7 ms·

Yeah, somehow I don't believe it. If we truly are only 7 years away from being totally fucked then I don't think we can actually do anything about it at this p

Yeah, somehow I don't believe it. If we truly are only 7 years away from being totally fucked then I don't think we can actually do anything about it at this point. I mean, if it's true I feel like my coworkers who talk about this kind of stuff all the time would trade in their SUVs and start carpooling... You know, actually try to do something about it. But even the people I know who believe the world is gonna end in 7 years bc of global warming don't do anything about it unless it's superficial and only requires them to post a comment online.

ayngg 5y ago
Generally the most outspoken climate change activists are the ones that will be affected the least by the costs of policy. The worst that will happen to them is there might be a little more crime in their area or things might be a little more expensive, things of that nature. Meanwhile the monumental social and economic upheaval it would likely cause would mimic the American Midwest after de-industrialization in many places. Maybe we should tell them all to learn how to code and it would miraculously solve everything.
UncleOxidant 5y ago
Yeah, I don't think we're 7 years away from totally fucked. I think it's probably more like we reached the totally fucked point 7 years ago but most won't realize it for another 7 years.
- RattleyCooper 5y ago
  I feel like looking at a prominent climate scientist's lifestyle, and looking at the measures they take would be a good indication of how fucked we are. If we are truly fucked I imagine they're taking some pretty drastic measures to do their part to fix the problem (or if we're passed the point of no return, to prepare for societal collapse or w/e).
  - aisengard 5y ago
    Their part to fix the problem would be to make sure they're able to do the maximum to affect things at a macro level. That means not bothering to obsess about individual acts of emitting carbon, or putting finite resources into guilt-mollifying individual carbon offsets. If an environmentalist needs to attend a conference where they can better-influence the movers and shakers of the world, then they should take the most convenient form of transport to get there, not a sailboat.
    - Syonyk 5y ago
      Can you point to any instance in history when a stance of "Suffering for thee, not for me!" has actually worked well? If the people who claim to be leading the movement aren't even willing to take major steps in their own lives to reduce their impact, how are they likely to lead others in that direction? Humans always have been, and always will, remain quite sensitive to hypocrisy. I can make the best arguments ever heard for a vegan diet, but if I do so while munching a bacon double cheeseburger on the side, nobody is going to take me even the slightest bit seriously.
      - aisengard 5y ago
        You're missing the point. Humans/citizens generally don't need to change their behavior, the world needs to change how it meets the demands of humans. There may be some environmentalists out there who say we need degrowth, or we all need to live in a commune, but those people are not going to be the ones who deliver the solution, because you're right, no one is going to bother following those people into the abyss, even if they do practice what they preach.
        AstralStorm 5y ago
        There are a few things we can and must do immediately. 1) Build any big power plants that will work for 30 years with no carbon emissions. If you're near equator or right on thermal vents, this may be renewable. Otherwise, build the darn nuclear fission plants post haste. We do not have 50 years to develop the alternative technologies. We barely have 15 to deploy all this. (I'm counting 3.5 C increase as likely deadly.) Close all fossil fuel plants. (You can have some for emergencies, just offline.) No ifs, buts or whens. This immediately makes electric cars and other transportation more useful and viable too. Tax won't do, it would get passed on to users. This includes oil and gas pipelines. They need to go. 2) Pour everything we can research wise into carbon capture or other means of cooling the planet, keeping water and food supplies rinning. Biotech, physics, chemistry, space technologies. It's too late to research clean energy sources at this point, though improvements in batteries and decentralized grid will be nice too. Heck, halt ITER if it will get these researchers to work on immediately critical problems. (Like say desalination or batteries even.) 3) Ban fossil fueled transportation. Tax won't do, it's too slow and weak. Reduce transportation if we can. Note that this immediately kills big airplane operators. (Electric or renewable don't have the mileage - use boats or airships.) To avoid the temptation, retrofit or scrap these immediately instead of shipping to poor countries. 4) Stop making stuff from hydrocarbons. There are alternative plastics that do not outgas or require methane. Heck, growing feedstock for some will capture carbon. 5) Prepare agriculture and housing for extreme climate, depending on place this will be drought, cyclones, floods, desertification, even potentially freezing. There are ways to deal with every such challenge. For the love of all that is holy, stop cutting Amazon forests for beef farming. Provide incentives and alternatives, and if that does not work, outright ban it. Ensure all farming is redone to minimize methane emissions. 6) Secure garbage disposal against methane outflow and water table contamination. Do not ship garbage thousands kilometers away to not be processed.
lm28469 5y ago
Going vegetarian or selling your suv won't do much when the entire world agrees that capitalism/consumerism and globalization are the ways to go.
