Current Events > A crucial system of ocean currents is heading for a collapse...

(+) Yeah! (+)

...that would affect every person on the planet

A vital system of ocean currents could collapse within a few decades if the world continues to pump out planet-heating pollution, scientists are warning an event that would be catastrophic for global weather and affect every person on the planet.

A new study published Tuesday in the journal Nature, found that the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Current of which the Gulf Stream is a part could collapse around the middle of the century, or even as early as 2025.

Scientists uninvolved with this study told CNN the exact tipping point for the critical system is uncertain, and that measurements of the currents have so far showed little trend or change. But they agreed these results are alarming and provide new evidence that the tipping point could occur sooner than previously thought.

The AMOC is a complex tangle of currents that works like a giant global conveyor belt. It transports warm water from the tropics toward the North Atlantic, where the water cools, becomes saltier and sinks deep into the ocean, before spreading southwards.

It plays a crucial role in the climate system, helping regulate global weather patterns. Its collapse would have enormous implications, including much more extreme winters and sea level rises affecting parts of Europe and the US, and a shifting of the monsoon in the tropics.

For years, scientists have been warning of its instability as the climate crisis accelerates, threatening to upset the balance of temperature and salinity on which the strength of these currents depend.

As the oceans heat up and ice melts, more freshwater flows into the ocean and reduces the waters density, making it less able to sink. When waters become too fresh, too warm or both, the conveyor belt stops.

It has happened before. More than 12,000 years ago, rapid glacier melt caused the AMOC to shut down, leading to huge Northern Hemisphere temperature fluctuations of 10 to 15 degrees Celsius (18 to 27 Fahrenheit) within a decade.

A shutdown would affect every person on the planet its that big and important, said Peter de Menocal, the president of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, who was not involved in the study.

A 2019 report by the UNs Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicted that the AMOC would weaken over this century, but that its full collapse before 2100 was unlikely.

This new study comes to a much more alarming conclusion.

As the AMOC has only been continuously monitored since 2004, the study authors looked to a much larger dataset, and one which could show how the currents behaved in a period without human-caused climate change.

We needed to go back in time, said Peter Ditlevsen, a professor of climate physics at the University of Copenhagen and one of the authors of the report. The scientists analyzed sea surface temperatures in the North Atlantic in an area south of Greenland over a period of 150 years between 1870 and 2020.

This part of the ocean is warmed by the water transported north from the tropics by the AMOC, Ditlevsen said, so if it cools, its because the AMOC is weakening. The authors then subtracted the impacts of human-caused global warming on the water temperature to understand how the currents were changing.

They found early warning signals of critical changes in the AMOC, which led them to predict with high confidence that it could shut down or collapse as early as 2025 and no later than 2095. The likeliest point of collapse is somewhere between 2039 and 2070, Ditlevsen said.

Its really scary, he told CNN. This is not something you would lightly put into papers, he said, adding, were very confident that this is a robust result.

De Menocal said the study results were both surprising and alarming.

Its been clear for a while that the AMOC will weaken in the coming decades, he told CNN. In 2021, a study found the AMOC was showing signs of instability due to climate change.

But until now, we havent had a time frame.

The new study provides a novel analysis that focuses on when the AMOC tipping point will occur, de Menocal said, and the studys prediction the collapse will occur around 2050 is alarmingly soon given the globally disruptive impact of such an event. Although, he added, it is important to note that there is no observational evidence yet that the AMOC is collapsing.

Stefan Rahmstorf, professor of physics of the oceans at the University of Potsdam in Germany, who was also not involved in the study, said the research helps bolster previous research.

There is still large uncertainty where the tipping point of the AMOC is, but the new study adds to the evidence that it is much closer than we thought just a few years ago, he told CNN. The scientific evidence now is that we cant even rule out crossing a tipping point already in the next decade or two.

The report calls for fast and effective measures to cut planet-heating pollution to zero, to reduce global temperatures and slow melting in the Arctic.

The key point of this study is that we dont have much time at all to do this, de Menocal said. And the stakes just got higher.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/25/world/gulf-stream-atlantic-current-collapse-climate-scn-intl/index.html

Yeah, we're fucked. We know it. Nothing will be done to change our collision course with world destruction.

At least some people got a lot of money.

Id care less than I already did, but that would involve going into the negatives.

tl;dr? I aint reading all that shit

When it collapses the conservatives will just shift to "well we couldn't have done anything about it anyway"

NeonTentacles posted...

tl;dr? I aint reading all that shit

There's a big current of water that circulates and regulates the temperature of pretty much every ocean (and therefore pretty much regulates every ecosystem) on earth. Climate change is on track to disrupt this current.

KanWan posted...

._.

we fucked up

Not we.
No one reading or posting in this topic has meaningfully contributed to this or any other aspect of climate change.

Dark_Arbron posted...

