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"For the first time, we are forced to consider the real risk of destabilizing the entire planet," says climate impact scholar Johan Rockström. In a talk backed by vivid animations of the climate crisis, he shows how nine out of the 15 big biophysical systems that regulate the climate — from the permafrost of Siberia to the great forests of the North to the Amazon rainforest — are at risk of reaching tipping points, which could make Earth uninhabitable for humanity. Hear his plan for putting the planet back on the path of sustainability over the next 10 years — and protecting the future of our children.
This talk was part of the Countdown Global Launch on 10.10.2020. (Watch the full event here: .) Countdown is TED's global initiative to accelerate solutions to the climate crisis. The goal: to build a better future by cutting greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030, in the race to a zero-carbon world. Get involved at
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What action should we take to save this amazing planet? While I questioning myself about this, I want you to always remember my friends, the future is here in our hands, all comes down in what we make of it right now, right here. Stay inspired, safe and healthy.
burning the rainforest will finally get rid of these greedy ruling class millionaires/billionaires and bankers the human race will not stop self destructing until the income inequality gap is closed and colonizing the moon and other planets for resource extraction begins !!! Funny how poor people aren’t the ones complaining about climate change it’s the wealthiest people because they know they’ll have to give up their positions as leaders in the world and the cushions they’ve created through exploiting governments and the uneducated!!! #EatTheRich !
Marcos, arson is not a solution.
You can’t be serious dude SMH
Extinction Rebellion!
We as humanity need to come together. Diverse minds all put together brain storming. All skill sets needed.
*”We don’t inherit the land from our ancestors. We borrow it from our children”*
– Native American Proverb
@David John no I’m not assuming anything it’s a proven fact that the top 1% of wage earners account for 50% of all pollution!!!
@Owdeez Strauz lol imma stop commenting with sarcasm. Thought the emojis gave it away
@Marcos Filho You need common sense
@Marcos Filho what is the integrity of this “proven fact”?
Siberian Immigrant*
I feel like we all know this already and we want to help, but we can’t do anything. Yeah we can all try do our part, but we aren’t gonna see any success unless large organisations/government act NOW. ‘Countdown’ is a good start
@Shane d …because they’re also kinda of conservative and aren’t really trying to change the status quo. Like they can’t even come together and push universal Healthcare, something CONSERVATIVES in other 1st world countries are fine with
Again, tell me what socialism is. I’d love to hear it because moderates and conservatives never do seem to know what it actually is
Also lol at Donald Trump, or any Republican really, being even close to the left. No, they’re insanely far right, just a little to the left of Nazis these days. Racist homophobes who deal with conspiracy theories and deny obvious reality all while helping out their wealthy friends aren’t on the left. Trump constantly shifted parties throughout his life but that’s because he’s a grifter who’s only concerned with getting himself ahead
Lol and you’ve got nothing to back up him being a “left leaning scoundrel” or having ties to China and Russia…whereas there’s plenty that ties Trump to them
Lol I ain’t the one who’s spouting Fox News / Breitbart / OANN nonsense on here. It’s people like you that make America a joke across the world. Notice how America’s respect always goes down with Republicans and only goes back up with Democrats
– Stop eating meat
– Travel by train instead of car
– Doing research on the products you are buying and choose brands that do less harm
– Buy second hand
– …
We can make a change! Use your money to vote. As a consumer you decide what you support and you can put pressure on brands.
@Somnorila You have no idea what you’re talking about xD.
@Hoop T. Coupe This is not true.
People that disagree with climate change, yeah sure you are an idiot, but you can’t deny this: we should at least stop polluting our oceans. The sea is full of rubbish that is killing our marine life. Like come on
Maybe the research on how to live in Mars is just a way to figure out how to live in inhabitable future Earth, with a cooler way of getting funds as “explorers” instead of destroyers… 🙁
We can do it once we want to save the others, all species, and not only “our children”.
Then tell the governments and corporations of the world committing environmental atrocities to get to work on that. Oh and remind them that their towering buildings, malls, corporate districts, and other commercial properties running 24/7 all year long even when no one is there could use a little reduction in water and power use. Telling us little people to run out and buy a luxury-priced EV, put our ACs at 78, and not eat as much meat (which many already do) isnt going to save the planet, but we get that we are the safer target to blame than multi-billion dollar entities with armies of attorneys.
It’s the humanity thing you have to put your beliefs aside and be willing to be a step above your nature to come up with a solution.
