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It's incredible how much damage we have done to ourselves in the past 250 years, and how much effort do we now need to spend to undo that damage

hagbard_c 1y ago
It's incredible how much good we have done to ourselves in the past 250 years, and how much good we can do in the now and the future.
- ysavir 1y ago
  Downvoted as this comment feels like it's trying to be witty/upshowing the parent comment without actually engaging with it or offering anything of substance. If the comment was along the lines of "yes, but we've also done a lot of good, let's reflect on both", great. But that's not what it was. Instead it feels like a statement that's trying to argue with the parent comment despite the parent comment never saying we haven't done any good.
  - bluGill 1y ago
    > Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith. regaurdless of what was intended your downvote and reply shows a lack of good faith.
    - ysavir 1y ago
      It wasn't a criticism of what they were saying (a point on which I agree with that poster), but whether the comment itself was contributing to the discussion or not. It was a very low-effort comment that offered no reflection on what the parent said, doesn't tie into the original post, and lacks depth towards its own point.
      - bluGill 1y ago
        Low effort but I disagree about the rest - the opposition helps makes it clear how silly the formula it was paroding is.
- mc32 1y ago
  It’s is! Just in medicine alone. And then economically, as well as justice. From 98% of the people living in abject poverty, no pairs of shoes, two changes of clothes, selling off relatives for money, dying from simple infections… to where we are today. It’s like the glory days of Rome but much better.
- rgreek42 1y ago
  Surely this is the best of all possible worlds, Dr. Pangloss.
- jebarker 1y ago
  The question is how much of that power will we use to do good for the rest of the species on the planet? I’ve just finished reading “Not the end of the world” and found it to be an informative and balanced discussion on the topic that recognizes the vast benefits of human development (to humans), the cost to the rest of the planet and the progress we’ve made in the past 50 years in undoing some of the harm. This is a nuanced topic and deserves that kind of debate.
  - alexey-salmin 1y ago
    Which exact species do you want to help? Ticks, mosquitos and anthrax or more like birds, trees and elk? Where do you draw the line?
    - jebarker 1y ago
      What a strange question. As a starter I’d like to see us help trees, coral, other primates and megafauna as much as possible. The former because they support so much other biodiversity and the latter because they’re nice to have in the world. Generally speaking though I favor sustainability where that means continuing to improve the quality of life for humans, especially those at the bottom of the socio-economic ladder, whilst trying to minimize the number of other species we drive to extinction. Again, nuance is key here - I don’t think my inability to enumerate every species worthy of help means that we should just dismiss the effort to help other species.
      - alexey-salmin 1y ago
        I don't ask you to "enumerate every species worthy of help" but rather to formulate a criteria you use to figure out who is worthy of help and who is not. The "nice to have in the world" sounds quite arbitrary to me. I don't think the question I ask is strange, I'm trying to figure out the idea you believe in. So far you assume we share some core belief on the topic and the rest is obvious, which I don't think is the case.
        1y ago
- quickthrowman 1y ago
  Are you really promoting the philosophy of Leibnizian Optimism in 2025? I suggest reading Candide by Voltaire, first published 266 years as a critique to the philosophy you are currently espousing.
  - bmacho 1y ago
    People: "If God, then why bad?"[0] Leibniz: "God and bad can coexist. E.g. we live in the best possible world."[1] Voltaire: "Here's a depiction of some fictional bad." I don't think Voltaire engaged meaningfully with Leibniz's argument. (I think that Leibniz is simply right tho, in the mathematical sense, so there isn't much room for Voltaire anyway.) [0] : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_evil https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_evil [1] : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_of_all_possible_worlds https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_of_all_possible_worlds
