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1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

theguardian.com

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Re: 1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

#91

Post by TheArcane »

dpark wrote: post #77
rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>No one wants to give up their own personal comfort or lifestyle for the sake of "the planet." Seriously? Who are you to say that of others?! I'm French (Parisian, actually) and I keep demonstrating with yellow vests to try and force political action so we can save the biosphere. I've been giving up on my personal comfort for years to reduce my environment footprint and help others do the same: I don't go skiing anym…

> I really want to scream a big FCK you to your face for saying that "No one wants to give up their own personal comfort or lifestyle for the sake of "the planet."". Can you understand that? You seem to have given up any hope in political change, but please, don't speak for other. You expect a political solution but your immediate reaction to someone expressing a differing opinion is overt hostility. I don’t know how…

I wouldn't call this "overt hostility".

Re: 1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

#92

Post by Diederich »

rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #89
Diederich wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No one I understand your anger here, but I'm 99% sure that the person you're replying to didn't mean that literally. 'No one' is often used to mean 'almost no one'. I'm sure you'll agree that your behaviour is well into 1% territory, as an overall percentage of people. You are to be applauded of course.

Do you realize that your comment contributes to a self-fulfilling prophecy that climate change deniers (among others) have been pushing for? Denying the possibility of political solutions makes it harder to fight for such solutions. Reducing one's environmental footprint is quite difficult already, but fighting the fossil fuel industry (and many other lobbies who do NOT want a transition) is even harder. When you rea…

> Denying the possibility of political solutions

Of course the most viable solutions are largely political; I've never said or implied otherwise.

> When you realize that many banks and financial institutions have huuuge fossil-related assets on their books, you'll realize that an enormous % of the economy is resisting the switch to renewables.

These and related facts have been high on my mind for decades now.

> So please, be very careful not to forget that things always end up being political because we always have to make decisions

I'll never forget that.

I think you need to calm down a bit.

Re: 1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

#93

Post by rthomas6 »

lawnchair_larry wrote: post #82
rthomas6 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The end result of this is that driving a lot and excessive heating and cooling of spaces are more of an expensive luxury. The problem is people see owning and driving a personal vehicle as something like a right instead of the extravagant over-the-top luxury it really is. And once someone gets used to something, they get really angry when something threatens to take it away, pretty much no matter what it is. That's o…

Owning an economy car is not “extravagant over-the-top” in the least. Another problem is hardliners taking such extreme positions against reasonable everyday people.

In a global sense, it really is. So is eating at restaurants regularly, or even eating meat with every meal. We just don't realize it because we live in such rich countries, and everybody does that stuff here. Me included. But most people in the world can't afford to live that way and currently don't. Please note that I don't think these things are bad or immoral, just that they are expensive to produce and expensive to consume. The Earth's resources can only sustain a small fraction of its population living that way. They are extravagant luxuries, and we should be thankful we get to have them.

Re: 1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

#94

Post by mac01021 »

TheArcane wrote: post #91
dpark wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really want to scream a big FCK you to your face for saying that "No one wants to give up their own personal comfort or lifestyle for the sake of "the planet."". Can you understand that? You seem to have given up any hope in political change, but please, don't speak for other. You expect a political solution but your immediate reaction to someone expressing a differing opinion is overt hostility. I don’t know how…

I wouldn't call this "overt hostility".

"I really want to scream a big F*CK you to your face" is certainly more overt than covert.

Still, I sympathize with the sentiment, the attitude of despair is EXTREMELY frustrating.

Re: 1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

#95

Post by asdfadsfgfdda »

jakewins wrote: post #66
bryanlarsen wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a pretty simple, viable solution. Carbon taxes. Yes, it's hard to get 195 countries to agree to implement a carbon tax, but you could have said the same thing about the ozone layer / CFC problem.

The problem with carbon taxes is that they are regressive. Carbon taxation plays out as a consumption tax on goods people consume in roughly the same quantities independent of income. Take fuel as an example. The average american adult consumes about 550 gallons of gas a year for driving. It doesn't matter substantially how wealthy you are - there are only so many hours in the day to drive. A $20/Metric Ton CO2eq car…

>>The average american adult consumes about 550 gallons of gas a year for driving. It doesn't matter substantially how wealthy you are - there are only so many hours in the day to drive.

