Climate Change: Why aren't more people concerned about it?

Search
Go

Discussion Topic

Return to Forum List
This thread has been locked
Messages 681 - 700 of total 2200 in this topic << First  |  < Previous  |  Show All  |  Next >  |  Last >>
tuolumne_tradster

Trad climber
Leading Edge of North American Plate
Dec 20, 2016 - 07:58am PT
As always, "follow the $$$" There will be winners and losers...

In Windfall: The Booming Business of Global Warming.
McKenzie Funk describes how people around the globe are cashing in on a warming world. McKenzie Funk has spent the last six years reporting around the world on how we are preparing for a warmer planet. Funk shows us that the best way to understand the catastrophe of global warming is to see it through the eyes of those who see it most clearly—as a market opportunity.

Global warming’s physical impacts can be separated into three broad categories: melt, drought, and deluge. Funk travels to two dozen countries to profile entrepreneurial people who see in each of these forces a potential windfall.

The melt is a boon for newly arable, mineral-rich regions of the Arctic, such as Greenland—and for the surprising kings of the manmade snow trade, the Israelis. The process of desalination, vital to Israel’s survival, can produce a snowlike by-product that alpine countries use to prolong their ski season.

Drought creates opportunities for private firefighters working for insurance companies in California as well as for fund managers backing south Sudanese warlords who control local farmland. As droughts raise food prices globally, there is no more precious asset.

[Click to View YouTube Video]


The deluge—the rising seas, surging rivers, and superstorms that will threaten island nations and coastal cities—has been our most distant concern, but after Hurricane Sandy and failure after failure to cut global carbon emissions, it is not so distant. For Dutch architects designing floating cities and American scientists patenting hurricane defenses, the race is on. For low-lying countries like Bangladesh, the coming deluge presents an existential threat.


Funk visits the front lines of the melt, the drought, and the deluge to make a human accounting of the booming business of global warming. By letting climate change continue unchecked, we are choosing to adapt to a warming world. Containing the resulting surge will be big business; some will benefit, but much of the planet will suffer.

Ken M

Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
Dec 20, 2016 - 02:21pm PT
California’s birth rate hits record low following job, housing woes


By Kurtis AlexanderDecember 19, 2016



California's birth rate dipped to an all-time low, according to data released Monday.

As California’s population grew to 39.4 million this year, its birth rate dipped to an all-time low amid the mounting challenges of raising a family, according to state data released Monday — a decline that some say threatens future economic growth and prosperity.

The preference for fewer kids is a trend that’s played out nationally and for at least a decade as women put off having children until later in life. But in California, the recession of the late 2000s, a lingering economic recovery and the state’s exorbitant real estate market have created fresh obstacles for young couples looking to settle down.

“It’s not like Millennials are all of a sudden different,” said Dowell Myers, a demographer at the University of Southern California’s School of Public Policy. “What’s different is they came of age at a really bad time. First, they lose their job opportunities. Second, they’ve been gridlocked by the shortage of housing.”

“It’s just been harder to get things in place before having kids,” Myers said.


The result for California was just 489,000 babies between July 1, 2015, and June 30, 2016 — or 12.4 births for every 1,000 people, according to the state Department of Finance. The rate surpassed the previous record low of 12.6 births for every 1,000 people set in 1933, during the throes of the Great Depression.

California’s small northern counties, which have long struggled to attract jobs and young families, logged the lowest birth rates. But coastal spots, including the booming Bay Area and the Central Coast, weren’t far behind.

Though the state figures don’t tease out birth rates by ethnicity, U.S. census data suggest the trend holds among virtually all groups. Even among the Hispanic population, among the nation’s fastest growing, women have been giving birth in decreasing numbers since 2006, when the economy began to take its turn.

California’s low birth rates are helping prolong a decade-long trend of minimal population growth. The 0.75 percent increase between July of 2015 and 2016 marks 12 consecutive years that the state has gone without a bump above 1 percent. That’s a far cry from last century’s growth, which at times soared to 3 percent or more annually.

“In the ’70s and ’80s, we were pretty much a new state, with plenty of opportunity and open land, and many people came here,” said Walter Schwarm, a demographer with the Department of Finance. “Now, we look like a state that isn’t at that point anymore. We’re a mature state.”

As with the birth rate, the number of people moving to California has done little to boost the state’s population. While the level of newcomers has gone up since the late 2000s, when the recession discouraged many from coming here, migration to California remains low by historical standards.

Between July of 2015 and July of 2016, the state gained 188,000 people through migration from another country. But it lost 118,000 people due to migration between states. In all, 70,000 more people arrived than left.

Public policy experts say there could be significant costs if California’s growth rate falls further.

The population needs to at least sustain itself, and ideally to grow modestly, to fill the state’s jobs, support its economy and pay for the social benefits of retiring Baby Boomers.

“These are your future workers, taxpayers and home buyers. It’s your future for the next 20 years,” Myers said. “And we’re not getting them.”

Myers said California’s high cost of living is largely to blame for not attracting the young families that the state needs.

“While the job market is good,” he said, “the housing market stinks.”

Pro-growth policies such as increasing the housing stock and expanding child tax credits have been proposed. So have plans to encourage immigration, especially among highly-educated foreigners. But each of these efforts comes with financial and political challenges.

Schwarm, the state demographer, said that even if the state’s biggest growth is in the past, California has plenty to lure the best and brightest.

“To a certain extent,” he said, “as long as we remain an attractive state and the jobs are here, people will come.”

