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As someone who works in risk management, I think I have a hard time understanding how anyone can be so blase about climate change. Like, it truly takes a level

As someone who works in risk management, I think I have a hard time understanding how anyone can be so blase about climate change. Like, it truly takes a level of willful ignorance to have something so dire happening, and just choosing to either ignore it, or ignore the evidence for it. Like, even if you think the science isn't that accurate, the impacts, the massive potential harms, should outweigh the choice to just ignore it. Then again, there are people buying wooden homes in wildfire, hurricane, and flood zones, so who knows; maybe doing risk management as a job has just inured me to head-in-the-sand reactions, since I've seen what happens when you don't beat the odds. This isn't a personal risk, either, like riding a motorcycle where you're the only one who's going to get hurt when your number comes up. This is literally going to kill millions.

kazinator 2mo ago
The millions it will kill first won't be among the overconsumers who are driving climate change.
smcg 2mo ago
they don't care who lives or dies. they probably think it only affects "bad" people.
chasd00 2mo ago
so I don't want to ignore it nor the evidence, now what?
- ang_cire 2mo ago
  So now use whatever political power you have to push for changes to mitigate, respond, or prevent as much of it as possible?
  - HDBaseT 2mo ago
    [flagged]
zem 2mo ago
this is perhaps the best thing written on the topic https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2006-jul-02-op-gilbert2-story.html https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2006-jul-02-op-gilbe...
- ang_cire 2mo ago
  Good read. I do think it's giving too much credit to our evolutionary instincts, though, and not enough to personal and political choices. Unless there's something lacking in the brain of climate change deniers (which as nice as it might be to believe that, there's no evidence to back up), they should be able to match the many people who are reacting in horror and fear to it.
- jazzpush2 2mo ago
  This was a fun, light read, but nowhere near 'best', hardly more than a fun opinion piece, and even then it completely ignored relevant topics (class inequality at foot, performative climate action [taylor swift], disparate impacts).
  - zem 2mo ago
    it's the clearest layman-accessible overview of all the issues at play that I've seen. if you know a better one feel free to recommend it.
    - jazzpush2 2mo ago
      "all the issues" - which issues exactly? It didn't explain any of the contributing issues at all - it was a think piece on motivations for lack of action. To answer your question: literally every linked YouTube video.
      - zem 2mo ago
        this is specifically about the psychological reasons why humans don't seem to care about climate change, despite it being a huge catastrophe in the making, which is exactly what the OP was asking.
nehal3m 2mo ago
I do care. I see a species ending disaster hanging over the future. I recycle, I have solar panels, a heat pump, an EV (that I leave on my driveway whenever my bicycle will do the job). But the planet is being ruined by greed on an unfathomable scale and aside from doing what I can and voting for parties that see the problem, I feel like there’s not a god damn thing I can do about it.
- keybored 2mo ago
  This consumer/suburbia-level checklist of individual eco merit is more of a scapegoating ritual than something that makes a difference. This is not a job for solar panel rebates. It’s more of a job for things like Extinction Rebellion; political demonstrations and activism that forces the issue. Which in turn (if successful) will lead to real organized work towards and ecological future. One where we are chipping in together rather than hunking down in our single-home bunkers with our plastic recycling and electric bicycles. Although things like adoption of EVs does probably have a great positive impact on the local pollution levels.
  - nehal3m 2mo ago
    I agree, you can’t shop your way out of political issues and joining a polity is probably the best thing you can do. Still, having to make a choice I’d opt for buying the more sustainable option.
    - keybored 1mo ago
      You agree. Yet you keep repeating this cul de sac attitude of recycling and other single home nice to haves? Simply miss me with these already-wise replies. That just means that your comments are something worse than naive.
- stevenwoo 2mo ago
  I think if you should be able to at least have the peace of mind that you did all you could (within reason, short of pulling a Ted Kaczynski or his modern equivalent Luigi Mangione). Maybe it’s inevitable - history shows tons of species go extinct and maybe unbridled capitalism is how we go, maybe seven million years give or take is all humans will have. Maybe I absorbed too much of Meditations by Aurelius.
Imustaskforhelp 2mo ago
