[Intro]
Dense woulds
(Could’s, should’s)
Can’t see the forest through the trees
Oh, please
Can’t see the trees through the forest
Unless…
[Verse 1]
Do we understand
The situation is large
Can we comprehend
When Man is in charge
[Bridge]
Can’t see the forest through the trees
Oh, please
Can’t see the trees through the forest
Unless…
[Chorus]
We can change our point-of-view
It’s up to me, it’s up to you
Come on, it’s something we have to do
If we’re to get through
[Instrumental, Guitar Solo, Drum Fills]
[Verse 2]
Do we appreciate
The problem is big
At any rate
Why do we still renege
[Bridge]
Can’t see the forest through the trees
Oh, please
Can’t see the trees through the forest
Unless…
[Chorus]
We can change our point-of-view
It’s up to me, it’s up to you
Come on, it’s something we have to do
If we’re to get through
[Instrumental, Saxophone Solo, Bass]
[Bridge]
Dense woulds
(Could’s, should’s)
Can’t see the forest through the trees
Oh, please
Can’t see the trees through the forest
Unless…
[Chorus]
We can change our point-of-view
It’s up to me, it’s up to you
Come on, it’s something we have to do
If we’re to get through
[Outro]
Dense woulds
(Could’s, should’s)
Can’t see the forest through the trees
Oh, please
A SCIENCE NOTE
Anthropogenic climate change is an exponential component of an unordered system (chaos theory). Climate change is primarily driven by the escalation of thermal energy affecting biogeophysical and socio-economic systems. While biogeophysical factors can be studied using math, physics, and historical records, socio-economic systems pose greater challenges due to the unpredictable consequences of human behavior and inexplicable consumer choices, exacerbating tipping points and feedback loops. Politicians hinder the fight against climate change exacerbating the problem.
The Age of Loss and Damage is a new way of thinking about economics by combining economics, climate science, statistics, and physics. Until now, economic models have been unfit to capture the full extent of climate damage. Traditionally, “integrated assessment models” (IAMs) were used to forecast “shock” events. IAMs use “quadratic function” to calculate GDP losses by squaring the temperature change, yet ignore other methods (such as the exponential function) that are better suited for rapid change. “Climate change is fundamentally different to other shocks because once it has hit, it doesn’t go away,” said Thierry Philipponnat, author of a report by Finance Watch, a Brussels-based public interest NGO on financial issues. “And if the fundamental assumption is flawed, all the rest makes little sense — if any.”
Unfortunately, even scientists are failing to see, let alone forecast, the rapid acceleration in climate change. Due to their complexity, the impacts of the Domino Effect are being underestimated. The Domino Effect is also known as “tipping cascades” in climate science. Cascading impacts in relation to tipping points include cascading impacts across biogeophysical and social systems. Until recently, scientist have been drastically underestimating the social-ecological systems. The University of Exeter reports, “There is a notable lack of topic clusters dedicated to how humans will be impacted by climate-related tipping cascades.” 2023 was a wake-up call to social-ecological scientists. The record breaking physical and economical impacts could be felt worldwide. The record warming year was seventeen times greater than any other record increase in history. Typically, record-breaking temperatures are measured in 100th degrees. There were also 200 consecutive days of record-breaking temperatures. Usually, there are one or two record breaking days in a row. The increase in intensity and frequency of record-breaking heat requires forecasting models to be recast.