UKC

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.buzzfeednews.com/amphtml/claudiakoerner/...

Dear Lord. What is wrong with people on the far right? I mean, seriously?

jcm

They fined it easier to attack rather than discuss or see another’s point of view   Always been the same.

In reply to johncoxmysteriously:

Depressing isn’t it? Looks like he may have cooked his goose with Fox though so maybe he is at this very moment mourning the ‘green’ he has lost.

Well, she got Fox to apologise, which is evidence of some sort of superpower in itself.

I love the way some on the far right see climate change as some kind of left-right issue. It is a bit like the ships cat mocking the rats as they realise there are no lifeboats on the ship.

From a right point of view it is logical; assumes the left are using climate change to push through policies amenable to their politics and that alarmism is being stoked (the world will die in a decade) to inspire an electoral choice (the alarmist parties being the only ones to save the world from dieing).  No different from saying the threat of the Russians/Saddam is a right-wing issue, aimed at increasing defence spending, gaining oil, and cracking down of socialists.  They're just sceptical of the motives, so understandable.

What is it about recognising a existential threat that runs contra to right wing views? I don't remember being right wing meant debunking science

Ftfy. 😉

I'd say its widely agreed on the right that a hell of a lot of what comes out of universities is entirely politically motivated (or simply debated in a monoculture of narrow thought), so why wouldn't you be sceptical?  If experts are presenting as unassailable fact things in other areas that you believe full-well to be bullshit, why would you automatically have faith in other apparent experts whose seem ideologically aligned with the experts you distrust?  The language of climate change has afterall always been heavily politicised;  its the greedy capitalists and elites who are causing the planet to overheat is it not?  Greta did afterall point her finger at 6 countries she identified as sinners, and "communist" China wasn't one of them.  Grist to the mill for the political right.

Equally, on the right there is a substantial debate about climate change.  Whether you think they are bunk or not, contrary opinions to the AGW thesis are presented.  On the left you are unlikely to see any contrary opinions - the narrative is that the science is settled.  I suspect if you actually presented many of these contrary opinions to people on the left (scepticism about the Vostok ice cores, challenges to the hockey-stick, etc.) they wouldn't have an answer other than to get angry and accuse you of sacrilege.  They've never been exposed to actual opposing viewpoints. 

So if you viewed the left from the right, you'd probably be as alarmed by what you see (a monologue in which contrary opinions never even register) and assume the left has no credibility.  Think how horrified you are when you see a right-winger make the case that AGW isn't happening.  Well, that's how the left looks to the right.

Quite, who’s got the mental illness here?

Dunno about that.

I mean, scientists and clever people at universities all seem to be agreed that black people can't be racists and that boys and girls are the same as each other.  Apparently, if I disagree with that I'm a bad person and only the right-wing people appear to vocally disagree.

Why should I assume those other clever people who are telling me that the world is getting hotter, and that its caused by greedy right-wing people, are any more correct?

I always thought one of the saddest aspects of the Iraq War was that people would no longer believe the government if it ever told us we needed to go to war.  The politicisation of science may have done similar damage to the credibility of climate science.

There does appear to be a strong link between right wing views and various types of ‘faith’ positions though, whether they be religious, moral, tribal, racist, anti-science or whatever.

If right wing politics is also associated with libertarian neo-capitalism then that does present the human race with a long term existential threat.

Forget the f*cking Iraq War and use your brain to analyse other issues.

Another perspective could be that (some) right wing people can have a natural antipathy towards living in/society being shaped in certain ways, meaning that wherever adapting to climate change suggests such a thing, they have an internal reaction against it ,and feel that there must be another agenda hidden within? 

It strikes me that, because climate science is apolitical (in talking about temperature rises, changes to the environment, and it's impact on humans), anybody who opposes any changes in how we live and cooperate as a result of what the science implies, has ultimately got to be rather obtuse, selfish, or callous, in opposing said changes towards safeguarding as many people as possible.  It's as simple as 'the world is changing thus' - 'which means we need to adapt thus, so that lots of people don't die'. 

Well, the science *is* settled. 

Just like the science on gravity causing you to accelerate towards the ground if you step off a cliff is settled. Increasing carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere leading to warming of temperatures has been mainstream uncontentious science since the middle of the 19th century. 

If the right is genuinely in the process of retreating to a pre-enlightenment world view because people on the left accept the findings of climate scientists (aka ‘reality’), and because they can’t draw a distinction between the output of the physical sciences and the social sciences, then they deserve what is coming to them. 

Unfortunately the rest of us who don’t decide whether to accept reality or not depending on whether the ‘other team’ believe it are going to suffer too, because the laws of physics don’t give a shit which side of the ‘culture war’ you’re on. 

Humanity’s epitaph: doomed by morons

I think people are using their brains. 

Being suspicious of someone, especially someone who makes no secret of being ideologically opposed to your core beliefs, who is telling you "the science is settled, there is no more debate, you have to believe this, this is the truth", is completely understandable. 

Being sceptical of that message IS using your brain.  Not using your brain is thinking because the guy on the news, or someone holding a placard, or some 16 year old girl, tells you there can be no more debate then that this is the way you have to think. 

And that is the way the AGW thesis is being packaged these days.

I believe in AGW.  I do my bit to reduce my environmental impact.  I chair bloody committees in my workplace dedicated to resolving our environmental footprint.

Yet I come here and simply try and present why I think people don't agree...and I'm a f*cking right-winger or climate change denier?  

THIS is why the debate is being lost.  It's not because sceptics are stupid.  Its because they are being given every reason to doubt the motives of the people pushing a viewpoint on them - and ample evidence for why supporters of the AGW thesis are themselves stupid.

 I'm not usually so blunt, but no they f*cking aren't, that's a stupid thing to say.

I don't agree with it, either.

No, the world is getting hotter because of the use of fossil fuels, and because we're not recycling resources within a 'closed loop' model, that this is a result of free market capitalism combined with how we generate power and use resources, doesn't mean that changing away from these (material and energy related) things is a left wing agenda. 

The science only seems to have been politicised, to anybody who has a political opposition to a logical way of adapting to a changing climate so that as many people as possible are saved from perishing. 

Luckily we get to experience that first hand, so its hard to refute.  That's not really the case with climate science.

Probably.  But if someone is also telling you that more footage of hurricanes on TV is proof of global warming, then perhaps you are going to be introducing a degree of scepticism.  Even more so if the person telling you to change your behaviour is globe-trotting in a private jet and telling you you need to change your political viewpoints too. 

And the left, for retreating in to pre-enlightenment ideas in academia should share the blame for that.

I agree.  

No, it’s not. No one, not even the 16 year old girl tells you there can be no more debate because of their  opinions. There can be no more debate because of this:

https://www.ipcc.ch/

And because the only people qualified to actually debate the science are climate scientists 

Yes, a skeptical approach is admirable, but only to a point. If the doctor says that you have sepsis and without IV antibiotics you are going to die, refusing to agree because doctors are in league with big pharma, or are communists because they believe in socialised medicine, or  are pushing vaccines for some nefarious purpose, probable to do with George Soros or something, would just be moronic. 

Skepticism without limits and the ability to recognise reality when faced with it is just stupidity dressed up in self righteousness.

Its not. Despite the orange buffoon’s antics, the grown ups in America are getting on with the job of moving to a low carbon future. Probably not fast enough to avoid losing a competitive edge to China in new technology developments, but that’s the price you pay for stupidity - you end up poorer

That's the narrative coming from experts I'm afraid.  I agree its stupid, but it also has mass support in institutes of higher-learning.  And don't we have to believe the experts, despite what our own thoughts may be? 

You right-winger!

Where do communist countries fit into that?  Those that don't believe in free-markets?  How economically advanced would we be, and how many children would each family be having, if we hadn't reaped the economic benefits of free markets?

The anger aimed at certain economic systems seems misplaced and, again, looks ideological. 

yes, there is nothing quite as immediate; but the signs that the climate is changing are there for anyone to see if they are prepared to look. And that’s with only 1 degree of warming. 

But ive never, ever heard anyone claim that. I’ve heard people say that a warmer world will have more, and more violent, storms; but that’s just stating basic science. But I’ve never heard any meteorologist or climate scientist say that a given hurricane was caused by AGW- quite the opposite, they are always at pains to point out that climate is not weather. And again, what is it with people taking self defeating viewpoints based on not liking someone they see on the telly? 

I don't understand what you're alluding to be honest, but any anger I come across which is aimed at free market capitalism, seems to come from a place of not liking what is happening to the planet (and people as a consequence).  Free market capitalism 'has' lifted people out of poverty, but with it's/our current use of resources, and how things are (aren't) recycled, we're poisoning the world and ourselves too.

If anybody has some kind of ideology opposition to changes away from how we're poisoning the world and ourselves, I think that ultimately makes them a fuckwit*.

* To be blunt.   Edit: Or it's because they have a financial interest in these changes not happening, which makes them a selfish ****.

As I said, on the right you will see the IPCC report picked apart.  People with as much scientific knowledge as those on the left are doing so.  It doesn't matter if they are right or wrong when they do so - they are at least engaging critically with the report, even if coming to the wrong conclusions.  The IPCC report did not mark the end of the debate I'm afraid and pretending that with its publication we can revert to citing pseudo-scientific evidence for AGW is a major problem.

That's great and I tend to agree.  But the only people qualified to debate social sciences are social scientists.  Where has that got us?  You need to come up with a better argument if you are going to win over sceptics.

Read some of the venom on here

https://www.facebook.com/MilitaryHumorpage/photos/a.1660895010907765/229354...

You'd think they were talking about Myra F*cking Hindley, shocking!!

A quick perusal of some of the worst offenders gives you, "Please save this donkey", "donate to stop cruelty to pigs in china", and they're happy to call her all sorts and what he bullwhipped!

The world's gone mad!

Why do you lot constantly go off topic about this. 

The title is about an adult calling a child mentally ill live on air, no one addresses this you just instantly go into climate change debates. In pretty much every post about her as well. 

Genuinely wanted to see some discussion related to the title of this post. Obviously none here. 

Pots, kettles.

and what is there to discuss, to be honest?  It was a shitty thing to do, so shitty that even Fox found it toxic.   I’m missing the cue for a closely argued debate on this one.

Name three.

And why do you persist in framing this in terms of left and right? This is not a political issue, any more than the findings of the Large Hadron Collider are a political issue, or developing gene therapy for Huntington’s disease is a political issue. The science is the science, irrespective of which party you vote for. 

It doesn't matter if they are right or wrong when they do so - they are at least engaging critically with the report, even if coming to the wrong conclusions.  The IPCC report did not mark the end of the debate I'm afraid and pretending that with its publication we can revert to citing pseudo-scientific evidence for AGW is a major problem.

well, it should have done for anyone that supports the enlightenment project of the advancement of humanity through the application of reason. An entire branch of science, united in its conclusions and warning us of the threat we face. It is telling that, because there are literally no significant climate scientists in dissent, critics are largely reduced to ad hominem attacks on the motives of the IPCC.  

no idea what you mean by ‘reverting to pseudo-scientific evidence’

as I said before, if people can’t draw a distinction between the output of the physical sciences and that of the social sciences, then they’re going to find reality biting them pretty hard. 

And, win over sceptics? Not possible. This is a core identity issue for many people. You might as well try to talk a religious believer out of believing in god. The only hope is damage limitation, and trying to keep them away from policy making. The next generation won’t have many denialists; theyll be too busy trying to mitigate the slow motion car crash they’ve been left to deal with; but boy will they hate our generation for what we did to them. 

To be fair, the OP was framed in terms of left and right. Typical really of the author’s style and nothing really to do with the aspirations of Greta Thunberg.

