Climate Change thread: tl; dr - We are so screwed

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Climate Change thread: tl; dr - We are so screwed

markgreyam: Mar 10, 2008; Talk to the mittens.

Trabisnikof posted:

What is it about technically true statements that make people so angry?

Without access to your codebase, I'm not the best person to explain human emotions to you; you'd best ask your programmer.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 03:49

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# ? May 30, 2024 23:26

icantfindaname: Jul 1, 2008

Trabisnikof posted:

What is it about technically true statements that make people so angry?

So you are admitting to trolling?

# ? Mar 19, 2015 04:03

SMILLENNIALSMILLEN: Jun 26, 2009

Trabisnikof posted:

So are you arguing that it is better to not adopt kids from the 3rd world because if you do they might consume more?

What the gently caress are you even talking about?

# ? Mar 19, 2015 04:05

Uranium Phoenix: Jun 20, 2007; Boom.

Trabisnikof posted:

Please explain how if humanity would survive if everyone followed the advice. That's why its bad advice for the future of the human race. I get that it really boils down to "those dirty poors shouldn't reproduce," but that's not the same advice.

Actually, given that the vast majority of over-consumption is from the rich, it's actually the rich who should stop reproducing.

quote:

The issue isn't that we don't know how climate works, its that we don't know how to shape our responses. So a PhD in engineering or social sciences could easily help attack the problems dealing with climate change.

No, we do know how we need to shape our response. We need to move away from fossil fuels and onto carbon free energy, such as nuclear, solar, or wind. We need to stop depleting resources faster than they can replenish, such as fish stocks and aquifers. We need to revamp our infrastructure to deal with the changing climate. There are plenty of people who already know these things. The problem is not a lack of PhDs. Given rampant higher education costs and the sheer inaccessibility of a PhD to most people, it's a stone-cold moronic suggestion, especially that it's the "most practical" thing one can do. If you look at people who have led activist movements that have changed things, you'd be hard pressed to find examples of higher education being the force behind their success. Sure, MLK got a BA in sociology (and a PhD in theology), but Malcom X and Eugene Debs were a high-school dropouts.

The reason we aren't doing these things is its not profitable, and our politicians serve the interest of corporations and rich oligarchs, not everyday people.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 04:10

Trabisnikof: Dec 24, 2005

Uranium Phoenix posted:

No, we do know how we need to shape our response. We need to move away from fossil fuels and onto carbon free energy, such as nuclear, solar, or wind. We need to stop depleting resources faster than they can replenish, such as fish stocks and aquifers. We need to revamp our infrastructure to deal with the changing climate. There are plenty of people who already know these things. The problem is not a lack of PhDs. Given rampant higher education costs and the sheer inaccessibility of a PhD to most people, it's a stone-cold moronic suggestion, especially that it's the "most practical" thing one can do. If you look at people who have led activist movements that have changed things, you'd be hard pressed to find examples of higher education being the force behind their success. Sure, MLK got a BA in sociology (and a PhD in theology), but Malcom X and Eugene Debs were a high-school dropouts.

That's great and all, but I'm pretty sure the science behind the restructuring and re-engineering of our entire resource chain isn't as fully studied as climate science.

We need more researchers focusing on not just normative answers of what should be done but also focusing on methods and means to effect that change.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 04:36

Uranium Phoenix: Jun 20, 2007; Boom.

Trabisnikof posted:

That's great and all, but I'm pretty sure the science behind the restructuring and re-engineering of our entire resource chain isn't as fully studied as climate science.

We need more researchers focusing on not just normative answers of what should be done but also focusing on methods and means to effect that change.

All of which is utterly meaningless if, as we're currently doing, we make no moves towards actually doing any of these things.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 04:52

Series DD Funding: Nov 25, 2014; by exmarx

How are u posted:

It's pretty loving clear what he meant if you're not being an autist about it. First world residents (i.e. virtually everybody reading this thread) contribute immensely more to climate change than residents of the third world. Thus the fewer first world children born means fewer first world people using tons of resources.

