2014 Was Earth's Warmest Year On Record 385
An anonymous reader writes: A lengthy report compiled by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration using work from hundreds of scientists across 58 countries has found that 2014 was the hottest year on record. "The warmth was widespread across land areas. Europe experienced its warmest year on record, with more than 20 countries exceeding their previous records. Africa had above-average temperatures across most of the continent throughout 2014, Australia saw its third warmest year on record, Mexico had its warmest year on record, and Argentina and Uruguay each had their second warmest year on record. Eastern North America was the only major region to experience below-average annual temperatures." They've also published a page showing highlights of the major findings. Greenhouse gas concentrations continue to rise, the global sea level reached a record high, and average sea surface temperatures reached a record high.
Cue (Score:5, Insightful)
Cue rabid mud-slinging between fossil-fuel addicted Morlocks and nuclear-power fearing Eloi.
I weep for the future.
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You shouldn't weep for the future, because there isn't one.
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You shouldn't weep for the future, because there isn't one.
Oh, there's a future. You just aren't going to be there for it.
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"We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives."
-- The Amazing Criswell.
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The future isn't what it used to be.
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be either.
Re:Cue (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Cue (Score:4, Insightful)
false dichotomy
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false dichotomy
No false dichotomy. Those two groups will engage in said behavior. He didn't exclude reasoned conversation among more moderate groups.
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Groups you no doubt consider yourself part of.
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A confirming data point that posting on the internet requires greater specificity than when writing mathematical proofs.
Re:Cue (Score:4, Insightful)
There is a false dichotomy because there are 3 obnoxious groups.
1) "God put that oil in the ground for our benefit and he'll return before the world gets too warm!"
2) "Oil and Nuclear power are driven by evil chemicals!"
But there is also the
3) "I'm going to smugly pretend that not having an opinion makes me balanced and superior."
clan.
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Cue rabid mud-slinging between fossil-fuel addicted Morlocks and nuclear-power fearing Eloi.
I weep for the future.
You insensitive sod. Don't expect an outdoor heater from me this Xmas.
Sincerely, Tony Abbott - I'm [smh.com.au] the [smh.com.au] Prime Minister of Australia - didn't you know?
Buy more coal [theguardian.com] - it's [nsw.gov.au] good [smh.com.au].
The Gods (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The Gods (Score:5, Informative)
I have actually heard this notion on Christian radio a decade ago... that is, God will always correct imbalances magically (as per God's promise to Noah) while He achieves His purpose on earth so there is no need to worry as we told to dominate all of the earth.
Even more recently Rep John Shimkus (you guess the party affiliation) also echoed this very same sentiment and claimed that government shouldn't attempt to control green house gases because
"I do believe in the Bible as the final word of God and I do believe that God said the Earth would not be destroyed by a flood"
The earth will end only when God declares its time to be over. Man will not destroy this earth. This earth will not be destroyed by a flood.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new... [dailymail.co.uk]
Of course this just demonstrates POE's law once again.
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He's right you know. But what he doesn't seem to realize is that mankind will make the Earth uninhabitable for itself. Ironic, really, being the first species that causes its own extinction.
Re:The Gods (Score:5, Informative)
I doubt the Earth will be destroyed by global warming. It might cause great havoc and a massive die off but I suspect the planet will continue to orbit the sun for some time and that life will continue although it might not have it nearly as easy as it is now. As far as how the world ends in the bible, it will be burned up.
"The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare.” 2 Peter 3:10
Re:The Gods (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm pretty sure, the promise was that "God" would not create another global flood. Mortals can frack it up however they like without violating that promise. But hey, whatever maintains fossil fuel profits...
Of all the religions, I don't think any other religion has come to be so manipulated by outside actors as has American Christianity. How very apt is the metaphor of sheep used to speak of its adherents.
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It's all the doing of fire giants from Muspelheim. Unfortunately, even the gods cannot stop them alone.
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10th level Elven Rogue
9th level Dwarven Fighter
7/7/7 Half Elven Ftr/Mu/Th
10th level Druid
8/8 Half Elven Cleric/Mu
9th level Human Cleric
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But, but, but there are ice cubes in my freezer!
