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

100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

independent.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 66 posts

Re: 100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

#41

Post by Joe-Z »

the_common_man wrote: post #21
mac01021 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Alice pays Bob to kill Cathy, I think we can all agree that Alice and Bob are both felons. If Alice pays Bob to procure a tuna sandwich for her, and Bob chooses a means of procural that kills Cathy as a byproduct, common sense dictates that Bob is again a felon, while the amount of responsibility born by Alice depends on the extent to which she was aware of what Bob was going to do.

> If Alice pays Bob to procure a tuna sandwich for her, and Bob chooses a means of procural that kills Cathy as a byproduct, common sense dictates that Bob is again a felon, while the amount of responsibility born by Alice depends on the extent to which she was aware of what Bob was going to do. Right. (In this case), Alice is now aware, they are both felons for future transactions.

However, Alice is dependent on tuna sandwiches to maintain her and is desperately hoping for Dick to change the rules, so she can finally go eat some mac'n'cheese.

Re: 100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

#42

Post by rayiner »

akgerber wrote: post #36
rayiner wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ah yes, what's better than trying to shift the blame from the actual people and groups doing this, to individuals, who often don't even know better? This isn't a situation where you're blaming someone who buys an iPhone for all the pollution Apple creates in making them. Here, the actual person "doing" the pollution is you and me, when we buy a gas-powered car and drive it dozens of miles through suburban gridlock…

People generally don't buy Exxon's products because they're hydrocarbon aficionados— they buy them because they need to get to work and their kids need to get to school. And they need cars and gasoline to do those things because American cities and suburbs are usually built around cars as opposed to walking, cycling, and mass transit. While that's not exclusively due to oil and car companies— desires to maintain segr…

Isolated anecdotes aside, oil companies had very little to do with how American cities are designed.

Re: 100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

#43

Post by rayiner »

Joe-Z wrote: post #38
rayiner wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ah yes, what's better than trying to shift the blame from the actual people and groups doing this, to individuals, who often don't even know better? This isn't a situation where you're blaming someone who buys an iPhone for all the pollution Apple creates in making them. Here, the actual person "doing" the pollution is you and me, when we buy a gas-powered car and drive it dozens of miles through suburban gridlock…

> the actual person "doing" the pollution is you and me, when we buy a gas-powered car and drive it dozens of miles through suburban gridlock to get to work, or leave the thermostat at 68 on a hot summer day These examples demonstrate what lies in the power of the consumer and what doesn't pretty well though. Leaving the thermostat at 68 could be argued to be wasteful for the mere convenience of having it 'nice and c…

> Similarly for your other example of driving through the suburban gridlock. I guess nobody wishes for traffic jams and long commutes through concrete deserts. However, people just use the existing infrastructure.

People aren't just using the existing infrastructure. This is what they're choosing to build. In the late 1980s, Loudon County VA (the county next door to where I grew up) was mostly rural. Over the last 30 years I've watched it develop, and guess what? People developed it into a car-dependent sprawl, on purpose, and from scratch. People want their McMansion on an acre of lawn they never use, where they have to drive 15-20 minutes to the nearest grocery store. People want it so much, they get on municipal zoning boards and outlaw building anything else.

Re: 100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

#44

Post by delazeur »

bamboozled wrote: post #39
delazeur wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I never said that Perhaps that isn't what you meant , but it sure looks to me like that's what you said .

Relying on someone else to fix it won't fix it, is essentially what I'm saying, for if everyone had that attitude, then nothing would happen, absolutely nothing. Politicians are just people too.

... People with far greater than average power to change society. I can't make laws. Can you?

Voting for representatives who will make laws that create the change you want to see in the world is absolutely not "relying on someone else."

Re: 100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

#45

Post by sqeaky »

delazeur wrote: post #22
daptaq wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah yes, what's better than trying to shift the blame from the actual people and groups doing this, to individuals, who often don't even know better? No need to address the companies or (dare I say) suggest regulations. It's the consumer who should think about this, he's the center of the market universe - besides 7 billion other centers - and only he - with the coincidental cooperation of all other 7 billion people -…

You're straw-manning here. A lot of rhetoric about pollution implicitly or explicitly paints a picture of evil corporations polluting for fun and profit, but any successful scheme to reduce pollution has to acknowledge that corporations are just one part (even if they are a very large part) of a broader human system. We can't move forward by simply pinning everything on corporations; that's a good strategy for making…

I don't think it is a straw-man to point at a real problem and demand answers. A straw-man argument is creating something that doesn't exist then attacking that. He didn't call them evil, you are accusing him of doing that (You are closer to constructing a straw-man than he is).

