All the right words on climate have already been said
July 2, 2021 11:54 AM Subscribe
Sarah Miller writes on climate change, two years after her essay "Heaven or High Water" about selling real estate in Miami:
What then? What would happen then? Would people be “more aware” about climate change? It’s 109 degrees in Portland right now. It’s been over 130 degrees in Baghdad several times. What kind of awareness quotient are we looking for? What more about climate change does anyone need to know? What else is there to say?Previously.
This. This, this, this. I’m coming out of the PNW heat dome and every year it gets worse here. I can’t even think about our climate future without spiraling into despair, and there’s no point talking about it with each other because it’s so devastating—what is there to say? Especially when no one in power seems to give two shits.
Sarah Miller always writes just what I’m feeling and this one is like my broken heart on the page.
posted by stellaluna at 12:14 PM on July 2, 2021 [23 favorites]
Sarah Miller always writes just what I’m feeling and this one is like my broken heart on the page.
posted by stellaluna at 12:14 PM on July 2, 2021 [23 favorites]
But all the right words about climate have already been deployed. It’s time for different weapons.
Linked as "different weapons":
posted by CrystalDave at 12:19 PM on July 2, 2021 [15 favorites]
Linked as "different weapons":
How to Blow Up a Pipeline - Learning to Fight in a World on Fire, by Andreas MalmJust to bring the conclusion to the fore.
No Safe Options: A Conversation with Andreas Malm
posted by CrystalDave at 12:19 PM on July 2, 2021 [15 favorites]
Gondolas on Wall St will be full of bankers arguing that climate change isn't real.
try putting your pillows in the freezer
posted by adept256 at 12:31 PM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
try putting your pillows in the freezer
posted by adept256 at 12:31 PM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
It's hard to argue with the emotions behind her conclusion. Not when courts throw out cases against Exxon and other oil executives who covered up evidence, bullshitted the public, and bought off politicians and media over the course of decades.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:32 PM on July 2, 2021 [7 favorites]
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:32 PM on July 2, 2021 [7 favorites]
It fucking snowed in the carribean. An Aussie is giving tips to Canadians on how to deal with the heat.
This is a boiling frog situation. And we're frogs.
posted by adept256 at 12:37 PM on July 2, 2021 [15 favorites]
This is a boiling frog situation. And we're frogs.
posted by adept256 at 12:37 PM on July 2, 2021 [15 favorites]
I do wonder how much blowing up pipelines would help or hurt. People freaked out after Russians hacked the gas pipelines on the east coast. Drivers lined up for miles in their cars to fill up tanks. Having mercenaries moving into and taking up shop in Miami seems ironic, but it also underscores what powerful people will spend to keep the carbonized economy propped up, armed, secured, and running. Seems we're just not ready to move away from oil, as bad as it is getting.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:42 PM on July 2, 2021 [8 favorites]
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:42 PM on July 2, 2021 [8 favorites]
Things the oil-industry and the military-industrial complex and cartels and empires know: small, organized, experienced and violent hierarchies can defeat, oppress, exploit and pacify large numbers of disorganized non-violent or insufficiently militarily powerful peoples.
The exploiters use guns and bombs but also missionaries and fairy tales, incentives and jobs, threats, internal divisions etc.
As the world dies we have the choice to fight back against them to try to save what can be saved and to try to overthrow their exploitive system. Our death was gauranteed since our birth. Victory is not guranteed but since we were going to die anyway, why not die fighting these monsters.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 12:57 PM on July 2, 2021 [30 favorites]
The exploiters use guns and bombs but also missionaries and fairy tales, incentives and jobs, threats, internal divisions etc.
As the world dies we have the choice to fight back against them to try to save what can be saved and to try to overthrow their exploitive system. Our death was gauranteed since our birth. Victory is not guranteed but since we were going to die anyway, why not die fighting these monsters.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 12:57 PM on July 2, 2021 [30 favorites]
The pandemic has shown me that a large amount of the general population (not politicians, businesspeople, coastal elites, etc.) are unwilling to make a minor change in their lives in order to protect themselves and their loved ones. Expecting lots of people to make drastic changes in their lives to save generations of people a few decades from now is even less likely.
posted by meowzilla at 1:03 PM on July 2, 2021 [83 favorites]
posted by meowzilla at 1:03 PM on July 2, 2021 [83 favorites]
So, who exactly are the monsters? Are they the oilfield workers? The engineers and scientists? The accountants and lawyers? The investors? The managers and advertising executives? The people cranking up the A/C and jetting to vacation spots?
By demonizing and depersonalizing others, we may perhaps make ourselves feel good for a time. But we are really just evading the essential problem which is precisely our tendency to depersonalize and demonize others. We must learn to understand human activity as an interlocked collectivity of personalities, with all the complexity of motive and intention that implies.
posted by No Robots at 1:11 PM on July 2, 2021 [25 favorites]
By demonizing and depersonalizing others, we may perhaps make ourselves feel good for a time. But we are really just evading the essential problem which is precisely our tendency to depersonalize and demonize others. We must learn to understand human activity as an interlocked collectivity of personalities, with all the complexity of motive and intention that implies.
posted by No Robots at 1:11 PM on July 2, 2021 [25 favorites]
So, who exactly are the monsters? Are they the oilfield workers? The engineers and scientists? The accountants and lawyers? The investors? The managers and advertising executives? The people cranking up the A/C and jetting to vacation spots?
We all are. Sort of. To be more specific, we are all monsters precisely to the extent that we have the power to change the course of the system we swim in, and to the extent that we knowingly deny, obstruct, or misinform about the danger we face. The fallacy of personal choice is pushed -- and pushed hard -- by the fossil fuel industry and their fellow travelers precisely because it deflects blame from their stranglehold on the political system.
So yes, we are all monsters. But some of us are far, far more monstrous than the rest because their influence is deep and the shadow they cast on the future is vast. Keith McCoy, for instance, is one of these great monsters, and his pet flock of fossil fuel-friendly Senators.
posted by tclark at 1:27 PM on July 2, 2021 [21 favorites]
We all are. Sort of. To be more specific, we are all monsters precisely to the extent that we have the power to change the course of the system we swim in, and to the extent that we knowingly deny, obstruct, or misinform about the danger we face. The fallacy of personal choice is pushed -- and pushed hard -- by the fossil fuel industry and their fellow travelers precisely because it deflects blame from their stranglehold on the political system.
So yes, we are all monsters. But some of us are far, far more monstrous than the rest because their influence is deep and the shadow they cast on the future is vast. Keith McCoy, for instance, is one of these great monsters, and his pet flock of fossil fuel-friendly Senators.
posted by tclark at 1:27 PM on July 2, 2021 [21 favorites]
I hadn't read the article at the time, and, having read it now, I really don't recognize the story that she characterizes as “LOL Miami, they’re selling real estate in a town threatened by sea level rise”. I mean, it may seem like that now, having been written in the Before Times, but there's a ton of anger and bewilderment beneath a very thin veneer of amusement.
posted by Halloween Jack at 1:32 PM on July 2, 2021
posted by Halloween Jack at 1:32 PM on July 2, 2021
(And, yeah, I also recognize that she may be feeling that way because her home is on fire. What I'm saying is that, from the perspective of someone who's just coming to it, and not choking on smoke, the article still holds up.)
posted by Halloween Jack at 1:34 PM on July 2, 2021
posted by Halloween Jack at 1:34 PM on July 2, 2021
So, who exactly are the monsters? Are they the oilfield workers? The engineers and scientists? The accountants and lawyers? The investors? The managers and advertising executives? The people cranking up the A/C and jetting to vacation spots?
Capitalism, oligarchs, republicans. Individual action isn't meaningless, but we can all use paper straws and turn off our A/C's and it won't make much difference as long as powerful people can block society-wide change.
posted by Mavri at 1:53 PM on July 2, 2021 [47 favorites]
Capitalism, oligarchs, republicans. Individual action isn't meaningless, but we can all use paper straws and turn off our A/C's and it won't make much difference as long as powerful people can block society-wide change.
posted by Mavri at 1:53 PM on July 2, 2021 [47 favorites]
Maybe I’m oversimplifying, but it seems to me like the people with the most power bear the most responsibility. I can’t get too mad at people on the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder who try not to think about it because they don’t feel there’s anything they can do.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 2:16 PM on July 2, 2021 [54 favorites]
posted by The Underpants Monster at 2:16 PM on July 2, 2021 [54 favorites]
Capitalism, oligarchs, republicans.
Joe Biden talks a good game but he is not focusing on climate change in the way I hoped he would.
posted by Pararrayos at 2:42 PM on July 2, 2021 [13 favorites]
Joe Biden talks a good game but he is not focusing on climate change in the way I hoped he would.
posted by Pararrayos at 2:42 PM on July 2, 2021 [13 favorites]
The pandemic has shown me that a large amount of the general population (not politicians, businesspeople, coastal elites, etc.) are unwilling to make a minor change in their lives in order to protect themselves and their loved ones.
I kind of disagree. A lot of people across the world did make the necessary changes to keep the virus under control and keep things running. But it is kind of disheartening to see that the pandemic has not led to the governments of the world admitting that no nation can solve these problems on its own and there is an urgent need to put aside or compartmentalize the rivalries and brinkmanship, even if it is temporary, and work together.
And I know it may seem impossible, but in a limited fashion it has happened before. The US, British Empire, USSR, China, and a bunch of other countries pulled together during WWII. And they certainly had different systems of government and were not exactly friend with one another either.
posted by FJT at 3:06 PM on July 2, 2021 [8 favorites]
I kind of disagree. A lot of people across the world did make the necessary changes to keep the virus under control and keep things running. But it is kind of disheartening to see that the pandemic has not led to the governments of the world admitting that no nation can solve these problems on its own and there is an urgent need to put aside or compartmentalize the rivalries and brinkmanship, even if it is temporary, and work together.
And I know it may seem impossible, but in a limited fashion it has happened before. The US, British Empire, USSR, China, and a bunch of other countries pulled together during WWII. And they certainly had different systems of government and were not exactly friend with one another either.
posted by FJT at 3:06 PM on July 2, 2021 [8 favorites]
So, who exactly are the monsters? Are they the oilfield workers? The engineers and scientists? The accountants and lawyers? The investors? The managers and advertising executives? The people cranking up the A/C and jetting to vacation spots?
100 companies are responsible for 70%++ of climate change. I bet if you dissolved all these companies, seized their assets, locked up all the decision-makers (both past and present) and seized their personal assets too, the rest of the corporations would fall in line very quickly.
But that would never happen in a million years because we prefer to yell at regular people who make stupid decisions rather than powerful people who make evil decisions, or just throw up our hands and say everyone's a little guilty so therefore no one's guilty. People are guilty. We know their names.
posted by 100kb at 3:10 PM on July 2, 2021 [72 favorites]
100 companies are responsible for 70%++ of climate change. I bet if you dissolved all these companies, seized their assets, locked up all the decision-makers (both past and present) and seized their personal assets too, the rest of the corporations would fall in line very quickly.
But that would never happen in a million years because we prefer to yell at regular people who make stupid decisions rather than powerful people who make evil decisions, or just throw up our hands and say everyone's a little guilty so therefore no one's guilty. People are guilty. We know their names.
posted by 100kb at 3:10 PM on July 2, 2021 [72 favorites]
I do wonder how much blowing up pipelines would help or hurt.
No one has to blow up the pipelines when Comstock, Columbia etc, build them incompetently. They make more money when supply is interrupted and the price goes up.
The govt incentivizes the companies to build them this badly
posted by eustatic at 3:12 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
No one has to blow up the pipelines when Comstock, Columbia etc, build them incompetently. They make more money when supply is interrupted and the price goes up.
The govt incentivizes the companies to build them this badly
posted by eustatic at 3:12 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
So, who exactly are the monsters?
Look at the EPA flight data. They are mostly in TX, OK, and LA.
posted by eustatic at 3:13 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
Look at the EPA flight data. They are mostly in TX, OK, and LA.
posted by eustatic at 3:13 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
unwilling to make a minor change
I see lots of folks using their own bags at the store these days, that is certainly, cough, minor.
Are there any good options? Any options? Stop all hydrocarbon burning now, no cars, no food delivery trucks, most places no electricity.
We need to do that but it's probably not enough just intentionally start the mass starvation. Need lots more tech and research that deals with non-pleasant environments.
posted by sammyo at 3:14 PM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
I see lots of folks using their own bags at the store these days, that is certainly, cough, minor.
Are there any good options? Any options? Stop all hydrocarbon burning now, no cars, no food delivery trucks, most places no electricity.
We need to do that but it's probably not enough just intentionally start the mass starvation. Need lots more tech and research that deals with non-pleasant environments.
posted by sammyo at 3:14 PM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
Just to bring the conclusion to the fore.
One of many themes in Kim Stanley Robinson's big, hopeful novel about climate change, Ministry for the Future, is that violence helps bring about a better world.
We see kidnappings, blowing up aircraft, terrorizing populations with threats of food poisoning, drone attacks, and more. They certainly change some behavior for the better. It's ultimately not clear who organizes these actions, although readers can infer and create theories.
In interviews Robinson has said he's uncomfortable with this plot strand and theme. Still.
posted by doctornemo at 3:29 PM on July 2, 2021 [6 favorites]
One of many themes in Kim Stanley Robinson's big, hopeful novel about climate change, Ministry for the Future, is that violence helps bring about a better world.
We see kidnappings, blowing up aircraft, terrorizing populations with threats of food poisoning, drone attacks, and more. They certainly change some behavior for the better. It's ultimately not clear who organizes these actions, although readers can infer and create theories.
In interviews Robinson has said he's uncomfortable with this plot strand and theme. Still.
posted by doctornemo at 3:29 PM on July 2, 2021 [6 favorites]
I was just going to suggest Ministry for the Future as well, but as a relatively well researched book that does not magically invent away climate change. I found it both realistic and hopeful, even though it was full of questionable tactics and violence.
It is only a matter of time and severity before we see militarized, asymmetric warfare against the fossil fuel industry. I’m honestly surprised we haven’t seen more of it yet. I know some lifelong Quakers who are vocally starting to drop their pacifist ideologies, over climate change. Very startling.
posted by furnace.heart at 3:41 PM on July 2, 2021 [5 favorites]
It is only a matter of time and severity before we see militarized, asymmetric warfare against the fossil fuel industry. I’m honestly surprised we haven’t seen more of it yet. I know some lifelong Quakers who are vocally starting to drop their pacifist ideologies, over climate change. Very startling.
posted by furnace.heart at 3:41 PM on July 2, 2021 [5 favorites]
And we’re not even putting a flute into a space probe so the aliens will remember us.
You'll know the End Times are nigh when someone crowdfunds a project to make the Face on Mars into a reality.
posted by jamjam at 3:46 PM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
You'll know the End Times are nigh when someone crowdfunds a project to make the Face on Mars into a reality.
posted by jamjam at 3:46 PM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
I found the Sarah Miller post from this excellent David Wallace-Wells article.
posted by doctornemo at 4:08 PM on July 2, 2021
posted by doctornemo at 4:08 PM on July 2, 2021
Face on Mars into a reality.
Well, yea, we're gonna need something a bit more robust than this guy if we want aliens to investigate the ruins of our civilization.
posted by pwnguin at 4:11 PM on July 2, 2021
Well, yea, we're gonna need something a bit more robust than this guy if we want aliens to investigate the ruins of our civilization.
posted by pwnguin at 4:11 PM on July 2, 2021
It's really hard not to lose hope when we know exactly who to blame and what we need to do to save ourselves. But unless Biden grows some titanium balls this week, I don't expect to see anything happen that desperately needs to happen. To add to the list of SURELY THIS, there is a raging fire in the Gulf of Mexico and it's not even mentioned in Google's list of TOP STORIES. The freaking ocean is on fire (again!) because -- YOU GUESSED IT -- a gas leak. No major American media seem to be covering it that I can find, so I've linked the Daily Mail article (sorry) below. It is all over Twitter and Bloomberg's headline is Pemex Controls Fire Near Offshore Oil Platform Complex. How nice of them to downplay the situation for Pemex, I'm sure they appreciate it.
