climate change news; as bad as I knew, but still...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Over 1000 people died this summer in the Northwest and Canada from the heat wave.

Those people aren't fine. They're dead.

This isn't some nebulous future anymore. The future is now.

10's of thousands dies each year from cancer, just as many crashing cars thousands die each year choking on food. the death rate as a result of cold exposure is up 8-12%. people die. the plantet needs people to die. humans are living longer than ever, and the planet has to figure out a way to cope it copes by killing people. with new strains of diseases, cancers, etc...

if we as humans, spread our load out across the globe. IE move away from coastlines, and lower our population density, I think that would help,

the amount of pollution in china and india is unthinkable. and if you think that as a home owner that recycling your beer cans is doing anything. you are mistaken. Its not hurting by any means, but don't get on your high horse thinking you are saving the world. while living in your 3K squarefoot home with the AC cranked, driving an SUV, etc..

Climate change could be just a result of the planet aging we really honestly don't know.... the earth is 4 billion years old. we've had maybe 4-5 major ice ages. as out continents move around the earth, weather and ocean currents are bound to change.

we have no idea what the real temperatures were thousands of years ago. we only know what temperatures are and have been for the last 140 years....

we are predicting the end of the planet based on 140 years of empirical data. that is .000003425% of the planets age. if you are 60years old thats 525600 hours. you are basically judging and figuring out a life span and health based on surveying one minutes of my life.

so pretty worthless data in the grand scheme of things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Over 1000 people died this summer in the Northwest and Canada from the heat wave.

Those people aren't fine. They're dead.

This isn't some nebulous future anymore. The future is now.

10's of thousands dies each year from cancer, just as many crashing cars thousands die each year choking on food. the death rate as a result of cold exposure is up 8-12%. people die. the plantet needs people to die. humans are living longer than ever, and the planet has to figure out a way to cope it copes by killing people. with new strains of diseases, cancers, etc...

if we as humans, spread our load out across the globe. IE move away from coastlines, and lower our population density, I think that would help,

the amount of pollution in china and india is unthinkable. and if you think that as a home owner that recycling your beer cans is doing anything. you are mistaken. Its not hurting by any means, but don't get on your high horse thinking you are saving the world. while living in your 3K squarefoot home with the AC cranked, driving an SUV, etc..

Climate change could be just a result of the planet aging we really honestly don't know.... the earth is 4 billion years old. we've had maybe 4-5 major ice ages. as out continents move around the earth, weather and ocean currents are bound to change.

we have no idea what the real temperatures were thousands of years ago. we only know what temperatures are and have been for the last 140 years....

we are predicting the end of the planet based on 140 years of empirical data. that is .000003425% of the planets age. if you are 60years old thats 525600 hours. you are basically judging and figuring out a life span and health based on surveying one minutes of my life.

so pretty worthless data in the grand scheme of things.

+1.

Have a little perspective folks.

[Anonymous]

Planet will survive, Just not most of the species right now. It will be uninhabitable for humans for sure. All within 30-40 yrs. The process has started already.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Over 1000 people died this summer in the Northwest and Canada from the heat wave.

Those people aren't fine. They're dead.

This isn't some nebulous future anymore. The future is now.

10's of thousands dies each year from cancer, just as many crashing cars thousands die each year choking on food. the death rate as a result of cold exposure is up 8-12%. people die. the plantet needs people to die. humans are living longer than ever, and the planet has to figure out a way to cope it copes by killing people. with new strains of diseases, cancers, etc...

if we as humans, spread our load out across the globe. IE move away from coastlines, and lower our population density, I think that would help,

the amount of pollution in china and india is unthinkable. and if you think that as a home owner that recycling your beer cans is doing anything. you are mistaken. Its not hurting by any means, but don't get on your high horse thinking you are saving the world. while living in your 3K squarefoot home with the AC cranked, driving an SUV, etc..

Climate change could be just a result of the planet aging we really honestly don't know.... the earth is 4 billion years old. we've had maybe 4-5 major ice ages. as out continents move around the earth, weather and ocean currents are bound to change.

we have no idea what the real temperatures were thousands of years ago. we only know what temperatures are and have been for the last 140 years....

we are predicting the end of the planet based on 140 years of empirical data. that is .000003425% of the planets age. if you are 60years old thats 525600 hours. you are basically judging and figuring out a life span and health based on surveying one minutes of my life.

so pretty worthless data in the grand scheme of things.

+1.

Have a little perspective folks.

And this sort of uninformed ignorant prattling helped kick the can down the road. Party is over people.

