Guwahati, Nov. 7 -- Written by James Dyke/The Conversation

This year may be seen as a turning point in the climate crisis. The UN has accepted that global warming is going to exceed 1.5degC, while climate scientists have concluded that the rate of warming has effectively doubled over the past decade.

What's worse, the world may be approaching climate tipping points that could trigger further heating and catastrophic environmental change.

Back in 2018, an international team led by Earth system scientist Will Steffen warned that continued greenhouse gas emissions and destruction of biodiversity could produce a cascade of warming that would culminate in the climate systems passing a threshold into a so-called "Hothouse Earth".

The engine...