Glacial cycles and the future of humanity
I've continued to be curious about the nature of the CO2 graphs I uploaded last week. Regular oscillations imply driving mechanisms and negative feedbacks.
There's a useful comparison of the energy system that defines the motion of a pendulum. A pendulum "works" conceptually by energy transfer between a Kinetic form (motion) and Potential form (gravity). If you grab a pendulum at the bottom, you must take away it's kinetic energy and this energy is lost. If you grab a pendulum at the top, the motion was minimal and energy is "stored" in the gravitational field itself and the pendulum can be restarted simply by letting it go again.
This sort of oscillation is called Simple Harmonic Motion (at least for low angle pendulums) and is represented by a second order differential equation. The solution of this equation becomes a sine graph for motion, a cosine graph for velocity, a negative sine graph for acceleration, and so on.
There is a theory, called Milankovitch cycles, that the Earth's orbital motion around the sun and rotational axis, with variations in eccentricity, obliquity being driving forces in the glacial cycles, just like the annual cycle around the sun controls the seasons on earth.
In compliment perhaps there's another theory called The Gaia Hypothesis which looks at the effects of life itself as a driving force for the conditions on earth. Whether considered driven by mystical ideas of "Life consciousness" or more of a "Natural selection", the idea basically says that living systems on earth moderate the conditions that best support their survival.
The simplest idea of life acting (unconsciously) as a moderation system was described in a model called Daisy World where there were two types of flowers, white and black. White flowers thrived in warm temperatures, and black flowers thrived in cool temperatures. If you imagine "moderate temperatures" and an equal amounts of each flower, as an initial equilibrium, and then you try "driving" the system by forced cooling. This cooling would give a competitive advantage to the black flowers, and they would increase in numbers. As they increased, they'd absorb more solar energy and radiate that energy back into the environment as infrared heat, and warm the environment. In contrast, if you warmed the environment, the white flowers would tend to dominate, and reflect more visible light energy back into space, helping to cool the extra heat. So this simple system could tend towards an equilibrium at different temperatures based on external driving forces.
IN CONTRAST, but like Daisy world, snow and ice offer a higher reflectivity of the planet. Unfortunately it is in the opposite effect. Snow thrives under cold conditions it reflects more light back into space, which cools the world and encourages more snow to accumulate over more land and cool things more. In the opposite direction, melting glaciers uncover more darker ground which absorbs more light and warms the temperature which can melt more ice.
Oscillating systems are interesting for spending the majority of their time in the extremes and relatively quick transition periods.
The most recent glaciation, named the Wisconsin in North America, began 70,000 years ago, reached a peak about 18,000 years ago and ended about 10,000 years ago. You can see the in the G1 part of the graph, a long continuous "fall" in CO2, and a sudden reversal.
If you were living 18,000 years ago, measuring the glacial ice advance and falling CO2, you'd perhaps think the world was falling into a permanent freeze of no return. Of course you'd be wrong, maybe just like a pessimistic Groundhog might be wrong on a cold mid-winter's day thinking the world was just getting colder. The "driving forces" are not visible in the cold-facts of CO2 levels, although they might be visible in careful measurements of averaged rates of change of CO2. A sine wave slows as it reaches its peak. Still, if you look at the graph in the last posting, there's no clear sign of slowing.
In COMPARISON perhaps, in our current CO2 increases, there's a strong and accelerating upward trend. Most likely MOST of this increase is due to Human actions on the environment - between agriculture, deforestation and burning of fossil fuels.
A 50 year trend is impressively consistent, and by limited prehistoric data is certainly unprecedented in BOTH the rate of change and the absolute levels of CO2.
Even more impressive is to compare to the 5000 year history:
What's harder to determine is "what it means". This period is considered "Human history" including the oldest written records. It makes sense that the increase since about 1850 correspond to our "fossil fuel era". It certainly also corresponds to the increase of human population. Human population has increased from slightly over a billion people around 1850 to close to 7 billion people now, and the "fossil fuel era" has also increases the power and resources available to people.