Obviously not all human beings are going to stop having children, creating an extinction event.

But that should have been loving obvious, friend.

By that logic we should all kill ourselves or move to the third world.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 04:58

Furnaceface: Oct 21, 2004

Evil_Greven posted:

Mother Nature is trolling the U.S. again

Except, of course, east of the Mississippi River.

Like last year.

I live right smack dab in the middle of the blue dongle (central Ontario), and yeah it was really freaking cold this winter. The jet stream is all kinds of hosed up now, but you dont really hear much about it from anyone, climate scientists included. Are they still trying to study the effects of climate change on it or is it just not worth studying?

# ? Mar 19, 2015 05:04

Uranium Phoenix: Jun 20, 2007; Boom.

Furnaceface posted:

I live right smack dab in the middle of the blue dongle (central Ontario), and yeah it was really freaking cold this winter. The jet stream is all kinds of hosed up now, but you dont really hear much about it from anyone, climate scientists included. Are they still trying to study the effects of climate change on it or is it just not worth studying?

Yes, climate scientists are still studying the climate.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 05:08

Furnaceface: Oct 21, 2004

Uranium Phoenix posted:

Yes, climate scientists are still studying the climate.

Thank tips. :thumbsup:

# ? Mar 19, 2015 05:50

Trabisnikof: Dec 24, 2005

Uranium Phoenix posted:

All of which is utterly meaningless if, as we're currently doing, we make no moves towards actually doing any of these things.

And we will keep making no moves towards actually doing any of those things without further research on how to get those things actually done.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 06:18

markgreyam: Mar 10, 2008; Talk to the mittens.

How exactly do a few of you get from "A reduced overall population (not specifically Western) with it's associated reduction in consumption would greatly reduce pressure on the environment" to:

Trabisnikof posted:

how if humanity would survive if everyone followed the advice.

Series DD Funding posted:

we should all kill ourselves or move to the third world.

Try not to be super surprised that in order to not end all life as we know it on this planet we might have to adjust how we do/approach a few things and not just study up in an attempt to respond to things caused by keeping everything else EXACTLY THE WAY THAT IT IS.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 06:59

Batham: Jun 19, 2010; _{Cluster bombing from B-52s is very, very accurate. The bombs are guaranteed to always hit the ground.}

Pyroxene Stigma posted:

Don't reproduce, start learning how to cultivate food and community, if economically feasible produce your own energy (solar panels) are as far as I've gotten.

E: listen to Inglonias

If you go that extreme as to put in 'don't reproduce', why don't you also add 'kill yourself preferably by jumping off a cliff or another less polluting way'. Depending on your current job or influence you're allowed to postpone it until you retire!

Only certain regions of the world are overpopulated and other factors like migration, consumption, ect... come into play. You can't just hand the kind of advice you just gave to anyone and not be considered an eco-idiot.

Batham fucked around with this message at 11:17 on Mar 19, 2015

# ? Mar 19, 2015 07:00

Rime: Nov 2, 2011; by Games Forum

Furnaceface posted:

I live right smack dab in the middle of the blue dongle (central Ontario), and yeah it was really freaking cold this winter. The jet stream is all kinds of hosed up now, but you dont really hear much about it from anyone, climate scientists included. Are they still trying to study the effects of climate change on it or is it just not worth studying?

This winter has been all kinds of weird.

Southern BC has 15% of our annual snowpack for this time of year and we're likely to suffer one of the driest summers in the recorded history of the province, Vancouver may actually run out of water since that snowpack is responsible for 50% of our reservoir levels. I am climbing mountains in shorts right now which should be fully inaccessible for another six months.

Meanwhile, PEI has something like 700% of their annual snowfall for this time of year and has basically ceased to exist, along with most other Atlantic provinces.

Yeah, things are pretty hosed up here in Canada right now.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 07:30

Slow News Day: Jul 4, 2007

Uranium Phoenix posted:

Actually, given that the vast majority of over-consumption is from the rich, it's actually the rich who should stop reproducing.

