I have some hope for a technological solution to the climate change problem. However, I constantly struggle with the question, what if we are wrong? What if we will not be able to fix it fast enough? We are sitting on our hands and praying for a deus ex machina to save us from ecological collapse, when we should be actively striving for a sustainable society.
So, in addition to being hopeful for technological innovation, we must advocate for widespread systemic change, so that we would not even need technology to fix the problem for us. This includes destroying the inherently unsustainable supply chain and in its place constructing a supply cycle. We need to abolish landfills, and require all (at least industrially) produced goods to have a clear recycling strategy. Sustainability is a problem that needs to be solved socially as well as technologically.
> when we should be actively striving for a sustainable society
Sorry to sound frustrated, but this is an argument for 60 years ago. It's irrelevant today. The die is cast. There is no situation when we will not even need technology to fix the problem for us, except the one where we just give up and say "fuck it". No models show an insignificant rise in global temperature, even if all emissions stopped today, and there is no foreseeable scenario in which all emissions stop even in the next 50 years. We need to get with the program. It sucks, we don't want it to be this way, but we are basically down to science and engineering solutions rather than regulatory or ground-level change.
Not saying we don't also need systemic change, just that is is not sufficient at this point.
I certainly do not want to go back in time to a pre-industrial society. I do want to go _forward_ into a truly post industrial society though, and not simply hide the dirty industries into the poorer parts of the world.
But, the technology must be met with an ideological shift away from technological dependence. We need to create more environmental technology, and less representational technology - interfaces and screens.
The software revolution is yet to happen, that is what I aim for.
What was magical about COVID was the ability to see a blue sky in China and India, people still had food, shelter and fornicated. COVID showed you that we could have a cleaner environment and have the basics provided.
COVID also gave us clear knowledge that it is easy to define socially necessary labor. Most jobs out here in the USA are downright bullshit jobs, and our 'labor' only contributes further to the current ecocide.
Today, our industries abuse our planet's resources for the short term benefit of all of us. Abolishing landfills is a confirmation that we are past such a myopic technological level. We no longer need them.
> Drive outside a major city sometime.
Growing up in the suburbs, I understand this quite well. But this land is not ours just because it is there and unused. We need to return a majority of the earth back to the ecology. Monkeys are falling out of trees in Mexico, 50% of bugs and birds are dead due to the ecocide, I could go on.
Just referencing 'unused land' as if it is ours to use by default is a gross misunderstanding and human-centric approach to ecology. There is more than us here.
The things you are describing are not going to make a material difference. Ground all plane travel, permanently. Ground all car and truck transportation that is not electric, permanently. No electricity generation except by solar, wind, wave, nuclear, etc., permanently. Kill all cows and have a giant BBQ and then no more methane producing livestock are allowed, permanently.
Solutions that are not "acceptable enough" are not solutions, they are notions.
We can still "have it all" -- flight, meat, etc., if the right incentives exist; this too is more notion than solution but is the only possible path.
We can make "sustainable" fuel, and cattle can be fed seaweed and restricted to existing range lands (i.e., don't destroy more forests).
A key problem is that this issue and associated solutions have been artfully politicized by their incumbent stakeholders so a significant portion of the population will resist these efforts purely out of spite.
Then we're wrong, and it doesn't matter. If we're wrong, what's the point in questioning it?
> We are sitting on our hands and praying for a deus ex machina to save us from ecological collapse
Well... no, we're not. Millions of people are working every day on the technology needed to solve these issues either directly (i.e., better pollution control on factories) or indirectly (i.e,. developing cleaner energy)
This isn't to say we all should just sit back and wait for the scientists to come up with an answer - we do very much need to fix many other issues as well, as you point out - but please let's not pretend that a) WE'RE DOOMED! or b) that we're just waiting for a "miracle" or some kind of "breakthrough" to save us
We definitely won't be able to fix it fast enough. And the answer to "what happens?" is simply: Darwin.
There is already historical precedent for what happens when a species makes the planet uninhabitable for nearly everything: after the evolution of photosynthesis, the atmosphere filled up with extremely toxic waste product known as oxygen gas, driving most species to extinction. The ecology recovered, with new species, millions of years later.
Rich people won't survive in their bunkers, either.
I reject your argument entirely. Your nihilistic thinking is what continues the crisis. Reject the void, choose productivity, and work to make the world better.
There's a strategy in politics of opting for the impossible futuristic solution that's "right around the corner" instead of doing boring (and sometimes unpopular) things today. It gives the illusion of progress without having to actually make the hard decisions. See also: Hyperloop vs. regular high speed rail.
It also allows the government to "encourage entrepreneurialism" or "stimulate the economy" by subsidizing private research (which, if successful, we would then turn around and sell to the globe—as if this would somehow be more attractive than ignoring the west and building another coal plant at lowest cost possible)
I've said this again and again—the only rational step is to directly subsidize poorer countries to not build coal plants and, in fact, replace them with more expensive but less destructive generation (inlcluding, say, battery farms, nuclear power, hydro, etc, that can properly address off-hour usage).
I’ve seen some pretty vivid demos of how soot affects melt rate of snow. Anything dark fucks up the albedo.
And the thing with soot is that it’s the sort of thing where if you could fix it, the benefits would be nearly immediate. All you need is a couple clean layers of snow on top of the pack and most of the absorption stops.
The Earth radiates an enormous amount of heat away into space(in fact the same amount that it receives from the sun), so all we really have to figure out (for a quick fix) is how to tip the balance negative enough to offset the additional warming from greenhouse gases.
Long term we need to stop the greenhouse effect, but things are getting dire way faster than even the most delusional optimist could forecast reversing emissions.