> This isn't a personal risk, either, like riding a motorcycle where you're the only one who's going to get hurt when your number comes up. This is literally going to kill millions. Just my personal opinion on why this might be the case. It's perhaps that people have hard time understanding the scale of the issue. They think, few inches so what?? but the downstream effects of it are catastrophic. Even if as you are suggesting that millions of people might die, its hard to imagine the scale of that or how that might look like. On the other hand, I have seen people far more passionate even about the lives/death of a single person. Maybe its the story telling aspects of it which plays a part in why a person cares about an issue or not, also how society reacts to problem. A man looks upwards, if everyone else around him is running saying the sky is falling. He might assume so too, but if everyone else is acting the same nonetheless, (Sure people are speaking but Words are cheap and actions are hard and its actions of our society that we subtly pay most attention to.) Maybe realizing this, I feel as if its a chicken and egg problem. We want people to care but people care especially more only if society at large cares about it but society is made up of people. Going on a tangent, I come to this topic of chicken and egg a lot in my life. It feels as if things can be stuck and perhaps this also explains why things aren't improving, because if it did improve then I wouldn't be talking about it. But because I am talking about this problem, it means that its usually involved of factors including societal/social dynamics and people are complicated and complex and its a hard problem to solve. But just because it could be hard doesn't mean it isn't impossible. We can try to be helpless or doomerist about it but also Humanity has shown from time to time to do the (hard things) or even impossible things. Humanity is really impressive in that sense but also unpredictable and as such, I have given up the ability to predict the future but I have hope and trust within my heart that we could (together, as a society) fix this issue of climate change for our next generations because our generation borrows it from the next one and we should try to give it in good shape because why not/why shouldn't we. I hope that we do, in fact, give a better future to the next generation and give them hope. Or certainly we can try to try our best in this possibility and perhaps be aware of the dynamics at play.
- dripdry45 2mo ago
  The thought and consideration is worth the time, I think. However, in a certain respect this is why government is supposed to exist: we never would have gone to the moon. Or built the highway system. Or train tracks. Or a whole lot of big things which don’t immediately seem to have a benefit. It takes a large body with power and money to enact regulations and movement and take on big projects which would obviously benefit a majority of people in the long-term. When this is done, countries can move mountains, literally, but without it? We are just left to boil in our own juices as people running around flailing. I think your idea is absolutely worth personal consideration, but at the same time my feeling is the answer is somewhat obvious on a societal scale. But we’ve lost all trust in government, and there is no political will left to get almost anything done in North America
ygjb 2mo ago
Millions? I don't usually meet many optimistic people in risk management :(
sajithdilshan 2mo ago
> This is literally going to kill millions. Unfortunately, given current trajectory that's how the mother nature is going to bring back balance. I wouldn't be surprised even billions die.
- osigurdson 2mo ago
  Do you have any credible source indicating that "billions will die"?
  - sajithdilshan 2mo ago
    what I stated was "I wouldn't be surprised even billions die.", that implies that it's my understanding and opinion and I do not need to link a source for my own opinion.
    - osigurdson 2mo ago
      If I stated that "I think everything will be completely fine", I would expect people to challenge me on that to provide some kind of evidence. Hyperbolic statements on both sides of the argument are not constructive.
      - thunderfork 2mo ago
        You've mistaken a statement for an argument
- ColdStream 2mo ago
  Yep, get in balance with nature or it will do it for you. And you don't want that.
locallost 2mo ago