Circle of flames erupts in the Gulf of Mexico after a gas leak causes an underwater pipeline to catch fire before ships rush to extinguish the blaze
posted by pjsky at 4:23 PM on July 2, 2021 [10 favorites]
Circle of flames erupts in the Gulf of Mexico after a gas leak causes an underwater pipeline to catch fire before ships rush to extinguish the blaze
posted by pjsky at 4:23 PM on July 2, 2021 [10 favorites]
The pandemic has destroyed any optimism I had about our ability to deal with these problems as a species. If we can’t get people to wear face masks how are we going to do the hard stuff. At this point all I have left is hope for magic science solution that I know is a lie.
posted by interogative mood at 4:25 PM on July 2, 2021 [21 favorites]
posted by interogative mood at 4:25 PM on July 2, 2021 [21 favorites]
but what if benevolent omnipotent alien overlords
posted by lalochezia at 4:27 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by lalochezia at 4:27 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
Humanity is on track to win the Darwin Award. Forever. We can't even get a damn voting rights bill through the Senate right now. What would anyone like Joe Biden to do, that's within the realm of reality rather than fan fiction?
posted by PhineasGage at 4:31 PM on July 2, 2021 [6 favorites]
posted by PhineasGage at 4:31 PM on July 2, 2021 [6 favorites]
Joe Biden talks a good game but he is not focusing on climate change in the way I hoped he would.
Early versions of his infrastructure proposal looked at broad improvements to public transit, water security, broadband. These sorts of things aren't sexy and they don't funnel as much grift to the current set of centrist left- and right-wing industry lobbyists infecting the system. But they do get more people out of cars and trucks, improve access to clean water, and help transition more of the workforce away from commuting. Obama and Biden did the same thing on improving energy efficiency standards for appliances and vehicles during their pre-Trump tenure. Not sexy, but short of Biden kicking down doors, nationalizing energy production and reworking all of the country's non-Texan grid entirely towards renewables, pushing your legislators to support these kinds of actions can help move the larger game's needle forwards.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:41 PM on July 2, 2021 [15 favorites]
Early versions of his infrastructure proposal looked at broad improvements to public transit, water security, broadband. These sorts of things aren't sexy and they don't funnel as much grift to the current set of centrist left- and right-wing industry lobbyists infecting the system. But they do get more people out of cars and trucks, improve access to clean water, and help transition more of the workforce away from commuting. Obama and Biden did the same thing on improving energy efficiency standards for appliances and vehicles during their pre-Trump tenure. Not sexy, but short of Biden kicking down doors, nationalizing energy production and reworking all of the country's non-Texan grid entirely towards renewables, pushing your legislators to support these kinds of actions can help move the larger game's needle forwards.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:41 PM on July 2, 2021 [15 favorites]
It’s easy to despair.
And that’s why I’m despairing, because it’s easy!
posted by mr_roboto at 4:54 PM on July 2, 2021 [23 favorites]
And that’s why I’m despairing, because it’s easy!
posted by mr_roboto at 4:54 PM on July 2, 2021 [23 favorites]
What is there to talk about? As others have pointed out, the vast majority of those in power don't want to do anything and humans in general refuse to do anything to help others. We're doomed and it only gets worse from here on in because humans are awful.
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:14 PM on July 2, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:14 PM on July 2, 2021 [3 favorites]
Just because we’re doomed is no reason to despair. We’ve always been doomed; we are mortal creatures with finite lifespans.
posted by interogative mood at 5:24 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by interogative mood at 5:24 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
100 companies are responsible for 70%++ of climate change. I bet if you dissolved all these companies, seized their assets, locked up all the decision-makers (both past and present) and seized their personal assets too, the rest of the corporations would fall in line very quickly.
I don't disagree with this. However, I do think that it is important to deal with "little people" as well. We had the Nuremberg trials for leaders, and de-nazification for the rest.
posted by No Robots at 5:29 PM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
I don't disagree with this. However, I do think that it is important to deal with "little people" as well. We had the Nuremberg trials for leaders, and de-nazification for the rest.
posted by No Robots at 5:29 PM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
I have read the book she references at the end "How to blow up a pipeline" and its a very good read. It's not as the tile may make you think how to actually blow up a pipeline, but rather a strong argument for a shifting from non-violent action to sabotage of key carbon infrastructure. Not even to destroy them, but to make them non-functional enough of the time to make them unable to turn a profit, and thus shut them down because they are no longer profitable. While at the same time making it clear to other such capital endeavors that the same will happen to them and they shouldn't even bother.
It also makes it perfectly mathematically clear that without such actions (or at least the threat of them), we as a society will not have a lot more time to bandy around worthless platitudes around about what we are going to do about climate change.
It also makes it clear that fighting is better than despair, even if despair is easier. It is time to get involved, in a big way, in a way that makes it a central part of your life. Because without such focus their wont be much life left to focus on.
Get in the streets, call your reps, join or form a union, join organizations like DSA, learn to farm, run for office, join or form mutual aid societies, make friends with your neighbors, talk to your family, support anti-trust, get organized, build power, be kind, love, fight. There is always something worth saving, no matter how bad things get.
posted by stilgar at 5:30 PM on July 2, 2021 [14 favorites]
It also makes it perfectly mathematically clear that without such actions (or at least the threat of them), we as a society will not have a lot more time to bandy around worthless platitudes around about what we are going to do about climate change.
It also makes it clear that fighting is better than despair, even if despair is easier. It is time to get involved, in a big way, in a way that makes it a central part of your life. Because without such focus their wont be much life left to focus on.
Get in the streets, call your reps, join or form a union, join organizations like DSA, learn to farm, run for office, join or form mutual aid societies, make friends with your neighbors, talk to your family, support anti-trust, get organized, build power, be kind, love, fight. There is always something worth saving, no matter how bad things get.
posted by stilgar at 5:30 PM on July 2, 2021 [14 favorites]
The big problem is that Ending climate change requires the end of capitalism.
and that will probably inevitably lead to war as those fuckers aren't going to let go easily.
posted by adamvasco at 5:30 PM on July 2, 2021 [17 favorites]
and that will probably inevitably lead to war as those fuckers aren't going to let go easily.
posted by adamvasco at 5:30 PM on July 2, 2021 [17 favorites]
We’ve always been doomed; we are mortal creatures with finite lifespans.
Many people derive a sense of purpose and meaning from the thought that things that they helped build or shape - institutions, their children, collective lines of scholarly inquiry - will survive them and flourish in the future. Climate change forecloses on those possibilities.
And that's even before you get to our collective response to this being a strong argument for the basic futility of all human endeavor.
posted by ryanshepard at 5:36 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
Many people derive a sense of purpose and meaning from the thought that things that they helped build or shape - institutions, their children, collective lines of scholarly inquiry - will survive them and flourish in the future. Climate change forecloses on those possibilities.
And that's even before you get to our collective response to this being a strong argument for the basic futility of all human endeavor.
posted by ryanshepard at 5:36 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
I don't think humans are awful. I just think that the problem of climate change is too big for us.
Our species has never taken on anything remotely like this. It would take an unprecedented level of international cooperation, as well as the end of capitalism and its replacement with [some other system that works better than capitalism on a global scale, but we haven't discovered it yet], plus massive technological innovation coupled with immense industrial projects larger than anything the planet has ever seen... and so on.
People are already dying from climate change, so obviously we can't save everyone. So now the question is, can we save anyone?
I fully expect the planet to become uninhabitable to humans within the next couple of centuries. We're not going to be able to gestate and raise healthy children in the super-heated soup of carbon dioxide, particulates, ground-level ozone, and paucity of oxygen that we'll be facing.
So we're going to be dealing with a world in which we'll need to generate oxygen and purify the atmosphere to survive.
Which means bunkers. Fortified to withstand the insane weather outside, sealed to maintain a breathable atmosphere, capable of providing food, water, and medical care to its inhabitants, and allowing for continued scientific progress with which to cope with the ever-changing environment outside.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for saving the Earth if at all possible. That's the best outcome here. Let's keep trying for that. But I think we're going to fail, and I think we should start planning for that eventuality.
But if our plans to save all of humanity rest on a sudden outbreak of world peace and cooperative harmony, we should probably have backup plans in place.
posted by MrVisible at 5:37 PM on July 2, 2021 [9 favorites]
Our species has never taken on anything remotely like this. It would take an unprecedented level of international cooperation, as well as the end of capitalism and its replacement with [some other system that works better than capitalism on a global scale, but we haven't discovered it yet], plus massive technological innovation coupled with immense industrial projects larger than anything the planet has ever seen... and so on.
People are already dying from climate change, so obviously we can't save everyone. So now the question is, can we save anyone?
I fully expect the planet to become uninhabitable to humans within the next couple of centuries. We're not going to be able to gestate and raise healthy children in the super-heated soup of carbon dioxide, particulates, ground-level ozone, and paucity of oxygen that we'll be facing.
So we're going to be dealing with a world in which we'll need to generate oxygen and purify the atmosphere to survive.
Which means bunkers. Fortified to withstand the insane weather outside, sealed to maintain a breathable atmosphere, capable of providing food, water, and medical care to its inhabitants, and allowing for continued scientific progress with which to cope with the ever-changing environment outside.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for saving the Earth if at all possible. That's the best outcome here. Let's keep trying for that. But I think we're going to fail, and I think we should start planning for that eventuality.
But if our plans to save all of humanity rest on a sudden outbreak of world peace and cooperative harmony, we should probably have backup plans in place.
posted by MrVisible at 5:37 PM on July 2, 2021 [9 favorites]
I think our best hope of forcing massive, progressive, changes, (like passing the Green New Deal), is not through sabotage of pipelines or other infrastructure, but a global strike. The only power we peons around the world have is our collective ability to not show up for work. Let the wheels of commerce come to a grinding halt. It’s the only thing that will get everyone’s attention. The question is, are there enough of us willing to do it, to make it work?
posted by pjsky at 5:45 PM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
posted by pjsky at 5:45 PM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
re: The "Monsters."
Some things are inescapable. One is that the monsters are doing what they do to make money by satisfying consumer demand. Who are the consumers? We are. Who created the conditions for the the demand to arise? We can fight about it, but it's history at this point. What matters is what comes next.
Hypothetically, we can exercise our personal responsibility and stop using fossil fuels, but due to structural and social conditions, that's unlikely to work. Expecting capitalists exercise personal responsibility and change their behaviour is unrealistic for precisely the same reasons.
The only thing that will change anything is regulation at the national and international level, and because there are billions of us and a few thousand of them, it is our responsibility to make that happen. If there are too few of us to take up the cause of saving the planet, we are fucked -- exactly as fucked, by the way, as if we do nothing except cut off the heads of oil execs and blow up their pipelines. They will simply chalk it up to the cost of doing business and top up their decapitation insurance.
I'm not optimistic, but I know the situation isn't completely hopeless, as long as we bring enough people on board.
posted by klanawa at 6:22 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
Some things are inescapable. One is that the monsters are doing what they do to make money by satisfying consumer demand. Who are the consumers? We are. Who created the conditions for the the demand to arise? We can fight about it, but it's history at this point. What matters is what comes next.
Hypothetically, we can exercise our personal responsibility and stop using fossil fuels, but due to structural and social conditions, that's unlikely to work. Expecting capitalists exercise personal responsibility and change their behaviour is unrealistic for precisely the same reasons.
The only thing that will change anything is regulation at the national and international level, and because there are billions of us and a few thousand of them, it is our responsibility to make that happen. If there are too few of us to take up the cause of saving the planet, we are fucked -- exactly as fucked, by the way, as if we do nothing except cut off the heads of oil execs and blow up their pipelines. They will simply chalk it up to the cost of doing business and top up their decapitation insurance.
I'm not optimistic, but I know the situation isn't completely hopeless, as long as we bring enough people on board.
posted by klanawa at 6:22 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
Individual action can be powerful but it needs to be coordinated and downstream of policy change. If we ever do get that policy change it will impact people’s lives in ways they find uncomfortable compared to the excessive convenience we live with now.
The oft-cited ‘100 companies are responsible for 70% of emissions’ line is disingenuous. Those 100 companies emit for us, on our behalf, for our convenience as rich Americans. They emit so we can consume. Once they are throttled, as they should be, our lives will absolutely change in ways that a lot of even well-intended people want to wish away.
We must get out of our cars but we are, and I’m not be hyperbolic here, addicted to them. Every little bit counts when it comes to reducing our car addiction. Small cars, fewer cars, electric cars. Fewer trips, shorter trips, no trips. Public transport, electric bikes, regular bikes, walking. Truly every individual’s improvement in this area counts because we’re so trained to hop into our cars for everything, without second thought. For those of us who are able-bodied it is even more imperative, because some people don’t have the option, and we need to model other ways of living for younger people who have seen nothing but car dependence.
posted by scantee at 6:35 PM on July 2, 2021 [14 favorites]
The oft-cited ‘100 companies are responsible for 70% of emissions’ line is disingenuous. Those 100 companies emit for us, on our behalf, for our convenience as rich Americans. They emit so we can consume. Once they are throttled, as they should be, our lives will absolutely change in ways that a lot of even well-intended people want to wish away.
We must get out of our cars but we are, and I’m not be hyperbolic here, addicted to them. Every little bit counts when it comes to reducing our car addiction. Small cars, fewer cars, electric cars. Fewer trips, shorter trips, no trips. Public transport, electric bikes, regular bikes, walking. Truly every individual’s improvement in this area counts because we’re so trained to hop into our cars for everything, without second thought. For those of us who are able-bodied it is even more imperative, because some people don’t have the option, and we need to model other ways of living for younger people who have seen nothing but car dependence.
posted by scantee at 6:35 PM on July 2, 2021 [14 favorites]
Dear Klanawa:
we didn't demand to have our continents invaded our people enslaved our land dug up our waters stolen or poisoned our horses banned our public transit dismantled our homes zoned away from our jobs, our mortgaes and insurance redlined our inventions for sustainable tech trapped in IP silos our leaders assasinated our cultures of care denigrated or eradicated.
We mostly can only buy what they offer, only what they will issue permits for. This helscape of pollution and destruction is not just the organic realization of massive human whims, it was planned workshopped legislated engineered advertized taught and sold to us.
Fossil fuels are optional and do more harm than good. We need to change from
A) make as much money for the rich and powerful as possible and maybe on the side try to not kill off all of the planet
to B) protect as much life as possible, human and otherwise and maybe on the side try to have a higher material standard of living starting with those who have the least.
As drawdown and organic ag and many other environmental and aboriginal and social movements can attest there is enough physical world and material resources for all of us alive to have what we need, and it is a 10% or less hyper consumer hyper wealthy wasteful as status symbol pyschotic monsters who have been rampaging around the planet for a few hundred years harnessing the labor and land of others to dig up fossils and burn the fucking atmosphere to global death.
So, its only hopeless if we keep obeying and assisting and funding the antisocial psychopaths of industry and exploitation. This is not an individual assignmet it mus be a group project and it can not be played according to the rules of the game written by said monsters.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 6:46 PM on July 2, 2021 [10 favorites]
we didn't demand to have our continents invaded our people enslaved our land dug up our waters stolen or poisoned our horses banned our public transit dismantled our homes zoned away from our jobs, our mortgaes and insurance redlined our inventions for sustainable tech trapped in IP silos our leaders assasinated our cultures of care denigrated or eradicated.
We mostly can only buy what they offer, only what they will issue permits for. This helscape of pollution and destruction is not just the organic realization of massive human whims, it was planned workshopped legislated engineered advertized taught and sold to us.
