For what it’s worth, the average interpretation I’ve seen from climate scientists is:
- No, we won’t hit scorched earth Venus-like runaway warming.
- If we don’t reduce emissions drastically, greenhouse gas warming plus various feedbacks will cause extreme weather, render some parts of the world unlivable due to wet bulb temperature, and overwhelm unprepared infrastructure, costing huge amounts of money and creating millions of migrants.
So, not the end times, but definitely dark times.
If you sprinkle a bit of pessimism about current politics it’s not a stretch to assume we probably won’t handle those impacts gracefully, or achieve the drastic emissions cuts required to avoid them.
What's your citation for suspecting that more than 1 in 8 living people will be a migrant? That seems pretty alarmist, and well over any number I've seen suggested elsewhere.
- 19 countries with the highest number of ecological threats are among the world’s 40 least peaceful countries including Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Chad, India and Pakistan.
- Over one billion people live in 31 countries where the country’s resilience is unlikely to sufficiently withstand the impact of ecological events by 2050, contributing to mass population displacement.
- Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, the Middle East and North Africa are the regions facing the largest number of ecological threats.
- 3.5 billion people could suffer from food insecurity by 2050; which is an increase of 1.5 billion people from today.
- The lack of resilience in countries covered in the ETR will lead to worsening food insecurity and competition over resources, increasing civil unrest and mass displacement, exposing developed countries to increased influxes of refugees.
Well if current temperatures and predictions are anything to go by, big chunks of Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Bangladesh will become uninhabitable, wet bulb temperatures wise. Just from that area you can easily get to 1 billion; there's also Africa and the Americas that could experience droughts, destruction of wildlife habitats relied upon for sustenance (mostly fishing), unviable temperatures, floodings, etc.
Just look at the population figures for the areas of the globe that are projected to become uninhabitable. That's your baseline number and it by itself is over a billion people. Any additional extrapolation for political and social upheavals related to resource conflicts (regardless of how conservative your analysis might be) only add to that baseline.
Well, this is when the military budget of many countries will be put to a test, for real this time. After all, the reason to keep investing into military force is to be able to defend sovereignty. It is a harsh thought, no question, but we have to admit that we always prepared for this case. Sure, the left is trying to make it a humanitarian thing, but in the end, available space and resources will determine how much the people of a country are willing to accept foreigners. Right now, this "game" is very much leaning in favour of the left, however, one day, it will pivot, and then there will be only tears. The real question is, will you be able to migrate before the borders are closed with military force?
> greenhouse gas warming plus various feedbacks will cause extreme weather, render some parts of the world unlivable due to wet bulb temperature, and overwhelm unprepared infrastructure, costing huge amounts of money and creating millions of migrants
This is what I've been trying to tell people for years. Climate change is everyone's concern, if only because entire nations becoming uninhabitable, wars over natural resources (not just oil - now we'll be seeing fighting over arable land and water sources), etc. will cause massive influxes of refugees. Even if many nations did not have a significant split in opinions on migrants, most are still ill-equipped to handle the many millions of climate refugees that will come.
Remember the Syrian migrant crisis? Where people were shouting about "the great replacement" (read: "white genocide") over people fleeing ISIS? That's going to seem like chump change compared to what's coming (and I'd bet good money that new extremist groups will start popping up as conditions deteriorate, governments collapse, etc. - a good chunk of the blame for climate change can be laid at the feet of developed nations, after all, so I would be shocked if no extremist groups decided to take matters into their own hands).
I could write at length about this, but I'll leave it at this: the US is not going to come out of this unscathed. Obviously, sea level rise will lead to coastal flooding, yada yada, but unless American agriculture is forced to be more conservative with its water usage, the aquifers we rely so desperately on for our farmlands will run dry due to over-pumping within this century (and with megadroughts getting worse, our aquifers are recharging far slower than before...this will only get worse as climate change worsens).
- No, we won’t hit scorched earth Venus-like runaway warming.
- If we don’t reduce emissions drastically, greenhouse gas warming plus various feedbacks will cause extreme weather, render some parts of the world unlivable due to wet bulb temperature, and overwhelm unprepared infrastructure, costing huge amounts of money and creating millions of migrants.
So, not the end times, but definitely dark times.
If you sprinkle a bit of pessimism about current politics it’s not a stretch to assume we probably won’t handle those impacts gracefully, or achieve the drastic emissions cuts required to avoid them.