These companies really do pollute, really are the largest American CO@ emitters and as Americans we have a right to answers and solutions.

Re: 100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

#46

Post by sqeaky »

fakesmoke wrote: post #40

There's a really scary picture of a power plant leading off the story. There is a huge amount of smoke pouring out of its smoke stacks. Only, most of the smoke stacks are chillers and most of all that smoke is steam. The chillers looks like the kind most often associated with nuclear power plants. If you took all those emissions and photoshopped away all the H2O, you'd have a very small wisp of smoke. That smoke woul…

CO2 is invisible.

Pictures makes articles more appealing, easier to understand and profitable.

It's not like they are even lying, you agree there is some smoke an pollutants in there.

What should they take a picture of?

Can't smokestacks, a long time symbol of industry, be just that a symbol? It's not like they are lying about the numbers in the article or even make claims about the picture.

Re: 100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

#47

Post by stevedt »

rayiner wrote: post #42
akgerber wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People generally don't buy Exxon's products because they're hydrocarbon aficionados— they buy them because they need to get to work and their kids need to get to school. And they need cars and gasoline to do those things because American cities and suburbs are usually built around cars as opposed to walking, cycling, and mass transit. While that's not exclusively due to oil and car companies— desires to maintain segr…

Isolated anecdotes aside, oil companies had very little to do with how American cities are designed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_consp...

Auto, tire and oil companies had an affect in some places.

Re: 100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

#48

Post by gyrgtyn »

jblok wrote: post #3

This article makes out like the companies themselves are directly responsible, rather than the customers of these companies, i.e. you and me. We cause these companies to pollute by creating a market demand for their products or services. Not to say there's not things a company can do to improve it's efficiency, but ultimately, a company isn't going to keep their factories firing away if no one is buying their stuff.…

> We cause these companies to pollute by creating a market demand for their products or services.

I don't know how this thread is surviving this long without someone arguing with you about this.

The demand is created by (the marketing departments of) the companies. Come on.

Re: 100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

#49

Post by delazeur »

sqeaky wrote: post #45
delazeur wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're straw-manning here. A lot of rhetoric about pollution implicitly or explicitly paints a picture of evil corporations polluting for fun and profit, but any successful scheme to reduce pollution has to acknowledge that corporations are just one part (even if they are a very large part) of a broader human system. We can't move forward by simply pinning everything on corporations; that's a good strategy for making…

I don't think it is a straw-man to point at a real problem and demand answers. A straw-man argument is creating something that doesn't exist then attacking that. He didn't call them evil, you are accusing him of doing that (You are closer to constructing a straw-man than he is). These companies really do pollute, really are the largest American CO@ emitters and as Americans we have a right to answers and solutions.

> I don't think it is a straw-man to point at a real problem and demand answers. A straw-man argument is creating something that doesn't exist then attacking that.

"You are shifting the blame" is a straw man because the GP didn't do that. Rather, it pointed out a nuance in the issue that the previous comment didn't acknowledge.

(And a nit: a straw man attacks an argument that was not made, not a thing that doesn't exist.)

> He didn't call them evil, you are accusing him of doing that (You are closer to constructing a straw-man than he is).

Read my comment again. I said "a lot of rhetoric does X," which is vastly different from "you are doing X."

Re: 100 companies responsible for 71% of greenhouse gas emissions

#50

Post by [deleted] »

winter_blue wrote: post #28

I looked at the report[1], and pretty much all of the companies listed are energy companies (e.g. coal/petroleum/etc). I was expecting to see a lot of heavy industrial manufacturing companies. I can understand a coal plant producing a lot of emissions, but I'm wondering: why would a petroleum company generate a lot of emissions? Do they burn a lot of the fuel they produce? I thought they just pump the crude oil out,…

[deleted]
Post reply on HN