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Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

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Re: Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

#81
post #60

Four words from the Pope could have the greatest effect per effort of any act on our environmental problems: "You can use contraception." It won't solve all problems, but it will help a lot. There is plenty of scripture he could call on to justify it. One, for example, is that the prophecy of having as many descendants as grains of sand on the beach couldn't have meant all at once , because we wouldn't all fit. Decre…

A contrarian point of view would be that it's modern capitalism, consumerism and individualism (that supports contraception, abortion, divorce, etc) that has caused the climate emergency. Thus opposing the things that consumerism supports also helps fight for the environment.

For most people doing this is harder than not and people will protect their investment.

Re: Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

#82
post #42

Hot take: it doesn't matter who comes out in favour of stronger action on climate change. The only way we'll get significant change is when it becomes economic to do so. The world population or even a significant percentage of it won't change their behaviour altruistically even for a minor inconvenience and risk. New coal plants aren't built (mostly) and old ones are closing not because of altruism or a genuine conce…

It's never going to be economic for individual countries. Tragedy of the commons and all that.

Re: Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

#83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Policies touted by a lot of left leaning politicians aren’t practical and many of them know it but they say it anyway. Your point stands, Democrat solutions addressing climate change are definitely pretty bad. That being said, at least they have some climate change policies they're pushing for right now instead of kicking the can down the road. Can you honestly say the same about Republicans?

Considering that the US share of greenhouse gases is fairly small (15% of world total), has decreased quite a lot over time, and becomes harder on the margin, I'd say it's mostly just slinging words for political power at this point. My own take is that you can avoid ecological devastation only through population reduction and in the short term by not up-leveling the Third World via mass immigration and industrializa…

Very hard sell for the "Third World" when rich westerners tell them to stop trying to reach for their heights.

Almost like pulling the ladder from under us after we're at the top. Doubt it would mean anything unless it's backed by sanctions, military action or intelligence operations to topple governments that attempt to pull their countries out of poverty. That would make us decisively "the bad guys", regardless of motive.

Re: Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

#84
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>True, but if they all went Democratic, it would tip the scales considerably. It would be a tricky thing. You'd have to convince Catholics that Oregon-style abortion law (legal right up until birth) was reasonable and that the normalization of mental illness was desirable (the current rage for transsexuals). OTOH, as a trans-national organization, I could see shifting the Catholic hierarchy into thinking that unlimit…

> OTOH, as a trans-national organization, I could see shifting the Catholic hierarchy into thinking that unlimited mass immigration to Western countries was desirable. More membership, more souls to save and all that. I don't think that's how it works. Churches are usually very "local", and "local" stuff is usually the ones that resists the most immigration.

It doesn't seem to me that local populations or organizations have much say in the matter.

Re: Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

#85
Joe Manchin argues: "If they're eliminating fossils, and I'm finding out there's a lot of language in places they're eliminating fossils, which is very, very disturbing," he said, "because if you're sticking your head in the sand, and saying that fossil has to be eliminated in America, and they want to get rid of it, and thinking that's going to clean up the global climate, it won't clean it up all."

How is that coherent at all?

Re: Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

#86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and 25% of the US population is Catholic, half of which group votes Republican (i.e., against reforms designed to prevent or slow climate change). If more people come to believe that they have a moral obligation to do what they can to prevent climate change—including by supporting government interventions and investments, and gracefully accepting higher energy costs and energy taxes—then maybe we can hope for a…

> half of which group votes Republican (i.e., against reforms designed to prevent or slow climate change). That’s a very cynical statement. Goes to show why both sides will never meet in the middle of the road with thinking that way. Voting republicans doesn’t mean I am against climate change reforms. The issue at hand is how practically we deal with it and reduce demands on fossil fuel and transition to clean energy…

> That’s a very cynical statement. Goes to show why both sides will never meet in the middle of the road with thinking that way.

I really meant only to reflect the reality that by voting for a Republican you are voting for someone who will use their power to prevent climate change reform. Is this actually controversial at all? I'd like to see the counterexample.