I mean laymen. Keyboard warriors, everyday people, with no expertise beyond the average supporter of the AGW thesis, reading the document and critiquing it.  I don't view that as a bad thing and I suspect many of those "crackpots" have given the document more attention than those who claim it as the gospel truth

Because I was responding directly to people posting that this was a "right" issue. I'm saying it's not and that the left is as much a contributor, seen to be using climate change arguments as a vehicle to achieve other goals.

well, everyday people with no experience of immunology beyond the average supporter of the humoral immunity thesis read documents about vaccination and critique them, and people die. AGW denialists are no more qualified to challenge climatologists on their science than anti vaxxers are to dismiss 100 years of immunology. It’s not just stupidity, it’s malignant stupidity, with real world harms. 

yes, JCM set a hare running, but you’ve certainly been chasing it ever since. And I’m not an apologist for the actions of the left. Again, this really isn’t a left vs right issue; it’s a morons vs reality issue. In the long run, getting on the wrong side of the laws of thermodynamics is a pretty stupid place to be 

Its not 'just'.

They have undone environmental protections and stopped government investment in renewables. They are now panicking because China is mopping up all international infrastructure projects, potentially working in areas with huge amounts if US military equipment like Israel, or within site of the US like the Bahamas.

It's actually laughable how much they've damaged the economy and the strength of the US renewable industry. 

Whether we believe in climate change or not its basic common sense that power generation at source is better than wires all over the country losing massive amounts of energy.

The honest answer to this is that the right simply don't believe in science. There is a history of the right denying smoking causes cancer, ozone depletion, HIV/aids, climate change etc etc.  Often exactly the same people move from one subject to the next.  It seems to be a feature of a right-wing world view that really *believing* something makes it true, despite any evidence.

Makes sense. Just as some people are insistent that they are the ones that know best how to use their hard-earned money, with little regard for others in society, so they must be allowed to insist that apples fall upwards. Nobody can take that personal freedom away.

I'm not sure far right people are able to use their brain. I was debating last night on facebook with someone who posted something about all the plastic bottles, 4x4's and aeroplane use is down to the younger generation. He genuinely couldn't see that the 16 year olds are inheriting this shit from us, 

So you think it’s important that people with little understanding are engaging with the science, even if they are coming to the wrong conclusions, rather than people who’s view is ‘well that’s the current understanding of over 95% of the experts in a very complex field, so I will go with what they are saying’?

Telling choice of agreed over believed there.

Whether or not I believe gravity is bullshit it'll still kill me given half a chance. It may not be fully understood but its effects are real and well described.

No way, political problem described in political language! What next. Anyway, as much as you bridle at the language used it is essentially reasonable, the richest among us, those with capital, are the biggest polluters by a long shot. The vast majority of them/us acquired our privileged positions directly or indirectly through the exploitation of the fossil energy at the root of our climate crisis. More importantly though by far, those 'greedy capitalists' are not just at present the barrier to a potential solution through their undue political influence, they are also through that power, their wealth and technological capability a necessary part of the solution.

Does anyone really still consider China properly communist? China's emission are soaring because of capitalist commerce.

I suspect if you presented them to someone technically qualified and left leaning they would be very well equipped to ask the right questions, to fit your grasped-at straws into their proper place in the bigger picture.

If as we must assume one of us, crudely characterised as left and right, is wrong, which path forward ends our civilisations and if we are genuinely uncertain, as you appear to contend, which course would a prudent person choose until that uncertainty is resolved?

jk

You're being lied to. When people want to oppose scientific evidence because it affects their commercial or personal interests they set about deliberately and consciously creating uncertainty about that science. They use scientific sounding terms and even create their own journals and 'research institutions' to add legitimacy. 

There are numerous examples from history (Scottish farmed salmon or evolution for example) but the most obvious and relatable case study is the tobacco industry which actively sought to undermine a building scientific consensus. Feel free to do your own research, as on the political right you are so much better than the left at being open minded and considering alternative opinions.

The science IS settled in that it has set out what is happening and how we can change that if we want. There is a legitimate political debate about how far and how fast we should reduce greenhouse gas emissions as a global community. Unfortunately, the political debate is being influenced by pseudo-science created by those with vested interests.

For those interested, Naomi Oreskes' and Erik Conway's Merchants of Doubt is a fascinating account of the ways in which vested industrial interests have used a range of tactics to undermine the prevailing science on topics such as the tobacco industry, as you say, the hole in the ozone layer, acid rain, and pesticides. Although now showing its age, the book is well-researched and tells a sorry tale of a wilful opposition to established science for political and commercial reasons. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt

No, it is not because of free-market capitalism.   It is simply because (1) that is the technology we have, and (2) people want to use that technology to have a high standard of living.   And they want that regardless of whether their economy is free-market capitalist.  No alternative way of organising the economy would be any better on this.   

It is a very bad idea to marry the necessity to deal with climate change to an anti-capitalist agenda. 

The global warming battle is lost.

Too little, too late.

We might have time to prepare for the consequences of the next ice age.

Or maybe a super volcano eruption puts things into a whole different perspective.

And they are actually right on that!    That is indeed a huge problem with "a hell of a lot of what comes out of universities" these days. 

However -- and I expect you know this, so this is not aimed at you -- that ideological nonsense is pretty much confined to the arts, humanities and some social-"science" areas.  It is not really a problem in the hard sciences (of which climate science is one).

But you're right that this, sadly, gives people who want it a lever to dismiss the climate science.    Which is one reason why academia really needs to do something about the ideological takeover of the arts, humanities and some social-"sciences".

How about listing this mass of academics who has publicly said black people can't be racist. I can only think of a tiny number of academics who have said such, they are very much a minority view even in their own (normally humanities) subject areas and their reasons they say what they say are not as simplistic as you imply.

If so much of what comes out of Universities is so widely wrong why not show us the evidence to prove such an amazing assertion. You can't though can you, as you are just another anti-intellectual right wing propagandist overblowing the influence of views you disagree with for your own ends. Just like when you say the far left were effectively running your old Uni... nothing in the public governence papers indicated such daft assertions beyond the odd nuisance issue like sit-ins. You just expect people to believe your paranoid personal experience in one UK institution.  I've spent my career opposing far left influence in academia... it's very real... but the numbers are tiny and any power they have usually comes from exploiting the majority of ordinary academics not bothering to vote in democratic internal or union elections and some genuine anger, even from moderates, where some managers overstep their all too unrestricted authority.

There is plenty of evidence out there that the 'market' and 'managerialism' and lack of good governance are damaging UK academic freedom and its a plain fact that career grade UK academics have the least secure contracts in the western world.

You lot!?!?

Aren't you one of "you lot" ? you could always post something more relevant to the OP if you want to.

xx

Oh come on! The dominant view in *many* university depts these days (particularly in America), is now:

Redefining "racism" from meaning "racial prejudice" to being "racial prejudice plus power", followed by the claim that the US is systematically biased against blacks in its institutional structures, and thus that whites have the power and blacks do not, and thus that US blacks cannot be "racist" because they do not have the institutional/societal power to meet the "... plus power" criterion. 

This is an entirely normal and mainstream line of thought in many US universities these days. 

That's a statement, not evidence. Also the US is hardly typical. 

Its also pretty important to have power to make racism cause major institutional bias. Do you think BAME academics do less well statistically in the US because they are less able?

The US is indeed typical of the US (and also its universities are hugely influential worldwide), and it was the US that Pan Ron was largely talking about, since it is US "religious right" rejection of science and climate change (and Fox News's comments on Thunberg) that this thread is about.   

As for academics adopting the "racism = racial prejudice plus power" line, just look at the many "women's studies", "gender studies", "race studies", "whiteness studies" and other po-mo departments and courses, and similar across US arts, humanities and social-science areas.

As for an academic explicitly adopting this, try: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/16/white-fragility-racism-interv.... (Robin DiAngelo, and her concept of "white fragility", is one of the most cited and quoted academics in this area, e.g. https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=rASV0NUAAAAJ&hl=en  https://robindiangelo.com/publications/)

''No, the world is getting hotter because of the use of fossil fuels, and because we're not recycling resources within a 'closed loop' model, that this is a result of free market capitalism combined with how we generate power and use resources, doesn't mean that changing away from these (material and energy related) things is a left wing agenda''

By not quoting the entirety of my sentence, the gist of what I said has potentially been lost, I didn't suggest moving away from free market capitalism, more, I talked about shifting away from how we derive our energy from fossil fuels, and away from how we don't recycle resources enough - not being a left wing agenda.

Capitalism did indeed help raise the living standard of people across the globe. However, its overall short termism, and a failure to correctly price in environmental costs are a problem. Capitalism as we know it, and whose success side we enjoy, will only work by continuous growth. Leaving decisions on resource use to the free play of markets will therefore necessarily lead to needless overproduction and waste or resources (including our air), simply because profit is the highest ranking good.

Do we really need a new phone every couple of years, or all the junk plastic toys and novelty items from China?

Clearly, Soviet style planned economies, aimed at achieving Western living standards, were even more wasteful, so this cannot be the solution either. However, the environmentalists arguing that we need to change our mode of resource allocation if we want to counteract climate change are correct: We simply cannot leave decisions about CO2 production to market forces. Emissions trading was an attempt to use market mechanisms for regulation, and was a massive failure. Also, it does not address the underlying problem of the addiction to growth.

CB

Given that we are discussing a comment by a Fox panelist, looking at the attitude of the right is only appropriate. Actually, it is politicians on the right who deliberately uses climate change denial (exploiting the convenience and stupidity of their target audience) to mobilize them against changes elsewhere. Trump, Bolsonaro, the AfD over here are all playing this game: Climate change is a lie, only we on the right will make sure you can go on as before, the evil left only want you to change your fuel consumption because they also want to take away your car/guns/gender identity ...  

There are of course exceptions, e.g. socialists or social democrats in mining regions who oppose ending coal based electricity generation, but overall climate change denial IS a right wing thing.

Also, we should avoid using the word climate change sceptic, it is not scepticism but wilful denial on par with gravity scepticism. You don't call flat earthers "globe sceptics" either.

CB

I'm not suggesting that we do.   We need governments setting proper rules to protect the environment, but then we need a capitalist, market economy -- operating within those environmental rules -- to produce much of the technology for a net-carbon-economy world and to produce a good standard of living within that environment.    

What I'm arguing against is hitching pro-environmentalism to a far-left,  anti-capitalist agenda.

I don't think that economic growth itself is a problem.  The IT revolution is an example of how better technology can produce economic growth without using up resources and without being worse for the environment than the older technology it replaces.

We have a form of capitalism that is no longer fit for purpose, a model that is rigged for the very few. I see even the FT realises this. 

Essentially what you're arguing for is a social democratic model, where the excesses of capitalism are regulated and its benefits are felt by the population as a whole. 

You are right. I should have argued economic growth associated with increasing use of limited resources. 

Another thing killing our resources is overpopulation. The world simply cannot cope with having countries anywhere that are already not self sufficient for food production having huge population increases (largely due to better child survival rates not being matched by a reduction in births). Religionists of all flavours have a lot to answer for!

CB

Yep!  Malthus finally coming true? 

No journalist is qualified to comment on Asperger's syndrome, OCD, depression and selective mutism without first doing some research into the effects they may or may not have on normal functioning in day to day life. Those 'disorders' are damned by their own inexactitudes of diagnoses, giving unethical and lazy journalists free rein to pin such labels on people they don't like, or who do not match their (or the news agency's) own political stance. 

Given that we are all placed somewhere on the complex mental health spectrum, I have an infinitely greater degree of respect for a young girl with a high-functioning form of Aspergers than I do for buffoonish, science-denying, self-serving, god-bothering sociopaths -  arguably the worst disorder to have when in the position of opinion-forming, and tantamount to public abuse.

There's not so much to say, I don't suppose? The person who said it is horrible, and even Fox News seem to think so. 

Although images of African kids picking through abandoned burning bits of old computers on a scrap heap to find enough bits of precious metal amongst the poison, to sell, reminds me of the not so well highlighted after-effects of dumping our quickly outdated tech.   WEEE is all very well if we knew where it all ended up.   

Simply not true.  The form of capitalism we have works well for the benefit of the broad mass of everyone.  It's not perfect, but it's better than any other system we have tried or know about.  

