The next years are going to be fun… The world is burning while the fossil fuel industry is chugging along like everything is great as long as you buy enough co2 credits.
I’m scared in what kind of world my children will have to live in…
The next years are going to be fun… The world is burning while the fossil fuel industry is chugging along like everything is great as long as you buy enough co2 credits.
That doesn't sound fun. That doesn't sound fun at all!
Here in Michigan we’ve been getting hammered with forest fire smoke all summer. It sucks because we only get a few months of nice weather as it is and we can’t spend most days outside if we value our lungs. I need my lungs for precious cannabis smoke, not forest fire smoke!
Yeah, I’m in Michigan and I really don’t like this year. First, we have a dry spring. Then a hot, dry summer up until a day or so ago. Now wildfire smoke. It’s like each day is worse this year. I’ll be happy when fires are stopped.
I need my lungs for precious cannabis smoke, not forest fire smoke!
You ever look into dry vaporizers? The old model of EQ is a pretty good value esp. on sale.
Unfortunately I normally like to run mine off of solar under our pavilion and keep the heat (esp. pre-heat stage) outside. Although I still have AVB saved up and I run mine at 175C tops (and de-chamber it or cool-down quickly) so it doesn't have a bad taste.
That aside, I'm in Michigan too. Not north enough to have lower summer heat but also apparently not south enough to avoid Canada's smoke. Though I am much more likely to die in a heat wave because I cannot sweat significantly.
Climate change is one of the biggest reasons I don’t want children. I can’t put blinders on and then feel zero responsibility for dragging them into a hopeless nightmare.
I really hope I’m wrong. Also, I love Kurzgesagt! Thanks!
Edit: I wrote that just before watching the video. I hadn’t even considered the idea of “weaponized hopelessness” that they talk about near the end, and how bleak thoughts and apathy ultimately help the fossil fuel industry. Good stuff!
I appreciate the link, but Kurzgesagt is so anti-corporate so much of the time that I don’t think this is a significant issue. The above video of theirs is a great example. They’re not afraid to call out the man.
i have kids. i actively worry about how miserable their future may be. i try not to talk about this stuff to them much because i don’t want to scare them with it. i don’t think there’s anything i or they can do (except maybe vote).
On the flipside, it’s also true that if we all simply give up and don’t have kids because the future looks so bleak, by definition we are admitting to a kind of psychic defeatism and epistemic hopelessness. Having kids is one of the best ways for regular people to have any hope of influencing the future.
Once my kids get older they will be taught science properly, and they will be fully aware of the seriousness of our situation.
I know people keep saying “I don’t want my kids to suffer” but the fact is the only way out of this is getting more younger people out there AND ENGAGED to make a difference. Your child could discover a breakthrough to solve the problem, who knows? More population isn’t the real problem, it’s what that population does and what corporations do in support of those choices.
I’d rather have taken the shot and failed instead of never trying at all (born and tried instead of never born).
Your child could discover a breakthrough to solve the problem, who knows?
There’s no “breakthrough discovery” needed to solve the problem - we’ve known how to solve this problem for more than a hundred years now. It’s called “dismantling capitalism” - and it’s still our only way out.
The proletariat is treated by the bourgeoisie the same as a mob boss treats his underlings.
Just good enough to make them comfortable, but not too comfortable to elevate themselves or no longer need them. Comfortably uncomfortable.
I agree with you, but half the US believes certain people aren’t actually people, so we have a long way to go to dismantle the problems of our world economic structure. An armed reform will just lead to authoritarianism, always has.
And you see the negative effects of this in many countries.
Don’t get me wrong, I totally get not having kids for financial reasons. I have kids myself, it’s been incredibly difficult. We’ve had to find the money and make ends meet, but at the end of the day we’ve been able to do it.
For my wife and I it was initially economic but now we would not have natural kids even if we bacame rich. might adopt if that happend. I am so glad we are not older because if we had been we might have had kids before realizing what a cluster everything is.
