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Claverjoe posted:Who is Tom Clancy, and why am I supposed to be him if I talk about how population pressures spill over to the empty parts of Russia. Tom Clancy is a... erm... 'speculative fiction' author who likes to fantasize about the day that the neo-cons are all proven right and America is invaded by the Islamic Communist Republic of Chechnya after all the drat liberals erode America's national security with their talk of 'social justice' and 'equality'. Imagine if someone who posted at StormFront as a teen grew-up to be a successful novelist.
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Nov 23, 2012 14:32
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Now his insult makes even less sense.
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Nov 23, 2012 15:35
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Claverjoe posted:Now his insult makes even less sense. Pick up a copy of "The Bear and the Dragon".
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Nov 23, 2012 16:24
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Yiggy posted:Just don't despair or give up or else we'll never get this totally ineffective solution going as one happy human team, all in this together. As much as I cringe at the liberal approach offered in the post you quoted, I don't think you're one to criticize him. Looking at what you've posted in this thread - 95% is doomsaying, with the remaining tiny portion of your posts being the preaching of tremendously vague and unspecified solutions. All you offer is a call to be more "radical", which could be interpreted as a call to anything from fascism to radical environmentalism to radical free marketism and some paranoid appeal for people to essentially start preparing for the apocalypse. In fact, I am more than a bit curious why one such as you bothers to spread your ideology, as such a vast majority of what you say in this thread is just hyperbolic doomsaying. I assume you have an actual radical solution to offer - but that begs the question why you don't actually say what it is. I would say that whenever someone criticizes a set of solutions so fervently, he should make the case for a different set of solutions (or "radical damage control" or whatever). You have hardly done so at all, which makes me think that this stance of yours is neither principled or altruistic as you portray it but just waste-of-time intellectual posturing that accomplishes even less than the liberal approaches you criticize. I honestly like it a lot more when people like yourself abide by the conclusions of your set of ideas, and separate from the greater progressive movement. You hate naivety and half-baked solutions - fine, I can agree with that. But if you conclude from this that all solutions are naive and half-baked, I ask you kindly to offer something better or to stop posturing - it isn't even justified within the context of your own ideas, let alone the ideas of society. At least that way you are merely useless, and not actively working against anyone who might try to do something different from what you say they should do (whatever that is, as you don't tell us). Dusz fucked around with this message at 22:08 on Nov 23, 2012 |
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Nov 23, 2012 22:05
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I don't have a solution. I don't think there'll be one. I don't need to show you my space elevator to show you why the other ones on offer (and in concept only when we needed action a decade ago...) are depending on wishful math. While I sincerely wish you the best of luck, stubborn positivism isn't going to scrub carbon out of the atmosphere and I'm sorry you resent anyone that's willing to read the writing on the wall. Forgive my "posturing", I didn't realize people were enacting actual policy and getting things done in here. And finally, it's important that people genuinely interested in a solution aren't wasting their time on faulty solutions. "Do anything, do something!" doesn't guarantee efficaciousness. Knowing what won't work at least saves the people that still believe a solution is possible from spending man hours on what is essentially a placebo.
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Nov 23, 2012 23:18
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Yiggy posted:While I sincerely wish you the best of luck, stubborn positivism isn't going to scrub carbon out of the atmosphere and I'm sorry you resent anyone that's willing to read the writing on the wall. Forgive my "posturing", I didn't realize people were enacting actual policy and getting things done in here. And finally, it's important that people genuinely interested in a solution aren't wasting their time on faulty solutions. "Do anything, do something!" doesn't guarantee efficaciousness. Knowing what won't work at least saves the people that still believe a solution is possible from spending man hours on what is essentially a placebo. I knew you would try to weasel your way out like this, which is why I invited you to offer a solution or damage control. So on the basis of everything you have posted, you think humanity will suffer a major catastrophe - meaning very severe depopulation and downfall of civilization. If you would bother to explain how your doom-embracing approach would help humans to better survive the calamity (even if you say they can no longer prevent it), you would at least have a case. However because you failed to do so even now that I have challenged you on it, makes me again think that what you are doing is pretentious intellectual posturing. Furthermore, you have some nerve to claim that your efforts are in any way related to people "genuinely interested in solutions". You yourself just claimed you have no solution and furthermore, that there won't be any solutions. Even further, you have spent an entire thread railing against anyone who doesn't accept your vapid ideology of absolute resignation and defeatism. I stand by what I said - people like you are useless. Furthermore, it seems to me that the cornerstone of your ideology is for people to internalize this uselessness, and to abandon all attempts to do anything. I honestly don't see what good such an opinion will do to anyone, even if you are right about the coming catastrophe. Finally, I don't know if you understand this but - if we are all going down, and this is how it will end, it will not give you or your grandchildren pleasure to smugly stand by and tell everyone "I told you so". And if you don't understand this - please at least have the dignity to only fellate yourself in private, and remove yourself from discussions like this.
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Nov 24, 2012 00:05
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Yiggy posted:"Do anything, do something!" doesn't guarantee efficaciousness. I've offered to the discussion what I think are potential policy options that can help to mitigate the damage caused by global warming. Nothing - not even nuclear power - is a panacea to this crisis, and it is doubtful there is anything that can completely negate what global warming would bring. Nevertheless, the potential options are there, and enacting them is surely better than not enacting them. I'm not sure if you've seriously misread what I've been posting here, but I am not hopelessly naive about what is happening. Neither, however, am I completely resigned to the idea that there is nothing efficacious that can be done. It is absolutely useless to navel-gaze about our own mortality when it is very clear that there are mitigation and resilience options available that can be implemented and in a manner that doesn't require a worldwide eco-socialist revolution. Dusz posted:As much as I cringe at the liberal approach offered in the post you quoted, I don't think you're one to criticize him. To discuss this point: I'm a terrible liberal, all things considered. I don't think that the "free market" or individual action or whatever is the best possible solution to implementing beneficial policy. This is something that requires an enormous, organized effort on the part of political actors and institutions, and is something that also requires a willingness to go against "popular" public opinion in order to implement these changes. I genuinely believe that the destruction of capitalism would be the "best" solution to further global warming, provided that it was followed up by a democratic/socialist political system that was able to implement the policy needed to help build resilience. The issue at hand is the seeming impenetrability of global capitalism, and the rapid rate of change we're observing in the global climate, which demands relatively speedy policy implementation. I'm open to other options pursuing resilience/mitigation that exist outside of (or in opposition to) the current capitalist climate, but it seems very difficult to implement them. Vermain fucked around with this message at 00:25 on Nov 24, 2012 |
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Nov 24, 2012 00:11
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Dusz posted:I knew you would try to weasel your way out like this... people like you are useless... fellate yourself in private, and remove yourself from discussions like this. This sort of bickering doesn't help anyone. I understand that you're passionate about the subject, but your entire post could be easily replaced with Vermain's just now and nothing of value to the discourse would be lost.
