INCREASING CHAOS

Before electing Donald Trump we thought we faced a myriad of problems, but mostly things we thought we handle. Except for the biggest one, Climate Change. However, the changing climate barely broke through the barrier of Russia, election meddling and so forth.

However, although climate change is getting far more attention, I believe it is not just inadequate, it will likely turn out to be catastrophic.

As I read the commentaries, it strikes me as a wide awake nightmare. In a different situation we might talk about managing the risk. This is fine for investments, businesses, etc. However, there is more than a small chance that we will loose the planet as a living space for billions of people. We have already stressed the planet severely. We have increased the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from about 240 ppm to approximately 410. The highest reasonable value is about 350 ppm.

Rex Tillerson said we must manage risk. Well risk management starts out with "worst case" and worst case here is an uninhabitable planet. To an engineer this requires reversing the situation and getting back to a safe value, or, in other words, one where the worst case cannot happen or has a vahishing small probability of happing. Why such a panic like reaction? Two reasons. One is that the climate could become both better and worse than predictions, and worse means kaput. Good bye. No place to live. Yet the attitude we have taken from a first solid warning 50 years ago is pretty much hands off. Bill McKibben (350.org), James Hansen and many others have drawn much attention but scientists are not very good prosylitisors. My purpose i