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>That is why discussions around such technological silver bullets are always toxic: people want to believe. On the flip side, some people reject technological

>That is why discussions around such technological silver bullets are always toxic: people want to believe. On the flip side, some people reject technological solutions on principle because for them, it's not about solving problems, it's about atoning for the sins of humanity. What does the alternative future look like where we solve the climate crisis by changing the way we live and organize society? Personally, I would prefer to continue having electricity, heat, running water, sewage treatment, shipping, transportation, and the internet. It seems to me that if we really wanted to, we could keep these things around while putting a substantial portion of GDP into building nuclear reactors and removing carbon from the atmosphere. But that's not a satisfying answer for people who have made the climate crisis into a religious issue.

jacquesm 3y ago
Bluntly: far fewer people, sustainability built into every process, no more oil, very high cost for transportation unless it is by ship, personal transport will be very costly and you won't do it unless you really have to. Think '1850' but with transistors.
- fasterik 3y ago
  >far fewer people Also bluntly: how would we do that ethically without severely restricting reproductive rights or "cleansing" populations?
  - titzer 3y ago
    What part of birthing billions of children into poverty was ethical again?
    - jacquesm 3y ago
      That's the problem right there: by asking the question like that you are essentially saying 'children are for the wealthy'. And that's also not how it should be. This is a super hard problem to resolve in a fair way that works in an international setting because you need everybody on board otherwise it will not work. It's the tragedy of the commons endgame.
      - titzer 3y ago
        This is a problem; with the inertia the system is carrying where there are no "ethical" choices left. That's of course no excuse to pick a horribly fascist and evil one. Yet that seems to be the inference in any conversation where you point out that fact that we're basically fucked. "Oh yeah, well obviously you are a genocidal monster. That must mean we're not fucked." Uh, no. I'm watching this garbage truck smash into the wall, same as you. We're all in the same boat.
        jacquesm 3y ago
        I don't care about what people call me, I'm just pointing out there are too many of us. Historically when there were too many people we ended up with wars or famine. I don't think this time around it will be an exception to that rule, but it's the first time this is happening at this scale. In that sense all bets are off, it is also possible that given such stakes humanity can find it in itself to pull the cart as one but I'm not too hopeful about that. We could easily be in 'adapt or die' territory somewhere in the next century.
        titzer 3y ago
        > I don't care about what people call me I hope it's clear from context that I wasn't directing anything at you; we're basically in complete agreement.
        jacquesm 3y ago
        We're well into 'uncomfortable truth' territory on this subject, so you can expect namecalling and downvoting rather than discussion, nothing surprising but people don't like to hear that their life style isn't sustainable. The majority of people around me would rather invest in holidays and luxury goods than sustainability and aim to increase their footprint rather than that they reduce it. I'm just as guilty because I too live in a wealthy country. And even though I bike when I can and have spent a small fortune on making this house less dependent on outside energy I make myself no illusions: I'm still a net negative on the environment, far in excess of any developing world denizen. All I have to do to have that reinforced is to look at our trash can, food bill and fuel bill for the times when we do drive. Each of those alone is probably well in excess of our 'proper' budget that would be sustainable. And for the life of me without stopping all activity I have no idea how I can further reduce it, this is just the world I happen to live in. I guess I could not have had kids, I guess I could live in a tiny shack. But overall everybody in the developed world will increase the problem by virtue of being alive. That's not good news, but I don't have anything better.
    - ahtihn 3y ago
      Struggling for survival is the natural condition of living beings on this planet. What's unethical about birthing children in poverty exactly? Rich people consume orders of magnitude more resources than poor people so if anything it's unethical for rich people to have children.
