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We humans have developed one fairly good approach to problem solving by focusing on localized concerns and self-interest. For many problems, this seems to work

We humans have developed one fairly good approach to problem solving by focusing on localized concerns and self-interest. For many problems, this seems to work fairly well with a few negative yet manageable side-effects. In my opinion, these approaches completely fail at solving large issues that require large orchestrated efforts that require things at state, nation, and even world scale and longer timescales than an individual or their kids. We haven't really developed a 'hammer' for those sort of problems and that hammer keeps competing with our 'saw' we use on the other problems whose proponents want to only use their 'saw' for every problem they see, ignoring its shortcomings.

bdamm 7y ago
Yes, I think it is pretty clear that this social structure is the cause and at this point the only solution. Why the only solution? Generally I view the prevention of a strong global government to be a conservative issue and for better or for worse that isn't likely to happen (peacefully). The construction of such a government would speed up solving this issue but then we'd be left with another power hungry government to reign in.
usaar333 7y ago
We've solved plenty of problems at scale; think ozone layer depletion being reduced. The problem with climate change is that it is really expensive to fix with highly uncertain costs to do so.
- jellicle 7y ago
  Climate action has a net negative cost; spending $10 will get you more than $10 of benefit for almost any intervention you'd care to name. So it's not expensive in any long-run calculation, only the short-run.
  - usaar333 7y ago
    Certainly high ROI ones (say not building new coal power plants), but definitely not the lower ROI interventions. Nor is cost net negative if you use high discount rates and try lower co2 targets (e.g. 3 degrees warming by 2100 is much more likely to have positive ROI than say holding 2 degrees). Huge controversy around protecting against lower probability, highly destructive scenarios. Point is there's lots of controversy here. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics_of_climate_change_mitigation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics_of_climate_change_...

bdamm 7y ago

Yes, I think it is pretty clear that this social structure is the cause and at this point the only solution. Why the only solution? Generally I view the prevention of a strong global government to be a conservative issue and for better or for worse that isn't likely to happen (peacefully). The construction of such a government would speed up solving this issue but then we'd be left with another power hungry government to reign in.

usaar333 7y ago

We've solved plenty of problems at scale; think ozone layer depletion being reduced. The problem with climate change is that it is really expensive to fix with highly uncertain costs to do so.

jellicle 7y ago
Climate action has a net negative cost; spending $10 will get you more than $10 of benefit for almost any intervention you'd care to name. So it's not expensive in any long-run calculation, only the short-run.
- usaar333 7y ago
  Certainly high ROI ones (say not building new coal power plants), but definitely not the lower ROI interventions. Nor is cost net negative if you use high discount rates and try lower co2 targets (e.g. 3 degrees warming by 2100 is much more likely to have positive ROI than say holding 2 degrees). Huge controversy around protecting against lower probability, highly destructive scenarios. Point is there's lots of controversy here. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics_of_climate_change_mitigation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics_of_climate_change_...