18 Comments

1. 

   George Kaplan on November 1, 2025 at 10:46 am

   Richard Crim does a pretty good job of showing warming is likely to be faster than the mainstream view but I didn’t exactly follow how he deals with secondary green house gasses. The easiest way to get an equivalent CO2 is with the NASA equations and these show we are only a couple of years away from a doubling. With earth sensitivity looking to be around 4 to 4.5 it’s pretty evident we are going well past 3 degrees of warming. Even with a civilisation collapse by the forties we are likely to get to 600 ppm (5 degrees warming) to 700 (6 degrees) CO2 equivalent. Any reduction in methane (which is not certain as there may be natural sources from permafrost melt) will be balanced by loss of sinks, burning of boreal and tropical forests and, again, permafrost melt, but in dry areas.

   Recent years have shown just how fast the warming can go as albedo falls and oceans stratify, and how much worse the local climate extremes get compared to the expected global averages.

   Paleoclimate precedents are useful but can only provide a lower bound to how bad things will be because we are changing the climate orders of magnitude faster than geology alone managed. I think this has three main impacts: 1) biomes, almost all of which would naturally be carbon sinks, cannot adapt fast enough and, at worst, can turn into sources; 2) there is insufficient time for heat and mass transfer to the deep oceans to reach equilibrium so the CO2 concentration and temperature rise stays in the atmosphere and surface waters where they do the most harm; and 3) localised phenomena do not have time to average out globally and temporally so the extremes are worse and their feedbacks more damaging.

   https://richardcrim.substack.com/p/the-crisis-report-122

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     Panopticon on November 1, 2025 at 5:46 pm

     Thanks, George, for your thoughts. That is a very good piece by Richard Crim, who is at pains to stress just how uncharted these waters are:

     “…there is NO geologic analog for [the sudden jump in ghg’s] in the entire 485my history of life on Earth. The ONLY thing that comes close is the Chicxulub Impact Event (dino killer 65mya)…

     “We ARE about to see how FAST it actually takes the Climate System to respond to a jolt of this magnitude… Theoretically, +1.5°C of warming can happen in just the next 15 years.”

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     Survivalist on November 1, 2025 at 7:12 pm

     Thanks for the info and link, George. Very interesting.

2. 

   zip on November 1, 2025 at 11:06 am

   Well, good luck over there at CBS with their new “anti-woke” direction.

   In about four or five years, we’ll reach a point where the two extremes will meet — almost like a thermodynamic cycle: on one side, the anti-woke camp that denies limits out of ideological opportunism; on the other, the transition camp that denies them out of moral optimism.

   Both share the same blind spot: the inability to face physical finitude.

   The so-called “woke” version does it through hope and technology — “we can still make it if we accelerate, innovate, invest.” The “anti-woke” version does it through nostalgia and denial — “there’s nothing wrong, we’ve always had oil.”

   But beneath these opposites lies the same faith in human mastery. They speak different dialects of the same disenchanted religion: progress.

   That’s why the lines will indeed converge — not in debate, but in implosion. The reality of physics — the end of cheap energy — is neither left nor right, progressive nor conservative. It’s simply unspeakable within any worldview that takes infinity for granted.

   • 

     VPK on November 1, 2025 at 2:13 pm

     Good points, no wonder all outlets are being silenced now; too obvious that it’s beyond fixing the final outcome….It’s even hard for me to grasp George Kaplan’s comment on the speed we are seeing today, but Justin has shown it with his postings as real world evidence.

     Noticed Gail Tverberg has a new post on the talk she gave recently at her website,
     Our Finite World. In the footnote she wrote this

     “Even though I didn’t mention it, having a rapidly growing energy supply at a very high EROI would not be sufficient to forestall collapse indefinitely. Other issues would emerge. Population would rise higher, and pollution would be more of a problem. Eventually, the system would still reach a limit and tend to collapse.”

     That’s the closest I’ve heard her say we are basically toast regardless.