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    That is a very good question, but it is also the wrong question. The better one would be how are we collectively going to avoid nature doing it for us? Because I don't know what the solution is but I do know that the alternative is going to be no fun at all. One possibility is that we all end up agreeing that we should at least try to reduce our numbers. My parents brought me up with 'replacement' numbers so that we'd end up with a steady population. I'm not so sure if that was wise. And I'm aware that there are many predictions out there that our numbers will eventually top out (they will, either because we do it ourselves, voluntarily or because our resources will run out, an exponentially expanding population in a fixed environment always ends in collapse). But unless we manage to massively reduce our impact on the environment I don't see a way for the increased consumption and eventual survival of our societies as we know them today. In another comment someone offhandedly asked whether we should all want leisure yachts or not. The obvious answer to that is 'no'. But we probably also shouldn't all want vehicles and the ability to transport ourselves to the end of the world on a whim. Hard choices are ahead of us, the time for easy answers is long behind us.
    - at_a_remove 3y ago
      This has been my "thing" for some time. Now, carrying capacity for Earth is a function, and one of the arguments is lifestyle, but I believe that we are beyond most values of that function for anything beyond "miserable and half-starved." The population will drop. We can do it or Nature will do it for us. Nature will be wanton, cruel, perhaps overshoot. It will be ugly and horrific. We will not be left in great shape. The only fairness it will possess is unpredictable randomness. Or, we can do it. Harsh. Belt-tightening. Unpleasant conversations. Lengthy debates about worth. Whole societies wanting their turn at the trough. Deprivation. Lifeboat politics. The Cold Equations in a hot, hot world.
      - UncleMeat 3y ago
        These “unpleasant conversations” have been universally the powerful talking about how to genocide the powerless. Frankly, I’d rather nature do it than follow the population control proposals we’ve seen. Everybody who decides that what they need to do is kill extremely large numbers of other people can just off themselves instead.
  - callmeal 3y ago
    >Also bluntly: how would we do that ethically without severely restricting reproductive rights Exactly. The dismantling of Roe v Wade in the US comes to mind as a form of severely restricting reproductive rights.
  - nonethewiser 3y ago
    We wouldn’t.
gjulianm 3y ago
> while putting a substantial portion of GDP into building nuclear reactors and removing carbon from the atmosphere. The first thing takes years and we still don’t have feasible technology for the second. Not to mention that we would still have a lot of emissions from transport, manufacture, and meat consumption. A technological silver bullet would be cool but the reality is that we don’t have one and there’s nothing in the near future. But reducing our consumption is something we can start doing now.
- fasterik 3y ago
  The problem with the term "silver bullet" when used in these discussions is that it's used to dismiss any proposal for a technological solution. I can flip that around and say "a societal silver bullet would be cool but the reality is that we aren't going to convince people to reduce their consumption." Which I actually sort of believe. I think a technological solution has a much better chance of succeeding than a social one. I'm not saying there's a silver bullet, I just think it's our decision as a society whether or not we invest in these technologies and do the work of developing them to the point that they actually have a chance of solving the problem. We were able to make rapid progress on nuclear in the 1940s and space flight in the 1960s. We have the resources, but it doesn't seem like we have the political will this time.
  - virgildotcodes 3y ago
    If someone came to you with a problem on a project, and you had a hard deadline of the end of the week, and you had two ways to go about it - 1) this is gonna be a pain in the ass to implement, you'll all be pulling 12 hour days but it's straightforward and crystal clear in how this directly addresses the problem, and 2) some completely unproven solution, that even when fully implemented the math/logic doesn't really work out in terms of it solving the problem, but there's some small hope that it might for some reason, and you'll get to wrap up the week on a Thursday no sweat (the honest reason), which do you spend the rest of your week pursuing? Now imagine it's not just some meaningless project at your job but a matter of life and death for the majority of life on Earth, which do you pursue?
titzer 3y ago
It's not about religion, but about empathy and justice. Some people actually think that other forms of life on this planet have a right to exist, and there's no question at all that human life has been catastrophically bad for virtually every other form of life on this Earth. You can't just apply an energy patch and presto-reverso the carbon content in the atmosphere; we've managed to seriously disrupt global ecosystems and going nuclear doesn't fix that. We're gobbling this planet up, and there's just frankly too many of us to keep living at the standard of living we are. > Personally, I would prefer to continue having electricity, heat, running water, sewage treatment, shipping, transportation, and the internet. Incredibly tone deaf, frankly, when most past humans had none of those things and yet dealt with it, living actual full lives. We've basically forgotten what we are, what we came from, and believe we deserve Saturday morning cartoons.
- fasterik 3y ago
