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The only thing we should be talking about is the climate crisis

latimes.com

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Re: The only thing we should be talking about is the climate crisis

#61

Post by clankyclanker »

YATA1 wrote: post #12
egberts1 wrote: post #2

Here are some of the many of Los Angeles Times’ newspaper headlines that they used to help with their circulations: 1966 - Oil gone in 10 years 1968 - Overpopulation will spread worldwide 1969 - Everyone will disappear in a Cloud of Blue Steam in 1989 1970 - World will use up its natural resources by 2000 1970 - Urban citizens will require gas mask by 1985 1970 - Nitrogen buildup will make all lands unusable 1970 - D…

I remember reading something somewhere in the 1990s that the entirety of New Orleans was going to be underwater by 2020 and the only way you'd be able to visit Bourbon Street was by boat.

Strictly speaking, that’s not wrong: it’s only through the Herculean efforts of the army corps of engineers that New Orleans is as unsubmerged as it is.

Don’t forget Hurricane Harvey: we spent ~$170B cleaning that up. It’s never that we can’t undo climate at a small scale, it’s that doing so may bankrupt entire states in the process.

Re: The only thing we should be talking about is the climate crisis

#62

Post by cogman10 »

mrfusion wrote: post #9

I’m a full on believer. I even own an EV but I think this alarmism is just making people numb. I think there’s a whole generation out there that never read “the boy who cried wolf”.

The big issue with climate change is it's gradual.

There will never be a point where "Oh shit, everything has exploded!". Instead, it will be every year that deserts will get bigger, it will rain a little less, and a few more extreme weather events happen.

This will happen just a little bit more year by year.

There won't really be a point where you can say "This was the year climate change became really bad!" instead it will take looking at the current state and comparing it to the year 2000 or 1980 or whatever. And by that time, you've got a full generation that does not remember what those years were like.

That's the thing that scares me the most about climate change. It won't be something that will hurt all at once, instead it will just be a steady increase of bad events. And by the time it becomes unworkable, it's too late.

Re: The only thing we should be talking about is the climate crisis

#63

Post by btrettel »

egberts1 wrote: post #2

Here are some of the many of Los Angeles Times’ newspaper headlines that they used to help with their circulations: 1966 - Oil gone in 10 years 1968 - Overpopulation will spread worldwide 1969 - Everyone will disappear in a Cloud of Blue Steam in 1989 1970 - World will use up its natural resources by 2000 1970 - Urban citizens will require gas mask by 1985 1970 - Nitrogen buildup will make all lands unusable 1970 - D…

Ignoring the fact that cherry picking the worst headlines says little about the average quality of journalism, I started looking into these claimed headlines and found that many were not in the LA Times, some were not headlines (they seem to be from the article text), and some don't seem to exist as described (like "5G cellular towers causes cancers" and "Volcano caldera ready to wipe out civilization").

I'm not a fan of CEI, but you can see scans of some of these articles here: https://cei.org/blog/wrong-again-50-years-of-failed-eco-poca...

Re: The only thing we should be talking about is the climate crisis

#65

Post by Eric_WVGG »

kgran wrote: post #40
mrfusion wrote: post #9

I’m a full on believer. I even own an EV but I think this alarmism is just making people numb. I think there’s a whole generation out there that never read “the boy who cried wolf”.

>I even own an EV I don't want to be that guy, but driving an EV (unless you drive some sort of electric bicycle or scooter) is not that environmentally friendly as the manufacturers and marketing people want you to believe. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_impact_on_the_environmen...

For real. Get a bicycle.

Re: The only thing we should be talking about is the climate crisis

#66

Post by Isinlor »

tonguez wrote: post #45
Isinlor wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are nowhere near exaggerating it. We should be simple executing what was agreed in the Paris Agreement as it reflects our best evaluation of the cost to benefits ratio. But current policies are aiming at 1.5 degree higher than what we evaluated as the optimal solution.

no one who is struggling to survive gives a shit. maybe if wealth were distributed more evenly you could get more people on board to care about this.

The poorest people will be hit the hardest. EU and USA will find it relatively easier to adjust given our location and overall wealth.

Re: The only thing we should be talking about is the climate crisis

#67

Post by endisneigh »

titzer wrote: post #60
endisneigh wrote: post #25

Is there any solution that doesn’t either involve developed countries lowering their quality of life or preventing developing nations from cheaply industrializing?

> developed countries lowering their quality of life I seriously disagree with this framing. Developed countries have been artificially inflating their quality of life through cheap energy available from burning fossil fuels. This is an unsustainable practice that will a.) come to end due to exhaustion of said fuels b.) have significant, compounding externalities that are subject to incredible levels of reality disto…

Framing aside it’s a fact that the quality of life will be lowered for some.

What you’re saying isn’t wrong, but it is what it is. This is a political issue, acting as if switching entirely to renewables will not result in some short term sacrifices is well, disingenuous.

Re: The only thing we should be talking about is the climate crisis

#68

Post by waqf »

endisneigh wrote: post #25

Is there any solution that doesn’t either involve developed countries lowering their quality of life or preventing developing nations from cheaply industrializing?

That seems like obviously the wrong question, since it has at least the potential to rule out viable solutions a priori.

For example, what would be wrong with preventing developing nations from cheaply industrialising, while also subsidising them to do something else instead?

Re: The only thing we should be talking about is the climate crisis

#69

Post by plaguepilled »

rhn_mk1 wrote: post #43
fredgrott wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SO lets apply logic to your statement. How can applying more resources to climate change be a misallocation of resources? Lookat this way, when jobs that are less efficient and re-structured to be more efficient the tendency is that we have job losses. Those can and will be offset by the re-allocation of resources towards green energy in the form of brand new jobs and career opportunities. We can either fear the unkn…

Taken to the extreme: if you allocate literally all resources to fighting global warming, you're bound to end up with no resources for something . Let's take nuclear disarmament as a trivial example. Moreover, I'm not seeing what job loss has to do with the parent's statement.

I think that any approach to climate change needs to actively monitor the motivations that a given country has to sabotage it.

In that respect, I don't think that climate change is solved by 'just give the EV companies all the money ever' but by pro actively addressing and then monitoring those detractive motives, nuclear threat inclusive.

Re: The only thing we should be talking about is the climate crisis

#70

Post by verisimi »

> The moment that, by the latest estimates, is less than 10 years away

The moment is always 10 years away.

Remember global cooling or the mini ice age of the 70s?

Remember Al Gore and global warming? It's an inconvenient truth that nothing has really materialised in the past 15 years following that, despite his hysteria. (He is surely sad that it hasn't, given his environmental investment portfolio).

I've seen nothing to indicate any change at all. The beaches of my childhood are the same, weather does change - but if anything, things seem cooler not warmer to me. There is surely pollution, but I lay all blame for that at the feet of corporations. They should pay, rather than getting their governments to socialise the expense of the population - by making us feel guilty for consuming, even teaching this in schools. Apparently we should feel guilty for merely existing. They can stick it.

I'm afraid that I do not trust the science, the media or politicians to convey truth to us here. They are all self-serving. They can stick it too.

And let's remember that this wasn't an issue until the Club of Rome came up with the idea to make Man the enemy in order to gain greater control of our lives on behalf of the oligarchs:

"In searching for a common enemy against whom we can unite, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like, would fit the bill. [. . .] All these dangers are caused by human intervention in natural processes, and it is only through changed attitudes and behaviour that they can be overcome. The real enemy then is humanity itself."

The Club of Rome, in their 1991 publications The First Global Revolution, under the heading “the common enemy of humanity is Man”.

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