    - chuckadams 1y ago
      I suspect that "being right in the mathematical sense" is the very thing that Voltaire was lampooning.
    - sdenton4 1y ago
      Doesn't Leibniz's argument assume a single all-powerful god, and an external notion of good and evil? I would call it a 'not-even-wrong' argument - perhaps it's perfectly correct given its assumptions, but the assumptions aren't (necessarily) anything to do with this world...
      - deleted 1y ago
        [deleted]
  - thfuran 1y ago
    I don’t really see how you got there from what they actually said.
  - narcraft 1y ago
    We've come a long way in those 266 years: global population 10x'd, meanwhile the share of the population living in extreme poverty went from over 80% to nearly 8%, so not all optimism was misguided. Also there's a lot of room between despair and a Panglossian caricature, and I don't think acknowledging that a lot of good has happened in the past (and not necessarily suggesting it was all inevitable or automatic) rises to that caricature.
- mykowebhn 1y ago
  These replies that simply restate a previous comment by inverting its meaning are really starting to annoy me. They're neither witty nor intelligent. Just lazy and annoying. Waiting for someone to reply to this doing exactly this
  - alexey-salmin 1y ago
    People assuming that last 250 years were predominantly harm are annoying. The human race is thriving by every objective metric of nature: population, lifespan, dispensable energy per capita.
    - mykowebhn 1y ago
      Humans on their phone 24/7 due to addiction and/or who hold multiple jobs and still can't afford rent and/or who suffer from racism, misogyny, homophobia, etc. are not thriving. Oh, but they live to be 75, can buy a 75 inch television, and there are 8 billion of them. I'd still say they're not thriving. Would you consider the folks in Brave New World thriving? And don't get me started on environmental destruction. This post was about wolves and trees thriving, by the way.
  - hagbard_c 1y ago
    In response to a one-sided and overdone statement a reversed and equally overdone statement is a good way to point out the problems with such statements. I am annoyed and dismayed by the simpleminded self-flagellation implied by statements like the one I reacted to and think that people who make such statements should be time-warped back the mentioned 250 years and made to live in that era for, say, a year or so. When they are returned to the current era they will sound a different tune - that is if they manage to survive that year without succumbing to disease, some violent attack by man or beast or by starvation.
throw83944i888 1y ago
> how much effort do we now need to spend to undo that Moving a few wolfs, I would hardly call that effort! Stopping regulations and allowing some hunters in Yellowstone would have similar effects! It is more like morons, who do not understand biology are in goverment! Overprotection allowed elk overpopulation!
- Incipient 1y ago
  For clarification, I wouldn't say stopping regulation. It should be "updating regulation" - either increasing hunt quotas, or having an 'open season' time.
  - derdi 1y ago
    [flagged]
    - lostlogin 1y ago
      This is an amazing take. I wonder if other novel ‘gun based solutions’ can be found.
    - appointment 1y ago
      The problem across most of North America and Europe is that hunters do not kill enough, and the number of hunters is declining as rural communities shrink.
      - derdi 1y ago
        I wasn't able to cram all hunting propaganda tropes into one post, but you are right that "when we kill for fun, its actually an important service we provide to society, and you should show some gratitude!!" is right up there. Bonus points for forgetting to state the problem you are supposedly solving. Though it's refreshing to see a hunting proponent admit that humans with guns are not actually capable of solving the problem they are claiming to solve. It's clear that we need some sort of distributed self-organizing agent-based solution that doesn't rely on humans in the loop. We could call it the Low maintenance Unsupervised Predatory Ungulate control System, or L.U.P.U.S. for short.