  I'm not saying it's a magic fix, I'm saying it's a really hard problem that we can solve if we put the resources and brain power into it. But some people apparently think that even trying to solve the problem is pointless. Needless to say, I disagree. >Incredibly tone deaf, frankly, when most past humans had none of those things and yet dealt with it, living actual full lives. We've basically forgotten what we are, what we came from, and believe we deserve Saturday morning cartoons. We came from a history of mostly starving, struggling for survival, dying of infections, dying during childbirth, being illiterate, and having little shelter or comfort. I think this nostalgia for the past is a golden age fallacy that needs to die. Technology has vastly improved human life and taking it away is essentially a call for reducing the standard of living for everybody.
  - titzer 3y ago
    > We came from a history of mostly starving, struggling for survival, dying of infections, dying during childbirth, being illiterate, and having little shelter or comfort. I think this nostalgia for the past is a golden age fallacy that needs to die. Technology has vastly improved human life and taking it away is essentially a call for reducing the standard of living for everybody. The past wasn't sunbeams and frolicking in meadows, but your take on it is totally off base. The fact is that in every period of (Western) history, the wealthy have always lived incredibly comfortable and enjoyable lives. Modern technology isn't the determinant variable. They did it by harnessing their respective civilizations--it was absolutely not equitable. They rested atop a pyramid of other people. And so do you and I! We do not live in equitable times globally. To the extent that we've made any strides morally, it's only that we've substituted technology and industrialization for slavery and oppression. But under no configuration is modern life sustainable for 8 billion people, energy, living space, and raw materials wise, so this situation is going to keep drawing down the reservoir until there is a brutal correction. I also think your characterization of all of history being "mostly starving, struggling for survival, dying of infections, dying during childbirth, being illiterate, and having little shelter or comfort" is frankly tripe. As if native peoples lives (over hundreds of thousands of years, indeed) are such utter trash that they need to be rescued from it by technology. "Oh, the poor brown people living such primitive lives, how sad. Let's do a mission to convert them to consumerism and fill their lives with junk, get them some jobs and atomize their tribes." I invite you to visit basically any place on Earth that is not Europe or North America. It's frankly a white/western superiority complex and technology is just a fig leaf over it, a fundamental belief that today's way of life is the only one worth living and is so obviously superior that it cannot be questioned. I mean, those stupid native Americans and their huts. Good thing we fixed that, right?
geysersam 3y ago
> for them, it's not about solving problems, it's about atoning for the sins of humanity. Never encountered that. Maybe it exists but it's extremely rare and irrelevant. > putting a substantial portion of GDP into building nuclear reactors and removing carbon from the atmosphere Spending lots of money, to produce lots of energy, to solve a problem we created by using too much energy... What people don't get is that environmentalists just want to solve the problem in the most cost effective way, and that is to stop destroying the environment we live in. > having electricity, heat, running water, sewage treatment, shipping, transportation, and the internet. Where in the Paris Agreement did you read we shouldn't continue having those things?
- fasterik 3y ago
  >Spending lots of money, to produce lots of energy, to solve a problem we created by using too much energy... How does this argument make sense? Why is producing energy inherently bad if it doesn't put carbon into the atmosphere? >What people don't get is that environmentalists just want to solve the problem in the most cost effective way, and that is to stop destroying the environment we live in. The most realistic way to stop destroying the environment is to switch to clean energy. That means spending money, and building a lot more nuclear reactors than we currently have. If the climate is truly an emergency, which I believe it is, then it's worth spending the money.
  - geysersam 3y ago
    > Why is producing energy inherently bad if it doesn't put carbon into the atmosphere? Because it costs money. Just not polluting in the first place is cheaper. Nuclear is probably an important part of the future energy mix but now we discussed using nuclear energy to remove carbon from the atmosphere and I believe that would be a huge waste of resources compared to just not putting the carbon in the atmosphere in the first place. Carbon capture is a scam.
    - ericd 3y ago
      Why do you think carbon capture is a scam? It's not going to replace reduction via reducing new emissions to zero like some people seem to think, but we're also going to need to pull a lot out of the carbon cycle - net zero isn't enough. We should be pouring a huge amount of money into nuclear fission right now, it's the most straightforward way toward a zero target, and repetition/scale with large series of identical reactors and streamlined regulatory oversight will hopefully make it cost competitive with fossil fuels.
kaba0 3y ago
