One of the likely effects of global warming is that the Gulf Stream will move and Europe will be as cold as America at the same latitude, isn't it? And don't people already have summer homes in Nova Scotia?
Anyway, for a limited time only shows us the way.
*do-over*
A relative who'd recently been to Sweden. We totally believe that. Did she compliment you on your biceps?
Buck is already talking to New Hampshireites he knows about buying up sunny hillsides to start planting vinyards.
How cool would it be if ogged were hilzoy's second cousin?
One of the likely effects of global warming is that the Gulf Stream will move and Europe will be as cold as America at the same latitude, isn't it? And don't people already have summer homes in Nova Scotia?
1) Haven't a clue.
2) Summer homes.
It's one of the possible effects, yes. I don't know what the odds are on it, though.
This is just a joke, right? I think so but I can't always tell. That's a terrible investment idea.
Buck is already talking to New Hampshireites he knows about buying up sunny hillsides to start planting vinyards.
There you go. The Breaths are thinking ahead. I'd go somewhere other than New Hampshire, but hey, I stay out of your way, you stay out of my way.
Am I joking? Not really; only because I don't know enough about the anticipated effects. If people have no real idea whether spot X is going to become warmer or colder, then yes, this is stupid. But if it's a pretty good bet that some section of the Earth between such-and-such coordinates will cool, while some other section will become warm, then it doesn't seem like a bad idea.
Why are you responding to 1 after I called do-overs? Grad student jokes, people!
I took your do-over to be more of an addendum than a repudiation.
Note that he communicated with the relative by phone, Matt. Marginal evidence that they don't have e-mail in Sweden?
If people have no real idea whether spot X is going to become warmer or colder, then yes, this is stupid.
There's that (which is a lot like "if poeple have no real idea whether lottery numbers X-Y-Z-A-B-C are going to come up tonight, then investing in lottery tickets is stupid). There's also the fact that your hopeful scenarios are beyond a realistic time-horizon, at least for anything other than a virtually risk-free investment. Making money 30 years from now is generally not worth doing. (From a purely financial perspective.)
realistic *investment* time-horizon, I meant...
That's not what do-over means, Persian.
beyond a realistic time-horizon
Well, this too seems like an empirical question. I've read things lately that say the changes are happening even faster than the models predicted. But I know you'll all call me sexist if I say this is why models should be seen but not heard.
At least, not on my interpretation. I am far from willing to claim mastery of the norms of the playground. If you'd known me in elementary school you'd understand why.
That's not what do-over means, Persian.
I'm not so sure, Texan. Consider:
"You cocksucker."
*I call a do-over.*
"You fucking cocksucker."
That seems like legit usage to me.
Maybe Mr. Breath wants to get in on all the hott NH primary action.
But there the first speech act is in fact annulled; it's that the second comprises the first and more besides. If I had meant to take another turn without retracting the first I would have called "Frontsies" or something.
*Frontsies*
And you meant "I'm not so sure, Aggie."
Again, that shoudl have said *investment* time horizon. You've got to be looking at 20-30 years, minimum. If the climate changed dramatically in the next 10 years, which I think is far faster than is commonly predicted, it would still take people a good few decades to relocate in sufficient numbers to push around property values in the ways you are imagining. It would eventually happen, but it's not like everyone would pack up and move overnight.
Re: beyond a realistic time-horizon in 13 and 16
You don't have to hold these options till fruition. In five years, you will be 25 years out, and the models will predict better. If you guessed right, your option will have become more valuable, possibly substantially so.
Although, if you're just looking to snag a beautiful beachhouse on the cheap, rather than as some sort of investment scheme, buying one in someplace that's currently a little-too-cold (and therefore not wildly overpriced) might be a very good idea. Wait a few years, and it might start to get nicer and nicer year-round.
That might have been all you were really saying.
I have a claim on some almost totally undeveloped land in the back of nowhereville, Yukon. Tell me that's not going to skyrocket in value, Mr. Investment Man.
I've never heard of "frontsies." I now retire from that sub-conversation, before I undergo puberty-reversal.
if you're just looking to snag a beautiful beachhouse on the cheap
Well, that's what I would hope to do, not having enough money to be a serious investor, but I'm genuinely curious about opportunities for people who want to invest.