Life finds a way, and if your in a well developed nation with a strong military you will be among the last to feel the full impact of it.
I felt this way before, but decided screw it, if people can laugh and smile and love, even if it’s only on occasion, while they work in a hell hole like a electronics recycling dump in Africa, then it’s still worth it to exist. Just teach them to hunt and garden and stuff and give them the best chance you can.
To be fair (and the article does sort of mention this) we are in an El Nino year, so of course things are heating up terrifying fast. Thing is, El Ninos are impacted by climate change, so… This isn’t a cop-out, it’s just this is kind of as bad as it can get (for now) which is reassuring (hopefully?)
I would disagree: Since we’re still in the early phase of a new (super? As is being discussed) El Niño — later this year and likely next 1-2 year/s will probably be worse.
It really depends on so many things. AR6 was a depressing read, but we do still have different pathways, people are responding to the crisis. I have the privilege of seeing first hand the commitments being made by some rather large emitters and the actions being undertaken to meet those commitments. I guess what I’m saying is, we can still hope. We shouldn’t give-up and resign ourselves to this fate.
On the other hand we literally have a CEO of a gas and oil company chairing COP28 next year… So… Yeah…
We need a system to hold those in power responsible for their promises and inactions.
I don’t trust corporations, the only thing important for them is the balance sheet, they will always take the easy and cheap way. There should be a world wide tax on all companies which decreases with the companies sustainability. Hit corporations where it hurts them: money.
But hey the last article I read was a bunch of totally-relatable-super-wealthy-individuals who are just like me, asking why people aren’t having kids! Are you telling me the world is actually a hellscape and I’ve been lied to?
The world failed to take action against climate change, now they’re going to be late to take action to the adaptation of civilization to a dangerous environment. Too late to stop climate change, it’s time to think about adapting to a new environment.
Humanity can certainly adept to climate change, but these changes will also cause a lot of people to relocate. I’m not sure if society, in the current political climate, can adapt quick enough to be able to deal with the influx of possible climate refugees.
Obviously the dude is not a biologist… Earth is gonna be fine long term, the other species are gonna be fine long term. The only thing we’re running into the ground is ourselves.
Edit: check out all these clowns below who have a human superiority complex so inflated that they believe the earth will die with us 😂🤡
This is pretty naive imo, the destruction we are responsible for has already driven numerous animals to extinction. You really think entire ecosystems collapsing doesn’t involve other species dying too?
The question isn’t even “are you an idiot” anymore in your case, it’s “is it by accident or willingly?”
You clearly have zero clue what you’re talking about. The ecosystems will exist long after we’re all gone. New species are introduced, they adapt, they live. You on the other hand, living under a rock and subsisting on moss, I’m afraid will not.
Have you heard of evolution or are you one of those loons that believe “god” placed a set number of species on the planet and that’s all there will ever be? Asking for a friend.
Evolution works on very long time spans. Anthropomorphic climate change will be way too fast for species to evolve and adapt. I highly doubt all life will ever be wiped out on Earth, but we might lose 99% of current species with new species evolving over time. This is our dinosaur asteroid moment for sure.
And yet, life survived even the asteroid. It’s arrogant as all hell to believe we have more destructive power than that asteroid. Or that we deserve to live on a planet we are destroying.
We are living through a mass extinction event right now. We have driven hundreds of species extinct even before getting deeply into the effects of climate change so it’s fascinating that you think that even more severe environmental change will harm no species at all.
Earth may persist as a dead rock floating though space, but I’d argue that doesn’t come close to ‘fine’.
Kinda like saying if you get lost in the desert you’ll be fine: sure your organs will fail, your muscles will turn to jerky, and you’ll be very much dead: but your skeleton will remain for decades!! 🎉
Life is what makes Earth special, and we’re on track to reducing life to extremiphiles. Hell, even those could be at risk - the problem with climate change is positive feedback loops, and who knows how far those will push. Even the most resilient of microbastards won’t do too great when Earth is molten.