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he doesn't hate all nations.
just the global poor who, for some reason never logically explained, will all die if we don't keep burning fossil fuels.
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Well they certainly seem anxious to burn fossil fuels.
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They hate our freedoms.
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You mean something like changing data sets ?
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gist... [nasa.gov]
uly 15, 2015: Starting with today’s update, the standard GISS analysis is no longer based on ERSST v3b but on the newer ERSST v4. Dr. Makiko Sato created some graphs and maps showing the effect of that change. More information may be obtained from NOAA’s website. Furthermore, we eliminated GHCN’s Amundsen-Scott temperature series using just the SCAR reports for the South Pole.
And eliminating pesky data ?
Improving data [Re:The Gods] (Score:2, Informative)
I'm not sure what your point is. The way science works is that scientists are constantly improving their work. You would be more worried if they didn't upgrade their data analysis methods from time to time.
It's not "eliminating pesky data": when you compare the old and new data reconstruction--which they show on their link [nasa.gov] --the difference is almost trivial:
1998 indeed was the warmest year on record... and kept that record until 2005. But that didn't change with the new data analysis-- the same years ho
Re:Improving data [Re:The Gods] (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not sure what your point is. The way science works is that scientists are constantly improving their work. You would be more worried if they didn't upgrade their data analysis methods from time to time.
There's a vast difference between improving your analysis and dropping data you don't like.
There's also a vast difference between ignorant and being willfully ignorant. There is a full detailed scientific explanation of WHY the change was made. It has nothing to do with "Oh we don't like it".
Grow up.
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There's also a vast difference between ignorant and being willfully ignorant. There is a full detailed scientific explanation of WHY the change was made. It has nothing to do with "Oh we don't like it".
The fact that it was explained is not evidence that the reasons were valid or sufficient.
They did some very unconventional things in Karl et al., and haven't rationally justified them.
For example: when you homogenize data, you don't normally take data with known small bias and uncertainty, and make adjustments to that in order to match another set of data with known greater uncertainty and known bias problems.
Further, you don't leave out data that is known to be more accurate and cover a greater ar
Re:Improving data [Re:The Gods] (Score:4, Insightful)
Is NOAA really doing that, or do you just have an axe to grind about NOAA?
Yes, they really did adjust data as I described.
Yes, they really did leave out more accurate data with wider coverage.
BUT, they were sure to INCLUDE data that was guaranteed to put a warming trend in their dataset.
Coincidence? I think not.
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If you really believe that then just ignore the adjusted data, and only consider the raw data... which show even more global surface warming over the last century than the adjusted data do.
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Science always seeks improvement and is never static unless it's dead. If you think the changes that have been made are scientifically unjustified then lets see your scientifically valid evidence challenging the updates.
Regarding the State of the Climate report this post is about, it was finished before the GISS update so there is no connection between the two.
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Yes I do read what I link to.
Do you have zero reading comprehension ?
Global Climate != Local Climate (Score:4, Interesting)
I have noticed that here in São Paulo the best time to talk about greenhouse effect is during the hottest days of the Summer, even though the rise in temperature downtown has more to do with deforestation and concrete than with greenhouse effect.
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Yeah, the East Coast had deep freezes this past winter. Alaska and CA and Russia though had exceptionally warm winters this year. It all balances out.
Re:Global Climate != Local Climate (Score:5, Insightful)
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That's right. Here in Western Europe it was pretty warm during winter. Many ski pistes stayed closed until very late in the winter.
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We had green fields in the middle of February here in Hesse and this area is two degrees of latitude further north than Seattle.
Re:Global Climate != Local Climate (Score:5, Interesting)
There was no winter in Germany in 2014. Only a prolonged autumn. And this summer sets new heat records.
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The basic problem is - most people mainly do "science" by anecdote, even as they deny they are doing it.
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Most people think someone should do something about global warming. The problem is they want someone else to do something.
