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[Reelya]

It's impossible to just say that global warming will devastate food production. For example, plants are made of CO2, so therefore more CO2 should make more plant, and data backs that up. Despite our best efforts to defoliate the planet, the amount of plant growth worldwide has kept pace with the increase in CO2 emissions. This doesn't mean we shouldn't attempt to stabilizing things to avoid disruptions, but this and other effects also mean that the more extreme "omg we're all going to starve to death" predictions are probably wrong, too.

The two most important questions about how food production will be impacted are what effects rising temperatures will have on wheat and rice production, which are the big staples. USA, Australia, Canada and Russia are the big whear exporters, so what happens in those places pretty much dictates the global price. Canada and Russia would see their wheat belts expand quite a bit for every degree of average temperature rise. For rice, it's India, Thailand, USA Pakistan who are the big 4. Rice needs a lot of water, and South Asia is very wet. With increased climate change, it's likely to become rainier in those regions. Sure, some production will need to move around but I don't necessarily think wheat and rice production are going to plummet in a warmer world, because both of those crops generally like warmer conditions, though wheat likes dryer regions, and rice likes wetter regions. So I think we'd be able to find places that are suitable for both even if some areas get wetter or drier.

[Frumple]

Just, uh. Just to check, but you're aware not all plants are particularly edible, right? Slash contribute much to human diets slash whatever.

... could swear it's also not sustainable some way or another. Wunnit one or more of the mass extinction periods prefaced by runaway plant growth heavily contributing to trollololofucking the environment in places, near as we can tell?

[smjjames]

It's impossible to just say that global warming will devastate food production. For example, plants are made of CO2, so therefore more CO2 should make more plant, and data backs that up. Despite our best efforts to defoliate the planet, the amount of plant growth worldwide has kept pace with the increase in CO2 emissions.

It’s more that it’ll disrupt agricultural regions as optimal growing regions move around. Richer countries and large ones can soften the impact sonewhat, but not everybody will be able to easily adapt. It’s the disruption that will cause problems, not massive crop die offs. Obviously if you continue to plant where growing conditions are no longer optimal, you’re more likely to have die offs.

Just, uh. Just to check, but you're aware not all plants are particularly edible, right? Slash contribute much to human diets slash whatever.

... could swear it's also not sustainable some way or another. Wunnit one or more of the mass extinction periods prefaced by runaway plant growth heavily contributing to trollololofucking the environment in places, near as we can tell?

Are you thinking of the Carboniferous period? That had nothing to do with the Permian-Triassic extinction as far as I know.

Also, I have to ask you to provide links as to what you’re talking about.

[Frumple]

Seem to be recalling something about algae blooms, mostly. Too tired to check, which is why I was asking instead of checking, heh.

[smjjames]

You’re probably thinking of dead zones https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_zone_(ecology) ?

[Culise]

I'm not sure either, but I do know that one of the Earth's past hot periods is believed to have come to a close at least in part because large amounts of aquatic or semi-aquatic plant blooms locked up free CO₂ in the atmosphere, died, and sank to the ocean floor where it would be protected from decay-based release.  Poking about my search history, I think it was the end of the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum that I saw, which may have contributed to the Earth's present icehouse period. 

I also stumbled across a note on the Late Devonian extinctions that may also be what it refers to: the development of advanced vascular systems in plants permitted complex branching and rooting systems that greatly increased their structural strength as well as aiding in water retention, allowing plants to grow bigger and further in more inhospitable regions.  They swarmed the land, locking up free CO₂ faster than it could be released by plant deaths.  Over time, and either in isolation or combined with volcanic activity, this contributed to a sharp drop in temperature that led to glaciation and sea-level drops.  Moreover, complex root structures were capable of breaking down bedrock and creating thick layers of soil capable of easier erosion for the first time, which released nutrients into the water and led to algal blooms and accompanying anoxic events, either contributing further to or being the chief driver of both Devonian extinctions in question. 

And of course, this leaves aside cyanobacteria entirely, which are photosynthetic and (sometimes) included in the algae polyphyletic group, which makes them pertinent for algal blooms.  They are also responsible for the Earth's greatest and worst extinction event as well as terraforming the Earth to a far greater degree than any life form before or since.  They are, however, not plants and are thus not included in runaway plant growth. 

[smjjames]

Going WAY Off-Topic, but I’ll respond to this one anyway.

I'm not sure either, but I do know that one of the Earth's past hot periods is believed to have come to a close at least in part because large amounts of aquatic or semi-aquatic plant blooms locked up free CO₂ in the atmosphere, died, and sank to the ocean floor where it would be protected from decay-based release.  Poking about my search history, I think it was the end of the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum that I saw, which may have contributed to the Earth's present icehouse period. 

