Earth May Have Breached Seven of Nine Planetary Boundaries, Health Check Shows (theguardian.com) 42
Industrial civilisation is close to breaching a seventh planetary boundary, and may already have crossed it, according to scientists who have compiled the latest report on the state of the world's life-support systems. From a report: "Ocean acidification is approaching a critical threshold," particularly in higher-latitude regions, says the latest report on planetary boundaries. "The growing acidification poses an increasing threat to marine ecosystems." The report, from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), builds on years of research showing there are nine systems and processes -- the planetary boundaries -- that contribute to the stability of the planet's life-support functions.
Thresholds beyond which they can no longer properly function have already been breached in six. Climate change, the introduction of novel entities, change in biosphere integrity and modification of biogeochemical flows are judged to be in high-risk zones, while planetary boundaries are also transgressed in land system change and freshwater change but to a lesser extent. All have worsened, according to the data. Stratospheric ozone depletion has remained stable, however, and there has been a slight improvement in atmospheric aerosol loading, the research says. At a briefing outlining the findings, Levke Caesar, a climate physicist at PIK and co-author of the report, said there were two reasons the levels of ocean acidification were concerning.
Thresholds beyond which they can no longer properly function have already been breached in six. Climate change, the introduction of novel entities, change in biosphere integrity and modification of biogeochemical flows are judged to be in high-risk zones, while planetary boundaries are also transgressed in land system change and freshwater change but to a lesser extent. All have worsened, according to the data. Stratospheric ozone depletion has remained stable, however, and there has been a slight improvement in atmospheric aerosol loading, the research says. At a briefing outlining the findings, Levke Caesar, a climate physicist at PIK and co-author of the report, said there were two reasons the levels of ocean acidification were concerning.
worm sign (Score:1)
the spice must flow
Fifth Seal Angel To Be Upstaged Twice (Score:3)
"The report, from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), builds on years of research showing there are nine systems and processes – the planetary boundaries – that contribute to the stability of the planet’s life-support functions.
"Thresholds beyond which they can no longer properly function have already been breached in six. Climate change, the introduction of novel entities, change in biosphere integrity and modification of biogeochemical flows are judged to be in high-risk zones, while planetary boundaries are also transgressed in land system change and freshwater change but to a lesser extent. All have worsened, according to the data."
Are these conditions ANDed together, or ORed together, to determine whether we're irreversibly screwed? And if it's ORed, does this mean we should have given up twenty years ago?
Actually, now that I think about it, I guess we DID kind of give up twenty years ago. At least.
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No thanks...I prefer to remain independent.....
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"...complete MY time left on this planet..."
That could be arranged, and we'd all be better off.
Re:Fifth Seal Angel To Be Upstaged Twice (Score:4)
I'm motivated to live healthy now (Score:2)
Just to live long enough to witness humanity topple over the edge.
Would be quite the finisher to a lifetime during several world changing events.
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It's sad for my kids that so many are complacent, and even celebrate this.
Nah. Just try to raise your kids with both a healthy sense of skepticism and empathy. Things'll work themselves out.
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Things will clearly not work out. Some people can see a trend when it stares them in the face. You are not among them.
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Things will clearly not work out. Some people can see a trend when it stares them in the face. You are not among them.
Sure. Or maybe you thought something was implied that wasn't? Maybe?
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In some sense, I feel like tourist. I was just old enough to understand what was going on when climate change science became soling in the 1980s. Now I might get to witness the great collapse. I also have a dark suspicion this timing is not an accident.
Re: I'm motivated to live healthy now (Score:1)
Re: I'm motivated to live healthy now (Score:1)
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The count of all the people who have ever lived on this planet totals approximately 110 billion. That means that if you were randomly born between the first human (a fuzzy range, but the populations then were so small it doesn't really matter) and the most recent one, you'd have a roughly 93% chance of not being alive now. You'd have already lived out your allotted time.
It is for some reason very psychologically compelling to want to believe in your own specialness and one of the things that leads to is k
That didn't take long (Score:1)
It's sad that it took such a short amount of time from industrialization until crossing these thresholds, and the amount of resources and time to fight back will be significant. Of course there will be a lot of bickering amongst ourselves before we even become effective.
Had to look it up (Score:4, Informative)
I had to look up Planetary Boundaries:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetary_boundaries
Seems 2 are left assuming we breached Ocean acidification: Ozone depletion and Atmospheric aerosols.
