Argument by ridicule is a really pathetic, short-sighted tactic. Please just stop. You are talking to concerned serious and intelligent people who are at bottom your allies. Stop being a prat. — unenlightened

That's the second time today I've been taken to task for my sense of humor. In my estimation you're free to think I'm a prat, and free to say so. A little edge is no bad thing - we are human afteral. If you'd argue I should treat ridiculous ideas seriously - can you tell me why, and convince me it's a good idea to do so? Or is this just about people's feelings? Because if it is - let me assure you, Jake isn't nearly as pissed off at what I said to him as I am at having to address his doom mongering nonsense over and over and over and over... without being able to effect it in the least by anything I say. Maybe taking the piss is the only strategy left to me - did you think of that?

Have you heard of the ocean cleanup project? (https://www.theoceancleanup.com)

I think it's at least partly funded by recycling, but in any case, I believe it's a relatively low cost and high benefit solution. — praxis

I have, but last time I heard of it - not too long ago, it was still in the test phase. In theory, I think it a wonderful idea. Whether it works in practice is another question. I'm sorry to have to say this, but that assessment should be really quite brutal. There's a tendency to conflate the virtue of the aim with the effectiveness of the technology - producing ostensibly virtuous white elephants. It was designed by young people too, I seem to recall - and so there's a lot of people wanting it to work. Including me - but if it doesn't work, I'd scrap it without a moment's hesitation.

We have thousands of hair trigger hydrogen bombs aimed down our own throat. Do you consider this a successful adaptation which increases our chances of survival? — Jake

No. Absolutely not. I consider it an ideologically driven misapplication of technology. Science as a tool, and not as a rule for the conduct of human affairs. I consider it using the tools without reading the instructions. Am I going to run out of ways to say this before it clicks? It's the consequence of an historical error - exemplified by the Church imprisoning Galileo for saying the earth orbits the sun. Science as an understanding of reality was suppressed relative to religious, political and economic ideology, even while science was used by the industrial revolution, and by military powers.

Yes, that's it, you get it now. To be more precise, they (as a group) have a lack of knowledge about the HUMAN reality, just as you do. The "more is better" paradigm assumes that humans can successfully manage any power which arises out of that process, irregardless of what rate that power emerges. That's simply false. Knowledge can be developed faster than maturity. The mismatch between these two rates is dangerous. That's simply true. — Jake

I understand it - but it's wrong. You identify a phenomenon, but do not identify the cause. The cause is described above.

There have been no devastating criticisms. I understand this particular issue (not all issues!) better than the rest of you. Sorry, not trying to be insulting, just providing a reality check.

Praxis showed there's no adult in the room to govern we so called children.
— karl stone

Praxis showed he has no interest in trying to meet that challenge, because he's not actually interested in this subject at all. As is his right. — Jake

Praxis spotted something I missed - and he's right. You say we are children playing with ever more dangerous toys - and so we should limit scientific progress. But who decides? Who is the adult in the room? You? No! It doesn't work, but you won't have it.

Yes, and one of our "needs and wants" is for a stable civilization which can well serve our descendants, instead of blowing up in our face due to arrogance, greed, and philosophical stubbornness. — Jake

So you think 7 billion people are all going to get into farming - do you? Sit around singing cum-by-yar while waiting on a giant pot of lentils to cook by the heat of a beeswax candle? If that appeals to you - go right ahead, but it's not an answer. People won't have it. They have needs and wants - like sending their children to a good school. So they have to make money. They gain knowledge and skills and sell them in the market - and it's a social good. Maybe they gain the knowledge and skills to improve crop yields - feeding more people from less land and water. The whole world benefits. You can't stop that. So why are you trying?

Is it because you get some cheap thrill from doom mongering - and hide that gross appetite behind the facade of anti-scientism?

I'm trying to describe an opportunity - not a diet regime, or a prison sentence.
— karl stone
— unenlightened

Less meat is not vegan, wearing a sweater is not a prison sentence. — unenlightened

No, but it's not a solution either. It is a hardship for a significant number of people in the world who have very little meat in their diet. And, like I told my mother - kids starving in Africa will gain no benefit from me eating my sprouts! Seriously though, our problems are not the consequence of too many people or insufficient resources. Malthus's famously incorrect prediction of mass starvation following from the disparity between the geometric rate of population growth, (2, 4, 8, 16 etc) and the arithmetic rate agricultural land can be developed (1, 2, 3, etc) proved incorrect. People are problem solvers - and to paraphrase the Martian we can "science the shit out of this!"

You have to have a car, because you have to live a long way from work because you don't get paid enough to afford to live where the work is and public transport is revolting and even more expensive than a car. So you contribute to the pollution that makes the city air so poisonous that you have to have an inhaler to survive in it. The travel time on congested roads and work leaves you neither time nor energy to cook your own food, so you have to eat prepackaged ready meals or takeaways, and so cannot properly control your own diet. So you have to buy supplement pills. — unenlightened

To paraphrase Job - Woe is me! I get where you're coming from but consider the possibilities that follow from abundant clean energy and producing fresh water. We can develop wastelands for agriculture and habitation - where previously, we had to gather in the river valleys, and burn down the forests. Consider telecommuting, and hydrogen powered vehicles, fish farming instead of trawling the oceans to death, warm homes from renewable energy, cool homes from renewable energy! Imagine automated hydroponic farms in the desert - using solar energy to produce as much food as anyone can eat. Think on what's possible if we can overcome this philosophical obstacle wherein, we have the knowledge and technology but are unable to apply it.

And you are so browbeaten by the propaganda you are subjected to day and night that you think this is freedom, and a healthy and contented existence a prison sentence. — unenlightened

No. I think it's a giant mess in a lot of ways - a moral victory in others. It's not the point. We cannot tear it all down and start again from scratch. That would be as bad or worse than carrying on as we are. We have to 'get there from here' - us, as who we are. The description of the error and its consequences is not a basis to junk everything, or anything. It's about reaching beyond ourselves to learn a lesson - and then bringing that lesson home and applying it very carefully. It's not about changing anything. It's about changing everything by looking at it differently.

The wrong path is changing the environment we inhabit faster than human beings can adapt to that environment. If you can reflect on this a bit, I think you will see this premise is actually not in conflict with your own premise. You feel we must align ourselves with reality or we will perish, for this is the law of nature. I agree with that. — Jake

More or less, but I don't agree we are unable to adapt quickly enough. If I thought that I wouldn't say anything. What would be the point? I'd just plaster on my smile and hope it lasted my lifetime. I'm speaking out because there's huge opportunity - because this technological adolescence is just the beginning, if it is not the end.

The problem, as seen from here, is that the group consensus you are speaking on behalf of doesn't have a very sophisticated understanding of reality, specifically human reality. You observe the landscape and see a technical problem, because you like technical challenges. But fundamentally what we face is not a technical problem, but a human problem. Unlimited free clean energy would simply empower us to do more of the stupid stuff we are already doing. — Jake

What group consensus? I'm not in your head - and I don't agree with you. I don't know what this vague term 'group consensus' refers to. Humankind? Science? Politics? Capitalism? Philosophy? Please be specific.

