Like the expertise certainly!

But what are you actually saying about what the models predict?

The non conservative models show stable states and tipping points, the holocene stable state we are leaving, and a new one we're heading to, several degrees higher (the anthropocene stable state let's say)?

- It to late now to stay in the holocene, because even if we cut emissions entirely (which won't happen anyway in the near future), having crossed tipping point will carry us further to the anthropocene?

- Is the implication then not that only reducing greenhouse gas-levels on a large scale, to maybe get back to holocene stable state, would have a tangible effect on climate, because anything less will just end us in the anthropocene stable state anyway?

Is that about right?

but I do find it hard to believe that violence is only the result of ideology. But sure that's ultimately just a guess I suppose.
— ChatteringMonkey

It's not for animals, anyway. Ideology is more a justification for being violent. I once asked someone who was knowledgeable about Viking culture and history why they pillaged. And they told me because other people had stuff they wanted! How often was that the case for some King or Pope or explorer looking to get rich? — Marchesk

Sure, it does seem ideology is often used merely as a justification... be we do get socialized into a culture too. Part of our nature is that we need to get an education wherein values are transmitted among other things. That's part of the problem of trying to find a 'natural state' of humans, you never find them in an uncultured state. Vikings had their cultural roots too. Also kings might not be all that representative for the species as a whole, but maybe the fact that we tend to follow them is... I dunno, it think it's a mixed bag, humans that is :-).

Basically it comes across to me that there's a certain political aspect to the way early human groups are portrayed, like there's a need for a certain kind of person to find some natural justification for their own personality traits. The view of early man as violent was forged largely by quite privileged white men between two world wars: paleontology and archeology were gentlemanly pursuits practiced by the kinds of people who today you would expect to vote Republican ;)

The actual fossil evidence and studies of the groups most similar to our prehistoric ancestors suggests the polar opposite to this handy "I can't help being a shit" theory. But it'll stick around no doubt. — Kenosha Kid

I can certainly buy that there's a political bias to the way things have been explained historically, and I'll even buy that our war-like nature has been seriously overblown, but I do find it hard to believe that violence is only the result of ideology. But sure that's ultimately just a guess I suppose.

I tend to think there's no one attribute that explains all our behaviour. I think we have both tendencies, we like cute things and have capacity for love, friendship and cooperation etc, but we can also flip out like disproportional maniacs when the things we value are threatened. And you know both makes sense from an evolutionary perspective, because the environment that we adapted too also isn't one monolithic fixed set of circumstances.

From anthropology, pretty much exclusively, wherein the consensus is that small, immediate return HG social groups -- which is how we spent most of our existence -- are pretty uniformly peaceful and cooperative until they have to defend themselves against warlike groups. I didn't think the paleontologist view you mention (axe wounds in skulls sort of thing?) was even still held today. I'll look into that. — Kenosha Kid

Yeah I'm no expert by any means, it's always hard to discuss these things if we get into the weeds, but from what I've gathered it's more of a general picture emerging from the paleontological record in combination with the new insights from population genetics. There are a whole bunch of quasi total population displacement and replacement events in our history, as well as patterns in Y-chromosme lineages that seem to indicate Mongol-style of ravaging in our pre-history.

Because similar groups of people survive to this day, and are a matter of record. Generally traditional societies aren't just tolerant of but cooperate with other groups, and only become warlike once they encounter other warlike groups. The whole intolerant, tribal natural human notion is just rubbish. — Kenosha Kid

I've heard you make that claim before, in your thread about delayed gratification, but I'm unsure about it. While we are certainly very cooperative as a species, current opinion among palaeontologists for example seems to be more that we are also very aggressive compared to other species closest to us. So you know, I'm certainly willing to reconsider this, but I'm not sure why or how you've come to that conclusion.

'Only become warlike once they encounter other warlike groups' could mean warlike most of the time.... we sure had a lot of war in the part of history that is documented.

Yeah or check out how population genetics show Bantu's spread across Africa and how they kept pygmies around as a slave population probably for a couple of millennia.

You're still talking about recent humans, a few thousand years at most. You know we've been around a lot longer than that, right? I mean, a _lot_! — Kenosha Kid

The written record doesn't go back much further does it? How would we know whether they were prone to racisme or not?

