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Comments 51 to 88 out of 88:

51. One Planet Only Forever at 04:16 AM on 9 March, 2022

    Evan,

    I agree with your statement in your comment @46.

    "So let's agree that the problem is a combination of consumption+population. If wealthy people consumed less and if population stabilized so that global growth stopped, we would likely be much better off."

    I would add that the consumption problem is the impacts of the consumption, including over-consumption and waste. Consumption of beef, or other food, produced in less harmful ways would not require as much reduced consumption. And foods produced in regenerative helpful ways can actually boost the amount of consumption, albeit needing to stay within the practical planet safe limits (the Planetary Boundary concept). 

    I applaud your long term efforts regarding the lifestyle example you are trying to set. And I hope you can maximize your achievement with great input like what wilddouglascounty provided.

    I would add that the book "Rebuilding Earth" by Teresa Coady may contain some additional helpful input regarding your new home and local environment. It appears that you are likely already aware of much, if not all, of what she shares in her book. But some of the considerations may be new to you.

    I also want to reinforce another comment you made @46.

    "What's odd is that when I write that we need to consume less, some argue that we cannot push for degrowth. When I write that it is partly a population problem (each person is a carbon emitter), people argue that it is not a general population problem and that the rich contribute more, and ..."

    Those points and the "and ..." points can be understood to often be variations on the theme of responses from the perspective of people who has developed a preference for harmful misunderstanding and related harmful actions in a socioeconomic-political environment of competition for perceptions of superiority relative to Others.

    Regarding climate science, and the need to reduce harmful climate change impacts, there is an almost endless variety of responses in that broader category of preferred harmful misunderstandings:

    • Consuming less can mean a loss of perceptions of better living status
    • Arguing it is only the rich who need to reduce their consumption is also attempting to defend the harmful unsustainable ways that middle class people live as they aspire to appear to be catching up to the supposedly higher status, the people with the 'newest technological gadgets' or other harmfully promoted desires for "More". I try to be clear that the higher status people need to lead the correction because they can afford to live less harmfully. And if they won't be rich if they have to give up how they benefit from sustained harmful misunderstandings and related harmful actions they obviously did not deserve their perceptions of higher status.

    Responses like that include:

    • resistance to reducing meat consumption, particularly industrial system produced meat, particularly beef produced less sustainably.
    • resistance to reducing powered recreation activity (being harmful just for fun)
    • resistance to reducing flying away for vacation (frequently flying long distances just for fun).
    • resistance to having less powerful, more energy efficient vehicles.
    • resistance to reducing the indoor temperatures during cold weather and increasing indoor temperatures during hot weather.

    All of those arguments resisting those sensible (should be common sense) things have a common root in the 'belief in the Right to the freedom to believe harmful misunderstanding and to act more harmfully excused by the harmful misunderstanding. It can actually be nearly impossible to communicate with someone who has immersed themselves in any version of that Harmful Freedom Belief that they are harmfully incorrect. Their developed perspective can be very far away from potential common sense understanding of how to be less harmful and more helpful that they will simplistically argue that the suggestions being made "Harm Them".

    I have had limited, occasional, success interacting with people I know (people I already have an established relationship with) by trying to find a common sense understanding among the many possible issues covered by the Sustainable Development Goals. I thought that if a person genuinely cares about helping in any of the many ways of helping and being less harmful that that shared common sense could be a basis for delving into the ways that climate change impacts make it harder to be helpful (they do). But those attempts to establish a shared starting point among the SDGs has often not worked. I usually end up facing a version of the 'resistance driven by a preference for harmful misunderstanding', often framed as some version of 'evil wealth redistribution'. That harmful misunderstanding can also rear its ugly head when Carbon Fee and Rebate is being discussed or when the requirement for harm causing richer people to pay to help poorer people harmed by already caused climate changes (along with demands for more certain proof that harm has been done by the people being required to provide the assistance).

    It is indeed hard to help people improve their awareness and understanding regarding the required corrections of what has developed in order to limit harmful climate change impacts. It is harder to do that for the compendium of the Sustainable Development Goals.

    Keep up the Good Work. Every person's impacts Add Up.

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52. Evan at 05:15 AM on 9 March, 2022

    OPOF you write, "I applaud your long term efforts regarding the lifestyle example you are trying to set."

    I can't figure out how to live sustainably. Sure, within my family I am considered to have a green conscience, but nothing I do makes my life sustainable. Most of us are not producing "percentages" more GHG emissions than we should, but rather orders of magnitude more GHG emissions than we should. But I keep trying. The best I can come with is that a person should strive to do more good than harm, however they internalize that.

    If we build our house, my goal is to show that we can consume less and live a meaningful, fulfilled life. But it means focusing on fewer activities. We wanted to install solar+geothermal HVAC, but with the high costs now, we can barely afford the house as it is, and so the solar will be delayed. My thought is that it is better to prioritize money on things that reduce energy consumption (such as geothermal HVAC) than things that produce energy.

    I broadly agree with all your wrote OPOF, and would only add that I think we will make inroads if we prioritize items that have a dual purpose of reducing GHG emission while buiding resiliency. EVs are an easy sell today when gas has spiked. Solar panels are an easy sell in terms of energy independence, to some degree. But I am not hopeful messaging to wealthy people to reduce their lifestyle. Wealth is intoxicating, and there is likely a reason these people are wealthy in the first place. I have no desire to pursue wealth. Other people desire wealth, power, status, etc. It will be a hard sell to convince them to change.

    Kind of like teaching a cat to not chase mice. :-)

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53. swampfoxh at 07:04 AM on 9 March, 2022

    Moderator (BL)

    I can do that. We ask that you retain the material in confidence as we are not yet ready to publish our work. I will send you, in hard copy, our References which include most of the global literature published as of 2021. This list is 30 pages long, largely peer reviewed and published in credible journals, etc. Please send me your  postal address as we don't wish to transmit the list electronically. My email address is swampfoxh@hotmail.com

    Please add an attachment in your own words agreeing to the matter of confidentiality. 

    Thank you for your interest in this topic.

    Swampfoxh.  

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    Moderator Response:

    [BL] Email address redacted. I'm sure none of us need more spam, and we have an email address as part of your registration. It is not necessary to display it publicly here.

    You are participating here in a publicly-visible forum. Sending me a reference list as an individual, expecting confidentiality, does not advance public discussion. If you want to promote a particular set of results here, simply asserting the numbers without any form of explanation of their source, methodology behind them, etc. does not provide readers with any way to assess the validity of your claims. As such, your assertions would carry no weight in the discussion.

    If you wish to continue the discussion of agriculture, etc. at this time, there are two possible threads here at Skeptical Science that might be suitable. If you are to comment on those threads, make sure to read the original post, any following comments, and make sure that your comments are on topic.

    https://skepticalscience.com/animal-agriculture-meat-global-warming.htm

    https://skepticalscience.com/veganism.htm

    If you get your own results published, then feel free to find an appropriate thread (use the search tool) where you can make on-topic comments and provide references.

54. One Planet Only Forever at 07:32 AM on 9 March, 2022

    Evan,

    Striving to live less harmfully and more helpfully is admirable, or it should be admired by all.

    I appreciate the point about how hard it would be to get all of the rich people to care to learn to be less harmful and more helpful.

    My way of having hope is recognizing that some of the wealthiest people do strive to learn to set excellent examples of how to be less harmful and more helpful.

    A possible helpful solution is getting 'more of the mice' to notice the difference among the cats, and develop the collective ability to help motivate the harmful cats to change their behaviour ... maybe by declaring as much as they can, like with their votes and purchase choices, that they admire the cats who are being less harmful and more helpful, and detest the other types of cats.

