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The electric car as a talisman of false hope

jussipasanen.com

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Re: The electric car as a talisman of false hope

#251

Post by irq11 »

mcny wrote: post #201
theworld572 wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know what would be EVEN more effective at fighting climate change than not having children? Committing suicide. But people don't want to listen to the harsh truths. They would rather consume their way out of the problem with electric cars, education for third world countries, reforestation, solar power and other false hopes.

> You know what would be EVEN more effective at fighting climate change than not having children? Committing suicide. I'm sorry but I think this crosses the line. I don't want to impose my morality on you but in my opinion me saying "most people should not have children" is not the same as basically telling people to kill themselves. I understand that I am in the minority when I say this I think not conceiving childr…

Exactly. This harsh reaction to what should be an obvious statement of fact underscores the ridiculousness of the conversation, and the point of the original post.

It’s not surprising at all (as I said, people don’t want to actually change their lives), but it does become a self-satire.

Re: The electric car as a talisman of false hope

#252

Post by AnthonyMouse »

irq11 wrote: post #235
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nothing else even comes close. According to this logic the real number one thing you could do is to kill yourself, but it fails for exactly the same reason. You're just measuring the impact and not the cost. Doing one thing with a large impact and an even larger cost is worse than doing three things whose total impact is more and total cost is less than that of the one thing. Especially since in this context they s…

Only if you equate “having fewer children” to “killing yourself”, which is transparently incorrect, not to mention tasteless. However, the responses to this simple fact continue to be enlightening: people would rather commit all sorts of tortured fallacies of reasoning than change their lifestyles in any meaningful way.

> Only if you equate “having fewer children” to “killing yourself”, which is transparently incorrect, not to mention tasteless.

It's the same result. You're just choosing it for yourself instead of your parents having chosen for you, which only seems fair -- I know I'd rather be the one to choose for myself. But the point is that the choice, in either case, is not worth the cost when there are better alternatives.

If we were at the point that population reduction was the only possible solution then we would be soliciting volunteers, but it's not.

> However, the responses to this simple fact continue to be enlightening: people would rather commit all sorts of tortured fallacies of reasoning than change their lifestyles in any meaningful way.

Why would anybody want to do that when it isn't necessary? You can't just buy an electric car and call it done, but it's one among a collection of things you can do that sum together to an actual solution that doesn't require people to abandon their standard of living.

Re: The electric car as a talisman of false hope

#253

Post by jdofaz »

bdamm wrote: post #247
Forge36 wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The interesting thing about electric cars is that many of them sorry scheduled charging (my charging station also supports remote configuration of when I can charge). If my electric provider was willing (and able) to control when I could charge my car, they could use the the batteries to level out peaks in production to a degree. Off peak charging already exists today, however there aren't enough electric cars to mak…

Much easier would be for the utility to transmit the current price of power and have the car or charger charge the car when the price is below a certain threshold. The problem is that the best time to charge a car is immediately after it has been used, so it is ready to go the next time. Who wants a half dead car sitting around?

Some cars have a lot of capacity, so in some cases that is like saying who wants a car with only half a tank of gas?

Re: The electric car as a talisman of false hope

#254

Post by s1artibartfast »

tryitnow wrote: post #187
Barrin92 wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the alternative is to figure out how to change the very fundamental levers of the system in a way that enables change on a scale that matters. The individual consumption lens is going to accomplish nothing. If you could move an entire country from being car dependent to being largely car free, by pushing rapid urbanisation and transit and you put 20 car drivers onto a train or a bus, then we're starting to talk a…

OK, you changed my mind. I still think buying an electric car is better than doing nothing, but I also see the emphasis on individual consumer decisions as a serious distraction. Sure, electric cars and other consumer decisions could maybe make a 10% contribution in solving the problem, but these individualist approaches are getting the bulk of the attention. I feel there should be a name for this phenomenon: When th…

If I understand the incremental benifit presented in the article correctly, upgrading to an ev before the useful life of your fuel vehicle is over could increase emissions, as would be buying a a ev as a secondary vehicle just used for commuting

Re: The electric car as a talisman of false hope

#255

Post by lm28469 »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #210
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"urban transit is never used by the wealthy" ... In North America What you are saying here is not true of Europe. This is a cultural problem, and says a lot about American culture. Racism, excessive individualism, and status seeking. I remember being shocked when I first visited suburban Atlanta for work. Atlanta is a lot like the greater Toronto area (where I live[d]) -- big giant sprawl. But unlike the Toronto area…

Or, if you have money, you can opt out of uncomfortable inconvenient dirty solutions to your transportation problems. What's money for after all.

