So, what are we going to do about it? Plant tons of trees?

Climate change is only one factor leading to ecosystem degradation and potential collapse, beside from increasing absolute quantities of material needed to maintain an increasing population over the long term (inorganic fertiliser depletion etc), the phenological shifts accompanying a changing climatic system on a global scale, are just one of the many pressures straining the carrying capacity. With many of the current chains of interaction (natural and man made ecosystems) being without historical precedent in type or magnitude.

>ecosystem degradation and potential collapse
I am studying ecology. I wonder what you mean with this, I find it extremely subjective.
Usually what are called degraded ecosystems are different or depauperate compared to the original ecosystem but I don't see them as non-functioning.

I can think of only one ecosystem that did sort of collapse and it was the Sahara which used to be greener. But even the Sahara is a functioning ecosystem.

I personally think climate change is a bigger threat to humans as non-humans as we are much more sedentary and it potentially threatens our crops.

When it comes to species we certainly will see a bunch of losers but we are also and already witnessing winners. Secretly I am kind of glad for climate change as ice ages have been really destructive to Europa's flora. At least as I understood if it was not for climate change we might have another ice age.

But I do worry, especially if we let climate change go out of hand. The feedback loops and so on.

What I find ironic is how nature conservationists are pushing for rewilding with large herbivores, getting more methane in the air, instead of opting for forestation (ecological boring perhaps, but hey).

If I got something wrong please let me know.

someone has issues ...

>de facto speculative
>endgame
moar buzzwords fgt pls

In Australia there's a fair few bad situations already, worst mammal extinction rate in the world, severe salinity issues in the Murray-Darling basin which is an important agricultural area (not quite the Aral sea though), mangrove clearing with the potential to impact fisheries, and I've studied a bit of urban ecology in particular and I see the anthropogenic and natural division as kind of arbitrary, the widespread establishment of various introduced species worldwide. And I didn't mean to downplay climate change, just point out that it's a more complex issue in general.

*the widespread establishment of various introduced species worldwide are now seemingly permanent fixtures, similar in a way to the Great American Interchange.

and I have heard some good things about European populations of lynx, wolverine, wolf and bear increasing.

>What I find ironic is how nature conservationists are pushing for rewilding with large herbivores

This is probably more common than i'm aware of, but here the push is more towards culling large feral mammals and reforestation, piecemeal though. The lowering of the water table from deforestation is also a problem here and is exacerbating the soil salinity issues, those feedback loops..

I come from the Netherlands and any original nature we had is gone.

From what I know Australia changed drastically in a short period. I just finished a book that talked about Aboriginals shaping the landscape using fire. Add to that novel species, changed landscape use and so on. Even hooves are novel.

I can see how one would call land that becomes less usable degraded. I am less fond of applying it to non-humans as there are both winners and losers. Even in Australia you had native winners: crocodiles, forest and (thus) koalas increased after Aboriginal fire management stopped among more.

Though sometimes we can rightly assume it is worse. I think monocultures are one of the phenomenon when intervention is worthwhile.

To come back to Australia, it seems that the lack of burning makes natural fires worse.
>and I have heard some good things about European populations of lynx, wolverine, wolf and bear increasing.
More productive farming might make farmland into ecological deserts it also allows more nature.

I've read that wolves and bears partly rebounded because of trash. I find it interesting how the wolf adapts so greatly to anthropogenic habitats.

I am wondering if they can make the Netherlands their home. I feel golden jackals fit better, a species also expanding and growing.

But I also remind myself that it are farmers who have the most skin in the game. Ecologists are all too glad to have certain species but they are often not the ones caring the burden that some bring.

It is nice seeing that farmers are more tolerant of wildlife, at least here in the Netherlands, but I hope that it remains so.

I am starting to think that it isn't that bad to think anthropocentric in the sense of a functional nature as long as there is some room of natural autonomy.

I think that wanting to opt for original ecosystems might not always be that beneficial for the planet.