I don't want to criticize you, but a question: what are you doing in practice to change something? Is your carbon footprint below what is sustainable? Let's look at me: I don't own a car, live in a smaller town, move around mostly on foot, take public transportation, long distance mostly train. I have two kids and for years my electricity total was 1500kwh a year. Last year it was 1100kwh (heating is gas though, that's what my building has). All this and I do cook a lot with an electric stove. I bought some new appliances before the old ones were completely broken (although they were close) partly because the new ones were all very energy efficient. But: I live abroad and take my kids to my parents once a year, and fly. Last year I flew four times, including intercontinental (albeit a true outlier of a year). I consume things produced all around the globe, either as items like phones, or food, and the food I do probably daily (I really like fruit, so bananas, mangos, avocados etc). My point is: my carbon footprint is pretty low, and I try to be mindful about not wasting resources. And it's not that hard, I don't feel like I am missing out on something if I don't drive a car. But I still took my kids to Spain on a vacation, and we still flew there to sit on the beach. Giving that up is hard, and making them sacrifice their childhood fun is hard. There's a range of what people are ready to give up. I would say I'm on the better side of it, but it's still not enough. Almost no one is ready to sacrifice, and we need almost everyone to sacrifice. Governments do lip service to these goals, but let's see how much countries like Spain sre ready to curb tourism, or countries like Germany and China that live off manufacturing to cut consumption. Who will give up their job to reduce carbon emissions? The saying train wreck in slow motion has merit.
- keybored 2mo ago
  > Is your carbon footprint below what is sustainable? What a waste of time this is. Carbon footprint? Zero-emission homes? The climate is global and the balance sheet is spread across all of us. Someone with a disability might have much more use for cars and transporation than someone who is able-bodied. And homes out in the boonies without much sun (for solar power) might need a diesel generator for their three-times-a-year power outages in order to keep up productivity and a comfortable existence. And twenty miles from that house is a village full of grid-connected homes running on hydropower. As long as the “balance sheet” is okay we should not fret about this individual stuff. “Carbon footprint” was explicitly designed as a distraction away from British Petroleum and onto the consumer. I think the kids call that a “whataboutism”. > I consume things produced all around the globe, either as items like phones, or food, and the food I do probably daily (I really like fruit, so bananas, mangos, avocados etc). Yeah things are made in Vietnam and China now. And that is the consumer’s fault? That eco-friendly wooden utensils used in Europe are made in China? Step one. Create and design a deeply interconnected, global market with specializations. The signal is just money, the most fungible asset. Step two: externalities. Step three: use money (see step one) to market your scapegoating to everybody, in direct contradiction with the sheer simplicity of step one; no, consumers aren’t supposed to just use money/price as the signal, that’s evil and has a high Carbon Footprint. > My point is: my carbon footprint is pretty low, and I try to be mindful about not wasting resources. And it's not that hard, I don't feel like I am missing out on something if I don't drive a car. But I still took my kids to Spain on a vacation, and we still flew there to sit on the beach. Giving that up is hard, and making them sacrifice their childhood fun is hard. I dunno, an extra twelve degrees Celsius and beaches is worth those flights? And sacrificing childhood fun? Children are an endless maw of desires. Of course if you give them the idea of something (or the TV does) and then don’t go through with it is the greatest crime in the history of humanity. And yet, our parents went without all of that, etc., despite their identical child programming.
criddell 2mo ago
> This is literally going to kill millions. Somebody (maybe Stalin) once said something like one death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic. A disaster on the scale of millions of deaths doesn't register in a lot of people's brains. It has to be made smaller, more personal.
- reverius42 2mo ago
  Covid killed over a million Americans and still half the population thinks the vaccine was worse than the disease.
wing-_-nuts 2mo ago
>This is literally going to kill millions. You could be right, but I think the more likely outcome is a 'Ministry for the Future' scenario where India or China just decide to unilaterally implement geoengineering and dare the rest of the world to stop them.
- Yizahi 2mo ago
  There is a tiny problem with that hypothesis - there are I think at most 3 potentially viable climate reversal options - DAC, sun shield and aerosol injection in the atmosphere. All 3 options are likely cost through the nose and will require sums and efforts on a global scale. Any single country attempting them on its own, would require to set aside double digit amounts of its GDP for decades, effectively crippling itself economically, while the world passes them by. And all option would require decades, if not centuries of constant work because we don't have any meaningful net negative DAC tech, we don't have any sun shield expertise outside of the JWST and a few small science experiments, and we don't have the required planes to seed atmosphere and neither they are net negative yet. By we I mean both whole globe or any single country.
