Headlines MIT scientists reversing climate change?

[antemortem]

BGR

The idea revolves heavily around the creation and deployment of several thin film-like silicon bubbles. The “space bubbles” as they refer to them, would be joined together like a raft. Once expanded in space it would be around the same size as Brazil. The bubbles would then provide an extra buffer against the harmful solar radiation that comes from the Sun.

The goal with these new “space bubbles” would be to ease up or even reverse climate change. The Earth has seen rising temperatures over the past several centuries. In fact, NASA previously released a gif detailing how the global temperature has changed over the years. Now, we’re seeing massive “mouths to hell” opening in the permafrost.

Researchers at MIT have taken that same basic concept and improved it, though, by changing out inflatable silicon bubbles for the spacecraft that Angel originally proposed. Being able to reverse climate change would be a huge step in the right direction. Shielding the Earth from the Sun’s radiation would only be one part of it, though. We’d still need to cut down on other things, too.

The researchers say we’d probably still need to put some kind of spacecraft out there to help keep things on track. But, it could give us a good chance at reversing climate change, or at least slowing down the changes. It is important to note that MIT does not view this as an alternative solution to our current adapt and mitigate efforts. Instead, it’s a backup solution meant to help if things spin out of control.

Dropbox of press release materials for the “space bubbles”
MIT’s interactive website that features an in-depth exploration of what “space bubbles” are made of and how they would perform


initial thoughts/instincts?

 

[MrHands]

Doesn't really matter. It's unlikely to get the support needed to put it into action and there's serious questions about how effective it would be, dangers of space junk, and effects on astronomy. It kind of reminds me of that Futurama episode where they just dropped ice in the ocean to combat climate change... until they ran out of ice. If we want something to negate the effects of co2 emissions we can use existing tech, like carbon harvesters, synthetic fuel, and just planting trees. No need for space bubbles.

But on topic of climate change anyone who is interested / concerned should watch this surprisingly optimistic video on the climate crisis by Kutzergart.

Tldr version is:

1) We aren't doing enough

2) But we also aren't doing nothing!

The effects of our fight against climate change have pushed us away from the global apocalypse scenario and towards a more mild global crisis. Very serious, but it's unlikely to cause armageddon and as technology improves and human opinion on climate change shifts to believing science we should be able to improve our future even more.

 

[Fishy]

View attachment 436048

BGR

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Dropbox of press release materials for the “space bubbles”
MIT’s interactive website that features an in-depth exploration of what “pace bubbles” are made of and how they would perform


initial thoughts/instincts?

thoughts: mad
instinct: mad because too little too late to go this route(and it sucks anyway)

"space bubbles" is probably one of the grossest examples of the incidental perils of capitalism, ie NASA strove to find a solution against global warming by attempting to curb the behavior of a goddamned star by creating a PRODUCT, meanwhile humans could "simply" stop emitting so much harmful BS into the atmosphere by forfeiting their obsession with endless production of: plastics, technology(planned obsolescence), and ofc steel and concrete used for all manner of projects, from gentrified neighborhoods to military gear to [insert your own example here!]

global warming is the one thing that gives me doom levels of anxiety, with contemplation of the average human psyche coming in at a far away 2nd, so combining the two when considering how higher government (and their likely complicit lobbyist friends) are able to straight up deny other groups attempting to uphold existing laws to combat climate change fills me with dread. climate change makes me want to riot for sure, for sure for sure

 

[cookie]

thoughts: mad
instinct: mad because too little too late to go this route(and it sucks anyway)

"space bubbles" is probably one of the grossest examples of the incidental perils of capitalism, ie NASA strove to find a solution against global warming by attempting to curb the behavior of a goddamned star by creating a PRODUCT, meanwhile humans could "simply" stop emitting so much harmful BS into the atmosphere by forfeiting their obsession with endless production of: plastics, technology(planned obsolescence), and ofc steel and concrete used for all manner of projects, from gentrified neighborhoods to military gear to [insert your own example here!]

global warming is the one thing that gives me doom levels of anxiety, with contemplation of the average human psyche coming in at a far away 2nd, so combining the two when considering how higher government (and their likely complicit lobbyist friends) are able to straight up deny other groups attempting to uphold existing laws to combat climate change fills me with dread. climate change makes me want to riot for sure, for sure for sure

First, if our carbon dioxide emissions dropped immediately to zero, we would still have a global warming problem because of existing emissions. We need technological solutions that sequester carbon, or reduce the amount of radiation Earth receives to undo things. I cannot stress this enough: we need new technologies so that millions of people do not die from climate change.

