The East Coast Is Sinking
February 29, 2024 8:28 AM Subscribe
New satellite-based research reveals how land along the coast is slumping into the ocean, compounding the danger from global sea level rise. An interactive map with analysis (previously)
See you down in Arizona bay.
posted by robotmachine at 8:41 AM on February 29 [9 favorites]
posted by robotmachine at 8:41 AM on February 29 [9 favorites]
Revising all my skiing "East Coast/Ice Coast" jokes to be "More like Iceberg Coast, am I right?". Of course assumes it will still be cold enough to have ice...which is not a fact entered into evidence.... (this sucks)
posted by inflatablekiwi at 9:02 AM on February 29
posted by inflatablekiwi at 9:02 AM on February 29
36% of the US population lives reasonably close to these sinking coasts. The real estate is worth trillions. There's no way to refill the aquifers. There's no way to reverse the oncoming sea level rise. Once you scrape away the terror and doom, you're left with really basic questions: What's to become of us? How will cities adapt? Where will all the people go?
posted by mittens at 9:04 AM on February 29 [18 favorites]
posted by mittens at 9:04 AM on February 29 [18 favorites]
Ormond Beach is rising? That's not a sentence I ever expected to parse.
See you down in Arizona bay.
Maybe Evan Dando could do the East Coast version of Ænema.
posted by credulous at 9:26 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]
See you down in Arizona bay.
Maybe Evan Dando could do the East Coast version of Ænema.
posted by credulous at 9:26 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]
Note to midwesterners: lock in your property situation now my dudes
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 9:30 AM on February 29 [11 favorites]
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 9:30 AM on February 29 [11 favorites]
LOL i love the idea that East Coasters will literally flee the country as refugees before moving to the Midwest, which in my experience 1000% checks out
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 9:31 AM on February 29 [32 favorites]
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 9:31 AM on February 29 [32 favorites]
We have this dumb collective inability to recognize that shoreline changes naturally, which compounds our issues with human acceleration of change. The difference between 17th century Boston shoreline and now was pretty interesting. Humans want to see how it is now and assume it always was and always will be just like this. Makes it really hard to get buy-in to the idea that decades from now, things will Not Be Good. So we keep doing dumb things like building on barrier islands or draining aquifers or cutting shipping lanes through salt marshes and wonder why things keep changing for the worse…
posted by caution live frogs at 9:31 AM on February 29 [10 favorites]
posted by caution live frogs at 9:31 AM on February 29 [10 favorites]
Hmmm, I thought this was going to be a technical article about tectonic plate subduction zones. Which just goes to show there's just more bad news every day.
There are too many people on this earth.
posted by BlueHorse at 9:32 AM on February 29 [8 favorites]
There are too many people on this earth.
posted by BlueHorse at 9:32 AM on February 29 [8 favorites]
Our house in Philadelphia is at an elevation of 89 feet, so we've got time. Looking forward to island life!
posted by grumpybear69 at 9:34 AM on February 29 [5 favorites]
posted by grumpybear69 at 9:34 AM on February 29 [5 favorites]
Did it start with Boston because this isn't happening in Maine, or because they assume nobody cares about Maine?
posted by joannemerriam at 9:47 AM on February 29 [4 favorites]
posted by joannemerriam at 9:47 AM on February 29 [4 favorites]
Wait I thought the super richies were making floating island paradises (which they undoubtedly will try to reside upon and avoid all taxation/laws/regulations and also use slave labor, accelerate ocean pollution and generally yeah, do what they do).
posted by Glinn at 9:51 AM on February 29
posted by Glinn at 9:51 AM on February 29
Eventually the U.S. will take over Canada one way or another for the water and we'll all be one big miserable, impoverished family.
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:53 AM on February 29 [2 favorites]
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:53 AM on February 29 [2 favorites]
combine this with the fact that sea level rise on the (northern) east coast is exacerbated by the warmer waters being um, thicker? (sea level is rising faster there due to water water being more expansive). so yeah, storm surges, flooding etc., will be worse, which is not a great look on aging infrastructure.
BlueHorse one thing at least that they don't have to worry about on the East Coast is a subduction zone. (shhh nobody tell the PNW about Cascadia Subduction Zone)
posted by supermedusa at 9:54 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]
BlueHorse one thing at least that they don't have to worry about on the East Coast is a subduction zone. (shhh nobody tell the PNW about Cascadia Subduction Zone)
posted by supermedusa at 9:54 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]
It took us this long to figure out what was happening to the East coast of the United States. Some of the most expensive real estate on the planet. Where some of the most prestigious universities with the best-funded science departments live.
I wonder where else this is happening?
I wonder what else we've missed?
posted by MrVisible at 9:54 AM on February 29 [6 favorites]
I wonder where else this is happening?
I wonder what else we've missed?
posted by MrVisible at 9:54 AM on February 29 [6 favorites]
> There are too many people on this earth.
nope.
just, nope. people are lovely and it's good to have a lot of them around. the problem is not people. the problem is things.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 10:17 AM on February 29 [23 favorites]
nope.
just, nope. people are lovely and it's good to have a lot of them around. the problem is not people. the problem is things.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 10:17 AM on February 29 [23 favorites]
People will move inland and it will be chaotic. We should start planning for that now, and have retreat scenarios that support the people who will need new homes, using projections of future population pressures/housing needs, etc.
I mean, we can handle this, if we want to. The US is big, we have room to move people and communities inland, though it won't be as simple as "move NYC 20 miles northwest" but we don't have to just wring our hands and wait for chaos and suffering.
We could plan!
We could build more housing, accelerate working from home/robust internet so people/business could stay stable regardless of location, provide moving support via government for affected communities, even make it more positive because there's a lot of half-abandoned, dying small towns in the interior of the U.S. that might be great places to help people move to and revitalize.
We could invest more in water reuse and stop pumping out irreplaceable groundwater. We have that tech already.
We could deploy environmental scientists to talk about how to best handle our coasts; move dangerous chemicals and industrial stuff away from the water, encourage wetlands, preserve historical artifacts that need to be moved, and so on.
We can and could do a lot of things, if we want to.
posted by emjaybee at 10:35 AM on February 29 [42 favorites]
I mean, we can handle this, if we want to. The US is big, we have room to move people and communities inland, though it won't be as simple as "move NYC 20 miles northwest" but we don't have to just wring our hands and wait for chaos and suffering.
We could plan!
We could build more housing, accelerate working from home/robust internet so people/business could stay stable regardless of location, provide moving support via government for affected communities, even make it more positive because there's a lot of half-abandoned, dying small towns in the interior of the U.S. that might be great places to help people move to and revitalize.
We could invest more in water reuse and stop pumping out irreplaceable groundwater. We have that tech already.
We could deploy environmental scientists to talk about how to best handle our coasts; move dangerous chemicals and industrial stuff away from the water, encourage wetlands, preserve historical artifacts that need to be moved, and so on.
We can and could do a lot of things, if we want to.
posted by emjaybee at 10:35 AM on February 29 [42 favorites]
But we don't, yet
posted by gottabefunky at 10:45 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]
posted by gottabefunky at 10:45 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]
Lex Luthor had the wrong coast .
Well *I'm* ahead of the game, I just bought a little place in Otisburg.
posted by credulous at 10:47 AM on February 29 [4 favorites]
Well *I'm* ahead of the game, I just bought a little place in Otisburg.
posted by credulous at 10:47 AM on February 29 [4 favorites]
Where will you go
When there's no San Francisco?
Whoop! Everybody
Better get ready to
Tie up the boat in Idaho.
(I didn't make that up)
posted by mule98J at 10:56 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]
When there's no San Francisco?
Whoop! Everybody
Better get ready to
Tie up the boat in Idaho.