I also stumbled across a note on the Late Devonian extinctions that may also be what it refers to: the development of advanced vascular systems in plants permitted complex branching and rooting systems that greatly increased their structural strength as well as aiding in water retention, allowing plants to grow bigger and further in more inhospitable regions.  They swarmed the land, locking up free CO₂ faster than it could be released by plant deaths.  Over time, and either in isolation or combined with volcanic activity, this contributed to a sharp drop in temperature that led to glaciation and sea-level drops.  Moreover, complex root structures were capable of breaking down bedrock and creating thick layers of soil capable of easier erosion for the first time, which released nutrients into the water and led to algal blooms and accompanying anoxic events, either contributing further to or being the chief driver of both Devonian extinctions in question.

I haven’t heard of it being the primary cause, but it was certainly a contributing factor along with the anoxic zones.

And of course, this leaves aside cyanobacteria entirely, which are photosynthetic and (sometimes) included in the algae polyphyletic group, which makes them pertinent for algal blooms.  They are also responsible for the Earth's greatest and worst extinction event as well as terraforming the Earth to a far greater degree than any life form before or since.  They are, however, not plants and are thus not included in runaway plant growth. 

I’ve heard of these so called ‘purple bacteria’ being involved with the anoxic zones, but I don’t think those are cyanobacteria.

[Culise]

And of course, this leaves aside cyanobacteria entirely, which are photosynthetic and (sometimes) included in the algae polyphyletic group, which makes them pertinent for algal blooms.  They are also responsible for the Earth's greatest and worst extinction event as well as terraforming the Earth to a far greater degree than any life form before or since.  They are, however, not plants and are thus not included in runaway plant growth. 

I’ve heard of these so called ‘purple bacteria’ being involved with the anoxic zones, but I don’t think those are cyanobacteria.

Sorry, I was referring to a different extinction event there, the Great Oxygenation Event, as an outside possibility for what was being referenced.  Anyways, you're right that it's quite off-topic, so with that clarification, I'll leave it be.

[wierd]

Sulfur cycle and methane cycle organisms did indeed get the short end of the stick once cyanobacteria emerged, and started tapping sunlight for energy, and dumping all that toxic waste that we oxygen breathers need to stay alive.

The major issue I see with climate change vis-a-vis food production, is the increased violence of weather, not the introduction of more rain, or more drought.

Wheat and rice plants don't really appreciate being ripped out of the ground by tornadoes or hurricanes.

However, another important thing to consider is the degree of CO2 in the atmosphere in aggregate, as it relates to human and animal health. While we are still quite some ways off from generally toxic levels, the rate of CO2 production is still *INCREASING* at a rate that is related to, but always faster than, population growth and technological utility.

While it would be a repeat of Malthus to make a prediction about these features (as the green energy phenomenon might actually make significant inroads this time. Maybe.... and transform the energy market in such a way that the predictions are useless, a-la what happened to Malthus, when nitrogen fertilizers and mechanical cultivation were introduced.), but that does not mean we should not see the data trends and go "Ok, yeah, we need to do something about that."

[WealthyRadish]

Personally what I find most disturbing about climate change are two possibilities:

1) The effectively permanent (on a human timescale) general collapse of biodiversity, as the planet's ecosystems are largely replaced by monocultures (or nothing), and
2) a sudden acceleration of global warming due to the release of methane clathrates, a process that may be unpreventable even if we halt emissions immediately.

One hypothesis that I've heard from a geology professor at my university (take this for what it's worth) regarding the Permian Extinction is that it may have been triggered by a period of intense volcanism (the creation of the siberian traps) which released tremendous amounts of CO2 and other gasses into the atmosphere, which in turn may have raised ocean temperatures enough to suddenly dump most of the methane clathrates that had been accumulating over the eons into the atmosphere. If this hypothesis were correct, then the mirrors to the present day would be obvious, since we have large amounts of methane currently frozen in the oceans and tundras that is right on the cusp of the temperatures needed for release.

Of course, the position of the continents is today much, much different from the time of the Permian Extinction, so it doesn't necessarily follow that total desertification would be a result, and indeed this sort of methane event may have been a recurring event that only triggered a mass extinction under those circumstances, but I think it's totally fallacious to think that the water situation in the event of sharp warming and desertification will be resolved by just moving production around to the "wetter" areas. Moisture isn't what limits production in areas already drenched that may get more intense precipitation, and if anything they may suffer from increased precipitation as these areas are already susceptible to massive flooding. Meanwhile, we can't maintain our current production in the "dryer" areas without depleting aquifers at an unsustainable rate, so further desertification is going to just exacerbate stresses on an already fragile water system in places like the western US and plains.

