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At this point it's obvious: CO2, which traps heat by a clearly understandable and straightforward physical mechanism, is altering the Earth's climate with unkno

by api 12y ago

At this point it's obvious: CO2, which traps heat by a clearly understandable and straightforward physical mechanism, is altering the Earth's climate with unknown but likely mostly negative consequences. That means we can add this fact to an already very long list of reasons that we must go beyond fossil fuels. I personally don't think the CO2 problem is at the top of that list. The top slot by far belongs to the depletion problem. There is a finite amount of the stuff that is economically recoverable. We don't know exactly where the limit is, but when we hit it -- assuming we have no alternatives -- we will begin a downward spiral toward the collapse of modern civilization. This might also involve global warfare, possibly nuclear, and a "mass die off" of the human species. At the very least all economic growth would cease and with it all opportunity for anyone to advance their condition in life. The pie would begin shrinking, and this would bring a return to a scarcity mentality in all things. An "orderly die-back and return to bare subsistence" is probably the best case scenario. The fact that our entire modern technological society is absolutely dependent upon a finite source of energy is probably the greatest existential threat that we face. That this isn't talked about more is likely a result of denial in the face of a very terrifying problem. A good way to think about it is to compare it to a planet-killer asteroid that we know is headed our way. Next up is probably the geopolitical nightmare of fossil fuels. Fossil fuels transfer massive quantities of wealth from (relatively) liberal open societies to brutal totalitarian states where people are beheaded for questioning the dominant religion or dictator. It finances both terrorism and the ideologies behind it. The only alternative way to still get these fuels would be to embark upon a blood-soaked imperial crusade to simply seize these fossil fuel reserves, an alternative that's arguably worse than the existing state of affairs for many reasons. I'd put the CO2 problem in the third slot below these. The fourth slot would probably belong to the other environmental damages inflicted by fossil fuel mining and use including air and water pollution and the destruction of otherwise valuable land. Anyone who argues for the fossil fuel status quo at this point is delusional or insane. I personally think this is the greatest problem facing our civilization.

mollerhoj 12y ago
"Can we stop arguing at this point? Anyone who still thinks the fossil fuel status quo is okay is insane." 72%[1] of republicans in the senate are insane apparently. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFOPf0s5u5E#t=54 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFOPf0s5u5E#t=54
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- lotsofmangos 12y ago
  I guess it comes down to your definition of sanity. A hell of a lot of people think they can talk to the creator of the universe by closing their eyes once a week. The human race does not generally set the sanity bar all that high.
- r00fus 12y ago
  They're perfectly sane (they see their constituency as their funders - of which Big Oil is a big name), but corrupt. How do you remediate a corrupt system?
- GFK_of_xmaspast 12y ago
  "72%[1] of republicans in the senate are insane apparently." I never doubted it.
corylehey 12y ago
CO2 argument aside, just because oil makes such a large portion of energy doesn't mean we are dependent on it to that degree. It's simply the most economic way to currently fill that energy need. If oil runs out, which may be way further into the future than anyone realizes, then it will no longer be the most economic option and thus replaced by the next in line. Mass die off? bare subsistence? What kind of comic books are you reading that in?
- 300bps 12y ago
  There is a BBC show called Bang Goes the Theory that is similar to mythbusters. There was a particular episode where they took a typical UK family and unbeknownst to them put them into a house that was solely powered by electricity generated by bicyclists. It is a stark lesson on how much we take easy energy from fossil fuels for granted: http://www.electricpedals.com/human-power-station/ http://www.electricpedals.com/human-power-station/ It is quite foolish and selfish that generations living from about 1900 to 2100 will burn up 3 billion years of stored sunlight in the form of fossil fuels. It will be at the least drastically painful when the fossil fuels run out if we don't take action.
  - api 12y ago
    Another way of thinking about it: You're in a startup, and you see that your "burn" gives you approximately six months of runway. Your revenue is increasing, but too slow. The lines do not intersect. Doing nothing proactive about the fossil fuel problem is identical to doing nothing proactive in that scenario. "Burn" is quite literal in this analogy, and "revenue" is analogous to our ability to tap and utilize other sources of energy economically. Right now we're like a startup on a death march to bankruptcy. Barring benevolent aliens, I doubt there's any more venture capital available. A lot of people have a cognitive block about this issue because historically it's an issue raised by "liberals" and "hippies." But it's not a political issue. It's a physics issue. It's as "hard" and objective an issue as it gets. If humanity were to fail as a species and you asked me (in the afterlife?) why, I'd say "because we used ideas and facts as indicators of membership in social cliques, making it impossible to think objectively about things without threatening our standing in those groups."
rralian 12y ago
> There is a finite amount of the stuff that is economically recoverable. We don't know exactly where the limit is, but when we hit it -- assuming we have no alternatives -- we will begin a downward spiral toward the collapse of modern civilization. Whoah, that seems a little overly pessimistic. We _do_ have alternatives, they just aren't economically competitive with fossil fuels. So I say bring on supply constraints... anything that raises the price of fossil fuels helps to make alternatives more attractive and increase investment into their research and refinement. So I'd still be way more concerned with the CO2 problem, overfishing, pollution, mass-extinction... all that stuff.
ThomPete 12y ago
The problem with this discussion is that it positions climate change is the biggest threat to humanity. But there are other dangers such as AI far more lethal to humans and there are other factors to take into consideration. For instance its hard to see the world in general becoming richer and getting more people out of poverty by doing green if we dont find effective alternatives to the green energy we have today as it's simply not enough to just replace current usage but also develop solutions that are exponentially more effective. At the same time its obvious that the way we currently ignore externalities in economy is not giving us a full picture of how things are really looking. In my mind we have to trust technology to be the solution even though it might end up advancing us.
nzealand 12y ago
Conservatives who deny that C02 is bad, simply don't like the solution, which they fear being more government... http://today.duke.edu/2014/11/solutionaversion http://today.duke.edu/2014/11/solutionaversion
- api 12y ago
  I'm not aware of any other political course of action that's ever been able to cope with a tragedy of the commons where property rights within the commons are difficult to assign.
rconti 12y ago
To think that a resource will suddenly disappear with no replacement is to ignore the entirety of history. Fossil fuels will not simply run out, and we are already transitioning to alternatives. That transition will speed up as costs increase. The market works. What the market is NOT doing is pricing in the impact of CO2. Which is why the CO2 emissions are the bigger problem.
- api 12y ago
  Nothing will suddenly disappear, but it will suddenly become impossible to increase production. Since it's the rate limiting reagent, that limits the economy to flat or shrinking.