Fossil fuels are optional and do more harm than good. We need to change from
A) make as much money for the rich and powerful as possible and maybe on the side try to not kill off all of the planet
to B) protect as much life as possible, human and otherwise and maybe on the side try to have a higher material standard of living starting with those who have the least.
As drawdown and organic ag and many other environmental and aboriginal and social movements can attest there is enough physical world and material resources for all of us alive to have what we need, and it is a 10% or less hyper consumer hyper wealthy wasteful as status symbol pyschotic monsters who have been rampaging around the planet for a few hundred years harnessing the labor and land of others to dig up fossils and burn the fucking atmosphere to global death.
So, its only hopeless if we keep obeying and assisting and funding the antisocial psychopaths of industry and exploitation. This is not an individual assignmet it mus be a group project and it can not be played according to the rules of the game written by said monsters.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 6:46 PM on July 2, 2021 [10 favorites]
We designed a great car that got 4.0L/100km or 56mpg about 10 years ago, I loved driving it for the time I had it, but the fact is, consumers didn't want it, and it went out of production very quickly. Instead, consumers just love to buy giant gas guzzling trucks and SUVs they don't need.
There's also the contentious topic about what people feel "entitled" to emit. Who gets to set the rules?
The world as a whole has exceeded its biocapacity by 50% - just the CO2 measure, we're roughly emitting 50% more CO2 than can be absorbed by the total plant life on the planet.
By this measure, Australia uses only 50% of its ecological biocapacity - it has a small population but large areas of wilderness. New Zealand and Canada also fall into this category, so they are net contributors to the world ecology.
Singapore exceeds its biocapacity limits by 27000% (that's not a typo). They have high levels of CO2 emissions and resource consumption (iPhones they buy made in China count against them) paired with almost no areas of wilderness to sustain it. The same goes for UAE, Kuwait, Hong Kong.
Indonesia is "perfectly" balanced, using almost its full allotment of biocapacity.
Both the US and China exceed their biocapacity by 100%.
Would that be fair, if a global authority was set up to penalize countries that exceeded their biocapacity quota and force them to reduce emissions and plant enough trees / re-wild their environment enough to offset their ecological footprint? It sounds like there would be an immediate pushback against how this was calculated and each country would want to use a metric that benefited them the most.
posted by xdvesper at 6:55 PM on July 2, 2021 [7 favorites]
There's also the contentious topic about what people feel "entitled" to emit. Who gets to set the rules?
The world as a whole has exceeded its biocapacity by 50% - just the CO2 measure, we're roughly emitting 50% more CO2 than can be absorbed by the total plant life on the planet.
By this measure, Australia uses only 50% of its ecological biocapacity - it has a small population but large areas of wilderness. New Zealand and Canada also fall into this category, so they are net contributors to the world ecology.
Singapore exceeds its biocapacity limits by 27000% (that's not a typo). They have high levels of CO2 emissions and resource consumption (iPhones they buy made in China count against them) paired with almost no areas of wilderness to sustain it. The same goes for UAE, Kuwait, Hong Kong.
Indonesia is "perfectly" balanced, using almost its full allotment of biocapacity.
Both the US and China exceed their biocapacity by 100%.
Would that be fair, if a global authority was set up to penalize countries that exceeded their biocapacity quota and force them to reduce emissions and plant enough trees / re-wild their environment enough to offset their ecological footprint? It sounds like there would be an immediate pushback against how this was calculated and each country would want to use a metric that benefited them the most.
posted by xdvesper at 6:55 PM on July 2, 2021 [7 favorites]
For anyone who's worried about climate change, I'd strongly advise taking the time to read Mark Jaccard's book The Citizen's Guide to Climate Success, free online. Jaccard observes that two sectors, transport and electricity, account for more than 50% of future global emissions. To decarbonize these two sectors, we don't need to invent new technologies, we only need to deploy existing ones (electric vehicles and renewables). To make this happen, we need regulations (or carbon pricing where it isn't political suicide), and we need carbon tariffs to encourage other countries to do likewise.
For this to happen, we need to focus on politics (admittedly an ugly and infuriating process) instead of giving in to despair and violence. Individual action isn't going to do it.
If Congress blocks action, look to state governments. Because California is such a large market for vehicles, they're able to unilaterally set higher fuel-efficiency standards. According to David Roberts, Washington State now has the most ambitious climate plan in the country. As Roberts says, the key factor here is electing Democrats.
Even at the federal level, the Obama administration's EPA regulations have had a huge impact on the economic viability of coal-burning power plants. Inside the war on coal.
In the short term, it's obvious that we also need adaptation - being prepared to respond to killer heat waves and wildfires. Even if we were to succeed in cutting emissions rapidly, we've already cranked the global thermostat so high that we can expect temperatures to continue rising for some time.
scantee: The oft-cited ‘100 companies are responsible for 70% of emissions’ line is disingenuous.
The list also includes a number of countries or state-owned companies, like China, Russia, and the national oil companies of Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Venezuela.
posted by russilwvong at 7:04 PM on July 2, 2021 [14 favorites]
For this to happen, we need to focus on politics (admittedly an ugly and infuriating process) instead of giving in to despair and violence. Individual action isn't going to do it.
If Congress blocks action, look to state governments. Because California is such a large market for vehicles, they're able to unilaterally set higher fuel-efficiency standards. According to David Roberts, Washington State now has the most ambitious climate plan in the country. As Roberts says, the key factor here is electing Democrats.
Even at the federal level, the Obama administration's EPA regulations have had a huge impact on the economic viability of coal-burning power plants. Inside the war on coal.
In the short term, it's obvious that we also need adaptation - being prepared to respond to killer heat waves and wildfires. Even if we were to succeed in cutting emissions rapidly, we've already cranked the global thermostat so high that we can expect temperatures to continue rising for some time.
scantee: The oft-cited ‘100 companies are responsible for 70% of emissions’ line is disingenuous.
The list also includes a number of countries or state-owned companies, like China, Russia, and the national oil companies of Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Venezuela.
posted by russilwvong at 7:04 PM on July 2, 2021 [14 favorites]
Continuing on the monsters theme:
Humans, Hickling said, have a fundamental need to create and maintain a narrative for their lives in which the universe is not implacable and heartless, that terrible things do not happen at random, and that catastrophe can be avoided if you are vigilant and responsible.
“We are vulnerable, but we don’t want to be reminded of that. We want to believe that the world is understandable and controllable and unthreatening, that if we follow the rules, we’ll be okay. So, when this kind of thing happens to other people, we need to put them in a different category from us. We don’t want to resemble them, and the fact that we might is too terrifying to deal with. So, they have to be monsters.”
That was from an article in the WaPo magazine about parents who forgot about a child in the backseat of their car. It's stayed with me since reading it years ago.
posted by perhapses at 7:20 PM on July 2, 2021 [13 favorites]
Humans, Hickling said, have a fundamental need to create and maintain a narrative for their lives in which the universe is not implacable and heartless, that terrible things do not happen at random, and that catastrophe can be avoided if you are vigilant and responsible.
“We are vulnerable, but we don’t want to be reminded of that. We want to believe that the world is understandable and controllable and unthreatening, that if we follow the rules, we’ll be okay. So, when this kind of thing happens to other people, we need to put them in a different category from us. We don’t want to resemble them, and the fact that we might is too terrifying to deal with. So, they have to be monsters.”
That was from an article in the WaPo magazine about parents who forgot about a child in the backseat of their car. It's stayed with me since reading it years ago.
posted by perhapses at 7:20 PM on July 2, 2021 [13 favorites]
Ok, the exxon execs who knew about climate change, that it would be catestrophic for agriculture and human civilization and that it would take the world a while to notice, choose not to use their massive wealth to move their business and their clients to a sustsinable energy system. None of those white men needed to work a day more in their lives to retire comfortbly rich. Their company held patents on solar panels and biofuels etc. All the drawdown methods we have now were known then. They choose to get richer and to condemn billions to this fate we now face. Knowing premeditated mass murder. I'm sorry if the word monster is too dehumanizing for some.
Fine, instead of monsters lets call them Freelance Lebinsraum Creators. or Leaders who Cleanse. Heros of profitable life de-extension. Thermal equilibrium innovators...
Coastline adjusters. The executives of unplanned popular childhood weightloss. commandants of permanent migratory vacation.
Inscribe whatever you like on their tombs.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 7:41 PM on July 2, 2021 [6 favorites]
Fine, instead of monsters lets call them Freelance Lebinsraum Creators. or Leaders who Cleanse. Heros of profitable life de-extension. Thermal equilibrium innovators...
Coastline adjusters. The executives of unplanned popular childhood weightloss. commandants of permanent migratory vacation.
Inscribe whatever you like on their tombs.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 7:41 PM on July 2, 2021 [6 favorites]
I can’t get too mad at people on the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder who try not to think about it because they don’t feel there’s anything they can do.
This is me. A few years ago I kind of hit a low point with the despair of all of this and what it means for, well, humanity itself. The more I learn about it, in order to be knowledgeable in order to be helpful...the more depressed it makes me. I may be a little smarter with the facts, but I'm about as powerless as they come, so those facts don't do anything but depress me. And I can't do it--frankly, I have other problems in my life aside from environmental doom and those other problems are plenty enough to deal with on a day to day basis.
So I don't read about this stuff anymore, not really. This article is maybe the first one about climate change I've read in two or three years. It's just too fucking much. I vote for non-Republicans, so there's the drop in the ocean I can do, but aside from that...? And as shitty as my attitude is, I have also learned to forgive myself for this attitude. Must be all the Stoics I've been reading as of late.
posted by zardoz at 7:56 PM on July 2, 2021 [23 favorites]
This is me. A few years ago I kind of hit a low point with the despair of all of this and what it means for, well, humanity itself. The more I learn about it, in order to be knowledgeable in order to be helpful...the more depressed it makes me. I may be a little smarter with the facts, but I'm about as powerless as they come, so those facts don't do anything but depress me. And I can't do it--frankly, I have other problems in my life aside from environmental doom and those other problems are plenty enough to deal with on a day to day basis.
So I don't read about this stuff anymore, not really. This article is maybe the first one about climate change I've read in two or three years. It's just too fucking much. I vote for non-Republicans, so there's the drop in the ocean I can do, but aside from that...? And as shitty as my attitude is, I have also learned to forgive myself for this attitude. Must be all the Stoics I've been reading as of late.
posted by zardoz at 7:56 PM on July 2, 2021 [23 favorites]
What is there to talk about? As others have pointed out, the vast majority of those in power don't want to do anything and humans in general refuse to do anything to help others. We're doomed and it only gets worse from here on in because humans are awful.
I have no real response to this, other than just nodding along. Governments around the world have shown an utter lack of interest in doing things, and in the states we have Senators and Representatives that still obstruct any meaningful ways forwards at the behest of those who have bought and paid for that obstruction.
I hesitate to even respond, having seen more than a couple mod notes about not being all doom and gloom in these threads, to the point that I've largely stopped reading them. I don't think I have anything else to offer. I feel we're at the point in the disaster movie where the minor characters know they aren't going to make it, and they do their best to comfort each other in the seconds they have left. That's where it feels like we are, that it's time to hold our loved ones close, not because there's no way to move forward, or to at least alleviate some of what's coming, but that there are people with vested interests in stopping any positive action for the future that might cost them pennies in their fortune. It's not that we can't cushion the blow, it's that people with money and power are making money off of how hard the blow lands. Barring a sudden change of heart (which, if it happened in a movie, it would be a terrible movie) in the global oligarchy and multinational corporations, the best, most realistic way forward is to vote out those that work against the survival of the human race, ignoring the vast resources they have available for campaigning. It's to rewrite laws, pass new legislation that could never get out of committee now. That involves decades of work in campaigning and elections, and we don't have the decades to spare at this point.
From the article, and god, this hurt to read:
There’s only one thing I have to say about climate change, I said, and that’s that I want it to rain, a lot, but it’s not going to rain a lot, and since that’s the only thing I have to say and it’s not going to happen, I don’t have anything to say.
It's getting harder and harder to teach my junior high students. I'm keenly aware that little if anything I'm teaching them is going to prepare them for the hardships they'll face.
posted by Ghidorah at 8:04 PM on July 2, 2021 [13 favorites]
I have no real response to this, other than just nodding along. Governments around the world have shown an utter lack of interest in doing things, and in the states we have Senators and Representatives that still obstruct any meaningful ways forwards at the behest of those who have bought and paid for that obstruction.
I hesitate to even respond, having seen more than a couple mod notes about not being all doom and gloom in these threads, to the point that I've largely stopped reading them. I don't think I have anything else to offer. I feel we're at the point in the disaster movie where the minor characters know they aren't going to make it, and they do their best to comfort each other in the seconds they have left. That's where it feels like we are, that it's time to hold our loved ones close, not because there's no way to move forward, or to at least alleviate some of what's coming, but that there are people with vested interests in stopping any positive action for the future that might cost them pennies in their fortune. It's not that we can't cushion the blow, it's that people with money and power are making money off of how hard the blow lands. Barring a sudden change of heart (which, if it happened in a movie, it would be a terrible movie) in the global oligarchy and multinational corporations, the best, most realistic way forward is to vote out those that work against the survival of the human race, ignoring the vast resources they have available for campaigning. It's to rewrite laws, pass new legislation that could never get out of committee now. That involves decades of work in campaigning and elections, and we don't have the decades to spare at this point.
From the article, and god, this hurt to read:
There’s only one thing I have to say about climate change, I said, and that’s that I want it to rain, a lot, but it’s not going to rain a lot, and since that’s the only thing I have to say and it’s not going to happen, I don’t have anything to say.
It's getting harder and harder to teach my junior high students. I'm keenly aware that little if anything I'm teaching them is going to prepare them for the hardships they'll face.
posted by Ghidorah at 8:04 PM on July 2, 2021 [13 favorites]
I apologize in advance for what is going to be a horribly depressing and unproductive comment: please skip if that's not your jam.
To those of you saying that we just need to band together and do x y z to lock up the elite (which I would love to do), have you Met People? I live among and have Trumpers for family members. Vast swathes of humanity in the US at least either don't give a shit about climate change or actively mock those who do. Yeah, even now with the wild weather that is vastly underreported in the mainstream media. "That's just weather in [name of state]." My state recently added a not insignificant yearly tax to hybrid and electric vehicles that gas powered cars don't have to pay.
Maybe 20 years ago I had a tiny bit of hope that something might turn around but it never has, and nearly everything else about life here has gotten worse. I've been very heartened by the BLM and LBTQIA and Metoo movements, but that doesn't require your so called average person to make any significant lifestyle or purchasing changes.
I'm worried we've already passed a climate tipping point. Everything is happening much faster than past predictions.
We are a culture eating its young. My niece was born this year with a rare genetic disorder that will require her to be on medication every day for the rest of her life. I worry deeply about what will happen with the medical supply chain when climate disruptions become more frequent and severe.
I will still do my best to work against climate change in the very insignificant ways available to me, but I try to think about the big picture as little as possible because there is no pill or meditation or therapy that will make it ok.
posted by ThreeSocksToTheWind at 8:35 PM on July 2, 2021 [10 favorites]
To those of you saying that we just need to band together and do x y z to lock up the elite (which I would love to do), have you Met People? I live among and have Trumpers for family members. Vast swathes of humanity in the US at least either don't give a shit about climate change or actively mock those who do. Yeah, even now with the wild weather that is vastly underreported in the mainstream media. "That's just weather in [name of state]." My state recently added a not insignificant yearly tax to hybrid and electric vehicles that gas powered cars don't have to pay.
Maybe 20 years ago I had a tiny bit of hope that something might turn around but it never has, and nearly everything else about life here has gotten worse. I've been very heartened by the BLM and LBTQIA and Metoo movements, but that doesn't require your so called average person to make any significant lifestyle or purchasing changes.
I'm worried we've already passed a climate tipping point. Everything is happening much faster than past predictions.