Yes, and that's pretty much what we have.   Though there are flaws, for example the costs of CO2 pollution are simply not priced and charged.

The FT thinks it's not fit for purpose. See their 'new agenda' stuff, and this:

Martin Wolf: Why rigged capitalism is damaging democracy

'Economies are not delivering for most citizens because of weak competition, feeble productivity growth and tax loopholes'

(Sorry - they've tightened up their paywall so I can't get a proper working link any more...)

That's complacent, not to mention untrue. The current form of capitalism is crony capitalism that works well for the benefit of a few. There are other forms of capitalism that haven't been tried which we do know about that would be better. Constantly placing this oligarchic capitalism in opposition to extreme communist forms is simply disingenuous. 

It simply isn't.  If you plot standards of living over decades, on any sensible basket of criteria, living standards have been steadily increasing for the broad mass of people. 

I think people forget that only a generation or so ago, few people had a car, outside loos were common, people often did not have central heating, glazing was always single, it was normal for kids to wear hand-me-downs and to share bedrooms with multiple siblings, holidays or substantial travel was once-a-year, and to Blackpool or Margate.   Et cetera. 

(This is not an assertion that everything is now perfect, or that no-one falls through the gaps; but it is true about the broad mass of people.)

I agree with you in that I understand why people are sceptical. It is human nature to be suspicious of things that threaten your core beliefs and way of life.

However the problem is that people seem to be sceptical and leave it at that, or else pick on any outlandish theory that supports the outcome they want.

The problem with climate change being a political issue is that it is not a political issue. In other words it is a planetary phenomenon that has been studied for years and a little digging will show the evidence for it.

In denying that evidence some people create a false argument for what to do about it. Conversly. Pushing the doom scenario to the other extreme (I am thinking hot house venuslike earth here) also muddys the argument.

As soon as people start manipulating the facts then you can't make headway.

The political argument is not 'is climate change happening?' But 'what is the best way for us to tackle it?'

It is now too late to stop it. The question is how to mitigate it and that is going to require lifestyle changes for all of us. Which at the moment most people are unwilling to make

The type of capitalism that did bring benefits for large segments of society has evolved into a much nastier form, with large companies not fulfilling their obligation to the societies they operate in (tax offshoring), where they can buy enough influence to even make this largely legal, where income inequality across workforces rises to levels never seen before, and where social achievements are constantly rolled back (zero hour contracts, WTF?).

This finance driven, greed is good, shareholder value only neoliberal ideological project is not the largely benevolent and beneficial postwar capitalism any more. 

CB

I suspect that nothing will ever convince you otherwise but there are plenty of people (often avowed capitalists) who lament the descent of western capitalism into crony capitalism. Here's an American example.

https://ritholtz.com/2019/03/its-not-capitalism-its-crony-capitalism/

I'm sure I could find something closer to home if I had time.

All those companies mentioned in the Panama Papers would be a good start.

There is a good reason why Brexit is being pushed by the mega-rich, and it's to do with a  new EU law coming in about not being able to hide money offshore.

The point here is that companies have become increasingly international, so that they can play between tax systems.  The governments and regulators have been a bit slow to catch up, and do need to find new ways of taxing such companies. 

But this sort of thing is tweaks that need implementing, not a repudiation of the whole system. Afterall, the main benefit of such companies to societies is *not* the tax they pay, it is the products they provide to the consumer, and the jobs and pay packets they provide. 

At the bottom end, pay levels are set by minimum-wage legislation, which have been implemented in many countries and then tend to rise.

As for the top end (and thus "inequality" differentials), well I don't really care, sorry!

It's up to governments to set what is allowable. 

I don't think there's any such "ideological project", just companies competing in a regulatory framework set by governments.  And it still does benefit society by continually providing advances that people want (e.g. smartphones), and jobs and wages. 

I've just looked at your link, and the set of examples under the heading: "Here are some of the worst manifestations of this pox on capitalism".

And I think that, if those are the "worst" examples, then things are not too bad. 

Just the tip of a very large iceberg. Do a bit of research. 

I notice you've gone from 'some of the worst' to 'If these are the worst'. Your interpretation implies that everything else is better, where as what is quoted suggests that the practices described in their examples, happen more widely than those picked up on, the difference might seem nuanced but it's an important one. 

As Bob Kemp suggests (though not in these exact words), doing some research is a good plan.  

No system is perfect, any human system is going to throw up problems such as those.  I'm not convinced that any alternative system would do better overall.

Edit: Which is fair enough. 

Have you not noticed the affect that unregulated IT has had on our democratic institutions, all those widgets and gadgets need exotic and often poisonous rare metals often from unregulated labour.

The biggest piece of horseshit  we’ve been fed is unregulated capitalism, the biggest improvements in quality of life in the west was during the high corporate tax, unionised 50’s where corporations where seen as very much subservient to government (and there fore the people)

Go on then, give as an outline of a system that would not suffer from such defects to some extent.

Free-market capitalism is not a perfect system, it's just better than anything else we know of. A bit like democracy. 

No-one at all here is advocating unregulated capitalism. I've quite explicitly advocated regulation. 

One of the tenants of free markets is there as little regulation as possible, for society it is probably best to sit on a stool with Government, unions and shareholders providing the legs, corporations seem to be intent on building a one legged stool at the moment.

The ideological framework is obviously not operating at the levels of companies, but very clearly at the level of what is considered economic orthodoxy and as such taught at universities. This is what is later translated into law by economic advisers to the government. Tell me that all the Friedman/Rand style crap that now infuses public dialogue is any less ideological than the endless lessons in Marxist economy one had to listen to in the former East! Neither has any scientific rational basis. If anything, Marx was closer to describing reality than the neolibs (monopolization of the means of production goods vs. the mythical rational consumer), even if his proposed solutions were deficient.

Anothe part of insidiously pushing the neolib agenda is the constant drip feed of of stock information on public radio, as if this information were of any use. Too slow if you are trading, and irrelevant if you are not. It does, however, spread the lie that a stock rising is good news, even though it usually only means that someone found another way of squeezing or cutting down their work force...

CB

Alternatives? Mixed economy; market socialism; participatory economics... actually, this paper is interesting on possible alternatives:

https://www.ssc.wisc.edu/~wright/Published%20writing/Alternatives%20to%20Ca...

There are many, but we are bogged down in this fossilised left-right argument of evil capitalism vs evil socialism/communism.

It's not as simple as less vs more regulation. The discussions around crony capitalism often highlight the way that capitalists influence the political apparatus to skew regulation in their favour, so there may be a high level of regulation but it supports and entrenches their position at the expense of consumers, workers, innovation and new businesses. 

No, actually, it's not. 

A tenet of free markets is to reduce trade barriers, but that's not the same as no regulation. 

I said it was fair enough that you're not very interested, don't have a go at me, Mr Shirty.  

But we are already have much of that in the sense of a welfare state, substantial regulation, taxation for the common good, and people are free to form worker cooperatives and such. 

Fully except that regulation can be distorted to game the system in favour of entrenched businesses.

An economic system that destroys life on earth is ' better than anything else'  ? 

You say in one of these threads about Greta today that the people keep voting for capitalism so its their fault , but dont you see that the system is rigged because the capitalists own everything so indoctrinate everyone to vote for capitalism and that they attack and destroy socialism everywhere as a warning to people not to think about that ?

... or, more likely, of giving the consumer what they want at an attractive price, while creating decently-paying jobs. 

Sorry but that's just wrong. Think about how Apple's share price has risen.

Also, I don't trade but I do take an interest in stock markets because I like to know my pension fund isn't about to be obliterated and suchlike.

The vast bulk of the Western-world's wealth these days is owned by a vast swathe of the middle classes.  (Anyone with a house and pension entitlements and some savings.)

In the end it depends on the circumstances of whatever stock is rising, which could be anywhere between the two.

Pefa's point about a system that is destroying our ability to survive as a species (and many other species) is rather strong, I would say..  Casually insisting it is the best available is lazy.  Something about it has to change if we are to have a future, so it is probably a good idea to give what that something might be some more serious thought.

I guess your idea of what constitutes the middle class and mine are rather different...

"The globe’s richest 1% own half the world’s wealth, according to a new report highlighting the growing gap between the super-rich and everyone else. "

"The world’s richest people have seen their share of the globe’s total wealth increase from 42.5% at the height of the 2008 financial crisis to 50.1% in 2017, or $140tn (£106tn), according to Credit Suisse’s global wealth report published on Tuesday."

https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2017/nov/14/worlds-richest-wealth-cr...

It's not "the capitalist system" that is causing climate change, it is humans having a large population, and a technology based on fossil-fuel burning.  Other systems, such as the USSR and China, are similar in that regard.

Do these middle classes own the media and means of production ? No and it is the capitalist media owners who tell the electorate how they should vote. That is the point i make.

Absolutely.

This is interesting, even the capitalists are waking up - 

https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/can-capitalism-combat-climate-...

Not anti-capitalist but a call for capitalists to buck their ideas up before it's too late. 

The USSR hasn't existed for 30 years and China is very much capitalist.    Capitalism is at the heart of essentially the entire world economy these days and is a key driver of emissions.  Something needs to change.  It could be different form of capitalism, different regulation or some other system if we can think of it.  Shrugging and saying its the best available is accepting we will be wipded (or most of us) within a century or so.

Pardon for seeming vaguely rude by the way. 

Yes, something needs to change (our technological abilities for example, or what the public are willing to accept), but that does not mean that "capitalism" should be ditched.   That's no more sense than saying "democracy is central to the developed world these days, but something needs to change, so we need to ditch democracy".

Capitalism is not the problem here.  The problem is reconciling people's desire for a high standard of living with a carbon-neutral economy. 

Those sorts of statistics rely on ludicrous ways of doing the sums, just to create a headline.

I'm not sure transitioning away from a system that has produced unprecedented human advancement, in favour of a 20%, 30%, 40% dump in productivity, will be attractive to anyone once they realise what that sacrifice actually entails.  

You only have to look at the anger expressed towards the Conservatives for "austerity", the Lib Dems for instituting university fees, the potential for house price inflation to slow, or the harms of the 2008 financial crisis.  All barely even register compared to the hit proposed by a revolutionary change in the economic system.  

It's pretty clear what is being wished for us pure utopian fantasy and largely oblivious to the extremely fortunate position we are in.  Humans lived for tens of thousands of years in relative poverty.  Essentially like animals for most of that period, at risk of extinction from starvation and entirely at the mercy of the elements. 

Capitalism, in very short space of time, has allowed changes that not only ourselves but even domesticated species have benefitted from.  We now don't risk starvation but over-consumption, but people still seek to blame the system for that over-consumption.

What do you think the transition that I haven't specified entails?  

Yes, and its always interesting to see people point fingers at the 1% while pretending not to remember where they, as middle-class westerners, sit in the ratio of have's to have-not's.    

How about we start at home with the great wealth redistribution?  Suddenly its not so attractive.  

a) I didn't say anything about ditching capitalism b) If democracy were central to the problem, then changes there would indeed be sensible.  

Simply changing nothing will have predicable and bad results.

So change nothing?  No, I disagree.  You and I will be dead before things get really serious.  I think however we do owe something to future generations.

I'm not suggesting changing nothing, but let me put it this way:

Suppose, tomorrow, 80% of the world's population woke up declaring "we really need to prioritise climate change, and we will accept radical changes in lifestyle and a lower standard of living, if necessary, towards that end", and then voted in a whole new set of politicians accordingly.

Would those politicians then conclude, "one of the first things we need to do is radically reform capitalism"?   No, if they're sensible, they wouldn't.  Instead, they would radically regulate carbon emissions, charging hugely for anyone or any company emitting CO2, and massively incentivising alternatives and research into alternatives by tax breaks and subsidies.

But then they could otherwise leave capitalism, markets and companies to get on with it.  Indeed, those would be the engines that would re-configure the economy and implement change.   

That's why capitalism is not the problem. The problem is people's unwillingness to accept the radical changes in lifestyle and a lower standard of living that moving rapidly to a carbon-neutral economy would produce.

