4 ms·

I see in some places people are trying to stop deserts from turning into something else and in other places people are trying to stop something else from turnin

by oneloop 10y ago

I see in some places people are trying to stop deserts from turning into something else and in other places people are trying to stop something else from turning into deserts. Are we always trying to stop things from changing, and a posteriori inventing arguments for why that particular change is bad? (Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that all change is equally indifferent either)

kuschku 10y ago
Well, there are two movements there: One, to conserve current state of nature because it is worth something - see UNESCO Natural Reserves, etc Two, because profits would be threatened by change. (Look at the constant work to keep the island Sylt from moving, for example)
- dogma1138 10y ago
  Countries at risk of losing 20-30% or more of their arable land over the next decades are not threatened by reduced profits they are threatened by famine, starvation and huge population shifts. But this has nothing to do with preservation efforts, if anything preserving dry subhumid and semi-arid natural habitats can prove to be a good barrier to prevent further desertification countries like Israel and Spain have been doing quite a bit of work in those areas. Wanting to preserve an existing natural environment and habitat to many species is not antithetical to not wanting to lose arable land to needless man caused or at least accelerated desertification.
  - ommunist 10y ago
    Is this claim based on any evidence or research? "Countries at risk of losing 20-30% or more of their arable land over the next decades are not threatened by reduced profits they are threatened by famine, starvation and huge population shifts." I say - that is bullshit. Belarus lost more than 20% of arable land and around 30% of forest land after Chernobyl accident in 1986. It suffered literal hell in social sphere after the USSR was ruined by its elites in 1991. But just 20 years later, by imposing special 17% tax on all businesses that was used to recover arable lands and forest lands from radionuclide contamination, balanced social policy and successful research in agriculture, it is doing just fine! It is HOW you deal with loss of arable land that matters. 2008 - Syria. They stupidly dug deeper wells until exhausting their precious ground waters to nothing. Result - 2 mln former farmers filled favelas of large Syrian cities. At the same time, same area, same problem - Israel invested into desalination tech and plants and successfully kept its agriculture running. It is not lost per se that causes famine and social shifts, it is right or wrong policy of the society that does it. We are humans - we can change things. But not 'saving deserts' or 'save beavers'. We are damn good at saving ourselves when we are together. Like Jews.
  - oneloop 10y ago
    I think your arguments against desertification have some merit. But then what's the argument pro desertification (from people who want to keep deserts desert)? Shouldn't you want to NOT preserve deserts, and instead turn them into arable land? It certainly seems more useful to me.
    - pyre 10y ago
      Your post says that someone must be either "all for deserts" or "all against deserts." It's unclear why people seem to want to force this false dichotomy.
      - oneloop 10y ago
        The dichotomy that I'm pointing out is not that people are "all for deserts" vs "all against deserts", you misunderstood my position. I'm pointing out a false dichotomy which is "all for environmental preservation" vs the position that "all environmental conditions are irrelevant".
        dogma1138 10y ago
        Again this is like being "pro-bear" but not wanting a bear to come out and maul your children at the playground. And one good way of ensuring that the bears don't come out and play is by not destroying their natural habitats. I don't know what false dichotomy you are trying to point out but it doesn't exist, no serious preservationist or environmental scientists saying "all for X". We want to preserve what we can do not cause further needless destruction and degradation in the biodiversity of our ecosystem. Many environmental problems including desertification are cause by us destroying natural habitats including deserts. If you have a desert more or less contained in its "natural" state providing a habitat to multiple species do what you can to preserve it. If you have man accelerated desertification that is threatening to turn your arable land into sand dunes within the next 5 decades you should do what you can to slow it down, stop it, and then reverse it. The only way of fighting desertification seems to be now to actually try to revert the damage you've done to the natural barriers and local environment in the first place. Sand dunes that have had migration patterns of barely a CM per year now migrating at rates of a few meters per year are not a "natural" state.
ommunist 10y ago
