[sys_64738]

When the ice shelves in Greenland (40 foot sea level rise) and Antarctica (200 foot seas level rise) occur then I reckon it'll not be gradual but will be a sudden collapse. All within a very short space of months.

The real issue is that nobody has proven this wasn't going to occur anyway. This is always the downfall with climate science in that there is no explicit proof that anything man does to the planet would alter what was going to occur anyway.

Climate scientists also have an agenda to keep their funding so will never say "there is no issue" but will always point to the inevitable as it matches what they want for a conclusion.

Follow the money, as they say.

[dragonwriter]

> The real issue is that nobody has proven this wasn't going to occur anyway.

Are you saying that the contribution of CO₂ levels to warming isn't established, or that the human role in increasing CO₂ levels isn't established? Because both of those are very well established.

> This is always the downfall with climate science in that there is no explicit proof that anything man does to the planet would alter what was going to occur anyway.

This is only true in the sense where “explicit proof” is restricted to pure abstract domains like math and not applicable to any domain of material fact; to the extent that it is possible to “prove” anything about what would happen in counterfactual alternative conditions in the material universe, though, this has been proven.

[stmfreak]

CO2 follows warming if you look at the data too closely.

No one has proved that mankind’s contribution is material to the underlying trend, nor proved that warming will be as bad as claimed. So what if Greenland becomes green again?

[sys_64738]

> Are you saying that the contribution of CO₂ levels to warming isn't established, or that the human role in increasing CO₂ levels isn't established? Because both of those are very well established

Established by who and where is their funding coming from? Would you trust a survey that says "Windows is better than Linux" if it was funded by Microsoft? That's why where the funding comes from is key.

> is only true in the sense where “explicit proof” is restricted to pure abstract domains like math and not applicable to any domain of material fact; to the extent that it is possible to “prove” anything about what would happen in counterfactual alternative conditions in the material universe, though, this has been proven.

If you want hundreds of billions of dollars to be invested in something which hasn't got clear proof of value then that's simply not enough. You need to prove the Return On Investment, regardless of field. It all comes down to money.

[nine_k]

The important part to me: e.g. "the Greenland ice sheet will end up in the ocean in 50 years, with p < 1e-5".

The less important part for me: "...this will happen because of the human activity that they cannot stop anyway".

So my idea is to prepare for this scenario, because we cannot realistically prevent it. E.g. build dams where it makes sense, evacuate the dangerous areas where protection cannot work, predict in detail what the coastal map is going to look like, try to predict how ocean currents and winds will change, and prepare to that, etc.

[devinl]

There is a huge monetary and PR incentive for the fossil fuel industry to publish research that proves "there is no issue" in regards to climate change. The energy industry is where the money is and your conclusions seems to be the exact opposite of this reality. While the field of climate science overall has gotten somewhat larger and more funding due to the strong evidence that climate change is going to cause problems for human life, any individual scientist who could prove climate change is not happening or won't affect human life in the foreseeable future has every incentive to do so and would get plenty of grant money.

This article has more written about monetary incentives of climate scientists: https://arstechnica.com/science/2016/05/if-climate-scientist...