Climate change is a heated topic. It’s on everyone’s mind. Unfortunately, the global warming controversy still rages on–especially in politics–and this is why data visualization is one of our best allies in this debate.
We’ve scoured the Web to find the best visualizations on climate change facts from the last few years. All these are incredibly educational and quite eye-opening. Every visualization in this list has a link next to it which will take you directly to the original study or research project …
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Kim Peart
February 4, 2019 at 17:46
One area I did not see covered is changes in biology driven by rising levels of CO2 in the air, thus making some food crops more toxic and less nutritious. This impacts the gum leaves tucker of the koala, which might send the marsupial into extinction because in time it will not be able to eat enough food to survive. The changes in plant biology are happening too fast for the koala to adapt.
A related matter is the impact of CO2 in the sea, making ocean water more acidic, and the impact on sea creatures like coral, and organisms like the Great Barrier Reef. With 93% of global heating having gone into the oceans, 40% more than previously believed, there is a double impact on corals and other sea creatures, of acidity and heat: https://www.businessinsider.com.au/oceans-warming-faster-than-we-thought-2019-1?r=US&IR=T
That raises the question of evolution from the impact of rising levels of CO2 in the air, the rising heat on land and in the sea, and the rising level of acidity in the oceans.
We can but wonder what the driving force in evolution is to deliver a clever tool-maker onto the scene that can cause harm to Nature, but can also build the means to go into space. Expansion is a primal force in Nature, seen in the Big Bang, exploding stars, the spread of life on Earth, the on-going evolution of life, and the progress of technology.
It would have to be a creationist perspective to suggest that humans are in some way not connected with Nature, and are in some way apart from evolution.
If space is in Nature’s gun sights, then what happens when the species delivered up to reach into space falls short?
Nature is like a blind machine driving survival through fitness, as with the survival of the fittest.
If we humans are not fit to survive in the Nature machine, what happens?
Do we need to consider the Great Filter theory as Nature’s way of clearing the unfit out of the way, even if this results in a dead Earth from a runaway greenhouse effect, as warned of by James Hansen with CO2 above 350 ppm, a level passed in the 1980s, when humans could have been active in space at a survival level?
For climate change discussion on the Great Filter theory in Fermi’s paradox, see David Wallace-Wells article, The Uninhabitable Earth: http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/07/climate-change-earth-too-hot-for-humans.html?utm_campaign=nym&utm_medium=s1&utm_source=fb
It would be good to see visual charts on the impact of CO2, heat, and ocean acidity on evolution.
max
February 4, 2019 at 18:57
This article must be wrong.
We have had a rise in temperature of only 0.7 of a degree in the last 50 years, and already we are experiencing what they claim for a 1.5 degree increase. 1.5 degrees is more than twice the present rise. God help us if we have a 2 degree rise.
The only conclusion I can get from this article is the powers that be are too frightened to tell us the truth. Can anyone imagine twice the present outcome of climate change, let alone nearly 3 times?
max
February 4, 2019 at 20:56
Sorry Kim, I once had your dream of space, but it is not going to happen. There are three countries that together could have made my dream and your dream come true .. America, Russia and China. Unfortunately America has decided to kick the arms race into top gear.
What hope have we when America, a country that has enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world ten times over, opts out of the Agreement it had and is going to build bigger and better ways of destroying the world?
Not to be left out, Russia is going to do better. This gives China a chance to play catch-up. As I said, sorry Kim but without these three countries coming together, it’s not going to happen. You are flogging a dead horse.
The statement “I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones” is attributed to an unidentified letter to Harry S. Truman in “The culture of Einstein” by Alex Johnson, MSNBC, (18 April 2005).
This would solve all problems with climate change.
Kim Peart
February 4, 2019 at 22:39
It was in the latter 1990s that I began to wonder if there was a force in Nature, in natural law, in evolution, that propelled the emergence of the clever tool maker that could build the means to go into space. In this context, what we do is an expression of Nature, just as life emerged on Earth when conditions were ripe, as fish found their way onto land, and as humans developed flight.
When wondering what the shape of human society would be in space, I came to see that we needed to be peaceful in space to survive, which would lead to a whole new phase in the evolution of life, in collaboration with our machines. I concluded that if we attempted to take war into space, we would be trapped on Earth. In my recent TT article on kinetic weapons, I point out how they can lead to peace in space, simply through the fear of their use:
https://tasmaniantimes.com/2019/01/implications-of-kinetic-missiles-in-space/
So stepping to a serious presence in space, will reveal the need to displace conflict with creativity, with a need for peace that will kick back to Earth, leading to peace on Earth.
Is that worth bothering with?
I suggest that it may not be the leading space nations that make space work, but it will be determined individuals in number, maybe ten million or more, who share a vision for Earth, space and survival, who will lead the way.
If there are ten determined individuals gathering in Washington, D.C. in October to launch this campaign, they could hope to inspire ten million campaigners within a year.
The evidence is in that this can happen.
With the focus on peace and creativity, we will not be presenting a threat to the nations.
We can call on citizens from all nations to collaborate in this campaign for survival with peace in space and on Earth.
Success would see nations follow where people lead, and then there would be a global movement of nations and citizens for space.
Then we would be able to deal with all strife on Earth, and fix the carbon crisis.
This horse cannot be dead, because the nag has never been led out of the stable before.
This race rests on the willingness of individuals to run like the wind with evolution to survive in space, and therefore, also on Earth.
That would make an interesting diagram in this article.
We know the problem ~ now what is the plan?
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Kim, all the above is way off topic. Yet again. According to TT’s Code of Conduct it therefore deserves deletion.
Please let it be the last of its kind.
— Moderator
Keith Antonysen
February 5, 2019 at 09:51
Graphics and quotes, and particularly graphs, can be altered by deniers to provide conclusions contrary to the source they use.
Some time ago I wrote about a graph provided in a study by Fredrik Ljungqvist which was “adapted” by climate change deniers.
“Adapted” is a neutral word for fraudulently altering the work of climate scientists. At about 6 min 20 sec into the referenced video there is discussion about how a graph of Ljungqvist was conveniently altered.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CY4Yecsx_-s