The economic system won't just go away. Humanity depends on it. And we have rejected every alternative. We have to come up with other alternatives that people can believe in or die trying. Or we reshape the system we have. Those are our alternatives.
The unfortunate fact is, while individual action is proper and laudable, not nearly enough to stem the damage. Private citizens just don’t directly control enough carbon footprint. We can’t solve it by any action we can take separately.
The world needs major systemic change, and that has to come from governments, as they have to power to set laws, regulations and the authority to enforce them.
Even Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg or Elon Musk couldn't do enough action on their own. I'd they shut down all the corporations and organizations that they own it would be maybe 1% of the problem? Even if you assume those 3 humans control 10% of the world's pollution - that's still only 10% of the problem.
Lookup the breakdown of the sources of climate change. It looks like a pie that's been split for 16 people. Mining, transportation, food, agriculture, deforestation, fossil fuels... each sector is only a fraction of the problem.
Snap your fingers and all cars and trucks and trains and planes and ships are non-polluting and it's the same problem as our billionaires - it's only 5-10% of the problem.
(All these numbers arent exact, but there's no one person or solution for it)
That's a good way to put it. There's no silver bullet, and it's unfortunate that the fact that there are so many layers that need to be addressed leads to people feeling defeated.
We're in a Mexican Stand-off with corporations and Government. We're all pointing at each other saying the others are responsible to fix this. It's an all hands on deck situation!
Stochastic violence like that won’t do anything to help us here.
Don’t get me wrong I’m totally fine with it, it just won’t move the needle unfortunately
We vote, we protest, we make sure the issue stays in the public eye. It hasn’t been enough to move the needle meaningfully. All we get are vague, non-binding targets that aren’t enough even if we met them. Which we’re not doing so far because there’s no systematic change.
And we have to make enough people care about this issue that they are willing to stand with us against our governments and protest their lack of action.
People would also need to be meaningfully willing to sacrifice in order to solve it which, I think it's clear by now, is not going to happen until it's much too late.
Honestly our best hope is some kind of vauge technofix like AI government, orbital sun shades or fusion energy plus direct air capture. People are just not capable of comprehending how much damage we are doing in a way that would galvanize the necessary social change.
Especially where I live ...
And good luck to all of us. The people are so easily distracted, whether it be overwhelmed with life/jobs, or social media, or the culture war topic of the moment (rn it’s immigration).
Vote blue, it's that easy. Biden and Dems have been the only thing giving us at least a hope of a chance with IRA and other significant climate bills. They need maximum political capital in the form of voter mandate in order to accomplish more.
A Democrat who doesn't support corporate interests won't get elected.
Yes Dem's are better than the alternative, however, it's not enough. And it's dangerous to pretend the Democrats are going to save us when they won't.
We the People have to take action in order to get that ball rolling. The good news is, all of these problems are connected. Economy (economic inequality), Energy (outdated fossil fuel based infrastructure), Ecology (global warming) and Equality. The root cause is the same (greed), which means we can address them all simultaneously.
Build a cooperative economy by building a new green infrastructure and reversing global warming.
I know this might seem like a big word salad, but we've created a 30-year plan and started a non-profit vehicle to make it happen. I'm happy to answer questions, provide resources etc. There ARE solutions. But we gotta work together.
Sorry for the wordy response
Individual action has an impact, the strongest impact being turning community opinions in the right direction so that the systemic change is more accepted.
Systemic change won't just flip from no one caring to someone at the top making a decision. For good and bad reasons, people at the top (usually) can't make decisions that aren't at least in most ways aligned with the individual people's desires. Not without undesired consequences for all parties
My attitude the past few years is that it is ethical and correct to make individual changes, but it’s not going to amount to much when corporations and extremely rich individuals treat the planet like it’s disposable. I got tired of thinking that not driving as much or recycling or any other common trope offered for individual climate action is going to displace the emissions produced by someone like Taylor swift who flies around on a private jet like we would drive to the grocery store
The most we can do is vote with our wallets and for politicians who care. Protests could work but unless they are extremely large and sometimes destructive/disruptive, no one on the top seems to care
Agreed. We can’t individually solve the problem. However, I like to think anything we do personally contributes in some small way to lessen the suffering of those most impacted. I think these folks are pointing to some ways forward: https://drawdown.org/
It would take a world wide totalitarian state, most people wouldn't support that, for one reason or another, it would be more restrictive than a communist wet dream.
You say individual actions are laudable. I doubt. I refrain from driving my car as often as possible. Then look at the street, just in my neighborhood I see people driving 10,000 cars, and what's the point of me doing my part!?
The only other option to governments seems to be investment funds, as many are seeing climate change as a system risk and are slowly putting pressure on their investments to move away from fossil fuels.
There are about 2000 private citizens (billionaires) who have the ability to change this. And they won't. They would rather us all die than be mere hundred millionaires.
I'd like someone to start a website or club where you can track your own carbon footprint and help develop strategies of degrowth that are the least painful possible. I'd like to see a breakdown of peoples carbon allowance and a way to share strategies to reduce more. a least we might have some first person narratives to share with future generations that we sort of tried.
Yep. But people influence the corps and the law makers. Bit like Carter said, it will take sacrifice. And not from those with nothing. We use and have and want way to much shit and corps use that to keep the people complacent enough to not care.
It's systemic.
Stop voting for people who deny that the problem exists.
Stop voting for people who deny the problem will continue to have a negative impact to our environment, our economy and our society that will only get worse over time.
Ah yes, we can vote the environment back with our extremely effective democracy that totally not controlled top to bottom from the very people causing climate change for their own benefit.
But it still is a tool to use and we'd be fools to not do so. Further, we know as a fact that should the right continue to win, it *will* get worse. We can't vote it out, but we can vote to slow it while we organize better approaches.
We find out how to get a ton of clean energy. And then hope we find out a way to use all that power to reterraform our planet. Scrubbing carbon or doing something.
There’s deep geothermal. The tech needs improving but we have the expertise from drilling oil wells as a starting point. You can listen more on this from 41:50 at [https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/38-sebastian-Heitmann](https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/38-sebastian-Heitmann)
If you believe that carbon is the ultimate evil and minimizing it is the only meaningful goal, then I agree with nuclear for electrification, considering technology currently available.
The issue with most renewables is the cost and time to scale it up worldwide.
There will be a need for lots of hydrocarbon production and use, even if we mostly stop using it for fuel. (It’s convenient to blame the “greedy oil companies” but the largest oil companies are owned by governments, and the politicians won’t shut off that cash flow. Look at one of the “greenest” governments around - Norway- who enacted a huge tax on ICE cars (something like $30,000 per vehicle, IIRC) to drive electric vehicles adoption, but their oil companies are still running flat out with no sign of slowing or stopping,)
We should stop blaming “governments” and “corporations.”
Representative governments loosely reflect the will of the people. Authoritarian governments reflect the goals and desires of those who are in power. In both cases, the government is lead by people who want to stay in power and enrich themselves.
Corporations (actually better to just say “businesses” since a corporation is just one of many forms of business organization) exist to invest money, sell a product or service to customers and reward their shareholders with the profit from that business. No customers (or no product customers want) - > no profit -> no business. (Sure entrenched managements sometimes reward themselves more than shareholders, but the market corrects that problem.)
There is no realistic hope for some kind of world government or consensus on a global basis. Empires come and go over history, but they’re all built on the power and wealth of the rulers for a period. There is no existing organization that can do this - notice how strikingly ineffectual are groups like the United Nations.