I don't know if we've given the functionality enough of a chance--ideally it should begin to indicate those members who make good contributions and who have been around for a while--but I'm interested to know what you think about it. — jamalrob

Like in the last forum, it will be used as an 'I agree with that' button. Or a 'yeah you show that dickhead' button. It won't indicate quality particularly. Just how popular the tings you say are. — bert1

Yes I agree, it doesn't necessarily indicate quality, but popularity one would think.

I could do without the function, but don't mind it that much either.

That's a pity, because I really do think this is the most effective way to turn this around... if we had some of the world players committed to and actively pushing for reduction of emissions, the rest of the world could fall in line pretty quick.
— ChatteringMonkey

But even if that happened, things could easily return to present level emissions in the next generation.

Short term doesn't mean much, does it? — frank

Changing your energy supply systems is not that easy, as is illustrated by China building more coal plants despite renewable energy being cheaper than ever... So presumably once you have made the switch to reduce emissions, there'd be some inherent resistance to switching back to fossil fuels too. And I'd think some of the whole earth ecology point of view will stick in the consciousness of next generations, we just know more now about it than we used to... you typically don't unlearn these kind of things.

The US is still the most powerful country in the world. Even aside from its own contribution to emissions, it gives a signal to the rest of the world.... you can't really go demanding other nations to reduce their emissions if you have among the highest emissions per capita.
— ChatteringMonkey

True, but there's no one to pressure the US, and it's not headed toward limiting emissions in any sort of meaningful way. The Democratic party is weak and the Republicans have become the alternate reality party. The US is going to be exporting stupid and crazy for the foreseeable future, until we have a system reset. — frank

That's a pity, because I really do think this is the most effective way to turn this around... if we had some of the world players committed to and actively pushing for reduction of emissions, the rest of the world could fall in line pretty quick.

From an energy theoretical point of view that might be true, but I suspect there are practical and technological reasons why it isn't used more as of now. I don't know enough about the technology to judge it myself, but I do know one of the research centres of my county has been trying to develop this for years now, with only moderate success. For instance they had some serious setback because drilling apparently caused seismic activity in the region. So sure, by all means why not use a virtually unlimited pool of energy, but you do have to have the technology working first.

Cheaper to whom? Likely sooner or later the iron laws of free market capitalism will take charge, but the transit isn't usually so quick.

I assume that once they have a large coal power plant infrastructure and companies building the power plants, things go with the already input motion. — ssu

Yes ok, that's along the lines of what I'd expect is happening. You've got the knowledge, the technology and the logistics already figured out and fine-tuned, the labour-force already trained, the connections for investments established etc etc... Renewables are maybe "cheaper" now in the abstract, if you'd have to start from nothing, but we're never actually starting from nothing.

I've thinking about it some more, and perhaps I've been understating the importance of the US reducing its emissions a bit.

The US is still the most powerful country in the world. Even aside from its own contribution to emissions, it gives a signal to the rest of the world.... you can't really go demanding other nations to reduce their emissions if you have among the highest emissions per capita.

Edit: I accidentally messed up this post by editing it instead of replying in a new one, ooh well...

https://e360.yale.edu/features/despite-pledges-to-cut-emissions-china-goes-on-a-coal-spree

I couldn't quite get a clear reason why they'd go with coal over renewables, but

- Economic growth of 6% a year is still far and above the prime directive
- Those decisions apparently depend on decentralized authorities for a large part and/or the central party isn't all that serious about cutting emissions
- Coal magnates have a lot of influence
- There are some practical/technical reason renewables can't supply their demand for energy?
- They want to use it as leverage in geopolitical negotiations (really?)

Anyway, the official line is that they will keep ramping it up until somewhere in the beginning of the 2030, and then reduce it slowly it to reach neutrality in 2060. If that's the official line, one should what... take the square root of that to gauge their real intentions?

This really won't do it, will it, considering they are good for a third of global emissions?

Catharina Hillenbrand von der Neyen, the author of the report, said: “These last bastions of coal power are swimming against the tide, when renewables offer a cheaper solution that supports global climate targets.

