Tuesday, September 19, 2017

But the science was settled!

A group of prominent scientists on Monday created a potential whiplash moment for climate policy, suggesting that humanity could have considerably more time than previously thought to avoid a “dangerous” level of global warming.

2 comments:

  1. It's possible. All ideas should be welcome.

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  2. It would be a good idea to read the entire study carefully:

    http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo3031.html?foxtrotcallback=true

    Here from the abstract:

    'Hence, limiting warming to 1.5 °C is not yet a geophysical impossibility, but is likely to require delivery on strengthened pledges for 2030 followed by challengingly deep and rapid mitigation. Strengthening near-term emissions reductions would hedge against a high climate response or subsequent reduction rates proving economically, technically or politically unfeasible.'

    Please stop berating 'settled' science as though it's the fault of the scientists themselves. There is no such thing, and any self-respecting scientist knows it. This study illustrates precisely what science does: continually revise its data and conclusions.

    And if anyone is genuinely interested in learning about the study, here is a fairly comprehensive guest post about the study and its implications by one of its key authors:

    https://www.carbonbrief.org/guest-post-why-the-one-point-five-warming-limit-is-not-yet-a-geophysical-impossibility

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