Getting started

The Problem

Background

The IPCC's '1.5 Degree Report' paints a dire picture that suggests we must fundamentally change the nature of society in the next 11 yrs 6 mo (mid 2019) See “Devastating UN Report: CO₂Emissions Must Go to Zero By 2050 to Avoid Worst Effects of Climate Change” at:

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/43eb4b/ipcc-15-degree-climate-change-report

“IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5ºC” (web pages) released in October 2018 is at:

https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/

“IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land (SRCCL)” released in August 2019 is at:

https://www.ipcc.ch/report/srccl/

“IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate” (pdf) released in September 2019 is at:

https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2019/09/SROCC-factsheet.pdf

We nearly did something 30 years ago, see “Losing Earth” at:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/08/01/magazine/climate-change-losing-earth.html ★ but were thwarted in the 80’s by the API and the fossil fuel industry that paid a few climate denier/skeptics to write editorials to raise doubt and undermine support for any policies which would affect their bottom line, when in fact it had been pretty much settled science at the time.

See the book “Losing Earth: A Recent History” - Nathan Rich – Macmillan – April 2019. https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374191337

And from Bloomberg – Dec 2019 “An Exxon-Owned Firm Figured Out How to Curb CO2 in 1991”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-12-04/an-exxon-owned-firm-figured-out-how-to-curb-co2-in-1991

But the media has been complacent too, see “The Media Are Complacent While the World Burns” from The Nation, Apr 2019, Mark Hertsgaard and Kyle Pope at:

https://www.thenation.com/article/climate-change-media-aoc-gnd-propaganda/ ★

Job One for Humanity has lots of general information at:

https://www.joboneforhumanity.org/

To learn more, read the not-for-late-night:

“The Uninhabitable Earth” – David Wallace-Wells – Penguin Random House – Feb 2019 ★

perhaps summarized in Catherine Ingram’s “Facing Extinction” essay

http://www.catherineingram.com/facingextinction/

and an update from the New York Times Dec 2019 “Climate Change Is Accelerating: ‘Things Are Getting Worse” at

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/04/climate/climate-change-acceleration.html

or:

“The End of Ice” – Dahr Jamail – The New Press – Jan 2019. Jamail uses the term ‘climate disruption’ a lot when he describes one man’s intimate experience with nature and the visible impact of climate change on glacial retreat, deforestation, coral reefs bleaching, etc. ★

or:

Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?” – Bill McKibben – Henry Holt & Co – Apr 2019 ★

or:

“Storming The Wall: Climate Change, Migration and Homeland Security” – Todd Miller – Sept 2017

or:

“This Civilisation Is Finished:[1]Conversations on the End of Empire - And What Lies Beyond” – Rupert Read, Samuel Alexander - Simplicity Institute – May 2019

Or:

“On Fire: - The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal” – Naomi Klein, - Simon & Schuster Sept. 2019

Then there is the report from Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) that predicts that a million species are currently ( May 2019) threatened with extinction at:

https://www.ipbes.net/news/Media-Release-Global-Assessment

One story on what Exxon knew in 1982 but didn’t share, from May 2019: “Exxon Predicted 2019’s Ominous CO₂Milestone in 1982” is at:

https://earther.gizmodo.com/exxon-predicted-2019-s-ominous-co2-milestone-in-1982-1834748763