We have enough resources to provide heating and running water for every living person on Earth, it is just not allocated fairly and smartly (e.g. in my country we flush the toilet with very good grade water meant for drinking, because historically we don’t have separate piping for less potable water and we are rich in waters). But do we really need to be able to order some bullshit plastic shit from China for 2 dollars? I think it is only fair to give up that for local production, even if that costs 10 dollars for the same thing. Similarly, do I have to eat argentine beef in Europe? Sure, make it available for a hefty price for the rare occasion, but it really should not be generally available. Fruit that is local and is out of season? Don’t import it from Peru, simply wait for it to be in season, or buy some product that was made locally when it was in season, like jam. Strengthening local production would already massively decrease the number of ships we need for minimal inconvenience (hell, it might just be beneficial for the local economy). Do I even have to eat meat each day? Similary, why don’t we ban most kinds of single-use plastics? How often do you buy milk that you plan on drinking while you walk somewhere? Couldn’t it be stored inside a container you have to bring back to the shop the next time, or buy again if not? Hell, most liquids meant for drinking could easily come in a few sizes of these reusable bottles. We have goddamn shops that can auto-subtract your bought items simply by camera imaging, don’t tell me we don’t have the tech to safely and hygienically refill containers, something we had 100 years ago. As for societal change: do my parents have to live in a separate house with way too much space for them, having them see their grandchildren only occasionally (making parents having to pay for babysitters)? Only so that they can later be cared for by some random person? Sure, not everyone has parents worth living together with, but this tendency that it is somehow a failure to not move out of your parents home is imo very harmful to everyone involved - parent not having enough self-time, grandparents being alone, slowly deteriorating mentally, children not seeing grandparents enough (also, parents having to figure out parenting from zero). These are not big sacrifices, but we will do them, one way or another. The question is, do we want to do it with self-agency, or let nature run its course?
- tticvs 3y ago
  But none of the examples you give move the needle enough with regards to climate change. You're just following what feels like it would be good for the environment (and maybe it is good for your local environment) but isn't actually impactful at a large scale. You write eloquently, but futilely.
nonethewiser 3y ago
> But that's not a satisfying answer for people who have made the climate crisis into a religious issue. Complete with language about believers and non-believers
febra_ 3y ago
> while putting a substantial portion of GDP into building nuclear reactors and removing carbon from the atmosphere. So, the first one taking decades and the second one being a meme """solution""" for the science illiterate?
- fasterik 3y ago
  It won't take decades if we invest sufficient resources. It takes about 5 years to build a nuclear reactor, but you can build a bunch of them in parallel. The real problem is opposition to nuclear by the general public, not the technology. If CDR is a meme solution for the science illiterate, then why does the IPCC include it as a key mitigation strategy? https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg3/resources/spm-headline-statements/ https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg3/resources/spm-headline-st... >C.11 The deployment of CDR to counterbalance hard-to-abate residual emissions is unavoidable if net zero CO2 or GHG emissions are to be achieved. The scale and timing of deployment will depend on the trajectories of gross emission reductions in different sectors. Upscaling the deployment of CDR depends on developing effective approaches to address feasibility and sustainability constraints especially at large scales. (high confidence)
jshen 3y ago
“ What does the alternative future look like where we solve the climate crisis by changing the way we live and organize society? Personally, I would prefer to continue having electricity, heat, running water, sewage treatment, shipping, transportation, and the internet.” This is either dishonest or ignorant. We can make a huge difference by moving faster to solar, eating a lot less meat, living in denser settings rather than suburbs, living in smaller houses, switching to heat pumps, not driving huge trucks and SUVs, avoid so much waste particularly in food, driving less, etc.
- jshen 3y ago
  Here's one relevant article. https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2021/10/02/treating-beef-like-coal-would-make-a-big-dent-in-greenhouse-gas-emissions https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2021/10/02/treating...
- fasterik 3y ago
  If you look at some of the other comments, "changing the way we live and organize society" for some people means depopulation and returning to a hunter gatherer way of living. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about. I agree that we can all do better on our individual choices. But we're not going to convince billions of people to that in the next 10 years. We need to fix the problem now, and the solution is to power our current level of growth with clean energy.
  - jshen 3y ago
    Gotcha, wasn't clear what you were referring to.