Second, there is nothing wrong with having multiple solutions in parallel. Social change is one partial solution to the problem, but it is incredibly naive for humanity to focus on one solution entirely lest it doesn't work out. Let people focus on solutions they can come up with in their domains. NASA goes for things like sun shields, car manufacturers will look at electric vehicles. Construction will look at eco-friendly concrete, reflective paints. Et cetera et cetera.

Third, this isn't even capitalism at play. NASA is a publicly funded entity, lol.

Fourth, capitalism is the idea that monetary incentives help drive economic growth (among other ideas). As you've implicitly pointed out, the current incentives to avoid climate catastrophe are a little bit too abstract to drive meaningful change, at least right now. And when people passionately and understandably go round telling people to "simply stop emitting carbon" tend to forget is that people do things because of incentives. If people aren't simply doing x or y, you need to figure out how to make them do that, or find another way round.

I wouldn't even say that capitalism caused this problem. You'd have the same problem under other economic models. The problem is that climate change plays out on longer timescales than election cycles or single generations, so there's no _incentive_ not to burn fossil fuels which are cheap.

On these space bubbles, it looks like a cool idea that could help buy is more time to transition towards renewables and develop carbon sequestration technologies. It will probably create its own set of (smaller) problems though - since you're also blocking light that plants use for photosynthesis (so it might reduce yields somewhat). But I don't know if light levels are the limiting factor in agriculture. Either way though, this is how humanity progresses: we solve problems, and our solutions create new problems, and we hope that the new problems are smaller than the old ones. Fossil fuels are an excellent example of this: we get these insanely dense forms of energy that support our civilisation, but as a nasty side-effect we get global warming. Another example is establishing food security results in a drop in poverty-related illnesses, but a huge increase in diabetes and other obesity-related illnesses.

 

[Fishy]

remember trees? lol. dang. we are doomed if we can't invent something better than an organic, naturally occurring species that eats carbon & water and produces oxygen as a byproduct. has the scientist that would save us all already been aborted? oh dear.

if you stop providing the fuel for the fire, it will go out. if you make space bubbles, it's because you haven't reconciled that you need to stop adding fuel to the fire and that's probably (definitely) because capitalism is a disease and you have no choice but to survive within it, you, the individual, or perhaps even a collective you @ NASA. NASA being "publicly funded" doesn't explicitly separate it from capitalism, so i don't consider that relevant. as if the USA could be that far from corruption... lol #2

corporations don't abide by incentives other than money, right, either earning it or keeping it, so, implying they need some greater incentive that isn't explicitly tied to a dollar sign seems like pure fantasy, and is another symptom of capitalism. if you think the individual needs more incentive to commit to positive climate change, their choices are direct reflections of the choices corporations and their governments offer/allow them. why would the supreme court bar the EPA from attempting to enact positive climate change if not for personal incentive/gain? the USA continues to double down on how dumb it wants to be about climate change vs other nations, and i'm sooo sick of it. believing that global warming (at its current pace) isn't a symptom of capitalist greed is more impressive than anything scientists could invent to combat climate change

 

[cookie]

remember trees? lol. dang. we are doomed if we can't invent something better than an organic, naturally occurring species that eats carbon & water and produces oxygen as a byproduct. has the scientist that would save us all already been aborted? oh dear.

Trees are good. What's your point? Nobody, and definitely not I, am/are saying that we can't plant trees to sequester carbon.

However, if someone can figure out a way to pull carbon out of the atmosphere more effectively than trees, then that's incredible. Nature doesn't necessarily know best. There is no reason we can't run multiple solutions in parallel.

if you stop providing the fuel for the fire, it will go out. if you make space bubbles, it's because you haven't reconciled that you need to stop adding fuel to the fire and that's probably (definitely) because capitalism is a disease and you have no choice but to survive within it, you, the individual, or perhaps even a collective you @ NASA. NASA being "publicly funded" doesn't explicitly separate it from capitalism, so i don't consider that relevant. as if the USA could be that far from corruption... lol #2

it's not as simple as "not adding fuel to the fire", because if it was we would have solved the problem of climate change right now. I'm not saying this to demoralise you, but mitigating or solving climate change isn't as simple as planting trees and telling people to switch from almond to oat milk, as much as that might make them feel better about things.