(I didn't make that up)
posted by mule98J at 10:56 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]
We can and could do a lot of things, if we want to.
Well, we'd need to do all those things. And a whole lot more. And for some reason there are a whole bunch of people out there who get mad when we do these things, and try to stop them in various ways, a lot of which have proven very effective.
So it's not just neglecting to do stuff we could be doing if we had the gumption. Let's not make light of the challenge we're facing, or the consequences should we fail to overcome it.
It's humanity trying to organize our species at an entirely unprecedented level to face an extinction event.
We don't actually know how to survive this. As this article points out, we don't even know how hard it's going to be yet; we haven't figured out all of the consequences of the changes we've made to our environment.
And for some reason the wealthy and powerful have spent the past half a century acting exactly like you'd expect them to if climate change couldn't be stopped. While getting really good at building bunkers and life support systems. And propagating a propaganda campaign that pits the people who don't believe in climate change against the people who think it can be stopped.
People want to stop climate change. A lack of want isn't the problem here.
posted by MrVisible at 11:05 AM on February 29 [5 favorites]
Well, we'd need to do all those things. And a whole lot more. And for some reason there are a whole bunch of people out there who get mad when we do these things, and try to stop them in various ways, a lot of which have proven very effective.
So it's not just neglecting to do stuff we could be doing if we had the gumption. Let's not make light of the challenge we're facing, or the consequences should we fail to overcome it.
It's humanity trying to organize our species at an entirely unprecedented level to face an extinction event.
We don't actually know how to survive this. As this article points out, we don't even know how hard it's going to be yet; we haven't figured out all of the consequences of the changes we've made to our environment.
And for some reason the wealthy and powerful have spent the past half a century acting exactly like you'd expect them to if climate change couldn't be stopped. While getting really good at building bunkers and life support systems. And propagating a propaganda campaign that pits the people who don't believe in climate change against the people who think it can be stopped.
People want to stop climate change. A lack of want isn't the problem here.
posted by MrVisible at 11:05 AM on February 29 [5 favorites]
Hmmm, I thought this was going to be a technical article about tectonic plate subduction zones.
Exactly. I have a Cannon Beach, OR poster so I bizarrely think of liquefaction chances daily.
Anyway, that’s a compelling map, and I hope it reaches the audience it needs to and in enough time.
posted by edithkeeler at 11:06 AM on February 29
Exactly. I have a Cannon Beach, OR poster so I bizarrely think of liquefaction chances daily.
Anyway, that’s a compelling map, and I hope it reaches the audience it needs to and in enough time.
posted by edithkeeler at 11:06 AM on February 29
I don't know that emjaybee is making light of it, so much as heading off a Malthusian call for solving the problem through population control, by suggesting other alternatives.
posted by tofu_crouton at 11:08 AM on February 29 [5 favorites]
posted by tofu_crouton at 11:08 AM on February 29 [5 favorites]
LOL i love the idea that East Coasters will literally flee the country as refugees before moving to the Midwest, which in my experience 1000% checks out.
Laugh if at us if you like, but I'm thinking this bolsters my case - long mocked in my own family - for abandoning D.C. for Milwaukee or Cleveland.
posted by ryanshepard at 11:11 AM on February 29 [6 favorites]
Laugh if at us if you like, but I'm thinking this bolsters my case - long mocked in my own family - for abandoning D.C. for Milwaukee or Cleveland.
posted by ryanshepard at 11:11 AM on February 29 [6 favorites]
I really like KSR's 2140 because its soooo NYC that the city would be half-submerged and buildings are collapsing but everyone is still hustling and trying to make a buck. so true.
seriously though, we should be planning now (but we are not), moving not only people but crucial and vulnerable infrastructure. it will only get more expensive the longer it's put off.
but like, what about Florida? nearly the entire population (20+ million) is going to have to move, eventually. where the hell will they go? the Mid West can only accommodate so many...
posted by supermedusa at 11:16 AM on February 29 [2 favorites]
seriously though, we should be planning now (but we are not), moving not only people but crucial and vulnerable infrastructure. it will only get more expensive the longer it's put off.
but like, what about Florida? nearly the entire population (20+ million) is going to have to move, eventually. where the hell will they go? the Mid West can only accommodate so many...
posted by supermedusa at 11:16 AM on February 29 [2 favorites]
Has ANYONE articulated what will happen WHEN NYC is uninhabitable? At some point won't the subways be filled and unable to be drained from a storm surge, for one very small point? I see these reports but never a plan for where NYC (for one) residents will go?
posted by tiny frying pan at 11:34 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]
posted by tiny frying pan at 11:34 AM on February 29 [1 favorite]
there is no plan
posted by supermedusa at 11:37 AM on February 29 [7 favorites]
posted by supermedusa at 11:37 AM on February 29 [7 favorites]
cool
posted by tiny frying pan at 11:45 AM on February 29 [3 favorites]
posted by tiny frying pan at 11:45 AM on February 29 [3 favorites]
If the East Coasters all move to "heartland" rural red counties, just about the whole country could turn blue.
posted by Western Infidels at 12:36 PM on February 29 [2 favorites]
posted by Western Infidels at 12:36 PM on February 29 [2 favorites]
(Eventually the U.S. will take over Canada one way or another for the water and we'll all be one big miserable, impoverished family.
Canada is not quite the vast storehouse of untapped natural resources that some Americans seem to picture it as.)
posted by eviemath at 12:36 PM on February 29 [11 favorites]
Canada is not quite the vast storehouse of untapped natural resources that some Americans seem to picture it as.)
posted by eviemath at 12:36 PM on February 29 [11 favorites]
Laugh if at us if you like, but I'm thinking this bolsters my case - long mocked in my own family - for abandoning D.C. for Milwaukee or Cleveland.
If they would rather start a new life as Waterworld: The Reality instead of running the risk of encountering hotdish and curds, man, let 'em!
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 1:26 PM on February 29 [2 favorites]
If they would rather start a new life as Waterworld: The Reality instead of running the risk of encountering hotdish and curds, man, let 'em!
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 1:26 PM on February 29 [2 favorites]
Has ANYONE articulated what will happen WHEN NYC is uninhabitable?
Rent would, somehow, still go up.
posted by star gentle uterus at 1:31 PM on February 29 [20 favorites]
Rent would, somehow, still go up.
posted by star gentle uterus at 1:31 PM on February 29 [20 favorites]
We have the same problem back home in Western Australia where too much water has been withdrawn from Perth's superficial aquifer, the Gnangara Mound. It's devastating local wetlands as well as the local cave systems.
The solution so far has been a shift to desalination and drilling bores down to the two lower aquifers (Yaragadee's saturated layer is ~2km/1.25 miles thick, the Ogallala Aquifer in comparison is 300m/1000ft at its thickest) and drawing more from there along with pumping in treated waste water into back into the highest superficial aquifer. They aim to rebalance the whole system by 2032 to stop any further degradation but I don't see any sort of urgency about aquifer overuse here in Mass.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 1:37 PM on February 29 [7 favorites]
The solution so far has been a shift to desalination and drilling bores down to the two lower aquifers (Yaragadee's saturated layer is ~2km/1.25 miles thick, the Ogallala Aquifer in comparison is 300m/1000ft at its thickest) and drawing more from there along with pumping in treated waste water into back into the highest superficial aquifer. They aim to rebalance the whole system by 2032 to stop any further degradation but I don't see any sort of urgency about aquifer overuse here in Mass.
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 1:37 PM on February 29 [7 favorites]
In not-unrelated news:
'Omen of the Future': Off-The-Charts Hot Oceans Scare Scientists
posted by non canadian guy at 1:46 PM on February 29 [8 favorites]
'Omen of the Future': Off-The-Charts Hot Oceans Scare Scientists
posted by non canadian guy at 1:46 PM on February 29 [8 favorites]
There are other places where this much worse. These Cities Are Sinking Into the Ground (National Geographic). Mexico City (8.8 million) is sinking over a foot a year. Jakarta (10.5 million) has an annual relative sea level rise (sea rise + subsidence) of 10 inches in some areas.