    A lot of helpful and harmful detail can be missed by 'looking at the averages'.

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55. nigelj at 07:49 AM on 9 March, 2022

    Just want to clarify that I'm not against a degrowth strategy. I'm largely retired, but I was in the top 10% income / wealth group, but I'm a below average consumer in that group. I'm struggling along with a similar approach to lifestyle and sustainability as Evan but I'm ok with where I'm at. Japan has shown that a society can do well with low rates of economic growth. There are obvious simple changes people can make without incurring personal pain for example just driving a smaller car.

    I'm just pointing out the hard reality that a very rapid and ambitious degrowth strategy / cuts in consumption would almost certainly cause considerable personal pain and cause our entire civilisation to collapse. I've provided plenty of clues why. If anyone doesn't get it I think they are in intellectual denial. Imho there is no point flaggelating ourselves and going back to the stone age levels of consumption.

    Strictly speaking you could argue population is the prime cause of environmental impacts because even a population of just one low consumimg human has environmental impacts and a large population of low consuming humans would have plenty of environmental impacts. Per capita consumption is a multiplier. But for practical purposes Evan is right its a combination of consumption and population.

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56. Evan at 08:12 AM on 9 March, 2022

    This is worth a read, and is what OPOF is pushing for. It can be done!

    Billionaire gives his money away.

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57. swampfoxh at 09:08 AM on 9 March, 2022

    nijelj

    Tim Flannery. In his book, The Weathermakers, asserts that mere years ago we were already using two planets of resources. If true, how can we persist in pursuing perpetual growth, even at a low rate, and still overcome Flannery's concerns about our apparent finite planet?

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58. nigelj at 10:42 AM on 9 March, 2022

    Evan. I've read Flannerys excellent book.

    
    Indeed we cant persist in persuing perpetual growth for two reasons:

    Firstly I already pointed out @37 "Degrowth is also obviously inevitable to some degree sooner or later, because the planets resources are finite and there is huge population pressure on them. "

    The fact that economic growth ( and also population growth ) has to slow down and stop eventually is obvious. It will be forced to slow down and stop by circumstances of rising costs of mineral resource extraction and demographic changes. Its not going to happen tomorrow but it will probably happen on multi decades to century timescales.

    Secondly our generation is essentially eating all the cheese and not leaving much for future generations. Its an ethical issue. I believe we should stop economic growth in a deliberative way to at least give future generations a better resource base to use.

    But the devil is in the detail. If we stop growth too rapidly we 1) compromise our own lives 2)  lock poor countries into a low quality state of development and deprive them of things we have, 2) risk causing a massive destbilisation of our own economies.

    Economic growth has to be phased down carefully.

    The same might all apply to population growth. A smaller global population would obviously improve all environmental problems ( various studies suggest that from 2 billion - 5 billion people is ideal). But if population shrinks too fast you get a huge bulge of dependent elderly people and not enough young people to support them.

    I believe these are hard realities that cannot be simply ignored.

    And more devils in the detail. Even if we stop economic growth in a few decades, future generations will still run out of some non renewable resources. Remember we are talking about possibly 9 billion people before population size stabilises and starts to fall. So all we are doing by stopping economic growth is delaying the inevitable shortages, and such shortages are unlikely to be catastrophic. It will just force people back to simpler lifestyles.

    Therfore its complicated,  and we have to weigh up carefully the impacts on us and future generations and avoid kneejerk reactions dismissive of the resource problems,  or the other extreme of suggesting we should panic and immeidately run off and join a commune and embrace hair shirt lifestyles.

    I believe much of it comes down to doing things that are commonsense: For example adopting a circular recycling economy, reducing waste, prioritising "family planning",  not being extravagent consumers, etc,etc. But adopting a "hair shirt" very low tech. lifestyle is definitely not going to be on my radar, because it doesn't make a lot of sense, and I've read a lot about it and chewed it over.

    Google Joseph Tainters work. It's well worth a read. He's written extensively on development of societies, growth, collapse theory, sustainability, and  simplification,  and is highly respected.

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59. One Planet Only Forever at 12:30 PM on 9 March, 2022

    Swampfoxh,

    Flannery's presentation of the current developed problem is aligned with the Planetary Boundaries understanding.

    nigelj and others,

    It is not necessary to stop economic growth or go backwards.

    What is required is correcting the harmful unsustainable aspects of what has been developed. That will allow growth of the economy through the development of even better ways of living than the 'sustainable' starting point humanity ends up at after the correction (not going back to cave living but, based on the evaluations by groups like Project Drawdown, going back to many pre-industrial ways of producing food with possible improvements due to legitimate improved understanding - note the base understanding is that many of the pre-industrial ways are actually superior to the industrial ways).

    And, of course, it is possible, actually essential, to increase sustainable economic activity while undoing (degrowing) the harmful developed activities. Government intervention is required here to help the sustainable alternatives overcome the start-up challenges and, more important, overcome the competitive disadvantage that sustainable alternatives have compared to more harmful options that are already popular and profitable in the marketplaces (economic and public opinion).

    The climate change challenge, like other challenges to keep total impacts within the Safe Planetary Boundaries, is affected by the success of efforts to limit population growth. But the corrective effort does not have to wait for population growth to be stopped.

    And achieving and improving on all of the Sustainable Development Goals is likely the only way to get to a lasting future for humanity that is actually able to be improved (as opposed to the current challenge of fighting to try to stop, and make amends for, the harm done by the harmful things that have already developed popularity and profitability, made more challenging by the power of misleading marketing to create and sustain harmful misunderstanding).

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60. nigelj at 15:29 PM on 9 March, 2022

    OPOF @59

    You appear to be promoting some form of perpetual and sustainable "green growth". I used to believe in this, but theres a growing body of expert opinion that it is neither possible or desirable. In addition cutting consumption of high income people is going to reduce growth by pulling demand out of the system. Adopting traditional farming would actually slow growth because its lower yield than industrial farming.

    These things along with zero economic growth, or low growth, are not bad things - provided they dont happen too quickly. The system needs time to adjust. Human civilisation is getting old and is about to slow down. This may be a hard truth to accept.

    This is all different thing  to crazy agendas to rapidly cut resource consumption by massive levels.

     

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61. One Planet Only Forever at 07:08 AM on 10 March, 2022

    nigelj,

    You appear to misunderstand my perspective. The staring point is the very robust evidence-based understanding of the Sustainable Development Goals, Planetary Boundaries evaluations, and other things like them.

    I suggest that you learn about the SDGs before dismissing them as unachievable or harmful with a misinterpretation that they are just some form of perpetual and sustainable "green growth". The SDGs were developed from the learning that occurred via the Millennium Development Goals and further understanding, like climate change science, that developed since the development of the MDGs. The Age of Sustainable Development MOOC is the comprehensive presentation of the basis for the SDGs. It is also presented in a book of the same name if books are more appealing to you.

    The Planetary Boundaries is developed understanding that is related to the SDGs. The current understanding is that there is no longer time to wait for the developed systems to 'naturally', in their own time-frame, decide to change to produce less harmful results.

    And Project Drawdown, and the related book Drawdown, provides many evidence-based corrections of 'expert opinion based' misunderstandings about 'modern' food production.

    And the 2020 Human Development Report fairly comprehensively presents all of this, with a major focus of climate change matters because failing to limit the magnitude of climate change impacts harmfully compromises achieving the development of lasting improvements. Waiting for the people benefiting from harmful pursuits of perceptions of 'improved living and supriority' to realize they need to stop being so harmful is no longer an option.

    I am learning and promoting the diversity of understandings associated with the only viable potentially eternally improving future for humanity on this planet.