The rich countries can afford to throw money at the problem. But it doesn’t matter, since China and India alone (plus every other poor country) will erase all the carbon reductions in the rich countries. Few if any governments will enact policies that force its citizens to live like serfs - they all want to promise and deliver prosperity to the middle class that the rich countries already enjoy.
I think we’re left with innovation and adaptation. Probably not revolutionary, but incremental.
End the production of useless crap like iPhones every year or cheap plastic shit that breaks in a year.
Have manufacturers work on high quality stuff with fair working conditions and environmental regulations.
No Smart phone ever year. You get a easily fixable and sustainable Fairphone every five years made from recycled parts
In a sense it’s simpler than most people seem to think. Decarbonize the electric grid, electrify everything we can, use CCS to compensate for everything we can’t.
As an individual, you’re not likely going to be able to make a tremendous difference. The best things you can do are a) run for office and direct funding towards the aforementioned efforts or b) work for one of the companies building those technologies.
Those are the solutions that are simpler to understand. How much of that and how we actually put that into effect, as well as how we even determine how much is enough, are the hard parts.
>Decarbonize the electric grid, electrify everything we can, use CCS to compensate for everything we can’t.
It blows my mind that anybody can confidently state that any of this is "simple".
On top of that, carbon capture is absolute pure fantasy unless you're talking about restoring grasslands or other ecosystems.
Well, our choice is to either figure it out, or have an increasingly bad time by the mid to late 21st Century.
We can only slow down so much, some of the carbon is going to need to be sucked out of the atmosphere in order for us to return the planet to climactic equilibrium... And that opinion is shared by the IPCC.
I hope we are able to make it feasible, the alternative paths are shit.
I don't even think we are actually trying. The best selling vehicles are giant pickup trucks and the EVs have 500+ hp and go zero to 60 in under 4 seconds.
[https://www.zeroto60times.com/vehicle-make/tesla-0-60-mph-times/](https://www.zeroto60times.com/vehicle-make/tesla-0-60-mph-times/)
[https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g43553191/bestselling-cars-2023/](https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g43553191/bestselling-cars-2023/)
Yeah without massive, world-wide revolution I genuinely don’t believe we can do anything substantial. We’ve already crossed the point of no return. Millions if not billions will die. Complete radical change of climates worldwide. From new tornado valleys to desertification of currently fertile plains to the melting of permafrost and the changing of wind streams like the Gulf Stream.
The blame is on the corrupt politicians, oil barons, and big plastic manufacturers, amongst others. If there is an afterlife, may they all endure the most sadistic of torture, and even then, they get off easier than what they truly deserve for ending our current world as we know it.
Climate refugees, food shortages, crop failure, fungi running rampant due to humidity + temp increases (not to mention the absolute idiotic mono-culture farming methods). Water levels rising, fresh water contamination, Ocean acidification, and the list goes on and on. We are truly and utterly fricked and that’s lowballing it.
The good news is that solar + batteries is already the cheapest way to make power so the whole planet will switch to that just out of economic desire rather than anything else.
Also electric cars are already cheaper over 10 years than gasoline so again everyone will switch for that reason too (which will help the grid as a lot of people want to charge over night when there's excess energy).
Also recycling of electric vehicle battery packs is a better way to get minerals than mining them so once a whole electric fleet is built out there'll be very little extra resources extraction needed for it.
So yeah both road transport and power generation will switch to electric without any need for government intervention, though it's good if governments tax fossil fuels (rather than subsidising them) to make it happen faster.
ratcheting up a global price on carbon would do it, bonus points to make it as progressive as possible so giving the most money back to the poorest most affected people/countries
but good god good luck implementing that even carbon taxes in an individual country is a tough sell
and typically anyone who stands to lose even an inch/dollar will fight it like crazy even if it's in their best long term interests
Find a way to catalyze a global paradigm shift.
I'm not kidding or being sarcastic -- this is the key. And the only real solution. All the suggestions to vote, buy an EV, incentivize green initiatives, etc., are primarily focused on providing specific solutions to specific manifestations of a very broad problem that goes far beyond climate change.
The problem lies in our deepest paradigms, behaviors, and personalities as individuals, and more importantly as a collective. Our proclivity for materialism, and the resource misuse and irresponsible consumption that accompanies it, must be replaced with a holistic view of the world that places humanity as a member of that world rather than the hub around which it turns. We must replace our self-centered priorities, decisions, behaviors, and morals with selflessness and the same holistic perspective that empowers the average person with a sense of duty to follow such categorical imperatives (to borrow language from Kant's philosophy). We must deprioritize (or, ideally, altogether eliminate) obsessions with wealth, power, status, and other fabricated ideals, and rediscover the organic paths to a happy and fulfilling life that lie in community, companionship, and cooperation -- with each other and the world as a whole.
Climate change *is* a massive problem, but it is not in a silo, disconnected from other issues. And if you pick any of them and trace them back far enough, you'll find these same problems. It isn't *just* a pollution and resource problem -- that's an outward manifestation of thousands of years of poisoning paradigms. Find out how to catalyze a global paradigm shift, and you've discovered how to solve them all.
The solutions have to be largely technological. Had I the power, I'd pour huge resources into recruiting, training, and employing engineers of all kinds to work on solutions for carbon free concrete, food production, energy, etc.
At the local level you can demand your energy providers switch to renewable, and get AS MANY people around you as possible to do the same.
Demand enough charging stations be available so that the entire automobile fleet can charge when needed.
Demand higher efficiency in any product you buy (don't buy low efficiency stuff).
Drive less.
Which means better public transportation.
You've got a lot better chance of effecting change at the local level, so get involved in your local government, show up for public meetings, write to your legislators, organize protests if necessary <-- Make them FUN or people won't show up, get petitions for legislation, go to farmer's markets, outside grocery stores, etcetera. Educate people on why it matters to them personally (their pocketbooks are the best way, not through shaming or trying to explain the science in detail).
One of my favorite things I've heard working in the renewables and carbon space is "there's no silver bullet... but there is silver buckshot". It's going to be a lot of everything.
The economic drivers around climate change are shifting. Insurance is starting to pass the cost down, and financial institutions are noticing. Renewables are catching up to and surpassing the efficiency of some of our dirtiest fuels.
Having said that, the apolitical progress is great, but I genuinely think it's too little too late.
We need to figure out how to sequester CO2. Direct air capture is a joke - it's parasitic load is like 4 MW/t CO2, which... it's just silly.
The key to extracting CO2 from the air is to grow more biomass, extracting CO2 via photosynthesis, then using anaerobic digestion to turn it in to biogas - 60% CH4 can be upgraded to produce renewable natural gas, then the 40% CO2 fraction can be sequestered... somehow. Geosequestration is on the horizon, and is the best, most deployable solution I've seen.
Basically the answer is we need to **both** stop our emissions **and** extract CO2 from the air in order to disrupt the natural tipping points we're stumbling in to, like thawing permafrost.
We need to divide wants vs. needs and supply the needs for everyone and only allow wants that do not use linear resources / ration them tightly. Today whether you order a sex doll or a sack of potatoes, their priority for transport is the same. Surely one is more of a need than another. (The sex doll obv.)
Or a very high carbon tax, which would have somewhat the same effect (but absolve the super rich, which is no small issue).
Or 3/4 og the population dies, and we can all drive diesel pickups and eat straks.
Everything is happening too slowly and co2 lingers around. So even if we stop co2 emissions today we will still see warming for a while.
Population growth is stalling, technology is getting better. At some point we will have less humans and less emissions and climate will recover. Not in my or your lifetime though.