Makes for lots of articles and airtime, that's all
Soon only multi-millionaires will be able to afford property insurance in large parts of Florida and California and eventually Nevada is going to have some amazing oceanview property.
I agree with you even though this is cynical. This is the likely response to climate change. It seems that our societal inertia is too great. People will not change unless climate change forces them to adapt.
You’re not thinking long enough term. We’re doing this for the benefit of our (far) future generations who won’t have any fossil fuels left to fall into this trap when restarting civilization.
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So, in addition to being hopeful for technological innovation, we must advocate for widespread systemic change, so that we would not even need technology to fix the problem for us. This includes destroying the inherently unsustainable supply chain and in its place constructing a supply cycle. We need to abolish landfills, and require all (at least industrially) produced goods to have a clear recycling strategy. Sustainability is a problem that needs to be solved socially as well as technologically.
Sorry to sound frustrated, but this is an argument for 60 years ago. It's irrelevant today. The die is cast. There is no situation when we will not even need technology to fix the problem for us, except the one where we just give up and say "fuck it". No models show an insignificant rise in global temperature, even if all emissions stopped today, and there is no foreseeable scenario in which all emissions stop even in the next 50 years. We need to get with the program. It sucks, we don't want it to be this way, but we are basically down to science and engineering solutions rather than regulatory or ground-level change.
Not saying we don't also need systemic change, just that is is not sufficient at this point.
But, the technology must be met with an ideological shift away from technological dependence. We need to create more environmental technology, and less representational technology - interfaces and screens.
The software revolution is yet to happen, that is what I aim for.
There's an ungodly amount of free space on earth. Drive outside a major city sometime.
Preventing people from dumping on unused land in order to reduce emissions seems ... ridiculous?
> Drive outside a major city sometime.
Growing up in the suburbs, I understand this quite well. But this land is not ours just because it is there and unused. We need to return a majority of the earth back to the ecology. Monkeys are falling out of trees in Mexico, 50% of bugs and birds are dead due to the ecocide, I could go on.
Just referencing 'unused land' as if it is ours to use by default is a gross misunderstanding and human-centric approach to ecology. There is more than us here.
We can still "have it all" -- flight, meat, etc., if the right incentives exist; this too is more notion than solution but is the only possible path.
We can make "sustainable" fuel, and cattle can be fed seaweed and restricted to existing range lands (i.e., don't destroy more forests).
A key problem is that this issue and associated solutions have been artfully politicized by their incumbent stakeholders so a significant portion of the population will resist these efforts purely out of spite.
A dangerous idea, there are fewer cattle than humans on Earth, even if we add sheep, goats and pigs, there are still more humans.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/livestock-counts
Then we're wrong, and it doesn't matter. If we're wrong, what's the point in questioning it?
> We are sitting on our hands and praying for a deus ex machina to save us from ecological collapse
Well... no, we're not. Millions of people are working every day on the technology needed to solve these issues either directly (i.e., better pollution control on factories) or indirectly (i.e,. developing cleaner energy)
This isn't to say we all should just sit back and wait for the scientists to come up with an answer - we do very much need to fix many other issues as well, as you point out - but please let's not pretend that a) WE'RE DOOMED! or b) that we're just waiting for a "miracle" or some kind of "breakthrough" to save us
There is already historical precedent for what happens when a species makes the planet uninhabitable for nearly everything: after the evolution of photosynthesis, the atmosphere filled up with extremely toxic waste product known as oxygen gas, driving most species to extinction. The ecology recovered, with new species, millions of years later.
Rich people won't survive in their bunkers, either.
I've said this again and again—the only rational step is to directly subsidize poorer countries to not build coal plants and, in fact, replace them with more expensive but less destructive generation (inlcluding, say, battery farms, nuclear power, hydro, etc, that can properly address off-hour usage).
And the thing with soot is that it’s the sort of thing where if you could fix it, the benefits would be nearly immediate. All you need is a couple clean layers of snow on top of the pack and most of the absorption stops.
Greenland gets it especially bad from all the Canadian fires that are nearly annual now: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/20...
There's only one solution: stop the greenhouse effect at the origin.
It's pretty involved, and harder to pull off exactly as planned, but should work in a pinch, e.g. to stop a catastrophic runaway heating trend.
Clouds are keeping heat in though.
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/44250/clouds-and-gl...
Long term we need to stop the greenhouse effect, but things are getting dire way faster than even the most delusional optimist could forecast reversing emissions.
From New York: https://psmsl.org/data/obtaining/stations/12.php
From Stockholm: https://psmsl.org/data/obtaining/stations/78.php
Simple: New York is sinking slowly. Stockhold is rising. Especially since the effects are pretty much linear 1880 to present.
Makes for lots of articles and airtime, that's all
Soon only multi-millionaires will be able to afford property insurance in large parts of Florida and California and eventually Nevada is going to have some amazing oceanview property.
That's how it works, we do nothing.
The rich can just get better air conditioning and air processing.
About the only blue black to any of the rich/ elite is war famine and general economic disruption from The four horsemen of the Apocalypse
We are doing a lot - all of California runs on solar for a few hours every day and no coal plants are being built.
Nihilism is pathetic.
It is sprayed around every airport in the United States and the world, there is always "reasons".
Lead molecular-mimics calcium in the body, there is no "undo" it is deadly and physically and mentally damaging.
Now go read about bunker fuel use in cruise ship and cargo ships around the world and how insanely toxic that is to wildlife.
Now go read about fracking burnoff for months just into the air, thousands of wells.
We have zero political will to changes things.
I am very old now and have seen climate change talk for nearly 50 years. Nothing is ever done.
Climate Change is past the turning point, billions will suffer the consequences, just not the wealthy.