Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Ocean is Broken (2013)

theherald.com.au

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 246 posts

Re: The Ocean is Broken (2013)

#171

Post by pdonis »

DougWebb wrote: post #23
Luc wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It won't make you feel better, but sadly the extinction of species is as much a part of nature as the death of an individual organism, with nearly all species that have ever existed having gone extinct. Given that, I think the small kindnesses you are showing towards your fellow biosphere inhabitants are about all you can do. IMHO.

Yes species have gone extinct, but they're also been replaced. We're not seeing the replacements these days, only the extinctions. Eventually the biosphere can redevelop from a very small core of survivors, but we'll be long-gone by then.

We're not seeing the replacements these days, only the extinctions.

Replacement can take a long time--millions of years.

Re: The Ocean is Broken (2013)

#172

Post by seanmcdirmid »

pdonis wrote: post #168
dredmorbius wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there is no way in which you can eat food and not have some negative impact. Actually, no, there are, collectively . Humans have existed, give or take, for a couple million years. In modern form for about 80,000, and with present levels of cognition, for around 10,000. For most of that time, humans most certainly did affect local ecosystems (and sometimes in significant fashion), but had relatively little impact on t…

what's desperately required is to reduce total population levels. By a lot. Got any ideas on how to do that?

Quickly become a class 2 civilization and fully leverage the resources of our solar system. Or reach singularity where inefficient human forms become obsolete. Or both...

its nice to know that human being environmental impact still trails that of insects...most notably ants.

Re: The Ocean is Broken (2013)

#173

Post by sizzle »

leobelle wrote: post #134
tolmasky wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"What are you doing for your part" is equivalent to nothing, UNLESS you are perhaps paradoxically working in finance to become rich enough to have enough money and/or influence to someday have a real effect on these problems. Or maybe actively researching sustainable technologies, or part of a pro-environmental lobbyist group or something. Don't kid yourself: if you want to stand on a high horse understand that your…

I don't kid myself, you're kidding yourself if you do not think that individual behaviors cause considerable impact on a vast scale in aggregate. The "high-horse" line is just a personal attack that doesn't have any merit in the argument, and really I shouldn't have bothered to respond to you because of it.

Thank you for responding for everyone else's sake, that's what keeps me coming back to HN

Re: The Ocean is Broken (2013)

#174

Post by seanmcdirmid »

dredmorbius wrote: post #105
o_s_m wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about the materials used in the solar panels, in addition to the process used to make them.

Noting that parent was referring to net primary productivity (on which, Jeffrey Dukes, "Burning Buried Sunshine", is very strongly recommended: http://globalecology.stanford.edu/DGE/Dukes/Dukes_ClimChange... ), the sustainability of various renewable energy technologies is an open question. But here's the dilemma as I see it: • Modern technological civilization is predicated on abundant cheap (high EROEI) energy sour…

There is enough uranium in Australia to last us a few ten thousands years. Sure, fossil fuels are cheaper to harness right now, but they are nowhere near what is possible and feasible.

Re: The Ocean is Broken (2013)

#175

Post by bananacurve »

beedogs wrote: post #169
bananacurve wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you believe your own claptrap you shouldn't you be killing as many humans as possible?

What kind of flippant, useless comment is that? You dismiss his entire experience as "claptrap" and then sarcastically suggest he go on a killing spree? Get the hell out of here.

This article was posted before and debunked. Believe it if you like.

Re: The Ocean is Broken (2013)

#176

Post by beedogs »

bananacurve wrote: post #175
beedogs wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What kind of flippant, useless comment is that? You dismiss his entire experience as "claptrap" and then sarcastically suggest he go on a killing spree? Get the hell out of here.

This article was posted before and debunked. Believe it if you like.

You weren't commenting about the article, though. Keep digging that hole deeper.

Re: The Ocean is Broken (2013)

#177

Post by stretchwithme »

dredmorbius wrote: post #114
pekk wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have mischaracterized the tragedy of the commons. These premises form an intellectualized rationale for crony capitalism, but your suggestion doesn't solve the tragedy of the commons. Suppose that you hand over Yellowstone to some big company (say, Wal-mart) for a song, because they are politically connected. Now Yellowstone is not part of the commons, so there is no tragedy of the commons, right? No, you have on…

I think stretchwithme is actually fairly accurate in his portrayal of the tragedy of the commons. The key is the externalities must be internalized . The problem arises where "privatization" is floated as the answer to a resource overconsumption situation, but where the property boundaries of what is privatized don't encompass the entire set of externalities. You nail this in your criticism of the hypothetical WalMar…

The future value of a resource is reflected in its resale value. Most people don't destroy their homes because they hope to resell them.

Of course, some resources have value simply because they exist. And nobody pays for the privilege of knowing or looking at them. A body of water provides such value to everybody that can look out the window at it.

If we did have ways to "own" the view, better decisions could be made about conflicting potential uses.

Whats clear to me is that deciding these things politically doesn't work well a lot of the time, especially in a system where lobbyists have so much influence.

Re: The Ocean is Broken (2013)

#178

Post by pdonis »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #172
pdonis wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what's desperately required is to reduce total population levels. By a lot. Got any ideas on how to do that?

Quickly become a class 2 civilization and fully leverage the resources of our solar system. Or reach singularity where inefficient human forms become obsolete. Or both... its nice to know that human being environmental impact still trails that of insects...most notably ants.

This counts as reducing human environmental impact (on Earth, at least), but I was asking specifically about ideas for reducing human population levels by a lot.

Re: The Ocean is Broken (2013)

#179

Post by seanmcdirmid »

pdonis wrote: post #178
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quickly become a class 2 civilization and fully leverage the resources of our solar system. Or reach singularity where inefficient human forms become obsolete. Or both... its nice to know that human being environmental impact still trails that of insects...most notably ants.

This counts as reducing human environmental impact (on Earth, at least), but I was asking specifically about ideas for reducing human population levels by a lot.

The answer is we don't, at least willingly. We should be optimistic rather than pessimistic.

The other answer is to get rich, which lowers birthrates faster than anything else. Beats a modest proposal.

Post reply on HN