   • 

     Panopticon on November 1, 2025 at 5:58 pm

     “…the anti-woke camp that denies limits out of ideological opportunism; on the other, the transition camp that denies them out of moral optimism. Both share the same blind spot: the inability to face physical finitude.”

     Nicely put, Zip. This is it in a nutshell. Inherently unsustainable, modern industrial civilisation is “the problem”, whether you put a green patina on it or not.

     Vince, in her comments section Gail links a Zero Hedge article gloating over Bill Gates’ recantation of his “climate alarmism”. 🙄

3. 

   jupiviv on November 1, 2025 at 11:18 am

   ”I liken Cop to Christmas. Countries meet every year, and it’s the same arguments, the same grumpy relationships, the embarrassing uncle who’s going to say climate change isn’t real. It’s become institutionalised into this very comfortable sitcom […] It’s kind of pointless. It’s a bit of theatre really.” [Baroness Worthington]

   I disagree with her supremely self-aware and self-righteous ladyship that COP30 is theatre. The theatre is the totality of what is known as climate action. Events like COP30 (and articles like this one saying the blatantly obvious part out loud, in an attempt to self-criticize one’s way back to the lowest common denominator of credibility) are the props, dialogues and actors coming together to work that wonderful show business magic.

   On next weeks explosive finale, the 40-something boss-b**** forces the climate-minimizer uncle to read an article about microplastics, whereupon both break out in tears, have a big long hug and finally agree that he needs to donate even more money to her badger resettling non-profit this year. It’s the least he can do for his dear departed sister’s favourite daughter *sob*.

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     Panopticon on November 1, 2025 at 6:12 pm

     “The theatre is the totality of what is known as climate action.”

     Jupiviv, I agree… but it feels a bit mean to lump all of the very sincere and concerned climate scientists, activists etc. under that umbrella.

     Your comment made me think of that famous quote from Shakespeare’s As You Like It: “All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players.”

     Sometimes it feels like that to me. The word “person” actually comes from the Latin persona, which originally meant “mask” or “the character played by an actor”.

4. 

   Cassandra on November 1, 2025 at 12:11 pm

   From Lyle Lewis, Author of Race to Extinction, an excellent new post:

   “Later Is Now: The Speed of the Sixth Extinction
   A deep-time look at how a 6 million year experiment called humanity became the engine of Earth’s final extinction event.”

   https://open.substack.com/pub/lylel/p/later-is-now-the-speed-of-the-sixth

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     Panopticon on November 1, 2025 at 6:17 pm

     Thanks, Cassandra. It is a very good piece. He concludes:

     “We often end such discussions with reassurance; with the idea that we can still choose how deep the crater goes. But history offers little evidence that we can. Knowledge without the capacity to act is irrelevant, and our species has always followed the same imperative: to consume what sustains us until it’s gone. The truth is that this extinction isn’t a problem we can solve; it’s a process we set in motion simply by being what we are.

     “All that remains is to bear witness; to understand what it means to live in the final stages of the unmaking of the world. In truth, every hominin of the last 2.5 million years has lived somewhere along this descent; life will go on, but not the life we’ve known. We’re simply witnesses to its undoing.”

     What can one say? He is right.

5. 

   James Fenech on November 1, 2025 at 1:20 pm

   “Queensland and the Northern Territory are on track for their warmest October on record against “every measure”, according to the Bureau of Meteorology.”

   Indeed. My QLD mates told me all about the golf-sized balls of hail, and how they didn’t get the opportunity to really yell “FORE!” while swingin’ at ‘em with copium and desperado gusto in the aftermath—and possibly into “miscellaneous Joe” neighbours’ back yard.

   I have a vague recollection of commenting here on how many climate records are constantly being smashed… that was about 2 years ago? And yet it seems every climate post you’ve shared since then, Pan, has many more records just being broken—to quote Cyndi Lauper—“Time after time.”

