Inauguration Day, Inauguration Hooooooraaay! - Discussion Forum

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Inauguration Day, Inauguration Hooooooraaay!

2017-03-24, 11:09 PM #1241

Jon`C

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Posts: 18,626

But I thought global warming was a hoax invented by the Chinese to make American companies less competitive??

2017-03-24, 11:30 PM #1242

Jon`C

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Posts: 18,626

Here's my personal prediction for all a dat.

What won't happen: Total extinction of all human life.

What probably won't happen, but probably ought to: Widespread human suffering, followed by the appropriate and fair prosecution (i.e. brutal public humiliation and execution) of people like the Kochs, who knew about the coming disaster for decades and conspired to suppress action for personal profit.

What probably will happen: Fusion breakthrough, rendering fossil fuels uselessly uncompetitive by 2030. 2-5 degree global warming still happens, kills maybe a few million people per year worldwide, mostly in North Africa and India. Western countries talk about how terrible it all is, but never do anything about it. Oh, and if anybody is curious how that whole fusion thing will play out, the oil rich, the financial sector, and US congress all use insider knowledge to front-run investment into the company that will be granted the fusion patents, which were all based on publicly funded research, and all of the rich get even filthier and richer than they ever were before.

2017-03-24, 11:31 PM #1243

Reid

^^vv<><>BASTART

Posts: 9,114

Originally posted by Reverend Jones:

Don't worry too much about that--at least on account of me.

When this whole Donald Trump reality star fascism sideshow blows over and he is either impeached, beaten down by the establishment, or starts a war, in every scenario the moneyed interests are still going to be marching along their merry way as they happily extinct our species, and there is literally nothing we can do to stop them so long as Rush Limbaugh is on the air and the red states continue to suffer economically.

You'll probably get more from me.

And I mean yeah eat the rich.

2017-03-24, 11:34 PM #1244

Jon`C

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Posts: 18,626

Originally posted by Reid:

eat the rich.

eat. the. rich.

2017-03-24, 11:40 PM #1245

Reverend Jones

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Posts: 9,096

The prospect of fusion energy making the planet hospitable for human life is genuinely something that makes me actually consider putting a child into this world without feeling guilty of child abuse.

OTOH, methane gas trapped in the now thawing (finished by 2020) arctic and permafrost.. .

2017-03-24, 11:48 PM #1246

Reverend Jones

Registered User

Posts: 9,096

Quote:

The cause for the end Permian mass extinction, the greatest challenge life on Earth faced in its geologic history, is still hotly debated by scientists. The most significant marker of this event is the negative δ13C shift and rebound recorded in marine carbonates with a duration ranging from 2000 to 19 000 years depending on localities and sedimentation rates. Leading causes for the event are Siberian trap volcanism and the emission of greenhouse gases with consequent global warming. Measurements of gases vaulted in calcite of end Permian brachiopods and whole rock document significant differences in normal atmospheric equilibrium concentration in gases between modern and end Permian seawaters. The gas composition of the end Permian brachiopod-inclusions reflects dramatically higher seawater carbon dioxide and methane contents leading up to the biotic event. Initial global warming of 8–11 °C sourced by isotopically light carbon dioxide from volcanic emissions triggered the release of isotopically lighter methane from permafrost and shelf sediment methane hydrates. Consequently, the huge quantities of methane emitted into the atmosphere and the oceans accelerated global warming and marked the negative δ13C spike observed in marine carbonates, documenting the onset of the mass extinction period. The rapidity of the methane hydrate emission lasting from several years to thousands of years was tempered by the equally rapid oxidation of the atmospheric and oceanic methane that gradually reduced its warming potential but not before global warming had reached levels lethal to most life on land and in the oceans. Based on measurements of gases trapped in biogenic and abiogenic calcite, the release of methane (of ∼3–14% of total C stored) from permafrost and shelf sediment methane hydrate is deemed the ultimate source and cause for the dramatic life-changing global warming (GMAT > 34 °C) and oceanic negative-carbon isotope excursion observed at the end Permian. Global warming triggered by the massive release of carbon dioxide may be catastrophic, but the release of methane from hydrate may be apocalyptic. The end Permian holds an important lesson for humanity regarding the issue it faces today with greenhouse gas emissions, global warming, and climate change

