15 Comments

1. 

   Harmon on August 5, 2023 at 11:38 am

   When I was a bit younger, about a decade ago , I went to Australia and new Zealand for the backpacking year, some of the medical doctors in my family were warning me about dengue , as I only considered the short stopover in indonesia to be a worry

   Things like weather Nile and dengue in Scandinavia would be unreal

   I just saw how hard it is for large countries to get any grip on mosquito zones in S-America

   This pre nino summer is an unexpected wild little window into , not the future, but the 2nd half of the 2020s I think now

   • 

     Panopticon on August 5, 2023 at 7:02 pm

     Scotland would also be at risk of viruses like West Nile and Usutu, unfortunately, as we get mosquitoes up here in addition to the hoards of midges.

     We get a lot of ticks, too. I am forever pulling them off the Labrador and some of the more vulnerable parts of my own anatomy. Lyme Disease is currently the worst potential eventuality of bites but I read that Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever is starting to gain a foothold in Europe.

     “CCHF was first detected in Crimea in 1944, which is where it takes its name from. It is caused by a tick-borne virus, Nairovirus, which belongs to the Bunyaviridae family. The virus causes severe viral haemorrhagic fever outbreaks- with symptoms like high fever, headaches, back and joint pain, stomach ache, and vomiting- and has a fatality rate of 10 to 40 per cent. In severe cases, jaundice, mood swings and sensory perceptions also appear on the list of symptoms caused by the virus, according to the WHO.”

     Sounds fun!

     https://www.euronews.com/next/2023/07/07/climate-change-is-helping-this-new-deadly-virus-to-spread-across-europe

     • 

       Harmon on August 5, 2023 at 11:12 pm

       I spend periods of a few weeks at times with krimCongo or comparable types of viruses , but to Pinadas point yesterday, let’s he fair where I can be, even though I travel for extensive periods of time I can still exit to a good hospital if necessary. It’s very very different to live tear around in these types of viruses

       Very very worrying we are already transitioning to a europe with tropical diseases

       (Not to your points Pinada , you have no idea where I travelled in general, for how long , and I have known people working in Africa for years that saw china as the greatest threat there , thank you again )

       Also, responding to Martin yesterday I believe it was , your response seemed like a typical left winger , of europeans “killing ” immigrants

       It never springs into mind that mass immigration is killing European culture , or that africa especially , even though I loved spending time there is killing itself by heavy overpopulation

       Or that the culture of islam is both not very good at their very wealthy parts helping out their poor parts , or assimilating nicely in their adoptive regions. It’s a mess

       And climate change will aggravate everything

       Still way too many types on sites like these that put all the blame of the world on white Europeans, mostly , in my experience older 50plus ex hippies (I’m a bit younger than that , and not very happy about the outcome of your generations policies)

       • 

         Pintada on August 6, 2023 at 2:45 pm

         Poor Harmon, the white mans burden is a heavy one.

2. 

   Rain on August 5, 2023 at 11:39 am

   Yes, Australia gets heat waves in normal summers without El Nino. Indeed, our wheat farmers love a good heat wave of 5-10 days in late January before harvest to ripen every last pod of the triticale. But normally, we would get 3-4 heatwaves, often only 3-5 days each.

   With just gradual GW, those are increasing to 5 or 6 over 2 months, and over a week in length. With El Nino its 6-8+ weeks of non-stop, without any night cooling.

   The super El Nino summer years, 97/98, 15/16 etc are are burned into the national memory.

   It is a little odd, but not unheard of (to me) that there is no evidence yet of the expected upcoming 23/24 “Super” El Nino conditions over here in the West Pacific, because it is obviously going gangbusters in the East Pacific! Even down to the Patagonia!

   The Antarctic is still pushing cool/cold fronts on me, so maybe blocking it from moving west? Cross-fingers, Antarctica and the southern polar jet stream might get more wobbly, and dissipating its heat, but still cold, may even help reduce or keep El Nino away from us?