  - majormajor 2mo ago
    Game of chicken. Wait as long as you can because as it starts to get worse for everyone, maybe more and more countries will join in on the efforts. I don't know if any country has the industrial base to do it yourself, as you say, but if any does, it's almost certainly China just due to manufacturing output and expertise alone. They're, what, 30-35% of the world's output? Set aside 30% of that and they can still feed a lot of exports to other countries - more than anyone else - to bring in money. And nobody else has anything close to the leading-edge hands-on know-how to build all the stuff that would be required. As you mention, there's a lot nobody has yet. So the country best at building cutting-edge hardware is gonna have the head start. If you're a western pessimist, that whole mega-project could easily unlock even more manufacturing, materials science, etc, progress that could be applied to the rest of their output too, furthering the gap between them and everyone else. (But I guess if they did single-handedly save however many billion people from displacement, and the majority of developed countries from massive crisis/invasion/etc, that's probably the least of our worries!)
deleted 2mo ago
[deleted]
kypro 2mo ago
I'm very concerned personally, but I find it easy to inhabit many minds on this topic... Firstly, most people just don't see the impacts of climate change that dramatically in their lives so it's easy not to care. They'll notice slightly warmer summers, but it's not that bad. Food is a bit more expensive too, but that's more to do with global oil supplies and geopolitical conflict than crop failure. Meanwhile (here in Europe) energy prices are crippling us and businesses. And over the last few years we've been constantly reminded just how vulnerable we are because we don't have enough domestic oil and gas production to cover domestic demand. Additionally, you have countries like the UK and Germany who (in my view) are massive global PR damage for green energy policies by showing the world just how economically harmful and expensive going all in on renewals is. Personally I project out and see we're screwed if we don't make a change yesterday, but I also know the UK investing more in green energy will do little more than just make us all poorer. Ultimately climate change is a global problem and we need global solutions. Even if the UK cut it's emissions to 0 that would represent less than a 1% of total global emissions... What's the point? Okay, so then I try to think about what those global solutions are... Maybe we can collectivise with other countries and assert pressure on others to pollute less with us? Okay great, but realistically this will kill millions of people... Energy is what keeps the global economy going and increasing energy costs in developing countries will mean cutting them off from the energy they need to survive. Additionally, this will push up prices of essentials in the West. Maybe people in the West won't die, but for those already struggling to get by, their lives will get far harder... Okay, so what's the alternatives? Would it be better to tolerate a little more heat? Maybe we can do some geo-engineering to hold down global temperatures a bit instead? Ultimately it seems to me there are no good answers here aside from a slow transition which ultimately will be forced on us by the fact that the supply of fossil fuels is limited. Fossil fuels are like a debt which we take out and enjoy the benefits of, then hand down to the next generation to pay back. All we can really do is decide who pays the price. Do we suffer greatly now for the good of future generations? Or do we hope that future generations will find a technological solution? As a wealthy European my position would be to take the cost now but I suspect if I were struggling to get by my position on this would be very different.
xdc0 2mo ago
These are the reasons I can think of: - The problem dimension is hard to visualize for most people. Similar to space distances are hard to understand. - There's nothing an individual can do about it other than trusting their local institutions and voting. Recycling, being a rational consumer, choosing greener options have negligible impact and it's main benefit is making people feel good. - The consequences are slow to materialize. Sure, it's a bit hotter or more rainy in some places. It'll take a few more of these for population as a whole to feel inclined to become more involved in the matter. Which might be too late. Either way, not much to do about it.
- ColdStream 2mo ago
  The term 'Hyperobject' summarized it perfectly. Essentially the problem operates at such a large scale and requires such a level of systemic thinking that it becomes the scope of most people. Not because they are stupid but simply because just a side effect of it being such a large subject. Also the multi-decade latency means it move slow enough that many can ignore it but it move quick enough that unaddressed it causes major issues.

