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Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

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Re: Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

#101

Post by wufufufu »

throwaway1777 wrote: post #23

Does anyone have a realistic comment that isn’t some Malthusian doomerism? There must be a solution to this problem besides drastically curtailing people’s lifestyle, even if it involves technologies that aren’t quite here yet like genetic engineering, space travel and fusion power.

Pragmatically, we need way more investment in environmental engineering and policies that put conservation first.

Since collectively we can't be bothered because we all need the newest electric vehicle, you can also accept that mass extinction is a byproduct of humanity.

Re: Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

#102

Post by __MatrixMan__ »

0xBombadilo wrote: post #92
__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They make land productive that otherwise would not be. Productive according to our fictions re: "value", destructive according to the ecology of systems that we rely on for survival.

>ecololgy Why were there tens of millions of bison in North America before human development? >value This entire discussion is about the proper use of land. That discussion is impossible without some notion of value, or highest and best use. Any other consideration just ends in "all humans should die". If that's your position then its a waste of time even discussing the situation with you.

I'm not saying that grazing animals are a problem, I'm saying that markets and regulators are doing a bad job of managing their location and population size, and that wolves would do it better. Those markets and regulators have a certain values system: they want certain numbers to go up, certain people to be re-elected, etc.

Most humans also want their grandchildren to grow up in an environment that isn't teetering on collapse--which is not something that the dominant values system is considering. So my issue with "value" is not that it's useless, but that we're using it in a way that fails to acknowledge that different people value different outcomes. We're instead encouraged to seek value of an unspecified type and leave it to other people to decide which outcomes actually result from that seeking. It's a sort of blindness and it's leading us off a cliff.

Re: Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

#103

Post by camel-cdr »

MadSudaca wrote: post #94
myshpa wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Regarding this point ... they eat the pig. I'm aware. Not necessary in 21st century (in most of the world). > proteins coming from vegetables are low quality Protein "quality" relates to the presence of essential amino acids. Animal proteins contain all nine essential amino acids and are thus considered "complete." Plant proteins often lack one or more essential amino acids. However, they aren't "low quality" - you…

They are low quality precisely because they are less rich in types of amino acids. Given the option of having animal or vegetable-based proteins you would always pick animal, all other things being equal. Having a “varied” diet is much easier said than done. Even people who are well off, living in rich and developed countries have difficulty maintaining this balance. This is a personal observation, but I suspect a lo…

> Having a “varied” diet is much easier said than done

I think you overestimate what varied means in this context, usually two or three different protein sources are enough.

Consider a random day where I tracked my food intake: I ate some oatmeal for breakfast and dinner, and noodles with chickpeas for for lunch. In the end I had between 120% to 250% of the RDA for the different essential amino acids.

Edit: Also "Another false assumption is that everyone can accommodate a purely plant-based diet". Do you have a source on that, with maybe an estimation to what percent of the population this applies to?

Re: Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

#104

Post by pmarreck »

shrimp_emoji wrote: post #24
moffkalast wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humanity: destroys environment in which animal lives Animal: goes extinct Humanity: Why would nature do this!?

https://youtu.be/75_nisowGX8?t=145

I never heard of this guy until now, insightful!

Re: Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

#105

Post by renewiltord »

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #88
renewiltord wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's fair. Europe should therefore pay Earth Reparations to those who have the opportunity to preserve the Earth. While Europe cannot afford to make good, she can try to hit the market clearing price to keep the Amazon unperturbed. This will likely be a debt never successfully paid, but sufficient hundreds of billions every year will likely work. What we need is a Green Treaty of Versailles.

Materially, helping is helping whatever the reason. But rhetoric matters. You're going to get a lot more participation if you're trying to make the world a liveable place for the children being born right now, and a lot less participation if you're trying to get people to pay off a debt taken out by their ancestors. Thinking in terms of money and debt is what got us into this situation. I'm doubtful that it will get…

A jubilee would only help those who caused these problems since they've reaped the rewards. I, too, would like all my debts forgiven while I retain the profits.

Typical of discourse today is to let off the societies that industrialized first with no complaint while simultaneously moralizing against those who are industrializing now.

Europe hoards nuclear technology and won't share it with the developing world. Europe burns oil and gas and coal in vast quantities to live. All while Europe says that all past carbon emissions must be considered forgiven debt and all present carbon emissions must be considered sin.

The developing world will do as Europe did to get to Europe's standard of living. The developing world will not listen to the moralizing of Europeans who won't do their part. And Europeans can clutch their pearls about the Amazon, but the people who live there will raze it for industry just as the Europeans did. And it will be right.

