The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better • Hacker News Board

Re: The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better

#31

Post by pracer » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:33 AM UTC

tomnipotent wrote: post #23

imgabe wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some food should be wasted. If 100% of food were consumed, that would mean that any slight disruption would result in not enough food, or that we were already in a state where there is not enough food. Wasting some food is better than having food shortages. Much better.

We've built a society that's so litigious that companies are incentivized to recommend throwing away food even if there's less than a 0.01% chance of food-borne illness. Our waste is in part out of fear of getting sued or sick, but I'm not convinced the waste is the lesser of two evils. Food poisoning sucks, but it's survivable. Unlike starvation. A good example of this caution is eggs and refrigeration, for which Am…

I think the point missing is that food that get wasted could not arrive where it is needed before getting rot. Letting aside the expenses to do that. The problem is not that we waste food, as it would not solve starvation, the problem is that in those places where people has no food, there is no production.

Re: The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better

#32

Post by Arkhaine_kupo » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:42 AM UTC

vitorbaptistaa wrote: post #3

If you enjoyed this post, I highly recommend reading Factfulness by Hans Rosling. He spent his later years trying to educate the public on the realities of the world. This book contains a series of tips on how to understand facts. His TED talks are masterpieces as well.

I really enjoyed Factfulness and in general enjoy his work and talks. But I would recommend also reading some of the criticism it received. Some really interesting discussions came from the publishing of that book

Re: The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better

#33

Post by yorwba » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 9:14 AM UTC

chongli wrote: post #12

Winsaucerer wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The world is going to be much awful-er as climate change unfolds. Climate change is not being addressed seriously currently, at all. And the trend is towards it not being addressed. The world has been getting better, and continues to get better. Unfortunately, I don't have a reference to it, but I recall attending a talk that charted out some kind of measure of wealth/welfare/well-off-ness based on various climate…

Life was much better for those in Europe who survived the black death. They lived longer, healthier lives. They were paid more due to labour shortages. By nearly every measure their lives were better off than those who lived before the plague. That is small comfort to those who suffered and died during the plague. We're in a similar boat. The winners (survivors) of the climate change disaster will be better off. But…

The black death is a bad analogy. At the time, population was at the upper limit that could be sustained with the technology of the time. If a farmer wanted a larger harvest, they would need to farm a larger area, denying its use to others, thus causing them to starve. Conversely, the large number of deaths directly increased the resources available to everyone else. It was a zero-sum game, with one person's loss being the other's gain, and vice versa.

We no longer live in that world. Assume climate change kills off 100 million people (more than any estimate I could find), i.e. slightly more than 1% of the current world population. The resulting increase in resources per capita would be less than a single year of global GDP growth. This is very much not zero-sum. If a farmer who used to till the fields by hand switches to using a tractor, they're feeding many more people than they harm with the tractor's greenhouse gas emissions.

Re: The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better

#34

Post by Winsaucerer » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 9:14 AM UTC

29athrowaway wrote: post #14

Winsaucerer wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The world is going to be much awful-er as climate change unfolds. Climate change is not being addressed seriously currently, at all. And the trend is towards it not being addressed. The world has been getting better, and continues to get better. Unfortunately, I don't have a reference to it, but I recall attending a talk that charted out some kind of measure of wealth/welfare/well-off-ness based on various climate…

> "The world has been getting better, and continues to get better." Perhaps the tiny surface of the world you interact with now has more conveniences than before, but that is very distant from a reality where things are getting better. Your perception depends on taking many factors for granted, not acknowledging we depend on multiple concurrent progress traps. If you go to the supermarket and the shelves are empty, i…

> Perhaps the tiny surface of the world you interact with now has more conveniences than before, but that is very distant from a reality where things are getting better.

By MANY measures, the world has been getting gradually better for just about everyone: https://ourworldindata.org/a-history-of-global-living-condit.... When we look at the facts globally, there is a clear and obvious trajectory.

> Toxic optimism won't make things better. Only acknowledging problems instead of hiding them behind layers of abstraction will.

Who isn't acknowledging problems? My optimism doesn't mean I think there aren't serious, present, and pressing problems (I do!). These problems must be identified, and we must take action to resolve them. I'm just optimistic that we will continue to do so, as we always have. I believe in doing the work involved, and my optimism makes me think it's worth putting in the effort, that it's worth doing the hard yards.

Re: The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better

#35

Post by Joeri » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 9:26 AM UTC

AussieWog93 wrote: post #27

joe_the_user wrote: post #4

If we're talking the general state of the world... The world is going to be much awful-er as climate change unfolds. Climate change is not being addressed seriously currently, at all. And the trend is towards it not being addressed. The world isn't going to be much better until climate change is addressed - if then. I think this trumps literally any statistical measure of well-being you could come up with.

>Climate change is not being addressed seriously currently, at all. And the trend is towards it not being addressed. While we could be doing better, we've made immense strides over the past ten years, to the point where we've already avoided the worst outcomes and could possibly even limit the rise to 2°C and avoid most harm altogether. At least, according to Kurzgesagt. https://youtu.be/LxgMdjyw8uw

Immense strides have been made, but I feel it is dangerous to take a too rosy outlook until the job is done. Complacency has always been the biggest threat to solving the climate crisis. On the other hand climate apathy and fatalism are also real, and equally dangerous.