Actually, the technical challenge is the least part of what I'm saying. It's not my area of expertise, and is not at all how I came to this issue. It began as a need to know what's true - a philosophical problem. And fundamentally, I'm saying the problem is a philosophical one: i.e. we devalue science relative to ideology.

The next problem, as seen from here, is that the group consensus has shifted the blind faith we used to have in religious clerics in to a blind faith in what I call the "science clergy". The obstacle here is that while scientists are indeed expert in the technical aspects of reality, they are really no better at understanding the human reality than any of the rest of us. And, the human reality is a very important component of the reality equation. Nor does science culture have a superior understanding of reason, given that they are still selling us an outdated "more is better" paradigm from the 19th century in spite of clear compelling evidence (thousands of hydrogen bombs) that we simply aren't ready for more and more power without limit. You can blame the weapons on religion or politicians or whoever you want, but the REALITY is that they exist, and we don't know how to get rid of them. And that "we" includes the science clergy. — Jake

I don't get this at all. You're saying that scientists are at the same time myopic specialists with a somewhat stereotypical lack of knowledge of the real world - and also the salesmen of a more is better paradigm? Something you've said 20 times already - without taking on board a single devastating criticism offered by anyone else. In the previous post for example, I spoke of how your ideas feed into right wing fears and insular politics, and you keep banging the same drum? Praxis showed there's no adult in the room to govern we so called children. I've put it to you that, because people have needs and wants - there's no stopping progress, yet here we are again. Talking about your ideas to the exclusion of my own. Jake - you have made no effort to understand what I'm saying, what you're saying is not right, and you're not helping.

Thus, blind faith in science or scientists is not warranted, just as it wasn't warranted in regards to religious clerics. — Jake

Science isn't about faith - it's precisely the opposite. It's about forming ideas and testing them to destruction, and only keeping the ones that cannot be destroyed. It's not blind, and it's not faith. But you don't even understand this. I've answered your beliefs several times. I have nothing else to say on the subject! I don't like being rude - so please, if it's your belief we are helpless - consider plastering a smile on your face and just hoping it lasts your lifetime.

I can go along with that. But with the emphasis on a good robust harness. At the moment, capitalist forces are at the wrong end of the harness - in the driving seat. — unenlightened

Imagine you are capitalism. Does that sound attractive to you? I'm trying to describe an opportunity - not a diet regime, or a prison sentence. I'm trying to explain that we don't have to back down, have less, go vegan - and see everything fall apart anyway, only slightly less rapidly.

Except that in a "more is better" knowledge economy characterized by accelerating social and technological change, whatever skills you develop are likely to go out of date before you're done needing them. As example, I just watched a documentary showing how robots are taking over many surgical tasks. It's not just factory workers who are at risk.

What this accelerating change does is infuse the society with considerable uncertainty, which generates fear, which eventually leads to masses of people doing stupid things like voting for President Dumpster. Dangerous wing wackos are rising to power all over the world, which illustrates that at least some of the forces at play are global, and not the result of local conditions.

Some of us will be able to develop skills that aren't quickly made obsolete by the market, that's true. That doesn't matter if large numbers of other people can't keep up, and thus become susceptible to persuasion by crackpot ideologues promising to "make America great again". Example, some of us are indeed thriving in this economy, while those who aren't thriving give us a leader who pulls us out of the Paris Agreement, humanity's best hope to avoid catastrophic climate change. — Jake

We see things quite differently, you and I - but it's not like I don't understand where you're coming from, nor indeed, where people voting for increasingly insular regimes are coming from either. I think you're right that it's fear based. The world is becoming an increasingly scary place as we progress down the wrong path - and if we continue, it'll only get worse.

It's cause and effect - the natural consequence of acting at odds to the actual nature of reality, best described by science, and mis-characterized by religious and political ideologies, as a context for economics. For example, it's a simple matter of fact we are unable - (and it would be unwise and premature) to accept, that the earth is a single planetary environment, and humankind is a single species. As a matter of fact, nation states are not real things - they're socially constructed. The world didn't come with borders painted on it, and similarly - an indigenous population is actually a somewhat random collection of hunter-gatherer tribes cobbled together into a civilization by all agreeing to convenient lies.

However, because we believe nation states are real things - we fear 'the other' - particularly in face of climate change, again caused by not acting in relation to scientific truth. We fear they will be driven by climate change to invade us, and thereby dilute our identity and prosperity. We see limits to resources, and imagine it's a zero sum game. But I would argue that by correcting the mistake we made way back when, we can multiply resources exponentially - tackle climate change and alleviate those fears.

Your approach is therefore in my view, hugely counter productive. More is better. Not indiscriminately more, as you seem to think I'm suggesting - but a careful more, where technology is applied in relation to science as truth to achieve sustainability.

Let me spell it out for you with a purely hypothetical example. I am a property developer called Grump, and you are a humble bricky. When times are good, I pay you well to build houses for me, and then lend you and your mates the money to buy one each. Times are good, so the value of the houses is high - everyone wants to own their own home. I pay your wages, and you pay me the mortgage, and everyone is happy. Then there is a downturn. I stop building houses, so you lose your job, and cannot pay your mortgage, and nor can your mates. You all have to sell up. Unfortunately (for you) no one is buying at the moment, and the value of the houses has gone down. They all go to auction, and I end up buying them at a very low price. Now I have the houses, the profit from selling high and buying low, and you still owe me the difference, plus you have to pay me rent. But don't worry, there are good times coming, and we can do it all again, because now I have even more money and I need to put it to work, and that means employing you again. I understand that this makes you angry, I understand that you don't want to believe it works this way, but wise up dude, it does. — unenlightened

I'm not angry at all. The crack about swearing was only for emphasis and hopefully, a chuckle. Sorry if it was misjudged.

I do not doubt that in individual transactions between parties in a capitalist economy there can be winners and losers, but there are mechanisms we invent to account for these like laws, and insurance. If what Grump did wasn't actually illegal - it probably should be illegal to offer a mortgage to an employee without insurance against redundancy.

In terms of the ideas I've put forward however, I'd argue that the ideological context of capitalism - as opposed to the scientific context that would ideally follow, had we accepted science as truth from 1630 - lends the motives for the disaster capitalism you allude to.

Take brexit as an example - a wildly false and divisive propaganda campaign incited the British to leave the EU in a manner that will very likely crash the economy, and provide the excuse for a rabidly right wing policy proscription to deal with the crisis.

Had we accepted science as truth, and integrated it on an ongoing basis since 1630 however - we'd be very different people in a very different world. It wouldn't be like this. We'd be more rational and honest - because science is rational and honest, and maybe such things wouldn't occur. Who can say? It's not what we did, and not who we are. We don't worship science as the revealed word of God made manifest in reality. But if we are to survive, we have to get there from here - and harnessing capitalist forces is indispensable to any possible solution to our problems.

I need to point out that capitalist economic interests do not equate to vast benefits. For us peasants, we float on the economic tide, and go up when the economy grows, and down when it contracts. But well managed capital prospers from downturns even more than from booms. When you can't pay the mortgage, someone else gets a cash bargain. So capitalists see advantages in conflict, war, and catastrophe, and not so much in stability, which explains why they should not be left in charge of things. — unenlightened

I could not disagree more without swearing!