Re: Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

#106

Post by gabereiser »

fsflover wrote: post #86
deanmoriarty wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do respect your opinion, but having kids just because "less smart" people would be having kids anyway is, in my humble opinion, the perfect example of a tragedy of the commons situation, where the resource at play is our scarce planet.

Alternatively, you spend your life helping and teaching other children, which could even result in better outcomes than only caring about your own ones.

This is the only way out of this, education. Teaching. Educating. Passing that along to the next generation. Genetics plays a role, yes, but collective intelligence can and will grow.

Re: Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

#107

Post by jakelazaroff »

jimbob45 wrote: post #68
ethanbond wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why "must" there be a solution like that? It's wild how when it comes to the biggest problems, people will say "let's not be so emotional about this" and then produce suggestions borne exclusively of their emotional coping mechanism.

Because we'll see government propaganda encouraging us to carpool or meet remotely to reduce emissions. And then we'll see this shit[0], which dwarfs whatever contribution we could have made by carpooling and it becomes rapidly clear that our individual contributions do nothing. Also, 2020 should have been a huge reversal of emissions fortune with the low amount of travel and recreation. If 2020 didn't make a dent in…

That doesn't really address the question, though. Even if this can't be solved with individual contributions, it's still likely that any societal changes we could make would have enormous impacts on our lifestyles. Think "cutting meat production/air travel/personal automobiles/etc by 95%". That's what OP is calling "Malthusian doomerism" — saying we need to instead look for solutions that don't involve drastic measures. Except there's not really evidence that such solutions actually exist.

Re: Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

#108

Post by dmbche »

gs17 wrote: post #100
dmbche wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah - individual changes will never change anything - I think the discussion has been poisonned, and we are blind to the actual solutions, which all seem unthinkable even though they are self evident

> Yeah - individual changes will never change anything - I think the discussion has been poisonned The idea that individuals have no responsibility or power is part of how it has been poisoned. I've known people who genuinely would say something like "did you know a half dozen companies put out the majority of emissions? so we don't need to consume less or differently, everything is those companies' fault".

Eh - people's power isn't in lower their impact on the environnement, it's in stopping the corporations that are doing in by all means.

We act like all the options are is a)Being mindful of your emissions (Which will change nothing for the planet) b)Do nothing (Also changes nothing)

While the actual option is to stop the corporations by any and all means. Native americans have a history of doing this with little support form the rest of americans.

If global warming is a real issue, is ''buying an EV'' or ''taking the bus'' an acceptable solution to you? Sincelrely, is it at the height of the problem? Shouldn't you have more - say - radical, views?

Re: Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

#109

Post by __MatrixMan__ »

renewiltord wrote: post #105
__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Materially, helping is helping whatever the reason. But rhetoric matters. You're going to get a lot more participation if you're trying to make the world a liveable place for the children being born right now, and a lot less participation if you're trying to get people to pay off a debt taken out by their ancestors. Thinking in terms of money and debt is what got us into this situation. I'm doubtful that it will get…

A jubilee would only help those who caused these problems since they've reaped the rewards. I, too, would like all my debts forgiven while I retain the profits. Typical of discourse today is to let off the societies that industrialized first with no complaint while simultaneously moralizing against those who are industrializing now. Europe hoards nuclear technology and won't share it with the developing world. Europe…

> A jubilee would only help those who caused these problems since they've reaped the rewards

Maybe jubilee wasn't the right word. I'm saying we stop accepting money for money's sake. So the reaped rewards would no longer be valuable.

Instead we need a system backed by something auditable, so that when a stranger offers it to you, you can investigate and decide if you actually value the activity that created it. Thus creating an incentive to work on projects that are more solution than problem.

Re: Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us?

#110

Post by gs17 »

dmbche wrote: post #108
gs17 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yeah - individual changes will never change anything - I think the discussion has been poisonned The idea that individuals have no responsibility or power is part of how it has been poisoned. I've known people who genuinely would say something like "did you know a half dozen companies put out the majority of emissions? so we don't need to consume less or differently, everything is those companies' fault".

Eh - people's power isn't in lower their impact on the environnement, it's in stopping the corporations that are doing in by all means. We act like all the options are is a)Being mindful of your emissions (Which will change nothing for the planet) b)Do nothing (Also changes nothing) While the actual option is to stop the corporations by any and all means. Native americans have a history of doing this with little supp…

Doing something is objectively better than actively making the problem worse while pretending you have no responsibility.

Calling for other people to do things you yourself won't do (how many acts of ecoterrorism have you done lately?) isn't really helping, it's the same self-serving logic I was complaining about.

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