jacquesm 3y ago

Bluntly: far fewer people, sustainability built into every process, no more oil, very high cost for transportation unless it is by ship, personal transport will be very costly and you won't do it unless you really have to. Think '1850' but with transistors.

fasterik 3y ago
>far fewer people Also bluntly: how would we do that ethically without severely restricting reproductive rights or "cleansing" populations?
- titzer 3y ago
  What part of birthing billions of children into poverty was ethical again?
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    That's the problem right there: by asking the question like that you are essentially saying 'children are for the wealthy'. And that's also not how it should be. This is a super hard problem to resolve in a fair way that works in an international setting because you need everybody on board otherwise it will not work. It's the tragedy of the commons endgame.
    - titzer 3y ago
      This is a problem; with the inertia the system is carrying where there are no "ethical" choices left. That's of course no excuse to pick a horribly fascist and evil one. Yet that seems to be the inference in any conversation where you point out that fact that we're basically fucked. "Oh yeah, well obviously you are a genocidal monster. That must mean we're not fucked." Uh, no. I'm watching this garbage truck smash into the wall, same as you. We're all in the same boat.
      - jacquesm 3y ago
        I don't care about what people call me, I'm just pointing out there are too many of us. Historically when there were too many people we ended up with wars or famine. I don't think this time around it will be an exception to that rule, but it's the first time this is happening at this scale. In that sense all bets are off, it is also possible that given such stakes humanity can find it in itself to pull the cart as one but I'm not too hopeful about that. We could easily be in 'adapt or die' territory somewhere in the next century.
        titzer 3y ago
        > I don't care about what people call me I hope it's clear from context that I wasn't directing anything at you; we're basically in complete agreement.
        jacquesm 3y ago
        We're well into 'uncomfortable truth' territory on this subject, so you can expect namecalling and downvoting rather than discussion, nothing surprising but people don't like to hear that their life style isn't sustainable. The majority of people around me would rather invest in holidays and luxury goods than sustainability and aim to increase their footprint rather than that they reduce it. I'm just as guilty because I too live in a wealthy country. And even though I bike when I can and have spent a small fortune on making this house less dependent on outside energy I make myself no illusions: I'm still a net negative on the environment, far in excess of any developing world denizen. All I have to do to have that reinforced is to look at our trash can, food bill and fuel bill for the times when we do drive. Each of those alone is probably well in excess of our 'proper' budget that would be sustainable. And for the life of me without stopping all activity I have no idea how I can further reduce it, this is just the world I happen to live in. I guess I could not have had kids, I guess I could live in a tiny shack. But overall everybody in the developed world will increase the problem by virtue of being alive. That's not good news, but I don't have anything better.
  - ahtihn 3y ago
    Struggling for survival is the natural condition of living beings on this planet. What's unethical about birthing children in poverty exactly? Rich people consume orders of magnitude more resources than poor people so if anything it's unethical for rich people to have children.
- jacquesm 3y ago
  That is a very good question, but it is also the wrong question. The better one would be how are we collectively going to avoid nature doing it for us? Because I don't know what the solution is but I do know that the alternative is going to be no fun at all. One possibility is that we all end up agreeing that we should at least try to reduce our numbers. My parents brought me up with 'replacement' numbers so that we'd end up with a steady population. I'm not so sure if that was wise. And I'm aware that there are many predictions out there that our numbers will eventually top out (they will, either because we do it ourselves, voluntarily or because our resources will run out, an exponentially expanding population in a fixed environment always ends in collapse). But unless we manage to massively reduce our impact on the environment I don't see a way for the increased consumption and eventual survival of our societies as we know them today. In another comment someone offhandedly asked whether we should all want leisure yachts or not. The obvious answer to that is 'no'. But we probably also shouldn't all want vehicles and the ability to transport ourselves to the end of the world on a whim. Hard choices are ahead of us, the time for easy answers is long behind us.
  - at_a_remove 3y ago
    This has been my "thing" for some time. Now, carrying capacity for Earth is a function, and one of the arguments is lifestyle, but I believe that we are beyond most values of that function for anything beyond "miserable and half-starved." The population will drop. We can do it or Nature will do it for us. Nature will be wanton, cruel, perhaps overshoot. It will be ugly and horrific. We will not be left in great shape. The only fairness it will possess is unpredictable randomness. Or, we can do it. Harsh. Belt-tightening. Unpleasant conversations. Lengthy debates about worth. Whole societies wanting their turn at the trough. Deprivation. Lifeboat politics. The Cold Equations in a hot, hot world.
    - UncleMeat 3y ago
      These “unpleasant conversations” have been universally the powerful talking about how to genocide the powerless. Frankly, I’d rather nature do it than follow the population control proposals we’ve seen. Everybody who decides that what they need to do is kill extremely large numbers of other people can just off themselves instead.
- callmeal 3y ago
  >Also bluntly: how would we do that ethically without severely restricting reproductive rights Exactly. The dismantling of Roe v Wade in the US comes to mind as a form of severely restricting reproductive rights.
- nonethewiser 3y ago
  We wouldn’t.