We are a culture eating its young. My niece was born this year with a rare genetic disorder that will require her to be on medication every day for the rest of her life. I worry deeply about what will happen with the medical supply chain when climate disruptions become more frequent and severe.
I will still do my best to work against climate change in the very insignificant ways available to me, but I try to think about the big picture as little as possible because there is no pill or meditation or therapy that will make it ok.
posted by ThreeSocksToTheWind at 8:35 PM on July 2, 2021 [10 favorites]
I think despair is a bit much. We're actually making significant inroads in enabling a less carbon intensive economy. We are very near a tipping point for renewable energy and electrification of much of the transportation sector. It is on its own not nearly enough, but neither is it a portent of doom. Despite the need to overbuild solar and wind capacity, it's still cheaper than running a fossil fuel plant. As a nice side benefit, that extra capacity will leave us with a wealth of low carbon electricity that can be used to cheaply power adaptations like desalination and mitigations like carbon capture. What we do with the excess is not set in stone, but its existence is inevitable.
Our path forward would have been a lot easier had these things come 20 or 30 years sooner, but there is still reason to believe we can manage to not completely cook ourselves. Much will be lost no matter what we do going forward, but the damage can still be limited.
posted by wierdo at 8:57 PM on July 2, 2021 [7 favorites]
Our path forward would have been a lot easier had these things come 20 or 30 years sooner, but there is still reason to believe we can manage to not completely cook ourselves. Much will be lost no matter what we do going forward, but the damage can still be limited.
posted by wierdo at 8:57 PM on July 2, 2021 [7 favorites]
I just think that the problem of climate change is too big for us.
Our species has never taken on anything remotely like this. It would take an unprecedented level of international cooperation,
Yeah, and obviously we haven't been able to pass that test during a pandemic. Maybe the best we did was WW2, but these days? No way.
The only power we peons around the world have is our collective ability to not show up for work. Let the wheels of commerce come to a grinding halt. It’s the only thing that will get everyone’s attention. The question is, are there enough of us willing to do it, to make it work?
I will never go on strike for any cause or reason. I would get fired. That ends my life because I can't get another job. Nope. I'm sure a lot of people have this same issue and every time someone says "General strike!" I think of how my office reacts to that sort of thing, and I have a lot cushier employment compared to everyone in harder/shittier/more peon professions. A lot of us aren't going to be okay if we go on strike.
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:58 PM on July 2, 2021 [8 favorites]
Our species has never taken on anything remotely like this. It would take an unprecedented level of international cooperation,
Yeah, and obviously we haven't been able to pass that test during a pandemic. Maybe the best we did was WW2, but these days? No way.
The only power we peons around the world have is our collective ability to not show up for work. Let the wheels of commerce come to a grinding halt. It’s the only thing that will get everyone’s attention. The question is, are there enough of us willing to do it, to make it work?
I will never go on strike for any cause or reason. I would get fired. That ends my life because I can't get another job. Nope. I'm sure a lot of people have this same issue and every time someone says "General strike!" I think of how my office reacts to that sort of thing, and I have a lot cushier employment compared to everyone in harder/shittier/more peon professions. A lot of us aren't going to be okay if we go on strike.
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:58 PM on July 2, 2021 [8 favorites]
For those in the USA complaining about Joe Biden not magically fixing everything in 6 months, or any other time frame, I simply point out that no politician in a democracy can do anything if the voters don't give them the power to do it.
In hard practical electoral terms that means making sure the Dems don't lose any House seats and do gain a minimum of two Senate seats in 2022.
That's it. There is nothing else on the table.
posted by Pouteria at 9:09 PM on July 2, 2021 [14 favorites]
In hard practical electoral terms that means making sure the Dems don't lose any House seats and do gain a minimum of two Senate seats in 2022.
That's it. There is nothing else on the table.
posted by Pouteria at 9:09 PM on July 2, 2021 [14 favorites]
I feel like all my life I've been told to worry about things by school, movies, various (usually left of for the time) media sources, but that's all it ever seems to be - worry: worrying about stuff, being concerned about stuff. So, this essay is pretty much a bullseye for me.
Like someone mentioned upthread, I too am watching with interest what comes out of congress regarding Biden's infrastructure/climate initiative. So far, it seems like a good start, but just that, a start. Switching to electric cars and investing in mass transit is great and long overdue (especially the transit investments), but in the end, what matters is where all the energy comes from. How fast can we switch to renewables? How quickly can we replace the millions of ICE cars on our roads? Its a problem on the scale of a war, and our enemies are within our very legislatures and corporate structures.
Really, the thread about the For the People Act and this thread could be grouped together. It's all part of one battle. People way smarter than me have drawn the connections between racism, capitalism, environmental destruction, imperialism ect. I just read about it and worry, and I try to support political candidates and organizations I think will fight those evils. My big fear at the moment is that this is the only chance Democrats are going to get to address climate change for the next 8-10 years.
I simply point out that no politician in a democracy can do anything if the voters don't give them the power to do it.
The US Supreme Court just gutted what remains of the Voting Rights Act and signaled it may move against legislative attempts to rebuild that law.
Supreme Court Mangles Voting Rights Act.
It's hard for voters to have influence if they can't vote. It's also hard for voters to affect progressive change if the constitutional deck is stacked against them. The US President has the power to nominate Supreme Court justices, and the Democrats won the popular vote in every Presidential election since 1988 with the exception of 2004, yet conservatives have a 6 - 3 majority on the Supreme Court. Democratic congress people represent areas where the vast majority of Americans live, yet Republicans can hold up legislation with a mere 40 Senate votes through the filibuster. There is even an article on this very site detailing how fossil fuel companies are using donations to influence the "moderate" Democrats behind the bipartisan infrastructure bill to water down attempts to decarbonize power generation. One of those "moderate Democrats" is from Biden's home state and is a close ally of Biden's.
All that being written, I'm not arguing that people should disengage or not vote. Quite the opposite. People need to be involved at every level. People need to support candidates in primaries and general elections that will fight these politicians and hold them accountable to counteract the influence of the fossil fuel lobby and other lobbies fighting efforts to mitigate climate change. Politicians respond to forces acting upon them; they are empty vessels, or, at least, they should be treated as such.
Also, at some point, it will become necessary to act against recalcitrant corporations themselves to force them to fight on behalf of decarbonization efforts. For example, several Nordic pension funds are pressuring Toyota to
cease lobbying against efforts to fight climate change. Many more such actions will be needed, not only against corporate efforts to fight decarbonization bills but also against corporations supporting efforts to suppress votes and delegitimize elections. Boycotts and protests also likely will be needed.
posted by eagles123 at 9:32 PM on July 2, 2021 [10 favorites]
Like someone mentioned upthread, I too am watching with interest what comes out of congress regarding Biden's infrastructure/climate initiative. So far, it seems like a good start, but just that, a start. Switching to electric cars and investing in mass transit is great and long overdue (especially the transit investments), but in the end, what matters is where all the energy comes from. How fast can we switch to renewables? How quickly can we replace the millions of ICE cars on our roads? Its a problem on the scale of a war, and our enemies are within our very legislatures and corporate structures.
Really, the thread about the For the People Act and this thread could be grouped together. It's all part of one battle. People way smarter than me have drawn the connections between racism, capitalism, environmental destruction, imperialism ect. I just read about it and worry, and I try to support political candidates and organizations I think will fight those evils. My big fear at the moment is that this is the only chance Democrats are going to get to address climate change for the next 8-10 years.
I simply point out that no politician in a democracy can do anything if the voters don't give them the power to do it.
The US Supreme Court just gutted what remains of the Voting Rights Act and signaled it may move against legislative attempts to rebuild that law.
Supreme Court Mangles Voting Rights Act.
It's hard for voters to have influence if they can't vote. It's also hard for voters to affect progressive change if the constitutional deck is stacked against them. The US President has the power to nominate Supreme Court justices, and the Democrats won the popular vote in every Presidential election since 1988 with the exception of 2004, yet conservatives have a 6 - 3 majority on the Supreme Court. Democratic congress people represent areas where the vast majority of Americans live, yet Republicans can hold up legislation with a mere 40 Senate votes through the filibuster. There is even an article on this very site detailing how fossil fuel companies are using donations to influence the "moderate" Democrats behind the bipartisan infrastructure bill to water down attempts to decarbonize power generation. One of those "moderate Democrats" is from Biden's home state and is a close ally of Biden's.
All that being written, I'm not arguing that people should disengage or not vote. Quite the opposite. People need to be involved at every level. People need to support candidates in primaries and general elections that will fight these politicians and hold them accountable to counteract the influence of the fossil fuel lobby and other lobbies fighting efforts to mitigate climate change. Politicians respond to forces acting upon them; they are empty vessels, or, at least, they should be treated as such.
Also, at some point, it will become necessary to act against recalcitrant corporations themselves to force them to fight on behalf of decarbonization efforts. For example, several Nordic pension funds are pressuring Toyota to
cease lobbying against efforts to fight climate change. Many more such actions will be needed, not only against corporate efforts to fight decarbonization bills but also against corporations supporting efforts to suppress votes and delegitimize elections. Boycotts and protests also likely will be needed.
posted by eagles123 at 9:32 PM on July 2, 2021 [10 favorites]
Without doubt, this is the best chance in the 20 years since I have been in the climate arena. We have seen false complacency in the past. [...] This is different. It feels different, it looks different, it smells different.Climatologist Michael Mann, interviewed in The Guardian.
I am optimistic about a favourable shift in the political wind. The youth climate movement has galvanised attention and re-centred the debate on intergenerational ethics. We are seeing a tipping point in public consciousness. That bodes well. There is still a viable way forward to avoid climate catastrophe.
Yes, the climate crisis is a crisis, and yes, the world is going to heat and change for the worse. But we are not doomed, and the people who have spent their lives fighting this fight since before the rest of us started listening to them, those people still think we can overcome. Despair is understandable; I despair sometimes, even often, too. But it is not a reasoned response to the challenge that actually faces us. There are actual, real, consequential advances being made, both in public discourse and opinion, and in actual national and international policy. This is not to say there aren't a huge number of people out there who will happily shove their heads deeper into the sand while the sun burns their asses: we've certainly seen how deep the rot of treating ignorance and selfishness as virtues runs during this pandemic. But although they are part of the challenge we face, they do not in the end fully control our destiny, and on climate change at least the world really is turning against them.
We're not going to be able to gestate and raise healthy children in the super-heated soup of carbon dioxide, particulates, ground-level ozone, and paucity of oxygen that we'll be facing.
So we're going to be dealing with a world in which we'll need to generate oxygen and purify the atmosphere to survive.
This is the kind of thinking we need to be careful to avoid. I am not aware of any climate model that seriously suggests that oxygen levels are going to drop meaningfully, nor am I aware of any mechanism by which that could happen on a reasonable time scale. If I'm mistaken and this is based in a real published source I will be happy to be corrected. But if this is just speculation or inference, I think we need to focus on the very real, huge problems that climate change is causing and will cause in the future, and not invent implausible or impossible hypotheticals that make the problem seem insurmountable or unsurvivable. Keep in mind that atmospheric CO2 concentration has risen from just under 0.0003% to 0.0004% since the start of the Industrial Revolution, and if unchecked is projected to rise to something like 0.0007%. Although those numbers are small, that change in CO2 concentration is of course hugely influential in terms of greenhouse gasses. But in terms of depleting oxygen, which is about 21% of our atmosphere, this is negligible. The Scripps Institute of Oceanography has managed to measure decreases in atmospheric oxygen over the last decades using very sensitive equipment, but they note specifically that "[t]he changes are too small to have an impact on human health, but are of interest to the study of climate change and carbon dioxide." Climate change is causing and will cause a huge number of very serious problems, from sea level rise to droughts to increases in extreme weather to permanent changes in local climate to collapse of ecosystems: if unchecked we will be dealing with famines, wars over water and land, mass migrations of climate refugees, and a world that is generally less pleasant to live in; but we are not going to be running out of oxygen. Life will be less sweet, but it will go on.
posted by biogeo at 10:04 PM on July 2, 2021 [9 favorites]
Talking about our car "addiction" is misguided at best, and fundamentally blames individuals for structures and policies that have been set in motion and then cemented into place for 70 years. We have built up the United States around the car, and telling someone who lives a dozen miles away from the city center with a long commute to just "ride a bike" is just going to alienate them.
We've built our lives around certain expectations that climate change is going to challenge - anywhere from waterfront property in Florida, to air-conditioned homes in Phoenix, and farms in the California desert - these aren't things that people are just going to give up because they feel bad about climate change.
posted by meowzilla at 10:31 PM on July 2, 2021 [7 favorites]
We've built our lives around certain expectations that climate change is going to challenge - anywhere from waterfront property in Florida, to air-conditioned homes in Phoenix, and farms in the California desert - these aren't things that people are just going to give up because they feel bad about climate change.
posted by meowzilla at 10:31 PM on July 2, 2021 [7 favorites]
In hard practical electoral terms that means making sure the Dems don't lose any House seats and do gain a minimum of two Senate seats in 2022.
That's it. There is nothing else on the table.
Vote harder!!
posted by Gadarene at 10:49 PM on July 2, 2021 [5 favorites]
That's it. There is nothing else on the table.
Vote harder!!
posted by Gadarene at 10:49 PM on July 2, 2021 [5 favorites]
I think there is middle ground between complete despair and simply trusting that US politicians and corporate leaders, regardless of their stated political affiliations, are going to "bend the arc of history towards justice" on this issue on their own without public pressure and activism. Certainly those youth climate activists Michael Mann references don't appear to believe so.
To be clear, I'm not saying I think anyone here believes either of those two binaries. I'm just putting the idea out there.
posted by eagles123 at 10:57 PM on July 2, 2021 [5 favorites]
To be clear, I'm not saying I think anyone here believes either of those two binaries. I'm just putting the idea out there.
posted by eagles123 at 10:57 PM on July 2, 2021 [5 favorites]
I remember in the 70s, were going to freeze in time.
I can't read this book on the dust bowl because I know how it ends.
It's hot and raining like crazy in late June until today. Mold, skeeters, more wild life, screaming motorbikes, folks waiting for there curbside AC kicking, feet out the sun roof and I think: that's freedom. The state lost a few lakes and still we got drought in areas and this is Michigan, 50 degree weather change in a day were it's sunny 75 and then rainy at 62 in like an hour that's sorta normal. But I see the chaos as stated in the article and comments and wonder if I'm at the same place of oh hey ya, see.
sorry to rant.
We have built up the United States around the car,
Have we? Built around perhaps, built up works for your time frame, thats only 1950. Post war infra thats crumbling but is still, well infrastructure that can, in most cases be replaced with new infra or nothing.
But Here in Michigan the same land routes, in cases with in yards have existed for 500 years. But your point is concrete and political, tell a someone they can't have a gas guzzler for work is a no sale, economic or politic wise because yelling/ sanctioning that person who buys a dualie just because, is like preying the gun, beer and joint out of some folks hands.
In short we need a new road cart, a plan and 200 million electric ones won't happen soon. Then sell it to the people. It can happen, in the 70s car pooling helped, dad bought a motorbike and mom a Chevette.
My point, those ACs, that waterfront, etc. will erode faster then we know so giving them up for a small part of them so to say is a given.
posted by clavdivs at 11:03 PM on July 2, 2021
I can't read this book on the dust bowl because I know how it ends.
It's hot and raining like crazy in late June until today. Mold, skeeters, more wild life, screaming motorbikes, folks waiting for there curbside AC kicking, feet out the sun roof and I think: that's freedom. The state lost a few lakes and still we got drought in areas and this is Michigan, 50 degree weather change in a day were it's sunny 75 and then rainy at 62 in like an hour that's sorta normal. But I see the chaos as stated in the article and comments and wonder if I'm at the same place of oh hey ya, see.
sorry to rant.
