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Just as a political lesson, reforestation is fascinating.It seems to have casually gone from seeming unfeasible practically and politically to feasible... witho

Just as a political lesson, reforestation is fascinating.It seems to have casually gone from seeming unfeasible practically and politically to feasible... without much of a struggle. Impossible until it isn't.

Angostura 7y ago
Surely that's because its a suggest that we can "solve" an extistential crisis without changing the way we do business or live our lives in any meaningful way. Feels a bit too good to be true.
- dalbasal 7y ago
  I disagree with the zero-sum assumption that often seem to permeate environmentalism, and climate politics in particular. Half the time it seems that effectiveness is judged by inconvenience, negative economic consequences and such. I sometimes think it hurts the cause more than outright anti-environmentalism. If the only "real" solutions are things like reducing human energy use long term, you might as well stop caring and just hope for the best. It won't happen, and even if it does than the long-term^ consequences might be worse than climate change. The actually sustainable solutions are those that are cheap, positive sum, and lead to humans thriving. IDK if this is a solution (or meaningful part thereof) for climate change. It's not really an easy solution though. Land politics are tough, to put it mildly. They always have been. ^Operative term.
  - baron_harkonnen 7y ago
    > If the only "real" solutions are things like reducing human energy use long term, you might as well stop caring and just hope for the best. It won't happen, and even if it does than the long-term^ consequences might be worse than climate change. But that's absolutely the path we're on and have repeatedly chosen. I don't think comments pointing this out are claiming they are environmentalists, just pointing out something that very few people really want to discuss. It's funny that we discuss "sustainability" as some sort of future goal, when, by definition, the alternative is a way of life that cannot be sustained. "Less unsustainable" is still unsustainable. Since serious sustainability is clearly seen as some sort of absurd joke, then we should at least stop pretending that things are going to be okay. The really interesting part will be when we feel the other pain of unsustainable living: resource depletion. Fighting the impact of climate changes is going to be even trickier when we have less energy to do it with.
    - goatlover 7y ago
      > The really interesting part will be when we feel the other pain of unsustainable living: resource depletion. Fighting the impact of climate changes is going to be even trickier when we have less energy to do it with. Energy is the one thing we shouldn't run low on given that we have the sun.
  - Angostura 7y ago
    > The actually sustainable solutions are those that are cheap, positive sum, and lead to humans thriving. You're assuming that there are cheap, positive-sum solutions that will lead to humans thriving. I would be absolutely DELIGHTED if such solutions by themselves will meet the goal (I would also like to see other organisms in the ecosphere thrive, by the way - not just humans). If such solutions exist, lets do it. However I'm both skeptical that they do exist and not yet ready to "stop caring and just hope for the best". I don;t find the counsel of despair to be particularly compelling.
    - dalbasal 7y ago
      Not assuming, more like hoping. I'm willing to bet on it, because I think it's a good bet and I think the alternative is a sure loser. Lets narrow this down to just energy consumption. I'm skeptical that we can reduce energy consumption^ enough to meaningfully impact anything. National/global energy austerity (like economic austerity) hits a wall very quickly. Whether that is at 5% or 20% doesn't matter. It certainly isn't near enough. Therefore, it is not a viable solution. If we are paying (via unemployment, etc) to avoid climate change. OTOH, clean energy obviously is possible. Reforestation is possible. Various geoengineering projects are possible. What makes them viable is, they carry the possibility of allowing us to massively increase our energy consumption. That is what cheap means, that we can afford more of it and be wealthier. ^Voluntarily. Obviously a major plague or somesuch could.
      - Angostura 7y ago
        You'll note in my original post I talked about 'changing our lives' that doesn't necessarily mean wearing hair shirts. So, energy consumption can certainly be helped by mandating insulation standards in building codes, by outlawing incandescent light bulbs, by introducing stringent emission standards for cars or introducing carbon fee and divided regulations. None of those mean "austerity", or unemployment, but they do mean adjustments. Moreover fee and dividend produces a nice market-driven mechanism to speed up the adoption of clean energy.
        7y ago
- goatlover 7y ago
  It's more realistic than thinking we're going to get a significant majority of the world's population to significantly reduce consumption while adding two more billion people and having the developed world catch up.

