Popular Mechanics Unhinged: “Scientists Are Mapping the End of the World”

Essay by Eric Worrall

But we can save the world by reducing meat consumption.

Scientists Are Mapping the End of the World. And Maybe, Just Maybe, a Way Out.

Positive climate action can have cascading effects.

BY DARREN ORF PUBLISHED: AUG 08, 2025 9:30 AM EDT

Here’s what you’ll learn when you read this story:

• Scientists are aware of planetary boundaries—a series of climate change thresholds that, once crossed, could cause a cascade of negative environmental effects.
• Now, scientists are developing a methodology to discover “positive tipping points”— a series of actionable green energy goals that could similarly compound in benefit once crossed. 
• While we’re already well on the way to reaching some of these tipping points—i.e. lowering the cost of wind and solar energy—there’s still lots of work to be done to stay within the two degrees Celsius range stipulate by the 2015 Paris Climate Accords.

To live in an era of anthropogenic climate change is to be constantly reminded of the warming threat to our planet. One way scientists illustrate this threat is by using climate tipping points, also known as planetary boundaries, which showcase around nine critical ecological thresholds that could have devastating effects for life on Earth once crossed. These include things like biosphere integrity, ozone depletion, ocean acidification, and a relative newcomer known as “aquatic deoxygenation.”

Although these thresholds are discussed with deadly seriousness, scientists wonder if the reverse of these doom-and-gloom thresholds—positive tipping points, if you will—could help encourage people, communities, and countries to adopt more aggressive green policies. In a new study, published in the journal Sustainability Science, experts from the University of Exeter in the U.K. explain these positive tipping points would be moments in society’s adoption of green technologies or behaviors that could perpetuate a cascade of positive outcomes.

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“Other transformations—such as a major shift away from meat consumption—might also be more likely than they appear,” Steve Smith from the University of Exeter said in a press statement. “In other sectors there is little sign of approaching tipping points and in a few, such as nuclear power and concrete production, we should not expect there to be tipping points at all.”

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Read more: https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/green-tech/a65616655/positive-tipping-points/

No mention of the 1.5C target. I guess it’s a bit embarrassing to talk about 1.5C these days, given we hit 1.5C and nothing bad happened.

As for the rest of the claims, there is zero risk global warming will have a major negative impact on oceans, even if several degrees of global warming were to occur, because last time the world experienced 5-8c of global warming, the biosphere and the oceans were fine.

Monkeys also did well during the PETM – which implies humans would also prosper in such conditions.

Stories like this make me seriously question the sanity of the people who write them. I mean, 5 minutes research could have turned up the fact that fish thrived during distant past extreme warm periods, that the entire biosphere thrived. Visiting hot climates to catch big fish is a major tourist industry in places like Florida and Australia’s far North.

Temperatures drop substantially as you move further from the equator. Any species which felt uncomfortable in a warmer climate would just relocate. All species are continuously adjusting their range, seeking out the best possible habitat, probing the edges of their habitable range.

So why write such nonsense? Why would anyone believe such outlandish claims? I wish I knew.