So capitalists and capitalism creates a situation that requires (to save all life) everyone to have say, 60% less stuff(That damages the earth etc) When 60% less stuff to most people ranges from hugely life changing to leaving you with nothing but 60% less for many others still leaves them with billions etc. 

That will create very big social problems.

Again, the problem arises from people's desire to burn fossil fuels for short-term advantage.  That is not unique to capitalism and is not caused by capitalism.

And climate change won't extinguish "all life", though it could be massively disruptive. (Though not nearly as bad as imposing a North-Korea-like regime on everyone!)

Yes, I know, this old cliche, but who does that hurt the most?
Yes, the poor. The people who can't afford to buy the latest minimal gas spewing vehicle, the people who can't afford to fit an air source heat pump to heat their home, the people who can't afford 10s of £1000s to turn their home into a carbon neutral dwelling etc etc etc.

Although in socialist countries this was much less in fact 10 times less in the DPRK. 

Wait a mo, did you just say if we all became socialist then that would be worse than the effects of climate change to come?

And if the bees are wiped out with everything else associated with climate change and our production and waste to then we could be in real trouble. 

I didn't mention even radical reforms.  You are making assumptions. You are assuming that any change leads to lower living standards, which is not necessarily the case, and anyway not changing will definitely lead to very drastically lower standards.

Which would, as I was suggesting be a different and better, system.  It would be constraining the aspects of capitalism that are doing the damage.

North-Korea-style socialism, why yes!   That would indeed be worse than simply going-along-for-the-ride of climate change. 

(Not that I'm advocating the latter as a policy.)

I guess it depends on where on is on the planet in a changing climate, or where one is within North Korea, having to escape from a rising sea might start to make living in North Korea seem possibly not too bad, but this feels like an alley way which won't lead very far.

One can migrate away from a rising sea, but one is not allowed to leave North Korea. 

HS2 will prove useful for relocating the population of the South East up North.

But you don't bother to show me what's wrong with the report cited in the article. I wonder why?

Anyway, Wikipedia has some interesting stats, if not entirely up to date:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distribution_of_wealth

Why yes, and -- barring big technological breakthroughs -- any solution that actually fixes climate change is going to hurt vast swathes of the population a lot.  And yes, the rich will be able to mitigate that to quite an extent, so the poor will bear the brunt.

Why do you think that politicians haven't acted on climate change?  Is it because they are ignorant, because they don't care, because they're in the pay of the fossil-fuel companies? 

Well, to a small extent, maybe, but the real reason that politicians don't act is because, if they did, so many people would suffer so badly from the changes that they'd be thrown out at the next election. 

It's ok for Greta Thunberg to swear off flying (and then have her boat crew fly back afterwards), but do you think that a government that banned flying and grounded all aircraft would survive the next election? 

It is changes of that magnitude that are required to fix climate change (barring big technological breakthroughs).  Don't kid yourself otherwise.  That's why politicians are not acting.

It's just not as sensible way of adding things up.   Measures of "wealth" are skewed by things like (at the top end) vast shareholdings of a few people in companies like Google, Microsoft, etc, and (at the other end) by taking into account debt, such that even people with high standards of living are "poor".

Take Tarquin, a 27-yr-old ex-Eton investment banker, who is paid £110,000 a year, who lives a flashy lifestyle in London, spending his money on high living.  He has bought a £1 million house (but has a £1 million mortgage), he's just bought a £60,000 Porsche, on a loan, and he also has student fee debt.  So, overall, adding up assets and debts, he comes to  £30,000 in debt -- but he can easily service that given his salary. 

Is he "wealthy" or "poor"?

Compare him to Amahl, who lives in a slum in India, scrapping a living by scavenging on rubbish dumps.    Assets 2 rupees coins in his pocket, debts zero.  Net wealth positive!

Who is the wealthier?   Amahl, obviously, he's £30,000 wealthier isn't he?  Poor Tarquin is poor! 

A more sensible way of doing things, and focusing on what matters, is to consider disposable income, the amount of "throughout", or the amount of money one gets to spend each year. 

On a "money spent per year" analysis, Tarquin is vastly richer than Amahl, and that surely is the more pertinent measure?

On that sort of measure, adding up the rate at which money flows around, the vast bulk of the "spent wealth" (movement of money) is controlled by the vast bulk of the middle classes. 

On that measure, mega-billionaires barely make a blip.  Yes, they're spending more than the average person, but only about the same as a few dozen people. 

And the other thing about this wealth analysis:

OK, so there are lots of mega-billionaries with large shareholdings in Google, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, etc, and these skew the wealth distributions.

Is it in any way a problem for me that such billionaires created those companies and are mega-rich?  Does it harm me in any way? Well no, it doesn't.  Indeed, I only benefit, because the products of those companies are available for me to use. 

Have they got rich by sucking value up from elsewhere, as the totally wrong, zero-sum-game analysis of Marxism would suggest?  Well no, the value of those companies has been created, created out of nothing, such that the overall economy is wealthier. It is not the case that the value of those companies comes from reducing the value of other parts of the economy.  Again, a Marxist zero-sum-game analysis (that the only way someone can get rich is by stealing from the poor) is just wrong.

So, so what about those billionaires?  It's not what matters. See previous comment for what does matter. 

Is it a lower standard of living or just a different standard of living?

For example having no fossil fuel cars/vehicles in city centres...does that really reduce the standard of living. You only have to look at London and recognise that alot of people get by without cars and also have a good standard of living to see you can easily do it differently.

Its like the argument I have with my sister who is married to a farmer and considers that farmers are being victimised on cows and climate change.I just say that tastes will change but it does not mean their living standard wil be altered as the farm will change.

Modern house are now being built differently, they usually do not  have gas central heating. Does that mean a lower standard of living...I think not.

I use alot of foundry castings in my business- nasty CO2 emissions, big issue. Can we design to get rid of the castings...yes.It will take a bit of thought, but it can be done.

We will adapt, we have to.There is no choice.

In the short-term, yes, it would be a markedly lower standard of living.   (If moving to a carbon-neutral economy on a 10-yr or so timescale, that is.)  Yes, in the longer term we would adapt, but that longer term would be far longer than the election cycle.

   It is a problem for society and therefore indirectly for you. It means that there is a small percentage of hugely wealthy and thereby influential people who share none of the concerns or issues of the rest of society. They don't require most public services. They don't require open democracy to have their voices heard etc. These things are just an expensive nuisance to many of them.

  Moreover, some of them use their wealth to influence the politicians. in some cases this is for the common good but often it is not. In the US this is influence is baked into the system. It is deeply unhealthy.

  Mark Zuckerberg is probably not a bad person, but he has enormous unelected power and influence and quite obviously he cannot be objective in how he uses that. A huge number of politicians probably benefit from political donations made by him or his ilk, or benefit from holding Facebook in their pension funds. It is therefore difficult for them to challenge the power of Facebook. That is not how democracy should work.

Is it really.?We are already changing and adapting.

Tell that to food bank users.

jk

Are we? In the Western world, CO2 emissions are roughly leveling out -- which means they are continuing at about the highest level ever.  Across the world CO2 emissions are still increasing.    They need to be zero to avoid substantial climate change.  In fact, even zero emissions from tomorrow onwards would not avoid substantial climate change, given the inertia in the whole climate system. We are nowhere near having zero emissions; all we're doing is reducing the rate of increase.

Edit to add:  Here's a graph of world CO2 emissions: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/dec/05/brutal-news-global-carb...

See the level of zero right at the bottom of the graph? That's where we need to be to avoid huge climate change.   Are we anywhere near addressing the problem?  No, nowhere near. 

Anyone who thinks we can change things sufficiently (on current technology) without massive disruption of lifestyles and huge and real reductions in standard of living (hitting the poor hardest) is just kidding themselves.  No we can't! 

And there's no chance of people voting for that  -- fat chance, no way Jose, no matter how many Thunbergs we have.  

The only plausible approach is *massive* spending on technological development (by which I mean "Iraq War" quantities of money, in the trillions of dollars, that hundreds of times more than we're currently spending), coupled with adapt as best we can as the climate changes.

That's a bit 'me, me, me,' isn't it? I would argue that as you don't live in a bubble economic inequality does affect you. It has impacts on crime and public health for example, and as PMP has said, it has a corrupting effect on our democracy, and on politics in general. 

There's a post I wholeheartedly agree with! 

My remarks were not really about "economic inequality" overall, they were about the massive wealth of some mega-billionaires.  I still don't see that that does me any harm.

On the political influence: suppose the CEOs of Facebook, Google, Amazon, etc,  did not have massive shareholdings, but were just paid a wage.   Wouldn't they still, by virtue of being CEOs of mega-companies, still have influence and access to politicians? I'd say, yes, they would.  Which suggests that the massive shareholdings are not, in themselves, much of a problem. 

I absolutely agree with this post!

CB

I think the problem is with lobbying, "think tanks" and donating to political parties. The Koch brothers wealth has funded the lobbying and climate scepticism which has probably brought forward the date of the extinction of us as a species measurably

The massive wealth of these billionaires might not do you harm Coel, but it's not all about you. One problem is the associated inherited wealth. Dynasties have a negative effect on attempts at meritocracy, as Warren Buffett said, and to come back to PMP's point, encourages the development of plutocracy. 

It's true that running a huge corporation gives political access and influence. But that's not the same as having inherited wealth of a kind that allows for free time, long-term influence, and reserves of money to use for campaigning and other more nefarious activities. 

If we are to accept we are making progress i would expect there to be a reduction of household municipal waste generation. i know its a small fraction of waste generated but it does suggest a trend... there has been no reduction in household waste generation between 2010-2019. the overall production of plastic waste is set to increase on an ever increasing rate. global co2 emissions remain unchanged and are marching upwards. don't be kidded by the value of recycling in the prevention of waste generation and resource use. scrap metal yes its valuable. paper card and plastic.. hope 600 quid per tonne its an emotive issue but in my opinion most of its valueless contaminated shit we dump in the developed world. sure some of it is a quality product. in january this year recycled mixed plastic had a value of £6.00 per tonne. suggesting an awful lot of shit in the market

The emphasis on these billionaires still seems to me to be largely scape-goating, which is a common resort when faced with a problem one doesn't know how to solve. 

It's not mere scapegoating. That would be blaming the rich for being rich. The point is that the tax and regulatory system allows for the development of plutocracy. That's the problem. 

Coming back to the original post, the furore appears to be that someone on FOX said:

"She is mentally ill. She has autism. She has obsessive-compulsive disorder. She has selective mutism. She had depression."

What exactly is factually wrong with that?  She does have all those.  Her parents have gone to great lengths to publicise this. 

Isn't it fair to note that the fears and reactions she presents to the media are a result of these conditions?  That there may be something a little odd in capitalising on the emotion that might result from it?  

It's not the facts that are the problem.  it's that they are being used to dismiss what she is saying. It's basically a very unpleasant form of ad hom attack.

He said this "The climate hysteria movement is not about science," Knowles said. "If it were about science, it would be led by scientists, rather than by politicians and a mentally ill Swedish child who is being exploited by her parents and by the international left."

And it is wrong on so many levels.

I know another ex-climber who got heavily into right wing politics.... think I'll keep climbing 🙂.

But there's also fair argument in there.  The "hysteria" (be that "we're all going to die" predictions, accusations of stealing Greta's childhood, or being lectured to by jet-setting celebrities) can look less like sober action based on science and more like jumping on bandwagons, political point-scoring, and self promotion.  You might question the motives of a FOX pundit for pointing that out, but it doesn't make them entirely wrong, or negate the fact that these observations are likely shared elsewhere and are probably pushing away the people you want to get on board. 

The entire statement is of course dumb in a number of ways.  But the Buzzfeed (and UKC) response just looks like more overblown outrage.  Is right-wing Twitter wrong to compare this with a left-wing journalist aiming an "I've never seen a more punchable face" comment at a 16-year-old Covington High School kid and noting this elicited no retraction, no apology and little outrage from the left?