- RattleyCooper 5y ago
  Then the people who aren't willing to do anything about it should just shut up already. It's like complaining that the person in the stall next to you is making the bathroom smell like shit, while you sit there taking a dump.
  - handrous 5y ago
    "We probably need to do something about our CO2 scrubbers on this space ship we're all traveling on. They don't seem to be working very well." "OH COME ON, if you were serious you'd have spaced yourself by now so you stop generating CO2. Just shut up already." [EDIT] OK so that's hyperbole but I do think it's absurd to disregard someone's opinion on climate change because they haven't voluntarily and unilaterally upended their own life in order to delay warming by, maybe, a few seconds.
  - aisengard 5y ago
    Those people generally aren't the ones trying to shame people into making mostly useless actions that don't move the needle. They know full well that the solution involves change at the highest levels. Individual action isn't solving this. Even a general shift in consumer-led actions isn't solving this. The only thing solving this at this point is coordinated, international action, changing how we produce, which is the only thing that will change how we consume at a level sufficient enough to be meaningful. Think about the difference between how we individually spend time and effort to sort our recyclables, and how meaningless (and even harmful) that turned out to be, when the real problem was that governments weren't cracking down the unnecessary production of plastics.
firebaze 5y ago
About 2 years ago the most probable scenario was 1.5° Kelvin until 2100. Now we're at 2.5° Kelvin. If this is right, there's nothing we can do at all, as long as CO² is the sole factor. If it's not right, we should do what we can to improve our models and - most importantly - search for all possible factors influencing the climate. The worst imaginable situation would be we're focusing just on CO² and then, just before extinction, realize the problem wasn't primarily CO² but methane, or atmospheric dust, or decreased albedo due to unknown effect, or whatever else. Edit: as obvious as I hope this is, but nevertheless: we MUST do anything we can to reduce CO²! But we should definitely not forget to investigate other possible causes for the raise in temperature. Edit2: Corrections
- endymi0n 5y ago
  Do you have any sources for this? I'm pretty sure 1.5°K was never a probable scenario, merely the internationally accepted one by the Paris Agreement for acceptable damage control. If anything, we're still spot on the target corridor that Shell (secretly) plotted 40 years ago: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2018/sep/19/shell-and-exxons-secret-1980s-climate-change-warnings https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97...
  - firebaze 5y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Report_on_Global_Warming_of_1.5_%C2%B0C https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Report_on_Global_Warmi... 2018, OK, but this was in the press until at least 2020 here in germany. Could provide links, if desired.
Syonyk 5y ago
I remain greatly annoyed by the class of individual who is typically well off, talks frequently about climate change, and has the attitude that "This is so important that the only thing one can possibly do is Vote Democrat and wait for them to fix it." While living a high carbon international type life that they likely don't even bother offsetting (because those are scams, you know - and I do agree with them there, carbon offsets smell very strongly of indulgences). And it extends on upwards. I've yet to hear a compelling reason why a many-millionaire needs a huge house, but many certainly go that route. If you actually believed in what you were talking about regarding climate change, I can think of an awful lot of better ways to put tens of millions to use than a mansion with the heating and cooling energy requirements of a small island nation.
- Bhilai 5y ago
  Voting for Democrats also does pretty much nothing evident from the current stalemate on the 3.5T plan.
  - aisengard 5y ago
    Whereas if we did not vote for Democrats, we'd have many policies that make things even worse. Remember, Republicans have agency too, and they use it to make everything much, much worse. Voting for Democrats, even if it's just to block Republican virulence, is therefore an undeniable positive act.
    - Syonyk 5y ago
      My objection is with the commonly held position that the solution to climate change is to "Sit back, relax, and Vote Democrat." That seems pretty well likely to end up in the same spot as "Doing nothing."
      - aisengard 5y ago
        It's actually much more effective than expending energy obsessing about how much carbon you're emitting on a daily basis. Use that energy instead to vote/support/campaign for Democrats, because the marginal utility of having more Democrats in power is exponentially more important, given the consequences of not having them in power.
bko 5y ago
I don't think anyone actually believes this number. Think about what your life would be like if you literally believe the end of the world is coming in 7 years. I certainly wouldn't have kids. And if I were trying to change the world, I certainly wouldn't be focusing on Western countries who have had their emissions going down in absolute terms for the last few decades. I would focus on China who is the largest contributor to CO2 and is the fastest growing contributor. But dunking on the Chinese government isn't as satisfying as blaming the west. Sure it might not be fair that China would never be able to enjoy the luxuries of the US, but we're talking about the literal end of the world. So lets focus on the place where we can make the most impact. And to those that will reply that it's all actually driven by western countries outsourcing dirty production to poor countries, if you look at the trade adjusted CO2 emissions (excludes production for trade purposes), you'll see that consumption based emissions are still ~90% of China's CO2 ( see China: Consumption-based accounting: how do emissions compare when we adjust for trade?) [0] https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/each-countrys-share-co2-emissions https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/each-countrys-share-co2-emi... [1] https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china
