"The research found “an almost complete loss of stability over the last century” of the currents that researchers call the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC). The currents are already at their slowest point in at least 1,600 years, but the new analysis shows they may be nearing a shutdown.
Such an event would have catastrophic consequences around the world, severely disrupting the rains that billions of people depend on for food in India, South America and West Africa; increasing storms and lowering temperatures in Europe; and pushing up the sea level off eastern North America. It would also further endanger the Amazon rainforest and Antarctic ice sheets."
The “worst case” has such a long tail.
I periodically see economists talk about portable water being the next oil economy, but I don’t think anyone really grasps what they means.
Folks talking about building rockets to Mars using fortunes they accrued as middle men for international shipping just a decade or two ago aren’t the guys who will be leading the charge into the next big crisis.
Even then, for all it is worth, we are a relatively small population on enormous continent. I don’t think civilization will just vanish in a puff of finance capital smoke. There’s far too much stuff and too many people who know how to use it for us not to adapt. It’s just a question of how much pain we’re going to experience as we go.
This is my line of thinking. The fuckers that want to run aren’t the ones that actually keep things running.
If they run, fine, the ones that do will take over. If they don’t and they begin to cut back on the alienated exploitation and start hurting the people that directly do the work of maintaining their society, there will be a massive revolutionary pushback. This is the peak of contradiction. Cowardly capitalists telling the workers to kill themselves and their communities because they don’t think it’s profitable to keep them alive anymore.