Once there's enough pressure from people on politicians and corporations to get shit done, it's already going to be too late and we'll be in a spiraling feedback loop and no amount of infrastructure changes or nuclear reactors or EVs or plastic recycling is gonna save us. I'm just happy I'll probably be very old or dead by that point, but I think we already might be in the early stages of that given every month for the past year has been the hottest ever.
I think the only real hope for future generations is some type of scientific breakthrough in energy production and carbon capture that can be easily rolled out on a mass scale.
We are doing everything we are going to do. Gradually evolving wind and solar. Technology is gradually improving. Oil and gas getting more expensive. The shale boom is leveling out. China is moving away from Fossil fuel, even though they continue to be big users. Europe is leading us. It will be however hot it will be in 2050, and we will deal.
And the population is peaking soon.
I am not even sure I want a "global initiative" to solve the problem. God know what major mistakes we would make.
All of the decisions would be driven by profit. A certain way to screw up
Global warming is a part of the larger problem of ecological overshoot, and it is debt that enables this overshoot. Pay off your debts, and refuse to take on new debts. This will greatly limit the amount of resources you can use or cause to be used. Convince your neighbor to do it too.
Sadly it will take some extreme event to trigger a change. And when I say extreme I mean millions dead or displaced etc. Because until there's a revolt it's business as usual. There's too much money and power at stake for the incumbents ... Why would they bother to change.
I think what will realistically happen is that we just destroy the planet as is and adapt our lives to a near-worst case scenario.
Probably just accepting the worst case instead of continuing the illusion based on lies is more constructive.
Has anyone actually researched the “climate crisis” here
Is there really any conclusive data aka : DAMN SURE DATA that we are running off a cliff
Or is this all “end of the world” propaganda.
Whos ready to sacrifice millions of people to create this “environmental Utopia”?
This isn't it. Because Socialism is poverty for the masses and Uber wealth for the upper classes.
We either solve it together or we die together. As long as Taylor Swift flies cross country every week and that one Kardashian flies for **literal lunch**, I will grill my beef on charcoal.
There’s no one solution.
Electric cars are what Europe is going for but then my country is closing down their nuclear power plants replacing them with gas fuelled plants - they’re saying it’s temporary but I’m not buying it - making the electric car basically worse than the fossil fuelled car as lots of energy goes to waste on transforming gas to electricity. That’s not gonna cut it.
Also if all cars would be exchanged rn to an electric type the grid wouldn’t support it. It would be too much.
So then let’s go with an emissions tax to pay for everything, they say. People can hardly afford their homes and food so let’s make them pay even more, right? Wrong!
One thing is for sure: it’s gonna cost a lot of investments and if we’re gonna wait for companies to do this we’re never gonna get there.
It’s gonna take a lot of small actions applied wide n large. It’s gonna take awareness. It’s gonna take us all to dial down. Dial down needless consumption. Only use what we really need. It’s gonna take solar power and wind power and nuclear and electric cars as well as hydrogen fuelled cars. Or no cars. Alternative transportation. It’s gonna take us to simplify our lifestyles. Its gonna take the rich supporting the poor. Its gonna take daring politicians who realise it will never happen if you gonna tax people to death. Its gonna take replanting the whole rain forest. Its gonna take adaptation to a changing world.
I believe the human race is resourceful and resilient enough to get through this and solve it but it’s not gonna happen if we keep bickering and put money over the planet and people. For every person who has too much there will be hundreds who have too little. Its gonna take us to share more equally. Its gonna take governments that have courage to achieve what needs to be achieved. Its gonna take all of us.
There really is no solution. Our entire world is built around fossil fuels now. How we grow our food. How we transport that food. The clothes we wear. The home we live in. Even the EV you drive. Where does electricity come from? In many cases, from burning fossil fuel! Basically everything in the modern world relies on fossil fuels. So the very concept that we need to reduce our reliance on them is preposterous. How any scientist could even say such a stupid thing is incredible.
I'm developing a system that digests bio garbage into nutrient water, into plant matter. It addresses methane and soil runoff, and should be very profitable. Nobody with the power to help cares, so it sits in my backyard and local community garden.
There are two options: have fewer people on earth, or maintain the same number of people on earth but use fewer resources per person.
The solution to the first one would be one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. The solution to the second would be either some form of global authoritarianism, or a world where an individuals best interest align with the collective best interest, and both are aimed at reducing emissions. It's difficult to imaging the second given the tragedy of the commons problem, but it might arise given an existential threat that cannot be ignored.
Ur so far gone in the woods. If there should be less people then since its your idea, you and your family and all your loved ones have to go and mine can stay. Sound fair? Remember it was your idea
As an individual….nothing. And we should be honest with people about that. As a bigger picture a coming together to focus on the things that work and are monetarily realistic and toss aside anything else. The perception now is that is just a cluster of a million ideas with way too many people screaming that this is happening and that is happening and not adding to the solution. Just being the unhelpful voice screaming in the wilderness.
The truth? Bare nitty gritty, the only thing that will stop it is when we are in such deep shit that not even corporations can fully function. Corporations and world trade as we know it must fail, must have CEO's that can no longer profit and jump shit. Or rather, if they see promising Capitol from having "greener" options.
Change is not going to occur when we need to do it AKA now. It will change when we are forced to have no other choice. That's it. Until then, strap in and enjoy the ride.
We are already solving. Just see the trends in energy Capex. Global Renewable Electricity Capex is already bigger than Global oil and gas Capex.
You're all are underestimating China's willingless to get itself free from the Malaca Strait.
It's going to get hotter than we want, and it's going to cause major problems, but unless climate change is combined with nuclear war humans will manage to muddle through. There are lots of ways to help pull the needle toward better outcomes - protests to raise awareness and drive change; volunteering for organizations that are working on climate related issues; working directly to deploy more clean tech as electricians, finance-bros, engineers, call center employees, marketers, salespeople. Major corporations have had a chance - Exxon, Conoco Phillips, Saudi Aramco, etc., all have deep pockets and deep technical knowledge but are still bad actors, so we're going to put them out of business with economics (regulatory capture means we probably won't legislate them out of existence). An important piece of that is addressing their misinformation when you find it in the wild.
Realistically, We'd have to permanently stop the people running the corporations responsible for this through irreversible capital punishment. And we have to apply that punishment universally and without compromise for the rest of time.
With a mentality shift.
If we put x pollutants out there we need a way to also remove and process them. No more of this “let’s just dump it into the environment with no care for the consequences leaded gasoline BS”
we can’t lol just gotta watch the population reduce by like 6 billion and try to survive, sorry. gonna try to mitigate it as much possible but it’s looking very over
The only way anything changes in a fashion that will *actually* make a difference is if India and China get their acts together. And they won’t. So I choose not to stress too much about it and be as reasonable with my other actions as I can be.
Honestly, people need to vote. At least in the US, there's a huge problem because a lot of the climate change rhetoric focuses on individual choices, and the reality is that the vast majority of the problem is created by industry. For example, the US nut industry uses enormous amounts of water. We should regulate the consumption of water through a variety of public policy means in order to moderate the use of scarce water resources. But instead, the US focuses on the final consumer. And that's just not very effective, so the nut industry continues to use enormous amounts of water and nothing changes except a few people make desperate social media posts. Other people roll their eyes. Nothing changes.
If we used public policy, we could actually create real change.
But in the US, you'd be accused of being a Communist so it's a non-starter.
