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> Someone in his position could do so many things on our little blue dot itself to help those in need. The entire article boils down to this one tired old argu

> Someone in his position could do so many things on our little blue dot itself to help those in need. The entire article boils down to this one tired old argument. And in the case of Musk, while Teslas don't help people in need directly, the adoption of electric cars and other electric transportation will help the entire world population by reducing air pollution and climate change. So, whynotboth.jpg.

qayxc 6y ago
> the adoption of electric cars and other electric transportation will help the entire world population by reducing air pollution and climate change. This one tired old argument again. While reducing air pollution is a plus (at least in city centres), electric cars are nothing but green washing. If you really are concerned about climate change and pollution, reduce the need for cars and own no car. Abandon Euclidian- and single-use zoning (i.e. reverse urban sprawl and make cities liveable again), improve public transport, make cities walkable, improve bike infrastructure, etc. etc. In other words, put in the actual work instead of shifting the problem around and creating even more intrusive infrastructure that needs to be built and maintained ("tunnels", "hyperloops", blah).
- bryanlarsen 6y ago
  The perfect is the enemy of the good. - Voltaire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy
  - qayxc 6y ago
    Haha - that can easily backfire, because by that logic wouldn't it be much easier to just demand better filters and higher norms for ICE cars? You don't even have to change anything if you just keep driving your 2010 ICE car until it literally rusts away under your buttocks instead of buying a new car (electric or not). It'd be interesting to compare the actual CO² and energy use difference (including manufacturing costs for the new car) between driving an existing ICE car less frequently and keeping it longer versus buying a new electric car while keeping the the same driving habits.
  - shrimp_emoji 6y ago
    More like the fallacy of relative privation: ```(also known as "appeal to worse problems" or "not as bad as") – dismissing an argument or complaint due to what are perceived to be more important problems. First World problems are a subset of this fallacy.```[0] 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies
- johnjj257 6y ago
  Rofl wow man you can trash anything must be nice to just shit on geniune development and call it crap. The issue is the article actually had a tired argument, your broken attempt to reframe electric cars as useless is really bizarre and not fitting at all to the sentiment it just points out how shallow and negative you are being
  - qayxc 6y ago
    > shit on geniune development and call it crap. That "genuine development" you talk about is over 140 years old. In fact the very first cars in mass use were electric and it was only later ICE cars became more popular due their advantages (back then). It's not a new or even great development at all if nothing changes in the end - you still need to build these cars, old ICE cars won't just disappear either - they'll be shipped to poorer countries in turn increasing their air pollution and need for infrastructure. So instead of viewing my point as "shitting on things", how about refuting it with counter facts instead? Like, how is it better to still rely on individual transport, huge wasted areas due to sealed natural ground for roads and parking spaces, the inefficiency of urban sprawl and ridiculous zoning laws which necessitates cars in the first place, deaths and injuries from car accidents, etc. etc.? Electric cars are like treating symptoms instead of the cause and the treatment basically just trades one symptom (air- and noise pollution) for another (need for more infrastructure) while leaving others untouched (roads, parking spaces, cities built for cars not humans, etc.) and celebrating them as a solution to environmental problems is... very irritating, to say the least.
