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China is also pushing 1 in 5 cars sold to be electric by 2025. The government definitely seems to be taking the problem seriously. (https://www.nytimes.com/201

China is also pushing 1 in 5 cars sold to be electric by 2025. The government definitely seems to be taking the problem seriously. (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/09/business/china-hastens-the-world-toward-an-electric-car-future.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/09/business/china-hastens-th...)

tw04 9y ago
At least someone is... it's a sad, sad day when the supposed "leaders of the free world" insist on burying their heads in the sand WRT: global warming. Even if we ARE wrong, acting as if reducing pollution is a bad thing is just silly.
- WalterSear 9y ago
  Not if you have access to oil money and don't give a fuck about anyone but yourself.
  - komali2 9y ago
    I think it boils down to short term vs long term thinking, and my friends and I have thrown around all sorts of crazy theories around this. In the context of the USA, could just be that republicans (the anti-climate change prevention party) are simply speaking to their conservative values in some way and want the USA to remain coal-powered with gasoline cars. All change is bad change? Another less tenable theory is that typically conservatives/republicans cater to religious groups, and a tenant of christianity is the only thing that matters on earth is your own works - earth is irrelevant in the face of eternal paradise. I don't buy this one as much but it's fun to chew on. I do feel very strongly though that not taking climate change seriously represents a fundamental inability to comprehend the term "long term investment."
    - philk10 9y ago
      EPA chief: ‘True environmentalism is using natural resources that God has blessed us with’
    - WalterSear 9y ago
      I agree, the resistance is so strong, it's arguably rooted in biology. However, I'd argue that it's more wide-ranging deficit than simply long-term thinking. I'd argue that it's about empathy deficits, all around - not just with in regards to the future. https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/12/self-control-is-just-empathy-with-a-future-you/509726/ https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/12/self-con...
      - rjsw 9y ago
        I have a theory that the pushback is an example of a Cargo Cult and that studying it could help us understand cargo cults elsewhere.
    - mikestew 9y ago
      As a former pastor of a main stream denomination church, and who hung around with those of much more conservative denominations, I think the second theory assumes way more thought about one’s chosen religious/philosophical framework than happens in practice. Generally speaking, those less “into it” at best would use religion as an excuse to drive their Suburban. Those that are actually amateur theologians tend to see the Earth as something God expects us to be good stewards of. In summary, people don’t give religion enough thought to let it influence their actions WRT climate change, except out of convenience.
      - woodandsteel 9y ago
        But according to Jim Inhofe, former head of the senate environmental committee, the climate can't be getting warmer because God is beneficent and would never allow that sort of harm to happen to the human race.
        mikestew 9y ago
        Yes, you found an exception to my general statement. Congratulations. Or perhaps the senator would fall under my “convenience” clause, dunno.
    - averagewall 9y ago
      I wouldn't be surprised if a bit part of it was just contrarianism to the "arrogant liberal elite". If people stopped being so forceful (even to the point of dishonesty) in their global warming demands, maybe it woudln't have become a divisive issue and people would make up their minds more independely of their political position.
- adventured 9y ago
  That's extremely far off base. The US has seen its CO2 emissions consistently falling for years, while generating ever greater economic output from its falling CO2 emissions output, a trend that is set to continue regardless of what the White House does. The US is presently a leader at reducing its CO2 output and CO2 output per unit of economic growth. Its CO2 emissions from energy production is at a 26 year low, a time when the economy was half its present size in real terms. Per capita CO2 emissions in the US have declined by nearly 30% since their peak, per the Department of Energy. They're back to where they were in 1960. The trend-line is persistently down. Several major economies of Europe are seeing similar aggressive trends in general CO2 emissions and per capita emissions. China's CO2 emissions are still rapidly increasingly by contrast. They have no plans to actually reduce CO2 emissions, their plan is to maybe slow the increase in the next two decades. They also have no plans to reduce their extreme consumption of coal, rather they plan to try to have more renewable energy as a share. Currently China is producing at least 2x the CO2 output of the US with growing CO2 emissions, while the US has an economy 60% larger with a trend of falling CO2 emissions (set to continue as natural gas & renewables replace coal). It's often said that the blame should be on the developed world because they're outsourcing pollution to China. At this point that's blatantly incorrect. China has made a choice about how it manufactures, to keep its costs artificially low so as to remain competitive. The US has doubled its substantial manufacturing output in roughly 30 years, without any corresponding output spike in CO2. China is cutting environmental corners, because if they don't the cost of their manufacturing would go up significantly.
  - Pigo 9y ago
    Get out of here with your facts and perspective. China finally did one good thing, so they are better than the US.
  - chmod775 9y ago
