I'm graduating with a major in Environmental Science this week, and my take on it is that realistically, we're probably going to face large scale environmental disaster, which social and legislative action will be considerably too little, too late to prevent, but which sophisticated technological interventions may significantly mitigate, and which will probably constitute a fairly major mass extinction event. The impacts on human society will be significant, but it's not a major existential risk for us, per se.
What does the community here think when it comes to climate change as a potential existential risk? While strategies for combating climate change are fairly straightforward, the seeming lack of political capital behind meaningful climate reform and legislation seems to indicate that the problem is going to get substantially worse before it gets better, and the potential consequences of ignoring this issue look to be quite severe indeed!
Should the rationality/x-risks community be spending more effort on evaluating this idea and exploring potential solutions? It certainly seems like a big problem, and the current trajectory is quite worrisome. On the other hand, the issue is a political minefield and could risk entangling the community in political squabbling, potentially jeopardizing its ability to act on other threats. What do you guys think?