But then who will create the jobs?

# ? Mar 19, 2015 08:41

Placid Marmot: Apr 28, 2013

Friendly Tumour posted:

You realise that population in Western nations is actually declining, right?

As many as 15 Western countries, population totaling less than 150million, are experiencing declining populations. [Based on the 2013 CIA figures here]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_growth_rate
The annual increase in the US population alone more than makes up for (by several times) the small decreases in the few contracting populations in the West. What you were thinking of was the rate of population growth/contraction, not population growth/contraction itself. The populations of Western countries, and indeed, most countries, are increasing, but at a lower rate than previously.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 13:18

Av027: Aug 27, 2003; Qowned.

Batham posted:

If you go that extreme as to put in 'don't reproduce', why don't you also add 'kill yourself preferably by jumping off a cliff or another less polluting way'. Depending on your current job or influence you're allowed to postpone it until you retire!

Only certain regions of the world are overpopulated and other factors like migration, consumption, ect... come into play. You can't just hand the kind of advice you just gave to anyone and not be considered an eco-idiot.

You are one of two people, I believe, that are making the "eco idiot" statement in this thread. Everyone else gets it.

We're not talking about overpopulation of a region here (unless the "region" is "Earth"). The issue is the carbon impact that children have. Especially when they live to adulthood in first world countries. Ice that off with having children of their own. Then those children have children. It's a snowball rolling down a hill, quickly becoming an avalanche. Having a child is one of the worst things you can do for the environment. If you don't throw the snowball, there can be no (personal) avalanche.

This of course does not mean Children of Men, but rather encouraging people to think twice before deciding to have children, and at the very least, having fewer. But hey, if you're firmly in the "7 billion assholes isn't enough to truly gently caress this planet up once and for all" camp, then gently caress it, go hog wild.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 13:50

OhYeah: Jan 20, 2007; 1. Currently the most prevalent form of decision-making in the western world

2. While you are correct in saying that the society owns

3. You have not for a second demonstrated here why

4. I love the way that you equate "state" with "bureaucracy". Is that how you really feel about the state

Rime posted:

This winter has been all kinds of weird.

Southern BC has 15% of our annual snowpack for this time of year and we're likely to suffer one of the driest summers in the recorded history of the province, Vancouver may actually run out of water since that snowpack is responsible for 50% of our reservoir levels. I am climbing mountains in shorts right now which should be fully inaccessible for another six months.

Meanwhile, PEI has something like 700% of their annual snowfall for this time of year and has basically ceased to exist, along with most other Atlantic provinces.

Yeah, things are pretty hosed up here in Canada right now.

Winter in Estonia (Easter/Northern Europe) has been very strange. Almost no snow, very warm weather, lot of rain. Right now, the weather is really hot for March (yestery +15 celsius, the warmest recorded in 150 years). And for the weekend they predict possible snow and temperatures down to -10 celsius. That's like 25 degree difference in just 3 days.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 15:12

Happy_Misanthrope: Aug 3, 2007; "I wanted to kill you, go to your funeral, and anyone who showed up to mourn you, I wanted to kill them too."

Time for our weekly "Hey here's another feedback effect making things worse than we thought!" article:

Amazon rainforest is taking up a third less carbon than a decade ago

quote:

The amount of carbon that the Amazon rainforest is absorbing from the atmosphere and storing each year has fallen by around a third in the last decade, says a new 30-year study by almost 100 researchers.

This decline in the Amazon carbon sink amounts to one billion tonnes of carbon dioxide - equivalent to over twice the UK's annual emissions, the researchers say.

If this pattern exists in other forests around the world, deeper cuts in human-caused carbon dioxide emissions are needed to meet climate targets, the researchers say.