    "Consistently falling for years": The current downward trend is just a blip in the general trend across all recorded data since ~1900 "Leader at reducing its output": Down is easier when you're standing on a mountian instead of at sea level. "Per capital...": US per capita output is still higher than China's. It really is a matter of how you look at it, and which timespans you observe. Looking at the same data you could come to vastly different conclusions: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/01/climate/us-biggest-carbon-polluter-in-history-will-it-walk-away-from-the-paris-climate-deal.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/01/climate/us-bi...
- JonFish85 9y ago
  Remember that the Chinese government doesn't have to deal with a lot of what the United States' government does have to: things like local governments and our election system. Our government is not set up to move quickly (by design!): our government can't decide to shut down thousands of businesses for a day without consequences, and for good reason. Americans have set up their government so that it more or less reflects the will of the people, and the relatively educated American public is not OK with the government taking drastic steps very quickly. For better or for worse, the Chinese government can move extremely quickly because they essentially answer to no one; if the government wants to raze a neighborhood for something, they do it. If they want to build a road, they move whatever's in the way and build it. In some ways it's incredibly efficient. But that's something the US government is not optimized for, and I'm personally glad for that.
  - killjoywashere 9y ago
    The Chinese very much have local government, and they lack many of the tools we have to centrally manage those local governments, in part because their central government is not at all transparent. The other issue is that only 6% of their government employees are at the central level. The US? 12%. EU? 14%. The Chinese have a saying for this: the mountains are high, and the Emperor is far away. Xi actually comes predominantly from the reformer branch of the Chinese political house. I think his biggest challenge is that his precedessors grew China too quickly.
  - tw04 9y ago
    >Americans have set up their government so that it more or less reflects the will of the people I patently disagree with this opinion. Between lobbyist money and "news" agencies blatantly lying to groups of people not educated enough to fact check what they're hearing on the news, the government very much does NOT reflect the will of the people. It reflects the will of a handful of extremely wealthy people, and large corporations seeking profits at the expense of *.
    - averagewall 9y ago
      That's part of the will of the people. Their will is influenced by those parties you identified but it's still their will. It's like saying Christians go to church against their will because because their parents brainwashed them when they were children, and them in turn back many generations to a time when it was done for the political power of extremely wealthy people. If Americans didn't want lobbyists or dishonest news, they would vote to ban lobbyists and not watch the dishonest news. But they choose to keep those things in a kind of self-reinforcing feedback loop.
- njarboe 9y ago
  Is everything that comes out of a factory pollution? Many environmentalists would say so. Even the intended products are pollution. Pure H2O steam going up into the air. This is polluting the atmosphere with water. If there was too much steam going into the atmosphere, this would also be a problem, like CO2. Now I agree that too much C02 in the atmosphere is bad, but some can be emitted with no problem. How much is too much and who get to emit? This is the hard part. I think many people join the "climate change denial" crowd too push back against the "humans are evil and should go extinct, the quicker the better" environmentalist crowd.
  - woodandsteel 9y ago
    >Is everything that comes out of a factory pollution? Many environmentalists would say so. Even the intended products are pollution. Pure H2O steam going up into the air. No, pollution means something going into the environment that causes harm, and in the amounts being emitted. That is how every environmentalist I have ever heard of defines it. But I bet you already knew that. You know, when someone uses bad arguments, I tend to assume it is because they lack good ones, and they lack good ones because the idea they are arguing for is mistaken.
  - woodandsteel 9y ago
    >I think many people join the "climate change denial" crowd too push back against the "humans are evil and should go extinct, the quicker the better" environmentalist crowd. No, not one in a thousand environmentalists believes that. You know, flat-out lies may work with the sort of people you identify with, but not people who know the truth.
    - njarboe 9y ago
      "people you identify with" Not sure where you got that idea when I said CO2 is a problem. I guess this topic is too charged with emotion to discus reasonably.
      - woodandsteel 9y ago
        Ok, you're right, I shouldn't have said that you identify with that crowd. But I am still saying that the claim that any significant proportion of environmentalists think the human race is evil and should all be killed is simply false. Do you want to defend it?
- hellofunk 9y ago
  I don't think you've been following the developments in this area. The Netherlands is aiming for half of all car sales by 2025 to be electric. Norway is already at one-third all electric. http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2017/06/electric-car-sales-take-off-in-the-netherlands-leads-in-eu/ http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2017/06/electric-car-s...
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
ams6110 9y ago
Won't help that much if they use electricity from coal. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/01/climate/china-energy-companies-coal-plants-climate-change.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/01/climate/china-energy-comp... Over all, 1,600 coal plants are planned or under construction in 62 countries

tw04 9y ago

At least someone is... it's a sad, sad day when the supposed "leaders of the free world" insist on burying their heads in the sand WRT: global warming. Even if we ARE wrong, acting as if reducing pollution is a bad thing is just silly.

