We’ve Passed the Tipping Point

Last week, the U.N. admitted that global temperatures will climb at least 1.8º C above pre-industrial temperatures, even in the best-case scenario. Under the 2015 Paris Agreement, the target had been set at 1.5º. The Nairobi-based UN Environment Programme that issued the report said, “There are no good outcomes above 1.5C.”

I began this three-part climate series a few weeks ago, teeing off on the massive El Niño taking shape in the Pacific. Since the first piece, this El Niño has grown even more powerful.

Last week, when I was planning on writing about the increased likelihood of isolated but supersized climate-fueled catastrophes, an enormous glacier failed, causing a catastrophic avalanche and flash flood, as well as some of the most devastating videos and images of the year.

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Trump and El Niño

Sam Osterhout · Aug 24

Our world is about to get weird, and nobody is ready. Not politicians. Not a hungry, thirsty third world. Certainly not the American political system. The coming 18 months will be a stress test for civilization as we know it.

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I’d planned this week to talk about the bigger picture, how we’re walking through a gateway into a world no one has ever seen, and what that might mean for our politics, our societies, our civilizations. The U.N.’s report is yet another headline that slots right in.

I didn’t anticipate this series being able to draw from breaking news. That’s kinda the thing about climate change: no one really knows what to expect. But that’s a much bigger deal than just shrugging our shoulders and saying … I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

Because knowing what to expect is the foundation of our civilization and all civilizations that have existed on Earth. It is how we plan our cities. Knowing what to expect is where architecture came from, and engineering, and science, and agriculture, and cities, and so on.

We don’t know what to expect is a fine thing to say if you’re going to a movie or trying a new restaurant. But if you’re trying to build a stable and productive society, that sentence is game over.

Let’s take a journey, and I’ll show you what I mean. ...