I must say reading all that ecology gives me a lot of headaches.

I just wrote a big response out but accidentally deleted it, the quick summary would be, The erosion and stream turbidity from hooved animals is actually quite significant.

That there is still controlled burning being done, but not to the extent or familiarity from 10's of thousands of years of living here.

I agree that monocultures are far from ideal.

Often the generalist species benefit disproportionately from urbanisation.

And there are forests of non-native camphor laurel here that are providing habitat for natural species being impacted by habitat loss and fragmentation, and I agree that not all the impacts from introduced species are negative.

and it definitely is a topic with a few difficult implications.

native species*

ggg

Does anyone know which trees are the best?

According to my teachers bog (English names are confusing so I hope I got this right) is actually better at capturing CO2 than forests.

I'm not sure how it compares to bog (peat swamp), but mangroves are definitely up there.

mangroves and other wetland environments are absolutely crucial as natural filters and carbon sinks

also support large biomass of fish and purify drinking water

Id like to come back to this because with the rise of sophisticated drone and quad copters and the like, it's something that is certainly becoming feasible

Just dragoon Brazil into sending a fleet of them in the wake of the slash and burn cattle ranchers or whatever

God made the world, but the Dutch made the Netherlands

Most forest will regrow unless you fucked up the soil. Why do you think sowing seeds is necessary?

As an ecologist I prefer seeds over planting though. It is mostly for aesthetic reasons tho.

Also it is interesting how in some parts of the world reforestation or to be more correctly forestation is seen as a problem, of course it has a reason because the ecologists want the original ecosystem with its species.

This happens in South Africa with the beautiful fynbos (I think with both non-native and native tree species, since fynbos needs fire to exist) and in the United States with native juniper. In New Zealand it happens on former sheep grazing land, tussock grassland, with non-native pines and firs.

Did you guys know that North-America used to have less forest but after the disease killed the Indians much land returned to forest? I even read of it causing the little ice age but I am unsure of that.

It goes the other way around too. If it wasn't for all that peat we wouldn't have the golden age. At least that's what teachers taught me.

Move coastal cities a few dozen miles inland and hope for the best. At this point we're just going to have to take it

So I gave some examples of forest increasing, be it they are not wanted, are there any examples of regions in which tree growth will be impossible?

I imagine the taiga will increase as well by the way - right?

Well aridification and salinisation in various regions would impact impact the potential for tree growth.

If we changed how we farmed and ranched. Then the soil and grasses would recover. Soaking up a significant amount of carbon.

Right now, industrial farming practices basically render soil a sterile growth medium for plants.

grass and brush lands developed in the presence of huge herds of herbivores. herds that would chomp down and mash down the plants. leaving behinds urine and feces to improve the soil. the matted down and chomped plants covered the soil from sun and eliminated dead vegetation. Which created moist soils ready for new plant growth. This is an easy fix though. We just have to herd cattle in tight groups and move them around more. To simulate the ancient herds that were moving from predators and to new grazing land.

>huge herds of herbivore
Methane is worse. How do you respond?

I honestly fear the worst
I think it's inevitable for us to go through some sort of extinction event

>I honestly fear the worst
>I think it's inevitable for us to go through some sort of extinction event
I come from an ecology background and this kind of thinking is not uncommon within environmentalists. But what makes you think so?

I consider myself a pessimist as opposed to the techno-optimists but pessimist in the sense of a lot of potential suffering, not human extinction or some kind of post-apocalyptic scenario.

That reminds me, I always thought it was funny how post-apocalyptic movies (Mad Max, the Road) and games (Fallout, Rage) lack nature but have a lot of humans. There should be a lot more greenery actually.

1) Kill off everyone in Africa, China, the Middle East, India, and everything south of the US in the Americas.

2) The remaining world focuses on adapting sustainable permaculture practices while developing fusion and effective space travel for asteroid mining.