First, consider the political and personal freedom provided for by a capitalist economy - compared to a command economy. In a command economy the state owns everything, and designs the production and distribution of goods and services from start to finish. This is necessarily oppressive. Any dissent requires the harshest of responses precisely because it's a threat to production upon which people depend. People are told what to do and when to do it, what to eat and wear - right down to what they think and say, must be controlled as a consequence of the economic model.

In a capitalist economy, it's a genuine miracle - that goods and services are produced and distributed as a consequence of people's free, and 'rationally self interested' choices. It's called the 'invisible hand' - an idea described by Adam Smith in 'The Wealth of Nations" (1776.) I appreciate - it's not much fun being poor in a capitalist economy - but that's why one has to develop skills, or specialist knowledge - required by the market. It's that imperative that promotes the general good.

Third is an off-hand observation - but more or less valid nonetheless, that even the poor in modern capitalist societies have a better standard of living than medieval Kings - precisely because everyone is pursuing their rational self interest.

The fact the discussion is more interesting without my taking part is an unexpected, and not altogether welcome revelation. Nonetheless, there are a few things I couldn't let go by without commenting on them. The first is SSU's remarks about the apparent hysteria centered around Earth Day, 1970. I can think of two reasonable explanations for what proved to be somewhat exaggerated claims. The first is that science isn't an independent activity in a world ruled by ideological conceptions of reality. There's a political and economic context that imposes certain imperatives - that might be met by sensationalism.

The second is that in 1970 - there were very few computers. Scientists communicated through journals and correspondence - (that's snail mail to you and I.) It's difficult to overstate the benefits personal computing and the internet have brought to scientific endeavor; less yet large computers capable of crunching numbers on a massive scale. The quality of scientific information is thus much improved since 1970.


The second thing I'd dispute is this:

We understand that prediction is prone to error. An error of 50 years in the timing of a catastrophe is important to those of us who will be safely dead in 50 years, but otherwise trivial. — unenlightened

For me, my life isn't confined to my current biological existence. It has a metaphysical dimension as a consequence of intellectual awareness. People have construed this dimension in many ways throughout the ages; but accepting a scientific understanding of reality, I'd suggest it implies the significance of genetic, intellectual and economic legacy carried forward by future generations. I believe this follows from a moral duty to the evolutionary struggle of previous generations that makes us who we are, and implies a moral obligation to use those abilities to further the interests of future generations.
I won't belabor the point by relating this back to the remarks above.

Next is this exchange between Jake and Janus:

Karl seems to feel that the human guidance system for the global technological machine can be successfully updated by some vague method that he can't seem to articulate beyond repeating "science as truth". Such vagueness seems acceptable to Karl, so he is up for full speed ahead on further construction of the global technological machine.
— Jake

Reading through this thread it is clear that what you utterly fail to see is that "the global technological machine" cannot be slowed (except by dire circumstances beyond human control of course), and so karl stone is right to propose that the only hope for humanity's future lies in technological redirection to more sustainable technologies. — Janus

I'm proposing a political course of action to correct our mistaken relationship to science and technology. I argue that nation states should accept a scientific understanding of reality in common as a basis to apply technology. At the same time however, I don't want to upturn the ideological apple-cart upon which billions of people depend. I do want to claim the functionality inherent in the relationship between valid knowledge and causal reality - but I also want people, politics and economics to be able to accept it. So it's a very delicate matter. There are religious sensitivities, political and economic interests, and a not entirely spurious fear that science as truth will turn us all into robots, marching foursquare in identical denim overalls. We don't want that!

In my arguments, the prior authority science owns as a consequence of epistemic superiority to primitive ideologies is limited by the principle of existential necessity; i.e. if we don't address this - we'll die. Beyond that, science has no authoritative political implication. That established, we can safely accept a scientific understanding of reality in common, in place of our various ideological misconceptions of reality, as a basis for the application of technology - to address scientifically conceived problems like climate change, deforestation, over-fishing, pollution etc. In the simplest possible terms - I'd describe this strategy as 'knowing what's true, and doing what's right in terms of what's true.'

The last thing I want to address is this:

As I pointed out, it would require an immodest amount of power, to put it mildly, in order to regulate all scientific research and technology across the globe. You'd need some pretty big guns to force your policies on every nation in the world, as well as some kind of advanced surveillance system like a powerful AGI. — praxis

Although this comment is offered in relation to Jake's suggestion that we 'stop the world while he gets off' - I think it's a reasonable criticism to take on board and address in relation to my own ideas. It's entirely central to my plan that political and capitalist economic interests see the advantages in this approach - and adopt it voluntarily. There are vast potential benefits unlocked by recognizing the relation between the validity of the knowledge bases of action and the consequences of such action. i.e. knowing what's true and doing what's right - and it's important they do not feel it's a threat to the bottom line - else it just won't happen.

Hemlock is just never on the breakfast menu for me, and it seems to be always there for him - — unenlightened

Well, as Rudyard Kipling said to Charles Foster Kane:

"If you can keep your sled when all about you are losing theirs..."

Having read through the thread, it seems I've spoken to all the major concepts, in an argument it took me over twenty years to craft - and about which, therefore, I am as certain as it's possible for me to be.

I have begun with the evolutionary nature of life, and discussed the causal relationship that exists on many levels between surviving organisms, and reality. From the structure of DNA, to the physiology, behavior, and intellectual awareness of surviving organisms - the implication drawn, is that all life must be essentially correct to reality, else be rendered extinct.

I have discussed the evolutionary history of humankind, and the transition from a hunter-gatherer tribal way of life to multi-tribal society, leading unto civilization. I have suggested this required inventing/discovering God as an objective authority for law - to overcome the obstacle inherent in conflicting tribal hierarchies.

I have discussed the first formal presentation of scientific method by Galileo - and the reaction of the Church to that discovery - identifying this as the root cause of a mistaken relationship to scientific truth that persists unto this day.

I've sought to explain how this wrongful relationship to science, explains the existential dilemma we find ourselves in, wherein - we have the knowledge and the technology to address climate change, among other issues - but lack the political will, or economic rationale to apply it.

I have argued that, only by correcting our relationship to science - as valid knowledge of reality, to compare to the religious, political and economic ideologies we assume are true, can we hope to avoid being rendered extinct in the near future.

I have acknowledged the difficulties such a conclusion presents to ideologically arranged societies, and suggested we limit the implications of science as truth, to tackling the existentially necessary challenges we face first and foremost. I have identified the key challenge as producing renewable clean energy on a scale sufficient to meet the world's energy needs, plus the ability to produce abundant amounts of fresh water from sea water.

I have discussed at length - the particular technologies I believe should be applied forthwith, and described means to find the money to do so, in such a manner that fossil fuels can be monetized without being extracted and burnt.

I believe that acting upon these ideas will set humankind on a sound footing for a long and glorious future - in the least disruptive manner possible, and I commend my arguments to my species. If the world is to be saved, this is how it can, and must be done. I believe it will work - and no other approach can, because, fundamentally - we must be correct to reality, else we shall be rendered extinct.

Should an engineer building a faster race car take in to account the abilities and limitations of the driver? Would doing so tend to make the car safer? Or is the human driver irrelevant to the subject of auto mechanics? — Jake

I kind of understand your argument, but there is a real danger, described in Karl Popper's 1947 treatise 'Enemies of an Open Society' - he describes as "making our representations conform" to science as truth. In other words, the danger that science will become dictatorial of the human condition. No-one wants that. The approach I devised specifically accounts for this potential threat - such that we can claim the functionality of science, to afford the delightfully irrational human condition.