Angostura 7y ago

Surely that's because its a suggest that we can "solve" an extistential crisis without changing the way we do business or live our lives in any meaningful way. Feels a bit too good to be true.

dalbasal 7y ago
I disagree with the zero-sum assumption that often seem to permeate environmentalism, and climate politics in particular. Half the time it seems that effectiveness is judged by inconvenience, negative economic consequences and such. I sometimes think it hurts the cause more than outright anti-environmentalism. If the only "real" solutions are things like reducing human energy use long term, you might as well stop caring and just hope for the best. It won't happen, and even if it does than the long-term^ consequences might be worse than climate change. The actually sustainable solutions are those that are cheap, positive sum, and lead to humans thriving. IDK if this is a solution (or meaningful part thereof) for climate change. It's not really an easy solution though. Land politics are tough, to put it mildly. They always have been. ^Operative term.
- baron_harkonnen 7y ago
  > If the only "real" solutions are things like reducing human energy use long term, you might as well stop caring and just hope for the best. It won't happen, and even if it does than the long-term^ consequences might be worse than climate change. But that's absolutely the path we're on and have repeatedly chosen. I don't think comments pointing this out are claiming they are environmentalists, just pointing out something that very few people really want to discuss. It's funny that we discuss "sustainability" as some sort of future goal, when, by definition, the alternative is a way of life that cannot be sustained. "Less unsustainable" is still unsustainable. Since serious sustainability is clearly seen as some sort of absurd joke, then we should at least stop pretending that things are going to be okay. The really interesting part will be when we feel the other pain of unsustainable living: resource depletion. Fighting the impact of climate changes is going to be even trickier when we have less energy to do it with.
  - goatlover 7y ago
    > The really interesting part will be when we feel the other pain of unsustainable living: resource depletion. Fighting the impact of climate changes is going to be even trickier when we have less energy to do it with. Energy is the one thing we shouldn't run low on given that we have the sun.
- Angostura 7y ago
  > The actually sustainable solutions are those that are cheap, positive sum, and lead to humans thriving. You're assuming that there are cheap, positive-sum solutions that will lead to humans thriving. I would be absolutely DELIGHTED if such solutions by themselves will meet the goal (I would also like to see other organisms in the ecosphere thrive, by the way - not just humans). If such solutions exist, lets do it. However I'm both skeptical that they do exist and not yet ready to "stop caring and just hope for the best". I don;t find the counsel of despair to be particularly compelling.
  - dalbasal 7y ago
    Not assuming, more like hoping. I'm willing to bet on it, because I think it's a good bet and I think the alternative is a sure loser. Lets narrow this down to just energy consumption. I'm skeptical that we can reduce energy consumption^ enough to meaningfully impact anything. National/global energy austerity (like economic austerity) hits a wall very quickly. Whether that is at 5% or 20% doesn't matter. It certainly isn't near enough. Therefore, it is not a viable solution. If we are paying (via unemployment, etc) to avoid climate change. OTOH, clean energy obviously is possible. Reforestation is possible. Various geoengineering projects are possible. What makes them viable is, they carry the possibility of allowing us to massively increase our energy consumption. That is what cheap means, that we can afford more of it and be wealthier. ^Voluntarily. Obviously a major plague or somesuch could.
    - Angostura 7y ago
      You'll note in my original post I talked about 'changing our lives' that doesn't necessarily mean wearing hair shirts. So, energy consumption can certainly be helped by mandating insulation standards in building codes, by outlawing incandescent light bulbs, by introducing stringent emission standards for cars or introducing carbon fee and divided regulations. None of those mean "austerity", or unemployment, but they do mean adjustments. Moreover fee and dividend produces a nice market-driven mechanism to speed up the adoption of clean energy.
      - 7y ago
goatlover 7y ago
It's more realistic than thinking we're going to get a significant majority of the world's population to significantly reduce consumption while adding two more billion people and having the developed world catch up.