No amount of engineering can solve that, though we'll try. Indonesia plans to:
* Move the capital to a new planned city (a al Brasilia I guess)
* extend the coastal wall and build an island in Jakarta
The NG article talks about how many cities are built near river deltas, which have very compressible soil. But the root cause is pretty much emptying the aquifer. And not to get deep into the argument above, but yes resources are incredibly unfairly distributed in the world and yes there are still too many people for our ecosystem and biological equilibrium, and no that doesn't imply some sort of eugenics or black helicopters program even though some past and current ZPG people have been super racist and terrible. We have definitely overstepped our carrying capacity by a lot, especially considering that fossil fuels are required to sustain the agricultural revolution and we insist on enormous cities where the resources under and around them do not and cannot keep that many people at a reasonable living standard.
Sorry, I did go into the population derail ... the main thing is that no matter how much climate (and environmental) reporting is finally catching up and highlighting this stuff, the actual reality in the next 20-50 years is going to be messier and maybe worse than the moderately concerning FPP link. We should all keep fighting the good fight, though, as it's not all or nothing: every little thing we do to solve the problems is going to make the world some tiny percent better and reduce future suffering by some other tiny amount. It's just pretty tough for a lot of people, including me, to grapple with.
Please keep posting this stuff!
posted by caviar2d2 at 2:24 PM on February 29 [15 favorites]
No amount of engineering can solve that, though we'll try. Indonesia plans to:
* Move the capital to a new planned city (a al Brasilia I guess)
* extend the coastal wall and build an island in Jakarta
The NG article talks about how many cities are built near river deltas, which have very compressible soil. But the root cause is pretty much emptying the aquifer. And not to get deep into the argument above, but yes resources are incredibly unfairly distributed in the world and yes there are still too many people for our ecosystem and biological equilibrium, and no that doesn't imply some sort of eugenics or black helicopters program even though some past and current ZPG people have been super racist and terrible. We have definitely overstepped our carrying capacity by a lot, especially considering that fossil fuels are required to sustain the agricultural revolution and we insist on enormous cities where the resources under and around them do not and cannot keep that many people at a reasonable living standard.
Sorry, I did go into the population derail ... the main thing is that no matter how much climate (and environmental) reporting is finally catching up and highlighting this stuff, the actual reality in the next 20-50 years is going to be messier and maybe worse than the moderately concerning FPP link. We should all keep fighting the good fight, though, as it's not all or nothing: every little thing we do to solve the problems is going to make the world some tiny percent better and reduce future suffering by some other tiny amount. It's just pretty tough for a lot of people, including me, to grapple with.
Please keep posting this stuff!
posted by caviar2d2 at 2:24 PM on February 29 [15 favorites]
If the East Coasters all move to "heartland" rural red counties, just about the whole country could turn blue.
It's unlikely that people in resettlement camps will be able to vote.
There'll be too busy digging and filling in holes anyway.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 3:02 PM on February 29 [3 favorites]
It's unlikely that people in resettlement camps will be able to vote.
There'll be too busy digging and filling in holes anyway.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 3:02 PM on February 29 [3 favorites]
It took us this long to figure out what was happening to the East coast of the United States. Some of the most expensive real estate on the planet. Where some of the most prestigious universities with the best-funded science departments live.
New Law in North Carolina Bans Latest Scientific Predictions of Sea-Level Rise
New Law in North Carolina Bans Latest Scientific Predictions of Sea-Level Rise
Aug. 2, 2012 -- A new law in North Carolina will ban the state from basing coastal policies on the latest scientific predictions of how much the sea level will rise, prompting environmentalists to accuse the state of disrespecting climate science.posted by achrise at 3:27 PM on February 29 [10 favorites]
LOL i love the idea that East Coasters will literally flee the country as refugees before moving to the Midwest
Not an east coaster by birth but this DC transplant and Colorado native def won't be moving anywhere in between if I can goddamn well help it; for one thing the midwest is flat as hell and if the water's rising I'ma try to get some elevation. For another thing, macaroni salad, WTF.
posted by aspersioncast at 3:34 PM on February 29 [3 favorites]
Not an east coaster by birth but this DC transplant and Colorado native def won't be moving anywhere in between if I can goddamn well help it; for one thing the midwest is flat as hell and if the water's rising I'ma try to get some elevation. For another thing, macaroni salad, WTF.
posted by aspersioncast at 3:34 PM on February 29 [3 favorites]
(#notallmidwest?)
posted by aspersioncast at 3:34 PM on February 29 [1 favorite]
posted by aspersioncast at 3:34 PM on February 29 [1 favorite]
We must return to the traditions of our ancestors. Throw our garbage on the ground! Our tels shall rise above the floodwaters!
posted by AdamCSnider at 3:48 PM on February 29 [2 favorites]
posted by AdamCSnider at 3:48 PM on February 29 [2 favorites]
the midwest is flat as hell and if the water's rising I'ma try to get some elevation.
Just because it's flat doesn't mean it at risk of sea-level rise...it may be flat but it's still 200+ feet above sea level, unlike the coasts which are at sea level. There may be other reasons you dont want to move to the midwest but this is a pretty weird one to cite.
posted by LizBoBiz at 4:21 PM on February 29 [8 favorites]
Just because it's flat doesn't mean it at risk of sea-level rise...it may be flat but it's still 200+ feet above sea level, unlike the coasts which are at sea level. There may be other reasons you dont want to move to the midwest but this is a pretty weird one to cite.
posted by LizBoBiz at 4:21 PM on February 29 [8 favorites]
we need a planned economy, and that planned economy absolutely must prioritize keeping folks alive and keeping the world from melting over all other concerns, even though the results this planned economy must yield must more closely resemble the economies of the old eastern bloc rather than the economies of the 20th century western liberal capitalist countries.
this cannot be done via a market economy, because no matter how hard you try there’s no way to get a market to yield eastern bloc results. and so we must get rid of our “efficient” market systems and replace them with clunky inefficient hilariously dimwitted planned economies or we are all fucked.
for my part, i would give up a whole lot to live in an economy where no one has all that much, where everyone has to stand in long queues sometimes, where you’re stuck using the same damn razor for six months cause none of the stores ever have any in stock, where no one works quite so hard as most people most places work these days, where no one gets paid more than peanuts, and where the world doesn’t melt. a whole fuckin’ lot.
i started out as an lumpenproletarian ragamuffin indifferently raised by neglectful-at-best criminals (not the good type) whose candleless pumpkinheads were both beslimed on the inside with a spicy melange of undiagnosed mental illness and raw viciousness, and despite my best efforts to dodge money all my life i have somehow become a petit-bourgeois mortgage payer with a stack of money in the bank and a job that pays far too much for what it is. even so, the relative comfort i experience as someone paid dumb amounts of money to do a graeberian bullshit job is palpably far, far less than the comfort I’d experience in an economy where everyone was brokeass and no one starved and everyone had a shitty rundown apartment and no one was homeless, where no one works all that hard and no one gets paid all that much. this is because i know for a fact that there are a large number of plausible catastrophes that could knock me all the way back down to the “do street crime or starve to death” demographic at any time — most especially i am always aware that it could all go away in a split second if too many of the mental illness timebombs that my bad parents and their bad genes and their neglectful-at-best parenting planted in my brain go off at once.
so, yeah, give me the economy of east germany circa 1985. give me the economy of cuba circa right now. being relatively wealthy in a first-worldish economy feels like shit even before taking into account that all the knick-knacks and unsatisfying luxuries that this economy wants to throw at me despite my best efforts to dodge money are also precisely the things that are gearing up to sink new york forever.