Figure out which side you are on, and stop pretending there is some mystical middle ground where things are less like reality than reality is. Just because you cant handle the truth. And since you clearly can't, you won't be helpful. So get out of the way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You people raising your children with some weird morbid fatalistic despair are abusive and psychotic. “I wish you were never born because of… global warming.” ?!

Seriously. Back off of your liberal crap. Most humans throughout history have been convinced by the best scientific minds and spiritual guides of their time that the end was nigh. Yet here we are. We’re no different.

The earth, and the humans, will be fine. Technology advances at staggering paces when survival is at stake.

We are literally in the middle of a mass extinction. Things are not fine

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I’m always a little perplexed when people say that individual consumer action doesn’t matter. Aren’t the industries responding to the consumer demands? So if people don’t want to buy crap, they will stop producing it? And if people won’t fly anymore, they won’t run all those airplanes for nothing. Residential and commercial use accounts for 30% of US greenhouse gas. If people insisted we stop air conditioning offices below 85 degrees, and put solar panels on every empty roof, couldn’t we cut that in half? The corporations and the governments are only giving us what we want. The businesses aren’t going to produce shit just for the sake of producing it (well, with the exception of military weapons), right?

I think it’s more like if the government doesn’t mandate changes to carbon emissions and things like that it won’t make much of a difference because not enough individuals will make all the sacrifices needed to slow things down. The ball is rolling downhill at this point and picking up speed. 20% of Americans stopping driving, flying and using plastic will not be enough change. It has to be forced through governmental action.

I think PP is talking about something different, which is the ability of individual actions to spur institutional change. I think it can, but consumer action is possibly the most difficult way to force change. Boycotts might be effective at getting a company to make a small change to their operations, but they probably won't get a company to fundamentally reimagine their business model. For the most part, widespread consumer action is most effective when/if it spurs policy or regulatory change...which requires the individuals who got interested enough in an issue to lobby their governments for change. It's why many cities and states are now issuing single-use plastic bans. It's why many jurisdictions are prioritizing renewable energy.

I try hard to reduce my plastic consumption, but plastic is so ubiquitous that at some point I'd have to stop participating in modern society to reduce it enough to be effective. If I can instead work with my government to ban a lot of the needless use of plastic, it would be far more effective. Where should I put my energy. Finding the one recycling center that will recycle my Starbucks lid? Or working with my government to create a regulation that incentivizes Starbucks to use a different material?

Perplexed poster here. I guess part of my point is also that if people don’t care enough to change their own behavior, how will they care enough to pressure the government to force changes—particularly when those changes will impact them as a consumer? Presumably if the government bans single use plastics, the companies will come up with alternatives that will likely be more expensive. That will make food cost more which consumers have regularly said they don’t want. (I always come back to the example of antibiotic use in livestock’s—it’s 100% clear it’s a bad idea but there’s no real political will to ban it because people like cheap meat more than they like public health.). People need to care about humanity more than they care about their own immediate needs and pocket book. It’s sort of amazing to me when I look back at our grandparents generation—the restrictions and cost increases they dealt with as part of the effort to win WWII. Gas rationing, bans on sales of new car, etc. People would be on full on revolution if you tried to ration gas now.

[Anonymous]

Who will here volunteer to give up their oversized Mcmansion, gas vehicles, gas stoves, air travel.....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who will here volunteer to give up their oversized Mcmansion, gas vehicles, gas stoves, air travel.....

None of this stuff matters!!

The only steps that could even potentially alter the trajectory even a little bit would be massive and immediate changes in major third world countries, mostly China and India. Essentially the termination of industry almost entirely in those countries. That’s it.

Unfortunately the climate change community overlaps quite a bit with the refusal to hold poor or brown folks accountable community. So round and round we go. Much more fashionable to castigate McMansions and SUVs (a rapidly growing proportion of which are carbon neutral…).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who will here volunteer to give up their oversized Mcmansion, gas vehicles, gas stoves, air travel.....

None of this stuff matters!!

The only steps that could even potentially alter the trajectory even a little bit would be massive and immediate changes in major third world countries, mostly China and India. Essentially the termination of industry almost entirely in those countries. That’s it.

Unfortunately the climate change community overlaps quite a bit with the refusal to hold poor or brown folks accountable community. So round and round we go. Much more fashionable to castigate McMansions and SUVs (a rapidly growing proportion of which are carbon neutral…).

So convenient other countries have to do everything to fix the planet while you do nothing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who will here volunteer to give up their oversized Mcmansion, gas vehicles, gas stoves, air travel.....

None of this stuff matters!!

The only steps that could even potentially alter the trajectory even a little bit would be massive and immediate changes in major third world countries, mostly China and India. Essentially the termination of industry almost entirely in those countries. That’s it.