What are you smoking BTW? NASA is funded by the government. It's funded by your (well not your, but the working population's in general) tax dollars. If the USA had some sort of collective socialist economy it would still be funded by tax dollars. And more importantly, NASA exists regardless of whether it makes a profit, so it wouldn't survive if it existed under capitalist rules. To quote the first sentence of Wikipedia:

Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit
NASA's non-profit status is relevant because it means what research/technology is producing is not for profit, hence these space bubbles are not products. There might be other companies that are trying to profit off of climate change, but you're way off base with NASA here. This is like saying that the nuclear bomb was a "product". It was also publicly funded by the US government to solve an existential problem.

corporations don't abide by incentives other than money, right, either earning it or keeping it, so, implying they need some greater incentive that isn't explicitly tied to a dollar sign seems like pure fantasy, and is another symptom of capitalism. if you think the individual needs more incentive to commit to positive climate change, their choices are direct reflections of the choices corporations and their governments offer/allow them. why would the supreme court bar the EPA from attempting to enact positive climate change if not for personal incentive/gain? the USA continues to double down on how dumb it wants to be about climate change vs other nations, and i'm sooo sick of it. believing that global warming (at its current pace) isn't a symptom of capitalist greed is more impressive than anything scientists could invent to combat climate change

Well, this is where taxes come in. You can tax things to get money from them, and to discourage certain activities - often to offset the harm caused. Smoking in the UK is a good example: rather than banning it entirely, you heavily tax it which has the dual benefit of discouraging it, and helping fund the NHS that needs to treat smokers for lung cancer.

You can't just throw capitalism in the trash. If you do that, millions of people will die because they can't get access to food, shelter and healthcare, because we get those things by paying farmers, doctors and (lol, I know), landlords/estate agents for their goods and services. If you just rip up capitalism what happens then? People aren't just going to keep doing things out of the milk of human kindness. We need to work with it, at least for now. Or, somehow convince people to do that before they are basically compelled to, when it's already too late.

 

[Surgo]

So this is the next generation of solar shades, huh. Well at least it's an alternative to aerosolized sulfides.

Like most geoengineering, it would only (maybe) solve one of the climate change symptoms (gross average temperature), while leaving basically every other symptom intact (ocean acidification, all that other stuff).

Too many half-brained ideas without a prayer of actually getting to production get way too much press because "lol MIT".

 

[Fishy]

Trees are good. What's your point? Nobody, and definitely not I, am/are saying that we can't plant trees to sequester carbon.

However, if someone can figure out a way to pull carbon out of the atmosphere more effectively than trees, then that's incredible. Nature doesn't necessarily know best. There is no reason we can't run multiple solutions in parallel.


it's not as simple as "not adding fuel to the fire", because if it was we would have solved the problem of climate change right now. I'm not saying this to demoralise you, but mitigating or solving climate change isn't as simple as planting trees and telling people to switch from almond to oat milk, as much as that might make them feel better about things.

What are you smoking BTW? NASA is funded by the government. It's funded by your (well not your, but the working population's in general) tax dollars. If the USA had some sort of collective socialist economy it would still be funded by tax dollars. And more importantly, NASA exists regardless of whether it makes a profit, so it wouldn't survive if it existed under capitalist rules. To quote the first sentence of Wikipedia:

Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit
NASA's non-profit status is relevant because it means what research/technology is producing is not for profit, hence these space bubbles are not products. There might be other companies that are trying to profit off of climate change, but you're way off base with NASA here. This is like saying that the nuclear bomb was a "product". It was also publicly funded by the US government to solve an existential problem.



Well, this is where taxes come in. You can tax things to get money from them, and to discourage certain activities - often to offset the harm caused. Smoking in the UK is a good example: rather than banning it entirely, you heavily tax it which has the dual benefit of discouraging it, and helping fund the NHS that needs to treat smokers for lung cancer.