That is the choice of the individual 60% of the world makes that choice the choice has been made the other 40% have to go along with the ride because the majority rules.
Something better is introduced in the right way it works. Recognizing is a better way choosing to go against your beliefs is an individual decision. Comes down to the people
only takes one person to do the with the right idea
You seem to be confusing the west (lowest emmisions) with China or India (biggest emissions). Not to mention China exploiting African nations for their rare earth minnerals.
I totally agree with you on that statement.
I feel powerless, i sign petitions and donate few bucks to some causes but when few men hold the half of the world in their hands and they are deaf to these concerns, how loud are we, the poor supposed to speak
@jeff becket try speeking first. Engage ib local elections run for them if you think you must. Dont just throw money at it and hope someone else will do all the work for you.
Science has never believed we had more time. Corporations and Wealthy private interest groups had a vested interest in what is known as planned obsolescence, which basically means, things are designed to break and be discarded in an amount of time conducive to generating profit through repair and/or the selling of replacements. A very popular example of this is 1000 hour light bulbs. There are light bulbs still in service that have lasted more than a century of continuous use. There was no reason to limit light bulb life to 1000 hours other than to profit from the replacements. Profit and the seeking of more profit are what put the planet in this position. Nothing more, and nothing less. The pursuit of profit is the destruction of our planet, ourselves, and our children’s future.
So it’s not so much that we have 10 years to “transform the future of humanity” as it is we have maybe 10 years to stop the people and corporations that have spent the last century doing everything they can to destabilize the planet. And the only real natural solution is to eat them. And make sure that any more that attempt to rise up and destroy the future are eaten as well. Preferably before they spend a century doing harm.
There are no good billionaires, and corporations are not people. Everyone who hoards more wealth and resources than they need to live a prosperous and comfortable life is an enemy of humanity. They are the real enemy who create all this political turmoil to distract us. To separate us into sales demographics and prevent us from standing united against them.
All we can do is choose to eat them, or let them eat our children’s future. Nothing else can be done. There isn’t enough time left to “adjust”. We must cut the cancer away. And the cancer would much rather kill the host than let that happen. The goal of the wealthy elite is to drastically reduce the human population. That means you need to die, so they can continue to live the lifestyle they currently exploit and abuse you to afford.
You are oil and fuel for the machines that feed them luxury and power. YOU. Every single one of you are being eaten. You lives, your futures, and you children’s futures are all to act as food for a handful of hungry psychopaths. So they can survive as they are into the future. They will kill billions to save themselves. Our only option is to eliminate the elite class, and permanently prevent them from every rising to power again.
We need to demonize the hoarding of wealth and resources. We need to make being a billionaire as disgusting as pedophilia. And we need to cut the cancer away before it consumes us all. We need to bind capitalism to the populous in a way that makes becoming too big to fail or too powerful to punish an impossibility. A median bound capitalist model that forces those who want to consolidate wealth and resources to prove themselves worthy of it by elevating the median wealth of working class people, and through no other possible mechanism.
If you want to be a billionaire you should have to do it by making at least a thousand millionaires. We need to force capitalism into a model that encourages equilibrium above all. Because allowing profit to be the goal has pushed us, and this planet, to the brink of global catastrophe. A catastrophe that we have the resources, technology, and Will to avert entirely. We’ve simply allowed too few, with too narrow a purpose, to determine too much of what we consider human progress.
And now that they have enough resources and power to suppress and attack the populous openly and with impunity directly related to how much they’ve managed to consolidate, we are left with a single solution. It’s just a solution that the meek and addicted cannot stomach. So they’ve already won and billions of people are going to die horrific deaths at the hands of those wealthy elite. Some of them have well laid out plans to very literally grind you up and turn you into food by the millions.
Enjoy.
@TheNeighborNicky you can find me in the usual places.
Corporations and Wealthy private interest groups. Will always find a way to literally make wealth, doesn’t matter the reality of the time, they will always adapt because that is their nature.
@Zenn Exile Perhaps you could enlighten us all on your political views and expand on your initial post, you only wrote 705 words. But I won’t be around to read it, I’ve got better things to do.
@andrew williams the itinerate internet troll. “I don’t have time to hear your response, I’m too busy not being a marxist” shows up 10 minutes later to continue trolling.
Very Good.
“our best resilient friend…” you don’t treat friends like we treat the planet. The planet would be pressing charges and we’d be facing life in prison, no parole.