kazinator 2mo ago

The millions it will kill first won't be among the overconsumers who are driving climate change.

smcg 2mo ago

they don't care who lives or dies. they probably think it only affects "bad" people.

chasd00 2mo ago

so I don't want to ignore it nor the evidence, now what?

ang_cire 2mo ago
So now use whatever political power you have to push for changes to mitigate, respond, or prevent as much of it as possible?
- HDBaseT 2mo ago
  [flagged]

zem 2mo ago

this is perhaps the best thing written on the topic https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2006-jul-02-op-gilbert2-story.html https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2006-jul-02-op-gilbe...

ang_cire 2mo ago
Good read. I do think it's giving too much credit to our evolutionary instincts, though, and not enough to personal and political choices. Unless there's something lacking in the brain of climate change deniers (which as nice as it might be to believe that, there's no evidence to back up), they should be able to match the many people who are reacting in horror and fear to it.
jazzpush2 2mo ago
This was a fun, light read, but nowhere near 'best', hardly more than a fun opinion piece, and even then it completely ignored relevant topics (class inequality at foot, performative climate action [taylor swift], disparate impacts).
- zem 2mo ago
  it's the clearest layman-accessible overview of all the issues at play that I've seen. if you know a better one feel free to recommend it.
  - jazzpush2 2mo ago
    "all the issues" - which issues exactly? It didn't explain any of the contributing issues at all - it was a think piece on motivations for lack of action. To answer your question: literally every linked YouTube video.
    - zem 2mo ago
      this is specifically about the psychological reasons why humans don't seem to care about climate change, despite it being a huge catastrophe in the making, which is exactly what the OP was asking.

nehal3m 2mo ago

I do care. I see a species ending disaster hanging over the future. I recycle, I have solar panels, a heat pump, an EV (that I leave on my driveway whenever my bicycle will do the job). But the planet is being ruined by greed on an unfathomable scale and aside from doing what I can and voting for parties that see the problem, I feel like there’s not a god damn thing I can do about it.

keybored 2mo ago
This consumer/suburbia-level checklist of individual eco merit is more of a scapegoating ritual than something that makes a difference. This is not a job for solar panel rebates. It’s more of a job for things like Extinction Rebellion; political demonstrations and activism that forces the issue. Which in turn (if successful) will lead to real organized work towards and ecological future. One where we are chipping in together rather than hunking down in our single-home bunkers with our plastic recycling and electric bicycles. Although things like adoption of EVs does probably have a great positive impact on the local pollution levels.
- nehal3m 2mo ago
  I agree, you can’t shop your way out of political issues and joining a polity is probably the best thing you can do. Still, having to make a choice I’d opt for buying the more sustainable option.
  - keybored 1mo ago
    You agree. Yet you keep repeating this cul de sac attitude of recycling and other single home nice to haves? Simply miss me with these already-wise replies. That just means that your comments are something worse than naive.
stevenwoo 2mo ago
I think if you should be able to at least have the peace of mind that you did all you could (within reason, short of pulling a Ted Kaczynski or his modern equivalent Luigi Mangione). Maybe it’s inevitable - history shows tons of species go extinct and maybe unbridled capitalism is how we go, maybe seven million years give or take is all humans will have. Maybe I absorbed too much of Meditations by Aurelius.