hagbard_c 1y ago

It's incredible how much good we have done to ourselves in the past 250 years, and how much good we can do in the now and the future.

ysavir 1y ago
Downvoted as this comment feels like it's trying to be witty/upshowing the parent comment without actually engaging with it or offering anything of substance. If the comment was along the lines of "yes, but we've also done a lot of good, let's reflect on both", great. But that's not what it was. Instead it feels like a statement that's trying to argue with the parent comment despite the parent comment never saying we haven't done any good.
- bluGill 1y ago
  > Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith. regaurdless of what was intended your downvote and reply shows a lack of good faith.
  - ysavir 1y ago
    It wasn't a criticism of what they were saying (a point on which I agree with that poster), but whether the comment itself was contributing to the discussion or not. It was a very low-effort comment that offered no reflection on what the parent said, doesn't tie into the original post, and lacks depth towards its own point.
    - bluGill 1y ago
      Low effort but I disagree about the rest - the opposition helps makes it clear how silly the formula it was paroding is.
mc32 1y ago
It’s is! Just in medicine alone. And then economically, as well as justice. From 98% of the people living in abject poverty, no pairs of shoes, two changes of clothes, selling off relatives for money, dying from simple infections… to where we are today. It’s like the glory days of Rome but much better.
rgreek42 1y ago
Surely this is the best of all possible worlds, Dr. Pangloss.
jebarker 1y ago
The question is how much of that power will we use to do good for the rest of the species on the planet? I’ve just finished reading “Not the end of the world” and found it to be an informative and balanced discussion on the topic that recognizes the vast benefits of human development (to humans), the cost to the rest of the planet and the progress we’ve made in the past 50 years in undoing some of the harm. This is a nuanced topic and deserves that kind of debate.
- alexey-salmin 1y ago
  Which exact species do you want to help? Ticks, mosquitos and anthrax or more like birds, trees and elk? Where do you draw the line?
  - jebarker 1y ago
    What a strange question. As a starter I’d like to see us help trees, coral, other primates and megafauna as much as possible. The former because they support so much other biodiversity and the latter because they’re nice to have in the world. Generally speaking though I favor sustainability where that means continuing to improve the quality of life for humans, especially those at the bottom of the socio-economic ladder, whilst trying to minimize the number of other species we drive to extinction. Again, nuance is key here - I don’t think my inability to enumerate every species worthy of help means that we should just dismiss the effort to help other species.
    - alexey-salmin 1y ago
      I don't ask you to "enumerate every species worthy of help" but rather to formulate a criteria you use to figure out who is worthy of help and who is not. The "nice to have in the world" sounds quite arbitrary to me. I don't think the question I ask is strange, I'm trying to figure out the idea you believe in. So far you assume we share some core belief on the topic and the rest is obvious, which I don't think is the case.
      - 1y ago
quickthrowman 1y ago
Are you really promoting the philosophy of Leibnizian Optimism in 2025? I suggest reading Candide by Voltaire, first published 266 years as a critique to the philosophy you are currently espousing.
- bmacho 1y ago
  People: "If God, then why bad?"[0] Leibniz: "God and bad can coexist. E.g. we live in the best possible world."[1] Voltaire: "Here's a depiction of some fictional bad." I don't think Voltaire engaged meaningfully with Leibniz's argument. (I think that Leibniz is simply right tho, in the mathematical sense, so there isn't much room for Voltaire anyway.) [0] : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_evil https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_evil [1] : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_of_all_possible_worlds https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_of_all_possible_worlds
  - chuckadams 1y ago
    I suspect that "being right in the mathematical sense" is the very thing that Voltaire was lampooning.
  - sdenton4 1y ago
    Doesn't Leibniz's argument assume a single all-powerful god, and an external notion of good and evil? I would call it a 'not-even-wrong' argument - perhaps it's perfectly correct given its assumptions, but the assumptions aren't (necessarily) anything to do with this world...
    - deleted 1y ago
      [deleted]
- thfuran 1y ago
  I don’t really see how you got there from what they actually said.
- narcraft 1y ago
  We've come a long way in those 266 years: global population 10x'd, meanwhile the share of the population living in extreme poverty went from over 80% to nearly 8%, so not all optimism was misguided. Also there's a lot of room between despair and a Panglossian caricature, and I don't think acknowledging that a lot of good has happened in the past (and not necessarily suggesting it was all inevitable or automatic) rises to that caricature.
mykowebhn 1y ago
These replies that simply restate a previous comment by inverting its meaning are really starting to annoy me. They're neither witty nor intelligent. Just lazy and annoying. Waiting for someone to reply to this doing exactly this
- alexey-salmin 1y ago
  People assuming that last 250 years were predominantly harm are annoying. The human race is thriving by every objective metric of nature: population, lifespan, dispensable energy per capita.
  - mykowebhn 1y ago
    Humans on their phone 24/7 due to addiction and/or who hold multiple jobs and still can't afford rent and/or who suffer from racism, misogyny, homophobia, etc. are not thriving. Oh, but they live to be 75, can buy a 75 inch television, and there are 8 billion of them. I'd still say they're not thriving. Would you consider the folks in Brave New World thriving? And don't get me started on environmental destruction. This post was about wolves and trees thriving, by the way.
- hagbard_c 1y ago
  In response to a one-sided and overdone statement a reversed and equally overdone statement is a good way to point out the problems with such statements. I am annoyed and dismayed by the simpleminded self-flagellation implied by statements like the one I reacted to and think that people who make such statements should be time-warped back the mentioned 250 years and made to live in that era for, say, a year or so. When they are returned to the current era they will sound a different tune - that is if they manage to survive that year without succumbing to disease, some violent attack by man or beast or by starvation.

throw83944i888 1y ago

> how much effort do we now need to spend to undo that Moving a few wolfs, I would hardly call that effort! Stopping regulations and allowing some hunters in Yellowstone would have similar effects! It is more like morons, who do not understand biology are in goverment! Overprotection allowed elk overpopulation!

Incipient 1y ago
For clarification, I wouldn't say stopping regulation. It should be "updating regulation" - either increasing hunt quotas, or having an 'open season' time.
- derdi 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - lostlogin 1y ago
    This is an amazing take. I wonder if other novel ‘gun based solutions’ can be found.
  - appointment 1y ago
    The problem across most of North America and Europe is that hunters do not kill enough, and the number of hunters is declining as rural communities shrink.
    - derdi 1y ago
      I wasn't able to cram all hunting propaganda tropes into one post, but you are right that "when we kill for fun, its actually an important service we provide to society, and you should show some gratitude!!" is right up there. Bonus points for forgetting to state the problem you are supposedly solving. Though it's refreshing to see a hunting proponent admit that humans with guns are not actually capable of solving the problem they are claiming to solve. It's clear that we need some sort of distributed self-organizing agent-based solution that doesn't rely on humans in the loop. We could call it the Low maintenance Unsupervised Predatory Ungulate control System, or L.U.P.U.S. for short.