
If India Chokes Less, It Will Fry More (economist.com) 47
South Asia has warmed far more slowly than the rest of the world over the past four decades with temperatures rising just 0.09C per decade compared to 0.30C elsewhere on land, according to new climate research. Scientists believe this "warming hole" results from two factors that have masked the true impact of global warming: heavy aerosol pollution that reflects sunlight back to space and expanded irrigation that cools air through evaporation.
The protective effect is temporary and comes at a deadly cost. Air pollution currently kills between 2 million and 3 million people annually in South Asia, while extreme heat causes 100,000 to 600,000 deaths. As governments reduce pollution and groundwater depletion limits irrigation expansion, atmospheric scientists predict India will warm at twice the rate of the past 20 years. By 2047, the average Indian could experience a four-fold increase in dangerous heat stress days, threatening a region where only 10% of households have air conditioning.
The protective effect is temporary and comes at a deadly cost. Air pollution currently kills between 2 million and 3 million people annually in South Asia, while extreme heat causes 100,000 to 600,000 deaths. As governments reduce pollution and groundwater depletion limits irrigation expansion, atmospheric scientists predict India will warm at twice the rate of the past 20 years. By 2047, the average Indian could experience a four-fold increase in dangerous heat stress days, threatening a region where only 10% of households have air conditioning.
Another reason we will have mass world war (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't plan on being around for the worst of it but still kind of fucked up that I ended up having a kid.
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It's also crazy to think that India's population is projected to continue growing until the early 2060's and peak at 1.7 billion people. For reference, they're currently at around 1.4 billion so that's almost an entire United State's worth of people they'll be adding to their country on top of the 1.4 billion they have now and their country is only about a third of the size of the US.
How? (Score:2)
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Demographic momentum. Large young population means that total births will remain high for decades.
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No, they just already have a huge population over there so even a small percent of growth compounded over time means huge numbers.
Re: Another reason we will have mass world war (Score:2)
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I don't know where you're getting your info from but you couldn't be more wrong on your point number 1. I think maybe you're mixing up the West's population growth leveling off with the world because the world still has a lot more years of population growth ahead https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]. .
As for your point number 2, all of the growth is happening in the developing world so feeding all these new people will indeed be a problem as we already have a hard time keeping them fed at their current numbers
So Japan has hit growth figures (Score:2)
I think it's stuff like that what she's talking about. Another good example is that there is research to indicate that replacement even in a developed nation is actually 2.7 not 2.1 like previously thought.
Also the grandparent is correct we do have plenty of food the problem is distribution. But to your point just because the problem isn't a lack of food doesn't mean that the problem magically goes away.
And finally though as someone else pointed out th
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By the way, looking at your own link will show you a current global population of around 8 billion with it topping out at around 10 billion several decades down the road. You arent reading your own citation correctly.
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If developed nations can demonstrate that a declining population is economically sustainable, developing nations can follow.
We won't though, so probably the best hope now is China doing it.
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We have too many people to sustain our current economic system and no desire to change it.
Among developed nations, and especially those with large militaries, the challenge is not too many people but too few people. The US, Canada, Australia, and a few European countries only have positive population growth due to immigration. That immigration is generally a positive for the economy because more workers are needed to sustain an economy with a rapidly growing older population.
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Its only generally positive as look as there is room for growth, in terms of physical space and natural resources.
After that runs out and it will run out, you are India, massive population that will have the same demographic characteristics we see playing out now, in the west, namely aging.
It is just a recipe for more needs, and fewer options for addressing them. This is why curbing growth in population via immigration, and economic growth sourced from population expansion is the thing we should be doing r
Re: Another reason we will have mass world war (Score:2)
Among developed nations, and especially those with large militaries, the challenge is not too many people but too few people.
My opinion is that the challenge is too many people of the wrong age and too few people within the right age range.
Just call Israel (Score:3)
Reforestation, ultra-low-water farming. Tents over plants.
Then reflective roofs, walls, and at least white roads. It'll make a huge difference.
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"Ultra-low-water farming" is what's practiced by the Palestinians whose water has been occupied, not by the fascists that occupy.
It's both, and the Israelis have a lot more money (we gave it to them) to spend on development. For example, Israeli-owned Netafim [wikipedia.org] is a leader in drip irrigation equipment. You can buy their equipment here in the USA. It is excellent.
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Mew mew... AC. Mew mew...
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Mew... mew... Before the Jews came back en masse, the region was practically abandoned and in terrible condition.
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> Mew... mew
What does that mean ?
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It's the whining sound of an ignorant kitten.
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* Yes, the amount of CO2 is small, the effects are disproportionally large
* The atmosphere is warming much faster than it has done before, and the warming is perfectly correlated with the "trace gas" increase
* You cannot "replicate the maths" either. Most "maths" are complex integral-differential equations that have no analytical solutions, and humans don't really excel at numerical computations. That's why they automated them.
* The fact that you think it is impossible to know historical temperature average
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A quick check of the user's posting history suggests that your words are falling on stupid eyes [slashdot.org]
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Trees! (Score:1)
Re: Trees! (Score:2)
And it will fall hardest on the poorest (Score:1)
Solar powered air con and desalination plants already. You've got 11,000 miles of coast India. Maybe ditch the caste system and the space race and look after your people for a change.
Air conditioning? (Score:2)
Only 10% have air conditining, in an area knows for being HOT HOT HOT all year.
Why will they need that wasteful technology that causes so much damage to the climate?
There are better ways as they already know and use.
Build better, build cooler. Sleep during the hottest part of the day like in many parts of the world.
Remember: Only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun.
Explains why they work so much (Score:2)
Call centres have AC.
Excuses (Score:2)
Geoengineering (Score:2)
This is geoengineering in action. We're already doing it. It works. Now we just need to switch to a different kind of aerosols that provide the same cooling without killing people.