You can't just throw capitalism in the trash. If you do that, millions of people will die because they can't get access to food, shelter and healthcare, because we get those things by paying farmers, doctors and (lol, I know), landlords/estate agents for their goods and services. If you just rip up capitalism what happens then? People aren't just going to keep doing things out of the milk of human kindness. We need to work with it, at least for now. Or, somehow convince people to do that before they are basically compelled to, when it's already too late.

you seem to think i don't think there are solutions within capitalism, which is simply untrue. i think abusing capitalism is how you get to where we are (much faster!) than other economic models, which you seem to agree with, although assuming we would eventually end up in such peril regardless of the global economy is harder for me to believe. i think part of why we're in this state is because of the specific voracity with which we arrived. my gripe is not with capitalism, it is with the runaway train speed at which it's being abused to our global detriment. i am scathingly critical of capitalism, but only because i think we are currently several degrees removed from a "good" version of it. kinda like how guns aren't bad, but people use them in all sorts of bad ways !

i think the USA can surely thrive within capitalism, but when profit = god within a country that is also trying to use a theocratic god (Jesus) to control and manipulate people toward certain incentivized goals, goals that often reflect a theocratic majority within a bigoted minority of the entire populace—i'm disenchanted. sure, NASA isn't making STUFF under the true "point" of capitalism, so we can leave NASA out of it. they're just the good ol boys doing their best ain't they

i will always be a proponent of prevention and a "less is more" mentality, so being in the current climate crisis within a nation that happily worsens it bc capitalism, is frustrating

 

[MrHands]

Fishy wtf are you talking about lol. Virtually every single nation on earth has switched to capitalism, even the dozens of ex socialist states have made the switch. Big red Russia is capitalist lmao. Why? Because the wealth generation from capitalism means that even if the 1% end up rich the 99% still see enormous quality of life increases and abundant resources. The planned state economies of the socialist / communist nations often had resource shortages. Capitalism forges innovation that drives prices down and the quality of goods up.

The issue comes when certain goods or services don't benefit the consumer with a for profit model. Things like roads, healthcare, public schooling, police and so on need to be offered to people regardless of economic ability. Imagine your house burning down because you were too poor to pay the fire dept, or your kids not learning to read because you can't afford private education. Also things like reducing emissions or paying a livable wage aren't really compatible with competition as the companies that don't waste money on green tech or that keep wages low usually annihilate the companies that do. Some things 100% can not be solely provided by private companies.

So the solution is a little bit of government intervention. Minimum wage, social services, and sometimes the public sector taking over entire industries. The question is how much free market is good vs the inefficiency yet guaranteed services offered by government. On one end of the capitalist spectrum you have the US with largely hands off Federal Government (though state governments vary wildly), but very low taxes with most services (like healthcare, maternity leave etc) offered by employers or private companies. On the other hand with European style capitalism you have high taxes but strong worker protections offered by government. Despite what the average Redditor might have you believe if you are middle class in the US you can actually live quite well with a decent job and health insurance, but if you aren't in the middle or upper class you will struggle far more than you might in a different first world nation.

As for the topic at hand yes, there are no incentives for companies to fight climate change out of the goodness of their hearts. The ones that try get destroyed by their competition. Survival of the fittest. However the abilities of each nation's government to enforce environmental rules and regulations forces competing companies to exist under a single standard. Government can step in and protect consumers from unethical corporations. A strong government can allow capitalism to thrive and prosper but still remain checked in a way where the average person benefits but is still protected against exploitation. There isn't really any difference here between capitalism and communism (or any other economic system) on the topic of climate change. In both systems government is the one to step in and create rules and regulations that protect air quality and other climate related issues. If anything capitalism has the advantage here as companies can compete to find cost efficient solutions to climate change that can either be purchased by consumers, as in electric cars, or by government, in the forms of greener industry and... space bubbles?

tl;dr Capitalism is the best and when regulated by strong government leaves us with thriving nations as we see in every first world nation. Any proposed alternative is usually based in ignorance or tries to incorrectly label capitalist nations "socialist / communist" when they're solidly capitalist just with a stronger safety net than we see in the US. Capitalism is also the only economic system that can naturally produce solutions to climate change via investment into technologies that can be sold to either consumers or the government. Mmmm $$$$

 

[sugar ovens]

Capitalism capitalism. What did "socialist" countries do for their people? Not even the most basic small-scale not destroying everything around us for the sake of production. Not to mention the speak up get jailed ur kids are not going to uni lol detail. No incentive! No difference between a capitalist hoarding wealth or a Ruling Class member. It's just about a functional democracy.. well, people should be able to somehow figure out what is good for them, right? Theoretically. After they are done blaming everything on some minority. If they are not brainwashed by their government that cares only about its self-preservation and wealth of its members or media owned by capitalists that only care about their self-preservation and wealth. With all the new super efficient tools that weren't here ten twenty years ago. Looking forward to the future, surely will be pretty sweet.