I'm not terribly worried about food production in particular though, because our current production is so incredibly wasteful. Much of our intensive agriculture goes into producing feed for livestock, something that we could easily tax and regulate out of existence if the food supply were really threatened (leaving meat production to marginal land only suitable for passive grazing, instead of using irrigated fields that employ massive amounts of fertilizer, pesticides, non-renewable aquifer water, etc). Even if we weren't able to improve yields in the future, converting production currently wasted on animal feed and things like corn biofuels could easily accommodate a much larger population than what we have currently. Of course, this sort of a policy-driven shift will never happen in the US, obviously, but the market should eventually drift there if prices on basic staples rise enough (after the aquifers have been depleted, 3/4 of north america is a postcard desert, all those resources on intensive agriculture are wasted, and however much global suffering is endured).

transform the energy market in such a way that the predictions are useless, a-la what happened to Malthus, when nitrogen fertilizers and mechanical cultivation were introduced

I always get triggered when people post Malthus, because the guy was such a goddamn hack. If you read his Essay on Population (his only work of any consequence, which was in essence plagiarized from an earlier obscure author), the thing is loaded with ridiculous conjectures and inapplicable examples that he just brazenly pulled out of his ass, often without explanation. Malthus' arguments were even for the most part rejected among contemporary economists as being too unsubstantiated (a challenging threshold to pass in economics), and were just kept alive over the decades though his patronage by the English aristocracy who used his statements about the condition of the poor as justification for policies in Ireland and their general position in society. People seem to imply Malthus was correct up until the "green revolution" skewed his "model", but the model was never even in principle near the truth, and doesn't fit any data sets or time periods!

[wierd]

I only mentioned Malthus, as he is the boogeyman spectre of "Woooo! Population growth DOOOOOOOOM! DOOOOOOOOM!"

The actual merits or lack thereof, of his population model are not terribly important. That he was a prominent figure (if a quack), is.  His argument was shot down by all possible forms by the adoption of chemical fertilizer and mechanical planting/harvest.

Most claims about CO2 rising to genuinely toxic levels from industrial activity will be seen with similar levels of "WOOOOOOO!". However, that does not mean we should not look at the rising trend data, and not go "Yeah, we should do something about that before it gets there."

Remember, the very people that discovered that CO2 was a greenhouse gas warned about climactic impacts back in the late 1800s. They recognized the trend data waaaay back then.  We have just reacted to that with "Oh, that's just more Wooo from the doom sayers. Buy FunDongles today!"

[McTraveller]

Eh, don't worry about CO2, worry about https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flood_basalt instead.

I guess the difference is there isn't as much money to be made in policy related to preventing magma plumes?  The closest you could come I guess is trying to get national funding for projects like http://www.thinkgeoenergy.com/cooling-down-a-supervolcano-and-generate-geothermal-power-a-possible-win-win/

I do have to say, using magma to both power the world and save it at the same time sounds like an awesome real-life megaproject.

[smjjames]

Permanent on human timescale at least, no telling what could happen to it over a geologic timescale. Not sure what would happen to the carbon dioxide over that long period of time, become bonded with the rocks probably.

In an attempt to re-rail this: Giuliani is claiming that Mueller is going to wrap up the investigation by Sept 1st. I wouldn’t believe that unless I heard it directly from Mueller or his spokesperson. Also not the first time a Trump lawyer has claimed it would wrap up at x date. It also seems rather close to the midterms to wrap up and release whatever findings.

Trump is also trying to order the DOJ to investigate whether the FBI/DOJ and the Obama admin actually did infiltrate his campaign.

[PTTG??]

For example, plants are made of CO2, so therefore more CO2 should make more plant

I shouldn't have to point out that this is intentional propoganda, but that is intentional propaganda that you're spreading. Please go suck a tailpipe and see if you sprout leaves.

Also, volcanoes release a small fraction the CO2 that humans do. Fun fact, there are also conspiracy myths that state that warming is caused by a decrease in volcanic activity. Sometimes I am jealous of those who leave fact behind; they get to have things both ways.

[Descan]

I only mentioned Malthus, as he is the boogeyman spectre of "Woooo! Population growth DOOOOOOOOM! DOOOOOOOOM!"

The actual merits or lack thereof, of his population model are not terribly important. That he was a prominent figure (if a quack), is.  His argument was shot down by all possible forms by the adoption of chemical fertilizer and mechanical planting/harvest.

Most claims about CO2 rising to genuinely toxic levels from industrial activity will be seen with similar levels of "WOOOOOOO!". However, that does not mean we should not look at the rising trend data, and not go "Yeah, we should do something about that before it gets there."

Remember, the very people that discovered that CO2 was a greenhouse gas warned about climactic impacts back in the late 1800s. They recognized the trend data waaaay back then.  We have just reacted to that with "Oh, that's just more Wooo from the doom sayers. Buy FunDongles today!"

The thing I think to take away from Malthus isn't "Malthus was wrong, we don't need to worry about the doom people say."

Malthus was right, and it took effort and decades to avert the crisis he saw coming. If he was wrong about anything, it was about whether it was something that could be fixed; but the "we can't feed the people we're birthing with current production" thing was true enough.

(Although considering how unsustainable current agricultural practices can be, from topsoil depletion to nitrogen run-off to using a non-renewable resource to make fertilizer, he might not have been as wrong as people say. :v)

(I also haven't actually read Malthus so disregard what he ACTUALLY said and just take what I said to mean the whole "people need food, we don't make enough food, ohshi-" thing.)