Imustaskforhelp 2mo ago

> This isn't a personal risk, either, like riding a motorcycle where you're the only one who's going to get hurt when your number comes up. This is literally going to kill millions. Just my personal opinion on why this might be the case. It's perhaps that people have hard time understanding the scale of the issue. They think, few inches so what?? but the downstream effects of it are catastrophic. Even if as you are suggesting that millions of people might die, its hard to imagine the scale of that or how that might look like. On the other hand, I have seen people far more passionate even about the lives/death of a single person. Maybe its the story telling aspects of it which plays a part in why a person cares about an issue or not, also how society reacts to problem. A man looks upwards, if everyone else around him is running saying the sky is falling. He might assume so too, but if everyone else is acting the same nonetheless, (Sure people are speaking but Words are cheap and actions are hard and its actions of our society that we subtly pay most attention to.) Maybe realizing this, I feel as if its a chicken and egg problem. We want people to care but people care especially more only if society at large cares about it but society is made up of people. Going on a tangent, I come to this topic of chicken and egg a lot in my life. It feels as if things can be stuck and perhaps this also explains why things aren't improving, because if it did improve then I wouldn't be talking about it. But because I am talking about this problem, it means that its usually involved of factors including societal/social dynamics and people are complicated and complex and its a hard problem to solve. But just because it could be hard doesn't mean it isn't impossible. We can try to be helpless or doomerist about it but also Humanity has shown from time to time to do the (hard things) or even impossible things. Humanity is really impressive in that sense but also unpredictable and as such, I have given up the ability to predict the future but I have hope and trust within my heart that we could (together, as a society) fix this issue of climate change for our next generations because our generation borrows it from the next one and we should try to give it in good shape because why not/why shouldn't we. I hope that we do, in fact, give a better future to the next generation and give them hope. Or certainly we can try to try our best in this possibility and perhaps be aware of the dynamics at play.

dripdry45 2mo ago
The thought and consideration is worth the time, I think. However, in a certain respect this is why government is supposed to exist: we never would have gone to the moon. Or built the highway system. Or train tracks. Or a whole lot of big things which don’t immediately seem to have a benefit. It takes a large body with power and money to enact regulations and movement and take on big projects which would obviously benefit a majority of people in the long-term. When this is done, countries can move mountains, literally, but without it? We are just left to boil in our own juices as people running around flailing. I think your idea is absolutely worth personal consideration, but at the same time my feeling is the answer is somewhat obvious on a societal scale. But we’ve lost all trust in government, and there is no political will left to get almost anything done in North America

ygjb 2mo ago

Millions? I don't usually meet many optimistic people in risk management :(

sajithdilshan 2mo ago

> This is literally going to kill millions. Unfortunately, given current trajectory that's how the mother nature is going to bring back balance. I wouldn't be surprised even billions die.

osigurdson 2mo ago
Do you have any credible source indicating that "billions will die"?
- sajithdilshan 2mo ago
  what I stated was "I wouldn't be surprised even billions die.", that implies that it's my understanding and opinion and I do not need to link a source for my own opinion.
  - osigurdson 2mo ago
    If I stated that "I think everything will be completely fine", I would expect people to challenge me on that to provide some kind of evidence. Hyperbolic statements on both sides of the argument are not constructive.
    - thunderfork 2mo ago
      You've mistaken a statement for an argument
ColdStream 2mo ago
Yep, get in balance with nature or it will do it for you. And you don't want that.

