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This is a great article. Do I have to go vegan? No. But it would have the biggest impact if you did. Is organic farming the answer? No. It tends to use more lan
by agentultra 8y ago
This is a great article. Do I have to go vegan? No. But it would have the biggest impact if you did. Is organic farming the answer? No. It tends to use more land for less output (although maybe the health-foodies could get off the No-GMO bandwagon). I also appreciate that the authors recognize that for some people living in certain cultures and climates _have_ to eat meat and there's no shame in that.
The bulk of the reduction can definitely come from rich, affluent nations and have the biggest impact.
Articles like this seem important. Hiding the fact that meat/dairy production is such a huge factor in climate change hurts people more than it helps. When we all start to wonder why it isn't getting any better we need to know that there are ways we can do our part. Even if they're small things!
- lowken10 8y agoExcept that meat/dairy production have zero effect on climate change. Other then that you are correct.
- jamil7 8y agoCare to provide a source to back up that claim? If you read the article and associated sources you'd find a stack of scientific evidence to confirm that it has quite a large impact.
- misiti3780 8y agoI wouldnt say zero, but not much at a macro level, here are the stats: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19799246 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19799246
- ThomPete 8y agohttp://www.infohow.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Greenhouse-Emissions.jpg http://www.infohow.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Greenhouse... Edit: Downvoted for providing data? A new low.
- jamil7 8y agoI didn't downvote you but I was replying to the (now removed) comment.
- rayiner 8y agoThis is an awful article because it doesn't put numbers on the various alternatives. Without hard numbers, the discussion of alternatives is meaningless. Even going from an average diet to fully vegan will only reduce your food-related emissions by 40%, which only accounts for about 12.5% of your carbon emissions to begin with (in the US): http://www.greeneatz.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/foods-carbon-footprint-7.gif http://www.greeneatz.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/foods-ca.... Cutting your CO2 footprint 5% is not going to do anything. Cutting it even less than that is utterly pointless. "Doing your part" and "doing small things" will not have any impact on climate change. It ignores the enormous gap between where our emissions need to be and where they are now. If you could convince everyone in America to become a vegan tomorrow, that would cut global CO2 emissions by about a gigaton. That is how much CO2 emissions went up last year alone, mostly due to China and India. Think about that: the effect of every American undertaking an unprecedented lifestyle change all at the same time would be totally wiped out by a single year's growth globally.
- specialist 8y agoI agree with both you and agentultra. I'm struggling to understand why. You're correct on the comparative impact. But I've long believed psychology is important too. We lefties are frequently criticized, for better or worse, for hypocrisy. Maybe personal pro forma efforts will remove that rhetorical angle of attack. Also, there's got to be some priming benefits, an opportunity to educate about the larger issues. However, my faith in this strategy has been rocked by failures (betrayal) of the whole recycling charade, which has served to alienate people and likely reduced future engagement. I wish I knew what is best. Right now, I don't even have an opinion, just more questions.
- agentultra 8y agoThe psychological factor of feeling empowered to take control of your part of the world, however insignificant, is important I think. "No silver bullet," is something I've said elsewhere. I don't think this article nor I have implied that if everyone went vegan then the climate crisis could be averted. I think it's a good article because it doesn't try to frame our dietary choices as a solution. It informs us of the impact of our choices and makes sure people realize that eating some meat is okay. But if you want to do more, you can, and it will have an impact -- however small -- and that's a good thing in my books.
- vram22 8y ago>Is organic farming the answer? No. It tends to use more land for less output Use of land per unit of output (or vice versa) is not the only important metric though, not by a long chalk. A more holistic approach is needed [1], otherwise it is back to the same as the issues that the OP attempts to address. [1] An approach that considers equally important things like effects of pesticides, other negative effects of non-organic farming (there are other important ones, and more).
- agentultra 8y agoI agree and the article was more nuanced than that. I think organic farming is great and maybe needs GMO in order to thrive, sustainably, into the climate/soil future. It's a deep topic and there are no simple answers, thanks for pointing that out!