7 ms·

How the oil industry made us doubt climate change

53 points by daedalus_f 6y ago

shakezula 6y ago
The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was getting the average person to blame themselves and not corporations for climate change. The numbers simply don’t add up for a consumer oriented solution to make any sense.
- throwawaysea 6y ago
  The article isn’t really about whether blame should fall on the individual versus a corporation, but why do you feel it doesn’t fall on individuals? It is individuals’ consumerist habits and hunger for extreme convenience that makes these corporations viable? I see the argument that the individuals didn’t know the tradeoffs (due to deceptive corporate actions the article mentions) but I am not confident that greater clarity would have mattered much either. I feel much of the problem is due to our culture - if you have a large population that wants a lot of things, bad things will happen. If a culture is willing to emphasize living more simply and portraying happiness and status in other ways, consumption will reduce. But culture is bigger than individuals and corporations - and I can’t see blaming just one of them.
  - breakyerself 6y ago
    Exxon had their own state of the art climate science department. Way back in 1982 they accurately predicted that in 2020 co2 would be around 415ppm and there would be about 1C of warming. At a time when the average person had never even heard of global warming Exxon had already confirmed their product was irreversibly damaging the planet and shortly thereafter shuttered their science program and began spending millions a year funding public influence campaigns to sew doubt misinformation, and turn the issue into a political wedge. Of course the companies are vastly more culpable than the public. The average person is far too busy trying to keep their lives in order to educate themselves on a highly complicated scientific issue. Especially when much of the population lives within a subculture that would turn on them and ridicule them if they did look into the issue deeply because the fossil fuel PR machine managed to co-opt all of their political and cultural leaders. The corporations had the information, the clarity, and the opportunity to do the right thing. Instead they chose to poison the discourse and stymie progress any way they could. edit: Exxon accurately predicted 1C of warming by 2020 not 2C
    - LifeIsThermal 6y ago
      As I understand, Oil companies only reviewed other scientists theories, they didn´t do research themselves. At the end of the day it will come down to you lowering your living standards by using less energy. Much less energy. And a really large reduction in living standard where everything you consume will cost at least double of what you pay today. Even if you blame the fossile fuel industry, you will have to pay. Oil is the cheapest energy there is. You have the choice today to stop all your emission of co2, so why don´t you? Because it´s uncomfortable. Your comfort is the cause of climate change. I´m fortunate enough to realize that climate change caused by co2 is a thermodynamic impossibility because it implies that earth heats itself by energy creation. Life is much easier without believing in doomsday cults.
      - breakyerself 6y ago
        That's bullshit. There is a myriad of ways to get energy without fossil fuels. Wind and Solar are both cheaper than coal now and electric cars are like 97% efficient compared to ICE cars that are closer to 40%. We can replace the fossil fuel energy we use and add more to meet growing demand using wind, solar, nuclear, geothermal, tidal, etc. We need a price on carbon and we need people to get their heads out of their own ass. Also you're understanding of the thermodynamics of climate change are completely bat shit.
      - breakyerself 6y ago
        Exxon HAD ITS OWN CLIMATE SCIENCE PROGRAM which was outfitted with better equipment than most government programs. They weren't just reviewing other scientists theories.
- djohnston 6y ago
  I mean, who is consuming the products built with these resources? The corporations aren't building them for fun, or each other.
  - Teever 6y ago
    corporations are building these products and then paying other corporations to convince people that they need to buy these disposable products made from nonrenewable and unsustainable resources. We wouldn't buy the dumb shit that we use if we weren't convinced that we needed it by marketers.
    - tengbretson 6y ago
      It seems that you have become quite aware of the people that are trying to convince you to buy all these things. Now that you know this, are there steps you are taking to become less convincable?
      - paulryanrogers 6y ago
        I am. Though it's hard to overcome the constant drumbeat of ads that exploit baser instincts. And while education is part of the answer it clearly doesn't work quickly or as thoroughly as regulation to protect the commons.
      - ghego1 6y ago
        Throw away your TV and always use an ad blocker online. You will still be exposed to some ads, but nothing compared to what you are avoiding. In my case it works so well I am often unaware of new "trends" in products adverti
      - xg15 6y ago
        You're pivoting right back to blaming the individual. Why is it my responsibility to not be convinced - but if those companies are bombarding me with propaganda each day, backed by state-of-the-art psychology, that's perfectly fine?
  - 6y ago
mavelikara 6y ago
Dupe of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24535374 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24535374
ncmncm 6y ago
All those tobacco, oil and paint executives retired with their $millions untouched, despite millions of deaths laid right at their doorsteps. Shoot up a Walmart, though, or crash one plane, and the nation goes on a rampage. Laws already on the books allow those executives to be charged personally. I want a Justice Department that will use the law to take on the killers of millions.
- lowdose 6y ago
  Yes exactly this, I think it is the only way to restore faith in capitalism. The bailouts should also over.
  - defterGoose 6y ago
    It's a difficult proposition to "restore faith in capitalism" when the core tenet of that ideology, that consumption is good because it is a marker of human industriousness, is directly responsible for most if not all of the environmental problems that we now face. Am I saying it is a bad thing to expand human knowledge and endeavor? Of course not, I like the medications and conveniences that it has brought me. But these things are also absolutely not an untainted justification of the processes used by capitalism to arrive at the result. The Soviets made great planes and tanks too, and Jonas Salk had no problem giving away the rights to his Polio vaccine. The Apollo program, perhaps the USA's greatest achievement, was also its greatest experiment in communal effort.
- danans 6y ago
  > Shoot up a Walmart ... and the nation goes on a rampage. And rightly so. The most prominent recent example of that was motivated by racism against Hispanics. It was terrorism. Using that as a foil for real crimes by those industry executives (whom I agree in a better society should be held to justice for their actions) reads like an apologism of one type of mass murder for another. There are far lesser crimes - like selling crack - that are far better examples of the unequal application of justice.
  - ncmncm 6y ago
rdlecler1 6y ago
The number one problem with climate science is that it’s not falsifiable in the same way that physics or biology is falsifiable.
- tasty_freeze 6y ago
  That seems unsupportable. Climate models make predictions and those predictions can be checked later. In fact the results are in, and despite what deniers claim, the models are not overstating the problem. If you doubt that, watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugwqXKHLrGk&t=2s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugwqXKHLrGk&t=2s "Gah, just another youtube idiot", I can hear you say. But here is the difference. The guy is a geologist by degree and spent his career as a science reporter. He repeatedly says: don't believe me, just like you shouldn't believe the press reporting on it (which is always prone to simplistic summaries and hyperbole). What sets him apart, besides his level tone, is he reads primary sources (and encourages you to do so too) and cites all of his sources, unlike just about every denialist. If he later finds out he has some fact wrong, he happily admits it and posts the correction prominently in the video description. As far as physics and biology ... those are very broad fields and some of it is falsifiable and some not.
  - rdlecler1 6y ago
    Please read Popper.
- breakyerself 6y ago
  It's not falsifiable in the sense that it's factual and so that makes it practically impossible to falsify, but if it wasn't factual it would absolutely be falsifiable. It isn't like some magical invisible ephemeral floating teapot with no mass that senses peoples attempts to detect it and evades them intelligently.