- fishtoaster 5y ago
  It sound like[0] This is not saying the world end in 7 years, nor is it even exactly saying something weaker like "the world will end in 50 years, but we have 7 years to prevent it." Rather, it's saying we have 7 years (at current emission levels) before we're over a 60% chance of eventually warming by 1.5˚C, which will probably have high-impact, potentially devastating effects. [0] https://climateclock.world/science#deadline https://climateclock.world/science#deadline
  - bko 5y ago
    It may be true, but its also true that such claims are always being made with a 5-10 year time-span, so people are weary: > In 1989, a senior U.N. environmental official said, “Entire nations could be wiped off the face of the Earth by rising sea levels if the global warming trend is not reversed by the year 2000.” https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nations-vanish-global-warming/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nations-vanish-global-warm...
endymi0n 5y ago
With all due respect, while OPs point is maximally shortened and alarmist, it's not claiming the world will end in 7 years. What's the case is that we're about 7 years away from the tipping point after which, no matter what we do, the world will stop being a hospitable place for 10-20% (and growing) of the world population starting another 10-20 years from that. Mankind itself will most probably survive. How the world will look like fending off a billion people from moving to more moderate climates is a different story I'm still not fully ready to mentally prepare.
- handrous 5y ago
  > Mankind itself will most probably survive. How the world will look like fending off a billion people from moving to more moderate climates is a different story I'm still not fully ready to mentally prepare. I'm pretty sure avoiding exactly the, uh, violent horror that is likely to result from that, is why New Zealand is such a popular place for billionaires to set up their doomsday retreats, lately. Hard to have a crush of unexpected and unwelcome climate migrants rushing over your border when reaching your country requires ships.
throwaway894345 5y ago
> I mean, if it's true I feel like my coworkers who talk about this kind of stuff all the time would trade in their SUVs and start carpooling... You know, actually try to do something about it. The problem is that no amount of "personal responsibility" is going to put a dent in the problem. The overwhelming majority of emissions come from industry, and the only way industry is going to change is by fiat, and a carbon price is probably the most efficient class of solution. And this "personal responsibility" mythology is intentionally cultivated by polluters. They want you to think that we can just change our lifestyles, because the actual solutions will invariably curb their profits. This means that the most effective thing you or I can do is vote, advocate, write our representatives, and donate to political causes, but 3/4 of those aren't outwardly visible to you and the other looks like "comments on the internet" in many cases. That said, I doubt 7 is the right number. I'm of the impression that the error margins are so large that we're not sure if we're already in "irreversible runaway global warming" territory or whether that remains decades off. Certainly "7" is too precise. In whichever case, urgency is absolutely warranted.
- Syonyk 5y ago
  > The overwhelming majority of emissions come from industry, Producing... what, exactly? Right, "consumer goods." Or upstream supply chains for said, or machines to produce the machines that build said, or... etc. "Consume less" solves an awful lot of problems too, but when the people who talk loudest about how awful climate change is going to be aren't willing to do so, they're unlikely to lead many people. Like her or not, Greta at least attempts to live something resembling a sane response to what she's talking about.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    > Producing... what, exactly? Right, "consumer goods." Or upstream supply chains for said, or machines to produce the machines that build said, or... etc. Sorry to ruin your mic drop moment, but... Of course, there is no way for individuals to know how much pollution was involved in the manufacture of the item, so the fact that they're manufacturing things that ultimately bottom out in consumer goods and services doesn't actually do anything. Even if you really want to minimize your footprint, you basically have to trust the packaging about whether the product is actually "green" ("greenwashing" exists as a term precisely because the packaging can't be trusted). But you can't cheat carbon pricing. And consumers don't even need to care about the environment--carbon pricing aligns their economic interests with the interests of the climate, so the cheapest products will be the greenest. Of course, that really puts a damper on the fun for those of us who like to make a big show about how much we sacrifice for the environment.
trappist 5y ago
Don't believe what, exactly? 0 emissions in 7 years, or else what? Even if we get to 20 years and nothing has yet happened, this could still stand. There is no proposition or prediction.

