[philipkglass]

Human driven climate change is going to do significant damage. It's not going to be halted in a mere decade or two. But it's always possible to make the consequences a little more severe by burning more fossils, or to make them a little less severe by burning less.

The people who claim "only X years left to save the world from severe climate change" are stretching the truth for effect or don't understand the primary research well enough. There are certain milestones that we'll pass if we don't make deep emissions cuts in those X years, but there's not a bright dividing line between "ok" and "doomed." Telling people that there is a bright line coming up in just a few years is likely to induce cynicism/apathy when we start living on the far side of that line.

[emteycz]

On the other hand, there certainly are significant irreversible events coming up if temperature rise is not capped, deforestation not stopped, industrial agriculture doesn't change, etc.