WalterSear 9y ago
Not if you have access to oil money and don't give a fuck about anyone but yourself.
- komali2 9y ago
  I think it boils down to short term vs long term thinking, and my friends and I have thrown around all sorts of crazy theories around this. In the context of the USA, could just be that republicans (the anti-climate change prevention party) are simply speaking to their conservative values in some way and want the USA to remain coal-powered with gasoline cars. All change is bad change? Another less tenable theory is that typically conservatives/republicans cater to religious groups, and a tenant of christianity is the only thing that matters on earth is your own works - earth is irrelevant in the face of eternal paradise. I don't buy this one as much but it's fun to chew on. I do feel very strongly though that not taking climate change seriously represents a fundamental inability to comprehend the term "long term investment."
  - philk10 9y ago
    EPA chief: ‘True environmentalism is using natural resources that God has blessed us with’
  - WalterSear 9y ago
    I agree, the resistance is so strong, it's arguably rooted in biology. However, I'd argue that it's more wide-ranging deficit than simply long-term thinking. I'd argue that it's about empathy deficits, all around - not just with in regards to the future. https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/12/self-control-is-just-empathy-with-a-future-you/509726/ https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/12/self-con...
    - rjsw 9y ago
      I have a theory that the pushback is an example of a Cargo Cult and that studying it could help us understand cargo cults elsewhere.
  - mikestew 9y ago
    As a former pastor of a main stream denomination church, and who hung around with those of much more conservative denominations, I think the second theory assumes way more thought about one’s chosen religious/philosophical framework than happens in practice. Generally speaking, those less “into it” at best would use religion as an excuse to drive their Suburban. Those that are actually amateur theologians tend to see the Earth as something God expects us to be good stewards of. In summary, people don’t give religion enough thought to let it influence their actions WRT climate change, except out of convenience.
    - woodandsteel 9y ago
      But according to Jim Inhofe, former head of the senate environmental committee, the climate can't be getting warmer because God is beneficent and would never allow that sort of harm to happen to the human race.
      - mikestew 9y ago
        Yes, you found an exception to my general statement. Congratulations. Or perhaps the senator would fall under my “convenience” clause, dunno.
  - averagewall 9y ago
    I wouldn't be surprised if a bit part of it was just contrarianism to the "arrogant liberal elite". If people stopped being so forceful (even to the point of dishonesty) in their global warming demands, maybe it woudln't have become a divisive issue and people would make up their minds more independely of their political position.
adventured 9y ago
That's extremely far off base. The US has seen its CO2 emissions consistently falling for years, while generating ever greater economic output from its falling CO2 emissions output, a trend that is set to continue regardless of what the White House does. The US is presently a leader at reducing its CO2 output and CO2 output per unit of economic growth. Its CO2 emissions from energy production is at a 26 year low, a time when the economy was half its present size in real terms. Per capita CO2 emissions in the US have declined by nearly 30% since their peak, per the Department of Energy. They're back to where they were in 1960. The trend-line is persistently down. Several major economies of Europe are seeing similar aggressive trends in general CO2 emissions and per capita emissions. China's CO2 emissions are still rapidly increasingly by contrast. They have no plans to actually reduce CO2 emissions, their plan is to maybe slow the increase in the next two decades. They also have no plans to reduce their extreme consumption of coal, rather they plan to try to have more renewable energy as a share. Currently China is producing at least 2x the CO2 output of the US with growing CO2 emissions, while the US has an economy 60% larger with a trend of falling CO2 emissions (set to continue as natural gas & renewables replace coal). It's often said that the blame should be on the developed world because they're outsourcing pollution to China. At this point that's blatantly incorrect. China has made a choice about how it manufactures, to keep its costs artificially low so as to remain competitive. The US has doubled its substantial manufacturing output in roughly 30 years, without any corresponding output spike in CO2. China is cutting environmental corners, because if they don't the cost of their manufacturing would go up significantly.
- Pigo 9y ago
  Get out of here with your facts and perspective. China finally did one good thing, so they are better than the US.
- chmod775 9y ago
  "Consistently falling for years": The current downward trend is just a blip in the general trend across all recorded data since ~1900 "Leader at reducing its output": Down is easier when you're standing on a mountian instead of at sea level. "Per capital...": US per capita output is still higher than China's. It really is a matter of how you look at it, and which timespans you observe. Looking at the same data you could come to vastly different conclusions: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/01/climate/us-biggest-carbon-polluter-in-history-will-it-walk-away-from-the-paris-climate-deal.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/01/climate/us-bi...