Well, "the people," have to make this their top voting priority. This is a political will problem, and has been for 50 years. We have had technology that would contribute to solving the problem for 25 years. Nobody WANTS to buy insurance. We have laws that require it because otherwise, people would make mistakes that would wipe others out financially. It will be "nickles and dimes," of billion dollar "natural," disasters that we've been predicting would happen for decades. Collectively, it's a multi trillion dollar event unfolding over the next 50 years.
start in the southern usa like florida
de occupy 500 square miles of land
remove hazards like chem tanks, fence posts
break up the roads, flatten buildings
transport all the zoo elephants to this location
have killer drones patroll cleared area of all humans
repeat
Money would have to not exist for something we do as a whole for it to maybe make a difference.
And then there’s a long list of stuff we should never manufacture ever again.
Fewer people.
As China and Covid have proven, with the political will it is possible to drastically reduce the number of people on the planet.
It is time for our society to grow up and realize that we are the problem. There needs to be fewer of us.
Yes, it will suck in the short term...especially for the top end business owners that depend on unfettered growth, and for the old, who depend on growth to pay down the debt their generation has incurred.
Longer term though, it is the only solution that we know will significantly impact our output of CO2.
- We aren't going to consume less...that is obvious.
- We aren't going to science out way out of this one in time to make a meaningful difference. To think otherwise is magical thinking.
- We aren't going to be saved by god/aliens/crystals/greenwashed bullshit. Stop pretending like we already have a solution.
Our population is going to drastically decrease one way or another. The remaining question is whether we want this to be a catastrophic decline or a controlled one.
Align economic incentives (individualistic greed) with environmental benefits and consequences. People don't always do things out of the goodness of their hearts, but give them a solid reason to do so. Examples:
If I have solar + storage I can save $5k/yr on electricity and break even in 5 years.
If I buy one good set of boots for $400 it's cheaper than buying 3 pairs of $200 boots over 15 years and they'll be nicer to wear.
Make rubbish more expensive than compost and recycling. Now half the neighbourhood prefers recycling since its cheaper and easy to find recyclable alternatives
Charge $0.50 for a disposable coffee cup but use a loan and borrow system for keep cups for free
Unite the world into one entity so it can be controlled by a benevolent emperor. One world government ruled by an iron fist. Then execute half the planet. Then MAYBE we have a shot at not being wiped back to the stone age.
You personally could make a huge difference; but you have to admit that it might be hard to get started:
Reduce or eliminate eating beef
Reduce or eliminate dairy
Eat more vegetables and fruit
Decrease buying new clothes
Stop buying new cars
Stop buying new most things.
Dry your laundry outside
Contact your politicians
=========
You can have a powerful influence use your spending to shape what needs to happen on a wider scale.
I think it would have to be a mix of UBI and AI taking jobs. If people have more resources to be taken care of, communities can focus on other things like health/education/equity rights/empathy and connection. I think too, we are going to have to dig up and industrialize some earth to get some infastructure in place that is more long term compatable with climate goals. We gotta make a bit of mess to get everything set up for the next stage like nuclear power. Also, religion is a problem - it creates a lot of war which has been really bad...we gotta remind ourselves to calm down.
We die. Machines don't work without us. Plants overtake areas they naturally would without human intervention. Atmosphere balances itself. We are really looking to be quite the temporary species in our current order.
Not all people consider climate change problematic. Yes, the Earth is dynamic and things change slowly over time. We adapt, overcome and live a happy life.
Read Project Drawdown and apply the solutions that are applicable in our lives/geography. In politics, ministries of agriculture, transports, forestries/natural resources, industries and education need to do the same.
Massive collective effort. The systems we built are not optimizing stable longevity. There are no such organizations so all the talk is just circle jerk.
But it’s fine. If the goal of the universe is to proliferate intelligent life, it’s happening elsewhere. We don’t have to be in the race until the end.
Population is finally slowing down and by 2035 we should actually start to see it drop. Development will slow dramatically as most emerging markets will have caught up. But some of the immediate things are 1. Stop unnecessary development 2. Green our buildings, 3. Conserve energy , hybrid cars, better AC, etc 4. Recycle, recycle, recycle . 5. Reflective coating on roads and bridges. These are all fairly easy to implement and will have huge effects. Electrification and solar are some of the dumbest ‘green’ government policies. These technologies generate more hazardous and toxic waste then anything we currently use. They are not “green”
The earth is massively powerful and our totally inadequate models can’t come close to understanding and duplicating the incredibly complicated climate systems that surround it.
Adaption is and has always been the logical and only solution. Current plans absolutely kill the poor of the earth and accomplish nothing.
We have 80 years of petroleum left. When it is gone the combustion problem will be solved. But a new problem will be in our face- what fuel do we use for energy?
Surprised nobody mentions china. Or CEOs who take private jets every other week to go on a ''business trip''. I can tell you one thing though, paper straws aren't nearly enough to offset half a percent of the previous two points I mentioned lol
I’m a doomer and think we are already too late but on the off chance that we actually do create some form of agi or asi and it is inherently good, I could maybe see it being able to save us somehow, maybe…
I mean I think we’ve introduced too much “new” carbon into the system so even if we stopped and just planted trees we would need too many trees which would require too much water to sustain. I think our only option is to extract it from the air and bury it back in the ground where we found it.
A significant part of climate change is caused by private jet usage. I've already published a solution to this in my Substack here: the main problem is simply spreading this information to enough people.
[The Infohazard Economy, Part 2 - by HumbleRando (substack.com)](https://questioner.substack.com/p/the-infohazard-economy-part-2)
We must protect our freedom but also we must capitalise all resources elsewhere and bring it back here so we can live like kings. Or we can accept that we're the problem.
Stop having a economic system where the default is growth for growths sake
*This; the road starts here. IMO it’s exactly why we won’t achieve it by choice. We will achieve it via collapse though, I’m certain.
Mexico is an example of slow GDP growth but measurable improvements in many people's lives.
So regress instead of progress?
The economic system won't just go away. Humanity depends on it. And we have rejected every alternative. We have to come up with other alternatives that people can believe in or die trying. Or we reshape the system we have. Those are our alternatives.
The unfortunate fact is, while individual action is proper and laudable, not nearly enough to stem the damage. Private citizens just don’t directly control enough carbon footprint. We can’t solve it by any action we can take separately. The world needs major systemic change, and that has to come from governments, as they have to power to set laws, regulations and the authority to enforce them.
Even Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg or Elon Musk couldn't do enough action on their own. I'd they shut down all the corporations and organizations that they own it would be maybe 1% of the problem? Even if you assume those 3 humans control 10% of the world's pollution - that's still only 10% of the problem. Lookup the breakdown of the sources of climate change. It looks like a pie that's been split for 16 people. Mining, transportation, food, agriculture, deforestation, fossil fuels... each sector is only a fraction of the problem. Snap your fingers and all cars and trucks and trains and planes and ships are non-polluting and it's the same problem as our billionaires - it's only 5-10% of the problem. (All these numbers arent exact, but there's no one person or solution for it)
That's a good way to put it. There's no silver bullet, and it's unfortunate that the fact that there are so many layers that need to be addressed leads to people feeling defeated. We're in a Mexican Stand-off with corporations and Government. We're all pointing at each other saying the others are responsible to fix this. It's an all hands on deck situation!
How can we pressure the government? All I can think of are like protests.
i would not be surprised to see eco-terrorists by the end of this decade and frankly, even that might not change much
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It will also give them the excuse to militarize against the movement
Stochastic violence like that won’t do anything to help us here. Don’t get me wrong I’m totally fine with it, it just won’t move the needle unfortunately
We vote, we protest, we make sure the issue stays in the public eye. It hasn’t been enough to move the needle meaningfully. All we get are vague, non-binding targets that aren’t enough even if we met them. Which we’re not doing so far because there’s no systematic change.
And we have to make enough people care about this issue that they are willing to stand with us against our governments and protest their lack of action.