Unfortunately the climate change community overlaps quite a bit with the refusal to hold poor or brown folks accountable community. So round and round we go. Much more fashionable to castigate McMansions and SUVs (a rapidly growing proportion of which are carbon neutral…).

Who exactly do you think is consuming the products of those industries?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

And this sort of uninformed ignorant prattling helped kick the can down the road. Party is over people.

Figure out which side you are on, and stop pretending there is some mystical middle ground where things are less like reality than reality is. Just because you cant handle the truth. And since you clearly can't, you won't be helpful. So get out of the way.

its not ignorant nor uninformed.
climate change folks are prattling on about a minuscule amount of data. we have no idea of the "life cycle of a planet" warming temperatures could very well whats normal for this planet. we just. dont. know. is the climate changeing, sure. is it normal for earth. dont know. any one tells you that its not normal is a liar. NO ONE KNOWS.


americans generate 254 millions tons of trash each year. commercial companies generate 7.6 Billion tons of industrial waste. That means residential America is responsible for 3% of the waste nationwide.

we recycle 30% of our garbage or 76 million tons. that means industry recycles 2.3 billion tons. you recycling the beer can. it helps, but again you are not saving the planet. It feels good. but even if you separate and claim to recycle, its likely that your trash hauler is not. it gets dumped with the regular and trash and gets commingled.

want do something and make a difference... outlaw plastic single use containers, Americans throw away 25 million plastic bottles every hour.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

And this sort of uninformed ignorant prattling helped kick the can down the road. Party is over people.

Figure out which side you are on, and stop pretending there is some mystical middle ground where things are less like reality than reality is. Just because you cant handle the truth. And since you clearly can't, you won't be helpful. So get out of the way.

its not ignorant nor uninformed.
climate change folks are prattling on about a minuscule amount of data. we have no idea of the "life cycle of a planet" warming temperatures could very well whats normal for this planet. we just. dont. know. is the climate changeing, sure. is it normal for earth. dont know. any one tells you that its not normal is a liar. NO ONE KNOWS.


americans generate 254 millions tons of trash each year. commercial companies generate 7.6 Billion tons of industrial waste. That means residential America is responsible for 3% of the waste nationwide.

we recycle 30% of our garbage or 76 million tons. that means industry recycles 2.3 billion tons. you recycling the beer can. it helps, but again you are not saving the planet. It feels good. but even if you separate and claim to recycle, its likely that your trash hauler is not. it gets dumped with the regular and trash and gets commingled.

want do something and make a difference... outlaw plastic single use containers, Americans throw away 25 million plastic bottles every hour.

Is it normal for the planet? Who cares? Is it harmful to people? Yes. We are people, this is what we care about. Whether it's harmful to us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

And this sort of uninformed ignorant prattling helped kick the can down the road. Party is over people.

Figure out which side you are on, and stop pretending there is some mystical middle ground where things are less like reality than reality is. Just because you cant handle the truth. And since you clearly can't, you won't be helpful. So get out of the way.

its not ignorant nor uninformed.
climate change folks are prattling on about a minuscule amount of data. we have no idea of the "life cycle of a planet" warming temperatures could very well whats normal for this planet. we just. dont. know. is the climate changeing, sure. is it normal for earth. dont know. any one tells you that its not normal is a liar. NO ONE KNOWS.


americans generate 254 millions tons of trash each year. commercial companies generate 7.6 Billion tons of industrial waste. That means residential America is responsible for 3% of the waste nationwide.

we recycle 30% of our garbage or 76 million tons. that means industry recycles 2.3 billion tons. you recycling the beer can. it helps, but again you are not saving the planet. It feels good. but even if you separate and claim to recycle, its likely that your trash hauler is not. it gets dumped with the regular and trash and gets commingled.

want do something and make a difference... outlaw plastic single use containers, Americans throw away 25 million plastic bottles every hour.

I'm sorry, but this is ridiculous. Do we know these things with 100% certainty? Of course not. We know nothing with 100% certainty. But we have a preponderance of evidence to suggest that this is not normal...to pretend otherwise is to be wilfully misleading and indicates that you are arguing in bad faith.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Over 1000 people died this summer in the Northwest and Canada from the heat wave.

Those people aren't fine. They're dead.

This isn't some nebulous future anymore. The future is now.

