
Forget Shorter Showers (2009) - raldi
http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/4801/
======
brandonmenc
The author presents the following options:

1\. participate in the industrial economy = lose

2\. living more simply = lose

3\. stop the industrial economy = win

How about a fourth option, which includes: massive geo and atmospheric
engineering, nuclear/fusion research/dissemination, desalination and water
pipelines, and large-scale laboratory meat production from real animal tissue.

My understanding is that the damage we've done will take thousands of years to
reverse if done naturally. If that's true, the only viable solution, and one
that may even let us maintain our standard of living, is the massive all-in
application of science and engineering we used to decades ago dream about and
assume would naturally come.

Are we that spooked as a species that we forgot to think big, or is it simply
delusional to think we can engineer the planet?

~~~
jmclean
One problem here is that any outcome (warming or no, human-engineered or no)
will impact every nation differently. Under current warming projections, some
nations will see massive increases in arable land, whereas others will be
completely underwater. Even within nations, some cities and regions will see
detrimental effects, whereas others could even see benefits (though this is
taboo to talk about, which foreshadows one variation of the problem).

It seems naively optimistic to think we will be able to geoengineer
altruistically or with the general good in mind. Even the concept of an
'average good' for the earth is a little morally problematic if some nations
benefit and others are hurt. When a nation acquires the ability to affect
climate at a large scale, it seems likely that it will be used for political
ends as much as for net positive outcomes.

~~~
waps
And what makes you think that random outcomes ("natural" outcomes if you will)
are any better ? I mean, didn't we stop believing in a benevolent God at some
point ?

Because when I look at the green movement, my mind very quickly feels the need
to point out that for the green movement to do any good at all with their
pushing of nature, nature would have to be good. Nature is not good, nor is it
evil, but let me point out that with very, very few exceptions murderers are
not evil either (the large majority are furthering their own ends, not killing
for fun or morals).

~~~
PeterisP
The mapping between natural features and human population/agriculture is
generally near a local optimum. If a random grassland would be swapped with a
random desert of the same size, from a natural viewpoint it would be nearly
the same, but it would have horrible consequences for the people living there.

Any significant changes to the natural features in random direction should be
expected to be harmful for us - we can be rather sure that moving 10 steps in
direction A is expected to be worse than moving 1 step in direction B even if
we don't know anything about the actual changes caused by those directions.

We should prefer small random changes to big changes, unless we're really,
really sure that the big changes are actually beneficial.

~~~
waps
> We should prefer small random changes to big changes, unless we're really,
> really sure that the big changes are actually beneficial.

True. But natural changes in history have been anything but small.

------
yummyfajitas
By the accounting of the article, I'm a wonderful person. I've cut back all my
consumption to virtually the bare minimum, vastly below the poverty level in
the US. For example I recently purchased a flight from NY to Delhi. By the
accounting of the article, the only waste I produced was the (now discarded)
boarding pass.

The only waste and pollution that was produced by the evil Air India
corporation. And if I (and sufficiently many other consumers) were to cut back
on consumption, it would have virtually no effect - those evil folks at Air
India would continue burning jet fuel and polluting.

Spot the flaw? I paid Air India to pollute on my behalf. If I (+ 50% of a
planeload of people) did not pay them they would not have wasted money
polluting.

There are many specific cases where this is not true, agricultural water
consumption being one of the most egregious. These are (economically, not
politically) low hanging fruit and should be fixed. But if the article wants
to argue that huge fractions of pollution fall into this category, it needs to
do a lot more quantitative work.

~~~
joelthelion
I think the key issue is that if you stop flying, it's a net loss to you with
very little marginal gain for the environment since other people will continue
to fly. So only the most environmentally conscious people actually take
action, and global warming goes on.

If we want things to change, I think we need to change the rules for
everybody, for example with strong taxation.

~~~
yummyfajitas
That is a valid argument in favor of the article's conclusions.