People would also need to be meaningfully willing to sacrifice in order to solve it which, I think it's clear by now, is not going to happen until it's much too late. Honestly our best hope is some kind of vauge technofix like AI government, orbital sun shades or fusion energy plus direct air capture. People are just not capable of comprehending how much damage we are doing in a way that would galvanize the necessary social change. Especially where I live ...
And good luck to all of us. The people are so easily distracted, whether it be overwhelmed with life/jobs, or social media, or the culture war topic of the moment (rn it’s immigration).
Vote blue, it's that easy. Biden and Dems have been the only thing giving us at least a hope of a chance with IRA and other significant climate bills. They need maximum political capital in the form of voter mandate in order to accomplish more.
A Democrat who doesn't support corporate interests won't get elected. Yes Dem's are better than the alternative, however, it's not enough. And it's dangerous to pretend the Democrats are going to save us when they won't.
We the People have to take action in order to get that ball rolling. The good news is, all of these problems are connected. Economy (economic inequality), Energy (outdated fossil fuel based infrastructure), Ecology (global warming) and Equality. The root cause is the same (greed), which means we can address them all simultaneously. Build a cooperative economy by building a new green infrastructure and reversing global warming. I know this might seem like a big word salad, but we've created a 30-year plan and started a non-profit vehicle to make it happen. I'm happy to answer questions, provide resources etc. There ARE solutions. But we gotta work together. Sorry for the wordy response
Individual action has an impact, the strongest impact being turning community opinions in the right direction so that the systemic change is more accepted. Systemic change won't just flip from no one caring to someone at the top making a decision. For good and bad reasons, people at the top (usually) can't make decisions that aren't at least in most ways aligned with the individual people's desires. Not without undesired consequences for all parties
My attitude the past few years is that it is ethical and correct to make individual changes, but it’s not going to amount to much when corporations and extremely rich individuals treat the planet like it’s disposable. I got tired of thinking that not driving as much or recycling or any other common trope offered for individual climate action is going to displace the emissions produced by someone like Taylor swift who flies around on a private jet like we would drive to the grocery store The most we can do is vote with our wallets and for politicians who care. Protests could work but unless they are extremely large and sometimes destructive/disruptive, no one on the top seems to care
Agreed. We can’t individually solve the problem. However, I like to think anything we do personally contributes in some small way to lessen the suffering of those most impacted. I think these folks are pointing to some ways forward: https://drawdown.org/
Oh yes, I totally support individual action simply because it’s right. But we need to understand it’s not enough.
Green authoritarianism is probably the only way.
It works. Problem is getting it. I’ve seen limited expressions of it, but that’s what they were, limited. Not general, long term policy.
Spoken like someone that hasn't protested a day in their lives.
It would take a world wide totalitarian state, most people wouldn't support that, for one reason or another, it would be more restrictive than a communist wet dream.
You say individual actions are laudable. I doubt. I refrain from driving my car as often as possible. Then look at the street, just in my neighborhood I see people driving 10,000 cars, and what's the point of me doing my part!?
The only other option to governments seems to be investment funds, as many are seeing climate change as a system risk and are slowly putting pressure on their investments to move away from fossil fuels.
You nailed it. I think it can be solved pretty easily if society wants too solve it. The problem is we don't want to solve it right now.
There are about 2000 private citizens (billionaires) who have the ability to change this. And they won't. They would rather us all die than be mere hundred millionaires.
I'd like someone to start a website or club where you can track your own carbon footprint and help develop strategies of degrowth that are the least painful possible. I'd like to see a breakdown of peoples carbon allowance and a way to share strategies to reduce more. a least we might have some first person narratives to share with future generations that we sort of tried.
Yep. But people influence the corps and the law makers. Bit like Carter said, it will take sacrifice. And not from those with nothing. We use and have and want way to much shit and corps use that to keep the people complacent enough to not care. It's systemic.
What damage? And how do you quantify the damage? Can you cite a paper stating EXACTLY WHAT IMPLICATIONS this has and not just speculation?
Stop voting for people who deny that the problem exists. Stop voting for people who deny the problem will continue to have a negative impact to our environment, our economy and our society that will only get worse over time.
Ah yes, we can vote the environment back with our extremely effective democracy that totally not controlled top to bottom from the very people causing climate change for their own benefit.
But it still is a tool to use and we'd be fools to not do so. Further, we know as a fact that should the right continue to win, it *will* get worse. We can't vote it out, but we can vote to slow it while we organize better approaches.
We find out how to get a ton of clean energy. And then hope we find out a way to use all that power to reterraform our planet. Scrubbing carbon or doing something.
This is the way. And guess what. The only way to get to that technology is the “progress” everyone been complaining about lol.
It exists. It's called nuclear. There is nothing else.
There’s deep geothermal. The tech needs improving but we have the expertise from drilling oil wells as a starting point. You can listen more on this from 41:50 at [https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/38-sebastian-Heitmann](https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/38-sebastian-Heitmann)
If you believe that carbon is the ultimate evil and minimizing it is the only meaningful goal, then I agree with nuclear for electrification, considering technology currently available. The issue with most renewables is the cost and time to scale it up worldwide. There will be a need for lots of hydrocarbon production and use, even if we mostly stop using it for fuel. (It’s convenient to blame the “greedy oil companies” but the largest oil companies are owned by governments, and the politicians won’t shut off that cash flow. Look at one of the “greenest” governments around - Norway- who enacted a huge tax on ICE cars (something like $30,000 per vehicle, IIRC) to drive electric vehicles adoption, but their oil companies are still running flat out with no sign of slowing or stopping,) We should stop blaming “governments” and “corporations.” Representative governments loosely reflect the will of the people. Authoritarian governments reflect the goals and desires of those who are in power. In both cases, the government is lead by people who want to stay in power and enrich themselves. Corporations (actually better to just say “businesses” since a corporation is just one of many forms of business organization) exist to invest money, sell a product or service to customers and reward their shareholders with the profit from that business. No customers (or no product customers want) - > no profit -> no business. (Sure entrenched managements sometimes reward themselves more than shareholders, but the market corrects that problem.) There is no realistic hope for some kind of world government or consensus on a global basis. Empires come and go over history, but they’re all built on the power and wealth of the rulers for a period. There is no existing organization that can do this - notice how strikingly ineffectual are groups like the United Nations. The rich countries can afford to throw money at the problem. But it doesn’t matter, since China and India alone (plus every other poor country) will erase all the carbon reductions in the rich countries. Few if any governments will enact policies that force its citizens to live like serfs - they all want to promise and deliver prosperity to the middle class that the rich countries already enjoy. I think we’re left with innovation and adaptation. Probably not revolutionary, but incremental.
I wouldn't put too much faith in hope...
End the production of useless crap like iPhones every year or cheap plastic shit that breaks in a year. Have manufacturers work on high quality stuff with fair working conditions and environmental regulations. No Smart phone ever year. You get a easily fixable and sustainable Fairphone every five years made from recycled parts
Love ideas like this. How about stop all new ICE passenger car and truck production now. Immediately. That would cause a ripple.
people getting smartphones every year is a strawman. very few people do that
In a sense it’s simpler than most people seem to think. Decarbonize the electric grid, electrify everything we can, use CCS to compensate for everything we can’t. As an individual, you’re not likely going to be able to make a tremendous difference. The best things you can do are a) run for office and direct funding towards the aforementioned efforts or b) work for one of the companies building those technologies.
Those are the solutions that are simpler to understand. How much of that and how we actually put that into effect, as well as how we even determine how much is enough, are the hard parts.
