| ▲ | CalRobert 5 hours ago |
| The crazy thing is that we have basically everything we need right now. You can live in a well-insulated fully electric home powered by renewable energy and have most things you need within a walk, bike, or public transport ride away, _OR_ use an electric car for the things that aren't. If you combine that with a mostly-plant based diet (or at _least_ swapping chicken for most of your beef and lamb) and have 2 kids or fewer you're... basically there. The main reason most people can't do this is because of political choices, not technological limitations. Granted this doesn't include luxuries like jetting halfway around the world for a 1 week holiday or living in a 4000 square foot house in the desert and driving a studio apartment an hour to work every day, but really, is that a better life? |
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| ▲ | graeme 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| >The crazy thing is that we have basically everything we need right now. Have you travelled? This doesn't describe most of the world. Most of the world would need to increase carbon emissions to live the way you're describing. You aren't describing a zero carbon lifestyle, you're describing a lower carbon lifestyle. And we still use carbon in building the things in your scenario: the building, the car, etc. Lower carbon lifestyles can slow the speed of the increase in global warming, but as long as we're emitting any carbon we're increasing global energy forcing. By all means choose lower carbon lifestyles, but fundamentally we need nuclear or renewables + battery or all of the above such that we don't face a tradeoff between energy use and getting stuff people want. Energy is extremely useful. |
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| ▲ | Loquebantur 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | The idea of average individuals being the relevant actors in global carbon emissions is pure misdirection. They're not, it's systemic with industry being the main culprit and the rich being the ones who benefit from that socialization of pollution costs. The AMOC shutdown isn't merely "possible" and due "this century" either. The math of the dynamics of complex systems shows the current behavior to be signs of a phase transition in the process of happening. The speed of that shutdown isn't "decades" either, it's more likely just years. The voices of "experts" telling you it was all some incomprehensible conundrum should deeply worry you. They're either not being honest or they're no experts. | | |
| ▲ | vladms 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | > They're not, it's systemic with industry being the main culprit and the rich being the ones who benefit from that socialization of pollution costs. You two might agree if we consider that when you say "rich" you might describe the average individual on this website (if we consider all people alive). I do believe that 90% of the people would not want to actually destroy the planet the way it seems to be happening, but I also believe that 90% of the people can't refrain themselves from bad health habits either. So, to fix the root cause I would discuss more about people's bad emotional/impulse control, otherwise we will just change one issue (climate) to any of the others (violence, unhappiness, etc.) | | |
| ▲ | Loquebantur an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | No, you're entirely wrong. The impact an individual has on carbon emissions is directly correlated with their wealth. The distribution of which is extremely uneven: as of 2024, the top 1% worldwide possessed as much as the lower 95% combined, 57 trillion US$. That has gotten only worse in the last two years. It's not about "bad habits", impulse control or whatever, at all. | |
| ▲ | tovej an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | It's an even smaller percentage of people that are most responsible. Any multimillionaire is already someone who could have an impact, but mostly it's the 100 million club and up that are causing the most damage. And bug LLCs in general, since those are essentially optimising for profit only. |
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| ▲ | CalRobert 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Indeed I have traveled, and I am in favour of nuclear and renewables and batteries for pretty much the reasons you state. There are other issues (concrete production comes to mind, and it always bugs me that houses in Europe are so dependent on concrete when its a huge emissions source) but when you're running your building equipment and factories and transit networks on zero emissions electricity (so we can include nuclear, which I suppose isn't renewable but is still very low carbon) then the building, the car, etc. have lower embodied carbon as well. |