Now of course, you would expect the Amazon's ability to sequester carbon would be reduced due to it being continually felled, but reduced acreage is not really the focus of the research:

quote:

A team of almost 500 people monitored trees in more than 300 sites across eight countries. Between 1983 and 2011, the researchers measured the trees in each plot, recording the number, size and density to calculate how much carbon each one stored.

quote:

As they grow, Amazon trees account for a quarter of the carbon dioxide absorbed by the land each year. Studies suggest that as human-caused carbon dioxide emissions increase, forests will absorb and store more carbon, assuming they have enough water and nutrients to grow.

But a new study, published today in Nature, suggests the Amazon has passed saturation point for how much extra carbon it can take up.

quote:

The trees took up more carbon and grew more quickly during the 1990s, before levelling off since the year 2000. You can see this in the middle chart below.

But during this growth spurt, Amazon trees have been dying off more quickly, as the bottom graph shows.

The combination of flat growth rate and increasing tree deaths means the amount of carbon the Amazon stores has declined by around 30% since the 1990s, the researchers say.

quote:

So what is causing more trees to die? Co-author Prof Oliver Phillips from the University of Leeds, tells Carbon Brief it could be down to the growth spurt fuelled by rising carbon dioxide levels:

"The faster trees grow, the sooner they reach maturity, and the sooner they may eventually age."

Speculation is also that as temp rises and biomass increases, it also increases the competition for scarce water/nutrient resources among all forms of biomass, so the trees have less to draw from.

quote:

"Regardless of the causes behind the increase in tree mortality, this study shows that predictions of a continuing increase of carbon storage in tropical forests may be too optimistic."

Naturally the "Plants love carbon! The more the better!" has been a moldy idiotic denier talking point for a while now with respect to hand-waving effect the deleterious effects of CH as a whole, but this is just further evidence of how simplistic that argument is.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 15:24

Batham: Jun 19, 2010; _{Cluster bombing from B-52s is very, very accurate. The bombs are guaranteed to always hit the ground.}

Av027 posted:

You are one of two people, I believe, that are making the "eco idiot" statement in this thread. Everyone else gets it.

We're not talking about overpopulation of a region here (unless the "region" is "Earth"). The issue is the carbon impact that children have. Especially when they live to adulthood in first world countries. Ice that off with having children of their own. Then those children have children. It's a snowball rolling down a hill, quickly becoming an avalanche. Having a child is one of the worst things you can do for the environment. If you don't throw the snowball, there can be no (personal) avalanche.

This of course does not mean Children of Men, but rather encouraging people to think twice before deciding to have children, and at the very least, having fewer. But hey, if you're firmly in the "7 billion assholes isn't enough to truly gently caress this planet up once and for all" camp, then gently caress it, go hog wild.

With your narrow minded view on things I'm surprised you actually use a computer when you aren't contributing to society in some way, considering how much energy they use and how wasteful their construction and disposal is.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 17:31

YarPirate: May 17, 2003; Hellion

Batham posted:

With your narrow minded view on things I'm surprised you actually use a computer when you aren't contributing to society in some way, considering how much energy they use and how wasteful their construction and disposal is.

To suggest that having fewer children in the developed world would be better for the environment is different from saying people should kill themselves. You seem to be taking offense to the former and implying that it is the equivalent of the latter. This leads me to believe that you feel strongly about the need to have more children. Why?

To me, it seems like a campaign aimed at reducing birth rates voluntarily would be a good thing. I see it as being sort of like recycling (at least in my area) - some people will do it, others won't... It won't cause the human race to go extinct.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 17:52

Evil_Greven: Feb 20, 2007; Whadda I got to,
whadda I got to do
to wake ya up?

To shake ya up,
to break the structure up!?

Happy_Misanthrope posted:

Time for our weekly "Hey here's another feedback effect making things worse than we thought!" article:

Amazon rainforest is taking up a third less carbon than a decade ago

Ugh. I've started watching Years Living Dangerously on Amazon Prime, and while I don't care so much for the way they cut between the aspects, it mentions a lot of poo poo that I hadn't heard about.

One example is that of palm oil; in Indonesia, vast tracts of forest are being burned to plant palm oil - which is in loving everything. This burning alone is contributing some single digit percentage to our entire global emissions and worldwide, deforestation accounts for up to 20%. Worse, some of these forests are not on soil but beds of peat... if that poo poo goes, it's going to be pretty dire.