>Decarbonize the electric grid, electrify everything we can, use CCS to compensate for everything we can’t. It blows my mind that anybody can confidently state that any of this is "simple". On top of that, carbon capture is absolute pure fantasy unless you're talking about restoring grasslands or other ecosystems.
Well, our choice is to either figure it out, or have an increasingly bad time by the mid to late 21st Century. We can only slow down so much, some of the carbon is going to need to be sucked out of the atmosphere in order for us to return the planet to climactic equilibrium... And that opinion is shared by the IPCC. I hope we are able to make it feasible, the alternative paths are shit.
I don't even think we are actually trying. The best selling vehicles are giant pickup trucks and the EVs have 500+ hp and go zero to 60 in under 4 seconds. [https://www.zeroto60times.com/vehicle-make/tesla-0-60-mph-times/](https://www.zeroto60times.com/vehicle-make/tesla-0-60-mph-times/) [https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g43553191/bestselling-cars-2023/](https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g43553191/bestselling-cars-2023/)
Protest. Depending on your country, I'd recomend doing it for carbon taxes first. It's the low hanging fruit.
Yeah without massive, world-wide revolution I genuinely don’t believe we can do anything substantial. We’ve already crossed the point of no return. Millions if not billions will die. Complete radical change of climates worldwide. From new tornado valleys to desertification of currently fertile plains to the melting of permafrost and the changing of wind streams like the Gulf Stream. The blame is on the corrupt politicians, oil barons, and big plastic manufacturers, amongst others. If there is an afterlife, may they all endure the most sadistic of torture, and even then, they get off easier than what they truly deserve for ending our current world as we know it. Climate refugees, food shortages, crop failure, fungi running rampant due to humidity + temp increases (not to mention the absolute idiotic mono-culture farming methods). Water levels rising, fresh water contamination, Ocean acidification, and the list goes on and on. We are truly and utterly fricked and that’s lowballing it.
The good news is that solar + batteries is already the cheapest way to make power so the whole planet will switch to that just out of economic desire rather than anything else. Also electric cars are already cheaper over 10 years than gasoline so again everyone will switch for that reason too (which will help the grid as a lot of people want to charge over night when there's excess energy). Also recycling of electric vehicle battery packs is a better way to get minerals than mining them so once a whole electric fleet is built out there'll be very little extra resources extraction needed for it. So yeah both road transport and power generation will switch to electric without any need for government intervention, though it's good if governments tax fossil fuels (rather than subsidising them) to make it happen faster.
ratcheting up a global price on carbon would do it, bonus points to make it as progressive as possible so giving the most money back to the poorest most affected people/countries but good god good luck implementing that even carbon taxes in an individual country is a tough sell and typically anyone who stands to lose even an inch/dollar will fight it like crazy even if it's in their best long term interests
We can’t at this point let’s be real
Find a way to catalyze a global paradigm shift. I'm not kidding or being sarcastic -- this is the key. And the only real solution. All the suggestions to vote, buy an EV, incentivize green initiatives, etc., are primarily focused on providing specific solutions to specific manifestations of a very broad problem that goes far beyond climate change. The problem lies in our deepest paradigms, behaviors, and personalities as individuals, and more importantly as a collective. Our proclivity for materialism, and the resource misuse and irresponsible consumption that accompanies it, must be replaced with a holistic view of the world that places humanity as a member of that world rather than the hub around which it turns. We must replace our self-centered priorities, decisions, behaviors, and morals with selflessness and the same holistic perspective that empowers the average person with a sense of duty to follow such categorical imperatives (to borrow language from Kant's philosophy). We must deprioritize (or, ideally, altogether eliminate) obsessions with wealth, power, status, and other fabricated ideals, and rediscover the organic paths to a happy and fulfilling life that lie in community, companionship, and cooperation -- with each other and the world as a whole. Climate change *is* a massive problem, but it is not in a silo, disconnected from other issues. And if you pick any of them and trace them back far enough, you'll find these same problems. It isn't *just* a pollution and resource problem -- that's an outward manifestation of thousands of years of poisoning paradigms. Find out how to catalyze a global paradigm shift, and you've discovered how to solve them all.
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The strangely peaceful protesters are discussed in How to Blow Up A Pipeline.
The solutions have to be largely technological. Had I the power, I'd pour huge resources into recruiting, training, and employing engineers of all kinds to work on solutions for carbon free concrete, food production, energy, etc.
At the local level you can demand your energy providers switch to renewable, and get AS MANY people around you as possible to do the same. Demand enough charging stations be available so that the entire automobile fleet can charge when needed. Demand higher efficiency in any product you buy (don't buy low efficiency stuff). Drive less. Which means better public transportation. You've got a lot better chance of effecting change at the local level, so get involved in your local government, show up for public meetings, write to your legislators, organize protests if necessary <-- Make them FUN or people won't show up, get petitions for legislation, go to farmer's markets, outside grocery stores, etcetera. Educate people on why it matters to them personally (their pocketbooks are the best way, not through shaming or trying to explain the science in detail).
I don't think EVs are as effective as people think.
One of my favorite things I've heard working in the renewables and carbon space is "there's no silver bullet... but there is silver buckshot". It's going to be a lot of everything. The economic drivers around climate change are shifting. Insurance is starting to pass the cost down, and financial institutions are noticing. Renewables are catching up to and surpassing the efficiency of some of our dirtiest fuels. Having said that, the apolitical progress is great, but I genuinely think it's too little too late. We need to figure out how to sequester CO2. Direct air capture is a joke - it's parasitic load is like 4 MW/t CO2, which... it's just silly. The key to extracting CO2 from the air is to grow more biomass, extracting CO2 via photosynthesis, then using anaerobic digestion to turn it in to biogas - 60% CH4 can be upgraded to produce renewable natural gas, then the 40% CO2 fraction can be sequestered... somehow. Geosequestration is on the horizon, and is the best, most deployable solution I've seen. Basically the answer is we need to **both** stop our emissions **and** extract CO2 from the air in order to disrupt the natural tipping points we're stumbling in to, like thawing permafrost.
We need to divide wants vs. needs and supply the needs for everyone and only allow wants that do not use linear resources / ration them tightly. Today whether you order a sex doll or a sack of potatoes, their priority for transport is the same. Surely one is more of a need than another. (The sex doll obv.) Or a very high carbon tax, which would have somewhat the same effect (but absolve the super rich, which is no small issue). Or 3/4 og the population dies, and we can all drive diesel pickups and eat straks.
So I’ll appoint my self as the czar of deciding “wants” vs “needs” and you’ll do what I say. Let me know when you’re ready.
Everything is happening too slowly and co2 lingers around. So even if we stop co2 emissions today we will still see warming for a while. Population growth is stalling, technology is getting better. At some point we will have less humans and less emissions and climate will recover. Not in my or your lifetime though.
Once there's enough pressure from people on politicians and corporations to get shit done, it's already going to be too late and we'll be in a spiraling feedback loop and no amount of infrastructure changes or nuclear reactors or EVs or plastic recycling is gonna save us. I'm just happy I'll probably be very old or dead by that point, but I think we already might be in the early stages of that given every month for the past year has been the hottest ever. I think the only real hope for future generations is some type of scientific breakthrough in energy production and carbon capture that can be easily rolled out on a mass scale.
We are doing everything we are going to do. Gradually evolving wind and solar. Technology is gradually improving. Oil and gas getting more expensive. The shale boom is leveling out. China is moving away from Fossil fuel, even though they continue to be big users. Europe is leading us. It will be however hot it will be in 2050, and we will deal. And the population is peaking soon. I am not even sure I want a "global initiative" to solve the problem. God know what major mistakes we would make. All of the decisions would be driven by profit. A certain way to screw up
Maybe China and India could stop building new coal power plants.