We have built up the United States around the car,
Have we? Built around perhaps, built up works for your time frame, thats only 1950. Post war infra thats crumbling but is still, well infrastructure that can, in most cases be replaced with new infra or nothing.
But Here in Michigan the same land routes, in cases with in yards have existed for 500 years. But your point is concrete and political, tell a someone they can't have a gas guzzler for work is a no sale, economic or politic wise because yelling/ sanctioning that person who buys a dualie just because, is like preying the gun, beer and joint out of some folks hands.
In short we need a new road cart, a plan and 200 million electric ones won't happen soon. Then sell it to the people. It can happen, in the 70s car pooling helped, dad bought a motorbike and mom a Chevette.
My point, those ACs, that waterfront, etc. will erode faster then we know so giving them up for a small part of them so to say is a given.
posted by clavdivs at 11:03 PM on July 2, 2021
Get your fucking hands up
Get up out of your seat
All eyes on me
All eyes on me.
(Seriously, the new Bo Burnam show is like this article but a musical.)
posted by kaibutsu at 11:33 PM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
Get up out of your seat
All eyes on me
All eyes on me.
(Seriously, the new Bo Burnam show is like this article but a musical.)
posted by kaibutsu at 11:33 PM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
telling someone who lives a dozen miles away from the city center with a long commute to just "ride a bike" is just going to alienate them
Observing the inequitable distribution of climate change, those who suffer the consequences are usually anyone but those in Western countries, particularly the United States. Perhaps it is not much different from telling people we don't need to wear masks during a pandemic, because it offends sensibilities around imagined freedoms, derived from myths of American exceptionalism. Perhaps it won't take long for these notions, too, to melt in the heat of extreme weather, along with everything else.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 11:49 PM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
Observing the inequitable distribution of climate change, those who suffer the consequences are usually anyone but those in Western countries, particularly the United States. Perhaps it is not much different from telling people we don't need to wear masks during a pandemic, because it offends sensibilities around imagined freedoms, derived from myths of American exceptionalism. Perhaps it won't take long for these notions, too, to melt in the heat of extreme weather, along with everything else.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 11:49 PM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
Global Warming is downstream from Global Overpopulation. Is the Catholic Church still teaching that birth control makes Baby Jesus cry? Well, that would certainly be a good place to start or maybe they prefer to lose their tax exempt status.
posted by Beholder at 1:16 AM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by Beholder at 1:16 AM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
stilgar: make them non-functional enough of the time to make them unable to turn a profit, and thus shut them down because they are no longer profitable . . .
This. We've lived rural in the Irish Midlands since 1996. In 1990, a geo-prospecting company discovered economic quantities of Andalusite [a mineral used to line blast-furnaces, so important to capital] in a spur of the hills behind our house. They applied for planning/prospecting permission to take Tomduff Hill away in 40 ton truck-loads. An unlikely, fizzy, cabal of local people [farmers, publicans, the relief postman, the parish priest] didn't like the idea that a chunk of their sheep-grazed landscape would be disappeared. So they raised money - by raffling a small car (tickets £50) and selling a lot of cakes - and commissioned an independent geological survey . . . which showed that the original survey couldn't be replicated and so the venture was unlikely to be profitable. It never came to hand-cuffing themselves to trees or cratering the access roads. Like Cincinnatus everyone thereafter went back to farming.
posted by BobTheScientist at 1:45 AM on July 3, 2021 [6 favorites]
This. We've lived rural in the Irish Midlands since 1996. In 1990, a geo-prospecting company discovered economic quantities of Andalusite [a mineral used to line blast-furnaces, so important to capital] in a spur of the hills behind our house. They applied for planning/prospecting permission to take Tomduff Hill away in 40 ton truck-loads. An unlikely, fizzy, cabal of local people [farmers, publicans, the relief postman, the parish priest] didn't like the idea that a chunk of their sheep-grazed landscape would be disappeared. So they raised money - by raffling a small car (tickets £50) and selling a lot of cakes - and commissioned an independent geological survey . . . which showed that the original survey couldn't be replicated and so the venture was unlikely to be profitable. It never came to hand-cuffing themselves to trees or cratering the access roads. Like Cincinnatus everyone thereafter went back to farming.
posted by BobTheScientist at 1:45 AM on July 3, 2021 [6 favorites]
The climate crisis is a crime story
Big Oil’s record of lying never became part of the public narrative about climate change, largely because most news outlets did not incorporate it into their continuing coverage of climate change.
posted by adamvasco at 4:05 AM on July 3, 2021 [3 favorites]
Big Oil’s record of lying never became part of the public narrative about climate change, largely because most news outlets did not incorporate it into their continuing coverage of climate change.
posted by adamvasco at 4:05 AM on July 3, 2021 [3 favorites]
It's hard for voters to have influence if they can't vote. It's also hard for voters to affect progressive change if the constitutional deck is stacked against them.
posted by eagles123
I accept all that. The SCOTUS decision is certainly not a step forward.
But it just makes it all the more important that those who can get in a vote against the shit fest do so.
posted by Pouteria at 4:12 AM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by eagles123
I accept all that. The SCOTUS decision is certainly not a step forward.
But it just makes it all the more important that those who can get in a vote against the shit fest do so.
posted by Pouteria at 4:12 AM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
I remember in the 70s we were going to freeze in time.
This is a commonly trotted out point by climate change deniers, just so you know.
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:51 AM on July 3, 2021 [4 favorites]
This is a commonly trotted out point by climate change deniers, just so you know.
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:51 AM on July 3, 2021 [4 favorites]
I live in a very NIMBY area. Recently the municipal gears starting moving to build a 900-unit rental high rise complex just across from my GO station (commuter trains.) A few people started sniffling on Facebook but were swiftly put down by people pointing out that building housing people can live in next to transit is a good thing.
My neighbour’s wife is pregnant. He just traded his Lexus SUV for a Prius. I asked him what made him make the move and he said he wasn’t going to wait for 2035 to start (Canada is banning gas cars for then.) This is a Conservative voter.
My kids’ feet grew and we went to get shoes this week. They had discussed amongst themselves what they need, and stuck to two pairs each (sandals + runners.) I tried to talk my older son, who normally walks a lot, into a third pair and he said he’d like to see how it goes first in case his feet grow again. It wasn’t an unusual conversation around here but it did bring into relief that our “use it up, use it out, make it do or do without” philosophy— IMPERFECT!!! — is a real thing.
Pre-pandemic my local bulk food store chain was allowing people to bring their own containers. My local free group is openly taking about food waste and insecurity with boxes of cereal and oat milk going around.
It’s all insufficient but it does give me heart. And helps me carry on a bit.
posted by warriorqueen at 6:58 AM on July 3, 2021 [5 favorites]
My neighbour’s wife is pregnant. He just traded his Lexus SUV for a Prius. I asked him what made him make the move and he said he wasn’t going to wait for 2035 to start (Canada is banning gas cars for then.) This is a Conservative voter.
My kids’ feet grew and we went to get shoes this week. They had discussed amongst themselves what they need, and stuck to two pairs each (sandals + runners.) I tried to talk my older son, who normally walks a lot, into a third pair and he said he’d like to see how it goes first in case his feet grow again. It wasn’t an unusual conversation around here but it did bring into relief that our “use it up, use it out, make it do or do without” philosophy— IMPERFECT!!! — is a real thing.
Pre-pandemic my local bulk food store chain was allowing people to bring their own containers. My local free group is openly taking about food waste and insecurity with boxes of cereal and oat milk going around.
It’s all insufficient but it does give me heart. And helps me carry on a bit.
posted by warriorqueen at 6:58 AM on July 3, 2021 [5 favorites]
I am not aware of any climate model that seriously suggests that oxygen levels are going to drop meaningfully, nor am I aware of any mechanism by which that could happen on a reasonable time scale.
I've never seen a paper like that either. But oxygen comes from forests and from the oceans, specifically oceanic phytoplankton. And the forests are burning. And the phytoplankton are declining rapidly because of the changes in the oceans' temperature and acidity.
And perhaps that's not enough to be concerned about for the next couple of hundred years all by itself. But you combine that with elevated levels of CO2, particulates and ground level ozone, and things look good for human reproductive health.
Global warming is a side effect of the changes we're making to our atmosphere. I think we need to look more carefully at the direct effects the atmosphere will have on our physiology. A good multigenerational lab rat experiment where the subjects are exposed to the atmosphere as we're expecting it to be seems like a good place to start, but I can't find any studies like that either. But from what I've seen, things aren't looking good.
posted by MrVisible at 7:11 AM on July 3, 2021 [2 favorites]
I've never seen a paper like that either. But oxygen comes from forests and from the oceans, specifically oceanic phytoplankton. And the forests are burning. And the phytoplankton are declining rapidly because of the changes in the oceans' temperature and acidity.
And perhaps that's not enough to be concerned about for the next couple of hundred years all by itself. But you combine that with elevated levels of CO2, particulates and ground level ozone, and things look good for human reproductive health.
Global warming is a side effect of the changes we're making to our atmosphere. I think we need to look more carefully at the direct effects the atmosphere will have on our physiology. A good multigenerational lab rat experiment where the subjects are exposed to the atmosphere as we're expecting it to be seems like a good place to start, but I can't find any studies like that either. But from what I've seen, things aren't looking good.
posted by MrVisible at 7:11 AM on July 3, 2021 [2 favorites]
Talking about our car "addiction" is misguided at best, and fundamentally blames individuals
I agree that our built environment is the biggest barrier that is keeping people in their cars. That is why I expend most of my political energy advocating for greater density that would to make it as easy as possible for people to get out their cars.
I’m also not fooling myself about how easy that will be. Even in a perfectly planned environment with ample public transit and bikeways there are still a ton of people who expect they should be able to drive very short distances in their very large cars. That is a barrier we’ll need to confront as we transition to a new way of living that is independent of the built environment.
posted by scantee at 7:14 AM on July 3, 2021 [3 favorites]
I agree that our built environment is the biggest barrier that is keeping people in their cars. That is why I expend most of my political energy advocating for greater density that would to make it as easy as possible for people to get out their cars.
I’m also not fooling myself about how easy that will be. Even in a perfectly planned environment with ample public transit and bikeways there are still a ton of people who expect they should be able to drive very short distances in their very large cars. That is a barrier we’ll need to confront as we transition to a new way of living that is independent of the built environment.
posted by scantee at 7:14 AM on July 3, 2021 [3 favorites]
Vast swathes of humanity in the US at least either don't give a shit about climate change or actively mock those who do.
Likewise self-satisfied pudding-brained Barnaby supporters in Australia. There are total fuckwits everywhere.
Fucking hell I resent those people. They are absolutely why we can't have nice things. But in order for their attitudes to change they'd need to learn to think clearly and that's something they're completely not interested in doing; whenever they have a half hearted crack at it they start feeling a little uncomfortable. Better not to, is the obvious conclusion. Better to fall back into the platitudes and the complacency and the hero worship and the sticking it to the fucking greenies.
Miller's observation that all the words that need to be written about climate change have been written is completely correct. There is no educating these people or bringing them along or around. The only thing left to do is realize that we do actually outnumber them, and get organized enough to make that matter, so that one by one, the pudding-faced cowardly fuckhead brigade discovers that Eurasia has always been at war with Eastasia and that the utterly conventional thing to do has always involved sticking it to the fucking coalies.
Eventually, of course, the world's Trumps and Barnabies will all be claiming that that's been their attitude all along and we would have got here sooner if it hadn't been for all those terrible lefties getting in the way, which is insufferably infuriating because the same bleating gurning wankers will keep supporting them on that basis but I really can't see how we'd ever fix that.
posted by flabdablet at 7:34 AM on July 3, 2021 [8 favorites]
Likewise self-satisfied pudding-brained Barnaby supporters in Australia. There are total fuckwits everywhere.
Fucking hell I resent those people. They are absolutely why we can't have nice things. But in order for their attitudes to change they'd need to learn to think clearly and that's something they're completely not interested in doing; whenever they have a half hearted crack at it they start feeling a little uncomfortable. Better not to, is the obvious conclusion. Better to fall back into the platitudes and the complacency and the hero worship and the sticking it to the fucking greenies.
Miller's observation that all the words that need to be written about climate change have been written is completely correct. There is no educating these people or bringing them along or around. The only thing left to do is realize that we do actually outnumber them, and get organized enough to make that matter, so that one by one, the pudding-faced cowardly fuckhead brigade discovers that Eurasia has always been at war with Eastasia and that the utterly conventional thing to do has always involved sticking it to the fucking coalies.
Eventually, of course, the world's Trumps and Barnabies will all be claiming that that's been their attitude all along and we would have got here sooner if it hadn't been for all those terrible lefties getting in the way, which is insufferably infuriating because the same bleating gurning wankers will keep supporting them on that basis but I really can't see how we'd ever fix that.
posted by flabdablet at 7:34 AM on July 3, 2021 [8 favorites]
Scientific American. Call it what it is.
We Are Living in a Climate Emergency, and We’re Going to Say So.
It’s time to use a term that more than 13,000 scientists agree is needed
posted by adamvasco at 7:35 AM on July 3, 2021 [2 favorites]
We Are Living in a Climate Emergency, and We’re Going to Say So.
It’s time to use a term that more than 13,000 scientists agree is needed
posted by adamvasco at 7:35 AM on July 3, 2021 [2 favorites]
Miller's observation that all the words that need to be written about climate change have been written is completely correct.
I disagree.
People like stories of a come-from-behind victory or an against-the-odds rescue. It's cool to see teams of dedicated people do well or to watch giant projects come together thanks to resourcefulness and ingenuity and hard work
So far virtually nobody has propagandised an epic vision of fighting and beating climate change, much as the rest of the progressive agenda is pitifully propagandised. Show people what they could have and that it's achievable and awesome, and I think we'd do a lot better. Give people a tangible product to reach for, something that makes them say "they did it in that movie, why can't we do it for real", something that politicians can say they'll be better at building than the other candidate.
Otherwise if we keep staring at the guardrail whizzing by, who is surprised when we finally drive into it.
posted by Chef Flamboyardee at 8:46 AM on July 3, 2021 [7 favorites]
I disagree.
People like stories of a come-from-behind victory or an against-the-odds rescue. It's cool to see teams of dedicated people do well or to watch giant projects come together thanks to resourcefulness and ingenuity and hard work
So far virtually nobody has propagandised an epic vision of fighting and beating climate change, much as the rest of the progressive agenda is pitifully propagandised. Show people what they could have and that it's achievable and awesome, and I think we'd do a lot better. Give people a tangible product to reach for, something that makes them say "they did it in that movie, why can't we do it for real", something that politicians can say they'll be better at building than the other candidate.
Otherwise if we keep staring at the guardrail whizzing by, who is surprised when we finally drive into it.
posted by Chef Flamboyardee at 8:46 AM on July 3, 2021 [7 favorites]
In Houston, every road is jammed with pristine trucks, all mammoth sized, and I rarely see any of them with a tow hitch. There is no justifiable reason to own one of these monsters if you aren't regularly towing a trailer.
Note, last year, Ford discontinued sales of the Fiesta in the US.
posted by Beholder at 10:32 AM on July 3, 2021 [3 favorites]
Note, last year, Ford discontinued sales of the Fiesta in the US.
posted by Beholder at 10:32 AM on July 3, 2021 [3 favorites]
So far virtually nobody has propagandised an epic vision of fighting and beating climate change
I wouldn't say *nobody*, there was Snowpiercer (though tragically the train was an ongoing metaphor for the enduring nature of class & capitalism, so the experience could've been better), Day after Tomorrow (dramatized in "oh no, this is changing in days rather than over the span of a decade", but), if you're into video games Frostpunk shows an ultimately optimistic view of survival...
