5 ms·

That's to be expected, the global variation over the last 2 decades has been about .2-.3 celsius. That's very difficult to notice, and basically completely swam

That's to be expected, the global variation over the last 2 decades has been about .2-.3 celsius. That's very difficult to notice, and basically completely swamped by local variations (what is called weather, not climate). The thing is climate change is an almost perfect example of the boiling frog parable. It occurs over several decades, just enough to cause skepticism or feelings of "it's not changing so quickly". See NASA's graph: https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/global-temperature/ https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/global-temperature/ This rate however is probably almost without precedents geologically, save for extreme events like giant eruptions or something. It's hard for life to adapt this quickly, on top of the many other habitat pressures we've introduced. Also, there will be significant consequences for humans (which could be catastrophic and hard to predict if we don't limit warming to say 2C). What frustrates me is that there's still significant resistance to not destroying our own home...

jongjong 3y ago
Given that it's such a small change... Surely this is not a problem for our generation. It definitely does not appear to be a problem that's worth destroying financial opportunities on a massive scale and enabling totalitarian governments in the current era. The way I see climate change activism is that elites want to fix the climate at the expense of the lower classes of society... In a time when wealth inequality is at an all time high and without the consent of the lower classes. This is incorrect. First, we have to fix inequality problem so that the pain of the transition will fall more or less evenly on everyone's shoulders... Then once this is the case, everyone should have more time to think about climate problems and we can expect broad support. Of course, 'we' will all be long dead by then. I feel totally fine and morally justified in leaving this problem to a future generation. Most people in my generation have way too many concrete personal problems concerning their own survival in a week's time to worry about abstract problems such as the survival of the human race in a few hundred years. ...Not to mention that in a few generations' time, if we focus on maximizing access to opportunities, through the resulting innovation, we will probably end up with extremely efficient renewable energy which will be able to fight climate change far more effectively with no sacrifices necessary. It seems literally like a no-brainer to me to just let the free market do what it does best in terms of innovation. Shut down government money printers and dismantle policies that are harmful to the free market and which centralize opportunities and create tech monopolies to control the masses. That's not the way. It needs to be done honestly. What's the point of even allowing the human race to survive if it turns the global economy into a squid game and only the most dishonest, manipulative people will remain?
jfengel 3y ago
...often, here on HN, whose members pride themselves on rational thinking and scientific prowess.
jlarocco 3y ago
> What frustrates me is that there's still significant resistance to not destroying our own home... It's really not a big deal - humans will adapt to deal with the changes, or they'll go extinct and something else will evolve.
- 2358452 3y ago
  Sure, but I'd rather live in paradise than burn my house. In that sense nothing's a big deal, but it is for me. I believe we all deserve good lives. The best adaptation to burning your house is the rational thought "Perhaps I should not burn my house". :) It dreads me to think we so much lost contact with living well that many don't care anymore. I think the first step in the journey would be to stop the destructive culture of desperate consumerism, greed, consumption, overwork and ill-being. Maybe that's something we should be prioritizing alongside climate change, as a species. Living well in our homes, and as a community.
  - sokoloff 3y ago
    Living well requires energy and lots of it. There are billions of people who aspire to use far more energy than they are currently using, in order to live better. Who are we to say that they can't use as much energy as we do/did? (I know you're not saying that directly, but it's hard to imagine how half the population could bring themself up to even the median energy consumption without dramatic increases in climate changing forces.)
    - 2358452 3y ago
      I think this is a false conundrum. We should use as much energy as we sustainably can, without destroying ourselves, if that improves our well being. But not more. And we should also make sure that all humans have good conditions. I think the essence of what makes a good life is surprisingly inexpensive in terms of resources. I believe that planning well, we can achieve a good compromise for everyone involved, with a larger focus on those more in need. Moreover, energy consumption isn't so significant as emissions per Watt. Our capacity for solar energy could sustain even energy growth without significant emissions. We already have the technology to make the transition. To reiterate, whatever we do, sitting back and watching the world burn (in an almost literal sense) is not a reasonable option!
AlexandrB 3y ago
> It occurs over several decades, just enough to cause skepticism or feelings of "it's not changing so quickly". It's also important to realize that this isn't all "natural" skepticism and there's plenty of money being thrown around to spread FUD about the causes, severity, and consequences of climate change.
- userbinator 3y ago
  Skepticism isn't the problemj; blind belief is --- and there's plenty of money being thrown around to do that too.
  - photonerd 3y ago
    Yes, but mostly on the denialism side
    - userbinator 3y ago
      Judging by the posts here and in mainstream media, I doubt that.
      - mngnt 3y ago
        Consider the economics. There are HUGE companies with a history of influencing legislature, lobbying an lying to everyone, whose existence depends on us to continue not caring about climate change. People like us can hardly imagine the amount of money they are throwing at us in the form of marketing, lobbying, astroturfing, etc. They are literally making money off us not taking action. Otoh, I cannot think of a single billion dollar company that got where it is by being climate friendly.
        userbinator 3y ago
        Media companies get views by being sensationalistic and spreading paranoia. Governments love that too, since it means another excuse they can use to enact more authoritarian policies. The Internet has taken that to the next level.
mongol 3y ago
> Also, there will be significant consequences for humans (which could be catastrophic and hard to predict if we don't limit warming to say 2C) I have trouble visualizing what form the catastrophe would take. The worst I can imagine is global famine, is that what we are talking about here? Or rather local famine, acting as catalysts to civil unrest, wars etc? Basically, I think the climate debate gets fuzzy here. Granted, just like you say, it gets hard to predict, but given that, what makes certain temperatures a threshold for disaster?
- Wojtkie 3y ago
  If oceans get too hot, fisheries will collapse and wreck coastal communities. Sea level rise will make storm surges worse and make "once in a lifetime" events more common. This instability will drive a migration of people inland, essentially as ecological refugees.
  - valval 3y ago
    Then what? Keep going.
olalonde 3y ago
It's interesting you chose the boiling frog parable because it's a fallacy. Skeptics contend that climate change will not precipitate an abrupt catastrophe; rather, humanity will simply adapt to it. To illustrate, the Earth's temperature has already risen by approximately 1 degree since the inception of industrialization, yet our lives have arguably improved significantly during this period. Would we willingly forsake the past century of human progress to revert the global temperature back by that single degree? This seems improbable, and yet it is a viewpoint advocated by certain climate change alarmists who propose concepts like degrowth.
- mulmen 3y ago
  > Would we willingly forsake the past century of human progress to revert the global temperature back by that single degree? Eh. I see what you are saying but have we felt the full effect? Do any of us have a perception of what was lost that would let us even make such a determination?
- sanp 3y ago
  Why do we need to sacrifice living standards to control emissions?
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - valval 3y ago
    How could we not? In the western world we might be able to, but that means poor people will start dying elsewhere.
- ClassyJacket 3y ago
  It's not alarmism to say we should take action to prevent out extinction. By your logic, people who call emergency services when a building is on fire are "alarmists". There has literally NEVER been a problem anywhere near as large as climate change, including World War 2. If being concerned about literally the largest problem to have ever existed is 'alarmism', then your position is simply that it's impossible for anything bad to ever happen.