The solution is obviously that we should somehow create some idyllic new system that would have no problems, would totally work and be great, because every single person would miraculously behave like a good, selfless angel, because that's what people are.

 

[Fishy]

Fishy wtf are you talking about lol. Virtually every single nation on earth has switched to capitalism, even the dozens of ex socialist states have made the switch. Big red Russia is capitalist lmao. Why? Because the wealth generation from capitalism means that even if the 1% end up rich the 99% still see enormous quality of life increases and abundant resources. The planned state economies of the socialist / communist nations often had resource shortages. Capitalism forges innovation that drives prices down and the quality of goods up.

The issue comes when certain goods or services don't benefit the consumer with a for profit model. Things like roads, healthcare, public schooling, police and so on need to be offered to people regardless of economic ability. Imagine your house burning down because you were too poor to pay the fire dept, or your kids not learning to read because you can't afford private education. Also things like reducing emissions or paying a livable wage aren't really compatible with competition as the companies that don't waste money on green tech or that keep wages low usually annihilate the companies that do. Some things 100% can not be solely provided by private companies.

So the solution is a little bit of government intervention. Minimum wage, social services, and sometimes the public sector taking over entire industries. The question is how much free market is good vs the inefficiency yet guaranteed services offered by government. On one end of the capitalist spectrum you have the US with largely hands off Federal Government (though state governments vary wildly), but very low taxes with most services (like healthcare, maternity leave etc) offered by employers or private companies. On the other hand with European style capitalism you have high taxes but strong worker protections offered by government. Despite what the average Redditor might have you believe if you are middle class in the US you can actually live quite well with a decent job and health insurance, but if you aren't in the middle or upper class you will struggle far more than you might in a different first world nation.

As for the topic at hand yes, there are no incentives for companies to fight climate change out of the goodness of their hearts. The ones that try get destroyed by their competition. Survival of the fittest. However the abilities of each nation's government to enforce environmental rules and regulations forces competing companies to exist under a single standard. Government can step in and protect consumers from unethical corporations. A strong government can allow capitalism to thrive and prosper but still remain checked in a way where the average person benefits but is still protected against exploitation. There isn't really any difference here between capitalism and communism (or any other economic system) on the topic of climate change. In both systems government is the one to step in and create rules and regulations that protect air quality and other climate related issues. If anything capitalism has the advantage here as companies can compete to find cost efficient solutions to climate change that can either be purchased by consumers, as in electric cars, or by government, in the forms of greener industry and... space bubbles?

tl;dr Capitalism is the best and when regulated by strong government leaves us with thriving nations as we see in every first world nation. Any proposed alternative is usually based in ignorance or tries to incorrectly label capitalist nations "socialist / communist" when they're solidly capitalist just with a stronger safety net than we see in the US. Capitalism is also the only economic system that can naturally produce solutions to climate change via investment into technologies that can be sold to either consumers or the government. Mmmm $$$$

i can tell you really love capitalism, but acting like my post is incoherent simply because it opposes your stance, is infantile. not appreciated

 

[Yonko7]

It seems the solution will be very difficult, however like others noted, even if the emissions were zero, we'd need a way to remove what is already in the atmosphere.

 

[cityscapes]

WOOO CAPITALIST REALISM WOOHOO IT'S EASIER TO IMAGINE THE END OF THE WORLD THAN THE END OF CAPITALISM WE LOVE TO SEE IT FOLKS

this is tragedy of the commons at work. something that has only a minute effect on a small scale and doesn't cause any huge issues for any individual person is something that your average person won't meaningfully care about. they have bigger priorities--feeding and sheltering themselves, making sure those around them can make it, striving for weird notions of fulfillment. the modern world has the tools to end climate change, yes, but that means nothing if no one materially cares enough about the environment to make these tools profitable.