I'm not one of those Guy McPherson types if that's what you're thinking.
I come from a paleontology/geology backround and my first feelings of dread about all of this came when I looked at what sort of things lead to mass extinctions in earth's history. To give one example, there are several well known big extinction pulses in the late Devonian who correlate with the first appearance of vascular plants with a growth of more than 30cm. That's when I thought to myself: if the growth of primitive plants can result in one of the biggest mass extinction events in geologic history, what might be possible for an unprecedented superpredator of global proportions like ourselves?
it's almost scientifically uncontroversial among paleontologists that we're on the verge of a new extinction event, immediately following the Quarternary extinction that wiped out almost all of the megafauna. And there's a good possibility that stratigraphers will declare the Holocene to have ended and a new series (Anthropocene) to have begun (this will likely happen in 2020 when the new edition of "Geologic Time Scale" will be published).

>I'm not one of those Guy McPherson types if that's what you're thinking.
I did not associate you with anything yet. I am very curious how people who aren't in the world of ecology or environmentalism see things.

I do however associate ecology or environmentalism with a more pessimistic outlook. There's even a particular brand of environmentalists that think a societal collapse would be beneficial for both humans and nature.
>And there's a good possibility that stratigraphers will declare the Holocene to have ended and a new series (Anthropocene) to have begun (this will likely happen in 2020 when the new edition of "Geologic Time Scale" will be published).
I check out a fella named Erle Ellis often, the Anthropocene is his thing. So I am very aware of it.

My own idea is that climate change will cause a lot of trouble in vulnerable regions, that we could see local collapses but that overall humanity muddles through.

As for plants and animals, I think the tropics will get worse but when it comes to Europe I am more positive.

I have great interest in urban environments, brown fields, old-fields, something like Chernobyl and so forth and it makes me positive that nature can recover.

Hope to see more Veeky Forumsentists from different backgrounds give their insights.

US people multiplying like rabbits, and
consuming 10x resources more per person
than the rest of the world
kys, amerifat pos

>We can't predict what the result of a coin flip will be
>Therefore anyone who tells you the number of heads and tails will be equal in the long run is a liar
You people are so dumb.

Oh look, it's this thread exactly copied:

veekyforums.com/thread/8294196/science/so-what-are-we-going-to-do-about-it-plant-tons-of.html

I can't predict what you'll do tomorrow but you're sure to still be a faggot 50 years from now.

>heads
this, killing 300 million americans will be better than killing 3-4 billion other people. Plus the obesity, diabetes and gun crime numbers will plummet.

I vote to kill the fatties. It's the best option.

Why not tax?
Of course that would work better in Europe than in the United States. I know that taxing is highly controversial within the USA.

nothing

climate will always change and currently it looks like it is changing in a good direction

>I do however associate ecology or environmentalism with a more pessimistic outlook.

sure that makes sense, if you weren't skeptical you'd exploit the potential out of the resources rather than being hesitant. because if you have no fears, it makes no sense to leave them untapped.

>There's even a particular brand of environmentalists that think a societal collapse would be beneficial for both humans and nature.

the concern is that society will drag the whole nature down with them and cause more long-term destruction this way for the future. man is very sophisticated, with things like nuclear it is clear we can no longer rely on us being ineffectual enough to be benign only by that.

>the concern is that society will drag the whole nature down with them and cause more long-term destruction this way for the future.
I think mankind is capable of bringing down a lot of species but the whole of nature seems a very unlikely scenario. If I remember correctly even after several mass-extinctions biodiversity has been increasing and increasing.

I do agree that the downfall of humans could be very destructive to nature. But it makes it kind of strange for some people to wish for it, no?

Chaotic non-linear systems are not ergodic.

That first part what I came to post, but leave the America's and Europe alone.

die

> implying there is a "we"

>So, what are we going to do about it?
probably die

That doesn't respond to the point. And it's irrelevant to climatology as well.

carbon capture, power to gas, synthetic fuels.

the carbon economy will become real but it won't be as bad as people think.