locallost 2mo ago

I don't want to criticize you, but a question: what are you doing in practice to change something? Is your carbon footprint below what is sustainable? Let's look at me: I don't own a car, live in a smaller town, move around mostly on foot, take public transportation, long distance mostly train. I have two kids and for years my electricity total was 1500kwh a year. Last year it was 1100kwh (heating is gas though, that's what my building has). All this and I do cook a lot with an electric stove. I bought some new appliances before the old ones were completely broken (although they were close) partly because the new ones were all very energy efficient. But: I live abroad and take my kids to my parents once a year, and fly. Last year I flew four times, including intercontinental (albeit a true outlier of a year). I consume things produced all around the globe, either as items like phones, or food, and the food I do probably daily (I really like fruit, so bananas, mangos, avocados etc). My point is: my carbon footprint is pretty low, and I try to be mindful about not wasting resources. And it's not that hard, I don't feel like I am missing out on something if I don't drive a car. But I still took my kids to Spain on a vacation, and we still flew there to sit on the beach. Giving that up is hard, and making them sacrifice their childhood fun is hard. There's a range of what people are ready to give up. I would say I'm on the better side of it, but it's still not enough. Almost no one is ready to sacrifice, and we need almost everyone to sacrifice. Governments do lip service to these goals, but let's see how much countries like Spain sre ready to curb tourism, or countries like Germany and China that live off manufacturing to cut consumption. Who will give up their job to reduce carbon emissions? The saying train wreck in slow motion has merit.

keybored 2mo ago
> Is your carbon footprint below what is sustainable? What a waste of time this is. Carbon footprint? Zero-emission homes? The climate is global and the balance sheet is spread across all of us. Someone with a disability might have much more use for cars and transporation than someone who is able-bodied. And homes out in the boonies without much sun (for solar power) might need a diesel generator for their three-times-a-year power outages in order to keep up productivity and a comfortable existence. And twenty miles from that house is a village full of grid-connected homes running on hydropower. As long as the “balance sheet” is okay we should not fret about this individual stuff. “Carbon footprint” was explicitly designed as a distraction away from British Petroleum and onto the consumer. I think the kids call that a “whataboutism”. > I consume things produced all around the globe, either as items like phones, or food, and the food I do probably daily (I really like fruit, so bananas, mangos, avocados etc). Yeah things are made in Vietnam and China now. And that is the consumer’s fault? That eco-friendly wooden utensils used in Europe are made in China? Step one. Create and design a deeply interconnected, global market with specializations. The signal is just money, the most fungible asset. Step two: externalities. Step three: use money (see step one) to market your scapegoating to everybody, in direct contradiction with the sheer simplicity of step one; no, consumers aren’t supposed to just use money/price as the signal, that’s evil and has a high Carbon Footprint. > My point is: my carbon footprint is pretty low, and I try to be mindful about not wasting resources. And it's not that hard, I don't feel like I am missing out on something if I don't drive a car. But I still took my kids to Spain on a vacation, and we still flew there to sit on the beach. Giving that up is hard, and making them sacrifice their childhood fun is hard. I dunno, an extra twelve degrees Celsius and beaches is worth those flights? And sacrificing childhood fun? Children are an endless maw of desires. Of course if you give them the idea of something (or the TV does) and then don’t go through with it is the greatest crime in the history of humanity. And yet, our parents went without all of that, etc., despite their identical child programming.

criddell 2mo ago

> This is literally going to kill millions. Somebody (maybe Stalin) once said something like one death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic. A disaster on the scale of millions of deaths doesn't register in a lot of people's brains. It has to be made smaller, more personal.

reverius42 2mo ago
Covid killed over a million Americans and still half the population thinks the vaccine was worse than the disease.

wing-_-nuts 2mo ago

>This is literally going to kill millions. You could be right, but I think the more likely outcome is a 'Ministry for the Future' scenario where India or China just decide to unilaterally implement geoengineering and dare the rest of the world to stop them.