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| ▲ | to11mtm 17 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > You can live in a well-insulated fully electric home powered by renewable energy and have most things you need within a walk, bike, or public transport ride away, _OR_ use an electric car for the things that aren't. If you combine that with a mostly-plant based diet (or at _least_ swapping chicken for most of your beef and lamb) and have 2 kids or fewer you're... basically there. 'political' is true but it covers so many different problems. For example, while there is a grocery store very accessible to me, you have to plot the route carefully due to the road design. Then there's the problem of the condo I currently live in not having the infrastructure for charging. (My compromise in that case is a hybrid. Kinda want a plug-in hybrid for my next car, they've gotten to where it very well could handle 80% of my driving.) > Granted this doesn't include luxuries like jetting halfway around the world for a 1 week holiday or living in a 4000 square foot house in the desert and driving a studio apartment an hour to work every day, but really, is that a better life? I've never gotten this lifestyle either... I'm not afraid to do a long road trip once a year or so, but yes in most cases too many costs have been externalized for too long. |
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| ▲ | hypfer 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > have 2 kids or fewer This is at odds with lots of other relevant topics that go beyond just "consumption". 2 or fewer is below the replacement rate of 2.1
This _has_ already happened, but there are a lot of voices voicing a lot of reasons why they believe that that might actually be not the best situation. |
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| ▲ | jandrese 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | You see a whole lot of panic from industrialists over the birth rate drop in the industrialized world. They claim it is an extinction level event for humanity. This is not quite correct. It is an extinction level event for economic models that assume unbounded growth of the consumer base. | | |
| ▲ | gorjusborg 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | This is an important distinction: what is good for ecology is not necessarily good for economy. If we need unbounded growth to jeep our economic system to function, its the economic system that is wrong, not nature. | | |
| ▲ | CuriouslyC 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Hence why the die hard capitalist shills are so set on going to space. | | | |
| ▲ | kruffalon 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Capitalist economy. Economies can exist in many different ways. At its core it is just a way to describe how we move resources between ourselves and that can be done in many, many ways. |
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| ▲ | archagon 35 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | If you read other things these industrialists say, it’s clear that their actual argument is a xenophobic/white supremacist one. The panic is entirely political, not economic. We have no shortage of viable immigrants to keep the economy going. | |
| ▲ | georgeburdell an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | It’s disingenuous to imply “industrialists” are the only ones unhappy. Anyone who doesn’t want to die a stranger in their own land is also concerned. | | |
| ▲ | surgical_fire an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | If the concern is one that sounds horribly like eugenics, perhaps this hypothetical "people" should indeed go the way of the dodo. | |
| ▲ | sosomoxie an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | What does "die a stranger in their own land" mean and how does it relate to birthrate? | | |
| ▲ | InsideOutSanta 32 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Probably "fewer kids means immigration is required to maintain social safety nets, but I don't like to look at people who don't look like me." |
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| ▲ | archagon 33 minutes ago | parent | prev [-] | | Yes, Native Americans ought to get their land back. (What do you mean “no, not like that”?) |
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| ▲ | tialaramex 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Below replacement would be terrifying if there were one thousand humans, it would be worrying if there were a million, and at least worthy of consideration if there were a hundred million, but there are almost ten billion simultaneous humans, we're fine. | | |
| ▲ | hypfer 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | On a humanity-level: yes. On an individual state-level: no. | | |
| ▲ | giantg2 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | "On an individual state-level: no." This might actually be a yes if you believe in the potential impact of automation and AI. | | |
| ▲ | generic92034 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | And if you believe in the fair distribution of the benefits of automation and AI in the population. IMHO, this belief is the more unrealistic one, at least in the short term. |
