Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Stop biodiversity loss or we could face our own extinction, warns UN

theguardian.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 165 posts

Re: Stop biodiversity loss or we could face our own extinction, warns UN

#41

Post by PavlovsCat »

anon1203 wrote: post #28

We can't even stop killing each other because of greed and other stupid reasons, we can't even stop global warming, who's going to stop biodiversity loss and how? It's in the nature of mankind to create but also destroy. Every era of civilization was build on the ashes of the former, and the next will not be different, a lot of people will have to die of violent death for humanity to evolve and come to its senses. we…

I disagree with such broad claims about a monolithic "human nature".

> When all are guilty, no one is; confessions of collective guilt are the best possible safeguard against the discovery of culprits, and the very magnitude of the crime the best excuse for doing nothing.

-- Hannah Arendt

> a lot of people will have to die of violent death for humanity to evolve and come to its senses

I hate to be that person, but I think that's still optimistic. People don't get smarter after having been sufficiently brutalized, both learning and evolution break down when there's just a whole lot of pressure and chaos, rather than speeding up. Just like children need both stimulation and "action", as well as "peace" and feeling of acceptance and security in which to assemble and integrate their personality from their experiences. If it's all just loud noises and bright colors, development gets stunted or halted, not accelerated.

Furthermore I also think it's also optimistic to think it would just "burn down" with everyone starting from scratch: I think it would just consolidate the power of assorted sociopaths further, or even finally. I'm not worried about human extinction, if anything I'm worried of us constructing a gravity well totalitarianism we might never escape from.

> Every era of civilization was build on the ashes of the former,

By definition, because we use such catastrophes to divide things into "eras". However, it's not like civilization is stagnant between "eras", eras are just labels, lines we draw, that could also be drawn in different ways.

Re: Stop biodiversity loss or we could face our own extinction, warns UN

#43

Post by bamboozled »

sverige wrote: post #36

A great place to start would be to seriously limit or eliminate pesticides like Roundup. Don't believe the alarmists in Big Ag who will say the world will starve. We overproduce food now, and organic farming techniques, if widely adopted, wouldn't make it impossible to continue to produce enough. The loss of diversity in insects and "weeds" has had a huge impact up the chain.

I once saw a great quote which was, "maybe food is too cheap". This is probably true, we could probably eat better quality, organic food grown in a more diverse way, it would just cost more. On the flip side, it would be more valued so we'd have less waste.

I can't imagine the amount of "non-valued" food, fruit vegetables etc which end up in the bin.

Re: Stop biodiversity loss or we could face our own extinction, warns UN

#44

Post by zeroname »

sverige wrote: post #36

A great place to start would be to seriously limit or eliminate pesticides like Roundup. Don't believe the alarmists in Big Ag who will say the world will starve. We overproduce food now, and organic farming techniques, if widely adopted, wouldn't make it impossible to continue to produce enough. The loss of diversity in insects and "weeds" has had a huge impact up the chain.

> We overproduce food now...

The alternatives to Roundup tend to be worse than Roundup. That's why people use Roundup. That's not to say Roundup per se is absolutely necessary, but farming without pesticides doesn't work at the scale necessary to feed the human population. There's no choice between "overproduction" and "appropriate production" by getting rid of pesticides. Despite all the overproduction, we still have spikes in food prices caused by bad harvests. Limiting production even more would be risky.

> ... and organic farming techniques, of widely adopted, wouldn't make it impossible to continue to produce enough.

First of all, "organic farming" is marketing BS. It doesn't have any properly defined meaning, it also uses pesticides (just not those deemed "not organic") which aren't harmless either, it is vastly more expensive even at scale (which by now it has, due to high demand in rich countries). It's wishful thinking that it could replace modern farming.

Re: Stop biodiversity loss or we could face our own extinction, warns UN

#45

Post by intended »

jacquesm wrote: post #38
intended wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont have fixes, I don't know where that idea crossed your mind. I see this as the likely path forward. It is not a fix, it is essentially the car careening off the cliff and people the survivors picking up and moving on. Could you let me know what was confusing in my text? I'll fix it up.

> Instead the highest probable path I see is a husk of a planet and us figuring out a way to reintroduce life after terraforming is complete. Terraforming is fantasy. Reintroducing life is a process that takes eons and is on the scale of the Gods, not of us mortals. We have a functioning planet with a well developed eco-system, we do not have a back-up and we do not have the abilities you ascribe to us. We would not…

Ok. Excellent - I too think that terraforming is dubious practical use.

