from Hacker News

Ocean acidification crosses "planetary boundaries"

by voxadam on 6/10/25, 4:01 PM with 7 comments

  • by toomuchtodo on 6/10/25, 4:53 PM

  • by TheOtherHobbes on 6/10/25, 8:11 PM

    Distressing and revealing that Apple's WWDC gets thousands of comments, and this - which is just a little more important - gets four.

  • by StopDisinfo910 on 6/10/25, 5:15 PM

    The planetary boundaries framework is not a very useful way to think about climate change.

    The variables are linked. Ocean acidification is a direct result of CO2 release. Plus, everyone knows we are not a trajectory for a stable system anyway even in the best case scenario. Apart from the pleasure of publishing gloomy articles when we cross the next one, it’s entirely pointless as a tool.

    It’s far better to view the issue as being about how to reach net zero as fast as possible. That puts people in the right frame of mind.

  • by perrygeo on 6/10/25, 8:39 PM

    We're already seeing plenty of real impacts on ecosystems (skeletal dissolution, slower coral growth). On top of that, acidification has "momentum" - even if we stopped emitting carbon today (hah) the oceans would continue dropping pH for decades.

    Given those two facts, I assumed we'd crossed that boundary already.

  • by ProllyInfamous on 6/10/25, 11:12 PM

    This is the major plot reveal of Soylent Green (that the oceans are/were toast, unfishable for decades). I only eat a minimal amount of ocean fish because the open sea is the world's toilet of last resort.