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There wasn't near enough snow along the US East Coast and in New England to make up for all of the snow we didn't get on the West Coast this past winter.
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I think it's hard to convince human-related climate change sceptics within this situation.
There's more total energy in the entire system, therefore there are more extremes of weather. Just because some fraction of the entire system was colder does not mean that everything, everywhere was colder, too, and anyone that claims that just because they had blizzards all winter where they live that there can't be 'global warming' is just plain not being very smart.
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You do realize temperature = energy applies for everything on the earth ?
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Didn't they have record breaking heat waves during their summer while those of us in the Northeastern US were buried in snow? I seem to recall people in the US declaring "It's cold here right now so Global Warming can't be real" only to have some Australians reply about their record breaking heat waves.
Number one! USA! USA! USA! (Score:2)
>> Eastern North America was the only major region to experience below-average annual temperatures.
Yeah, world take THAT. We're number f***ing one! USA! USA! USA!
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It really is quite amazing to me that the one place that has an ideological interest in not believing in climate change (and the economic push to ensure that nothing is done about it) is the one place that's actually getting colder. If I were the type to believe in such a thing, I'd feel like somebody was playing a cosmic joke on us.
I don't think that the Republican party would really be taking all that different of a stance if the southern US were hitting heat records year after year... but it sure does ma
Eastern US (Score:5, Funny)
Personally, I'm disappointed in the weather. I like the heat, and I don't like cold and snow. But I live in New England. I've been hoping since I can't relocate my family to warmer climate, that the warm climate would come to me. But it's certainly taking its sweet time getting hot around here! The rest of the globe is getting warm while I'm still freezing in New England. I'm disappointed.
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Zip up your skirt, hot house orchid. You don't know what cold is.
Pucker up. Winter is coming.
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One could say that the Heath is at it's Zenith.
Blame the far right and left for this. (Score:3)
If the west , esp America's far left, REALLY wanted to solve this, they could within 10 years:
BTW, that is why I oppose the idea of putting taxes on JUST OUR CO2. America has one thing that we can really batter about, which is the fact that we are the largest importer in the world. As such, we should be taxing ALL CONSUMED GOODS (local and imported) based on the CO2 from the nations/states that the item and its sub-parts came from.
1) we need ACCURATE numbers of what CO2 is going into and coming from what areas. The only way to do that, is from orbit with OCO2 and shortly, with OCO3. Already, China has been shown to emit a great deal more than is widely accepted.
http://www.nasa.gov/sites/defa... [nasa.gov]
2) we need a SANE normalization. Skip this garbage of per capita. Ppl do NOT create the bulk of the CO2. BUSINESSES do. In particular, utilities, iron works, even commercial vehicles, etc are the major polluters.
So, instead, do emissions / $ GDP (REAL). THis has to be real GDP, and not PPP GDP. The later is a calculated value that allows them to basically cheat on their exports. By using REAL GDP, it means that if a nation drops their monetary value, then they also need to drop their emissions, or suffer higher taxes.
3) now create a tax that starts at 5% of the product and increases by 10% a year.
If you have a product in which all sub-parts are from a clean area, then you simply register it, and list the parts and country/state of origin. Then a % of the above tax is applied.
So, assume that some is 100% from Sweden. It is one of the cleanest nations in the world. As such, it would likely get 0% of the tax. Even when the tax hits 100% of the product value, it would still get nothing.
Assume that one of the parts comes from China, which is by far the WORST nation. As such, it would get 100% of the taxation, so, it would get 5% the first year, 15% the next, 25% the next and so on.
However, assume that a good comes from a relatively clean place such as say Colorado (which is in the middle of states). We might get around 33% of the tax, but lets assume 50% of the tax. That means that the good would be taxed at 2.5% and then 7.5%, and 12.5%, and so.
This approach will make each state responsible for cleaning up their own emissions. They might choose to go after cars, or they might choose to go after coal plants, etc.
Point is, that this tax takes the feds out of the equation and allows LOCAL govs, along with other nation's gov to make choices to clean up.
