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Is It Too Late to Stop Climate Change? [video]

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Re: Is It Too Late to Stop Climate Change? [video]

#31

Didn't watch the video, but my personal feeling is that it is never too late--but people won't like the solution. We either do a voluntary contraction, the most humane way being to simply stop reproducing (not entirely, but drastically), and for those that remain, to live simply, with fewer things, traveling far less. Essentially, we would move toward an agrarian economy (plus internet). No more suburbs. Cities would…

or... we can just introduce a $100/tonne carbon tax, which would not even cause more than short dip in economic growth. Consumption isn't bad, carbon is bad. All the modern conveniences can be produced by low-carbon technology or offset by direct air capture, and for relatively low cost. An anti-growth mindset is religious thinking.

Energy moves atoms around, at all levels of scale, and a lot of our energy comes from unwinding the chemical springs in fossil fuels that leave those flacid springs in the air. Making and shipping stuff requires a lot of atoms to move, at each phase of the supply chain, and all of that motion requires a lot of energy. This is in addition to the energy required to run and maintain the machinery in a modern American household!

So yeah, I think consumption is bad because it drives a great deal of carbon release, both at production and during operation.

As for growth, I guess I'm in favor of quality over quantity, of both stuff and people. It seems to me that Earth would be better off with, like, 1B people gardening and sustainable farming, reading and writing books on paper, with perhaps one or two high-tech cities where people work on things like particle physics experiments, do space missions (especially planetary defense and exploration).

I wish it weren't so. Part of me wishes I lived in the 19th century, when so much of the world was still new, and to be explored, and the forests seemed endless and forbidding. And, unlike earlier times, there was technology available to exploit all those endless resources. People were blessedly ignorant of the externalities of their actions, and TBH the tech was relatively inefficient, so truly massive harm wasn't even possible. But I would say that to have a "pro-growth" mindset is itself a religious view, one that stands in opposition to the simple truth that we live in the very thin, very precious skin that is the entirely unique and valuable biosphere of Earth.

Re: Is It Too Late to Stop Climate Change? [video]

#32
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Siberia is already very hot in the summers. Like 40C+ in the summers and -40-50C in the winter. That range is not going to be 'Mediterranean' anytime ever.

Greenland or Antarctica, then.

How many people are going to live there? Supported by what infrastructure? How is the infrastructure going to be maintained? Where are all the machines that you need to repair and replace the infrastructure? Where are the plants to produce the machines? Who is going to maintain the infrastructure, the machines and the plants? How do you decide who's going to get to Antarctica? How are you going to prevent other from going there themselves? How are you going to stop the rest of the world from nuking Antartica in retaliation? How are you going to stop the USA and China from going to war over that last habitable piece of earth? How are you going to provide food and oxygen to the few survivors?

Not really.

Re: Is It Too Late to Stop Climate Change? [video]

#33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

or... we can just introduce a $100/tonne carbon tax, which would not even cause more than short dip in economic growth. Consumption isn't bad, carbon is bad. All the modern conveniences can be produced by low-carbon technology or offset by direct air capture, and for relatively low cost. An anti-growth mindset is religious thinking.

Energy moves atoms around, at all levels of scale, and a lot of our energy comes from unwinding the chemical springs in fossil fuels that leave those flacid springs in the air. Making and shipping stuff requires a lot of atoms to move, at each phase of the supply chain, and all of that motion requires a lot of energy. This is in addition to the energy required to run and maintain the machinery in a modern American ho…

So what if we could profitably do carbon recapture for $100/ton which was funded by a $100/ton carbon tax and start an entire industry that reverses carbon in the atmosphere, would you still be against consumption then?

Re: Is It Too Late to Stop Climate Change? [video]

#35

what is the meaning of "too late"? the planet will survive, the organisms will adapt, humanity will die so what? maybe some amebas will evolve into something more peaceful that the savages we have become.