    Any expert opinions that appear to claim that that is not achievable, or that the identified corrections are harmful, should be seen as a version of resistance to learning about the harmful lack of sustainablity of what has developed (wasteful consumption of resources producing accumulating harmful waste and a reduction of available resources due to a lack of recycling).

    And I say the higher status people need to change their ways of living to be the examples of ways of living that others can aspire to develop towards without the total impacts being unsustainable. And those changed ways do not need to be reduced consumption, just changes of consumption. However, I also accept that it is helpful for the higher status to participate in the global economy by helping less fortunate people instead of exclusively pursuing 'more of what they want for themselves', like the example Evan linked to in his comment @56. However, Government intervention by taxing the 'reluctant to help' among the wealthy is also a solution. And it is clear that some actions like Carbon Fee and Rebate would not occur through the chosen actions of helpful wealthy people.

    The fundamental understanding is that competitive pursuits of superiority will produce harmful results as the harmful and undeserving among the higher status pull the power levers available to them, especially the misleading marketing ones, to promote and excuse harmful misunderstandings about the ways of living that they benefit from and enjoy. And those harmful examples set by the more harmful people cause the added harm of inspiring lower status people to strive to develop to be more harmful like the examples they see being set by higher status people.

    It is undeniable that the competition for superiority promoting and excusing harmful misunderstandings has created the evidence of its harmful unsustainability and the need for significant rapid corrections. This understanding was globally acknowledged 50 years ago at the 1972 Stockholm Conference. The resistance to many of the identified required corrections through the past 50 years, especially the destructive resurgence of libertarian capitalism (Reagan-Thatcher nonsense like 'Freer Markets and less Governing is Better' and 'trickle-down benefits of the rich getting richer' ) has developed the requirement for a more dramatic correction now. The problems of harmful undeserved perceptions of prosperity, advancement, and superiority are bigger now and continue to get worse.

    Saying 'things will eventually work out' won't achieve an effective limitation and correction of the harm done. That kind of talk is unacceptable from an Engineer's perspective, and a business leader perspective, and a medical professional perspective, and a professional accountant perspective, and a professional housing framer perspective, and a professional bricklayer perspective ...

    The developed systems of competition for perceptions of superiority can be seen to resist limiting harm done, and even be seen to fight to be able to be more harmful. And powerful fights against external governing develop. The competition often produces increasingly harmful results unless there is external helpful thoughtful governing that effectively limits the risks of harm done. The lack of success of that type of external governing through the past 50 years has been a tragedy in many ways. More tragic is the ways that many people fight to defend and ignore the harm done by harmful misunderstanding, selectively highlighting what they see as 'benefits developed'.

    The reality is that the benefits developed based on harmful misunderstandings and actions will make things worse until those misunderstandings about prosperity and advancement become too hard to maintain, which will happen too late on many matters that matter to the future of humanity.

    Poverty perceived to be alleviated by fossil fuel use or other harmful developments, like harmful modern day unsustainable agriculture, are clear examples of that problem. Lasting poverty reduction has not occurred if harmful unsustainable actions are required to maintain the illusion.

    The incessant promotion of harmful misunderstanding is the reason for the now undeniably required dramatic correction of many perceptions of superiority, not just the Coal Barons significantly losing perceptions of superiority.

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62. One Planet Only Forever at 07:15 AM on 10 March, 2022

    There were links that did not come through in my comment @62

    ... The starting point is the very robust evidence-based understanding of the Sustainable Development Goals, Planetary Boundaries evaluations, and other things like them.

    ... The Age of Sustainable Development MOOC is the comprehensive presentation of the basis for the SDGs. It is also presented in a book of the same name if books are more appealing to you.

    And Project Drawdown, and the related book Drawdown, provides many evidence-based corrections of 'expert opinion based' misunderstandings about 'modern' food production.

    And the 2020 Human Development Report ...

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63. One Planet Only Forever at 07:18 AM on 10 March, 2022

    I now see that in some cases the links did not end up with Red text. All the links are there in Bold text. Some of the bold text is not linked.

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64. nigelj at 09:08 AM on 10 March, 2022

    OPOF @61

    "I suggest that you learn about the SDGs before dismissing them as unachievable or harmful with a misinterpretation that they are just some form of perpetual and sustainable "green growth".

    I never dismissed the UN development goals. Never even commented on them. You are absolutely twisting what I said. The UN SDGs are mostly desirable things,  but are largely a separate issue from whether green economic growth is possible and sustainable longer term.

    My comments were entirely on green growth in a general global sense.  You haven't been able to demonstrate that it is plausible longer term. Some of the problems with perpetual green economic growth selected at random:

    www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/29/green-growth-economic-activity-environment

    www.vice.com/en/article/qj4z9p/green-economic-growth-is-a-myth

    www.ft.com/content/47b0917c-f523-11e9-a79c-bc9acae3b654

    (I dont neceasarily agree with everything in these links but they give the general idea. And I dont promote massive and rapid cuts to consumption because its just not a viable solution. )

    And  low income countries need to be allowed to grow short to medium term, as I previously stated.

    "And Project Drawdown, and the related book Drawdown, provides many evidence-based corrections of 'expert opinion based' misunderstandings about 'modern' food production."

    I'm sure it does but you don't indicate anything relevant to what I said. So again,  traditional farming systems are less productive than industrial agriculture. This is not controversial or seriously contested. It means a shift to traditional farming  would reduce output and levels of gdp growth, although such a shift is still desirable over time for the sake of the environment, and I'm sure  ways will be found to deal with the yeilds issue as things are phased in.

    "And I say the higher status people need to change their ways of living to be the examples of ways of living that others can aspire to develop towards without the total impacts being unsustainable. And those changed ways do not need to be reduced consumption..."

    You appear to be moving the goalposts from high income people "reducing their consumption" to just "changing their consumption" and substituting low carbon products. Or perhaps your previous comment was just shorthand. But we ALL need to do the same regardless of incomes.

    "Saying 'things will eventually work out' won't achieve an effective limitation and correction of the harm done."

    I never said that. Never even commented on those sorts of issues related to people who over consume or make poor choices. My comments were entirely related to whether green economic growth is viable.  However while I agree wealthy people should be leading by example its very difficult to see elected governmnets forcing them in some way.

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65. One Planet Only Forever at 13:06 PM on 10 March, 2022

    nigelj,

    Thank your for clarifying the basis for your comment. It establishes that we are very well aligned ... if you fully understand the 3 articles you linked and the larger understanding that they are part of.

    What I present is very comprehensively aligned with what Monbiot presents in the first article you point to. The article content also aligns with the evaluations in Project Drawdown. So that clearly is not the basis for the comments you offered regarding my thoughts.

    The second article highlights the need to decouple perceptions of economic advancement (like GDP measurement) from harmful or unsustainable activity, that would include consumption. Again aligned with my thoughts, and part of the 2020 Human Development Report (though it is far more robustly presented and justified in the 2020 HDR).

    The third article contains a nice fit to my thoughts “green growth probably doesn’t exist — at least not for the next couple of decades”. That exactly aligns with my understanding that sustainable growth will probably only be possible after the harmful unsustainable developed ways of living, including modern industrial agriculture, are substantially corrected or removed from the system.

    You claim that you “...never dismissed the UN development goals. Never even commented on them." You did that, perhaps without realizing it, when responding to my comments. Or "You (were) absolutely twisting what I said in your mind (without realizing it)".

    But, to be fair, I suggest you avoid using the wide-open to interpretation "green growth" term. That term can mean many things. And because you used it as a way to describe thinking aligned with the SDGs (and the 3 articles you referred to) as perpetual and sustainable "green growth", I responded as I interpreted the intent.