>That doesn't respond to the point.
> I don't know what ergodic means.
Flipping a coin is trivially ergodic so that you know in the long run you'll have 50% heads and 50% tails. Its a path-independent process. However, weather is chaotic which means it is path dependent (not ergodic). For example along one possible path you may get a severe hurricane. Along another you don't. Now sense climate is the mean value of the weather over time, you should get the same number of hurricanes in either scenario. But you don't. Generalizing means that climate is path-dependent and you don't know what future path you're going to take. Therefore, you can't predict climate.

This is a fairly nuanced strawman but still a strawman. If climatology was primarily a physical or thermodynamical science you would be correct. But climatology is primarily a statistical science. We are not trying to solve the climate system, we are trying to model its statistics. This is achievable regardless of whether the climate as a whole is ergodic because at least certain parts of it show ergodic behavior. For example, the cyclicity of the seasons. This can be summed up well in the rest of the quote which you selectively ignored:

"The climate system is a coupled non-linear chaotic system, and therefore the long-term prediction of future climate states is not possible. Rather the focus must be upon the prediction of the probability distribution of the system's future possible states by the generation of ensembles of model solutions. Addressing adequately the statistical nature of climate is computationally intensive and requires the application of new methods of model diagnosis, but such statistical information is essential."

Oh, and by the way, hurricanes are weather, moron.

*hurricanes are predictable, moron.

>*hurricanes are predictable, moron.
"Butterfly effect" idiot.

Yeah I saw that movie too

>If climatology was primarily a physical or thermodynamical science you would be correct.
>But climatology is primarily a statistical science
Statistical "Science." Good luck applying statistics to a non-ergodic system. What's the mean value of the temperature going to be in 50 years? What's the variance going to be in 50 years?

You've begun to engage in projection, using the term "strawman" while saying certain aspects of climate are predictable. Like the seasons. That, of course is a strawman, because the seasonal cycle is completely irrelevant and because you gave no substantive examples of predictable aspects of real world climate that are relevant to climate change.

It's already been done. The fIeld of climatology exists and has successful models. No amount of sticking your fingers in your ears changes that. The idea that non-ergodic systems cannot be statistically modeled is baseless and empirically false. If it were true then the seasons would not be predictable. So your argument is disproved. Now what you should do is attempt to argue that global temperature cannot be predicted.

>predictable aspects of real world climate that are relevant to climate change

How about intensification of the El Niño–Southern Oscillation?

Long terms shifts in phenology of many species showing sustained movements in distribution indicative of a warming climate?

Plant a tree instead of a tombstone.
>Forest is better than graveyard.

Grow metric fucktons of algae then compress them and drop them to the bottom of the ocean

Atmospheric Processors
>its the only way to be sure

>Most forest will regrow
...in two hundred years
>forestation is seen as a problem
...but deforestation is just fine.
>North-America used to have less forest
O RLY

w..what did they mean by this?

>...in two hundred years
Where you got that from?
>...but deforestation is just fine.
NO. But if we really wanted more forest we could make it happen.
>O RLY
There are a lot of people who still think that the nature that colonists found was there all along and not a result of Indians dying by the thousands.

>But if we really wanted more forest we could make it happen.

Reforestation have been an ongoing effort in a lot of first world countries for over a hundred years. Nations like denmark was on the brink of ecological disaster with forest levels at less than 1% and erosion and desertification ongoing. Today they're at 10% or so in forest cover.

Thank to the industrial revolution, fossil fuels and forest management practices we have 10 times more people and ten times more forests.

But of course the enviromemers are still going to try to blame modern man and high tech society for deforestation and somehow suggest that going back to primitive living where we chop down the forest for firewood to cook and heat with is the solution to all mankinds problems.

>has successful models.

200+ models and every single one of them a failure. What kind of success are you talking about?

Note this is just for the sake of the topic and not necessarily a reply to you.
>desertification ongoing.
In the Netherlands ecologists recreate desertification. I know they do it for rare plants, insects and reptiles but it still feels kind of wrong. In this case not so much that it could be a forest but that one is recreating a habitat that is essentially degraded.