Not we.
No one reading or posting in this topic made a relevant difference.

What is the purpose of this kind of thinking

Will the corporations be ok?

pinky0926 posted...

What is the purpose of this kind of thinking

Just correcting the people who say that were all at fault. Im not at fault for shit.

pinky0926 posted...

There's a big current of water that circulates and regulates the temperature of pretty much every ocean (and therefore pretty much regulates every ecosystem) on earth. Climate change is on track to disrupt this current.

Ah okay. Thanks

Dark_Arbron posted...

Just correcting the people who say that were all at fault. Im not at fault for shit.

Ok cool but this isn't about who to blame or get in trouble, it's about trying to like...help makes things a little better

rexcrk posted...

Will the corporations be ok?

Thats the real concern here. Those CEOs cant keep wearing newspaper for shoes forever.

pinky0926 posted...

What is the purpose of this kind of thinking

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4VMM7Cc42w

pinky0926 posted...

Ok cool but this isn't about who to blame or get in trouble, it's about trying to like...help makes things a little better

And no one reading or posting on this topic is in a position to make a difference either. Theres no point saying Im being unhelpful when the ability to be helpful doesnt exist.

pinky0926 posted...

Ok cool but this isn't about who to blame or get in trouble, it's about trying to like...help makes things a little better

Well, considering that us as individuals can't do shit, what are we supposed to do?
Me turning off AC won't help anything.

GunmaN1905 posted...

Well, considering that us as individuals can't do shit, what are we supposed to do?
Me turning off AC won't help anything.

Hence why I think vegans who miss the taste of meat should go back to eating it. 10000 people could go vegan tomorrow, never buy a steak again, and still not equal a rounding error on the industrys next quarterly report. All theyre doing is depriving themselves of a nice meal for the sake of fake virtue signalling.

Dark_Arbron posted...

And no one reading or posting on this topic is in a position to make a difference either. Theres no point saying Im being unhelpful when the ability to be helpful doesnt exist.

Climate change is obviously a big problem so it's not like any one person is going to make a large contribution, but there are things you can do which are better than other things you might do:

• vote for parties or politicians that back large scale changes to emissions
• Make more ethical choices in corporations you support where possible
• call out practises that don't help
• spread awareness of the problem and support the drive to large scale change

These things are marginally better than like, rolling coal in your 4x4.

Dark_Arbron posted...

And no one reading or posting on this topic is in a position to make a difference either. Theres no point saying Im being unhelpful when the ability to be helpful doesnt exist.

I cant accept this. If everybody who thought they couldnt make a difference actually made the effort to try wed have a hell of a lot higher chance of a difference being made.

Dark_Arbron posted...

Hence why I think vegans who miss the taste of meat should go back to eating it. 10000 people could go vegan tomorrow, never buy a steak again, and still not equal a rounding error on the industrys next quarterly report. All theyre doing is depriving themselves of a nice meal for the sake of fake virtue signalling.

"Everybody is doing it therefore I can too", right?

If you're just not that bothered that's one thing, but that's different from saying there's no ethical choice to make.

pinky0926 posted...

Climate change is obviously a big problem so it's not like any one person is going to make a large contribution, but there are things you can do which are better than other things you might do:

* vote for parties or politicians that back large scale changes to emissions
* Make more ethical choices in corporations you support where possible
* call out practises that don't help
* spread awareness of the problem and support the drive to large scale change

These things are marginally better than like, rolling coal in your 4x4.

Voting doesnt help when none of the options presented are helpful (though there are definitely better ones than others).

There is no ethical consumption. Not supporting corporations who do shitty things means not buying anything at all.

Calling out practices only helps you feel better about yourself. Politicians dont act based on public opinion.

For the record Im not going around putting shit in the wrong bins out of spite. I am using biodegradable straws and spoons. I am doing what the 1% tell me I should be doing.

Dark_Arbron posted...

Hence why I think vegans who miss the taste of meat should go back to eating it. 10000 people could go vegan tomorrow, never buy a steak again, and still not equal a rounding error on the industrys next quarterly report. All theyre doing is depriving themselves of a nice meal for the sake of fake virtue signalling.

Yeah, I'm not giving up anything because as you say, we're all just a rounding errors as long as corporations can bribe their way into destroying the ecosystem.

And I'm as green as it gets.
All of my power comes from hydropower plant.
I've got a low consumption car and I don't even drive daily.
I just have an AC, all I need for temperature regulation at home.

pinky0926 posted...

"Everybody is doing it therefore I can too", right?

Pragmatically? Yes. By all means make the ethical choice for the sake of your feelings, just dont delude yourself into thinking its actually changing anything.

Dark_Arbron posted...

Voting doesnt help when none of the options presented are helpful (though there are definitely better ones than others).

There is no ethical consumption. Not supporting corporations who do shitty things means not buying anything at all.

