Global warming appears to have shifted into a faster gear. After removing the effects of El Niño, volcanic eruptions, and solar cycles, researchers found that the planet has warmed at roughly 0.35°C per decade over the past ten years, compared with just under 0.2°C per decade from 1970 to 2015. The acceleration, which becomes visible around 2013 to 2015, appeared across five major global temperature datasets with more than 98% statistical certainty.
Crypto farming, feeding the ai bubble, large scale wars of aggression, commuters replacing cars with trucks, buying throwaway junk has never been easier. That’s the relatively new completely unnecessary hubris that I can think off atm. These should be the low hanging fruits to just not do, but apparently we’re going to continue doing them anyways. If we can’t address the low hanging fruits, then tackling the harder challenges will remain a pipe dream until it’s too late. Climate stability is fucked, and we’re in for a rough ride.
The real “low hanging fruit to not do” is blaming individual choices for societal issues. Capitalism is the one and only reason for anthropogenic climate change. Ending capitalism is the one and only way to solve it. There is no individual action you can take that is effective, we have to reorder society in such a way that it is impossible to profit from environmental destruction.
the only real solution to climate change is renewable energy, and solar energy in particular. capitalism or no capitalism basically doesn’t matter.
Except for the part where capitalism is actively sabotaging the transition to renewables, because fossil fuels areore profitable, so it really does matter.
Like 3/5 things that poster mentioned were not individual choices. The 2/5 that are individual choices are real issues. It is an issue, not just societally but also environmentally and in terms of public health, that the world is polluted by plastic because people wanted momentary convenience. Capitalism has to end and it incentivizes those choices of convenience, but people are still simultaneously responsible for making those choices unless they have no alternative… in which case it’s not really a choice.
Human nature is the reason. Regardless of the system we live in. People want more, better, etc. and feel important/strong/rich/… It has always been like that. Heck, even monkeys display such things.
Nah, that is the conservative talking point in favour of the status quo. History shows that humans are perfectly capable of being social creatures cooperating for mutual benefits.
That a handful of psychopaths are our current rulers aren’t necessarily descriptive of our general species.
100 thousand years ago you’d say human nature was to live in small bands and only assemble for seasonal hunts or cultural events. Anything else would be perpetual war.
10000 years ago you would be saying that it’s against human nature to be sedentary or do repetitive work so agriculture is ultimately only a hobby at best.
4000 years ago you’d say it’s human nature to live in city states ruled by tyrant warrior-kings and dedicate your life to cereal farming.
Maybe human nature isn’t some well characterised and stiff thing? humans have lived in more ways than you can dream of.
I have difficulty accepting that corporations did this and therefore we should all keep going with the status quo. Although an individual’s choices don’t amount to enough in and of themselves, the choices of masses of individuals drive the consumer market. The more disposable shit we buy, the more disposable shit corporations make.
We as a society have normalized be everyone individually owning 17 appliances that are used 0-2 times per year, having 53 outfits made by overseas slave labour, and accumulating gigabyte after gigabyte of data that must be managed. And if you tell someone this, they will say it’s all necessary - what the pandemic taught me is the degree to which people cannot identify the difference between essential services and non-essential, as everything becomes justifiable based on niche situations and the blanket defense of mental health.
If we all forever point the finger and say that someone else is actually responsible, and therefore we refuse to make changes, then nobody is ever going to get started. Much like on a national scale how the US simultaneously blames climate change on China and India (“we shouldn’t bother doing anything, they’re bigger!”) and Canadian forest fires (although by the previous logic, a country with 1/8 the population should be incapable of changing their climate).
…this message brought to you by Exxon-Mobil corporation.
In what way is my suggestion that people should be environmentally conscious with their choices supporting oil companies?
So we should just sit back and wait for the oil companies to benevolently act on our behalf? Forgive me if I don’t feel like circling the drain without a fight.
In the way that it reinforces the oil companies’ favorite narrative where individual consumers are responsible for the damage the company does to generate profit for its parasitic shareholders.
No, we should be doing things we don’t organize in public posts on social media to make the executives and shareholders of those companies absolutely terrified of what will happen if they don’t do as we demand.
Funny, that’s exactly what your first comment shows is the only thing you’re willing to do.
What? And stop indiscriminately slaughtering babies? You monster!