give me comfortable poverty and a healthy safety net or give me death. give everyone comfortable poverty and a healthy safety net, at gunpoint if necessary, or the very efficient market will very efficiently consign us to graves under hot seawater.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 4:28 PM on February 29 [9 favorites]
this cannot be done via a market economy, because no matter how hard you try there’s no way to get a market to yield eastern bloc results. and so we must get rid of our “efficient” market systems and replace them with clunky inefficient hilariously dimwitted planned economies or we are all fucked.
for my part, i would give up a whole lot to live in an economy where no one has all that much, where everyone has to stand in long queues sometimes, where you’re stuck using the same damn razor for six months cause none of the stores ever have any in stock, where no one works quite so hard as most people most places work these days, where no one gets paid more than peanuts, and where the world doesn’t melt. a whole fuckin’ lot.
i started out as an lumpenproletarian ragamuffin indifferently raised by neglectful-at-best criminals (not the good type) whose candleless pumpkinheads were both beslimed on the inside with a spicy melange of undiagnosed mental illness and raw viciousness, and despite my best efforts to dodge money all my life i have somehow become a petit-bourgeois mortgage payer with a stack of money in the bank and a job that pays far too much for what it is. even so, the relative comfort i experience as someone paid dumb amounts of money to do a graeberian bullshit job is palpably far, far less than the comfort I’d experience in an economy where everyone was brokeass and no one starved and everyone had a shitty rundown apartment and no one was homeless, where no one works all that hard and no one gets paid all that much. this is because i know for a fact that there are a large number of plausible catastrophes that could knock me all the way back down to the “do street crime or starve to death” demographic at any time — most especially i am always aware that it could all go away in a split second if too many of the mental illness timebombs that my bad parents and their bad genes and their neglectful-at-best parenting planted in my brain go off at once.
so, yeah, give me the economy of east germany circa 1985. give me the economy of cuba circa right now. being relatively wealthy in a first-worldish economy feels like shit even before taking into account that all the knick-knacks and unsatisfying luxuries that this economy wants to throw at me despite my best efforts to dodge money are also precisely the things that are gearing up to sink new york forever.
give me comfortable poverty and a healthy safety net or give me death. give everyone comfortable poverty and a healthy safety net, at gunpoint if necessary, or the very efficient market will very efficiently consign us to graves under hot seawater.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 4:28 PM on February 29 [9 favorites]
dignified poverty now! universal dignified poverty now!
this has been your bombastic lowercase pronouncement for the day, and maybe the most important of all the bombastic lowercase pronouncements to date
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 4:40 PM on February 29 [5 favorites]
this has been your bombastic lowercase pronouncement for the day, and maybe the most important of all the bombastic lowercase pronouncements to date
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 4:40 PM on February 29 [5 favorites]
at gunpoint if necessary
To be honest, it sounds like you want not just the economy but also the Stasi of east Germany, which wasn't super great? There's a reason people died trying to get out, and it wasn't just because they wanted capitalism.
posted by LizBoBiz at 4:47 PM on February 29 [3 favorites]
To be honest, it sounds like you want not just the economy but also the Stasi of east Germany, which wasn't super great? There's a reason people died trying to get out, and it wasn't just because they wanted capitalism.
posted by LizBoBiz at 4:47 PM on February 29 [3 favorites]
LizBoBiz, how else do you expect the rich to give up their unearned wealth?
posted by sagc at 4:57 PM on February 29 [4 favorites]
posted by sagc at 4:57 PM on February 29 [4 favorites]
Ah see, I'm of the notion that it will be the rich with their guns pointed at the poors.
posted by LizBoBiz at 5:27 PM on February 29 [6 favorites]
posted by LizBoBiz at 5:27 PM on February 29 [6 favorites]
But even here, we don't have a mental model: We picture rich people ordering us around from their compounds or sea cities or whatever, but if that wealth is based on real estate on the East Coast, it will be gone. I'm not even sure how you have the NYSE at that point--certainly not with its hyperfast internet connections for picosecond trades or whatever they're up to right now. If you have a slow stock market, and skyscrapers are uninhabitable (which, I mean, that's not going to happen tomorrow or ten years from now, but it's coming), (oh, and the insurance industry collapses) then our entire modern conception of wealth becomes very tricky.
posted by mittens at 5:38 PM on February 29 [4 favorites]
posted by mittens at 5:38 PM on February 29 [4 favorites]
I'd rather not be impoverished, dignified or otherwise. I'll even move to Cleveland if necessary. I can quit the ocean any time.
posted by otsebyatina at 6:01 PM on February 29 [1 favorite]
posted by otsebyatina at 6:01 PM on February 29 [1 favorite]
Yeah, yeah, everything is terrible, the world is ending, we're all gonna die.
Why is no one talking about how horrible the presentation of that article is? A map I can slowly scroll up and down on while factoids pop up and slide at vastly different rates? I don't need inrushing ocean waters, I got seasick just trying to read about it.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 7:01 PM on February 29 [8 favorites]
Why is no one talking about how horrible the presentation of that article is? A map I can slowly scroll up and down on while factoids pop up and slide at vastly different rates? I don't need inrushing ocean waters, I got seasick just trying to read about it.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 7:01 PM on February 29 [8 favorites]
I'm just going to go ahead and laugh, a tiny little bit, because I grew up in Los Angeles and the "falling into the ocean" jokes, along with the airhead jokes and the lack of culture jokes and the overwhelming tide of assholes moving to LA to pronounce how crap it was, makes getting older and moving to the Midwest seem like the funniest f-u I could ever give to those smug ghosts. I have lots of fresh water nearby, too.
In serious vein, caviar2d2 comment was FANTASTIC; I appreciate the information and pragmatism. As I plan my garden, I'll be installing rain barrels anyway, tending the land so it's healthy and I can share produce, help others.
posted by winesong at 7:15 PM on February 29 [5 favorites]
In serious vein, caviar2d2 comment was FANTASTIC; I appreciate the information and pragmatism. As I plan my garden, I'll be installing rain barrels anyway, tending the land so it's healthy and I can share produce, help others.
posted by winesong at 7:15 PM on February 29 [5 favorites]
...if that wealth is based on real estate on the East Coast, it will be gone. I'm not even sure how you have the NYSE at that point... ...skyscrapers are uninhabitable...
The current NYSE sits on land that is about 30 feet above sea level (and most of Manhattan is significantly higher than that). 30 ft is higher than almost the entire nation of Bangladesh. By the time wealthy east coast USAians feel the sort of pain you're talking about, hundreds of millions of the global poor are going to have experienced a heck of a lot worse.
posted by judgement day at 8:32 PM on February 29 [7 favorites]
The current NYSE sits on land that is about 30 feet above sea level (and most of Manhattan is significantly higher than that). 30 ft is higher than almost the entire nation of Bangladesh. By the time wealthy east coast USAians feel the sort of pain you're talking about, hundreds of millions of the global poor are going to have experienced a heck of a lot worse.
posted by judgement day at 8:32 PM on February 29 [7 favorites]
Nobody here wants to hear this, but the absolute most effective long-term thing you can do for the environment as a citizen of the US, Canada, or Europe is don't have any children. Not because of "overpopulation", which really isn't a thing, but because every single resident of those countries contributes to climate change (by way of carbon emissions, plastic garbage, etc) way more than anyone else in the fucking world.
posted by adrienneleigh at 10:06 PM on February 29 [3 favorites]
posted by adrienneleigh at 10:06 PM on February 29 [3 favorites]
Has ANYONE articulated what will happen WHEN NYC is uninhabitable?