Sure, some voters may have other things in mind when they vote Republican (for instance, taxes, or abortion) but the end effect of that vote is that if the person they vote for is elected, reforms to prevent or slow climate change will be less likely to be implemented. Do you disagree with this as a factual matter?

> Voting republicans doesn’t mean I am against climate change reforms. The issue at hand is how practically we deal with it and reduce demands on fossil fuel and transition to clean energy.

I am incredulous that you actually believe that today there is any kind of Republican plan to "reduce demands on fossil fuel and transition to clean energy" that has any chance of doing anything in any way to prevent the worst outcomes of climate change.

Even if there were such a plan proposed by a small clique of Republican politicians, it would never be implemented by any Republican-controlled legislature or executive because, as a whole, the party still sees fossil fuel energy as a moral good (see: rolling coal), rejects pollution regulation (dismantling it at every opportunity), and dismisses climate change science as a fiction promulgated by their political enemies in order to further a diabolical agenda.

Even if you can assuage your own guilt by telling yourself that the individual politician you are voting for supports some kind of "Republican climate change plan", your vote for that politician will make any reform less likely to be implemented than if you had voted for their opponent. As a factual matter, no Republican-controlled legislature will ever enact climate change reforms into law, and no Republican executive will ever implement any climate change plan—not even a Republican-authored plan—within the next 10 years, unless we see a sea change in sentiment broadly within the party.

> Goes to show why both sides will never meet in the middle of the road with thinking that way.

If there was a reasonable prospect of a "middle of the road" plan to slow climate change that the Republican party would actually support—meaning, would actually help push through Congress—then the Biden administration and the current Congress would pass it in a minute and immediately begin implementing it.

The reason that this is not happening is because there is no plan whatsoever that the Republican party will put any support behind. I wish there was such a plan.

Re: Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

#87
post #42

Hot take: it doesn't matter who comes out in favour of stronger action on climate change. The only way we'll get significant change is when it becomes economic to do so. The world population or even a significant percentage of it won't change their behaviour altruistically even for a minor inconvenience and risk. New coal plants aren't built (mostly) and old ones are closing not because of altruism or a genuine conce…

Some say that’s why slavery ended: steam power was cheaper

Oh yeah, I remember those steam powered humanoids picking cotton in the fields.

Re: Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

#88
post #42

Hot take: it doesn't matter who comes out in favour of stronger action on climate change. The only way we'll get significant change is when it becomes economic to do so. The world population or even a significant percentage of it won't change their behaviour altruistically even for a minor inconvenience and risk. New coal plants aren't built (mostly) and old ones are closing not because of altruism or a genuine conce…

> The only way we'll get significant change is when it becomes economic to do so.

I think this is the consistent empirical fact. People say and think they act in the public interest, but in reality they follow incentives.

This could in theory be fixed with Carbon Taxes, but they turn out to be politically impossible in most places.

So I think the only path is developing new technology that is cheaper and better per kWh. Solar and battery tech is coming along quite well.

> New coal plants aren't built (mostly)

China is building new coal plants at a furious pace:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-coal/chinas-new-coa...

"Including decommissions, China’s coal-fired fleet capacity rose by a net 29.8 GW in 2020, even as the rest of the world made cuts of 17.2 GW"

Re: Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

#89
post #42

Hot take: it doesn't matter who comes out in favour of stronger action on climate change. The only way we'll get significant change is when it becomes economic to do so. The world population or even a significant percentage of it won't change their behaviour altruistically even for a minor inconvenience and risk. New coal plants aren't built (mostly) and old ones are closing not because of altruism or a genuine conce…

Some say that’s why slavery ended: steam power was cheaper

Some say it ended because Britain got industrialized, became substantially richer, and could afford to have and enforce morals in this field.

Re: Pope Francis and Other Christian Leaders Are Calling for Bold Climate Action

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some say that’s why slavery ended: steam power was cheaper

Oh yeah, I remember those steam powered humanoids picking cotton in the fields.

Way to prove my point. Cotton-rich areas tried to hold on to slavery.

Areas with steam-friendly industries (Britain, Northeast USA) converted to steam and got rid of slavery.

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