OK. There is to be no discussion. So why're you wasting time posting here? You should be out there in the world, implementing your plans. The world is in a parlous state. You'd better get to it! Good luck. — Pattern-chaser

I disagree. I think this is the perfect place to present my ideas - that is, from the lowest possible platform.

Would this include a detached, objective, impartial, evidence based observation of the human condition, built upon the thousands of years of history we have available to examine? Are human beings part of the reality which we should seek to develop a coherent understanding of? — Jake

No. Absolutely not. Freedom baby! There's a principle that both limits the legitimate implications of science as truth - and lends science the authority to overrule ideology, and that is existential necessity! i.e. if we don't we'll die!

Nothing. This is a discussion forum. I'm not out to convert anyone to a radical course. This topic asks how to save the world, and I (and others) have offered alternatives that you seem unwilling to consider. So tell me, what happens when enough people don't sign up for your approach? Nothing, I imagine...? :chin: — Pattern-chaser

No, it doesn't 'ask how to save the world.' It presents a plan. A plan you haven't read.

Then why are you 'telling, not asking', as you say? :chin: You are not open to comments that don't support your preferred course. You are not open to anything that doesn't support your preferred course. Is this not your One Truth, alternatives to which you will not discuss or consider? That's how it looks. — Pattern-chaser

You know very well you are taking that line out of context. You suggested I was asking you and other people generally How to Save the World. Well no, I'm telling you how. I started this thread to discuss my plan. I'm quite happy to discuss other people's ideas on the subject, but it can only be in relation to the ideas I've presented. Don't try making the superiority of my long thought out ideas - a problem because its better than your off the cuff thoughtlets!

Or killing everyone!
— karl stone

I note just one last time: no-one has suggested killing. Except you. The human race could be got rid of, if that is our aim, by simply preventing us breeding. There is no need/call for piles of bodies. Straw man. — Pattern-chaser

Really? A strawman? Okay Pattern, tell me - what happens when enough people don't sign up for your approach? All those who have signed up to the view that people are the problem - aren't going to migrate toward a policy of involuntary extermination? After what they've sacrificed - they won't drop the "V" from VHEM?

I've always found One Truthers scary. :scream: Discussion is pointless. :fear: Shame. :roll: — Pattern-chaser

I've always found emojis childish - particularly in a forum such as this. That aside, I'm not a "one truther." I am however arguing that science constitutes a highly valid and coherent understanding of reality - we need government and industry to be responsible to, or we're all going to die.

Otherwise, I don't care what people in general believe in. I have no desire to go around disabusing little old ladies of their belief in God. But we're philosophers - and government and industry similarly, have profound responsibilities that transcend those of the man on the Clapham omnibus.

First, thank you for re-engaging. In thanks I'll make a good faith effort to downscale my ornery bombastic belchings. Sorry for getting so wound up. — Jake

Ditto. I'm sorry too. For my over-reaction - just to be crystal clear.

So, you're saying science doesn't establish valid knowledge of reality.
— karl stone

I agree to this, no problem. But that doesn't automatically equal more science being better in every case. My complaint is not with science which I see as being an effective tool, which like any tool is neither good nor bad in and of itself. My complaint is with our relationship with science. — Jake

But it's only indiscriminately more - if you ignore science as truth, and only apply technology for profit and power. If you accept there's a natural responsibility owed to valid knowledge of reality, because it's valid, it will guide us in applying technology in a valid way.

I'll try and give you a metaphor to explain the principle. Imagine yourself in the middle of a city with a map of that city - and you want to get to... the train station. But you're holding the map upside down. You follow the directions - left, right, straight on - but don't get to the train station. Why not? Because there's a cause and effect relationship between the validity of the knowledge bases of action - and the consequences of that action. i.e. if your info is wrong, you can do the right thing - but you won't get where you're going. And that's us - doing all the right things for all the wrong reasons.

I'm going to stop there - because I need to know you have understood this concept.

Personally, you would endorse a science worshiping ideology. You are the spectrum! — Jake

So, you're saying science doesn't establish valid knowledge of reality. It hasn't built, fact by hard won fact into a highly valid and coherent understanding of reality, as it really is - to compare to ideological conceptions of reality. You're saying the world did come with nation states borders painted on it - and that money does grow on trees, naturally. You're saying that thousands of conflicting religious ideologies are all true, and not at all made up - but that science is voodoo? You're saying if we destroyed every religious text and every science book today - it would be religion that was back in 100 years, exactly the same, and not the science books? Well, hallelujah, God Save the Queen, and get your hands off my stack!

We'd be spoiling your thread to continue a discussion of socialism here; there's Tinman's thread on socialism and Fdrake's thread on Marx's value theory if we want to pursue the topic. — Bitter Crank

I cannot promise I'll be there soon - I have my hands fairly full, and while I thought it was important to state a position here, I'm not out to spread the message. The moderate left has achieved an enormous amount for ordinary people - and plays an important role balancing out oligarchic power. Personally, I'd have a political spectrum ranging from ideologue to scientist - but left to right will have to do for now!!

By the way, it was Salvador Allende who was the democratic socialist in Chile; General Pinochet was a run of the mill South American dictator after Allende. The US helped kill Allende in 1973. — Bitter Crank

I may have got it wrong - I didn't research the film after I saw it - The Colony with Emma Watson, for the benefit of readers. Astonishing film based closely on real events. I got the impression it was Pinochet - but I could be mistaken.

Doom mongers, who don't read other's posts - and so don't take on board repeated explanations of why, what's right about their ideas is subsumed under a paradigm with greater explanatory potential, while theirs reaches a false conclusion, should not expect to have their trolling acknowledged, less yet encouraged.

I'm neither telling nor asking you to do anything at all. Why do you think I am? — Pattern-chaser

It's the natural inference of your position, as set out in a thread entitled - How to Save the World. You're making people the problem - and that's always wrong. If it's something you believe - fine, but don't publish it - because you are suggesting I should adopt that approach too. You are implying that my existence, and my children's existence is not worthwhile.

I especially didn't tell you that you are not worthy of existence. I think you are worthy of existence, but I've been wrong before.... — Pattern-chaser

To be frank, it's not your call.

I have observed that humans are the cause of the world's problems - which we are, sadly — Pattern-chaser

I don't dispute that, but that's not all you're saying.

- and that one way to sure most of the world's problems would be to get rid of us. — Pattern-chaser

It's not the right answer. Consider philosophical conundrums like - "If a tree falls in forest.." and you might begin to understand why it's not the right answer. We matter. Intelligent life is the first addition to the universe in 15 billion years - an emergent property that should reach its full potential.

But that's not the only possible solution, and it's not one that I personally recommend. — Pattern-chaser

You fooled me! I thought you were serious. In that case, thank you for bringing this issue up - despite my angry reaction, it's actually been useful to argue against this view.

Some things that would save the world provoke anger and insults from you. Why is this? — Pattern-chaser

I'm just passionate. I don't mean to cause anyone pain or harm. But there are times when it's necessary to bang on the table. I'm sorry if I offended you.