Per above, perhaps a film adaptation of Ministry for the Future is what you're looking for? I think it'll be tricky to get a film funded which must fundamentally argue that the system funding it must be broken apart; but stranger things have happened.
posted by CrystalDave at 10:42 AM on July 3, 2021
I wouldn't say *nobody*, there was Snowpiercer (though tragically the train was an ongoing metaphor for the enduring nature of class & capitalism, so the experience could've been better), Day after Tomorrow (dramatized in "oh no, this is changing in days rather than over the span of a decade", but), if you're into video games Frostpunk shows an ultimately optimistic view of survival...
Per above, perhaps a film adaptation of Ministry for the Future is what you're looking for? I think it'll be tricky to get a film funded which must fundamentally argue that the system funding it must be broken apart; but stranger things have happened.
posted by CrystalDave at 10:42 AM on July 3, 2021
I left in the weasel word "virtually" on purpose :-) But whether there are a few videos or not, I think you want big, simple, engaging propaganda that draws people in like sports. Think Ron Howard or James Cameron directing a series of screenplays co-authored by Andy Weir, to be really unimaginative about it.
I think you can even sidestep a lot of the political awkwardness: instead, just show the mechanics of physical challenges being met and of improvements and alternatives, and leave it to viewers to connect the dots between here and there.
No matter what, I don't think you want Shakespeare. Ultimately this is an advertisement, it's a "how to" vision that fights the fear-based messaging that the oil companies use so well to reinforce the status quo. It works by showing people what a different world would be like, and how it's not all that different to where we are today. Because in real life, it isn't.
posted by Chef Flamboyardee at 12:19 PM on July 3, 2021 [3 favorites]
I think you can even sidestep a lot of the political awkwardness: instead, just show the mechanics of physical challenges being met and of improvements and alternatives, and leave it to viewers to connect the dots between here and there.
No matter what, I don't think you want Shakespeare. Ultimately this is an advertisement, it's a "how to" vision that fights the fear-based messaging that the oil companies use so well to reinforce the status quo. It works by showing people what a different world would be like, and how it's not all that different to where we are today. Because in real life, it isn't.
posted by Chef Flamboyardee at 12:19 PM on July 3, 2021 [3 favorites]
Global Warming is downstream from Global Overpopulation. Is the Catholic Church still teaching that birth control makes Baby Jesus cry? Well, that would certainly be a good place to start or maybe they prefer to lose their tax exempt status.
Uhh, so not saying the original commenter is doing it, but every time a climate change article or op is posted on NYT, I notice there's always comments about overpopulation as a problem, sayin it's a problem "over there" or with "those people", and sometimes with an implication (or even less subtlety) that it's non-whites that are actually having too many kinds. That's bullshit, because the developing countries are not contributing the lion's share of carbon emissions, the One Child Policy is widely seen as a disaster, and that still doesn't justify controlling women's bodies. But I do I keep wondering whether the comments are just some random ignorant person or if all of these people are getting their info from the same right wing sources.
posted by FJT at 1:16 PM on July 3, 2021 [7 favorites]
Uhh, so not saying the original commenter is doing it, but every time a climate change article or op is posted on NYT, I notice there's always comments about overpopulation as a problem, sayin it's a problem "over there" or with "those people", and sometimes with an implication (or even less subtlety) that it's non-whites that are actually having too many kinds. That's bullshit, because the developing countries are not contributing the lion's share of carbon emissions, the One Child Policy is widely seen as a disaster, and that still doesn't justify controlling women's bodies. But I do I keep wondering whether the comments are just some random ignorant person or if all of these people are getting their info from the same right wing sources.
posted by FJT at 1:16 PM on July 3, 2021 [7 favorites]
(Or the comments originate from bots and malicious actors who are paid to spout these evil talking points.)
posted by tiny frying pan at 1:58 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by tiny frying pan at 1:58 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
FJT - I think it’s just the default dumb position. It reminds me of deficit hawks, whose whole shtick is just pointing at a large number and fear-mongering about how large it is.
posted by thedamnbees at 3:23 PM on July 3, 2021
posted by thedamnbees at 3:23 PM on July 3, 2021
I am not aware of any climate model that seriously suggests that oxygen levels are going to drop meaningfully,...Well there's this press release, about a study which
posted by biogeo at 1:04 AM on July 3
"has shown that an increase in the water temperature of the world's oceans of around six degrees Celsius ... could stop oxygen production by phytoplankton ... About two-thirds of the planet's total atmospheric oxygen is produced by ocean phytoplankton - and therefore cessation would result in the depletion of atmospheric oxygen on a global scale. This would likely result in the mass mortality of animals and humans."posted by ecco at 3:47 PM on July 3, 2021 [3 favorites]
You say that like it's a bad thing.
posted by kirkaracha at 4:10 PM on July 3, 2021
posted by kirkaracha at 4:10 PM on July 3, 2021
If it came to that, I think we'd make ourselves a few Krakatoas worth of fake airborne volcanic ash. Not ideal, not a plan, but it would hopefully keep the critters alive long enough for Elon to pack the diamond medallion club off to Mars.
posted by Chef Flamboyardee at 5:29 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by Chef Flamboyardee at 5:29 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
@FJT:
It has long been a concern of mine that I frequently see much more uninformed and fractious paranoia about supposed ecofascism (including spurious accusations based on one-upping eachother) than I do explicit ecofascism, and I spend enough time lurking the web to keep my eye on trends amongst actual right wingers, not just facebook grandparents.
"that still doesn't justify controlling women's bodies" is a complete reversal of the actual problem. Wherever access to education increases, and women subsequently gain more autonomy, they choose to have fewer children. Education is an incredibly important tool for increasing the practical agency of women in a patriarchal society. It's very much by design that literacy rates in developing countries are unevenly distributed across the genders. Tackling feminist issues pretty much anywhere brings the birth rate down.
One of the greater reasons some continental regions are still experiencing a tremendous baby boom has a lot to do with how they have partially acquired modern amenities previously unavailable, primarily medical, and infrastructure like water treatment, without others, like mass education. Women are being kept down and forced to give birth, instead of having the societal power to decline partners uninterested in wearing protection, and their rational right to receive abortions. Highly developed countries used to have similar issues. I am absolutely certain my great grandmother didn't want to have the 20 children she carried. Developing economies are drunk on the antiquated and dangerous notion that population growth is integral for economic growth. Most people are not interested in having the number of children they are having, and politicians are looking the other way because they think it will help their nations accrue power, economic or military (for the latter, see France up until about 1850, or Germany from the late 1800's to the end of WWI).
The truth is that each additive (re: in addition to replacement) mouth to feed will be another mind that craves a level and type of comfort, tacitly modeled on our own wasteful and indulgent lifestyles (which we export in a global media system centered on ourselves!) in NA and Europe (that I believe should be legislated away here first), which cannot be universally offered to over 10 billion people without stripping the earth bare. As it stands, I don't think this hyperconsumerist nightmare should exist anywhere. The disposability of our products, the superfluous nature of half of all market goods, it's all waste. The accompanying mindset of hedonism and shortsightedness is what got the process of climate change rolling to begin with.
There is no right to exponential population growth, and unsurprisingly (and amusingly ironically) the desire for ever-increasing numbers of people on this planet is somewhere that the populist left and the obscure right align with each other on, from hoping that women will remain shackled, right down to insisting that we have the infinite resources to achieve it. Advocating for that puts you in a box with Anatoly Karlin, not Noam Chomsky. This is the domain of people who believe climate change will improve productivity in the Arctic circle in such a way that it compensates for the complete cessation of habitation along the equator and the massive loss of agricultural land in the subtropics. It promises a future of violent warfare over dwindling resources. And to reiterate: it is inherently, albeit subtly, an anti-feminist stance.
posted by constantinescharity at 6:07 PM on July 3, 2021 [8 favorites]
It has long been a concern of mine that I frequently see much more uninformed and fractious paranoia about supposed ecofascism (including spurious accusations based on one-upping eachother) than I do explicit ecofascism, and I spend enough time lurking the web to keep my eye on trends amongst actual right wingers, not just facebook grandparents.
"that still doesn't justify controlling women's bodies" is a complete reversal of the actual problem. Wherever access to education increases, and women subsequently gain more autonomy, they choose to have fewer children. Education is an incredibly important tool for increasing the practical agency of women in a patriarchal society. It's very much by design that literacy rates in developing countries are unevenly distributed across the genders. Tackling feminist issues pretty much anywhere brings the birth rate down.
One of the greater reasons some continental regions are still experiencing a tremendous baby boom has a lot to do with how they have partially acquired modern amenities previously unavailable, primarily medical, and infrastructure like water treatment, without others, like mass education. Women are being kept down and forced to give birth, instead of having the societal power to decline partners uninterested in wearing protection, and their rational right to receive abortions. Highly developed countries used to have similar issues. I am absolutely certain my great grandmother didn't want to have the 20 children she carried. Developing economies are drunk on the antiquated and dangerous notion that population growth is integral for economic growth. Most people are not interested in having the number of children they are having, and politicians are looking the other way because they think it will help their nations accrue power, economic or military (for the latter, see France up until about 1850, or Germany from the late 1800's to the end of WWI).
The truth is that each additive (re: in addition to replacement) mouth to feed will be another mind that craves a level and type of comfort, tacitly modeled on our own wasteful and indulgent lifestyles (which we export in a global media system centered on ourselves!) in NA and Europe (that I believe should be legislated away here first), which cannot be universally offered to over 10 billion people without stripping the earth bare. As it stands, I don't think this hyperconsumerist nightmare should exist anywhere. The disposability of our products, the superfluous nature of half of all market goods, it's all waste. The accompanying mindset of hedonism and shortsightedness is what got the process of climate change rolling to begin with.
There is no right to exponential population growth, and unsurprisingly (and amusingly ironically) the desire for ever-increasing numbers of people on this planet is somewhere that the populist left and the obscure right align with each other on, from hoping that women will remain shackled, right down to insisting that we have the infinite resources to achieve it. Advocating for that puts you in a box with Anatoly Karlin, not Noam Chomsky. This is the domain of people who believe climate change will improve productivity in the Arctic circle in such a way that it compensates for the complete cessation of habitation along the equator and the massive loss of agricultural land in the subtropics. It promises a future of violent warfare over dwindling resources. And to reiterate: it is inherently, albeit subtly, an anti-feminist stance.
posted by constantinescharity at 6:07 PM on July 3, 2021 [8 favorites]
International Monetary Fund (IMF) report estimates 6.5 percent of global GDP ($5.2 trillion) was spent on fossil fuel subsidies (including negative externalities) in 2017"
Worse:
"fossil fuels account for 85 percent of all global subsidies,"
posted by adamvasco at 6:30 PM on July 3, 2021 [2 favorites]
Worse:
"fossil fuels account for 85 percent of all global subsidies,"
posted by adamvasco at 6:30 PM on July 3, 2021 [2 favorites]
FJT - I think it’s just the default dumb position. It reminds me of deficit hawks, whose whole shtick is just pointing at a large number and fear-mongering about how large it is.
When you look at fossil fuel burning, or deforestation, or the environmental impact of poultry and beef eating, so who are doing these things, people, and the more people, the more these things will happen.
posted by Beholder at 6:41 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
When you look at fossil fuel burning, or deforestation, or the environmental impact of poultry and beef eating, so who are doing these things, people, and the more people, the more these things will happen.
posted by Beholder at 6:41 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
World’s population is projected to nearly stop growing by the end of the century
I would be very interested in seeing calls by "the populist left and the obscure right" expressing "desire for ever-increasing numbers of people on this planet." It is true that some equate population growth with economic growth, and that kind of thinking needs to be opposed. But I would think that most people can be brought to accept the idea that, say, halving the human population over the next couple of centuries is both inevitable and beneficial. There may be some need for governments to encourage a reduction in the number of births, but those measures would simply be reinforcing a trend that exists in its own right.
posted by No Robots at 7:14 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
I would be very interested in seeing calls by "the populist left and the obscure right" expressing "desire for ever-increasing numbers of people on this planet." It is true that some equate population growth with economic growth, and that kind of thinking needs to be opposed. But I would think that most people can be brought to accept the idea that, say, halving the human population over the next couple of centuries is both inevitable and beneficial. There may be some need for governments to encourage a reduction in the number of births, but those measures would simply be reinforcing a trend that exists in its own right.
posted by No Robots at 7:14 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
"I would be very interested in seeing calls by 'the populist left and the obscure right' expressing 'desire for ever-increasing numbers of people on this planet.'"
Maybe you don't spend your time surrounded by young self-identified leftists in their 20's as much as I do. These are all my friends. They seem to think some kind of advancing front of global consumerism and furious capitalism, supported by unbound population growth, is the shape of progress. I've heard such laughable madness as people telling me abortion should be banned because of how it potentially lowers birth rates for some POC demographics. As if forcing people to bear children is somehow justice.
"World’s population is projected to nearly stop growing by the end of the century"
These are merely projections, which rely on profound assumptions. As I said, it doesn't really matter if we eventually reach some equilibrium. We're already well past a point where the lifestyle that we have actively and intentionally exported is a destructive force that everyone desires to participate in. Living in hyperconsumerist nightmare zones is not something that can be instituted in every place without incredible destruction. Even here, where things are seemingly well-regulated, we are still decimating the biosphere. Every year several species on this continent tumble from vulnerable to endangered to extinct. We continue to pave over and fragment habitat. Invasive species continue to arrive. The West coast is on the path to being completely denuded, while its charred remains will be overgrown with introduced Mediterranean species that will ensure the fires are even faster-burning and more dangerous. The planet will not be able to support 10 billion living like suburban Americans, and because of decades of propagandizing, there is no alternative course. To say no to people living in less developed places in the near future, and perhaps to actively compete with them for precious resources, is far more cruel than giving women the agency to refuse births they seldom want. Which loops back to the original premise: it is deeply misogynist to insist that we should leave high birth rates to decline "on their own". We could solve these oncoming resource crunches and environmental crises by simply enabling women to make choices for themselves through the widespread distribution of prophylactics and extensive education (not just about matters of reproduction).
posted by constantinescharity at 7:53 PM on July 3, 2021 [2 favorites]
Maybe you don't spend your time surrounded by young self-identified leftists in their 20's as much as I do. These are all my friends. They seem to think some kind of advancing front of global consumerism and furious capitalism, supported by unbound population growth, is the shape of progress. I've heard such laughable madness as people telling me abortion should be banned because of how it potentially lowers birth rates for some POC demographics. As if forcing people to bear children is somehow justice.
"World’s population is projected to nearly stop growing by the end of the century"
These are merely projections, which rely on profound assumptions. As I said, it doesn't really matter if we eventually reach some equilibrium. We're already well past a point where the lifestyle that we have actively and intentionally exported is a destructive force that everyone desires to participate in. Living in hyperconsumerist nightmare zones is not something that can be instituted in every place without incredible destruction. Even here, where things are seemingly well-regulated, we are still decimating the biosphere. Every year several species on this continent tumble from vulnerable to endangered to extinct. We continue to pave over and fragment habitat. Invasive species continue to arrive. The West coast is on the path to being completely denuded, while its charred remains will be overgrown with introduced Mediterranean species that will ensure the fires are even faster-burning and more dangerous. The planet will not be able to support 10 billion living like suburban Americans, and because of decades of propagandizing, there is no alternative course. To say no to people living in less developed places in the near future, and perhaps to actively compete with them for precious resources, is far more cruel than giving women the agency to refuse births they seldom want. Which loops back to the original premise: it is deeply misogynist to insist that we should leave high birth rates to decline "on their own". We could solve these oncoming resource crunches and environmental crises by simply enabling women to make choices for themselves through the widespread distribution of prophylactics and extensive education (not just about matters of reproduction).
posted by constantinescharity at 7:53 PM on July 3, 2021 [2 favorites]
Look, I'm all for giving more access to education and birth control to women across the world, but I think it's good because it increases women's rights and choices. The fact that it lowers population growth is just a side effect and it's bad to say that's THE reason to increase education access and birth control because, again, it leads to a weird situation where developed (and mostly white) countries trying to impose population control on developing (mostly non-white) countries. I do think in general it would be best to package education/birth control access for women with things that increase economic growth/development to avoid that.
