This is not about everybody else but you just writing really bad posts. If everybody interprets it a certain way, you're going to have to work on how to better convey what you actually mean.

This. We can end this thread here and now.

I did: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/723090

Imagine you're debating a topic and your opponent deletes your posts. He subsequently states that your posts were off topic. Does that sound good to you? Do you think it might undermine discussion on the forum if a moderator is doing that?

Xtrix simply disagreed with me. The post he deleted was about information one would learn in a freshman class on global warming. It was on topic and non-offensive in any way. — Tate

Xtrix only deleted them after I raised the issue that I thought you were trolling. The only reason I didn't delete them is because I wanted others to look (because I'm on holidays) into whether this was a general issue or just in the climate thread. Because I raised it Xtrix felt comfortable deleting the posts another moderator (eg. me) already flagged.

So your argumentation is about winning instead of edification? Good to know, I guess. Must be why you don't want to discuss with @boethius anymore since you were losing that one.

Who are your "opponents"?

I raised the question with moderators whether you were trolling the thread or not. Particularly that decontextualised comment about being in an ice age and others should get up to speed, triggered that. So I thought your comments were at least low quality and wanted other moderators opinion on that.

@Tate fyi, I was just thrown off by 180proof's substantive climate post above and as a result thought we were still in the climate change thread and accidentally deleted your comment immediately above it, thinking it was feedback on moderating in the regular climate change thread. I've asked if it could be put back but this can take some time (if possible).

Not just in the USA. Climate change denial is alive and well with about 20% of people in the Netherlands and that's probably true in most Western countries. Two recent posts making the rounds, an overview of heat waves in the Netherlands since 1900, which ignores the local nature of those, and a table with CO2 levels in the cambria period (which we're 10 times as high as now), ignoring water temperatures at the time that would kill every living aquatic thing existing now but solely pointing out the average temperature was lower. There were also no ice caps so we can imagine what coast lines would look like. All in all, there's a large segment still resisting doing anything.

I knew at the age of 4. So that's 1982 for you. It was mainstream knowledge in Europe dus to the Club of Rome's report in 1972.

My preferred approach is to shoot them. Kill them now and safe future generations later. Unfortunately, that approach doesn't have much support.

The point is that you're missing the point. Energy networks are complex and balancing in- and output is an issue that goes far beyond putting different cables in the ground and tweaking power stations.

True. This is reminscint of the necessary and sufficient conditions discussion we've had, what, 2 years ago?

I also notice a continuous misinterpretation of the nonidentity problem by antinatalists, which is persistent but I have neither time nor inclination to explain at this time since I'm on holidays.

However, I don't think for Europe and US a voluntary de-growth is now feasible, but it will happen involuntarily. President of the EU telling member states to cut gas consumption by 15% is already manifestation of that process. — boethius

Just tuning your heating system can get you these cuts, factory presets are generally wasteful. But nobody really knows that and installers know but don't take the time to do it. You'll have to separately make a 300 eur appointment for "hydronic balancing", which is actually easy and something your granny could do.

Then there's the ridiculous law in the Netherlands that requires potable water from heating systems to be heated to at least 60 degrees because of fear of legionellabacteria, while next door Germany happily heats it to only 50. That saves a ton too. So I broke a law as well.

Using less gas would be easy actually if people were made aware and supported with these kind of energy saving tips but I had to learn it from my dad for some weird ass reason. And he knew because he built refineries for a living.

Yes, at current levels. The current problem is scale.

As the population grows and more energy — specifically, electricity and the materials needed to make solar panels, batteries, wires, etc.— is demanded, that will be a problem. No one is denying that.

That’s a different issue from lowering emissions, which is the driver of climate change— the issue at hand. — Xtrix

Sorry to burst your bubble. There's no way to move to renewables at current energy usage levels. Energy networks can deal with at most a 10-15% shift in energy production, anything beyond that and you get black outs. Renewables will cause much larger shifts and we don't have adequate battery technology to store the necessary energy to fill in the gaps. (That's not to say there aren't hopeful developments in this area).

It has nothing to do with wealth. Maintaining the same standards of living, yes. Which, it's true, is excessive, wasteful, and overly comfortable in the US. That needs to change.