This make no sense at all, why are they doing this? Even if they don't give a damn about effects on climate change, you'd think they choose the cheaper option.

Anyway, there is an very interesting and eye opening Global Coal Plant Tracker , which I advise to people to look at. A lot of info on coal plants! — ssu

Nice.

You can go on comforting yourself with the idea that tipping points and feedback loops are improbable, or whatever else you'd like. But it's pure irrationality, honestly. If the chances of an existential threat were 0.1%, it'd still be absurd to not take that seriously. — Xtrix

If you're really going solely by whether it wipes out every last human on the face of the planet, then I suppose nuclear weapons aren't an existential threat either. Perhaps the aforementioned asteroid (depending on the size) isn't an existential threat.

So it'll only be a radically changed, hell-like earth. But we'll survive in some capacity -- so we can't call it "existential." If you're somehow comforted by that, you're welcome. — Xtrix

You keep saying I want to comfort myself by not calling it an existential threat, but that was never my intention. At every opportunity I said it was going to be very bad... but not an existential threat. I agree that we shouldn't be comforting ourselves by underestimating the risk or ignoring small risks with grave consequences, but at the same time we shouldn't overstate how bad it's going to be either, because really it's bad enough as it is.

Anyway I think we actually agree for the most part, just not on the way we want to communicate the issue. I think you lose credibility by overstating the case and people get desensitized by continual doomsaying (i.e. the boy cried wolf), while you seem to think we need to spur people into action by putting it into the strongest of terms. Maybe this is a result of you living in the US and me being in Europe. Most here, except maybe for that stubborn minority that you'll never reach anyway, seem well aware of the dangers of climate change, while in the US there's probably more ignorance and apathy about the issue still.

And I think accurate assessment of risks matters, for the kind of measures we are willing to take. If it really were an impending existential threat or even "just" a civilization collapsing threat, a la a large asteroid about to impact, we should we willing to contemplate the most drastic of measure, like shutting down all fossil fuels and slaughtering all livestock overnight, pumping aerosols into the atmosphere, declaring war on nations that aren't complying with zero-emissions etc... Some measure would be more or less disruptive for our societies. That's the question for me.... not should we do something about it, but how far and how fast should we be willing to go? How much disruption to current societies do the risks warrant?

Ash/clouds, the effect is the same - no sunshine! Venus is closer to the sun by the way, that must surely mean something. — TheMadFool

It matters what kind of molecules the stuff in the atmosphere is made of. They don't all have the same effect on light coming in and energy radiating out. Some reflect light coming in, like volcanic ash, some trap infrared energy bouncing back from the earth, like greenhouse gasses...

The difference in distance between the earth and Venus matters, but doesn't account for the almost 500 degrees Celsius difference.

That's a non sequitur - Venus is Venus, Earth is Earth. Also, look up Year Without A Summer - volcanic ash clouds over the entire earth caused global temperatures to nosedive to winter levels. Global "warming" is going to blot out the sun with clouds at an even grander scale. Earth cooling down is what I think'll happen. — TheMadFool

This is a non sequitur, volcanic ash is volcanic ash and not clouds and a lot of greenhouse gasses.

Anyway, read up on some science TheMadFool, you seem to be missing the basics.

How do you know that? A lot of that liquid water, a predicted outcome of global warming, means more clouds, more clouds means less sun, less sun means (more) cooling. As a case in point, it's early July, peak summer, where I am and I picked up a cool idiom a coupla months ago - "it'll be a cold day in July when x happens" - and it feels like mid-September, coldish. Who's to blame? Thick cloud cover over the week with mild rain. Global warming is going to, heat up the oceans, and all that water will eventually end up as a vast blanket of clouds covering the skies from pole to pole. No prizes for guessing what happens next. — TheMadFool

Greenhouse gasses trap heat, and causes global warming. This is well documented, from the geological record, and follows from the physics of how light and heat radiation interacts with greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere.

As for the cloud scenario, Venus is covered in a thick blanket of clouds... should be freezing cold over there then, right?

It's not an existential threat, not even close.
— ChatteringMonkey
Really? It certainly is for some people and some nations. Killed some, and soon will make some uninhabitable. Of course, those aren't the important people, so voila, no existential threat! — tim wood

Come on, put in some effort please. Existential threat is defined as a threat to all human life. It's right there in the article Xtrix linked to. I'm well aware that people will die because of climate change, and that we need to do something about it, I've said so multiple times already in this thread alone.