    And saying "The system needs time to adjust." is the same as saying "things will eventually work out". The system needs to be corrected. And, as Planetary Boundaries and the 3 articles you referenced point out, the lack of corrective action though the past 50 years has developed a situation where it is foolish to “wait for things to work out”. It is also incorrect to wait in the hope that things actually will work out well for the future generations. As the likes of Greta correctly state they do not want the current generation to claim things like admiration for the future generation’s ability to deal with the troubles the current generation is creating’. And claiming that new technological developments (what Monbiot refers to as "green" technologies) by ‘systems of competition for perceptions of superiority that have a clear history of developing harmful activity and resisting correction’ will solve the problem in a timely manner is also a version of insanity (continuing to do the same thing but expecting a different result). Back to the 3rd article you point to. It contains the simple point “Our generation has to choose: we can be green or we can have growth, but we can’t have both together.” That applies to those who are 60+ years-old. They need to lead the change. The 40 - 60 generation would follow that lead. And the 20 - 40 year-olds may then be able to make green growth a reality when they are the 40-60 group.

    As for the relevant information in Project Drawdown that contradicts the claims you prefer to believe (traditional farming systems are less productive than industrial agriculture), I suggested you investigate it, especially by adding the understanding of the Planetary Boundaries. As I read the book Drawdown I saw many correlations between the SDGs and Planetary Boundaries, and the evaluations and recommendations of Project Drawdown. If you go to the Project Drawdown website you will be able to find a multitude of examples of the benefits of pre-modern food production replacing modern methods. But I will not cherry-pick among them.

    I have tried to consistently present the need for the higher-status and wealthier people to be better examples, being less harmful and more helpful. That would include consuming 'less than they need to', no change of goal posts required (and well aligned with the thoughts presented in the 3 articles you linked).

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66. nigelj at 16:16 PM on 10 March, 2022

    OPOF @65

    "And saying "The system needs time to adjust." is the same as saying "things will eventually work out"......"

    No it doesn't mean that.  This is what I said: "These things along with zero economic growth, or low growth, are not bad things - provided they dont happen too quickly. The system needs time to adjust. Human civilisation is getting old and is about to slow down. This may be a hard truth to accept."So all I'm saying is economic growth has to slow down gradually, so the economic system has time to adjust without becoming unstablle, and the  introduction of something like regenerative farming or cuts to consumption has be scaled up gradually. 

    All I'm really arguing is economic growth has to pretty much stop, whatever colour it is , but with the exception of poor countries that need to be able to grow enough to meet the basic requirements outlined in the UN sustainable development goals (clean water, adequate incomes, etc,etc). The evidence is becoming fairly compelling, the links I posted broadly support growth stopping and I could post 100 more. Ironically your comments on rich people cutting consumption and going back to traditional farming (which has merit) are likely to reduce levels of growth anyway. It's still not clear to me whether you think growth should stop or not, but it might be worth thinking about the idea if you haven't already.

    I don't want to get into a long  argument about all the numerous other details you outlined, because we are on the same page on most of the big issues anyway. Its not useful to have big explosive arguments over the details. I may discuss things if you keep to just a couple of points.

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67. One Planet Only Forever at 01:47 AM on 11 March, 2022

    nigelj,

    I will simply say your simplistic position that modern ways of food production are superior to pre-modern ways is wrong. There is ample evidence proving that. And it is easy to find examples in the Project Drawdown content.

    What I try to point out is based on the understanding that beliefs that the  system needs time to adjust would have been a little questionable even 50 years ago, when the Stockholm Conference of 1972 occurred.

    But, with the increased awareness and understanding developed since then due to increased focus on identifying harmful developments and how to correct things that 'let the system painlessly adjust' attitude lost most of its potential to be reasonable about 30 years ago.

    There now is increasing undeniable evidence, like the Planetary Boundaries understanding, that things have over-develped so harmfully that painful corrections are required, with the biggest current problems due to industrial food production (which contributes to the climate change problem but has caused massive harm unrelated to climate change impacts). And the pain and loss of required correction needs to be experienced by the people who enjoy the most benefit from the continued incorrect directions of development through the past 30 years. Those people can be hard to identify in the past. So what has to be done is focusing the pain and loss on the ones who more recently, and currently, are committing the most per person harm. However, the nations that benefited the most through the past 100 or more years are able to be identified and should be the groups suffering the loss due to the increasingly urgent correction, especially the nations whose leaders resisted the correction the most. And that makes some among the top 10% angry.

    When you think about what the resistance to acceptance of Kyoto was motivated by, the motivation was largely the reluctance of powerful wealthy people to give up the perceptions of superiority they had developed. And US President Bush declared that 'Americans do not need to change how they live' when he announced that the USA was withdrawing from Kyoto. And a bunch of others chanted versions of Kyoto 'robbing the rich'. And the misleading attempts to excuse other harmful activities and maintain harmful misunderstandings apply to far more than climate science.

    I see that understanding as the best explanation for everything that can be seen to be harmfully happening, including the harmful resistance to correction of harmful misunderstandings. The 1980s resurgence of libertarian capitalism was one of the most damaging developments in recent history. And the populist misunderstanding demands for 'political or nationalist identity protection from learning it is a harmful misunderstanding' and the other harmful freedoms to misunderstand things are aspects of the same systemic problem.

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68. nigelj at 07:04 AM on 11 March, 2022

    OPOF @67

    "I will simply say your simplistic position that modern ways of food production are superior to pre-modern ways is wrong. "

    I didn't say that. I've explained my position at least twice now. I said several times that traditional farming has merit and we need to ultimately go back to some sort of traditional farming. Personally I think we need a combination of modern and pre modern.

    I only that that traditional agriculture has lower yields and productivity than industrial agriculture and this will push down growth. This was in support of the proposition that growth has to stop anyway. I said that over time we will find ways to overcome the yields problem. I said we would have to phase in more traditional forms of farming slowly.

    And if you believe traditional farming or something like organic farming has equal or higher yeilds than conventional industrial farming please provide proper citations form the peer reviewed literature. Not vague references to something like project drawdown.

    "let the system painlessly adjust"

    I didn't say that. I don't care if rich farmers feel some pain. My comments were entirely about the system stability and effects on ordinary people. If traditional farming was introduced universally and abruptly the lower yeilds would be problematic. The system needs time to adjust. Things have to be phased in. This is obvious and basic.

    "The 1980s resurgence of libertarian capitalism was one of the most damaging developments in recent history"

    The problem of libertarian capitalism is well known. I've said much the same on many websites. But the causes of our environmental problems go well beyond this. Its not the one and only thing. If anyone is being "simplistic" you are. I'm using your terminology. Imho you are being too doctrinaire.

    Not going to waste my time further responding to people who consistently put words in my mouth / twist what I say, and who create these strawmen. You have done it numerous times now. It gets frustrating and I have other things to do. 

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69. One Planet Only Forever at 08:25 AM on 11 March, 2022

    nigelj,

    I responded to the folowing in the context of the topic and comments.

    "You appear to be promoting some form of perpetual and sustainable "green growth". I used to believe in this, but theres a growing body of expert opinion that it is neither possible or desirable. In addition cutting consumption of high income people is going to reduce growth by pulling demand out of the system. Adopting traditional farming would actually slow growth because its lower yield than industrial farming.

    These things along with zero economic growth, or low growth, are not bad things - provided they dont happen too quickly. The system needs time to adjust. Human civilisation is getting old and is about to slow down. This may be a hard truth to accept.

    This is all different thing to crazy agendas to rapidly cut resource consumption by massive levels."

    That was twisting, significantly misunderstanding, my comments. So I replied accordingly. And I will maintain the understanding that 50 years ago there was potentially time to let the system adapt. But the evidence indicates that the system is powerfully uninterested in changing, and certainly won't change rapidly enough. That system has now developed the need for a much more rapid and painful correction, as illustrated by Figure 2, or massive damage will be done to future generations as many people today continue to enjoy what they believe to be success.

