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Climate change is terrifying, but I also have a hard time taking self titled Doomers totally seriously. It makes sense to consider all of the worst case scenari

Climate change is terrifying, but I also have a hard time taking self titled Doomers totally seriously. It makes sense to consider all of the worst case scenarios for any event, and to prepare for them. But Doomers seem to have an obsession with it, and a need to convince others that the worst will happen. I noticed this a lot in 2020. COVID was (and is) awful, but there was so much shit that Doomers claimed would happen that year that just didn't. They seem to have a bias towards always considering the worst case scenario the most likely.

jazzyjackson 3y ago
Apocalyptic Ideation see also: the book of revelations There will always be people fixated on The End, some because they think we all deserve it, others because they can't seperate their own existential crisis from potential global crises
- PheonixPharts 3y ago
  And still others because they've started looking at the pieces of how our global society functions as a system and realized that it's very possible we have pushed our environment beyond it's ability to support us. Leading ultimately to overshoot which leads to collapse.
  - jjoonathan 3y ago
    Maybe, but they never seem to weigh any of the challenges against humanity's staggering ability to adapt and overcome. Doomerism has planet-sized infomercial hands. There is a long and embarassing trail of false apocalypses predicted from extrapolations + assumptions of helplessness, often made by otherwise intelligent and scientifically inclined people. We were all going to starve, but then Haber figured out how to chemically fix Nitrogen. Nuclear war was going to end the world, but then MAD actually worked. The ozone hole was going to cook the plant life, but then we cleaned up our refrigerants. We were going to run out of oil by 2010, but then we found more. Betting against humanity isn't a historically wise move. You don't have a choice in the matter, and it's easy to fixate on this and imagine yourself trapped, but you are "trapped" with one hell of a fighting chance so the truth is you just don't know.
    - PheonixPharts 3y ago
      > they never seem to weigh any of the challenges against humanity's staggering ability to adapt and overcome. I'm not sure who the "they" you're referring to is, but the fast majority of authors/researchers I've read on these topics are quite well aware. The problem is the vast majority of this "adapt and overcome" has been based on two major things: - Historically: a geologically remarkable period of climate stability - More recent: abundant fossil fuels Malthus was wrong because he failed to predict the Haber process. But currently the Haber process relies heavily on fossil fuels. We didn't produce astoundingly more food per acre then ever before in history because we are incredibly smart, but because we had ready access to hydrocarbons. The same logic follows for nearly all great inventions of recent eras > Betting against humanity isn't a historically wise move. I see this comment all the time but it's a very odd one. As far as species go humans are very, very young and survived very little, just about 300,000 years. Additionally, like I said, we've only existed as a species during one of the most stable climates in the history of the planet. One final point on the "people always think the world is ending!" rhetoric. We've only really started seeing strong apocalyptic thinking in the last several hundred years. Let's say, for argument, that humans were wiped out in the next 100 years. Alien scientists visiting would see people thinking about the end times in the last 1/300,000 of the species' existence to be fairly prescient, even if they were off by several of their own species lifetimes. On top of that the writing on this topic is not without merit historically. Revelations was written during the Siege of Jerusalem, when things were collapsing for the world of the author. Most medieval apocalyptic literature was written or based on the black death which wiped out between 30-50 percent of Europe. Hardly irrational beliefs that the world is ending based solely on existential anxiety. There's also an obvious logical fallacy in all this thinking. Most of the time when people look up webMD they think they have cancer, and they don't most of the time. But it doesn't logically follow that they can't have cancer no matter how strong the evidence.