by api 12y ago

mollerhoj 12y ago

"Can we stop arguing at this point? Anyone who still thinks the fossil fuel status quo is okay is insane." 72%[1] of republicans in the senate are insane apparently. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFOPf0s5u5E#t=54 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFOPf0s5u5E#t=54

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
lotsofmangos 12y ago
I guess it comes down to your definition of sanity. A hell of a lot of people think they can talk to the creator of the universe by closing their eyes once a week. The human race does not generally set the sanity bar all that high.
r00fus 12y ago
They're perfectly sane (they see their constituency as their funders - of which Big Oil is a big name), but corrupt. How do you remediate a corrupt system?
GFK_of_xmaspast 12y ago
"72%[1] of republicans in the senate are insane apparently." I never doubted it.

corylehey 12y ago

CO2 argument aside, just because oil makes such a large portion of energy doesn't mean we are dependent on it to that degree. It's simply the most economic way to currently fill that energy need. If oil runs out, which may be way further into the future than anyone realizes, then it will no longer be the most economic option and thus replaced by the next in line. Mass die off? bare subsistence? What kind of comic books are you reading that in?

300bps 12y ago
There is a BBC show called Bang Goes the Theory that is similar to mythbusters. There was a particular episode where they took a typical UK family and unbeknownst to them put them into a house that was solely powered by electricity generated by bicyclists. It is a stark lesson on how much we take easy energy from fossil fuels for granted: http://www.electricpedals.com/human-power-station/ http://www.electricpedals.com/human-power-station/ It is quite foolish and selfish that generations living from about 1900 to 2100 will burn up 3 billion years of stored sunlight in the form of fossil fuels. It will be at the least drastically painful when the fossil fuels run out if we don't take action.
- api 12y ago
  Another way of thinking about it: You're in a startup, and you see that your "burn" gives you approximately six months of runway. Your revenue is increasing, but too slow. The lines do not intersect. Doing nothing proactive about the fossil fuel problem is identical to doing nothing proactive in that scenario. "Burn" is quite literal in this analogy, and "revenue" is analogous to our ability to tap and utilize other sources of energy economically. Right now we're like a startup on a death march to bankruptcy. Barring benevolent aliens, I doubt there's any more venture capital available. A lot of people have a cognitive block about this issue because historically it's an issue raised by "liberals" and "hippies." But it's not a political issue. It's a physics issue. It's as "hard" and objective an issue as it gets. If humanity were to fail as a species and you asked me (in the afterlife?) why, I'd say "because we used ideas and facts as indicators of membership in social cliques, making it impossible to think objectively about things without threatening our standing in those groups."

rralian 12y ago

> There is a finite amount of the stuff that is economically recoverable. We don't know exactly where the limit is, but when we hit it -- assuming we have no alternatives -- we will begin a downward spiral toward the collapse of modern civilization. Whoah, that seems a little overly pessimistic. We _do_ have alternatives, they just aren't economically competitive with fossil fuels. So I say bring on supply constraints... anything that raises the price of fossil fuels helps to make alternatives more attractive and increase investment into their research and refinement. So I'd still be way more concerned with the CO2 problem, overfishing, pollution, mass-extinction... all that stuff.

ThomPete 12y ago

The problem with this discussion is that it positions climate change is the biggest threat to humanity. But there are other dangers such as AI far more lethal to humans and there are other factors to take into consideration. For instance its hard to see the world in general becoming richer and getting more people out of poverty by doing green if we dont find effective alternatives to the green energy we have today as it's simply not enough to just replace current usage but also develop solutions that are exponentially more effective. At the same time its obvious that the way we currently ignore externalities in economy is not giving us a full picture of how things are really looking. In my mind we have to trust technology to be the solution even though it might end up advancing us.

nzealand 12y ago

Conservatives who deny that C02 is bad, simply don't like the solution, which they fear being more government... http://today.duke.edu/2014/11/solutionaversion http://today.duke.edu/2014/11/solutionaversion

api 12y ago
I'm not aware of any other political course of action that's ever been able to cope with a tragedy of the commons where property rights within the commons are difficult to assign.

rconti 12y ago

To think that a resource will suddenly disappear with no replacement is to ignore the entirety of history. Fossil fuels will not simply run out, and we are already transitioning to alternatives. That transition will speed up as costs increase. The market works. What the market is NOT doing is pricing in the impact of CO2. Which is why the CO2 emissions are the bigger problem.

api 12y ago
Nothing will suddenly disappear, but it will suddenly become impossible to increase production. Since it's the rate limiting reagent, that limits the economy to flat or shrinking.