"but city wont people start to care once things actually get bad?" nope! all of that gets abstracted away. let's say that over a period of time, a space of land becomes barren and unable to support crops. shipping exists. the food will not disappear, it will just become more expensive. and if you can't afford it, that's just a skill issue on your part! there is no apocalypse, the standard of living will just decline, decline, decline, decline. no one is worse at fighting for their rights than the person fighting tooth and nail to get a meal on the table, or a table in general. we already expect these people to die or live unhealthy & unfulfilled lives without batting an eye. do you expect them to have any sort of sway in making people buy renewable stuff?

eco terrorism exists but i don't see it happening. if i took it at all seriously i would redact it to be funny, but i'm too tired to do even that at this point.

please note that im not actually a doomer thats dumb millennial stuff and im not a millennial. i just saw some posts by people who took too many econ classes im kind of envious of those brain worms they look comfier than mine

 

[cookie]

when I talk about incentives, I specifically talk about making climate change the problem for emitters, because that currently isn't the case. When you get a dollar's worth of work from burning a thimbleful of petrol, the effect on the atmosphere isn't priced in.

The free market on its own won't do this. The free market needs regulation to work optimally, and there are plenty of examples of this: anit-trust laws, environmental regulations to prevent you from dumping waste and making it someone else's problem. What we're doing is dumping waste into the atmosphere, which is as cityscapes pointed out, a tragedy of the commons problem.

An alternative is a centrally organised solution. Like a Manhattan Project for climate change: we pour trillions of dollars into various technologies to suck carbon out of the atmosphere.

Unfortunately the problem with any solution is that it will be incredibly expensive in the short/medium-term - the money needs to come from somewhere. Citizens in developed countries are not going to be happy with getting taxed an extra 10% when they can't even afford childcare and housing. Before anyone jumps down my throat and tells me that money isn't everything and I'm still phrasing things in capitalist terms, what I mean is that it we need to divert more of our civilisation's productive output to fighting climate change, which means cutting back on other things. And given that developed countries consume more resources on average, this means that they will need to take a hit on their lifestyles in order to save lives in less developed ones.

I don't know which is more politically viable - reducing consumption or a manhattan project. We should try both. A technological magic bullet that saves us just in time might validate capitalism further, but I really don't give a shit if it means we can save people's lives.

 

[boo836]

Fishy wtf are you talking about lol. Virtually every single nation on earth has switched to capitalism, even the dozens of ex socialist states have made the switch. Big red Russia is capitalist lmao. Why? Because the wealth generation from capitalism means that even if the 1% end up rich the 99% still see enormous quality of life increases and abundant resources. The planned state economies of the socialist / communist nations often had resource shortages. Capitalism forges innovation that drives prices down and the quality of goods up.

The issue comes when certain goods or services don't benefit the consumer with a for profit model. Things like roads, healthcare, public schooling, police and so on need to be offered to people regardless of economic ability. Imagine your house burning down because you were too poor to pay the fire dept, or your kids not learning to read because you can't afford private education. Also things like reducing emissions or paying a livable wage aren't really compatible with competition as the companies that don't waste money on green tech or that keep wages low usually annihilate the companies that do. Some things 100% can not be solely provided by private companies.

So the solution is a little bit of government intervention. Minimum wage, social services, and sometimes the public sector taking over entire industries. The question is how much free market is good vs the inefficiency yet guaranteed services offered by government. On one end of the capitalist spectrum you have the US with largely hands off Federal Government (though state governments vary wildly), but very low taxes with most services (like healthcare, maternity leave etc) offered by employers or private companies. On the other hand with European style capitalism you have high taxes but strong worker protections offered by government. Despite what the average Redditor might have you believe if you are middle class in the US you can actually live quite well with a decent job and health insurance, but if you aren't in the middle or upper class you will struggle far more than you might in a different first world nation.