In the meantime, electrifying these things is good and will bring emissions down. They're not at all exhaustive. — Xtrix

Yes, standards of living, excuse my English but you understood what I meant. And not just the US, every country in Europe.

Doing things individually, like installing solar panels, heat pumps, electrifying one's home (stoves, water, etc) and buying other electric things (like lawnmowers) would be helpful too. All very cost effective. E-bikes are great if you live close to your job or supermarket. Electric cars are a good choice too, but still probably too expensive for people -- and we should be pushing more for public transit anyway. — Xtrix

All aimed at maintaining current wealth levels. Fuck cars and the idea that individual transportation should be a thing. Prohibit them in cities and large towns and invest in public transportation. Lawnmowers? You can mow by hand, which also require a lot less maintenance as they rarely break down. Heat pumps are useless in badly isolated houses. What are the Rc requirements in the US in Wisconsin for instance? Is there a maximum in energy use defined per square or cubic meter? Even in the Netherlands isolation helps more than installing heat pumps, which in any case should be coupled with solar panels to be effective.

The reporter had asked a number of Ukrainians what they thought of statements like those quoted, and they all just shrugged at them, responding that nothing coming out of those people can be trusted. — jorndoe

How is this even relevant? A bunch of nobodies telling us politicians can't be trusted? I'm shocked. Now go back to those quotes and explain why they aren't true instead of dismissing it as theatrics. And if you can't manage that consider what the implications are if they are true. Nothing in your post is interesting politically or philosophically without a bit of legwork - I don't think anybody here needs a biased news aggregator.

Destroying capitalism could likewise be thought of as "really the point." But I'm not interested in fantasies — Xtrix

That's precisely what's needed and the fact you call it a fantasy is proof in the pudding that we will not resolve it on time. If even the optimists don't believe it will happen, then it certainly won't.

Renewable energy is sustainable. — Xtrix

Wrong. Not at current energy use levels.

Most people here are reflecting an understanding of the issues as we had it 20 years ago.

I mean good luck with that, but there are a lot of people out there who are dead set on making sure that we don't do anything at all. At first the line was that climate change wasn't happening, so we shouldn't do anything at all. Then they accepted the existence of climate change but now deny that it was manmade, so again, let's do nothing at all. Now it's a combination of "renewables bad", "China should do something first", or "some climate people fly in private jets", all with the implication that we should, you guessed it, not do anything at all. — Mr Bee

Oh, if I had my way, I'd have climate denying politicians and one-percenters summarily executed for murder.

Doing nothing isn't really an option and expecting scientific solutions to what in essence are socioeconomic systems that are unsustainable is misplaced scientism. Most people would be fine with a lower standard of living if wealth would be much more equitably distributed and it's not average people who are the problem here anyway. Living in the 50s-60s wasn't bad and that's the standard we'd more or less be talking about.

I'm ensuring for my kids as well, a way to escape the consequences, which in my view are inevitable.

I'm in favor of de-growth, but there's no reason to believe anything short of that will fail. Might as well make the claim that anything short of the destruction of capitalism will fail. Sure, if that's the case then it's very unlikely -- but we should fight for it still. — Xtrix

Yeah no. I know this thread is about global warming but it's a bit idiotic to decouple it from what really is the point, which is extracting more than nature can sustain. So we might solve global warming of I'm very optimistic but that won't really solve anything.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_ecological_footprint

For humanity, having a footprint smaller than the planet's biocapacity is a necessary condition for sustainability. After all, ecological overuse is only possible temporarily. A country that consumes more than 1.73 gha per person has a resource demand that is not sustainable world-wide if every country were to exceed that consumption level simultaneously. Countries with a footprint below 1.73 gha per person might not be sustainable: the quality of the footprint may still lead to net long-term ecological destruction. If a country does not have enough ecological resources within its own territory to cover its population's footprint, then it runs an ecological deficit and the country is termed an ecological debtor. Otherwise, it has an ecological reserve and it is called a creditor. — Wiki

When I talk about being damned to contribute, I mean I refuse to be part of the problem. I use about a quarter of the energy the previous owners did and about 50% of the gas and I don't even have solar panels yet. The electricity I use goes to a 100% renewable energy provider (and not because they traded carbon certificates) and the gas supplier offsets CO2 I use by planting trees. In the energy saving area, I'm happy to advise anyone who asks. I've done alot of research in which area of Europe is most likely to easily return to rural farming that if close enough to the Netherlands that I can regularly travel there to prepare something my grandchildren can escape to when it's required.