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Nov 24, 2012 00:20
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Vermain posted:I've offered to the discussion what I think are potential policy options that can help to mitigate the damage caused by global warming. Nothing - not even nuclear power - is a panacea to this crisis, and it is doubtful there is anything that can completely negate what global warming would bring. Nevertheless, the potential options are there, and enacting them is surely better than not enacting them. I'm not sure if you've seriously misread what I've been posting here, but I am not hopelessly naive about what is happening. Neither, however, am I completely resigned to the idea that there is nothing efficacious that can be done. It is absolutely useless to navel-gaze about our own mortality when it is very clear that there are mitigation and resilience options available that can be implemented and in a manner that doesn't require a worldwide eco-socialist revolution. I agree, although if you read his posts you can see that he isn't advocating for an "eco-socialist revolution". His argument is that we should do nothing because we can't do anything. He thinks this because nothing is currently being done, which is a good argument for complete resignation in his mind. Cobweb Heart posted:This sort of bickering doesn't help anyone. I understand that you're passionate about the subject, but your entire post could be easily replaced with Vermain's just now and nothing of value to the discourse would be lost. I usually don't for the reasons you state in this post. However, in this case I am actually somewhat sickened by his attitude, and the slightly insulting remark is the middle way between just letting it go and posting something I would get probated for. In my opinion, not every attitude should be afforded full respect. Dusz fucked around with this message at 00:27 on Nov 24, 2012 |
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Nov 24, 2012 00:20
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Dusz posted:I agree, although if you read his posts you can see that he isn't advocating for an "eco-socialist revolution". His argument is that we should do nothing because we can't do anything. He thinks this because nothing is currently being done, which is a good argument for complete resignation in his mind. You're right - that last bit of my post was a bit of channeling on my part, since I see the "seemingly" indestructible nature of capitalism as the greatest mental barrier to looking at potential policy options. That is: I can understand if people at first believe there's nothing to be done, given how obstinate modern capitalism appears.
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Nov 24, 2012 00:23
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Vermain posted:To discuss this point: I'm a terrible liberal, all things considered. I don't think that the "free market" or individual action or whatever is the best possible solution to implementing beneficial policy. This is something that requires an enormous, organized effort on the part of political actors and institutions, and is something that also requires a willingness to go against "popular" public opinion in order to implement these changes. I genuinely believe that the destruction of capitalism would be the "best" solution to further global warming, provided that it was followed up by a democratic/socialist political system that was able to implement the policy needed to help build resilience. The issue at hand is the seeming impenetrability of global capitalism, and the rapid rate of change we're observing in the global climate, which demands relatively speedy policy implementation. I'm open to other options pursuing resilience/mitigation that exist outside of (or in opposition to) the current capitalist climate, but it seems very difficult to implement them. Honestly, there is nothing wrong with mitigation, especially coupled with a reasonable attitude like yours. After all, if the opportunity comes for a comprehensive solution, it might very well help if mitigation efforts have slowed down the escalation of the crisis. People will use the means available to them to try to fix the problem, and once those means are exhausted, the need for a more abrupt change would more likely become apparent to the population. In any case, doing anything is better than doing nothing at all.
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Nov 24, 2012 00:39
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Almost on cue, Dusz stomps into the thread, angry and red-faced that so many of us are willing to openly say what scientists have been privately saying for years now. In the course of his finger-wagging at all of us lazy sadsacks, he once again reveals that he doesn't understand the depth of the problem or what it implies about human nature or the modern human lifestyle. Dusz, in the course of crossing swords with you in this thread, I realize that I've been uncourteous by not asking you to share your opinions with us. I'd like to take the opportunity to do so now. Some questions: 1. From your view, why did this catastrophe happen? I don't mean just a basic scientific explanation of the forces of nature at work here, but rather an exploration of the psychology of what is going on. 2. Can we stop the worst damage from happening, or only mitigate it? How? Can we even mitigate it? Why or why not? 3. Given that human behavior is solely responsible for the ecological disaster that is unfolding, how can we amend our behavior to prevent ecological disasters in the future?
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Nov 24, 2012 00:44
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I found this on twitter.
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Nov 24, 2012 00:46
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Your Sledgehammer posted:Almost on cue, Dusz stomps into the thread, angry and red-faced that so many of us are willing to openly say what scientists have been privately saying for years now. In the course of his finger-wagging at all of us lazy sadsacks, he once again reveals that he doesn't understand the depth of the problem or what it implies about human nature or the modern human lifestyle. Hey, I am going to answer the questions in a bit but first answer me this - why bother asking me anything if you have already made up your mind about me? Do you think your passive-aggressive mud-slinging strengthens your argument, or are you finally being honest and putting on your sanctimonious blowhard spectacle before you even let me argue my case?
