sure that the truest thing you know is what is getting your attention
March 2, 2024 11:47 AM Subscribe
daniel schmactenberger on the metacrisis. [slyt] "why is it that no literally no country, no company, in the world wants climate change. no nobody is like climate change is the world that I want, but we're orienting to it so fast and we can't stop and nobody can stop it because we all want stuff that requires energy that is driving that thing and nobody wants species Extinction and nobody really wants to live in a world with automated AI weapons but we're all racing to build them so what is actually driving the world to a world that literally nobody wants I think there's a deeper analysis of that and the market is a part of it"
" think of money as a proxy for Value but only value that is measurable extractable and exchangeable and all the types of value that on your deathbed you'll really care about are not measurable extractable and exchangeable. We'll destroy all those types of value in the pursuit of these types and we have to because they are right and so now think about that as a decentralized incentive system that is incenting all the eight billion humans to figure out how to get it "
" think of money as a proxy for Value but only value that is measurable extractable and exchangeable and all the types of value that on your deathbed you'll really care about are not measurable extractable and exchangeable. We'll destroy all those types of value in the pursuit of these types and we have to because they are right and so now think about that as a decentralized incentive system that is incenting all the eight billion humans to figure out how to get it "
"Nobody's like, climate change is the world that I want. ...So what the fuck is actually driving the world to a world that literally nobody wants."
I want to postulate a hypothetical. A historical hypothetical.
Let's say that sometime in the late 1940s the wealthy and powerful realized that there was no way to avoid catastrophic climate change. That the biosphere was going to collapse, and there was nothing we could do about it. Climate change is real, and it can't be stopped.
Yes, I know, it's unthinkable. If we all work together, if we can limit consumption, yada yada yada. But bear with me a moment here.
First of all, why is that idea so unthinkable? I mean, it's incredibly horrific, but realistically speaking, this is a challenge larger than any we have ever faced as a species. I mean, the speaker in this video is pretty much admitting, as so many do these days, that we'd need a radical restructuring of global society along altruistic lines in order to make any progress. Basically, an outbreak of world peace.
Consider, if you will, the political climate of the late 1940s. Post-war. The beginnings of the cold war. The beginnings of the world's race to build atomic weapons. And the wealthy and powerful of the world are presented with a problem that will doom humankind if we don't all find a way to peacefully work together.
Now, I know I'm a cynic, but let's face it. World peace is a long shot. It's a birthday cake wish, not a foundation for geopolitical maneuverings. Nobody believed back then that the world could come together in a way that would stave off this problem, and frankly, I don't think anybody really believes it now. I mean... Putin.
Anyway, so there you are, back in the 1940s, and you've been told we either get world peace or the world is no longer habitable within, say, 150 years or so. The scientists who've been trying to figure out the damage that the war did have all sorts of charts and graphs that lay things out pretty inevitably. So what do you do?
Well, the war did a lot of things for technology, but it did an enormous amount for propaganda, ehem, excuse me, public relations. So you go to your PR people and you say, um, climate change is real and it can't be stopped. How do we spin this so we can keep things going long enough to figure out what the hell we're going to do?
And the clever, clever PR people say, simple. Convince half the people that climate change isn't real, and convince the other people that it can be stopped. That way even asking if it can be stopped becomes anathema. Neither side even wants to consider the question.
So that then freed them to spin up the space program in the hopes that we could go elsewhere, and it became apparent that that was a bust, but the life support systems in combination with the bomb-proof bunkers people were working on looked promising...
And from that point on, they have been free to behave exactly as we'd expect them to if climate change wasn't a soluble problem. Find out that plastics are terrible for the environment and for humans, and that can only be controlled by limits on production? No way, we need the engines of productivity screaming along, so have the PR people dream up recycling as a way of making pollution the public's fault.
And so on and so forth. People seem to keep expecting the wealthy and powerful to come to the realization that the planet is in danger, and to shake themselves out of their torpor, put on their spandex, hop into the quinjet and start working together to save everyone.
But if you look at their behavior over the course of the past seven decades, it's pretty clear that they know how bad things are. They're not behaving like they're ignorant about climate change; they wouldn't be funding a gargantuan multibillion dollar public relations campaign about it if they were. They're behaving exactly as I'd expect them to if they can't stop the earth from becoming uninhabitable.
