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Technologies also have risks. If the risk of a technology is the vast devastation of life it should not be used.

by holri 12y ago

hyperbovine 12y ago
Compared with the vast devastation of life which is already taking place as a result of climate change? I'll take my chances with the nukes.
- holri 12y ago
  There are other possibilities than nuclear and fossil energy without those vast risks. The OP article is all about that. Nuclear is not a viable alternative energy.
- Lorento 12y ago
  Human life? Is it? Remember famines that used to regularly wipe out the peasants in most civilizations? It's been a while since disasters on those scales happened in most countries. Climate change doesn't sound so bad when you compare it to normal life a few centuries ago.
  - saiya-jin 12y ago
    yes and no... climate change is not about having +2 degrees globally, we can handle that easily even if sea rises significantly. Not even about extinction of a lot of species, which will trash some foodchains around the world. It's more about longer perspective - some effects are cascading, and in longer uncontroleld run, we might end up with pretty much inhabitable planet (at least for mankind). Life itself will handle this easily, mass extinctions happened many times in the past for various reasons, mankind in its current level of evolution would be probably over.
  - DennisP 12y ago
    For a look at what's actually projected for the climate, read the book Six Degrees by Mark Lynas, who read about 3,000 peer-reviewed papers and summarized them, with extensive references. It's quite frightening, and far beyond anything that human civilization has ever experienced, even at +2C. If we go all the way to +6 it's hard to imagine anyone surviving. Somewhere between +2 and +3, climate feedbacks kick in and take it several degrees further with no more help from us. Right now we're at +0.8.
  - hyperbovine 12y ago
    I didn't say anything about humans, but even the most anthropocentric among us can see that killing everything in sight serves to hasten our own demise. And yes, it is. Read the latest predictions, they are really that bad.
maccard 12y ago
I agree. How many more thousands of miners must be killed before we finally abolish coal as a fuel source?
- holri 12y ago
  Yes I agree. Let's move on to modern and safe technologies. For example wind, solar and energy storage.
mauricemir 12y ago
There regularly have been single mining accidents that killed far more then ALL the nuclear accidents.

Technologies also have risks. If the risk of a technology is the vast devastation of life it should not be used.

by holri 12y ago

Technologies also have risks. If the risk of a technology is the vast devastation of life it should not be used.

Compared with the vast devastation of life which is already taking place as a result of climate change? I'll take my chances with the nukes.

holri 12y ago
There are other possibilities than nuclear and fossil energy without those vast risks. The OP article is all about that. Nuclear is not a viable alternative energy.
Lorento 12y ago
Human life? Is it? Remember famines that used to regularly wipe out the peasants in most civilizations? It's been a while since disasters on those scales happened in most countries. Climate change doesn't sound so bad when you compare it to normal life a few centuries ago.
- saiya-jin 12y ago
  yes and no... climate change is not about having +2 degrees globally, we can handle that easily even if sea rises significantly. Not even about extinction of a lot of species, which will trash some foodchains around the world. It's more about longer perspective - some effects are cascading, and in longer uncontroleld run, we might end up with pretty much inhabitable planet (at least for mankind). Life itself will handle this easily, mass extinctions happened many times in the past for various reasons, mankind in its current level of evolution would be probably over.
- DennisP 12y ago
  For a look at what's actually projected for the climate, read the book Six Degrees by Mark Lynas, who read about 3,000 peer-reviewed papers and summarized them, with extensive references. It's quite frightening, and far beyond anything that human civilization has ever experienced, even at +2C. If we go all the way to +6 it's hard to imagine anyone surviving. Somewhere between +2 and +3, climate feedbacks kick in and take it several degrees further with no more help from us. Right now we're at +0.8.
- hyperbovine 12y ago
  I didn't say anything about humans, but even the most anthropocentric among us can see that killing everything in sight serves to hasten our own demise. And yes, it is. Read the latest predictions, they are really that bad.

maccard 12y ago

I agree. How many more thousands of miners must be killed before we finally abolish coal as a fuel source?

holri 12y ago
Yes I agree. Let's move on to modern and safe technologies. For example wind, solar and energy storage.

mauricemir 12y ago

There regularly have been single mining accidents that killed far more then ALL the nuclear accidents.