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Nov 24, 2012 00:50
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Dusz posted:Hey, I am going to answer the questions in a bit but first answer me this - why bother asking me anything if you have already made up your mind about me? Do you think your passive-aggressive mud-slinging strengthens your argument, or are you finally being honest and putting on your sanctimonious blowhard spectacle before you even let me argue my case? Proceed, governor. ...I kid. But in all seriousness, I'll freely admit that I come across as a "passive-aggressive, sanctimonious blowhard" at times, but this really is a case of the pot calling the kettle black. I'm perfectly willing to drop the juvenile jabs and debate and discuss the ideas like adults.
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Nov 24, 2012 00:58
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Your Sledgehammer posted:Proceed, governor. I'm responding to your questions but I'd just like to tell you something - my outrage has nothing to do with the "novelty" of your ideas, as you seem to assume. My outrage has everything to do with the following. You are a person who actually understands the problem. However, instead of trying to find ways to solve it , you choose to conjure up a fake consciousness founded on obscurantism and cowardice that also just so happens to justify your dedication to doing nothing at all. It is in fact in some ways more despicable than some conservative and fundamentalist ideas because at least some of them have the "excuse" of being raised in a sheltered and paranoid environment which truth was never able to penentrate. On the other hand, you know what the problems are and yet your only struggle is to justify your abstention from struggle. As I have made clear in this thread already, I find that not worthy of respect, even if I try to be as courteous as my patience permits.
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Nov 24, 2012 01:07
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See, Dusz, I can totally respect that. If that's what you really think about me, then your anger is justified. The problem is that you presume too much. How do you know what I have and haven't done to address climate change? I'll level with you here. I'm a pretty normal mid-20's American guy - I drive a car, work for a living, all that. Ever since I've come to understand what we are facing, I've been trying to figure out what I can do. Thought about trying to stop driving and basically become a monk of sorts, but that won't help me convince anyone else that we're in big trouble and will actively prevent me from doing so in most cases. 9 months ago, I started volunteering at a local wildlife refuge run by the US Fish and Wildlife Service. About 2 hours a week every week. They do all sorts of community outreach and have children's programs to teach them about nature and why it is important. My last week of volunteering is next week. I feel that my effort is not effective enough, and I'm looking for something new to do. To tell the truth, what I'd do right now that I feel would be most effective would be to put myself in harm's way as part of the Tar Sands Blockade organization that is conducting civil disobedience protests in an attempt to block the construction of the Keystone Pipeline. The hangup there is that I will alienate everyone I know and love and also land myself in jail, which would immediately mark me in most people's eyes as a radical environmentalist loony who didn't know what he was talking about. Not exactly the most effective way to resist climate change. What I've been thinking lately is trying to restart a local community garden project that fell apart a few years back that I was never part of, but see if I can focus it more on self-sufficiency and growing food for the community. Maybe like take all the food grown and give it away to homeless shelters and the like. Dusz, you may not like what I have to say about the subject, but don't throw stones, man. I'll stop making assumptions about you. I'm doing all that I know to do with what resources I have. And I'm not being a smug asshat when I ask - what do you think I should do? I'm asking seriously. I'm trying to figure out what would be most effective while at the same time being something that I can accomplish by myself or with a small group for starters, so that I can start getting other people to understand what is going on.
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Nov 24, 2012 01:28
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Your Sledgehammer posted:Dusz, in the course of crossing swords with you in this thread, I realize that I've been uncourteous by not asking you to share your opinions with us. I'd like to take the opportunity to do so now. Some questions: Second, all three of your questions are worded in a way that a definitive answer is impossible. All three would be fitting (sans hyperbole) subjects for a graduate school dissertation, or a rather thick book. I think that the human condition, including capitalism and the degradation of the environment, are a dismal but not all that unexpected conclusion of human existence spanning through the tribal era into modern civilization. Although I cannot claim to know the ultimate cause (which mind you, is not singular), I can guess that the greed and rapacious behavior of humanity has its origins in the sustenance-level tribal societies that preceded it. The simple fact that food would be an unimaginably scarce resource compared to what it is like in most modern societies, would give an incentive to gathering of such means of sustenance. This to me explains one major part of the interaction of humans and the environment - that nature is a resource for men to be harnessed. It is not difficult to extend this concept from gentle appropriation to exploit of nature. This does not yet explain why exploit of nature extended to exploit of human beings. There are countless theories on this, none of which give a definitive answer because of insufficient data. One of the more compelling ones however I read from "The Theory of the Leisure Class" which stated that the most primitive form of a class society might have been a form of a tribal society with a war-like orientation. In such a society, first, prowess of warriors would be a value (since it would extend into a useful function, that being defense). Then later, some of these societies would, through success in warfare, gain wealth for their exploit. This wealth would be awarded to warriors of prowess but over time wealth itself would become the indicator of prowess. This gave birth to another concept of our current society – the birth of wealth as an intrinsic value. This was coupled with another process where over time, professions of exploit (such as warfare) gained not just respectability but respectability over professions of production (such as farming or foraging). A conduit for this process was the introduction of primitive slavery through again, warfare. So over time, professions of production would become associated with subservience and lack of martial prowess (and thus, material means), while professions of exploit would be the highest valued in society. This explains the fetishism of warfare and exploit in general (including the ideal of the enterpreneur). So you have a society which lionizes exploit over productivity, war over peace, and material accumulation over equal distribution. All this further leads into a hierarchical form of social order, complete devaluation of all non-humans and partial devaluation of minorities. This causes capitalism and the current environmental problems. This all leads into a second problem. So we have a society which values war and exploit. The values of this society have led to the development of capitalism, imperialism, environmental problems in general. How are we to get rid of it? I will just give you the two broad solutions people give to this problem. The first is the liberal approach, which tries to achieve success through strict non-violent activism, and is willing to tolerate some co-operation with the established ideologies of the time. Now, I am critical of liberalism but not of all of it. Certainly