ayngg 5y ago

Generally the most outspoken climate change activists are the ones that will be affected the least by the costs of policy. The worst that will happen to them is there might be a little more crime in their area or things might be a little more expensive, things of that nature. Meanwhile the monumental social and economic upheaval it would likely cause would mimic the American Midwest after de-industrialization in many places. Maybe we should tell them all to learn how to code and it would miraculously solve everything.

UncleOxidant 5y ago

Yeah, I don't think we're 7 years away from totally fucked. I think it's probably more like we reached the totally fucked point 7 years ago but most won't realize it for another 7 years.

RattleyCooper 5y ago
I feel like looking at a prominent climate scientist's lifestyle, and looking at the measures they take would be a good indication of how fucked we are. If we are truly fucked I imagine they're taking some pretty drastic measures to do their part to fix the problem (or if we're passed the point of no return, to prepare for societal collapse or w/e).
- aisengard 5y ago
  Their part to fix the problem would be to make sure they're able to do the maximum to affect things at a macro level. That means not bothering to obsess about individual acts of emitting carbon, or putting finite resources into guilt-mollifying individual carbon offsets. If an environmentalist needs to attend a conference where they can better-influence the movers and shakers of the world, then they should take the most convenient form of transport to get there, not a sailboat.
  - Syonyk 5y ago
    Can you point to any instance in history when a stance of "Suffering for thee, not for me!" has actually worked well? If the people who claim to be leading the movement aren't even willing to take major steps in their own lives to reduce their impact, how are they likely to lead others in that direction? Humans always have been, and always will, remain quite sensitive to hypocrisy. I can make the best arguments ever heard for a vegan diet, but if I do so while munching a bacon double cheeseburger on the side, nobody is going to take me even the slightest bit seriously.
    - aisengard 5y ago
      You're missing the point. Humans/citizens generally don't need to change their behavior, the world needs to change how it meets the demands of humans. There may be some environmentalists out there who say we need degrowth, or we all need to live in a commune, but those people are not going to be the ones who deliver the solution, because you're right, no one is going to bother following those people into the abyss, even if they do practice what they preach.
      - AstralStorm 5y ago
        There are a few things we can and must do immediately. 1) Build any big power plants that will work for 30 years with no carbon emissions. If you're near equator or right on thermal vents, this may be renewable. Otherwise, build the darn nuclear fission plants post haste. We do not have 50 years to develop the alternative technologies. We barely have 15 to deploy all this. (I'm counting 3.5 C increase as likely deadly.) Close all fossil fuel plants. (You can have some for emergencies, just offline.) No ifs, buts or whens. This immediately makes electric cars and other transportation more useful and viable too. Tax won't do, it would get passed on to users. This includes oil and gas pipelines. They need to go. 2) Pour everything we can research wise into carbon capture or other means of cooling the planet, keeping water and food supplies rinning. Biotech, physics, chemistry, space technologies. It's too late to research clean energy sources at this point, though improvements in batteries and decentralized grid will be nice too. Heck, halt ITER if it will get these researchers to work on immediately critical problems. (Like say desalination or batteries even.) 3) Ban fossil fueled transportation. Tax won't do, it's too slow and weak. Reduce transportation if we can. Note that this immediately kills big airplane operators. (Electric or renewable don't have the mileage - use boats or airships.) To avoid the temptation, retrofit or scrap these immediately instead of shipping to poor countries. 4) Stop making stuff from hydrocarbons. There are alternative plastics that do not outgas or require methane. Heck, growing feedstock for some will capture carbon. 5) Prepare agriculture and housing for extreme climate, depending on place this will be drought, cyclones, floods, desertification, even potentially freezing. There are ways to deal with every such challenge. For the love of all that is holy, stop cutting Amazon forests for beef farming. Provide incentives and alternatives, and if that does not work, outright ban it. Ensure all farming is redone to minimize methane emissions. 6) Secure garbage disposal against methane outflow and water table contamination. Do not ship garbage thousands kilometers away to not be processed.

lm28469 5y ago

Going vegetarian or selling your suv won't do much when the entire world agrees that capitalism/consumerism and globalization are the ways to go.