Extreme-case scenario, but whether that’s what happens or we get some kind of miracle climate shift and Earth lives happily ever after, or anywhere in between, is roll of the dice.
Almost ten years ago, I was in Miami for a conference, and they were pumping water out of the streets back then. I would guess it’s not gotten any better.
Almost ten years ago, I was in Miami for a conference, and they were pumping water out of the streets back then. I would guess it’s not gotten any better.
Weather and even temperature are a bit of a red herring in all this. The extreme weather is caused by the rising temps and feedback loops, but what’s happening is just the heat trying to normalize. We’re not going to end up with 70c at the equator and -30c at the poles. Look at the cretaceous temp, CO2, and fossil records and you’ll see that the temp evens out even with CO2 massively higher then today, and you end up with things like temperate rainforest at the south pole. Our real issue and the one we should be actively fighting against (as in actual in-the-street rebellion) is the absolute destruction of the environment. Chemical dumping, strip mining, industrial fishing, industrial agriculture, forever chemicals, microplastics, desertification and deforestation. These things are going to cause ecological collapse and kill almost everyone in the next generation or two, no question about it. We don’t have to worry about the heat getting us
Some parts of the world definitely do have to worry about the heat getting them. We’ve already seen wet bulb temperatures exceeding human habitability in places where millions live, and some recent studies have suggested that in the long run our metric for true human habitability may actually be too wide.
From where I am in the Philippines, it’s a huge fucking deal. We’ve been getting supertyphoons more frequently, more intense and abrupt storms, and if not that, regular temperatures more than 30C°, and our country being an archipelago, is humid AF. We’ve been getting more crop shortages, more droughts, even constant hours-long water interruptions in the big cities. Not to mention, the huge damages due to those typhoons.
You are right, all these other problems are also really bad. A lot of stuff is happening at the same time. It’s hard for me to read about all the shit that is going down and not be able to do anything impactful against these things.
Yeah its really tough and I try to limit my doomscrolling to the amount needed to stay informed. One huge problem with all this is that it effects the most privileged the least, and even the day to day things we can do to feel like we’re helping are only really available to those of us with that privilege. Like, I could say “start a vege garden, buy hemp and wool clothes, fix things in your workshop instead of buying new” but yeah, those aren’t really options most people can take unless we change the underlying structure of our society first. But then, why don’t we try changing society so we can then fix these issues? In the end, it’s all part of the class war, and we’re losing badly.
I’m living in a flat, this limits what I can do on my own. But I’m looking into getting some solar panels to put up on the balcony, coupled with a storage battery this should bring down the kW/h I need from an external provider.
In the far future I would like to move out of the city and start producing more of my own food, but prices are just to high right now.
Don’t be convinced that by lowering your impact you can make any change. Corporations want you to think that because if the masses think that they are the issue then they can continue what they are doing. The only way we can contribute is if we all get on the streets and protest. If millions of people get out on the streets for an indefinite amount of time, stop working, stop buying things, and demand change then we will get change.
If millions of people get out on the streets for an indefinite amount of time, stop working, stop buying things Sadly, this will never happen. People are too lazy, selfish and wrapped up in this ‘Gotta have cheap, sparkly plastic tat’ that they’ve seen on an ‘influencers’ Instagram or TikTok page.
Doesn’t stop the rest of us doing our bit though, to keep our conscience clear 😒
no, those peple will be just mowed down by automatic weapons fire until put in their place.
AI’s creators are taking care to ultimately obsolete as many people as possible. If you’re not a source of profit to a capitalist you’re disposable. If you’re a source of a cost then you’re to be disposed of as fast as possible. There are several billion people fleeing uninhabitable areas, they’ll gladly replace spoiled woke kids at their spots in factories and glass towers.
Sorry for bluntness but this is the reality in the minds of those who rule.
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