They're already building bunkers.
I suggest we do the same. There's some great work being done on bioregenerative life support systems and closed ecological life support systems that I think shows a lot of promise, and China's Lunar Palace one experiments have been very successful. I don't want the wealthy and powerful to be the only ones to decide who survives.
They're not behaving like they're ignorant, or evil, or stupid, or crazy, or at least not all of them all the time.
The wealthy and powerful are behaving like climate change can't be stopped.
posted by MrVisible at 2:19 PM on March 2 [9 favorites]
I want to postulate a hypothetical. A historical hypothetical.
Let's say that sometime in the late 1940s the wealthy and powerful realized that there was no way to avoid catastrophic climate change. That the biosphere was going to collapse, and there was nothing we could do about it. Climate change is real, and it can't be stopped.
Yes, I know, it's unthinkable. If we all work together, if we can limit consumption, yada yada yada. But bear with me a moment here.
First of all, why is that idea so unthinkable? I mean, it's incredibly horrific, but realistically speaking, this is a challenge larger than any we have ever faced as a species. I mean, the speaker in this video is pretty much admitting, as so many do these days, that we'd need a radical restructuring of global society along altruistic lines in order to make any progress. Basically, an outbreak of world peace.
Consider, if you will, the political climate of the late 1940s. Post-war. The beginnings of the cold war. The beginnings of the world's race to build atomic weapons. And the wealthy and powerful of the world are presented with a problem that will doom humankind if we don't all find a way to peacefully work together.
Now, I know I'm a cynic, but let's face it. World peace is a long shot. It's a birthday cake wish, not a foundation for geopolitical maneuverings. Nobody believed back then that the world could come together in a way that would stave off this problem, and frankly, I don't think anybody really believes it now. I mean... Putin.
Anyway, so there you are, back in the 1940s, and you've been told we either get world peace or the world is no longer habitable within, say, 150 years or so. The scientists who've been trying to figure out the damage that the war did have all sorts of charts and graphs that lay things out pretty inevitably. So what do you do?
Well, the war did a lot of things for technology, but it did an enormous amount for propaganda, ehem, excuse me, public relations. So you go to your PR people and you say, um, climate change is real and it can't be stopped. How do we spin this so we can keep things going long enough to figure out what the hell we're going to do?
And the clever, clever PR people say, simple. Convince half the people that climate change isn't real, and convince the other people that it can be stopped. That way even asking if it can be stopped becomes anathema. Neither side even wants to consider the question.
So that then freed them to spin up the space program in the hopes that we could go elsewhere, and it became apparent that that was a bust, but the life support systems in combination with the bomb-proof bunkers people were working on looked promising...
And from that point on, they have been free to behave exactly as we'd expect them to if climate change wasn't a soluble problem. Find out that plastics are terrible for the environment and for humans, and that can only be controlled by limits on production? No way, we need the engines of productivity screaming along, so have the PR people dream up recycling as a way of making pollution the public's fault.
And so on and so forth. People seem to keep expecting the wealthy and powerful to come to the realization that the planet is in danger, and to shake themselves out of their torpor, put on their spandex, hop into the quinjet and start working together to save everyone.
But if you look at their behavior over the course of the past seven decades, it's pretty clear that they know how bad things are. They're not behaving like they're ignorant about climate change; they wouldn't be funding a gargantuan multibillion dollar public relations campaign about it if they were. They're behaving exactly as I'd expect them to if they can't stop the earth from becoming uninhabitable.
They're already building bunkers.
I suggest we do the same. There's some great work being done on bioregenerative life support systems and closed ecological life support systems that I think shows a lot of promise, and China's Lunar Palace one experiments have been very successful. I don't want the wealthy and powerful to be the only ones to decide who survives.
They're not behaving like they're ignorant, or evil, or stupid, or crazy, or at least not all of them all the time.
