more sure that we will most likely go through a hellish century or two, worse than any apocalyptic sci-fi I have ever seen.

Unfortunately, every report on the climate gets us one step closer to the McPherson world view. I think the biggest question is one of time. How long before Sea Level Rise becomes critical, 10 years or 100? How long before the weather extremes make is impossible to feed 7 billion plus people? Will mass migration and hunger of millions of people bring down our economy and society itself? How long will it take before Republicans even acknowledged anything is happening to the climate, and is it already too late to do anything to head off real disaster?

Well on that happy note, I came across a small independent film that illustrates what life would be like after the collapse of society due to a food production collapse. The film is called "22 After" and is a series of interviews of survivors after a societal collapse. A compilation is here https://vimeo.com/133679877 . The full film also available, but has some graphic suicide scenes not in the compilation, and although interesting I would strongly warn anyone if you have any mental health issues with suicide. You can find the full film also on vimeo.

[GliderGuider]

3. Just to close to feedback loop...

The man who directed "22 After" just posted on Nature Bats Last trying to raise money and interest for another kick at the can:

http://guymcpherson.com/2015/07/normalcy-bias-the-uniquely-human-tendency-to-believe-that-things-cant-be-that-bad/

Your comment about people needing a swift kick to get past their normalcy bias is the best argument in favour of Guy's approach. Of course, a counter-argument is, "What difference will it make if a few more people wake up?" If it won't make much difference, why disturb everyone's sleep by screaming in their ears, "Quick, wake up and kiss your children goodbye!"

I suppose a measure of how deeply I've accepted the inevitability of the clusterfuck is that I'm not trying to wake people up to it any more. I don't even get outraged by many of the monumentally stupid, heartless things people do to the planet and each other, because I can see that behaviour as normal given human nature and our physical circumstances.

I have much kinder, more productive things to do with my time.

[Delphinus]

10. Glider,

I so understand what you say that you've given up trying to wake people up. I guess I have too.

[pscot]

2. Floor it

and see how far we get?

[OKIsItJustMe]

4. … What's the appropriate response to a risk with consequences this great?

In my opinion, the appropriate response is not to throw up our hands and say, “It’s our fate. We must accept it.”

Recently, I watched a documentary on World War II. WW II was an, “existential threat,” and the US (eventually) responded appropriately, with scientific research and industrial build-up. Businesses converted their production lines virtually overnight. Money was raised for the effort by selling “war bonds.”

If we took this threat as seriously as we did World War II (post Pearl Harbor) we could have a significant impact on the outcome.

[GliderGuider]

5. Everyone's idea of an appropriate response will be different.

I'm not asking forcing anyone to accept mine.

[Ghost Dog]

7. Yeah, the Pentagon or similar will take all power eventually,

and seek to protect itself and the, say, 1% or so it will deem 'worth' trying to 'save'...

A 'religious' political power behind that would also seem likely.

[Nihil]

9. Unfortunate support of our current situation

> If we took this threat as seriously as we did World War II (post Pearl Harbor)
> we could have a significant impact on the outcome.

The sad thing is that "we" are currently acting in the same way as the US
prior to Pearl Harbour: "Hey, we can make a profit from this" has not
yet been replaced by "Hey, we need to do something serious about this".

What will be the "Pearl Harbour" event this time?

No-one in "The Leadership" notices or cares about the odd thousand people
dying "somewhere abroad" so this would have to be a group of Continental USA
events (e.g., Miami, New York & Washington DC drowning with significant loss of
life rather than just a bunch of insurance claims to be pushed off the headlines
next time some non-entity "celebrity" shags another non-entity "celebrity&quot .




(And no rat-holing this by noting the 2001 "Pearl Harbour" event for completely different goals ... )

[GliderGuider]

6. We should keep in mind that climate change is just one of the existential problems we face

Warming and acidifying oceans;
Chemical pollution;
Habitat destruction;
Deforestation and desertification;
Depletion of fresh water supplies;
Declining soil fertility.
Resource depletion;
Overly complex and unstable social, political and economic systems;
Rising economic inequality among people and nations;
Corporate ownership of the global food supply;

Together they form a "wicked problem". As Ugo Bardi has recently pointed out, wicked problems generate wicked solutions - i.e. stovepiped attempts solutions that actually make the problem worse.

http://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-07-15/wicked-problems-and-wicked-solutions-the-case-of-the-world-s-food-supply
And here's a good look from an expert at what we tend to do in these cases: push in all the wrong places...
http://www.donellameadows.org/archives/leverage-points-places-to-intervene-in-a-system/

[GliderGuider]

8. The most effective ways to change a system, according to Donella Meadows

Of her list of 12 leverage points listed in the post above, here are the four most effective:

4. The power to add, change, evolve, or self-organize system structure.
3. The goals of the system.
2. The mindset or paradigm out of which the system — its goals, structure, rules, delays, parameters — arises.
1. The power to transcend paradigms.

Consider first that the system we need to change is a global human economy that is currently providing for 7.3 billion people, composed of 190 sovereign nations that can each make their own economic and political rules.

Now:
4. Is there any overarching power that could accomplish #4 on a global scale?
3. Is the world willing to give up economic growth as a goal? Because that's what fixing this clusterfuck will take, just for starters.
2. Can people living in societies collectively abandon the mindset of growth? At its root this mindset is the search for status and material comfort that has been part of our evolutionary makeup for as long as we've been human
1. Can individuals transcend their own paradigms? If not, what makes us think that the world as a whole can do anything so majestic?