[P2P-F] Fwd: Feedback dynamics in climate and society

Mon Jan 21 05:52:36 CET 2013

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Tom Atlee <cii at igc.org>
Date: Mon, Jan 21, 2013 at 11:42 AM
Subject: Feedback dynamics in climate and society
To: undisclosed list <cii at igc.org>

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Dec 2012-Jan 2013  Co-Intelligence Institute fundraiser  progress report:

Funds raised so far:  $3740  //  Our target:  $20,000
Percentage of needed funds raised so far: 18.7%
People on our list:  1781  //   Days remaining in this fundraiser:  11

Thank you to the 37 people who have responded so far!

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
If you value our work, please participate with a donation.
See the end of this mailing for how to contribute.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

http://tom-atlee.posterous.com/feedback-dynamics-in-climate-and-society
short link: http://post.ly/A8l23

Dear friends,

In the debate over climate change, I find myself paying more attention to
authorities who highlight important positive feedback loops through which a
warming atmosphere triggers increased climate change.  Their troubling
scenarios come not from innate pessimism but from paying attention to
system dynamics.

A feedback loop is a systemic dynamic through which outputs re-enter the
system, magnifying (positive feedback) or balancing (negative feedback) the
conditions in the system.  For a positive feedback loop, consider a wealthy
person who donates to a candidate and gets legislation favorable to his
business, so that he can make more money to support candidates who pass
favorable legislation, etc.  His investments (output) generate returns
(input) which he reinvests (output) ad infinitum, steadily increasing his
stock of money as he repeats this feedback process.

Feedback dynamics have a powerful impact shaping what happens next in a
system.  To the extent we understand the feedback dynamics, we gain insight
into what will happen next in a system and, perhaps most importantly, what
we might do about it.

So here are four major positive feedback dynamics impacting the rate of
climate change.  They involve reflective ice, methane, oil reserves, and
trees, and they cause the atmosphere to continue to warm faster than we
would expect if we didn't take them into acount.

FOUR CLIMATE "POSITIVE FEEDBACK" LOOPS

Feedback loop #1 - ALBEDO:  As skiers and other snow-sport enthusiasts
know, ice and snow reflect sunlight - an effect known as albedo.  When ice
melts in the Arctic, less of the sun's energy is reflected off into space
and more of it is absorbed by the dark water water and land that's left
behind.  The absorbed solar energy heats up the Earth and our atmosphere.
 The more glaciers melt, the more heat is absorbed, which leads to more
glaciers melting, etc., an effect dramatized by the disturbing (and
incredibly beautiful) 2012 movie "Chasing Ice".  (A related but
seldom-discussed albedo effect is the fact that climate change causes
sub-arctic trees which lose their dark needles in the winter - thereby
increasing reflection - to be replaced by trees that keep their dark
needles - thereby trapping more heat.  This causes the atmosphere to warm
and replace more of the trees, causing the atmosphere to warm further,
etc...)

Feedback loop #2 - METHANE RELEASE:  Hundreds of gigatons of environmental
methane exist in the form of methane clathrate (methane frozen into water
crystals, also known as methane hydrate) frozen beneath Arctic ice and on
the sub-arctic sea floor, and in frozen tundras and peat bogs.  As global
warming melts these frozen methane deposits, gaseous methane is released.
 (You can watch videos online of people lighting methane fires though a
hole in Arctic ice http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wofv9o0j1Ew.)  That's not
good news, because methane has a global warming potential 72 times as great
as carbon dioxide over 20 years, and 25 times as big over 100 years.  So
the more methane that gets released into the atmosphere, the more the sun's
heat gets absorbed by that atmosphere.  The atmospheric warming melts more
glaciers and more tundra acreage, releasing more frozen methane into the
atmosphere, and on it goes.... (To get a glimpse of how big a deal this is,
here are estimates of how much frozen methane exists and how much carbon
that adds up to:  The 390-455 gigatonnes of carbon (Gt C) currently stored
in peatlands is about one-third of the total land-based carbon store and
over half the amount of carbon already in the atmosphere. The estimated
0.24 to 1.2 million cubic miles of oceanic methane clathrate contains
500-2500 Gt C, which is smaller than the 5000 Gt C estimated for all other
fossil fuel reserves but substantially larger than the ~230 Gt C estimated
for other natural gas sources.  One estimate suggests that 70,000,000,000
tonnes of methane might be released over the next few decades.)

Feedback loop #3 - ARCTIC OIL (very few people are talking about this as a
feedback loop): Arctic ice melting uncovers vast oil deposits previously
unreachable thanks to the polar ice cap.  A 2008 United States Geological
Survey estimated that areas north of the Arctic Circle have 90 billion
barrels of undiscovered, technically recoverable oil.  Nations and
corporations are jockeying with increasing intensity - economically,
politically, diplomatically, militarily - for access to that oil (and other
newly available minerals).  Such rivalry is pretty much business-as-usual
in our competitive global economy when new resources are discovered.  But
notice the feedback dynamic:  As that arctic oil starts to be used - i.e.,
burned - more CO2 will be released, warming the climate, melting more ice,
opening up more oil to burn, releasing more CO2... (Well subsidized oil
companies are also working on mining methane clathrate as an energy source,
adding to our carbon fuel stock.  So as new sources of carbon fuels are
developed, the pinch (or catastrophe) of "peak oil" gets delayed a bit
longer, helping us continue our carbon-based business as usual longer,
emitting more CO2 into the atmosphere and further suppressing healthy
pressures for developing more sustainable forms of energy - which gives us
another unhealthy positive feedback loop.)