The wealthy and powerful are behaving like climate change can't be stopped.
posted by MrVisible at 2:19 PM on March 2 [9 favorites]
Not only that, but the wealthy and powerful view climate change as a GOOD thing, because it's going to enact their wildest dreams: the mass extinction of most of the rest of humans. Capital doesn't really need labor that much anymore, and AI/robotics are only going to accelerate that. Just let superhurricanes and Covid-27 go on ahead and kill most of the troublemakers and whiners who think they can "tax" our betters, and the suffering will keep the rest of them in line.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 2:35 PM on March 2 [5 favorites]
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 2:35 PM on March 2 [5 favorites]
Nobody's going to give up the convenience they have now, en masse, to stave off climate change. Humans can't agree on anything en masse, period.
posted by jenfullmoon at 2:44 PM on March 2 [4 favorites]
posted by jenfullmoon at 2:44 PM on March 2 [4 favorites]
The wealthy and powerful are behaving like climate change can't be stopped without becoming somewhat less wealthy and powerful.
posted by fnerg at 2:58 PM on March 2 [12 favorites]
posted by fnerg at 2:58 PM on March 2 [12 favorites]
Jared Diamond thinks civilizations collapose in significant part because of their elites being able to shield themselves from consequences temporarily.
Examples: American voters having only two choices. Rich people moving their wealth between nations. Jared Diamond's fun contra-positive example is Dutch elites drowning when the dikes broke.
Jared Diamond and Daniel Schmachtenberger both suggest that wealth being mobile between nations encurages collapse. It's likely this winds up with any people being mobile between nations encurages collapse.
> we'd need a radical restructuring of global society along altruistic lines in order to make any progress
As I understand it, we know of two forms of sustainability:
Among wild animals, we've multiple species who keep one another in check by predation, starvation, etc.
Among humans, island civilizations do recognize their ecological limits more easily, so some survive while some die out. Among those who fair better, there are more dictatorships like Japan under the shogunate and the Dominican Republic under Trujillo & Balaguer. There is some cultural interest in nature that underlies those dictatorships pro-ecological activities of course, but ultimately the dictatorship gives the orders. And ultimately the dictatorship winds up not being such a stable government form.
We've a third good possibility that tribal warfare reduced the ecological damage done by many human societies, but so far I've never noticed this being seriously discussed.
We've afaik zero evidence that global altruism or global collaboration would bring anything but even worse ecological distruction. Indeed, our society exploits so badly in part because it collaborates at a global scale.
An example: Around 2% of plastic waste is traded, but the Philippines does not produce all the plastic they dump into the oceans. It's everyone else selling them plastics which they use.
Instead, we should coninsider paths that weld together what animals do and what more sustainable human societies do. Nations could reduce other nations CO2 emissions, plastic use, fertilizer use, etc. Acts of war should include mining coal, building refineries, raising cattle, etc.
> Capital doesn't really need labor that much anymore
Almost surely a temporary situation because our high tech remains extrmely dependent upon massive supply chains. It's true however that Economists like William Nordhaus have heavily marketed exactly this idea, aka the priest class shielding itself from consequences.
posted by jeffburdges at 3:40 PM on March 2 [3 favorites]
Examples: American voters having only two choices. Rich people moving their wealth between nations. Jared Diamond's fun contra-positive example is Dutch elites drowning when the dikes broke.
Jared Diamond and Daniel Schmachtenberger both suggest that wealth being mobile between nations encurages collapse. It's likely this winds up with any people being mobile between nations encurages collapse.
> we'd need a radical restructuring of global society along altruistic lines in order to make any progress
As I understand it, we know of two forms of sustainability:
Among wild animals, we've multiple species who keep one another in check by predation, starvation, etc.
Among humans, island civilizations do recognize their ecological limits more easily, so some survive while some die out. Among those who fair better, there are more dictatorships like Japan under the shogunate and the Dominican Republic under Trujillo & Balaguer. There is some cultural interest in nature that underlies those dictatorships pro-ecological activities of course, but ultimately the dictatorship gives the orders. And ultimately the dictatorship winds up not being such a stable government form.
We've a third good possibility that tribal warfare reduced the ecological damage done by many human societies, but so far I've never noticed this being seriously discussed.
We've afaik zero evidence that global altruism or global collaboration would bring anything but even worse ecological distruction. Indeed, our society exploits so badly in part because it collaborates at a global scale.
