Thom Hartmann: Climate Change is Worse than You Have Ever Imagined

[thomhartmann]

Climate change is real - deadly - and worse than you have ever imagined.

The Big Picture with Thom Hartmann on RT TV & FSTV "live" 9pm and 11pm check www.thomhartmann.com/tv for local listings

[revmclaren]

1. Big oil interests will kill us all for a few bucks in their pockets.

"The hell with the future...DRILL,DRILL,DRILL!!!"

[jimlup]

2. Thank you Thom! Well said

I was at a local meeting on climate change in a Right Wing denier district last night through OFA (Organizing for Action.) We had three professors from the U. of Michigan speaking as a panel. The climate scientist said something that alarmed me and unfortunately I didn't get a chance to ask the follow up question.

He said 11C of warming by 2200 if we continue on business as usual (which I unfortunately think is very likely at least until 2050 or further because people don't act until things get dire.) I'm still thinking he meant Fahrenheit but didn't get a chance to follow up. While 11F is dire and civilization threatening 11C is catastrophic and a human extinction event. If we are on that course we had damn well better get our butts in gear because our survival as a species is really at stake.

Full disclosure - I'm a Ph.D. physicist (not a climate scientist) and I have consoled myself recently by think that 5 to 6C was probably the worst case long term warming. If I am wrong about this I need to rethink my level of seriousness towards this issue (not that I'm not already serious as I stand with those who are getting arrested protesting Keystone XL and would get arrested if needed.)

Yes the problem is very serious. How serious is very serious I honestly don't know and I'm a Ph.D. scientist.

[cprise]

4. I think he meant 11C

There has been much talk of 11F (6C) by 2100 in the past couple years from climatologists talking with the press.

However, the warming trend will continue well beyond 2100 and climatologists are keen to compare the long-term projections with the PETM warming event 56 million years ago. The PETM went to about 6-8C above today's baseline, however the rate of carbon injection into the atmosphere today is about 15x what is was during the PETM which raises the question of whether man-made warming will eventually exceed temperatures in the PETM.

[jimlup]

5. Thanks...

Yeah that's pretty frightening. I guess I've been assuming 6-8C because that's what we've seen in the past. That would be my only reason for assuming that.

[swilton]

3. It isn't rocket science

to recognize that by getting a consensus one has to take the middle ground - not too alarmist but also not a look at the world through rose colored glasses. The predictions have been watered down for decades.

I have been following this through political policies since the early nineties under Bush I when some of the international studies began to be published - Bush senior would continually call for more certainty, more studies.......rather than action....This has continued through to the present day and the Copenhagen Summit.

I can't say that any of the politicians in either of the political parties have listened to the international climate panel studies nor have they listened to the warnings of the NGO's. Other than grandstanding at the UN Conference in Rio in 1992, it's been nothing but hot air from the majority of the politicians.

This shouldn't be a surprise for those who have been watching this unfold over the decades.