[tiptap]

Having discussed the inhibitor feedback it would be important to mention positive feedback. You mentioned that ice lost would mean positive feedback. The big concern amoung climatologists is frozen methane. As a enviromental chemist you should have some introduction to this. The methane tied up under the ocean is quite large. But the exposure is more close to the shore (and includes shore in Siberia and Northern Canada) in higher latitudes. Methane with increase in temperature of a few degrees will become gaseous and not trapped. Methane ultimately adds to the COtwo but even as Methane it will as heat trapping gas. And this conversion could be cataclysmic. It is a real concern as ice retreats in the northern latitudes.

In the scale of millions of years this burb may have little effect (though a similar event is tied to the Permian Extinctions). But within the lifescales of human civiliztion of 10,000 years the 100 years of displacement as the climate shifts wildly even more so than now before settling down into some quasi equilibrium would be dire.

It would seem prudent to cut back rather than accelerate the gamble. And as the most advanced country it would seem we could choose to do the hard and right thing rather than the easy and profitable notion.

One of the hardest human understandings is to recognize when the status quo is an extreme position. To understand and anticipate when to change as opposed to reacting and being behind in changing.

Most studies in behavior whether it is economic, biological or otherwise tend to indicate we wait to long in accomodating change to our harm. We don't have confidence in the prediction of the future vs the evidence within our life. Well this thread is all about how we use to have snow and winters in Kansas or Iowa or Missouri. And now we have a blistery December and winter plays out for the rest of the season. So we have indications of change already, not just predictions.

So go back and look at the timing for prediction of change of even the most conservative predictions. And understand how large a ship that we will need to steer clear of the danger. And it is your responsibility to calmly ask for a more conservative direction in the economy rather than the rather peculiar outlier now (compared to so much of human history production) of such huge production of hothouse gases. I do think opportunities for industry will still exist. But energy plants don't want to lose their cash cow.
Reform in the energy economy requires distributed energy production. But that would mean the trend would be everyone producing their own energy. This parallels the distributed process in computing. We do have the technology to make a difference. The solutions are easily democratic and not autocratic. But it does require we all move in the general direction. And so this plea.