Scientists warn of 'societal collapse' on Earth with worsening climate situation

We can't even figure out how to not have half our society be rasict, how the hell are we gonna save a whole planet from our fuckery?

We're not gonna be able to combat climate change under capitalism anyway. The number one thing we need to do is to produce less but that goes directly against what capitalism needs to function. Not to mention that governments are bribed by companies to make laws in their favour.

But hey, what's the point of saving our planet anyway if we can't maximize profits anymore?
- Yep. And if you mention this, you're a commie and capitalism is the greatest thing ever and under socialism we will all starve and have nothing and it never worked look at Cuba.
  
  Like capitalism works, and there are no imaginable alternatives.
  
  Just don't use resources to produce that much useless crap to just dump it in a landfill or burn it? Is it so hard to understand?
Bold of you to assume that most people even want that. From what I can tell...
- There are a large number of people out there who seem to be deliberately making it worse - not even for profit, but just out of spite.
We don't and we won't.
We cant even figure out how to make recycling work.
- We could but it's not profitable enough for corporations.
- Recycling was never supposed to work alone. It was literally the last ditch effort after Reduce and Reuse.
  
  Also, we already figured out how to make it work, but it isn't profitable when it works, so obviously we have to use the less effective methods so that a small handful of big wigs can milk the process for personal gain.
We do what the British did with Australia, but with mars.

Send Elon and all the maga weirdos to the red place and we can begin following the plot of the expanse.

Like it should be.

Humanity is fucked. My sympathy lies with the animals.

I sympathize with the children that had nothing to do with it.
- It’s why I’m not having kids.
- That's all of us unless you're an executive in a multinational corp, or work for the oil and gas industry.
  
  We've all been ramrodded into this reality by a handful of giant Corporations, over the last 100 years.
Animals are fucked! We decimated 75% of wildlife in 50 years, and it is still growing
- If only we'd only "decimated" wildlife. Alas.
- growing
  
  Dwindling?
They’ll be fine 100 years after we’re extinct.

societal collapse

Ah yes, that thing that has us laboring to chase meaningless plastic crap we're brainwashed into needing instead of growing our own food and maintaining our own shelters as small, purposeful communities, all so the owners of this society can siphon our energy while poisoning the earth, all to live like wannabe gods above us.

No more penis Space tourist rockets? What a loss...

I dont think you would like what comes after societal collapse. It's easy to pin society as just capitalism, but collapse will mean more than just the economic system. Democracies will collapse and entire regions will cease to exist. Food scarcity and mass migration will result in extreme regimes that will defend their territory, and a bunch of nomads who have to live with the constant worry of where the next food and freshwater source is. Not to mention the constant fighting over geopolitical issues (imagine current day scaled up exponentially)

Yes, we should fix our economic system, but societal collapse is not an end result we ever want.
- Suffering I fear, death I welcome.
I know, we all weep for our poor capitalist lords :c

/s

You know what would be useful in a societal collapse? Electric vehicles and solar panels.

Hopefully peppers aren’t building zombie busses because they’ll be useless in 6 months after the oil stops flowing.

An ev with a charger panel and bicycles will be useful indefinitely.

When society collapses, upwards of around 95-100% of us die. That's reality.
- I’ll probably be one of them.
Solar panels and batteries require massive supply chains. They require our rarest minerals and highest tech, with highly educated workers to develop and produce and state of the art clean rooms and factories.

If we stop producing them, the current stock will be useful for like 50 years tops. Then it's back to fossil fuels, I'm afraid. Diesel generators last for a long time, and they're easier to maintain and produce.

I remember i read a doomer theory stating we should be stockpiling coal for the humans that remain to rebuild society since there is nothing we can do at this point and fossil fuels is the only thing that will outlast the collapse. I'm not that pessimistic, but i can see what they mean.
- Lol, Diesel can on average only be stored for 6 to 12 months before degrading. Good luck with that.
  