Sell their houses.
posted by Pendragon at 12:33 AM on March 1
Sell their houses.
posted by Pendragon at 12:33 AM on March 1
I mean, we can handle this, if we want to.
I completely agree, but the "we" part is sticky, because the covid pandemic, among other things, has demonstrated that a significant chunk of the U.S. population doesn’t want there to be a “we.” Of course I mean the right-wing contingent that votes Republican; though of course not all Republicans and many who claim to be centrist, Libertarians, etc. (It’s somewhat simplistic to label them as MAGA, but it works as a shorthand.)
Or rather, MAGAs want “we” to mean a select group of people that only the approve of, and they seem to disapprove of those of the wrong color, sexual orientation, etc.
Something as “simple” as going to the doctor and getting a shot forces people to draw a line in the sand and fucking die over, so what will it mean to uproot entire cities and relocate them in new areas. I can already imagine the issues and problems and nightmares that MAGAs would cause when it’s people and neighborhoods and homeowners and careers, and just life uprooted. I would love for everyone to gain empathy for everyone else in such a situation, but some people just want to watch the world burn.
posted by zardoz at 3:29 AM on March 1 [5 favorites]
I completely agree, but the "we" part is sticky, because the covid pandemic, among other things, has demonstrated that a significant chunk of the U.S. population doesn’t want there to be a “we.” Of course I mean the right-wing contingent that votes Republican; though of course not all Republicans and many who claim to be centrist, Libertarians, etc. (It’s somewhat simplistic to label them as MAGA, but it works as a shorthand.)
Or rather, MAGAs want “we” to mean a select group of people that only the approve of, and they seem to disapprove of those of the wrong color, sexual orientation, etc.
Something as “simple” as going to the doctor and getting a shot forces people to draw a line in the sand and fucking die over, so what will it mean to uproot entire cities and relocate them in new areas. I can already imagine the issues and problems and nightmares that MAGAs would cause when it’s people and neighborhoods and homeowners and careers, and just life uprooted. I would love for everyone to gain empathy for everyone else in such a situation, but some people just want to watch the world burn.
posted by zardoz at 3:29 AM on March 1 [5 favorites]
But even here, we don't have a mental model: We picture rich people ordering us around from their compounds or sea cities or whatever
As has been noted here before, if we reach a state of genuine economic collapse, or even a serious devaluation of money, it seems highly likely that the rich will be immediately murdered by their help.
posted by ryanshepard at 5:07 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]
As has been noted here before, if we reach a state of genuine economic collapse, or even a serious devaluation of money, it seems highly likely that the rich will be immediately murdered by their help.
posted by ryanshepard at 5:07 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]
It's humanity trying to organize our species at an entirely unprecedented level to face an extinction event.
And the longer we persist in the parochial delusion that the extinction we need to be acting with the most urgency to prevent is that of H. sap specifically, the worse our descendants are going to fare.
There are eight billion of us on this planet right now and rising, which is more than its web of life can carry over the long term. We've got away with it over the few centuries it's taken this population bomb to go off by killing off indigenous peoples and drawing down irreplaceable reserves of fossil fuels and water but we can't keep on doing that for more than another few generations, either because the non-renewable resources themselves are disappearing (non-renewable, duh) or because using them has destructive side effects like climate change.
A sustainable planetary population of H. sap is going to be more like two billion than eight, because we need to leave room for everything else to thrive as well.
Whether we manage to ease our population down to that kind of figure gently via natural attrition and voluntary birth rate self-control, or whether we continue to do our best impersonation of a mouse plague and just eat everything until there's nothing left and we crash, is up to us. But whichever way we go about it, we're going to continue making other species go extinct just from the pressure our sheer numbers exert on all the resources they rely on.
If we manage to wipe ourselves out as well - and for the foreseeable future that's a pretty big if, given the staggering population base we're starting from - then we're well down at the tail end of the extinctions queue, and the most likely ultimate cause of our extinction will be the ecological impoverishment we've inflicted on ourselves by killing off everything else before getting to that point. Get it badly wrong and we could plausibly drop the carrying capacity for H. sap of this planet and any accessible Planets B from billions all the way down to millions.
It ought to be manifestly obvious that the more diversity of life we can maintain on this planet, the better all its occupants - us included - will do over the long term. And the single most consequential decision any of the present eight billion can make on an individual level with respect to that aim is whether or not to leave behind a tree of descendants of some unknowable size greater than zero.
We're the smart ones, yeah? Are we not the ones capable of understanding that every allele we possess is already more than thoroughly represented already across the existing populace? Or understanding that each one of us sharing 99% of our genetics with any randomly selected orangutan calls for a fairly radical re-imagining of what "family" and "tribe" and "us" should mean? Or deploying convenient forms of contraception that decouple our actual reproduction rate from the hardwired urges that would otherwise doom us to the boom and bust cycle seen in every top predator that has come before us?
So yeah. We need to organize ourselves not just to face the current, ongoing extinction event but to do our level best to slow it down. Make room! Make room!
And the more resources any of us currently has access too, the stronger becomes the moral imperative to hand that access on to somebody other than an immediate biological descendant. It's not like existing kids in desperate need of a stable and loving family environment are in short supply.
posted by flabdablet at 5:30 AM on March 1 [3 favorites]
And the longer we persist in the parochial delusion that the extinction we need to be acting with the most urgency to prevent is that of H. sap specifically, the worse our descendants are going to fare.
There are eight billion of us on this planet right now and rising, which is more than its web of life can carry over the long term. We've got away with it over the few centuries it's taken this population bomb to go off by killing off indigenous peoples and drawing down irreplaceable reserves of fossil fuels and water but we can't keep on doing that for more than another few generations, either because the non-renewable resources themselves are disappearing (non-renewable, duh) or because using them has destructive side effects like climate change.
A sustainable planetary population of H. sap is going to be more like two billion than eight, because we need to leave room for everything else to thrive as well.
Whether we manage to ease our population down to that kind of figure gently via natural attrition and voluntary birth rate self-control, or whether we continue to do our best impersonation of a mouse plague and just eat everything until there's nothing left and we crash, is up to us. But whichever way we go about it, we're going to continue making other species go extinct just from the pressure our sheer numbers exert on all the resources they rely on.
If we manage to wipe ourselves out as well - and for the foreseeable future that's a pretty big if, given the staggering population base we're starting from - then we're well down at the tail end of the extinctions queue, and the most likely ultimate cause of our extinction will be the ecological impoverishment we've inflicted on ourselves by killing off everything else before getting to that point. Get it badly wrong and we could plausibly drop the carrying capacity for H. sap of this planet and any accessible Planets B from billions all the way down to millions.
It ought to be manifestly obvious that the more diversity of life we can maintain on this planet, the better all its occupants - us included - will do over the long term. And the single most consequential decision any of the present eight billion can make on an individual level with respect to that aim is whether or not to leave behind a tree of descendants of some unknowable size greater than zero.
We're the smart ones, yeah? Are we not the ones capable of understanding that every allele we possess is already more than thoroughly represented already across the existing populace? Or understanding that each one of us sharing 99% of our genetics with any randomly selected orangutan calls for a fairly radical re-imagining of what "family" and "tribe" and "us" should mean? Or deploying convenient forms of contraception that decouple our actual reproduction rate from the hardwired urges that would otherwise doom us to the boom and bust cycle seen in every top predator that has come before us?
So yeah. We need to organize ourselves not just to face the current, ongoing extinction event but to do our level best to slow it down. Make room! Make room!
And the more resources any of us currently has access too, the stronger becomes the moral imperative to hand that access on to somebody other than an immediate biological descendant. It's not like existing kids in desperate need of a stable and loving family environment are in short supply.
posted by flabdablet at 5:30 AM on March 1 [3 favorites]
eviemath - "Canada is not quite the vast storehouse of untapped natural resources that some Americans seem to picture it as.)