   After all, the UK escaped the 23 summer heat with the northern jet stream(s) wobbling farther south than last year, perhaps the opposite might happen in the south? Im willing to try some Hopium:-)

   I was taught in high school that the Pacific ENSO cycle, starting in the east Pacific, was like the Earths oceans’ “pressure valve”, where the oceans start “blowing off the steam” that built up over the years since the previous El Nino erupted.

   IIRC my school geography, Santiago in Chile (and Buenos Aires-Argentina) are almost the same latitude as Sydney, and they are obviously both getting hit.
   Peru, northern Brazil etc etc are in the tropic band.

   And methinx that tropical band around the Equator should be renamed the “Boiling Band”.

   • 

     Panopticon on August 5, 2023 at 6:48 pm

     “After all, the UK escaped the 23 summer heat with the northern jet stream(s) wobbling farther south than last year.”

     We did but June was, overall, very hot; indeed the hottest on record by far for the UK:

     https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20230703-uk-breaks-record-for-hottest-month-of-june

     It was also extremely dry in my part of Scotland. The sun was relentless – the leaves on my willow were well on the way to turning brown – and then the jet stream flipped south and gave us our wettest July on record. The forecast promises more of the same. Parts of the UK are also about to be hit by what will no doubt be the first of many storms coming in off the exceedingly warm N Atlantic:

     https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/aug/05/met-office-issues-amber-weather-warnings-as-storm-antoni-hits-uk

3. 

   Regan P on August 5, 2023 at 4:52 pm

   We will not survive this decade.

   • 

     Panopticon on August 5, 2023 at 6:51 pm

     That is a bold prediction, Regan. I can certainly imagine that the wheels will be demonstrably coming off by 2030.

   • 

     Harmon on August 5, 2023 at 11:15 pm

     Nah still gone be a couple of hundred million people around in 2080 humans are very cockroach like

     But the era of the 8 billion will be over after 2035 plus , all for the best I’d say

     • 

       Rain on August 6, 2023 at 12:01 am

       Harmon, Im with you on that one. Multiple population crashes from multiple causes over the coming decade or two, ultimately with ‘pockets of prosperity’ (relatively speaking) that remain sustainably survivable for the fewer, but not the many.

       I recently heard Lierre Keith speaking, about the mainstream environmentalist push for vegetarianism. She lives in northern California but grew up in Massachusetts where her family still live and once or twice a year, drives across .. and she was mentioning how she drives for hours and days across the Great Plains seeing nothing but wheat, corn, soy, etc and the “Marching Armies” of the huge heavy machinery at harvest time, wondering about the estimated 60 million bison, birds, groundfowl, predators and other fauna that once roamed there, regenerating the land and plants and trees without fertilisers….

       Anyway, she philosophised about the ancient conflict between herders and croppers. Even the bible story of Cain and Abel.

       • 

         TR on August 6, 2023 at 12:56 am

         Thanks for the mention of Cain & Able.
         I’ve been saying for 60 years, that nothing this species does surprises me. We have been killing each other since Cain & Able or since we climbed down from the trees. When we aren’t killing each other we are killing the habitat.

         The best argument for abortion: Adam & Eve.
         Second best: Look in a mirror. I don’t do that often,it’s a terrible picture. How did that guy get so old? 😉

4. 

   Rain on August 6, 2023 at 2:16 am

   Cain and Abel… the farmer vs the shepherd, but God accepted the shepherd’s sacrifice, and rejected the farmers. So the farmer killed the shepherd out of jealousy, in all the variations of the story across the planet. Not just the first murder but the first victory of agricultural cropping, over herding. To this day, herding peoples pushed to the margins where they still exist at all.

   Those organisations like ‘Deep Green Resistance’, (hoping civilisation will collapse & the sooner the better — focussing their activism on Saving wild spaces that are still left, blocking mining etc – not blocking traffic in cities like ‘Just Stop Oil’ etc), theorise it was cropping agriculture that started the entire downfall of every community, society and civilisation since we came down from the trees with our clever opposable thumbs.