No it couldn't lead to global cooling
— ChatteringMonkey

Why not? All climate-change-is-real believers (what do you call 'em?) talk about is extreme weather. Ergo, if it snowed heavily (6 - 10 ft) all day for a month (that would be weather) all over the earth, it would be because of global warming but such an event will cause long-term global cooling, no? Ice, snow, cools, right? — TheMadFool

Extreme weather in the form of cold, for a month, 'globally' probably is very unlikely in a global warming scenario.

And even then it does not cause climate cooling. Climate is an average over years. One month would have an impact on that number sure, a month is a fraction of years after all, but not significantly.

Are you serious? The climate is not the weather. It's about the average global temperature, not local temperatures on a certain day. The fact that is snows somewhere, some day doesn't mean anything for climate change. Average global temperatures rising is what is meant with global warming.
— ChatteringMonkey

I was talking about the climate, not the weather - global cooling in the form of worldwide snow, freezing temperatures in (say) the Sahara, and so on. Remember climate change is about extremes - that cuts both ways (h9t or cold). Ergo, global warming can lead to global cooling. Paradox or climate change is a hoax, a well-orchestrated one. — TheMadFool

No it couldn't lead to global cooling, then it would be global cooling instant of global warming.

Extremes are possible, temporarily, but then that's not climate, or locally, but then that's not global.

Are you serious? The climate is not the weather. It's about the average global temperature over longer periods, not local temperatures on a certain day. The fact that is snows somewhere, some day doesn't mean anything for climate change. Average global temperatures rising is what is meant with global warming.

I recently had a conversation with my brother-in-law and I made a comment about a recent heat-wave and that global warming really is true; he was kind enough to correct me - global warming doesn't necessarily imply heat, it could also manifest as unusual cold weather. — TheMadFool

It could locally and temporarily manifest as unusual cold weather, because of the effects of global warming on phenomena like the gulf stream which gives Northern America and Europa a warmer climate then you would expect based solely on latitude.

I look at it this way Frank, after a long history of human struggle we are on the verge of finally pulling our shit together somewhat. Coming technological advances, in bio-tech, genetics, AI and what have you, have the potential to define the future course of humanity. If we mess up with how we deal with those we could have some real nasty dystopias on the horizon... I think, especially now, it is of prime importance that we keep our sanity as societies, because the state of our societies will determine how we will handle those. Climate change, if not dealt with properly, has the potential to become a problem we definitely could do without.

It's not an existential threat, not even close.
— ChatteringMonkey

Based on what we understand now, this is true.

How would you reframe the issue to give it a little punch? — frank

I'm not great at punchy lines but.... We're degrading the earth at the expense of current and future generations? Probably not punchy enough?

The longer version is that greenhouse gasses warm the earth which will cause a number of problems, for us, and for the rest of biological life and ecosystems which will in turn have effects on us. More floods and heat waves, food and water shortages, more extreme weather, disturbed ecosystems, new pandemics etc etc... This is very unlikely to kill us all or even most of us, but a number of people will die because of it and it will make things generally worse for most.

And this are only the direct consequences of climate change. Imagine what kind of immigration problems Europe will have when it gets really bad in sub-Saharan Africa with its massively rising population. It's already a major political and social problem now, and that could be dwarfed by climate refugees to come. The real danger is that societies that are already under tension now, will collapse under the strains of climate change. And when tensions get high that also increases the chances of wars between nations for resources that have become more scarce. If you lose control over that, the problems could compound...

Greenhouse gasses stay a long time in the atmosphere and are hard to remove, even with foreseeable future technologies. This means that if we don't do enough now and in the coming decades we are essentially condemning future generations to put massive amounts of effort in dealing with it... we're restricting their potential to flourish.

I like that interpretation.

Being is becoming... overcoming... over man. Joy is the feeling of 'increase' in power, not the feeling of power itself. The point of the continually changing, non-fixed contingent values and goals, is the overcoming... or put in another, maybe somewhat cliche, way, it's the journey not the destination that matters.

