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Weak emotional vocab strikes again? "Climate anger" is a strange phrase. Maybe "climate shame" instead? We're living a tragedy. We do this to ourselves. Shame

Weak emotional vocab strikes again? "Climate anger" is a strange phrase. Maybe "climate shame" instead? We're living a tragedy. We do this to ourselves. Shame is basically anger at yourself. The one real thing people have any control over is self-correction that comes from acknowledging those pressing feelings, painful as they are to take-on.

PaulHoule 2y ago
People aren't sure what to feel. One way to think about it is that an individual should avoid air travel, drive a small car, or not eat meat. Another is that we need to do an overhaul of technology; currently it looks daunting but not impossible. 100 years from now we might look back and wonder how we could ever afford fossil fuels when we now have super-cheap renewables + storage and dry nuclear plants. (e.g. you could never fly a plane with a steam turbine, people quit building coal burning power plants in North America the same time they quit building nuclear power plants because regardless of what the reactor costs you can't afford the steam turbine) On the other hand, 20 years from now the permitting process for a solar farm in California might stretch on for 20 years because there is always some endangered arthropod wherever you want to build. It is a classic collective action problem because I can cut my own emissions but it doesn't solve the problem. The US can impose a $400 carbon tax but if China doesn't go along with it there will be no manufacturing whatsoever in the US. The one thing everybody agrees on it is that is is someone else's fault. (e.g. the folks who think Jeff Besos should sell his $150M yacht so we can all get 15 minutes of health insurance are a case in point) Thus it is more of an anger thing than a shame thing. It is easy to be angry at people who deny a problem, politicians who won't implement a solution, etc. In 2000 I was in the same place w/ climate activism that many people are at now, I was bitterly angry about Al Gore keeping the issue off the table in 2000 because he thought it was a loser in the election. He lost anyway.
- nonrandomstring 2y ago
  > everybody agrees on it is that is is someone else's fault. > In 2000 I was in the same place May I ask what moved you and where you feel you moved to Paul? For myself, trying to transcend that anger, as I expect you have during 25 years, is emancipating. To take ownership, rather than pleasure in anger, allows shame begin doing its hard work, the path to a powerful and infectious change of perspective. "I did this" is empowering because it restores agency lost in the fog of rationalisation - some of which you allude to. What a free person does a free person has a firm right to undo as they choose. Taking responsibility is therefore a freedom rather than encumbrance for the rational person who hopes to engineer a way out of a complex problem. These are conclusions I'm drawing toward in the last parts of my series on "Tech rights or responsibilities", which I hope you'll enjoy as a whole when the final chapter is written. edit: s/emacs-org/HN/
  - PaulHoule 2y ago
    Here is what I practice today: (1) Science & engineering: A physics PhD and involvement in technology has given me a good foundation for climate science and also the engineering of solutions ranging from solar energy, biomass, carbon capture and storage, etc. Every so often I wish I knew some more about chemistry. My RSS reader shows me many articles on this topic every day that it selects for me. (2) Social sciences. I have a perspective on the science of civilization that we are in a race between problems and solutions. When the problems get too bad people start looking for solutions and when they get really bad growth stops and there is no choice to find solutions. Someone could have despaired for humanity in 1938 but it turned out pretty well in the end. (3) Meaningful work. I'm a software dev at a public opinion data archive. As GW is really a people problem this is relevant. Somebody down the hall from me has written a lot of papers about what people think on the subject and the difference you get when the issues are framed differently. We enabled the research described in the movie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Join,_or_Die https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Join,_or_Die (4) Shamanism. I've recently felt a call to the ministry and I'm learning about Chinese and North American shamanism and developing a practice that helps people change even when it seems impossible.
    - nonrandomstring 2y ago
      Your lifestance anchored in the physical, social, personal and spiritual is a strong base to stave off despair. [Not sure you included the right link for a movie?]
      - PaulHoule 2y ago
        Oh sorry, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Join_or_Die https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Join_or_Die We had a showing of the movie that my organization sponsored at Cornell cinema. A few of the people from my office were in the movie and were at the showing so it made me think of the ending of Pee Wee Herman's Big Adventure.
        nonrandomstring 2y ago

