Given the privilege, I’d say, “please, listen to what Ms Thunberg is saying”.
Particularly as Ms Thunberg is saying “I am using my privilege to try to get you to listen to what the scientists are saying.” I mean, she literally made the point that it’s not important whether people listen to her as long as they actually listen to the scientific experts on the matter.
The point is that anything we do to address AGW is going to cost poor people as much or more as it does rich people, rich countries, or those in power in either poor or rich countries. Solar and wind is more expensive than fossil fuels (or nuclear), so the increased cost of energy is going to hurt poor people. If we try to stop industrialization, the traditional path for developing nations is choked off and they don’t develop. If we try to get away from fertilizer-intense agriculture, poor farmers can’t raise as much food. If we push for bio-fuel, that raises the cost of food crops and that hurts poor people who need to buy food. If we make it illegal to have another child, people in poorer countries who tend to have more children are impacted more than people in rich countries who reduce their reproductive rates automatically. Poor people in SE Asia can’t have air conditioning while we try to address the long-term causes of AGW, because that uses up fuel and contributes to AGW.
The notion that we aren’t doing anything about AGW because it hurts those in power is way too narrow a view. It will cost a lot of money to address AGW, and money doesn’t grow on trees.
Which, again, is what’s wrong with Ms. Thunberg’s speech. ‘Global leaders are to blame’ is both wrong, and counter-productive. It assumes that there are solutions that can be implemented if the leaders just decide they should be.
There aren’t any easy, cheap, or politically viable solutions, and blaming ‘global leaders’ misses the point.
Fixing the blame instead of talking about practical solutions is why we aren’t going to do much about AGW.
Solar and wind will not scale up, subsidies do not reduce cost, they shift them, we do not have batteries that can store energy on a practical level, China is the largest emitter of GHG and they ain’t gonna stop, the world is not going to go vegan and give up cars, the Green New Deal failed in Congress without a single vote in its favor, and the Greens here and in Europe determinately change the subject and/or go into fainting fits when we try to implement nuclear.
I hope Ms. Thunberg feels better after her speech, because it isn’t going to accomplish anything beyond that.
Regards,
Shodan
History teaches that all a revolution does is change the members of the elite.
This seems like a childishly simplistic view of history. Sure, some revolutions don’t really change anything, or don’t change things for the better, but some do.
That is an amazingly defeatist attitude. So we just give up? It’s all over? Because it’s hard, we simply can’t save ourselves or the planet? When did humanity get so feckless? We landed on the moon, we defeated global fascism, we’ve conquered deadly diseases. The history of our species is filled with amazing achievements, but all of a sudden now we are just totally incapable of solving a problem we know exists, and we know is a threat to us and to all life on the planet, but it’s just too hard?
How do you think that sounds to today’s youth? You are literally telling them, sorry kids, we are fucking up the place, but we don’t want to have to sacrifice anything at all to try to fix it for you, so good luck!!
I thought we were better than this.
So the American Revolution was a failure?
The French Revolution?
I think your understanding of the lessons of history is a bit lacking.
Where in my post did you see the word “failure ?”
I clearly said the composition of who makes up the elites changes in times of revolution. Do you dispute that?
No doubt he slept through history class, but the American revolution isn’t a good example because it was a reactionary revolution (rebellion by a certain elite for the purpose of retaining elite status). As was the American Civil War.
That’s why American conservatives admire & defend these revolutions and disdain pretty much all the other ones.
We could do something. We could tell global leaders (like Sanders and Warren) and the Greens to “follow the science” just as much as we do, or Thunberg did, everyone else.
No, we need to tell today’s youth that the solutions that are practical are going to cost them. It is not going to be ‘soak the rich’ - China and the Third World are going to suffer as much, or more, than the rich countries, and that includes if we do something vs. if we don’t.
Maybe we can save the planet, overall, and suffer less in the long term than if we just concentrated on remediating the effects as they occur. But that does not mean the short- and medium- and long-term solutions are not going to significantly impact the poor.
It’s going to hurt. And it is going to hurt you. You have to deal with the drawbacks of nuclear waste. You have to deal with the toxic waste of the solar panel factories. You have to give up your car, or another child, or forgo the economic growth that results when we spend on higher cost energy sources instead of lower cost. Not just “the rich”.
Maybe we are better than that. The question is more are you better than that, in that you will sacrifice, and especially concentrate on solutions, instead of focusing on the much more emotionally satisfying blame game.
Regards,
Shodan
I think you are putting a lot of words in my mouth, or you are making a general response on the issue while specifically addressing me?
I have no problem with the fact that society has to make some big changes if we really want to make things better for the future. I’m prepared to be just as much a part of the solution as everyone else will need to be. Our most important job as members of the human species is to do our part to leave the world a better place for those that come after us. If we do not do that we are dooming our own species out of selfishness.
Are you prepared? Are you willing?
Instead of yet another directly insulting post why not demonstrate the error in my post? Preferably with a quote that isn’t 1% of the post.
I was addressing the idea that we are being prevented from doing “something” about AGW because it will hurt the rich. “Something” will hurt everybody, not just the rich. There are no solutions that will only hurt those I want to blame for the problem.