In addition, I'm also kind of leery of espousing population control because I suspect some people would rather push that as the solution for climate change they reach for first, rather than the necessary and permanent changes needed for the economy and scientific/engineering advancements. I can see people even further delaying those changes because they think reducing the birth rate is doing enough.
posted by FJT at 9:14 PM on July 3, 2021 [2 favorites]
In addition, I'm also kind of leery of espousing population control because I suspect some people would rather push that as the solution for climate change they reach for first, rather than the necessary and permanent changes needed for the economy and scientific/engineering advancements. I can see people even further delaying those changes because they think reducing the birth rate is doing enough.
posted by FJT at 9:14 PM on July 3, 2021 [2 favorites]
I would be very interested in seeing calls by "the populist left and the obscure right" expressing "desire for ever-increasing numbers of people on this planet."
Among the obscure right are the Quiverfull movement and similar religious groups.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:35 PM on July 3, 2021
Among the obscure right are the Quiverfull movement and similar religious groups.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:35 PM on July 3, 2021
I wasn't suggesting it was one for the other. It is achieving two good things at once. And while "population control" is one way of negatively framing it, one could also use a more future-oriented perspective to say it is a resource scarcity pre-empting act. Probably a better way to package that one. People become afflicted when there are too many humans in too small a space, with too few opportunity and not enough water/jobs/etc. A future where Nairobi feels like Dhaka is not one that indigenes will enjoy. Many of my closest friends are from the more dense areas of South Asia, and they have informed my thoughts on this.
As for reducing the global population, including our own in NA, to reduce consumption, that is and should be part of the solution, though not even close to the primary components. Obviously a reduction in fossil fuel production, dramatic reorganization of our consumer culture, our supply lines, our industry, etc. all come first. And then we need to export such methods aggressively, instead of the current maelstrom of greed, hypercompetition and overconsumption that we tout as our values through our global media dominance.
posted by constantinescharity at 9:51 PM on July 3, 2021
As for reducing the global population, including our own in NA, to reduce consumption, that is and should be part of the solution, though not even close to the primary components. Obviously a reduction in fossil fuel production, dramatic reorganization of our consumer culture, our supply lines, our industry, etc. all come first. And then we need to export such methods aggressively, instead of the current maelstrom of greed, hypercompetition and overconsumption that we tout as our values through our global media dominance.
posted by constantinescharity at 9:51 PM on July 3, 2021
The one thing that would have larger, quicker, more positive impact on weaning humanity from fossil fuels than anything mentioned so far in this thread is nuclear power. The recent closure of New York's Indian Point nuclear power plant meant a jump in the state's fossil fuel usage. As long as the traditional environmental movement remains anti-nuclear, we are doomed.
posted by PhineasGage at 9:56 PM on July 3, 2021 [5 favorites]
posted by PhineasGage at 9:56 PM on July 3, 2021 [5 favorites]
I just wanted to take a moment to push back against this paranoia about "ecofascism" which seems to overshadow any actual expression of it, because I have a creeping suspicion that resistance to it is in some cases a Trojan horse for exhortations to consume, to build, to stifle environmentalists outside of discussions on climate change (pollution, habitat destruction, etc.) and to generally sow discord amongst lefties. Like I said, I've seen troubling examples of people I know espousing some sort of weird rainbow capitalism hyperconsumerist bullshit in the name of shouting down a purported surge in ecofascism which they have not directly witnessed. I was hearing about it every day and seeing tepid instagram posts for months.
posted by constantinescharity at 9:59 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by constantinescharity at 9:59 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
The atmosphere and oceans only care about total concentraioms of pollutants and greenhouse gasses, not who it comes from.
People care about who it comes from.
The overwhelming majority of emissions come from or are products for the top 10%. You could reduce the worlds pop by billions and solve nothing. Wastefulness and warfarw by the rich was and is the disproportionate culprit.
Global or regional population size only matters if you pretend or plan on improving/imcreasing the material standard of living of the worlds or nations poor.
The population that is both disproportionately large for its geography, its preindustrial baseline population and its pollution are europeans and the marrooned people of european ancestry that europeans invaded into other people's continents.
If you wanna clean this mess up, thats where the biggest changes have to come from.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:19 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
People care about who it comes from.
The overwhelming majority of emissions come from or are products for the top 10%. You could reduce the worlds pop by billions and solve nothing. Wastefulness and warfarw by the rich was and is the disproportionate culprit.
Global or regional population size only matters if you pretend or plan on improving/imcreasing the material standard of living of the worlds or nations poor.
The population that is both disproportionately large for its geography, its preindustrial baseline population and its pollution are europeans and the marrooned people of european ancestry that europeans invaded into other people's continents.
If you wanna clean this mess up, thats where the biggest changes have to come from.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:19 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
I would think that most people can be brought to accept the idea that, say, halving the human population over the next couple of centuries is both inevitable and beneficial.
But you don't understand! MALTHUS WAS WRONG!
baaaaaa
posted by flabdablet at 12:25 AM on July 4, 2021
But you don't understand! MALTHUS WAS WRONG!
baaaaaa
posted by flabdablet at 12:25 AM on July 4, 2021
I consider it a foregone conclusion that the standard of living must increase elsewhere, and I sense that you are implying I would rather have it otherwise. You are reiterating my point that people will want to be comfortable, and we set the model for what that constitutes through how we live, ourselves. I'm not writing to lay out any program. Don't forget that the only reason I was saying anything at all was that someone was rather dramatically accusing another of genocidal or eugenical thought. I had only meant to step in and temper that because I find such attacks all too common between fellow lefties these days.
To the above: Malthus was wrong about permanent, exponential growth. Doesn't mean the basic requirements of comfort for the current global population (or one larger) are any less difficult to achieve without further decimating a beleaguered biosphere, and scraping the bottom of the barrel for every morsel of raw material we can get. We're "only" at seven billion and vast numbers of species are disappearing left and right.
posted by constantinescharity at 12:30 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
To the above: Malthus was wrong about permanent, exponential growth. Doesn't mean the basic requirements of comfort for the current global population (or one larger) are any less difficult to achieve without further decimating a beleaguered biosphere, and scraping the bottom of the barrel for every morsel of raw material we can get. We're "only" at seven billion and vast numbers of species are disappearing left and right.
posted by constantinescharity at 12:30 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
The one thing that would have larger, quicker, more positive impact on weaning humanity from fossil fuels than anything mentioned so far in this thread is nuclear power.
Nope.
Nuclear power is on the hard energy path. It's inherently centralized, hugely expensive, still reliant on an extraction-to-use-to-waste fuel pathway, and insanely slow to get from the planning stage to switch-on.
Centralization is poor design because when centralized plant fails (as every kind of generation plant does, from time to time) the consequences to supply are severe. Solar rooftop arrays fail all the time and the grid basically doesn't notice.
For the same amount of money it costs to implement a gigawatt of centralized nukes we can have maybe four gigawatts of decentralized wind and solar plus batteries. Maintenance costs for the latter are lower because the associated safety risks are lower, and there's no fuel cost.
For the same amount of money it costs to implement a gigawatt of centralized nukes we can retrofit maybe ten gigawatts of demand reduction through increased efficiency in buildings and vehicles. This is equivalent to creating a permanent revenue stream compared to what was there before.
Maybe one day we might be able to use relatively small thorium reactors to decentralize nuclear generation a bit. That technology is not here yet. Wind and solar and batteries are here. We don't have the time to wait for thorium reactors which would, in any case, offer zero operational advantages over wind and solar and batteries.
Advocating for nukes merely makes a conceptually lazy substitution of fuels into an inherently terrible idea (huge centralized generation plant). We can do much better, much faster, without them.
posted by flabdablet at 12:39 AM on July 4, 2021 [3 favorites]
Nope.
Nuclear power is on the hard energy path. It's inherently centralized, hugely expensive, still reliant on an extraction-to-use-to-waste fuel pathway, and insanely slow to get from the planning stage to switch-on.
Centralization is poor design because when centralized plant fails (as every kind of generation plant does, from time to time) the consequences to supply are severe. Solar rooftop arrays fail all the time and the grid basically doesn't notice.
For the same amount of money it costs to implement a gigawatt of centralized nukes we can have maybe four gigawatts of decentralized wind and solar plus batteries. Maintenance costs for the latter are lower because the associated safety risks are lower, and there's no fuel cost.
For the same amount of money it costs to implement a gigawatt of centralized nukes we can retrofit maybe ten gigawatts of demand reduction through increased efficiency in buildings and vehicles. This is equivalent to creating a permanent revenue stream compared to what was there before.
Maybe one day we might be able to use relatively small thorium reactors to decentralize nuclear generation a bit. That technology is not here yet. Wind and solar and batteries are here. We don't have the time to wait for thorium reactors which would, in any case, offer zero operational advantages over wind and solar and batteries.
Advocating for nukes merely makes a conceptually lazy substitution of fuels into an inherently terrible idea (huge centralized generation plant). We can do much better, much faster, without them.
posted by flabdablet at 12:39 AM on July 4, 2021 [3 favorites]
Malthus was wrong about permanent, exponential growth
Seems to me personally that that remains to be seen.
We see essentially Malthusian over-growth cause resource depletion and consequent population crashes in other species all the fucking time. Thinking it can't happen to us is, it seems to me, arrogant human exceptionalism.
We're an ingenious lot; recent history offers strong hints that it won't be beyond the wit of humanity to cause near-total resource depletion for everybody else and then for us even without projected exponential human population growth.
And yes, the places in which the global ecosystem would benefit the most from reduced human population densities are absolutely those places running "advanced" economies with the highest per-capita resource consumption. Anybody who advocates prioritizing population controls in low-consumption economies is talking through their arse, as is anybody who seriously mounts an argument that there's a necessary and inevitable correlation between a safe and comfortable life for all and the total quantity of resources that must be consumed to secure that.
posted by flabdablet at 12:47 AM on July 4, 2021 [2 favorites]
Seems to me personally that that remains to be seen.
We see essentially Malthusian over-growth cause resource depletion and consequent population crashes in other species all the fucking time. Thinking it can't happen to us is, it seems to me, arrogant human exceptionalism.
We're an ingenious lot; recent history offers strong hints that it won't be beyond the wit of humanity to cause near-total resource depletion for everybody else and then for us even without projected exponential human population growth.
And yes, the places in which the global ecosystem would benefit the most from reduced human population densities are absolutely those places running "advanced" economies with the highest per-capita resource consumption. Anybody who advocates prioritizing population controls in low-consumption economies is talking through their arse, as is anybody who seriously mounts an argument that there's a necessary and inevitable correlation between a safe and comfortable life for all and the total quantity of resources that must be consumed to secure that.
posted by flabdablet at 12:47 AM on July 4, 2021 [2 favorites]
Obviously a reduction in fossil fuel production, dramatic reorganization of our consumer culture, our supply lines, our industry, etc. all come first. And then we need to export such methods aggressively...
OR we could, you know, STFU with the aggressive exporting thing and import the required dramatic reorganizations of underpinning social relations from cultures that have already been implementing them for tens of thousands of years.
Colonialism is, to a pretty good first approximation, the entire root cause of the problem. Maybe time we gave it a fucking rest?
posted by flabdablet at 12:55 AM on July 4, 2021 [3 favorites]
OR we could, you know, STFU with the aggressive exporting thing and import the required dramatic reorganizations of underpinning social relations from cultures that have already been implementing them for tens of thousands of years.
Colonialism is, to a pretty good first approximation, the entire root cause of the problem. Maybe time we gave it a fucking rest?
posted by flabdablet at 12:55 AM on July 4, 2021 [3 favorites]
Low per capita consumption economies will eventually become high per capita consumption economies, while most high per capita consumption economies are dealing with their own population surpluses by slowly eliminating themselves. Do you think that anyone will give a sigh of relief that Europeans don't have children, and then go on to tell their own children to never adopt the same patterns of consumption if their standard of living increases? I really don't give a shit if we have to murder every white person on earth to convince everyone else that it isn't some colonialist enterprise, reducing the world population (via passive and pacifistic means) in turn with the introduction of less harmful energy production and less toxic industrial processes.
While we ourselves have already proven largely reticent about changing, everyone else is just as eager to take up the mantle. The moment we stop is the moment someone else is going to adopt everything we did before and say it's "fair" because it's "their turn", and I guess we'll all ride to venusian hell together. We need to change in such a way that it sets an example while encouraging others not to emulate our prior misdeeds. To think this it is impossible for previously colonized peoples or those in the global South to come to embody our worst qualities as their economies further develop because you've canonized them in your mind is adjacent to noble savage tropism. Ditto for the fetishization of other cultures who won't hold magical answers for the reorganization of society because, unfortunately, evil and greed lurks in us all.
As for your critique of resource consumption, are you going to tell me we'll all live in a Star Trek world with replicators? Many raw resources are already in low supply. Do you think the future's new middle class consumers will care when elephant habitat is reduced to make way for their oversized housing allotments? Will their telecoms be mysteriously free of rare earth metals?
posted by constantinescharity at 1:41 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
While we ourselves have already proven largely reticent about changing, everyone else is just as eager to take up the mantle. The moment we stop is the moment someone else is going to adopt everything we did before and say it's "fair" because it's "their turn", and I guess we'll all ride to venusian hell together. We need to change in such a way that it sets an example while encouraging others not to emulate our prior misdeeds. To think this it is impossible for previously colonized peoples or those in the global South to come to embody our worst qualities as their economies further develop because you've canonized them in your mind is adjacent to noble savage tropism. Ditto for the fetishization of other cultures who won't hold magical answers for the reorganization of society because, unfortunately, evil and greed lurks in us all.
As for your critique of resource consumption, are you going to tell me we'll all live in a Star Trek world with replicators? Many raw resources are already in low supply. Do you think the future's new middle class consumers will care when elephant habitat is reduced to make way for their oversized housing allotments? Will their telecoms be mysteriously free of rare earth metals?
posted by constantinescharity at 1:41 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
The big problem is that Ending climate change requires the end of capitalism.
and that will probably inevitably lead to war as those fuckers aren't going to let go easily.
Maybe it does but this Guardian opinion piece doesn't make that case effectively. Since almost the entire world now lives under a capitalist system and has for a few decades and since the world's formerly and currently notionally non-capitalist states aren't doing notably better at reducing their emissions nor have they historically it seems a strong claim to make.
It is also the case that because of our end of history moment, all the countries that have reduced their emissions the most, countries like Denmark and the UK, have done so using state funding but privately-owned and controlled means. Meanwhile, plenty of countries with state owned oil companies continue to explore for new resources.
It is perhaps more accurate to say that none of the known systems for organising social and economic relations seem terribly well suited for doing what is required.
One of the articles linked to from the Guardian link is described by the Guardian writer as showing why carbon taxes won't work. Except that what it actually shows is that extremely low carbon taxes won't work well enough. Their "high" scenario is a tax that starts at $70 and rises to $115 by 2050. It reduces emissions but not enough for policy goals. At the time the article was written, the EU ETS scheme was at $16. It is now at 55 euros.
Broadly speaking there is both good and bad news.
The good news is that we now have the technology package that lets us reduce our emissions about 80% and have a pretty good line of sight to 90%. Actual net-zero or net-negative may require some of the rogue's gallery of second tier technologies like next gen nuclear, green hydrogen, and CCS to be developed but even there I'm quietly confident that we make those last 10% work as well.
