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‘We should have better answers by now’: climate scientists baffled by unexpected pace of heating
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 15 Aug 2024
633 points (98.2% liked)
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Great question, I glad you asked. When I said both multicellular and microbial life would be fine, what I meant is it's unlikely either would be wiped totally out.
As highlighted in the article you linked, only about 90% of [multicellular] species died out during the Permian-Triassic Extinction Event, specifically the "things have been worse before" situation I was thinking about. Also noted in the article is that the conditions we're experiencing now are not to the same degree although we're observing events similar to what we understand may have happened during the Permian-Triassic Extinction, again to a much lesser degree.
Keep in mind atmospheric CO2 levels were estimated to be around 2500 ppm, about 6 times greater than our current levels of around 420 ppm. Preindustrial CO2 levels were 270 ppm, so we've added about 150 ppm. It's not all that much but it's enough to start changing things for the worse for many of the planet's current inhabitants.
As to microbial life, I'm a microbiologist so I know my microbes. They as a whole are far more resilient and will outlast all multicellular life. Some thrive in conditions where no multicellular life on Earth could survive. Even if conditions were so hostile than no microbes could survive, some form endospores. These are incredibly resilient little escape pods that can remain viable for millions of years, then reactivate when conditions are better, reconstituting back to bacteria.
While extinctions are frankly depressing, they do open ecological niches into which other species with suitable traits can expand and, given time and selective pressure, differentiate. For example, all we'd need is mice and a suitable food source to survive and, a few million years later, the earth will be covered with various species decended from both of them.
When you said life would be fine, what you meant was it may MOSTLY all die and may take millions of years to evolve again. That's not "fine."
Second, we really don't know that it will ever evolve again or that other conditions won't deteriorate. Bacteria can't live in molten lava. Biology has a general upper and lower limit before things start denaturizing. Our moon is further away and the earth isn't as young as it once was. The conditions that gave rise to life so long ago might not be replicable enough in the future.
I agree that it's likely extremophiles at least will survive. I don't take for granted that it definitely will happen and I don't call it "fine."
I pretty distinctly defined when I meant by saying "fine" in my follow-up comment. If you want to pretend I meant something different so you can "prove me wrong", that's "fine" (define that however suits you.).
That, along with the rest of your comment, suggests you're just more interested in feeling you're right at all costs instead of actually discussing the topic, so I'm out.
Edit: I had to look - of course you downvoted me. LOL.
Yes, you moved the goalposts to have "fine" include what I do not consider "fine." This is part ofntthe disagreement we have here. Agree to disagree ig.
I mean go ahead, be out. Have a good day. You don't have to believe as I do, and your last comment also made it seem you were "happy I asked."
Tl;dr: I was genuinely happy until you showed yourself to be a petty, intellectually dishonest person.
I was genuinely happy you asked. I hoped we'd have an interesting conversation. What I received in response was the type of comment I haven't seen as much of since leaving Reddit: unnecessarily antagonistic and full of bad arguments, seemingly for no other purpose than to state "nuh uh, you're wrong!".
You start by telling me that the intended meaning of my words wasn't what I explained, followed up by how the meaning you instead fabricated for me is wrong. Now you're calling my explaining my original meaning further, even before you generated this artificial contention, "moving goal posts". That doesn't hold up under even the merest scrutiny. Again, you're just looking to score metaphorical points, but you don't do it by the merit of your own arguments - you instead pick apart my statements, but dishonestly. It's bizarre.
Then you follow up with several outlandish responses that only make sense if you ignored my previous comment. My comment was about how things have been massively worse on earth before and life has pulled through, with stated logic and references. Your response? "Well, life can't survive beyond certain bounds and the moon is further away, and the conditions from which life arose may not happen again". Pretty clear you didn't even bother to understand my comment before your rebuttal. Again, just looking to dunk.
Plus you downvoted me for a response I took quite a bit of time to write, all in good faith. So yeah, to the block list you go.
Lol it's genuinely wild to say life is "fine" while admitting a large extinction is taking place and may require millions of years to re-evolve. It does seem like "moving goalposts" (a sign of sophistry on your part) to include this in the definition of "fine."
I agreed to disagree there though.
Yes, conditions for life were in some ways harsher. But we have new conditions that make it harsh in a different way, and we don't have the same conditions as before when multicellular life first evolved (ypur claim that life will definitely evolve again).
Maybe I'm not "looking to dunk," and you're just losing?
I'm free to downvote whatever. That's how Lemmy works.
Sorry you took this exchange so personally lol. Weird of you to start insulting and getting grouchy when I agreed to disagree previously as a matter of different perspective.