In evaluating existential risks it’s essential to focus our attention on actual predictions and realistic scenarios, instead of fanciful ‘worst imaginable case’ scenarios. Earth could be destroyed by a giant asteroid made of antimatter moving at 99% C tomorrow, but since there’s no reason to think such things actually exist it would be a waste of time to worry about them. Better to focus our attention on the scenarios that are actually plausible, so we don’t waste our efforts.
With that in mind, I’ll point out that even the worst-case IPCC scenarios do not come remotely close to posing an existential risk. The predicted climate changes are only somewhat larger than what we experienced in the 20th century, and the predicted effects are mostly an increase of suffering in countries that are too poor to adapt easily. As near as I can tell global warming is only included in this kind of list because so many people have it in their mental ‘scary global bad stuff’ bucket, and don’t notice that crop failures and malaria outbreaks are in a completely different league than the end of all life on Earth.
In evaluating existential risks it’s essential to focus our attention on actual predictions and realistic scenarios, instead of fanciful ‘worst imaginable case’ scenarios. Earth could be destroyed by a giant asteroid made of antimatter moving at 99% C tomorrow, but since there’s no reason to think such things actually exist it would be a waste of time to worry about them. Better to focus our attention on the scenarios that are actually plausible, so we don’t waste our efforts.
With that in mind, I’ll point out that even the worst-case IPCC scenarios do not come remotely close to posing an existential risk. The predicted climate changes are only somewhat larger than what we experienced in the 20th century, and the predicted effects are mostly an increase of suffering in countries that are too poor to adapt easily. As near as I can tell global warming is only included in this kind of list because so many people have it in their mental ‘scary global bad stuff’ bucket, and don’t notice that crop failures and malaria outbreaks are in a completely different league than the end of all life on Earth.
I would want to hear that from a climatology pro who acknowledged other existential risks to be really reassured, but thanks, and I hope you’re right!