We have many such projects were forest is kept from growing so hence I state that forestation can be done if we really want. And I know of similar stuff in other countries. I think I've even read that parts of the great plains is turning into a forest because of lack of fire and grazing.

Note not saying that it ought or should be done since in most cases it means loss of certain species, but what I am saying is that if we had no choice we could.

I do not know that much about tropical areas. Only of former agricultural lands in Puerto Rico turning into forest again and specifically by non-native trees acting as a nursery.
>somehow suggest that going back to primitive living where we chop down the forest for firewood to cook and heat with is the solution to all mankinds problems.
I suggest environmentalists to learn about Haiti and the Dominican republic. Picture related.

Anyway I am not knowledgeable enough on whatever forestation helps to mitigate climate change enough, just saying that if it would and if it was necessary it could be possible, be it at a cost.

I personally wish that there wasn't such dislike of nuclear energy. I myself am not fond of the personal car but wouldn't be surprised if that had benefits for the environment too (by uncoupling).

Forgot the picture, here it goes.

>every single one of them a failure
A later run showed one single exception (INM-CM4), a Russian model. Source: docs.house.gov/meetings/SY/SY00/20160202/104399/HHRG-114-SY00-Wstate-ChristyJ-20160202.pdf
"Even if climate models were correct, a 50% reduction in U.S. CO2 emissions by 2050 would avert only 0.07°C of warming by 2100."

Shouldn't marine phytoplankton be more efficient and a more rapid carbon sink than mangroves?

Fuck off back to /pol/

Where is the uncertainty in the models and data? Without them the graph does not show discrepancy between the models and data because it does not accurately represent them.

Also, showing that some models have failed does not respond to the point that climatology has successfull models. It is in fact necessary that most of the models in your graph would fail since many of them are the same model with different initial conditions, but only one set of initial conditions is correct. Additionally, by focusing on the TMT, you ignore all the successful models that describe global surface temps, ocean heat content, sea levels, etc.

Not a very effective sequestering method, that. It'll be better to just bury it deep within the driest desert there is. Probably the Atacama.

...

Well, the models are fabricated so they didn't feel any uncertainty was needed, they were producing true facts after all.

Fucking nigger. The problem with global warming is that if the temperature goes up, even by a minuscule amount such as 0.5 Celsius, then all life on the planet could die.

Reminder:

youtube.com/watch?v=BiKfWdXXfIs

(interview starts at 2:55)

Ah I see we've reached the limits of your memegraphs and cherrypicked quotes folder.

Nothing, agriculture is booming as a result of increased CO2 and temperature increase.

Plants love this climate change, remember that circa 100 million years ago it was much warmer than even global warming predictions are set to take us in the next 100 years. The average global temp was 75F at one point. Its 60 now...

shhh don't make climate change fags feel uncomfortable. He's obviously another "denier".

Yes of course there will be no consequences in reversing a change in temperature that took previously took hundreds of millions of years in only a few centuries. And everyone knows that humans were doing so well 100 million years ago anyway. Nothing could possibly go wrong.

Reminder: Dyson has no idea what he's talking about

initforthegold.blogspot.com/2007/08/dyson-exegesis.html?m=1

What about all the methane under the permafrost?

What about densely populated areas becoming potentially inhabitable?

What about agricultural lands potentially becoming less productive or not productive at all?

I am more worried about humans than nature and that comes from someone studying ecology.

that blogpost is so shitty i'm pretty sure it's your own. I read the original Dyson's interview and he said nothing wrong.

Great response. Really convinced everyone with those rock solid counterarguments.

hahaha I hope this is bait or at least I hope you're underage.

I shitpost too (ie CTs don't cause cancer, 500mSv are safe etc) but your level of shitposting is either too high or too low.

