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

What can I do about climate change?

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 243 posts

Re: What can I do about climate change?

#171

Post by JoeAltmaier »

SmellyGeekBoy wrote: post #167
mikro2nd wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I'm with you on the issue of honey vs. sugar, it's not quite so simple... Where's that honey coming from? Locally harvested? Great! But likely not the bulk of supply. Supermarket honey? Transported from Goodness Knows Where -- very likely China or Chile, where the bees are intensively fed... (you guessed it!) sugar! That's why the honey is so flavourless, not to mention the Carbon footprint of all those honey-k…

> Bees are almost as intensively farmed as anything else, and, while the effects and outcomes are nowhere near as severe as other forms of intensive husbandry, the honey is not necessarily the pure and innocent product you might think it is. Thankyou for pointing this out. I say the same about almond milk and other products hyped by vegans that are pollinated by bees. The commercial beekeeping industry is horrific. P…

Really? We have to be sympathetic to mindless insects now? For instance, folks raise millions of crickets in my state for flour and protein - we eat them - but the bees deserve special empathy because they're not free-range or something?

I understand folks like bees, see them in a kindly light. But they're little automatons with maybe a neuron or two total. If we raised them, crushed them and ate them, it'd be no different from how we treat other insects.

Re: What can I do about climate change?

#172

Post by Vinnl »

KozmoNau7 wrote: post #143
Vinnl wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ugh, I once read a booklet that had the same premise of the article. One of the suggested solutions: use less soap when doing the dishes, to preserve packaging. As I mention in a different comment, individual action is important. However, there is a large difference in effectiveness, and promoting obviously ineffective ones isn't going to convince people to do the ones that are likely to be effective.

It's always a good idea to Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. Do you need to use that much soap? Do you need to keep the lights on everywhere? Do you need to use a tumble-dryer or could you let your clothes air dry instead? Do you need that shiny new phone or is your current one good for another couple of years? Yes, all of these are absolutely small things individually, but put together and done by many people, it does make a…

As a broader principle: sure, Do The Little Things, if only to create an environment that shows people that climate change is considered important by many people.

That's not what this advice was, though; the advice was specifically to use less soap when doing the dishes.

Re: What can I do about climate change?

#173

Post by SmellyGeekBoy »

moviuro wrote: post #35
lumberjack wrote: post #11

If people were not so stuck up on individual action, that would be some progress towards solving climate change. One of the big obstacles is admitting that we need collective action to solve this worldwide problem. Would ee propose individual action when less dangerous situations occur in society? Say, a bank run is imminent. Does individual action work? Does the government broadcast it on the 8 o'clock news and do t…

> we expect individual action to work on climate change. Don't regulations come into play? In the EU, inefficient light bulbs have been phased out [0] In France, we have free energy market since 2010 [1], with some players [2] focusing on green energy, etc. Diesel & gas (for cars) prices are sky-rocketting (taxes !! [3]). Not cool for people who don't have the choice to keep using their old cars (students, unemployed…

Something something freedom. Humans should be free to destroy the planet without meddling from them pesky guvments dagnabbit!

Re: What can I do about climate change?

#174

Post by Vinnl »

tom-- wrote: post #154
KitDuncan wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdotal, but I went vegan 3 years ago and in those 3 years, quite a few of my very close friends went vegan or vegetarian as well. It really does give me a lot of hope. Even my parents started eating meat a lot less, basically only for big events and startet using oat milk for their coffee!

Have you been finding the jokes regarding vegans forcing veganism on others to be on the decline or is it still pretty bad? If that sort of 'stigma' goes away I would imagine a lot more people would be going vegetarian/vegan.

That's one thing I've noticed in my environment: the number of vegetarians has exploded, there actually are several vegans now, and there is nobody loudly proclaiming how much they love meat and how they could never give that up. Likewise, nobody is claiming about activist vegans - which is probably due to the also relevant factor that none of the vegans and almost none of the vegetarians are activist. They're just setting an example, are willing to discuss it if you bring it up, and that's it.

Re: What can I do about climate change?

#175

Post by SmellyGeekBoy »

doombolt wrote: post #100
gaius wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just be honest and admit that this possible solution (fewer kids!) conflicts with your ideology or your reader’s The planet’s population has doubled in my lifetime alone, and I may see it double again, and it could be pure coincidence that all the warning signs clearly track the human population (CO2 levels, sea temperature etc etc) but maybe, just maybe, there is some causation there...? We could all have nice thing…

Most countries actually did. Should you only send this message to societies which did not? Caution: Will be very un-PC.

You mean like distributing contraception in places like Africa? There's been a huge push for it in recent years and until your comment I don't think I've ever heard it described as "un-PC".

Re: What can I do about climate change?

#176

Post by moduspol »

lumberjack wrote: post #11

If people were not so stuck up on individual action, that would be some progress towards solving climate change. One of the big obstacles is admitting that we need collective action to solve this worldwide problem. Would ee propose individual action when less dangerous situations occur in society? Say, a bank run is imminent. Does individual action work? Does the government broadcast it on the 8 o'clock news and do t…

Banks can be shut down to prevent bank runs, but only temporarily. You can't just close the bank down or heavily restrict withdrawals forever without significant negative consequences. Fighting climate change is not a short term proposition.

Even if you are totally correct, it's irrelevant unless (A) you can maintain democratic support for such collective actions, or (B) you get rid of democracy.

In the US at least, even the democrats don't propose climate regulation strong enough to have a measurable impact on the climate over ten years. People will absolutely resist the moment energy prices go up notably, which will be necessary to measurably affect climate.

The problem isn't that collective action needs to be taken, it's that sufficient collective action won't sufficiently be supported by voters. That's why Democrats aren't proposing it, and that's the actual hurdle that needs to be overcome.

Re: What can I do about climate change?

#177

Post by SmellyGeekBoy »

sashimy wrote: post #89

> 8. Should I think about how many children I have (or don’t have)? Maybe the worst point of the whole article, here is my point of view : educated and people aware of environment change have fewer kids, people with the opposite way of thinking have more kids and have the same education. We create a world where the people who don't care outnumber those who care, since the most praised government system is Democracy t…

I certainly don't share my parents' political views. Do you?

Are you arguing that climate change denial is a genetic trait?

Re: What can I do about climate change?

#178

Post by danielbln »

WA wrote: post #82

On the one hand, I think individual action is quite useless to stop climate change. Too many people still do too many things that have a more negative impact. For example, SUVs is still a fast-growing car segment (the fastest?). The number of SUVs in Germany (where I live) have significantly increased over the years. People want their fat cars. On the other hand, if more and more people demand certain things, for exa…

Whatever REWE did is certainly working to keep me as a customer. The amount of plastic I buy with my groceries is ludicrous, every measure to reduce this amount is highly welcome.

Re: What can I do about climate change?

#179

Post by beaconstudios »

oppzixi00 wrote: post #57
joelthelion wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As the article mentions, individuals can do something about corporate pollution: - Buy less stuff. Corporations produce waste because we buy their stuff . Get the stuff you still buy from more environmentally-friendly companies, if possible. - Political action. Corporations need to be regulated and that can only happen through political action. Lobbies may have a lot of power, but in the end, it's the citizens who vo…

> it's the citizens who vote The citizens are easily diverted with racist flamebait issues and neofascism. Nothing will be done.

please don't bring more partisan flame-baiting onto HN.
Post reply on HN