Do you mean to ask how the world might be saved if we all stick to your beliefs? — Pattern-chaser

No. I mean to say that adopting my "beliefs" will save the world. I'm not asking - I'm telling. This is a proposal, not a question - a broad brushstrokes plan, that explains from philosophical premises where we went wrong, and how to correct it without turning the world upside down. Or killing everyone!

There's a fair amount of unravelling to do here. This topic asks "How to save the world?". The question that sits just before that one is: WHY does the world need saving? And I don't think that answer to that one is contentious, or one that anyone here would argue with: humans are the problem. — Pattern-chaser

I'd argue against it. It's too simplistic. It implies we have no choice but to destroy the environment, but that's not so. The reason we have had such a detrimental impact on the environment is because our relationship to science is wrong, as explained above.

No-one mentioned killing anyone, although that is certainly one possibility. — Pattern-chaser

I don't think so. Technically, it would be very difficult. Eight years of World War Two only killed 50-80 million people. That may seem like a lot, and it is - but in terms of human population as a whole, it's a fraction of a fraction. Besides, how could anyone live with that afterward? We might try, but it would be utterly corrosive to have murdered billions of innocent people for our own gain. And imagine the smell!

VHEMT, for example, ask people not to breed, they don't recommend mass extermination. Nor do I. — Pattern-chaser

So, besides not eating meat, cycling to work, wearing my overcoat indoors - now you're telling me my kids are a problem. I say this without malice - but fuck you. Live your life as you choose - and bon voyage, but don't tell me that I'm not worthy of existence - because I fucking well am. Part of that existence is a genetic legacy. Not only do I have a natural right to seek to further my genetic legacy - but I have a moral duty to the struggles of all previous generations, to make good on what they suffered to provide me with. From the evolution of my physical form, to the knowledge they gained, and the society they built - that I may make good for future generations - and thereby perpetuate my genetic legacy.

As a side note, to answer some of the criticism of your scheme to use hydrogen, it is quite possible to produce fairly conventional fuel from solar. This would have advantages in not requiring a total transformation of present infrastructure. — unenlightened

I've seen something like this recently; it might even have been you who brought it up before - I'd have to check. I argued against it - not because I think it's a bad idea per se. It's a carbon neutral fuel that works in an internal combustion engine - and that's a good thing. We get the fuel without adding any carbon to the atmosphere. Rather, I was arguing for the approach I favour - which as you know, is a vast array of solar panels floating on the surface of the ocean, producing hydrogen fuel and fresh water.

One of the reasons I chose that approach is, first - because it could provide the world's energy needs sustainably, but secondly, because it doesn't require a total transformation of existing energy infrastructure. I considered a number of ways to utilize hydrogen, including piping hydrogen into the home as a gas, for use in hydrogen fuels cells - producing electricity. That would require a total transformation of infrastructure - and that's why I ruled it out. But beyond the solar/hydrogen production infrastructure, using hydrogen in power stations - energy is distributed through existing grids, and for transport, hydrogen distributed at gas stations - only requires modification of the ICE - (internal combustion engine.) Given that BMW's limited production of an 187 mph HICE - I know it's possible.

You are quite right, though more careful use has a role also. But forests make their own water, or their neighbour's. There is a complex relationship, not fully understandable, between vegetation and aquifers, and there would be some effect also from large scale solar cells cooling the atmosphere and increasing rainfall. But enough is known about the cycle of desertification to understand that the loss of vegetation leads to erosion, faster runoff, and sets up a vicious cycle that can be reversed with careful management. It's not called 'the green movement' for nothing - caring for our green brothers that form the 'other' side of the carbon cycle that we are the consumer side of, has got to be the backbone of the solution. — unenlightened

Well, this is another reason I favour the approach I described - the increasingly desperate need to produce fresh water in vast quantities. Desalination is an energy intensive process however you do it. Electrolysis is the method I favour - and that works well with floating solar panels. But am I going to argue against planting trees? Hell, no! It's precisely to break man's dependence on deforestation for agriculture - often, subsistence agriculture, we need to produce fresh water. Re-planting trees is great - obviously, but logically, might we not want to stop burning forests to clear land for agriculture first? To develop wasteland for agriculture - we need to produce fresh water.

I'm sorry if it seems like I'm being a dick about it - but that's not my intention. I'm merely explaining my reasons for picking this particular approach. I love the great green wall - I'm all for planting things; you plant them, and fingers crossed - I'll water them!

Sorry unenlightened, but I must away. I will get back to you ASAP.

The USSR was a command economy sometimes described as "state capitalism". What the hell does that mean, you ask? In state capitalism there is one corporation: the state. The state corporation runs industry, commerce, politics, religion, whatever there is to run. That is not "socialism" or "communism" as Marx defined it. It's just a totalitarian society. Marx described a system where all the institutions of capitalism (including the state) were replaced by a bottom-up system of social management. — Bitter Crank

Ah, the "not real communism" defense. It never is, is it? Russia wasn't communist, Venezuela wasn't socialist - nor was Cuba, or anywhere else you care to mention. I don't suppose you've seen The Colony - with Emma Watson. (Harry Potter) It's about General Pinochet's Chile - which I don't suppose was real communism either. People, places and events in the film really happened though - and watching that film it's a good way to get inside what always seem to transpire when you convince people they are being disenfranchised for their own good.

I've read Marx, of course. I think he's plain wrong in the claim 'the history of all hitherto existing societies is a history of class struggle.' If that were true - how could the working class lack the class consciousness necessary for his glorious revolution? Miseducation? His theory of historical materialism is fundamentally misconceived. But I don't agree with Karl Popper's assessment that it's unfalsifiable - in that it can explain away any fact brought before it, and is therefore pseudo-scientific.

Historical materialism can't explain the fact that hunter gatherer tribes agreed to join together to form societies - and didn't achieve that by overthrowing the alpha male dominated hierarchy. Rather it was achieved by inventing/discovering God as an objective authority for law. That wouldn't have been necessary if Marx's historical materialism were correct - there would be no need to account for the natural conflict of tribal hierarchies, by creating an objective authority - and laws that apply to everyone. Yet we find that all early civilizations had Gods - and world's apart, Egypt and South America for instance - built temples to their Gods in the shape of symbolic representations of hierarchical society, i.e. pyramids.

Now, the UK is not the US. Our political and class systems and history are quite different. Workers in the US have tended to have harsher experiences than workers in the UK have had, at least under the post-war labor governments. The same goes for much of Europe, which has had a longer history of social welfare programs than the US.
The US has done a much better job than you Brits of camouflaging the fault lines of class differences. Both the UK and the US have a ruling class, and an overlapping very wealthy class. Most American workers have been taught to not see class. That 5% of the population owns more wealth than the rest of the population is unbelievable to many Americans. Credit that to pervasive miseducation. Americans have drunk the kool aid that "Anyone can get rich in America." Your are poor because you just didn't try hard enough. ETC. — Bitter Crank

Overwhelmingly, hierarchies are hierarchies of competence. There's an intergenerational element - where the success of an ancestor can hand privilege to an utter buffoon, which explains the decline of the aristocracy in Europe, leaving little more than the occasional monarch symbolically hanging around. There's intergenerational disadvantage too - but a truly competent individual will tend to overcome that, and a capitalist society will gladly look past class differences where there's talent and tenacity that can be translated into profit. And here we come back to socialism.