An example: Around 2% of plastic waste is traded, but the Philippines does not produce all the plastic they dump into the oceans. It's everyone else selling them plastics which they use.
Instead, we should coninsider paths that weld together what animals do and what more sustainable human societies do. Nations could reduce other nations CO2 emissions, plastic use, fertilizer use, etc. Acts of war should include mining coal, building refineries, raising cattle, etc.
> Capital doesn't really need labor that much anymore
Almost surely a temporary situation because our high tech remains extrmely dependent upon massive supply chains. It's true however that Economists like William Nordhaus have heavily marketed exactly this idea, aka the priest class shielding itself from consequences.
posted by jeffburdges at 3:40 PM on March 2 [3 favorites]
Better phrasing: capital doesn't THINK it really needs labor that much anymore.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 3:42 PM on March 2 [10 favorites]
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 3:42 PM on March 2 [10 favorites]
They're behaving exactly as I'd expect them to if they can't stop the earth from becoming uninhabitable. your imaginary plot demands they act.
We don't need a grand 8-decade conspiracy among elites to explain the crisis we're in, just normal human myopia and inertia, and rich people who think that doing something about climate change will make them a little less rich.
And by and large you might never in your life find a more venomous and panicked individual than a rich person whose wealth is at any significant risk.
posted by tclark at 4:12 PM on March 2 [17 favorites]
We don't need a grand 8-decade conspiracy among elites to explain the crisis we're in, just normal human myopia and inertia, and rich people who think that doing something about climate change will make them a little less rich.
And by and large you might never in your life find a more venomous and panicked individual than a rich person whose wealth is at any significant risk.
posted by tclark at 4:12 PM on March 2 [17 favorites]
For the past seven decades, when faced with the fact that if they don't act swiftly and decisively, the planet that their wealth depends on, the planet where they spend their money, is going to be uninhabitable. And they've done nothing, even though they're completely capable of saving the planet.
Seven decades worth of wealthy and powerful have been waiting for the public to raise their awareness to some particular threshold which will make them see the error of their ways and start taking the actions that they could be taking to save the planet they live on.
And there's no question that they have the power to do that. They're just too dumb/crazy/stupid/lazy/psychotic/mean/angry/etc. All of them.
Or, and bear with me a second, the wealthy and powerful know the limitations of their wealth and power better than anyone. And as the wealthy and powerful get to be wealthy and powerful, they become aware that there are some problems they can't solve.
Now, here's what gets me. If the wealthy and powerful couldn't solve climate change, they'd need to pretend that they could so that they could keep their wealth and power. But they couldn't actually solve it, so they'd have to find a way to keep putting it off, while remaining in power. So you'd expect them to create a PR campaign that promulgated the idea that they could solve climate change, but for some reason they don't, and it's because of you, the public.
I mean, that's what I'd do, and I'm not even that good at public relations.
posted by MrVisible at 4:22 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]
Seven decades worth of wealthy and powerful have been waiting for the public to raise their awareness to some particular threshold which will make them see the error of their ways and start taking the actions that they could be taking to save the planet they live on.
And there's no question that they have the power to do that. They're just too dumb/crazy/stupid/lazy/psychotic/mean/angry/etc. All of them.
Or, and bear with me a second, the wealthy and powerful know the limitations of their wealth and power better than anyone. And as the wealthy and powerful get to be wealthy and powerful, they become aware that there are some problems they can't solve.
Now, here's what gets me. If the wealthy and powerful couldn't solve climate change, they'd need to pretend that they could so that they could keep their wealth and power. But they couldn't actually solve it, so they'd have to find a way to keep putting it off, while remaining in power. So you'd expect them to create a PR campaign that promulgated the idea that they could solve climate change, but for some reason they don't, and it's because of you, the public.
I mean, that's what I'd do, and I'm not even that good at public relations.
posted by MrVisible at 4:22 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]
DON'T EVEN GET ME STARTED ON THE FUKIN' SCIENTISTS
posted by lalochezia at 4:29 PM on March 2 [3 favorites]
posted by lalochezia at 4:29 PM on March 2 [3 favorites]
They're just too dumb/crazy/stupid/lazy/psychotic/mean/angry/etc. All of them.