>What about all the methane under the permafrost?
Thawing out is a slow process and methane is cleared out of the atmosphere in a few decades. If temperatures spike hard enough to cause mass thawing it will burn us to crisps from the spike that precedes the thawing.

>What about densely populated areas becoming potentially inhabitable?

If they can't build a seawall at a rate of 5mm per year then fuck them. Cities have risen and fallen and relocated several time in history so having to move wouldn't be unprecedented.

>What about agricultural lands potentially becoming less productive or not productive at all?

They are becoming more productive due to high levels of CO2. Longer seasons in addition would be a fantastic boon to agriculture.

Thanks for the answers.
>They are becoming more productive due to high levels of CO2.
We surely will lose some farmland, right? But I can imagine it doesn't matter much because productivity goes up and maybe new land becomes available.
>Cities have risen and fallen and relocated several time in history so having to move wouldn't be unprecedented.
But I am worried about potential immigrants. Where do they need to go? And I imagine social unrest increasing if immigration would increase once again.

As I am not exactly fond of /pol/ ideology. But I also do think that immigration has its issues. I think it would be quite scary if whole regions would be displaced. Not sure if it will, but hey.

>We surely will lose some farmland, right?
Why?

> I am worried about potential immigrants. Where do they need to go?

10 minutes further inland and they'll have three decades to do so. Or up a few meters to get a good margin. Assuming it's rising waters they're fleeing.

>Why?
Desertification? Drought? Floods? Though now I am feeling it is more a matter of soil.
>Assuming it's rising waters they're fleeing.
You don't think there's other climatic changes that make regions less hospitable?

wtf Veeky Forums is this bait?

>whole regions will be displaced, low lying indo-pacific islands are copping it already

>high CO2 --> ocean acidification = goodbye fish stocks, reefs, life sustaining ecosystem processes

>oceanic temperature spike catalyzing mass thawing can definitely occur while ambient air temperature remains close to current temp
>in fact it has happened before
>google please 'siberian traps event'
>last time the result was called 'the great dying'

the ocean is a fkin massive carbon and heat sink

>global warming
>should be called ocean warming

I don't think you have any idea how fragile the ecosystem is. For example of krill go extinct then half of the marine species will go extinct as well. If bees go extinct then so do half the land animals and plants.

the PT extinction methane release was due to biological sources of methane, not thawing. The latter was concluded to be over a magnitude too slow to ever play a role in an extinction event.

The rest of your post is equally bullshit, next time you might add niburu and the lizard NWO to it as the degree of hysterics surrounding something seems to be equated to fact in your tiny mind.

lmfao

this is absolutely incorrect, but not willing to argue with brainlet over well-established scientific consensus

>geology major detected

????
I am possible a fucking imbecile but why is your reply directed to me? I am just asking stuff, if anything I should be the one getting baited.
>google please 'siberian traps event'
>last time the result was called 'the great dying'
I know these events but will recheck them anyway.
>For example of krill go extinct then half of the marine species will go extinct as well. If bees go extinct then so do half the land animals and plants.
Ecosystems do not collapse like that. You seem to be thinking of the honey bee which is not the only pollinator. Do you have anything to back up your claims?

Even if all pollinators were go to extinct, wind pollination plant species would persist and this will still allow several species to survive.
Maybe you would be right that if all pollinators would go extinct half the land animals and plants would go too. But it would take all pollinators not just bees.

I do not know enough about ocean ecology. It seems more likely that if krill would go extinct many marine species would go extinct too. In fact there is a lot I don't know, so enlighten me. I thought the purpose of Veeky Forums was learning.

But maybe I should stay away from Veeky Forums and for science stick to asking questions on related subreddits.

wrong user, my apologies old boy

>ecosystems do collapse like that when you are referring to crucial trophic links like krill

not terrestrial biologist so cannot say whether bees can be ecologically replaced

but krill absolutely cannot... in this instance, yes that is exactly how ecosystems collapse

It would require a global effort, which means bringing developing nations like China and India on board, which won't be easy because of the appeal of cheap fossil fuels.