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What would you expect astronomers to do if there's a building-sized asteroid headed for Earth in 40 years and the response so far has been to build a handful of

by Aachen 3y ago

What would you expect astronomers to do if there's a building-sized asteroid headed for Earth in 40 years and the response so far has been to build a handful of bunkers and now there's 6 years left to build the complicated spaceship that needs to save the remaining millions living in the region where it's going to hit? I understand the idiology of science existing in a abstract realm detached from reality and politics, but also, I can't fault them from feeling the heat under their feet. Climate change is not existential for us, but it's gonna suck and can be entirely prevented if you can only somehow get through to people > And if you associate yourself with the position that "we have to take immediate and drastic cuts that will cause huge numbers of people to quickly die," then people might get upset with you. People got upset with Nelson Mandela also, enough to lock him up for 27 years. I wonder if he'd say today he'd rather not have made people upset to help solve a big problem

AnonC 3y ago
On the asteroid question, you don’t have to wonder. Watching the satirical movie “Don’t Look Up” from 2021 [1] is enough commentary about humanity. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don't_Look_Up https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don't_Look_Up
prewett 3y ago
> [climate change] can be entirely prevented ... People need to accept that this statement is just incorrect. We cannot stop it in the near future. Even if we had the means of producing non-CO2 energy in quantities enough to provide all our energy needs today (that is, net-zero CO2 today), what we've already added will still continue to add heat. We do not have the facilities to produce bio-jet fuel in industrial quantities at inexpensive prices. It's going to take years to convert the elect grid to wind and solar, and that's even when people want to do it because it's cheaper. We need some way to replace all the fossil fuel used in agriculture, somehow make concrete net-zero, efficiently create steel without CO2. Ain't happening any time soon, even everyone wanted it. > ... if you can only somehow get through to people Actually, a large number of people have actually decided. They want to ignore it. It's not the choice you want, and I don't think it's a responsible or wise choice, but if you want to actually solve the problem, you need to deal with that reality. Just saying "well, if we could only pass a law and force people..." is foolish (which is the next step after "getting through to people" doesn't work because they already made their choice). If you want to solve the problem, make people want to do it of their own free will. For instance, make it cheaper to be net-zero CO2 than to burn it. Make it cheaper to take out CO2 from the atmosphere than to burn it. Make it so much cheaper to use less than people want to use less. Unfortunately, there are some hard problems from a chemistry standpoint here.
- Aachen 3y ago
  The main comment I have is this: even though 1.5 degrees is is unavoidable because there's not enough willpower as you say, the runaway effects are very uncertain (both when and how bad). You're technically correct that warming is unavoidable (indeed, some of it is already here), but I think you're overlooking that it still makes sense to make it clear to people that we can and should avoid worse. Current projections based on committed and implemented policies have us already avoiding a +5°C world, but if we stop caring, that's still on the table. What people do, based on their opinion as informed by the information they get, matters. > It's going to take years to convert the elect grid to wind and solar, and that's even when people want to do it because it's cheaper. Exactly. We still have years (sufficient years to avoid much worse than 1.5 degrees), and we had more years before. It's starting to happen now because it's cheaper, not because it's the right thing to do for those alive 50+ years from now (estimate, idk the exact value). That's perhaps the most depressing part: we can't make people care about things that aren't exceedingly obvious and it causes a lot of suffering. Even now, with events starting to happen that would have been very unlikely without the already-here warming, we're nitpicking over what might be the cheapest path instead of making a comprehensive plan with all available options included in optimal proportions to minimise the total cost, and breaking ground such that we're at least going to be finished transitioning the electricity generation part of the equation in 20 years or so. Don't need to force anyone if you can offer them nice jobs building the infrastructure we need anyway. > make people want to do it of their own free will. For instance, make it cheaper to be net-zero CO2 than to burn it. Thermodynamics wants to have a word with you :( if it were that simple, that's what would have been done. Who wouldn't want cheaper energy? Don't even need climate change to want that. Since that didn't happen before, I don't see why it suddenly would now if we only want it hard enough. We might get lucky with breakthroughs, but in the meantime, it makes sense to try and get through to people that maybe they should look at heat pumps for their next gas burner upgrade (for example, and as local climate permits of course)
  - ath3nd 3y ago
    > I don't see why it suddenly would now if we only want it hard enough. It wouldn't. It hasn't happened so far or at least what's been happening has been painfully slow. We don't have the time to convince mom-n-pap who don't see why their SUV is a problem. We don't have time to convince your average gym bro who has suddenly adopted an all-beef diet to look swole. We don't have the time to convince big oil to stop investing in and opening new oil refineries. What we do have the time for is organizing enough people who see where we are heading and voting and electing for representatives that support a green/fossil free agenda. Removing all the ridiculous farming subsidies on beef/animal agriculture, stopping with bailing banks and oil companies and holding them accountable with jail time and company-ending fines when they mess up seems to be a step in the right direction. Creating enough criminal/punitive and economical/taxation incentives to FORCE everybody to get on board with a fossil-free world is the only clear path to mitigating what's already happening and accelerating in nature. Everything else is just waiting for the hammer to fall.
petre 3y ago
> What would you expect astronomers to do if there's a building-sized asteroid headed for Earth in 40 years Tell the truth. Display a counter reading "39 years, 11 months, 29 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes until the astroid hits Earth".
- xboxnolifes 3y ago
  If only climate change came with such explicit deadlines and immediate reprocussions. We probably wouldn't be in this mess.
- Aachen 3y ago
  Call out falsehoods when you see them. What "lies" do "scientists" tell in your considered opinion?