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1871174X16300488

2017-03-24, 11:50 PM #1247

Reid

^^vv<><>BASTART

Posts: 9,114

Jon's take is probably right, you'll basically have huge tracts of land become uninhabitable, and you'll have mass migrations and wars and stuff. Lots of suffering.

2017-03-24, 11:55 PM #1248

Reverend Jones

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Posts: 9,096

Disclaimer: that paper could literally be a Chinese / Canadian hoax, since it is not highly cited and at least one of the authors is from Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology (I checked a couple of the others and they are from Brock University).

2017-03-24, 11:56 PM #1249

Reverend Jones

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Posts: 9,096

Originally posted by Reid:

Jon's take is probably right, you'll basically have huge tracts of land become uninhabitable, and you'll have mass migrations and wars and stuff. Lots of suffering.

Assuming there isn't a catastrophic release of methane. Check out the video I linked to if you want to hear some climate scientist losing his **** over this.

2017-03-24, 11:59 PM #1250

Reverend Jones

Registered User

Posts: 9,096

Originally posted by Reid:

Jon's take is probably right, you'll basically have huge tracts of land become uninhabitable, and you'll have mass migrations and wars and stuff. Lots of suffering.

Which, btw, in the methane scenario includes all of the Mediterranean and the heartland of the united States.

The will be room for a few thousand people in Antarctica.

2017-03-25, 12:00 AM #1251

Reverend Jones

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I could be totally wrong, but I read about this on hacker news.

2017-03-25, 12:02 AM #1252

Reverend Jones

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Posts: 9,096

There, I've filled this thread with bizarre content.

Goodbye!

2017-03-25, 12:04 AM #1253

Jon`C

Admiral of Awesome

Posts: 18,626

Originally posted by Reverend Jones:

There's almost no models that show the kind of climate change I think you're talking about here. Most models say human CO2/CH4 can't force a climate change that will make us literally go extinct*, but it can trigger weaker runaway effects like permafrost thawing, which was going to happen eventually anyway.

Like, one of the main differences between Earth and Venus is that most of Earth's carbon is trapped in carbonate rocks due to early life. That carbon's not going anywhere. Venus turned out the way it did because it didn't have life, none of the carbon was sequestered, and its oceans boiled off due to photodissociation. Even in the worst case, Earth won't ever have as much C to worry about as Venus. The worst case for us is a weak moist greenhouse, where the planet is still (at least partially) inhabitable, but global warming causes the oceans to evaporate, which increases atmospheric albedo. Then either we'll cool off enough for things to go back the way they were, or we'll slowly lose our oceans to space over a few thousand years. Yee haw.

I'm not saying this to minimize what's happening. It's going to be supremely ****ty, and billions of people will die. That doesn't mean all humans are going to instantly die, though.

Edit: * The models that do show full-fledged Venus effect also say it's too late to do anything anyway, so you might as well strap in and enjoy the ride.

2017-03-25, 12:09 AM #1254

Reverend Jones

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Posts: 9,096

That's somewhat reasurring, so thanks for that.

2017-03-25, 12:12 AM #1255

Reverend Jones

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Posts: 9,096

I guess the scenario was getting from that video is described on this Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.Org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis

2017-03-25, 12:56 AM #1256

Reverend Jones

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Posts: 9,096

For the record, after reading a bit more, I suspect that guy in the video was overstating the risk. I think there will be big troubles (but not extinction) for humans living in 2100, but maybe not so much long before then. Sorry about that, but I guess I'm glad to have cleared that up for my own benefit....