Let me save all the "it's not an existential threat" crowd on here some time. Here's Republican Dan Crenshaw for you:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQAGr1s1XFc

If you're convinced by this, that's your own issue. — Xtrix

I've said this before, I'm not an American, I'm not invested in republic-democratic politics either way. I fully expected some cherry-picking of scientific findings at best and outright distortion of the science more probably... to suit his political agenda. He's a politician afterall, that's what I expect.

But I have to say the claims he's making in this particular video concerning the impact of climate change don't even seem to be all that outrageous (i'm not talking about the particular policies he proposes, which I generally don't agree with). And sure he leaves out a whole lot, but science does seem to support the things that he does say. Democrats are making it easy for him to sound somewhat reasonably on these points because they are overstating the scientific case.

It's not an existential threat, not even close. Calling attempts to clarify or nuance what is meant by existential threat "hair-splitting" is a bit disingenuous. Given the gravity of the claim and the consequences thereof, it would seem especially important to be clear about what kind of threats we should be expecting.

That's just nonsense. Climate change is an existential risk -- there's little doubt about that. What you -- and others -- want to do here is split hairs: "Well, it's not really existential because some humans may survive" or "We'll probably get enough things done, so it's not very likely," etc. You have no idea what you're talking about, I'm afraid. — Xtrix

I'm splitting hairs when that's how the term is used in the article you linked to and literally the conclusion of the article?

So where does this all leave us? It’s worthwhile to look into the worst-case scenarios, and even to highlight and emphasize them. But it’s important to accurately represent current climate consensus along the way. It’s hard to see how we solve a problem we have widespread misapprehensions about in either direction, and when a warning is overstated or inaccurate, it may sow more confusion than inspiration.

Climate change won’t kill us all. That matters. Yet it’s one of the biggest challenges ahead of us, and the results of our failure to act will be devastating. — article

And apparently it's not even close to an existential risk, even in worst case scenario's:

Further, “the carbon effects don’t seem to pose an existential risk,” he told me. “People use 10 degrees as an illustrative example” — of a nightmare scenario where climate change goes much, much worse than expected in every respect — “and looking at it, even 10 degrees would not really cause the collapse of industrial civilization,” though the effects would still be pretty horrifying. — article

What kind of rhetoric? The truth? — Xtrix

Poltical rethoric from climate activists and the like... Of course there is rethoric from both sides, that is what happens in politics, only scientists are after the truth.

If that's difficult, I'll put it this way: an asteroid is heading to earth. (1) If we do nothing -- what happens? We're dead. (2) If we act, we'll survive. Suppose someone starts saying, "We're doomed." What does this imply exactly? It seems to exclude (2), and thus no matter what we do we're dead. — Xtrix

See that is exactly not what this problem is, and only further proves the point I was trying to make. Climate change is a slow building problem and can have varying effects on a wide spectrum over centuries and millenia depending on how much greenhouse gasses will be pumped into the atmosphere. It's nothing like an astroid hitting the earth where we either prevent the impact or die immediately.... The analogy is only good if you want to scare people into action, it's rethoric.

--Here — Xtrix

I actually read most of the articles and papers linked too here, and if anything a lot of scientists seem agree that climate change is very unlikely to be an existential risk. It's for the most part politicians and policy advisors that seem to be overstating the scientific case, I would presume because they think that is needed to inspire political action.

And while I do think climate change is a serious problem that needs to be resolved, I don't think this kind of rhetoric serves that cause really. I think it damages their credibility, handing out free ammunition to climate deniers... and maybe more importantly accurate assessment of risks is important to determine what kinds of drastic solutions we need to consider to solve the problem.

What could potentially be an existential risk, and typically not included in these risk-analysis, are the social and political problems we cause as a reaction to the effects of climate change. The last thing we need it is more oil on the fire of an already overheated debate (pun intended!).

It is a theory but it's not recognised as such in analytical jurisprudence. The closest to it would probably be legal positivism which suffers from "turtles all the way down". Kelsen reaches the undefinable and conceptually useless "Grundnorm", which is just "natural law" dressed up in different wording. I don't like the theory for the reason given in the previous post, the weakness inherent to it in establishing what is and isn't law and the fact I'm a firm believer in bad law, not being law. Civil disobedience is required sometimes. — Benkei

Ok, I guess I don't understand why 'turtles all the way down' would be a problem in this case. You have to start somewhere...

