Explore Posterous

The lesson of recent years would appear to be that apocalyptic threats — when their impacts are relatively far off in the future, difficult to imagine or visualize, and emanate from everyday activities, not an external and hostile source — are not easily acknowledged and are unlikely to become priority concerns for most people. In fact, the louder and more alarmed climate advocates become in these efforts, the more they polarize the issue, driving away a conservative or moderate for every liberal they recruit to the cause.

Fascinating discussion from Yale Environment 360 in the Guardian of why, despite steadily increasing media coverage over the past 20 years and high profile "celebrity" endorsement by the likes of Al Gore, not many people really care about climate change.

I guess the same points would apply to the related issue of peak oil and the energy crisis, though it's by no means as widely discussed in the media -- although it will lead to similarly reduced standards of living among those of us addicted to fossil fuels.

About a year ago, the Hadley Centre for Meteorological Research provided an update [to the IPCC predictions], indicating that, in the absence of complete economic collapse, we're committed to a global average temperature increase of 2 C. Considering the associated feedbacks, such an increase likely spells extinction of the "wise" ape.

Last month, the United Nations Environment Programme concluded we're committed to an increase of 3.5 C by 2100, thus leaving little doubt about human extinction by then.

Last week, Chris West of the University of Oxford's UK Climate Impacts Programme indicated we can kiss goodbye 2 C as a target: four is the new two, and it's coming by mid-century. In a typical disconnect from reality, the latest scenarios do not include potential tipping points such as the release of carbon from northern permafrost or the melting of undersea methane hydrates. Giving the response I've come to expect from politicians, the Obama administration calls any attempt to reduce emissions "not grounded in political reality."

A bleak assessment of humanity's (and earth's) chances for survival based on the latest climate change figures. Not sure I agree with the "human extinction by 2100 line", but if you substituted "unprecedented levels of misery, suffering and death, especially among the world's poor majority - and even in many industrialised areas - by mid-century" I'd probably say you have a fair point. Enjoy your weekend everyone!

Once again the apocalypse is the theme that I am drawn to most. This time it comes to us by way of God and Angels rather than nature or mankind's own doing. While this does remind me a bit of the Prophecy or Constantine I'm still interested in watching this one for the winged angel fight sequences, cursing grannies, oh and the second coming of Christ!