The best source for the amount of warming we are heading for is the yearly UNEP emissions gap report, which takes all the national commitments and calculates global outcomes. With the currently planned measures we are heading for 2.7 degrees of warming by the end of the century. If the countries that have promised a net-zero strategy actually implement one we are headed for 2.2 degrees. Realistically there is at present no path to less than 2 degrees of warming without major political upheaval or technological revolution and we are probably heading for 2.5 degrees of warming. Even at 2 degrees the consequences are severe. We are looking at a near-total loss of coral reefs and one fifth of insect species, 40% of humanity will become exposed to extreme heat waves, many coastal areas will need to be abandoned displacing hundreds of millions of people. The effects get disproportionately worse when temperatures exceed 2 degrees of warming. So, the situation is not hopeless, but without further action we are still locked into some pretty bad outcomes, and we need to keep the pressure on with all governments to take further steps.

https://www.unep.org/resources/emissions-gap-report-2021

Re: The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better

#36

Post by BrandoElFollito » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 9:32 AM UTC

Is there a consensus on this organization (givewell.org)?

I donate to French organizations I know and see their work directly, but have no experience with international ones such as this one.

I would be most interested in ones that provide education capacities to girls but the one from the post concentrates on health related ones (which is of course great as well)

Re: The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better

#37

Post by klft » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 9:46 AM UTC

Arkhaine_kupo wrote: post #32

vitorbaptistaa wrote: post #3

If you enjoyed this post, I highly recommend reading Factfulness by Hans Rosling. He spent his later years trying to educate the public on the realities of the world. This book contains a series of tips on how to understand facts. His TED talks are masterpieces as well.

I really enjoyed Factfulness and in general enjoy his work and talks. But I would recommend also reading some of the criticism it received. Some really interesting discussions came from the publishing of that book

Could you share some entry points to the criticism?

Re: The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better

#38

Post by martinrf » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 9:49 AM UTC

klft wrote: post #37

Arkhaine_kupo wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really enjoyed Factfulness and in general enjoy his work and talks. But I would recommend also reading some of the criticism it received. Some really interesting discussions came from the publishing of that book

Could you share some entry points to the criticism?

A great paper [1] (published by Linköping University) criticizes the book's unbalanced optimism and bias:

"Factfulness actually employs a biased selection of variables, avoids analysis of negative trends, and does not discuss any of the serious challenges related to continual population growth. A policy based on the simplistic worldview presented in Factfulness could have serious consequences."

[1]: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/328759928_Good_Thin...

Re: The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better

#39

Post by Winsaucerer » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 9:57 AM UTC

chongli wrote: post #12

Winsaucerer wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The world is going to be much awful-er as climate change unfolds. Climate change is not being addressed seriously currently, at all. And the trend is towards it not being addressed. The world has been getting better, and continues to get better. Unfortunately, I don't have a reference to it, but I recall attending a talk that charted out some kind of measure of wealth/welfare/well-off-ness based on various climate…

Life was much better for those in Europe who survived the black death. They lived longer, healthier lives. They were paid more due to labour shortages. By nearly every measure their lives were better off than those who lived before the plague. That is small comfort to those who suffered and died during the plague. We're in a similar boat. The winners (survivors) of the climate change disaster will be better off. But…

I don't see how they could be better off than us in any of the following dimensions, or the ones you mention, and likely many more:

* Health/medical technology and access

* Abundance and variety of food

* Education

* Life expectancy

* Quality (in terms of health) of life

* Child mortality

Looking at life expectancy alone, I'd be surprised if their life expectancy was higher (is this what you had in mind? https://sc.edu/uofsc/announcements/2014/05_sharondewitte_bla...). Certainly some individuals would live longer lives than some individuals, but I wouldn't expect the life expectancy to be higher, nor would I expect the quality of health of that life to be better.

In some ways I could imagine they'd be better -- e.g., amount of land they could own. If you have some data or information about their life quality, I would be interested in seeing it.

Regarding Rawls' veil, I did say, and do think, that we should be ensuring that everyone gets brought along. For someone who isn't convinced about that, the veil may be a good thought experiment to help them along.

Re: The world is awful, the world is much better, the world can be much better

#40

Post by lotsofpulp » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 9:59 AM UTC

yorwba wrote: post #33

chongli wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Life was much better for those in Europe who survived the black death. They lived longer, healthier lives. They were paid more due to labour shortages. By nearly every measure their lives were better off than those who lived before the plague. That is small comfort to those who suffered and died during the plague. We're in a similar boat. The winners (survivors) of the climate change disaster will be better off. But…

The black death is a bad analogy. At the time, population was at the upper limit that could be sustained with the technology of the time. If a farmer wanted a larger harvest, they would need to farm a larger area, denying its use to others, thus causing them to starve. Conversely, the large number of deaths directly increased the resources available to everyone else. It was a zero-sum game, with one person's loss bei…

> Assume climate change kills off 100 million people (more than any estimate I could find), i.e. slightly more than 1% of the current world population. The resulting increase in resources per capita would be less than a single year of global GDP growth.

I presume this is highly dependent on which 100M people are killed.