Yes. Therefore, Sanders and Warren and Ocasio-Cortez and the Greens in the US and worldwide and Austria and Australia and Germany and Belgium and Denmark and Italy can go pound sand. Nuclear power is the way to go, and does not receive nearly the attention or commitment that it needs if the issue of AGW is to be addressed effectively.
Maybe I should take a boat and address the UN on the topic. It might help more than an appeal to emotion.
Regards,
Shodan
1% of the post? Literally your entire contribution in post #104 was this sentence:
Don’t expect me to bother disproving something that you didn’t bother to prove. It’s just an ignorant opinion that I suspect hinges largely on a bad understanding of history combined with weaseling around a uselessly broad definition of “elite”.
Feel free to prove me wrong, though.
Well, the answer to this is…I never said it was, and I don’t think it is. Really, it’s…huh? I pretty clearly stated that we have to move forward without nuclear, and that I don’t think it’s going to destroy either our species, as a whole or our civilization, though it’s going to be some rough times ahead for the next century or so. Demise of future generations isn’t my schtick, it’s the folks who are saying that global climate change is going to wipe us out or destroy our civilization. Personally, I don’t think that’s the case, though I think that poor nations and peoples are going to fair a lot worse than you, I or most in this thread…or most in Sweden, Canada, Germany, and most if not all of the 1st world nations.
Not sure what the point of the rest of that is in the paragraph. I don’t think having cable cars would have or could have had the benefits that fossil fuels have had in the explosive growth of not just this nation but pretty much across the globe, or what that has to do with socialism or whatever, or what any of that has to do with nuclear or what I was saying. I honestly don’t see the connection.
Yeah that was a weak point…
Of course it is then obligatory to point out how nuclear power became so prominent in France, it was by doing it in a way that made a good socialist proud. With education to the people and direct government intervention in the construction of the nuclear plants.
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/reaction/readings/french.html
I think Try2B Comprehensive is close to that argument, and I will have to say what I pointed before in a previous discussion: The current conservative party in the US would prefer to die before investing more in education and allowing mostly big government to build the big energy nuclear projects like the French did.
Yeah, we wouldn’t want childish simplistic thinking.
What was the thread about? Oh yes, people taking cues on how to solve a global, highly complex problem from a child.
The “cues” she’s giving are “look at the actual science and listen to the actual experts in the field”. That seems like a pretty good first step to solving a global, highly complex problem.
The content of her message is simple and emotionally delivered but that is pretty much what you’d expect of a sixteen year old. Having read all the speeches she’s given they are high on anger and emotion and low on concrete suggestions. She isn’t a speaker of the calibre of Malala and she sounds like an angry teenager because she is, I don’t think she is deserving of any scorn or insult at all for that. I’m just not sure what she says has any real substance to it outside of the volume and publicity it generates. The end point of all of this is practical action and all the anger and outrage generated is not a substitute for that.
There is the novelty value of a young girl getting angry at world leaders and building up popular momentum but I’m really not sure how that helps move us to do the right things. It may lead us to do *something *sure but not necessarily the right things, and potentially some counterproductive things.
I thought it was rather depressing that she was encouraged in her sailing stunt. Something that was far more environmentally damaging than actually just taking a flight or organising a container ship journey, or organising telepresence. It superficially looked like it was the right thing to do but I don’t think taking a ride on a millionaire’s sailing yacht is a particularly good look for an environmental figurehead. I don’t think such such things ultimately help the environmental cause because they perpetuate such superficiality of thought. It made a point, but ignored a more powerful one that things are more complicated than they appear at first glance.
Not her fault, let me stress that. She’s acting as a conduit for anger and despair and we can’t expect to her to be particularly wise or incisive but others are and I hope that if she accomplishes anything it is to prepare the stage for those that do have the nuanced solutions but I do fear that what they have to say will not have the clarity of Greta’s anger or appear as interesting or engaging now that we have basically had a schoolgirl call Trump a twat. (which, seeing as she can do little wrong at the moment she must be tempted to do)
For interest, hereis a breakdown of the UK’s power generation over the last 13 years:
Fossil fuels Nuclear Renewable Other Total
Q1 2006 75% 19% 4% 2% 100%
Q1 2019 44% 14% 33% 8% 100%
It’s pretty good news. Fossil fuel use has fallen by more than a third and now accounts for less than half of energy use. The reason I bring it up is that this hasn’t been done through nuclear - it too has fallen as a share of energy generation, although not by nearly as much. What has increased dramatically are renewables, which is almost entirely due to Wind and Solar (one category in the data).
Now, quite possibly, had we renewed our nuclear plants when we had a chance, we could have even lower fossil fuel use now. Just as possibly, nuclear would have crowded out the rise in renewables. But even so: while reducing our nuclear capacity, we have driven down fossil fuel use significantly, and are continuing to do so.
In fact, if you look hereyou can see that (at time of post) renewables are generating 42% of the UK’s electricity demand: coal and oil are generating 0.0%
It’s also worth noting that the cost of renewable energy in the UK is now below that of fossil fuels.
So good news - nuclear is good, but it’s not the only viable solution.
NB, the percentages above are my calculations based on the terawatt hour figures given in the first link.