2017-03-25, 1:10 AM #1257

Jon`C

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Posts: 18,626

Originally posted by Reverend Jones:

I guess the scenario was getting from that video is described on this Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.Org/wiki/Clathrate_gun_hypothesis

That's what they think caused the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, which was 8 degrees warmer on average. We're looking at 4 degrees if we do literally nothing about global warming.

2017-03-25, 8:18 AM #1258

Spook

-eeeee

Posts: 5,963

Good luck with agriculture at 3*+ warming. The geoengineering project that is civilization is honestly pretty impressive, and has averted the glacial period we should be returning to which would be almost equally disastrous for large human populations. But we didn'tt build brakes in and there's no way we are avoiding at minimum 3* and probably 4* since we are doing nothing and once ecosystem collapse really kicks into gear (lol as if it hasn't already) whatever surviving population you are talking about is by necessity rich techbros and their slaves/employees who will survive until their high tech vertical aquaponics system gets hit with some pestilence. I don't think that humanity will become extinct in a single cataclysmic climate event, though we may experience a population bottleneck on the order of hundreds of thousands remaining, and unless they have fully automated luxury communism they aren't maintaining industrial civilization, and depending on the strength of positive climate feedbacks like the clathrate gun (lots of known unknowns to say nothing of unknown unknowns) it isn't going to be an option to just pick up where we left off in the early 1800s. Humans grew up in an unusually cold period on earth, and have been doing **** all to learn to adapt and have ****ed up the systems we used previously. And if we do survive long term, it will almost certainly require modifying ourselves (well, probably not me) beyond the parameters of homo sapiens.

Our species is going extinct this century one way or the other!

Epstein didn't kill himself.

2017-03-25, 9:04 AM #1259

Wookie06

Administrator

Posts: 8,395

Somebody please try to remember to BUMP this thread in about 83 years.

"I would rather claim to be an uneducated man than be mal-educated and claim to be otherwise." - Wookie 03:16

2017-03-25, 9:50 AM #1260

Spook

-eeeee

Posts: 5,963

I will have long ago moved the goalposts by then man what would be the point

Epstein didn't kill himself.

2017-03-25, 9:56 AM #1261

Wookie06

Administrator

Posts: 8,395

Well, never mind anyway. Reverend Jones is pretty young. This thread will probably still be going strong at the turn of the century.

"I would rather claim to be an uneducated man than be mal-educated and claim to be otherwise." - Wookie 03:16

2017-03-25, 10:09 AM #1262

Reverend Jones

Registered User

Posts: 9,096

Well we'd probably have started a new thread with a more appropriate title, unless Baron Archduke Barron Trump is still king as he approaches his 100th birthday.

2017-03-25, 10:19 AM #1263

Wookie06

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Posts: 8,395

One can hope.

"I would rather claim to be an uneducated man than be mal-educated and claim to be otherwise." - Wookie 03:16

2017-03-25, 10:24 AM #1264

Reverend Jones

Registered User

Posts: 9,096

Peter Thiel will provide the stem cells and the CRISPR expertise. And the two will be good friends by then as the older supervillain mentors his young apprentice from his offshore bunker.

But first to prove his loyalty to the new order, he must strike down Count Bannon. There is room for only one archduke 'Ba(n|r)(n|r)on' in this town.

2017-03-25, 10:34 AM #1265

Reverend Jones

Registered User

Posts: 9,096

Conspiracy theory: Trump knew the comedians would say "President Bannon". That's exactly why he picked him as his sith master, so that people would get used to hearing the phrase "President Ba(n|r)(n|r)on".

2017-03-25, 11:00 AM #1266

Jon`C

Admiral of Awesome

Posts: 18,626

Originally posted by Reverend Jones:

Peter Thiel will provide the stem cells

Gathered from the spittle on his chin after guzzling another pint of millennial blood.

2017-03-25, 11:06 AM #1267

Wookie06

Administrator

Posts: 8,395

Wouldn't millennial blood make you weaker?

