It's a bit warm/ wet/ cold outside

[Funt Solo]

Climate change: Australian TV audience boos sceptical senator

[sheridan]

Climate change: Australian TV audience boos sceptical senator

Well, that's good news - part of the reason (other than lobbying - read bribing - by oil companies) politicians don't act on climate emergencies is because they think they'll lose votes if they do anything which impinges on those who drives cars and take two airplane holidays a year.  If that isn't a guarantee of popularity then maybe a more principled crop of politicians might get near the decision making...

[shaolin_monkey]

Ah , good old Prof. Mann - he's one of the best climatologists in the world, and he's out in Australia on sabbatical - right in the middle of it burning down around him!!

I might have posted this one before, but here's an example of another Aussie senator, this time taken on by our very own Brian Cox.  It's reassuring to note that the audience reaction was not favourable towards this senator either, and this was before the current bushfire crisis:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lf3TGmaLXow

[shaolin_monkey]

Kids in Cork do a totally charming and very well put-together rap video about our imminent extinction:

https://www.irishpost.com/news/irish-primary-school-kids-release-brilliant-music-video-rapping-climate-change-isnt-half-bad-178873

[shaolin_monkey]

“They’re tobacco.”

CNBC’s Jim Cramer tells it like it is re fossil fuels .

As the climate emergency worsens, shareholders dump the likes of Exxon from their portfolios for sustainable alternatives.


https://youtu.be/fBAPJg_FAfI

[Funt Solo]

Where have all our insects gone? Report finds 50 per cent fewer than 15 years ago

[shaolin_monkey]

Where have all our insects gone? Report finds 50 per cent fewer than 15 years ago

Yup!  Scientists have been banging on about this for ages. 

For example, species are moving north at a rate of knots as the globe warms.  However, insects struggle with this, as the plants they rely on don't move north as quickly, or the plant growth/flowering will be become less reliable in terms of seasons because of unreliable climactic variation. 

This means the bands of liveable environment (temperature, moisture, plants for food, stable breeding conditions) for insects narrows significantly, or disappears altogether.  End result?  Less insects.

This 7 minute video, created in 2015, from the Denial 101X course I did recently, explains this far better than I can, such as why some insects are now condemned to extinction - a global catastrophe happening in slow motion:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nThLNcXkWg

[shaolin_monkey]

If you want to get really deep into ecological fragility against a backdrop of climate change, and previous mass extinctions, here's a 47 min vid with one of the scientists in that 7 min clip, Jon Bridle:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzTuK5I3Mz8

[IndigoPrime]

a global catastrophe happening in slow motion

Not even that slow. And some hot takes I’ve seen on this subject have amounted to “great – fewer annoying insects”. ARGH.

[shaolin_monkey]

a global catastrophe happening in slow motion

Not even that slow. And some hot takes I’ve seen on this subject have amounted to “great – fewer annoying insects”. ARGH.

I have to admit, my immediate knee-jerk reaction was "Great - less wasps."  Those things are my arch-nemesis.  They love the smell of my fear and always make a point of buzzing around me.

But yeah, the folk who are saying "Great, fewer, annoying insects!" may as well be saying "Great - there goes our food supply!"



Moving away from insect extinction for a moment, I have recently been going down a rabbit-hole of fossil fuel key players funding institutions who then create debate, where there is none, about what is causing climate change.

Here a great resource which illustrates the amount of money Exxon slung at denial between 1998 and 2014, and to whom. 

Check out the interactive map (option in bar on left) - it is INSANE:

https://exxonsecrets.org/html/index.php


Here's a 20 min interview with one of the people who 'followed the money'.  Utterly shocking:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zn_9uBIubzU

[IndigoPrime]

Judging by last summer, an insane amount of wasps is somehow the future, despite everything else being in decline. They were all over the fucking place in our area. Every day, we had swarms of the buggers all over our garden, leading to the first time ever our dog got stung. (Poor blighter. 13 years and never a bite and then – RONCH! – angry wasp.)

[shaolin_monkey]

I saw a few, but only a few more than the previous year. I wonder if there’s an online resource that tracks wasp numbers in various locales..?

[IndigoPrime]

I’ve never seen anything like it. The deck was a blanket of wasps, every day. As much as we hate killing things, we bought traps. (Our dog is 13. One sting was one too many.) The things were basically full after a couple of days. It was disgusting. Friends about 10 miles away had much the same problem. Their entire neighbourhood was swamped with wasps. But, yeah, it’d be good to know if this is some bizarre relatively localised issue.

[Funt Solo]

We had trouble with wasps sometimes when I was growing up - but we lived in a wood, so pretty sure it was just localized and we happened to be near a nest that year.

We built jam traps (one of which was an enamel baby bath), and that did for them.

[M.I.K.]

I haven't noticed an increase in wasps, but over the past couple of decades these facehugger gits have become increasingly prevalent up here from a starting point of zero.

They're also far too fast for my liking...

With speeds clocked at 0.53 m/s (1.9 km/h; 1.2 mph; 1.7 ft/s), the giant house spider held the Guinness Book of World Records for top spider speed until 1987 when it was displaced by solifugids, although the latter are not true spiders