   Very first proto-humans, probably homo-habilis, before we ever figured out building our own fires, were scavengers – following the migratory herds and their predators on the savannah, and waiting patiently for the predators to finish gorging on their kills … often left in shady vegetative spots next to watercourses and leaving bones full of calorie-rich fatty bone marrow, that we figured out how to smash open with our opposable thumbs, with whatever implement at hand.

   And probably competing with carrion birds, managing to catch one or two now and then. My dad was half-Native American, and us kids were always sooooo disgusted when he would break his dinner bones to noisily slurp and suck the marrow,,, *shudder*

   But nooo… our species planted annual grasses (to replace perennials) by the hundreds of square miles for their seeds to ground into flour, and then planted even more hundreds of square miles when we decided river valleys werent good enough or big enough, and figured out how to get water them at distance through primitive irrigation. And centuries of genetic engineering/breeding to make them no longer ‘wild’ anyway, and full of even more sugar. I even read recently, that while some gluten is naturally in wheat – over the centuries, commercial baking adds even more gluten in milling, to make the bread even more sweet, tender and fluffy. Annual grasses, (being annual), and growing their concentrated sugary seeds along river valleys, were meant to be a “seasonal treat”, not an all year round staple diet.

   But I am admittedly very biased, since middle age creeped up – my gut no longer coped with it in my diet anyway – so as far as just, me, myself and I, is concerned, those humungous grain fields covering the planet can go the way of the dinosaur! LOL 🙂

   And let the herds of ruminants (and their predators, birds, rodents etc) recover and roam free…

   But I draw the line at sucking marrow… Yuck…

   • 

     Pintada on August 6, 2023 at 2:42 pm

     Indrajit Samarajiva sometimes says exactly what I am thinking/feeling, and since he says it so well …

     https://indi.ca/the-meaning-of-life-in-a-dogs-death/

     “Eating and shitting are the gods breathing through us — taking in energy and expelling ‘waste’ — which, as I’ve said, is just a matter of perspective. High or low, rich or poor, single-celled or multiple-limbed, we’re all part of the same energy cycle, which is neither created nor destroyed. We’re just custodians of it for a while, before we shuffle off the mortal coil and get recycled. So I sit there watching the flowers fall on old Merc’s grave while a new dog tries to eat my hand. I learned everything I needed to know from watching that old dog die, and hearing the vet say “as long as you’re shitting and eating, you’re fine.” We go on and on about the meaning of life, but when you’re actually facing death, that’s all it comes down to. Is the energy flowing through you or not? That’s the meaning of being alive.”

     I worried about surviving the end of this civilization, and then I worried about preserving a place for my progeny – or more to just prevent or even lessen their suffering. Now, I know that I likely will not survive to see the end of this civilization, and I know that my children and grandchildren will suffer greatly (whether they live to see the end of the civilization or not) and they will die. It is such an obvious thing, how could I have imagined something different?

   • 

     TR on August 6, 2023 at 10:57 pm

     Sucking marrow might be a delicacy close to NTHE.
     Guy McPherson says only love remains at the edge of extinction. He may be losing a little memory. Did he forget about: pride, envy, wrath, gluttony, lust, sloth, and greed & anything else that leads the Clever Ape to violent acts possibly to the end.

     There is one mammal that shouldn’t be allowed to roam free, the Clever Ape. I believe they have proven this with their habitat destruction.

5. 

   FamousDrScanlon on August 6, 2023 at 4:38 am

   I had a dream where I had figured out how to get tics to follow my directions & I trained them up to only infect climate change deniers. The non denying public loved me…………… the Tic Whisperer they called him and henceforth climate change deniers were known as the Lymees.

   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

   Here’s great resource for floods & climate, world wide.

   https://floodlist.com/