------
hackuser
I love this essay because it challenges us[1] about things most are too polite
to mention. If you feel outrage at the following, then try recognizing that as
a challenge to your beliefs.[2]

1) _The third problem is that it accepts capitalism’s redefinition of us from
citizens to consumers. By accepting this redefinition, we reduce our potential
forms of resistance to consuming and not consuming. Citizens have a much wider
range of available resistance tactics, including voting, not voting, running
for office, pamphleting, boycotting, organizing, lobbying, protesting ..._

Two things we[1] generally promote contribute to this:

* 'Free market' economic policy: By reducing citizens' control over the economy and businesses, and by reducing their bargaining power (i.e., via the dominance of money in elections, reduced organized labor, click-wrap agreements, etc.), we reduce people's roles to that of consumers: If you like or dislike something, all you can do is consume or not consume.

* Reduction of end-user control in technology: From hosted applications to automatic updates to eliminating confidentiality to mobile devices built for consumption and not content creation to closed systems and data, we train users to passively consume rather than to control and create. Information technology, to some significant degree, establishes the Zeitgeist of our time.

2) _So how, then, and especially with all the world at stake, have we come to
accept these utterly insufficient responses?_

Climate change is putting the world at stake. How can you accept your utterly
insufficient response? Whatever you are doing, it's probably utterly
insufficient.[3]

It's nothing new to humanity to walk open-eyed into catastrophe. To borrow the
author's analogy, now you know how people in Germany could watch Hitler rise
to power and people in the West could watch him start marching across Europe,
all knowing the very likely result, and do nothing about it.

[1] By "us" and "we", I mean what I imagine to be most HN readers.

[2] For the record, I like the author's questions but don't at all agree with
his solution of ending modern 'industrial' society; things weren't so great
before it

[3] Me too

~~~
pdonis
_> By reducing citizens' control over the economy and businesses, and by
reducing their bargaining power_

I agree these are bad things, but they are not the outcome of a free market.
The so-called "free market" coerces people into engaging in transactions they
would not choose to engage in voluntarily; that is the opposite of a free
market. (Perhaps you recognize this and that's why you put "free market" in
quotes.)

 _> Climate change is putting the world at stake._

This statement illustrates part of the problem: we don't all agree on which
problems are "putting the world at stake". I don't think climate change is one
of them; you do. We can't agree on what actions to take if we can't agree on
what we're trying to accomplish.

One possible way out is to redefine the goal: instead of "stop climate
change", for example, make the goal "stop burning oil and coal". That goal I
can agree with, because I have other reasons to support it that don't involve
climate change. Of course, then we get to argue (maybe) about whether nuclear
reactors are part of how we reach the goal.

 _> I like the author's questions but don't at all agree with his solution of
ending modern 'industrial' society; things weren't so great before it_

I completely agree.

------
vacri
Why does something have to be at the magnitude of 'defeat Hitler' to be worth
doing?

Edit: to add a little content, personal sacrifices also make you aware of
others' use. If you're limiting water and everyone in your neighbourhood has
brown grass, then there's going to be pressure on the local golf course to
follow suit. And plenty of business chiefs, especially in small-to-medium
businesses, start applying the lessons they learn at home to their workplace
as well. To characterise the equation as merely "the effort stops at your
front door" is pretty misleading.

If the author wants to effect political change, there's got to be a better way
to convince people than 'your individual efforts are worthless', methinks.