Yes, exactly. Just about all of them are.
Some are dumb.
Some are crazy.
Some are stupid.
Some are lazy.
Some are psychotic.
Some are mean.
Some are angry.
And they all found fellow travelers.
posted by tclark at 4:30 PM on March 2
Yes, exactly. Just about all of them are.
Some are dumb.
Some are crazy.
Some are stupid.
Some are lazy.
Some are psychotic.
Some are mean.
Some are angry.
And they all found fellow travelers.
posted by tclark at 4:30 PM on March 2
There is a government that's joined at the hip with the fossil fuel extraction business, a government with real estate and fossil fuel reserves that are projected to become hugely more valuable in a warmed world, a government with connections to climate-change-denying political actors around the world, a government that has become infamous for running cultural influence operations everywhere.
I think this government just might be pro-global-warming.
posted by Western Infidels at 4:38 PM on March 2 [4 favorites]
I think this government just might be pro-global-warming.
Russia has been explicit about its intention to come out ahead as the climate changes; in its national action plan on climate released in January, it called on the country to “use the advantages” of warming and listed Arctic shipping and extended growing seasons among things that would shower “additional benefits” on the nation....
And Russia! For generations poets have bemoaned this realm as cursed by enormous, foreboding, harsh Siberia. What if the region in question were instead enormous, temperate, inviting Siberia? Climate change could place Russia in possession of the largest new region of pristine, exploitable land since the sailing ships of Europe first spied the shores of what would be called North America....
Table 5 shows that the low latitude regions are currently hot. These temperatures are actually beyond the optimum for most climate-sensitive economic sectors. In contrast, the mid latitude regions enjoy a range of current temperatures near the optimum. The former Soviet Union and northern Europe have cool current temperatures that make warming good for their economy....
Among the immediate winners are the Arctic nations, namely Russia. It is estimated that the Arctic holds approximately 30 percent of the world’s undiscovered natural gas reserves and 13 percent of the world’s undiscovered oil reserves. Russia is believed to hold over half of the total Arctic resources.I realize that this is not directly responsive to the point about Metacrisis being made here. I won't harp on this any longer. But it's baffling to me that this simple idea, that there are powerful actors who are in favor of global warming, has so little traction in the public discourse.
posted by Western Infidels at 4:38 PM on March 2 [4 favorites]
capitalism isn’t the rule of capitalists, it’s the rule of capital, like, the actual objects themselves rather than by the people who own those objects. capitalism isn’t a conspiracy between capitalists, it’s a state of relations between people that’s actually dictated by physical objects.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 5:11 PM on March 2 [3 favorites]
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 5:11 PM on March 2 [3 favorites]
Some believe that they are powerless. They hold to the belief that people have no choice but to optimize their own short term interests.
Some don't think it is an emergency yet. Sure, millions may die, but multi-millionaires will be mostly fine. And when it gets bad they can get everyone else to pay for the problems.
Some believe it is an emergency. But they don't think they can make a difference with their wealth individually.
Some don't care what happens after they die.
Some think it isn't a problem. Not theres at least.
The richest 10% of the USA control "only" 2/3 of the wealth of the country. On average that is "only" 20x more economic power than the average 90% bottom person. And the top 1% "only" controls like 1/3 of the resources.
They can easily convince themselves that they, alone, could not change the direction of the economy. Just like you can.
The richest people earn on the order of 3 billion per year (outside of market noise) on the order of 0.01% of US GDP. A 1/10000 fraction of the economy.
Sure, huge for one person - but not controlling interest.
Solving US most carbon emissions is a 10-100 trillion dolllar problem (example: build enough nuclear plants to replace all electrical generation, plus enough excess power to synthesize hydrocarbon fuel for every car. Poof, US carbon emissions drop 10 fold.) This is *too big* for even US billionaires to pay for, all together.
posted by NotAYakk at 5:22 PM on March 2
Some don't think it is an emergency yet. Sure, millions may die, but multi-millionaires will be mostly fine. And when it gets bad they can get everyone else to pay for the problems.
Some believe it is an emergency. But they don't think they can make a difference with their wealth individually.
Some don't care what happens after they die.