I do agree that there are bad laws, I still would call them laws though even if they are bad. And yes civil disobedience should be possible at all times, it's a form of politics... and politics ultimately takes precedence over law because it determines who gets to decide what the laws are going to be or how they should be changed.

I reject procedural requirements because you end up with circular reasoning. Procedural laws are after all laws themselves, so you end up with: the law is only law when passed in accordance with the law. That strikes me as rather meaningless. — Benkei

But this is what it ultimately is, circular. You have a constitution usually, which is a subtype of law requiring special majority to change, that determines how laws can be passed. Of course, behind those procedural requirements there are philosophical ideas, in case of democracies the legislative organ consists of representatives that are voted in by the people etc... So ultimately yes laws are rules that are devised according to a procedure that a certain community has decided on to be the procedure of passing laws.

I mentioned this explicitly in my previous post but I tend to just refer to "signing" to avoid long sentences. I assumed current posters here know this and will forgive the inaccuracy. — Benkei

Sure, but the splitting of hairs does lay bare a distinction that is I think important for the discussion. If some executive power, like say trump, would decide to declare war in violation of a ratified treaty, that would be illegal. If however parliament would decide on declaring a war in violation of a ratified treaty, I'm not so sure that decision would necessarily be "illegal"... because they decide what is law. Then you presumably have a conflict between two norms of equal value, and it would depend on the particular legal system which one takes precedence.

But I'll grant you that in most countries, as far as I know, treaties usually take precedence above a regular law... which makes sense because, as you pointed out, if you - as a country - don't follow up on your contractual obligations, other parties typically won't be as willing to deal with you in the future.

The entering into a contract creates expectations between us about the nature of promises and rights and it also creates expectations in a wider community if they are aware of the promises we made. As a result, we've established rules intended to regulate behaviour through performative acts (two promises). It's these expectations and the underlying intent that is aimed at creating such expectations that, in my view, create law. — Benkei

I don't think this is fundamentally different where it concerns treaty obligations. The system of national laws sets out that any treaty signed and ratified is accepted as binding and that national laws will be set aside in favour of the treaty rules. — Benkei

Laws are rules approved by an organ that has legislative power. Treaties become law in a country if they are ratified by parliament. That is why ratification is necessary. Note that often treaties are not ratified even if they were signed by a country, in which case they wouldn't be law... I don't quite see how contractual expectations would have much bearing on whether something is a law or not.

This is why I don't think enforcement is necessary for a rule to be law, because I think it's about intent and expectations; or, the meaning that arises from the promises made. — Benkei

Yeah enforcement isn't necessary for something to be a law, it just makes the law largely ineffective. It is about intent and expectations, they are normative after all, but I wouldn't say that is what makes something a law. Whether something is a law or not is determined by it being approved in a legislative organ or not.

you agree by treaty that your won't go to war except in self defence or with UN security counsel approval then not abiding by those rules makes the law illegal. If you want to argue you aren't bound by treaties then you shouldn't sign them in the first place — Benkei

Splitting hairs a bit probably... but signing a treaty is done by some executive power. In itself that doesn't lend legal power to that treaty. It's only after ratification (by a legislative power) that it gets that status in an internal legal order of that country... and even then, laws do conflict with eachother (even aside from treaties), it will depend on the internal rules of conflict resolution and hierarchy of norms which law should take precedence.

The big problem for global governance that I see though, is bureaucracy. If structures get that big, you get a whole new layer of logistic and administrative problems.
— ChatteringMonkey

The only thing I can currently think of in regard to this is that for it to stand a chance of working there must first be an ideal that is aimed at; one that most folks are not opposed to. Headaches will occur one way or another. But in the absence of such ideal that serves as a common cause for most, I can't foresee the possibility of good results. And I think this is where Xtrix's notion of a global awakening comes into play. Still, in seeing how many have had big problems with the wearing of face masks during the current pandemic, it will take considerable effort to bring such global ideal about. — javra

I would think we need something more concrete at this point. An awakening, a shared ideal would help no doubt, but as I said a bit earlier, that kind of general cultural shift takes time... and a lot of time is something we don't have in this case.

