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Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

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Re: Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

#331

Post by sillystuff »

raffraffraff wrote: post #321
sillystuff wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as the elites believe they have a plan B, whether it be New Zealand or Mars, they will not make the sacrifices necessary to avert disaster. The author writes on his experience with a group of elites who were seeking ways to protect their positions in the face of collapse (societal / ecological / etc.). Salvation will not come from the top. https://archive.ph/AABsP original: https://onezero.medium.com/survival…

Nobody is making it off earth. And it's not just elites, we're all shitting in the drinking water to some degree, and we're all stuck here. I don't know anybody (personally) who actually makes significant lifestyle sacrifices that curb their impact on climate change. My wife and I are vegetarian, have no kids, don't own a car, and haven't been on a plane for years. I don't know any other person in the "first world" w…

Vegan. Grow much of my own food (mill my own flour, etc.). I lived without electricity or running water for most of a decade '00s (and only added a small DC only solar system for electric lighting for the rest of that decade). I continue to maintain a small footprint, but electric lighting, refrigeration, heat in the winter and hot and cold running water are pretty great (hot and cold running water is fucking amazing!), and I don't want to give those up again. But, none of that matters as much as my being a US citizen. The US military has CO2 emissions larger than 140 countries combined. My share of those US military emissions made my carbon footprint very high throughout the 00's in spite of near zero personal emissions. Presently, the US pushing for sanctions on Russia, led to much higher carbon footprint LNG being shipped to Europe to replace Russian pipeline gas (US oligarchs are making a killing selling LNG, though). Etc.

If everyone, in the developed world, made similar personal choices, to the two of us, things would be better, but it would still be insignificant compared to US policy decisions like the massive US military perpetually deployed across the world. And, if the entire world's population was able to share in hot and cold running water, heat in the winter, electric lighting, refrigeration, etc., much of those gains from personal choices of westerners would be negated.

I don't know the answer. Yes, a lot of people need to reduce their waste, and share with the rest of humanity and non-human life. But, it will not be enough-- somehow we must change governmental and corporate policies.

As things currently stand, the average American has near zero impact on policy decisions[1]. While our rich and powerful elites are driving us off a cliff. The change we need will not be led by them, but in the current climate, a revolution, in the US, is highly unlikely, and if it were to happen would likely result in an extreme far-right authoritarian/theocratic regime even more extreme than the individual enrichment at any cost, "drill baby drill," right to far-right regime that currently rules. And, the US currently controls much of the world (see all western nations observing US illegal sanctions against 1/4-1/3 of the worlds population and also providing support for recent US illegal wars of aggression). Maybe the rise of China will save us, if the US elites do not lash out in desperation to maintain power and e.g., cause a nuclear holocaust. But, pinning hopes of halting environmental destruction on China is a slim hope.

It is difficult to not lose hope.

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746

Re: Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

#332

Post by bmitc »

ls15 wrote: post #300
saxonww wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we ban chemical fertilizers (what does this include, btw?), will we be able to grow enough food to feed everyone? What else would have to change to make that possible?

Permaculture is soil- and insect-friendly and can be productive and resilient, but it requires more manual labor and setting up a permaculture system takes a lot of knowledge and I think it takes years before it is producing competitively, depending on the soil conditions. If we ban synthetic fertilizers (and more importantly herbicides/pesticides) abruptly before having established organic methods at scale, that wil…

I was thinking of banning them for residential use and then re-evaluating their use in commercial agriculture industries. There's no reason that I can think of that they should be used in residential applications. All they do is keep grass artificially green and destroy soil health.

Re: Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

#333

Post by tremon »

naasking wrote: post #245
wickedsight wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this is part of the reason behind the push to ban nitrogen fertilizer Sure, that might be true, but it is definitely blatant misinformation that Dutch farmers are being blamed for climate change. It is not part of the discussion that's currently ongoing in The Netherlands and that is purposefully being misrepresented in (mostly American) right-wing media. This needs to be clear, because the violent protests by fram…

I admit find this response confusing. Given that climate change is the primary reason for restricting nitrogen fertilizer, it's implicit that the farmers are contributing to climate change. Are the people claiming that the farmers are being blamed for climate change saying that the farmers are the only or primary driver for climate change? That would obviously be incorrect, but the former claim is absolutely correct.…

Given that climate change is the primary reason for restricting nitrogen fertilizer

That's simply not true. The primary reason for restricting nitrogen fertilizer in NL is habitat change (i.e. it has profound effects on the habitats of native species), not climate change.

Re: Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

#334

Post by naasking »

donkeyd wrote: post #324
naasking wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, but one HN comment is not a misinformation trend throughout right wing media, per the parent comment.

Here's an example about the misinformation campaign that's happening in the US about the issues in the Netherlands: https://youtu.be/IUGwT8irPKc This video is full of blatant misinformation and misrepresentation. Our current discussion is not about climate change, it's about acidification and that's it. No matter how true your comments may be, it has nothing to do with the situation in the Netherlands and it continue…

Good to know, but I don't see why it's harmful. Here in Canada they're also contemplating nitrogen fertilizer bans for reasons of climate change, so it's not like this argument isn't being made.