~~~
zdean
I don't think the article is suggesting that. What I read was that the
"misdirection" about individual impact on these environmental issues is taking
focus away from much larger scale issues that are not being addressed (as a
result of the misdirection). The author I think implies that environmental
challenges seem to be of a "defeat Hitler" magnitude...and that to face the
challenge we need to make sure we're fighting on the right front.

~~~
vacri
I think the article would be better off phrased as "don't just stop here,
continue the fight", though.

------
steven2012
The article brings up a good point. It's a good way of making us feel
responsible when in fact we make little impact.

For example, the 15 largest freighters create more pollution as every single
car in the world. If this is the case why aren't we trying to fix pollution on
these 15 ships instead of all this nonsense with fixing individual cars?
Eliminating the pollution from these industrial ships by 10% is akin to taking
millions of cars off the road. Yet all we talk about is car pooling, proudest
and Teslas, etc.

[http://www.industrytap.com/worlds-15-biggest-ships-create-
mo...](http://www.industrytap.com/worlds-15-biggest-ships-create-more-
pollution-than-all-the-cars-in-the-world/8182)

~~~
zaroth
"15 largest ships in the world emit as much nitrogen oxide and sulphur oxide
as the world’s 760 million cars."

First step is countries ban the vessels from coming anywhere near land. I
guess that keeps pollution out of sight, out of mind. Next step.... I don't
know. But I'm hopeful soon enough the powerplant will be significantly
greener. In the short term you can get 1 order of magnitude from regulation.
In the long term it's new technology.

------
PhantomGremlin
When an article says, in a casual matter of fact way:

    
    
       we’d lose some of the luxuries (like electricity)
       to which we’ve grown accustomed
    

then it has lost 99% of its potential audience. Without electricity we
couldn't be much more than stone age hunter gatherers. To which my response
is: NO FUCKING WAY!!!

~~~
joeyo
While I certainly would not cheer on a return to a pre-electric era,
electricity has only been available for 125 years or so. We have done and
could do very much better than hunting and gathering in the complete absence
of electricity.

------
zaroth
The first part of this essay is actually really interesting. Consumers are
being asked to cut back, even though the things they are cutting back are not
actually the problem? Municipalities are paying $3+/sq ft to dig up lawn, if
that's a pointless endeavor, then it should stop.

The second part I think is completely BS. The three options are all
ridiculous. I think technology is moving very fast right now. We need tight
regulation of obviously bad behavior, we need appropriate investment in
infrastructure. But to some extent if you want to invest in anything just
invest widely in technology.

------
arjie
This is very true, but the fact is that I'm not interested in solving the
problem. I'm satisfied with contributing less to it. The sacrifice asked of me
is too much, and it seems most people think so. Would we rather have
catastrophic climate change in the future if it permits our current standards
of living? I think I speak for almost everyone when I answer in the
affirmative.

Sure, I bike, I recycle, and I take public transit instead of driving. But I
know that this doesn't change the world. It just reduces my contribution to
the problem, and that is sufficient for me.

~~~
fulafel
It seems to me this is the de facto situation of most environmentally
conscious people. A good first step is to acknowledge that baby steps are OK
as long as they are on a good trajectory, and you show people around you that
you can admit the facts to yourself without immediately falling into a funk of
bad conscience and apathy.

------
xupybd
After reading that, the only conclusion I can draw is it's all too hard.

------
schalab
The problem with a decentralized evolutionary economy is that it is blind to
long range problems.

The solution is not to abandon the status quo. We are not smart enough to
centrally plan even a small portion of it at the moment.

But rather educate the populace through solid, irrefutable facts over a period
of time, until it becomes common knowledge that a particular action causes a
disastrous effect.

Analogous to how smoking has receded from popular use.

------
byEngineer
If you can read between the lines then you will know that the author of
"inconvenient truth" mr al gore tells you to cut down on co2 emissions when he
flies his private jet between McMansions that he owns from your taxes and owns
a business trading co2 quotas internationally. But you prone to his propaganda
peddle your little funny bike. The Chinese put online 20 new coal burning
plants a week while we are shutting down ours. The chinese, ISIs, Russia, etc
don't even need to do anything kick our asses. They just need to sit and
patiently wait as the cancer of socialism and cultural Marxism do all the hard
work for them. At the end they will just need to knock on the door of our
country and the whole thing will collapse under the weight of its own
stupidity.