Make saving the world profitable.
Global warming is a part of the larger problem of ecological overshoot, and it is debt that enables this overshoot. Pay off your debts, and refuse to take on new debts. This will greatly limit the amount of resources you can use or cause to be used. Convince your neighbor to do it too.
Fascist authorities around the world stemming consumption and population. That’s the only true answer
You are so far out in the woods man. 😵💫
Sadly it will take some extreme event to trigger a change. And when I say extreme I mean millions dead or displaced etc. Because until there's a revolt it's business as usual. There's too much money and power at stake for the incumbents ... Why would they bother to change.
I think what will realistically happen is that we just destroy the planet as is and adapt our lives to a near-worst case scenario. Probably just accepting the worst case instead of continuing the illusion based on lies is more constructive.
Monetize the solution at a higher rate than you monitize the cause.
The problem is humanity. We can and won't fix it. So no. There is no fixing it until we stop being human and become something more.
Has anyone actually researched the “climate crisis” here Is there really any conclusive data aka : DAMN SURE DATA that we are running off a cliff Or is this all “end of the world” propaganda. Whos ready to sacrifice millions of people to create this “environmental Utopia”?
It will never be "solved," at this point. At best it might be a tiny bit mitigated.
Socialism
This isn't it. Because Socialism is poverty for the masses and Uber wealth for the upper classes. We either solve it together or we die together. As long as Taylor Swift flies cross country every week and that one Kardashian flies for **literal lunch**, I will grill my beef on charcoal.
Because it works so well every time it's tried?
There is no solving it. The best we can hope for at this point is a well managed transition, with minimal damage, but even that seems unlikely.
There’s no one solution. Electric cars are what Europe is going for but then my country is closing down their nuclear power plants replacing them with gas fuelled plants - they’re saying it’s temporary but I’m not buying it - making the electric car basically worse than the fossil fuelled car as lots of energy goes to waste on transforming gas to electricity. That’s not gonna cut it. Also if all cars would be exchanged rn to an electric type the grid wouldn’t support it. It would be too much. So then let’s go with an emissions tax to pay for everything, they say. People can hardly afford their homes and food so let’s make them pay even more, right? Wrong! One thing is for sure: it’s gonna cost a lot of investments and if we’re gonna wait for companies to do this we’re never gonna get there. It’s gonna take a lot of small actions applied wide n large. It’s gonna take awareness. It’s gonna take us all to dial down. Dial down needless consumption. Only use what we really need. It’s gonna take solar power and wind power and nuclear and electric cars as well as hydrogen fuelled cars. Or no cars. Alternative transportation. It’s gonna take us to simplify our lifestyles. Its gonna take the rich supporting the poor. Its gonna take daring politicians who realise it will never happen if you gonna tax people to death. Its gonna take replanting the whole rain forest. Its gonna take adaptation to a changing world. I believe the human race is resourceful and resilient enough to get through this and solve it but it’s not gonna happen if we keep bickering and put money over the planet and people. For every person who has too much there will be hundreds who have too little. Its gonna take us to share more equally. Its gonna take governments that have courage to achieve what needs to be achieved. Its gonna take all of us.
There really is no solution. Our entire world is built around fossil fuels now. How we grow our food. How we transport that food. The clothes we wear. The home we live in. Even the EV you drive. Where does electricity come from? In many cases, from burning fossil fuel! Basically everything in the modern world relies on fossil fuels. So the very concept that we need to reduce our reliance on them is preposterous. How any scientist could even say such a stupid thing is incredible.
I'm developing a system that digests bio garbage into nutrient water, into plant matter. It addresses methane and soil runoff, and should be very profitable. Nobody with the power to help cares, so it sits in my backyard and local community garden.
Contact your representatives and get them to enact policies on getting people off gas heating. Heat pumps are cheaper and do not pollute.
Vote. Solutions are pretty well known and documented in publications like Drawdown. We need more people in power willing to take action
Every major industrialized country would have to do a WW2 style, all hands in, mobilization starting today.
I’m going to crack open another beer. That’s how I plan on tackling climate change. One beer at a time.
The ministry of the future book seeks to present a plausible path - a currency based on carbon credits
There are two options: have fewer people on earth, or maintain the same number of people on earth but use fewer resources per person. The solution to the first one would be one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. The solution to the second would be either some form of global authoritarianism, or a world where an individuals best interest align with the collective best interest, and both are aimed at reducing emissions. It's difficult to imaging the second given the tragedy of the commons problem, but it might arise given an existential threat that cannot be ignored.
Ur so far gone in the woods. If there should be less people then since its your idea, you and your family and all your loved ones have to go and mine can stay. Sound fair? Remember it was your idea
As an individual….nothing. And we should be honest with people about that. As a bigger picture a coming together to focus on the things that work and are monetarily realistic and toss aside anything else. The perception now is that is just a cluster of a million ideas with way too many people screaming that this is happening and that is happening and not adding to the solution. Just being the unhelpful voice screaming in the wilderness.
The truth? Bare nitty gritty, the only thing that will stop it is when we are in such deep shit that not even corporations can fully function. Corporations and world trade as we know it must fail, must have CEO's that can no longer profit and jump shit. Or rather, if they see promising Capitol from having "greener" options. Change is not going to occur when we need to do it AKA now. It will change when we are forced to have no other choice. That's it. Until then, strap in and enjoy the ride.
Policy changes, Carbon taxes, and incentives to reduce population/procreation.
Nuclear winter can cancel out global warming
We are already solving. Just see the trends in energy Capex. Global Renewable Electricity Capex is already bigger than Global oil and gas Capex. You're all are underestimating China's willingless to get itself free from the Malaca Strait.
It's going to get hotter than we want, and it's going to cause major problems, but unless climate change is combined with nuclear war humans will manage to muddle through. There are lots of ways to help pull the needle toward better outcomes - protests to raise awareness and drive change; volunteering for organizations that are working on climate related issues; working directly to deploy more clean tech as electricians, finance-bros, engineers, call center employees, marketers, salespeople. Major corporations have had a chance - Exxon, Conoco Phillips, Saudi Aramco, etc., all have deep pockets and deep technical knowledge but are still bad actors, so we're going to put them out of business with economics (regulatory capture means we probably won't legislate them out of existence). An important piece of that is addressing their misinformation when you find it in the wild.
No. Unless the people at the top decided to, and they won't, we can't fix it.
Protest? This isn't a technology problem. It's a political and cultural problem.
Realistically, We'd have to permanently stop the people running the corporations responsible for this through irreversible capital punishment. And we have to apply that punishment universally and without compromise for the rest of time.
With a mentality shift. If we put x pollutants out there we need a way to also remove and process them. No more of this “let’s just dump it into the environment with no care for the consequences leaded gasoline BS”
we can’t lol just gotta watch the population reduce by like 6 billion and try to survive, sorry. gonna try to mitigate it as much possible but it’s looking very over
The only way anything changes in a fashion that will *actually* make a difference is if India and China get their acts together. And they won’t. So I choose not to stress too much about it and be as reasonable with my other actions as I can be.
Vote Blue - across the board
Honestly, people need to vote. At least in the US, there's a huge problem because a lot of the climate change rhetoric focuses on individual choices, and the reality is that the vast majority of the problem is created by industry. For example, the US nut industry uses enormous amounts of water. We should regulate the consumption of water through a variety of public policy means in order to moderate the use of scarce water resources. But instead, the US focuses on the final consumer. And that's just not very effective, so the nut industry continues to use enormous amounts of water and nothing changes except a few people make desperate social media posts. Other people roll their eyes. Nothing changes. If we used public policy, we could actually create real change. But in the US, you'd be accused of being a Communist so it's a non-starter.