53 points by daedalus_f 6y ago

The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was getting the average person to blame themselves and not corporations for climate change. The numbers simply don’t add up for a consumer oriented solution to make any sense.

throwawaysea 6y ago
The article isn’t really about whether blame should fall on the individual versus a corporation, but why do you feel it doesn’t fall on individuals? It is individuals’ consumerist habits and hunger for extreme convenience that makes these corporations viable? I see the argument that the individuals didn’t know the tradeoffs (due to deceptive corporate actions the article mentions) but I am not confident that greater clarity would have mattered much either. I feel much of the problem is due to our culture - if you have a large population that wants a lot of things, bad things will happen. If a culture is willing to emphasize living more simply and portraying happiness and status in other ways, consumption will reduce. But culture is bigger than individuals and corporations - and I can’t see blaming just one of them.
- breakyerself 6y ago
  Exxon had their own state of the art climate science department. Way back in 1982 they accurately predicted that in 2020 co2 would be around 415ppm and there would be about 1C of warming. At a time when the average person had never even heard of global warming Exxon had already confirmed their product was irreversibly damaging the planet and shortly thereafter shuttered their science program and began spending millions a year funding public influence campaigns to sew doubt misinformation, and turn the issue into a political wedge. Of course the companies are vastly more culpable than the public. The average person is far too busy trying to keep their lives in order to educate themselves on a highly complicated scientific issue. Especially when much of the population lives within a subculture that would turn on them and ridicule them if they did look into the issue deeply because the fossil fuel PR machine managed to co-opt all of their political and cultural leaders. The corporations had the information, the clarity, and the opportunity to do the right thing. Instead they chose to poison the discourse and stymie progress any way they could. edit: Exxon accurately predicted 1C of warming by 2020 not 2C
  - LifeIsThermal 6y ago
    As I understand, Oil companies only reviewed other scientists theories, they didn´t do research themselves. At the end of the day it will come down to you lowering your living standards by using less energy. Much less energy. And a really large reduction in living standard where everything you consume will cost at least double of what you pay today. Even if you blame the fossile fuel industry, you will have to pay. Oil is the cheapest energy there is. You have the choice today to stop all your emission of co2, so why don´t you? Because it´s uncomfortable. Your comfort is the cause of climate change. I´m fortunate enough to realize that climate change caused by co2 is a thermodynamic impossibility because it implies that earth heats itself by energy creation. Life is much easier without believing in doomsday cults.
    - breakyerself 6y ago
      That's bullshit. There is a myriad of ways to get energy without fossil fuels. Wind and Solar are both cheaper than coal now and electric cars are like 97% efficient compared to ICE cars that are closer to 40%. We can replace the fossil fuel energy we use and add more to meet growing demand using wind, solar, nuclear, geothermal, tidal, etc. We need a price on carbon and we need people to get their heads out of their own ass. Also you're understanding of the thermodynamics of climate change are completely bat shit.
    - breakyerself 6y ago
      Exxon HAD ITS OWN CLIMATE SCIENCE PROGRAM which was outfitted with better equipment than most government programs. They weren't just reviewing other scientists theories.
djohnston 6y ago
I mean, who is consuming the products built with these resources? The corporations aren't building them for fun, or each other.
- Teever 6y ago
  corporations are building these products and then paying other corporations to convince people that they need to buy these disposable products made from nonrenewable and unsustainable resources. We wouldn't buy the dumb shit that we use if we weren't convinced that we needed it by marketers.
  - tengbretson 6y ago
    It seems that you have become quite aware of the people that are trying to convince you to buy all these things. Now that you know this, are there steps you are taking to become less convincable?
    - paulryanrogers 6y ago
      I am. Though it's hard to overcome the constant drumbeat of ads that exploit baser instincts. And while education is part of the answer it clearly doesn't work quickly or as thoroughly as regulation to protect the commons.
    - ghego1 6y ago
      Throw away your TV and always use an ad blocker online. You will still be exposed to some ads, but nothing compared to what you are avoiding. In my case it works so well I am often unaware of new "trends" in products adverti
    - xg15 6y ago
      You're pivoting right back to blaming the individual. Why is it my responsibility to not be convinced - but if those companies are bombarding me with propaganda each day, backed by state-of-the-art psychology, that's perfectly fine?
- 6y ago

