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This is part of the plot of my current holiday read: Termination Shock by Neal Stephenson (published 2021). Given that the startup was founded in Oct 2022 [1],

This is part of the plot of my current holiday read: Termination Shock by Neal Stephenson (published 2021). Given that the startup was founded in Oct 2022 [1], I wonder if they were inspired by the book. [1]: https://makesunsets.com/pages/about https://makesunsets.com/pages/about

andyjsong 4y ago
We were.
- gubneor 4y ago
  Whats it like being a rogue?
  - hef19898 4y ago
    According to the CEOs words in the article, the better question how it is being a bind villain leading a cult. Not sure how releasing sulfur into the atmosphere can be legal so.
    - voiper1 4y ago
      Sounds more like he thinks he's chaotic good, not a blind villain.
      - idontwantthis 4y ago
        I think he meant “Bond villain”. James Bond.
    - kadoban 4y ago
      > Not sure how releasing sulfur into the atmosphere can be legal so. At a guess: nobody thought to make a law against it yet and/or nobody with power has yet tried to apply an existing law to it.
      - andyjsong 4y ago
        >At a guess: nobody thought to make a law against it yet and/or nobody with power has yet tried to apply an existing law to it. This was the most surprising thing we discovered, it's the wild west. The closest thing we found was https://2009-2017.state.gov/t/isn/4783.htm https://2009-2017.state.gov/t/isn/4783.htm. We're not hostile, we come in peace.
        tsimionescu 4y ago
        You're willfully releasing pollutants into the atmosphere to see what happens, and hoping something good will come of it. I very very much doubt this can't be shut down by some environmental agency, if they only care to look. Even if there is no specific law about it, you can't normally just release stuff into the shared environment - you have to have some kind of dispensation for it (like the oil and coal industries unfortunately have for their own pollution, for example).
        piva00 4y ago
        So I hope your actions turn it into not-Wild West anymore. Launching sulfur into the stratosphere with the noble goal of increasing Earth's albedo might sound good locally but you don't seem to have applied any systems theory or scientific experiments to understand what complex interactions your actions might generate. The atmosphere is not a simple system, your actions might have very unintended consequences and you don't even seem phased by that...
        hef19898 4y ago
        Because one could make the point, that this companies goal is to make ten bucks per credit off of people that fall for all there we-save-the-world crap. So there won#t be more than trace amounts of sulfur up there, if at all. And yes, even it would scale they don't seem to care too much. makes me somehow think of the Klean, with a K, billionaire type from "Glass Onion".
        klyrs 4y ago
        > We're not hostile, we come in peace. Bearing gifts of free blankets! Since you're calling this the "wild west," I sure hope you know your history.
  - andyjsong 4y ago
    It's like being the first monkey in space. You're standing on the shoulders of giants.
    - rpastuszak 4y ago
      It's funny, because the image I have in my head is a little monkey wearing a fez, also standing on a shoulder of a giant. The monkey thinks it's important, because everyone's clapping. I rarely engage in comments like this, but I think what you're doing is irresponsible, selfish, myopic and needs to be pointed out. Tone down the god complex if you really want to help the cause.
    - nextaccountic 4y ago