  If a collapse ever happens I'd rather have solar panels and an EV. Fuel production and transport would instantly grind to a halt and the existing fuel goes bad soon after.
- The doomer theory variation I read is that we’ve played out most of the accessible fossil fuels. If society has to rebuild, they have no way to get past the stage of fossil fuel use, because advanced extraction like fracking would not be possible. The very things that made our society possible, are bridges were burning as soon as we cross them. There is no rebuilding
"We don't know who struck first, us or them. But we do know it was us that scorched the sky..."
you would get murdered for those rather quickly, i'd imagine. what would be useful is to get far away from strangers somewhere defendable near fresh water.
- That would be only one of the many competing reasons for my murder.
  
  I do have camping gear, woodworking hand tools, a good bike, I know how to shoot and clean fish+game and cook, and I have knowledge of some remote areas with sparse populations including their flora.
  
  On paper it all sounds good, but I would likely die miserably in the first Canadian winter.
- Maybe. I’ve wondered about that. It’s easy to imagine a Mad Max scenario with bands of raiders looting all potentially useful technological remains, but does solar change that? You can’t as easily steal that without destroying it. You can’t just put it to use without some technical knowledge. It’s not immediately useful to loot.
  
  Destroy, sure.
- win win.
That's why Musk is backing Trump and Putin and trying to turn the world into Thunderdome. EVs will reign supreme.
- Pretty sure Thunderdome itself hit the nail on the head with Methane cars, easier and more sustainable than either EG or ICE.
Don't worry, we'll fix climate change by reflecting sunlight before it hits the Earth's surface. Of course this will eradicate most pests (and nature) but hey, problem solved!
batteries die

"Well, shit."

That’s unfortunate because I have been trying really hard to participate in society.

We're moving back to office until we can't move at all.

That's old news, no? I recall reading that basically from 2°C there is no more economic growth, what means a lot of people are thrown under the bus. From 3°C there is no more economy, meaning no food, heating, fighting everywhere. From 4°C there is basically no more humanity.

That sounds pretty extreme. I'd be Interested in reading that article, if you can find it.
- https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/syr/
  
  I'm looking at the Full Volume, and on page 71 you can see
  
  With about 2°C warming, climate-related changes in food availability and diet quality are estimated to increase nutrition-related diseases and the number of undernourished people, affecting tens (under low vulnerability and low warming) to hundreds of millions of people (under high vulnerability and high warming) ... Climate change risks to cities, settlements and key infrastructure will rise sharply in the mid and long term with further global warming, especially in places already exposed to high temperatures, along coastlines, or with high vulnerabilities (high confidence).
  
  At global warming of 3°C, additional risks in many sectors and regions reach high or very high levels, implying widespread systemic impacts, irreversible change and many additional adaptation limits (see Section 3.2) (high confidence). For example, very high extinction risk for endemic species in biodiversity hotspots is projected to increase at least tenfold if warming rises from 1.5°C to 3°C (medium confidence). Projected increases in direct flood damages are higher by 1.4 to 2 times at 2°C and 2.5 to 3.9 times at 3°C
  
  Global warming of 4°C and above is projected to lead to far-reaching impacts on natural and human systems (high confidence). Beyond 4°C of warming, projected impacts on natural systems include local extinction of ~50% of tropical marine species (medium confidence) and biome shifts across 35% of global land area (medium confidence). At this level of warming, approximately 10% of the global land area is projected to face both increasing high and decreasing low extreme streamflow, affecting, without additional adaptation, over 2.1 billion people (medium confidence) and about 4 billion people are projected to experience water scarcity (medium confidence). At 4°C of warming, the global burned area is projected to increase by 50 to 70% and the fire frequency by ~30% compared to today
  
  However, if you really want to get into it, you can read the Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability Full Report. It has a lot more details about the effects of climate change on all parts of the world, but it's also a 3,000 page pdf.
- It's mild hyperbole, but it's not far off from best-guess speculation. It's well and regularly covered in IPCC reports. Have at.

a bit late for that when society is turning to fascism all over the world.