RattleyCooper 5y ago
Then the people who aren't willing to do anything about it should just shut up already. It's like complaining that the person in the stall next to you is making the bathroom smell like shit, while you sit there taking a dump.
- handrous 5y ago
  "We probably need to do something about our CO2 scrubbers on this space ship we're all traveling on. They don't seem to be working very well." "OH COME ON, if you were serious you'd have spaced yourself by now so you stop generating CO2. Just shut up already." [EDIT] OK so that's hyperbole but I do think it's absurd to disregard someone's opinion on climate change because they haven't voluntarily and unilaterally upended their own life in order to delay warming by, maybe, a few seconds.
- aisengard 5y ago
  Those people generally aren't the ones trying to shame people into making mostly useless actions that don't move the needle. They know full well that the solution involves change at the highest levels. Individual action isn't solving this. Even a general shift in consumer-led actions isn't solving this. The only thing solving this at this point is coordinated, international action, changing how we produce, which is the only thing that will change how we consume at a level sufficient enough to be meaningful. Think about the difference between how we individually spend time and effort to sort our recyclables, and how meaningless (and even harmful) that turned out to be, when the real problem was that governments weren't cracking down the unnecessary production of plastics.

firebaze 5y ago

About 2 years ago the most probable scenario was 1.5° Kelvin until 2100. Now we're at 2.5° Kelvin. If this is right, there's nothing we can do at all, as long as CO² is the sole factor. If it's not right, we should do what we can to improve our models and - most importantly - search for all possible factors influencing the climate. The worst imaginable situation would be we're focusing just on CO² and then, just before extinction, realize the problem wasn't primarily CO² but methane, or atmospheric dust, or decreased albedo due to unknown effect, or whatever else. Edit: as obvious as I hope this is, but nevertheless: we MUST do anything we can to reduce CO²! But we should definitely not forget to investigate other possible causes for the raise in temperature. Edit2: Corrections

endymi0n 5y ago
Do you have any sources for this? I'm pretty sure 1.5°K was never a probable scenario, merely the internationally accepted one by the Paris Agreement for acceptable damage control. If anything, we're still spot on the target corridor that Shell (secretly) plotted 40 years ago: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2018/sep/19/shell-and-exxons-secret-1980s-climate-change-warnings https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97...
- firebaze 5y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Report_on_Global_Warming_of_1.5_%C2%B0C https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Report_on_Global_Warmi... 2018, OK, but this was in the press until at least 2020 here in germany. Could provide links, if desired.

Syonyk 5y ago

I remain greatly annoyed by the class of individual who is typically well off, talks frequently about climate change, and has the attitude that "This is so important that the only thing one can possibly do is Vote Democrat and wait for them to fix it." While living a high carbon international type life that they likely don't even bother offsetting (because those are scams, you know - and I do agree with them there, carbon offsets smell very strongly of indulgences). And it extends on upwards. I've yet to hear a compelling reason why a many-millionaire needs a huge house, but many certainly go that route. If you actually believed in what you were talking about regarding climate change, I can think of an awful lot of better ways to put tens of millions to use than a mansion with the heating and cooling energy requirements of a small island nation.

Bhilai 5y ago
Voting for Democrats also does pretty much nothing evident from the current stalemate on the 3.5T plan.
- aisengard 5y ago
  Whereas if we did not vote for Democrats, we'd have many policies that make things even worse. Remember, Republicans have agency too, and they use it to make everything much, much worse. Voting for Democrats, even if it's just to block Republican virulence, is therefore an undeniable positive act.
  - Syonyk 5y ago
    My objection is with the commonly held position that the solution to climate change is to "Sit back, relax, and Vote Democrat." That seems pretty well likely to end up in the same spot as "Doing nothing."
    - aisengard 5y ago
      It's actually much more effective than expending energy obsessing about how much carbon you're emitting on a daily basis. Use that energy instead to vote/support/campaign for Democrats, because the marginal utility of having more Democrats in power is exponentially more important, given the consequences of not having them in power.