Another example is from Syria - that the civil war there started because of a multi-year drought where the government completely let people down. It seems that hunger was a huge and ignored motivation behind this conflict.

A third example is from Texas, where a meat packing plant closed due to a declining cattle population from the ongoing drought. This place employed some 10% of the town, so poo poo's gone bad pretty fast. And that is just from the first episode.

There was also an amazing VICE documentary on Antarctica that I watched on YouTube last week, but it seems to have been made private, pity. Episode 23, I think it was - Our Rising Oceans.

Evil_Greven fucked around with this message at 18:08 on Mar 19, 2015

# ? Mar 19, 2015 18:06

tsa: Feb 3, 2014

YarPirate posted:

To suggest that having fewer children in the developed world would be better for the environment is different from saying people should kill themselves. You seem to be taking offense to the former and implying that it is the equivalent of the latter. This leads me to believe that you feel strongly about the need to have more children. Why?

To me, it seems like a campaign aimed at reducing birth rates voluntarily would be a good thing. I see it as being sort of like recycling (at least in my area) - some people will do it, others won't... It won't cause the human race to go extinct.

It's striking a nerve because a lot of people here want kids. You either argue against the point or you admit you really aren't willing to make many sacrifices to help stop climate change. Or you just get snarky because it's pretty drat obvious having children in a first world country is a pretty big net negative for the environment.

Series DD Funding posted:

By that logic we should all kill ourselves or move to the third world.

I wouldn't recommend it but it doesn't change the fact it's correct to say more people consuming more = more climate change.

tsa fucked around with this message at 18:12 on Mar 19, 2015

# ? Mar 19, 2015 18:09

DoctorDilettante: May 16, 2013

Furnaceface posted:

I live right smack dab in the middle of the blue dongle (central Ontario), and yeah it was really freaking cold this winter. The jet stream is all kinds of hosed up now, but you dont really hear much about it from anyone, climate scientists included. Are they still trying to study the effects of climate change on it or is it just not worth studying?

A lot of this has been driven by interactions between the El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and it's eastern counterpart the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). Both a low ENSO index and a low NAO index contribute significantly to the winter weather in the eastern part of North America; a strong NAO in particular pushes some of the major atmospheric circulation patterns northward and shields North America from the Arctic air that's been hammering it for the last few years. In the last two or three years, both the NAO and ENSO indices have been on the low side, contributing to the colder, wetter weather than you've been seeing out in your part of the world. Combined with a solar activity minimum (which we're just starting to pull out of now), it's led to some very harsh and cold winters in eastern North America.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 18:10

Strudel Man: May 19, 2003; ROME DID NOT HAVE ROBOTS, FUCKWIT

Av027 posted:

We're not talking about overpopulation of a region here (unless the "region" is "Earth"). The issue is the carbon impact that children have. Especially when they live to adulthood in first world countries. Ice that off with having children of their own. Then those children have children. It's a snowball rolling down a hill, quickly becoming an avalanche.

People also die from time to time. When overall fertility in the first world is basically at replacement levels, the avalanche metaphor doesn't really seem to fit very well.

tsa posted:

I wouldn't recommend it but it doesn't change the fact it's correct to say more people consuming more = more climate change.

I think it's a lot easier to stomach the idea of lesser or no growth in population, than it is the idea of actually declining populations. The former sounds like planning, the latter like a die-off.

Strudel Man fucked around with this message at 18:36 on Mar 19, 2015

# ? Mar 19, 2015 18:29

Av027: Aug 27, 2003; Qowned.

^^Personal avalanche. If I have two children, and they each have two children, and they each have... that's the avalanche I mean. No kids, no snowball. This obviously makes more impact in first world countries. Also, as an aside, why do we assume we need 7 billion assholes on this planet? I'm sure we can all agree that the more people on this planet, the faster we destroy it, right? How is growing or even maintaining our current population important or beneficial in the slightest?^^

Batham posted:

With your narrow minded view on things I'm surprised you actually use a computer when you aren't contributing to society in some way, considering how much energy they use and how wasteful their construction and disposal is.

