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Actually it would. 2% is a lot in the scheme of things. Every bit counts. And to thin it doesnt or that we need to slash only those things emitting more than X

Actually it would. 2% is a lot in the scheme of things. Every bit counts. And to thin it doesnt or that we need to slash only those things emitting more than X amount is a bit simplistic. Thinking we should just leave billionaies alone and let them do as they wish is nonsense.

xscott 2y ago
2% is not a lot. If it takes 50 years of accumulation for things to get bad, saving 2% means it'll be bad in 51 years. And remember, that's for all of the airplanes in all of the world (tens of thousands from commercial alone). The actual savings from Bezos' and Musk's planes is something like 0.000_024 percent. So if it takes 50 years until it gets bad, it'll take about 50 years and 8 minutes after you take away their planes. Whether something counts should be done with math, not feel good sentiment or pandering to people's envy.
- adrianN 2y ago
  If you group emissions sufficiently finely, no single measure has any effect. We need to do hundreds of little changes to reach carbon neutrality. The discussion what to prioritize is not easy, but dismissing things just because they only contribute x% is not helpful.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - xscott 2y ago
    Please look at that chart and aggressively pick all the items you're going to add up. Prioritize the difficult choices and make the helpful decisions. Focusing on energy CONSUMPTION is a losing battle, you won't even get to 50% in theory, and in practice you'd lose political will as people realize you're taking them back to the stone age. Now look at the chart and focus on energy PRODUCTION. If someone could make enough emission-free electricity, you can get rid of nearly all of it. Except for airplanes, because batteries are heavy - but thankfully that's only 2% and doesn't matter very much. No matter how you slice it or whatever sentimental argument you throw at it, Bezos, Musk, and Taylor's jets don't add up to anything that matters.
    - simgt 2y ago
      It's death by a thousand cuts, with that way of thinking why would we close a single coal plant? Taken in isolation they amount to nothing either. If your argument is "everything but airplanes", it would be interesting to know why you think they are so important? As for energy consumption reduction leading us back to stone age: it's about cutting the excess to keep what matters, no one arguing for it will pretend for a second that the excess stops at stone age level. Thankfully it doesn't even go as far as 250 years ago, when our world was still entirely renewable. If commuting for 50km for work is what matters, cutting the excess means replacing many SUVs by an (electric) bus or a train plus an e-bike. And maybe create jobs or housing closer. Not "not working" or "dying".
      - xscott 2y ago
        My argument is not "everything but airplanes". My petty argument is that this article is stupid, and the bigger point is that focusing on the energy consumption side is a dead end. The problem is that EVERY sector is not very significant. That's what that chart shows: Eliminate air travel: 1.9% Eliminate all trucking and cars: 11.9% Eliminate residential heating/cooling: 10.9% Eliminate commercial energy use: 6.6% And so on... If you focus on energy consumption, you can't solve that WITHOUT a thousand cuts, and that's totally unrealistic. And rage bait articles appealing to people's dislike and envy of billionaire airplanes for 0.000024% benefit don't help. Anyone who focuses on that is not using an engineering mindset and is distracted from the goal. Ok, so now look at it from the energy production side. Get real serious about nuclear or wind/solar/batteries (and a few agricultural changes), and you could actually make a difference. This is usually the point where someone says nuclear plants are always over cost and take too long to build, but the US military has hundreds of reactors running safely, and they were constructed for some government definition of "on time". If we were serious about achieving the goal in the US, we'd be pushing for a new branch of the military to manage public reactors or something, or we'd get real serious about batteries. Btw, I fucking hate flying. The experience is miserable, and I can deal with ground/water shipping for anything I buy. It wouldn't change my life one bit if we grounded all the airplanes. But I'm not dumb enough to think that would change anything about the predictions for the climate, and flying has benefits to other people. The point was that you can't really solve air flight with batteries or nuclear power, so thankfully 2% isn't much.
- Timon3 2y ago
  > 2% is not a lot. If it takes 50 years of accumulation for things to get bad, saving 2% means it'll be bad in 51 years. Only if you simplify everything beyond all measures. But the climate is a little more complicated than "we can only emit X more tons before things get bad". As an example, there are feedback loops that accelerate climate change once hit. Over time this amplifies the effect of any reduction we achieve now. Also, the more time we have to "find a solution" as many people bet on, the more of our current biosphere will survive. Aside from any moral obligations, this is obviously in our best interest as it increases the chances of more humans surviving. Even if you argue against these points, there are many others - none included in the math you've done.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - xscott 2y ago
    I don't think you understood the argument. I rounded up to 2% to give the most possible benefit of the doubt that anything involving airplane flights matters. Do you really think that saving .000024% by getting rid of Bezos and Musk's jets is going to delay that complicated feedback loop and buy someone the time to save the world? Do you really think 2% is going to delay anything significantly? Because I don't see how you can "it's complicated" your way into that belief.
    - Timon3 2y ago
      No, I'm pretty sure I understand your argument perfectly well: by removing any nuance and simplifying the model beyond belief you show that changes have no effect. When adding that nuance back in, suddenly the effect comes back. > Do you really think 2% is going to delay anything significantly? As soon as you define "significantly", I'll gladly answer your question.
      - xscott 2y ago
        My back of the napkin example chose 50 years because it made the numbers round. Let's pick more relevant numbers. The Paris Climate goals are to keep the increase under 2C, and depending on what IPCC model you believe, it looks like we'll blow through that goal in about 25 years (2050). So now, assuming you get to take all airplanes out of the skies, not just Bezos and Musk's, and you save 2% on emissions because of it. How many years does 2% buy you past 2050? I would consider 10 years significant, 1 year certainly is not. If your answer isn't measured in years, possibly with a confidence interval, we'll both know this is more of you trying to "win" an internet discussion by arguing in bad faith.