liberalism can succeed in some ways. For example, the ideological system of liberalism is founded on a certain set of rather strict moral principles. As a result of this, it has and does inspire moral behavior in people. And although I think liberals have only a partial understanding of the world, their (at least formal) dedication to elementary principles of humanism benefits all progressive movements in some way - when they are confronted with the flaws of liberalism, liberals just might face up to them honestly, as that is a value that some of them uphold. However, liberalism is limited. The forces arraigned against our society are tremendous in scope and power. Don't get me wrong - I am not saying we are all being hoarded into concentration camps. However, the limitations placed on human action are still great. If they are not through direct oppression, they are through economic oppression. And even if some freedom is permitted in a select few areas (like business and academia), those fields are still under rigid control to be as unprovocative as possible. As a result, we reach a dilemma. On one hand we have a powerful system of control. On the other hand we have liberalism, which is in principle sooner willing to be impotent than to be immoral. From this proceeds (in my opinion at least), that liberalism is insufficient to solve the problems of the world at their core. Mind you, they can do something about them, but it will never be enough, it will never be final. For every reprieve won by liberals, an escalation of oppression will later take place. This is because liberals are incapacitated - they deny themselves the usage of tools that are available to the system of control, such as violence. And this system is inherently stronger than them. Based on these two factors, I would say liberals are unlikely to solve the problem. This I think is the origin of the much maligned alternative theory of political action - that being revolutionary marxism. And yet there is a third approach, which is inferior to both. It is uniquely hypocritical, cowardly, delusional and wrong at the same time - it is that of the sanctimonious cynic. For this approach to be established, first it is necessary to assume the firm belief that the problems of the world are tremendous and possibly beyond human power to solve. This alone is not enough though as this attitude is not unique to the sanctimonious cynic - there are countless examples of humans struggling against such odds. However, for the sanctimonious cynic is not satisfied with a hopeless cause. So instead of accepting the truth about the world and maintaining his integrity, he pulls a despicable psychological move. He goes just a small step further from "the problems are tremendous" and extends them into hyperbole, stating that "everything is hopeless, nothing can be done". It might not be obvious why anyone would assume such an understanding of the world. However consider for a moment, what such an attitude has on the responsibility of a person. The life of the sanctimonious cynic just became a hundred times easier - after all now that everything is impossible, he has no duty to do anything. However at the same time he can continue to pretend that he is dedicated to truth - after all he still thinks the world has problems, but now he has an excuse not to do anything about it. However, just to add a twist of the knife, the sanctimonious cynic takes one final step. Not only does he want the sure knowledge that he is right. Not only does he want an excuse to not do anything. But he also wants to believe that what he is doing is not just "neutral" but ethical. Here enters the greater portion of the delusion. The sanctimonious cynic cannot abandon his hatred of the current world, and neither can he abandon his lack of enthusiasm for common solutions. So what he will instead perform is a leap of logic, where what he is doing (that is to say nothing) is the highest form of ethical behavior imaginable. The only way he can achieve this is to conjure up a personal ideology, complete with a specific eschatology of the world. In the case of people like you (who I like to call eco-Millerites after the infamous apocalyptic cult in the 19th century) your leap of logic is to conclude that what comes after the fall and absolute destitution of humankind is not only as good as the current existence but better (more sustainable and possibly egalitarian). In your case (and I guess also in the case of your obscure friend, Yiggy), it is the naive hope in the superiority of a sustenance-level (in other words, tribal) society. Now, remember I told you that I think that the problems of humanity do not start with civilization, they begin with tribal society. From this follows that there is nothing intrinsically evil about civilization that isn't already manifest in some form in a primitive society. This leads to two further conclusions. First, that civilization is not a bastardized form of human existence, but a natural form. And second, that it is probably natural for humans to form civilizations at some portion of their development. And I see no reason why this would stop being the case after any sort of societal collapse. In other words, even if civilization does collapse, over time humans will recreate civilization. Based on all of this, I can say that your particular delusion is just that, a delusion. Your motivations and your pompousness proceed from this convenient false consciousness you have built for yourself, most likely during the (understandably) distressful time during which humans become aware of the nature of the world. And to be honest, I do not despise you. However, I also do not respect you. Your view of the world is a childish fantasy, and a self-serving delusion. I actually do not even think you are a great danger or anything, you and yiggy are just manifestations of the malaise of our society. Since your credo is to be as useless as possible, that is what you will be. However, during your time of being useless, your pompousness still drives you to sabotage of arguments for the sake of sabotage. Your false consciousness drives you to derail arguments of liberals and marxists and offer mere nothingness in replacement. And although I cannot despise you or blame you, I will not just let you carry on in your ignorance, spreading falsehood in your wake. Finally, it would be too presumptuous to say that a sanctimonious cynic is all that you are. Almost nobody in the world falls into a neat category like that. The "critical but unhelpful" attitude of Yiggy and you is the part of you two that is, though. Same for any primitivist inclinations you two might have - I think they exemplify what I talk about in the latter part of my post. I have no right to pass judgement on you but I can give you my opinion. The only redeeming quality of you two is strangely, your liberal inclinations - that you try to limit pollution and carry out activism and information in spite of your hatred of civilization. It is the part of you that has value and even if small, can be basis for further growth at least. Otherwise, you two are as lost as any conservative or fundamentalist, and in some ways more so.
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Nov 24, 2012 02:31
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quote:In any case, doing anything is better than doing nothing at all. In the aftermath of a Cesna crash, two survivors are left slowly freezing to death on a mountain peak as the night draws-in on them. In desperation, one of the survivors begins to wave their hands around and utter gibberish nonsense. "What are you doing?" "Fire incantation. My druidic grandfather taught it to me." "Magic isn't real. That won't work." "WELL AT LEAST I'M TRYING SOMETHING!" No, doing anything is not better than doing nothing in every case. Sometimes, you're just going to die. We can do something about climate change, sure, but it really does not look like anyone is interested (or will be interested until it's too late). It doesn't really matter that there is some technically plausible solution if nobody is going to do it anyway. I've already said, several times, what people can do: change your lightbulbs. How many people even do that little? Have you even done that little?