> maybe some amebas will evolve into something more peaceful that the savages we have become.

That's very unlikely. Our behavior is rooted in our biological need to consume resources and reproduce. Our failure to moderate our behavior is the same as the rabbit that's unable to reproduce once the environment's carrying capacity has been reached.

I'm pretty sure that this fundamental biological behavior (compete for resources to reproduce) is the Big Filter. So I reckon that every species going planetary apex will make the same mistake.

Re: Is It Too Late to Stop Climate Change? [video]

#36

Didn't watch the video, but my personal feeling is that it is never too late--but people won't like the solution. We either do a voluntary contraction, the most humane way being to simply stop reproducing (not entirely, but drastically), and for those that remain, to live simply, with fewer things, traveling far less. Essentially, we would move toward an agrarian economy (plus internet). No more suburbs. Cities would…

> Didn't watch the video, but my personal feeling is that it is never too late

This is borderline hijacking a post.

The whole point of the video is to point out that its getting dire but its not too late, by breaking down climate change to a basic factors.

Re: Is It Too Late to Stop Climate Change? [video]

#37
Ok, so climate change is an existential threat. So why instead of talking about how we should stop reproducing and live frugally- which we all know it's not going to happen- we don't replace 100% of our non-renewable power generation with nuclear? Because it is expensive? But who cares? Or because it is dangerous? But again, 100 Chernobyls are better than complete destruction, right? So where are the climate activists' rallies for nuclear power?

Re: Is It Too Late to Stop Climate Change? [video]

#38
post #18

Well, I can be carbon negative pretty easily. So just make everyone pony up for their carbon.

No monetary solution will work. In a free market doing something bad for the planet while being able to avoid paying the cost of cleaning up is an advantage. Companies don't move operations to places with less strict emissions rules and fewer labor laws for fun - they do it to increase their profit. As soon as governments start making corporations really pay for carbon it'll give any country that wants to grow its ec…

A free market without government doesn't prevent lawsuits against polluters that are ruining the air / water / climate / resources shared by everyone arbitrated by third parties and backed by rights enforcement agencies (on both sides).

Capitalism is not the root of the problem. If anything I'd say big companies lobbying big governments is the cause for no-one fixing this in 50 years.

Re: Is It Too Late to Stop Climate Change? [video]

#39

Didn't watch the video, but my personal feeling is that it is never too late--but people won't like the solution. We either do a voluntary contraction, the most humane way being to simply stop reproducing (not entirely, but drastically), and for those that remain, to live simply, with fewer things, traveling far less. Essentially, we would move toward an agrarian economy (plus internet). No more suburbs. Cities would…

The USA has a similar level of taxation (when not higher) than European countries, so I would argue America's freedom is basically free speech and right to own weapons. You're slaves like the rest of us here in Europe and the government allows you to keep some of the profits you make.

Everything you mentioned is the result of badly spent public money: - Ridiculous spending on politics causing society polarization - Army overspending and warmongering - Poor education leading to people making poor choices (and live the wasteful lives you described) - Inflated cost of health care because of insurance companies lobbying the government - Terrible public transport

You're not free but 200 years ago you were the closest thing to free we had in the world.

It's sad to see that the minarchist experiment of the USA failed over time: the USA is the largest employer in the world and spends 13bln per day.

Hopefully the next experiment won't make the same mistake.

Re: Is It Too Late to Stop Climate Change? [video]

#40
post #37

Ok, so climate change is an existential threat. So why instead of talking about how we should stop reproducing and live frugally- which we all know it's not going to happen- we don't replace 100% of our non-renewable power generation with nuclear? Because it is expensive? But who cares? Or because it is dangerous? But again, 100 Chernobyls are better than complete destruction, right? So where are the climate activist…

Because you need every nation to do it and they won't.

Because it would be way too expensive and you could get the same result much cheaper and quicker other ways.

Because even if we did this, it would be less than 20% of what we need to do.

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