As I age, the metaphor of Canada as "America's attic" becomes more literal.
I now own a barn. All of my people own barns, this is a hard fact. We used to build them but the residential housing stock in our community has now exhausted the option - every property has a barn on it, now.
When we bought our homestead I was especially impressed with the quality of the barn. The previous owner had done it right. The entire thing was built out of lvl headers. I postulate that the family who built the barn owned an lvl header manufacturing operation. Anyway.
I told my spouse the story of our barns. "They fill up with shit." My partner was distracted, I could tell they weren't really paying attention. "Seriously," I said, "it seems impossible, but within a few years they are floor-to-ceiling bullshit."
They dismissed my concerns. "Well, don't fill it up with shit." I nodded - but in my brain I said, "you don't understand."
I studiously avoided putting any bullshit in the barn. I was approached on three separate occasions by proximate family members who wanted to store shit in my barn. Literally yesterday I participated in a group-text chat where it was clear that I was being shamed for not storing their shit in my barn.
"It's a Jenny Lind bed, it's been in our family for ages. Your brother can't take it - he lives a thousand miles away! It would be so sad if it ended up in a dump."
So help me God I will build a moat around my barn.
Yet it haunts me. The empty space. Last week I went up into the barn. So beautiful and precious, so empty.
What I'm saying is, Canada: don't let us in. Don't do it. The pressure will become unbearable. Don't do it, there is no returning. Interminable, the shit is interminable, it flows in one direction - into the barn. Avoid this at all costs.
posted by Baby_Balrog at 5:35 AM on March 1 [23 favorites]
As I age, the metaphor of Canada as "America's attic" becomes more literal.
I now own a barn. All of my people own barns, this is a hard fact. We used to build them but the residential housing stock in our community has now exhausted the option - every property has a barn on it, now.
When we bought our homestead I was especially impressed with the quality of the barn. The previous owner had done it right. The entire thing was built out of lvl headers. I postulate that the family who built the barn owned an lvl header manufacturing operation. Anyway.
I told my spouse the story of our barns. "They fill up with shit." My partner was distracted, I could tell they weren't really paying attention. "Seriously," I said, "it seems impossible, but within a few years they are floor-to-ceiling bullshit."
They dismissed my concerns. "Well, don't fill it up with shit." I nodded - but in my brain I said, "you don't understand."
I studiously avoided putting any bullshit in the barn. I was approached on three separate occasions by proximate family members who wanted to store shit in my barn. Literally yesterday I participated in a group-text chat where it was clear that I was being shamed for not storing their shit in my barn.
"It's a Jenny Lind bed, it's been in our family for ages. Your brother can't take it - he lives a thousand miles away! It would be so sad if it ended up in a dump."
So help me God I will build a moat around my barn.
Yet it haunts me. The empty space. Last week I went up into the barn. So beautiful and precious, so empty.
What I'm saying is, Canada: don't let us in. Don't do it. The pressure will become unbearable. Don't do it, there is no returning. Interminable, the shit is interminable, it flows in one direction - into the barn. Avoid this at all costs.
posted by Baby_Balrog at 5:35 AM on March 1 [23 favorites]
So help me God I will build a moat around my barn.
When you're done, you could store the excavator inside it! Sounds like you've got room.
posted by flabdablet at 5:55 AM on March 1 [8 favorites]
When you're done, you could store the excavator inside it! Sounds like you've got room.
posted by flabdablet at 5:55 AM on March 1 [8 favorites]
Yes, in order to keep the biosphere habitable we'd have to not only stop, but reverse the sixth extinction event, which is already in progress.
The idea that our species has the power to do that seems like a patriarchal delusion to me.
What if world peace doesn't suddenly break out? What if the wealthy and powerful don't change their behavior completely and learn to collaborate for the common good? What if our species can't organize at a high enough level to take on a challenge of this magnitude?
Perhaps we should be humble enough to build some contingency plans that account for these possibilities.
Like, you know, bunkers.
But in the meantime, good luck convincing most of the major religions in the world to reverse their position on human fertility.
posted by MrVisible at 6:20 AM on March 1
The idea that our species has the power to do that seems like a patriarchal delusion to me.
What if world peace doesn't suddenly break out? What if the wealthy and powerful don't change their behavior completely and learn to collaborate for the common good? What if our species can't organize at a high enough level to take on a challenge of this magnitude?
Perhaps we should be humble enough to build some contingency plans that account for these possibilities.
Like, you know, bunkers.
But in the meantime, good luck convincing most of the major religions in the world to reverse their position on human fertility.
posted by MrVisible at 6:20 AM on March 1
And in case you didn't know, this is what sea surface temperatures have been up to lately.
posted by MrVisible at 6:29 AM on March 1 [3 favorites]
posted by MrVisible at 6:29 AM on March 1 [3 favorites]
There’s never a shortage of room if you have an excavator. Plus, I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that even if you’re having trouble getting the excavator out of the hole, you can just leave it there and use it as a new furnace.
posted by mubba at 6:30 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]
posted by mubba at 6:30 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]
robotmachine: “See you down in Arizona bay.”Bad news about Arizona.
“AI Is Taking the Drinking Water in Goodyear, Arizona,” Karen Hao, The Atlantic, 01 March 2024
posted by ob1quixote at 7:28 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]
I really like KSR's 2140 because its soooo NYC that the city would be half-submerged and buildings are collapsing but everyone is still hustling and trying to make a buck. so true.
NY is sinking at 3cm per decade, so 120 years from now: 12 decades: 36 cm. NY will be down one solid foot.
posted by The_Vegetables at 7:38 AM on March 1
NY is sinking at 3cm per decade, so 120 years from now: 12 decades: 36 cm. NY will be down one solid foot.
posted by The_Vegetables at 7:38 AM on March 1
And how much will the sea have risen in 120 years?
posted by supermedusa at 8:04 AM on March 1 [1 favorite]
posted by supermedusa at 8:04 AM on March 1 [1 favorite]
And how much will the sea have risen in 120 years?
Are you actually asking me? It's rising at 4.62mm per year, so 4.62mm * 120 = 554mm, or about 2 ft.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:32 AM on March 1
Are you actually asking me? It's rising at 4.62mm per year, so 4.62mm * 120 = 554mm, or about 2 ft.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:32 AM on March 1
A sustainable planetary population of H. sap is going to be more like two billion than eight.
Instead, we're going to get to two billion plus eight soon enough.
The population of the world was two billion in 1927. It had doubled by the time I was seven in 1975, 48 years later. By the time I was 55 last year—another 48 years later—it had doubled again.
It's unlikely to double again by 2071. The rate of growth has slowed. Between 1951 and 1993 world population growth was never below 1.5% a year, and often closer to 2%. Between 1994 and 2012 it was never below 1.25%, but never above 1.5%. Since 2020 it hasn't been above 1%. That's better than past rates of growth, but it still suggests we'll hit 10 billion around the middle of the century.
What's especially striking is looking at the absolute growth figures. Every year since 1951, the world population has grown by between 43 million and 93 million people. Last year it grew by 70 million people. We've been adding a large country's worth every single year for seven decades.
Harry Harrison's Make Room! Make Room! (which flabdablet referenced above), written from the vantage point of a world of 3.4 billion in 1966, predicted a world of seven billion people by 1999. He was only a billion over, or twelve years too early, depending which way you look at it. He overestimated the rate of US growth, though. The book ended with a Times Square billboard on new year's eve announcing that the US had reached 344 million citizens. The chances are it'll reach that figure this year.
We aren't going to get back down to two billion in any kind of timely way voluntarily. To get back there by mid-century would require the global population to fall by 5% a year every year for the next 25-30 years: 400 million this year, a bit less next year, and so on down to a mere 100 million drop in the final year.