   Disclaimer: apologies, yes, I took Cyndi’s lyrics completely out of context just to make a point. I hope you don’t mind if this occasionally happens from my end, time after time. 😁

   Cyndi Lauper – Time After Time

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     Panopticon on November 1, 2025 at 6:37 pm

     No need for any apologies on that score, James. Clumsy shoehorning is fine by me if it leads to an 80’s gem like that. I still have Cyndi’s cover of Roy Orbison’s “I Drove All Night” on 7 inch, squirrelled away somewhere.

     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2y1TZXc5DiY&list=RD2y1TZXc5DiY&start_radio=1

6. 

   Heather B on November 1, 2025 at 2:34 pm

   https://www.thewhitehouseeffect.com/
   Ran across this documentary last night. Do far Regan used the science advisor not to show how bad things are but the opposite to downplay it and then they show internal documents from Exxon that show they knew how bad things were. Also the start of cop and why. After living through it all its good look back.

   • 

     Localron on November 1, 2025 at 4:38 pm

     I look forward to seeing the film!
     I was in charge of the U.S. government exhibit for Ecobrasil in ’92 for the Bush administration. I still have photos of it somewhere.
     After the exhibition was installed. I had time to walk through all the exhibits from both government and private sector sources. I remember being really excited at some of what I saw, still feeling that we might be able to keep the plant habitable. But by somewhere around 2015, I had lost all hope. Overshoot and Limits to Growth had become my basis for our future reality.

     • 

       Panopticon on November 1, 2025 at 6:58 pm

       And mine, Localron.

       Heather, thank you – that documentary looks fascinating. Climate policy-makers are largely constrained by the thermodynamic imperatives of the global economy, so the outcome of that internal battle in the Bush administration is not a surprise; and, had it gone the other way, those policies would have subsequently been reversed – but all of that political intrigue and the skulduggery of the fossil fuel industry means it’s probably a great watch.

7. 

   TR on November 2, 2025 at 1:42 am

   I just went over Thursday’s & Friday’s posts. Got down to this link today:
   ” as furious residents accuse authorities of failing to learn from last year’s catastrophic Valencia DANA”. Who put the authorities in charge? Who elected any officials, anywhere, that monkey minds aren’t happy with. Find out who these people are & you will find the enemy. POGO knew.

   It’s not my fault! It’s others’ responsibility! I don’t have to do anything even when it’s happened before! I can remain uselessly ignorant & blame others.
   A little hint at politics: Republicans & Conservatives are not immune to a pissed off Mother Nature.

   “acute water shortages for Pakistan’s densely populated plains.” How dare anyone even hint that population could ever be a problem. We are just short of water, that’s the only problem? 😉

   One of my favorites lately from first link Thursday Oct 30, 2025 – ““We are hurtling toward climate chaos. The planet’s vital signs are flashing red. The consequences of human-driven alterations of the climate are no longer future threats but are here now… A dangerous hothouse Earth trajectory may now be more likely due to accelerated warming, self-reinforcing feedbacks, and tipping points.”

   What this “may” you speak of?

   • 

     Martin on November 2, 2025 at 8:00 am

     In real life, anyone dipping a chain “link” to disgusting, random horseshit would rightly be looked on as insane. What the hell do you think you are doing? Horseshit cannot be “linked” to. It’s viscous slime, nothing more. There is no substance there, no material strength.

     From the executive summary’s last bullets:

     “Climate change mitigation strategies are available, cost effective, and urgently needed. From forest protection and renewables to plant-rich diets, we can still limit warming if we act boldly and quickly.
     •
     Social tipping points can drive rapid change. Even small, sustained nonviolent movements can shift public norms and policy, highlighting a vital path forward amid political gridlock and ecological crisis.
     •
     There is a need for systems change that links individual technical approaches with broader societal transformation, governance, policies, and social movements.”

     Cities in the US used to be awash in literal horseshit – tons of it everywhere, smelling to high heaven, permeating every orifice with pungent disaster. Now progress has brought us the figurative kind, everywhere, all the time.

     • 

       Survivalist on November 2, 2025 at 7:31 pm

       In real life cue Pol Pot. How do people think food shortages are gonna play out? Not a great era for being an old fat person.