Lazy writing alert! (Score:3)
I did not read any further than "ppl". You are a damning indictment of whatever education system failed you.
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Yeah but if he/she didn't use abbreviations to shorten his post you would have probably responded with tl;dr :)
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That depends on the content.... and you know what they say about assumptions?
They are the mother of all fuck-ups.
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I don't know whose posting history you're looking at, but that doesn't sound like mine - I generally use correct English.
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The only thing a carbon tax is going to lead to is massive graft and pork projects (see Solyndra)
If it's a tax that reduces some behavior we don't like then that's still a net win. Generally when you tax something you get less of it. Forcing the re-internalization of externalized costs is a legitimate function of government.
Actually there is a 34% CHANCE... (Score:2)
... that it is the warmest since 1850 or so. They don't actually know... these are estimates with a big margins of error. Global records of temperature going back that far are not that accurate.
Keep in mind the whole thing is very political with one side hammering the other about the "pause" and the other side either trying to prove the pause doesn't exist, doesn't matter, or stopped pausing.
Both sides have politicians, business interests, lobbying groups, and scientists. Yes... BOTH sides have scientists o
LaLaLaLaLa I can't hear you... (Score:2)
inside my Hummer with the windows rolled up and the AC on max. And if I can't hear you, there's can't be a problem.
Hey, why does the dash say "engine overheating"?
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Hey, why does the dash say "engine overheating"?
Because Hummer is a GM product?
Back in the days it wasn't political (Score:2)
Maybe not as much as it is now but I remember in 1970s there was discussion about greenhouse gases i.e. CO2 and Venus as an example. It was also when NASA flew Pioneer Venus (I was thinking we have been ignoring that planet). Of course there was no internet in form we know now where anyone can post whatever. Though we have datasets by NASA, NOAA, EPA (though most don't have the training to interpret these sets) we also have all kinds of sites that offer proof that climate change is/isn't (take your pick dep
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Again.
For million and oneth time.
The adjustments LOWER the amount of apparent warming.
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If you're going to link to a site, you should link to one that involves actual scientists using actual science.
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If you're going to link to a site, you should link to one that involves actual scientists using actual science.
Nah; if we do that, they'll all just agree with each other. (Haven't you been paying attention. ;-)
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Part of your problem is that you think someone repeating peer reviewed science is on equal footing with someone who spouts gibberish.
Re:well, no. (Score:5, Insightful)
Part of your problem is that you think someone repeating peer reviewed science is on equal footing with someone who spouts gibberish.
If Skeptical Science were publishing and creating its own scientific research.....the way WUWT does....then you would have a point.
But since they simply repeat what actual scientists say, tracing everything back to verifiable scientific observations and papers, they stand on pretty firm ground.
Unlike WUWT, and unlike you.
Follow the link [Re:raw data] (Score:5, Informative)
Until they provide the raw unedited unnormalized data this can't be believed.
Your wish is granted. The article discussed is a 267 page report with pages of data and extensive references explaining where the numbers come from [ametsoc.org].
Which, of course, you haven't read and have no intention of reading. It's just easy to say "show me the data" when you actually don't have the slightest interest in it.
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Which, of course, you haven't read and have no intention of reading. It's just easy to say "show me the data" when you actually don't have the slightest interest in it.
Sounds like you did the work for us. Which pages should we read?
Just imagine how much more interesting and satisfying historical and scientific debates would be, if everyone settled arguments by telling people to read several hundred page reports.
Re:raw data (Score:4, Informative)
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=raw+clima... [lmgtfy.com]
First link on page: http://www.realclimate.org/ind... [realclimate.org]
Any other uninformed questions?
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Throwing out Argo temps for ship engine intake temp
Homogenizing,
Interpolating,
etc.
I see a lot of hand waving about the temperature adjustments but I seldom see any serious scientifically rigorous challenge that addresses the reasons and methods that scientists give for making the adjustments. If you want to challenge the scientific mainstream you need to use science. Anything else is inadequate.