While it may be an attempt to dismiss Greta, her parents make hay by highlighting exactly the conditions the pundit quoted.  I was always intrigued by the strong correlation between students submitting medical evidence of special conditions, and hence extended deadlines, and being amongst the most radical rabid members of student politics.  The mental health on display is worthy of discussion. 

Not entirely sure what you're getting at there but presume you are referring to me.  If so, you may be mistaken.  I always considered myself pretty left-wing.  But I've an extremely low tolerance for left-wing extremes and possibly have more first-hand experience than most of where that intolerance leads.  In recent years pointing this out results less in thoughtful debate and more in accusations that I'm a traitor to the cause or right-wing myself.  I'd hope you see the problem in that.  Others in similar positions, if being told by the left that they no longer belong, might just do the logical thing and start voting for parties that don't tell them to piss off.  That's not the pull of populist right-wing politics.  Its the push of the left.

Is that not playing the person rather than the topic being addressed and is a person who is well adjusted to a sick society without mental health problems ? 

Interesting choice of 'note' over 'hypothesise' and 'are' over 'may be'. You're clearly incredibly well informed about Ms Thunberg's psychological state.

jk

I think that point on left wing radical students reporting more mental health problems is probably the most stupid of your right-wing paranoid statements to date. How on earth would you know? It seems pure bs from my decades of experience with many thousands of such evidenced requests and of a variety of recording systems where political views are most certainly never included in any related data. It also doesn't correlate with the hundreds of students with mental health problems I've known well as a tutor.

I think a rough translation from Pan Ron to reality will be:  I once had a student with mild mental health problems who was also a member of a student union.

I was going to say something similar – that is one of the most ridiculous and utterly ill informed pieces of crap I have ever seen on this website.  

I say this from detailed experience at what most be one of the most politically apathetic universities in the UK.  

Pick whichever words you want.  I simply listened to what her parents said (try 28 minutes into this https://www.democracynow.org/2018/12/11/meet_the_15_year_old_swedish) and have read items quoted from her mother's book.  They're entirely open about her mental state. 

Plenty of others have commented on it too.  Notable that this psychologist (https://extra.ie/2019/09/26/news/world-news/psychologist-concern-greta-thun...) has to add caveats to his statement, presumably to keep the baying mob away from accusing him of being right-wing.  

Pointing out that a disproportionate number of students who appear apoplectic with rage, protesting about injustices on the steps of the university, under the auspices of "student activism", also report mental health issues is not quite saying "left-wing radical students report more mental health problem".  Well done on completely misrepresenting the point and not at all surprised by the choruses of outrage.

You know perfectly well why I would know this.

" students who appear apoplectic with rage, protesting about injustices on the steps of the university," 

Jacob Rees-Mogg is to 19th century gentlemen as Pan Ron's view of students is to actual students

Struggling to keep playing the ball there, champ?

Aspies aren't exactly famous for their ability to internalise the feelings of others.  Yet here we have the major figurehead in a cultural movement demanding radical change, and who might not be fully cognizant of the damage that'll be caused to people's lives for some minimal impact on CO2 emission.  That perhaps things that seem simple might not be, and that people who actually care a lot about the environment aren't doing nothing?  That's before even considering what is pretty evident distress on her part that might be wholly unecessary if she was presented something a bit more nuanced.   

I would have thought it might be possible to discuss such things.  But I guess that's another one for the verboden list.

No, just idly passing time on a train chuckling at your sub-Peterson nonsense 

I find your love of Maoism quaint too.

Here you go. Help is available for you

https://twitter.com/markhumphries/status/1177178666402365440?s=19

What makes you think he's angry at Greta?

His posts.

This sort of non-reply does you no credit. I suspect you couldn't defend the opinion with a proper analysis of what he's said. 

Pan Ron strikes me as one of the more sensible and level-headed posters here, and one who wants to discuss things on the facts and the substance -- which is not to say that I always agree with him, sometimes I do, sometimes I don't -- but the dismissive responses to someone just because they disagree and defend a contrary line is typical of the poverty of public debate these days.   Tis a pity.

Edit to add: the unwillingness to acknowledge any opinion inbetween: "Greta is a saint who is right on everything", and "Greta is evil and wrong on everything", is also symptomatic of the poverty of public debate these days.  

His posts are defending the crude ad hom attacks on her from Fox and similar because of her mental make-up.  I'd say that indicates anger towards her.  Otherwise he'd engage with what's she's saying.  This is on top of the fact that Pan Ron's lengthy posts on pretty much all subjects end up blaming The Left, whatever that is.

You are talking nonsense about debate too.  There is ample scope to discuss climate change in many and nuanced ways while acknowledge Thunberg has done a great deal to raise awareness.  Probably more than any other individual in at least ten years.

Is anyone disagreeing with that?

Much of what Pan Ron tries to do is to explain to those on "the left" (whatever that is!) why they are not always as persuasive as they think they should be, and why many people see things differently.  That's valuable (at least it should be!).

He actually presents a pretty thoughtful and middle-of-the-road perspective on a lot of things. The response that his posts merely derive from "hate" and "anger" suggests that many people don't want actual substantive discussion, but just want to yell at anyone not fully in line with their own views. 

Sensible and level-headed? Maybe if he wasn't obsessed with imaginary threats from 'the left' and always quick to defend a range of right-wing thinking I might believe you. 

[Edit] Just seen your last post. PR is not expressing a middle-of-the-road position. His contrarian positions are almost all directed towards left-wing people and thinking. 

Well you were above.  It is simply false and nonsense to say the only acceptable positions are "St Greta" or Greta is evil"

Well I disagree.  If the conclusion is always "its the The Left's fault", which it appears to be, that is not thoughtful.

That's mostly because there are lots of left-wing people here, so a contrarian has lots of left-wing people to disagree with. 

In contrast, just for example, I've never seen anyone on UKC espouse the denialist line: "climate change is not happening, it's all a hoax designed to enable big government to regulate us, and it's invented by scientists in order to get grant money". 

That line is influential in the US and on other websites, but it is hardly ever seen here, so a contrarian is not going to post opposition to it here. 

I was disagreeing with the statement: "... Thunberg has done a great deal to raise awareness"?  Err, no, I wasn't!  

Well sure, it's nonsense, that's what I was saying.   But some people act as though it is true, as though any commentary on Greta that is not 100% positive must arise from "anger" about her message and "hatred" of her as a person.

Nothing that Pan Ron has said can fairly be assessed as "hatred" of Greta. 

Yes and you're attempting to use that openness to delegitimise her concerns, to imply they're irrational and therefore the rest of us who see the world differently may safely continue to ignore them while feeling a little bit sorry for her: it's not that she's having a powerful reaction to a real and pressing issue, she's ill and over reacting.

That doesn't support your assertion that her Asperger's causes her beliefs and fears. I presume that's what you mean by caveats? And yes, it does come across as someone writing from a particular lassaiz faire perspective WRT climate change.

‘She seems to be caught up in a doomsday scenario where she’s massively exaggerating the threats posed by climate change...'

I'm impressed at the depth of the teaching in Australian psychology departments if he's qualified to make that assessment! Or it could be a hint of complacency from a wealthy older man living insulated on an enormous, sparsely populated and resource rich island... hard to say for sure.

jk

I was thinking more widely than just the people on UKC.

Not they don't, or at least no sensible number.

Nobody suggested it was.

OK, "anger" then, nothing that Pan Ron has said can fairly be assessed as "anger" at Greta. 

Well I disagree for the reasons I gave above.

You don’t even need « science » or even trust the climate scientists to understand that we shouldn’t mess up the climate. If we didn’t understand the climate at all the logical thing to do would be to not do anything to mess it up.

My take on it is that her (mild) Asperger's is actually of benefit: She could not have achieved what she did if she had not been more prepared to ignore social convention and the emotions of the powerful adults she addressed. Not giving a f*ck is sometime helpful. I also assume that it helped her to be uniquely focussed and persistent. Most others might have given up long before her movement took on a life of its own.

CB

OK, from basics, why would PR be "angry" at Greta?

I can only guess, but I'd speculate he is having some of his fundamental beliefs challenged by someone he regards as too young (and female) to be an appropriate person to do this.  Shooting the messenger is easier than engaging with the message.

Which "fundamental beliefs" would you think these might be?

Any actual evidence that he thinks like this? 

(Appeal to "because he's obviously angry at her" would be circular here.)

Which message do you think he doesn't want to engage with?

No idea. Never met the man, and wouldn’t care to speculate on potential causes of just emotional state 

she does seem to press some people buttons though

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/sep/27/the-greta-thunberg-pr...

The world's OK really, climate change isn't actually such a big deal, it (everything) is the lefts fault. 

As I clearly said, it was speculation. A glance at twitter however shows many do think that way so it's a reasonable guess. 

A much better way of proceeding is to attribute to people things they've actually said. 

There is a strong element of circularity in your assessment: you're *assuming* that he thinks that climate change is no big deal, because you conclude that he's angry at Greta.  But then the "he's angry at Greta" assessment depends on the *assumption* that he's thinks that climate change is no big deal. 

Yes, mainly the buttons of inadequates who have what little pride they have deflated by having a 16 year old girl and her followers dominating the debate. It is not about climate change at all.

Instead, for them, challenging the established hierarchy, which afforded them at least some (perceived) status simply for being white and male, while otherwise having achieved f*ck all, is simply inacceptable.

Hence the popularity of that intellectually vacuous shit Peterson, whose only ability is to rephrase this realization of inadequacy in academic terms.

CB

If everybody pointing out to the danger of global warming has to be morally pure and free of all hypocrisy when it comes to their own carbon emission, then we are totally f*cked.

Not really.  Her concerns are legitimate.  But I believe the way they are expressed is massively overblown, her demands for action unrealistic, her identification of the causes skewed, and while the tone of her appeals resonates with AGW supporters it probably has the opposite effect on sceptics. 

I'm assuming the goal here is to win over sceptics, rather than making everything louder in the echo-chamber? 

So try viewing this from their point of view; a teenager, remonstrating with anyone older than her, accusing them of causing destruction, as if she has knowledge and virtues they lack, coming out with simplified arguments, who is now the spokesperson for the movement. 

More likely she comes across as a preaching petulant child with ill-informed opinions, who if they were an adult you could roundly criticise - but because of her youth she is placed beyond criticism. 

I referred to pseudo-science in a previous post, where proponents of AGW resort to lazy rationales for their beliefs either because they are ignorant of the actual science and arguments for and against, or have simply been swayed by emotive appeals.  I see this constantly; e.g. an activist screams that they see more weather events on TV and this is evidence of the thesis, they get challenged, the challenger then gets told that the science is settled, as if any argument is now justified because of that.  Greta's rationales come across as similar to this. 

The more we accept any articulation of the argument because it fits with the overall view, the weaker the foundations of the argument become.  If you start telling people they have no right to criticise, even more so.  Sceptics are being given ever more ground to laugh at the prognosis and the scientific signal gets lost in the noise.  

She/they might be saying what you want to hear.  But that doesn't make the approach good.  I have no doubt she passionately believes what she says.  But if she really fears for her life and views that things are really that bad, if she is being driven to depression, if she thinks we can simply switch off our emissions but we are too self-interested to do so, then that is plain wrong and unhealthy.  

No, by caveats I meant that the psychologist having to make a prominent point that he's a climate change supporter - clearly aware that by not saying so he will be painted as being in the other camp and his views disregarded entirely...as you seem to be trying to do. 

What happened to accepting that he's probably more qualified than most to make an observation on the psychology of a person with her mental health history?  What happened to trusting experts?

I do believe that her mental state heavily influences her beliefs and her expression of them, in the unique way she does.  She, and her family, say as much - repeatedly.  That uniqueness is what the movement is cashing in on. 

Again, you may be comfortable with that because it is a direction you want things to go in.  And because you think its right that she should be beyond criticism.

