Such an odd and sad sentiment. One important use of science is to tell us when we are headed the wrong way. We want science to us when something increases the chances of cancer, threatens the extinction of honey bees, is destroying the ozone layer, or causing brain damage in children. Well, you do if you are rational.
Apparently people don’t understand the concepts of “risk” and “probabilities”. Climate is very complex, far more so than the stock market. Not many can routinely predict tomorrow’s stock performance. Try predicting it a decade in advance. Or a century. Yet that is what science is being asked to do with climate. So climate scientists run their models and make their projections with the best available information and find that there is a significant probability that really bad stuff could happen. Not a certainty, but a probability
So what do you want scientists to do? Downplay the bad stuff and emphasize the uncertainty? Is that really the rational thing to do? Being obese doesn’t guarantee getting diabetes, it only raises the probability. Should the medical science message to the overweight be don’t worry about the increased risk because it might not happen?
For the past 50 years we have been living in the golden age of climate change, when the warming trend has been a net positive to humanity. That’s coming to an end. From here on out, life is going to become more difficult, requiring greater amounts of adaptation. How difficult it ends up being, whether it is truly apocalyptic or not, depends on what we do from here on out. That’s what science is telling us.
Back in the old Fool board I was called an alarmist because I agreed with an article that there was a strong probability that Phoenix would be mostly uninhabitable during the summer by 2050. That people would then be abandoning what is now one of the nation’s fastest growing cities. I certainly could be wrong (and truly hope I am) but after the recent run of 31 consecutive days of 110F highs I don’t think many would be shocked if that article turns out to be right.
Indeed. Whenever I’ve seen blame attached “Science”/Science or Scientists, “Experts” (always with quotes, right?) or The Elites, it’s almost always a result of opinions formulated/given out by articles in the popular press (such as, say, The Telegraph as in the OP)…or meanderings through the internet field of cow pats or the study hall at Dunning-Kruger U. I cannot recall these critiques ever coming after a study of actual research data that the scientific community tends to use as its source.
True it’s the emissions that matter, but twice as many people will require twice as many emissions.
More people, more demand for stuff that produces emissions to produce or operate.
“it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!” The Red Queen.
The media certainly doesn’t care about the concepts of “risk” and “probabilities”. The weather media here, and probably in most of the rest of Shiny-land, always reports the worst case scenario. The weather service quite often, puts the part of Michigan I live in under a “marginal risk” of severe weather. What the media does not do is define exactly what a “marginal risk” is, they just shriek their default “severe weather” forecast of 60mph wind and 1" hail. A “marginal risk” is a 5% probability, But the hysteria obsessed media carries on like it’s the end of the world, when there is a 95% probability the weather will not be “severe”.
Maybe. But looking at this as an example purely mathematically, it depends on how and where those people are located. More people in high GDP countries will produce a higher level of emissions.
So, if by using some magic wand one could remove half the population, the emissions would drop by half only if every country was equally cut in half, more or less. Cut most of them from poorer developing countries and you might hardly notice that change.
I think the reduction would be significantly less than 50%.
There are “sunk costs” that likely neither grow nor shrink at the same rate as the population.
Think of it like a married couple. They have a lower utility bill with a single house than if they had one house each. They may also share one vehicle. If one of them was gone, their annual expenses would not necessarily be cut by 50%. Same would likely be said for carbon footprints.
If we had less people, we would necessarily have less refineries? Perhaps even worse, if we had less people, would we even be compelled to continue the efficiencies we currently use or would it be an excuse to pollute more? Would less people lead to more affluency? Would that affluency lead to greater energy usage (it usually does)?
Great graph from your link that illustrates that our per capita carbon usage continues to grow - which is a bad indicator for anyone thinking a population reduction would necessarily result in a carbon reduction.
I have no issue with the basic idea of a population of 4B versus 8B would make a difference; but the difference would only be timing. With 4B we might only be at 1950 levels of CO2 but we would still be spewing CO2 in to the air and it would mean our current crisis might be delayed from 2050 to 2150 or whatever. CO2 is long lived in the atmosphere.