"I would rather claim to be an uneducated man than be mal-educated and claim to be otherwise." - Wookie 03:16

2017-03-25, 11:24 AM #1268

Reverend Jones

Registered User

Posts: 9,096

I guess, if you assume that the pampering and sheltering of your children is something that can be transmitted genetically.

Unless you are talking about the sterile microbial environment millennials are being raised in, then yeah maybe? Still better than the abuse and toxins that accumulate in your cells as you age, though, which is sort of the whole point of being a vampire.

2017-03-25, 11:25 AM #1269

Wookie06

Administrator

Posts: 8,395

I thought the point had more to do with ever freakier sex.

"I would rather claim to be an uneducated man than be mal-educated and claim to be otherwise." - Wookie 03:16

2017-03-25, 11:29 AM #1270

Wookie06

Administrator

Posts: 8,395

So, did anybody actually know anything about the Republican health care bill? I honestly don't have a clue what was in it or if it or any part of it was good in anyway. That whole "disinterested" thing. I know conservatives hated it and Democrats had no reason to support it. Could they have planned for it to fail any harder than it did or did it fail exactly as they planned it too?

"I would rather claim to be an uneducated man than be mal-educated and claim to be otherwise." - Wookie 03:16

2017-03-25, 12:27 PM #1271

Jon`C

Admiral of Awesome

Posts: 18,626

Originally posted by Wookie06:

It was Obamacare/ACA with a few tweaks, mostly bad ones. It reduced the low income subsidy, increased the age differential from 3X to 5X, and replaced the single/employer mandate tax penalty with an industry administered penalty applied at the time you reinsure.

It also repealed the net investment income tax, extra Medicare tax, and doubled the expense deduction cap for insurance executive pay from $500,000 to the first $1m. So that's, like, whatever. Republicans.

Basically, all of the complicated **** that made ACA a gong show is still there. It's going to make insurance more expensive for businesses and individuals. And it would cost the government even more money than ACA to implement this, a ****tier version of ACA.

23 million Americans would have lost insurance, mostly lower income old people (i.e. Republican voters).

Democrats didn't want it because, whatever, it doesn't matter what they think right now.

Radical right won't vote for anything short of full ACA repeal.

Moderates won't vote for something this ****ty.

Career Republicans won't vote for something that will get them crucified.

And that's why the bill died.

Edit: as for whether they "planned" for this to fail, no. Don't be ridiculous. ACA was originally a Republican idea. They spent the last 8 years *****ing about getting a fair compromise, and they've got zero ****ing alternatives to show for it. ACA + billionaire tax cuts. That's it. That's their genius ****ing idea. This is the best they could do.

If they wanted a spectacular public failure to iustify not working the problem anymore, they'd've put this to a vote on Monday and let their own party sink it in a huge public spectacle. Not quietly ditch the bill in a Friday news dump hoping it would blow over.

2017-03-25, 1:54 PM #1272

Wookie06

Administrator

Posts: 8,395

Okay. I'll take your word for most of that. It's presently a topic that doesn't affect us directly except for killing the forty hour work week for non-full time employees. Even then, my wife wouldn't be super excited about putting in anymore hours where she works anyway. She does get some vacation and sick time anyway, a benefit she didn't even realize that she had for awhile.

At some point (60-something-ish) I will no longer be eligible for my current plan and get dumped on Medicare. By that point it shouldn't be an issue and if there's something I can't get done correctly should be able to just get it done on my own assuming that won't be illegal by then.

But I do have empathy for those that are affected in anyway (negative or positive) by this decade long fiasco. I seriously think the best solutions are simpler rather than ever more complex. Good luck.

"I would rather claim to be an uneducated man than be mal-educated and claim to be otherwise." - Wookie 03:16

2017-03-25, 2:28 PM #1273

Jon`C

Admiral of Awesome

Posts: 18,626

Yeah, well, the simplest solution is single payer. Private healthcare is always going to be more wasteful and require more government intervention because free markets fall apart under perfectly inelastic demand.