What I'm not wasting time on anymore is trying to move politicians and rich assholes to do what is necessary. The idea of global warming is finally landing but 20 years too late and the solutions are still non-solutions. Anything not embracing degrowth will fail.

It's why I've moved away from group goals to personal goals. I'll be dammed if I'm contributing any further.

What is needed is a bloody technological revolution! Can we do it? Necessity is the mother of invention. — Agent Smith

Yes, let's not do what needs to be done and wait for the invention and implementation of things currently not existing!

I wish people would stop pretending science will solve everything, which is something other people do, after all, so they have an excuse not to make the necessary sacrifices themselves, which we're all going to have to do.

I suppose it's a win you realise at least one of the problems.

It does. As natural resources are more difficult to mine, you need to spend more energy to get to it, which increases fossil fuel usage. But even if it didn't, the point really is that only focusing on energy use while not aiming at degrowth is a recipe for disaster all the same.

not sure how to understand that comment. Are you referring to circularity? Because that only takes us so far. With continued growth the earth's capacity to replenish resources will not keep up nor will recycling. If I make 100 phones each year but only 50 are recycled, I still need resources for 50 phones. It's an important step to sustainability but degrowth is absolutely necessary.

No, it isn't. Even with a profound technological shift we are depleting the earth. We need to use less. Estimates are average lifestyle of the 60s in Europe, which probably will be a little higher due to technological advances. But anything more isn't really sustainable.

The whole idea of battling climate change while attempting to maintain levels of prosperity is totally misguided and doomed for failure.

I by and large agree with the point you're making so these are two quibbles but I think important enough to mention.

1. I don't know about the FED but full employment is not a goal of the ECB, that's solely price stability (which is my biggest gripe with ECB policy, see 2).
2. Price stability/inflation control was sold as necessary for growth and to stave of crises, which it never did, yet you assume we need to control inflation. Only hyperinflation is an issue in my view. That's not to say there aren't immediate political policy concerns to act on it but I disagree this has to be monetary policy.

Graft.

If only if it was a war, then this would've been solved two decades ago with unlimited budget.

Subsidizing industry is pretty common. — Tate

Not profitable industry. That's not a subsidy anymore.

That’s pretty cool.

So you see all of this as inevitable? Better to just get away from it?

I hope you’re wrong, if that’s the case. — Xtrix

Unfortunately yes. I see no awareness with most people in power. Still fucking around with more immediate crises, which will always pop up. While Sunak wants to tackle inflation again and Biden is writing a cheque for 50 billion the world is burning.

And China along with Europe will most definitely overtake the US in the green tech revolution since the US is incapable of getting it's act together on just about anything. — Mr Bee

I wouldn't underestimate the ability of the USA to become a frontrunner because a lot of people do see the problem. Just because politics is filled with dinosaurs, doesn't mean the citizenry is.

Would a clone refer to its original as "father"? Possibly. Would we consider some kind of continuation of personhood as well between a clone and its original? Probably. So obviously we were created by all powerful aliens in their image where only Jesus was a clone. Problem solved.

I kind of love your optimism even during the election cycle when I saw no reason to be optimistic about Biden.

I bought this in the meantime:



And looking into building this in France:

So how is everyone feeling about the biggest transfer is wealth from regular people to profitable companies who made enough profits last year to match that transfer but instead spent most of it to buy back shares? Why the fuck is the US government considering gifting the semi conductor industry 50 billion?

The issue of our time will be biodiversity collapse. We can adapt to global warming and rising water levels even if it would destroy countries but not us as a race. Biodiversity collapse will potentially wipe us from the earth as well.

That's because there is no paradox to solve. You're just equivocating "apple" with "1". Just stop doing that.

I can add a pear and a twig and get to two.