JonFish85 9y ago
Remember that the Chinese government doesn't have to deal with a lot of what the United States' government does have to: things like local governments and our election system. Our government is not set up to move quickly (by design!): our government can't decide to shut down thousands of businesses for a day without consequences, and for good reason. Americans have set up their government so that it more or less reflects the will of the people, and the relatively educated American public is not OK with the government taking drastic steps very quickly. For better or for worse, the Chinese government can move extremely quickly because they essentially answer to no one; if the government wants to raze a neighborhood for something, they do it. If they want to build a road, they move whatever's in the way and build it. In some ways it's incredibly efficient. But that's something the US government is not optimized for, and I'm personally glad for that.
- killjoywashere 9y ago
  The Chinese very much have local government, and they lack many of the tools we have to centrally manage those local governments, in part because their central government is not at all transparent. The other issue is that only 6% of their government employees are at the central level. The US? 12%. EU? 14%. The Chinese have a saying for this: the mountains are high, and the Emperor is far away. Xi actually comes predominantly from the reformer branch of the Chinese political house. I think his biggest challenge is that his precedessors grew China too quickly.
- tw04 9y ago
  >Americans have set up their government so that it more or less reflects the will of the people I patently disagree with this opinion. Between lobbyist money and "news" agencies blatantly lying to groups of people not educated enough to fact check what they're hearing on the news, the government very much does NOT reflect the will of the people. It reflects the will of a handful of extremely wealthy people, and large corporations seeking profits at the expense of *.
  - averagewall 9y ago
    That's part of the will of the people. Their will is influenced by those parties you identified but it's still their will. It's like saying Christians go to church against their will because because their parents brainwashed them when they were children, and them in turn back many generations to a time when it was done for the political power of extremely wealthy people. If Americans didn't want lobbyists or dishonest news, they would vote to ban lobbyists and not watch the dishonest news. But they choose to keep those things in a kind of self-reinforcing feedback loop.
njarboe 9y ago
Is everything that comes out of a factory pollution? Many environmentalists would say so. Even the intended products are pollution. Pure H2O steam going up into the air. This is polluting the atmosphere with water. If there was too much steam going into the atmosphere, this would also be a problem, like CO2. Now I agree that too much C02 in the atmosphere is bad, but some can be emitted with no problem. How much is too much and who get to emit? This is the hard part. I think many people join the "climate change denial" crowd too push back against the "humans are evil and should go extinct, the quicker the better" environmentalist crowd.
- woodandsteel 9y ago
  >Is everything that comes out of a factory pollution? Many environmentalists would say so. Even the intended products are pollution. Pure H2O steam going up into the air. No, pollution means something going into the environment that causes harm, and in the amounts being emitted. That is how every environmentalist I have ever heard of defines it. But I bet you already knew that. You know, when someone uses bad arguments, I tend to assume it is because they lack good ones, and they lack good ones because the idea they are arguing for is mistaken.
- woodandsteel 9y ago
  >I think many people join the "climate change denial" crowd too push back against the "humans are evil and should go extinct, the quicker the better" environmentalist crowd. No, not one in a thousand environmentalists believes that. You know, flat-out lies may work with the sort of people you identify with, but not people who know the truth.
  - njarboe 9y ago
    "people you identify with" Not sure where you got that idea when I said CO2 is a problem. I guess this topic is too charged with emotion to discus reasonably.
    - woodandsteel 9y ago
      Ok, you're right, I shouldn't have said that you identify with that crowd. But I am still saying that the claim that any significant proportion of environmentalists think the human race is evil and should all be killed is simply false. Do you want to defend it?
hellofunk 9y ago
I don't think you've been following the developments in this area. The Netherlands is aiming for half of all car sales by 2025 to be electric. Norway is already at one-third all electric. http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2017/06/electric-car-sales-take-off-in-the-netherlands-leads-in-eu/ http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2017/06/electric-car-s...
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

ams6110 9y ago

Won't help that much if they use electricity from coal. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/01/climate/china-energy-companies-coal-plants-climate-change.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/01/climate/china-energy-comp... Over all, 1,600 coal plants are planned or under construction in 62 countries