Some think it isn't a problem. Not theres at least.
The richest 10% of the USA control "only" 2/3 of the wealth of the country. On average that is "only" 20x more economic power than the average 90% bottom person. And the top 1% "only" controls like 1/3 of the resources.
They can easily convince themselves that they, alone, could not change the direction of the economy. Just like you can.
The richest people earn on the order of 3 billion per year (outside of market noise) on the order of 0.01% of US GDP. A 1/10000 fraction of the economy.
Sure, huge for one person - but not controlling interest.
Solving US most carbon emissions is a 10-100 trillion dolllar problem (example: build enough nuclear plants to replace all electrical generation, plus enough excess power to synthesize hydrocarbon fuel for every car. Poof, US carbon emissions drop 10 fold.) This is *too big* for even US billionaires to pay for, all together.
posted by NotAYakk at 5:22 PM on March 2
Thinking about how different groups prioritise global warming priorities, I thought this link by Global Capitalist was interesting, Democrats in the survey stigmatise: mining, manufacturing and agriculture. Conversely Republicans stigmatise entertaiment, and the upper education and media industries.
Both parties were equally negative about the real estate industry, I don't know why, Republicans would be negative about property developers.
posted by Narrative_Historian at 5:29 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]
Both parties were equally negative about the real estate industry, I don't know why, Republicans would be negative about property developers.
posted by Narrative_Historian at 5:29 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]
This is where I first heard of Daniel.
https://youtu.be/KCSsKV5F4xc?si=2djHaHY8qrVVshJj
Liv is an interesting voice as well, and I really appreciate their work on bringing Moloch into the public discourse. I think it’s the ONLY conversation that matters, reining in our Moloch-y behaviors as a society.
posted by karst at 7:03 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]
https://youtu.be/KCSsKV5F4xc?si=2djHaHY8qrVVshJj
Liv is an interesting voice as well, and I really appreciate their work on bringing Moloch into the public discourse. I think it’s the ONLY conversation that matters, reining in our Moloch-y behaviors as a society.
posted by karst at 7:03 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]
> it's baffling to me that this simple idea, that there are powerful actors who are in favor of global warming, has so little traction in the public discourse.
Ain't so surprising. We make some systemic policy choices, including neoliberal trade policy, in significant part because they reduce large scale human conflicts. In particular, extensive global trade means clonflicts impact elites more immediately, while ecological distruction and local social distruction impacts them less immediately. It's intentionally choosing reduced human conflict as more important than the ecosystems or socail systems upon which humans depend.
It's conversely useful if we make your point more today because one people blaming another people should help inspire the first to forcably reduce the emissions of the second.
Ain't so useful to sinbgle out Russia though, given their CO2 emissions per capita wind up only like 20% higher than Europeans or Chinese, and far below the US and Canada. Russia ranks like 8th in oil reserves, so ideally they'd "take their ball and go home". If conflict there occurs too soon, then Russian resources could wind up being more effectively exploited. A worst case scenario would be Americans & Europeans burning more Russian oil, while China chops down Russian forests, which then causes drought throughout Asia.
Instead, we'd ideally want the US and China to blame one another for emissions, as partial excuse for a trade war, which hopefully then reduces production, consumption, and shipping for everyone.
posted by jeffburdges at 2:18 AM on March 3 [1 favorite]
Ain't so surprising. We make some systemic policy choices, including neoliberal trade policy, in significant part because they reduce large scale human conflicts. In particular, extensive global trade means clonflicts impact elites more immediately, while ecological distruction and local social distruction impacts them less immediately. It's intentionally choosing reduced human conflict as more important than the ecosystems or socail systems upon which humans depend.
It's conversely useful if we make your point more today because one people blaming another people should help inspire the first to forcably reduce the emissions of the second.
Ain't so useful to sinbgle out Russia though, given their CO2 emissions per capita wind up only like 20% higher than Europeans or Chinese, and far below the US and Canada. Russia ranks like 8th in oil reserves, so ideally they'd "take their ball and go home". If conflict there occurs too soon, then Russian resources could wind up being more effectively exploited. A worst case scenario would be Americans & Europeans burning more Russian oil, while China chops down Russian forests, which then causes drought throughout Asia.