jongjong 3y ago

Given that it's such a small change... Surely this is not a problem for our generation. It definitely does not appear to be a problem that's worth destroying financial opportunities on a massive scale and enabling totalitarian governments in the current era. The way I see climate change activism is that elites want to fix the climate at the expense of the lower classes of society... In a time when wealth inequality is at an all time high and without the consent of the lower classes. This is incorrect. First, we have to fix inequality problem so that the pain of the transition will fall more or less evenly on everyone's shoulders... Then once this is the case, everyone should have more time to think about climate problems and we can expect broad support. Of course, 'we' will all be long dead by then. I feel totally fine and morally justified in leaving this problem to a future generation. Most people in my generation have way too many concrete personal problems concerning their own survival in a week's time to worry about abstract problems such as the survival of the human race in a few hundred years. ...Not to mention that in a few generations' time, if we focus on maximizing access to opportunities, through the resulting innovation, we will probably end up with extremely efficient renewable energy which will be able to fight climate change far more effectively with no sacrifices necessary. It seems literally like a no-brainer to me to just let the free market do what it does best in terms of innovation. Shut down government money printers and dismantle policies that are harmful to the free market and which centralize opportunities and create tech monopolies to control the masses. That's not the way. It needs to be done honestly. What's the point of even allowing the human race to survive if it turns the global economy into a squid game and only the most dishonest, manipulative people will remain?

jfengel 3y ago

...often, here on HN, whose members pride themselves on rational thinking and scientific prowess.

jlarocco 3y ago

> What frustrates me is that there's still significant resistance to not destroying our own home... It's really not a big deal - humans will adapt to deal with the changes, or they'll go extinct and something else will evolve.