Re: Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

#335

Post by tuatoru »

kdbeall_ wrote: post #249
leokennis wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The farmers' protests are insane. They either flat out deny science, or frame biodiversity as some "left wing bleeding heart liberal" hobby. Despite that they get offered millions to stop their farming activities. Despite that they dump asbestos on highways and threaten politicians by visiting their homes. And despite that our politicians cheer them on. It really is the worst of times.

Oh, so the Dutch government should expropriate their land?

Why is that the alternative you leap to? There are others.

Re: Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

#336

Post by csteubs »

iancmceachern wrote: post #35
RamblingCTO wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can attest that. I drive a Land Rover Defender which, you know, has the aerodynamics of a wall. It's full of bugs after driving on the highway for more than 30 minutes.

I love defenders, I had a series 1 discovery that I simply loved, I was even able to successfully complete Hella Revenge in Moab with it 100% stock

The new Defenders are awesome. I got to borrow one for the day from a buddy in Colorado and it was the ideal vehicle for the terrain. My only qualm was that the turbo lag felt pretty significant but it scoots once it's all spooled up. Very luxurious and very capable vehicles.

Re: Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

#337

Post by Panzer04 »

bmitc wrote: post #259
namaria wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no salvation. Whatever was Earth before human civilization is in a death spiral. What comes next is anyone's guess. Elites are massing wealth to get off planet, and when the mass migrations really start and mid income countries start becoming failed states on their path, I hope you are in a place that can hold you safe for the remainder of your time here.

I believe that if we acted today, that there could be salvation. Institute massive taxes against plastic use. Ban it for take-out food and other single-use instances. Start heavily taxing other wasteful areas. Heavily encourage if not enforce composting and recycling. Immediately start restoring mowed lawns with native plants. Ban the use of chemical fertilizers. It could be done, but we won't. Salvation is at our fi…

These suggestions sound like a classic "central planners know better" attitude.

Would taxing/banning plastic actually reduce waste/pollution? or would the shift to more expensive replacements (paper/wood/etc) actually increase pollution and waste?

Banning chemical fertilisers would almost immediately cause a massive famine, enormous drops in agricultural productivity, etc. People consuming "organic" foods that don't use fertiliser can only do so from the position of privilege wherin chemically-fertilised crops are feeding 95%+ of the population. We even have a real example of the consequences! See Sri Lanka recently :(.

It's times like this I can't help but see why some people are so keen to keep the government away from things.

Re: Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

#338

Post by Siddarth1977 »

fleddr wrote: post #311
bmitc wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what's crazy is that everyone thinks it's going to be electric cars that somehow saves us. When the fact of the matter is there is a ton of stuff we can start doing today that would positively impact the environment. It's pretty easy: * Restore lawn areas to native plants: small (wildflowers), medium (bushes), big (trees) * For areas that are kept as lawn, simply mow less. Allow plants to flower. Don't treat clov…

I'm totally with you. I'm annoyed by the climate change (CO2) narrative. It is far too narrow. Rather we should be talking about an umbrella of unsustainability that includes wildlife decimation, biodiversity collapsing, pollution, overfishing, deforestation, water and air quality. We shouldn't just live in a way that expels less CO2, we should live in a way that doesn't annihilate the biosphere. And yes, gardens are…

People do talk about all those things. There are plenty of groups dedicated to each of those things individually or which include all of those things in their mission statement.

Unfortunately, we live in a world where getting even the most basic policy changes to protect the environment is a herculean effort, so people rationally focus much of their attention on the largest or most urgent things.

If you had a friend who was playing with Uranium, smoking cigarettes and eating food with artificial colors, it'd be fair to say they should stop doing all of those things to avoid getting cancer. But it'd also be fair to focus mostly on the Uranium.

Re: Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

#339

Post by therealdrag0 »

BenjiWiebe wrote: post #287
donkeyd wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think this would stop anyone from using the evolution argument, since in their mind this would just show that they evolved to not fly towards the deadly light.

One bulb, one night, once a year wouldn't be enough to select for light avoidance.

What about a thousand lit streets and a million cars every night swashing bugs? What about night lights helping predators see the bugs to weed out those light lovers?

I’m not saying these are true. But your response lacked imagination :)

Re: Why are there so few dead bugs on windshields these days?

#340

Post by bmn__ »

hedora wrote: post #261
bmitc wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that it's a fantasy. For one, I think Mars is just a power play by the likes of people like Musk and Bezos. It doesn't even make sense to view Mars as a backup for Earth because, at least currently, Earth is still alive and Mars is already completely dead. It's like saying "we're going to kill off the only planet that can sustain us to get to a planet that cannot sustain us". It's mind boggling that we can ge…

As far as I can tell, humans can't survive for extended periods of time in gravity as low as it is on Mars. There's also the problem of surface radiation. Given that we can't figure out how to build subterranean cities at scale on earth, I'm not sure what the plan is for dealing with that. Honestly, a self sustaining space station seems easier to achieve than a self sustaining Mars base: You can spin the space statio…

> Given that we can't figure out how to build subterranean cities at scale on earth, I'm not sure what the plan is for dealing with that.

Some ideas and napkin calculations: https://marshallbrain.com/mars

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