They're not exactly sure when this will happen, but one thing they know for sure is the Gulf Stream has definitely lost its stability and is in the process of slowing. A collapse will mean the end of the world as we know it, and it is expected to happen quickly.
I went to Safeway and there was no horseradish! Might as well be dead.
I guess if the gulf stream dies, there won't be any shrimp to make coctail sauce for, so maybe it's OK.
This article says: "It is not known what level of CO2 would trigger an AMOC collapse" but we have to take action nonetheless - what hubris!
When they are sure when it will happen then we'll have a testable condition which will render this disprovable and therefore scientific, but not until then.
Flyguy imagines that the US could survive a rerun of the Younger Dryas
The precautionary principle means that anybody sane would go to a lot of trouble to make sure that it didn't happen, once they understood the nature of the risk (which Flyguy doesn't).
Lots of attitude there, but no common sense. 'Sure when it will happen' is like asking for infinite precision; once you get upper and lower limits (one week, one millenium) you already know 'when'. As for disprovable, that's what you want in an hypothesis, it isn't relevant when a model makes the useful prediction that justifies its existence.
A lake in WA state was getting more sewage than was healthy, and its oxygen-depletion death was predicted, SO our local governments formed a coalition to reroute that waste, and clean up the lake. It worked. That doesn't mean the prediction wasn't scientific, because TESTING a prediction is uninteresting, unless it tests a (questionable, uncertain, untested, controversial) hypothesis.
Scientific predictions are sometimes warnings of things we can prevent.
Read about it here
Traditionally the computational models have underestimated the AMOC current effects by a factor of 10 as compared to ocean buoy measurement data. The tipping point has as already been exceeded for some time now, and the they're really watching the transition to the slower/ weaker state.
Here is a little more on the same paper:
Here's some of what they have in place to monitor this complicated mess of interfering factors.
It's hard to argue against a thousand years of automated buoy data.
And, arguing against data is silly as well as hard. How do you know it's hard, silly boy?
The AMOC isn't going to put out a sign I'M COLLAPSING INTO WEAK SLOW STATE.
Fred's not either.
They could predict that because fluids flow through pipes predictably, not chaotically.
How does this compare to the magnetic field reversal for doom prospects?
Sometimes I watch a video that explains the most beautiful math proof, and I'm tempted to share it, but then realize it's moot in the face of doom.
Fear springs eternal in the human wuss.
SL0WMAN is a member of the FIRE, aim, ah maybe we're ready club.
They will after the glaciers put out the WE'RE RETREATING sign.
Flyguy hasn't seen any of the before and after pictures. Here's one - 1941 versus 2004.
You don't need to worry about 'the human'; he's tiny. The Atlantic ocean, however, is big enough to overwhelm you, and it makes good sense to worry about THAT.
What has the Gulf Stream done for you lately? If you don't know, you'll be hit unawares when it stops.
It never makes good sense to worry. Even less when there's nothing you can do about it. Less yet when the threat is flakey simulations.
But whimper and cower if you enjoy it.
Oh, that kind of thinking will get you halfway through a minefield. Better plans are the ones that get you all the way.
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