gjulianm 3y ago

> while putting a substantial portion of GDP into building nuclear reactors and removing carbon from the atmosphere. The first thing takes years and we still don’t have feasible technology for the second. Not to mention that we would still have a lot of emissions from transport, manufacture, and meat consumption. A technological silver bullet would be cool but the reality is that we don’t have one and there’s nothing in the near future. But reducing our consumption is something we can start doing now.

fasterik 3y ago
The problem with the term "silver bullet" when used in these discussions is that it's used to dismiss any proposal for a technological solution. I can flip that around and say "a societal silver bullet would be cool but the reality is that we aren't going to convince people to reduce their consumption." Which I actually sort of believe. I think a technological solution has a much better chance of succeeding than a social one. I'm not saying there's a silver bullet, I just think it's our decision as a society whether or not we invest in these technologies and do the work of developing them to the point that they actually have a chance of solving the problem. We were able to make rapid progress on nuclear in the 1940s and space flight in the 1960s. We have the resources, but it doesn't seem like we have the political will this time.
- virgildotcodes 3y ago
  If someone came to you with a problem on a project, and you had a hard deadline of the end of the week, and you had two ways to go about it - 1) this is gonna be a pain in the ass to implement, you'll all be pulling 12 hour days but it's straightforward and crystal clear in how this directly addresses the problem, and 2) some completely unproven solution, that even when fully implemented the math/logic doesn't really work out in terms of it solving the problem, but there's some small hope that it might for some reason, and you'll get to wrap up the week on a Thursday no sweat (the honest reason), which do you spend the rest of your week pursuing? Now imagine it's not just some meaningless project at your job but a matter of life and death for the majority of life on Earth, which do you pursue?

titzer 3y ago

It's not about religion, but about empathy and justice. Some people actually think that other forms of life on this planet have a right to exist, and there's no question at all that human life has been catastrophically bad for virtually every other form of life on this Earth. You can't just apply an energy patch and presto-reverso the carbon content in the atmosphere; we've managed to seriously disrupt global ecosystems and going nuclear doesn't fix that. We're gobbling this planet up, and there's just frankly too many of us to keep living at the standard of living we are. > Personally, I would prefer to continue having electricity, heat, running water, sewage treatment, shipping, transportation, and the internet. Incredibly tone deaf, frankly, when most past humans had none of those things and yet dealt with it, living actual full lives. We've basically forgotten what we are, what we came from, and believe we deserve Saturday morning cartoons.