Feedback loop #4 - DYING/BURNING TREES:  Trees absorb CO2.  Climate change
causes droughts in rain forests and other places near and far - California,
Colorado, Australia - setting conditions for fires (caused by lightning or
humans) which burn down millions of trees.  Not only are those incinerated
trees no longer able to absorb CO2, but their burning released their
sequestered CO2 back into the atmosphere, causing the climate to heat up,
stimulating more droughts and fires, causing more atmospheric heating,
etc., in an ascending spiral of heat...  (Related dynamics:
 Climate-induced desertification also wipes out vegetation that previously
absorbed atmospheric carbon.  And in many areas climate change is
increasing populations of microorganisms, parasites and insects that kill
trees.  This cluster of tree-destroying feedback loops adds to the already
overwhelming deforestation activities of humanity in search of lumber,
biofuels, and land for housing, farms, ranches, roads, golf courses... all
of which undermine the biosphere's capacity to constrain atmospheric CO2.)

COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE FEEDBACK LOOPS

Intelligence is a cognitive feedback system that allows us to adjust
appropriately to changing conditions.

Here's how it works - at least ideally:  Using our intelligence, we observe
and organize what's going on in and around us.  We learn - by reflecting on
what we observe, calling up memories, and creating understandings -
recognizing patterns and creating ideas and narratives.  We decide on how
to act, based on our understandings.  When we observe the results of our
actions and reflect on what we observe, we can modify our understandings -
our ideas, stories, beliefs, and worldviews - to take into account what
we've observed.  This is "learning from experience" - the most fundamental
role of intelligence.

The same dynamic happens with collective intelligence in society.  As a
society, we use things like science, journalism, blogs, twitter feeds, and
intelligence services to collectively observe what's going on within and
around our society.  We use pundits, academia, government deliberations,
boardroom conferences, online forums and other conversations to reflect on
what we've observed and to formulate our responses based on what we think
we're learning.  We call up relevant pieces of the past using libraries,
databases, history, the records of mass media, and our own individual
memories.  We take action through corporate and government policies and
activities and the billions of decisions and activities of variously
informed individuals, families, networks, and other social groupings.  We
then reflect on the results of what "we" have done, not only through the
institutions I mentioned earlier - science, journalism, etc. - but also
through the investigations and protests of activists and other political
players working through political campaigns and lobbying.

This is our societal collective intelligence - or lack of it - the feedback
system through which our society responds to changes in its collective
circumstances - changes like climate change.

If our society is not responding well to the issues it faces, we can be
sure there are faulty circuits in the cognitive systems that constitute our
collective intelligence.  Are there forces distorting science and
journalism, preventing them from performing their proper roles with
integrity?  Are their systemic design issues or parasitic influences that
prevent government deliberations, corporate conferences, and individual
citizens and consumers from taking into account what needs to be taken into
account?  Do certain cultural assumptions and worldviews color the thinking
of both powerholders and depowered citizens so they can't perceive - or
they obsessively deny - emerging threats and possibilities?  Is the flow of
information and collective memory smooth and useful - or does the society
manifest dangerous levels of collective Alzheimer's, unable to even
remember who it is in the larger scheme of things?  Do the change agents
who seek to correct society's failings attend only to specific cases or
issues - or to healing and upgrading the systems and cultures that
constitute their society's collective cognitive capacity - it's collective
intelligence and wisdom?  These are important questions that can direct the
attention of change agents to more fruitful targets, based on an
understanding of collective intelligence.

How well does our society's collective intelligence feedback system - the
many ways we collectively learn (or not) from experience - recognize and
deal with the feedback systems that generate climate change?  What factors
help us do this - and which ones hinder us?  THIS is what we need to attend
to.

Because ultimately, climate change is not the issue.  Ultimately, the issue
is our collective ability to observe, think, feel, decide, act, and reflect
on our actions and their results.  If we can do that well, we can deal well
with every issue we face because - thanks to our own cognitive feedback
powers - it doesn't matter where we start.  We'll be able to improve and
correct our course as we proceed, collectively, into a better future.

Coheartedly
Tom

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

TO SUPPORT THE CO-INTELLIGENCE INSTITUTE & TOM ATLEE'S WORK...

Please send a tax deductible donation of any amount --
   $10, $25, $50, $100, $500 or more -- to

The Co-Intelligence Institute
PO Box 493
Eugene, OR 97440

or use your Visa or MasterCard - or Paypal - to make an online donation at
http://co-intelligence.org/donations.html

or tell some friends you know about our work, and invite them to support it.

Do let me know when you've mailed a donation, so I can add it to our tally
right
away.  Including your email address on your check will help me keep track of
your gift.

You can also use the link above to arrange a monthly donation.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

                For a contribution of $100 or more
  we will send a signed copy of "Empowering Public Wisdom".

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

________________________________

Tom Atlee, The Co-Intelligence Institute, POB 493, Eugene, OR 97440
http://www.co-intelligence.org  /  http://tom-atlee.posterous.com
Read THE TAO OF DEMOCRACY -  http://www.taoofdemocracy.com
EMPOWERING PUBLIC WISDOM - http://empoweringpublicwisdom.us
REFLECTIONS ON EVOLUTIONARY ACTIVISM - http://evolutionaryactivism.com
________________________________

-- 
P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net

<http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates:
http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens

#82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: https://lists.ourproject.org/pipermail/p2p-foundation/attachments/20130121/23fecab8/attachment.htm 