      That's fitting. The first monkey in space was sacrificed for humanity's self-centered project. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkeys_and_apes_in_space https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkeys_and_apes_in_space > The first primate launched into subspace was Albert, a rhesus macaque, who on June 11, 1948, rode a rocket flight to over 63 km (39 mi) in Earth's atmosphere on a V-2 rocket. Albert died of suffocation during the flight and may actually have died in the cramped space capsule before launch.[1][2][3] Killing Albert was entirely unneeded; we did it because we could.
- starwatch 4y ago
  I recall the PayPal peeps were similarly inspired by Cryptonomicon. It's incredible how much influence Neal Stephenson's imagination has!
- gavanwilhite 4y ago
  I know your intentions here are good. However, you aren’t being “edgy” or “bold”, you are being unwise. This is not a place to shoot from the hip. Rationalizing from science fiction, has serious failure-modes, and your approach risks poisoning public support for an important climate intervention. If you want to do right by this, you need to steelman the scientists critical of your work. Reflect back to them the best version of their argument until they agree that you understand it.
  - TEP_Kim_Il_Sung 4y ago
    Or just do what public policy did for medicine in the last five years.
- zmgsabst 4y ago
  You realize if you harm the environment unilaterally, people will execute you — right?
  - TEP_Kim_Il_Sung 4y ago
    The key is to nationalize the harm; People are blind to the pollution when government does it, and if they do notice, you can blame the opposition, or just resign. Nobody who really screws up gets held accountable in government unless it helps someone get elected, so be sure to have dirt on enough people.
  - gremlinsinc 4y ago
    Just playing devil's advocate but are you being facetious? Because I'm pretty sure the execs at Dupont have not been executed, and there's not many companies with a bigger environmental impact than Dupont at least with chemicals in our drinking water, other than oil companies of course but you could argue those are secondary effects since most of the damage comes from a resource they sell and use.
ackbar03 4y ago
Is there a happy ending in that book?
- jillesvangurp 4y ago
  The whole outrage around this company is the very topic of the novel. It's a bit of a crazy plot and it artificially compresses the timeline a bit. But is not actually that far off the mark in terms of the urgency and the level of desperation that might cause some countries to act sooner than later. Or the violence that that might provoke. So, the ending of the book is a bit open ended. But it's a "the cat is out of the bag" type ending as well. As in, since we're trying this anyway and it seems to be working, multiple countries start replicating the effort and people move on. By the end of the book, there are multiple countries doing this. And they would be the countries most affected by the consequences of global warming. There are a few zones in the world where billions of people live that are going to be ground zero for any such effects that are also booming economies. Basically, much of Africa, China, India, etc. And indeed parts of the US with some extremely high value real estate on some of its coastal areas (like Houston, as the book speculates). So, the notion that these people in these economies are just going to sit there fiddling their thumbs until their economies collapse under the effects of global warming is unlikely. When something plausible comes along that works or might work, they'll support it. And some will start acting pro-actively. And others will counter act. It might get ugly. I think the book mostly got this right and we'll see this play out in slow motion in the next few decades.
  - throwuwu 4y ago
    So what happens if these interested parties see a lot of success and want to do even better? India and the Middle East are quite hot, it would be a nicer climate if they cooled it down by a few degrees. What would that do to North America, Europe and Asia?
euroderf 4y ago
It also figures in The Ministry of the Future, by KSR.