Negative population growth.
Gwynne Dyer just wrote a whole book on this
By becoming Type 1 civilization on Kardashev scale https://youtu.be/QByk4jJwp9c?si=m9ZbSZC7pKsNUTnm
My guy
Well, "the people," have to make this their top voting priority. This is a political will problem, and has been for 50 years. We have had technology that would contribute to solving the problem for 25 years. Nobody WANTS to buy insurance. We have laws that require it because otherwise, people would make mistakes that would wipe others out financially. It will be "nickles and dimes," of billion dollar "natural," disasters that we've been predicting would happen for decades. Collectively, it's a multi trillion dollar event unfolding over the next 50 years.
start in the southern usa like florida de occupy 500 square miles of land remove hazards like chem tanks, fence posts break up the roads, flatten buildings transport all the zoo elephants to this location have killer drones patroll cleared area of all humans repeat
Stop polluting the ocean. No plastics allowed in any waterways at all. No more single use plastic.
Ask the sun to not be so hot.
I'm not worried about climate change anymore, our testicles filling with microplastics is the new leading cause of what'll be the end of us
Colonize space and transform Earth into a sanctuary.
PROJECTDRAWDOWN.COM
Thunderstorm generator!
It's over, bro.
Money would have to not exist for something we do as a whole for it to maybe make a difference. And then there’s a long list of stuff we should never manufacture ever again.
A much more lethal Covid would have a bigger effect than just about anything.
stop voting for rebublicans and conservatives
You are in control of you. Facts will help you more than opinions.
Fewer people. As China and Covid have proven, with the political will it is possible to drastically reduce the number of people on the planet. It is time for our society to grow up and realize that we are the problem. There needs to be fewer of us. Yes, it will suck in the short term...especially for the top end business owners that depend on unfettered growth, and for the old, who depend on growth to pay down the debt their generation has incurred. Longer term though, it is the only solution that we know will significantly impact our output of CO2. - We aren't going to consume less...that is obvious. - We aren't going to science out way out of this one in time to make a meaningful difference. To think otherwise is magical thinking. - We aren't going to be saved by god/aliens/crystals/greenwashed bullshit. Stop pretending like we already have a solution. Our population is going to drastically decrease one way or another. The remaining question is whether we want this to be a catastrophic decline or a controlled one.
"This problem", what problem? Context please.
The best thing we can do is vote for people who believe in climate change and intend to take action
Everyone one needs to significantly reduce their consumption or replace fossil fuels with nuclear. Good luck on either.
Align economic incentives (individualistic greed) with environmental benefits and consequences. People don't always do things out of the goodness of their hearts, but give them a solid reason to do so. Examples: If I have solar + storage I can save $5k/yr on electricity and break even in 5 years. If I buy one good set of boots for $400 it's cheaper than buying 3 pairs of $200 boots over 15 years and they'll be nicer to wear. Make rubbish more expensive than compost and recycling. Now half the neighbourhood prefers recycling since its cheaper and easy to find recyclable alternatives Charge $0.50 for a disposable coffee cup but use a loan and borrow system for keep cups for free
Massive reduction in global population over several generations.
Unite the world into one entity so it can be controlled by a benevolent emperor. One world government ruled by an iron fist. Then execute half the planet. Then MAYBE we have a shot at not being wiped back to the stone age.
You personally could make a huge difference; but you have to admit that it might be hard to get started: Reduce or eliminate eating beef Reduce or eliminate dairy Eat more vegetables and fruit Decrease buying new clothes Stop buying new cars Stop buying new most things. Dry your laundry outside Contact your politicians ========= You can have a powerful influence use your spending to shape what needs to happen on a wider scale.
Cold fusion. It will have to be cheaper than any other fuel or we won't stop burning shit.
I think it would have to be a mix of UBI and AI taking jobs. If people have more resources to be taken care of, communities can focus on other things like health/education/equity rights/empathy and connection. I think too, we are going to have to dig up and industrialize some earth to get some infastructure in place that is more long term compatable with climate goals. We gotta make a bit of mess to get everything set up for the next stage like nuclear power. Also, religion is a problem - it creates a lot of war which has been really bad...we gotta remind ourselves to calm down.
No. We are apes.
Nothing that I can legally post on Reddit
We die. Machines don't work without us. Plants overtake areas they naturally would without human intervention. Atmosphere balances itself. We are really looking to be quite the temporary species in our current order.
With AI and Nuclear Energy, but first we need the greedy psycopath out of power.
We can supply regional markets regionally...transportation of goods all over the world is a huge problem
Well, none of these are going to stop geomagnetic reversal.
Not all people consider climate change problematic. Yes, the Earth is dynamic and things change slowly over time. We adapt, overcome and live a happy life.
Read Project Drawdown and apply the solutions that are applicable in our lives/geography. In politics, ministries of agriculture, transports, forestries/natural resources, industries and education need to do the same.
Massive collective effort. The systems we built are not optimizing stable longevity. There are no such organizations so all the talk is just circle jerk. But it’s fine. If the goal of the universe is to proliferate intelligent life, it’s happening elsewhere. We don’t have to be in the race until the end.
Population is finally slowing down and by 2035 we should actually start to see it drop. Development will slow dramatically as most emerging markets will have caught up. But some of the immediate things are 1. Stop unnecessary development 2. Green our buildings, 3. Conserve energy , hybrid cars, better AC, etc 4. Recycle, recycle, recycle . 5. Reflective coating on roads and bridges. These are all fairly easy to implement and will have huge effects. Electrification and solar are some of the dumbest ‘green’ government policies. These technologies generate more hazardous and toxic waste then anything we currently use. They are not “green”
The earth is massively powerful and our totally inadequate models can’t come close to understanding and duplicating the incredibly complicated climate systems that surround it. Adaption is and has always been the logical and only solution. Current plans absolutely kill the poor of the earth and accomplish nothing.
We have 80 years of petroleum left. When it is gone the combustion problem will be solved. But a new problem will be in our face- what fuel do we use for energy?
There is only one way. Kill about 8 billion people. Ground hogs and blue whales aren't causing this mess. We are.
Surprised nobody mentions china. Or CEOs who take private jets every other week to go on a ''business trip''. I can tell you one thing though, paper straws aren't nearly enough to offset half a percent of the previous two points I mentioned lol
I’m a doomer and think we are already too late but on the off chance that we actually do create some form of agi or asi and it is inherently good, I could maybe see it being able to save us somehow, maybe…
Get rid of the main source-humans
I mean I think we’ve introduced too much “new” carbon into the system so even if we stopped and just planted trees we would need too many trees which would require too much water to sustain. I think our only option is to extract it from the air and bury it back in the ground where we found it.
About 3B deaths.
A significant part of climate change is caused by private jet usage. I've already published a solution to this in my Substack here: the main problem is simply spreading this information to enough people. [The Infohazard Economy, Part 2 - by HumbleRando (substack.com)](https://questioner.substack.com/p/the-infohazard-economy-part-2)
destroying several critical pieces of infrastructure across the earth to reset humanity, i.e deliberately cause a collapse of human populations
Wave energy. Every day the coast is slammed with waves where there could be energy harvesting machines that could power atmosphere cleaning
Force the rich to pay more in taxes, eat the rich, wolves
Vote. People really have to vote for politician who act to save people.
We must protect our freedom but also we must capitalise all resources elsewhere and bring it back here so we can live like kings. Or we can accept that we're the problem.