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Humans benefit from using energy, but our current energy systems release terrifying amounts of greenhouse gases. Continued global heating will involve mass deat

Humans benefit from using energy, but our current energy systems release terrifying amounts of greenhouse gases. Continued global heating will involve mass death, and a great deal of human suffering along the way. Energy use is necessary to support human life, but limiting energy use is vital to avoid climate catastrophe. It's not a fun problem to have, but you can't wish it away by saying "but people need and enjoy energy!" Of course they do, that's why we need to limit energy use, so that they can enjoy energy in the future, rather than suffering the complete collapse of the systems that allow them to enjoy energy.

djschnei 4y ago
You are wrong. You will have incredibly realtime examples of how dangerous this way of thinking is when winter hits Europe this year. Energy is life. It's not a "nice to have" or something people "enjoy".
- skyfaller 4y ago
  What part of "Energy use is necessary to support human life" did you not understand when I said it? Do you understand that heat waves, flooding, forest fires, and other extreme weather events will interfere with the delivery of energy? Do you understand that water shortages will interfere with the delivery of energy (e.g. nuclear power plants need water for cooling)? Do you understand that resource wars will interfere with the delivery of energy? Do you understand that climate change preventing food from growing will interfere with the survival of the people who deliver the energy? Of course energy is vital to human existence, I recommend e.g. Energy and Civilization by Vaclav Smil to anyone who wants to understand this in great detail: https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/energy-and-civilization https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/energy-and-civilization But the climate crisis will interfere with energy production and delivery, just as it interferes with everything else that humans want or need to do. Refusing to reduce energy usage voluntarily will result in involuntary reduction in energy usage as systems fail.
  - djschnei 4y ago
    > limiting energy use is vital to avoid climate catastrophe. This is what I have issue with. Energy use benefits humanity. Full stop. If you said civilization needs bananas to survive and flourish, then some good samaritan came along and said "I will always buy any leftover bananas you can't sell no matter where or when you grow them", you would get many more banana farms, people experimenting with new banana growing/harvesting technology, etc. It's an undeniable benefit if your goal is to produce more bananas.
    - skyfaller 4y ago
      I'll try a simple analogy: imagine that your goal is to consume as much corn as possible. (A silly goal for many reasons, but that's a different discussion.) You have all of the corn that you've grown to eat, and then there's the seed corn you would need to plant in order to eat more corn in the future. If you decide to eat the seed corn as well, you will eat more corn in the immediate future, and then much less corn after that. Clearly limits to consumption are sometimes necessary in order to maximize consumption over the long term, even if you grant the premise that maximizing consumption is desirable.
      - djschnei 4y ago
        Terrible analogy. Energy production requires large upfront investments in infrastructure. There is nothing analogous to seed in energy. There are only farms and corn that expires extremely quickly and is hard to transport.

djschnei 4y ago

You are wrong. You will have incredibly realtime examples of how dangerous this way of thinking is when winter hits Europe this year. Energy is life. It's not a "nice to have" or something people "enjoy".

skyfaller 4y ago
What part of "Energy use is necessary to support human life" did you not understand when I said it? Do you understand that heat waves, flooding, forest fires, and other extreme weather events will interfere with the delivery of energy? Do you understand that water shortages will interfere with the delivery of energy (e.g. nuclear power plants need water for cooling)? Do you understand that resource wars will interfere with the delivery of energy? Do you understand that climate change preventing food from growing will interfere with the survival of the people who deliver the energy? Of course energy is vital to human existence, I recommend e.g. Energy and Civilization by Vaclav Smil to anyone who wants to understand this in great detail: https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/energy-and-civilization https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/energy-and-civilization But the climate crisis will interfere with energy production and delivery, just as it interferes with everything else that humans want or need to do. Refusing to reduce energy usage voluntarily will result in involuntary reduction in energy usage as systems fail.
- djschnei 4y ago
  > limiting energy use is vital to avoid climate catastrophe. This is what I have issue with. Energy use benefits humanity. Full stop. If you said civilization needs bananas to survive and flourish, then some good samaritan came along and said "I will always buy any leftover bananas you can't sell no matter where or when you grow them", you would get many more banana farms, people experimenting with new banana growing/harvesting technology, etc. It's an undeniable benefit if your goal is to produce more bananas.
  - skyfaller 4y ago
    I'll try a simple analogy: imagine that your goal is to consume as much corn as possible. (A silly goal for many reasons, but that's a different discussion.) You have all of the corn that you've grown to eat, and then there's the seed corn you would need to plant in order to eat more corn in the future. If you decide to eat the seed corn as well, you will eat more corn in the immediate future, and then much less corn after that. Clearly limits to consumption are sometimes necessary in order to maximize consumption over the long term, even if you grant the premise that maximizing consumption is desirable.
    - djschnei 4y ago
      Terrible analogy. Energy production requires large upfront investments in infrastructure. There is nothing analogous to seed in energy. There are only farms and corn that expires extremely quickly and is hard to transport.