    Agreed that many traditional agriculture systems are less productive per hectare in the short-term. But they have a longer future. Industrial agriculture is depleting the ability of lands to be productive, all while being more profitable than the longer lasting less harmful alternatives.

    Reviewing the "Land Sinks" set of solutions evaluated and compiled in Project Drawdown is a way to learn about instances where modern industrial agriculture is not as good as pre-modern ways. And it can be appreciated that Project Drawdown is focused on changes and new developments that, in combination, address the required limiting of climate change impacts. There are, of course, many other aspects of developed modern industrial agricultural practices that need to be changed, to be more like the pre-industrial ways, to get Phosphorous and Nitrogen impacts back below safe Planetary Boundaries.

    The summary page of the Land Sink set of solutions in Project Drawdown includes the following statement:

    "Shift Agriculture Practices

    What and how we grow, graze, or harvest can be a means to cultivate biomass and regenerate soil carbon. An array of “regenerative agriculture” methods are being rediscovered and developed worldwide, and show promising results. The integration of trees into farming through agroforestry practices is particularly powerful. All solutions that sustainably raise yields on existing farmland can also reduce the pressure to clear other areas."

    And the most beneficial of the food related "Solutions" presented in Project Drawdown are (along with their overall standing among the 82 solutions evaluated in Drawdown Scenario 2 which is roughly in-line with achieving 1.5˚C temperature rise by 2100 - and Scenario 1 which is roughly in line with 2˚C temperature rise by 2100):

    Reduce food waste (#3 in Scenario 2 - #1 in Scenario 1)
    Plant rich diets (#4 - #3)
    Tropical forest restoration (6 - 5)
    Silvopasture (11 - 11)
    Tree plantations (on degraded land) (13 - 13)
    Perenial staple crops (14 - 19)
    Managed grazing (16 - 17)
    Tree intercropping (17 - 20)
    Regenerative annual cropping (20 - 21)
    Multistrata agroforestry (22 - 25)
    Abandoned farmland restoration (23 - 23)

    And there are more agriculture related items on the list. But always keep in mind that the Planetary Boundaries evaluation has identified that Phosphorous and Nitrogen impacts, largely unrelated to climate change impacts, are already significantly exceeding Safe Planetary Boundary limits due primarily to modern industrial agriculture.

    I suggest multistrata agroforestry and indigenous people's forest tenure and tree intercropping as examples of traditional methods that are superior to industrial methods, from the perspective of being able to be continued long-term. Tree intercropping is described as something that was "Plowed under during the twentieth century to make room for industrialized methods of farming, tree intercropping is one of dozens of techniques that can create an agricultural renaissance—a transformation of food-growing practices that bring people, regeneration, and abundance back to the land."

    But there are many other examples where more labour intensive methods, and ways that are potentially less productive per hectare in the short-term, are superior because they result in a lasting system that ultimately produces a larger total amount of food from the land that the industrial practices that deplete land quality and produce other harmful impacts while they 'appear to be superior - for a little while - because they are more profitable for investors who pursue maximizing their short-term return from every investment they make'.

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70. nigelj at 10:33 AM on 11 March, 2022

    OPOF @69

    "That was twisting, significantly misunderstanding, my comments. So I replied accordingly."

    No its not twisting what you said.  I said "you appear" to be saying xyz. This is not putting words in your mouth or twisting what you said. I honestly couldnt figure out 100%  what you were saying - so I paraphreased my best guess in the hope you would clarify your position and used the word appear.

    And even if I had twisted what you said, how does that give you the right to do the same? Have you heard the wise old saying "two wrongs dont make a right?"

    You "appear" to also still be supporting that growth can and should go on forever. Your comments:  "It is not necessary to stop economic growth or go backwards" @57. If so, I think you are wrong other than to say poor countries need to be allowed to grow their economies.

    Your comments on the system adapting are too general for me to be meaningful. If you mean the world should instantly go back to traditional farming I believe that would be very problematic for the reasons stated. However we can phase in such changes at a reasonable pace and it would likely happen that way anyway. I'm not suggesting we stall such things or go like a  snail.

    Thank's for the comments on regenerative farming. I'm fully aware of much of that material and the the problems of industrial agiculture. I've said many times on this thread and elsewhere that industrial agriculture is causing environmental problems and has to change, however I don't support pie in the sky delusions that either traditional farming or regenerative agriculture is superior in every way and can achieve miracles that some so called experts have claimed . If it was, everyone would be doing it and industrial farming wouldnt exist.

    I'm very passionate about the need to do better conserving the environment but I also like to maintain some realism and scientific objectivity. The solution is going to contain elements or modern and traditional agriculture. There are no simple, perfect doctrinaire solutions.

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71. One Planet Only Forever at 14:05 PM on 11 March, 2022

    nigelj,

    My response to your @60 which started with "You appear...", started with "You appear to misunderstand my perspective."

    In my comment @36 I included the following along with other information about my perspective. "I prefer to say something like ‘correction of harmful development’. Degrowth is too generic. I understand that undoing harmful developments at the pace required to limit harm done to future generations could result in reductions of measures used to track economic progress like GDP. But that indicates that the measure of economic progress failed to properly account for harm done because they are ‘externalities to the money math that are hard to precisely monetize’. They would be negatives if they were monetized."

    And I paraphrased your "The system needs time to adjust." to highlight what Figure 2 indicates ... there is no longer the luxury of time.

    From your comment @70 "However we can phase in such changes at a reasonable pace and it would likely happen that way anyway. " That is where we are unlikely to establish a common understanding. That is a different way of saying "things will eventually work out". I have pointed out that the available evidence, particularly through the past 50 years, is that the developed systems have harmfully resisted being corrected, persisted at being poorly governed to limit harm done (and, agreed, the Soviet Union and China also pursued harmful ways of appearing to be superior). They are powerfully biased to resist being corrected. And, going back to Figure 2, what is your anticipated time frame to maximize climate harm impacts and begin the reduction of CO2 levels (well past 2050)? And what total impact (well above 2C) are you suggesting is fair to the future generations and less fortunate who will suffer the most?

    And I agree, the less fortunate, especially the ones that have been further challenged by climate change impacts caused so far, should not be the ones to suffer. That may be where we differ. Your perspective may be wanting to minimize suffering in the middle class of the richer nations. I share the perspective that those who have benefit more from the harm done should suffer the most. But it is too late to have only limited loss suffered by the middle classes of the nations that, to this day, continue to have the highest per capita ghg impact rates. Based on WorldoMeters 2016 data, those nations would include:

    • a bunch of smaller oil producing nations
    • Canada (18.6 tonnes per capita) The country I live in
    • Australia (17.1)
    • USA (15.5)
    • Russia (11.4)
    • all other nations are below 10 and most are doing better

    New Zealand at 7.14 is not facing a significant rate of correction (NZ is not in the top 10% of high impacting nations), certainly nothing like what is required in Canada. And I live in Alberta, the epicenter of rapid required correction. Some of us in Alberta 'get it'. Recently, the Conservative Government tried to undo protections that were keeping coal mining out of important natural areas. They appear to have backed down because of public opposition. But, many Albertans fight really hard not to understand, and they did not understand the demands for reinstating the decades old protections.

    Please re-read all of my comment on this item. I did not provide the comment @57. And after quickly reviewing things I am pretty sure I never commented that "It is not necessary to stop economic growth or go backwards", and certainly not @57. If you do find it let me know and I will respond to the full statement in its context.