PaulHoule 2y ago

People aren't sure what to feel. One way to think about it is that an individual should avoid air travel, drive a small car, or not eat meat. Another is that we need to do an overhaul of technology; currently it looks daunting but not impossible. 100 years from now we might look back and wonder how we could ever afford fossil fuels when we now have super-cheap renewables + storage and dry nuclear plants. (e.g. you could never fly a plane with a steam turbine, people quit building coal burning power plants in North America the same time they quit building nuclear power plants because regardless of what the reactor costs you can't afford the steam turbine) On the other hand, 20 years from now the permitting process for a solar farm in California might stretch on for 20 years because there is always some endangered arthropod wherever you want to build. It is a classic collective action problem because I can cut my own emissions but it doesn't solve the problem. The US can impose a $400 carbon tax but if China doesn't go along with it there will be no manufacturing whatsoever in the US. The one thing everybody agrees on it is that is is someone else's fault. (e.g. the folks who think Jeff Besos should sell his $150M yacht so we can all get 15 minutes of health insurance are a case in point) Thus it is more of an anger thing than a shame thing. It is easy to be angry at people who deny a problem, politicians who won't implement a solution, etc. In 2000 I was in the same place w/ climate activism that many people are at now, I was bitterly angry about Al Gore keeping the issue off the table in 2000 because he thought it was a loser in the election. He lost anyway.

nonrandomstring 2y ago
> everybody agrees on it is that is is someone else's fault. > In 2000 I was in the same place May I ask what moved you and where you feel you moved to Paul? For myself, trying to transcend that anger, as I expect you have during 25 years, is emancipating. To take ownership, rather than pleasure in anger, allows shame begin doing its hard work, the path to a powerful and infectious change of perspective. "I did this" is empowering because it restores agency lost in the fog of rationalisation - some of which you allude to. What a free person does a free person has a firm right to undo as they choose. Taking responsibility is therefore a freedom rather than encumbrance for the rational person who hopes to engineer a way out of a complex problem. These are conclusions I'm drawing toward in the last parts of my series on "Tech rights or responsibilities", which I hope you'll enjoy as a whole when the final chapter is written. edit: s/emacs-org/HN/
- PaulHoule 2y ago
  Here is what I practice today: (1) Science & engineering: A physics PhD and involvement in technology has given me a good foundation for climate science and also the engineering of solutions ranging from solar energy, biomass, carbon capture and storage, etc. Every so often I wish I knew some more about chemistry. My RSS reader shows me many articles on this topic every day that it selects for me. (2) Social sciences. I have a perspective on the science of civilization that we are in a race between problems and solutions. When the problems get too bad people start looking for solutions and when they get really bad growth stops and there is no choice to find solutions. Someone could have despaired for humanity in 1938 but it turned out pretty well in the end. (3) Meaningful work. I'm a software dev at a public opinion data archive. As GW is really a people problem this is relevant. Somebody down the hall from me has written a lot of papers about what people think on the subject and the difference you get when the issues are framed differently. We enabled the research described in the movie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Join,_or_Die https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Join,_or_Die (4) Shamanism. I've recently felt a call to the ministry and I'm learning about Chinese and North American shamanism and developing a practice that helps people change even when it seems impossible.
  - nonrandomstring 2y ago
    Your lifestance anchored in the physical, social, personal and spiritual is a strong base to stave off despair. [Not sure you included the right link for a movie?]
    - PaulHoule 2y ago
      Oh sorry, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Join_or_Die https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Join_or_Die We had a showing of the movie that my organization sponsored at Cornell cinema. A few of the people from my office were in the movie and were at the showing so it made me think of the ending of Pee Wee Herman's Big Adventure.
      - nonrandomstring 2y ago