xscott 2y ago

2% is not a lot. If it takes 50 years of accumulation for things to get bad, saving 2% means it'll be bad in 51 years. And remember, that's for all of the airplanes in all of the world (tens of thousands from commercial alone). The actual savings from Bezos' and Musk's planes is something like 0.000_024 percent. So if it takes 50 years until it gets bad, it'll take about 50 years and 8 minutes after you take away their planes. Whether something counts should be done with math, not feel good sentiment or pandering to people's envy.

adrianN 2y ago
If you group emissions sufficiently finely, no single measure has any effect. We need to do hundreds of little changes to reach carbon neutrality. The discussion what to prioritize is not easy, but dismissing things just because they only contribute x% is not helpful.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- xscott 2y ago
  Please look at that chart and aggressively pick all the items you're going to add up. Prioritize the difficult choices and make the helpful decisions. Focusing on energy CONSUMPTION is a losing battle, you won't even get to 50% in theory, and in practice you'd lose political will as people realize you're taking them back to the stone age. Now look at the chart and focus on energy PRODUCTION. If someone could make enough emission-free electricity, you can get rid of nearly all of it. Except for airplanes, because batteries are heavy - but thankfully that's only 2% and doesn't matter very much. No matter how you slice it or whatever sentimental argument you throw at it, Bezos, Musk, and Taylor's jets don't add up to anything that matters.
  - simgt 2y ago
    It's death by a thousand cuts, with that way of thinking why would we close a single coal plant? Taken in isolation they amount to nothing either. If your argument is "everything but airplanes", it would be interesting to know why you think they are so important? As for energy consumption reduction leading us back to stone age: it's about cutting the excess to keep what matters, no one arguing for it will pretend for a second that the excess stops at stone age level. Thankfully it doesn't even go as far as 250 years ago, when our world was still entirely renewable. If commuting for 50km for work is what matters, cutting the excess means replacing many SUVs by an (electric) bus or a train plus an e-bike. And maybe create jobs or housing closer. Not "not working" or "dying".
    - xscott 2y ago
      My argument is not "everything but airplanes". My petty argument is that this article is stupid, and the bigger point is that focusing on the energy consumption side is a dead end. The problem is that EVERY sector is not very significant. That's what that chart shows: Eliminate air travel: 1.9% Eliminate all trucking and cars: 11.9% Eliminate residential heating/cooling: 10.9% Eliminate commercial energy use: 6.6% And so on... If you focus on energy consumption, you can't solve that WITHOUT a thousand cuts, and that's totally unrealistic. And rage bait articles appealing to people's dislike and envy of billionaire airplanes for 0.000024% benefit don't help. Anyone who focuses on that is not using an engineering mindset and is distracted from the goal. Ok, so now look at it from the energy production side. Get real serious about nuclear or wind/solar/batteries (and a few agricultural changes), and you could actually make a difference. This is usually the point where someone says nuclear plants are always over cost and take too long to build, but the US military has hundreds of reactors running safely, and they were constructed for some government definition of "on time". If we were serious about achieving the goal in the US, we'd be pushing for a new branch of the military to manage public reactors or something, or we'd get real serious about batteries. Btw, I fucking hate flying. The experience is miserable, and I can deal with ground/water shipping for anything I buy. It wouldn't change my life one bit if we grounded all the airplanes. But I'm not dumb enough to think that would change anything about the predictions for the climate, and flying has benefits to other people. The point was that you can't really solve air flight with batteries or nuclear power, so thankfully 2% isn't much.
Timon3 2y ago
> 2% is not a lot. If it takes 50 years of accumulation for things to get bad, saving 2% means it'll be bad in 51 years. Only if you simplify everything beyond all measures. But the climate is a little more complicated than "we can only emit X more tons before things get bad". As an example, there are feedback loops that accelerate climate change once hit. Over time this amplifies the effect of any reduction we achieve now. Also, the more time we have to "find a solution" as many people bet on, the more of our current biosphere will survive. Aside from any moral obligations, this is obviously in our best interest as it increases the chances of more humans surviving. Even if you argue against these points, there are many others - none included in the math you've done.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- xscott 2y ago
  I don't think you understood the argument. I rounded up to 2% to give the most possible benefit of the doubt that anything involving airplane flights matters. Do you really think that saving .000024% by getting rid of Bezos and Musk's jets is going to delay that complicated feedback loop and buy someone the time to save the world? Do you really think 2% is going to delay anything significantly? Because I don't see how you can "it's complicated" your way into that belief.
  - Timon3 2y ago
    No, I'm pretty sure I understand your argument perfectly well: by removing any nuance and simplifying the model beyond belief you show that changes have no effect. When adding that nuance back in, suddenly the effect comes back. > Do you really think 2% is going to delay anything significantly? As soon as you define "significantly", I'll gladly answer your question.
    - xscott 2y ago
      My back of the napkin example chose 50 years because it made the numbers round. Let's pick more relevant numbers. The Paris Climate goals are to keep the increase under 2C, and depending on what IPCC model you believe, it looks like we'll blow through that goal in about 25 years (2050). So now, assuming you get to take all airplanes out of the skies, not just Bezos and Musk's, and you save 2% on emissions because of it. How many years does 2% buy you past 2050? I would consider 10 years significant, 1 year certainly is not. If your answer isn't measured in years, possibly with a confidence interval, we'll both know this is more of you trying to "win" an internet discussion by arguing in bad faith.