I think any spokesman for any movement should be as open to criticism as anyone else.  And that putting someone so emotive into the limelight is ethically dubious.  I've seen it before when the mentally ill become the leaders of protest movements, and those around them, unaware of their mental state assume that the ideas and tone they are projecting is based on a level-headed reading of reality.  If someone in a manic state presented to you a doomsday projection, you'd be right to consider their mental condition underlying this, surely?  

That is the way her arguments come across to me.  The science, the causes, and the solutions, are far more nuanced.  Quoting worst-case scenarios all the time is painting doomsday scenarios.

Australians have been suffering extreme weather events.  Why do you assume he is complacent?  

And you seem to be saying that because he only has a doctorate in psychology he cannot comment on global warming.  But you presumably accept the judgement of all the other laymen who buy into the AGW thesis despite 99% of us surely being unable to form an objective judgement on the science?  Why does his education suddenly become a factor?

Can you not see that you are applying completely different burdens of proof, seemingly because of assumptions about their underlying motives?

"Inadequates", "challenging the established hierarchy", "status", "white", "male", "achieved f*ck all", "intellectually vacuous shit Peterson"....

Golly. 

It didn't take a whole lot to bring that out and expose a pretty profound bias, if not bigotry, in your own beliefs.

And that, my dear Pan, is where you are going badly wrong! 

We covered most of this before, and in detail. 

The science is not nuanced. 

The causes are not nuanced. 

She is not quoting worst case scenarios.

its not a ‘thesis’, any more than the heliocentric model of the solar system is a ‘thesis’

Autism/Aspergers is not a mental illness 

no professional in mental health should be venturing opinions about the clinical status of someone they’ve had no contact with except through the media, especially in politically sensitive situations 

And, where  are you constantly seeing ‘activitists’ claiming individual weather events are proof of climate change and objection to that being disallowed?  because I literally never see that 

And in the end, your third paragraph is the key one: she hits a nerve

but the people she hits a nerve with aren’t who she’s talking to. They’ve had 20 years to take on board the progressively more compelling evidence of the reality if this and its likely consequences; if they haven’t been persuaded yet, they aren’t ever going to be. So she shouldn’t even try; it’s wasted effort. She’s speaking to people who can be reached, and I expect some of the venom that she elicits is because the denialists know she’s reaching them. 

No bigotry, simply superiority  (insert a bloody smiley here, to make the point clear).

Also, I was not necessarily making assumptions about you, unless, of course, in case you do feel threatened by the fact that a 16 year old girl managed to shake up the societal discourse and established power structures. 

What I stated is definitely typical, though, for the right wing losers of the AfD over here (or Trump's base), and they are just as easily triggered if it is pointed out to them.

If you do feel personally addressed by my post, though, I am sure you can take it as well as you can dish it out.

CB

Coel, you are fully aware that debates like this are more complex than a binary ‘skeptic vs believer’ situation 

sadly climate change denial has become an identity issue, particularly in the US it seems, and is strongly associated with other political positions and views. You know that you can’t argue people out of positions like that with evidence. They have too much invested in holding the beliefs

Thunberg is speaking in the opposite of an echo chamber; she used her platform at the UN to speak directly to people who know already she is correct to inspire and motivate them, and to people who haven’t made their minds up yet; and also to world leaders to put pressure on them, irrespective of their own beliefs 

And on those terms, I think she was very successful. Which probably goes some way to explaining the reaction she elicits in some quarters; a perception that she is ‘winning’

But -- sadly -- she's not winning in any significant way (which means action). For example, it looks like we'll soon by into a general election.  I'm willing to bet that that election will be all about Brexit and hardly at all about climate change. 

Yes, she is influential, but is she really influencing people enough that they take serious action?  How many have, like her, sworn not to fly?  Are the airports idle? The roads empty? 

The one thing wrong with parts of her message is that it gives the impression that, to overcome climate change, all we need to do is start taxing billionaires and overturn their influence.   And that the politicians are simply inept or wicked not to have done so.

The reality is that, to meet her requests we'd have to implement: ban flying; ban private car use; ban commuting; everybody needs to get a new job or a new house within cycling distance; et cetera.  And yes this would hit the poor hardest.  The reasons that politicians are not doing that are obvious. And the public are not prepared for that and wouldn't accept it; too many think it's just a matter of taxing billionaires. 

She's not winning; this time next year, nothing much will have changed.   Nor the year after nor the year after that.  Bet you.  Too many people are thinking "I'm cheering on Greta, therefore I'm part of the solution".  Unless you've stopped all your use of fossil fuels and products dependent on fossil-fuels then you're not. 

Tough.

Going to the moon was unrealistic in '62. Impossible becomes unrealistic becomes normal when we turn our extraordinary minds and resources to it. We've chosen not to, others are free to do outherwise.

Why would you assume that? I assume the intention of climate protesters young and old alike is to build a movement to overwhelm the 'sceptics', marginalise and drown them out as they have done to others for decades. Reasoning has failed. The earth is for the young to inherit, they want a world they can live in and pass on in good order and they're not bound to keep doing things as we did. Good for them.

Why would I, or anyone want to hear what we've done to our world and the scale of the challenge we face in addressing or ignoring that? It's plain right in identifying short term self interest as the reason we haven't and I don't see anything unhealthy in acknowledging that and seeking solutions.

I presume he is well qualified to say what he's saying regarding stress and celebrity but he isn't saying what you are implying, that her non-typical mind results in her beliefs with the implication that they are therefore irrational. He's saying that exposure to extreme pressure may not be good for her. It probably isn't but lots of people make sacrifices and are celebrated for it.

I think it's the way things need to go but personally I'm a pessimist, I think it's probably too late and I don't think we'll find a way to pull together to face our challenges, far more likely we fight. Nobody is beyond criticism where they deserve it but frankly I don't think history will judge Greta Thunberg harshly.

Climate change isn't extreme weather. Stable developed countries with resources, especially those physically insulated from those that doesn't describe aren't first in the firing line.

No I'm saying he indicates by his assertion that climate activists' fears are wildly exaggerated that he's speaking from a certain position, he believes in APC but he believes it'll all be fine. It probably will be ok for him. Maybe me too. It doesn't mean it will be for those who live more precariously now or the young we complacently leave our denuded planet to.

jk

That's my take too. It's fascinating that it often seems to take such a person to start a movement but then maybe it's a case of the right time, right place, she's coincidentally the spark to light the fire a generation on from anthropogenic climate change becoming taught orthodoxy in school science classes.

jk

Och, Coel, you know that that’s a false dichotomy- the roads don’t have to be empty, and the airports idle, or else it represents failure 

it won’t look much different by next year; but it will be a little different. There will be more renewable generation, as there has been every year for decades now, and it’s installation will continue to accelerate. There will be more efficient engines and more electric cars. The issue will continue to move up the political pecking order. 

Will it be enough? Or too little, too late?

no one really knows. I’m pessimistic, people are on balance selfish and not prepared to make personal sacrifices to help the bigger picture. Which leaves us hoping for a technological fix. A big ask, but with sufficient motivation and resource, perhaps it will be done 

in the meantime expecting all debate to be carried out in a way that doesn’t offend the sensibilities of denialists would be unrealistic. We’ve got Attenborough doing the patient patrician angle, and they didn’t buy that approach either. 

Thunberg has a place in this. For every denialist she offends, how many young people will have had this issue presented in a way they can connect with? How much does she keep this on the agenda of world leaders and encourage pressure from their citizens? And perhaps a young person inspired by her speech will go on to develop the technological breakthroughs we need in future. 

Next year is too soon to judge. Let’s see where we are in 10 years. I think a lot could have changed in that time.

Well they do have to be emptier and idler (substantially so).

That would be way too little and too late to avoid substantial climate change, yes.  (Which is not to say it's not worth doing, obviously the more emissions the more change.)

The IPCC reports are, if anything, underplaying things (they get so much flak they err on the side of underplaying things).  And the tipping points are real. 

I'm not criticising her for offending denialists (that's fine with me).  I'm criticising her for some parts of her message -- not all parts of it, much of it is fine -- that gives the impression that it's the fault of the politicians, rather than a matter of most people not wanting to give up their lifestyles and high standard of living, and that all we need do is tax billionaires.  

I'm strawmanning her a bit there, yes, but she's done the easy and popular bit, namely criticise politicians (that's always easy and popular). Now she needs to get real -- if she really expects 80% reduction in worldwide CO2 emissions by 2030 -- now that she has the attention of the people at large, she now needs to start blaming *them* and telling them what would be required to achieve that and head-off climate change.    

Action starts with awareness of the urgency of the problem in the public conscience and I think we can safely say she had a massive impact. Various surveys show that the climate crisis is becoming more and more a prominent concern amongst the electorate all across the western world, consumers are more and more likely to look for green alternatives, Europeans countries at least are taking more and more agressive actions to curb carbon emissions etc etc.

Just because you don’t see any overnight decarbonisation doesn’t mean she’s not having a positive impact. In fact whatever we do at this point we’ll have very serious issues linked to global warming, but everything we do to reduce it takes us away from the most hellish scenarios.

She's had an impact of "awareness", yes.  She's not had much impact on "action".  She can be fairly described as "winning" when graphs of global CO2 emissions start pointing substantially downwards.   Whereas we've had 30 years of climate-change campaigns and the graphs are pointing as upwards as ever.

Yes, I mostly agree. I think it’s too late to avoid significant climate change; and some of the potential tipping points are truly apocalyptic, I prefer not to think of them as I need to be able to sleep at night...

And I think that’s expecting too much of her. She’s only 16- she’s done something remarkable already. Perhaps now she has got peoples attention she can start to move in the direction you suggest - but to expect her to do something that our political leaders haven’t yet is setting a high hurdle. 

But it really *is* our leaders’ job to lead on this and to start telling difficult truths. Thunberg can contribute by reaching out to people and convincing enough of them this matters enough that when leaders come with policies to make a real difference their voters will go with them on it. 

Not really true in any objective sense.   There has been some decline, yes, owing mainly to replacing burning coal with burning gas, and off-shoring a lot of production to China and elsewhere, but essentially all that Europe has done is stabilise emissions  at way-too-high levels.

The politicians are the very last people to start telling difficult truths, because their "job" is to get voted for at the next election.  

There are some drawbacks to democracy!

That’s exactly the kind of truly idiotic reasoning that sets us up for failure. It’s not because it’s not going downwards that she’s not having a positive impact. Every little decrease in the steepness of that curve is a win.

What I see is that since she started her media campaign the issue has become a lot more prominent in the minds. If that changes behaviours and policy even slightly, that’s a massive win. And it seems to me that it does. This can be difference between a bad outcome, now almost certain, and the most hellish outcomes, which we can still avoid.

Well even if that’s just stabilising, that’s waaay better than just keeping emitting more and more.

And burning natural gas is a a lot better than burning coal.

This could be the difference between having a severe warming we can still cope with somewhat, and having most of the earth surface inhabitable to humans. At the very least anything we can do to buy some time is a good thing.

What you need to understand is that nobody is going to fix this problem entirely, it’s way too late for that, but at least we can try to make it not as bad as it could be.

Yes- interesting China is stealing a march in this in solar technology it would seem- massive installation of this at a cost which is now cheaper that fossil fuel alternatives 

you are right; the politicians can’t be too far ahead of their electorate. The door needs to be slightly ajar before they can push it open

i think that’s where Attenborough, Thunberg et al can have the biggest impact- shifting perceptions on this incrementally to give the politicians scope to move further, faster

and there is something about challenging them to be bolder in testing out how far their electorates are willing to go!

I never said she was not having a positive impact, I said she's not "winning".

(PS Sentences with three "nots" in them are rather difficult to parse; mine only has two of them. )

As usual, you resort to pedantry, the unmistakable mark of cluelessness.

Well duh! You don't say!

I don't think that my understanding is any less than yours on such issues, so no need for patronising-git phrases such as "What you need to understand ...".

I do realise that such a posting style is your trademark, so you likely can't help it, and I should make allowances.

As usual, when Rom arrives, the thread takes a turn to the nasty.

