What I'm getting tired of is Hollywood films, documentaries, awards, etc. preaching to me.
Specifically nature documentaries, when I watch recent productions I get the feeling that they aren't trying to show the results of studying nature, to educate about this or that: I get the feeling that they are packaged environmentalist manifestos (look at all these cute little animals that are going to die because you don't recycle) either made to shame/enlighten people who don't do the right thing or to boost the egos of people who do good.
It bothers me because it so often feels shoehorned in and off topic. I wouldn't mind at all if it were the topic, but injecting it into every topic is the problem.
Using art as a tool is complicated. When overdone it is unambiguously wrong, when done correctly it can be a powerful good force, and somewhere in the middle is a wide grey area which is difficult to navigate.
The feeling of everyone studying the natural world now is one of overwhelming loss, that everything they've devoted their lives to is disappearing before their eyes. There isn't any way to make an honest nature documentary and not include that. To do otherwise would be to pretend that the careful selection they do to show a pristine wilderness and healthy animals is reflective of reality.
> The feeling of everyone studying the natural world now is one of overwhelming loss
I am beginning to have my doubts about the reasoning behind these feelings.
It is not that I deny that there are problems which have happened, are happening, and certainly will happen.
I'm starting to think most people thinking, talking, and feeling about it are being driven and biased by a shared sort of doomsday cult not in major but only subtle ways. "Everyone" just "knows" it.
There is loss, there is reason for concern, there is change in progress, and lots of reasons to feel about it. The feelings though don't seem like they are driven by fact, reason, analysis, and – well – science, but driven by shared feelings and ambiguous knowledge that things are bad.
>She had been taking these sorts of research trips for two decades, and over recent years she had witnessed about 85 percent of the island’s reef system perish due to rising ocean temperatures. “I was diving with tears in my eyes,” she recalls.
> We found a large proportion of respondents, including Australians and overseas visitors, expressed forms of grief in response to loss and damage to the iconic ecosystem. Negative emotions associated with words given in short statements about “what the Great Barrier Reef means to you”, included sadness, disgust, anger and fear.
> 76% claiming to have personally experienced global heating in their daily lives, from coping with dangerous sea ice journeys to having sled dogs euthanised for economic reasons tied to shorter winters.
Sometimes it seems all nature documentaries are implicitly becoming (unintentional) sequels to Last Chance to See. Maybe they should just start opening with the line: we're recording this so we'll know what it was like after it's gone.
Don't forget that we just switched all our plastic straws to paper straws that are 1) less recyclable than plastic (or straight-up non-recyclable), 2) cost more in energy and carbon to produce, 3) cost more, and 4) are less effective.
Carbon pollution is not the only type of pollution that environmentalists care about. I'm not a fan of the paper straws either, but it is entirely possible that a switch from plastic to paper straws increases carbon usage but decreases plastic pollution to the extent that it is an overall net positive for the environment.
I find individual glory-seeker's behavior even worse.
Example: The recent mega-A-lister junket to Italy, where there was something like a 1-to-3 ratio of attendees to private jets.
I will readily listen to earnest spokespeople for almost any cause. I'd listen to Ralph Nader today. But a bunch of Hollywood Limosine liberals, flying in by private jet to hobnob about how to preach to the unwashed masses about climate change? Total turnoff.
Why is the working class responsible for fighting climate change? Why must Hollywood "challenge audiences to change their ways"? Especially when China is building 300-500 new coal plants?[0][1]
Actually, as individual consumers, the best way one can lower one's carbon footprint is to not spend money. Don't buy the brand new cars product placed in films. Don't drive to the theater, wait until the movie can be streamed. And don't buy candy or soda or beer in theaters. Use as little resources as possible.
> Especially when China is building 300-500 new coal plants?
China is also building a ton of renewable energy. They're building a ton of everything and "India and China are doing X" isn't a reason for others to do nothing.
> Actually, as individual consumers, the best way one can lower one's carbon footprint is to not spend money.
I can't upvote this enough. This is the best way for individual consumers to make a difference.
> This is the best way for individual consumers to make a difference.
Disagree strongly. Individuals cannot solve this on their own, it can only be solved at the national and international level. This means voting and ensuring that politicians know that your vote rides on their action: letter writing, protests, et cetera. And of course politicians won't do anything until such intentions are widespread, so this means grass-roots movements.
I'm not advocating selective boycotts of things or companies that are bad actors - those are not effective. I'm also not saying it's the best way for individual citizens to make a difference. Obviously laws are better because of the tragedy of the commons/prisoner's dilemma nature of the problem. Whoever pollutes will outcompete whoever does not because (currently) it's cheaper to pollute than to not.
I was saying that the best way to make a difference as a consumer is to be less of a consumer. Most people in developed countries buy way too much shit. Changing that is a win for the individual (more money in your pocket) and the environment. And doing this does not preclude pressuring your elected representatives for broader change.
> “The past 25 years of the environmental narrative is about sacrifice and doom and not doing what you want and not getting what you want,” said Aaron Matthews, head of industry sustainability at BAFTA. “We don’t think that’s the right tone to get people over the line.”
It's not Hollywood's job to get people over the line.