bko 5y ago

I don't think anyone actually believes this number. Think about what your life would be like if you literally believe the end of the world is coming in 7 years. I certainly wouldn't have kids. And if I were trying to change the world, I certainly wouldn't be focusing on Western countries who have had their emissions going down in absolute terms for the last few decades. I would focus on China who is the largest contributor to CO2 and is the fastest growing contributor. But dunking on the Chinese government isn't as satisfying as blaming the west. Sure it might not be fair that China would never be able to enjoy the luxuries of the US, but we're talking about the literal end of the world. So lets focus on the place where we can make the most impact. And to those that will reply that it's all actually driven by western countries outsourcing dirty production to poor countries, if you look at the trade adjusted CO2 emissions (excludes production for trade purposes), you'll see that consumption based emissions are still ~90% of China's CO2 ( see China: Consumption-based accounting: how do emissions compare when we adjust for trade?) [0] https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/each-countrys-share-co2-emissions https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/each-countrys-share-co2-emi... [1] https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china

fishtoaster 5y ago
It sound like[0] This is not saying the world end in 7 years, nor is it even exactly saying something weaker like "the world will end in 50 years, but we have 7 years to prevent it." Rather, it's saying we have 7 years (at current emission levels) before we're over a 60% chance of eventually warming by 1.5˚C, which will probably have high-impact, potentially devastating effects. [0] https://climateclock.world/science#deadline https://climateclock.world/science#deadline
- bko 5y ago
  It may be true, but its also true that such claims are always being made with a 5-10 year time-span, so people are weary: > In 1989, a senior U.N. environmental official said, “Entire nations could be wiped off the face of the Earth by rising sea levels if the global warming trend is not reversed by the year 2000.” https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nations-vanish-global-warming/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nations-vanish-global-warm...

endymi0n 5y ago

With all due respect, while OPs point is maximally shortened and alarmist, it's not claiming the world will end in 7 years. What's the case is that we're about 7 years away from the tipping point after which, no matter what we do, the world will stop being a hospitable place for 10-20% (and growing) of the world population starting another 10-20 years from that. Mankind itself will most probably survive. How the world will look like fending off a billion people from moving to more moderate climates is a different story I'm still not fully ready to mentally prepare.

handrous 5y ago
> Mankind itself will most probably survive. How the world will look like fending off a billion people from moving to more moderate climates is a different story I'm still not fully ready to mentally prepare. I'm pretty sure avoiding exactly the, uh, violent horror that is likely to result from that, is why New Zealand is such a popular place for billionaires to set up their doomsday retreats, lately. Hard to have a crush of unexpected and unwelcome climate migrants rushing over your border when reaching your country requires ships.

throwaway894345 5y ago

> I mean, if it's true I feel like my coworkers who talk about this kind of stuff all the time would trade in their SUVs and start carpooling... You know, actually try to do something about it. The problem is that no amount of "personal responsibility" is going to put a dent in the problem. The overwhelming majority of emissions come from industry, and the only way industry is going to change is by fiat, and a carbon price is probably the most efficient class of solution. And this "personal responsibility" mythology is intentionally cultivated by polluters. They want you to think that we can just change our lifestyles, because the actual solutions will invariably curb their profits. This means that the most effective thing you or I can do is vote, advocate, write our representatives, and donate to political causes, but 3/4 of those aren't outwardly visible to you and the other looks like "comments on the internet" in many cases. That said, I doubt 7 is the right number. I'm of the impression that the error margins are so large that we're not sure if we're already in "irreversible runaway global warming" territory or whether that remains decades off. Certainly "7" is too precise. In whichever case, urgency is absolutely warranted.

Syonyk 5y ago
> The overwhelming majority of emissions come from industry, Producing... what, exactly? Right, "consumer goods." Or upstream supply chains for said, or machines to produce the machines that build said, or... etc. "Consume less" solves an awful lot of problems too, but when the people who talk loudest about how awful climate change is going to be aren't willing to do so, they're unlikely to lead many people. Like her or not, Greta at least attempts to live something resembling a sane response to what she's talking about.
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  > Producing... what, exactly? Right, "consumer goods." Or upstream supply chains for said, or machines to produce the machines that build said, or... etc. Sorry to ruin your mic drop moment, but... Of course, there is no way for individuals to know how much pollution was involved in the manufacture of the item, so the fact that they're manufacturing things that ultimately bottom out in consumer goods and services doesn't actually do anything. Even if you really want to minimize your footprint, you basically have to trust the packaging about whether the product is actually "green" ("greenwashing" exists as a term precisely because the packaging can't be trusted). But you can't cheat carbon pricing. And consumers don't even need to care about the environment--carbon pricing aligns their economic interests with the interests of the climate, so the cheapest products will be the greenest. Of course, that really puts a damper on the fun for those of us who like to make a big show about how much we sacrifice for the environment.

trappist 5y ago

Don't believe what, exactly? 0 emissions in 7 years, or else what? Even if we get to 20 years and nothing has yet happened, this could still stand. There is no proposition or prediction.