    - johnjj257 6y ago
      ROFL NO. The entire sentiment is a kids argument and you sound like a crying kid and a hater. No one's gonna refute the ""arguments"" because it's a fucking long dipshit statement of epic proportions. Who wants to argue with a 5 year old?
- alexvoda 6y ago
  The role that can achieve those goals is not antrepreneour but politician or beaurocrat. Just because someone has proven to be a high achiever does not mean you get to retroactively choose what career they should have had. Put in the actual work yourself instead of shifting the blame on others for not enacting the changes you desire. Note: I agree all the issues you listed (mostly city life related) are real important issues. And they are hard issues. Especially because they are not technical issues. And I would love to see them fixed. But they are not Musks responsability.
  - qayxc 6y ago
    I understand that it's not Musk's job to fix these issues. I just take issue with his (and especially his devout followers') claims that electric cars are any sort of "fix" apart from air pollution in densely populated areas. They're a band-aid at most. By the way Musk did and still does claim to provide "fixes" for these problems: tunnels, hyperloops, and point-to-point rocket flights, because "I would love to see my customers in Riyadh, leave in the morning and be back in time to make dinner" - you know, as one does. [1] The thinking there isn't visionary at all - it's good old 20th (or even 19th) century thinking with 21st century tech applied to them. I mean - why even fly all the way to Riyadh in the first place if you could instead improve tele-presence to the point that physically going there doesn't make much difference anymore? > Put in the actual work yourself instead of shifting the blame on others for not enacting the changes you desire. First of all - cheap shot, especially since it's not me who declares that electric cars are the solution to pollution and climate change and it's not me who advocates for personal lifts into underground tunnels under every home to fix traffic. Secondly - I don't own a car and take the bike, the bus and the train instead. I live by my principles, even if it hurts sometimes. What about you? [1] https://www.ted.com/talks/gwynne_shotwell_spacex_s_plan_to_fly_you_across_the_globe_in_30_minutes#t-1017088 https://www.ted.com/talks/gwynne_shotwell_spacex_s_plan_to_f...
    - TeMPOraL 6y ago
      > I just take issue with his (and especially his devout followers') claims that electric cars are any sort of "fix" apart from air pollution in densely populated areas. They're a band-aid at most. Oh come on. Electric cars are a fix, just not a total fix. Cars are going to be replaced by new cars anyway, and replacing them with electric instead of ICE is strictly, objectively better for the climate problem, as it cuts emissions down and increases energy efficiency. Would it be better if we had less cars and more public transit? Sure. It's also a completely orthogonal problem. Also, what would be even better than more of current public transit? Fully electrified public transit. That is a possibility now only because of development done for electric cars. I'm reminded of "Copenhagen Interpretation of Morality" - the view that if you as much as touch or comment on an issue, or worse, try to do something towards fixing a part of it, you suddenly become responsible for it all, and judged by not coming up with a complete solution.

