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Climate Change Is the Product of How Capitalism “Values” Nature

globalpolicyjournal.com

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Re: Climate Change Is the Product of How Capitalism “Values” Nature

#61

Quoted post unavailable.

In 2021 China and the Europe have the following Wind Power Capacities (MW):

China: 328,480 Europe: 235,712

Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_the_European_Uni...

China also produces the majority of Solar PV Panels - https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/solar-pv-manu...

Re: Climate Change Is the Product of How Capitalism “Values” Nature

#62
post #26

Hear me out: "Climate change" is a terrible phrase, of course climate changes, when talking to regular people that's like saying "water flow" to describe flooding. "Climate destabilization" or something akin to that would communicate what is happening better to the people that vote.

At this point, there's been

- Inadvertent climate modification*

- Global Warming

- Anthropogenic Global Warming

- Global Heating

- Climate Change

- Climate Crisis

- Climate Emergency

I don't disagree with the thrust of your point, but the same argument you make against 'climate change' could also be made against 'climate destabilizaiton', since destabilization can have human and non-human causes (for example, the rise of plant life, asteroids, or the periodic advancement and retreat of the glaciers)..

The first term in the list above seems to capture the point a bit better, since 'inadvertent' strongly implies human agency is involved.

In practice, 'human caused' is implied in the terms 'global warming' and 'climate change'. For my money it's better to stick with those terms, and add 'anthropogenic' if there is potential for confusion.

* Thanks, wikipedia!

Re: Climate Change Is the Product of How Capitalism “Values” Nature

#64

Is every form of industrialization, from the USSR to the UK to the US to China, capitalist? Is the current energy transition, funded by massive amounts of capital, and the result of industrialization of technology, somehow less capitalistic? Are the ESG efforts somehow less capitalist? Sometimes, our mental frames are traps rather than tools for understanding the world. This essay makes me think that this person is q…

> This idea that capitalism is all growth is a very simple-minded and inaccurate view of capitalism. It's also the death of firms. It's stagnation. Its fortunes squandered, in addition to fortunes built.

Capitalism incentivizes increased economic output, which incentivizes increased energy consumption. Barring regulations to internalize the externalities of co2 emissions, this means it incentivizes increased fossil fuel consumption.

Yes, some companies die, and that's part of capitalism as envisioned by Adam Smith, but the companies that survive are the ones that are able to produce products cheaper, usually by producing more, by consuming more energy.

> Sometimes, our mental frames are traps rather than tools for understanding the world. This essay makes me think that this person is quite trapped, unable to absorb or explain climate action of the past 30 years.

> Don't get me wrong, I don't think that capitalism is the be-all end-all system, but these critiques are so weak as to block any chance at actually fixing the many many problems of capitalism.

We have failed to do anything about climate change within the system of capitalism in the past 30 years, so isn't it the people who refuse to consider the possibility that it's a problem that capitalism is unable to address who may be trapped in a mental frame?

Re: Climate Change Is the Product of How Capitalism “Values” Nature

#66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where do you think all the products manufactured in China are going? The west is taking advantage of cheap labor in China and pushing all the externalities there. You're using a computer or smartphone that was presumably largely made in China to post this message. To then turn around and say that climate change is entirely China's fault is absurd. You have to look at what countries are actually consuming the products…

Quoted post unavailable.

When exactly did they say they were not? They stated the opposite:

>"You have to look at what countries are actually consuming the products leading to the emissions."

Re: Climate Change Is the Product of How Capitalism “Values” Nature

#67

Quoted post unavailable.

> Wondering what are countries such as china and india doing to maintain a cleaner planet if anything at all

They did SO gigantic a reforestation that it is visible from space.

https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/144540/china-and-in...

> We keep blaming ourselves while underdeveloped and corrupt nations pollute virtually everything in the their management.

That literally sounds like supremacist, 'we are civilized' nonsense.

Those countries are literally the world's factories. Majority of the emissions of those countries belong to Western corporations. Except they are recorded as those countries emissions.

And the West arrogantly tries to sell them 'carbon credits' - another financial scam - have another country manufacture your products in sweatshops and have little emissions. Then make them buy 'carbon credits' from you.

Re: Climate Change Is the Product of How Capitalism “Values” Nature

#68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where do you think all the products manufactured in China are going? The west is taking advantage of cheap labor in China and pushing all the externalities there. You're using a computer or smartphone that was presumably largely made in China to post this message. To then turn around and say that climate change is entirely China's fault is absurd. You have to look at what countries are actually consuming the products…

Quoted post unavailable.

Yes, that was the point.

Re: Climate Change Is the Product of How Capitalism “Values” Nature

#69
post #41

Quoted post unavailable.

That is incredibly short sighted. The reason why you don’t see that much pollution in your country is that it has been outsourced to other countries with more lax pollution laws and less worker protection laws. This means that fabrication of an item produces more pollution than if it was built in your country (where there’s more regulation). And then there’s even more pollution due to the long transportation haul. Bu…

Can you back that up with evidence? I'm not sure what the situation is for Europe/the UK, but for the US it really doesn't seem to be the case that we are outsourcing our emissions:

https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/no-the-us-didnt-outsource-...

Re: Climate Change Is the Product of How Capitalism “Values” Nature

#70

Quoted post unavailable.

In 2021 China and the Europe have the following Wind Power Capacities (MW): China: 328,480 Europe: 235,712 Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_the_European_Uni... China also produces the majority of Solar PV Panels - https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/solar-pv-manu...

China population is 1.4B Europe population is 700M

What is your point ?

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