I'd venture a guess I can go through many, many PC's without making the same carbon impact having a child does. Having children remains a choice, and a poor one at that when taking the environment into account, despite the other excesses and wastes of our self-centered, greedy, self-destructive society. Film at 11:00.

Av027 fucked around with this message at 18:37 on Mar 19, 2015

# ? Mar 19, 2015 18:30

Series DD Funding: Nov 25, 2014; by exmarx

Av027 posted:

I'd venture a guess I can go through many, many PC's without making the same carbon impact having a child does. Having children remains a choice, and a poor one at that when taking the environment into account, despite the other excesses and wastes of our self-centered, greedy, self-destructive society. Film at 11:00.

So? I'm sure you can go through many, many children without making the same carbon impact building a coal plant does.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 18:33

Av027: Aug 27, 2003; Qowned.

Series DD Funding posted:

So? I'm sure you can go through many, many children without making the same carbon impact building a coal plant does.

I choose not to have coal plants.

poo poo, that did nothing.

Again, choosing not to have children is a positive environmental decision that individuals can achieve. If you find a way to wish away coal plants, let me know though.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 18:45

khwarezm: Oct 26, 2010; Deal with it.

Can I ask, do people envision some kind of fascist policy to rip out women's wombs at gunpoint and burn the third child every family has for fuel? Can we go further with this kind of insanity:

Series DD Funding posted:

By that logic we should all kill ourselves or move to the third world.

Batham posted:

If you go that extreme as to put in 'don't reproduce', why don't you also add 'kill yourself preferably by jumping off a cliff or another less polluting way'. Depending on your current job or influence you're allowed to postpone it until you retire!

and come to the conclusion that the worldwide drop in fertility ~~mostly caused by such awful policies as educating women, providing access to contraception and abortion and breaking down patriarchal structures~~ represents humanity basically committing suicide?

# ? Mar 19, 2015 18:48

Series DD Funding: Nov 25, 2014; by exmarx

Av027 posted:

I choose not to have coal plants.

poo poo, that did nothing.

Again, choosing not to have children is a positive environmental decision that individuals can achieve. If you find a way to wish away coal plants, let me know though.

And can you choose to not use computers?

# ? Mar 19, 2015 18:56

How are u: May 19, 2005; by Azathoth

I didn't realize that people would feel so personally offended by the mere fact that having children contributes to climate change. Personally, looking forward at all of the poo poo that is going to go down in 60-80 years makes me lean pretty hard toward the "don't bring a child into that world, that world will be hellish" camp.

What, do you people feel like your lives are worth less if you don't personally reproduce?

# ? Mar 19, 2015 19:02

Harold Fjord: Jan 3, 2004

These people clearly have some sort of guilt complex about their having or desire to have children. Look at this poo poo:

Series DD Funding posted:

And can you choose to not use computers?

Literally "you can't tell me what to do because you use carbon"
You'd think someone was trying to take their guns away.

Having read the water thread, do climate change models account for expected increases in power consumption for desalination and is it expected to be a significant contributor?

# ? Mar 19, 2015 19:02

pangstrom: Jan 25, 2003; Wedge Regret

How are u posted:

I didn't realize that people would feel so personally offended by the mere fact that having children contributes to climate change. Personally, looking forward at all of the poo poo that is going to go down in 60-80 years makes me lean pretty hard toward the "don't bring a child into that world, that world will be hellish" camp.

What, do you people feel like your lives are worth less if you don't personally reproduce?

It's going both ways, as you and Nevvy Z are making pretty clear. Welcome to topics re: children, everybody.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 19:08

Av027: Aug 27, 2003; Qowned.

Series DD Funding posted:

And can you choose to not use computers?

