the ignorance is a consequence of our societies system of incentives. everything keeps pointing back towards that each time theres an event like this. But if we aren't going to attach an economic price for emissions then it remains an externality and not a recognized reality to the economy. The current US administration is playing a leading role in keeping it that way. And voters keep voting for it. Incentives.

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Loquebantur 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The economic system itself is incompatible with the physical reality of a finite planet.

The ones steering society choose to crash and ruin everything rather than to jeopardize their positions in power.

That obvious failure in morals and ethics, basic principles of adult responsibility really, is made possible by a lack of rational reflection in the populace.

Objective truth has to take precedence over subjective desires when it comes to existential questions. Currently it does not.

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constantius an hour ago | parent [-]

I'd push back.on blaming the populace for this: the widespread belief in general polls is that the climate situation is dire and that drastic measures need to be taken.

However, the constraints that most people have to contend with do not allow them to be more radical in their calls for change. You saw it in the Gilets Jaunes/Yellow Vests uprising in France, that was motivated not by the passion for IC engines but by the inability to weather the costs of taxation on older vehicles.

The real culprit is far and away corporations that benefit from activities that carry with them extreme effects on the climate, and who can influence both politics and media. The research (sorry for lack of link) that shows that political direction is largely controlled by moneyed interests is not ambiguous.

I do agree that the populace also deserves some of the blame however: regular renewals of electronic devices, and especially the continuing consumption of animal products, is a moral failure justified only by pleasure.

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Loquebantur an hour ago | parent | next [-]

You're right about the general sentiment acknowledging the seriousness only when you look at the center and left of society. The majority in the US however supports or tolerates the actual political decisions made, contradicting that level of importance.

When you paint people as being "disallowed" from more radical actions, the same question of true importance arises? The current trajectory leads to Armageddon, plain and simple.

My point here thus is about the proper scale on which people place the topic.

It's not a "lifestyle choice" to doom humanity's children to ruin.

Placing responsibility with the irresponsible is a cop-out.

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inigyou an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The culprit behind corporations is politicians who allow them to get away with what they do, and the culprit behind this nexus is game theory.

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pluralmonad an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Throwing everything animal under the bus is not warranted. CAFOs and grain heavy operations certainly. Regenerative ag using animals on pasture is an amazing carbon sink. I agree that the factories using petroleum grown grains as feed are terrible.

	▲	constantius 27 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		90% of farmed animals globally are in factory farms: https://www.sentienceinstitute.org/global-animal-farming-est... I don't have data on the West specifically, but I'd be surprised if it's not 99%. "Free range" animals are largely a fiction. Animals being used for pasture grazing, for the benefit of the climate, could be understandable, but I think enslavement and torture of 200+ billion animals annually is a moral failure that goes far beyond its effects on CO2 ppm.

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the_real_cher an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Does any country care? Isnt China far worse thsn the US?

	▲	defrost an hour ago \| parent [-]
		> Does any country care? China ostensibly cares, their five year plans drawn up by committees of Engineers (Civil, Mechanical, Electrical) and Scientists are on an arc to minimise reliance on fossil fuels and transition to renewables (wind, solar), and nuclear. There are strategic reasons for this, of course. > Isnt China far worse thsn the US? "It's complicated" * Historically the US is responsible for a greater mass of the CO2 humans have added to the atmosphere. * Currently, China is adding more per annum (and India is in the bleeding edge mix also, as is Australia) in absolute terms, but still less(?) in per capita terms (having a much much larger population). * China is still using coal (although they are on the cusp of peaking their use) - that gets thrown at them a lot, the caveats are -- China shut down a lot of badly polluting inefficient coal power plants. -- China opened up a lot of more up to date less polluting but still coal power plants. -- China is using these to power all manner of stuff including the build out of the largest renewable power components production line in the world. -- Coal is set to be phased out "soon" (and it seems to be slowly going that way, see peaked comment above). * A lot of China's CO2 emissions are a direct result of their mineral processing, production, and assembly of the rest of the world's consumption. ( eg: The case can be argued that the fall in US per capita CO2 emissions is a result of US consumption now being met by manufacturing that has moved from the US to China) There are literal books and stacks of research papers arguing about each point mentioned above - and that's just skimming the surface.