The bad news is also the reason why there will be the political will to make the last 10% happen - Even at a fast pace from now, we are still in for some bad times because of the emissions already out there and because of the time taken to complete the switchover. We're already at 1.2C, that's locked in. I think it's almost impossible to imagine not hitting at least 1.5C at this point. I think that as the cost of key renewable technologies continue to fall and the urgency becomes increasingly obvious, efforts will ramp-up and by the time we're working out way through the last few % in the late 2040s it will be obvious how catastrophic any further warming would be. Unfortunately the reason it will be obvious is because by that point we will probably have many years of obviously escalating climate change driven crises. We will really wish we had started seriously working on this in the 1980s and 1990s which would have given us a lot more runway.
posted by atrazine at 3:00 AM on July 4, 2021 [4 favorites]
and that will probably inevitably lead to war as those fuckers aren't going to let go easily.
Maybe it does but this Guardian opinion piece doesn't make that case effectively. Since almost the entire world now lives under a capitalist system and has for a few decades and since the world's formerly and currently notionally non-capitalist states aren't doing notably better at reducing their emissions nor have they historically it seems a strong claim to make.
It is also the case that because of our end of history moment, all the countries that have reduced their emissions the most, countries like Denmark and the UK, have done so using state funding but privately-owned and controlled means. Meanwhile, plenty of countries with state owned oil companies continue to explore for new resources.
It is perhaps more accurate to say that none of the known systems for organising social and economic relations seem terribly well suited for doing what is required.
One of the articles linked to from the Guardian link is described by the Guardian writer as showing why carbon taxes won't work. Except that what it actually shows is that extremely low carbon taxes won't work well enough. Their "high" scenario is a tax that starts at $70 and rises to $115 by 2050. It reduces emissions but not enough for policy goals. At the time the article was written, the EU ETS scheme was at $16. It is now at 55 euros.
Broadly speaking there is both good and bad news.
The good news is that we now have the technology package that lets us reduce our emissions about 80% and have a pretty good line of sight to 90%. Actual net-zero or net-negative may require some of the rogue's gallery of second tier technologies like next gen nuclear, green hydrogen, and CCS to be developed but even there I'm quietly confident that we make those last 10% work as well.
The bad news is also the reason why there will be the political will to make the last 10% happen - Even at a fast pace from now, we are still in for some bad times because of the emissions already out there and because of the time taken to complete the switchover. We're already at 1.2C, that's locked in. I think it's almost impossible to imagine not hitting at least 1.5C at this point. I think that as the cost of key renewable technologies continue to fall and the urgency becomes increasingly obvious, efforts will ramp-up and by the time we're working out way through the last few % in the late 2040s it will be obvious how catastrophic any further warming would be. Unfortunately the reason it will be obvious is because by that point we will probably have many years of obviously escalating climate change driven crises. We will really wish we had started seriously working on this in the 1980s and 1990s which would have given us a lot more runway.
posted by atrazine at 3:00 AM on July 4, 2021 [4 favorites]
Centralization is poor design because when centralized plant fails (as every kind of generation plant does, from time to time) the consequences to supply are severe. Solar rooftop arrays fail all the time and the grid basically doesn't notice
All of the really low cost renewables are centralised. The cost of small rooftop solar is vastly higher than utility solar and the best and cheapest wind comes from large onshore and offshore arrays.
It is nonetheless true that no place with renewable penetration under about 60% should be bothered about new fission reactors as a good use of money and time for the immediate future but as we come down that curve, there are challenges that nuclear may well be the answer to.
posted by atrazine at 3:36 AM on July 4, 2021 [2 favorites]
All of the really low cost renewables are centralised. The cost of small rooftop solar is vastly higher than utility solar and the best and cheapest wind comes from large onshore and offshore arrays.
It is nonetheless true that no place with renewable penetration under about 60% should be bothered about new fission reactors as a good use of money and time for the immediate future but as we come down that curve, there are challenges that nuclear may well be the answer to.
posted by atrazine at 3:36 AM on July 4, 2021 [2 favorites]
Advocating for nukes merely makes a conceptually lazy substitution of fuels into an inherently terrible idea (huge centralized generation plant). We can do much better, much faster, without them.
It's not unreasonable to be against building new nuclear plants (at any large scale, at least until we get better at building them again), but it's also blindingly stupid to shut down existing nuclear plants except in the relatively rare case where a reactor is beyond economical repair or so poorly sited that the chance of a natural disaster causing a major radiation release can't be mitigated.
We can afford to go backwards even less than we can afford to not go forward.
posted by wierdo at 4:17 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
It's not unreasonable to be against building new nuclear plants (at any large scale, at least until we get better at building them again), but it's also blindingly stupid to shut down existing nuclear plants except in the relatively rare case where a reactor is beyond economical repair or so poorly sited that the chance of a natural disaster causing a major radiation release can't be mitigated.
We can afford to go backwards even less than we can afford to not go forward.
posted by wierdo at 4:17 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
flabdablet: We see essentially Malthusian over-growth cause resource depletion and consequent population crashes in other species all the fucking time. Thinking it can't happen to us is, it seems to me, arrogant human exceptionalism.
Weird, then, that Malthus saw his theory specifically as human exceptionalism. As Marx put it:
posted by No Robots at 6:12 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
Weird, then, that Malthus saw his theory specifically as human exceptionalism. As Marx put it:
I'm amused that Darwin, at whom I've been taking another look, should say that he also applies the ‘Malthusian’ theory to plants and animals, as though in Mr Malthus’s case the whole thing didn’t lie in its not being applied to plants and animals, but only — with its geometric progression — to humans as against plants and animals. It is remarkable how Darwin rediscovers, among the beasts and plants, the society of England with its division of labour, competition, opening up of new markets, ‘inventions’ and Malthusian ‘struggle for existence’. It is Hobbes’ bellum omnium contra omnes and is reminiscent of Hegel’s Phenomenology, in which civil society figures as an ‘intellectual animal kingdom’, whereas, in Darwin, the animal kingdom figures as civil society.--Marx To EngelsMarx correctly saw that the primary threat to mankind's future development came from an ideology of biological determinism in which the theories of Malthus and Darwin were used to deny human agency.
posted by No Robots at 6:12 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
I love how it always comes down to whether a long dead economist moron was wrong or not and how much of a racist dipshit he was, as if it mattered any to the mind-bending notion that *gasp* limits exist and infinite growth is impossible.
Hey, I heard Milton Friedman breathed oxygen, welp, guess it's time to suffocate to death, wouldn't want to be associated with that turd in any way!!
posted by Bangaioh at 7:14 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
Hey, I heard Milton Friedman breathed oxygen, welp, guess it's time to suffocate to death, wouldn't want to be associated with that turd in any way!!
posted by Bangaioh at 7:14 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
All of the really low cost renewables are centralised.
Yes, but less so. Nukes need to be designed at order-of-gigawatt scale to make them even plausibly economical; utility renewable installations are more typically tens to hundreds of megawatts.
posted by flabdablet at 7:28 AM on July 4, 2021
Yes, but less so. Nukes need to be designed at order-of-gigawatt scale to make them even plausibly economical; utility renewable installations are more typically tens to hundreds of megawatts.
posted by flabdablet at 7:28 AM on July 4, 2021
Here's Just Have a Think making some interesting observations about assumed vs achieved capacity factors for fossil fuel generators (YouTube, 00:13:40)
posted by flabdablet at 7:32 AM on July 4, 2021
posted by flabdablet at 7:32 AM on July 4, 2021
And here's a typically on-point The Juice Media piece on the level of pudding-brain disease within the present Australian Government: Honest Government Ad | We Make Everything Good Sh!t (YouTube, 00:04:26)
posted by flabdablet at 7:36 AM on July 4, 2021
posted by flabdablet at 7:36 AM on July 4, 2021
"World’s population is projected to nearly stop growing by the end of the century"
Perhaps sooner. Demographic projections vary, and I've heard some demographers and other analysts argue that the UN publications are too conservative.
posted by doctornemo at 8:14 AM on July 4, 2021
Perhaps sooner. Demographic projections vary, and I've heard some demographers and other analysts argue that the UN publications are too conservative.
posted by doctornemo at 8:14 AM on July 4, 2021
I love how it always comes down to whether a long dead economist moron was wrong or not and how much of a racist dipshit he was, as if it mattered any to the mind-bending notion that *gasp* limits exist and infinite growth is impossible.
As opposed to the long-dead racist biologist?
posted by No Robots at 8:39 AM on July 4, 2021
As opposed to the long-dead racist biologist?
posted by No Robots at 8:39 AM on July 4, 2021
The point is who the fuck cares who said what and what they did in their spare time? There's no lack of trash people grabbing onto a real issue and taking advantage of it to peddle their own repugnant worldview. That doesn't have any bearing on whether the issue is real or not.
Overpopulation and physical and ecological limits are real issues regardless of how many stopped clocks became famous for talking about it.
posted by Bangaioh at 8:50 AM on July 4, 2021
Overpopulation and physical and ecological limits are real issues regardless of how many stopped clocks became famous for talking about it.
posted by Bangaioh at 8:50 AM on July 4, 2021
Overpopulation and physical and ecological limits are real issues regardless of how many stopped clocks became famous for talking about it.
True enough. However, we have all acquired habits of thought that may inhibit progress. These habits have to be scrutinized and subjected to criticism. This requires patience and understanding.
posted by No Robots at 8:55 AM on July 4, 2021 [2 favorites]
True enough. However, we have all acquired habits of thought that may inhibit progress. These habits have to be scrutinized and subjected to criticism. This requires patience and understanding.
posted by No Robots at 8:55 AM on July 4, 2021 [2 favorites]
There is no arbitrary number of humans this planet can support. It's a function of so many factors, including housing density, agricultural yields, overall energy efficiency, energy sources, per capita water usage, and even where people live, all of which have changed drastically in just the past few decades. We need fewer people isn't an assertion that solves the problems facing us right now, nor is it likely to have any political traction.
posted by PhineasGage at 9:23 AM on July 4, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by PhineasGage at 9:23 AM on July 4, 2021 [3 favorites]
I can say that living in an area with 95% humidity and 95-115 degree heat, breathing outside does get much harder.
posted by Jacen at 9:26 AM on July 4, 2021
posted by Jacen at 9:26 AM on July 4, 2021
Large explosion reported near oil platform in the Caspian Sea; officials say it may have been caused by a mud volcano
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:11 PM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:11 PM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
you haven't earned despair
if you are typing something into this thread, you had the luxury to do so. if it's that bad, you won't even be able to type one day. there will be nothing, no MetaFilter no policies (or lack of policies) to argue about, none of this will matter.
some people are experiencing this to a greater degree than any of us, minus the leisure etc. to sit and type on about it. at least have the grace to remember that next time you want to be cynical or hopeless. there is always hope, and being alive is reason enough to be hopeful.
posted by elkevelvet at 3:13 PM on July 5, 2021 [1 favorite]
if you are typing something into this thread, you had the luxury to do so. if it's that bad, you won't even be able to type one day. there will be nothing, no MetaFilter no policies (or lack of policies) to argue about, none of this will matter.
some people are experiencing this to a greater degree than any of us, minus the leisure etc. to sit and type on about it. at least have the grace to remember that next time you want to be cynical or hopeless. there is always hope, and being alive is reason enough to be hopeful.
posted by elkevelvet at 3:13 PM on July 5, 2021 [1 favorite]
Got more self-righteousness than I need, though, if you ever find yourself running short.
posted by flabdablet at 5:09 PM on July 5, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by flabdablet at 5:09 PM on July 5, 2021 [1 favorite]
Nordic countries endure heatwave as Lapland records hottest day since 1914
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:49 PM on July 5, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:49 PM on July 5, 2021 [1 favorite]
My road trip from the San Francisco Bay Area to Arizona over the Independence Day holiday weekend covered a lot of ground on this topic, from the many political water billboards in the Central Valley to the above average temperatures in the Phoenix area.
On the return trip, we stopped at the Camp Roberts rest area on Highway 101, where we encountered a very well-designed electric car charging station. The key idea for this free, solar-powered charging station was that it provided benefits to all visitors. If you have an electric car, you can charge it up at no cost. If you don't, you can park in the spaces covered by the four solar panel arrays for free shade.
This type of low-key innovation provides something for everyone, combined with educational panels on nearby fossil fuels for the children who may have asked about the small oil derricks that they passed on the way in. Dozens to hundreds of people see this place every day, hopefully taking away a positive impression of an environmental win that doesn't take away anything from anyone.
Hopefully, the infrastructure bill can place a few hundred more of these units at the other highway rest stops in California.
posted by JDC8 at 8:49 PM on July 6, 2021 [1 favorite]
On the return trip, we stopped at the Camp Roberts rest area on Highway 101, where we encountered a very well-designed electric car charging station. The key idea for this free, solar-powered charging station was that it provided benefits to all visitors. If you have an electric car, you can charge it up at no cost. If you don't, you can park in the spaces covered by the four solar panel arrays for free shade.
This type of low-key innovation provides something for everyone, combined with educational panels on nearby fossil fuels for the children who may have asked about the small oil derricks that they passed on the way in. Dozens to hundreds of people see this place every day, hopefully taking away a positive impression of an environmental win that doesn't take away anything from anyone.
Hopefully, the infrastructure bill can place a few hundred more of these units at the other highway rest stops in California.
posted by JDC8 at 8:49 PM on July 6, 2021 [1 favorite]
I missed a couple of zeroes in my conversion from parts per million to percentages above. CO2 concentrations have risen from 0.03% to 0.04% and are expected to rise to 0.07%. Sorry for the mistake!
posted by biogeo at 5:28 AM on July 8, 2021
posted by biogeo at 5:28 AM on July 8, 2021
One of the media tropes that I find puzzling and less than useful is the "hottest day since 1921" kind of framing in weather stories. By definition this means it was equally hot 100 years ago. The trends are clear, and frequencies of hot days and other aggregate measures make the case for how bad climate change has been, but using a single example of a single metric that isn't more dire than the same metric a very long time ago doesn't seem the best way to persuasively communicate the fix we're in.
posted by PhineasGage at 5:45 AM on July 8, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by PhineasGage at 5:45 AM on July 8, 2021 [2 favorites]
I was writing a reply to a now-deleted post mentioning the latest climate impacts in Europe and elsewhere, framed in terms of deadlines and tipping points, in ways that I challenged.
I won't rewrite the full comment here, but on the easily misused topic of tipping points, I would invite more focus, especially now the climate impacts are increasingly closer to "home", on the concept of social tipping points for climate justice, as seen at work here, for example.
posted by progosk at 1:19 AM on July 17, 2021
I won't rewrite the full comment here, but on the easily misused topic of tipping points, I would invite more focus, especially now the climate impacts are increasingly closer to "home", on the concept of social tipping points for climate justice, as seen at work here, for example.
posted by progosk at 1:19 AM on July 17, 2021
Thanks for linking that progosk otherwise I would never have seen Rhaomi's comment
Deleting that post was definitely head in sand stuff but that seems to be where metafilter is at these days
posted by adamvasco at 10:14 AM on July 17, 2021 [2 favorites]
Deleting that post was definitely head in sand stuff but that seems to be where metafilter is at these days
posted by adamvasco at 10:14 AM on July 17, 2021 [2 favorites]
As Frozen Land Burns, Siberia Fears: ‘If We Don’t Have the Forest, We Don’t Have Life’
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 3:12 AM on July 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 3:12 AM on July 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
Non-essential travel to Saskatchewan's north discouraged due to record-setting wildfires
Saskatchewan's 2021 wildfire count has already exceeded the five-year average by over 170 fires.posted by They sucked his brains out! at 3:15 AM on July 18, 2021 [1 favorite]
There have been 383 fires to date this year. The five-year average is 210, according to the Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency.
As of Friday, 137 fires remain active in the province. Overnight storms contributed to new fires due to lightning strikes, the safety agency said.
Hawaiʻi Brush Fire Consumes Over 36,000 Acres, Evacuation Order Continues
(scale)
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 2:46 PM on August 1, 2021
(scale)
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 2:46 PM on August 1, 2021
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Thank you for posting this.
posted by Drastic at 12:07 PM on July 2, 2021 [9 favorites]