The wealthiest 10% of Americans by income spend ~$3,000/year on gas, while the poorest 10% spend only $870/year. So looking at only gas purchases, the wealthy do consume much more gas. This could be caused by differences in vehicles (bigger/luxury cars are more expensive and typically consume more fuel), fuel grade (premium vs regular gasoline), and distance driving (poor Americans are just not driving as much).

https://www.bls.gov/cex/2017/combined/decile.pdf

Re: 1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

#96

Post by rcMgD2BwE72F »

sonofaragorn wrote: post #78
jakewins wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

.. but I thought the yellow vest protests directly lead to rolling back legislation meant to increase prices of CO2-polluting fuel, so that renewable fuels would be able to compete? https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/12/fr...

Yep, that was my understanding as well https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-46439469

No: https://www.lemonde.fr/climat/article/2018/12/08/marche-pour...

I'm a yellow vest only because I care about the environment.

I was in most of the demonstration and believe me, we share a lot between ecologists and the poor workers who cannot bear the burden of the transition. I come from a "milieu social" (don't know how to translate) where you pollute 100 times more than the poor and be praised by Macron for being part of the "startup nation", "those who succeeds vs those who are nothing" etc.

Macron doesn't really care about the environment (ask Nicolas Hulot!).

Re: 1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

#97

Post by rcMgD2BwE72F »

Diederich wrote: post #92
rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you realize that your comment contributes to a self-fulfilling prophecy that climate change deniers (among others) have been pushing for? Denying the possibility of political solutions makes it harder to fight for such solutions. Reducing one's environmental footprint is quite difficult already, but fighting the fossil fuel industry (and many other lobbies who do NOT want a transition) is even harder. When you rea…

> Denying the possibility of political solutions Of course the most viable solutions are largely political; I've never said or implied otherwise. > When you realize that many banks and financial institutions have huuuge fossil-related assets on their books, you'll realize that an enormous % of the economy is resisting the switch to renewables. These and related facts have been high on my mind for decades now. > So pl…

That was in reaction to the parent comment ("There is no viable solution to climate change through policy or political action."), sorry.

Re: 1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

#98

Post by mac01021 »

The World Economic Forum in Davos is not just about Climate. In fact most of the topics discussed are not.

It is not clear from this article that most of the attendees are even pretending to be concerned with global warming.

So, while this is certainly tragic, the act is not as hypocritical, nor as obviously ironic, as The Guardian would like us to think.

Re: 1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

#99

Post by Diederich »

rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #97
Diederich wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Denying the possibility of political solutions Of course the most viable solutions are largely political; I've never said or implied otherwise. > When you realize that many banks and financial institutions have huuuge fossil-related assets on their books, you'll realize that an enormous % of the economy is resisting the switch to renewables. These and related facts have been high on my mind for decades now. > So pl…

That was in reaction to the parent comment ("There is no viable solution to climate change through policy or political action."), sorry.

No worries.

This is profoundly important stuff. Likely THE MOST important stuff.

For things that are really important, it's vital, in my opinion, that we lay emotions aside and get as pragmatic and focused as possible.

Re: 1500 Private Jets Fly to Davos for Climate Talks

#100

Post by jellicle »

rthomas6 wrote: post #68
normal_man wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It won't be an extinction event, it will be a gradual decline where the global poor suffer and die by the millions. "People will need to move" is not a realistic solution for massive amounts of people; they will starve, and drown. It's not happening because your friends fly to Burning Man, it's happening because global corporations are seeking profit above all else. Climate change cannot be combatted while capitalism…

You're kind of talking around the parent comment's point. Global corporations don't make that profit in a vacuum, they do it by selling people things they want. Barring huge technological progress, our current way of life has to change to sufficiently lower climate emissions. Regardless of what kind of government system controls industries, for carbon emissions to be sufficiently low, a lot of our current luxuries mu…

Simply untrue. Solar panels are cheap. We do some unsustainable things, for sure, but the idea that everyone has a choice between killing the Earth or living in medieval times and hoeing the mud like some Monty Python peasant is just the rankest sort of bullshit.

We do unsustainable things largely because the monetary incentives are to do so. We could easily have advanced, sustainable lifestyles.

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