2358452 3y ago
Sure, but I'd rather live in paradise than burn my house. In that sense nothing's a big deal, but it is for me. I believe we all deserve good lives. The best adaptation to burning your house is the rational thought "Perhaps I should not burn my house". :) It dreads me to think we so much lost contact with living well that many don't care anymore. I think the first step in the journey would be to stop the destructive culture of desperate consumerism, greed, consumption, overwork and ill-being. Maybe that's something we should be prioritizing alongside climate change, as a species. Living well in our homes, and as a community.
- sokoloff 3y ago
  Living well requires energy and lots of it. There are billions of people who aspire to use far more energy than they are currently using, in order to live better. Who are we to say that they can't use as much energy as we do/did? (I know you're not saying that directly, but it's hard to imagine how half the population could bring themself up to even the median energy consumption without dramatic increases in climate changing forces.)
  - 2358452 3y ago
    I think this is a false conundrum. We should use as much energy as we sustainably can, without destroying ourselves, if that improves our well being. But not more. And we should also make sure that all humans have good conditions. I think the essence of what makes a good life is surprisingly inexpensive in terms of resources. I believe that planning well, we can achieve a good compromise for everyone involved, with a larger focus on those more in need. Moreover, energy consumption isn't so significant as emissions per Watt. Our capacity for solar energy could sustain even energy growth without significant emissions. We already have the technology to make the transition. To reiterate, whatever we do, sitting back and watching the world burn (in an almost literal sense) is not a reasonable option!

AlexandrB 3y ago

> It occurs over several decades, just enough to cause skepticism or feelings of "it's not changing so quickly". It's also important to realize that this isn't all "natural" skepticism and there's plenty of money being thrown around to spread FUD about the causes, severity, and consequences of climate change.

userbinator 3y ago
Skepticism isn't the problemj; blind belief is --- and there's plenty of money being thrown around to do that too.
- photonerd 3y ago
  Yes, but mostly on the denialism side
  - userbinator 3y ago
    Judging by the posts here and in mainstream media, I doubt that.
    - mngnt 3y ago
      Consider the economics. There are HUGE companies with a history of influencing legislature, lobbying an lying to everyone, whose existence depends on us to continue not caring about climate change. People like us can hardly imagine the amount of money they are throwing at us in the form of marketing, lobbying, astroturfing, etc. They are literally making money off us not taking action. Otoh, I cannot think of a single billion dollar company that got where it is by being climate friendly.
      - userbinator 3y ago
        Media companies get views by being sensationalistic and spreading paranoia. Governments love that too, since it means another excuse they can use to enact more authoritarian policies. The Internet has taken that to the next level.

mongol 3y ago

> Also, there will be significant consequences for humans (which could be catastrophic and hard to predict if we don't limit warming to say 2C) I have trouble visualizing what form the catastrophe would take. The worst I can imagine is global famine, is that what we are talking about here? Or rather local famine, acting as catalysts to civil unrest, wars etc? Basically, I think the climate debate gets fuzzy here. Granted, just like you say, it gets hard to predict, but given that, what makes certain temperatures a threshold for disaster?

Wojtkie 3y ago
If oceans get too hot, fisheries will collapse and wreck coastal communities. Sea level rise will make storm surges worse and make "once in a lifetime" events more common. This instability will drive a migration of people inland, essentially as ecological refugees.
- valval 3y ago
  Then what? Keep going.

olalonde 3y ago

It's interesting you chose the boiling frog parable because it's a fallacy. Skeptics contend that climate change will not precipitate an abrupt catastrophe; rather, humanity will simply adapt to it. To illustrate, the Earth's temperature has already risen by approximately 1 degree since the inception of industrialization, yet our lives have arguably improved significantly during this period. Would we willingly forsake the past century of human progress to revert the global temperature back by that single degree? This seems improbable, and yet it is a viewpoint advocated by certain climate change alarmists who propose concepts like degrowth.

mulmen 3y ago
> Would we willingly forsake the past century of human progress to revert the global temperature back by that single degree? Eh. I see what you are saying but have we felt the full effect? Do any of us have a perception of what was lost that would let us even make such a determination?
sanp 3y ago
Why do we need to sacrifice living standards to control emissions?
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- valval 3y ago
  How could we not? In the western world we might be able to, but that means poor people will start dying elsewhere.
ClassyJacket 3y ago
It's not alarmism to say we should take action to prevent out extinction. By your logic, people who call emergency services when a building is on fire are "alarmists". There has literally NEVER been a problem anywhere near as large as climate change, including World War 2. If being concerned about literally the largest problem to have ever existed is 'alarmism', then your position is simply that it's impossible for anything bad to ever happen.