by Aachen 3y ago

AnonC 3y ago

On the asteroid question, you don’t have to wonder. Watching the satirical movie “Don’t Look Up” from 2021 [1] is enough commentary about humanity. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don't_Look_Up https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don't_Look_Up

prewett 3y ago

> [climate change] can be entirely prevented ... People need to accept that this statement is just incorrect. We cannot stop it in the near future. Even if we had the means of producing non-CO2 energy in quantities enough to provide all our energy needs today (that is, net-zero CO2 today), what we've already added will still continue to add heat. We do not have the facilities to produce bio-jet fuel in industrial quantities at inexpensive prices. It's going to take years to convert the elect grid to wind and solar, and that's even when people want to do it because it's cheaper. We need some way to replace all the fossil fuel used in agriculture, somehow make concrete net-zero, efficiently create steel without CO2. Ain't happening any time soon, even everyone wanted it. > ... if you can only somehow get through to people Actually, a large number of people have actually decided. They want to ignore it. It's not the choice you want, and I don't think it's a responsible or wise choice, but if you want to actually solve the problem, you need to deal with that reality. Just saying "well, if we could only pass a law and force people..." is foolish (which is the next step after "getting through to people" doesn't work because they already made their choice). If you want to solve the problem, make people want to do it of their own free will. For instance, make it cheaper to be net-zero CO2 than to burn it. Make it cheaper to take out CO2 from the atmosphere than to burn it. Make it so much cheaper to use less than people want to use less. Unfortunately, there are some hard problems from a chemistry standpoint here.

Aachen 3y ago
The main comment I have is this: even though 1.5 degrees is is unavoidable because there's not enough willpower as you say, the runaway effects are very uncertain (both when and how bad). You're technically correct that warming is unavoidable (indeed, some of it is already here), but I think you're overlooking that it still makes sense to make it clear to people that we can and should avoid worse. Current projections based on committed and implemented policies have us already avoiding a +5°C world, but if we stop caring, that's still on the table. What people do, based on their opinion as informed by the information they get, matters. > It's going to take years to convert the elect grid to wind and solar, and that's even when people want to do it because it's cheaper. Exactly. We still have years (sufficient years to avoid much worse than 1.5 degrees), and we had more years before. It's starting to happen now because it's cheaper, not because it's the right thing to do for those alive 50+ years from now (estimate, idk the exact value). That's perhaps the most depressing part: we can't make people care about things that aren't exceedingly obvious and it causes a lot of suffering. Even now, with events starting to happen that would have been very unlikely without the already-here warming, we're nitpicking over what might be the cheapest path instead of making a comprehensive plan with all available options included in optimal proportions to minimise the total cost, and breaking ground such that we're at least going to be finished transitioning the electricity generation part of the equation in 20 years or so. Don't need to force anyone if you can offer them nice jobs building the infrastructure we need anyway. > make people want to do it of their own free will. For instance, make it cheaper to be net-zero CO2 than to burn it. Thermodynamics wants to have a word with you :( if it were that simple, that's what would have been done. Who wouldn't want cheaper energy? Don't even need climate change to want that. Since that didn't happen before, I don't see why it suddenly would now if we only want it hard enough. We might get lucky with breakthroughs, but in the meantime, it makes sense to try and get through to people that maybe they should look at heat pumps for their next gas burner upgrade (for example, and as local climate permits of course)
- ath3nd 3y ago
  > I don't see why it suddenly would now if we only want it hard enough. It wouldn't. It hasn't happened so far or at least what's been happening has been painfully slow. We don't have the time to convince mom-n-pap who don't see why their SUV is a problem. We don't have time to convince your average gym bro who has suddenly adopted an all-beef diet to look swole. We don't have the time to convince big oil to stop investing in and opening new oil refineries. What we do have the time for is organizing enough people who see where we are heading and voting and electing for representatives that support a green/fossil free agenda. Removing all the ridiculous farming subsidies on beef/animal agriculture, stopping with bailing banks and oil companies and holding them accountable with jail time and company-ending fines when they mess up seems to be a step in the right direction. Creating enough criminal/punitive and economical/taxation incentives to FORCE everybody to get on board with a fossil-free world is the only clear path to mitigating what's already happening and accelerating in nature. Everything else is just waiting for the hammer to fall.

petre 3y ago

> What would you expect astronomers to do if there's a building-sized asteroid headed for Earth in 40 years Tell the truth. Display a counter reading "39 years, 11 months, 29 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes until the astroid hits Earth".

xboxnolifes 3y ago
If only climate change came with such explicit deadlines and immediate reprocussions. We probably wouldn't be in this mess.
Aachen 3y ago
Call out falsehoods when you see them. What "lies" do "scientists" tell in your considered opinion?