Yizahi 2mo ago
There is a tiny problem with that hypothesis - there are I think at most 3 potentially viable climate reversal options - DAC, sun shield and aerosol injection in the atmosphere. All 3 options are likely cost through the nose and will require sums and efforts on a global scale. Any single country attempting them on its own, would require to set aside double digit amounts of its GDP for decades, effectively crippling itself economically, while the world passes them by. And all option would require decades, if not centuries of constant work because we don't have any meaningful net negative DAC tech, we don't have any sun shield expertise outside of the JWST and a few small science experiments, and we don't have the required planes to seed atmosphere and neither they are net negative yet. By we I mean both whole globe or any single country.
- majormajor 2mo ago
  Game of chicken. Wait as long as you can because as it starts to get worse for everyone, maybe more and more countries will join in on the efforts. I don't know if any country has the industrial base to do it yourself, as you say, but if any does, it's almost certainly China just due to manufacturing output and expertise alone. They're, what, 30-35% of the world's output? Set aside 30% of that and they can still feed a lot of exports to other countries - more than anyone else - to bring in money. And nobody else has anything close to the leading-edge hands-on know-how to build all the stuff that would be required. As you mention, there's a lot nobody has yet. So the country best at building cutting-edge hardware is gonna have the head start. If you're a western pessimist, that whole mega-project could easily unlock even more manufacturing, materials science, etc, progress that could be applied to the rest of their output too, furthering the gap between them and everyone else. (But I guess if they did single-handedly save however many billion people from displacement, and the majority of developed countries from massive crisis/invasion/etc, that's probably the least of our worries!)

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kypro 2mo ago

I'm very concerned personally, but I find it easy to inhabit many minds on this topic... Firstly, most people just don't see the impacts of climate change that dramatically in their lives so it's easy not to care. They'll notice slightly warmer summers, but it's not that bad. Food is a bit more expensive too, but that's more to do with global oil supplies and geopolitical conflict than crop failure. Meanwhile (here in Europe) energy prices are crippling us and businesses. And over the last few years we've been constantly reminded just how vulnerable we are because we don't have enough domestic oil and gas production to cover domestic demand. Additionally, you have countries like the UK and Germany who (in my view) are massive global PR damage for green energy policies by showing the world just how economically harmful and expensive going all in on renewals is. Personally I project out and see we're screwed if we don't make a change yesterday, but I also know the UK investing more in green energy will do little more than just make us all poorer. Ultimately climate change is a global problem and we need global solutions. Even if the UK cut it's emissions to 0 that would represent less than a 1% of total global emissions... What's the point? Okay, so then I try to think about what those global solutions are... Maybe we can collectivise with other countries and assert pressure on others to pollute less with us? Okay great, but realistically this will kill millions of people... Energy is what keeps the global economy going and increasing energy costs in developing countries will mean cutting them off from the energy they need to survive. Additionally, this will push up prices of essentials in the West. Maybe people in the West won't die, but for those already struggling to get by, their lives will get far harder... Okay, so what's the alternatives? Would it be better to tolerate a little more heat? Maybe we can do some geo-engineering to hold down global temperatures a bit instead? Ultimately it seems to me there are no good answers here aside from a slow transition which ultimately will be forced on us by the fact that the supply of fossil fuels is limited. Fossil fuels are like a debt which we take out and enjoy the benefits of, then hand down to the next generation to pay back. All we can really do is decide who pays the price. Do we suffer greatly now for the good of future generations? Or do we hope that future generations will find a technological solution? As a wealthy European my position would be to take the cost now but I suspect if I were struggling to get by my position on this would be very different.

xdc0 2mo ago

These are the reasons I can think of: - The problem dimension is hard to visualize for most people. Similar to space distances are hard to understand. - There's nothing an individual can do about it other than trusting their local institutions and voting. Recycling, being a rational consumer, choosing greener options have negligible impact and it's main benefit is making people feel good. - The consequences are slow to materialize. Sure, it's a bit hotter or more rainy in some places. It'll take a few more of these for population as a whole to feel inclined to become more involved in the matter. Which might be too late. Either way, not much to do about it.

ColdStream 2mo ago
The term 'Hyperobject' summarized it perfectly. Essentially the problem operates at such a large scale and requires such a level of systemic thinking that it becomes the scope of most people. Not because they are stupid but simply because just a side effect of it being such a large subject. Also the multi-decade latency means it move slow enough that many can ignore it but it move quick enough that unaddressed it causes major issues.