Comment by zdragnar | Hacker News Reader

Comment by zdragnar | Hacker News Reader

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Congresswoman Cortez said that the world would end by 2030 if we did nothing. Later, she said only a sea sponge would believe her.

Presumably, she is arguing that hyperbolic proclamations are a valid way to get people to listen and engage in political discourse.

Of course, I presume that by "serious people" you are referring to scientists, but it definitely creates a mixed message from politicians- you know, the ones setting government policy.

At what point is it not hyperbole, but actual serious discussion? Should we treat everything as hyperbolic? All this does is confuse the problem (making it more or less drastic than it actually is).

In my lifetime, "serious people" have often made predictions about drastic things and were completely wrong- and they had models to support them! This is true about many things beyond climate change as well. Why should this be any different? Why should I believe that I should act, or believe that there is still time to do so? Is this a new hockey stick graph?

If you don't invest a lot of time sorting through all the BS, most people I think end up flipping a coin, picking a side and just going with it.

You were talking about Kids in your comment, Doomers I guess you said. So by serious people I mean not that.

"The world would end by 2030", like obviously there is no way this can be true. No matter what happens the world will not end in a biblical sense.

"People made predictions and were wrong in the past" is a great point.

Why should you believe you should act or that you can and do something about it? I don't know great question! I'm sure someone has explored the morality of avoiding the worst case scenario caused by human induced climate change.

> "The world would end by 2030", like obviously there is no way this can be true. No matter what happens the world will not end in a biblical sense.

Cortez said exactly that though. You could argue that she isn't a serious person, but lots of people do take her seriously, she is a very public figure.

Exact quote from 2019: "The world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change".

https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2019/...

That's not an exact quote. From the article you linked:

"Millennials and Gen Z and all these folks that come after us are looking up, and we're like, 'The world is going to end in 12 years if we don't address climate change, and your biggest issue is how are we gonna pay for it?' " she said.

Even a very middlebrow newspaper like USA Today was able to figure out that she was characterising a political viewpoint rather than making a straight scientific assertion, as shows by the use of single quotation marks.

It's misleading to strip away that context, just as it would be accurate-but-misleading if I trimmed her quote down further to say 'Ocasio-Cortez: 'Don't address climate change.''

She's clearly characterizing a viewpoint that she finds valid, even if it was intentionally hyperbolic (which I know it was).

The thing is, she put it out there. It put the notion in people's minds. If we don't fix it by then, we'll be unable to avoid a mass extinction event. That was the whole point of the green new deal (along with a grab bag of other social justice items).

When we are talking about how people can become overly distressed, and then jaded when their fears don't come to pass, that is exactly the kind of rhetoric that makes the situation worse, not better.

I get your point, but we should stop trying to get buy-in from the slowest and/or least cooperative people out there. If it's over-simplified, they'll dismiss it. If it's too complex, they'll dismiss it. If it's not certain enough they'll dismiss it. If it's too specific they'll dismiss.

There is always going to be some % of the population saying something is a terrible idea and their concerns aren't bein treated seriously enough, like the minority of people alleging that wearing face masks and social distancing is tyranny. One should certainly make a few good faith efforts to get them on board, but after the 3rd or 4th irrational or bad-faith rejection, it's OK to sideline them.

I'm not the person you responded to originally (about the kids and doomers bit). That said, they come from somewhere and what AOC said (or the way she said it) don't help. Sorry if that threw you off.

Anyway, my point was that we are better off avoiding such hyperbole and overstating the case; it biases people towards inaction, especially when the worst case is consistently promoted and consistently fails to occur.

We could (theoretically) end global warming this instant by turning off every electrical appliance and not burning a single molecule of fossil fuel. How many people would die in an hour, without life saving medical equipment or heat in their homes? A day? A year?

When you discuss the morality of avoiding the worst case scenario, you still have to weigh the consequences of the actions (or inactions).

If the doom-and-gloom worst case scenario is consistently wrong, and that is the one that gets talked about most frequently, then people are going to avoid the most serious consequences that would occur by drastic action to head off the worst case scenario- especially when that means putting off personal sacrifices.

I don't see that you've really responded to what I've said beyond repeating the previous poster.

I'm not American, climate change is not an American problem it's a global one. It's completely out of the scope of the conversation to require me to explain how you are deficient in your understanding of the nuance of what was actually said by the Congresswoman.

The conversation of Climate Change, Global Warming, whatever has been going on long before AOC even ran for Congress so I really don't see the point you and the original poster I was responding to are actually making by invoking her as some boogie man.

Yes sure talking hyperbolic doesn't help and can turn people off. Ok agreed. Excellent points all aroud.

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