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Nov 24, 2012 02:45
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The Ender posted:In the aftermath of a Cesna crash, two survivors are left slowly freezing to death on a mountain peak as the night draws-in on them. In desperation, one of the survivors begins to wave their hands around and utter gibberish nonsense. Yeah, just read the second part of my really big post to find out what I think about you.
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Nov 24, 2012 02:52
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Thanks to Dusz for pushing this thread into goldmine territory. If you had fewer words in your head you might have more room for knowledge. I think global warming is unfixable. The only way is to significantly reduce growth worldwide. Imagine dozens of self-inflicted Arab Springs. In the middle of pre-existing economic troubles. Not going to happen. Of course, once arable farmland is greatly reduced that'll happen anyways. In any case, it's too late to avoid that. I might be a pessimist, but at least I'm not blind.
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Nov 24, 2012 02:56
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Mozi posted:I think global warming is unfixable. The only way is to significantly reduce growth worldwide. Imagine dozens of self-inflicted Arab Springs. In the middle of pre-existing economic troubles. Not going to happen. Of course, once arable farmland is greatly reduced that'll happen anyways. In any case, it's too late to avoid that. This is already happening, and it appears to have the effect of reducing growth! Who would have thought political turmoil amid economic troubles would accomplish your goal of reducing growth? If nothing else we need to accelerate this! Looks like you are quite blind indeed.
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Nov 24, 2012 03:29
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The Ender posted:*inapplicable story about a strawman* Mozi posted:*needless insults* Time and time again in history, drastic, practically unforeseeable changes have taken place, upsetting the status quo in ways that people probably claimed were impossible just years or even days before they happened. The revolution in Tunisia is a modern example. That one revolution is far from insignificant, and we can see how its effects reverberated throughout the world, into Egypt, Libya, Syria, and even inspired events in the US such as the 200,000 people protesting cuts in Wisconsin and later the Occupy movement. Russia is a good historic example. Who would have imagined, as World War I began, that backwards Russia would, in a matter of years, go through multiple revolutions and end up one of two global hegemons pioneering things like launching spacecraft? Who at that time period could have predicted the leaps in technological advancement we've made today? Plenty of other historic events like revolutions in France in 1968 or in Germany or Spain after World War I could have taken history in a drastically different direction had they gone a little differently. Many people think of the status quo as a nearly unstoppable force, but it's anything but that. History is the tale of how unstable and capricious civilization really is. One thing that is important is to learn how massive changes take place. Take the Civil Rights movement in the US, for example. Imagine if it had been just one guy trying to change the racism and systemic oppression of blacks across the country. Would that have worked? Hell no. So what did happen? Like-minded individuals began a long campaign of civil disobedience (some, outright violence), and attacking systemic injustice on every front they could, from shops to courts and legislatures. History books like to merely point to the prominent leaders of the movements, such as MLK, but they were nothing without the millions following them. We can learn from that. Of course one dude changing his lightbulbs or a single or even a large group of scientists warning of doom aren't going to stop climate change. We need to do much more than that. A modern example would be 10,000 people encircling the White House protesting the Keystone XL Pipeline. Their efforts caused the pipeline to be delayed--Obama didn't want to risk pissing off the environmentalists until after the next Presidential election. Of course, too many people went home after that. A mass environmentalist movement needs to be sustained--looking at any mass movement in history can tell us that. The environmentalist movement can also find allies. The ongoing economic crisis, high unemployment, drastic cuts to social services, and lowering of wages and the standard of living all over the country (and world, but I'm focusing on the US) is causing a great deal of unrest (again, Occupy was an outbreak of that anger. The problem hasn't gone away, and the frustration hasn't either), and fortunately, the solution to climate change is the same solution to the economic crisis. The massive restructuring of society (mass transit, new electric infrastructure, switch to zero-emissions power, revamping water infrastructure, renovate buildings to be storm resistant and energy efficient, etc.) all requires millions of people being put to work to accomplish in the time-frame we need. That sort of program would reinvigorate the economy and be a huge step towards climate change mitigation and prevention. And--one country setting such a powerful example would inspire other countries--or their people. But something like that requires a lot of sustained, organized effort, and someone has to take the first steps. Talk to people. Join organizations, or create them if need be. Work on local environmental campaigns, or change the dialogue. If no one is talking about switching from coal power in your area, start that conversation. One there's a movement, it needs to be sustained and grown. I'm talking in generalizations here, but I can get into some of the specifics people are doing in my area. The point is, there's plenty of viable ideas on how to stop or mitigate climate change. They're difficult, but that doesn't mean they're impossible, and the only way to start changing things is to start changing things.
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Nov 24, 2012 05:39
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quote:Changing your lightbulbs is a less than useless step. You can do so much more than that. Yeah, reducing your household energy use is 'less than useless'.  The point is that this extremely simple, extremely cheap, individual-scale step is one that very few people have bothered to take in spite of the extremely low barrier to entry. Yourself and Dusz expect people to make extremely big changes on an extremely large scale when they won't even do something as simple as throwing CFLs into their grocery cart when they're out at a department store.