      - jjoonathan 3y ago
        My thesis was: > the truth is you just don't know You disproved: > it doesn't logically follow that they can't have cancer Good job, you really pwned that straw man. Also, I want to preserve this one for posterity, because I'm pretty sure it's hilariously wrong but I have better things to do than dig through the literature right now: > We've only really started seeing strong apocalyptic thinking in the last several hundred years.
doubled112 3y ago
Personally, I like to prepare for the worst but hope for the best. I wish more people would take a reasonable middle approach like that. Are we still, as a society, allowed to do things like that? The reality is rarely "as bad as we imagined" OR "nothing is wrong at all".
- Trasmatta 3y ago
  I guess the problem I run into is that "the worst" as proposed by Doomers is usually so bad that there's no way for me to prepare for it except by becoming a full time prepper. And that just becomes exhausting to even consider, so it's easier to fall into the trap of either depression or complete inaction instead.
  - doubled112 3y ago
    I've come to accept that I simply can't be prepared for everything. I don't think my landlords would approve of a bunker. And where would I put it? The whole property is 25x75 feet. "Prepare" is sometimes "realize that I'm completely screwed and I have to die of something someday". Everything is temporary, after all, including me and you.
no_wizard 3y ago
My take on it is that "well presented doomers"[0], if you will, serve to balance the "well presented optimists"[1] in that they are needed in society so we can have some take on how things could actually go wrong and sound warnings for potentially catastrophic failures. Its important though, that I think it needs moderating, like not everything "Doomers" say needs to be taken at face value, its important that others can come up and really either shore up their case or make a case for different more likely outcomes, for instance. I feel the same way about overly optimistic takes as well. They serve an important function in society to keep us aware of just how fragile things can be and that we need to be vigilant about understanding the second order affects of our actions as a society. [0]: Ones that generally rely on nonpartisan facts / science / evidence for making their claims, without resorting to debunked information to further their claims and/or not relying on conspiracy theories, for instance. [1]: I'd put alot of technologists in this group, for an example. People who constantly hype real breakthroughs and advancements as proof that we will always be trending upward as a species
- abracadaniel 3y ago
  One downside though is that people generally love an excuse to avoid change or avoid additional effort. “It’s not real, so we don’t have to do anything” is functionally equivalent to “it’s already too late, so why bother doing anything”
  - no_wizard 3y ago
    This is true even with positive things. I wish I had a good answer for human nature and resistance to change, as that would be game changing generally speaking
  - DoingIsLearning 3y ago
    I disagree, learned helpless is an easy attack on realists who tell it as it is. We consistently fall in the worst case scenario of most climate models so much so that "faster than expected" is now a meme. It is indeed too late to avoid famine and water wars but it is not too late to keep large parts of the world still livable. I would very much like my children and my children's children to have a fighting chance.
smolder 3y ago
I think it's an error to regard "doomers" as a cohesive group.