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The Koch brothers tried that with Berkeley Earth [berkeleyearth.org] and that didn't turn out so well (for them). The researchers at BE were pretty much unconnected with the climate science community and use their own methods of adjustment yet their results came out about the same as everyone else.
Re:After all the "Adjustments" (Score:5, Informative)
And what makes you think that isn't just EXACTLY what they do?
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=raw+clima... [lmgtfy.com]
Very first result: http://www.realclimate.org/ind... [realclimate.org]
Any uniformed suggestions?
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What are you talking about and do you have a source for what you're talking about?
Raw data is available and has been used. For example the Berkley Earth project re-analyzed the data starting with raw data and addressing concerns about heat islands, bad sources, etc.
http://berkeleyearth.org/about... [berkeleyearth.org].
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It's the scientific method at work. If the data doesn't support the hypothesis, then it's obviously flawed data.
It's the denier method at work. If the data doesn't support the conclusion that it's ok to burn fossil fuels, then it's obviously flawed data. Throw it out and shout "it's biased!" Repeat as many times as needed Doesn't matter how many scientists, or how many different institutions in how many different countries; they're all biased.
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While I'm hardly a denier, I have to point out that the reverse is true as well. Anyone who tries to demonstrate that AGW isn't real is shouted down pretty fast without much of a hearing.
Honest science lets the facts speak for themselves. If we removed the hype and just looked at the facts, I think we'd see the obvious conclusion that man affects the environment. We might even answer the vital question of 'how much'.
Meanwhile, I'll be writing checks to neither Al Gore nor the Republican Party, neither of wh
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Re:After all the "Adjustments" (Score:4, Insightful)
Without a hearing? The hearing happened, and they lost big time. At this point, they are just repeating vague and badly grounded accusations.
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Their long list [skepticalscience.com] of unsupported claims and illogical objections have been found wanting time and again. The national academies of science (and many, many, similar institutions)
Not quite so simple... (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.epa.gov/climatechan... [epa.gov]
" the effect of increased temperature will depend on the crop's optimal temperature for growth and reproduction. [1] In some areas, warming may benefit the types of crops that are typically planted there. However, if warming exceeds a crop's optimum temperature, yields can decline"
Not to mention that the available land mass for agriculture (due to rising oceans and increasing desertification) will be much less.
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It's clearly been working out for California! Talk about bumper crop!
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Look at Mexico and the middle east to get an idea of what 30-50 N and S will look like.
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How about the bees dying off? There was a recent study that showed that while the climate amenable to bees is moving north, the bees aren't. So the bees in southern regions are dying off (too hot) and the entire population of bees is suffering. If the bees die off, many plants (including crops) will suffer.
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That study was specifically about bumblebees - not bees in general. And it's exactly one study; so, while it's interesting, it's not wise to put too much weight on its conclusions.
Also, most crops are not pollinated by bumblebees. The big pollinators here in North America are non-native European honey bees - and they are generally trucked from place to place by companies that specialize in providing pollination services.
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Agreed.
Yearly Temperature [wikimedia.org]
CO2 levels [wikimedia.org]
It's too bad I have no way to put those charts right next to each other. It's not like we can't predict what happens when infrared light streams through CO2-laden air. And there's no denying that we're the ones filling the atmosphere with it. They're both such easily verifiable claims. It's high-school level science. But when you suggest that our CO2 is causing the world to heat, somehow there's this mental disconnect.
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The problem is that putting those two charts right next to each other also displays the timeline.
Alas, a degree of temperature change over the last two millenia doesn't really get people all that excited.
It's just like that "Sea level could rise 20 feet!!!" thing last week (early this week? whichever). Yeah, it could. At the rate they were citing, it would take nearly two millenia for it to do that.
Unfortunately, it's really hard for a species that lives a century or less to get really excited about
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Well the other thing is if you look at rates of technological change, our rate of progress renders the proposed regulations little more than self inflicted wounds. By the time they would start saving us, they won't matter anyway.