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Nov 24, 2012 05:45
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Dusz posted:I knew you would try to weasel your way out like this, which is why I invited you to offer a solution or damage control. Here's a solution for damage control, you and your entire family can kill yourselves. Save us the resources and spare us the carbon. Happy? Theres your damage control. And still, it won't make a difference. As if you were going to respond in any way but a dismissive one. quote:So on the basis of everything you have posted, you think humanity will suffer a major catastrophe - meaning very severe depopulation and downfall of civilization. If you would bother to explain how your doom-embracing approach would help humans to better survive the calamity (even if you say they can no longer prevent it), you would at least have a case. However because you failed to do so even now that I have challenged you on it, makes me again think that what you are doing is pretentious intellectual posturing. I'm not here to save humanity, as if any of us are going to do so with the ideas hatched in this thread. Sorry. v  v As long as we're talking about climate change, pointing out the myriad half measures that aren't going to affect climate change is perfectly germane, regardless of how indignant that makes you. But hey, if I post some things that aren't going to work, then suddenly I'll have contributed to the discussion  quote:Furthermore, you have some nerve to claim that your efforts are in any way related to people "genuinely interested in solutions". You yourself just claimed you have no solution and furthermore, that there won't be any solutions. Even further, you have spent an entire thread railing against anyone who doesn't accept your vapid ideology of absolute resignation and defeatism. No. You're missing the point of my posting. I'm really not interested in defeatism and resignation but half-measures and unrealistic solutions aren't helping anyone, and I'm not about to suffer Dusz gladly because he wants to join hands and kumbaya around hopeful determination, all because he wants to feel better reading the thread. By all means, don't give up, but don't sit here and tell me with a straight face that community gardens and organizing will fix the atmosphere, and that no one is allowed to criticize these weak rear end solutions for what they are. Because poo poo pee pee what a bummer. <  >quote:I stand by what I said - people like you are useless. Furthermore, it seems to me that the cornerstone of your ideology is for people to internalize this uselessness, and to abandon all attempts to do anything. I honestly don't see what good such an opinion will do to anyone, even if you are right about the coming catastrophe. Again, saying "no, that's not good enough, sorry, not that either" Is not the same thing as "Hey, stop everything!" I mean, I can see how you might jump to that conclusion since I personally don't believe a solution is forthcoming, but no one will be happier than me to be proved wrong. If I see you post something I think will matter, I'll even throw you a  . Promise!quote:Finally, I don't know if you understand this but - if we are all going down, and this is how it will end, it will not give you or your grandchildren pleasure to smugly stand by and tell everyone "I told you so". And if you don't understand this - please at least have the dignity to only fellate yourself in private, and remove yourself from discussions like this. Hey buddy, I'll be happy to offer comfort to my loved ones as poo poo is going down, but as long as we're here just discussing and stuff on a free Internet, I'm more than happy to reiterate that no one in this thread has a realistic solution and severe climate change is immanent. Things that might matter: *A precipitous drop in population (not realistic) *Deux ex machina miracle breakthroughs (possible, but not guaranteed *Extreme reorganization of the world economy (not realistic on necessary time tables) *a retreat from growth focused economics (not realistic until things are much more dire, at which point so what? Because of political intransigence the last two aren't going to happen. Because killing a bunch of people to save the world sort of defeats the point of saving the world for its inhabitants, that's not going to happen (and shouldn't). That second one, maybe Yiggy fucked around with this message at 05:52 on Nov 24, 2012 |
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Nov 24, 2012 05:50
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The Ender posted:Yeah, reducing your household energy use is 'less than useless'. Thanks for completely missing the point and ignoring the rest of my post. To elaborate on the single point you did respond to, yes, people should take basic steps like replacing bulbs, insulating their house, doing an energy audit and unplugging high-energy devices, using mass transit or bikes instead of cars, etc. Yes. Of course. I've already done stuff like that. However:  Even reducing all household electrical consumption to 0 would still only be 4.86% of US energy use. Individuals only modifying their lifestyle slightly is not enough. Stopping or mitigating climate change is going to require collective effort on a massive scale.
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Nov 24, 2012 06:00
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Also it's 'less than useless' because it causes people to say 'welp, I've contributed, I've done my part!' and sit out. Same thing with the breast cancer awareness bracelets- people who wear them have a much lower donation rate than average donators.
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Nov 24, 2012 06:35
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I was hearing that cutting out driers and using clotheslines instead would save a HUGE amount of energy. How much would it really save?
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Nov 24, 2012 06:49
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OwlBot 2000 posted:I was hearing that cutting out driers and using clotheslines instead would save a HUGE amount of energy. How much would it really save? I'd love to see you use a clothesline in a Minnesota winter. Your clothes would be frozen onto the line until spring.
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Nov 24, 2012 07:03
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Evilreaver posted:Also it's 'less than useless' because it causes people to say 'welp, I've contributed, I've done my part!' and sit out. Same thing with the breast cancer awareness bracelets- people who wear them have a much lower donation rate than average donators. My experience has been the polar opposite; if you throw everything at someone, they'll do nothing. If you introduce things one at a time, starting with the most simple, you can get them to change their energy intake substantially over a few months. "I changed my lightbulbs." "That's great! Now you should start composting your food waste." "I started composting my food waste." "That's great! Now you should start upgrading your appliances." "I upgraded my appliances." "That's great! Now you should switch to a high efficiency vehicle." etc And, again, it works for anyone who: A) Buys into climate change in the first place B) Gives a poo poo about it So it's a pretty limited demographic. quote:Even reducing all household electrical consumption to 0 would still only be 4.86% of US energy use. Individuals only modifying their lifestyle slightly is not enough. Stopping or mitigating climate change is going to require collective effort on a massive scale. Yup. And we won't get it. Like I said, things like lightbulbs are a litmus test, and the public fails said tests all of the time. I mean, how much of the American public outright denies that climate change? How much of the American public doesn't even understand that the age of the Earth is greater than a few thousand years? We would almost certainly need some authoritarian force to implement the necessary changes (slowing the economy down, aggressively funding alternative energy, eliminating subsidies for hydrocarbons, accepting that unemployment will spike as business barons fight back with lay-offs / closures, etc). Such a force just plain isn't materializing, and I have a feeling that if it ever began to, the delusional, stupid & self-centered public would run it out of town.
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Nov 24, 2012 07:15
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-Troika- posted:I'd love to see you use a clothesline in a Minnesota winter. Your clothes would be frozen onto the line until spring. Maybe not but clothes airers are perfectly suitable and it's not like you're not using heating inside your house. You just need a garage or basement to drip them out.