I've been thinking about global governance... So the problem with a real global government is I think it gets to big as an effective ruling structure. You get lots of bureaucracy, you invariably get an even bigger democratic deficit because representation will be ten times removed from the people at that scale etc... The most straightforward solution, and the least conditional on other fundamental changes happening first, is working with what we have now, nation states. This is how we got to that agreement on the minimum tax for enterprises. Something similar could be done for fossil fuels and emission costs. According to that IMF report the fundamental problem is that the costs for the environment aren't included in the prices for fossil fuels (that is how they are 'subsidized'). If states could agree globally on effectively including all costs in the prices than that would already be one step in the right direction. Other such agreement could be made as needed...

Brings to mind the - acknowledged toothless - global 15% minimum corporate tax that was recently in the news. — javra

Yeah, this was long overdue... even if 15% isn't a whole lot compared to what regular people pay.

I do agree with your point, this can only work if applied globally, because the economy is global.

The big problem for global governance that I see though, is bureaucracy. If structures get that big, you get a whole new layer of logistic and administrative problems.

Thx for the info.

I didn't read the whole report yet, but it seems like they also count the non-inclusion of 'externalised cost' as subsidies, which I agree should be taking in account... but the point is they aren't, and so from a competitive point of view, as the cost paid by enterprises, they are cheaper.

Also note that China is again the biggest offender here. They subsidise everything, there isn't even a real difference between private and public sector there, to the point that 'free competition' with them is not a real possibility from the beginning.

If the issue is that people understand/are aware, but don't care or feel overwhelmed, then that's another issue we have to deal with. That takes more education as well as more organizing. — Xtrix

I agree in principle that this is the way to go, but for that to have an effect on this particular problem, I don't think we have the time. That kind of basic cultural shift doesn't happen overnight....

But that's complete nonsense. We're a world leader, and what we do is important for the rest of the world. We're also the second biggest CO emitter in the world, #1 per capita. That's significant. — Xtrix

I'm not an American, I'm viewing it from a different perspective I guess. I don't disagree that the US could have a lot more impact than most other countries, but still it can't do it on it's own, it is a global coordination problem.

There's no evidence transitioning away from pollutants to clean energy is an economy killer -- to the contrary, it will likely stimulate the economy. But don't take my word for it -- look at the trends in assess management, insurance, and even some oil companies. — Xtrix

But I really don't see why we should buy into the notion that going green will harm our economy or weaken our country. — Xtrix

Maybe I need to look into it some more (feel free to share sources that could educate me on this), but I don't think you get around the fact that green energy is just more expensive... I know, not if you would include externalised costs, but the point is that they are not included now. If energy is more expensive, products are more expensive and you loose a competitive edge... which is why I think this is ultimately a coordination problem. Everybody needs to get on board or your economy will suffer... in relation to others, which is how economies suffer.

China has made stronger pledges than we have. Doesn't mean much until it happens, but they're very much aware of it. Most of their emissions right now are coming from coal. — Xtrix

The figures for emissions sure would have me fooled.

But even if it were true, again I repeat: better a destroyed economy/recession than a destroyed EARTH. — Xtrix

This is straight out of conservative media. This transition is inevitable -- it's not a matter of if, but when. It just happens to be the case that it needs to happen sooner than later. So we need to stop dicking around with "what ifs" and "What about China?" and "what if it's bad for the economy", etc. All worst case scenarios, and yet we HAVE to do something or we're dead. An asteroid is hurling towards Earth, and we're arguing about how the worst case scenarios involved in stopping it -- just utter insanity. — Xtrix

My point is that if everybody is not on board, or at least the biggest polluters like China and the US, the earth will be destroyed anyway, even if you destroy your economy right now.

And let's be clear about this, the earth will not be destroyed if we can't solve the problem. It will be very very bad for a whole lot of biological life on earth, possibly/probably something akin to the five great mass extinctions we had in earths history. A lot of life will die off, some amount will most likely survive. This is in no way meant to diminish the problem, hard to diminish a problem by comparing it to mass extinctions anyway, it just seems better to say it like it is to pre-empt accusations of doomsaying.