Most of all I suppose such historical data shows that we're in a special time in history and that there's multiple possible futures, AND they EXCLUDE the possibility of continued exponential growth. Something has "got to give", and the possibility of supporting more than a billion people in 100 years may be the option we have to give up. Scary stuff, and there's plenty of websites supporting such fears, like http://dieoff.org . My strongest argument is that our "energy resources" are the limiting factors of our way of life and we'll either find more sustainable ways to support us OR we won't be supported in the future.
A conservative rational perspective would seem to always promote moderation. If we're going to "live beyond our means", at least let's do it with moderation. Rather than holding drinking parties EVERY night, perhaps we'll just hold them once a week, right? Or perhaps we'll give up beer, and just drink a little glass of wine on special occassions?
It's hard to imagine "moderation" on the fossil fuel consumption. If our current "binge" is consuming fossil fuels at a rate of a million times faster than they are being created, are we better off cutting our consumption by a factor of 10? Well, probably we are since we have a "large stash" of it, and then we have 10 times longer to make use of it.
On the other hand, unfortunately humanity appears to be heading in the opposite direction, continued increase in population, continued increase in "per capita" consumption, and a worldwide 5 billion person underclass waiting to catch up to the highest consumption centers like the U.S.
An optimist would say that perhaps the "Meteoritic" approach to life is the way to go - give it all you got and go in style if things don't work out. Perhaps "Necessity is the mother of invention" and the "Necessity of feeding 9 billion people without petroleum" is the incentive we need to prioritize our needs and focus our energy on alternatives.
I'm not against fairy tales, and I can accept that our current delimma, although intractable in itself, might be offset by "something new" (like controllable nuclear fussion) which will make our current problems obsolete. Not that the dilemma of environmental distruction will end if we find a new superior source of energy, but SOME of the coming failures in the next 30 years can be delayed at least.
Still I'm forced by my temperament to be a stick in the mud and admit "we really don't know what we're doing", and "people will suffer and die unnecessarily" because of it. If I were religious I'd point out that "God knows" and things'll be better as soon as we all are forced to admit our weaknesses to build "Heaven on earth" by our own good management.
Since I'm not looking for God to come down and save us (or punish us), I'm left to accept the high probability that this current "Energy bubble" will burst sooner or later and we'll all "make do" when it happens and discover a new set of rules to govern the world. I do fear this may lead to a devaluing of "democratic" principles, and a new "survival of the fittest", which means the ambitious will fight it out for dominion and "peace" happens when a clearly strongest dictator stands on top. The rest of us can make do with the scraps that fall from below, and put up with injustice as we must.
It would be fun to see into the future and see which trends continue, and which trends reverse. Although I guess if I knew too much I'd probably be even more depressed. Uncertainy of doom allows some hope, while guarantees aren't easily helpful.
Sadly, knowing unsustainable trends, I'll vote for "taking my medicine" earlier than later, so I hope for an early sickness that demands attention. On the other hand, I'll keep playing the game as I can, pay down my mortgage for now, and invest here and there as I can in slightly less insane things.
The biggest "working issue" for me may be transportation. With oil as perhaps the "first energy crisis" coming, and transportation 90% dependent upon oil, it would seem cars are the first thing that'll get stretched in the coming decade.
I rather like that I've gone now over 10 months without a car, merely sharing expenses with my girlfriend's minivan, which I hate to drive and can go months without driving, at least under nicer weather.
I can't imagine how our modern sprawl cities can function with out cars. In a week I'll ride-share with a coworker to a Saturday Christmas party. On the day after Christmas, I'll likely borrow the minivan and drive my niece and sister to an extended family gathering at Old Country Buffet. I'm still working out how I'll attend my bimonthly Toastmaster club meetings, but at least next week looks like bicyclable weather, even with chances for light snow messing up the roads.