So why immediately discount Greta’s contribution on the ground that she’s not “winning” ?

If a few policies and behaviour change because of her, that’s a good thing.

In fact, we are even now talking of an “Greta thunberg effect” with various politician taking more radical actions, philanthropists organising themselves to help, people changing some behaviours, etc etc.

I think she’s doing a hell of a lot of difference for one person. Not bad for a 16 year old kid.

Your understanding does seem very limited I’m afraid. But I suspect it’s your over-politicised view of everything blurring your understanding more than anything else. You don’t even have the excuse of being intellectually limited or ignorant I’m afraid.

I did not discount Greta’s contribution.  

<sigh>

<sigh>

So what's your excuse for not, if you wish to reply,  replying to what I have actually and straightforwardly said?

The usual backpedaling. I was waiting for it. It’s systematic with you.

My job here is done.

OK, them, give a quote where it can fairly be said that I: "immediately discount Greta’s contribution ...".

Excellent!   (I suppose it's too much to hope that by "here" you mean "UKC" and not just the thread?)

The science points to far more varied outcomes than Greta does.  Her message is simple and singular: if you don't cut your emissions by 50% in 10 years it's all over.  In which case we might as well give up now and enjoy the holidays and fast cars.

It's down to greedy leaders doing nothing then.  Should be easily solvable and I'm mystified why we haven't already got there yet. 

Tell me, are you on target for a 50%-80% reduction, and if not, why not?  Perhaps it's all not so simple?  Why are climate change deniers the problem if even the people on-board with the programme, who love pointing fingers, are also culpable in destroying Greta's future?  Maybe get one's house in order before complaining about others?

Or perhaps hybrid cars and carbon capture, brought to us via capitalism, are relatively recent things.  And rather than people sitting twiddling their thumbs, massive social inertias are at play.  Perhaps China's prolonged boom wasn't quite envisaged in 1990 and perhaps the IPCC report is a relatively recent thing too.  Perhaps no matter what we do, population growth and consumption patterns in the developing world will render the impact of our behavioural change negligible.  Perhaps market access and trade (consumption and freight in other words) and the wealth that comes with that are the keys to third world prosperity, population control and achieving the real reductions.  Perhaps the impact of even minor reductions in people's living standards will result in disproportionately greater reluctance to insulate lofts, buy a more efficient vehicle, or switch to the green energy supplier.  So perhaps constraining capitalism may prevent the exact innovations required to prevent run-away climate change?  

How do proponents of Greta's arguments propose telling all those billions who haven't benefitted from Swedish living standards that they can't have what she has?  Perhaps the tools at Greta's disposal to lead a carbon-neutral vegan lifestyle weren't available to all and sundry just a decade ago?

No room for nuance?  

Really? 

Happy to call it what you wish.  But "AGW thesis" has long been an accepted term.  No need to read any ulterior motives into its use.

Ok, so its a "super-power".  Regardless, you'll be performing mental gymnastics (and challenging her own statements) if you want to pretend her diagnosis doesn't impact her opinions and the articulation of them - and potentially their validity, the ethics of how she is being used, or how the narrative around climate change is being presented to her.  Its right to be highlighted and criticised.

Great.  What points exactly do you think he should have refrained from and are his views invalid?  I eagerly anticipate those myriad comments on Trump or Boris' narcism being struck from Google's menu.  

You may be right there.  She is afterall levelling her accusations at anyone she claims is not doing enough.  And unless you have made the reductions she says are necessary then that includes you - you're really no better than a climate change denier given its all or nothing.  Ten-years time is the point of no return.  Chop chop!   

I think people are critical not because of who she is, but that its the same message jet-setting celebs or anti-capitalist activists have been delivering for years.  It is hectoring and naive without offering an actual plausible way forward.  But now, as its repackaged in the form of a sweet, distressed, 16 year old girl, if they do attempt to argue with it they seen as engaging in an unfair fight.  Hence the cynicism.

If my mere mention of "left-wingers" has the UKC readership reaching for their smelling-salts, why shouldn't people who don't buy into many of the climate movement's aims also get sick of being lectured to as if they are responsible for the end of the world?  Especially when they might already be shopping from cut-price stores and reliant on whatever non-carbon-neutral employment they can find?  And perhaps the only reason anyone isn't annoyed by the message is because they mistakenly think her comments are aimed at someone else?  

She can certainly try.  Great to know kids are engaged with the issue.  But don't mistake the complaints about it as being directed at her when it is really targetted at the message and its tone.  And perhaps annoyance that she has been made the messenger.

I read this

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Report_on_Global_Warming_of_1.5_&de...

and this 

https://www.npr.org/2019/09/23/763452863/transcript-greta-thunbergs-speech-...

she is quoting the IPCC: “estimates of 400–800 GtCO2 (gigatonnes of CO2) for the remaining budget are given (580 GtCO2 and 420 GtCO2 for a 66% and 50% probability of limiting warming to 1.5 °C, using global mean surface air temperature”

she is quoting the IPCC: “The emission pathways that reach 1.5 °C contained in the report assume the use of negative emission technology to offset for remaining emissions...Reversing an overshoot of 0.2 °C might not be achievable given considerable implementation challenges”

she is quoting the IPCC: “Sea level rise will continue beyond 2100 even if global warming is limited to 1.5 °C. Around 1.5 °C to 2 °C of global warming," irreversible instabilities could be triggered in Antarctica and "Greenland ice sheet, resulting in multi-metre rise in sea level."

she is quoting the IPCC: "Limiting global warming to 1.5°C, compared with 2°C, could reduce the number of people both exposed to climate-related risks and susceptible to poverty by up to several hundred million by 2050.”

she is quoting the IPCC: “Pathways limiting global warming to 1.5 °C with no or limited overshoot would require rapid and far-reaching transitions in energy, land, urban and infrastructure (including transport and buildings), and industrial systems.”

she is quoting the IPCC. Nothing in her speech goes beyond what the 2018 Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5 degree sets out. And nothing in that report supports your contention that “the science points to far more varied outcomes than Greta does”. It’s like she’s actually read the report, and you haven’t.

she is quoting the IPCC. And she’s got the message contained in their report out to a massively larger audience that would have been exposed to it without her intervention. That speech will be played for decades to come. And it will cause people to question their own actions, and inspire some to take action they would not have taken otherwise. Some of those may be world leaders, some of them may be young researchers into new technologies, some may be everyday people. It will change the world.  

she is quoting the IPCC. Putting your words in her mouth and insinuating her diagnosis invalidates her opinion is pretty low stuff

A million likes for this 👌

Here's First Dog on the Moon's take on the reaction to Greta:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/sep/27/the-greta-thunberg-pr...

AGW thesis is not a common term. In fact Google throws up one relevant result to a climate change denying article in the Spectator. Now we know your source of "information". 

ZOMG, Greta does Death Metal! Awesome!

https://twitter.com/GretaThunberg/status/1178002285751865344

Capitalism is all about money, and if something makes less money for the shareholder it doesn't happen unless regulation forces it to, or by some small chance the shareholder wants it to. Free-market capitalism IS the cause of the problem.

Sure, and absolutely no-one advocates totally unregulated capitalism.  There is nothing incompatible with capitalism about protecting the environment and regulating companies to that end.  

Absolutely not.  The cause of the problem is: (1) people's desire for a high standard of living based on the availability of abundant and cheap energy; and (2) the only way of supplying that, given current technology, being the burning of fossil fuels. 

Any other non-capitalist system that tried to deliver the same high standard of living would face exactly the same problems.

This is a gross oversimplification. Your identification of the problem is focusing on a small part of the system that produces the pressure to burn fossil fuels. Our current socio-political systems depend on the creation of surpluses, sustained growth in production, consumption, and the accumulation of capital. In other words capitalism has a central role. 

This isn't to say that capitalism is the root of all evil. But as presently constituted - under-regulated, skewed towards shareholder return and so on - it is a key part of the problem. 

Un-regulated in the sense that there's nothing to stop anyone burning fossil fuels with no account of the environmental damage -- yes, indeed.

That is *not* a defect of "capitalism". That's a defect of lack of such regulation! There are non-capitalist systems where the same applies, and there is nothing that makes such regulation incompatible with capitalism.

You say that as though "shareholder returns" (benefiting from investing money) are a negative thing.  They're not, they're the very engine of achieving a high standard of living. 

Now, yes, if you're ok with a system that delivers a much lower standard of living, then sure, you could straightforwardly move to burning less fossil fuels.  But the fundamental problem here is as in my previous comment.

Looking back  I am not sure the let us say Russia was a paragon of virtues in preserving the environment or controlling emissions.

Capitalism has had a role in the current situation there again it is crazy to say that other systems have not had a role.

Its also very much part of the solution. The drive to sort out the issue  may lead to capitialsim helping solving it , as there is money to be made.Witness Elon Musk as an example.Nothing wrong in that as it is this sort of entreprenurial drive that gets things done faster.

Like it or not, profit, improved living standards, security are big drivers for folk who are self employed or business owners to push themselves. The key is how much you tap off them with taxation, without killing their motivation. Simply making everything state run will remove many of the drivers of innovation in society that have made lives better for everyone, rich of power. Of course it will be equal, but it isn't likely to move forwards as other nations, unless we set up a bigger spy agency to steal tech, drugs and other innovations as they create them. 

Regulation, inspection and a credible court system are the answers hear. Something missing in a few communist nations. 

The USSR was no paragon of virtue ecologically but their per capita CO2 output was 1/3 of the capitalist countries and they wasted much much less because of their socialist system. Capitalism has driven the world to the edge of the abyss and still it rolls on. Change the system and focus investment into what we need to survive rather than short term financial killings.

Summo and what do you know about regulation and inspection in former socialist countries? 

Capitalism has brought millions out of poverty in China and other places ( never mind in Western Europe etc).

It will require a multipronged approach and part of that includes recognising that capitalism can also help. Put it this way I doubt that the drivers for EV's or carbon trading fo example will have come from any other system.

Alternatively restrict capitalism to Western Europe and let everywhere else stay where they are producing a lot less CO2 and leave us to do it here.

 What's communism got to do with it? I'm not advocating communism. 

You and Summo like your straw men. Where do you get the idea I might think Russia is a model?

Indeed, but at what cost?  We're 11 years from an infinitely bigger cliff edge than Brexit.

Again, indeed!
We should be able to science our way out of this mess...
Oh, if only, humans are too greedy and selfish to make it happen.

Well I've been a professional energy consultant for the last 35 years or so and I've worked in a number of former soviet states.  I can assure you that waste of energy as a percentage of what they use is much higher than for similar industries in the West. I did see a lot of poverty in those countries, very low proportion of car ownership etc which I think has more to do with the lower per capita energy use and CO2 emissions. 

There is a very good point being made though, that even though capitalism has brought millions out of poverty, the economic development it has led to also led to the destruction of our planet.

So you may say capitalism brought out millions of people out of poverty, but if in the end it brings down the whole of human civilisation, that kind of erases of all the gains, doesn’t it.

Truth it, for most of human history, economic growth was zero, and maybe in hindsight it wasn’t such a bad thing.

Tbh I’ve got nothing against capitalism but it’s like with any other system, when it becomes an ideology devoid of any pragmatism, that works only on paper but not in practice, it’s just stupid. We need to be open to adjustments and react to reality otherwise we are f*cked. 

The observation is also valid of course for Pefa claims about communism. Another striking example of a system that works well on paper but completely fails in reality.

Reads like a first year essay before going out in the real world 

Poverty is relative and got substantially worse after these countries went capitalist but it depends on the place. I'm not specifically talking about car ownership although it is a factor, I'm talking about all major transportation in socialist countries being done by rail( which we in UK used to do also up to the 70s)and the extensive use of trams and the fact bus transportation was practically free in socialist countries. Also we have all the energy that goes into making food and the fact in capitalist countries we throw 1/3 in the bin. Then we move onto the consumer society that is inherent to capitalism but not to socialism and the overproduction and waste produced by this which must be a huge percentage. In socialist societies it was in the interest of the state to make products last as long as possible and not built to fail after a few years like it has been in capitalism over the past 50 or 60 years. Now I remember coal burning pollution and acid rain from Polish, Czechoslovakian and East German plants in the 70s and 80s combining with ours and wrecking the water systems so I'm not saying their heavy industries were better than ours here as they were probably even but they also had much less air travel to in socialist countries with most holidaying done by rail or bus although people still took their families in Ladas down to the Yugoslavia coasts. 