qayxc 6y ago

> the adoption of electric cars and other electric transportation will help the entire world population by reducing air pollution and climate change. This one tired old argument again. While reducing air pollution is a plus (at least in city centres), electric cars are nothing but green washing. If you really are concerned about climate change and pollution, reduce the need for cars and own no car. Abandon Euclidian- and single-use zoning (i.e. reverse urban sprawl and make cities liveable again), improve public transport, make cities walkable, improve bike infrastructure, etc. etc. In other words, put in the actual work instead of shifting the problem around and creating even more intrusive infrastructure that needs to be built and maintained ("tunnels", "hyperloops", blah).

bryanlarsen 6y ago
The perfect is the enemy of the good. - Voltaire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy
- qayxc 6y ago
  Haha - that can easily backfire, because by that logic wouldn't it be much easier to just demand better filters and higher norms for ICE cars? You don't even have to change anything if you just keep driving your 2010 ICE car until it literally rusts away under your buttocks instead of buying a new car (electric or not). It'd be interesting to compare the actual CO² and energy use difference (including manufacturing costs for the new car) between driving an existing ICE car less frequently and keeping it longer versus buying a new electric car while keeping the the same driving habits.
- shrimp_emoji 6y ago
  More like the fallacy of relative privation: ```(also known as "appeal to worse problems" or "not as bad as") – dismissing an argument or complaint due to what are perceived to be more important problems. First World problems are a subset of this fallacy.```[0] 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies
johnjj257 6y ago
Rofl wow man you can trash anything must be nice to just shit on geniune development and call it crap. The issue is the article actually had a tired argument, your broken attempt to reframe electric cars as useless is really bizarre and not fitting at all to the sentiment it just points out how shallow and negative you are being
- qayxc 6y ago
  > shit on geniune development and call it crap. That "genuine development" you talk about is over 140 years old. In fact the very first cars in mass use were electric and it was only later ICE cars became more popular due their advantages (back then). It's not a new or even great development at all if nothing changes in the end - you still need to build these cars, old ICE cars won't just disappear either - they'll be shipped to poorer countries in turn increasing their air pollution and need for infrastructure. So instead of viewing my point as "shitting on things", how about refuting it with counter facts instead? Like, how is it better to still rely on individual transport, huge wasted areas due to sealed natural ground for roads and parking spaces, the inefficiency of urban sprawl and ridiculous zoning laws which necessitates cars in the first place, deaths and injuries from car accidents, etc. etc.? Electric cars are like treating symptoms instead of the cause and the treatment basically just trades one symptom (air- and noise pollution) for another (need for more infrastructure) while leaving others untouched (roads, parking spaces, cities built for cars not humans, etc.) and celebrating them as a solution to environmental problems is... very irritating, to say the least.
  - johnjj257 6y ago
    ROFL NO. The entire sentiment is a kids argument and you sound like a crying kid and a hater. No one's gonna refute the ""arguments"" because it's a fucking long dipshit statement of epic proportions. Who wants to argue with a 5 year old?
alexvoda 6y ago
The role that can achieve those goals is not antrepreneour but politician or beaurocrat. Just because someone has proven to be a high achiever does not mean you get to retroactively choose what career they should have had. Put in the actual work yourself instead of shifting the blame on others for not enacting the changes you desire. Note: I agree all the issues you listed (mostly city life related) are real important issues. And they are hard issues. Especially because they are not technical issues. And I would love to see them fixed. But they are not Musks responsability.
- qayxc 6y ago
  I understand that it's not Musk's job to fix these issues. I just take issue with his (and especially his devout followers') claims that electric cars are any sort of "fix" apart from air pollution in densely populated areas. They're a band-aid at most. By the way Musk did and still does claim to provide "fixes" for these problems: tunnels, hyperloops, and point-to-point rocket flights, because "I would love to see my customers in Riyadh, leave in the morning and be back in time to make dinner" - you know, as one does. [1] The thinking there isn't visionary at all - it's good old 20th (or even 19th) century thinking with 21st century tech applied to them. I mean - why even fly all the way to Riyadh in the first place if you could instead improve tele-presence to the point that physically going there doesn't make much difference anymore? > Put in the actual work yourself instead of shifting the blame on others for not enacting the changes you desire. First of all - cheap shot, especially since it's not me who declares that electric cars are the solution to pollution and climate change and it's not me who advocates for personal lifts into underground tunnels under every home to fix traffic. Secondly - I don't own a car and take the bike, the bus and the train instead. I live by my principles, even if it hurts sometimes. What about you? [1] https://www.ted.com/talks/gwynne_shotwell_spacex_s_plan_to_fly_you_across_the_globe_in_30_minutes#t-1017088 https://www.ted.com/talks/gwynne_shotwell_spacex_s_plan_to_f...
  - TeMPOraL 6y ago
    > I just take issue with his (and especially his devout followers') claims that electric cars are any sort of "fix" apart from air pollution in densely populated areas. They're a band-aid at most. Oh come on. Electric cars are a fix, just not a total fix. Cars are going to be replaced by new cars anyway, and replacing them with electric instead of ICE is strictly, objectively better for the climate problem, as it cuts emissions down and increases energy efficiency. Would it be better if we had less cars and more public transit? Sure. It's also a completely orthogonal problem. Also, what would be even better than more of current public transit? Fully electrified public transit. That is a possibility now only because of development done for electric cars. I'm reminded of "Copenhagen Interpretation of Morality" - the view that if you as much as touch or comment on an issue, or worse, try to do something towards fixing a part of it, you suddenly become responsible for it all, and judged by not coming up with a complete solution.