The essential problem with revolutionary socialism is an artificial upturning of hierarchies of competence - i.e. a bottom-up system of social management. I don't agree that's what Marx was proposing exactly, he was talking about property held in common ownership for the common good. That's a command economy. The problem is that the natural hierarchy of competence will reassert itself over time - and so pogroms against the intelligent and talented are consistent features of communist societies. Pol Pot - for example, went around killing people who wore glasses, or who spoke a foreign language. But I guess he wasn't a real communist either. They never are!

As a socialist, it's not my job to defend capitalism. "We have not come to praise Capital; we have come to bury it." I do not believe that capitalism is compatible with continued human existence into the next century. Despotic dictatorships are also not compatible with human life, whether they pay heed to Karl Marx or Adam Smith. — Bitter Crank

I'm in the UK, and consider myself centrist. I liked Tony Blair - Labour Prime Minister from 1997- 2007, and I generally dislike the Conservatives. But I'm very suspicious of Jeremy Corbyn. He's too far left for my liking. I'm fine with capitalism with a social conscience - but dragging down the successful to make everyone equal is where I draw the line. One has to remember, I think - that production is fundamental to human welfare, and it's only in addition to productive activity that socialist values have any meaning whatsoever.

A capitalist economy - as opposed to a command economy, allows for personal and political freedom, a command economy must necessarily prohibit. In order to design production, a command economy must tell people what to do, when to do it, and cannot stand dissent of any kind - because the State manages production.

The miracle at the core of capitalism is the invisible hand - described by Adam Smith in Wealth of Nations as the coincidence of rationally self interested actions that marry like the cogs of a wheel, to drive society forward. And it's real. It's a genuine miracle, that the goods and services people want and need are produced and distributed without any central planning whatsoever. It's rather ironic actually, that capitalism affords you the political freedom to be socialist!

In relation to our bigger problem, I honestly do not see capitalism as the guilty party, but rather - place blame with the failure to recognize science as truth from 1630, which had the effect of divorcing science as a valid understanding of reality, from science as a cornucopia of cool gadgets and neat ways to kill people. Had science as truth been integrated politically over the past 400 years - rather than decried at every turn as heresy, it would have provided a valid regulatory context for the conduct of capitalism - that would have outlawed the excesses, many assume paint capitalism as the villain of the piece.

In my view, capitalism is indispensable to any possible solution - and it's my aim to convince capitalist interests that they are best served - ending the race to the bottom by adopting scientifically valid standards of production. You might ask - "Why would they take on these regulatory burdens? It will reduce profits!" But not necessarily. If all companies are required to adopt the same standards, and all pay the same opportunity cost in regards existentially necessary environmental welfare regulations, there's no competitive disadvantage.

Capital finance (embodied in a few hundred people who make major investment decisions) and fossil fuel owners don't care (can't care) about the environment, the various species, and whether you and I freeze or not. They pretty much MUST focus on perpetuating the life of the gold-egg laying goose and generating a steady stream of profits for hundreds of thousands stock holders.
You and I would experience too much cognitive dissonance to be worrying about the future of the species and at the same time doing business as usual.
The situation is reflected in the statements of some business leaders traveling to Saudi Arabia who were asked about their presence, considering the Saudi crowned thug's recent chopping up a journalist in their Turkish embassy. "I'm here to make deals; I'm not concerned about anything else." — Bitter Crank

A lot of business leaders didn't go to Davos in the desert though - did they? Admittedly, it was mainly companies who's business model requires they give a crap about their public image - but nonetheless, it's a little simplistic to give me the Scrooge McDuck theory of capitalism as an explanation of our existential dilemma - particularly after I've given you an exquisite epistemic theory, identifying the fundamental problem as our relationship to science. Capitalism has achieved extraordinary things, and could do so much more. Focused by a science based political rationale on solving our problems, capitalism would solve them.

There is of course also the possibility of carbon sequestration. And on that front, and on other fronts, it is worth considering low tech solutions. http://www.greatgreenwall.org China is also reducing its deserts. Techno-energy solutions have their place, wind, tidal, solar, geothermal etc, but bio-solutions are even more important. — unenlightened

That's really quite hopeful. Those people are on the frontline of climate change, and they're acting now - with some really quite amazing efforts. Below the great green wall story - there's a dozen other stories, all similarly hopeful. Solar farms, irrigation, agriculture. I'm almost ashamed to strike a pessimistic note - but facts are facts. The GRACE satellite conducted a major study of aquifer depletion, published in 2009, and the news was not good. About 2 billion people are dependent on water from aquifers - and they are being used up fast:

According to Jay Famiglietti, director of UCI’s Center for Hydrologic Modeling, “Most of the places that we see with the GRACE where groundwater is being depleted are the arid and semi-arid regions in those mid-latitudes,” he added. Many of these areas tend to be big population hubs. “Most of those are agricultural regions — the North China Plain, Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, the Middle East, some southern Europe and North Africa. In the U.S., we see the Ogallala Aquifer and the Central Valley. Even the southeastern U.S. — you think of it as being very humid, but they are in the grips of a long-term drought, and so they are using groundwater, too.”

https://www.circleofblue.org/2012/world/satellite-perspectives-nasas-grace-program-sees-groundwater-from-space/

Like I've said above, we need to start making huge amounts of fresh water, and only with a renewable energy infrastructure can we do that. Otherwise, those 2 billion people will migrate in ever increasing numbers - and migration is already becoming a contentious political issue.

First of all, that's not a hidden fact. Secondly, all those factors you mention make fossil fuels cheap and the supply ample. Our transport fleet, ships, aircraft, trucks and personal cars won't immediately be replaced either. One has to count also this to the equation: it's not only that we are adding renewable to the mix, it's that we would be scrapping existing infrastructure that would still work for a long time. It's a huge task to replace and grow the sector when you are reducing energy production simultaneously. — ssu

I didn't say it's a hidden fact. I said it's a 'hidden' advantage. I do not mean to suggest 'shhhh! - people don't know we have fossil fuel infrastructure' - but rather that enormous government aid in establishing fossil fuel infrastructure - is not reflected in the price of fossil fuel energy, with which - it was argued, renewable energy should compete.

You apparently understand the principle - because you say: "all those factors you mention make fossil fuels cheap and the supply ample." That's exactly what I meant - so how can renewable energy compete? I also agree: "Our transport fleet, ships, aircraft, trucks and personal cars won't immediately be replaced either." Which is why, I expect we will experience significant climate change - and have suggested building renewable energy infrastructure to produce fresh water and hydrogen. Abundant fresh water will be necessary for irrigation and habitation, and hydrogen can be used, with minimal adaptions, in power stations, cement and steel plants, while transport technology adjusts.

Let's not forget that Germany is already paying the highest price for electricity in the EU (alongside Denmark). In my country (Finland) the price per KW/h is half of that in Germany. The cost has risen all the decade and this does start to have an effect for example on industry: — ssu

I have read the following passages - but I'm not reproducing them here. To me, the plight of the Mittelstand speaks of the need for abundant clean energy. The example of the wind turbine factory with a $100k hike in energy bills precisely illustrates my point, that renewable energy is a price taker - and not a price maker. The price of energy is set by the fossil fuel market - as is clearly stated:

...well up from below €20 at its lowest point in February 2016, and following sharp rises in world prices for oil, coal and gas.