    I have said versions of the thought that it is possible for economic growth to happen de-coupled from harmful impacts and material consumption. (and in my comment @65 I included a quote from the Fortune article you linked “green growth probably doesn’t exist — at least not for the next couple of decades” - and put in context regarding my thinking). Improved ways of living can always be developed that are better than what we already understand are sustainable ways to live - fitting in as parts of the robust diversity of life on this planet and developing helpful technology that does not require its harms to be excused by misleading claims about the benefits obtained, by some people, being worth the harm done to Others.

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72. One Planet Only Forever at 15:47 PM on 11 March, 2022

    nigelj,

    Found the quote in my comment @59

    "It is not necessary to stop economic growth or go backwards.

    What is required is correcting the harmful unsustainable aspects of what has been developed. That will allow growth of the economy through the development of even better ways of living than the 'sustainable' starting point humanity ends up at after the correction (not going back to cave living but, based on the evaluations by groups like Project Drawdown, going back to many pre-industrial ways of producing food with possible improvements due to legitimate improved understanding - note the base understanding is that many of the pre-industrial ways are actually superior to the industrial ways)."

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73. swampfoxh at 12:31 PM on 12 March, 2022

    This has been the longest chat I've seen since joining Skep/Sci some 8 years ago.  Just a couple of things I've noticed re:

    One Planet Only Forever: "(underdevelops) have the right to live more like the higher status people...higher status people do not have the right to be more harmful."

    nigelj:  "...poor countries need to be allowed to grow their economies"

    The theory of rights grew from the pen of Aristotle (Atomistic Theory) and was developed over 2,500 years in the writings of many political philosophers. Plato's theory of man's place in the world did not include rights.  I won't take time reviewing 2,500 years of political history, herein, but in cutting to the chase, Classical Liberalism (America) holds that humans "retain certain rights" and Authoritarians believe all right are granted by authority, especially government authority, be they Kings, Despots, Autocrats, Dictators, etc.

    Any discussion of "rights" is a political position and a political question.  What any individual thinks constitutes a "right" (either natural/retained or granted by authority) is purely a matter of opinion, a political opinion.

    Both, One Planet and Nigel, imply that there is a "right" that the poor have, to do whatever is necessary to make itself into a "First World" country and that the rest of "us" should stand down while they do so.

    Nope.  These people have missed the bus.  It has left the station and is not backing up to board the stragglers.  The global population's consumption and ecological footprint has probably already exceeded the planet's carrying capacity in sustainably supporting the 7.8 Billion humans now present.  Injecting a "right", which is a political construct, disparages another politically constructed "right" to which a First World entity might adhere...as they refuse to watch the "poor catch up".  We need not fiddle while the plant burns by allowing any more global damage than has already been done...just to wait on stragglers.  Regardless, let us not proffer a "right" unless, perhaps, we can establish it as a universal right...which the entire humans race would have to agree to...but to which they are unlikely to do so.        

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74. swampfoxh at 12:49 PM on 12 March, 2022

    As to the issue regarding the Reference catalog I offered the monitor/Skep/Sci, I did not mean to imply that its contents be held in confidence.  I just did not want the 30 page document in its entirely broadcasted to others.  Certainly, every single reference can be found most anywhere because they are published works.  The convenience of having these references in one document is of significant value and each of you can probably appreciate that putting together such a comprehensive catalog is no easy task.  We should have the study's peer review completed by mid summer, so I shall refrain from criticizing Industrial Animal Agriculture until then.

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75. Evan at 21:57 PM on 12 March, 2022

    swampfoxh@73, is there some minimum living standard to which you feel all people have the right to pull themselves up to? Such as minimum standards for food, clothing, and housing?

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76. swampfoxh at 03:05 AM on 13 March, 2022

    Evan @ 75

    No. There is no minimum standard that lies outside a subjective evaluation normally made by human committees. Amazonian natives live in huts, billionaires live in mansions. The only way you can obtain a "minimum standard" is to seize the reins of government and enforce (effectively at gunpoint) that minimum standard (whatever it is). Moreover, "minimum standards" are usually set by the committees that have the least stake in the decision, or if the affected parties are allowed to participate, their solutions will encroach upon the interests of those whom are not the target group affected by the proposed "minimum standard".
    

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77. Evan at 03:40 AM on 13 March, 2022

    swampfoxh@76, something doesn't feel quite right. We seemingly know how to provide minimum standards for incarcerated persons, so it seems that similar standards could be used for all people. Incarcerated persons are not provided cars nor houses, but they are provided with some minimum levels of nutrition, health, and lodging.

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78. Evan at 05:29 AM on 13 March, 2022

    I should have written my previous comment not that people "are provided with some minimum levels of nutrition, health, and lodging," but rather that we should allow disadvantaged people to use fossil fuels to pursue some minimum level of nutrition, health, and lodging, longer than people in developed countries are allowed to use fossil fuels to pursue these goals. I am not an expert in this area nor have I given it a lot of thought, but it just seems that we should make allowance for people who are really struggling to make ends meet.

    Sure wish we could edit our posts. :-)

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79. nigelj at 06:48 AM on 13 March, 2022

    Swampfox @73.

    I should clarify my position a bit. I don't think its feasable that poor countries can have the same standard of living the middle classes in America have (for example) for a range of reasons. I do think they need to be allowed develop decent basic healthcare and education and eliminate dire poverty etcetera. I meant that in the sense that we in western countries cannot expect them to freeze their rates of economic growth at this stage of their development. We cant make them anyway - and I dont think we would have a "right" to force them to stop growth. They are sovereign countries. At most be could encourage them to slow their rates of growth down once they have developed the basics better.

    The question of whether people have rights to a mimimum  basic standard of living and this be payed for by "other people" of better means seems like a separate thing. Western countries already do this for their own populations with things like minimum wages, government financial support for very poor people, and the unemployed or as Evan points out even prisoners get the basics these days. I'm generally ok with such provisions, as long as we just provide for a basic minimum level.

    I agree whether we do such things is ultimately an opinion and there is no satisfactory clear cut philosophical answer. However the vast majority of people appear to support such an approach,  and if you don't agree with the community consensus on the issue,  you always lobby for change, or vote for a very small government  leaning party, and you have the choice of going and living in another country that takes a different approach and gives no governmnet support to anyone. This may seem harsh, but life is harsh, as you allude to yourself.

    I've read some of the Greek philosophers and modern philosophers on such issues. 

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80. swampfoxh at 17:28 PM on 13 March, 2022

     Nigelj & Evan

    This topic about "rights" could take more time and tolerance on the part of others who post here, so I'd like to just offer another approach. Suppose we drop the "rights" issue and see if we might share common ground on moral duty? We are seeing an inexorable rise in the Keeling curve, the implications being that if we don't put a stop to that, the rich and poor, advantaged and disadvantaged all fall into the abyss together. But, if we First Worlders take the draconian steps to eliminate all of the sources of GGEs as fast as we can, then all of us will be the better for it. Certainly the disadvantaged will suffer, for awhile. But our waiting for the disadvantaged to "catch up" will soon imperil us all. The Keeling curve will rise, inexorably, to the killing point. So "rights" entirely aside, I suspect we really have a moral duty to save the human race, rather than an obligation to honor a "right".

    Your view?

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81. swampfoxh at 17:39 PM on 13 March, 2022

    Before I drop the subject of Animal Ag's coextential responsibility with FF for the emissions problem, I declared that AA contributed only a meager 1.5% to the Global Gross Product of Goods and Services. My source was: Bowles, N et al 2019 "The livestock sector..." Published in Ecological Economics 160 PP 128-136

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82. Evan at 20:23 PM on 13 March, 2022

    swampfox@80, absolutely agree there is no time to waste to take action to stabilize the Keeling Curve. I am simply suggesting that we in the developed countries take the lead in cutting emissions and expect that people in developing countries may continue to increase their emissions for a while. For people trying to put food on the table it is a cruel message that they have to cut down. It is also an impossible message. People have a "right" to feed and clothe themselves using the best available methods. If that method involves using fossil fuels, then that is what they need and have a right to do.

