Interesting Links for 26-03-2017

[andrewducker]

Scientists made a detailed roadmap for meeting the Paris climate goals. It’s eye-opening. (tags: globalwarming co2 Technology environment thefuture viaFanf ) Why the government should invest in the arts (tags: art money government ) The BBC finally release Steven Moffat's first Dr Who writing "The Curse of Fatal Death" (tags: video funny drwho

Comments

[gonzo21]

That carbon roadmap, is that basically saying it's an impossible task, and we might be better employed working out how to survive on a planet with a runaway greenhouse effect?

[andrewducker]

From the article:
"Rockström adds that the road map’s sheer difficulty doesn’t mean climate action is hopeless. “You could just as easily see this becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy,” he says. “Countries start taking these targets seriously and then begin pursuing the innovation needed to make this come true.” That’s what Moore’s law did for the semiconductor industry; the prediction that chip performance would double every 18 months helped guide firms in thinking what they needed to do to make that come true. A “carbon law,” Rockström argues, could do the same for countries and cities and companies."

[ice_hesitant]

When it comes to greenhouse effect, is "runaway" the same as or distinct from "a lot more of"?

[danieldwilliam]

My understanding is that as the climate warms there is a risk that methane currently stored in permafrost in Siberia or Canada will be released in the atmosphere and drive further, more rapid climate change.

Satanism In The Royal Navy

[cartesiandaemon]

Questions like "should satanists be allowed to serve in the navy" feel a bit like "does 'unionised' refer to chemistry or workplace collective action" -- the answer is not usually in people's opinions, but in how they interpret the word. Murderous cultists? Probably not. Pro-freedom-of-religion-trolls? Probably yes. As in this case, followers of an actual religion with a potentially controversial name? Also yes.

Hoping for a headline like "People feel temporarily uncomfortable about it, but freedom of religion fortunately continues operating as intended."

[swisstone]

Curse of Fatal Death went out on video in 1999, though I guess it's been difficult to get hold of in the intervening period ...

[andrewducker]

Nice to have it available on something other than VHS.

The quality is rather higher than the old pirated copies I used to see on YouTube too.

[ggreig]

I think the terms under which people agreed to take part at the time forbid any commercial release after the initial one; so whatever they put on YouTube is probably the best we'll get.

[andrewducker]

The link above definitely seems better quality than the old versions I used to see on YouTube, and is an official release, so I assume that it's going to be as good a quality as is possible.

[drplokta]

That carbon roadmap is stupid. The shape of the graph is the exact opposite of what it should be. They're saying we should cut CO2 emissions by some amount X in the 2020s, and then only by ½X in the 2030s, even though the alternative technologies will be ten years more advanced. If we can halve emissions in the 2020s, we can eliminate them altogether before the end of the 2030s. The plan should have initially slow decreases that get bigger over time, not initially big decreases that get slower over time. A true Moore's Law for carbon emissions would have the size of decrease doubling every n years, not total emissions halving every n years.

[danieldwilliam]

I wonder if they are factoring in an increase in carbon emisions due to increasing prosperity and therefore energy use in the developing world. That the implication is that we need to cut CO2 emissions harder earlier in order to give us some capacity for India, Africa and China to emit more?

[heron61]

Scientists made a detailed roadmap for meeting the Paris climate goals. It’s eye-opening.

This is why I believe that humanity will manage to avert serious global problems from climate change, but that doing so will require geoengineering - which will of course cause its own problems, that we'll then need to find ways of fixing. I think the only way around that would be for some astounding fortuitous discovery, like durable, high efficiency solar cells that can be sprayed on roads and similar surfaces, room temperature superconductors that are also suitable for use as superconducting batteries, or (least likely of all) cheap, easy cold fusion. Short of something like that, I'm betting we'll be starting to use geoengineering within a decade.