Do-overs don't apply to saying things, they only apply to doing things. And they are invoked by a person who made a mistake, not by somebody whose rights were infracted upon.
GOSH!
SCMT: there's an option component to the value here, but it's not a large enough piece of the overall investment to play a significant role (especially as any potential payoffs on the option component are decades in the future, and therefore discounted almost completely). That's my whole point.
If there was some market whereby you could separate the option component from the real estate component here, and just trade the option, your point would have some force, and you could potentially make some money. Although even then, this would be a very risky game.
Is Western civ going to be in such good shape after the inconvenient truth manifests that "investment" will be the operative consideration? "beautiful beachhouse" s/b "northern compound"
29 -- are there no exchange-traded weather options? If not, why not? Betting on the weather seems like an excellent revenue-generating activity.
ALso to be kept in mind when looking at oceanfront property--how will a 20-foot (3 meter) rise in sea levels impact your property. (Note that this is one of the models for the projected fall in Temps in Europe---reduced salinity of the ocean from all of the artic ice meltwater disrupts the North Atlantic Current.
Me, I'm thinking about lakefront property on the North Shore of Lake Superior, aka the new Meditteranean (in Canada--too expensive in Minnesota).
30: Well, if not, it's as good an investment as any other (barring dried fruit and ammo.)
31: Of course there are -- there are a variety of weather futures and other derivative products traded on the Chicago exchange, probably other places as well. Here's a decent article.
See, I can never keep track of that metric system- one day 3 meters is 10 feet, suddenly you're saying it's 20 feet. My house is at 33 feet elevation, so I'm looking forward to owning waterfront property.
I got a "What to do if a hurricane hits New York City" brochure in the mail yesterday. I would have expected a "we're just covering our ass" tone but instead it was "OMG!!1! HURRICANE!"
30: Well, if not, it's as good an investment as any other (barring dried fruit and ammo.)
Anyone read Farnham's Freehold? Ogged should start a barn on his suddenly not-so-arctic property.
SCMT: there's an option component to the value here, but it's not a large enough piece of the overall investment to play a significant role (especially as any potential payoffs on the option component are decades in the future, and therefore discounted almost completely). That's my whole point.
I'm not so sure. I think we disagree on the issue of time. You care about is the relative return on your investment as compared to other options and, I suppose, liquidity. There's nothing particularly special about time, except as it relates to the predictive ability of your model. If someone invents a wayback machine that takes me 30 years into the past, I'm going to give my grade-school self advice about how things turn out now. As regards the relative value of the option, that's going to depend on the land. If you know that Lex Luthor in Superman I is going to be successful in turning now-worthless NV land into beachfront property 30 years hence, it is still worth it to buy the land-it costs you next-to-nothing, and it's going to be Malibu in 30 years.
The real problem is that our models suck, and if the models didn't suck, it would priced into the cost of your land pretty quickly.
38: Oooh, there's a creepy book. "Let's make an insightful point about racism and civil rights by throwing our courageous white heroes into the future where they'll be enslaved by cannibalistic Negroes!" I mean, I'm sure it was well meant, but at the very least, kinda tin-eared.
A libertarian science fiction writer with a tin ear for social nuance? Never happen.
I remember reading that when I was ~12 and being creeped out: "this isn't like Rocket Ship Gallileo!"
You have to wonder if it seemed that freaky when published, or what?
Pish, tush, the platypus flu will kill us all long before global warming makes Honningsvåg a nice summer retreat.
According to my GPS, WeHo is 343 feet above sea-level, so I figure we'll be the new Malibu when the Arctic melts. Not that we aren't terribly trendy already, what with Paris Hilton barf all over our streets and that shrine in the Viper Room car park where River Phoenix OD'd.
40: I worked in a book store around the time Stranger in a Strange Land was outrageously popular. People would come in wearing "Grok me" buttons and ask for more books by RAH.
I would give them Farnham's Freehold. There's something about being a happy sadist...
I just like the idea of "Grok me" buttons.
I have to explain that I actively tried to like Heinlein, but kinda failed. There were sometimes attractive illustrations on the front of Heinlein paperbacks, I'll say that.
Clearly you were an insufficiently nerdy child. I read pretty much everything he ever wrote, and enjoyed a surprising amount of it (with occasional disturbing moments like FF).
