3 ms·

We're presently operating at a level of abstraction that makes it impossible to accept or dismiss anything.

• dredmorbius 5y ago
  Several items are concretised in this thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27998576 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27998576 I've addressed specific dismissals and their proponents numerous times on my subreddit, search "cornucopians": https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/search?q=cornucopians&restrict_sr=on https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/search?q=cornucopians&r... One of the most cogent arguments for limits I've found is in William Ophuls, Ecology and the Politics of Scarcity, most especially the first three chapters. The book is available on the Internet Archive: https://archive.org/details/ecologypoliticso0000ophu/page/n7/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/ecologypoliticso0000ophu/page/n7... As well as many libraries: https://www.worldcat.org/search?qt=worldcat_org_all&q=au%3Aophuls%20william%20ti%3Aecology%20politics%20scarcity https://www.worldcat.org/search?qt=worldcat_org_all&q=au%3Ao... Other examples of dismissed consequences can be found in the works of Naomi Oreskes, notably Merchants of Doubt, on the negative long-term latent and complex consequences of asbestos, lead, CFCs, cigarette smoke, and fossil fuels. There are also the consequences of pesticides (both environmental contamination and increased resistance), antibiotics (resistance), various medications (thalidomide comes to mind), advertising, shipping (invasive species), just off the top of my head. Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome argues compellingly that civilisations co-evolve with their plagues, which raises some interesting implications. I've been suggesting in conversations elsewhere that we're living in an era of consequences.