As adaptable as you claim we are, just look how difficult we find it to adapt to the rather modest changes we are seeing so far. Sure, our species are under no risk of extinction yet, but go ask Australians how they are adapting.
Umm, they seemed to be doing OK overall when I was there a couple of years ago, despite the horrible drought, terrible floods, and Hurricane Yasi.
Ask sub saharan inhabitants. So Im not sure what your point is. Something along the lines of "its not likely more than a billion people will die, and a few billion people will suffer, so whats the problem" ?
I'm all for doing things to keep people from dying and suffering. Rereading the
IPCC report, the big killers/dangers will be an increase in malaria and other diseases in poor countries.
It seems to me policies that make the poor countries richer (free trade, open immigration, stable political institutions and rule of law) is the best way to tackle those problems.
Or to put it another way: The US will probably spend years arguing over whether or not a carbon tax (or cap and trade or whatever) is a good idea (I'm watching to see what happens with Australia's carbon tax with great interest, by the way). Maybe we'll eventually pass one and reduce our carbon emissions.
I predict that will just move carbon-intensive industries somewhere else in the world, and carbon emissions will continue to rise.
I think it would be better to spend the time arguing over what we could do to help make poor countries rich. Or argue for open borders so poor people in places that are getting flooded (don't buy real estate in Bangladesh...) have a place to go.
Or, if you REALLY think rising CO2 levels will be a catastrophe, then rich countries or individuals should create solar-powered CO2 scrubbers and spend money installing gazillions of them in the desert. Because betting on the whole world coming together and agreeing to do something is about a million times
less likely than getting everybody on this forum to agree on... well, pretty much anything.
Lets all just abandon all our coastal cities like New York and L.A , and lets all move to OKLAAAAAAAAAAHOMA!!
Don't buy real estate in Florida. New York will be mostly OK ("The average elevation of Manhattan is reported to be 29 meters (97 feet"); I can't find a mean elevation for LA, but city hall is 300 feet above sea level so unless you buy beachfront property you'll be OK.
With global warming, we're talking changes that happen over a hundred or three (or more) years. I may be wrong (I often am), but I'd be the big worry 100 years from now will not be global warming, but something else. Maybe running out of Unobtanium for our flying cars....