Our usual human methods of eradicating each other won't get us there. Estimated deaths in World War II were 70-85 million, 3-4% of the global population of the time, and that was over six years.
As for involuntary means, Covid won't get us there. The estimated global deaths in the pandemic have been somewhere in the region of 15-30 million (7 million confirmed to date), a fraction of a percentage point.
It would take something almost but not quite as bad as the Black Death: 50% of Europe's population dying in the space of seven years was a loss of around 10% a year. At a loss of 5% a year it would take 13-14 years to halve a population. So we need two plagues in succession, each of them half as bad as the Black Death.
Or a series of equivalent events as awful and as devastating as that.
posted by rory at 8:38 AM on March 1 [3 favorites]
Instead, we're going to get to two billion plus eight soon enough.
The population of the world was two billion in 1927. It had doubled by the time I was seven in 1975, 48 years later. By the time I was 55 last year—another 48 years later—it had doubled again.
It's unlikely to double again by 2071. The rate of growth has slowed. Between 1951 and 1993 world population growth was never below 1.5% a year, and often closer to 2%. Between 1994 and 2012 it was never below 1.25%, but never above 1.5%. Since 2020 it hasn't been above 1%. That's better than past rates of growth, but it still suggests we'll hit 10 billion around the middle of the century.
What's especially striking is looking at the absolute growth figures. Every year since 1951, the world population has grown by between 43 million and 93 million people. Last year it grew by 70 million people. We've been adding a large country's worth every single year for seven decades.
Harry Harrison's Make Room! Make Room! (which flabdablet referenced above), written from the vantage point of a world of 3.4 billion in 1966, predicted a world of seven billion people by 1999. He was only a billion over, or twelve years too early, depending which way you look at it. He overestimated the rate of US growth, though. The book ended with a Times Square billboard on new year's eve announcing that the US had reached 344 million citizens. The chances are it'll reach that figure this year.
We aren't going to get back down to two billion in any kind of timely way voluntarily. To get back there by mid-century would require the global population to fall by 5% a year every year for the next 25-30 years: 400 million this year, a bit less next year, and so on down to a mere 100 million drop in the final year.
Our usual human methods of eradicating each other won't get us there. Estimated deaths in World War II were 70-85 million, 3-4% of the global population of the time, and that was over six years.
As for involuntary means, Covid won't get us there. The estimated global deaths in the pandemic have been somewhere in the region of 15-30 million (7 million confirmed to date), a fraction of a percentage point.
It would take something almost but not quite as bad as the Black Death: 50% of Europe's population dying in the space of seven years was a loss of around 10% a year. At a loss of 5% a year it would take 13-14 years to halve a population. So we need two plagues in succession, each of them half as bad as the Black Death.
Or a series of equivalent events as awful and as devastating as that.
posted by rory at 8:38 AM on March 1 [3 favorites]
The_Vegetables that is at the current rate of rising. if (as is likely) the rate of rising increases (say a collapse of Antarctic ice sheets, all of Greenland's land ice melting etc.,) combined with this land subsiding...then you throw in the occasional hurricane, and you will have Sandy level events becoming a regular feature.
This is not catastrophizing (I do that too, but I know the difference) this is just what is coming, and people/governments/whatnot should be preparing for it.
posted by supermedusa at 9:32 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]
This is not catastrophizing (I do that too, but I know the difference) this is just what is coming, and people/governments/whatnot should be preparing for it.
posted by supermedusa at 9:32 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]
Much of Hawaii has higher elevation than the midwestern US.
link
posted by waving at 12:22 PM on March 1 [1 favorite]
link
posted by waving at 12:22 PM on March 1 [1 favorite]
Because all these numbers can be a little hard to visualize, I'll share my favorite link for this, NOAA's Sea Level Rise viewer. It's very easy to plug in different values, and see what areas will be affected. One suggestion to start, choose one of the optimistic projections, where we maintain 1.5 C heating and have only a 55-cm rise. (Avoid turning the scale much higher than that unless you want to be depressed the rest of the day.)
posted by mittens at 12:48 PM on March 1 [3 favorites]
posted by mittens at 12:48 PM on March 1 [3 favorites]
Stuff we can do on the population overload issue that's also good for people:
* make sure all women / possible baby-havers are in charge of their reproductive choices
* embrace increased but orderly immigration to countries with declining birth rates
* (the hard one) phase out capitalism/growth economies in favor of sustainable ones. Capitalism is the main reason aging populations and declining birth rates are portrayed as a "crisis". There are plenty of humans available to take care of the old people if we value that.
* Spend 100x as much on statecraft and conflict resolution for wars and conflicts as we do on weapons production rather than the other way around (made-up ratio)
* Outlaw or heavily tax industries that use water and other resources without providing a benefit to humanity as a whole (crypto, luxury goods, unnecessary duplicate goods - esp. plastic)
* Related to last one: use laws, taxes, and social pressure to decrease resource use by developed world consumers (anyone remember the very first SUVs that we mocked and were outraged by? what happened there?)
* find out how to focus on local communities over large systems without going back to the bad kind of tribalism
* ???
posted by caviar2d2 at 7:35 AM on March 2 [6 favorites]
* make sure all women / possible baby-havers are in charge of their reproductive choices
* embrace increased but orderly immigration to countries with declining birth rates
* (the hard one) phase out capitalism/growth economies in favor of sustainable ones. Capitalism is the main reason aging populations and declining birth rates are portrayed as a "crisis". There are plenty of humans available to take care of the old people if we value that.
* Spend 100x as much on statecraft and conflict resolution for wars and conflicts as we do on weapons production rather than the other way around (made-up ratio)
* Outlaw or heavily tax industries that use water and other resources without providing a benefit to humanity as a whole (crypto, luxury goods, unnecessary duplicate goods - esp. plastic)
* Related to last one: use laws, taxes, and social pressure to decrease resource use by developed world consumers (anyone remember the very first SUVs that we mocked and were outraged by? what happened there?)
* find out how to focus on local communities over large systems without going back to the bad kind of tribalism
* ???
posted by caviar2d2 at 7:35 AM on March 2 [6 favorites]
Maybe it's time to revisit that floating turtle before the water rises.
This time, let's not forget the unicorns.
posted by mule98J at 9:17 AM on March 2 [1 favorite]
This time, let's not forget the unicorns.
posted by mule98J at 9:17 AM on March 2 [1 favorite]
In 2023, the crude death rate for the world was 0.755%, and the crude birth rate was 1.669%, giving net growth of 0.914%. Even if no children were born ever again, at a 0.755% decrease per year the world's population would fall by only 25% by 2062, to around 6 billion, and then would plummet to zero in the space of a decade as women age out childbirth. In the meantime, we'd all be living in Children of Men, with a particularly grim 2050+ to look forward to.
If we (a bit more than) halved the current global birthrate, like we have since the late 1980s, world population would then plateau, which on its own isn't going to relieve our current level of environmental damage. But we'll still have thirty-odd years of population growth in the meantime, unless we pick up the pace. So will we plateau at 9 billion? Ten?
Much, much more needs to change than population, and much, much faster. The only plausible ways of getting us to where we need to be by mid-century, in terms of total human impact on the planet, are drastic changes in everyone's lifestyle, horrifying plagues or natural disasters, and wars beyond all human experience. I'm guessing we'll see a bit of each, alongside attempts to carry on with business as usual for as long as possible (ten, twenty years?).
Sorry, I hadn't meant to be such a downer. It depresses me to think this through, too.
posted by rory at 3:26 AM on March 3 [1 favorite]
If we (a bit more than) halved the current global birthrate, like we have since the late 1980s, world population would then plateau, which on its own isn't going to relieve our current level of environmental damage. But we'll still have thirty-odd years of population growth in the meantime, unless we pick up the pace. So will we plateau at 9 billion? Ten?
