Is Geoengineering Unavoidable? Using Our CARS Skills!

Session 20

Geoengineering concerns scientists, climate change does as well. Use your MCAT CARS Skills to see if you can find the main point regarding geoengineering!

As always, we’re joined by Jack Westin of JackWestin.com, the premier MCAT CARS tutor online. It’s an investment at $1,450 but you can break that down into ten weekly installments, which helps and makes it affordable for a lot of students.

Back on the episode today, Jack says that you have to be prepared for anything. Be prepared for all easy or all hard reads. However, really easy and hard depends on the student. You may find something hard which others would find easy, or you may find something easy that others find it hard. So it all depends on the student. Hence, it’s your job to focus on the things you’re weak on. If it’s economy passage, focus it on those economy passages. If it’s government passages, focus on that. That’s all you have to do to see improvement.

Link to article: https://earther.gizmodo.com/geoengineering-is-inevitable-1829623031

Here’s what’s going to happen: Every year for the foreseeable future, scientists, activists, and citizens concerned about climate change will have a discussion in one form or another about geoengineering. There will be editorials and vague proposals in journals; there will be think pieces on the need not to do it, but to talk about it. These will increase in volume and urgency as our situation becomes ever clearer, perhaps starting right now, with the release of the latest and most dire Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report.

But then, one day, you will look up, and the planes will be in the sky. They will be dumping tiny aerosol particles designed to deflect bits of sunlight back into space. Maybe this will happen when 10 million people have to vacate coastal Bangladesh and start pouring into India. Maybe when the last resident of Kiribati finally gives up hope and moves to Fiji.

But it will happen, and buried in chapter 4 of the new IPCC report is the reason why: it’s cheap, and it’ll probably work.

We have been having the same conversation about geoengineering for at least a decade. It was “a bad idea whose time has come” in 2010. Scientists were “nervous” about it in 2015. They called it “terrifying” in 2014. And those are just from the first few pages of a Google news search.

We have this same conversation about intentional, large-scale tinkering with the climate to counteract our ongoing, less-intentional tinkering with the climate because climate change is scary, and it is dangerous, and because we are paralyzed. But the dark not-really-a-secret of solar radiation management, as the primary idea is known, is that it is absurdly cheap.

Maybe a few billion dollars per year could retrofit some planes and send them into the stratosphere, where they would endlessly dump out sulfate aerosols until the planet starts to cool. And by most scientists’ estimates, it would cool the planet. Those simple facts are the driving force that will turn our never-ending conversation cycle of scary-but-necessary-but-dangerous-but-crucial into planes in the sky.

[03:47] Paragraph 1, Sentence 1:

Jack says:

We already know we’re talking about climate change and the discussion of geoengineering.

[04:31] Paragraph 1, Sentence 2:

There will be editorials and vague proposals in journals; there will be think pieces on the need not to do it, but to talk about it.

Jack says:

The author is pointing out what those discussions may look like; editorials, and proposals, and think pieces.

[04:55] Paragraph 1, Sentence 3:

These will increase in volume and urgency as our situation becomes ever clearer, perhaps starting right now, with the release of the latest and most dire Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report.

Jack says:

It seems like we might be starting to think about geoengineering more and more as things get dire. So maybe climate change is getting worse, maybe geoengineering becomes more of a factor. We don’t really know since they didn’t describe it really well.

[05:39] Paragraph 2, Sentence 1:

But then, one day, you will look up, and the planes will be in the sky.

Jack says:

The author is maybe showing us what geoengineering may look like.

[05:58] Paragraph 2, Sentence 2:

They will be dumping tiny aerosol particles designed to deflect bits of sunlight back into space.

Jack says:

It’s like the whole idea that the world is warming and our glaciers are melting. You don’t need to know any of that right now. It’s going to help build context. It’s going to help you understand this better, but as long as you know geoengineering is reducing sunlight and that somehow counteracts this dire situation we’re in, that’s it. As long as you know geoengineering includes planes and using planes for that to happen.

[07:01] Paragraph 2, Sentence 3:

Maybe this will happen when 10 million people have to vacate coastal Bangladesh and start pouring into India.

Jack says:

The author is painting a picture of potentially what this tipping point would be; kind of a mass migration of people. As long as you know that and what these planes are doing, you’re you’ll be fine.

[07:38] Paragraph 2, Sentence 4:

Maybe when the last resident of Kiribati finally gives up hope and moves to Fiji.

Jack says:

The author is just giving another example here.

[07:56] Paragraph 3, Sentence 1:

But it will happen, and buried in chapter 4 of the new IPCC report is the reason why: it’s cheap, and it’ll probably work.

Jack says:

So it’s cheap and it will probably work. What will work? What is cheap? Well the whole thing is about geoengineering – probably that. The point the author was trying to make with people moving is maybe that’s when we realize how important it is to actually do this. Remember that because they said in the third sentence of that previous paragraph, maybe this will happen. What will happen? Well, it’s this idea of geoengineering.

[08:51] Paragraph 4, Sentence 1:

We have been having the same conversation about geoengineering for at least a decade.

Jack says:

The author is just saying this isn’t a new discussion. We’ve been talking about this.

[09:03] Paragraph 4, Sentence 2:

It was “a bad idea whose time has come” in 2010.

Jack says:

This is probably someone else’s point of view saying that geoengineering is a bad idea.

[09:27] Paragraph 4, Sentences 3-5:

Scientists were “nervous” about it in 2015. They called it “terrifying” in 2014. And those are just from the first few pages of a Google news search.

Jack says:

So it’s been a concern. You know, they’ve been thinking about it, though it seems like it’s a bad thing, maybe it’s not.

[10:26] Paragraph 5, Sentence 1:

Jack says:

The author is trying to paint a picture of how people are very worried. But do you think the author thinks we should be worried? Maybe not. Because the author is using these quotes – nervous, terrifying – to kind of explain that maybe it’s really not nervous. Maybe it’s really not terrifying. It’s kind of an exaggerated concern. At least that’s the way the author is trying to paint the picture.

[11:33] Paragraph 5, Sentence 2:

But the dark not-really-a-secret of solar radiation management, as the primary idea is known, is that it is absurdly cheap.

Jack says:

The author is trying to say that maybe it’s scary, but hey, it works. So don’t freak out.

[12:05] Paragraph 6, Sentence 1:

Maybe a few billion dollars per year could retrofit some planes and send them into the stratosphere, where they would endlessly dump out sulfate aerosols until the planet starts to cool.

Jack says:

This is something that even if you don’t know anything about climate change, you will know warm is bad, cool is good. Cooling is the solution and warming is the problem. They don’t mention that anywhere, but they’re educating you that by reading.

[12:44] Paragraph 6, Sentences 2-3:

And by most scientists’ estimates, it would cool the planet. Those simple facts are the driving force that will turn our never-ending conversation cycle of scary-but-necessary-but-dangerous-but-crucial into planes in the sky.

Jack says:

The author is reiterating it will work. The author is saying that because it’s cheap and it works, then we might be driven to actually do it. So he likes the cheap part and that it works. The vibe we’re getting from the author, too, is there’s no reason to freak out or be alarmed or terrified.

[13:42] The Gist of the Passage

Jack says:

The author is talking about something that most people are worried about in a different context than we’re accustomed to. Most people think of Al Gore, and how climate change is bad, and how there are problems with it. There probably are. It’s probably a bad thing for the world and it’s probably happening. But here is someone who’s saying don’t freak out and that we have the solution, No one has probably ever heard about this geoengineering through planes in the sky. It’s pretty cool and it’s something that most people would not agree with or would think about, at least.