I'm in a very mellow stage of my life with needs for transportation. I've no children to drive around, no dating requirements, and really not doing much hanging out with distant friends. There were times when I had weekly outings with friends and we'd drive to a bowling alley, drive to a restaurent, often tens of miles combined and multitudes of cars between us. A nice freedom, automobile's provide, and who would give that up? It just seems a little silly in the back of my mine to select friendship circles across a wide city and neglect equally nice people closer to home. A long old guilt, one I'm not overly controlled by, and one I'm unlikely to give up as long as email and phones exist.
Anyway, whatever the solutions, it seems clear to me that the future of transportation by personal automobile will be more limiting the future and those on the bottom will be those who will first most be effected and have to react. Partly I accept improved mass-transit is part of the solution, but not a quick one, nor at all a replacement, except for people who happen to live, or choose to live in the highest density locations of the city.
It is fun to imagine starting a "No car club" or something equally idealistic, but I'm not fully sure I'm committed to it, except on altruistic grounds. I DEFINITELY like not having a car means I'm not obligated to drive others around who can't drive. Definitely the top reason for not having a car. Still if I wanted to re-enter a "social stage" where I had lots of varied activities, I have a hard time imaging wanting to play that game without a car. The reality in my whole life is in fact having a car for "pleasure", for socializing, for dating, for vacations. Practical uses like commuting I've been able to avoid, and "shopping uses" definitely don't justify a daily access to a car for myself.
Enough lost thoughts. I'll just leave smiling with the Saudi Arabian saying "My father rode a camel, I drive a car, my son flies a jet plane. His son will ride a camel."
I'll add a wonderment at the changes of the last century, and also the tragedies. It seems we've been overall lucky for good weather for a couple decades and we can't continue hoping the luck will continue without some more rainy days, some more cold winters, some more droughts, some more times of economic fear and downturn.
Whatever else is true, I'm SURE the minimum goodness for the moment is to get out of debt and conserve some resources for the coming winter.
There's a useful comparison of the energy system that defines the motion of a pendulum. A pendulum "works" conceptually by energy transfer between a Kinetic form (motion) and Potential form (gravity). If you grab a pendulum at the bottom, you must take away it's kinetic energy and this energy is lost. If you grab a pendulum at the top, the motion was minimal and energy is "stored" in the gravitational field itself and the pendulum can be restarted simply by letting it go again.
This sort of oscillation is called Simple Harmonic Motion (at least for low angle pendulums) and is represented by a second order differential equation. The solution of this equation becomes a sine graph for motion, a cosine graph for velocity, a negative sine graph for acceleration, and so on.
There is a theory, called Milankovitch cycles, that the Earth's orbital motion around the sun and rotational axis, with variations in eccentricity, obliquity being driving forces in the glacial cycles, just like the annual cycle around the sun controls the seasons on earth.
In compliment perhaps there's another theory called The Gaia Hypothesis which looks at the effects of life itself as a driving force for the conditions on earth. Whether considered driven by mystical ideas of "Life consciousness" or more of a "Natural selection", the idea basically says that living systems on earth moderate the conditions that best support their survival.
The simplest idea of life acting (unconsciously) as a moderation system was described in a model called Daisy World where there were two types of flowers, white and black. White flowers thrived in warm temperatures, and black flowers thrived in cool temperatures. If you imagine "moderate temperatures" and an equal amounts of each flower, as an initial equilibrium, and then you try "driving" the system by forced cooling. This cooling would give a competitive advantage to the black flowers, and they would increase in numbers. As they increased, they'd absorb more solar energy and radiate that energy back into the environment as infrared heat, and warm the environment. In contrast, if you warmed the environment, the white flowers would tend to dominate, and reflect more visible light energy back into space, helping to cool the extra heat. So this simple system could tend towards an equilibrium at different temperatures based on external driving forces.