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Nov 24, 2012 07:57
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Yiggy posted:Here's a solution for damage control, you and your entire family can kill yourselves. Save us the resources and spare us the carbon. Happy? Theres your damage control. And still, it won't make a difference. As if you were going to respond in any way but a dismissive one. So you have proven my thesis a hundred times over with this post, so I'll restate it and update it a bit. First, you are useless. I had suspicions that you had nothing productive to say, and my suspicions have been proven right over and over again. I have given you opportunities to explain yourself in countless different ways, and you have failed to accept my challenge, ever. You are unable to present any solutions, fine. However you are also unable to present strategies for humans to deal with their problems, even if the fall is inevitable as you believe. As a result I conclude that you are waste of space personified, simply put - you are useless. Second, you are despicable. I invited you to at least appear as a decent human being - by having you say that at least this all isn't about schadenfraude and "I told you so". And although you gave me an extremely petulant "nuh uh", I don't need to read your post for long to see you have done anything to abandon that attitude. In almost every one of your paragraphs, you try to pull off some fetid insults against me for "not seeing the light". So no, I refuse to accept your disingenuous denial, and I reiterate that you are despicable. Third, you are a hypocrite. That much should be obvious by this point. I have suspicions that you might not even understand what I am saying. How otherwise could you pull your little "nuh uh" shtick and still in every paragraph continue your pretentious rambling about poor little sheeple me "not seeing the light". Either you have no self-awareness, or you are approaching this discussion only with the intention of barking stupidities until the other side submits out of fatigue. Fourth, you cannot read. I know, perhaps it is too much to expect you to read my definitive answer to people like you in this last page, because it wasn't addressed to you and thus you have excuse to ignore it. However, when you then pull around and put words into my mouth ("community gardens"? that was sledgehammer, not me), I am beginning to think that you skim through my posts, paint up an image of "dumb sheeple kumbaya dusz" according to your liking, and fight against a strawman version of me. Even in the best case scenario, it makes you an intellectually lazy blowhard, that only cares about his self-image to the exclusion of everything else. Fifth, you are a child. Now there is nothing wrong with being a child but I have a problem when children claim experience and knowledge that they do not have, and in fact cannot have due to their lack of experience. This is actually a core part of why I find people like you and sledgehammer to be pitiable - your first response to a major problem is to retreat into a fantasy where your behavior is validated. Your little "dumb sheeple" gig just ties into this - it allows you to reinforce your false consciousness at no cost at all. In the end, the only thing that will take people like you to maturity is when you comprehend what exactly you are pontificating for. When you realize what a collapse actually looks like, and what effect it has on human society, you would probably cease your attitude. However, that is unlikely to happen because you are a coddled Western infant playing guitar and "enjoying the arts", with no knowledge of the sustained hardship that accompanies destitution. So to summarize, I find you even less worthy of respect than I did to begin with. In fact in your case, I find absolutely nothing redeeming, like I do in the case of Your Sledgehammer. At least, I know you are not dangerous - bawling infants have a penchant for being useless and self-gratifying. But at the same time you are a human-shaped road block in the path of the rest of society. You are a useless person who revels in his own uselessness, an obstruction that lionizes obstruction. You are the most worthless person in this thread, and among the most worthless people in western society, which, as you should know, is actually saying something.
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Nov 24, 2012 12:11
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Mozi posted:Thanks to Dusz for pushing this thread into goldmine territory. If you had fewer words in your head you might have more room for knowledge. Hey, I am an evil marxist-sheepleist, so here is my inhuman punishment for you: I sentence you to write the following sentence on the blackboard 100000 times like Bart in the Simpsons. pre:it will not give me or my grandchildren pleasure to smugly stand by and tell everyone "I told you so".
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Nov 24, 2012 12:18
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Dusz posted:So you have proven my thesis a hundred times over with this post, so I'll restate it and update it a bit. Drowning your ad hominem in words doesn't mean you're smart. zer0 nil fucked around with this message at 12:46 on Nov 24, 2012 |
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Nov 24, 2012 12:44
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zer0 nil posted:Drowning your ad hominem in words doesn't mean you're smart. It's not an ad hominem because he isn't using it to cast doubt on or disprove the argument of his opponent. He is venting his frustration with having to deal with some sort of buddhist hipster whose main replying motif is the ' ' emoticon.Also, read his points. He's accurately accused the guy of among other things not just misreading his posts, but also attributing words to him that he never said.
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Nov 24, 2012 12:55
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zer0 nil posted:Drowning your ad hominem in words doesn't mean you're smart. What I said in that post I mean with the same tone as when I say pi is approximately equal to 3.14159. I think that the statements I say are true, and I gave ample reasons for why I think they are true. I did not use hyperbole or exaggerate. I literally think he is a useless, despicable, hypocritical and illiterate child. You are welcome to challenge me in this but what you do here, semantical bickering about tone, is not a challenge - it is hardly anything at all. You chose to frame my whole post as an insult that I try to "drown out in words". Believe what you want to believe but the "drowning out with words" part were reasons behind my argument, which I feel are satisfactory to indicate the veracity of the case I am making. Finally, unlike you and Yiggy my focus is not to appear smart, I care about making a coherent and internally consistent argument that leads to the point I am trying to make. If my focus was on appearing smart I would do what you are doing - semantical bickering about minutiae while ignoring the main points of the arguments I am arguing against. After all, if I behave like you, and put as little skin in the game as possible, I would be less likely to be proven wrong, and thus more likely to appear "smart". I do not do this though, because that is not my focus.
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Nov 24, 2012 12:58
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Mozi posted:Assuming we go over 4 degrees, where would be a good place in the world to live and watch civilization tear itself apart? Northern Canada? Well... There's always Norway. The main consequence we face over climate change is milder winters and lots more rain... in a country that's nearly 100% hydro-electric powered. Power is gonna be cheap, unless the right-wingers sell off the government power monopoly. What's not so great is that we're not self-reliant on foodstuffs, we produce about 50% of what we eat, and this percentage is going down due to hostile agricultural reforms. Nobody wants to be a farmer anymore, because they make crap money. And should food become really expensive or even become horded on the international markets for some reason, Norway might be poo poo out of luck.