This is because social parasites, calling themselves 'environmentalists' want their piece of taxpayers money, no matter how bullshit their ideas are. They have to pay for college for their kids, sort of. And the mortgage. Do not get me wrong, I worked with US EPA, Environment Canada, Japanese JICA and swedish SSNC on a number of projects. I know what I am talking about. Humanity is not geological force. Everything changes. This is natural. UPD: for those interested, this interest to this desert has only one reason, Environment Canada wants some budget. And I am calling these guys parasites from pure ecological point of view. They inhabit intestines of the state system providing no value in return. Because those who can provide value work in business.
- oneloop 10y ago
  I have two issues with your comment: A) You provide no evidence for your major claim (that the people fighting change are doing it for selfish motivations). Neither in general, nor in the case of this specific desert. B) Even if the _motivations_ for doing something were selfish, it could be that the actual environmental concerns themselves were valid. Don't get me wrong, the phenomenon that you speak of (social parasites) does exist. But in this case I was hoping for a more environmental (as opposed to sociological) discussion. Just to be clear, you don't disagree that valid environmental concerns could exist, right?
  - ommunist 10y ago
    there is no such a thing 'environmental concern'. There is only concern for power of some certain individuals. All, I repeat, all environmental protection agencies are political instruments of certain power groups to impose rules on some businesses. This is far wider topic to elaborate it here in detail. When was the last time humanity saved a single species, by restoring its unique habitat and mantaining the balance of energy and materials for ecosystems? For A-B, finance me, I will get you evidence or disapprove myself. But It took me 17 years to understand clearly how these tricks work, and what actually is 'raising environmental awareness'. I myself spent tens of thousands EU taxpayers money to 'save endangered species'. Believe me, after final report NO ONE ever will ask you about the outcome.
dogma1138 10y ago
Those are 2 different things, and usually both are caused by humans. Desertification is a big problem and it has many human linked causes, large cities change rainfall patterns, deforestation causes soil migration changes the mineral content of the soil and reduces its moisture content and most importantly desertification affects humans as it creeps into arable land increasing the cost of growing crops or in some areas making it almost impossible. The other problem is the destruction of natural deserts due to buildup of man made structures, agriculture, diversion of water sources, overall climate change (a desert doesn't have to be a "hot" place, many deserts are actually in danger due to rising temperatures which increase rainfall, melt glaciers, or soil locked ice) and many other things. No one is inventing posteriori arguments and decides arbitrary what is good and what is bad, one environmental change can drastically affect human civilization including costing human lives in the long run, the other is unnecessary destruction or damage to existing natural habitats which do not have much (negative) impact over human civilization or lives but can and should be prevented if not reverted. This is not different than any other preservation effort, you want bears in the wild, doesn't mean you want them living in the woods just by your house, and it also doesn't mean that you would not shoot them if they come and endanger human lives.
- oneloop 10y ago
  But much like you say "humans have an impact on what's around them, causing it to change, and eventually that could cause loss of lives", you can also say that for anything at all, can't you? Replace humans with X = bears, trees, anything...
  - dogma1138 10y ago
    Humans are not really subjected to natural selection anymore, we need to really screw up the planet for that to happen and by that time it would be too late. Nature tends to balance itself out, this is slightly harder to do with humans which have the technology to geoengineer their habitats. But even if it was so it doesn't matter, no person in their right mind would think it's ok for me to die, and for millions or billions of other people to die just because it's the natural order of things. And for the most part you can't even hide behind it's a "natural process" because humans are geoengineers we build huge concrete cities, we build dams, we divert rivers, we strip whole mountains and dig the decomposing biomass of our "ancestors" and burn it as fuel. Bears and trees don't do that.
oneloop 10y ago
Follow up to the above comment. After making this comment two users (dogma1138 and ommunist) showed up that reinforce my point. On one side, according to dogma1138 (it appears from his comments) that any change to the environment is inherently bad. Talk about change and he will quickly point out the loss of lives. I asked several times whether there were any exceptions from this and got no compromise. On the other side, according to ommunist, any concerns that anyone can have about the environment are necessarily misconceptions stemming from corporate propagandist shills, and no compromise here either. This topic is so polarised that it's impossible to have a productive discussion.
- fatbird 10y ago
  You have failed to understand dogma1138's point. He wasn't denying that change can be good, he was refusing to engage an oversimplification you were presenting. They're not the same thing, and your attempts to present binary questions are what derailed the productive discussion.