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| ▲ | NoMoreNicksLeft 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | >Below replacement would be terrifying if there were one thousand humans, The funny part is that it should terrify you whether there are 10 humans or 10 billion. At the current rates, it's over in about 12-13 generations regardless of the number you start with. That's how it works... no matter how big the starting number, it's how many generations you have left. Think of it this way? You know the dumb story they taught us in school, about the guy whose payment from the king for doing something clever was to have one grain of rice on the first chess square, and 2 on the second, 4 on the third, and so on... and how it bankrupted the king long before the 64th square? That's the same math with fertility rate of 1.0! (The Chinese have a fertility rate of 1.0, famously.) Each generation will be half the size of the previous. But how long before that is effectively zero? Will it be 1 million years, 250,000 years? No, about 300ish. 300 years. But long before you reach that point, your civilization has fallen apart. Those last 4 or 5 generations live life without electricity, anything but muscle power, or metallurgy. And China's fertility rate isn't even the lowest! South Korea's rate just dropped to around 0.5! That's where each generation is one quarter the size of the previous. The best part of all is that these rates haven't even bottomed out. We will almost certainly see rates right around 0 long before the century ends. >but there are almost ten billion simultaneous humans, we're fine. At least math illiteracy ought to console you guys towards the end. | | |
| ▲ | yoyohello13 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | This whole comment rests on a very big assumption that these rates will never recover. Just because you can fit a trend line doesn’t mean the projections will pan out. It could just as easily be the case that once population starts meaningfully decreasing, the opportunity cost of children will also decrease and fertility rates will recover. This happens all the time in nature. Our population absolutely exploded over the last 100 years. This can easily just be a reversion to the mean. There really is no reason to be worrying about human extinction right now. In fact, the ‘extinction’ rhetoric is harmful and dangerous since so many ‘solutions’ to fertility rates are less education and less freedom. I have no trouble believing a handmaids tail like faction emerging because they believe they are saving the species. | | |
| ▲ | NoMoreNicksLeft 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | >This whole comment rests on a very big assumption that these rates will never recover. J The opposite, actually. Your assumption is that the rates bounce up and down, mostly because you don't want to believe there's a problem. The rates are transmissible, older generations to the younger. No one growing up in a world where people have few or just one child will say to themselves "hey, you know what, I want 10 kids when I'm an adult!"... but that's what would have to happen. You and everyone else on HN whines "the reason people aren't having kids is the economy is awful and we can't afford them"... but in a world with a shrinking, aging population the economy just gets worse. You're the one making the very stupid assumption, and you can't even say why. I can, it's because you haven't thought about it. Perhaps it's uncomfortable to think that you're driving your species to extinction. >Our population absolutely exploded over the last 100 years. More nonsense. Our population isn't exploding, it's just big. And it will shrink rapidly. I already laid out the math... how long before 8 billion becomes 1000 when you're splitting it in half every generation (a generation is commonly held to be 20-25 years)? Can you do that math puzzle for us? There are only about 5 generations living on Earth at any given time. Just do the math already. None of this is pretty. >There really is no reason to be worrying about human extinction right now. Yes, there is. People are only generally capable of reproduction from the ages of 16 to 36... just 20 years. Every moment you waste "not worrying about it now" is the problem compounding with interest. You've already waited too long to worry about it. >In fact, the ‘extinction’ rhetoric is harmful and dangerous since so many ‘solutions’ to fertility rates are less education and less freedom. Well at least when our species dies out, the last few people will have masters degrees. That's the important part, right? >I have no trouble believing a handmaids tail like faction emerging It'd be because you and those like you forced the issue. Go ahead, stick your head in the sand some more. We all know that willful obliviousness to reality can change the rules of the universe themselves, right? Wish it all away! | | |
| ▲ | tsimionescu 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > The rates are transmissible, older generations to the younger. No one growing up in a world where people have few or just one child will say to themselves "hey, you know what, I want 10 kids when I'm an adult!"... but that's what would have to happen. And yet this exact thing happened, in reverse, everywhere in the world as certain social conditions were met. So it's not just not impossible, it's by far the likeliest scenario. > Our population isn't exploding, it's just big. And it will shrink rapidly. The whole population of the world slowly rose from some 10-50 million before 1 CE to some 100 million by 1000 CE, to maybe some 2-300 million by 1700 CE. And then it suddenly reached 1B in 1800, 2B in 1920, 4B in 1974, 8B in 2022. This is a massive population explosion, with the doubling rate increasing rapidly, especially before the 2000s. > People are only generally capable of reproduction from the ages of 16 to 36... just 20 years. This is wildly wrong. Children of 16 years should NEVER reproduce, it's an awful thing that this happened for so long of human history, a shameful reality that will hopefully never happen again. And as health has increased, women have become able to reproduce (with some medical aid) well into their 40s (note that the record is currently 74), while men can and often do reproduce well into their 60s+. Now, is it better if people who want to have children have them when they're younger, probably in their late 20s? Absolutely - mostly to keep generational gaps manageable, to benefit from grandparents' help, etc. But it's not in any way a strict biological necessity, and as fertility science advances, we have every reason to believe this will continue to improve. > Well at least when our species dies out, the last few people will have masters degrees. That's the important part, right? This is absurd hyperbole for the exact reasons above. | |