It would help in myriad ways. If people get educated about this, and awareness is raised, then it'll hopefully lead to higher prioritization. People will thus vote accordingly, and can perhaps adjust their ways of living accordingly (including business and political leaders). If you don't see or understand what the problem is, then talking solutions is moot -- it'd be like the common occurrence of trying to convince someone to stop drinking when they don't see it as a problem.

People are also more likely to come together in organizations, collectively working towards goals, if they recognize a problem. We see this with war and rallying around the flag over foreign invader/attacker. — Xtrix

I could easily see it going the other way though. You know, that knee-jerk reaction of falling back on the instinct of saving oneself in the first place, and maybe those closest, in bad times.... let's build that wall etc.

I've said this before, but I don't think awareness is the problem, there's already plenty of information available for anyone interested to inform themselves about the problem. People just don't care/ don't want to know/ don't believe we can manage the coordinated action needed to solve the problem...

I find it especially hard to believe that political and business leaders in particular wouldn't know after all this time, especially since this isn't even disputed seriously in science. They know, they just don't have the courage to sell massive and unilateral scaling back of the economy to their people... because let's be honest, one country unilaterally scaling back except for China and maybe the US won't make that big of a difference anyway. You're just running your economy into the ground for little effect.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions

It's a coordination problem hindered by geo-political and economical struggle between world powers. China is good for almost a third of global emissions, if not more by now, and together with the US for almost half of global emissions. They are also the two most powerful countries in the world... they need to move. Problem is the US is seeing China rapidly overtaking the US in economic terms, and political and military power usually follows shortly thereafter. I can't see the US saying, sure let's just speed up that process a little bit more. So ultimately China has to take action, but they have their own problems, and far from reducing them, emissions have skyrocketed the last 20 years. I don't know enough about their particular situation, but it wouldn't surprise me that they just can't turn that around without massive economical and societal problems.

So yeah, anyway you slice it, it's going to hurt.

So you have read it and liked it? Cool. — frank

Yeah, I read most of his stuff. What I like about this polemic is that he doesn't waste time on pointless discussions about the truth of Christian doctrine etc, like for instance the new atheist would. He pretty much just assumes it is all myth, and goes straight to the heart of it, questioning the values it promotes.

He's similar to Kierkegaard in declaring that only a few people will understand his works.

Was he a revolutionary? Or a lunatic? I'll add comments as I go through it. All comments welcome. — frank

Few contemporaneous people I think he meant predominately. People are educated in the culture of their times, and assume that frame as a given for their thinking for the most part. It takes a lot of work and a certain kind of temperament to be able to create a point of view beyond that. If one doesn't have that particular mindset, one probably won't get it.

He was a philosopher. Questioning the mores of their times, re-evaluation of values as he would put it, is what "real" philosophers do according to Nietzsche. And that is what he does, revealing the psychological motives of the cultural and religious ideas of his time... sounding them out with a tuning-hammer, to see what they mean not in terms of truth necessarily, but in terms of motive.

Anyway, it's an interesting read, especially for the psychological insight into Christianity and the archetype of Christ.

A Boycott only is effective if enough people join in.

People are not likely to join left to their own devices, usually they'll just buy with their wallets.

The usual ways of organising collective action runs via national political parties, which seem difficult to move at this point.

Purchase power taken as a whole however, has enormous political potential. The question is how to get enough of it on board.

Start a site and call it the 'Peoples Purchase Power Party (PPPP)' or something, with the goal of using purchase power all over the world for good causes. Keep it simple, state your goals clearly, list the obvious good causes, list the products that are being targeted etc... do the work and the research for them.

Campaign the internet for people to join purchase boycotts and finance the project. I'd say there's enough people who would would be willing to join ideologically, but still, chances seem rather slim that it works. There just isn't any organised direction at this moment, to much splintering and disinformation, and no faith in the success of such actions....

Until it maybe gets some traction, somehow, at which point people could start to join in droves. Once you have that, the sky is the limit really, you could even leverage the potential purchase power to negotiate directly with governments or companies.

Oh yeah, be sure to find ways to keep the monster under control, should you get there.