And again, I take umbrage that it’s _our_ planet, that it’s only about _us_ … there are all the *other* species on this planet that *haven’t* been f$%&ing it up.
All other species self-regulate.. they diminish if conditions aren’t ideal, and thrive if they are.. with predators following the same cycle.
So true!
The good news: we can do it for sure
The bad news: humans are greedy by nature. Here is the best quote from the Native Americans:
“Only when the last tree has been cut down, the last fish been caught, and the last stream poisoned, will we realize we cannot eat money”
Money money money…until it does not mean anything anymore and it is too late. Maybe when the rich countries have to deal with the millions of bothersome climate refugees, will they consider not getting a new Iphone every year.
Imagine what we could do to solve these problems if we worked together. So many look at this through the film of politics, and don’t consider the ramifications of these changes.
“If we don’t prepare now we will panic and fail. Last time I checked there’s not another planet for sale…”
Asked Elon he said Mars is pretty available but needs some work
@Edit your name but is it for sale? Lol. It’s going to be a long time before life on Mars can be even slightly comparable to life on Earth. Living in lava tubes sounds good for a holiday but that’s about it. Too bad we didn’t continue with moon missions and build a base there years ago, then we could already have the infrastructure in place to do proper Mars missions. We’ll get there, eventually, hopefully.
Yep, Mars is a red herring… (1000 X more toxic than earth even after warming)
@Trade Prosper red planet… red herring… …I see what you did there xD
You’re asking the impossible from humanity, people would see this as a regression. Anything that would hamper progress or growth would be rejected by the masses. When in reality that’s what we need, to slow down these pollution systems before we can’t turn back. Humanity prob has 5-10 generations left before the planet is no longer habitable for human civilization.
“5-10 generations” dude no. We could see massive famines and war in 2
Regenerative agriculture.
It helps but is not a cure-all. The consequences of continued global heating will destroy plants & agriculture. Greenhouse gas emissions must be drastically reduced for our grandchildren to survive into middle age. No IFS, no BUTS, no MAYBES.
@Mike Harrington It could be a cure all. Better food, healthier people (less strain on resources), carbon sequestering, restoring of ecosystems, increasing the capacity of the land to store water (thus restoring ground water), restoring of local climates, increasing biodiversity, increasing land yields, reducing the need for deforestation for farmland, limiting fossil fuel dependence to name a few… Let’s not forget that about half of the world’s topsoil has been destroyed by modern agriculture in an alarmingly short amount of time. And actually, plant life will do just fine. More carbon in the air means more plants (plants literally eat CO2). The question is whether WE will survive, because plants will do just fine. Saying that plants will get destroyed is not scientific in the least and is deliberate misinformation (or fear-mongering). So, in my opinion, a ground-up solution to restore the land (and potential “cure-all”) is much better than reductionist top-down approaches that could end up doing more harm than good. I’m convinced that we will face food shortages far before we feel drastic climate effects and a solution that addresses both, like regenerative agriculture, is the literal definition of a “cure-all”.
Yes. Regenerative agriculture is a big carbon sink. Capture YUGE amounts of carbon and puts it back in the soil.
The pandemic presents an opportunity for us to evaluate some of our everyday life choices. The slow down in global economic activity should force business to reconsider products services and target markets.
But..
People and corporations have shown themselves to be unreliable time and time again…
Once there are no immediate incentives or deterrents there won’t be any change to the state we are in.
That’s why we need laws and regulations.
That’s why we need the right law makers and enforcers in positions of government office.
That’s why we need voting age people to step up and be informed.
Your little vote means so much.
The War of the Sons of Light Against the Sons of Darkness
Transform humanity into a distopian servant class to serve the rich who are responsible for the exploitation of our environment.
Never underestimate human stupidity. There was a time when I used to view environmental apocalyptic movies with fun and joy. Turns out, they were actually documentaries.
The people who need to hear and see this video won’t bat an eye.
You mean the celebrities and politicians routinely flying on their private jets and cruising yachts, right?
Any ideas to fix this?
We need to end low cost flights. Crossing the counrty for 50 bucks and getting away with the ecological consequences without paying isn’t tolerable.
The sad thing is that the influential evangelicals & vocal pro-life lobby in power in the USA are adherent to ludicrous visions of our future which includes a fantastical rapture., & commits the rest of us to extinction by imposing their belief in fairy stories over scientific fact. Is it Planet Earth or Planet Asylum ?