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Re:Well understood phenomena works as predicted (Score:5, Informative)
Ah yes. Newsbusters understands neither science nor probability, and misrepresented the statements of scientists in order to imply that the scientists are most likely wrong...news at 11:30.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/... [washingtonpost.com]
So what’s up with this 38 percent figure, and does it really undermine the idea that 2014 was the hottest year on record?
The figure comes from slide 5 of the PowerPoint presentation mentioned above, where NASA scientists noted that there was a 38 percent chance that 2014 was the hottest year, but only a 23 percent chance that the honor goes to the next contender, 2010, and a 17 percent chance that it goes to 2005.
The same slide shows that NOAA’s scientists were even more confident in the 2014 record, ranking it as having a 48 percent probability, compared with only an 18 percent chance for 2010 and a 13 percent chance for 2005.
According to a NASA spokesman, the PowerPoint containing this slide went online at the same time that the 2014 temperature record itself was announced. So it may not have been as prominent as the press releases from the agencies, but it was available.
The slide was also discussed in the press briefing when the news of the new record was released. In the briefing, NOAA’s Thomas Karl, director of the National Climatic Data Center, noted:
Certainly there are uncertainties in putting all this together, all these datasets. But after considering the uncertainties, we have calculated the probability that 2014, versus other years that were relatively warm, were actually the warmest year on record. And the way you can interpret these data tables is, for the NOAA data, 2014 is two and a half times more likely than the second warmest year on record, 2010, to actually be the warmest on record, after consideration of all the data uncertainties that we take into account. And for the NASA data, that number is on the order of about one and a half times more likely than the second warmest year on their records, which again, is 2010. So clearly, 2014 in both our records were the warmest, and there’s a fair bit of confidence that that is indeed the case, even considering data uncertainties.
Karl further noted that the Japan Meteorological Agency had also found 2014 to be the hottest year on record.
In light of all of this, is there anything wrong with NASA and NOAA declaring 2014 a record? To the contrary, it’s hard to see how there could be.
If anything, in criticizing NASA, and holding forth the 38 percent figure as though it somehow undermines the analysis, climate “skeptics” are simply exaggerating scientific uncertainty — which always exists and can never be fully dispelled — and letting it undermine what we actually know.
A better scientific way of assessing evidence, in contrast, is to take uncertainty into account — which NASA and NOAA clearly did — but then go with the conclusion that is supported by the weight of existing evidence. And from Karl’s words above, you can clearly see that the weight of the evidence, supported by both NASA’s and NOAA’s analyses, shows that the most reasonable conclusion is that 2014 is the hottest year on record.
Indeed, NASA’s Gavin Schmidt, who heads up the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (which did the temperature analysis from its records, dubbed “GISTEMP”) and also participated in the press briefing above, has written a blog post to explain all of this further. Here’s what he notes:
In both analyses, the values for 2014 are the warmest, but are statistically close to that of 2010 and 2005. In NOAA analysis, 2014 is a record by about 0.04C, while the difference in the GISTEMP record was 0.0
Re:Well understood phenomena works as predicted (Score:4, Insightful)
It's far away from wild guesses. Yes, you can do awful things that might appear to someone not looking closely like Statistics, but they really aren't. And you can draw conclusions from Statistics that are not really supported by the data, but again, it might look like Statistic, but it isn't.
Statistics are a very valuable tool for Science. Science is of course not just Statistics, it is much more. But Statistics have their uses in Science, and in many cases, there is no replacement. Thermodynamics for instance are purely Statistics.
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Nope, wrong. The magic you're trying to get away with is accounting magic. We can incur the cost of carbon, and never have to pay the principle ......plus interest.
Looko, all that has to happen is the effects of carbon become so consequential that car and truck travel become tightly regulated. Long before human civilization itself becomes threatened by climate change, the government will get involved in bigger and bigger ways NO MATTER HOW UNHAPPY IT MAKES PEOPLE.
The real, least painful answer is found in t
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You don't have even a glimpse of an idea what unhappy is. If they become unhappy enough they will rise up, your heroes will LOSE, and all the apologists for the apparatchik will be in real danger of getting caught in the cleansing. At that point you can either smarten up, or go down fighting. I don't much care which.
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