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Nov 24, 2012 13:58
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Dusz posted:I will just give you the two broad solutions people give to this problem. The first is the liberal approach, which tries to achieve success through strict non-violent activism, and is willing to tolerate some co-operation with the established ideologies of the time. Now, I am critical of liberalism but not of all of it. Certainly liberalism can succeed in some ways. For example, the ideological system of liberalism is founded on a certain set of rather strict moral principles. As a result of this, it has and does inspire moral behavior in people. And although I think liberals have only a partial understanding of the world, their (at least formal) dedication to elementary principles of humanism benefits all progressive movements in some way - when they are confronted with the flaws of liberalism, liberals just might face up to them honestly, as that is a value that some of them uphold. I don't really see how you're offering any more of a solution than those posters. You basically write three paragraphs about how liberalism will fail, namedrop revolutionary marxism (I thought you were a social democrat? Maybe another poster?), and then go to talking about how "worthless" an ideology those who don't see a way out have. "Revolutionary marxism" isn't a solution, in fact it's more of a handwave than many of the posters you're accusing of having weak arguments have pulled in this thread. So please, share your solution to this problem. Dusz posted:Finally, unlike you and Yiggy my focus is not to appear smart, I care about making a coherent and internally consistent argument that leads to the point I am trying to make. If my focus was on appearing smart I would do what you are doing - semantical bickering about minutiae while ignoring the main points of the arguments I am arguing against. After all, if I behave like you, and put as little skin in the game as possible, I would be less likely to be proven wrong, and thus more likely to appear "smart". I do not do this though, because that is not my focus. The problem is when you coat your posts with insults, regardless of whether its how you actually feel or not, it makes your argument weaker. When I start seeing ad homs flying all over the place it just makes me tune out the argument because it's clear you've let emotion take over. Nobody wants to sit here in 50 years and tell their grandkids "told you so". What you are seeing is the response to a problem that is it out of our control as individuals. You can talk about replacing CFLs, buying more energy efficient cars (haha as if this is actually a solution), building community gardens or what not but ultimately none of those things are going to stop climate change or even meaningfully slow it. You're absolutely right that human existence and environmental destruction are inexorably linked. What confuses me is why, looking at the situation we're in, you've decided that those who don't see a way out as only deserving of insults and ad hominems instead of sharing your revolutionary marxist plan. a lovely poster fucked around with this message at 15:02 on Nov 24, 2012 |
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Nov 24, 2012 14:54
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XakEp posted:Pick up a copy of "The Bear and the Dragon". Somehow I get the feeling this book is a fantasy jack-off game of governments, rather than people who just get desperate to the point of ignoring governments. Either way, its not like these posts will be remembered by the time poo poo like this happens. EDIT: And yet, this is a less silly line of discussion than Dusz's posturing. The Dipshit fucked around with this message at 15:55 on Nov 24, 2012 |
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Nov 24, 2012 15:08
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a lovely poster posted:I don't really see how you're offering any more of a solution than those posters. You basically write three paragraphs about how liberalism will fail, namedrop revolutionary marxism (I thought you were a social democrat? Maybe another poster?), and then go to talking about how "worthless" an ideology those who don't see a way out have. "Revolutionary marxism" isn't a solution, in fact it's more of a handwave than many of the posters you're accusing of having weak arguments have pulled in this thread. I think you haven't paid much attention to this thread. The cynics are posters whose whole ideology is that there is no solution, and that is what they are proudly declaring in this thread. I have highlighted solutions proposed by others in this thread, including the post which you quoted but apparently didn't read. So I am not going to accept your ridiculous misrepresentation that I am not offering any more of a solution. I am not trying to boast to being exemplary in this but both me and practically every poster in this thread other than Yiggy and the other cynics has offered more solutions than them. I do not think there is some kind of unbridgeable chasm between revolutionary and liberal practice. As I said in my post that you ignored, the two approaches can and have cooperated with each other. Liberal approaches, anything from non-violent activism to an ecological lifestyle are somewhat useful as preventative measures. Revolution comes in when the non-violent activist measures prove insufficient. The disparity between them becomes relevant only during a time when revolution is already imminent, which is not now obviously. In so far that I argued for revolutionary measures, it is for people to acknowledge them as a potentially necessary option, and preferable to the defeatism of the cynics when more peaceful methods fail. Third, you are disingenuous to demand me to give a comprehensive solution to a problem of such magnitude. The way you phrase your challenge sets me up to a standard nobody can match, least of all you or the cynics. In fact, the cynics have failed the standard no matter how you phrase it because they have resigned themselves to the futility of collapse. If you want complete answers, I recommend you stay away from politics because you will not get them. However, that does not mean partial solutions or discussion about solutions is worthless. That is in fact why I repeatedly call the cynics defeatists - it is quite possible based on the melancholy of their language that they are disappointed a solution is not spontaneous and immediate, and have thus reduced themselves to despair. Then, I am not going to change my tone. I do not see my statements as insults any more than I consider calling a fascist a racist an insult. I use strong terms but only because they are applicable in this case. After all words like coward and despicable have a meaning beyond just being incendiary, and I think they describe people like Yiggy and the other cynics accurately. And unlike them, I choose to be accurate and honest about my opinions, instead of the deliberately vague language that they use to make themselves appear better. It is especially fetid of you to use "emotional" in the way that you do - I have yet to see goons in D&D and elsewhere consistently apply the "unemotional at all costs" maxim while arguing against people who deserve no respect and thus I do not feel obliged to do so now. So I do not think they are deserving of "insults and ad hominems", they are deserving of accurate and critical language that highlights their foolishness and immaturity. I do not think that they deserve to be punished for their opinions, but I think I am obliged to kick out the soapbox from under their feet and to reveal the misguided nature of their arguments, what little they have.
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Nov 24, 2012 15:40
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