IN CONTRAST, but like Daisy world, snow and ice offer a higher reflectivity of the planet. Unfortunately it is in the opposite effect. Snow thrives under cold conditions it reflects more light back into space, which cools the world and encourages more snow to accumulate over more land and cool things more. In the opposite direction, melting glaciers uncover more darker ground which absorbs more light and warms the temperature which can melt more ice.
Oscillating systems are interesting for spending the majority of their time in the extremes and relatively quick transition periods.
The most recent glaciation, named the Wisconsin in North America, began 70,000 years ago, reached a peak about 18,000 years ago and ended about 10,000 years ago. You can see the in the G1 part of the graph, a long continuous "fall" in CO2, and a sudden reversal.
If you were living 18,000 years ago, measuring the glacial ice advance and falling CO2, you'd perhaps think the world was falling into a permanent freeze of no return. Of course you'd be wrong, maybe just like a pessimistic Groundhog might be wrong on a cold mid-winter's day thinking the world was just getting colder. The "driving forces" are not visible in the cold-facts of CO2 levels, although they might be visible in careful measurements of averaged rates of change of CO2. A sine wave slows as it reaches its peak. Still, if you look at the graph in the last posting, there's no clear sign of slowing.
In COMPARISON perhaps, in our current CO2 increases, there's a strong and accelerating upward trend. Most likely MOST of this increase is due to Human actions on the environment - between agriculture, deforestation and burning of fossil fuels.
A 50 year trend is impressively consistent, and by limited prehistoric data is certainly unprecedented in BOTH the rate of change and the absolute levels of CO2.
Even more impressive is to compare to the 5000 year history:
What's harder to determine is "what it means". This period is considered "Human history" including the oldest written records. It makes sense that the increase since about 1850 correspond to our "fossil fuel era". It certainly also corresponds to the increase of human population. Human population has increased from slightly over a billion people around 1850 to close to 7 billion people now, and the "fossil fuel era" has also increases the power and resources available to people.
Most of all I suppose such historical data shows that we're in a special time in history and that there's multiple possible futures, AND they EXCLUDE the possibility of continued exponential growth. Something has "got to give", and the possibility of supporting more than a billion people in 100 years may be the option we have to give up. Scary stuff, and there's plenty of websites supporting such fears, like http://dieoff.org . My strongest argument is that our "energy resources" are the limiting factors of our way of life and we'll either find more sustainable ways to support us OR we won't be supported in the future.
A conservative rational perspective would seem to always promote moderation. If we're going to "live beyond our means", at least let's do it with moderation. Rather than holding drinking parties EVERY night, perhaps we'll just hold them once a week, right? Or perhaps we'll give up beer, and just drink a little glass of wine on special occassions?
It's hard to imagine "moderation" on the fossil fuel consumption. If our current "binge" is consuming fossil fuels at a rate of a million times faster than they are being created, are we better off cutting our consumption by a factor of 10? Well, probably we are since we have a "large stash" of it, and then we have 10 times longer to make use of it.
On the other hand, unfortunately humanity appears to be heading in the opposite direction, continued increase in population, continued increase in "per capita" consumption, and a worldwide 5 billion person underclass waiting to catch up to the highest consumption centers like the U.S.
An optimist would say that perhaps the "Meteoritic" approach to life is the way to go - give it all you got and go in style if things don't work out. Perhaps "Necessity is the mother of invention" and the "Necessity of feeding 9 billion people without petroleum" is the incentive we need to prioritize our needs and focus our energy on alternatives.
I'm not against fairy tales, and I can accept that our current delimma, although intractable in itself, might be offset by "something new" (like controllable nuclear fussion) which will make our current problems obsolete. Not that the dilemma of environmental distruction will end if we find a new superior source of energy, but SOME of the coming failures in the next 30 years can be delayed at least.