Instead, we'd ideally want the US and China to blame one another for emissions, as partial excuse for a trade war, which hopefully then reduces production, consumption, and shipping for everyone.
posted by jeffburdges at 2:18 AM on March 3 [1 favorite]
"Consider, if you will, the political climate of the late 1940s"
Not the 40s, but an alternate climate change 1970s is the subject of this game.
posted by doctornemo at 11:33 AM on March 3
Not the 40s, but an alternate climate change 1970s is the subject of this game.
posted by doctornemo at 11:33 AM on March 3
we should coninsider paths that weld together what animals do and what more sustainable human societies do. Nations could reduce other nations CO2 emissions, plastic use, fertilizer use, etc. Acts of war should include mining coal, building refineries, raising cattle, etc.
jeffburdges, would this be a global society with fewer people and more localized communities?
posted by doctornemo at 11:38 AM on March 3
jeffburdges, would this be a global society with fewer people and more localized communities?
posted by doctornemo at 11:38 AM on March 3
danjo, thank you for sharing this video. I've heard Schmachtenberger on Great Simplication before (as jeffburdges notes) but this one was... more introductory, and also more intense.
posted by doctornemo at 11:53 AM on March 3
posted by doctornemo at 11:53 AM on March 3
The wealthy and powerful are behaving like climate change can't be stopped.
A bunker isn’t going to save you from climate change or the collapse of the biosphere. We keep referencing it as if it’s some indication of their super genius, when it’s just a measure of the particular brand of delusion and egotism characteristic of the super rich.
posted by ryanshepard at 12:01 PM on March 3 [3 favorites]
A bunker isn’t going to save you from climate change or the collapse of the biosphere. We keep referencing it as if it’s some indication of their super genius, when it’s just a measure of the particular brand of delusion and egotism characteristic of the super rich.
posted by ryanshepard at 12:01 PM on March 3 [3 favorites]
For whatever reason, I'm reminded of the Dark Mountain Uncivilization Manifesto, which I still haven't been able to take aboard since the last time I mentioned it.
posted by ob1quixote at 1:32 PM on March 3 [1 favorite]
posted by ob1quixote at 1:32 PM on March 3 [1 favorite]
As always, it's overall resource consumption, not population per se, doctornemo. I beleive this still holds when nation X wants to reduce nation Y's consumption by force: X sabatoges Y's shiny new refinery, or gives Y's cows some cow disease, but ignores Y's population as far as possible. In fact, we should envision a post-oil world where US style force projection becomes impoissible, and hopefully millitary occupation becomes crazy difficult, so X really needs spys & colaborators in Y too.
It's even plausible enough time like this could transition humanity back into something gentiler but still obeying limits. I doubt that becomes possible until after elites witness both real collapse and some solution that imposes limits by violence. MLK's Civil Rights movement succeeded only because the Marxist-Leninist Black Panthers represented a credible threat, but the Black Panthers represented a credible threat, unlike Nation of Islam, only because communist revolutions succeeded several places previously.
We'll presumably retain higher populations the sooner collapse occurs. As for scale, I'd hope many nations could maintain sizes large enough for an industrial base, including manufactoring renewables, even without international trade. Japan is 378,000 km² and had a sustainable period. Germany is 5% smaller. France is 70% larger.
posted by jeffburdges at 2:21 PM on March 3
It's even plausible enough time like this could transition humanity back into something gentiler but still obeying limits. I doubt that becomes possible until after elites witness both real collapse and some solution that imposes limits by violence. MLK's Civil Rights movement succeeded only because the Marxist-Leninist Black Panthers represented a credible threat, but the Black Panthers represented a credible threat, unlike Nation of Islam, only because communist revolutions succeeded several places previously.
We'll presumably retain higher populations the sooner collapse occurs. As for scale, I'd hope many nations could maintain sizes large enough for an industrial base, including manufactoring renewables, even without international trade. Japan is 378,000 km² and had a sustainable period. Germany is 5% smaller. France is 70% larger.
posted by jeffburdges at 2:21 PM on March 3
I'm reminded of the Dark Mountain Uncivilization Manifesto, which I still haven't been able to take aboard since the last time I mentioned it.
ob1quixote, re: Dark Mountain, we had a good conversation with one of its authors last year.
posted by doctornemo at 5:33 PM on March 3 [2 favorites]
ob1quixote, re: Dark Mountain, we had a good conversation with one of its authors last year.
posted by doctornemo at 5:33 PM on March 3 [2 favorites]
jeffburdges, thank you for taking the time to reply.
