Hacker News Reader

Comment by ikeboy | Hacker News Reader

>Even if climate change would be a hoax (which it is not), then why would it be a bad thing to make changes to prevent it from happening anyway?

Because those come at significant cost, and if there's nothing to worry about then why spend tens of trillions of dollars to stop it?

I mean you might as well use Pascal's wager to argue for religion if you're only looking at potential benefits and ignoring costs.

View on HN

it's also the imbalance of cost, where western countries get shamed and blamed if they don't agree to costly restrictions while places like China and India cause most of the world's pollution and don't care

Per capita US produces more CO2 than China right now.

But renewables are more decentralised. I can't stick a coal plant on my roof. Decentralisation means less corrupt monopoly, less need to regulate.

Are you trying to make an argument that regulations on carbon would pay for themselves due to decentralization? I don't think economists would agree with that.

No.

Yeah sunlight and air are more decentralized but how many companies make solar panels and windmills?

Countless?

> if there's nothing to worry about then why spend tens of trillions of dollars to stop it?

Extremely shortsighted thinking. If we're talking about cost, this should be the argument: tens of trillions < the future of humanity.

Remember, the hypothetical being discussed is that climate change is a hoax. In that scenario, inaction doesn't lead to any harmful consequences.

Maybe the strategy should have been to maintain trustworthiness and condemn hoaxes on all sides of the isle, such as the type that have been talked about on Capitol Hill lately. Who can blame them at this point?

Nor does it improve the situation.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com