Still I'm forced by my temperament to be a stick in the mud and admit "we really don't know what we're doing", and "people will suffer and die unnecessarily" because of it. If I were religious I'd point out that "God knows" and things'll be better as soon as we all are forced to admit our weaknesses to build "Heaven on earth" by our own good management.
Since I'm not looking for God to come down and save us (or punish us), I'm left to accept the high probability that this current "Energy bubble" will burst sooner or later and we'll all "make do" when it happens and discover a new set of rules to govern the world. I do fear this may lead to a devaluing of "democratic" principles, and a new "survival of the fittest", which means the ambitious will fight it out for dominion and "peace" happens when a clearly strongest dictator stands on top. The rest of us can make do with the scraps that fall from below, and put up with injustice as we must.
It would be fun to see into the future and see which trends continue, and which trends reverse. Although I guess if I knew too much I'd probably be even more depressed. Uncertainy of doom allows some hope, while guarantees aren't easily helpful.
Sadly, knowing unsustainable trends, I'll vote for "taking my medicine" earlier than later, so I hope for an early sickness that demands attention. On the other hand, I'll keep playing the game as I can, pay down my mortgage for now, and invest here and there as I can in slightly less insane things.
The biggest "working issue" for me may be transportation. With oil as perhaps the "first energy crisis" coming, and transportation 90% dependent upon oil, it would seem cars are the first thing that'll get stretched in the coming decade.
I rather like that I've gone now over 10 months without a car, merely sharing expenses with my girlfriend's minivan, which I hate to drive and can go months without driving, at least under nicer weather.
I can't imagine how our modern sprawl cities can function with out cars. In a week I'll ride-share with a coworker to a Saturday Christmas party. On the day after Christmas, I'll likely borrow the minivan and drive my niece and sister to an extended family gathering at Old Country Buffet. I'm still working out how I'll attend my bimonthly Toastmaster club meetings, but at least next week looks like bicyclable weather, even with chances for light snow messing up the roads.
I'm in a very mellow stage of my life with needs for transportation. I've no children to drive around, no dating requirements, and really not doing much hanging out with distant friends. There were times when I had weekly outings with friends and we'd drive to a bowling alley, drive to a restaurent, often tens of miles combined and multitudes of cars between us. A nice freedom, automobile's provide, and who would give that up? It just seems a little silly in the back of my mine to select friendship circles across a wide city and neglect equally nice people closer to home. A long old guilt, one I'm not overly controlled by, and one I'm unlikely to give up as long as email and phones exist.
Anyway, whatever the solutions, it seems clear to me that the future of transportation by personal automobile will be more limiting the future and those on the bottom will be those who will first most be effected and have to react. Partly I accept improved mass-transit is part of the solution, but not a quick one, nor at all a replacement, except for people who happen to live, or choose to live in the highest density locations of the city.
It is fun to imagine starting a "No car club" or something equally idealistic, but I'm not fully sure I'm committed to it, except on altruistic grounds. I DEFINITELY like not having a car means I'm not obligated to drive others around who can't drive. Definitely the top reason for not having a car. Still if I wanted to re-enter a "social stage" where I had lots of varied activities, I have a hard time imaging wanting to play that game without a car. The reality in my whole life is in fact having a car for "pleasure", for socializing, for dating, for vacations. Practical uses like commuting I've been able to avoid, and "shopping uses" definitely don't justify a daily access to a car for myself.
Enough lost thoughts. I'll just leave smiling with the Saudi Arabian saying "My father rode a camel, I drive a car, my son flies a jet plane. His son will ride a camel."
I'll add a wonderment at the changes of the last century, and also the tragedies. It seems we've been overall lucky for good weather for a couple decades and we can't continue hoping the luck will continue without some more rainy days, some more cold winters, some more droughts, some more times of economic fear and downturn.
Whatever else is true, I'm SURE the minimum goodness for the moment is to get out of debt and conserve some resources for the coming winter.
posted by Ares Olympus at 6:05 PM
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