Me personally? Not really, I work in IT. But some can, yes, and some people do. However, it won't make the same impact choosing not to have children does. I would be very surprised if an individual could influence the environment in a more impactful way than whether or not they choose to have children. Again, here's what I posted on the last page:

http://www.livescience.com/9701-save-planet-kids.html

quote:

Under current conditions in the United States, for instance, each child ultimately adds about 9,441 metric tons of carbon dioxide to the carbon legacy of an average parent � about 5.7 times the lifetime emissions for which, on average, a person is responsible.

I know the concept "having kids is bad, here's why" is unpalatable, but that doesn't change the fact that it's true. For some, choosing not to have children will make sense. For others, they will have 9 children no matter how dire things get. It's a personal choice, and whether you bring the environment into that choice is your own decision. Having children is bad for the environment, full stop.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 19:08

Harold Fjord: Jan 3, 2004

pangstrom posted:

It's going both ways, as you and Nevvy Z are making pretty clear. Welcome to topics re: children, everybody.

Lol at this "The truth must be in the middle" nonsense. What goes both ways? People are acting crazy, we are just pointing it out.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 19:11

pangstrom: Jan 25, 2003; Wedge Regret

Nevvy Z posted:

Lol at this "The truth must be in the middle" nonsense. What goes both ways? People are acting crazy, we are just pointing it out.

I'm just saying there's a little extra "energy" in the pro-kid stuff and in the anti-kid stuff, as there is in any kid discussion. Or console discussion. Or circumcision discussion. Using the word "discussion" loosely, of course. Your post is dripping with it, it's not that subtle.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 19:15

Series DD Funding: Nov 25, 2014; by exmarx

Nevvy Z posted:

Lol at this "The truth must be in the middle" nonsense. What goes both ways? People are acting crazy, we are just pointing it out.

Using a computer is objectively bad for the environment and mortgages the future for short-term gain. Refusing to admit it doesn't change it.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 19:15

Harold Fjord: Jan 3, 2004

pangstrom posted:

I'm just saying there's a little extra "energy" in the pro-kid stuff and in the anti-kid stuff, as there is in any kid discussion. Or console discussion. Or circumcision discussion. Using the word "discussion" loosely, of course. Your post is dripping with it, it's not that subtle.

I think you are reading something into it that isn't there. I don't care much either way who does or does not have kids. I just think people's flailing attempts to strawman and ad hom the guy who brought it up are hilarious. Like this guy for whom it's very important and relevant to talk about computers using power because...

Series DD Funding posted:

Using a computer is objectively bad for the environment and mortgages the future for short-term gain. Refusing to admit it doesn't change it.

Yes and?

Harold Fjord fucked around with this message at 19:21 on Mar 19, 2015

# ? Mar 19, 2015 19:17

Strudel Man: May 19, 2003; ROME DID NOT HAVE ROBOTS, FUCKWIT

Seems like any voluntary environmentally-motivated fertility reduction would be pretty self-limiting, anyway, since within a generation or two the great majority of the population would have been raised by people who didn't consider that to be a reasonable tradeoff.

Av027 posted:

^^Personal avalanche. If I have two children, and they each have two children, and they each have... that's the avalanche I mean. No kids, no snowball. This obviously makes more impact in first world countries. Also, as an aside, why do we assume we need 7 billion assholes on this planet? I'm sure we can all agree that the more people on this planet, the faster we destroy it, right? How is growing or even maintaining our current population important or beneficial in the slightest?^^

Humanity is the only thing that makes the environment worth anything. Personal opinion, of course. That you refer to it as "7 billion assholes" I think is rather telling.

Strudel Man fucked around with this message at 19:21 on Mar 19, 2015

# ? Mar 19, 2015 19:18

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? May 30, 2024 23:26

Zombie #246: Apr 26, 2003; Murr rgghhh ahhrghhh fffff

Okay but what if the kid you have is the one that leads the eco-revolution, that seems like a pretty good carbon negative impact

# ? Mar 19, 2015 19:21

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Climate Change thread: tl; dr - We are so screwed

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