> What's money for after all.

> At the heart of capitalism is a vast and scarcely examined assumption: you are entitled to as great a share of the world’s resources as your money can buy. You can purchase as much land, as much atmospheric space, as many minerals, as much meat and fish as you can afford, regardless of who might be deprived. If you can pay for them, you can own entire mountain ranges and fertile plains. You can burn as much fuel as you like. Every pound or dollar secures a certain right over the world’s natural wealth.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/mar/15/capita...

Re: The electric car as a talisman of false hope

#256

Post by lm28469 »

Have anyone seriously studied the impact of switching to all-electric cars on a global scale ?

I read that there are over a billion passenger cars right now, let's say we manage to shift them all to electric by 2050 (not saying this is realistic), sure it'll move the air pollution out of the city, but what about long term pollution, manufacturing, recycling, &c. ? Would it really solve the problem or simply move it out of our sight for a few decades ?

Re: The electric car as a talisman of false hope

#257

Post by saghm »

jdofaz wrote: post #253
bdamm wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Much easier would be for the utility to transmit the current price of power and have the car or charger charge the car when the price is below a certain threshold. The problem is that the best time to charge a car is immediately after it has been used, so it is ready to go the next time. Who wants a half dead car sitting around?

Some cars have a lot of capacity, so in some cases that is like saying who wants a car with only half a tank of gas?

Unfortunately, until there's more infrastructure supporting electric cars, it's much easier to refill your car with gas if it runs low while you're out than recharge it.

Re: The electric car as a talisman of false hope

#258

Post by lm28469 »

stuaxo wrote: post #14
pif wrote: post #6

> To have any chance of slowing down climate breakdown rather than accelerating it further, we need to change our entire way of life... I agree with him. And that's why I keep saying that global warming is here to stay. We had better to learn to cope with it rather than hoping it can be reversed!

We're going to have to reverse it at some point. If we keep accelerating it there won't be any learning to live with it.

The more we let it go the harder it'll be to reverse / the more lifestyle changes we'll have to go through.

Re: The electric car as a talisman of false hope

#259

Post by microtherion »

Barrin92 wrote: post #132
theworld572 wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So whats the alternative? Do nothing at all? If you have $100k left to pay on your mortgage, and somebody offers you $5k towards the mortgage are you going to tell them they're offering you a "false hope because you'd still have $95k left to pay"? EDIT: This is also known as the "nirvana fallacy": because the solution is not perfect - that means it is worthless. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy

No, the alternative is to figure out how to change the very fundamental levers of the system in a way that enables change on a scale that matters. The individual consumption lens is going to accomplish nothing. If you could move an entire country from being car dependent to being largely car free, by pushing rapid urbanisation and transit and you put 20 car drivers onto a train or a bus, then we're starting to talk a…

And companies like Tesla not only don't accomplish anything to reduce car dependency, they (or at least their principals) are actively working to maintain or possibly even extend car dependency (cf. the Boring Company with its mission to direct even more transportation funding to individual transportation).

Re: The electric car as a talisman of false hope

#260

Post by localhost »

OrangeMango wrote: post #225
localhost wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The real problem, as the author tangentially points out, is our over-reliance on cars to move us around. That’s due to the intentional choices that we have all made. If you look at the structure of suburban areas of cities in the US, you’ll immediately see that they are entirely designed the assumption of the existence of a personal car for YOU. You simply cannot get around without one. A choice that I’m grappling wi…

> A choice that I’m grappling with personally (as someone who lives in the suburbs in the US and owns two Teslas) is that I should really move somewhere more sustainable, i.e., more density so that I can get rid of my cars. There is an alternative. Lobby your city to relax zoning. Let someone replace one of the homes in your subdivision with a coffee shop/convenience store/pizza parlor. Things like that. Your current…

I agree. Although I wasn't advocating building a new city; rather just moving to a city that already has the infrastructure in place.

I struggle with this as moving is most definitely giving up on my current "community" and lobbying would most definitely push me out of my comfort zone. But perhaps that's a good thing :)

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