Much, much more needs to change than population, and much, much faster. The only plausible ways of getting us to where we need to be by mid-century, in terms of total human impact on the planet, are drastic changes in everyone's lifestyle, horrifying plagues or natural disasters, and wars beyond all human experience. I'm guessing we'll see a bit of each, alongside attempts to carry on with business as usual for as long as possible (ten, twenty years?).
Sorry, I hadn't meant to be such a downer. It depresses me to think this through, too.
posted by rory at 3:26 AM on March 3 [1 favorite]
and then would plummet to zero in the space of a decade
I didn't think that through. It would take five or six more decades for the population to reach zero, once the last people born this year died. But during that time, there'd be no hope of recovery (by natural means, anyway). Half a century of hopelessness in old age.
posted by rory at 3:51 AM on March 3 [1 favorite]
I didn't think that through. It would take five or six more decades for the population to reach zero, once the last people born this year died. But during that time, there'd be no hope of recovery (by natural means, anyway). Half a century of hopelessness in old age.
posted by rory at 3:51 AM on March 3 [1 favorite]
Mexico City has an elevation of 2,240 m, so sea level rise shall never concern them, but sinkholes or other uneven sinking sucks. Jakarta has an average elevation of 8 m, so subsiding plus sea level rise is hugely problematic.
It'd be nice if this impacted the US east coast fast enough to prompt some climate action, but zero chance of that.
posted by jeffburdges at 4:52 AM on March 3 [2 favorites]
It'd be nice if this impacted the US east coast fast enough to prompt some climate action, but zero chance of that.
posted by jeffburdges at 4:52 AM on March 3 [2 favorites]
Mod note: [btw, this post and Baby_Balrog's comment have been added to the sidebar and Best Of blog!]
posted by taz (staff) at 2:52 AM on March 4 [2 favorites]
posted by taz (staff) at 2:52 AM on March 4 [2 favorites]
The idea that our species has the power to do that seems like a patriarchal delusion to me.
Is the fact that we had the power, as a species, to cause the problem in the first place a patriarchal delusion?
posted by eviemath at 6:07 AM on March 6 [2 favorites]
Is the fact that we had the power, as a species, to cause the problem in the first place a patriarchal delusion?
posted by eviemath at 6:07 AM on March 6 [2 favorites]
What I'm saying is, Canada: don't let us in. Don't do it. The pressure will become unbearable. Don't do it, there is no returning. Interminable, the shit is interminable, it flows in one direction - into the barn. Avoid this at all costs.
I kind of disagree. And not just because I’m an American who emigrated to Canada ‘cause that’s where I found work. There’s a crucial difference between letting people in and letting wealth out, via exploitative resource extraction. Sharing on an equitable basis is good; and in particular, Canada is also currently dealing with some regressive xenophobia around immigration that the fascists here are trying to stir up to help them gain more political power, and that is very bad. But one can be compassionate toward members of our global community who are in need while also building and protecting robust, sustainable local economies and preserving environmental health and quality.
But my main point was that, literally, Canada doesn’t have the amount of water that some Americans seem to imagine is has. The Canadian prairies have the same seasonal drought issues as the US plains; the Western Canadian mountains and coastal region are impacted by the same seasonal snowpack issues as the US West Coast. The Canadian Maritimes have been impacted by drought and wildfires to similar levels as New England, and have the same issues around Nestle extracting “artesian” water for next to nothing to sell at a huge profit, impacting local home wells, etc. The strip of Canada along the southern border where the majority of people live isn’t that different from the northern US; the parts of Canada farther north are not snow-covered year round (for water extraction) and also have minimal snow cover (so agriculture can’t just shift north as climate changes); mining is already causing significant environmental degradation in many parts of northern Canada, and I’ve read that the Alberta tar fields have passed or will soon pass their peak oil production. It’s simply not a store of infinite natural resources, regardless of whether it’s Americans or Canadians or anyone else profiting from exploiting them.
posted by eviemath at 6:29 AM on March 6 [4 favorites]
I kind of disagree. And not just because I’m an American who emigrated to Canada ‘cause that’s where I found work. There’s a crucial difference between letting people in and letting wealth out, via exploitative resource extraction. Sharing on an equitable basis is good; and in particular, Canada is also currently dealing with some regressive xenophobia around immigration that the fascists here are trying to stir up to help them gain more political power, and that is very bad. But one can be compassionate toward members of our global community who are in need while also building and protecting robust, sustainable local economies and preserving environmental health and quality.
But my main point was that, literally, Canada doesn’t have the amount of water that some Americans seem to imagine is has. The Canadian prairies have the same seasonal drought issues as the US plains; the Western Canadian mountains and coastal region are impacted by the same seasonal snowpack issues as the US West Coast. The Canadian Maritimes have been impacted by drought and wildfires to similar levels as New England, and have the same issues around Nestle extracting “artesian” water for next to nothing to sell at a huge profit, impacting local home wells, etc. The strip of Canada along the southern border where the majority of people live isn’t that different from the northern US; the parts of Canada farther north are not snow-covered year round (for water extraction) and also have minimal snow cover (so agriculture can’t just shift north as climate changes); mining is already causing significant environmental degradation in many parts of northern Canada, and I’ve read that the Alberta tar fields have passed or will soon pass their peak oil production. It’s simply not a store of infinite natural resources, regardless of whether it’s Americans or Canadians or anyone else profiting from exploiting them.
posted by eviemath at 6:29 AM on March 6 [4 favorites]
Is the fact that we had the power, as a species, to cause the problem in the first place a patriarchal delusion?
We broke it. That doesn't mean we can fix it.
And that's what gets me. It's that kind of thought that's at the basis of the whole "of course we can fix the climate" conclusion. And it's so obviously, blindingly nonsense. Ask a toddler to fix the computer they broke, see what happens. Ask your beagle mix to put the garden back together.
I mean seriously, ask yourself how you can believe that the fact we broke the climate in any way suggests that we have the ability to fix it. You're so much smarter than that. Doesn't that make you wonder why you believe what you believe about climate change?
The saying isn't "you broke it, you fix it." It's "you broke it, you pay for it."
I think we're a young, dumb species. I don't think we know how to organize at a level that would allow us to face a challenge at this scale. I think we've done a great job with civilization so far, given that we're making it up from whole cloth with no guidance and no examples, but I think fossil fuels turned out to be a trap that we simply weren't prepared for.
So now it's survival of the species time. I hope we make it.
posted by MrVisible at 4:44 PM on March 10 [1 favorite]
We broke it. That doesn't mean we can fix it.
And that's what gets me. It's that kind of thought that's at the basis of the whole "of course we can fix the climate" conclusion. And it's so obviously, blindingly nonsense. Ask a toddler to fix the computer they broke, see what happens. Ask your beagle mix to put the garden back together.
I mean seriously, ask yourself how you can believe that the fact we broke the climate in any way suggests that we have the ability to fix it. You're so much smarter than that. Doesn't that make you wonder why you believe what you believe about climate change?
The saying isn't "you broke it, you fix it." It's "you broke it, you pay for it."
I think we're a young, dumb species. I don't think we know how to organize at a level that would allow us to face a challenge at this scale. I think we've done a great job with civilization so far, given that we're making it up from whole cloth with no guidance and no examples, but I think fossil fuels turned out to be a trap that we simply weren't prepared for.
So now it's survival of the species time. I hope we make it.
posted by MrVisible at 4:44 PM on March 10 [1 favorite]
For what it is worth, if we hadn't found fossil fuels, we wouldn't have any trees now because we'd have burned them all.
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:02 PM on March 10
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:02 PM on March 10
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posted by biblioPHL at 8:38 AM on February 29 [3 favorites]