As for the topic at hand yes, there are no incentives for companies to fight climate change out of the goodness of their hearts. The ones that try get destroyed by their competition. Survival of the fittest. However the abilities of each nation's government to enforce environmental rules and regulations forces competing companies to exist under a single standard. Government can step in and protect consumers from unethical corporations. A strong government can allow capitalism to thrive and prosper but still remain checked in a way where the average person benefits but is still protected against exploitation. There isn't really any difference here between capitalism and communism (or any other economic system) on the topic of climate change. In both systems government is the one to step in and create rules and regulations that protect air quality and other climate related issues. If anything capitalism has the advantage here as companies can compete to find cost efficient solutions to climate change that can either be purchased by consumers, as in electric cars, or by government, in the forms of greener industry and... space bubbles?

tl;dr Capitalism is the best and when regulated by strong government leaves us with thriving nations as we see in every first world nation. Any proposed alternative is usually based in ignorance or tries to incorrectly label capitalist nations "socialist / communist" when they're solidly capitalist just with a stronger safety net than we see in the US. Capitalism is also the only economic system that can naturally produce solutions to climate change via investment into technologies that can be sold to either consumers or the government. Mmmm $$$$

This isn't really an accurate description of post-Soviet Russian society. The introduction of capitalism didn't really lead to an enormous quality of life increase as it did a major plunge in life expectancy by ten years for men. Improved quality of life stems more from integration with the rest of Europe more than it does any change in economic system IMO. There wasn't really a whole lot of change to the Russian economy outside of increased foreign direct investment (which has since dried up). Russia is still a gas station with nukes and tanks. It doesn't really produce anything anyone wants outside of oil and weapons. The greatest systemic change IMO was the role organised crime had, shifting from being a partner in the Soviet economy to having outsize control over the postSoviet economy. You're definitely right though that climate change is an issue for governments to solve though, but one point I'll add is that private sector actors play a role insofar as they are contracted or invested in by governments to resolve certain climate issues (infrastructure resilience, tree planting, tech R&D). There definitely are incentives for companies to go green, but governments will still be the ones setting up incentives to push markets towards sustainability.

Is capitalism the best system though? No. National economies are in dire need of restructuring out of petrol extraction and into sustainable manufacturing. Capitalism is proven to essentially have ecological limits on growth outside of the surveillance/predictive data sector (because information is infinitely (re)producible). There Is a need to move beyond the current economic system, the real question though is what that ecologically sound economic system would look like.

Anyways, throwing shit into near-space to stay there is a terrible fucking idea that would become extremely difficult to reverse or even correct. Even if it's out far enough from the planet to avoid Kessler syndrome, it's just a really bad practice to throw resources into space. Again, what we need are economic and behavioural changes around the world to properly deal with climate change. This sort of thing (and the mirrors) are just unserious solutions that shouldn't be entertained

 

[dreepy]

buubles are fun. i like bubbles.

 

[Divine Retribution]

Man, I had half this post already written out, then I accidentally hit something and posted it incomplete, panicked, deleted it without copying what I already wrote, and now here I am at square one. I fucking hate this forum.

Because the wealth generation from capitalism means that even if the 1% end up rich the 99% still see enormous quality of life increases and abundant resources.

Big old citation needed here, chief. I'm still waiting to see those enormous quality of life increases from Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, or whatever other soulless husk of a supposed human being having enough capital to single-handedly end world hunger almost overnight. I'm still wondering why, if resources are so damn abundant, we have to work harder and longer in order to afford them. If resources are so damn abundant, why does one little thing going wrong, say, the emergence of a new virus, collapse the entire fucking economy? If the end goal is for resources to be abundant, why are things like planned obsolescence and artificial scarcity fair game? How is resource abundance even a desirable thing for a system driven by profit? If resources are so abundant, why do over 10% of Americans face food insecurity? Why did we waste enough food in the US alone in 2021 to literally end world hunger? Yes, resources are abundant, and we destroy most of them to keep prices up. Because of profit, not because it benefits the average citizen or the 99% or whatever. So much for free markets, eh? I guess that includes the freedom to destroy goods to artificially inflate prices.

Virtually every single nation on earth has switched to capitalism, even the dozens of ex socialist states have made the switch. Big red Russia is capitalist lmao.

Do you really figure this apparent exodus from supposedly socialistic economic models to supposedly capitalistic ones is driven by the innate superiority of capitalist economic systems? That outside economic, political, and even military pressure from established capitalist countries has nothing to do with it? See the U.S.'s continued embargo of Cuba, considered illegal by, at last count, 184 of 189 U.N. member nations, with 3 abstainees. See American military intervention and U.S. supported coups in Korea, Chile, Venezuela, the Dominican Republic, Columbia, and failed attempts at intervention in Vietnam and Cuba.