| ▲ | 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | [deleted] |
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| ▲ | AnimalMuppet 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | When will the trend recover? When civilization falls to the point that nobody can make birth control pills, if not before. | | |
| ▲ | Jare 23 minutes ago | parent [-] | | It recovers when having 1.1 kids per person on average does not mean making substantial sacrifices in quality of life over your entire life. Since many people will still not have kids, that sounds like 3 kids per couple being affordable in a comfortable, enjoyable, not stressful manner. Right now you can guess that for many couples, 2 kids becomes close to unaffordable, and 3 becomes nearly unmanageable. Individually, you will see couples choose to do it and even to do it in ways that others both envy and chastise; but overall, it's not happening. It requires many things to change not just in economy, but in society as a whole. It's not going to happen in a society devoted to growth, that's for sure. |
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| ▲ | 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | [deleted] | |
| ▲ | InsideOutSanta 33 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | No, this should absolutely not terrify anyone, at all. The only reason it is a concern is that our economic system is built on infinite growth, which is going to fail one way or the other eventually. It's better it fail by people voluntarily having fewer kids than any of the other possible fail states. The solution is to fix the economic system, not to worry that teenagers aren't getting accidentally pregnant so much anymore. Productivity is increasing all the time, and we're very likely on the verge of another huge productivity increase with LLMs and robotics. The idea that we need to constantly increase the number of humans to maintain our current economic system is absolutely asinine. | |
| ▲ | CalRobert 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | The way emissions are going we* won't make it another 12-13 generations either. * Some humans will likely survive, but modern civilisation won't. |
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| ▲ | Avicebron 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > You can live in a well-insulated fully electric home powered by renewable energy and have most things you need within a walk, bike, or public transport ride away, _OR_ use an electric car for the things that aren't. For this to be the most effective it really needs to be deployed somewhere like India. How are they coming along with that? |
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| ▲ | dgroshev 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| You're missing the vast interconnected network of stuff that's required to sustain that home. From your home battery to cancer treatments that you might need to sewer that runs to your home, all of this needs to be made and sometimes replaced. Most of those things are still unavailable to most humans; in many places we still haven't built roads, much less sewers and water distribution systems. Household electricity self-sufficiency obscures the vast requirements to support it and extend this self-sufficiency to billions of other people. |
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| ▲ | yoyohello13 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | You’re right about that. I do think that access to more and cheaper energy has the downstream effect of making all those other things cheaper too and more available too. Energy is the foundation of it all. |
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| ▲ | mc32 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| All of the Western nations are at 2 kids or fewer but also so are China and India. Most of the 2+ children come from the ME and subsaharan Africa and areas in Oceania/SEAsia, Maybe some parts of South America. One could slow consumption by not importing people from low carbon footprint into high carbon footprint countries -though many countries, except Japan, aren't comfortable adjusting to lower populations. |
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| ▲ | dmitrygr 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| Western nations reducing will DO nothing - it is too small a fraction of greenhouse emissions. The large fraction is coming form india and china. And they do not have electric everything. they don't even have running water in most places. |
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