Kurtis Alexander is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kalexander@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kurtisalexander

39.4 million

California residents as of June 30, up 0.75 percent year-to-year

489,000 and 264,000

births and deaths, respectively, recorded by the state

in the last fiscal year

70,000 more people moved into California than moved out of the state in the last fiscal year.
rockermike

Trad climber
Berkeley
Dec 20, 2016 - 09:22pm PT
I have no opinion but here's an alternative voice


[Click to View YouTube Video]
monolith

climber
state of being
Dec 20, 2016 - 09:30pm PT
Giaever is snoped here: http://www.snopes.com/2015/07/08/nobel-ivar-giaever-obama-climate-change/

His first point is hilarious, stating that the temp has only changed from 288.0K to 288.8K, implying no significance. It sounds like something a physicist would say about climace science without much understanding of climate science.

Will have to see the rest of his garbage tomorrow.
rockermike

Trad climber
Berkeley
Dec 20, 2016 - 11:18pm PT
Another naysayer:
[Click to View YouTube Video]

And again... I'm really not promoting the 'no change' argument (hell I'm an anti-civilization radical cyclist) but I do sense a bit of groupthink going on which always makes me suspicious. Good to listen to alternative voices. :)
Ed Hartouni

Trad climber
Livermore, CA
Dec 21, 2016 - 01:14am PT
there's a lot of agreement on Quantum Mechanics...

maybe that smacks of "group think" to you rockermike?
same with special and general relativity...
and a whole lot of other science.

obviously, the scientists who are doing the science can't be trusted (?)

AP

Trad climber
Calgary
Dec 21, 2016 - 07:04am PT
Groupthink occurs because the current theories fit the facts. Then a revolution occurs when new data is discovered that does not fit the theories. Now science has to devise new theories.
I have said it before but if a scientist can demonstrate that Co2 is not a major factor in climate change they will be famous overnight and maybe win a Nobel prize. New models and theories will have to be devised. This is the "something else" factor that deniers talk about.
So far we haven't found "something else"
monolith

climber
state of being
Dec 21, 2016 - 08:03am PT
Patick Moore was not a Greenpeace co-founder, just an early member.

Sheesh, RockerMike you do gobble up the glitzy vids.
Chaz

Trad climber
greater Boss Angeles area
Dec 21, 2016 - 08:10am PT
Congress can. They just write a different law.
AP

Trad climber
Calgary
Dec 21, 2016 - 09:33am PT
I can't hear the name Patrick Moore and keep a straight face as he is a fraud and totally incompetent.
We should not have to drill in the Arctic at this time and hopefully never in the future.
My fear is the "give federal lands to the States group" win out and we have massive drilling in sensitive areas.
eeyonkee

Trad climber
Golden, CO
Dec 21, 2016 - 10:31am PT
Agree with you wholeheartedly, DMT. It happens sometimes:)
rick sumner

Trad climber
reno, nevada/ wasilla alaska
Dec 21, 2016 - 11:21am PT
From the state lands of the Beaufort to the foothills of the Brooks Range billions of barrels of recoverable oil is being added to the known north slope reserves. Just as they are discovering huge new reserves via modern exploration and production techniques in the Permian Basin so to are they on the slope. The main problems on refilling the aging Alaskan pipeline is that the world is awash in cheap oil (so much for the fallacy of peak oil) and the AK state government resembles a third world banana Republic. ANWAR and federal waters are irrelevant at this point in this under explored province.
monolith

climber
state of being
Dec 21, 2016 - 01:57pm PT
TGT will be along shortly with this: http://www.sfgate.com/weather/article/snow-Sahara-photos-for-first-time-in-40-years-10811276.php
monolith

climber
state of being
Dec 21, 2016 - 06:11pm PT
rockermike

Trad climber
Berkeley
Dec 21, 2016 - 09:08pm PT
The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule. H. L. Mencken
monolith

climber
state of being
Dec 21, 2016 - 09:32pm PT
The urge to see conspiracy is strong in those who can't or won't understand the science
Flip Flop

climber
Earth Planet, Universe
Dec 21, 2016 - 09:40pm PT
A question for the scientists. Will there be another Ice Age? ( no hidden inferences, I'm honestly wondering what the patterns predict, if that's possible.
rockermike

Trad climber
Berkeley
Dec 21, 2016 - 09:45pm PT
I'm on a roll: :)

[Click to View YouTube Video]
monolith

climber
state of being
Dec 21, 2016 - 09:48pm PT
Tim Ball, another conspiracy droid. Good one RockerMike.

As far as ice ages go, you can judge for yourself how much temp offset from manmade sources will keep an ice age from happening.

I'm thinking it's about 7c to 9c. We are now at about 1c with more locked in.


http://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/will-there-be-another-ice-age/

https://www.skepticalscience.com/heading-into-new-little-ice-age-intermediate.htm
rockermike

Trad climber
Berkeley
Dec 21, 2016 - 10:48pm PT
Listen to the video then get back to me. :)
I'm agnostic on the topic but some of the ad hominem attacks on my posts kind of prove my point..... group think is going around. Are there some 'facts' that Tim Ball gives that are wrong, that are lies? Was the famous hockey-stick graph actually created only after deceptively cutting off earlier and later time periods (one of Tim's claims.)
Anyway, even if coal and fossil fuels do prove the cause, you yourself are not a climate scientist so you are simply taking another's word for it.
Messages 681 - 700 of total 2200 in this topic << First  |  < Previous  |  Show All  |  Next >  |  Last >>
Return to Forum List
 
Our Guidebooks
spacerCheck 'em out!
SuperTopo Guidebooks

guidebook icon
Try a free sample topo!

 
SuperTopo on the Web

Recent Route Beta