Despite being premised on competition (which isn't a good thing), capitalism itself can't survive competition, not with a socioeconomic model that actually raises the standards of living for the average citizen in a meaningful way. The owning class, the ones who make all the decisions that matter in this fucking Kafkaesque parody of democracy we live in, know this, and they will go to any lengths to ensure that a viable alternative never arises. Abroad, that means brutal suppression of socialist, communist, and Marxist movements. At home, that means spreading lies and blatant propaganda about the supposed efficiency of capitalism (hint: it isn't) and the supposed evils of communism, which is basically the same thing as socialism and every other leftist movement ever.

The issue comes when certain goods or services don't benefit the consumer with a for profit model. Things like roads, healthcare, public schooling, police and so on need to be offered to people regardless of economic ability. Imagine your house burning down because you were too poor to pay the fire dept, or your kids not learning to read because you can't afford private education. Also things like reducing emissions or paying a livable wage aren't really compatible with competition as the companies that don't waste money on green tech or that keep wages low usually annihilate the companies that do. Some things 100% can not be solely provided by private companies.

Maximizing benefit to the average citizen and maximizing profit are mutually incompatible. The pursuit of profit necessitates anti-consumer and anti-worker business practices. The rest of this paragraph is an indictment of the system you're trying to defend. Strange how the solution to all the problems with capitalism seems to be to fill in the gaps with little bits and pieces of this supposedly failed economic model that nobody uses anymore because it's bad. On the other hand, I think you're part of the way there. Just take a few more steps and realize that the whole damn system is rotten and needs to be replaced.

Despite what the average Redditor might have you believe if you are middle class in the US you can actually live quite well with a decent job and health insurance, but if you aren't in the middle or upper class you will struggle far more than you might in a different first world nation.

The Redditor quip is cute, I'll give you that. Somewhat undermined by the fact that it's preceded by an average uninformed Redditor's description of the spectrum of capitalist economic models, but cute. But what I really love here is the tacit admission that even if you're a middle class American living the American Dream™ and not one of the ever swelling number of people living below the poverty line or in absolute destitution on the streets, you're one bad day at work, one company down-sizing, one unexpected medical expense that your insurance refuses to cover away from the security of that cushy little "middle class" life being ripped away from you. You know this. This is precisely the position your masters, sorry, employers, want you in. This is where they can wring the most productivity for the lowest wages from you. Security for the average citizen is not in the best interest of profits.


Capitalism will never solve climate change. I don't understand why some people insist that playing within the rules of the very system that incentivized the rampant burning of fossil fuels and destruction of important carbon sinks that got us to where we are today is the way to go forward. It isn't. There's an old Cree proverb; "only when the last tree has been felled, the last fish caught, the last river poisoned, will we realize that we cannot eat money". Strange how a people who lived removed from the capitalist system could be so insightful into it. We can see this in effect in the world around us this very moment. Corporations are still funding misinformation campaigns about climate change. They're still digging their heels in and resisting efforts to curb emissions (which is a little bit like trying to put a band-aid on a sucking chest wound; it's already too late for such mild measures). Governments across the globe are abetting them. Most refuse to invest in measures to mitigate the effects of climate change outright; in the case of the few that do fund some projects to mitigate or prevent climate change, it's too little, too late. We haven't even begun to take meaningful steps in the right direction.

The IPCC reports are clear; only one thing even has the potential to stave off an environmental disaster and accompanying human suffering the likes of which haven't been seen in human history. That one thing isn't to shoot shit into near earth orbit and hope that doesn't make the problem worse in the long run, it isn't to sit around and wait for some miracle technology to come along and fix all our problems, it's to slash carbon emissions to near zero as soon as possible. That cannot happen under a capitalist system. That will not happen under a capitalist system. It goes against the short-term profit motive that drives capitalism, and no amount of socialist policies and market restrictions grafted to the side of a great capitalist machine will change that fundamental fact. The only thing that can enable that kind of change is radical and widespread social change to match it. Every minute spent trying to make capitalism work despite its clear and evident failings is a minute squandered in the face of disaster. Grab yourself some vodka, embrace the revolution, and read some fucking Marx, Blue Harvest.