Condemning western societies for squander and waste is one thing and a perfectly legitimate thing to do but comparing them to socialist, never mind communist countries, seems a little naive given the evidence. I'm not sure that those poor souls standing in bread queues watching big limousines cruise past in lanes preserved exclusively for the well fed elite would have agreed with your analysis. I would agree however that expecting continual and continuous growth is unrealistic and damaging but these factors should not be used to condemn capitalism in it's entirety or principle.

Al

Bread queues only started when Gorbachev stated the return to capitalism in 1985. And was 1/3 being thrown in the bin? No. 

There’s an awful lot of nostalgia for communist times among those who lived through them. 

In the Soviet USSR you were guaranteed a wage if you just turned up at your factory drunk out of your mind every day. This is why they have struggled post-Gorbachev - capitalism isn't perfect, but it does assume that people are doing a useful job in return for their wage.

Me and the Mrs went to Moscow about 1984 or 5.
Shops were pretty empty, but there was so much vodka available, you could've had two or three baths a day in it.

If communism was so fantastic, why doesn't it still exist as it did in the ussr era etc..  surely there would have been no desire to change. They would have been keen to keep the wall up, keep us sponging westerners out. 

Learn how to put a sentence together before you criticise others, kiddo.

I think that Yanis's comment is reportage, not a claim that communism was fantastic. It's quite a well known phenomenon - it even has a Wikipedia page:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nostalgia_for_the_Soviet_Union

I’ve spoken to a few Russians who have a nostalgia for the soviet era, as a system most Russians in 1917 were pheasants living in a rural servitude, communism bootstrapped Russia to provide food,  warm housing and jobs, cars etc in a much quicker time than the equivalent leap in Western Europe standards of living. That is despite winning world war 2 in some of the bloodiest ever seen in history, and being lumbered with a homecidal maniac in Stalin.

Lots of people have nostalgia for their youth.  Plenty here will reminisce about their times dossing in Stoney Middleton, when they lived in a cardboard box in the middle of the road, survived on eating half a handful of freezing cold gravel, and worked twenty-four hours a day at the mill for fourpence.

Were you drunk when you wrote that?
"Russians in 1917 were pheasants living in rural servitude" being quite funny though

 

Lots of nostalgia by people in ex-socialist republics for free health care, full employment, worker control, interest free loans, free education, cheap land, no homelessness, relatively no drug abuse and drug addicts, 8 hour days and security for all workers to build a future on. 

youtube.com/watch?v=KIP2vukNOPc&

My periods working in the former Soviet countries were around the time of Glasnost with the changes bought about by the collapse of the centrally planned economy.  It was interesting comparing household budgeting with the locals, they were used to getting virtually free housing with district heating laid on, but could barely afford the scarlessly available food from week to week; a complete reversal of life in the west where paying rent or a mortgage are often the greatest strain during hard times.

Whilst some of the luckier or less scrupulous ones did well out of the opening up of the economy most did not and the older ones hankered back to the good old days of Uncle Joe Stalin.

My experience was that the hard times and inability to compete with the west came about due to chronic under investment in industry after decades of a centrally planned economy prioritising resources to political and military priorities. (which led to its collapse)

Another equally important factor was the management culture at the time (maybe still?) where it was forbidden to question or disagree with the boss, this typically resulted in faulty products being produced rather than the more open quality circle approach, for example in Western car manufacture.  I was aware of major export orders to other countries being returned due to defects, the complete opposite of Pefa's romantic picture of sturdy Ladas and Trabants.

One thing that did impress me was the high level of technical education by technicians and engineers, however they were under utilised due to lack of investment and the management culture.

These two factors of under investment and dictatorial management combined with no market pricing for energy resulted in industries being massively wasteful of energy with high levels of pollution.

" Summo and what do you know about regulation and inspection in former socialist countries? "

I did some work supporting local environmental enforcement agencies, they had little teeth but I was able to help them show that reducing consumption of newly market priced energy could also reduce pollution, so I have experience of regulation and inspection in former soviet countries.

Rather than Gorbachev wrecking the centrally planned economy by introducing socialism, the centrally planned economy was collapsing - supply couldn't meet supply so Gorbachev had to open up the markets to investment

I think it misses the point to interpret this as a black and white socialist/capitalist argument.  It's much more about the unique histroy and culture of the USSR.   China's change from centrally planned to market economy was very different with its own winners and losers. 

I visited around 92 and the place was changing, inflation and shortages, no system has really worked, Neo liberalism is prooving to be a failed system, soviet style communism didn’t really work, we’ve got to keep working at it, and also realise that the “real world” is only a snap shot and can be changed.

Thanks for an informative and balanced post. 

It is a well known fact in Russia and many other former socialist States that there was no collapse, the only collapse started when Gorbachev started to reintroduce capitalism as he has stated since. 

Tell me did the people of the USSR want to stop socialism and did they have national debt of 1 trillion like we do or $20 trillion like the USA? No they had debt but it was manageable. The USSR was attacked economically in two ways though first by the US trap in Afghanistan and second when they got their sharia law pals in the ksa to flood the oil market in the mid eighties just like they did a few years ago to punish Russia and Venezuela. 

You see the fact is that the USSR was brought down the only way the capitalists could bring it down and that was from the inside using pseudo-communists who admit to being capitalists. The capitalist countries had tried every trick in the book to destroy the Soviet Union from the first signs in October 1917 but everyone of them failed. There was only one option left and that was to topple it from the inside. 

After the capitalists of the West built up the Nazi way machine and then unleashed on the USSR murdering 27 million people the Soviet government would be remiss not to prioritise defence from capitalist countries who were destroying socialist movements and people all over the world all the time. 

This is a mistake of some kind here as it was workers who could not be forced to do extra hours or being treated unfairly by gaffers in factories as they all had very strong worker control and in a society that didn't pay allegiance to an aristocrat but to the workers. 'Western quality control', in the auto industry you say? so how many of these highly inspected cars are recalled for all manner of faults every year? Its counted in hundreds of thousands,for exame how many VW recalls were there for emissions? 1 million? No I just look it was 11 million. 

True there were high levels of pollution in fact I was told by a friend who grew up in Poland but reminiscences about those days of being taken to the countryside as young pioneers only to find the smell of pollution from nearby factories. However the CO2 output of the USSR was only 1/3 of capitalist countries then and they were also not the ones destroying the Amazon rainforest by the size of Wales every year. Nor were the Soviets large producers of plastics or large producers of plastic wrappers or bags. 

Any critique of the environment that does not critique capitalism is done by those with vested interests in capitalism and not the environment. 

To a degree Russia is survivng because of Europe's need to burn gas. It's our pollution, but it keeps their economy afloat. And what keeps the money flowing, helps keep Putin in power. 

Plus what they might have previously lacked in plastics, they more than made up with their chemical and nuclear pollution of rivers, lakes and land. They produced their plutonium for example with zero regard for the workers or local inhabitants.

Even the Morning Star has a more balanced perspective than you...

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/c/valuable-insights-demise-soviet-u...

Stalin’s purges had a devastating effect that the USSR never recovered from.

Maybe counter intuitively this may well have had a positive impact. Cheap Russian gas has allowed many European countries to move away from burning coal which is a lot, lot, worse.

That’s true, but Russia is also the world’s third largest exporter of coal, it sells a significant amount to Germany 

https://www.eia.gov/beta/international/analysis.php?iso=RUS

Or delayed investment and a move into renewables, because we have consoled ourselves with a half hearted measure, whilst bankrolling Putin. 

Judging their science (in the area of astrophysics, since I know about that), the Soviet scientists were indeed very well educated and were top-notch theorists.  Lots of good theoretical work came out of the Soviet Union.  But there was almost nothing on the observational side of astrophysics, since their technology was just so much behind that in the West.

They did attempt some big observational projects, such as the BTA 6-metre telescope, then the largest telescope in the world.  But it never really worked, and hardly anything came out of it.

Maybe, but still, the move from coal to gas is a big positive impact on CO2 emissions.

Unfortunately renewables do not provide the kind of stable baseline power that coal offers, you can invest as much as you want in it, and we did invest a lot, it’s not going to change this reality unless we get some kind of breakthrough on battery technology or other to store effectively the power generated by renewables. The cleanest alternative is nuclear but because of political reasons countries like Germany have stopped it.

That leaves you with two choices, either continue with coal, which is terrible, or use natural gas, which is much, much much better. Better than nothing.

This is such an important point. The 'real world", as far as human societies are concerned, is a created world. Any system is just that - free markets as much as communism. The trick surely is to ensure the models we use to order our societies are adaptive and intelligent. 

And ethical and humane?

Exactly. And in that order.

I would argue that an adaptive, intelligent model would have to be ethical and humane.

Benign dictatorship?  No chance of folk voting for that sort of thing

I thought that might be the case. But I suspect not everyone is as enlightened, and that's why I added the extra bit. 

Greed. Everyone was sold the western dream, when the reality was that only a minority benefit.

I too have met a Polish chap in the Dollies that had communist nostalgia. He said everyone had a job and some self worth, then all that was taken from them.

You mean:

... when the reality is that most people benefit.  Which is why Western populations keep voting for a continuation of the Western system. 

he problem is whether it can continue to deliver for 'most people'. The signs are that it's failing in various ways. This is an interesting appraisal:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/22/capitalism-broken-bet...

True but don't most people benefit in practically all economic systems though other than feudalism or slavery? I mean most Russians long for the USSR and socialism in the same way that probably most British would long for capitalism if we became socialist but that doesn't address the most pressingly important issue of our time.

If we want to talk about what the public will vote for then we must add both points together meaning will they vote to save life and progressive civilisation as we know it by cutting back drastically on our lifestyles even to the point of changing our economic model or system or do we continue with some cutting back but not too drastic in the hope that we can quickly invent more eco-friendly tec that will sustain our current economic model before we reach a tipping point? (presuming we haven't already) 

I make it sound simple but as others have pointed out before, we are talking about the livelihoods of perhaps tens of millions of workers here that work in industries harmful to the environment who will need alternatives and we need a more unified world to implement any changes.

I don't know which choice people would vote for or even if that decision should be decided by ordinary people. 

Don't get me wrong the American dream of the consumer society is a wonderful thing that gives us so much happiness, prosperity and freedom and it did tempt the Soviet people's and many of the nomenclature and KGB( hence 1989 and 1991 coups) but I think it maybe like an unhealthy drug addiction that feels wonderful at the time but our bodies aren't built to cope with it in the long term.

Or maybe closer to the truth, many people used to benefit, but more and more the benefit produced by their work becomes concentrated onto a small, already rich section who, as Marx put it, own the means of production, while the expanded middle class is increasingly squeezed, but Turkeys keep voting for Christmas because it was always thus, and anything else is socialism and therefore evil?

CB

That sort of claim is just not true. 

Russian gas is a powerful political tool. When I worked in Georgia (Caucasus) the government was in dispute with Russia over the rates they were paying for their gas. The Georgians for whatever reason decided to withhold a payment, so the Russians immediately cut off the supply. This was during the winter and within 2 days things were in such a situation that Georgian Army trucks were driving through the streets of the capital (Tbilisi) throwing logs out of the back of the trucks onto the streets; folk were running out to get the logs to heat their homes ( and the winters in Tbilisi arnt that bad) . 

Seems to me that in the West they are starting to vote more and more for something along the lines of Communist China. Whether it’s in the US with Trump or in the UK with Brexit, more and more  authoritarian state control seems to be what people increasingly want (sadly). You’ve got the left wing flavour and the right wing flavour, but essentially they have taken over.