10's of thousands dies each year from cancer, just as many crashing cars thousands die each year choking on food. the death rate as a result of cold exposure is up 8-12%. people die. the plantet needs people to die. humans are living longer than ever, and the planet has to figure out a way to cope it copes by killing people. with new strains of diseases, cancers, etc...

if we as humans, spread our load out across the globe. IE move away from coastlines, and lower our population density, I think that would help,

the amount of pollution in china and india is unthinkable. and if you think that as a home owner that recycling your beer cans is doing anything. you are mistaken. Its not hurting by any means, but don't get on your high horse thinking you are saving the world. while living in your 3K squarefoot home with the AC cranked, driving an SUV, etc..

Climate change could be just a result of the planet aging we really honestly don't know.... the earth is 4 billion years old. we've had maybe 4-5 major ice ages. as out continents move around the earth, weather and ocean currents are bound to change.

we have no idea what the real temperatures were thousands of years ago. we only know what temperatures are and have been for the last 140 years....

we are predicting the end of the planet based on 140 years of empirical data. that is .000003425% of the planets age. if you are 60years old thats 525600 hours. you are basically judging and figuring out a life span and health based on surveying one minutes of my life.

so pretty worthless data in the grand scheme of things.

These are silly arguments. We actively try to reduce cancer risk and prevent cancer deaths through research and public health activities. We are always working toward improving vehicle safety. I take active measure to reduce the risk that my kids choke on their food, and we have public health campaigns to teach people the Heimlich maneuver in order to reduce choking deaths overall.

To argue that because other things also kill people is a silly distraction. We are always trying to reduce harm to humanity. It's sociopathic to argue otherwise. And maybe that's the point. People who argue against climate policy are sociopaths.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I’m always a little perplexed when people say that individual consumer action doesn’t matter. Aren’t the industries responding to the consumer demands? So if people don’t want to buy crap, they will stop producing it? And if people won’t fly anymore, they won’t run all those airplanes for nothing. Residential and commercial use accounts for 30% of US greenhouse gas. If people insisted we stop air conditioning offices below 85 degrees, and put solar panels on every empty roof, couldn’t we cut that in half? The corporations and the governments are only giving us what we want. The businesses aren’t going to produce shit just for the sake of producing it (well, with the exception of military weapons), right?

I think it’s more like if the government doesn’t mandate changes to carbon emissions and things like that it won’t make much of a difference because not enough individuals will make all the sacrifices needed to slow things down. The ball is rolling downhill at this point and picking up speed. 20% of Americans stopping driving, flying and using plastic will not be enough change. It has to be forced through governmental action.

I think PP is talking about something different, which is the ability of individual actions to spur institutional change. I think it can, but consumer action is possibly the most difficult way to force change. Boycotts might be effective at getting a company to make a small change to their operations, but they probably won't get a company to fundamentally reimagine their business model. For the most part, widespread consumer action is most effective when/if it spurs policy or regulatory change...which requires the individuals who got interested enough in an issue to lobby their governments for change. It's why many cities and states are now issuing single-use plastic bans. It's why many jurisdictions are prioritizing renewable energy.

I try hard to reduce my plastic consumption, but plastic is so ubiquitous that at some point I'd have to stop participating in modern society to reduce it enough to be effective. If I can instead work with my government to ban a lot of the needless use of plastic, it would be far more effective. Where should I put my energy. Finding the one recycling center that will recycle my Starbucks lid? Or working with my government to create a regulation that incentivizes Starbucks to use a different material?

Perplexed poster here. I guess part of my point is also that if people don’t care enough to change their own behavior, how will they care enough to pressure the government to force changes—particularly when those changes will impact them as a consumer? Presumably if the government bans single use plastics, the companies will come up with alternatives that will likely be more expensive. That will make food cost more which consumers have regularly said they don’t want. (I always come back to the example of antibiotic use in livestock’s—it’s 100% clear it’s a bad idea but there’s no real political will to ban it because people like cheap meat more than they like public health.). People need to care about humanity more than they care about their own immediate needs and pocket book. It’s sort of amazing to me when I look back at our grandparents generation—the restrictions and cost increases they dealt with as part of the effort to win WWII. Gas rationing, bans on sales of new car, etc. People would be on full on revolution if you tried to ration gas now.

You are making a very black and white argument. A lot of people are willing to make changes, but for me to make individual changes that have a meaningful impact, I'd pretty much have to completely remove myself from society, go off-grid, bike everywhere, grow my own food, etc. All of that stuff would take a lot of time and energy, and I'm doubtful there is a huge group of people willing to do it. If instead of doing that, I spent even a fraction of the time advocating to ban single use plastics, the overall impact would be much, much higher. I live in California, where we implemented a single-use plastic ban (though COVID delayed its enforcement). The only people lobbying against it were the plastic industry.

You overestimate how much people are invested in the status quo vs. inertia.