    But I sense that more to the point this is all an academic discussion. because we are really locked in a 2-front battle: one front is people fighting to maintain their right to consume whatever they want and the other, people fighting for survivial. There is a thin slice of humanity that seems to "get it" and to at least agree to take action. But for all of the positive-sounding polls that indicate people support climate action, in the end, people's voting records seem to hinge more on other social and economic issues.

    These comment threads are full of suggestions for what people should do (and I think we are largely in agreement with these conceptual opinions), but what people are actually doing is markedly different.

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83. swampfoxh at 01:59 AM on 14 March, 2022

    Evan at 82

    One final "short" then I have to go. Animal Agriculture, arguably the largest multifaceted threat to the planet, responsible for a large share of GGEs, deforestation, desertification, eutrophication and acidification of the oceans, massive excessive fresh water use, widespread habitat destruction, wild animal and plant species extinction, land use degradation. various human illnesses from  hormones and endocrine disruptors...could be outlawed, "today" because we have an adequate, alternative, suitable and available food supply: Plants.  Fossil fuels, burned, essentially affect the balance of gasses in the atmosphere but are not a factor in the above laundry list of damages to the remaining ecosystems.

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84. Evan at 02:11 AM on 14 March, 2022

    swampfox@83 "..could be outlawed, "today" because we have an adequate, alternative, suitable and available food supply: Plants. "

    Yes, they could be outlawed. But I expect that the move to vegetarian will be a blip and coexist along with the numerous carnivors on our planet. Most people simply want meat.

    I agree with your assertion, and this is a large reason why I became vegetarian. I just don't expect people to make this change in numbers large enough to make a difference.

    I hope I'm wrong.

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85. nigelj at 05:54 AM on 14 March, 2022

    Swampfox @80, I believe the climate problem is very serious, but solutions that impoverish the world in the process seem as bad as the climate problem. Poor countries have to be able to put food on the table and meet basic needs ( as per Evans comments)  including modern healthcare and this means at least some economic growth for a period. However there is much they can do to reduce their emissions anyway by  building wind and solar farms rather than coal fired plant. The costs favour wind and solar anyway. The solution to the climate problem is primarily an energy substitution process, rather than reducing growth. This is the theme of the IPCC reports.

    I see that there are problems with industrial agriculture. I think the IPCC mitigation section promotes a "low meat diet". This is not a bad solution all things considered. Some land is only really suitable for grazing.

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86. One Planet Only Forever at 04:19 AM on 15 March, 2022

    Here is my response to what swampfoxh wrote @74 (in the context of other responses and all the other comments on this thought provoking OP).

    Regarding animal agriculture, I support corrections of all food production, distribution, and consumption aligned with the understanding that harmful unsustainable ways of food production need to be ended. It is especially important to correct the developed types of production and consumption that have already caused phosphorous and nitrogen impacts to exceed safe planetary boundaries (see Planetary Boundaries). It is also important to limit waste and ensure that all people receive at least basic decent nutrition, preferably from maximized local food production (refer to the compendium of climate impact related solutions presented in Project Drawdown).

    Upon reflection it appears that serious important questions are raised by the way that swampfoxh chose to try to focus attention on the matter Rights (in spite of the content of my first comment on this topic @3, and all subsequent comments).

    The (sort of) quick response is:

    Fossil fuelled development can produce perceptions of prosperity and superiority. And the competitive for pursuit of higher status (admiring and aspiring to be like the highest status) can develop harmful misunderstandings in attempts to develop and prolong harmful activity. Undeserved status would be lost by a correction of what has developed and a correction of the direction of development (away from fossil fuel use).

    A correction to limit the harm of climate change impacts will cause loss of developed status. The more rapid the correction, the more significant the losses will be. And it now appears, based on Figure 2, that significant losses will have to happen in the remaining lifetime of many people who fought to delay the correction. Their fight against change, their fight against correction of harmful developed misunderstandings, has created the need for more rapid correction. That has motivated increased resistance to learning in people who would prefer to have the losses happen to Others, especially the future generations who have no influence today. They make excuses that the future will always be better for everyone. And they make related demands that they not suffer any loss of their status relative to others due to required corrections, claiming things like ‘everybody’s perception of prosperity needs to constantly improve fro the current developed starting point, like a marathon racer who wants to start 20 miles into the race, because that is where they are when the race starts.

    Rights are an ethical matter that gets harmfully compromised by political game players. The harmful socioeconomic game players who have significant political influence can become the least ethical people, using the power of misleading marketing to promote and prolong harmful misunderstanding.

    Poverty in the midst of Plenty is the result of systems that create cases of people who do not deserve the circumstances they experience. Many of the lower status do not deserve their lower status. And many of the higher status do not deserve their higher status.

    A different response is:

    It is a misunderstanding to believe that people who were less able to develop the more harmful, less sustainable, fossil fuelled ways of living (mistakenly perceived to be more advanced or superior) have ‘missed the bus’. It is also unacceptable to declare that the people enjoying the ride on the ‘harm-full bus’ must not have their level of enjoyment limited or governed externally by others. It is not right to declare that the ones on the ‘Harm-Full Bus’ have the right to be more harmful than Others. And it is not right to declare than others cannot develop to harmfully joy-ride like the ones already on the ‘Harm-Full Bus’.

    And helpful people should not have to try to undo or repair the harm done by people on the ‘harm-full bus’. However, until the Harm-Full Party Bus is safely kept from harmfully compromising leadership actions, all possible helpful hands are required to build the power to limit the harm done - no more bystanders or people ‘just focused on the science’, because those type of people are part of the harm problem by not being as helpful as they could be.

    Competitors who are willing to try to benefit from something harmful that others may not notice as harmful (like sports cheaters) or try to benefit from a harmful misunderstanding (including unethical rules or unethical enforcement of rules) can mistakenly develop the belief that ‘everyone is like they are’. That can create a mind-set that can be easily tempted to spiral down into more harmful misunderstanding.

    Less fortunate people have more excuse for being less aware of how to avoid being harmful to others. More fortunate people have less excuse. And the legitimacy of the highest status, like the wealthiest 10%, should be evaluated based on the understanding that they all have ‘little excuse for maintaining harmful misunderstandings’.

    Disclosure: I have lived for decades in Alberta, a major region of origin of harmful fossil fuelled misunderstanding. I have tried to be less harmful, engineering was a good fit for that, and more helpful to others (a diversity of volunteer activities are part of that). My abilities, combined with those focuses, appear to have enabled me to rise into the top 10% of income earners in Alberta. I may have been able to achieved a higher status, but I was not interested in compromising my ethical perspective in pursuit of that.

    A detailed response regarding my perspective on the issue follows:

    Constant learning from a constantly improving ethical perspective is an important part of the pursuit of increased awareness and improved understanding of how to be less harmful and more helpful to others. And that expanded ethical perspective includes consideration for all other life, humans do not stand apart from nature, now and into the future, constantly learning to correct, and make amends for, developed harmful misunderstandings and related actions.

    Everyone learns and develops their motives and perspective from the environment they are born into and grow up in. A lack of diversity of experience, including a lack of natural experiences, can develop a harmfully limited perspective. And that developed limited perspective can resist learning how harmful the things that are perceived to be beneficial actually are. Too much focus inside a man-made socioeconomic-political environment of competition for survival and superiority relative to others can develop intensely held harmful misunderstandings.