Good ol' fascism! You can always count on fascism to to help people. Well, the right people. I mean, some of the right people, maybe a small subset of the right people.
- An ever increasingly small subset of the right people because Fascism requires there to ALWAYS be an other to blame it on.
- Fascism saved my buddy's life in 'Nam, maaaaan.

Societal collapse, eh? Sounds like a great opportunity for profit!!!

Imagine how much ACs we could sell! And how expensive we could make food!
- I really have to slow down on Armored Core, I thought you were talking about selling everyone mechs for a minute

I'd say the ones who have been saying it's not real should be the first to become soylent green

:shocked-picachu:

Societal collapse is the best thing that can happen right now, capitalism will not save the workers nor the environment. Only a complete revolution can save the workers, the environment, and the future of humanity.

Societal collapse doesn’t guarantee anything for people who want any kind of revolution
- Most people forget they are probably just gonna die in an apocalypse.
- Human death and suffering are guaranteed...
- Societal collapse is enviable, the downfall of humanity however is not.
- It means industry and industrial pollution stops.
So back to the rule of kings and Strongman Despots.

Because that's what a social collapse will get you every time. There will be no "worker's paradise".
I'm afraid it's not going to save anyone, because it's going to be a collapse with many casualities mainly on the side of the poor, not a revolution. I imagine it as a social disaster. The rich will be ok.
- The rich will be ok and their kids will repopulate earth. With a plow, a hammer and a sicle. Oh the irony...
- The rich are only safe if they keep every grain of gunpowder and lump of c4 in there with them.
Your accelerationist bullshit does nothing but harm us all
- I'm not all for his rhetoric that it will be an improvement, but I'm not doubting it won't happen.
- It’s not accelerationism if it’s happening anyway.
- Better to understand it is inevitable and prepare for it instead of sticking your head in the sand about it.
Do you actually think that?

As though we just do societal collapse on Wednesday and then start living our best lives on Thursday?
- If capitalism is allowed to continue it will render humanity extinct. If we collapse now, and are reduced to a fraction of our population this century, humanity may live.
  
  I don't enjoy that being the best option we have at this point. It brings me no joy. But what brings me less joy is knowing that we won't even make a choice. We will continue blindly waddling along and as capitalism consumes the world, we will wonder who will save us. And no one will.
- As though we just do societal collapse on Wednesday and then start living our best lives on Thursday?
  
  Commenter never said that. So you're just strawmannning. Do you honestly think capiatlism and consumerism will do an about face and start taking care of the rapidly degrading environment? If not, it would seem that we then we need to change how we behave, soon-- right? Accelerationists are at least doing something, even if it may not be the right plan, while you are whining to keep the exact status quo going thats killing us all, and doing nothing to improve things .
  
  To use a metaphor: dont criticise the fat guy working out at the gym while you youself are sitting on your butt, are also fat and have ice cream on your face. If you want to criticise, get off your ass and get to work on something better. Otherwise shut it and let the adults figure out how to save your ass while you do nothing.
If you take a look at history, you'll notice a pattern:

civilization/empire/society/whatever X begins forming

X is at it's peak, it's situation is pretty stable and prosperous

event Y starts

as a result, X's situation begins to worsen

X has fallen completely, it's previous members now struggle with disease, famine, and political instability

whoever survives begins to form a new civilization/empire/society/whatever

repeat

And honestly, I don't think that the left at it's current state is anywhere near strong, large, or unified enough to be the one to rise from the ashes. It's better to do what we can now, and save the revolution for when we are able to actually succeed at it.

We'll burn down capitalism one piece at a time.

People think it's gonna be fun, like Zombieland. Instead, it's going to be fun, like The Road.

gestures broadly

🤨

What a time to be alive!

We didn't start the fire...

Scientists. Experts. Covid. Elon.

Spam!

Good, I'd rather it all burn than to be looked down upon by the Trumpler in the Ivory Tower

Wow, yeah if only we had some alternative to Trump.
- We do, but for some fucking reason a ton of people think not voting for her will magically save Palestine from Nethanyu. I voted for Harris, everyone else needs to do the same fucking thing.

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