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Well a few decades ago it was nuclear annihilation. I was a teen then, and it was more scary than climate change if you were the sort of kid who worried about s

Well a few decades ago it was nuclear annihilation. I was a teen then, and it was more scary than climate change if you were the sort of kid who worried about stuff.

dv_dt 8y ago
With the Cold War, you might worry about being attacked, but could feel that your own nation was clearly taking action to protect your tribe. That's not the case with climate change.
- sevensor 8y ago
  But that's the thing about nuclear annihilation. Nothing can protect you from it. All your leaders can promise is that the entire planet will be unlivable, and not just our side of it. Cold comfort for a cold war. Different apocalypse than climate change, but just as bad.
  - dv_dt 8y ago
    Right or wrong, it was very visible that the US blockaded navies, invaded nations, formed alliances - fought in every way against the primary threat of the USSR. I lived through the same time, it was very obvious the government did things frequently and in many levels to fight the Cold war. Doing something, even if it doesn't reduce the core risk, reduces anxiety. (And I'm sure many people would say that many cold war actions actually did reduce the core risk too..) I suppose we're still invading nations, but now it's for little apparent benefit, and certainly not connected to climate change. What has the US done at the national level, especially recently, that's even easily within reach against climate change? People know - they feel it.
    - ams6110 8y ago
      > What has the US done at the national level, especially recently, that's even easily within reach against climate change? Nationally? Not sure. I don't pay much attention to national news or politics. But every day? I see wind farms and solar farms going in all over the place. I see more and more people buying EVs. I see all the major automakers devoting significant R&D to EVs (thanks Tesla, even though your cars are too expensive for me, I do appreciate the kickstart). I see local utilities decommissioning coal power plants or converting them to natural gas. I see people seriously talking about nuclear power again. People are acting, and whether it really makes a difference or not it feels like it does. That was not the case in the Cold War times, when you felt it was all out of your control as an individual, and everything that was or might have been happening was top secret and invisible.
  - rchaud 8y ago
    > But that's the thing about nuclear annihilation. Nothing can protect you from it. If it happens. The whole point of the nuclear arms race was for nuclear-capable countries to deter one another from attacking. No such luck with climate change. We can try to slow it down, but the damage has been done.
nkingsy 8y ago
We no longer fear nuclear annihilation because we have a functional global society. Climate change is already causing huge damage to this. Syrian drought -> refugees -> anti-immigrant sentiment -> populist leaders -> ++boomLikelihood
- jpindar 8y ago
  The phrase "fire and fury like the world has never seen" doesn't sound familiar? I grew up in the cold war but I was never as viscerally afraid as I was this past year.
techdmn 8y ago
The nukes didn't exactly go away though. We're still welcome to worry about it. :-)
pantalaimon 8y ago
For nuclear annihilation, someone actually has to press the button. For climate change we just have to keep on doing what we already do - and in fact we are still accelerating. Droughts and famine are no joke, it feels every more likely we might be the last generation to experience prosperity. I think the only sensible conclusion at this point is hedonism. Enjoy it while it lasts.
- imtringued 8y ago
  I think hedonism is the root cause of this problem...
nostrademons 8y ago
My pet prediction is that nuclear annihilation will solve climate change. Now that we've forgotten how bad nuclear war is and destabilized all the major superpowers, it's going to become very tempting for some splinter group (or orange-haired maniac) to press the Big Red Button and launch WW3. Nuclear winter has a global cooling effect that's significantly larger than the global warming effect of global warming, plus if you get rid of all the humans you get rid of human-caused climate change.

Well a few decades ago it was nuclear annihilation. I was a teen then, and it was more scary than climate change if you were the sort of kid who worried about stuff.

dv_dt 8y ago

With the Cold War, you might worry about being attacked, but could feel that your own nation was clearly taking action to protect your tribe. That's not the case with climate change.

sevensor 8y ago
But that's the thing about nuclear annihilation. Nothing can protect you from it. All your leaders can promise is that the entire planet will be unlivable, and not just our side of it. Cold comfort for a cold war. Different apocalypse than climate change, but just as bad.
- dv_dt 8y ago
  Right or wrong, it was very visible that the US blockaded navies, invaded nations, formed alliances - fought in every way against the primary threat of the USSR. I lived through the same time, it was very obvious the government did things frequently and in many levels to fight the Cold war. Doing something, even if it doesn't reduce the core risk, reduces anxiety. (And I'm sure many people would say that many cold war actions actually did reduce the core risk too..) I suppose we're still invading nations, but now it's for little apparent benefit, and certainly not connected to climate change. What has the US done at the national level, especially recently, that's even easily within reach against climate change? People know - they feel it.
  - ams6110 8y ago
    > What has the US done at the national level, especially recently, that's even easily within reach against climate change? Nationally? Not sure. I don't pay much attention to national news or politics. But every day? I see wind farms and solar farms going in all over the place. I see more and more people buying EVs. I see all the major automakers devoting significant R&D to EVs (thanks Tesla, even though your cars are too expensive for me, I do appreciate the kickstart). I see local utilities decommissioning coal power plants or converting them to natural gas. I see people seriously talking about nuclear power again. People are acting, and whether it really makes a difference or not it feels like it does. That was not the case in the Cold War times, when you felt it was all out of your control as an individual, and everything that was or might have been happening was top secret and invisible.
- rchaud 8y ago
  > But that's the thing about nuclear annihilation. Nothing can protect you from it. If it happens. The whole point of the nuclear arms race was for nuclear-capable countries to deter one another from attacking. No such luck with climate change. We can try to slow it down, but the damage has been done.

nkingsy 8y ago

We no longer fear nuclear annihilation because we have a functional global society. Climate change is already causing huge damage to this. Syrian drought -> refugees -> anti-immigrant sentiment -> populist leaders -> ++boomLikelihood

jpindar 8y ago
The phrase "fire and fury like the world has never seen" doesn't sound familiar? I grew up in the cold war but I was never as viscerally afraid as I was this past year.

techdmn 8y ago

The nukes didn't exactly go away though. We're still welcome to worry about it. :-)

pantalaimon 8y ago

For nuclear annihilation, someone actually has to press the button. For climate change we just have to keep on doing what we already do - and in fact we are still accelerating. Droughts and famine are no joke, it feels every more likely we might be the last generation to experience prosperity. I think the only sensible conclusion at this point is hedonism. Enjoy it while it lasts.

imtringued 8y ago
I think hedonism is the root cause of this problem...

nostrademons 8y ago

My pet prediction is that nuclear annihilation will solve climate change. Now that we've forgotten how bad nuclear war is and destabilized all the major superpowers, it's going to become very tempting for some splinter group (or orange-haired maniac) to press the Big Red Button and launch WW3. Nuclear winter has a global cooling effect that's significantly larger than the global warming effect of global warming, plus if you get rid of all the humans you get rid of human-caused climate change.