Climate Change Apocalypticism Was a Fashion, Not a Cause | [Blatant Climate Denial]
Posted by Great-Help7394@reddit | collapse | View on Reddit | 3 comments
Published recently on National Review, this article dismisses the threat of climate change simply because they don't like the source. Suppose the democratic party used climate change to garner more votes (they totally did)
Does that mean the threat itself isn't real?
Let's use an extreme hypothetical.
Your opponent has spoken out against molesting children. You find out that was part of some elaborate campaign strategy. So maybe molesting children isn't so bad. Maybe the issue was exaggerated!
That's exactly what this rag is doing here. This pathetic excuse for journalism wants us to ignore an imminent threat because someone you might disagree with on totally different issues is worried about it too.
This is how they cope with their failures. Its the only way they know how.
Konradleijon@reddit
Yes
upvotes2doge@reddit
The NR piece leans on the IPCC retiring RCP8.5, but that update came from the same scientists saying 1.5°C is now unreachable and we're tracking toward 2.5-3°C of warming. Retiring one overstated scenario is not the same as debunking the underlying science. Carbon Brief breaks down exactly how this framing misleads: https://www.carbonbrief.org/factcheck-trumps-false-claims-about-the-ipcc-and-rcp8-5-climate-scenario
AdmiralAsshat69@reddit
It's a political argument against a scientific one so it's not surprising that people are willing to accept it.
They'll say, "Look, this government repealed the carbon tax, which means they never believed in climate change, which means climate change is a hoax."
No, repealing a tax is a political decision based on politics, just like the implementation of a tax is a political decision, because there's no real scientific argument for implementing that kind of tax in a single country, not unless every country does it - which, again, lets people argue that since it won't "solve" climate change, it's just politics.
As it is now, we're taking what is left of our energy and capital infrastructure and ploughing it into AI because there's some generalized sense that it will make us so efficient or superintelligent that it will save us.
OK, great. Except our (western, capitalist) goals are skewed towards profits, not efficiency, or some kind of overarching national imperative, or a general goal to help humanity flourish, or even our own survival, because humans, at least under capitalism, don't have much interest in helping other humans.
So where is AI going to be aimed? Probably into internal security, social engineering, media manipulation, and - of course - profits, And profits are political because they keep people happy while the walls are falling down around them.