46: Because it means that it is possible to imagine a society of adults in which I'm the cool one.
Clearly you were an insufficiently nerdy child
Rather: clearly, I was a failure even at being a nerdy child.
a society of adults in which I'm the cool one
At which time, don't you want to exercise the hermit option?
Now that we've all reversed puberty, I can explain: "frontsies" is cutting in line in front of someone. (Not this, which is perverse. Colbert knows.) Often found in the phrase "no frontsies." I was taking some poetic license, thinking that posting twice in a row was cutting in front of anyone else.
I challenge 28. We've had comment do-overs before, and I was the one who made a mistake.
a society of adults in which I'm the cool one
If this ever comes to pass I think the survivors would envy the dead.
40 -- On a related note, has anyone read either of these books? I wasn't optimistic when I first heard that Steven Barnes was working on that alternate history but they have surprisingly good reviews on Amazon.
Heinlein spent a lot of time exploring alternate societies. I'd suggest that the one depicted in Farnham's Freehold is far less creepy than, say the eugenics-and-public-duelling utopia of Beyond this Horizon.
I'm a total Heinlein fanboy--if I ever got into collecting first editions of anything, it would be his books.
I'm going to stick with my position that it's hard to get creepier than postulating a future world where cannibalistic Negroes castrate white men, keep white women as sex slaves and breed whites to be small and weak. I mean, I'm sure he meant well, but boy you could sell copies of that at a Klan rally. (I do believe that they'd be missing the point, which I am certain was to say something wholesome about equality and civil rights. But it wouldn't be terribly hard to miss.)
I see what you're saying, but I think it's clear in FF that the author thinks the world he's written about is a bad one, something that is very much not the case in BTH. Thus, creepier. To me, at least.
Stranger in a Strange Land = excellent, excellent book when I was 13. Somehow I can't really picture rereading it today. But: the word grok is an excellent addition to the language.
(Also, "Valentine Michael Smith" is a cool name. And I never read Farnham's Freehold.)
I once had a bumper sticker that read "Science Fiction Fans Eat Their Dead", which I had put over the dealer ad in the plate frame on my new and unplated car. This was in the era when there were still gas station attendants who took down one's plate number for a credit card sale. My receipts looked a tad strange: "Lic. No.: Eat Dead" or "Science Eats". Freaked out some poor soul on the way from LA to Phoenix who seemed to think we were Satanists.
if your reaction to the threat of global warming is to buy "beachfront" property anywhere, then I would advise against a career in oceanography. The whole point of global warming is that the beachfront is likely to shift a few miles back.
This is where I give up on my scheme and you swoop in and buy all the good land, is it? Miles my ass; the coastline is expected to move back a few to several dozen meters, and not suddenly.
Miles my ass; the coastline is expected to move back a few to several dozen meters, and not suddenly.
Dude, places like FL have a mean elevation of like 100 feet. I think the highest point in that state is under 500. A hell of a lot of that place is barely above sea level. You raise the ocean even 25 or 30 feet, and you're going to see miles of encroachment.
I'm willing to credit FL with 29 inches, and you want to tell me that he has a mean elevation of 100 feet? That's not going to fly.
Since I was talking about cold places that will become more hospitable, Florida isn't really my concern, ditto, say, Bangladesh. Though it's true that places like that would be completely fucked.
This is a good, short summary.
Weirdly, I floated almost this exact idea to my wife like two days ago. Although I had rainfall/snowpack as one of my criteria as well. Gotta keep an eye on those precipiation nunbers. Don't want to buy something that's going to warm up only to turn into a dust bowl.
40: Did Heinlein ever mean anything well? He always struck me as exactly the sort of "libertarian" who would be right up Cheney's butt these days. Well no, because back when I read him nobody could have imagined Cheney, but YKWIM.
39- Tim, I don't want to hammer this into the ground, but you're really missing the point. It's not at all about the accuracy of our climate models (though that in and of itself is problematic and certainly heightens the risk).
What I'm saying is that even if scientists reached the indisputable conclusion that -- with 100% accuracy -- town [x] would have it's mean temperature rise by 15 degrees by the year 2025, and this were widely reported and universally believed, real estate prices in town [x] would not move significantly in the near term. (In other words if the option "paid off" in the most dramatic possible way for people holding real estate there now -- the "pay off" is still going to be very, very small). There's still too much uncertainty on the payoff (when exactly will values rise as a result of the increased temps? how high will they rise?), which is occuring too far in the future to make any meaningful investment worthwhile in present dollars.