andyjsong 4y ago

We were.

gubneor 4y ago
Whats it like being a rogue?
- hef19898 4y ago
  According to the CEOs words in the article, the better question how it is being a bind villain leading a cult. Not sure how releasing sulfur into the atmosphere can be legal so.
  - voiper1 4y ago
    Sounds more like he thinks he's chaotic good, not a blind villain.
    - idontwantthis 4y ago
      I think he meant “Bond villain”. James Bond.
  - kadoban 4y ago
    > Not sure how releasing sulfur into the atmosphere can be legal so. At a guess: nobody thought to make a law against it yet and/or nobody with power has yet tried to apply an existing law to it.
    - andyjsong 4y ago
      >At a guess: nobody thought to make a law against it yet and/or nobody with power has yet tried to apply an existing law to it. This was the most surprising thing we discovered, it's the wild west. The closest thing we found was https://2009-2017.state.gov/t/isn/4783.htm https://2009-2017.state.gov/t/isn/4783.htm. We're not hostile, we come in peace.
      - tsimionescu 4y ago
        You're willfully releasing pollutants into the atmosphere to see what happens, and hoping something good will come of it. I very very much doubt this can't be shut down by some environmental agency, if they only care to look. Even if there is no specific law about it, you can't normally just release stuff into the shared environment - you have to have some kind of dispensation for it (like the oil and coal industries unfortunately have for their own pollution, for example).
      - piva00 4y ago
        So I hope your actions turn it into not-Wild West anymore. Launching sulfur into the stratosphere with the noble goal of increasing Earth's albedo might sound good locally but you don't seem to have applied any systems theory or scientific experiments to understand what complex interactions your actions might generate. The atmosphere is not a simple system, your actions might have very unintended consequences and you don't even seem phased by that...
        hef19898 4y ago
        Because one could make the point, that this companies goal is to make ten bucks per credit off of people that fall for all there we-save-the-world crap. So there won#t be more than trace amounts of sulfur up there, if at all. And yes, even it would scale they don't seem to care too much. makes me somehow think of the Klean, with a K, billionaire type from "Glass Onion".
      - klyrs 4y ago
        > We're not hostile, we come in peace. Bearing gifts of free blankets! Since you're calling this the "wild west," I sure hope you know your history.
- andyjsong 4y ago
  It's like being the first monkey in space. You're standing on the shoulders of giants.
  - rpastuszak 4y ago
    It's funny, because the image I have in my head is a little monkey wearing a fez, also standing on a shoulder of a giant. The monkey thinks it's important, because everyone's clapping. I rarely engage in comments like this, but I think what you're doing is irresponsible, selfish, myopic and needs to be pointed out. Tone down the god complex if you really want to help the cause.
  - nextaccountic 4y ago
    That's fitting. The first monkey in space was sacrificed for humanity's self-centered project. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkeys_and_apes_in_space https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkeys_and_apes_in_space > The first primate launched into subspace was Albert, a rhesus macaque, who on June 11, 1948, rode a rocket flight to over 63 km (39 mi) in Earth's atmosphere on a V-2 rocket. Albert died of suffocation during the flight and may actually have died in the cramped space capsule before launch.[1][2][3] Killing Albert was entirely unneeded; we did it because we could.
starwatch 4y ago
I recall the PayPal peeps were similarly inspired by Cryptonomicon. It's incredible how much influence Neal Stephenson's imagination has!
gavanwilhite 4y ago
I know your intentions here are good. However, you aren’t being “edgy” or “bold”, you are being unwise. This is not a place to shoot from the hip. Rationalizing from science fiction, has serious failure-modes, and your approach risks poisoning public support for an important climate intervention. If you want to do right by this, you need to steelman the scientists critical of your work. Reflect back to them the best version of their argument until they agree that you understand it.
- TEP_Kim_Il_Sung 4y ago
  Or just do what public policy did for medicine in the last five years.
zmgsabst 4y ago
You realize if you harm the environment unilaterally, people will execute you — right?
- TEP_Kim_Il_Sung 4y ago
  The key is to nationalize the harm; People are blind to the pollution when government does it, and if they do notice, you can blame the opposition, or just resign. Nobody who really screws up gets held accountable in government unless it helps someone get elected, so be sure to have dirt on enough people.
- gremlinsinc 4y ago
  Just playing devil's advocate but are you being facetious? Because I'm pretty sure the execs at Dupont have not been executed, and there's not many companies with a bigger environmental impact than Dupont at least with chemicals in our drinking water, other than oil companies of course but you could argue those are secondary effects since most of the damage comes from a resource they sell and use.

ackbar03 4y ago

Is there a happy ending in that book?

jillesvangurp 4y ago
The whole outrage around this company is the very topic of the novel. It's a bit of a crazy plot and it artificially compresses the timeline a bit. But is not actually that far off the mark in terms of the urgency and the level of desperation that might cause some countries to act sooner than later. Or the violence that that might provoke. So, the ending of the book is a bit open ended. But it's a "the cat is out of the bag" type ending as well. As in, since we're trying this anyway and it seems to be working, multiple countries start replicating the effort and people move on. By the end of the book, there are multiple countries doing this. And they would be the countries most affected by the consequences of global warming. There are a few zones in the world where billions of people live that are going to be ground zero for any such effects that are also booming economies. Basically, much of Africa, China, India, etc. And indeed parts of the US with some extremely high value real estate on some of its coastal areas (like Houston, as the book speculates). So, the notion that these people in these economies are just going to sit there fiddling their thumbs until their economies collapse under the effects of global warming is unlikely. When something plausible comes along that works or might work, they'll support it. And some will start acting pro-actively. And others will counter act. It might get ugly. I think the book mostly got this right and we'll see this play out in slow motion in the next few decades.
- throwuwu 4y ago
  So what happens if these interested parties see a lot of success and want to do even better? India and the Middle East are quite hot, it would be a nicer climate if they cooled it down by a few degrees. What would that do to North America, Europe and Asia?

euroderf 4y ago

It also figures in The Ministry of the Future, by KSR.