fasterik 3y ago
I'm not saying it's a magic fix, I'm saying it's a really hard problem that we can solve if we put the resources and brain power into it. But some people apparently think that even trying to solve the problem is pointless. Needless to say, I disagree. >Incredibly tone deaf, frankly, when most past humans had none of those things and yet dealt with it, living actual full lives. We've basically forgotten what we are, what we came from, and believe we deserve Saturday morning cartoons. We came from a history of mostly starving, struggling for survival, dying of infections, dying during childbirth, being illiterate, and having little shelter or comfort. I think this nostalgia for the past is a golden age fallacy that needs to die. Technology has vastly improved human life and taking it away is essentially a call for reducing the standard of living for everybody.
- titzer 3y ago
  > We came from a history of mostly starving, struggling for survival, dying of infections, dying during childbirth, being illiterate, and having little shelter or comfort. I think this nostalgia for the past is a golden age fallacy that needs to die. Technology has vastly improved human life and taking it away is essentially a call for reducing the standard of living for everybody. The past wasn't sunbeams and frolicking in meadows, but your take on it is totally off base. The fact is that in every period of (Western) history, the wealthy have always lived incredibly comfortable and enjoyable lives. Modern technology isn't the determinant variable. They did it by harnessing their respective civilizations--it was absolutely not equitable. They rested atop a pyramid of other people. And so do you and I! We do not live in equitable times globally. To the extent that we've made any strides morally, it's only that we've substituted technology and industrialization for slavery and oppression. But under no configuration is modern life sustainable for 8 billion people, energy, living space, and raw materials wise, so this situation is going to keep drawing down the reservoir until there is a brutal correction. I also think your characterization of all of history being "mostly starving, struggling for survival, dying of infections, dying during childbirth, being illiterate, and having little shelter or comfort" is frankly tripe. As if native peoples lives (over hundreds of thousands of years, indeed) are such utter trash that they need to be rescued from it by technology. "Oh, the poor brown people living such primitive lives, how sad. Let's do a mission to convert them to consumerism and fill their lives with junk, get them some jobs and atomize their tribes." I invite you to visit basically any place on Earth that is not Europe or North America. It's frankly a white/western superiority complex and technology is just a fig leaf over it, a fundamental belief that today's way of life is the only one worth living and is so obviously superior that it cannot be questioned. I mean, those stupid native Americans and their huts. Good thing we fixed that, right?

geysersam 3y ago

> for them, it's not about solving problems, it's about atoning for the sins of humanity. Never encountered that. Maybe it exists but it's extremely rare and irrelevant. > putting a substantial portion of GDP into building nuclear reactors and removing carbon from the atmosphere Spending lots of money, to produce lots of energy, to solve a problem we created by using too much energy... What people don't get is that environmentalists just want to solve the problem in the most cost effective way, and that is to stop destroying the environment we live in. > having electricity, heat, running water, sewage treatment, shipping, transportation, and the internet. Where in the Paris Agreement did you read we shouldn't continue having those things?

fasterik 3y ago
>Spending lots of money, to produce lots of energy, to solve a problem we created by using too much energy... How does this argument make sense? Why is producing energy inherently bad if it doesn't put carbon into the atmosphere? >What people don't get is that environmentalists just want to solve the problem in the most cost effective way, and that is to stop destroying the environment we live in. The most realistic way to stop destroying the environment is to switch to clean energy. That means spending money, and building a lot more nuclear reactors than we currently have. If the climate is truly an emergency, which I believe it is, then it's worth spending the money.
- geysersam 3y ago
  > Why is producing energy inherently bad if it doesn't put carbon into the atmosphere? Because it costs money. Just not polluting in the first place is cheaper. Nuclear is probably an important part of the future energy mix but now we discussed using nuclear energy to remove carbon from the atmosphere and I believe that would be a huge waste of resources compared to just not putting the carbon in the atmosphere in the first place. Carbon capture is a scam.
  - ericd 3y ago
    Why do you think carbon capture is a scam? It's not going to replace reduction via reducing new emissions to zero like some people seem to think, but we're also going to need to pull a lot out of the carbon cycle - net zero isn't enough. We should be pouring a huge amount of money into nuclear fission right now, it's the most straightforward way toward a zero target, and repetition/scale with large series of identical reactors and streamlined regulatory oversight will hopefully make it cost competitive with fossil fuels.