mavelikara 6y ago

Dupe of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24535374 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24535374

ncmncm 6y ago

All those tobacco, oil and paint executives retired with their $millions untouched, despite millions of deaths laid right at their doorsteps. Shoot up a Walmart, though, or crash one plane, and the nation goes on a rampage. Laws already on the books allow those executives to be charged personally. I want a Justice Department that will use the law to take on the killers of millions.

lowdose 6y ago
Yes exactly this, I think it is the only way to restore faith in capitalism. The bailouts should also over.
- defterGoose 6y ago
  It's a difficult proposition to "restore faith in capitalism" when the core tenet of that ideology, that consumption is good because it is a marker of human industriousness, is directly responsible for most if not all of the environmental problems that we now face. Am I saying it is a bad thing to expand human knowledge and endeavor? Of course not, I like the medications and conveniences that it has brought me. But these things are also absolutely not an untainted justification of the processes used by capitalism to arrive at the result. The Soviets made great planes and tanks too, and Jonas Salk had no problem giving away the rights to his Polio vaccine. The Apollo program, perhaps the USA's greatest achievement, was also its greatest experiment in communal effort.
danans 6y ago
> Shoot up a Walmart ... and the nation goes on a rampage. And rightly so. The most prominent recent example of that was motivated by racism against Hispanics. It was terrorism. Using that as a foil for real crimes by those industry executives (whom I agree in a better society should be held to justice for their actions) reads like an apologism of one type of mass murder for another. There are far lesser crimes - like selling crack - that are far better examples of the unequal application of justice.
- ncmncm 6y ago

rdlecler1 6y ago

The number one problem with climate science is that it’s not falsifiable in the same way that physics or biology is falsifiable.

tasty_freeze 6y ago
That seems unsupportable. Climate models make predictions and those predictions can be checked later. In fact the results are in, and despite what deniers claim, the models are not overstating the problem. If you doubt that, watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugwqXKHLrGk&t=2s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugwqXKHLrGk&t=2s "Gah, just another youtube idiot", I can hear you say. But here is the difference. The guy is a geologist by degree and spent his career as a science reporter. He repeatedly says: don't believe me, just like you shouldn't believe the press reporting on it (which is always prone to simplistic summaries and hyperbole). What sets him apart, besides his level tone, is he reads primary sources (and encourages you to do so too) and cites all of his sources, unlike just about every denialist. If he later finds out he has some fact wrong, he happily admits it and posts the correction prominently in the video description. As far as physics and biology ... those are very broad fields and some of it is falsifiable and some not.
- rdlecler1 6y ago
  Please read Popper.
breakyerself 6y ago
It's not falsifiable in the sense that it's factual and so that makes it practically impossible to falsify, but if it wasn't factual it would absolutely be falsifiable. It isn't like some magical invisible ephemeral floating teapot with no mass that senses peoples attempts to detect it and evades them intelligently.