    Ethical fairness of what is being evaluated is determined by considering the system and its results from versions of the following perspective: The system is fair and just if I end up experiencing any of the diversity of individual circumstances that the system could potentially produce (consider the history of European colonial conquest from that perspective, and extend that thinking into the future).

    That evaluation justifiably determines that systems that produce poverty in the midst of plenty need correction. It also establishes the understanding that a person who acts in ways that harm others does not deserve credit for helping ‘a different sub-set of others’. A person who ‘helps some people’ in ways that ‘harm other people’ is harmful. And that individual-based understanding can be extended to groups of people. A group or nation is not Collectively Good if some of its members are helpful pursuers of being less harmful while other members of the group or nation pursue benefit in harmful ways.

    A fundamental ethical point is understanding that each person born should not have ‘advantages or special rights and privileges’ due to where and when they are born or who their parents and ancestors are. That understanding is often attempted to be denied by the promotion of harmful misunderstandings regarding ‘perceptions of status’ (like believing that a ‘special sub-set of the population’ deserve to be the first and only ones on a bus). A related point is that a person who has attained higher status relative to others by benefiting from harmful actions does not ‘deserve the ability to be harmful because they can afford it or can legally win attempts to penalize them for the harm they benefit from’. Harmful laws and harmful application of laws have been developed, proving that all Rule of Law is not Ethical Law and Order. Harmful laws and enforcement are often developed to defend and excuse harmful people who have become wealthier or more powerful through harmful means.

    That context leads to ethical questions of how fair and just it is for someone to declare that:

    • They were the first to benefit from a harmful unsustainable activity and therefore must not be corrected, but others who have not developed to live that way must not be allowed to develop to be like that.
    • They have developed to be the most harmful pursuer of personal interest and must not be corrected, but others who have not developed to live that way must not be allowed to develop to be like that.
    • Because they were born into a group that had developed perceptions of higher status relative to others through actions that are now understood to be harmful and that were/are excused and defended by harmful misunderstandings, they must not be corrected, but others who have not developed to live that way must not be allowed to develop to be like them.

    Applying that thinking to climate change impacts, what swampfoxh states @74 can be understood to be arguing for the right to continue to be more harmful than Others are allowed to be.

    Applying a different perspective, what swampfoxh argues @74 is no reason for nations like China or India to forego their development. There is lots of coal and oil to burn. It is clearly inexcusable for people in nations with a history of benefiting from harmful actions to demand that they have the exclusive Right to maintain their harmfully obtained benefits, insisting that others who have been less harmful and have less developed ways of living must not develop to be like them.

    I will use Canada (representing the Western developed nations), the nation I was born in about 60 years ago and continue to live in, as the example to reinforce the point. The following compares per person emissions from 1960 (World Bank data) between Canada - USA and the BRIC nations. The average atmospheric CO2 levels are provided in brackets to indicate harm already done primarily by western nations (with 280 ppm as the understood level before those impacts:

    Yr (ppm) Canada - USA: Brazil – Russia – India - China
    1960 (317)  10.8  -  16.0:   0.65     12.1        0.27      1.2
    1970 (326)  16.0  -  21.1:   1.0       18.1        0.35      0.94
    1980 (339)  18.1  -  20.8:   1.6       25.1        0.45      1.5
    1990 (354)  15.1  -  19.4:   1.3       14.6        0.64      1.9
    2000 (369)  16.8  -  20.5:   1.8       10.2        0.89      2.6
    2010 (389)  15.7  -  17.4:   2.0       11.1        1.4        6.3
    2018 (410)  15.5  -  15.2:   2.0       11.1        1.8       7.4 latest World Bank values
    2020 (412) Canada 16.8 (= 637 Mt / 38 million): China approx 10 (like Canada was in 1960)

    There is ample coal and oil for China and India to develop to match the pattern of high emissions per person for 60 years. What is their motivation to not do that? Why wouldn’t they follow the examples set by the more developed nations? The argument by swampfoxh @74 would deservedly be laughed away.

    And, revisiting my comments about how averaging things can obscure what needs to be seen, why wouldn’t every region of China and India develop to match what the region of Alberta/Saskatchewan in Canada has currently developed to be? The combined population of Alberta and Saskatchewan is 5.6 million (4.4 + 1.2) with emissions impact rates of 60 tonnes per person (potentially increasing if the rate of extraction and export of fossil fuels, especially Western Canada Select - diluted bitumen - is increased). It is important to note that that high rate of impact does not count the additional harm done outside of Canada to process the exported product into final products for burning. What is exported, WCS, is heavy sour crude. Upgrading it to the quality of other globally traded oil products before export would result in more emissions in Canada (that understanding indicates that the federal government shares the blame with the provincial governments for exporting more harmful products to make Canada’s numbers look better).

    I am fairly proud of a lot of actions taken by Canada's leadership on matters of corrections of harmful developed misunderstandings, but not regarding climate change.

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    Moderator Response:

    [BL] As was suggested earlier, if people want to discuss veganism and/or agriculture, there are two possible threads here at Skeptical Science that might be more suitable. If you are to comment on those threads, make sure to read the original post, any following comments, and make sure that your comments are on topic.

    https://skepticalscience.com/animal-agriculture-meat-global-warming.htm

    https://skepticalscience.com/veganism.htm

87. One Planet Only Forever at 05:55 AM on 15 March, 2022

    I agree with the Moderator's comment on my post @85.

    Only the second paragraph of my comment departs from the OP topic of the need for rapid required corrections of developed activity and development activity.

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88. One Planet Only Forever at 04:24 AM on 17 March, 2022

    Recent leadership actions in Texas and other parts of the USA (NPR News item - Texas and other states want to 'boycott' fossil fuel divestment) are examples of why Figure 2 is what it is.

    These types of actions through the past 30 years are why the required correction of developed activity is now so large and needs to be so rapid. These ‘legal efforts’, and the recent repost in SkS of Supreme Court hears case on EPA GHGs regulation, are further evidence supporting many of the points I make in my comment @86:

    • Undeserving people try to avoid suffering loss of status by prolonging harmful misunderstanding that excuses their harmful pursuits of benefit.
    • Legal power is abused to create harmful laws and push for harmful legal decisions.
    • Bad exampes are set by many wealthy and powerful people

    Those types of actions by supposedly more advanced people clearly set bad examples for people who are pursuing improved lives. Many of those hoping for a better life incorrectly aspire to develop to match the harmful examples that have been set. And harmful powerful and wealthy people in developing nations learn from bad examples set in the supposedly more advanced nations.

    A related point is that helpful action, like renewable power built in Texas, does not off-set the harm done by Texas leadership. Harm is not to be masked by claims of ‘deserving credit for appearing to be helpful’. It is incorrect to do a utilitarian style overall evaluation of help and harm, especially when one group is helped to do more harm to others.

    Harmful resistance to learning to be less harmful and more helpful, especially by many among the rich and powerful, is a major root of the problem. The ‘successes’ of those type of people through the past 30 years have made the required correction larger and more rapid. And some of them did succeed in not experiencing the losses of status associated with the required correction in their lifetime. Their success made the current day challenge worse than it needed to be.

    Tragically, the cycle of harm continues. Many people today have developed the same harmful misunderstanding fuelled hope. They hope to be able to make the problem worse for others, including the future generations. They do not care how much harm is done to Others, including not caring about a more significant and rapid correction happening in the future in places like Texas, or Alberta. They hope they will not suffer the consequences of their resistance to learning to be less harmful. But they also promote the misleading claim that people who are less harmful than they are must not be allowed to develop to be like them, even though the bad examples they set can clearly encourage others to aspire to develop to be like them, just like today's leaders in places like Texas continue to try to set the examples of how to be as harmful as possible.

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