kaba0 3y ago

We have enough resources to provide heating and running water for every living person on Earth, it is just not allocated fairly and smartly (e.g. in my country we flush the toilet with very good grade water meant for drinking, because historically we don’t have separate piping for less potable water and we are rich in waters). But do we really need to be able to order some bullshit plastic shit from China for 2 dollars? I think it is only fair to give up that for local production, even if that costs 10 dollars for the same thing. Similarly, do I have to eat argentine beef in Europe? Sure, make it available for a hefty price for the rare occasion, but it really should not be generally available. Fruit that is local and is out of season? Don’t import it from Peru, simply wait for it to be in season, or buy some product that was made locally when it was in season, like jam. Strengthening local production would already massively decrease the number of ships we need for minimal inconvenience (hell, it might just be beneficial for the local economy). Do I even have to eat meat each day? Similary, why don’t we ban most kinds of single-use plastics? How often do you buy milk that you plan on drinking while you walk somewhere? Couldn’t it be stored inside a container you have to bring back to the shop the next time, or buy again if not? Hell, most liquids meant for drinking could easily come in a few sizes of these reusable bottles. We have goddamn shops that can auto-subtract your bought items simply by camera imaging, don’t tell me we don’t have the tech to safely and hygienically refill containers, something we had 100 years ago. As for societal change: do my parents have to live in a separate house with way too much space for them, having them see their grandchildren only occasionally (making parents having to pay for babysitters)? Only so that they can later be cared for by some random person? Sure, not everyone has parents worth living together with, but this tendency that it is somehow a failure to not move out of your parents home is imo very harmful to everyone involved - parent not having enough self-time, grandparents being alone, slowly deteriorating mentally, children not seeing grandparents enough (also, parents having to figure out parenting from zero). These are not big sacrifices, but we will do them, one way or another. The question is, do we want to do it with self-agency, or let nature run its course?

tticvs 3y ago
But none of the examples you give move the needle enough with regards to climate change. You're just following what feels like it would be good for the environment (and maybe it is good for your local environment) but isn't actually impactful at a large scale. You write eloquently, but futilely.

nonethewiser 3y ago

> But that's not a satisfying answer for people who have made the climate crisis into a religious issue. Complete with language about believers and non-believers

febra_ 3y ago

> while putting a substantial portion of GDP into building nuclear reactors and removing carbon from the atmosphere. So, the first one taking decades and the second one being a meme """solution""" for the science illiterate?

fasterik 3y ago
It won't take decades if we invest sufficient resources. It takes about 5 years to build a nuclear reactor, but you can build a bunch of them in parallel. The real problem is opposition to nuclear by the general public, not the technology. If CDR is a meme solution for the science illiterate, then why does the IPCC include it as a key mitigation strategy? https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg3/resources/spm-headline-statements/ https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg3/resources/spm-headline-st... >C.11 The deployment of CDR to counterbalance hard-to-abate residual emissions is unavoidable if net zero CO2 or GHG emissions are to be achieved. The scale and timing of deployment will depend on the trajectories of gross emission reductions in different sectors. Upscaling the deployment of CDR depends on developing effective approaches to address feasibility and sustainability constraints especially at large scales. (high confidence)

jshen 3y ago

“ What does the alternative future look like where we solve the climate crisis by changing the way we live and organize society? Personally, I would prefer to continue having electricity, heat, running water, sewage treatment, shipping, transportation, and the internet.” This is either dishonest or ignorant. We can make a huge difference by moving faster to solar, eating a lot less meat, living in denser settings rather than suburbs, living in smaller houses, switching to heat pumps, not driving huge trucks and SUVs, avoid so much waste particularly in food, driving less, etc.

jshen 3y ago
Here's one relevant article. https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2021/10/02/treating-beef-like-coal-would-make-a-big-dent-in-greenhouse-gas-emissions https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2021/10/02/treating...
fasterik 3y ago
If you look at some of the other comments, "changing the way we live and organize society" for some people means depopulation and returning to a hunter gatherer way of living. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about. I agree that we can all do better on our individual choices. But we're not going to convince billions of people to that in the next 10 years. We need to fix the problem now, and the solution is to power our current level of growth with clean energy.
- jshen 3y ago
  Gotcha, wasn't clear what you were referring to.