by oneloop 10y ago

kuschku 10y ago

Well, there are two movements there: One, to conserve current state of nature because it is worth something - see UNESCO Natural Reserves, etc Two, because profits would be threatened by change. (Look at the constant work to keep the island Sylt from moving, for example)

dogma1138 10y ago
Countries at risk of losing 20-30% or more of their arable land over the next decades are not threatened by reduced profits they are threatened by famine, starvation and huge population shifts. But this has nothing to do with preservation efforts, if anything preserving dry subhumid and semi-arid natural habitats can prove to be a good barrier to prevent further desertification countries like Israel and Spain have been doing quite a bit of work in those areas. Wanting to preserve an existing natural environment and habitat to many species is not antithetical to not wanting to lose arable land to needless man caused or at least accelerated desertification.
- ommunist 10y ago
  Is this claim based on any evidence or research? "Countries at risk of losing 20-30% or more of their arable land over the next decades are not threatened by reduced profits they are threatened by famine, starvation and huge population shifts." I say - that is bullshit. Belarus lost more than 20% of arable land and around 30% of forest land after Chernobyl accident in 1986. It suffered literal hell in social sphere after the USSR was ruined by its elites in 1991. But just 20 years later, by imposing special 17% tax on all businesses that was used to recover arable lands and forest lands from radionuclide contamination, balanced social policy and successful research in agriculture, it is doing just fine! It is HOW you deal with loss of arable land that matters. 2008 - Syria. They stupidly dug deeper wells until exhausting their precious ground waters to nothing. Result - 2 mln former farmers filled favelas of large Syrian cities. At the same time, same area, same problem - Israel invested into desalination tech and plants and successfully kept its agriculture running. It is not lost per se that causes famine and social shifts, it is right or wrong policy of the society that does it. We are humans - we can change things. But not 'saving deserts' or 'save beavers'. We are damn good at saving ourselves when we are together. Like Jews.
- oneloop 10y ago
  I think your arguments against desertification have some merit. But then what's the argument pro desertification (from people who want to keep deserts desert)? Shouldn't you want to NOT preserve deserts, and instead turn them into arable land? It certainly seems more useful to me.
  - pyre 10y ago
    Your post says that someone must be either "all for deserts" or "all against deserts." It's unclear why people seem to want to force this false dichotomy.
    - oneloop 10y ago
      The dichotomy that I'm pointing out is not that people are "all for deserts" vs "all against deserts", you misunderstood my position. I'm pointing out a false dichotomy which is "all for environmental preservation" vs the position that "all environmental conditions are irrelevant".
      - dogma1138 10y ago
        Again this is like being "pro-bear" but not wanting a bear to come out and maul your children at the playground. And one good way of ensuring that the bears don't come out and play is by not destroying their natural habitats. I don't know what false dichotomy you are trying to point out but it doesn't exist, no serious preservationist or environmental scientists saying "all for X". We want to preserve what we can do not cause further needless destruction and degradation in the biodiversity of our ecosystem. Many environmental problems including desertification are cause by us destroying natural habitats including deserts. If you have a desert more or less contained in its "natural" state providing a habitat to multiple species do what you can to preserve it. If you have man accelerated desertification that is threatening to turn your arable land into sand dunes within the next 5 decades you should do what you can to slow it down, stop it, and then reverse it. The only way of fighting desertification seems to be now to actually try to revert the damage you've done to the natural barriers and local environment in the first place. Sand dunes that have had migration patterns of barely a CM per year now migrating at rates of a few meters per year are not a "natural" state.

ommunist 10y ago

This is because social parasites, calling themselves 'environmentalists' want their piece of taxpayers money, no matter how bullshit their ideas are. They have to pay for college for their kids, sort of. And the mortgage. Do not get me wrong, I worked with US EPA, Environment Canada, Japanese JICA and swedish SSNC on a number of projects. I know what I am talking about. Humanity is not geological force. Everything changes. This is natural. UPD: for those interested, this interest to this desert has only one reason, Environment Canada wants some budget. And I am calling these guys parasites from pure ecological point of view. They inhabit intestines of the state system providing no value in return. Because those who can provide value work in business.