jazzyjackson 3y ago

Apocalyptic Ideation see also: the book of revelations There will always be people fixated on The End, some because they think we all deserve it, others because they can't seperate their own existential crisis from potential global crises

PheonixPharts 3y ago
And still others because they've started looking at the pieces of how our global society functions as a system and realized that it's very possible we have pushed our environment beyond it's ability to support us. Leading ultimately to overshoot which leads to collapse.
- jjoonathan 3y ago
  Maybe, but they never seem to weigh any of the challenges against humanity's staggering ability to adapt and overcome. Doomerism has planet-sized infomercial hands. There is a long and embarassing trail of false apocalypses predicted from extrapolations + assumptions of helplessness, often made by otherwise intelligent and scientifically inclined people. We were all going to starve, but then Haber figured out how to chemically fix Nitrogen. Nuclear war was going to end the world, but then MAD actually worked. The ozone hole was going to cook the plant life, but then we cleaned up our refrigerants. We were going to run out of oil by 2010, but then we found more. Betting against humanity isn't a historically wise move. You don't have a choice in the matter, and it's easy to fixate on this and imagine yourself trapped, but you are "trapped" with one hell of a fighting chance so the truth is you just don't know.
  - PheonixPharts 3y ago
    > they never seem to weigh any of the challenges against humanity's staggering ability to adapt and overcome. I'm not sure who the "they" you're referring to is, but the fast majority of authors/researchers I've read on these topics are quite well aware. The problem is the vast majority of this "adapt and overcome" has been based on two major things: - Historically: a geologically remarkable period of climate stability - More recent: abundant fossil fuels Malthus was wrong because he failed to predict the Haber process. But currently the Haber process relies heavily on fossil fuels. We didn't produce astoundingly more food per acre then ever before in history because we are incredibly smart, but because we had ready access to hydrocarbons. The same logic follows for nearly all great inventions of recent eras > Betting against humanity isn't a historically wise move. I see this comment all the time but it's a very odd one. As far as species go humans are very, very young and survived very little, just about 300,000 years. Additionally, like I said, we've only existed as a species during one of the most stable climates in the history of the planet. One final point on the "people always think the world is ending!" rhetoric. We've only really started seeing strong apocalyptic thinking in the last several hundred years. Let's say, for argument, that humans were wiped out in the next 100 years. Alien scientists visiting would see people thinking about the end times in the last 1/300,000 of the species' existence to be fairly prescient, even if they were off by several of their own species lifetimes. On top of that the writing on this topic is not without merit historically. Revelations was written during the Siege of Jerusalem, when things were collapsing for the world of the author. Most medieval apocalyptic literature was written or based on the black death which wiped out between 30-50 percent of Europe. Hardly irrational beliefs that the world is ending based solely on existential anxiety. There's also an obvious logical fallacy in all this thinking. Most of the time when people look up webMD they think they have cancer, and they don't most of the time. But it doesn't logically follow that they can't have cancer no matter how strong the evidence.
    - jjoonathan 3y ago
      My thesis was: > the truth is you just don't know You disproved: > it doesn't logically follow that they can't have cancer Good job, you really pwned that straw man. Also, I want to preserve this one for posterity, because I'm pretty sure it's hilariously wrong but I have better things to do than dig through the literature right now: > We've only really started seeing strong apocalyptic thinking in the last several hundred years.

doubled112 3y ago

Personally, I like to prepare for the worst but hope for the best. I wish more people would take a reasonable middle approach like that. Are we still, as a society, allowed to do things like that? The reality is rarely "as bad as we imagined" OR "nothing is wrong at all".

Trasmatta 3y ago
I guess the problem I run into is that "the worst" as proposed by Doomers is usually so bad that there's no way for me to prepare for it except by becoming a full time prepper. And that just becomes exhausting to even consider, so it's easier to fall into the trap of either depression or complete inaction instead.
- doubled112 3y ago
  I've come to accept that I simply can't be prepared for everything. I don't think my landlords would approve of a bunker. And where would I put it? The whole property is 25x75 feet. "Prepare" is sometimes "realize that I'm completely screwed and I have to die of something someday". Everything is temporary, after all, including me and you.

no_wizard 3y ago

My take on it is that "well presented doomers"[0], if you will, serve to balance the "well presented optimists"[1] in that they are needed in society so we can have some take on how things could actually go wrong and sound warnings for potentially catastrophic failures. Its important though, that I think it needs moderating, like not everything "Doomers" say needs to be taken at face value, its important that others can come up and really either shore up their case or make a case for different more likely outcomes, for instance. I feel the same way about overly optimistic takes as well. They serve an important function in society to keep us aware of just how fragile things can be and that we need to be vigilant about understanding the second order affects of our actions as a society. [0]: Ones that generally rely on nonpartisan facts / science / evidence for making their claims, without resorting to debunked information to further their claims and/or not relying on conspiracy theories, for instance. [1]: I'd put alot of technologists in this group, for an example. People who constantly hype real breakthroughs and advancements as proof that we will always be trending upward as a species

abracadaniel 3y ago
One downside though is that people generally love an excuse to avoid change or avoid additional effort. “It’s not real, so we don’t have to do anything” is functionally equivalent to “it’s already too late, so why bother doing anything”
- no_wizard 3y ago
  This is true even with positive things. I wish I had a good answer for human nature and resistance to change, as that would be game changing generally speaking
- DoingIsLearning 3y ago
  I disagree, learned helpless is an easy attack on realists who tell it as it is. We consistently fall in the worst case scenario of most climate models so much so that "faster than expected" is now a meme. It is indeed too late to avoid famine and water wars but it is not too late to keep large parts of the world still livable. I would very much like my children and my children's children to have a fighting chance.

smolder 3y ago

I think it's an error to regard "doomers" as a cohesive group.