Calling out practices only helps you feel better about yourself. Politicians dont act based on public opinion.
For the record Im not going around putting shit in the wrong bins out of spite. I am using biodegradable straws and spoons. I am doing what the 1% tell me I should be doing.

I find the last point a bit incongruous with the rest. It sounds like you want to do the right things, meaning on some level you value these actions even if you feel their overall contribution is a piss in the ocean.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSb585bGYmQ

pinky0926 posted...

I find the last point a bit incongruous with the rest. It sounds like you want to do the right things, meaning on some level you value these actions even if you feel their overall contribution is a piss in the ocean.

Nah its just a programmed response at this point, and its hard to fight your own conscience. Im not rich, so that mental faculty hasnt been destroyed yet, and the fact I have a conscience in the first place is one of several things stopping me from becoming rich.

There's a philosophical question here. Should your ethics be determined by the consequence or principle of your actions?

Is it acceptable to steal from someone who won't miss the money, or punch someone who won't get hurt?

pinky0926 posted...

There's a philosophical question here. Should your ethics be determined by the consequence or principle of your actions?

Is it acceptable to steal from someone who won't miss the money, or punch someone who won't get hurt?

Since were talking about the super rich here, we can add Is it acceptable to steal from those whose money is, itself, stolen?

how come USA pumps trillions in the military, but doesnt do jack on stopping this...are the rich just going to run the apolocapyse from underground protected by the military?

HelloMave posted...

how come USA pumps trillions in the military, but doesnt do jack on stopping this...are the rich just going to run the apolocapyse from underground protected by the military?

That would involve thinking long term. They dont do that. Their brains can only contemplate the time until their next quarterly report.

Scientists uninvolved with this study told CNN the exact tipping point for the critical system is uncertain, and that measurements of the currents have so far showed little trend or change

k

HelloMave posted...

how come USA pumps trillions in the military, but doesnt do jack on stopping this...are the rich just going to run the apolocapyse from underground protected by the military?

I might be wrong, but once you get filthy rich, everything around you happens in a way as if you were the center of the universe.

Climate change isn't something that concerns 50+ year olds.

Yeah I found that part odd too.

Scientists uninvolved with the study for some reason have opinions worth citing.

GunmaN1905 posted...

I might be wrong, but once you get filthy rich, everything around you happens in a way as if you were the center of the universe.

Climate change isn't something that concerns 50+ year olds.

Part of why, if Im lucky, I was born just early enough that the worst of climate change wont be my problem. Those only born in the past 5-10 years though

pinky0926 posted...

it's about trying to like...help makes things a little better

the level of "help" required to reverse the path we're on would be inhuman to actually implement

Kloe_Rinz posted...

the level of "help" required to reverse the path we're on would be inhuman to actually implement

What's the end game here. Accelerate things into the dirt as fast as possible because it would be difficult to improve things?

HelloMave posted...

how come USA pumps trillions in the military, but doesnt do jack on stopping this...are the rich just going to run the apolocapyse from underground protected by the military?

Damn right!!

pinky0926 posted...

What's the end game here. Accelerate things into the dirt as fast as possible because it would be difficult to improve things?

thats the whole idea of capitalism

and you simply dont understand. there is no "improving" things. to reverse climate change, we're talking genocide levels of atrocities. with that safely written off, theres either a slow painful demise or a fast burnout.

I'll never understand why conservative Christians don't care about taking care of earth when it literally commands people to do so in the bible

These discussions always have people acting like all a person can do is use paper straws and ride a bike more, as if long term and widespread active support for advocacy efforts and political action wouldnt improve the odds of things being changed for the better.

Dark_Arbron posted...

Just correcting the people who say that were all at fault. Im not at fault for shit.

You are if you vote for Republicans (or if you're in another country, if you vote for political parties that support conservative / big-business-oriented viewpoints)

Zikten posted...

I'll never understand why conservative Christians don't care about taking care of earth when it literally commands people to do so in the bible

Thats not the only part of the Bible they dont care about.

not a huge fan of seafood anyway

HeeathLivesOn posted...

You are if you vote for Republicans (or if you're in another country, if you vote for political parties that support conservative / big-business-oriented viewpoints)

Whats your option if both your parties push big business interests? Not vote? People give you grief over that too.

The good news is I dont have to worry about retirement now

Dark_Arbron posted...

Whats your option if both your parties push big business interests? Not vote? People give you grief over that too.

While that isn't the case in America, if it was in other countries, you're only real option is mass citizen action like widespread protests or riots, since the political system would be completely fucked. Hence, those countries must necessarily be authoritarian to suppress resistance (and then trend back to one real party).

That movie "Don't look up" was basically predicting the future, we're just fucked there's nothing we can do because a few people's greed and power outweighs everyone else. The only vague hope we have is that our eventual deaths will be quick and painless or join the orgy pile