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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 1/11
Here is a brief look at the bigger picture of global climate change. Writing a substantial piece on the history of Earth has been in my head for many years, but that may have to wait many more years. This piece is in response to a specific question about the AMOC.
05:42 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 2/11
It all begins with the formation of our planet Earth, estimated to be 4.6 billion years ago. Try to wrap your head around THAT number! Life is estimated to have begun on Earth 3.5 billion years ago, and when cyanobacteria evolved 2.4 billion years ago, photosynthesis began.
05:42 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 3/11
After a billion and a half years of oxygen production, the first animal life formed roughly 800 million years ago. However, oxygen levels weren’t high enough to sustain much animal life until the Paleozoic Era, roughly 500 million years ago.
05:42 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 4/11
The Paleozoic was an era of great change, when life in the ocean transitioned to life on land. Then the Great Permian Extinction resulted in the extinction of 90% of all species, when carbon dioxide levels exploded and oxygen levels plummeted. There are different theories as to why this happened.
05:42 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 5/11
The Permian was followed by the Mesozoic Era, when dinosaurs ruled Earth. Mammals began to appear but remained insignificant until the next great extinction, when a large meteor crashed to Earth 66 million years ago causing massive climate disruption that killed up to 80% of the world's species.
05:42 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 6/11
This leads us to the Cenozoic Era. Most of the climate transitions in the past 66 million years are associated with changes in greenhouse gas levels. Human ancestors evolved 2.8 million years ago and Homo sapiens evolved 300,000 years ago. Human civilization didn’t develop until around 11,000 BCE.
05:42 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 7/11
Now to the subject of the question at hand, over 8000 years ago the North Atlantic and Europe experienced dramatic cooling due to alterations in a system of ocean currents known as the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC).
05:42 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 8/11
Researchers suspect that the melting of an expansive polar ice sheet, as is currently occurring today, resulted in an influx of a massive amount of freshwater into the North Atlantic causing the AMOC to break down, leading to the intense cooling event.
05:42 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 9/11
In Europe, this led to plummeting temperatures and increasing rainfall, persisting for a couple centuries. And parts of Africa had extended periods of drought as a result.
05:42 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 10/11
Hali Kilbourne of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science:

“Scientists’ uncertainty about the timing of an AMOC collapse shouldn’t be taken as an excuse for not reducing greenhouse-gas emissions to try to avoid it...
05:42 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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Kurt Seitz
@kurtseitz
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thread 11/11
"It is very plausible that we’ve fallen off a cliff already and don’t know it. I fear, honestly, that by the time any of this is settled science, it’s way too late to act.”
05:43 PM - Nov 14, 2023
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