Nice to see the US is the only Country not in the "Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants". Not that it seems to matter too much. I believe nothing will stop us from reaching 3C.
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I think that definition of Planetary Boundaries is wrong. There's nothing in there about the Gini Coefficient [wikipedia.org].
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Nice to see the US is the only Country not in the "Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants". Not that it seems to matter too much. I believe nothing will stop us from reaching 3C.
The US is kind of a bitch like that- we refuse to join all kinds of international conventions.
However- don't let that lead you to think we don't set similar, or in most cases- more stringent regulations.
POPs are highly regulated in the US, with most effectively banned now.
Click-bait headline (Score:1)
Should have been closer to "Ocean acidification may be close to tipping point". K.I.S.S.
They overcomplexitized it. -G.W.Bush
Oblig. (Score:2)
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How far does a fart diffuse? (Score:3)
When I read the title, but not yet read the text, I wondered what that meant - "Earth May Have Breached Seven of Nine Planetary Boundaries".
If you still accept Pluto as the 9th planet, then I thought the title referred to the solar system.
What I imagined the title meant was that man-made volatile industrial chemicals, synthetic organics that do not occur naturally, have diffused outward far enough to cross the orbit of Uranus. For Uranians and Neptunians, detecting them would be an indicator of life elsewhere.
Admittedly, I completely misunderstood the title, but that is now an intriguing question. Since we first started making synthetic chemicals in the latter half of the 19th century, are there any that could have diffused that far at detectable levels? Keep in mind that other than nuclear and the most powerful of conventional explosives, none would have had the high impulse of rockets and spaceships, so Voyager and New Horizons exhaust don't count.
Any thoughts?
Seven of Nine (Score:4, Funny)
Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix Zero One
It's infuriating. (Score:4, Interesting)
We have all the warnings in the universe pointed at us, every day for decades now, and still, we barely move the needle on trying to stop ourselves. Being down here in the low-middle of the economy, while being told we're all gonna die, constantly, gets a tiny bit depressing at times. It's important. It's an existential threat. It's a political and corporate football that gets tossed around for profit and bullying, but it doesn't seem like anybody with the power to affect real change actually believes any of it. Because if they did, they wouldn't be meh'ing out on the bit where they, ya know, affect change.
I'm wondering if anything about climate change really registers to the big movers and shakers. Will they ever notice? Or will they just keep moving themselves away from the worst impacted areas and then preaching at us that *we* all have to change, but they're not gonna because there's more profit to wring from the system before it all shuts down? We truly have prioritized greed over everything, even life itself.
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You've answered all your questions yourself. You just don't believe you, yet.
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Oh, the people in charge do believe in climate change. It's just that solutions feature personal cost for global benefit. Participating puts you at a disadvantage vs other politicians, businesses, nations. If people even care, you can instead do much cheaper greenwashing (also good for milking hippies).
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It's a political and corporate football that gets tossed around for profit and bullying, but it doesn't seem like anybody with the power to affect real change actually believes any of it.
You do have to wonder.
Wealthy elites who talk most about global warming live on the coasts, in their, er, energy efficient mansions ... do they really believe that their properties are going to be underwater soon, with sea level rise?
Maybe they do, and just use cognitive dissonance ... but you can see why us great unwashed might just have a few doubts about whether they really do believe it, as opposed to just using their supposed belief as a weapon. .
Bye bye cruel world (Score:1)
My BS meter is flashing (Score:2)
Admitting up front that I don't know anything about the actual theory of "planetary boundaries", nevertheless my BS meter is triggered by claims such as this one: "[Planetary boundaries are] thresholds beyond which [planets] can no longer properly function...".
Indeed? And how, precisely, would they know this? Are there other planets whose "functions" we can assess to determine what is "proper" and what is not? And why are you using words like "threshold" in reference to dynamic, chaotic systems such as whol
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Seventh Seal (Score:2)
Seventh Seal / Ninth Boundary - Michael Creighton was right about this being a new religion.
It's amazing how close it's getting to the Unibomber Manifesto.
Starfleet gonna be pissed (Score:2)
The only reason you got away breaching Seven of Nine so far was because she's no longer part of the collective. But she's captain of the Enterprise now so you are probably in trouble.