[TRDRVR]

I’ve heard a lot of denialists push the Tonga volcano and resultant water vapor in the stratosphere as evidence that climate change is more complex than we understand.

I always whole heartedly agree that it’s very complex, but we do know introducing novel gases to various parts of the atmosphere is generally chaotic and something to be avoided when we can.

[psychlops]

Where do you listen to denialists?

[yareal]

Plenty of them make their way to hn. Give this article enough time in the front page and you'll have a chance to listen to them.

[claytongulick]

> denialists

I don't think that's a very good word.

It stratifies people into weird binary groups, while ignoring the reality that people have nuanced opinions, and many of those are quite reasonable.

It's a subtle form of "you're with us or against us", and disparages people who don't see things exactly the same way you do.

It's also used to move goal posts. I.e. if a person believes that yes, it's likely that humans are having some effect on climate, but that we aren't sure exactly what it is and how harmful it will be over a period of time - are they a "denier"?

It has its roots in holocaust denialism, and tries to paint folks skeptical of a single climate viewpoint with that same brush.

It doesn't further the discussion and encourages tribalism.

Inflammatory words like that are a barrier to quality discussion.

[jemmyw]

> if a person believes that yes, it's likely that humans are having some effect on climate, but that we aren't sure exactly what it is and how harmful it will be over a period of time - are they a "denier"?

Yes 100% they are a denier. This was a position that was valid in the 80s. It's also exactly the bs talking point spread by those who profit from us not moving away from fossil fuels. Confuse and delay as much as possible and discredit those pesky scientists with their models that can't decide if it'll be terrible or catastrophic.

[exoverito]

Climate is the premier example of a non-linear chaotic system, as evoked with the butterfly effect and unreliability of weather forecasts more than a week out. Making predictions of the far future state of chaotic systems is obviously going to have wide error bars. In just the past couple thousand years there has been significant climate change with little ice ages and warm periods. Notably, the colder climates have generally been far more destructive to civilization than the warm periods.

A sober approach would weigh the pros and cons of climate change and cost benefit analyses of the various mitigation strategies. Climate alarmists advocate degrowth in the extreme, or spending many trillions on intermittent energy sources and impractical energy storage systems. This would obviously reduce human well-being as energy consumption per capita is tightly correlated with standards of living. The costs of climate change are still unknown, and it could very well be the case that higher CO2 levels do not increase global temperatures to catastrophic levels, as evident with life thriving during the Carboniferous Era. Increasing CO2 levels would also be beneficial due to the CO2 fertilization effect, effectively greening the Earth, while also increasing agricultural yields as observed in greenhouses. And if temperatures rise too much then stratospheric aerosol injection is always an option. Calcium carbonate could be a good alternative to sulfur dioxide since it doesn't react with ozone, and cooling the Earth is estimated to cost only a few billion a year.

Obviously energy independence and ecological preservation should still be pursued for their own sake. Yet we should be careful of succumbing to hysteria and malinvestment.

[collingreen]

Are global climate trends a non-linear, chaotic system the way short term local weather is? If not this sounds intentionally misleading.

I don't like to feed the trolls usually but I found it entertaining to see you mix and match a "be reasonable" tone with bonkers suggestions and irresponsible "just buy your way out of it later" proposals. In particular I laughed out loud when you handwaved away catastrophic temperature changes because we could try to intentionally change the climate by injecting aerosols. I guess that unpredictable, chaotic system is totally predictable when it supports the (in)action you prefer?

> And if temperatures rise too much then stratospheric aerosol injection is always an option.

This reads like bad faith.