Economic effects like this are complex, because arguably - that should make renewable energy more attractive, but at the same time - imposes costs on the industry that eat away at operating capital, and make for a stunted application of technology. In face of the existential threat climate change poses - I find it very difficult to understand why a comprehensive renewable energy infrastructure isn't government funded. Instead, they want me to stop eating meat, cycle to work and wear my overcoat indoors - just so they can keep pumping the black gold!

Indeed one could do that. But solar-thermal power hasn't taken off. Mirrors can focus a lot of heat, but not on cloudy days, and not at night. Your solar to H plan is better. — Bitter Crank

Right, but it was a counter example to your suggestion that renewable energy should be applied piecemeal, and on a commercial basis, to compete with fossil fuels. If I were starting a business - I wouldn't go for solar/hydrogen. The start up costs are prohibitive. So I'd go for an ultimately less effective, but cheaper alternative. And this is the very dilemma renewable energy faces. It's subject to commercial demands (fossil fuels were not subject to in the early days) where prices are dictated by its main competitor.

Right; I would just drop "mortgage" from your description. It has too many specific connotations connected to purchasing property or getting consumer loans. — Bitter Crank

Maybe you're right, but we're talking about it. The essential idea has been communicated, and now - we're talking about how oil could be monetized without being extracted. (That's a clumsy turn of phrase.) The one thing that hasn't come up yet, is that besides oil - there's about 2000 years worth of coal we can't burn either, and massive amounts of natural gas. I don't have an answer for that - other than, once renewable energy infrastructure is in place - there will be no economic motive to dig for coal.

Where there is no political will, nothing happens. Period. Your plan is going to require plenty of political will too. I don't know exactly when political will is scheduled to arrive. It had better be pretty damn quick or we are totally screwed. — Bitter Crank

I accept that's true - but politics is often the art of the possible. If we can prove it's possible - it might happen. If we can jigger the economics so that it's profitable, the chances of the political will manifesting are improved considerably. It's not an easy circle to square. (Theoretically, it would require a near infinite number of non-Euclidean geometric operations!) But seriously, this is either an incredibly difficult problem to solve - or it's very simple. Do we value human existence or not? I think we do - mostly our own, admittedly, but I think there's a number - a cost we're willing to bear for the continued existence of our species, and I'm trying to show we can meet with that number.

I disagree. The reason has been that the technology hasn't been there earlier to make renewable energy like wind and solar competitive compared to fossil fuels. Once it's far cheaper to produce renewable energy than produce energy with fossil fuels, then the market mechanism takes over. It's as simple as that. — ssu

I don't believe that's correct. I think there's a massive 'hidden' advantage for fossil fuels in the fact that we've developed and applied the infrastructure - oil rigs, tanker ships, chemical refineries, cars and petrol stations etc, coal mines, railways, power stations - all of which enjoyed vast government support in the early days - that it seems, renewable energy is denied today. Subsidies for piecemeal application of renewable energy technology merely cement that structural disadvantage. If renewable energy is even nearly competitive - it's actually out performing fossil fuels by a huge margin. Given the kind of support for renewables, fossil fuels historically received - i.e. on a level playing field, renewable energy would easily win out.

Perhaps the thing is about using oil and coal to produce energy and this is the big issue. Yet there are a variety of other uses for oil like making plastics. — ssu

That's true, and those are things we are going to need, assuming we secure a sustainable future now. We are past "peak oil" - and still burning a non-renewable resource at a rate of 100 million barrels a day, from which we derive thousands of products vital to civilized life. However:

"On average, U.S. refineries produce, from a 42-gallon barrel of crude oil, about 20 gallons of gasoline, 12 gallons of distillate fuel, most of which is sold as diesel fuel, and 4 gallons of jet fuel."

That adds up to 36 gallons of fuel, from a 42 gallon barrel of crude oil - leaving six gallons of waste, from which thousands of products are made. But do you think those products account for 600 million gallons of non-fuel waste per day? Assuming incorrectly, this waste only has the density of water, that's easily a trillion tons per year - about 300 million tons of which is made into plastic, and plastic is everywhere. It's choking the rivers and the oceans. So where's the other 700 million tons of non-fuel waste going? Someone should probably look into that.

Assets can be mortgaged - and in this way, fossil fuels can be monetized without being extracted. The money raised by mortgaging fossil fuels would first go to applying sustainable energy technology.
— karl stone

If solar generated hydrogen is a practical energy source (and let's say it is) then the logical place from which to obtain capital finance is the market. Since the technology is scalable, you don't have to finance the final stage before the first stage is built. IF you built the final stage of the project today, had 300 square miles of solar panels and a plant cranking out hydrogen, and freighters lined up to take it away you wouldn't be able to sell much of it because the industrial base isn't ready to receive and use H. What you would do is finance a 10 square mile solar panel set up, located near the right shore, and start producing electricity, drinking water, and some H. The electricity and water could be sold to the nearby shore (i.e., India). The H would have to find its market. The profit could be plowed back into the operation, or used to pay dividends. When you were ready to expand, additional shares could be sold to finance enlarging the plant. And so on down the line.

The usual way to pay for capital projects is either a national subsidy or the capital market. — Bitter Crank

That seems like a reasonable argument, from a certain perspective - but in fact it's not. It doesn't recognize that ideological motives for action cut across the grain of nature. Your comments demonstrate quite clearly how an assumption that ideologies are true and authoritative, limits the application of technology. But we have followed those ideas to this point, where we now know we are under threat, and though we have the knowledge and technology to meet the challenge, we lack the will to apply it. We have to transcend that rationale.

If renewable energy could displace fossil fuels through market mechanisms alone, it would have happened already. But the ubiquitous position of fossil fuels in the market makes it more economically rational to continue using fossil fuels, than it does to change. Inelasticity of demand for energy - basically ensures that, whatever the price - we'll pay it. Even at the vast expense of building oil rigs, and towing them miles out to sea, to drill holes in the seabed, two miles down - it's more economically rational to do that, than it is to collect free radiant energy from the sun. It's a trap - and one that will strangle us to death!

Bearing in mind the dire warnings issued by scientists in recent weeks and months - a more comprehensive approach is warranted. I do not insist it be my approach - but it's the best idea of which I'm aware, that addresses all the relevant factors (of which I'm aware.) Describing this approach illustrates the relevant issues - issues which must be addressed by any other idea. Your argument, reasonable as it may seem - doesn't address the one reason we're doing this at all: climate change!

If I were merely trying to start a business - I'd use mirrors to heat sea water, to produce clean water and steam to drive a turbine to produce electricity, and irrigate wasteland for agriculture. But I'm trying to save the world from a fossil fuel addiction, built into the very infrastructure of society. And that's like... the end of Homer's Odyssey, where Odysseus fires an arrow through a dozen axe heads.

