{"id":30604,"date":"2012-06-04T14:34:57","date_gmt":"2012-06-04T18:34:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetsave.com\/?p=30604"},"modified":"2019-07-01T18:49:35","modified_gmt":"2019-07-01T22:49:35","slug":"the-science-of-apocalypse-climate-flips-and-global-collapse-two-dire-visions-of-the-21st-century","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetsave.com\/articles\/the-science-of-apocalypse-climate-flips-and-global-collapse-two-dire-visions-of-the-21st-century\/","title":{"rendered":"The Science of Apocalypse: Climate ‘Flips’ and Global ‘Collapse’ – Two Dire Visions of the 21st Century"},"content":{"rendered":"
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It is ironic to me that much recent print and media coverage has been given to very scientific-minded folks dispelling the myth known as the Mayan 2012 Apocalypse (based upon a simplistic and narrow reading of the Maya Astronomical Calendar)…. While, in this same year, we have seen an increase in science-based warnings of impending enviro-catastrophes (‘Armegeddons’) possibly on a global scale.<\/p>\n
Learned folk from the world’s leading research institutes all seem to be forecasting their own vision of the pending ‘eco-apocalypse’, or ecopalypse<\/em> (trademark).<\/p>\n Two of the more newsworthy visions or versions are covered herein.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n As global production (in all sectors) and population (consuming) continues to increase as predicted, it becomes increasingly unsustainable. Many know this, but the massive global production system has too much “inertia” (too much invested interest) to slow itself down, or change its course, to keep from flying off the cliff of no return.<\/p>\n This dire view was first articulated in the famous 1972 book The Limits to Growth<\/em>. Despite the fact that the global production economy has continued to grow since that time — defying some predictions with just a few shocks to the system along the way — the concern over that approaching economic-environmental ‘cliff’ are mounting.<\/p>\n Based upon scenarios predicted by a 4-decade-old,\u00a0MIT computer simulation called World3<\/em> (produced in collaboration with the Club of Rome<\/a>), some researchers, despite valid criticisms of the model’s simplifications, are renewing research into this possibility, but predict that things won’t get really<\/em> bad until after 2050.<\/p>\n Jorgen Randers, author of 2052: A Global Forecast for the Next Forty Years<\/a><\/em>, and member of the BI Norwegian Business School in Oslo, was one of the original developers of the World3<\/em> model, as well as a co-author of The Limits to Growth<\/a><\/em>*). Randers sees an apocalypse later<\/em>, starting around 2050.<\/p>\n In the coming few decades, Randers asserts, renewable energy and more efficient systems (less wasteful, less polluting) will mitigate the short-term impacts of climate change due to global warming. But after this point, Randers sees rapid decline, as the severe impacts of human-accelerated global warming (already set in motion) will overtake us.<\/p>\n Food production will continue to rise as warming opens up new agricultural land (note: this will deplete nitrogen and impose a limit to this production); growth in wealthy nations will still occur, but more slowly, as more capital is diverted to treating resource declines and mitigating climate change impacts. It will be ‘business as usual’ for the most part.<\/p>\n This continued growth will lead to a population of about 8 billion by 2040, predicts Randers. But shortly after this point, the impacts of flooding, drought, forest fires, and soil degradation will drastically reduced agricultural output (note: 25% of the world’s arable land area is currently “degraded,” according to the UN FAO), and therefore the availability of key foods, such as grains. Whole populations will be forced to migrate, and as a result, conflicts will erupt and spread and grow into regional wars, or even worse.<\/p>\nThe Once and Future Environmental ‘Collapse’<\/h2>\n