If you could strip away all the uncertainty, so you were guaranteed that [x] property will be worth [y] dollars in 2036 (almost as if it were a gov't bond), well then yeah, you could make a meaningful investment. But that's not even bordering on an interesting hypothetical -- it's totally absurd and unrealistic.
"it's" s/b "its". Although honestly, I think this is the last time I'm ever going to bother correcting typos like that for you people. Unless there is some genuine ambiguity, I'm just going to let them stand. My official response to all future corrections: Yes, I make a lot of typos. Bite me.
But: the word grok is an excellent addition to the language.
You are wrong, Clownae. People who use the word "grok" should be rounded up and sent to Mars.
What's funny about 70 is that no correction need be made.
Actually I don't think I've used that word more than about once (not counting the meta-use above and similar) since I was about 13. But, it seems like a nice one to have on hand should the situation arise where I need it.
69: I don't think we're disagreeing.
What I learned at the Mineshaft:
(a) Eating salmon will make me die a nasty horrible death
(b) I can be kicked out of the country any time the government feels like it [OK, I told the Mineshaft that]
(c) The whole world is going to get flooded
(d) But after civilization ends I'll be able to shave with pumice!
So, about even.
Did Heinlein ever mean anything well? He always struck me as exactly the sort of "libertarian" who would be right up Cheney's butt these days.
See The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Friday, or The Red Planet. Not real big on government intrusion.
He was also the kind of Libertarian who felt that if a nation couldn't survive with a volunteer army, it didn't desrve to--he was absolutely horrified by the drat.
he was absolutely horrified by the drat
As am I -- I'll take my profanity straight up, if you please.
If you could strip away all the uncertainty, so you were guaranteed that [x] property will be worth [y] dollars in 2036 (almost as if it were a gov't bond), well then yeah, you could make a meaningful investment.
Personally, I don't care about having an investment, per se. I want something that can be converted to a hidey-hole, with a means for producing food and with clear lines of fire. More like a last ditch insurance policy. But that's just me.
But are there going to be any beaches left in the world?
Chopper, you sound more like Larry Niven (Lucifer's Hammer) than Heinlein.
73: Think twice, Clownae. The Grok Police are waiting. With tasers.
A question for the ages: does it rhyme with "rock" or with "oak"?
OFE--Heinlein and Niven are both guilty pleasures--any of the post-apocolyptic stuff is. I'll confess that the bit in Lucifer's Hammer where the guy buries his library in zip-loc bags so that civilization can rebuild from the knowledge contained therein had some small amount of impact in my formative years, though. I think what I've liked about Niven, Heinlein, Stirling, etc., is the idea of individual preparedness and having thought things through for when it all drops in the shitter.
That being said, I think we as members of a society are each also individually responsible for the outcomes of society collectively. If we reach the point where we have to use our plans for individual protection and survival, we as individuals have each failed our society.
OFE--Heinlein and Niven are both guilty pleasures--any of the post-apocolyptic stuff is.
Neither Riddley Walker nor A Canticle for Liebowitz is a "guilty pleasure".
Think of Florida, a flat state. A lot of water in a lot of basements. Are my feet, are my feet wet? It's only the encroaching shoreline.
Ogged's got it figured out. He's gonna find a city, find himself a city to live in. There's good points—there's bad points.
Look over there! a Whole Foods. Good place to get some flirting done!
My favourite post-apocalyptic novel when I was a kid was this:
http://www.coldfusionvideo.com/book/hierosjourney.html
Looking at that summary it sounds pretty 'special'.
The only thing I remember about it is that the paperback edition I had, had a foxy Pam Grier looking woman on the cover.
Well, this thread has gone dramatically off topic, as always. What else are comments for?
But I do need to say this: If you come trying to buy a beachfront home in Nova Scotia, you will find that a German beat you to it 6 years ago. And he thinks that water is quite warm, thank you.
And also, keep your hands of my family's THREE beachfront homes in Nova Scotia. (It pays to be in a family that's been here for 250 years. We got in on the beachfront groundfloor.)