BAFTA could always create an incentive to make the kind of film they want to see. Maybe an award for best film featuring environmental issues.
Hollywood isn't scared of climate change. They are good at understanding what we're scared of and making entertainment out of it.
What you see in Hollywood is nothing but a reflection of our own fears.
Also note that Thanos cutting the population in half isn't going to solve environmental problems. Humans reproduce at an exponential rate so cutting the population in half is ultimately futile.
> Hollywood isn't scared of climate change. They are good at understanding what we're scared of and making entertainment out of it.
I don't think it's fear. People fantasize about the collapse of civilization. It doesn't matter whether it's due to zombies, meteors, or manmade ecological disaster.
I think there's something in the modern human psyche that longs for simpler times where success is measured by survival and all of the barriers we've built between ourselves and our biological needs vanish.
That might not be a smart fantasy but I think it's present in most of us.
I really don't know where you're getting your information. Geographically, most of the world's nations still have a positive population growth rate, including some developed nations such as the US[1]. India may have a lower proportional growth rate than some African nations, but since its population is already very large, it contributes more to the overall world population growth than any country[2]--surely this is "worth mentioning"?
Go to interactive mode. India and USA are already on sub-replacement. China is way under. Africa is the main reason world’s population is still growing.
Did you even read my post? OWID was one of the links I cited.
I'm not sure how to go to interactive mode, but the chart you linked does not say that India and the USA are on sub-replacement. That's a graph of TFR, not population change, and it shows 2.35 children being born per woman in India as of 2015, so by itself the chart proves that India is increasing the world population. The rates are 1.87 for the US, which is sub-replacement, but the US also has increasing population due to immigration. Obviously that isn't a change to the world's population, but if you're counting immigration out of other countries in population change, you have to count immigration into the US.
To quote Wikipedia:
> From 2017 to 2050, nine countries are expected to account for half of the world's projected population increase: India, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Pakistan, Ethiopia, Tanzania, the United States, Uganda, and Indonesia, listed according to the expected size of their contribution to that projected population growth.
5 out of 9 of those countries are in Africa, but note that India is #1.
Note that if you look into where they are getting their data, both OWID and Wikipedia are citing the UN DESA.
Also note that a decline in population growth rate is not the same as a decline in population. Growth rates have been in decline worldwide since the 1950s, but are still positive, meaning population in those countries is still growing.
How high is child mortality? 4.1% as of 2016[1]. Even using your low number (2.2) that you didn't cite, 2.2 * (1 - 0.041) = 2.109, still above replacement. Please at least try to look up the statistics and form your opinion based on them, rather than forming your opinion and making up claims about the statistics based on your opinion.
Why don't I just make this really simple for you: India's population will grow by 1.10% annually from 2015-2020 according to UN estimates from 2017.[1] If that's not recent enough for you, India is projected to grow 1.08% in 2019.[2] So however you want to argue this, India's population is growing. As I said and cited before, its absolute (not proportional) growth is greater than any other country in the world.[3]
The fact that India’s population is growing does not imply TFR is above replacement.
Now you can go back up to my original post, and see what it was about (I was replying to someone claiming that halving world population won’t help as we are “reproducing exponentially”). I think you are trying to make some point I probably agree with (or correct something I’ve said but it’s unclear what)
> The fact that India’s population is growing does not imply TFR is above replacement.
That's true: the UN measuring the TFR being above replacement is what implies that the TFR is above replacement.
You just ignored half the post you responded to, so I'll say it again: How high is the child mortality rate? 4.1% as of 2016[1]. Even using your low number (2.2) that you didn't cite, 2.2 * (1 - 0.041) = 2.109, still above replacement.
> Now you can go back up to my original post, and see what it was about
My original point was that the TFR for developed nations is fairly irrelevant given the overall world population is still growing. But we're well past the point where you can maintain any credibility based on your original post anyway, because you've made a bunch of erroneous claims since then. All the following are wrong statements quoted from you:
* Most of the world is already on sub-replacement. The only worth mentioning exception is Africa.
* India and USA are already on sub-replacement.
* India's TFR is reported 2.2-2.3 for 2018. That is, for a developing country with high child mortality, the replacement rate.
Since you are now selectively reading the facts, my posts, and even your own posts, to try to draw attention away from where you're wrong, I don't think you're engaging in good-faith debate any more, so I'm done.
The common formula/approximation is inverse of product of probability of reaching mean fertility age and female ratio.
The female ratio in India is 0.482. The other factor I have no idea. If it’s ~94% then 2.2 is the replacement rate. I think that’s fairly high provided we start at 96.8% but who knows.
Specifically nature documentaries, when I watch recent productions I get the feeling that they aren't trying to show the results of studying nature, to educate about this or that: I get the feeling that they are packaged environmentalist manifestos (look at all these cute little animals that are going to die because you don't recycle) either made to shame/enlighten people who don't do the right thing or to boost the egos of people who do good.
It bothers me because it so often feels shoehorned in and off topic. I wouldn't mind at all if it were the topic, but injecting it into every topic is the problem.
Using art as a tool is complicated. When overdone it is unambiguously wrong, when done correctly it can be a powerful good force, and somewhere in the middle is a wide grey area which is difficult to navigate.