oneloop 10y ago
I have two issues with your comment: A) You provide no evidence for your major claim (that the people fighting change are doing it for selfish motivations). Neither in general, nor in the case of this specific desert. B) Even if the _motivations_ for doing something were selfish, it could be that the actual environmental concerns themselves were valid. Don't get me wrong, the phenomenon that you speak of (social parasites) does exist. But in this case I was hoping for a more environmental (as opposed to sociological) discussion. Just to be clear, you don't disagree that valid environmental concerns could exist, right?
- ommunist 10y ago
  there is no such a thing 'environmental concern'. There is only concern for power of some certain individuals. All, I repeat, all environmental protection agencies are political instruments of certain power groups to impose rules on some businesses. This is far wider topic to elaborate it here in detail. When was the last time humanity saved a single species, by restoring its unique habitat and mantaining the balance of energy and materials for ecosystems? For A-B, finance me, I will get you evidence or disapprove myself. But It took me 17 years to understand clearly how these tricks work, and what actually is 'raising environmental awareness'. I myself spent tens of thousands EU taxpayers money to 'save endangered species'. Believe me, after final report NO ONE ever will ask you about the outcome.

dogma1138 10y ago

Those are 2 different things, and usually both are caused by humans. Desertification is a big problem and it has many human linked causes, large cities change rainfall patterns, deforestation causes soil migration changes the mineral content of the soil and reduces its moisture content and most importantly desertification affects humans as it creeps into arable land increasing the cost of growing crops or in some areas making it almost impossible. The other problem is the destruction of natural deserts due to buildup of man made structures, agriculture, diversion of water sources, overall climate change (a desert doesn't have to be a "hot" place, many deserts are actually in danger due to rising temperatures which increase rainfall, melt glaciers, or soil locked ice) and many other things. No one is inventing posteriori arguments and decides arbitrary what is good and what is bad, one environmental change can drastically affect human civilization including costing human lives in the long run, the other is unnecessary destruction or damage to existing natural habitats which do not have much (negative) impact over human civilization or lives but can and should be prevented if not reverted. This is not different than any other preservation effort, you want bears in the wild, doesn't mean you want them living in the woods just by your house, and it also doesn't mean that you would not shoot them if they come and endanger human lives.

oneloop 10y ago
But much like you say "humans have an impact on what's around them, causing it to change, and eventually that could cause loss of lives", you can also say that for anything at all, can't you? Replace humans with X = bears, trees, anything...
- dogma1138 10y ago
  Humans are not really subjected to natural selection anymore, we need to really screw up the planet for that to happen and by that time it would be too late. Nature tends to balance itself out, this is slightly harder to do with humans which have the technology to geoengineer their habitats. But even if it was so it doesn't matter, no person in their right mind would think it's ok for me to die, and for millions or billions of other people to die just because it's the natural order of things. And for the most part you can't even hide behind it's a "natural process" because humans are geoengineers we build huge concrete cities, we build dams, we divert rivers, we strip whole mountains and dig the decomposing biomass of our "ancestors" and burn it as fuel. Bears and trees don't do that.

oneloop 10y ago

Follow up to the above comment. After making this comment two users (dogma1138 and ommunist) showed up that reinforce my point. On one side, according to dogma1138 (it appears from his comments) that any change to the environment is inherently bad. Talk about change and he will quickly point out the loss of lives. I asked several times whether there were any exceptions from this and got no compromise. On the other side, according to ommunist, any concerns that anyone can have about the environment are necessarily misconceptions stemming from corporate propagandist shills, and no compromise here either. This topic is so polarised that it's impossible to have a productive discussion.

fatbird 10y ago
You have failed to understand dogma1138's point. He wasn't denying that change can be good, he was refusing to engage an oversimplification you were presenting. They're not the same thing, and your attempts to present binary questions are what derailed the productive discussion.