Your mistake is assuming that democratic consensus will spur the kind of action we really need. Once voters realize that this would take personal cost for benefits they won't see in their lifetime, I can't see them willfully voting for any substantial reversal.
> Once voters realize that this would take personal cost for benefits they won't see in their lifetime, I can't see them willfully voting for any substantial reversal. Luckily renewable energy is getting to the point where it actually saves money over fossil fuel based energy. People might be loathe to move to electric or fuel cell vehicles, but costs are coming down there too, not to mention that many governments ar…
There's already a news on front page at the moment which says bird population is declining in North America. The comments section mention that it's not just North America but also Britain, France and also that it could be due to declining insect population. We rarely get this kind of data from developing countries, which means these studies are rarely or not at all performed simply because they don't have resources t…
We are still debating if we should listen to science /s
No, we're debating whether we should listen to the charlatans that present us our science. Every time I read a pop-sci article and then go check the original research paper I find out that the pop-sci journalist completely misrepresented the research they are writing about, usually due to a mix of trying to get more clicks and Hanlon's Razor (incompetence).
Most people don't have the skills to be able to listen to science. They don't know how to read and interpret and abstract and then dig in further and read an entire scholarly peer-reviewed paper. That's just part of the problem. The other part is that most people are completely innumerate.
Do you know if there are any current technologies to trap and sequester green house gases ?
One technology is called “TREES”, actually scratch that a more advanced version is called “RAINFOREST” (that one sequesters far more CO2 per square meter than TREES alone). Unfortunately people have cut down a significant portion of both TREES and RAINFOREST because they are economically incentivized to do so.
one way to effect that directly is to eat less beef, I wonder how many are willing to make that sacrifice?
This is why I really like Andrew Yang for 2020. He wants to give everyone in the US $1000/month so people don't constantly have "the economic boot on their neck". You can't worry about climate change when you are worried about paying bills and feeding your kids.
Basic income also means citizens can't be held as economic hostages by obsolete "too big to fail" industry players who've achieved significant regulatory capture. The labor market can't efficiently shift supply around when workers are trapped in crushing poverty and stressed to the breaking point.
When I think about basic income I see everyone suddenly being able to afford a lot more which is good and I like that. But what I do worry is that as soon as the stores realize people have more cash to spend they start to increase the prices to match that. So how do we prevent that if we implement a basic income? I think what would be better then a basic income is some sort of basic housing, health and food rights. I don't want 1000$ a month. I want to know every month I will have enough funds to feed my kids and house them and treat them when they are not well. I think this can be achieved by a number of means. I am Canadian so we have the health care mostly figured out though I would make changes to the cost of prescriptions for low income families. I have struggled at times to afford antibiotics for my kids and I make a lot more then minimum wage. The housing could be tackled as well. We have a lot of rules which I feel are restrictive for no reason in this day and age. For example the minimum square footage I can build a place for a person to live here is 700 square feet. My dad built a 2 level tiny home that was 100 square feet I would die to own. He had to put it on a trailer to avoid the 700 square foot rule. Why? My property could fit 20 tiny homes and have room left over to play. But the city would never allow it so I truly do think housing shortage is a political issue not a logistics issue. As for food, I would like to basically see a government funded/run food kitchen with basic foods offered to low income families where they can access nutritious food. I am thank full my kids school has a breakfast program, also thankful I do not need it, but come Christmas break, summer break, any break, my heart hurts a little knowing there are several kids that 100% rely on that program for getting food. One kid was caught stealing food and the teacher asked why are you trying to hide it you can eat as much as you like, his reply was his little brother at home who was too young to be in school was hungry so he was trying to take him something to eat. That is soul crushing to me. We live in such a damn rich county no kid should be left to go hungry at home. I don't have all the answers. I don't know how it would all be paid for but I do know something needs to change.
> Do we need more evidence to act? What are we waiting for? We're waiting for a reversal in the apparent worldwide collapse of liberal democracy, I guess. Probably climate change and said collapse will feed into each other. The way most oligarchs and their toadies are wired, I think they're more likely to look to pull the ripcord for themselves rather than spend big on best-effort change for everyone else. Dismantlin…
Your mistake is assuming that democratic consensus will spur the kind of action we really need. Once voters realize that this would take personal cost for benefits they won't see in their lifetime, I can't see them willfully voting for any substantial reversal.
It's not so much that voters are selfish (although some are; probably 20-30%) as that they don't like being ripped off and it has become very clear over the last ~30 years that all the happy talk of market economics is mostly self-serving BS.
We've seen from recent economic crises that people are willing to tolerate and even vote for austerity; but since then they've noticed that all the austerity happened to people at the bottom of the economic pyramid and those at the top barely suffered at all. They've also noticed that a considerable portion of their taxes is pent on policing whose purpose is not the prevention of crime but the maintenance of the economic status quo.
> Once voters realize that this would take personal cost for benefits they won't see in their lifetime, I can't see them willfully voting for any substantial reversal. Luckily renewable energy is getting to the point where it actually saves money over fossil fuel based energy. People might be loathe to move to electric or fuel cell vehicles, but costs are coming down there too, not to mention that many governments ar…
> many governments are banning ICE vehicles anyway I'm going to hold off on giving these governments credit until one of these bans actually goes into effect. Even the most aggressive of the measures that has passed still has a decade in which to be weakened, delayed, or reversed.
By the time these bans come into force hardly anyone will be buying new ICE vehicles anyway. It's already cheaper to lease and run an EV than it is to lease and run an ICE.
The decline will be rapid. Why maintain a fuel supply chain when there aren't many customers?
Well, I'm in Alberta, Canada, and I guarantee 95% of voters here would choose increasing oil production vs. any sort of climate action. We just had a pretty bad recession, our unemployment is still above typical levels, and we just had an unseasonably cold summer after a pretty cold winter. It's not an issue of being brainwashed, people really do prefer having jobs and homes over climate targets to fix a problem that…
This is why I really like Andrew Yang for 2020. He wants to give everyone in the US $1000/month so people don't constantly have "the economic boot on their neck". You can't worry about climate change when you are worried about paying bills and feeding your kids.
Why not just go after the much smaller number of boot-wearers?
We are still debating if we should listen to science /s
No, we're debating whether we should listen to the charlatans that present us our science. Every time I read a pop-sci article and then go check the original research paper I find out that the pop-sci journalist completely misrepresented the research they are writing about, usually due to a mix of trying to get more clicks and Hanlon's Razor (incompetence). Most people don't have the skills to be able to listen to sc…
Based on what I’ve read from old library archives, quality changed for popular science type magazines after the 1950s. Everything becomes closer to being ads, or just glosses over the basic details.
I doubt it is intentional, the journalists now aren’t capable of understanding, but they know how to write things in a way to get as many clicks.
(Disclaimer I believe in climate change with all my heart) If methane levels are higher than we thought wouldn’t that make our climate models wrong? Ie less of a heating effect from co2?
>Disclaimer I believe in climate change with all my heart
Ridiculous that the subject has become so dogmatic that one must prostrate oneself before stating anything even potentially critical
We are still debating if we should listen to science /s
No, we're debating whether we should listen to the charlatans that present us our science. Every time I read a pop-sci article and then go check the original research paper I find out that the pop-sci journalist completely misrepresented the research they are writing about, usually due to a mix of trying to get more clicks and Hanlon's Razor (incompetence). Most people don't have the skills to be able to listen to sc…
> No, we're debating whether we should listen to the charlatans that present us our science.
I'm sure some do, but considering the huge number of deniers and their effect on government policy humanity's biggest issue is not understanding the facts (established by science) of climate change.