That vision of degrowth is very appealing in this context. I'm not seeing it get much traction in the US so far, though. Perhaps it'll take the real collapse and the violence you mentioned.
posted by doctornemo at 5:36 PM on March 3
That vision of degrowth is very appealing in this context. I'm not seeing it get much traction in the US so far, though. Perhaps it'll take the real collapse and the violence you mentioned.
posted by doctornemo at 5:36 PM on March 3
doctornemo: “ob1quixote, re: Dark Mountain, we had a good conversation with one of its authors last year .”If you, like me, have had a hard time with the heavy lift of the Uncivilization Manifesto, this was an extremely enlightening hour.
posted by ob1quixote at 7:45 AM on March 4
I finally watched & enjoyed this. Some parts bring back Charles Stross' 34C3 talk Dude, you broke the Future! As above, I support his position that money, stocks, bonds, etc. must largely disapear, which comes off stronger around 32m:
"There is no human future that is compatible with a single fungible global currency and interest and most of human access mediated by private property"
It's wonderful you guys all engaged with the substance further into the talk because during the first 15 minutes Daniel Schmachtenberger works hard damaging his credibility. I'm instantly turnned off by the sci-fi trendy silly human-centric bullshit worries like AI, bio-agents, etc.
We've never had mad scientists before, so we've no credible reason to worry about individuals learning about bioweapon from the internet and/or ChatGPT. We do not live in a cartoon where during a scene change characters produce amazing economically impactful works, instead require years by dedicated teams. Instead, we have organizations so bioweapos, etc wind up governed by exactly the same rules that limit or encurage malphesance by other organizations.
We only have fancy computer malware in part because malware is pretty simple, and in part because governments & their contractors have teams that create malware, and then their sloppily usage results in them becoming public.
At 16 minutes, there is a turn where he suddenly refocuses upon organizations doing things, and even turns against them being the priority anyways. I've largely skipped his interviews with Nate Hagens specifically because he plays those silly cards so much. I'll forgive him that since now I've seen him bend it somewhere useful.
posted by jeffburdges at 4:20 AM on March 6
"There is no human future that is compatible with a single fungible global currency and interest and most of human access mediated by private property"
It's wonderful you guys all engaged with the substance further into the talk because during the first 15 minutes Daniel Schmachtenberger works hard damaging his credibility. I'm instantly turnned off by the sci-fi trendy silly human-centric bullshit worries like AI, bio-agents, etc.
We've never had mad scientists before, so we've no credible reason to worry about individuals learning about bioweapon from the internet and/or ChatGPT. We do not live in a cartoon where during a scene change characters produce amazing economically impactful works, instead require years by dedicated teams. Instead, we have organizations so bioweapos, etc wind up governed by exactly the same rules that limit or encurage malphesance by other organizations.
We only have fancy computer malware in part because malware is pretty simple, and in part because governments & their contractors have teams that create malware, and then their sloppily usage results in them becoming public.
At 16 minutes, there is a turn where he suddenly refocuses upon organizations doing things, and even turns against them being the priority anyways. I've largely skipped his interviews with Nate Hagens specifically because he plays those silly cards so much. I'll forgive him that since now I've seen him bend it somewhere useful.
posted by jeffburdges at 4:20 AM on March 6
Nate Hagens gave a talk The Superorganism and the future at the same event.
posted by jeffburdges at 4:26 AM on March 6
posted by jeffburdges at 4:26 AM on March 6
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I do think our value system promoting the measurable, extractable, and exchangeable worsens the problem dramatically, but the maximum power principle applies regardless, or similar game theoretic rules. At the same time, natural ecosystems wind up remarkably circular, so hope exists, but maybe not the way humans wish to build societies.
posted by jeffburdges at 12:32 PM on March 2 [2 favorites]