Crazycryodude posted:

Well yeah, the purpose of sand dunes is to be a place where windblown sand particles accumulate, the purpose of a fire is to move a system towards entropy via combustion, the purpose of DNA-based life is to maximize copies of its DNA.

If you mean on like a higher philosophical level, then ok there is no purpose to life, or fire, or sand dunes. But I'm speaking in practicalities of how and why, not spiritual philosophy.

Hubbert posted:

reminder that capitalism did this

toggle posted:

dubai is flooding because of cloud seeding

smoobles posted:

it's desert it's supposed to be wet

Crazycryodude posted:

Not true, human history is full of societies across cultures and continents that exceeded their local ecological limits through a combination of natural climate shifts and human impact, and collapsed/suffered a dieback to sustainable levels in their new ecological conditions. The Bronze Age Collapse in the Fertile Crescent, Angkor Wat, Easter Island, Great Zimbabwe, Cahokia, Harappans, the list goes on and on and on. This isn't some uninformed Reddit nihilism thing, this is the academic consensus among a bunch of very serious anthropologists and paleontologists.

What's different this time is that we're seeing a crossing of ecological limits in the first ever truly global society. Previous societies killed off by ecological boundaries were regionally limited due to smaller populations and less developed technology, now we've grown up enough to kill an entire planet at the same time instead of just different regions of it at staggered times. But this is only a difference in scale, not in kind. Humans have been doing this at least since we invented agriculture - agriculture is inherently a process for redirecting ecological energy and resources towards human ends outside of "natural" cycles after all.

mags posted:

if we just kill the rich people we can make the end times much more comfortable

Grag the thunfler posted:

doesn't seem like it

https://www.wired.com/story/dubai-flooding-uae-cloud-seeding-climate-change/

Crazycryodude posted:

Can't believe that capitalism made us hunt all the megafauna to extinction with sharp sticks, how had I never considered the bourgeois character of the neolithic hunter?

Crazycryodude posted:

Can't believe that capitalism made us hunt all the megafauna to extinction with sharp sticks, how had I never considered the bourgeois character of the neolithic hunter?

Crazycryodude posted:

Can't believe that capitalism made us hunt all the megafauna to extinction with sharp sticks, how had I never considered the bourgeois character of the neolithic hunter?

Crazycryodude posted:

Can't believe that capitalism made us hunt all the megafauna to extinction with sharp sticks, how had I never considered the bourgeois character of the neolithic hunter?

Communist Cop posted:

quote:

Climate crisis: average world incomes to drop by nearly a fifth by 2050
Cost of environmental damage will be six times higher than price of limiting global heating to 2C, study finds
Average incomes will fall by almost a fifth within the next 26 years as a result of the climate crisis, according to a study that predicts the costs of damage will be six times higher than the price of limiting global heating to 2C.

Rising temperatures, heavier rainfall and more frequent and intense extreme weather are projected to cause $38tn (£30tn) of destruction each year by mid-century, according to the research, which is the most comprehensive analysis of its type ever undertaken, and whose findings are published in the journal Nature.

The hefty toll – which is far higher than previous estimates – is already locked into the world economy over the coming decades as a result of the enormous emissions that have been pumped into the atmosphere through the burning of gas, oil, coal and trees.

Crazycryodude posted:

Can't believe that capitalism made us hunt all the megafauna to extinction with sharp sticks, how had I never considered the bourgeois character of the neolithic hunter?

Crazycryodude posted:

Not true, human history is full of societies across cultures and continents that exceeded their local ecological limits through a combination of natural climate shifts and human impact, and collapsed/suffered a dieback to sustainable levels in their new ecological conditions. The Bronze Age Collapse in the Fertile Crescent, Angkor Wat, Easter Island, Great Zimbabwe, Cahokia, Harappans, the list goes on and on and on. This isn't some uninformed Reddit nihilism thing, this is the academic consensus among a bunch of very serious anthropologists and paleontologists.

What's different this time is that we're seeing a crossing of ecological limits in the first ever truly global society. Previous societies killed off by ecological boundaries were regionally limited due to smaller populations and less developed technology, now we've grown up enough to kill an entire planet at the same time instead of just different regions of it at staggered times. But this is only a difference in scale, not in kind. Humans have been doing this at least since we invented agriculture - agriculture is inherently a process for redirecting ecological energy and resources towards human ends outside of "natural" cycles after all.

041724_3 posted:

Skaffen-Amtiskaw posted:

Communist Cop posted:

https://twitter.com/volcaholic1/status/1780320716509864364?t=yZ6ndymakIEHcbJb4E_MBA&s=19

A year's worth of rain fell in Dubai in a single day lmao

mdemone posted:

War was always here. Before man was, war waited for him. The ultimate trade awaiting its ultimate practitioner.

mags posted:

the thing that is “different” this time is capitalism which is funny since they wrote that to disagree with me only to agree with me and then dismiss the difference as not being important

farming is fine actually

mags posted:

the thing that is “different” this time is capitalism which is funny since they wrote that to disagree with me only to agree with me and then dismiss the difference as not being important

farming is fine actually

mistermojo posted:

you have to think of the positives, like all this free water

quote:

On this episode, economist Steve Keen offers a deep forensic history of why modern economic theory has neglected the role of energy in productivity - and why this “Energy Blindness” is now a major blindspot in how our culture views the present - and the future.  The massive, temporary carbon surplus we’ve extracted over the last few centuries has resulted in an exponential increase in the standard of living for many. This explosion of global economic growth also happened to coincide with the development of all modern economic theories and formulas, leading to a core misunderstanding in the way our economies are powered. How have technology and innovation been used to cover up the role of a growing energy supply in the last century of rising prosperity? In the midst of discussions between value and labor, where does energy really fit into the equation? Where do we go once we understand the true role of energy in our economy - and will we have the ability to reshape economic policies to be in line with our energy realities?

About Steve Keen

Steve Keen is an economist, author of Debunking Economics and The New Economics: A Manifesto. His new book, Rebuilding Economics from the Top Down, will be released in 2024. He is a Research Fellow at the Institute for Strategy, Resilience, and Security at University College in London. Steve was one of the handful of economists to realize that a serious economic crisis was imminent, and to publicly warn of it from as early as December 2005. This, and his pioneering work on modeling debt-deflation, resulted in him winning the Revere Award from the Real World Economics Review.

quote:

Now, when you read Marx properly, and I think there were three people who have done that, I'm one of them, Rosovsky is another, but most Marxists don't realize that Marx actually had an explanation for how capital can add value or be a source of surplus value in his terms. But I won't get into that here, but that's saying the Marxists don't read Marx properly

Hubbert posted:

crazy idea here: what if it was possible to talk about economics within the context of the natural sciences without being called an Italian fascist

Skaffen-Amtiskaw posted:

Farming makes more humans.

Check. Mate.