The particular approach I describe - mortgaging fossil fuels to provide funding to build floating solar farms, producing hydrogen and fresh water, is quite simply, the cheese at the end of the maze. When you work the problem - it's there. And it maintains, and works with the larger part of existing energy infrastructure. Hydrogen can be burnt in power stations, and distributed at petrol stations with fairly minimal adaptions to existing technology. I think we can do a little better than this:



If you'll forgive me for going on at such great length - I want to address again, this question of mortgaging an asset that cannot be used, so has no value. I think we're getting hung up on the word mortgage. I cannot think of a more apt word - but the economic logic of commercial assets that follows from the word, is unwelcome baggage. Funding on such a scale could only be had with government assurances; essentially, sovereign debt. Sovereign debt is not secured by the mortgaging of an asset with a commercial value. It is however, necessary to monetize fossil fuels to keep them in the ground. There is no political will to simply ban them, and so this is where we came in, with transcending the rationale. Surety for the debt follows from an explicit political commitment to ensure the continued viability of civilization.

So it gives your life meaning now to work for the well-being of your descendents. So you know your ancestors felt the same way about you. They blessed your life without knowing you.

I would say remember to honor them by looking on this world with a loving eye. So many people who engage this issue come to it with abiding hatred for humanity. It's a breath of fresh air to meet someone who comes to it with love. — frank

And no small measure of self regard! But thank you Frank. That's a kind thing to say and a lovely thing to hear. I do think there's a natural moral duty to the struggles of past generations, to make good on what evolution, hard work and sacrifice have provided - to use our abilities and our knowledge to further the cause of future generations. To not give it our all is the most egregious betrayal, not just of future generations who will suffer for our failure, but of past generations who built all this. Giants upon whose shoulders we stand.

I understand. You love us. — frank

Erm... Of course I love us. I love me. I want my genetic, intellectual and economic legacy to be carried forward. I want human inquiry and creativity to reach its full potential - whatever that may be. If there's a way to travel to the stars - we'll find it. It might be alternate dimensions, or uploading our minds into machines. It might even be God. But whatever it is, I'd belong to that legacy - and thus my life now would have meaning. I don't think there's any meaning to life if we chart off the edge of the map in the near future. It's just masturbation. An empty gesture.

p.s. I read your PM and I'll keep an eye out! Thanks!

Solar/hydrogen is the best all round solution.
— karl stone

That, or fewer people? :chin: If there were no humans none of the issues we're discussing would have become problematic, would they? So focus clearly on the elephant in this topic: humans are the problem. The topic asks "how to save the world?", and there is an obvious answer.... :gasp: — Pattern-chaser

If that's what you truly believe - kill yourself! You are the only person on earth you have a right to say shouldn't exist. No? Hypocrite!

When we factor in time, we can make estimates of the inherent dangers. We have had now for over 70 nuclear energy and in those 70 years we have seen accidents. And yes, when nuclear energy is as dangerous as solar power with it's unlucky installers, that does indicate the inherent danger especially when compared to the massive casualties of coal energy. Chernobyl was a reactor that could blow up, the people there were doing tests with the safety systems off, hence we do have an example of the worst kind of accident. — ssu

I think we're incredibly conscious of the dangers of nuclear power and go to extraordinary lengths to contain it. That's not so with fossil fuels. So, it's not really a fair comparison - or rather, such a comparison only carries one so far.

Really? And how much energy one has to need for the steel plant in Sweden using hydrogen you referred to? — ssu

It's powered by hydrogen made from renewable electricity - exactly what I'm proposing we do on a global scale.

Energy infrastructure needs energy to be built, yet 90 percent of the carbon emissions from electricity generation in the United States come from coal-fired power plants. — ssu

We would need to use existing fossil fuel infrastructure to overcome the need for fossil fuels, that's true - but surely that's a better use of fossil fuels than building new nuclear power stations, that wouldn't provide a comprehensive solution for domestic, industrial and transport energy needs. Further, they cost vast amounts of money and energy to build, they're potentially dangerous, there's no solution to the hundreds of thousands of tonnes of nuclear waste already stored in decaying bunkers all over the US, and no doubt - other countries. Compare that to 350 square miles of solar panels - used to produce hydrogen - broken down any way you like:

350 x 1 mile square
175 x 2 miles square etc..
700 x 1/2 mile square.

any part of which breaks, causes no environmental damage, and can be replaced very easily. Nuclear is no contest.

My basic point is that our energy policies have to be tuned to reality and not wishfull thinking or the ignorance of the masses. — ssu

Are you accusing me of either wishful thinking or playing upon the ignorance of the masses? I just want to be clear before I tell you where to go to do something unpleasant with a particular object.

The basic line is that when Coal power far kills hundred fold more people (basically counted in the millions) than nuclear and nuclear power emits no greenhouse gases, why are we then giving up first on nuclear? — ssu

I don't know that we are. I know Germany and Japan are - but the French company EDF want to build a nuclear power station in the UK, and agreed an electricity price with the government about 3 times the market price. Make of that what you will!

And taking off a energy source that doesn't emit greenhouse gasses has meant that then fossil fuels are used because the renewable energy infrastructure is not there yet. — ssu

I mentioned before something before called 'base load.' It's a tricky concept, but basically refers the "umph" necessary to power the electricity grid. With a piecemeal application of renewable energy technology like German wind and solar farms, you can get still and cloudy days that don't provide the "umph" necessary to power the grid. I rather suspect that if Germany is building new coal power plants, they are as a backup. Because there can be little doubt as to the efforts they've gone to promote renewables. It's conceivable that divesting from nuclear created a shortfall - they are supplementing with coal, but their direction of travel is clear.

Sure, there are risks, but these risks have to put in some kind of rational scale to the danger of others. The problem is that environmental friendly administrations in many countries (perhaps with the exception of the US) can make too ambitious goals like Sweden did, and then fall totally flat on those goals as those goals simply were not realistic in the first place. Then as the energy policy has basically failed, we use the old energy resources, namely fossil fuels. — ssu

Really? What happened in Sweden?

Sweden on target to run entirely on renewable energy by 2040 | The ...
https://www.independent.co.uk › News › World › Europe
26 Oct 2016 - Sweden is on target to run entirely on renewable energy within the next 25 years, a regulatory official has said. Last year, 57 per cent of ...

I don't have anything against a hydrogen economy, yet that still begs the question of where the electricity to produce hydrogen fuels comes from. Nowadays global hydrogen production is 90% done by fossil fuels. — ssu

Oh, I see - you mean, you having dismissed my plan for floating solar farms producing hydrogen fuel as wishful thinking - and/or preying upon the ignorance of the masses. That is a head scratcher. Good luck with that!

Interesting plan. But if it works, people might still dig up the coal 5000 years from now and burn it. — frank

We might need to Frank. Climate change can also go the other way. We might need to stave off an ice age someday - if only we survive our technological adolescence.

Whatever CO2 we put up will be scrubbed out of the atmosphere by the oceans. If we burn all the coal, the atmosphere will be back to normal in around 100,000 years. — frank

Are you unaware of the dire warnings issued by thousands of scientists? Or do you have solid grounds to disagree with specialists in this particular field?

If something unforeseen pops up and makes us extinct, there will still be life. The world doesn't need to be saved. — frank

The world? No! Humankind - the only intellectually intelligent animal we're aware of, the knowledge we've gained, the art and literature, the music and cuisine, the comedy - the tragedy, is in my view worth saving.