The only reason the US doesn't have single payer today is because of a historical accident. The geniuses who wrote the IRC didn't think to tax non-monetary compensation, so employers started paying for services, tax free, that their executives would have bought anyway (like even food and ****). The government eventually cracked down on everything else, but left health insurance alone for reasons I can only assume involved massive bribes.

And today, there's just a shameful amount of money to be made in private health insurance. Which is why you're stuck with a broken, inefficient system that combines the absolute worst things about both public and private services, and costs 4x more than it should because ******* CEO needs a new pool.

2017-03-25, 2:33 PM #1274

Eversor

Given to fly

Posts: 5,234

Jon, how sure are you that most of the 24 million that the CBO projected would have lost their insurance were older Republican voters? I know that the 5x age differential was going to hit, and premiums for some older American were going to go up, especially for low-income Americans in rural areas, leaving many priced out of insurance. But I also got the impression (and I'm not sure about this) that before 2020, most people who lost insurance were going to lose it from the repeal of the individual mandate. Many who dropped out were going to be younger Americans, who would chose not to buy insurance because they didn't want/need it. (After 2020, iirc, most who were going to lose their insurance would lose it because of changes in eligibility for medicaid).

former entrepreneur

2017-03-25, 2:51 PM #1275

Jon`C

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Posts: 18,626

I'm not. It was an exaggeration to point out how badly ****ed the GOP would be if they had voted for it.

CBO says 14 million projected to lose insurance by 2018, due to the individual mandate repeal, mostly healthy non-elderly. The rest (another 10 million) are projected to lose insurance over the next 4 years due to being priced out. The combination of a higher age differential and worse (non-refundable) tax incentives, mean lower income older people are going to carry a higher share of the cost of a more expensive system no longer subsidized by young healthy people. The CBO says that some of these people would pay 750% more on premiums alone.

Whether they can afford it or not, this would have been an absolute ****show and Republican congresspeople were right to tell their whip where to stick it.

2017-03-25, 3:27 PM #1276

Reid

^^vv<><>BASTART

Posts: 9,114

At least Republicans have a sliver of shame.

2017-03-25, 3:38 PM #1277

Eversor

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Posts: 5,234

Some of the so-called moderate Republican congressmen, who wouldn't have voted for the bill, may have some sense of shame. But the vast majority of Republican congressmen don't. Most were willing to vote for the bill, despite the fact that various compromises made behind closed doors were actually making the bill more expensive despite lowering coverage. And what's worse, many of those who refused to vote for it did so because they attacked it from the right (and thought the bill didn't do enough to eliminate regulations).

former entrepreneur

2017-03-25, 3:40 PM #1278

Eversor

Given to fly

Posts: 5,234

But more likely, it wasn't shame that drove moderate Republicans to refuse to vote for the bill. It was fear of alienating their constituents and losing their seat to a Democrat in 2018.

former entrepreneur

2017-03-25, 3:53 PM #1279

Reverend Jones

Registered User

Posts: 9,096

So what you guys are saying is that partisan politics in America is like chess, where pretty much the only winning tactic is to fork your adversary into choosing the lesser of two bad outcomes?

Or, alternatively, hope that that your opponent is not too bright, and forks himself. :-)

Orrrrr... to appropriate a 4cahan meme: Drumpf is playing n-dinensional chess with us and we are too naive to see it, as has been the case all along with all of his supposedly daft antics and outbursts, all of which time will ultimately reveal to be mere pawns in a grandmaster plan. >:-)

2017-03-25, 4:06 PM #1280

Jon`C

Admiral of Awesome

Posts: 18,626

Originally posted by Reverend Jones:

Orrrrr... to appropriate a 4cahan meme: Drumpf is playing n-dinensional chess with us and we are too naive to see it, as has been the case all along with all of his supposedly daft antics and outbursts, all of which time will ultimately reveal to be mere pawns in a grandmaster plan. >:-)

Or to appropriate another 4chan meme: How could Donald Trump be a worse president than Obama?? He's white!