I put it forward for two reasons - To leaven the bleakness and because pursuit terraforming is inevitable.

It’s just the perfect PR product. Spend money; create jobs, fix the environment.

Re: Stop biodiversity loss or we could face our own extinction, warns UN

#46

Post by ramblenode »

zeroname wrote: post #44
sverige wrote: post #36

A great place to start would be to seriously limit or eliminate pesticides like Roundup. Don't believe the alarmists in Big Ag who will say the world will starve. We overproduce food now, and organic farming techniques, if widely adopted, wouldn't make it impossible to continue to produce enough. The loss of diversity in insects and "weeds" has had a huge impact up the chain.

> We overproduce food now... The alternatives to Roundup tend to be worse than Roundup. That's why people use Roundup. That's not to say Roundup per se is absolutely necessary, but farming without pesticides doesn't work at the scale necessary to feed the human population. There's no choice between "overproduction" and "appropriate production" by getting rid of pesticides. Despite all the overproduction, we still hav…

> First of all, "organic farming" is marketing BS.

At least in the US, there is a "certified organic" label regulated by the USDA. https://www.ams.usda.gov/about-ams/programs-offices/national...

Re: Stop biodiversity loss or we could face our own extinction, warns UN

#47

Post by dahdum »

ah765 wrote: post #9

I agree with the big idea of conservation of biodiversity, but it really bothers me when these articles are using what seems like lies and fear tactics to convince me. 2 years? Why is it so urgent? The article doesn't explain. And "By 2050, Africa is expected to lose 50% of its birds and mammals," sounded really implausible to me. I had to do further research to determine that they are probably actually referring to…

I too am sick of these exaggerations, it makes it hard to separate real science from crackpots. Two years before we face human extinction? Why did the reporter ask zero questions about “how”? Likely they got the quote they wanted for a clickbait headline, smirked, and carried on.

Re: Stop biodiversity loss or we could face our own extinction, warns UN

#48

Post by intended »

boombust wrote: post #37
intended wrote: post #2

So precisely who is going to pay for all this, and the reduction in growth it’s going to entail? Markets are levered if not overlevered, and maintenance of biodiversity is going to have both spending costs for the govt and resource extraction reductions (arguable), followed by compliance costs for firms. Sure we save ourselves, but face it, our economic system is a rational system which at the end must put a finite p…

As you hinted in your edit, you are describing the essence of a collection action problem. Ultimately, we measure the success of our capitalist economies in total receipts, and optimise accordingly. Our markets (and our cultures) prioritise consumption over repair or even abstention. That last point might seem contentious but truth be told, most of us would rather buy something new than repair something broken unless…

As you pointed out, one of the issues is special interests.

But in a rational world, it is obvious that people will use whatever tools at their disposal to improve their chances.

So by definition, any sentient and rational society will have lobbying - anywhere in the universe.

So this is not a bug but a feature. In theory these lobby groups will be dragged to a stale mate by counter lobby groups, but practically the more unethical group will win just because of operational flexibility.

I don’t see any way this worst case out come doesn’t come to pass because of these very issues.

The collective action problem can’t be solved.

Re: Stop biodiversity loss or we could face our own extinction, warns UN

#50

Post by apocalypstyx »

justaaron wrote: post #20
9712263 wrote: post #5

Terraforming Mars, or maybe just create a habitable satellite is easier than saving the earth. Current economical model fosters growing business, and only government regulation to deal with externality. Growing is intuitive to human activity, but restricting human growth is counter-intuitive. I forget the link, but a lecture video using bacteria growth as a metaphor of human growth creeps me out. Supposed bacteria in…

Holy guacamole. "easier to terraform mars or create a habitable satellite than saving earth" this is the most ignorant thing I've ever seen written on the internet. Get back to me once you have 1/10000000th the bio-diversity of earth on your habitable satellite. 1) change our paradigms, economic system, and other social factors. I can assure you that this is far more maleable than Martian soil composition... our soci…

> change our paradigms, economic system, and other social factors.

As the famous quote goes: "it has become easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism."

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalist_Realism:_Is_There_No_Alternative

Post reply on HN